“WATCHING YOUR LIFE”

Meditation simplified & demystified

“WATCHING YOUR LIFE”

Meditation simplified & demystified

Teja Anand

Copyright 2019
All rights reserved
Anatta Press

CONTENTS:
PART 1: MEDITATION SIMPLIFIED & DEMYSTIFIED
Introduction: Meditation is Simple…………….5
1. A brief bit of background
2. What is meditation
3. Now & the flow of life
4. Shifting identification & shifting to other, non-mind, forms of knowing
5. The types of meditation
6. The practice of witnessing (sakshi) & awareness/allowing (visaati)
7. Allowing and letting go of control
8. When, where and how often to practice sakshi vasati meditation
9. Being in the meditative state full-time
10. Feelings and experiences that may come up in meditation
11. The ego-mind’s argument with reality and resistance to meditation
PART 2: WATCHING YOUR LIFE
1. Conditioned identification………………38
2. Deeper levels of meditation: samadhi and watching wordlessly
3. Enlightenment: a new easy, explanation
4. Psychological assessment causes unpresence and unneeded suffering
5. Is that actually enlightenment?
6. Living your life, watching your life
PART 3: COMMON QUESTIONS ABOUT
MEDITATION
…………….65…………….

PART 4: THE SIMPLICITY OF MEDITATION, WITNESSING AND

LIFE ITSELF
…………….107…………….

“WATCHING YOUR LIFE”

PART 1: MEDITATION SIMPLIFIED & DEMYSTIFIED

INTRODUCTION: MEDITATION IS SIMPLE
Dear Reader,
Meditation is the simplest thing in the world. Like falling off a log simple.
No kidding!
Yet you may have heard some things that made you think it’s complicated
and esoteric.
Have you heard that there are many different types and techniques of
meditation?
Probably.
Have there been many learned explanations and treatises on meditation,
how it works and what happens in the brain/body/mind during meditation,
by centuries’ worth of wise sages and teachers?
Yes.
Has meditation become so “trendy,” here in the 21st century, that you can
now find a meditation center or teacher in virtually every neighborhood,
each with their own particular method or variation on how to meditate?
You bet.
Has all of this served to confuse you, the beginning meditator. It certainly
can. As you will see in the question and answer format in the second part of
this book, people come up with all nature of queries about what meditation
is, how concerned they are about doing it properly or “wrong,” or about
missing out on the “best, ultimate” meditation method, and about what
results “should be” expected, all of which can turn meditation into this
daunting or mystical endeavor more complicated than it need be.
That’s too bad, because meditation really is a no-brainer (pun intended.) If
more people realized that, fewer would be bewildered, or frightened off by
something they think they could never be “good at,” or have time for, and
more would enjoy the benefits.
That’s what this book is all about. Demystifying and deconstructing all the
confusion around meditation, and confirming that you can begin meditating
right now, and experiencing the benefits right now, today.
And what natural, wonderful benefits they are! It can literally transform
your life.

1. A BRIEF BIT OF BACKGROUND

Meditation has a long history, going back thousands of years across many
cultures and contributors. As far back as 5000 years ago, ascetics who were
seeking answers to the essence of existence and the deepest questions of life
perfected different forms of deep contemplation, removing themselves first
from the distractions of the outer world, and then plummeting through the
inner layers of mind and awareness, hopefully to arrive at essential ‘truth’
and the essential Self.
The best known of these ‘inner voyagers’ was Buddha, who predated Christ
by six centuries. But there are both older & newer masters of meditation
and awakening, with a list that must include the ancient teachings of the
Hindu Vedas (which contain Krishna’s clear instructions in the Bhagavad
Gita,) the Yoga Sutras of Patanljali, The Tao Te Ching of Lao Tze, the
Advaita teachings of Adi Shankara, and so many more.
For the purposes of this short instruction booklet, devoted to simplifying
and demystifying meditation for all, a deep dive into meditation’s history is
not necessary or useful; it will only confuse and fill our minds with excess
information. Those with a historical bent who want to do a deeper
exploration of meditation’s past-to-present development will find ample
information throughout the Internet.
Similarly, because this book will focus on showing you the simplest, most
direct form of meditation, Witnessing & Allowing, we won’t be delving
deep into the many other recognized forms & techniques. The author has
tried, and taught, them all, and can clearly affirm the Witnessing-Allowing-
Awareness (SakshiVasati) meditation presented in these pages is the most
simple, direct and impactful form of meditation for both beginners and
advanced meditators.
All meditation techniques can essentially be divided into two
categories: methods based on focusing the mind on an object of
concentration (such as the breath, a mantra, a visual object like a candle
flame, or a full up-&-down scan of the body) and methods of simply
observing all phenomena without focus, being directly with the Observer
than the observed.
If you have researched meditation a bit, you probably have encountered
there are many subsets of these two basic categories. More detail about
other meditation forms is mentioned further on in the book.
In “Watching Your Life,” it is the author’s desire to get you meditating
and directly experiencing the benefits as quickly as possible, so we will
proceed directly to exposition and instruction of the SakshiVasati
Witnessing-Allowing-Awareness approach. Clogging the mind with a lot of
alternate approaches just brings us back to confusion and worry of missing
out on the “best” method. Learn this simple Witnessing-Allowing-
Awareness method first and practice it with regularity for a while. It is
doubtful, after that practice, that you will have much concern or curiosity
about the numerous other approaches, but if you do, you can always circle
back around to them at a later date, now firmly established in the most
direct path.
2. WHAT IS MEDITATION
Meditation is simply releasing the identification
with the mind. That’s it! Mind, here, includes all thoughts, feelings,
judgments, emotions, moods and body sensations. This essential definition
of meditation will be repeated often throughout this book, to help you
remember both the simple purpose and practice of meditation.
Most of the time, we identify with our minds, our thoughts, emotions
and body sensations. Commonly and erroneously, we don’t just think we
have these, we think we are these. We hear the running narrative in our
head that chatters “I’m anxious,” “I’m angry,” “I’m unsatisfied or “I want
something, I must get something, plan something, do something” and,
instead of just noticing, just being aware of these feelings, we think we are
that, we think we, our entire being, is really worried, upset or unsatisfied.
That same voice ruminates over the past and future, over plans, health &
money concerns, desires and judgments of ourselves or others, and once
again, we don’t feel we have this ruminating mind and running internal
voice, we think and operate as if we are that voice. We identify with it.
This is how most of us live our entire lives.
In reality, we are not our thoughts, emotions and body sensations, nor are
we the sum total of them. We have those, so we couldn’t be those. Then
‘who’ has them? We are the silent, neutral watcher who is simply observing
all that, while Itself is remaining totally still, non-judgmental and unfazed.
We are Awareness, the Space in which all that appears. We can ‘experience’
this directly.
There’s no problem with having all these thoughts & feelings. We could not
function in human life without them. Only with thinking we are them,
identifying with them. Most people live a life identified with thoughts,
body, emotions and judgments, and as a result have lives and relationships
tossed and turned by whatever is running through their mind, emotions and
body sensations. The meditator finds out he/she is the awareness behind all
these, and from that moment on, lives a different life, with a vastly different
relationship to thoughts, feelings, judgments and body.
The purpose of meditation is to disengage this identification with mind.
To discover the inner silent, neutral Witness, recognize that is your actual
identity, then watch your mind, thoughts, plans, worries, feelings, and body
sensations, your whole life, unfold from that Witness. Since the Witness is
always neutral, still and calm, imagine the peace you will feel if you watch
your life unfold from there, instead of being caught up in mind
identification?
As stated, we all have these mind aspects, so we could not be them. Our
ability to observe all these aspects is the proof. You often say “my mind, my
body, I have a pain, I have some fear, I have judgments about that. Since
you can say, “I have a mind, thoughts, emotions and body,” you obviously
are not them, right? Then, who is this “I” that possesses them?
Awareness. Simple awareness, noticing-ness, Is-ness. You are that Is-
ness, that simply “witnesses” these aspects but is separate from them,
not them.
And that’s good.
Because the “I” just watches, uninvolved and unreactive. It is only
awareness. Being aware is it’s only faculty and capability.
And it’s simple.
Because that real You, the neutral awareness that’s just watching your life,
is already there. You needn’t go within or without to find it, or ‘meditate’
your self into it. It’s right there. It’s Who You Are. Your True Nature.
Meditation doesn’t give you your True Nature, it simply helps you to see
this neutral awareness, to discover it waiting there, to discover is was
always there, watching everything dispassionately. Once you see it, you can
no longer delude yourself that you are just a hot mess of thoughts, feelings
and body sensations. Because you saw that uninvolved, non-reactive place
that’s just watching…you sensed it, felt it, experienced it, experienced it’s
simple stillness and peace. You’ve broken the false identification with those
rising & falling phenomena in your body-mind, and you can never truly go
back again. You know, now and forever, that there’s always a place where
the true You abides, a deeper You just witnessing everything, that is always
fine, naturally in touch with reality, naturally in the flow of Life Itself,
without psychological assessments, judgments or arguments.
And that the same simple meditation that showed you this is always
available to show it to you again, to re-awaken you to its existence and
peace. One day, you may be so firmly established in that witnessing
awareness, you will find yourself perpetually in a meditative state.
Here’s an analogy to help you sense this witnessing awareness:
Picture yourself sitting in the grass near the ocean, with nowhere to go and
nothing to do. You’re just enjoying watching the ocean. The deep blue calm
part way out from the shore. Waves of all different size and intensity
crashing the shoreline. The clear lagoons and tide pools that have formed
inland. The stagnant corners of ocean that have collected masses of rotting
seaweed. You have absolutely no judgment or concern about any part. You
simply observe it all, while remaining totally neutral.
All those different phenomenon of the ocean are your thoughts, feelings and
judgments. You are just a watcher watching.
After a while, you lay back and look up at the clouds. Once again there is
much variety. Small, still clouds, large puffy important looking ones, clouds
that appear dark and saturated with moisture, thundering ones, thin ones
that seem to zip by or evaporate in mere seconds. But you are just watching,
just a witness. These clouds aren’t you, so you are not trying to change,
reduce or eradicate any of them, and wouldn’t bother even if you could.
They’re just empty phenomena and you are just watching, totally at peace.
This is the essence of meditation. There are all kinds of phenomena rising
& falling, inside your being (thoughts, concerns, plans, desires, judgments,
etc.) and outside you (sounds, sights, activities, etc.) You just watch,
without engaging or reacting to them, knowing you are not these. You
couldn’t be – not only because you possess them and can observe them, but
because they are in constant change & flux, appearing and disappearing like
smoke signals, yet your “I” is always “I.” It never changes. What is that
“I?”
The Witness. Pure Awareness. Discovering you are this neutral witness and
resting in that, watching your whole thought-stream and life unfold from
that, can, for most people, be the most beautiful and valuable thing that will
ever happen in their life. Then you can ‘watch’ all your thoughts, worries,
desires, judgments, opinions, moods and body changes without taking them
so seriously, without getting tied up in knots about them. When you
discover that your witness, your pure awareness, never gets ruffled by even
the biggest events in your life, you are free. You are indestructible. You are
always at peace.
Once again, meditation is simply releasing the identification with the
mind (includes body, emotions, moods and all thoughts and
judgments.) It is a tool, your simple doorway, into shifting your
identification from the turbulent mind to pure, peaceful Awareness.
And again, you don’t need to acquire it or develop this silent just-noticing
witness. It’s like your heart; everybody already has one and doesn’t need to
develop it, but most of us are not aware of our heart most of the time. It’s
just in there, doing it’s job, while we go about our lives. It’s the same with
your neutral witnessing awareness. It’s always there, and you may not be
conscious of it. The purpose of meditation is to become conscious of it, and
then practice spending more & more time there, more & more aware of
Awareness, till that’s where you live from, full-time.
Right now, notice any thought or feeling - a peaceful thought, a disturbing
one, an enjoyable or worrisome feeling, a pleasant or painful body
sensation. Now notice the Noticer, the awareness behind that just noticed it,
was aware of it, but was not it, and not another thought. The “I” that would
say, “I am having this thought/feeling.” Notice that this “I” is still,
impartial, dispassionate, just noticing. Pure Awareness, that is not involved
in the thought or feeling, not judging, just noticing. Do you ‘feel’ that?
That’s your Witnessing Awareness. That’s meditation. That’s all there is to
it, that the ‘how-to’ of meditation, the practice.

