Regarding Mindfulness Meditation
Being Mindful, aware, and in the moment is seen as the final answer by many. “There is no where to go and nothing to do; we are already enlightened.” “Just be aware of your eternal unchanging observer.” “Just be and watch your thoughts pass by.” The Vipassana adherents say this is hard work, while the westernized Vedantists say there is no work to be done. I sense that neither has the complete picture.
There is an awareness in the mind. The Vipassana practitioners aim directly at discovering this. They advise many hours of observing the body sensations and thoughts. Not judging, simply observing. This is useful because it brings one to the conclusion that he is not the body or the thoughts. According to Vipassana, one must therefore be the awareness. This assumption is incomplete.
They fail to ask many key questions. What is this awareness? Could it merely be a subtle aspect of the mind and therefore of the body? Is it truly unchanging, or simply changing so slowly that we cannot detect it? Glass is changing, but to us seems solid. How does one know that they are aware? This knowing implies awareness of awareness. One finds that awareness, also, can be observed, so where is the final observer?
To wholeheartedly practice Vipassana, though, should lead one to focusing their energy on discovering the final Observer. The experience of the final Observer is beyond experience. It is a place of no things, no duality, and no you. It is the end of everything, so is nothing in a sense. Far from being oblivion or bliss, this nothingness is, inconceivably, aware of itself as Allness.
I have less patience for the westernized Vedantists. Within the phrase “westernized Vendantists,” I include a host of teachers, authors, and meditation instructors (with cosmic smiles pasted on their faces) ranging from Osho, to disciples of Poonjagi (Gangagi, Vartman, Catherine Ingram, et.al.), and your local meditation shop. All more or less saying that we are already enlightened because we have the faculty of choiceless awareness. Cosmic bliss, peace, happiness, oneness, universal goodwill, and lovingkindness are waiting for us, if we simply admit to the fact of awareness.
“Just be aware,” and “there is nothing to do,” seem to be the catchwords, and I find little else offered. “We are already Whole,” is a pretty phrase. It makes you feel warm inside, expanded and exhalted. They have half the truth – we imagine our worries, but we also imagine our joy, and our selves. We are truly “such stuff as dreams are made on.”
In Vipassana, I at least find the beginnings of a path to Truth, as opposed to the kind words and “go with the flow” mentality of the westernized Vedantists. A path is a good thing. It sets you off in a direction and focuses your mind and energy for the journey. No worded path will take you the whole way, however. The path will fail you, and you will wander in the desert, and despair. Yet, because you have come so far, you are unlikely to turn around. In the trackless wastes where Truth dwells, It may find you.