When I say that my mind is empty or is without thoughts I am really saying that the true nature of mind is devoid of movement while, simultaneously, allowing movement in the form of thoughts, conceptions, etc. To suppress thoughts doesn’t bring about the pure nature of Mind, or the same, mind that is unmoved which is substance.
If we were, somehow, able to go into the mind of a Buddha we would still be unable to see what he sees which is pure Mind which is the very substance of thoughts which are constantly arising and perishing. No matter how long or how many times we viewed the Buddha’s mind we would be unable to see or connect with his pure Mind.
Somewhat ironic, we are this pure Mind or the same, we are this pure substance. But here is the big problem. We don’t recognize ourself in the world of thoughts, concepts, emotions and so on. However, a Buddha does. If everything were ice, he would see the water. If everything were made of clay, he would see the clay. On the other hand, the unenlightened would only see ice shapes or different kinds of pots and other clay objects. Turning to our complex world including the cosmos, the Buddha sees its substance, directly. But in this profusion of complexity we do not. We are baffled by the complexity. Our only refuge from the complexity is our body and our thoughts, including our memories.
Our psychophysical body is not easy to let go of by which we interact with the world around us. It is who we are, or so we imagine because of our close contact with it beginning at birth. The Buddha in the Pali Nikayas tries to tell us we are not this human body of ours consisting of physical shape, feeling, perception. volitional formations, and consciousness. He even goes so far as to tell us that our body is a demon (Mara) and it is murderous. But still we cling to it as if this is really who we are, intrinsically.
All of us are fooling ourselves if we believe that the conditioned world we look upon through our body is going to give us a clue as to what pure Mind is. On the same score, we are fooling ourselves in attempting to conceive of this pure Mind. Our concept of it is a poor copy—not the real thing. The worst mistake we make is to deny there is such a substance as pure Mind. We are the proof if only we realize our true nature.
Comments