3. NOW & THE FLOW OF LIFE

Meditation is the human practice of just Being. Of being the still center
within the flow of Life, within Reality, allowing everything within that
Reality to be just as it is. Of simply living in the flow of Life as Life Itself,
the ‘container,’ not the ‘content,’ not constantly identified with the
psychological mind that feels the need to analyze, judge, worry, plan and
otherwise try to ‘control’ Life Itself.
I say human practice, because other species don’t need to meditate. They
just live. Animals, birds, trees, insects and microbes just live every moment,
intuitively, in the eternal Now, without doing this constant analysis or
identifying with an internal psychological “thinker.”
For the most part, we humans don’t live in the eternal Now, just flowing
with life. We have minds capable of constantly analyzing & evaluating
every situation, working and planning to gain more pleasure, to avoid pain
and to avoid the thing we fear most, ‘death.’
This is both a beneficial attribute, that allows us to survive longer, build
beautiful civilizations, and create amazing works...and one that has
drawbacks, at least 3 major ones: • Because the mind is always trying to
find ways to survive, improve life and gain more pleasure, and because it
has the power to analyze and evaluate, it is almost constantly in the process
of comparing ‘past’ successful strategies with what it wants for the ‘future,’
and, hence, is incapable of just living in the Now. This false sense that it is
the ‘chooser’ that can ‘control’ life (it can’t) causes an almost constant
undercurrent of concern, unease or outright stress & anxiety. Virtually
everyone who first shows an interest in meditation say their interest came
from being stressed out, lacking calmness, and hearing meditation could
provide this. Once again, animals just live, moment to moment, without fear
of the future, of dying, of being immediately threatened (observe the
wildebeests grazing unafraid with a lion right in their midst, because the
lion has already made its kill for the day and the danger has passed.) They
never need to work at calming themselves, or see a psychoanalyst to cure
their recurring anxiety or depression.
• This capacity the mind has to distinguish ‘past’ and ‘future,’ pleasure and
pain, is the same feature that creates a false sense of it’s own ‘separate
identity,’ a psychological “me” that ‘time,’ pleasure, pain and eventual
death is happening to. It then feels all these things are critical to this “me,”
and puts this “me” and its pleasure and survival above all the other “me’s”
(who obviously feel the same way,) causing all the conflict we see in the
world.
• As a result of these almost-ceaseless judging, evaluating and planning
strategies, the mind comes to rely on itself as the sole arbiter of ‘knowing’
what’s right and what’s wrong, what’s best and what’s worst, what’s ‘true’
and what is ‘false,’ and forgets about non-mental, intuitive, ‘natural
knowing,’ the knowing that is available beyond mind & intellect, just by
being fully present, being One with, anything in existence.
4. SHIFTING IDENTIFICATION & SHIFTING TO OTHER, NON-
MIND, FORMS OF KNOWING
The purpose of meditation is to create opportunities to ‘break’ that constant
identification, that the mind is all-knowing and is your identity, allowing
you to relax, access other forms of knowing, drop into Now instead of
constantly being caught up in the past & future, and live in your natural
state in the flow of life. Simply put, meditation allows you to have a mind,
and use it when it’s truly needed or beneficial (as opposed to it using you,)
while realizing you are not your mind, and then live in that realization
constantly.
This automatically contains some of the other purposes some people seek
from meditation, such as ‘a calmer mind,’ ‘being more present,’ gaining
insight’ and ‘living liberated or enlightened.’ Permanent peace, joy,
calmness, presence, wisdom and enlightenment are only possible if we are
in this moment, in Now, having permanently broken this false identification
with the psychological “me” identity and evaluator that’s always trying to
manipulate things to its advantage. The moment you re-identify with that as
“yourself,” you start controlling and worrying again, rummaging through
the past & future, and sustained peace and joy is impossible.
So even though you can come to meditation with simpler ‘objectives’ in
mind, such as merely more calmness and presence, or more peace and joy,
the core purpose of meditation is always to let go of your false
identification with mind and return to your natural state, who you Truly
Are.
“Great, I get it” you say, “so how do I use meditation to sense and grasp this
Witnessing Awareness, drop deep into it, become established in It, and
release the identification with mind?”
5. THE TYPES OF MEDITATION
There are many different types of meditation, all which can offer their own
benefits.
As mentioned previously, all meditation techniques can essentially be
divided into two categories: methods based on focusing the mind on an
object of concentration and methods without an object or a particular focus
of concentration.
Most common meditations have you focusing constant concentration on
something repetitious – your breath, a mantra, a repeated up & down scan
of your body sensations, visualization of a placid nature scene, a candle
flame or a diamond in a lotus - hopefully pulling your attention away from
all the other constant noise in your mind. There are also meditations which
have you purposely visualizing or feeling the energies moving up through
your various energy centers (chakras,) starting from the base-of-spine up
through the crown-of-head chakra, or focusing on specific purifications of
these chakras (such as Kriya Yoga.) There are meditations asking you to
repeat a beneficial prayer or ‘affirmation’ continuously, like “I am one with
the Divine,” or Nam My ō h ō Renge Ky ō ” (“I am devoted to the Law of
the Supreme.”) Meditations for opening to more love & compassion in the
heart center; movement-based meditations such as ecstatic dancing (Sufi,)
and Kinhen (walking meditation.) All of these types of meditation come
under the heading of Samatha (Buddhist) or Dharana-Dhyana (Vedic)
meditation, both of which mean “concentration.”
There are also various forms of meditation which focus, not on the object of
your awareness, but on that underlying Awareness itself, the “I” that is
aware of the breath, mantra, prayer. What is it? Where does it originate?
Who am I, the true “I?” This approach would include Vipassana or Insight
meditation, and ‘mindfullness,’ or being aware of all inner & outer
phenomena without judging or engaging, as well as the ‘neti, neti’ (“not
this, not that”) process-of-elimination inquiry in Advaita (non-duality.) All
of these approaches have their appeal & benefit for you, depending on your
taste and temperament. Here, I am going to present you with the simplest,
most direct from of meditation, Witnessing/ Awareness/Allowing or
SakshiVasati meditation:
6. THE PRACTICE OF WITNESSING (SAKSHI) &
AWARENESS/ALLOWING (VISAATI)
Sit comfortably.
Breath normally.
Be Still.
Just Be.
Watch.
Allow.
Be Aware.
That’s It.
That’s the “short version.”
Meditation is doing nothing and identifying with nothing. Here’s the
breakdown: 1. Sit comfortably. You can sit in a comfortable position
directly on the floor, or on a supportive cushion, or in a chair, it doesn't
matter. Your body should be comfortable, at ease, unnoticeable.
2, Breathe normally. No need to make any effort to change the speed, length
or depth of your breath in any way. Just breathe like you normally would. It
may get slower, deeper or shallower on its own. Just notice that. Don’ t try
to induce that in any way. You may notice the slow expansion and
collapsing of your belly.
3. Be Still. Sit still with the fewest amount of extraneous body movements,
and feel that physical stillness replicated in inner stillness 4. Be. Just relax
there. Don’t be concerned about how long you’ll sit, how soon you need to
get up and move onto the next task, about what ‘should’ happen or what
you ‘hope’ will happen. Just let all that go, and relax and be there, fully,
until you're not.
5. Watch. Just watch whatever arises. If some thoughts, feelings, plans,
desires, worries, plans or judgments arise in your body/mind, that’s fine.
Just watch them come and go. Make no effort about their content or
volume. Do not try to reduce or still the thoughts, or force the mind to focus
on this and not that. Just watch.
So if you’re mind thinks, “Oh, I need to plan my day,” just notice it’s
thinking that but don’t engage or get involved. If it thinks “When will this
be over. Nothing’s happening. I don’t think I’m getting anywhere. Maybe
I’m not doing it right,” just notice it’s making those judgments, but don’t
engage or get involved. If it says, “I’d rather be gratifying one of my sense
desires, like getting something to eat or having sex,” just notice it’s thinking
that but don’t respond or get involved. If it says, ”My legs hurt. And what’s
that pain in my chest, it’s been coming up frequently. It’s probably a heart
problem, or cancer. Oh dear, now I’m rather anxious.” just observe all that
without reacting, judging or doing something about it.
This is the Sakshi part of meditation, just Witnessing. You watch all these
rising and falling phenomena, which you usually took to be you, but now
you are meditating, which means, for this short while, 15-20 minutes at
least, you have committed to just watching without any identification or
reaction, dispassionately, like the fellow laying on his back watching
clouds. You don’t care what they look like, their shape or content, even the
really intense-looking ones. You just watch, as if all these were coming up
in someone else’s sky.
Some thoughts or feelings will have a particularly strong pull: A worry
about a recent health or money problem, a strong judgment and feeling of
anger towards someone who upset you, etc. And after a short period of
witnessing, you may notice you dropped back into engaging and ruminating
about that thought or feeling, thinking it over like you always do. Or
ruminating about nothing in particular, which we call daydreaming or
reminiscing. That’s OK. The moment you notice you’ve dropped back into
that identification with the thoughts, feelings and body, you are witnessing
again. Now simply resume watching. Draw yourself back into the silent
observer that sees all that but is not engaged, and continue witnessing.
6. Allow. You need do nothing else. Meditation is not an activity, a doing. It
is the ultimate non-doing. The minute you start thinking you should be
doing more and making something happen in your meditation, you are, of
course, back in the thinking, judging mind, not the witness. When you
notice you have that thought, just go back to witnessing that thought, just
noticing you are judging your meditation. Minds are constantly-active
doing-thinking machines, by their very nature, so it’s natural for them to
think, “What is this business of sitting still and doing nothing? Doesn’t
seem productive. There must be something else I’m supposed to add or do.”
Nope. Just be there, just be, and just be aware. That’s it. Any ‘antsy-ness’
that you feel is simply the clear indication that you haven’t known how to
just be and watch, which means you’ve been living as your mind, not as the
silent, witnessing Awareness that You really are.
Now you are breaking that false identification, and it feels so good! “My
body/mind is having all these thoughts and feelings that, as always, are
threatening to bother me, toss me, disturb me…but Oh, look! There’s my
still witness that’s just aware of that, just noticing all that, with absolutely
no involvement or reaction to any of it. It doesn’t even have the equipment
for that. All it can do, all it can be, is a watcher, a witness. It’s never upset.
It’s just there. It’s always pure stillness, pure awareness, pure primordial
peace. What a revelation! I’m a new person. I’m free!”
The minute you discover that, your life is permanently transformed. And
you can discover it the very first time you site for mediation, in the first 5
minutes.
7. Be Aware. As your meditation naturally deepens, through letting go in all
the above steps, you naturally begin to go beyond knowing intellectually
that your are not that voice in your head, to apperceiving it directly. You
‘feel’ your self, directly, as the thoughtless, wordless pure Being that simply
Is. Just empty Awareness. All the internal dialogue becomes clearly not
you, as if coming from another room, or something in which you are totally
disinterested. It may even stop altogether.
This deep step is the beginning of firmly establishing you in your pure
Awareness, forever breaking the identification with that constantly
assessing mind and voice in your head.
You don’t have to do anything for this apperception. Just practice the first 6
steps and this step 7 will naturally occur. As you let go in the first 6 steps,
opportunities will naturally arise where your Awareness stops being
interested in the thought-stream, and seems to turn in on Itself, or more
accurately, rest in Itself. It will notice Itself, notice it’s not the thoughts or
words or judgments of that constantly-running narrative, or even this
supposed ‘person’ or person’s ‘story,’ and, poetically speaking, become
totally intrigued and in bliss about this fathomless, endless peace that is Its
True Identity.
Simply be aware of these opportunities to Be Awareness, to let go that
deeply and rest there.
7. ALLOWING AND LETTING GO OF CONTROL
The second half of SakshiVasati meditation is Vasati or Allowing, allowing
everything to be as it is, which you started in step 6, above. That same mind
that always wants to think and do things, also always thinks it needs to fix
and improve things (for it’s own pleasure and survival, of course.) But in
meditation, we just allow everything to be as it is. Everything is as it is,
anyway, so resisting or arguing with that (which only the mind will do,
never the Awareness,) can only cause friction, suffering and re-
identification with this ego-mind that feels it needs to “control” and
improve life. Allowing everything to be as it is immediately puts you in
alignment with reality, with how things are, flowing with the river of Life
instead of struggling against it, which immediately eliminates all
psychological friction and added suffering.
Simple witnessing without engaging or judging (Sakshi) makes it easy to
allow thing’s to be as they are, and allowing everything to be as it is
(Vasati) makes it easy to just keep watching, dispassionately, and remain as
the Witnessing Awareness. So the two compliment each other.
Now, sitting still and watching everything inside and outside you, with no
judgment, involvement, or trying to change or control anything, is about as
simple as it gets. It’s literally doing nothing. It is the essence of
SakshiVasati meditation. It is the essence of all meditation methods.
And that’s all there is to it. There are no other steps or instructions and you
need do nothing else. Indeed, if you just sit, watch and allow, anything you
add is no longer meditation. Now you’ve moved into “manipulation,’ trying
to “make something happen” in your meditation. Anything you add will
only take you out of meditation, because the only part of you that would
want to add more and make things happen faster or deeper is the ego-mind
with which you are breaking identification. Which, of course, would only
serve to reinforce your identification, not release it.
Let go of all “trying.” Let go of unnecessary extra techniques, that maybe
someone told you would “get you deeper, faster.” Let go of everything!
Meditation is letting go, not adding on. Doing just those simple steps above
and nothing else will radically alter your life, and take you everywhere the
deepest meditations & meditators have ever gone, I promise you.
8. WHEN, WHERE AND HOW OFTEN TO PRACTICE SAKSHI
VASATI MEDITATION
For the greatest benefits, practicing SakshiVasati regularly, for at least some
time every day, is recommended.
You want to always feel like meditation is something you look forward to,
not something you start see as a chore and start resisting. Remember,
meditation is just sitting witnessing, not doing anything, with no hurry to
achieve any goal. It’s not ‘goal-oriented.’ So you never want it to feel like
something you are forcing yourself to do. I have found that regularity is
more important than the amount of time you sit, so pick a time-length that
feels very doable, near the edge of your comfort, but not beyond. Each
sitting of ten minutes, thirty minutes or even over an hour, is complete in
and of itself, so there’s no value in forcing yourself to sit for a longer
meditation than feels right to you. You’re not going to “get there” any faster
by sitting for an hour instead of ten minutes, because there’s no “there” to
get to. Ultimately, you want the Witnessing Awareness to continue all the
hours of your day (see 9. next,) so what difference could it possibly make if
you stopped your formal sitting session after 20 minutes instead of staying
there for 25?
I would recommend starting with one sitting in the morning, for 15-20
minutes, right at arising and before breakfast as long as you’re not too
hungry, and another, sometime in the late afternoon or before bedtime. The
reason for starting the morning session right at arising is to take advantage
of a mind that has not yet kicked into high thinking-&-planning gear. If
those times or time-length don’t quite fit your schedule or comfort, adjust to
your needs and temperament. Many may feel like 10-15 minutes is already
a push, whereas others may immediately feel comfortable with a deep 30-
40 minute sitting. Three minutes of truly witnessing your mind & body and
releasing the identification with them is better than 30 minutes of identified
thinking and daydreaming.
Once you experience the ease and simplicity of this meditation – remember,
you are doing nothing, just watching – as well as the depth of peace into
which you can sink, you may likely find yourself looking eagerly forward
to these sittings and find them naturally expanding to longer durations
without any ‘trying’ on your part. You may even find you have stopped
checking the clock altogether, and simply remain in meditation until you
naturally feel like you’ve ‘had enough’ for one session.
9. BEING IN THE MEDITATIVE STATE FULL-TIME
Another beauty of our SakshiVasati style of meditation is, since you are
simply witnessing whatever phenomena arises both within you and without,
you can practice it anywhere – sitting with eyes closed, of course, but also
walking down the street, driving on the highway, at work, at meals,
anytime. How? Simple. You watch your mind bring up whatever it needs to
carry out the task at hand, and you also witness all the unnecessary
psychological assessment it tends to add on top of that, and notice how,
even in intense & dynamic work and life situations, the witness is neutral
and unperturbed by any of it.
Indeed, this is the “Watching Your Life” point of our SakshiVasati
meditation, to remain in the neutral Witnessing Awareness all the time.
More about this in part 2

