Contents

FOREWORD
—Tara Brach, PhDAuthor, Radical Acceptance and True Refuge
INTRODUCTION

PART 1: LAYING THE GROUNDWORK

CHAPTER 1: UNDERSTANDING HABITS

What Are Habits?
The Price We Pay for Unhealthy Habits
It’s Hard to Change Established Habits
The Power of Mindfulness to Change Unwanted Habits
Understanding Habits—Summing Up
CHAPTER 2: THE BASICS OF MINDFULNESS
What Mindfulness Involves
The Origins of Mindfulness in Buddhist Teachings
The Buddha’s Teaching on Suffering and the End of Suffering
The Role of Mindfulness
A Buddhist Understanding of Habits and Ways to Transform Them
Mindfulness and Changing the Brain—Neuroplasticity
Your Brain’s Negative Bias
How Mindfulness Works
How Mindfulness Can Help You Change Unwanted Habits
Seven Skillful Mindfulness Practices to Transform Habits
The Basics of Mindfulness—Summing Up

PART 2: PUTTING WISDOM INTO PRACTICE

CHAPTER 3: THE POWER OF INTENTION: WHAT MATTERS

MOST?
How to Set an Intention
Connect with What Matters Most
Recognize What’s Getting in Your Way
Connect with Your Intentions Moment to Moment
Intention—the Buddha’s Quest
 The Power of Intention: What Matters Most?—Summing Up RELATIONSHIPS AND THE WIDER WORLD
CHAPTER 4: WELCOMING YOUR “GUESTS” Bringing Mindfulness to Habits in Your Relationships
Relaxing Your Body and Mind Mindful Communication in Situations of Conflict
Welcoming the “Guests”—Summing Up Applying Mindfulness to Shared Habits
Breaking Harmful Habits in Your Relationships and the Wider World—Summing Up
CHAPTER 5: CULTIVATING ATTITUDES OF MINDFULNESS
Seven Attitudes of Mindfulness CONCLUSION: MAKING MINDFULNESS YOUR DEFAULT HABIT
Three Core Qualities That Support Mindfulness ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Kindness
REFERENCES
Curiosity
Acceptance
Bringing Attitudes of Mindfulness to Unwanted Habits
Habits of Wanting
Habits of Distraction
Habits of Resisting
Habits of Doing
Cultivating Attitudes of Mindfulness—Summing Up
CHAPTER 6: HARNESSING THE POWER OF ATTENTION
Paying Attention Before, During, and After
The Two Forms of Self-Awareness
The Art of Paying Attention
How Can the Art of Paying Attention Help You Change Unhelpful Habits?
Harnessing the Power of Attention—Summing Up
CHAPTER 7: UNTANGLING YOURSELF FROM HABITUAL
THOUGHTS AND BELIEFS
Observing Your Thoughts, Letting Them Come and Go
Untangling Your Thoughts from Your Bodily Sensations and Emotions
Investigating Beliefs and Narratives
Untangling Yourself from Habitual Thoughts and Beliefs—Summing Up
CHAPTER 8: RIDING THE WAVES OF EMOTIONS, URGES, AND
CRAVINGS
Riding the Waves of Emotions, Urges, and Cravings—Summing Up
CHAPTER 9: TAKING IN THE GOOD: CULTIVATING EMOTIONS
THAT SUPPORT WELL-BEING AND HAPPINESS
Loving-Kindness
Self-Compassion
Taking In the Good—Summing Up
CHAPTER 10: BREAKING HARMFUL HABITS IN YOUR
 Chapter 1
Understanding Habits
We become what we repeatedly do.
—Sean Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens
You probably consider yourself as a rational being whose life is guided by
your choices, plans, and intentions. When you choose to eat something sweet
or check your e-mail or take a particular route to work, you’re doing so
because you have made a conscious choice—or so you think.
You might be surprised to know that almost half the time, you do what
you do because you have done it before under similar circumstances.
Researchers have found that between a third and half of all behaviors tend to
be repeated in the same physical location every day (Wood, Quinn, and
Kashy 2002, 1286). In other words, they’re habits.
Understanding how habits form, why they can be hard to change, and
potential ways to transform them is an important step to finding greater
freedom and peace. The better you understand habits and the more you shine
the light of your own awareness on them, the more you’ll be empowered to
bring your actions into alignment with your deepest values. This ability can
be a source of freedom and power.
What Are Habits?
Habits are behaviors that have developed through repetition over time.
