Today I set aside my doubts about Loch Kelly's approach in his "The Way of Effortless Mindfulness: A Revolutionary Guide For Living an Awakened Life," and continued on with my re-reading of his book.
I liked what I read, by and large. Then I listened to the daily guided meditation by Sam Harris on his Waking Up app. It struck me as highly compatible with what I'd just read in Kelly's book. Which isn't surprising, since both Harris and Kelly embrace a similar Buddhist approach, that of Dzogchen.
Here's my transcription of what Harris said.
Just sit comfortably. And close your eyes. And become aware of the weight of your body, the feeling of gravity holding you in place. See if you can let the shape of your body dissolve. And notice whatever sensations spontaneously appear.
As you pay attention to sensations, let your mind expand and become an open space in which everything is appearing. Notice if your mind feels contracted at all. Are you stressed, or tired, restless? Notice if there is any pattern of energy here that's coloring your awareness.
Recognize that too as a mere appearance in this prior condition of consciousness.
However your mind feels in this moment, recognize that this moment is the only moment in your life that is your life. This is the only moment that stands a chance of being real. Everything else is just something you're thinking about.
Resolve to fully connect here.
The moment you realize your mind has been captured by thought, drop back and recognize thought itself as an appearance. Where does it come from? And where does it go? There is a single space of consciousness.
See if you can feel your identity with that. Not meditating on it. Not wandering from it. Everything that's happening is happening in, and as, consciousness. And if it feels like you are the observer, the center of experience, see if you can observe how that feeling arises.
It must be something, yet another appearance. Otherwise you couldn't feel it. It too is arising in a condition that is totally undefined. Just be that condition.
In the last minutes of the session, pay careful attention to each breath. Simply cover each inhalation and exhalation with your awareness.
OK. Well, as you go about your day today, you might try an exercise. You'll confront many things that annoy you, that cause you anxiety. You'll see many things online about which you have a strong feeling of judgement.
As a frame for the rest of the day, see if you can just decide in advance to dial down your reaction to all of that. Dial it down to 50 percent. Be 50 percent less reactive, less perturbed, less judgmental. Just see if you can decide to do that, and see if it has an effect.
And I'll see you here tomorrow for the next session of the Waking Up course.
Before speaking more abut Kelly's approach to mindfulness, I'll share a recent Pearls Before Swine comic that illustrates what I find lacking in my own approach to mindfulness.
OK, usually I'm not quite as bad off as Rat, but some days I'm right there with him. And I have to say that I think Rat is correct about what mindfulness is all about. Kelly includes a quote from Jon Kabat-Zinn, a leading teacher of mindfulness.
Mindfulness means paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally.
Here's how Kelly distinguishes traditional mindfulness from effortless mindfulness. I'm sure I'll have more to say about this in another blog post. For now I'll just share this passage, which appeals to me even though I'm not completely confident that what he describes is attainable.
One simple way to distinguish the two types of mindfulness is to say that they are both being mindful but from different levels of mind. This is important because what you can be mindful of depends on what level of mind you're mindful from.
In effortless mindfulness, it is not as important to focus on what thoughts and emotions are arising but rather to ask, "Who or what level of mind are they arising to?" In effortless mindfulness, we shift from focusing on what we are aware of into focusing on awareness itself -- moving from a detached observer and into a view from interconnected awake awareness.
In deliberate mindfulness, we are aware, from our mindful witness, of things arising and passing. Effortless mindfulness invites us to be more intimately connected with our experience and all that is happening. This begins when we shift out of both our conceptual mind and our mindful witness and into awake awareness.
Deliberate mindfulness focuses on the contents of consciousness, while effortless mindfulness turns back to be aware of the context -- awareness itself. With deliberate mindfulness, we discover who we are not. With effortless mindfulness, we discover who we essentially are.
Effortless mindfulness does not lead to being detached from emotions but rather to both feeling more vulnerable and to having more capacity to be tender and welcoming of all feelings. The radical reports from my students are that our essential nature is loving, joyous, and free of worry, and we just need to untie the knots of conditioning to reveal these natural qualities.
(1) The mind is the brain in action
(2) There is no enduring, unchanging self or soul
(3) Free will is an illusion
(4) We humans see reality through a species-specific lens
(5) Consciousness is created by the brain
(6) All living beings exist in a web of interconnections
Brian's six premises from the previous blog seem pretty okay to me. I like to keep up on the latest publications by neuroscience and its research. As such, I appreciate the recent publications from Dr. Chirapat Ukachoke who writes “Because the mind is a composite of information-processing processes, it is an informational entity – a non-material entity that is composed of information and information processing . . .” But just because it is 'non-material', it doesn't negate the fact that it is a product of the brains' neural processes.
Even as layman (perhaps through meditation) it can become obvious that the mind is an accumulation of information gathered over the years via the senses and brain and 'stored' as neural information, to be utilised as and when needed. An amazing survival attribute.
Not to sure about Loch Kelly's "awake awareness" as a term for what effortless mindfulness is all about. It sounds somewhat like J. Krishnamurti's term 'Choiceless Awareness' – being “ . . . complete awareness of the present without preference, effort, or compulsion.” I can see the distinction between 'Effortless Mindfulness' and 'Deliberate Mindfulness'. Even so, I feel that in 'awareness of the present' the mind must surely throw up a thought or image or two about what's appearing in the present. Perhaps its just a case of when the thought or image appears in the present moment, just to let that also be the observed present – as did 'Rat'.
I don't believe that meditation is solely to do with lovely experiences (although great if they happen), more to do with the awareness of what the mind is and seeing how it can be both a boon and a bane – or in Buddhist terms seeing the cause of suffering (dukkha) and the liberation from suffering. Of course, there will always be physical and mental pain, we are simply flesh and blood creatures, but the ending of suffering is, I believe, more to do with our habit of wishing something or someone to be different from the reality of what it or they are at that moment (attachment) and trying to hold onto things that are constantly changing and a continuous unsatisfactoriness in all forms of existence as everything in life is changing and impermanent.
Posted by: Ron E. | October 25, 2022 at 03:32 AM
Gurinder singh dhillon, the clown, and rssb , have created the need for meditation, and peddling it as a science of the soul. This is nothing but made up system created by satan, God's adversary, to grab blind gullible souls and lead them astray. They create a complex path, with a satanic mantra to trap souls into a false heaven, where they the satanic gods get sexual pleasures at the expense of innocent souls. The souls are then thrown back to earth for being unworthy and so they are thrown into the wheel of reincarnation. Gurinder singh dhillon is a monster diguised as a self proclaimed guru and his days are numbered. Your karma will be served
Posted by: Ranvir | October 26, 2022 at 03:36 PM