10. FEELINGS AND EXPERIENCES THAT MAY COME UP IN

MEDITATION
So now you are sitting regularly, watching, witnessing everything that rolls
across your mind, body and emotional landscape, without engaging or
tracking any of these phenomena, without judging them or reacting to them
– just observing.
As you continue to just watch, different phenomena and sensations may
arise. Bursts of energy, washes of sleepiness, inner visions and light,
feelings of bliss, unexpected bolts of anxiety or fear, even unexplained
sadness and tears. Deny none of these, let them all come up and pass
through you. Remain in your neutral Witnessing Awareness, allow them to
express themselves all the way through, and then pass on. Experience them
without identifying with them.
Indeed, it is common for unexpected thoughts, feelings and sensations to
arise in meditation, something from your ‘past’ or something wholly new,
because by meditating and witnessing, your are giving your whole being –
body, mind, emotions – permission to allow all previously-avoided or
suppressed phenomena and backlog to bubble up to the surface. By sitting
in silence, promising to watch without involvement, you are essentially
saying to the body-mind, “Let whatever needs to arise and pass through,
arise and pass through. It’s OK, it’s all just phenomena, and I’m just
observing.”
As a result, from the ‘past’ might arise images and feelings about past
actions or interactions that felt strained, awkward or incomplete, and with
it, the sense of sadness, anxiety or self-judgment, as mentioned above. From
the present might come glimpses of the Oneness the Emptiness that
underlies all creation, or deep sensing of the non-dual nature of Reality,
which may in turn bring up surges of energy, immersions in bliss, bolts of
fear, avoidance (daydreaming or sleepiness,) and other visual or emotional
sensations.
Since the purpose of meditation is simply to witness it all as passing
phenomena that is not you, you want to simply notice all these unexpected
or ‘special’ sensations, no matter how profound or strong they are, and not
engage with them or move into ego-labeling or pathologizing them - either
that ‘something special’ is happening that should be coveted and sustained,
or ‘something wrong and threatening is happening’ that must be reacted to
or rejected in any way. Treat even the most intense arisings with the same
dispassion as a discursive thought about what you want for dinner later. Just
thoughts, feelings, sensations. Just empty phenomena of no special
significance. Just more to be witnessed and let to pass.
Because of our identification with our false psychological identity (which
we can call our ‘ego’) there is a tendency for ego to co-opt the blissful,
energetic or transcendental experiences, and label it as “Wow! I’m having a
‘special, profound, spiritual experience, an ‘awakening,’ and want this to
continue (remember, the ego covets pleasure,) and for ego to ‘pathologize’
the fearful and uncomfortable experiences and say “This is ‘bad,’ there’s
definitely something ‘wrong’ with me! I don't know if I should continue”
In both cases, we have moved out of just watching, just neutral witnessing,
and back into being identified with the ego-mind and its judgments, fears
and desires. No matter how powerful, intense or ‘cool’ the feelings,
sensations and experiences are, just watch it all unfold. Don't identify with
it. Just witness.
11. THE EGO-MIND’S ARGUMENT WITH REALITY AND
RESISTANCE TO MEDITATION
The mind is a useful tool for many important functions: Balancing your
checkbook, driving safely on a busy highway, figuring out a recipe and
knowing the details of your job description at work are just a few examples.
However, our conscious minds make up only a small percentage of our total
consciousness, and our intellect is quite limited. Our eye cannot see itself,
and our intellect cannot grasp itself, its true nature.
The mind’s main job is to analyze and scrutinize everything in it’s inner and
outer environment, and use that data to make choices. Psychologically, over
years of conditioning, we come to believe we are our minds and the voice
inside our head, the ceaseless internal dialogue, instead of the Being or pure
Awareness that sits behind mind, body, emotions and all other phenomena,
just watching (see Conditioned Identification, next.) This false
identification as the mind (instead of having a mind) we call ego. Once we
become certain we are our minds, the mind turns it’s full attention to
satisfying and surviving its egoic self. So perhaps you see a stick on the
trail, and mistake it for a poisonous snake. Since this represents possible
pain and even death for the ego-mind, it immediately generates anxiety,
adrenaline, visions of ‘past’ encounters with snakes, and lots of thoughts
and plans on where to turn and run to avoid this snake. Upon closer
examination, the stick is seen for what it is, not a poisonous snake, just a
stick, and the mind immediately rejects all those responses, calms down,
and turns it’s attention back to it’s normal function, planning and analyzing
for it’s own assured survival and pleasure, and avoidance of ‘future’ pain.
The Witnessing Awareness watches the mind do this chaotic dance, but
Itself remains unperturbed, just aware.
Beginning meditators often complain their minds, feelings, sensations and
thought-stream is overwhelming, and perhaps too hard to release
identification with. One sage said, ”Mind is like a monkey. Worse, it’s like a
drunken monkey. Worse still, like a drunken monkey that has been bit by a
scorpion!”
As we sit for simple meditation, just witnessing and allowing, we witness
this monkey mind. As long as we know we are the witness, and do not
identify with the mind (includes body and emotions,) we can sit there
forever. But after a short while, the body might say “My legs hurt;” the
emotions might say, “This sitting silently is creating too many opportunities
for sadness, irritation or anxiety to arise” and the thoughts might judge,
“This is dry and boring. This sitting doing nothing, just witnessing, isn’t
productive, isn’t getting me anywhere, it’s a waste of time, I think I’ll jump
up and get something to eat or do something productive or pleasurable.”
Over the continued weeks and months of practice, it’s common for the ego-
mind to simply resist sitting for meditation, which, of course, is simply
resistance to letting go of its illusory ‘control’ and allowing you to witness,
allow and be aware again.
This kind of mental resistance comes up for virtually every meditator at
some time or another. Obviously, giving in to the body, emotions or
thoughts would only mean you are identified with them again. If instead
you hear all those body-mind complaints, and simply watch those, too, from
your unconcerned Witness, you’re free. The choice is yours, and you’re
certainly not ‘bad’ if you choose to re-identify and obey the egoic mind. At
some point, you will tire again of the vicissitudes and chaos of a life lived
identified with the ego-mind, and long for the silent, still Witness again.
Or you could just witness all that, right from the start, and not engage or
react. Just watch, and allow it all to be there, but don’t get up and stop
meditating. Allow yourself to feel the peace of just being a Witness, and
notice that all that mental noise is just random phenomena, as Shakespeare
once said, “A tale full of sound and fury…signifying nothing.”
PART 2: WATCHING YOUR LIFE
1. CONDITIONED IDENTIFICATION
You have a car, sitting in the driveway or at the curb, and you have no doubt
you are not your car. It’s just a tool, and a great one at that, but it’s a tool
that you have, separate from you, not something you are. How come you
can look at your car two times, twenty, 200 times a day and have no trouble
knowing you aren’t your car, yet you contact your thoughts, emotions and
body sensations and immediately feel you are that?
Because you have been conditioned, since infancy, birth, even pre-birth, by
what your parents, family members and the rest of society express when
they feel their thoughts, emotions and body sensations.
They never said, “I’m having some strong feelings about something you
did, and I’m witnessing them and seeing they are just random phenomena
passing through me, no my true self.” No, they said, “I’m angry, I’m pissed
off at you. I am this or that.” And you picked up on their identification with
their mind and emotions. If they see a stick on the trail and mistake it for a
snake, they don’t say, “I think that’s snake, and I notice I’m having some
fear and adrenaline sensations rising in my body.” They identify with their
fear and say, “Oh my God, a snake! Looks like rattler! It might bite me, and
I’ll go into shock an die right here on this trail!” They literally became their
fear, so you figure, if something scares you in life, you won’t simply be
aware of fear, you will be possessed by it. Or you are driving in your Dad’s
car, down a busy highway, and another driver cuts recklessly in front of
your hum, with less than an inch of margin. You hear your Dad’s response.
He doesn’t say “I have question and confusion about why that driver would
drive so dangerously, but I can’t draw any conclusions. He may simply have
not seen me, or gotten distracted by a bee inside his car, or whatever.” No
he says, “What an asshole! That guy is a jerk for sure! That’s not a
judgment, son, that’s the truth.”
So by the time you are 3 or 4, you also think you are your thoughts,
feelings, fears and judgments.
Newborns are totally in the moment, totally in their natural state. They are
pre-verbal and pre-psychological assessment. They experience each feeling
passing through them point-blank, and because they have no assessments
about what it ‘means,’ or about what kinds of expression are ‘acceptable,
they have no compunction about roaring and letting you know!
As we grow and society tells us what is acceptable, what everything
‘means,’ what will impact our body-mind’s pleasure, pain and outright
survival, and most critical, reinforces our illusion that we are all separate
and must compete and fend for ourselves to successfully ‘be’ in this Flow of
Life, we determine we are not pure Awareness watching our minds and life.
We are our calculating minds, analyzing everything and constantly
jockeying for the best position in this oppressive existence. Conditioning,
familial and societal training & reinforcement all conspire to convince us of
this. “No one else is witnessing their anger, fear, desires and judgments,
they are all one with their anger, fear, desires and judgments, of
themselves…so I guess I must be too.”

2. DEEPER LEVELS OF MEDITATION: NOW-NESS, SAMADHI AND

WATCHING WORDLESSLY
As you continue in your SakshiVisati meditating, you may experience
deepening levels of witnessing and the clear separation from identifying
with what Patanjali called the chitta vrittis, or the ‘ripples in the mind-
stuff.’
One of the first realizations I had as my meditation deepened, was that all
my thoughts were inextricably linked to words. It is impossible to have a
thought rise up in the mind without words, or images, attached. When
meditating, most people hear words, internal dialogue, connected with each
thought. So if thoughts of planning your day or week arise, they always
have words attached to, and describing, them, such as, “I need to make sure
I make that phone call to Tom before 11, and, oh, I have to remember to
water the garden sometime today.” Without those words, thoughts about
plans, desires and judgments could not exist. Or if health concerns want to
arise, they must have words attached like, “This pain in my abdomen has
been there for weeks. I wonder if it’s something serious. Now I’m worried.
I better plan to see a specialist.”
Since it is obvious that thoughts rely on words – not just a random word
here & there, but complete descriptive phrases and sentences – you can
lightly introduce a sort of ‘reverse-engineering’ of this thought-word
marriage, to help you witness the phenomenon instead of getting lost in it.
When you notice your mind is thinking full or partial sentences,
ruminations and paragraph-long figure-outs, just silently and lightly say
“Thinking.” One word to stand in for, and ultimately neutralize and diffuse
the long, diverse streams of words that usually arise around each subject
mind feels is important, right now, to consider. If it’s a series of images
instead of words, you can still distill those down to “Thinking,” or perhaps
“Seeing.” If it’s a worrisome body sensation, “Feeling.” By distilling all
those various long thought-with-words combinations down to just one word
each, you remove all the engaging and ‘thinking-through’ of those thoughts,
and thus any significance or identification with them. When even the most
critical, got-to-be-considered-right-now thoughts are condensed to just one
word, “Thinking,” you diffuse what they’re about, and instead become the
silent observer of the pure function itself. “I’m simply witnessing these
functions arising called thinking, seeing, feeling. I’m not interested in what
they’re about or a detailed breakdown. Just the natural functions arising like
any other purely-functional phenomena. Like watching the sun rise & set,
or watching a wave arise & subside in the ocean.
This reduced word-count in your thinking process, and the resulting
reduced contemplation and significance of any subject matter, moves us
quickly towards mouna, or wordlessness. With all the other long strings of
words gone, “Thinking,” “Seeing,” and “Feeling” are not that ‘interesting’
to mind. So very soon, even those three simple words attached to the
witnessing of three pure functioins drop away, and we move into ‘Watching
Wordlessly.’ Very near complete silence and samadhi.
Another powerful insight in the deepening and unfolding of your meditation
is the recognition of absolute Now-ness.
Mind is past. Any thought you can have, any descriptive set of words and/or
images rolling through your mind are already in the past to the actual raw
event. You can only imagine & consider thoughts about any event in reality
after the actual experience happened. It could be a moment after, or 20
years after, but, either way, if you’re in a thought about the moment, you’re
not in the moment itself…that moment is already long past.
One of the main benefits of simply Witnessing, Allowing and being Aware
of every rising & passing phenomena, is the peace, the infinite,
immeasurable, primordial peace inherent in being in the moment, this
moment, right now. Not the after-thoughts and after-psychological-
assessments we add to this moment, which only pull us out of the
unimaginable peace of the Now into the restlessness, chasing and suffering
of mind.
As you sit in meditation, you notice one thing that all the thoughts arising
have in common, no matter what they’re about or their level of supposed
importance. None of them are Now. They’re all after the fact, or in the case
of worries, plans and desires, ‘before’ the fact. None of them are just Being
Now with what you are experiencing right now. So if you follow them,
you’ve left the Now. You’re no longer just here, in SakshiVasati meditation,
just witnessing, allowing, Being. You are somewhere in the ‘future’ or
‘past’ hoping to work things out and set things up mentally to bring you
happiness then. Even though all the peace and bliss you could ever want is
sitting there with you right now.
Right now, as you sit there, you need for nothing, correct? You may need
food, water, money, work, love or a better body later, but not Now. You are
here, now, and in fact, everything is perfect. Yet you plan, worry, desire,
judge and ruminate about the ‘past’ and ‘future’ in your mind, because you
are identified with mind, still consider it to be who you are, and still
consider it to be the sole arbiter and form of ‘knowing & controlling things’
that will bring you the happiness you think you don’t already have. So you
hear some ‘important thoughts’ in your mind, and go off & running with it.
As the saying goes, how’s that working out for ya’?
Not too good, because we can’t control anything – with our minds, our
bodies, our ‘best-laid plans,’ our strategies – none of it guarantees anything.
We do our best ruminations, considerations (of ‘past’ & ‘future,’)
intellectualizations and figure-outs, all our dancing and mental
gymnastics…and Life happens anyway, the way it happens. Which is
virtually never the way we thought it would or should go.
And the funny thing is, contentment and happiness exist only in
desirelessness , and desirelessness exists only in Being. After your mind
has thought through everything and set it up for maximum ‘control, it may
get what it wants. And after your mind gets exactly what it wants, there is
bliss, ecstasy,,,but not because mind got what it wanted, but because for
a short moment it has no desire . The momentary lack of desire in the mind
causes an emptiness of mind that reveals Being. That you could already
have had all the peace & bliss you wanted but just Being, with no desire in
the first place!
Realizing this, as you meditate, with each thought that arises, your
Witnessing Awareness, your core Being, can quickly, efficiently disbelieve
and disregard every single thought, knowing that every thought is already
past, already after Now, and can’t control anything or bring you happiness
anyway. Knowing that the true peace happiness you seek is already sitting
right there with You, before the thought, before any desire to add, alter or
improve things is generated by mind. You can just rest in the Now and be
done, complete, perfect…and then take that Now Awareness with you
wherever you go, always be totally liberated and totally free!
In my third book, “The Folly of Enlightenment,” we clarify that in truth,
there isn’t even really a cohesive, locatable ‘thinker’ thinking these
thoughts in one body, just random phenomena pasing through Reality, so
you can even quickly disregard & disbelieve there is “someone” thinking
these particular thoughts.
But for now, it’s enough to simply witness all your thoughts as disbelieve-
able phantoms to which you need give no credence. In Sanskrit, I call this
disregard/disbelief witnessing Vivakti.
At some point, the thought-stream can cease completely, or, firmly
established in Awareness as your nature, even if thoughts continue, they
sound like distant background noise of which you have no interest.
This is the beginning of the culmination of dhyana or meditation, into the
final phase that Patanjali called samadhi, or absorption into pure
Awareness. If your meditation focused on an object (such as a mantra, a
visual, or your breath,) it is as if you become one with that object, devoid of
thoughts or feelings about the object, or even a sense that there is still a
separate ‘subject’ – you – aware of that feeling of Oneness.
If, as in our SakshiVasati meditation, you did not meditate on a particular
object, but simply witnessed everything from your pure Awareness, at some
point your Awareness may turn its attention to…Itself, pure Awareness.
Then you may experience that you are, indeed, that Awareness and nothing
else, not just by perceiving it in your mind, but by being one with it.
Thoughts and the subject-object-based mind disappears, so there will no
longer be a thought, “I (subject) am only this Awareness (object.)” The “I”
that would make such an observation is gone. All that’s left is Awareness,
and you experience you are that simply by being that…one thing without
duality.
This is samadhi, total absorption and immersion beyond the subject-object
based mind. As I mentioned in the Introduction on page 1, there have been
many learned treatises and explanations of how meditation works and what
happens in the brain/body/mind during meditation, by wise sages and
teachers, over centuries. This includes breakdowns of samadhi into various
deeper levels, and discourses on what is actually happening in the mind of
the being who is experiencing the various levels of samadhi.
For the purposes of a booklet about getting you quickly into the benefit of
Witnessing-Awareness-Allowing and avoiding re-identifying with the ego
that covets ‘personal experiences’ and windows into mysticism and
immortality, it is not necessary to go into a lengthy exposition of the
different levels of samadhi. Suffice it to say, if you witness (Sakshi) and
allow (Vasati) long enough to become fully established in your Witnessing
Awareness identity, you will already be One with Who You Really Are, in a
very deep level of absorption (samadhi) and any deeper awakenings and
even full-circle enlightenment will take care of themselves without any
mental understandings of samadhi or ego-efforts on your part.
And there, again, is that Vasati component - allowing everything to be as it
is, not as your ego attempts to make it  . For those analytical types minds
still curious about samadhi’s levels, here’s a link to a nice web discourse on
the ten levels of samadhi.
https://dondeg.wordpress.com/2014/05/28/patanjalis-ten-types-of-samadhi/