They’re things you have done so often that you now do them automatically.
The philosopher William James wrote 125 years ago:
Any sequence of mental action which has been frequently repeated
tends to perpetuate itself; so that we find ourselves automatically
prompted to think, feel, or do what we have been before accustomed
to think, feel, or do, under like circumstances, without any
consciously formed purpose, or anticipation of results. (James 1890,
112)
Modern science confirms James’s assessment of habits: Repetition of an
action in a consistent context leads, over time, to the behavior being activated
by contextual cues (time, place, feelings, and so forth), rather than by
conscious intention. What that means is that the behavior becomes more like
a reflex—one that’s triggered by where you are, what time it is, whom you’re
with, how you’re feeling, or what you’re thinking. In other words, you carry
out the action automatically whenever the circumstances seem to fit. At this
point, the behavior is no longer linked directly to your intentions or your
original goal. You’re unaware or only dimly aware of the reason for the
behavior, and you may not even be aware of what you’re doing. It’s as if
you’re on autopilot.
But habits aren’t an aberration, some glitch in our evolutionary wiring.
Charles Duhigg, bestselling author of The Power of Habit: Why We Do What
We Do in Life and Business, explains habits as the brain’s way of conserving
energy, allowing our minds to ramp down more often, and points to the
evolutionary benefits:
An efficient brain requires less room, which makes for a smaller head,
which makes childbirth easier and therefore causes fewer infant and
mother deaths. An efficient brain also allows us to stop thinking
 constantly about basic behaviors, such as walking and choosing what
to eat, so we can devote mental energy to inventing spears, irrigation
systems, and, eventually, airplanes and video games. (Duhigg 2012,
18)
Following are some common unhealthy habits:
Human beings are creatures of habit, and that’s not a bad thing, because
habits aren’t inherently good or bad. Habits typically begin as behaviors
undertaken to achieve a goal. For example, you drive to the train station to
take a train to get to work; you brush and floss your teeth to prevent cavities
and support good health; or you eat a bowl of ice cream for comfort when
you feel lonely or bored.
Habit formation is intended to help us be efficient. Think how much more
complex and stressful our lives would be if all our everyday activities were
the subject of deliberation and decision-making. Driving a car, for example,
would be a much more complex and challenging activity if we had to relearn
the rules of the road every time we got behind the wheel.
Still, sometimes our habits run counter to our long-term goals, needs, and
values. It’s easy to develop habits that bring you comfort but don’t serve you
or don’t reflect your deepest needs. Habits may distance you from your own
life, or they may prevent you from achieving a deeper connection with your
loved ones and the world. They may at times be harmful, unhealthy, and even
deadly.
The Price We Pay for Unhealthy Habits
Eating, drinking alcohol, using drugs, using tobacco, having sex,
shopping, overworking, or gambling to comfort yourself or avoid
feeling something unpleasant (for example, anxiety, loneliness, or
uncertainty)
Compulsively or continually checking your messages, going online,
or watching TV, which saps your time and energy and causes you to
be absent from your life, your family, and the present moment
Acting out angrily in thought, word, or action in ways that cause pain
to yourself or others (for example, getting frustrated with staff in
stores or on the phone; driving impatiently; sending angry e-mails;
feeling annoyed or angry with family members, friends, or colleagues;
or judging yourself or others negatively)
Feeling as if you’re forever on the go, on your way somewhere, or
crossing things off a to-do list