3. ENLIGHTENMENT: A NEW EASY EXPLANATION

In part 3 of this book, I answer some of the most common, and bizarre,
questions that arise for ‘seekers’ on the meditative path. One of the most
common is: ‘Will meditation lead to awakening or enlightenment?’
Because meditation has its origins in the same ancient teachings as
awakening (Buddha literally translates as the Awakened One,) people often
ask about the connection between meditation and ‘having a spiritual
awakening’ or ‘enlightenment’ - will meditation lead to those ‘states?’
Certainly, you can meditate simply for increased calmness, relaxation, and
stress-relief, with no aspirations to self-realization, dissolving of the ego or
‘enlightenment,’ and in many ways, it’s actually better if you never put any
attention on all that – because “you” cannot cause that. Ultimately it does
not matter if anyone, meditator or not, ever experiences full enlightenment.
Enlightenment is a concept, a much-misunderstood one, and ‘individual
persons’ don’t get enlightened. In Reality, enlightenment absolutely doesn’t
matter. More explanation of why this is so can be found in the author’s third
book, “The Folly of Enlightenment.”
But to address this connection between meditation and enlightenment, and
what this means with regards to ‘watching your life,’ here’s the simple
explanation: Enlightenment is simply living in your natural state.
In your totally natural state, stripped of all that is extra, added, overlaid and
unnatural, you are already fully ‘enlightened.’ Full enlightenment can be
defined as not only the dissolving of identification with mind, but the
complete and utter dissolution of that psychological mind, and the end of
believing that mind and all its content is, or ever was, real. Identifying with,
and believing in, the psychological mind could be called, simply, ego.
Remember that here, when we say ego-mind, we are including all thoughts,
emotions, moods and judgments.
As we covered earlier, by age 3-4, we come to believe that mind is its own,
real, separate entity and identity, and we identify with it, separate from the
Flow of Life. Then, like any ‘separate’ identity, its main concern becomes
surviving itself, making sure it doesn’t die. Once it’s found out what
strategies (seemingly) assured that in the past, it constantly scrutinizes the
environment in the present and becomes preoccupied with how to insure
that into the ‘future.’ Beyond that, it is naturally drawn to seek pleasure,
avoid pain, and make meticulous and relentless assessments – hundreds
every minute – as to what will continue to provide that survival, pleasure,
joy, and pain-avoidance in the ‘future’ (even just the next few seconds into
the future) based on memories of what seemed to work best in the ‘past.
That means that the ego-mind is almost never in the now, the raw, direct
experience of what’s happening right now, because it’s constantly making
assessments of how it relates to past & future survival and pleasure. This
constant addition of psychological assessment to every experience, coupled
with the erroneous identity that you are your ego-mind, takes you
completely and overwhelmingly out of your natural state. You certainly
don’t feel one with the flow of Life, or enlightened.
4. PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT CAUSES UNPRESENCE AND
UNNEEDED SUFFERING
We live, we grow, we experience good times and challenges, we die. We are
already living in the Flow of Life, just like a tree or a bird. That bird has it’s
own set of challenges – predators, other birds that might dominate it and
steal its food or even its eggs. But unlike humans, that bird doesn’t add any
judgments or psychological assessments to these events. It just goes
forward to whatever is next, and next, and next.
We add all these psychological assessments on top of both our joyous times
and our difficult ones. This results in us being less present-in-the-moment
for our joyous times (we’re already thinking about something else,) and
turning any temporary pain in the flow of our life into timeless and
endlessly compounded suffering.
Let’s look at one day’s example:
As you sit for your morning meditation, you need for nothing. Breathing is
normal, body in a comfortable position. You’ll need some food and water
later, perhaps also work and income, but not now. You literally have no
reason why you couldn’t enjoy just sitting there, just being (which is the
definition of meditation,) except for the psychological assessments your
ego-mind is adding & overlaying, and your belief in and identification with
those assessments.
“Oh, this just sitting & being is boring, a waste of time. I’ll never get far
with this anyway, my mind always races with thoughts when I try to
meditate. I feel a strong urge to stop, get up and get something to eat (even
though still full from breakfast.”) We call that a ‘discursive’ desire – a
random desire for some gratification when you are already full up.
“I’m feeling some random anxiety or sadness, and judging those as ‘bad’
feelings that I don’t want to feel. Meditating is making me stay with them.
I’m ruminating about someone who hurt me or took advantage of me, and
I’m judging them as ‘bad’ or an ‘asshole,’ and thinking of ways to get back
at them. I need to plan today, this week and next week and it’s more
important to be planning and doing something productive.”
Now, in actuality, none of that stuff is now, relevant or even real. You are
absolutely fine right now, just sitting and being. Feel that now. As a natural
living being, in this moment, you have everything you need. But because
the ego-mind is creating all these added assessments, and you are believing
and identifying with them, you are feeling impatient, feeling you cannot just
be, and introducing real suffering into your experience, where absolutely
none is needed or apparent. There’s nothing actually of concern or potential
harm happening at that moment, no reason why you couldn’t just sit in deep
peace for a good, long time, and yet, you are suffering because of all this
added psychological assessment.
So you get up and go to work, another straight-forward activity in the Flow
of Life. But here again, you overlay considerable psychological assessment
on it – “I don’t like this job, it’s not fulfilling, but I need the income, so
thank God I have a job, but how come the boss has promoted that other
person to a better position while I’m still stuck at this lower level…I’m
smarter and a better worker than that one, it’s favoritism or discrimination,
etc., etc.”
In the flow of life, that bird must work a long day, flitting from tree to tree,
ground patch to ground patch, looking for food to feed itself and it’s young.
But it doesn't psychologically assess about it, it just does it, and moves
forward, now and now and now. Your job is similarly neutral – just
something you need to survive – but all the assessments of your ego-mind
make it impossible to just be in your job, and get the real reward of being
very present with your work and turning in high-quality results. To have the
reward of totally being in each now, be enough.
Later that evening you have a dinner party, and you are looking forward to
the food, libations and fun with others available. There’ll be some new
folks there you don’t know, but, hey, you’re a ‘people person’ and should
have a good time with your known friends as well as the newcomers. But
then you arrive, and it turns out one of the new gentlemen is your ex-wife’s
new lover…and naturally he’s brought her along with him. The Flow of
Life, the Reality is, you are just 3 people standing in the same room
together and no one has any pressing needs or is any imminent danger. So
on the outside, you are smiling & cordial, but inside your ego-mind is
racing with all kinds of unnecessary psychological assessments, and you are
seething! “How could she pick that jerk, I’m so much better than him. I’m
still holding onto the past, so this hurts (even though she is doing absolutely
nothing hurtful to me, and I couldn’t wait to get away from her when we
together.) She’s gonna hurt him too, I just know it, he’s gonna be sorry he
picked her.”
So you can see how all this unnecessary added psychological assessment
takes you out of your natural state and adds unneeded pain & stress to the
easy times, and will surely take the difficult times, when you actually are in
pain or ill, and add a world of suffering on top of them. This was Buddha’s
definition of dukkha, suffering. Everyone has some pain in the flow of their
lives. That’s a natural part of life and Reality. When you psychologically
assess, worry and ruminate about it, you turn this real but simple thing
called pain into this false imagined behemoth called “suffering.” Take away
the psychological assessment, and it’s just being and dealing with now, and
the next now, and the next now.
Granted, humans have a much more complicated life than a bird –
especially humans of the hi-tech, jet-paced, internet age. The bird simply
has to find a place to build its nest, avoid predators, and find daily food and
water. Perhaps the homo sapiens of 5000-10,000 years ago had lives nearly
as simple as a bird or other mammal.
But the main difference and complication is in that human ability to
psychological assess and add illusory ‘past’ and ‘future’ to every present
moment, which may seem to provide many creative benefits, but ultimately
causes untold suffering – not only internally but also all worldwide conflict
and war. So in this opportunity to break the false identification with all that
unneeded, non-useful PA and live fully in the moment, it would be a silly
point to insist we can’t live as simple as the animals, because human life is
‘too complicated.’ Argue for your constraints and complications, and you
get to keep them.
But remove all unnecessarily-added psychological assessments (PA,) and
you’re back in your natural state, just living and being in the flow of your
life until you die, with no added suffering, just like that tree or bird or
animal. That, my friend, is enlightenment.
When asked what is enlightenment like, one answer I have offered is simply
“I no longer confuse my imagination and PA with Reality.”
5. IS THAT ACTUALLY ENLIGHTENMENT?
Some will ask, is that true enlightenment, the same kind or level of
enlightenment that people talk about when referring to some great master or
guru who ‘achieved’ moksha, jivanmukta, full liberation?
Actually it is, because what distinguishes those ‘levels’ of enlightenment is
the complete dissolving of the ego-mind into the One Reality, the Flow of
Life. One cannot give up every trace of psychological assessment as long as
there’s still a seemingly-separate, identified “me” (ego) to whom things are
happening. And one’s ego cannot fully dissolve into the One Reality as long
as there is any psychological assessment being added to the natural flow of
life events. So the two go hand-in-hand. The direct experience (not
intellectual conclusion) that this psychological “you” is not the real You,
that it never really existed at all, is Self –Realization. Then, since the ego’s
actuality, its “suchness,” has been invalidated, it proceeds over time
(months, years, a decade) to dissolve totally, leaving only the Real You –
pure Awareness, pure Reality – in your natural state, full Enlightenment.
More importantly, it doesn’t matter anyway, Most people’s idea of
enlightenment is very romanticized, some ‘special’ or ‘lucky’ aspirant who
sails off into a permanent cosmic ecstasy of mystical visions, all-knowing
wisdom and, of course, perpetual bliss, happiness and an end to all their
problems. The psychological ego certainly covets that version of a
‘personal’ heavenly existence, but that kind of personal enlightenment is the
ego’s myth, its dream.
Since the psychological “you” disappears at enlightenment, there’s no you
left to say “I am experiencing the enlightened state, I am enjoying
permanent peace and bliss.” At that ‘stage’ (non-stage,) “you” are gone and
all that is left is Life Itself, This Everything, Reality, and You are just part
of that spontaneous Flow, and simultaneously, All Of It.
That last paragraph cannot be grasped by the…wait for it…mind! Mind is
part & parcel of what dissolves at enlightenment, so naturally, it cannot
grasp what’s beyond itself. And since the subject-object based mind cannot
comprehend something subject-less like pure Is-ness or Awareness, mind
cannot make it any more comprehensible using it’s favorite tool, words. So
describing enlightenment verbally is, indeed, a fools errand. More attempts
at parsing enlightenment in words is available in this fool’s 3rd volume,
“The Folly OF Enlightenment.”
6: LIVING YOUR LIFE, WATCHING YOUR LIFE
By now you should be clear that you have been operating as if you have
two lives. Your real life, with everything as it is, happening now and now
and now…and your psychological ego’s dream life, the one in which you
are constantly arguing with reality, adding relentless unnecessary
psychological assessments and judgments, and keep an endless running
commentary that keeps you in a state of imagined suffering, never enough-
ness and never-in-the-Now-ness.
You are also clear that you can always drop into the Now, the Flow of Life
and the simple Awareness that is your true natural ‘state,’ by dropping into
your still, silent Witness, simply watching all of it and allowing all of it.
Realize this: Every thought, feeling, worry, desire, agenda, mood or
judgment that arises in you is just rising and passing phenomena. They are
always in flux, contradicting each other or disappearing altogether – the
thought, fear or mood you felt 5 minutes ago is often completely reversed
by 5 minutes later – so it’ obvious they are not significant, not even real.
Just empty ripples in the mind-stuff. Since they are not real, what’s just as
obvious is they cannot actually create any extra ‘control’ over your life, and
cannot provide lasting peace and happiness. Realize this Now, and forever.
It’s great to have a mind and all those aspects, but not to identify with it or
let it run your life. That would be like you thinking you were your car and
letting it take you here and there, down all kinds of roads, even when you
didn’t want to go anywhere, all the while changing from a car to a horse to a
boat and back to a car again. That’s what it’s like to be used by your
psychological mind instead of simply being aware of it, knowing its not
you, using it when needed but being fully able to set it down and just be
when not needed.
This is what I call “Watching Your Life.”
Will this introduce any detriment or disassociation with living a full life?
No.
As long as you are alive and breathing, as long as you are doing whatever
calls to you in life, you will still be fully in your life, living it to its fullest.
You will not miss anything by being dis-identified with your ego-mind and
no longer taking it seriously. Indeed, the simple awareness of witnessing
your life while living it instantly makes you much more here and now,
totally in the moment, with no argument with Reality, which in turn makes
you cease assessing everything and adding suffering, and enjoy your full
life so much more.
As you practice your Sakshi/Visati Witnessing-Allowing-Awareness as a
formal sitting meditation practice every morning and evening, be clear that
your formal sittings are preparation for Witnessing Allowing and being
Aware all day long, at work, at play, while eating, driving, interacting with
others. Being aware of your mind’s machinations and knowing which parts
are essential while simply watching all the added psychological phenomena
and nonsense that’s clearly not needed, is something you can and should do
all day. It’s not a separate activity or practice…it’s a lifestyle As you
become more familiar and find it easier to sense that silent, foundational
Awareness in you, you will find it becomes quite easy & natural to keep
sensing that, keep witnessing your mind and watching your life, ongoingly,
throughout the day. Doing so, you are truly cultivating remaining in the
meditative state all the time.
You are truly living your life and watching your life, in the eternal,
enlightened Now. Devoid of psychological assessment and identification
with the ever-changing empty ripples of the mind, you are returned to your
natural state, simply living in the Flow of Life, Reality…and you are totally
free.

Here’s a wonderful, prosaic explanation of meditation from another teacher,

my dear friend Edg Duveyoung:
Lord Brahma tried to meditate. Didn’t work.
Lord Brahma tried to create. Couldn’t.
See the point?
You cannot get there from here even if you’ve got omniscience,
omnipresence, and omnipotence.
Trying always fails. If your meditation requires effort — tsk tsk.
Finally, Lord Brahma asked Himself, “What’s wrong here? Why can’t I
create?”
And from out of the Absolute — pure awareness — came the answer that
manifested in Lord Brahma’s mind: “retire.” (In Sanskrit “tapas.”) Stop
pretending that doingness is possible. Understand that an ego is not causally
enabled. Minds don’t create.
Lord Brahma is not the author of His own thoughts. Lord Brahma is not
actually Tippy-Top-God-God.
Lord Brahma has to get all His thoughts from the same Source That you
get your thoughts.
We cannot control the mind. We cannot know our next thought.
Solution: Same as Lord Brahma’s - We can not do but we can do not.
We retire.
We get out of the “I’m an empowered entity” business.
We stop.
We abide.
We don’t.
We let come what may.
We reside.
We rest.
We witness.
Even if the mind is having a blizzard of ideation, we can witness instead of
engage.
How?
As already stated: “We can do not.” “Nothing is what we can do.”
Like Lord Brahma, we can stop. We can “not” any doingness.
We are experts at this already. In fact, if you look into your mind, right now
— to see what thought you are having — it will disappear on you POOF
and leave you with a speck — or hunk — of silence. If it’s a speck, you
might miss it, but keep looking, and it will become a boulder, and then a
mountain of sentient, serene, silent, self.
See that by ending doingness, we are forthrightly entering pure identity
fully and instantly — albeit for a nonce. To stop attending thoughts
(concepts, emotions, sensations) is to realize the basis of the real — no-
thingness — pure awareness — pure soul — pure identity — pure self.
Detailed instructions:
Close the eyes. Keep them closed.
See but don’t engage.
Abide.
Settle.
That’s it. That’s the whole list. It works on every mind. What is not detailed
will be learned by you naturally.
Posture? You’ll find what’s comfy without inducing sleep.
Best thought to use as a meditation vehicle? Optional.
Diet? You’ll find out how much and what kind of food can be in the
stomach for comfort’s sake.
Religion? Any, or none - it’s personal. It’s merely a style.
Venue? Anywhere.
When? Now is always the time on the clock.
It’s not rocket science. Any child already knows how to stop what is being
done instantly. Even breathing.
Bottom line: We close the eyes, and we say, “Go ahead, hit me with your
best shot.”
And then we wait.
And what arrives is Silence — the fullest expression of God. God doesn’t
send an angel when you ask for the best. God fills the mind that has arms
outspread to receive. God rushes into your mental embrace.
You find yourself hugging nothing. With a great big smile.
Do you think you are more real now or would you perhaps agree that when
God’s Mind dwells upon you, then that mental entity in God’s Mind has a
divine actuality that outshines your worldly presentation in what you take to
be your sole manifestation?
This is the truth about reincarnation. You are always alive in God’s Mind,
and any story you’re put in is merely another scrapbook entry. Your
“incarnations” are as infinite as the Mind of God can imagine — and all of
it in an instant.
To meditate is to discover that you are being invented by God. On the fly —
moment by instant by tachyonic nanosecond you are created.
You’re as un-alive as Pinocchio in your present story, but you can meditate
and realize your true status of residing in the divine — a real boy entity
with a beautiful nose.
And now the spectacular news: you can become really real instantly at any
time you want — even RIGHT NOW before you finish reading this.
Close your eyes and ask, “Who am I?”
For a speck of a titch of a wisp of a hint, you’re going to be real.
Repeat until you’re always residing in God’s Embrace.
Simple, eh?
Look for your self.
And find you’re on God’s Lap.
Kickin’ back and witnessing the story as God tells it.
With a bowl of double butter popcorn.
PART 3: COMMON QUESTIONS ABOUT
MEDITATION
Q. What makes meditation easy or difficult?
A. Expectation of reaching a goal is the only thing that makes meditation
difficult, as well as misguided. Meditation is a non-doing, it is literally
doing nothing. Just sitting and being, witnessing everything that comes up
without judging, reacting or doing anything about any of it. You’d have to
work hard to make that difficult. “Trying” and “efforting” to make your
mind still is guaranteed to make your meditation more of a chore or battle.
As a great sage once said, “If you go to war with your mind, you’ll be at
war forever.”
Minds we’re not meant to reach a goal like enlightenment, nor were they
meant to shift into permanent calmness. Their very nature is to scrutinize,
analyze, ruminate and be wary about everything, to insure the survival of
the ego and body.
Sustained peace & happiness is the realm of Being. Being is always present,
everywhere. And it just Is, so it is never scrutinizing, judging or second-
guessing anything So even though it sounds counterproductive (to the
mind,) the way to make our meditations most easy and productive, and drop
deep into Being, is to just sit and allow everything to be as it is. Don’t try to
calm your mind, pull your attention away from the thought stream or your
body sensations, don’t try to change or improve anything. Being doesn’t.
Being means everything as it is, so Being isn’t trying to change anything.
Using meditation to try to improve or change something (including how
calm or ‘awake’ your mind is) will only reinforce your ego-mind’s sense as
a separate ego identity, which can only lead to more mind-thoughts, more
pain and suffering, as well as making you feel your meditation is difficult or
a bothersome chore, or simply not working.
The minute you allow everything to be as it is, you are instantly in Being’s
realm, and beyond the realm of mind & ego. The impersonal neutrality and
effortless bliss you feel there immediately puts you at the “goal” of the
highest, most-enlightened meditations… and you didn’t even have to do
any-thing, except sit and allow everything to be as it is!
If you practice this easy Sakshi Visaati or Witnessing-Allowing=Awareness
meditation regularly, one day you’ll find that you can sustain this
meditative perspective, even when you get up from the cushion. You’ll find
yourself meditating in this way, allowing everything to be as it is, even as
you’re walking through your busy day. Then, effortlessly, you’ll find
yourself spending more time in Being, in the meditative “state,” then in the
mind, all the time.
Q. My mind is an endless barrage of thoughts. How will I ever thin out
the sheer number of them and acquire inner peace?
A. Thoughts don’t matter. The number and restlessness of the thoughts
don’t matter. A quiet, nearly-blank mind vs. a very noisy, flooded, racing
mind…doesn’t matter.
In meditation, your job is not to still the thoughts, or even reduce them.
Your job is not to achieve an empty mind. Anybody who tells you it is, is
lying. Trying to tame your mental thought-stream is a fool’s errand.
Your job is only to observe your thoughts, from your silent, neutral witness.
Everybody has this witness, you don’t have to get one. It’s that neutral place
inside that just watches everything, your thoughts, body sensations,
emotions, outside sounds, etc. and makes no comment - no judgment, no
evaluation, no reaction, no plans to do something. It just notices…that’s all.
If trying to still your thought-stream and quiet your mind is an endless
battle, watching your mind means the battle is instantly over and you’ve
already won. Your thoughts can only effect your meditation and mess with
your life if you identify with them, if you think that’s you doing all that
inner chatter. If you observe them as a neutral witness, they’ve lost their
power over you. “Lots of thoughts are pouring through my mind. I am just
noticing, I am fine. Ho hum, here comes even more thoughts, they seem to
be increasing rather than decreasing. I am just noticing, I have no problem
with that.”
That is how you should meditate. Just enjoy watching the show. If you rest
in the witness and just watch it all, instead of worrying about how soon
your mind will quiet down, or “trying” to make it happen through focusing
on something like your breath or a mantra (that’s not meditation, it’s
manipulation) you may find you are having advanced-level meditations and
awarenesses even as a beginning meditator.
Thoughts don’t matter. A quieter mind doesn’t matter. If thoughts, the
amount of them, and how noisy your mind is matters, you’re in trouble,
because even if you succeed it making your mind totally quiet and thought-
free, they can, and will, always start up again. If you make a home in your
witness, your entire life will be transformed.
Q. How do I look at my thoughts in meditation without getting caught
in them?
A. By looking back, also, at the neutral, thought-less observer that’s looking
at them.
It’s a useful question. Every meditator has (most likely) already understood
the basic tenet, “If I have these thoughts, I couldn’t possibly be these
thoughts. Who is the “I” that has them? What is it that’s aware of these
thoughts. Certainly not another thought.”
All correct. You have thoughts so you aren’t your thoughts. And the neutral
observer or Awareness that’s aware of them isn’t another thought. But in
actual practice, we forget about the observer and get lost in the thoughts.
The first remedy is to never try to control your thoughts - to resist getting
caught in them or stop them or even quiet them down. Resistance just
causes persistence. Just allow yourself to be as you are. If how you are this
morning is a meditator with a monkey mind full of racing thoughts and
concerns, allow that to be, don’t fight it. Just notice, “Gee, I have a lot of
thoughts today.”
Then notice who noticed that. What awareness noticed that, yet it was just
pure observation - no judgment about it, no concern, just neutral. Like
sitting by the ocean, noticing there’s a lot of waves this morning. No
judgment, no problem with a lot of waves, and you’re not trying to smooth
them out. You just noticed, that’s all.
As you practice this, the neutral observer becomes more familiar to you and
you find it easier to spend more time there and less time getting caught in
the thought-stream. Your awareness will fall where it will, it’s fluid.
Sometimes it will fall on thoughts, sometimes on body sensations,
sometimes on outer sounds. You become familiar with that playful
awareness, and with practice you come to see that that’s you. The true you
is the neutral observer.
As you continue being your awareness, watching thoughts, body, sounds,
etc. without following them, one day your awareness may turn it’s attention
to…itself! What is this awareness, what is the nature of it, it may ask. This
is the doorway to the deepest meditations and revelations.
Q. How can I avoid ‘making an effort’ in meditation?
A. It’s an important question. I wondered the same thing, for years of
mantra japa and other forms of ‘concentration-based’ meditation When we
sit for meditation, why do “we” make any efforts at all? Because we think
“we” are the Doer, the controller, and we can control oour mind and thus
make it calmer or more ‘enlightened.’. Because “we” think if “we” just
effort enough, be patient enough, and “get it right,” something will happen.
What do we think will happen? A stilling of all our thoughts? A quiet,
peaceful mind? Cosmic Wisdom? Enlightenment?
All realized sages will tell you, in Enlightenment, there is no “individual
person,” separate from Awareness or Reality or Life Itself. Enlightenment is
the full, direct Realization that there never was a separate locatable “you,”
that was always a psychological phantom, an illusion.
There is and always was only Awareness, or the One Reality, and that
Reality is already complete & “enlightened” and doesn’t need a quieter
mind or some spiritual awakening. So there’s nothing to attain, nothing to
effort for.
Awareness just Is, it’s just Pure Being, it just sits and be’s. How can we
“reach” that if we sit and try to make something happen? The way to
Awareness is to Be Awareness, and the way to do that is to ‘act’ as
Awareness does…that is, don’t try to make anything happen, just allow
everything to be as it is.
Sit, chant a mantra or watch your breath or whatever, and then just let go.
Let go of what? Everything! Let go of trying, let go of effort, let go of
achievement or attainment, let go of thinking there’s even a real “person”
sitting there that could accomplish any of these things.
Just allow everything to be as it is, including you, exactly as you are, right
now.
That’s how you NOT make an effort with your meditation. When you allow
everything to be as it is, you are already instantly in sync with Awareness,
or Reality.
Q. Isn’t the witness just another thought?
The witness is not one more thought from which you are watching the other
thoughts. It is just awareness, just being aware of something without
thinking, judging or reacting. Believe me, it takes a thought to judge,
evaluate or react to other thoughts. But this pure awareness is just noticing,
so it can’t be another thought. It is who you really are.
Q. How long do I have to meditate before I see any type of meaningful
results?
A. For you, what would constitute meaningful results? If you mean just a
basic sense of inner calm and the beginning stages of breaking your
identification with your body & mind, from my experience, it will happen
within the first few sittings. I started to feel both of those things the very
first time I sat down and got still.
Those two things are very meaningful results, and if you just keep at it, out
of that peace and dis-identification alone, all the other deeper states will
naturally unfold. Looking for deeper results - blissed-out mystical
experiences or samadhis, self realization, etc. - would obviously be the
opposite of just allowing everything to be as it is.
That kind of meditation (which is actually not mediation, it’s manipulation)
and those kind of results, are for those who want to use meditation to be a
collector of ‘still-in-the-dream’ “experiences,” not to wake up from the
dream. But every person’s path & desires are different, as is every person’s
progress, so it’s hard to predict how long before any person experiences this
or that result.
I’d stick with just feeling calm and becoming a witness to your thoughts,
plans, worries and body sensations…that, plus allowing everything to be as
it is, really is more than enough :-)
Q. How long must one meditate before achieving ‘spiritual awakening’
or ‘enlightenment?’
A. Let’s set the record straight: Meditation, even long, sustained fully-
committed years of meditation, DOES NOT = enlightenment. If it did, the
over 1 billion committed meditators in the world, including millions of
monks who live in monasteries and give their whole life over to deep
meditation, would have “achieved” enlightenment. The number of them
who actually have is infinitesimal.
We are so oriented to cause & effect, especially in the West, that it’s so
difficult for the mind to grasp that enlightenment is not an achievement, and
that you cannot ‘meditate’ yourself (or any other spiritual practice) into
enlightenment. You cannot cause enlightenment…Period!
Cause & effect are in the realm of mind. Enlightenment just is. It is already
your true, natural state. You don’t need to meditate or do anything else to
become what you already are.
Although you may not realize it now, enlighten-ment is a ‘state’ (actually, a
non-state) you already have. I promise you, meditating to ‘get there’ will
only take you further away from it.
You ‘realize’ your natural enlightenment by stripping away all that is un-
natural in you….including your identification with a mind that thinks it
must do some cause & effect to ‘attain’ something. Ramana Maharshi said,
“Be as you are. Believe that you are in bondage, and you are in bondage.
Believe that you are free, and you are free.“ Know that you are enlightened
now, and meditate just because that’s something you enjoy.
Q. If Awakening happens by Grace, not dependent on what you do,
what is the point of practicing meditation, silence and being present?
A. No point at all!…if the “point” for you doing these practices is to
awaken. One won’t lead to the other, it’s not cause & effect.
Cause & effect is something minds do, thinking “doing this will lead to
that.” In Pure Awareness, there is no subject-object, i.e., no ego or mind,
that wants something or thinks it (subject) needs to experience awakening
(object.) Everything just is as it is, now, so there’s no cause & effect, which
would also require this other thing that doesn’t exist called “time.”
Everything is already awakened, enlightened. We all abide, full-time, in
Pure Awareness, in Reality. It could not be otherwise. If we were somehow
‘separate’ from Reality, we could no longer call it the one Reality. It would
have to ne some subset of All That Is or one Reality. The illusory
distinction is that some “locations” of this Reality live in an imagined
‘dream,’ thinking these psychological minds are their true identity, while
some have allowed this illusion to drop away, and have ceased confusing
Reality with their imagination. They’ve ‘woken up’ from the dream.
Reality totally savors and enjoys both perspectives, it is both perspectives,
so there’s no problem there.
In the very rare instance that a few locations of Awareness seems to ‘wake
up’ in this way, it will truly be Life Itself, Reality, or “grace” as some call it,
that deems that, not the “individual” location.
So then, what’s the point of practicing silence and being present? Because
you love to, because you enjoy it, because it really resonates with you,
because you feel irresistibly “called” to. Remember, there’s no separate
“you,” so that’s Reality doing the calling, “leaning into” whatever is next
for It to discover and enjoy.
Do you have space for “no personal self” and allowing the Lila (the Divine
Play) to be?
Q. Can you become enlightened without meditating?
A. You can only become enlightened” without meditating.
Every truly enlightened sage you can meet will tell you, without question,
meditation may have been a powerful and wonderful activity that calmed
their mind, made them the detached “observer” of their thoughts, and led
them deep into Silence and Being…but did not “cause” their enlightenment.
One thing has nothing to do with the other.
‘Separate individual persons’ don’t get enlightened. Reality appears to
wake up to Itself, when It’s ready, and it doesn’t need meditation to do so.
Indeed, for this seeming awakening to take place, any activity done by an
illusory “individual” is superfluous, and the belief that “they” are the doer
just gets in the way.
If meditation comes naturally to you, and seems to facilitate more peace and
joy in you, meditate.
If meditation feels like a chore to you, and you’re not particularly attracted
to it, don’t meditate. You can do other practices, or no practices at all. It
won’t matter to Reality.
Q. Can you maintain a meditative state after you stop formal
meditation, i.e., in a crowd, at work, etc.
A. Your neutral witness, pure Awareness, is always there. Formal
meditation is just one tool to help you sense that Awareness, discover its
presence and abide there, identifying with That instead of the noise in your
mind. And of course, that wouldn’t really be of much use to you if the only
time you could experience that is when you’re siting for those 20 minutes or
an hour in a quiet room with you eyes closed.
But that’s the beauty of the Witness. It is your Silent, Primordial
foundation, and it always just Is. Once you discover It, then cultivate just
observing everything in your inner and outer world from It in your formal
sitting practice of Witnessing-Allowing-Awareness meditation, you
eventually arrive at a point where you continue to interface with everything
from this neutral Witness. Your thoughts, your feelings, your body
sensations, other people and their actions, noise & lights, pleasant
sensations and interactions and difficult ones, everything. Then your
witnessing keeps going long after you’ve left the cushion, and you remain
in the meditative state 24/7/
Q. What was your deepest ‘revelation’ from meditation?
A. I disappeared.
The “meditator” disappeared. There was no ‘person’ meditating, no person
having a revelation, no person experiencing anything. There was only
Being.
Other previous meditations seemed to contain revelations, like seeing the
perfection in everything or “understanding” that there is nothing but Being
and Awareness. But those always still had “me” present, as the one seeing
and understanding …coming out of the meditation and going “Wow! Guess
what “I” just experienced or understand.”
Certainly, that was ecstatic and felt like “I” was having profound
revelations.
But they were nothing compared to…well, Nothing. In that final
meditation, truly, the subject (“I”) and the object (the “revelation “I” am
having) were nowhere to be found. All that existed, still exists, is Being and
Pure Awareness.
Q, How does one ‘feel’ after meditation? What feeling and results is
one looking for after meditation?
There is no “supposed to feel” after meditating. Some feel much calmer,
with a quieter mind. Some feel like something “profound happened.” Some
feel more neutral, about the same as before they started. Some feel more
disturbed and upset than before they meditated. All of these are natural and
fine.
True meditation is not something you do to make things change or make
things better. True meditation is simply letting go into deep Silence and
Being. That Silence and Being is the Source of everything that is, exactly as
it already Is. So if your intention in meditating is not to covet a certain
“feeling,” but rather, to awaken to your true self as Pure Being, the best
meditation is not the one where you try to do anything, or the one where
you hope to feel a certain way after your done, but the one where you allow
everything to be as it Is.
This immediately pulls your ego out of the endeavor, and immediately puts
you in sync with Pure Being, which is also allowing everything to be as it
is.
Another way to say this is: the “best” way to feel after meditating, as well
as during meditation, is that the “meditator” who covets any certain feeling
or result, disappeared.