Worrying about the future and imagining negative or scary scenarios

Spending large amounts of time ruminating on the past—how you

acted, what you might have done differently, or what people have
done to you

Procrastinating (finding ways to put off particular tasks or projects

you need to complete)

These habits may be causing you suffering and harming others as well. At
the very least, they don’t serve your needs, your long-term goals, or your
deepest intentions. Think of the ways in which a constant need to be online
can separate you from your loved ones, or how mindless snacking can leave
you feeling judgmental and separated from yourself. Consumerism can keep
you locked in patterns that conflict with your deepest sense of what’s good
for you. Even habits of distraction, like biting your nails or humming or
picking your fingers when you’re feeling nervous or anxious, prevent you
from being fully present for your life—experiencing the passing joys and
sorrows in various moments.
Roy’s Story
One of my students, Roy, has quit cigarettes, alcohol, and drugs. But a
long-time source of suffering for Roy—one that has been compared to
heroin (Avena, Rada, and Hoebel 2008)—remains: a craving for sweets,
which visits him most strongly in the hour or two before bedtime. Most
evenings Roy eats a large bowl of ice cream or a plate of cookies even
though he’s a diabetic, and afterward he feels bad both physically and
emotionally.
Roy’s craving is familiar to many. Michael Moss, in his powerful book
Salt, Sugar, Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us, points out: “There are
special receptors for sweetness in every one of the mouth’s ten thousand taste
buds, and they are all hooked up, one way or another, to the parts of the brain
known as the pleasure zones, where we get rewarded for stoking our bodies
with energy” (Moss 2014, 3–4). (We’ll come back to Roy’s efforts to work
with his sugar habit in later chapters.)
In addition to the drawbacks mentioned above, some unhealthy habits
have extraordinarily high social costs, as shown in statistics for addictions
rooted in unhealthy habitual behaviors:
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in the United
States. Worldwide, tobacco use accounts for five million preventable
deaths a year—some 10 percent of deaths overall (Brewer et al.
2011).
Alcohol consumption, illicit drugs, and obesity account for an
additional 21 percent of preventable deaths in the United States
(Adams et al. 2014; Bowen and Marlatt 2009).
Substance abuse and addiction cost more than $600 billion annually
(including productivity and health- and crime-related costs)—illegal
drugs, $193 billion; alcohol, $235 billion; and tobacco use, $193
billion (NIH 2012). “As staggering as these numbers are, they do not
fully describe the breadth of destructive public health and safety
implications of drug abuse and addiction, such as family
disintegration, loss of employment, failure in school, domestic
violence, and child abuse” (NIH 2012, n.p.).
The incidence of obesity (key causes of which lie in unhealthy eating
habits and insufficient physical activity) in the United States has
increased from 13 percent to 34 percent in the past fifty years, and
obesity accounts for $190 billion in medical costs alone (Begley
2012).
More than 40 percent of people between 19 and 39 years old say they
text while they drive, and 10 percent say they do so regularly. Driving
while distracted by smartphones and other devices caused 3,331
deaths and 387,000 injuries in 2011 (Neyfakh 2013; Halsey 2013).
In our individual lives, unhealthy and unwanted habits can cause intense
physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual suffering. When we act in ways that
are out of alignment with our values, intentions, and deepest needs, we suffer.
And unsuccessful attempts to change behavior—often caused by lack of
awareness of the power of habits and the most effective ways of changing
them—can engender a sense of failure, guilt, disappointment, or resignation,
helping perpetuate unhealthy behaviors.

It’s Hard to Change Established Habits
Almost all of us, if we look at our lives honestly, have habits and patterns that
we would like to change. Have you ever found yourself repeatedly doing
something that you know doesn’t reflect the best of who you are? Have you
ever thought, Why do I keep doing this? Perhaps you have made plans or
resolutions to kick this habit, but found yourself falling back or relapsing—
and then felt disappointed with yourself.
Here are some common habits that are hard to change:
Eating too much or too often—not from hunger, but to numb an
emotion or to feel a sense of comfort
Spending long hours on social media or checking your e-mail,
knowing this isn’t the best use of your time and energy
Smoking cigarettes, despite the serious health costs
Working long hours as a way of avoiding other areas of your life
Getting caught up in negative or judgmental thoughts about yourself
or others
If you develop unhealthy or harmful habits, it doesn’t mean you’re flawed
or that you have failed somehow. You have simply lost connection with your
true interests and intentions, possibly mistaking short-term relief from
unpleasant or uncomfortable feelings for real happiness and well-being.
Intuitively, you might think that once you recognize that a behavior was
unhealthy or unwanted, and you decide to change it, you should be able to
modify your behavior so that your actions and habits correspond with your
intentions and goals. But it’s not so simple, because there are two separate
behavioral systems in your brain.
According to Nobel Prize–winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, there
are two modes of “cognitive function”: an intuitive mode (which he calls
System 1), in which judgments and decisions are made automatically and
rapidly, and a controlled mode (which he calls System 2), which is deliberate
and slower.
The operations of System 1 are…often emotionally charged; they are
also governed by habit and are therefore difficult to control or modify.
The operations of System 2 are…more likely to be consciously
monitored and deliberately controlled; they are also relatively
flexible. (Kahneman 2003, 698)
Walter Mischel, a psychologist renowned for his studies of children’s
abilities to defer gratification (for example, by not eating a marshmallow
right away, in order to get an extra marshmallow), calls these two brain
systems the hot emotional system and the cool cognitive system (Mischel
2014).
What’s more, these systems don’t always coordinate well. The “hot”
brain system responds more quickly, and its messages are more compelling
than those of the “cool” brain system. Thus when your intentions and plans
(the workings of the “cool” brain system) conflict with your firmly
established habits (the workings of the “hot” brain system), your habits tend
to win out.
Studies involving blood donation, use of seat belts, modes of travel, and
fast-food consumption show that as habit strength increases, intentions play
less of a role in predicting behavior (Nilsen et al. 2012). As one study noted,
“Essentially, habits yield tunnel vision, thus reducing the effectiveness of
interventions aimed at changing behaviour through conscious cognitive
deliberation” (Nilsen et al. 2012, 2).
Does the persistence of habits in the face of intentions to change them
mean that we’re doomed to keep repeating them? Is habit destiny? Clearly
not. Most of us have changed unwanted behaviors, and you probably know
people who have transformed deeply painful and entrenched habits. You can
consciously develop habits that are aligned with your intentions and goals. If
you wish to develop a healthy habit, you need to repeat the desired behavior
in a consistent context until the behavior becomes automatic. Recent studies
suggest that it takes about sixty-six days to develop a new habit (Gardner
2012). If you want to abandon an unhealthy or unwanted habit, you have to
find ways to disrupt and discontinue the automatic behavior.
 Studies have shown that certain conditions and processes aid changing
unwanted habits and developing more productive and beneficial ones:
Changes in the environment can support shifting from habit mode into
more intentional or planned behaviors. For example, when the context
changes (taking a vacation, moving to a new residence, or changing
colleges), the “cues” that trigger habitual behaviors may be absent or
less available, resulting in greater potential for new behaviors to be
guided by intentions (Nilsen et al. 2012).
Taking steps to circumvent the “cues” that trigger habitual behaviors
can support habit change. For example, an alcoholic in recovery
might choose to avoid oft-frequented drinking places or old drinking
buddies, or a person who’s trying to eat healthily might walk or drive
home by a different route to avoid a donut shop or fast-food restaurant
(Quinn et al. 2010).
To act in keeping with your intentions in the face of strong habits,
your intentions need to be strong and clear. When intentions come
into conflict with strong habits, behaviors are likely to be directed by
intentions only if held “with sufficient strength and implemented with
sufficient skill to override well-practiced behavior,” as one influential
study of habits and intentions proposed (Ouellette and Wood 1998, 7).
Change is less likely if the person hasn’t already committed to
change. Studies have shown that a person who at the start of a
smoking cessation program is actively preparing to quit smoking or
already taking steps to quit is almost twice as likely to succeed in
quitting as someone who at the start of a smoking cessation program
is only contemplating quitting (Prochaska, DiClemente, and Norcross
1992).
“Vigilantly monitoring” habitual behaviors (such as actively watching
yourself for the behavior and thinking Don’t do it) heightens
cognitive control and is an effective way of inhibiting strong habits
(Quinn et al. 2010).
Most of the common means of making changes, including methods
developed by psychologists and health professionals, aim to alter habits by
establishing new plans and intentions—for example, setting yourself the goal,
“I’m going to eat healthy food instead of junk food.” But although intentions
are crucial to habit change, in order to be effective they need to be very clear
and specific, and they need to be supported by strong practices of self-
awareness. This involves making what’s largely invisible visible, by
intentionally and mindfully bringing into conscious awareness habitual
patterns of thought and behavior.