Q. Why does meditation sometimes make me fell more anxious or

emotional, not calmer?
A. True meditation has you letting go of all your preconceived concepts and
defenses so you may drop deep into Silence and see what it “tells” you.
Since you are wide open in that let go state, anything that needs attention or
touching, especially something you’ve been denying or avoiding, can &
will come bubbling up to the surface for your embracing and closure - old
anger, fears, transgressions, judgments, etc.
This can definitely result in you starting to feel quite perturbed or anxious.
Often, you won’t immediately make the psychological connection to the
original event, so you will just feel the strong anxiety, but not know what
it’s about…which, of course, just increases the anxiety.
Remember: This is good news, not a problem. Anything not completed
lodges in your body and emotional body, and it all has to be “completed” as
your path in life unfolds…or you will be held in stasis in an old “event.”
Sometimes you will find yourself weeping in meditation. Sometimes the
emotion - fear, anxiety, anger, hatred, etc. - will last long after the original
meditation that forced it up (in my case, one band of unbearable anxiety
lasted many months.) But stay with it, and don’t stop meditating. Keep
visiting the Silence, listen for Its messages, and don’t resist the feelings.
Don’t try to “fix” it. Just allow everything to be as it is. I promise you will
come through:-) Q. Describing meditation in its simplest terms, you have
said it is simply “witnessing” (sakshi) and/or “letting go” (vijaati.) How do
we practice these two simple essences of meditation?
A. The “simplest terms” to describe meditation is “witnessing” “allowing”
and “letting go.”
No matter what anybody tells you, including experienced meditation
instructors, the “best” mediation is simply letting go. “Letting go of what?”
you ask. Of everything!
Of meditating towards an “enlightenment’ goal like ‘realizing the Truth.”
Of meditating towards an earthly goal, like being permanently calm &
peaceful.
Of gaining deep insights and knowledge for “yourself,” or having cool
mystical experiences and visions.
Of trying to meditate “right.”
And ultimately, of being the meditator.
“So how do I let go of all that, of everything?” you ask
Just sit and allow everything to be as it is.
That’s it!
When you notice, in meditating, that you want something, want to “achieve
something,” wonder if you’re doing it right or feel if you can just get this
right you’ll advance spiritually, that you are worrying about your body
sensations, or about about your plans for the day, etc…just let that all go.
Just notice your ego-mind is tripping through all that, and allow everything
to be as it is. Including allowing your monkey mind to be busy and
distracting.
In Reality, awareness is the Only Real Thing, and if there’s any meditating
being done at all, it’s Awareness that’s “doing” it, not a “you.”
That’s why allowing everything to be as it is works. Every time you try, in
your meditation, to change things, improve things or reach some goal in
your meditation, you move further away from Who you really Are, Pure
Awareness. You assert that there is a “you,” a “meditator,” who must do
certain “efforts” to realize something…and in so doing, all you do is
reinforce your sense of ego.
If you allow everything to be as it is, not try to change anything, you
immediately sync up with Reality, because Reality Is Everything Just As It
Is!
So just let go! All forms of meditation - concentrating on your breath or a
mantra, trying to still your thoughts, more visceral forms of meditation like
vigorous pranayama, kundalini and shaktipat meditations, etc. - eventually
lead to just letting go…of everything! If they don’t their useless and not at
all simple.
What could be simpler than just sitting and allowing everything to be as it
is. You can also allow everything to be as it is when your walking, working,
eating, making love, and living life. So it’s not only the simplest, most
direct form of meditation, it’s not restricted to just your formal daily sitting.
One of the things you may notice when you attempt to let go and allow
everything to be as it is, is there appears to be some thoughts, worries,
plans, judgments, desires or feelings that you have greater difficulty letting
go of, because you are certain those thoughts and judgments are you – you
are identified with them. Your story, your history, your loneliness or
relational dramas, your chronic maladies, your hopes & dreams for the
‘future.’
Being identified with that witness (Sakshi) instead of with the mind’s
constant noise, you will still see and feel everything you need to see and
feel, yet always rest in pure peace and pure awareness. So the simple
practice is just to witness everything from this neutral, unengaged
awareness, which compliments your ability to allow everything to be as it is
and let go This is SakshiVasati meditation, watching, allowing and letting
go…just being aware.
Q. Are there benefits to listening to, or meditating with, an enlightened
teacher?
A. Yes and No. The teacher is just an external reflection of your own inner
guru. Enlightenment realizes there is no one out there. Individual ‘persons,’
some enlightened and some not, some being teacher and some students, is
an illusion. It's all just the One Thing, Reality, seemingly manifesting
through this or that ‘location,’ a star here, a planet there, a bird here, a tree
there, an unenlightened ‘seeker’ here, a ‘guru’ there.
You can be sure, anything that looks like your choices or efforts on the path
are just that Reality moving through you, your true inner guru. So you could
answer this either as, it couldn’t make less difference if your meditation is
done sitting with an enlightened master or totally alone, or just as truthfully,
every time you meditate, even alone, you are meditating with the most
enlightened teacher possible, Reality or Life Itself…which is actually
meditating through you.
That said, The greatest thing I ever heard from a teacher was, ”Even though
I seem to give long, clear explanations about enlightenment, and answer all
your questions about how to “be enlightened,” the truth is, all those words
have little or no effect or your actual progress. I only talk this much to calm
your mind enough so that the real transmission can take place.”
True Awareness and True Enlightenment are silent. They are Silence Itself,
and can never be conveyed in words. So the teacher talks a while, to soothe
your mind and give the impression that you are receiving useful information
& guidance. All the while, he or she is creating the opportunity for the True
Silent Transmission to take place, Reality to Reality, Being to Being, Pure
Awareness to Pure Awareness.
This is what’s available if you sit with a truly enlightened teacher. This is
what can be transmitted if you meditate alongside them, all the while
staying totally open and let go…especially of any preconceived notions
about what it should feel like to be with that teacher.
Q. What’s the difference between truly meditating and just spacing out,
and how does witnessing help?
A. Sometimes it can be difficult to tell the difference. The difference is in
our Awareness.
The simplest answer is:
Spacing out is still being aware of thoughts, daydreams, and energies
passing through the mind, while still being identified with mind as ‘who
you are,’ (currently.) Meditation is being aware of Awareness itself. What is
this Awareness that is aware of these thoughts, daydreams, and energies
passing through ”my” mind, that is even aware of me spacing out?
So if you find yourself spacing out in meditation (which we all do,
sometimes,) the moment you notice it, let go into observation, and just
notice that your mind is ruminating randomly. Then notice that there’s
something that’s not your mind and which is not just one more thought,
watching all that. It isn’t at all involved in the thought process, it’s just
sitting behind or beyond thought and body, totally neutral (no judgments,)
watching you think, make plans, feel desires, feel antsy like you want to
stop meditating and get up, etc., while It stays neutral, unmoving, and just
being.
In short, the way you know you are letting go and dropping deeper in to real
meditation and not just spacing out is that you are Aware your mind is
spacing out, instead of actually spacing out….and that you are Aware of
that Awareness. Every time you notice that, ‘break away’ and resume being
the observer of your actions, you’ve broken out the ‘trance.’
You might have to do it repeatedly for a while, to become more established
in the watcher, Pure Awareness, but it will definitely evolve.