One of the most effective ways to change harmful habits and ensure
that your actions are in keeping with your values and goals is to
establish “implementation intentions”—plans of action that specify
the exact behaviors you’ll take in response to specific cues. For
example, “as soon as the six o’clock news is over I will switch off the
TV, put on my running shoes and go out for a thirty-minute run”
(Gollwitzer and Schaal 1998).

Anticipating difficulties and envisioning ways of responding to them

increase the possibility of successful habit change. For example, a
person attempting to lose weight might imagine how he or she would
respond in a social situation where high-calorie food was offered
(Quinn et al. 2010).

The Power of Mindfulness to Change Unwanted
Habits
Through mindfulness—an approach for bringing a kind and nonjudging
awareness to your moment-to-moment experience, rooted in centuries of
Buddhist teachings and practice—you can change even long-established and
seemingly entrenched habits.
This book provides mindfulness skills and practices for letting go of old
habits and creating new, healthier habits and healthier ways of living.
Mindfulness gives you the power to transform your behaviors because it
shines a light on whatever is happening in the moment—including thoughts
you normally aren’t aware of and things you normally don’t notice yourself
doing.
Mindfulness is both a training and a practice. Since habits develop
through repetition over time, it’s rarely enough to clearly see your unhealthy
patterns just a few times. You need to create new patterns—and new neural
pathways in your brain—that can help you learn to identify unwanted or
harmful habits. You need to learn to accept and let yourself experience
challenging sensations, emotions, and mind states. You also need to cultivate
kindness and compassion toward yourself, because they’re the key to
freedom and to healing from the stresses of being caught up in painful habits.
In chapter 2 we’ll look at ways in which mindfulness can be an antidote to
habitual behavior and provide a powerful path to changing unhealthy habits.
Before we go any further, however, it’s important that you identify a
habit or habits that you would like to change. There may be an obvious area
for you to work on, perhaps a behavior you have already tried to change. If
not, or to help you identify behaviors that may be affecting your life in
negative or painful ways, try the following practice.
Practice 1: Identifying Habits That Don’t
Serve Your Well-Being
This activity is meant to help you reflect on activities or areas of your life in which you’re not
fully present.
Over the coming week, with kindness and without judging yourself, take
some time each day to write down your responses to the following questions,
perhaps in a notebook. (It can be helpful to keep a notebook for responding to
the practices in this book and for recording any insights that come to you as
you read about and practice mindfulness.)
At what times are you on autopilot?
At what times do your actions or thoughts have negative consequences for your health,
relationships, or overall well-being?
Is there something you do that you feel is unhealthy or compulsive or that separates or isolates
you from others? Something that’s not in alignment with how you want to live your life?
If there’s a habit that seems unhealthy or that you’d like to change, how do you feel (in your
body and your mind) when you carry out this habit? What are you aware of before, during,
and after carrying out the habit? Is there tension, pleasure, numbness, judgment? Simply
notice whatever is present, and write it down.
In what ways does this habit cause you stress, pain, difficulty, or suffering? Does it separate
you from your family, from your friends, or from yourself? Does it feel out of alignment with
how you want to live? Does it leave you feeling guilty, self-critical, or regretful? Do you feel
physically uncomfortable afterward—as with a smoker’s cough, a hangover, or the feeling of
having eaten too much?
What need do you think this behavior or way of thinking fills for you? If it doesn’t serve a
need now, what need did it meet for you at some point? Is there another way, or ways, you
could achieve the original goal or objective of this behavior? Visualize how you might feel if
you abandoned this unhealthy habit. As you imagine yourself no longer practicing this
unhealthy habit, notice how you feel both physically and emotionally. Notice the thoughts that
arise.
Is there a healthy or helpful habit that could replace your current habit? It might be an
alternative behavior, such as eating fruit or nuts instead of eating candy, or simply not doing
what you have been doing and learning to stay with whatever feelings are present.
At this time, how strong is your commitment to changing this habit or developing a new
habit? How important is it to you personally? If the answer is less than “very,” it’s likely that
 your old ways will prevail. Take some time to reflect on the potential benefits of making a way that makes it easy to become dependent on the habit (with negative
change. Think about potential obstacles to breaking this habit, and envision effective ways of consequences). The more activities you do consciously, the more
responding if these obstacles or other challenges arise. Would talking about your commitment opportunities you’ll have to make choices that truly benefit you.
with and seeking support from a family member or friend help you make this change?

Throughout the upcoming chapters, our discussion of mindfulness will

often center on one or more of six common habits that are challenging to
change:

Smoking

Worry and anxiety

Procrastination

Aggressive and unmindful driving

Unhealthy and unmindful eating

Overuse of electronics

I’ll illustrate how specific mindfulness skills can help bring about change
in these and many other habitual ways of thinking and acting.
I want to be clear that in the case of these last two habits, we’ll be
focusing on the “unconsciousness” and the negative consequences involved
as what makes these habits unwanted or unhealthy. Regarding eating, if there
are no health issues involved, having a donut or a slice of cheesecake can be
harmless or even contribute to your emotional well-being. Regarding use of
electronics, computers provide great benefits—thanks to the Internet,
thousands of meditations (including the ones created for this book) and talks
on mindfulness and related themes are available to anyone at the click of a
button. And in recent months I have found myself walking about twice as
much as I had previously, thanks to an app on my phone that has made me
more conscious of how much exercise I’m getting.
In fact, how much any habit is detrimental has to do with the
consciousness or unconsciousness with which you do it. When it comes to
drinking a glass of wine, for example, you can drink mindfully, paying
attention to the experience, or you can drink without paying attention, in a

Understanding Habits—Summing Up
Almost half of our actions are habitual in nature: performed in an automatic
way and activated by contextual cues rather than conscious intention. Habits
help us simplify and organize our lives—life would be infinitely more
complex if we had to think about and make decisions about the many aspects
of all our daily activities. By making our brains more efficient, habits have
helped humans become who we are today. Habits have helped us travel to the
moon and paint the Sistine Chapel.
But almost all of us have habits that we’d like to change because they
don’t serve us or because they don’t reflect our deepest values, goals, or
intentions. Unhealthy habits and addictions like tobacco, drug and alcohol
abuse, and distracted driving carry huge social costs, both in terms of lives
lost and in terms of economic resources that could be better spent. Getting
caught up in even seemingly harmless automatic behaviors can actually have
a very high cost: we can miss out on our children, our family, and our lives.
Changing well-established habits is difficult. When an intention to change
a behavior confronts a strong habit, the habit often wins, because the
messages coming from the “cool” cognitive brain system are slower and less
urgent than those coming from the “hot” emotional brain system.
Understanding how habits form and operate, and why they can be so
resistant to change, is key to changing them. Also essential is bringing
awareness to your direct experience through mindfulness. Mindfulness gets
to the heart of habitual behaviors and gives you a means of releasing yourself
from their grip. Mindfulness can help you become aware of patterns of
behavior that have become automatic and unconscious. It can help you bring
unconscious thoughts and behaviors into consciousness and render the
invisible visible.
Chapter 2
The Basics of Mindfulness
The essence of mindfulness is to bring the light of attention to all that has
been invisible and habitual.
—Christina Feldman, Compassion: Listening to the Cries of the World
Imagine two very similar but very different scenarios:
Scenario 1: You’re walking through the woods on a crisp early autumn
day. You see the interplay of light and shade as the sun shines through
the leaves swaying in the breeze, and you feel the cool air on your face.
You feel the weight of your body on your feet as you walk along the
path, and you feel the beating of your heart as the path gets steeper. You
hear the chirping of birds, the buzzing of insects, and the distant rumble