Q. Can you speak about mantras, their inherent power, and their use in
meditation?
A. Mantra is a repeated sound or phrase. There are mantras in ancient
languages which are closer to pure sound vibration, rather than ‘meaning,’
and can evoke various connections between the meditator and primordial
aspects of Reality. Then there are mantras in any language where the
meditator is more focused on what they ‘mean,’ an affirmation to shift ones
perspective or possibly bring about a very specific result or healing in a
certain life area.
Mantra japa is a type of meditation where the meditator repeatedly chants
one mantra and focuses on either it’s sound, it’s meaning, or both, to the
exclusion of all other intruding thoughts & feelings, so as to still the mind
and make it one-pointed. It can be a very effective tool for drawing the
meditator into a pure state of witnessing the mind dispassionately, and
sometimes the awareness of the mantra sound becomes so all-pervasive that
the mantra keeps going on and being the mind’s main focus even long after
formal meditation is over.
Mantra is like a ‘calling,’ like irresistible sweet music calling you to the
lake of Deep Silence. Once you arrive where it’s calling you, the Deep
Silence, you discard it.
Enjoy chanting a mantra as much as you like, or as little as you like. Get a
(supposedly) sacred one from a teacher, use a generic one like Om Nama
Shivaya or Om Shanti, or make one up yourself (for awhile I used, “I am
empty of all attributes,” and it did, indeed, seem to help me plummet to the
depths of Silence.) After a while, if it “wants” to change to different words
or a certain sound, allow that. And just follow it. It may have more wisdom
about what it should sound like and where it’s taking you, than you do :-)
Q. Does meditation make you less ambitious on a material scale? Is
wanting to achieve material success in contradiction with the
development and realization of your being?
A. At the “dream” level (the level where we have overlaid an illusory
psychological identity onto Reality,) wanting to achieve material success
and wanting to realize Reality or pure Awareness come from the same place
- the ego. You desire material success so you can deflect the pain of life and
fear of death with financial security and “consumer therapy.” But most
people are using the promise of realizing their being or having “spiritual
awakening” in the exact same way - to come to an end of life’s suffering
and fear of death. Eventually, instead of finding material or spiritual things
to run away from Life, we must dive into it, into and through all the things
the ego wants to gloss over with a false sense of “bliss.” You have to keep
coming back and examining your true motive, and letting go, letting go,
letting go, and it can be a painstaking process. So full realization of Reality
is not for everyone.
Meditation can do two important things: It can calm you down, so your less
apt to run for a “fix,” (both spiritual pursuits and material pursuits are
addiction,) when you encounter painful feelings in life. And it can train you
to be the observer of your thoughts & feelings, rather than identified with
them, so you can recognize each “yearning” thought as an insignificant
thing that does not need to be reacted to. You can patiently look at what is
the real desire or fear behind the thought, which usually comes down to
craving pleasure to avoid pain, and fearing your own impending death.
So it’s not that meditation makes you less ambitious. It makes you less
urgently reactive to reaching for a material or spiritual fix. If you go deep
and discover that you are not using material or spiritual to get a fix, when
you finish meditating, you can go out into the world and be as ambitious as
you want. Just keep witnessing, keep vigilantly questioning your motives
and Who/What is the true you that has them, and keep being willing to let
go of everything in the dream that covers the True Reality, and you will
keep developing your “collision with the Infinite.”
Q. How does meditation compare with prayer?
A. When prayer or mediation are done from the correct intention, they can
produce exactly the same benefit. When done from the misguided intention,
they will both produce no benefit, and maybe even harm.
The correct intention for either prayer or mediation, is starting with the
bodily-felt, clear certainty that you and The Absolute or the One Reality are
already one, could never be separate, and that everything is perfect exactly
as it Is. Then your act of prayer or meditation becomes an acknowledgment
of the perfection of everything exactly as it is, and you resting in that, rather
than you feeling “separate” from the One Life or Reality (an impossibility)
and wanting things to be different than they are.
This means when you meditate, you are allowing everything to be as it is,
including whether or not your mind is very busy or you’re not particularly
getting any deep ‘spiritual’ experiences from your meditation. You don’t
resist or fight anything. You just sit and allow everything to be as it is.
Same thing when you pray. You let go and allow everything to be as it is, so
you’re not asking some God who you imagine is ‘separate’ from you (when
in fact that is You) to change things. There’s no quicker way to separate
yourself from The Absolute One Reality than to pray that It makes what is
Real (whatever is currently existing) into something different, better, and
essentially ‘unreal.’
Psychologically, in either case, since you have allowed everything to be as
it is, the benefit is that you are free, immediately. Not later, after your
meditation made you feel calmer, better, or after your prayers have been
‘answered.’ But right now, because everything is as it is, you are free!
Q. How meditation is different from positive thinking? Why meditation
is more preferred of the two?
A. Positive thinking is ‘manipulating’ your thoughts and attitude (feelings)
to feel better about yourself and your life, within the dream.
Meditation is not trying to alter your thoughts and feelings one bit, simply
watching them and giving them no substantial credence. Rather than done
to feel better about yourself and your life within the dream, it is done to
realize your true Self, and that you are Life, in Reality, not the dream.
Neither one is’better’ or ‘preferred.
Some people, most actually, spend their entire lives trying to manipulate
their dream and keep a positive attitude. That’s fine.
Some people realize this constant manipulation of their dream, their
thoughts and their attitudes is a zero-sum game of diminishing returns, and
decide instead to inquire, witness all that as passing, insubstantial
phenomena (meditation,) and wake up. That’s just fine too.
It’s all the play of Life, and Life or Reality includes it all.
Q. Can I meditate when I’m angry or upset?
A. It could be the best time to meditate.
Meditation means witnessing all your thoughts, judgments, emotions and
body sensations without identifying with them or reacting to them. Just
about anyone can do this when their thoughts are calm, their emotions and
body at relative ease.
The real test of your dis-identification comes when you witness a bunch of
agitated thoughts and angry, self-righteous judgments and firmly believe
they are real, they are you and they must be responded to. Did you remain
the witness, or did you identify?
“But, but, but…this person is such an asshole and said or did something
really terrible. They deserve my anger.”
Nope, There’s no one out there. They are just the reflection of you,
something you need to touch in yourself. Even if you can’t realize that right
now, and are still sure it’s them, just watch.
Allow all the angriest, most judgmental thoughts and feelings to fill your
mind, you body, your bloodstream. Sit comfortably and watch all of that.
Is the mind & body filled with angry thoughts and emotions. Yes. Is the
watcher angry or judging? Nope. Can’t. Doesn’t have the equipment.
Doesn’t possess a mind, emotions or a body. It’s just awareness. Only
capable of being aware, of watching.
Differentiate.
Q. How does one become an ‘expert’ at mediation? Will deeper insights
be forthcoming?
A. One of the cool things about meditation is that you don’t need, or even
want, to become an expert at it.
Unlike other endeavors, where expertise is marked by how much you know
and can do in that field, in meditation, the less you know and do is better.
Can you sit and watch your thoughts? Can you notice that there’s a neutral
watcher, watching them, without getting involved, just noticing detachedly?
That’s It! You’re an expert. Anything else you try to know or understand the
process of, or do is, in meditation, just a distraction.
Will your meditations evolve and deepen. Yes. Will you learn more about
them, Yes. But this will happen naturally, and only naturally, just by doing
the simple instructions above, regularly, without “you” adding anything or
trying to become more ‘expert’ at it.
Insight is nothing but seeing Reality for what it really is. Your natural
Awareness Is Reality, can only live in Now and Reality. It cannot live in
illusion and the dream. When you meditate, if done correctly, you access
this Awareness by witnessing your mind, thoughts, feelings, body
sensations and all other ever-changing phenomena, from your neutral,
uninvolved stillness that just watches with no judgment of engagement.
This still, peaceful witness is always there and it is the doorway to the
Awareness that you Are, is what you Are.
From there, everything you experience is an insight …so nothing is.
Q. When meditating, how do I go deeper?
A. Meditation is the opposite of doing anything or going anywhere…
including going ‘deeper.’
In true meditation, you let go of doing anything. If you’re meditating, and
you feel a desire to go ‘deeper,’ and then you ask the ‘how to,’ or start
doing things to go deeper, you’ve just stopped meditating. Now you are
doing a totally other thing called ‘manipulating.’
In true meditation, if you feel a desire to go deeper, you watch that desire,
just notice it, but don’t respond to it, react to it, or even give it any credence
as a worthwhile thought. You treat it like all other thoughts and feelings -
simply a bunch of rising & falling phenomena that are not you and so mean
nothing to you.
If you just witness in this way, allowing everything to be as it already is,
instead of trying to change, improve or deepen anything…if you let go that
much…your meditation will deepen naturally. To the deepest Silence and
freedom, very quickly. But of course, You are not the part of you that wants
to ‘hurry up’ and have experiences anyway, right”
I hope you can see that our minds are addicted to believing we must do
things, cause-&-effect, in order for experiences and change to take place.
This is a lie, we are not the “doer.” In normal life we can prop up this lie by
pointing out something that got done by using our mind to make a choice or
follow some instructions and then take action. But meditation is about
realizing you are not your mind, so doing things using the ‘mind-makes-It-
happen way’ would be counterproductive. Deep meditation is not cause-&-
effect…it comes from letting go of all causes and all effects.
Of course, you can manipulate your mind, breath and thought-stream to go
into very deep mystical states and experiences, indeed.
Bet you perked up with that piece of information! “Yeah! That’s what I was
asking! Can you tell me how to do that…from your experience?”
From direct experience, I can tell you, none of those manipulated states and
samadhis are worth a damn - and I’ve experienced them all. They make you
feel very lofty, very altered and very ’spiritual,’ and as such, they totally
inflate your ego, your false sense of an ‘accomplished spiritual being,’ and
make you addicted to these mystical experiences. There is no difference,
none, between being addic-ted to those and being addicted to heroin, sex,
power, wealth or any worldly high. They come & go.
Renounce them. Renounce going deeper, higher, wiser, more ‘spiritual,’
more ‘enlightened.’ Re-nounce all mystical states, astral or out-of-body
experiences, kundalini awakenings, or coveting ‘bliss.’ Renounce your
‘self’ as the doer and ‘haver’ of these temporal, illusory experiences. Re-
nounce everything except just witnessing, with no particular depth or
realization as your goal, no goal at all…
…if you really want to go deeper.
Q. So many teachers say, “Be present. Stay in this present moment,” or
“Come back to the moment.” How do we do this? What do we focus
on?
A. Nothing. You focus on nothing.
Focusing on one thing or the other implies ‘doership,’ “I am the doer, the
focuser,” which immediately thrusts you right back out of the moment
again.
Coming back to the moment implies doing, taking action to reach a specific
goal. But being in the moment isn’t a goal or a doing, it’s Being.
When you are just in the moment, there’s no sense of coming to it or trying
to hold yourself there by focusing on any one thing. There is just being in
the moment, in the Flow of Life.
The only thing that takes you out of directly experiencing each moment,
each Now, is the psychological assessment that is added to each moment -
“This means this, This is a “good” moment, this is a “bad” one. This
experience in this moment means I must consider regrets about the ‘past,’
and how I should plan to deal with this in the ‘future.’” All these
psychological assessments are being added to the raw, core experience, so
it’s impossible to stay in the moment.
The cure? Stop doing that. Stop adding anything. Then you won’t have to
‘come back to the moment,’ you’ll just be and remain in the moment.
How do you do that? Witness. Watch the moment arise, watch how you are
experiencing it directly, then watch all your assessments and other nonsense
your ego-mind wants to add to it. Treat it as the empty. meaningless rising
& falling phenomena that it is, and just stay with what’s actually happening,
in Reality, right now.
As you practice witnessing and being aware of this, theadded psychological
assessments - also called ego - will diminish and dissolve from lack of use
and belief in them.
The you will always be in the moment, and as such, never have to ‘come
back to’ it, or pick a particular component of focus to guide you back there

Q. Can you add walking meditation to sitting sessions? How do we
practice walking meditation?
A. Many Zen-based practices combine sitting meditation with Kinhen
(walking meditation.) Since the only purpose of meditation is to witness all
phenomena rising and falling without engaging or identifying with them -
both inner (thoughts, feelings) and outer (sounds, activity) phenomena - it’s
quite useful to sit for a while and dispassionately watch those phenomena
on the cushion, then get up and walk for a while, keeping the exact same
non-judgmental, non-involved awareness going with everything you
encounter - inner & outer - on your walk.
At a nearby Zen retreat center, we do a standard version of this. The 25 or
so students take a vow of silence for the day, and at first dawn, we enter the
Zendo and sit for 30 minutes on our cushions, meditating. The gong rings,
and we quietly get up and walk out of the Zendo, onto a lovely path that
loops around the entire property. It takes about 10 minutes to complete the
loop back to the Zendo, so we make 3 circuits around for a total of 30
minutes kinhen. Then it’s back into the Zendo for another 30 minute sitting.
Another kinhen. And one more sitting. The number of rounds of each is
optional, as are the time lengths of each, so choose your own best
‘schedule.’
One cool addition to doing kinhen with a whole single-file line of people, is
to keep the exact same pace and distance between you, as those in front &
behind. You actually step in each other’s last footstep, exactly where they
had planted their foot. One time, as we were making our our 2nd kinhen
circuit around he Zen center property, the leader in front noticed, up ahead,
two snakes crossing our path. They were rattlesnakes. The leader paused
and the line came to a halt. Naturally, nobody said a word, and every person
remained perfectly in line and equidistant, We could all see the rattlers up
ahead. The leader waited until the rattlers were just to the other side of the
path, and without hesitation, started walking again. And we all followed
suit. That particular kinhen, I just happen to be the 3rd person back from the
leader and as we walked at a brisk pace, I passed the snakes with only about
one meter of space between them and my feet. Curiously, I felt absolutely
no concern. Reviewing this incident with others the next day, everyone
reported the same lack of concern, just fine about passing mere 3–6 ft’ from
these full-size rattlesnakes.
The meditation was working! :-)
Find a nice walk near your home where you can try this back and forth.
Walk at a comfortable pace, perhaps with your hands lightly clasped behind
your back to prevent too much swinging, and perhaps with your eyes half-
open instead of wide open, to keep some of your gaze drawn inward. As
you walk, watch everything that comes up related to your thoughts,
feelings, body sensations and the world outside you, and remain in the
neutral, just-aware witness, just like you did in your sitting meditation.
They do the walk…they do the walk of Life!
Q. Are there any daily methods to cultivate witnessing besides
meditation?
A. Witnessing (Sakshi) just means watching all phenomena rise and pass
without engaging or reacting to them, in any way.
Thoughts come, thoughts go, Emotions and body sensation come and they
go. Sounds, sights, smells, and activity outside your body comes and goes.
Constant change. You are always You.
The Witness is just Awareness, and Awareness doesn’t change. It can’t,
because the only faculty it has is being aware…so it’s always just going to
be pure Awareness. Always only neutral, unconcerned, uninvolved, just the
Watcher.
Right now, with or without meditation, you can ‘sense’ this still, uninvolved
Awareness, this primordial Beingness that just Is. Feel it now.
I feel it all the time, and you can too. It’s like, there’s all this activity going
on outside, and then there’s this peace. There’s all kinds of thought and
feeling activity going on inside, and then there’s this peace. Yes I have a
body, things to get done, activities to attend to, plans, responsibilities,
desires, and all the judgments my mind is making at every turn…and then
there’s this peace.
Underlying all of it, all is silent, still, unmanifest, just Being without any
without any thinking, planning, or doing. Like that moment in between just
finishing your last exhale and not yet started your next inhale. Total silence.
Total nothing-happening-ness. Total nothing-needs to-happens-ness. Just
Nothingness. Peace, primordial peace. Sense into that now, feel that, right
now. Yep, there it is!
God’s floor, upon which everything seemingly-manifest is built, and
without which no existence or activity would be possible.
You can fall deep into this stillness, this pure Awareness, certainly, while in
meditation. But once you’ve sensed it, you can feel it there all the time, and
it’s easy to drop into it any time of day, no matter the activity, work,
interactions, etc.
While doing precise woodworking today, which required focused attention,
I checked, and there it was, pure Awareness, just watching everything. Later
I went for a nature walk in our woods near a river. My mind had lots of
thoughts about everything I was seeing in nature, my body was enjoying the
feeling of the ground on my feet and the smells - the jasmine and orange
blossoms were both in bloom, incredibly fragrant! - and my emotions were
all over the place, for no particular reason. My Awareness just watched all
of it, from someplace that felt so Is, it was just bliss. Now I am writing to
you, and the Witness is watching my expressions and words appear, with no
attachment or concern, because the Real “I” is underneath all that, and
always at peace.
So…my best advice for how to cultivate the Witness besides meditation, is
to just be aware of that Awareness, all day. As often as you remember to, 5
times a day or 5 times each hour, just check in and sense the thing that’s just
sitting there, watching, being, totally peaceful. Don’t just look for ways to
‘practice’ being in your Witness throughout your day. after meditation,
Don’t make it a practice…make it a lifestyle!
All the time, there’s all your thoughts, plans, concerns, feelings, body
sensations, judgments and activity…and then, there’s this peace.
Ahh!
Q. If I don’t feel like I’m getting the results I want form Witnessing-
Allowing SakshiVisati meditation, is it OK to experiment with other
meditation techniques, like Vipassana, mindfulness or Self-Inquiry,
even simultaneously?
A. Meditation is not doing something, it is doing nothing. So worrying
about what is the best method, or doing it properly, or getting confused
about the exact technique, is doing something…too many somethings. Your
only job is just to sit, allow things to be as they are, and relax. If you find
one particular method that’s the best fit for you, stick with it, not just for
months but for years, without experimenting with other techniques.
Observation of your all your mental activities and body sensations from a
neutral observer is the very core of what mindfulness means.
Once you are steadfast and stable in mindfulness meditation, self-inquiry is
something you add to it, not replace it with. You drop a self -inquiry
question like “What am I” or “What is it that’s aware of my mind and body”
into the dis-identified, neutral mind, and let go. You don’t “think” about
what you just asked, or try to “figure out” the answer. You just let the
question go deep into your intuitive nature, and go back to doing nothing.
The only reason people rummage around through lots of different
meditation techniques and get themselves all confused is because they are
unwilling to just do nothing. Which is what true meditation is. They keep
thinking that meditation is doing something, to reach a goal, and that it must
be done correctly. And in our modern microwaved world, they’re in a big
hurry to get baked and see results, so if it seems like nothing’s happening,
they’re quick to experiment with other meditation techniques. All of that is
just ego, and identification with the ego, which is the very thing you are
trying to break identification with by meditating. Don’t give into the ego’s
desires to keep you confused, unsatisfied and in a hurry for quick results.
Drop all that and just sit in silence with no agenda. Let go.
Q. Meditation is boring. I can't meditate for more than 15 minutes.
How can I meditate longer?
A. “Boring” is mind’s term for “I want constant stimulation, without which
I get antsy to just be, in stillness, because I’m scared of the Void, and will
keep any stimulation going just to avoid the Void.”
Meditation is simply being, being with whatever phenomena arises,
including any phenomena or fear that arises in total stillness and the Void.
So for the meditator, “boring” is good. Rather than holding it as, “I’ve been
sitting here for 15 minutes and there’s nothing happening, I’m bored,” the
meditator sees it as “Yes I’ve been sitting here a long time and nothing’s
happening, no stimulation, and that’s great, because my true Being is the
stillness & silence behind all that stimulation, the Peace That Passeth All
Understanding, far vaster than any temporary pleasure I will derive from
one more mind stimulation. “
The meditator is ‘spiritually curious’ and inquisitive enough to ask, “What
is the nature of this feeing, this tension to fill every moment with some
stimulation, this inability to just sit and be? It is one of the most
‘enlightening’ self-inquiries a meditator can ask, and can lead to true
freedom. So the meditator looks that ‘boredom’ in the eye and says, “What
is this? Who is feeling that? What’s behind it?” He’s interested in this
exploration, very interested.
If you are not interested in that, you will remain identified with the mind
and it’s feeling of “boredom.”
If you are really curious, you will just watch - watch the thought-stream,
watch sensations rise & fall, watch any fears or suppressed emotions that
arise, watch something that seems like pure undisturbed Awareness that
seems to sit behind all of it, and eventually, even your curiosity will fall
away with the sense of a separate ‘you’ that is curious.