of a truck. Thoughts of daily life come and go, but they don’t interfere
with your enjoyment of the simple pleasure of your walk. You feel alive
and present, open to your experience and to life.
Scenario 2: You’re walking through the woods on a crisp early autumn
day. Your mind is caught up in worries about all the work you have to
do and fears that something important will fall through the cracks. Your
mind is pulled back to the memory of a difficult encounter with your
boss earlier in the week and what that might mean for your future. This
thought is followed by concerns about the poor grades your teenage son
received on his latest report card and worries about the friends he has
been hanging out with. You check your phone to see whether any
important messages have landed in your inbox since you began your
walk. Consumed by your anxious thoughts, you’re barely aware of your
surroundings. Like a seesaw, your mind alternates between ruminating
on the past and worrying about the future. If you stopped to pay
 attention to what was going on in your body, you might notice that your
muscles were tense, reflecting your mental state.
Each moment of our waking lives, we have the opportunity to be present
—aware of what’s unfolding in our bodies, our hearts, our minds, and our
environment—or to be somewhere else. Sages have taught for centuries that
being present here and now allows us to feel greater peace, contentment, and
joy.
It’s easy, though, to develop patterns of thought and behavior that take
you away from your present experience—into rumination, worry, and fear,
which, in turn, lead to stress and suffering. If you don’t practice awareness,
it’s easy to eat too much, drink too much, or slip into other unhealthy
behaviors that offer momentary relief but separate you from your deepest
intentions. Mindfulness practices and skills will help you change unhealthy
habits and balance your life.
What Mindfulness Involves
Although mindfulness was developed within the Buddhist tradition over the
past 2,500 years, it’s a universal quality of present-moment awareness that
can be experienced and cultivated independent of any particular religion or
philosophy.
Have you ever for a moment felt fully alive, engaged, and embodied,
connected to yourself, to what you were doing, and to life? Have you been at
a concert or a play where you were fully immersed in the action or the music?
Or simply walked through your neighborhood or in nature and felt fully
present? Mindfulness is being here and knowing you’re here, being present
here and now, which is a direct path to well-being, happiness, and freedom.
Different forms of mindful awareness exist in many religions:
Going on pilgrimage, in many traditions
Walking a labyrinth and centering prayer, in Christian practice
Kneeling to pray five times a day, in Islam
Shabbat or the Sabbath as a time of pausing and inner reflection, in
Judaism
All of these are ways of “remembering” to come home to yourself and
your life. In fact, the Pali word for “mindfulness,” sati, also means
“remembering.” (Pali is the language in which the Buddha’s teachings were
first written—some five hundred years after his death.)
Both in Buddhism and in more secular approaches to mindfulness, you
learn to bring awareness consciously and intentionally to your present-
moment experience as it is, without judgment and with acceptance of
whatever arises. It’s a more intentional and attentional focus than you
typically bring to your everyday life, in which you may spend much of your
time lost in thoughts about the future or the past, daydreaming, or on
“autopilot.”
 Jon Kabat-Zinn, a scientist and meditation teacher who has played a
major role in making mindfulness widely accessible in the West, defined
mindfulness as “the awareness that emerges through paying attention on
purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally to the unfolding of
experience moment to moment” (Kabat-Zinn 2003, 145).
Mindfulness is a quality of attention or awareness. When you pay
attention intentionally and without judgment to your experience, you’re being