Q. What is the best way to overcome it, if meditation just feels like
boredom even after the sixth try?
A. You are very close to being an expert meditator. No kidding!
You sat down to meditate, a number of times, six to be exact. That was
correct & fine.
Then a feeling came up. Perfect.
You recognized this feeling from the past. So you named it - “boredom.”
Still no problem.
Then you had a judgment come up: “Boredom is ‘bad,’ it’s ‘unpleasant,’ I
don’t like it.” Still good so far.
Then a reaction arose, which is just a combination of a thought, feeling,
judgment and action: “This is useless, this is bullshit, I’m gonna jump up
and get out of here.” You’re still right on track.
You only left out one last element.
Watching all that, without doing anything.
Witnessing - “there’s a feeling, there’s a part of me naming the feeling, then
it’s judging the feeling, then it’s reacting to the feeling. But there’s also this
other part of me that’s just watching, noticing, without being involved or
reactive. It has no thoughts, feelings, judgments or reaction. It only has the
ability to observe, to watch, without comment.”
“Like me laying in a field, watching clouds pass by overhead, without being
affected by them, or me trying to change them, in any way.”
“SO…if I identify with the thoughts & reactions, I’ll feel compelled to
jump up, judge this as stupid and a failure, and give up meditating (which
would be OK, by the way.)”
“But if I identify with my witness, I can just watch all that, and not feel
compelled to do anything. Just keep watching the boredom, the judgments,
the responses, la-de-da, and just rest in peace, instead of being led around
by my capricious mind, like a horse with a ring through its nose. That’s
meditation! That’s all it is.”
Voila!
See that? You were practically an expert meditator. You got most of it right.
You just left out one thing, the last lynchpin.
Sit down again, for non-try number 7. This time, when the boredom, or
antsy-ness, or frustration, or judgments come up…don’t move! Don’t react!
Don’t change a thing. Just watch…and be the Watcher.

PART 4: SUMMARY: THE SIMPLICITY OF MEDITATION,

WITNESSING AND LIFE ITSELF
Meditation is really the art of doing nothing.
Much has been written about meditation as something to do. You meditate
to experience a more calm and peaceful mind, expanded consciousness,
beyond-body experiences, oneness with the Divine, and for getting
enlightened. In a curious way, using meditation to get those things virtually
guarantees you will not. Because the very part of you that wants those
things, the ego-identification, is the part of you that’s in the way of actually
having them. Actually, all those things are already here, in your natural
state. True peace, consciousness and enlightenment is only here when we
totally accept everything exactly as it is, now. If you are meditating to try to
“change” things for the better, you’ve lost before you start.
This may seem paradoxical, because in “normal” life, if we want to achieve
something, it seems we have to do something. If we want wealth, we can’t
simply intend it. We must get off our butts and work hard towards
cultivating financial success. If we want a loving relationship, we can’t just
sit home practicing the laws of attraction or chanting, “Lover come, lover
come, lover come”. We need get out there and mix with others, dating,
courting, and so on. We are conditioned to think we must “do something” to
“make something happen or change.” So, initially, that’s how most of us
approach meditation. Our minds are conditioned to believe, if we want a
more peaceful, spiritual, enlightened life experience, we must practice
certain activities and “techniques” committedly until we reach our goal.
But if you think about it clearly, you’ll see that practicing meditation as a
“non-activity,” as doing nothing, is not really paradoxical at all. When you
try to get money or a lover, you are trying to get something outside of you
that you do not already have. But you already have true peace, awareness
and even enlightenment...indeed you are peace, awareness and
enlightenment. So the “normal” rule of doing something to change and
improve the way things are, by getting something you don’t already have,
doesn’t apply here. You already have everything you’re searching for. You
may not realize you have it at this moment, but you do. Master after
enlightened master has told variations of the same story over & over again;
that when full enlightenment dawned, they laughed heartily at themselves
and the world, because they realized they were right back where they
always were, and already had everything they’d been seeking, the whole
time. You are the Buddha you are bowing & meditating to on your altar. It’s
the grand Play of the Universe.
Minds are always looking to “change things for the better,” to get more
pleasure and avoid more pain, to assure the survival of - you guessed it -
themselves, the ego-mind! That’s what minds do; that’s their job. Nothing
wrong with that. Except if you think you are your ego- mind. Then you
think you need to always be changing the way things are now, instead of
just Being...with everything in your life just as it is. Enlightenment is just
being with everything exactly as it is. Living in Reality and not confusing it
with your psychological assessments, your imagination, your ‘dream-
world.’ That’s really all there is to enlightenment, peace and consciousness.
That’s all there is to meditation, too.
So when you sit to meditate, don’t think of it as an activity to change
anything - your noisy mind, your limited consciousness, your being
“unenlightened” - for the better. Don’t think of it as “doing” anything at all.
Instead, think of it as time for Being, just being, with everything in your
life, just the way it is. If there’s any “doing” in meditation it’s just to watch,
dispassionately.
You may indeed have a noisy mind, cluttered with a seemingly endless
stream of discursive thoughts. Don’t try to change them, reduce them or
quiet them. Just watch them pass. You may feel your consciousness to be
very limited, ordinary & boring, seemingly only aware of the mundane
world, unable to experience the subtler energies and astral planes. Don’t try
to “meditate yourself” into altered states or expanded experiences. Just be
here, now, with exactly what is. This moment is filled with so many
amazing things, including the miracle of being alive itself, it could never be
boring.
Of course, you will almost certainly feel like being fully Enlightened is
‘where it’s at.’ Where you can have permanent peace, total knowledge and
an end to all your problems. Don’t meditate to “reach” that, checking &
hoping to see if full enlightenment is here yet. If you were 100% in the
Here and Now, just Being with exactly what is, you’d be enlightened, in
this very moment. True meditation is full-time, every moment, all day, not
just when sitting on the cushion. If, after you get up and go into your daily
life, you continue to Be with everything, exactly as it is, you remain
enlightened all the time.
Since meditation is simply Being, simply watching, not doing anything,
then how do we “practice” meditation?
The glory of Being is that it is nothing more or less than Pure Awareness.
Our Being is just aware, that’s all. It’s not anything else. And just as
humans have been gifted with a body-mind that can think, plan, analyze and
do, we’ve also been gifted with a place from which we can observe all that,
observe our bodies & minds and all their noise & activity, include them
while not being them. We’ve all felt that part of us that is just “aware,” in
the background behind every thought, body sensation and activity. It’s just
watching, dispassionately; no comment, no judgment, not even any naming
or words. It’s the part where, even when something seemingly significant is
happening - like you’re in the middle of an accident, or you’re hearing
applause after you spoke or performed, or you’ve just been told you have
cancer (to use some powerful examples) - that part just notices and just “is.”
It is the still ‘space’ in which those significant events and your reactions
take place. If your mind gets frightened or elated, or you body feels pain or
drain, it just notices that, too. It’s just aware of it. We all know that part of
us that, even when our mind is racing or our body is in pain, doesn’t change
or get riled; it just notices. Like the calm in the eye of a storm.
That timeless part that’s just aware of everything, just watching, is the core
of who we Really Are. It is Being. It’s pure Consciousness, our essential
True Nature. It’s the true “I” that’s always there, and always the same, even
as the rest of us changes so many times across our lives. That’s why, even
though no single cell in your current body is left from seven years ago
(they’ve all been replaced,) you still feel like “you,” still see yourself when
you look in the mirror.
You can feel that pure awareness, pure Watcher, right now. Just take a deep
breath and go inside and feel it in you. There it is, just watching everything
without making a single comment, totally still and at peace. If you hear a
comment or judgment or something that says, “I can’t feel that place inside
me,” you are hearing your mind, not your Pure Awareness. If you hear a
voice evaluating that, “Well maybe that pure peaceful place does exist
inside me, but I’m in far too much pain or have far too many problems to
ever touch it or experience it,” once again, that’s the voice of your ego-
mind, not your Watcher, which is beyond words.
It’s fine that you have that voice; everybody has one, and hears it nattering
and critiquing much of the time. It’s truly wonderful that you have a
commenting mind, a feeling body, and a personal identity (ego) that feels it
must protect & survive itself. It’s no accident; those parts of us are as much
a loved, treasured and necessary part of Reality’s “creation” as the Pure
Awareness part. The only “problem” is that we forget that they are just
parts of us, not All of us, not the core of our Being, Our only issue then
becomes this: which one do we identify with. Our Pure Awareness, our
Watcher...or our body-mind-ego. Who do we think we are?
This makes meditation, enlightenment and life itself very simple. Whenever
we are identifying with our mind, thoughts, moods, plans, desires, worries,
body sensations, pains or our sense that we are a separate self from
everybody & everything else in the world, we feel “unenlightened” and
burdened by Being and the natural flow of life. Whenever we drop back
into Pure Awareness, just Being, just watching the Flow of Life wordlessly
and without judgment, we are as fully enlightened as The Buddha himself.
Now, every moment of your life, whether during your formal sitting
meditation, or in the midst of every daily activity, notice where you are. Are
you hearing that voice in your head, feeling those sensations in your body,
hearing all your thoughts, plans, worries and judgments? Good! That means
you’re still alive in a human body on Earth. Are you also able to be aware
of the silent, peaceful Watcher who’s noticing all that but not “involved” in
it, not doing anything, sort of like the wordless “container” for all of it?
Good!
So how do we practice meditation, this art of doing nothing, just Being?
Simply, include all of it. One moment, you feel the flow, the noise, indeed
the chaos, of your life, and you are fully involved in it, perhaps even
momentarily identified with it and thinking that’s who you are; the next
instant, so close it is virtually simultaneous, you feel your pure, perfect,
peaceful Observer, your uncommenting wordless Awareness, watching it all
with dispassion and immeasurable peace and bliss.
Since that Pure Awareness or Observer, is who you really are at the core,
your Essential Being, it’s irresistibly impactful to spend any moments there.
The power of those moments will expand out into your life, until, without
any trying on your part, they will grow to encompass most of your
moments, becoming the touchstone and sustained perspective from which
you view & experience the rest of your days. You will “rest in Being,”
watching the miraculous flower of your life unfold while resisting none of
it, forever enlightened.
Practicing a formal daily meditation is helpful, so it’s highly recommended.
So how do we do that? Sit in a quiet place in any comfortable posture, and
watch your mind & body. That’s it. You thought it was more complicated
than that, didn’t you. You can have your eyes fully closed, partially or fully
open. You can breathe normally. You can sit in front of an altar with a guru
on it, and start with a few prayers or OMs, or you can sit in front of your
65” flat screen TV or in your Datsun or Mercedes, starting with, “Well, here
we go again!.” Doesn’t matter. Remember, we’re not trying to get ourselves
into an “altered state, we’re just learning how to Be and Watch whatever
state we’re already in. And remember, we’re preparing for a lifetime of
constant meditation, where you’re going to be able to maintain the
meditative state of Just Being & Watching even when you’re trying to hail a
cab on a busy Manhattan street corner. How much good would it do you if
the only time you achieved that state was on a comfy cushion in front of a
candle and Buddha statue in a soundproof room?
Now as you sit there for some time (10 minutes, an hour, as long or short as
you want) find that place in you which is just purely aware, just watching
everything with no comment, just Being. You know that place because
you’ve felt it many times before - that still place where everything’s just
OK, it’s all perfect. Feel it again, now, consciously. Drop into it and just
watch. If your mind and body are particularly preoccupied with pains,
plans, strong emotions, fears, etc, you may “think” it’s going to be hard to
find that calm stillness. Little “you” (the mind) may “think” that, ‘cause
that’s how worried minds like to think. But You know better, You know It’s
always there, you’ve felt It many times before, sometimes in your most
chaotic, painful or terrified moments. Indeed, whether we are conscious of
it or not, we all go in & out of that place, many times every day & night
(Buddha is reported to have said we are enlightened 8,000 times every
minute.) You know you can drop back into that with one breath, don’t you?
Sense into that now, and feel its peace, its non-judgment, its total neutrality
and “is-ness” for everything that’s occurring - the “good” and “bad” parts of
your life, your busy mind, your important plans, your body sensations, and
all your emotions. Those parts of you will try to call you back into
identifying with them and attending to or worrying about them. Don’t fight
that! Let it happen. After a while, you may notice you’re back to thinking,
judging, planning, worrying and believing that you are that voice in your
head again. (Indeed, one of the judging thoughts your voice might say to
you is, “Well, yeah, I found that place, but I can’t stay there, I’ll never be
able to sustain it.) The minute you notice that, don’t try to jerk your mind
back to the silent, non-thinking, non-voice place. Instead, just ask, “Who
just noticed that? Who just noticed that I was back into being identified
with my thoughts & emotions again? Aha...I just noticed it!“ The part that
has no comment about it or involvement in it (if it did, that would be the
mind again,) but is just aware of it, is just Awareness itself, is You. You’re
back! Now stay in that place of Pure Awareness for a while. Every moment
you spend there, you are as enlightened as you’re ever going to be.
How about using a more focused meditation “technique?”
Some meditators like to fix the mind on some kind of body-mind anchor to
help keep it from rushing around everywhere and distracting from dropping
into that Being place. You can repeat a mantra (sacred word) over & over,
or watch & feel the movement of each breath as it comes in, raising your
belly, then coolly exits your body. Since you are staying with the same word
or breath over & over again, there’s a feeling you are taking one step back
from the chaos of your mind and one step closer to the peace of pure Being.
And indeed, fixing your mind on just one thing instead of ruminating
through hundreds of things, definitely brings a sense of peace & relaxation.
That said, remember that resting in pure Being means you would be just
wordlessly watching the mantra or the breathing too, not trying to fixate on
those. Otherwise, you’re not really purely watching and Being yet, you’re
still trying to manipulate the comings & goings of your body-mind and
“change things to be better,” as in, “It would be better if I wasn’t thinking
and being distracted by my voice and my body.” So you can start with those
“techniques” if it feels like, as a “beginner” meditator, those anchors are
helpful. But eventually, you want to let go of all “trying to change or
improve things” techniques. Remember, you are not a beginner. You know
what pure Awareness, pure enlightenment and just Being feels like, because
you’ve felt it many times before, you are That, and have always been That.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Teja Anand has been offering clear guidance in meditation & awakening for
over 40 years. His grasp of the essence of meditation has been called
‘unsurpassed,’ and his style of teaching and easy, direct method makes
meditation simple, accessible and powerful for all. Teja is a frequent
contributor to many publications on meditation and enlightenment, the
founder of The Journal of Awakening & Enlightenment, toawaken.org and
the author of “Watching Your Life” and ”To Awaken,” Tejas own personal
awakening journey. A new volume “The Folly of Enlightenment” is due in
2020.