mindful. Mindfulness is also the conscious practice of cultivating this quality
of attention.
Internationally recognized expert in mindfulness Shauna Shapiro and
colleagues (Shapiro et al. 2006) have pointed to three key elements that
compose mindfulness: intention—why you practice, your motivations and
aspirations; attention—observing and recognizing what you’re experiencing;
and attitude—the qualities of heart and mind that you bring to attention.
These three essential qualities are tools available to anyone who wishes to
change unhealthy or unwanted habits.
You can apply mindfulness to any area or activity of your life: you can
drive mindfully, walk mindfully, eat mindfully, shower mindfully, be a
mindful parent, or be a mindful leader. Through this quality of presence—
showing up for your life—you can improve any aspect of your life, including
the painful and difficult times.
Mindfulness meditation differs from “everyday” mindfulness only in the
sense that you formally set aside a time and place to make the practice of
mindfulness the focus of your activity. You can practice mindfulness
meditation while sitting, standing, walking, or lying down, and while
engaged in any kind of formal meditation practice, such as an eating
meditation. The importance of formal practice is that it gives you the time
and the opportunity to observe and train your mind in a setting of your
choosing, where you’ll be relatively free of distractions.
The Origins of Mindfulness in Buddhist Teachings
Some 2,500 years ago, Siddhartha Gautama, a man born into nobility in
northern India, left his home and family on a quest to discover whether
freedom from grief and suffering was possible. He studied with leading
teachers of his time and engaged in intense ascetic practices. Then, leaving
behind the path of austerity, he meditated through a full-moon night and
discovered a “middle way,” a path to a complete end to suffering. This was
his awakening or enlightenment.
After his awakening and until his death forty-five years later, the Buddha
(which translates as “one who has awakened”) shared his teachings with
people from all walks of life. His teachings have been passed on throughout
Asia for a hundred generations by a monastic community, supported by lay
followers. Over the past century, and particularly in the last two generations,
these teachings have come to the West and are having a profound impact on
our society, where a growing body of research points to the beneficial effects
of mindfulness.
The Buddha’s Teaching on Suffering and the End of Suffering
At the core of all the Buddha’s teachings are four basic propositions—the
Four Noble Truths. As the Buddha himself recommended, these are to be
explored and tested, rather than taken as a set of “beliefs” that must be strictly
adhered to.
Suffering—a sense of dissatisfaction or persistent unease—is pervasive in
human life. The Buddha taught that birth, death, sickness, aging, and loss are
all forms of suffering. This is the First Noble Truth—the existence of
suffering.
The typical sense of dissatisfaction characteristic of human suffering
arises from wanting things to be different. We want more of what we like and
less of what we don’t like. We experience this as craving, and it leads to
suffering. This is the Second Noble Truth—craving as the cause of suffering.
When you’re willing to be open to your experience just as it is, you’ll see
that pleasant experiences can’t be held onto and that unpleasant experiences
also pass. Everything is constantly changing. You’re constantly changing—
you have no stable, permanent “self.” Rather, the illusion of a permanent self
is created by your mind’s clinging to certain ideas about yourself. When you
see clearly that trying to cling to anything leads to suffering, you can begin to
let go. Letting go completely, accepting things as they really are, is the end of
suffering, the goal of the Buddhist path. This is the Third Noble Truth—the
end of suffering: freedom, or nirvana.
The Fourth Noble Truth is the path to the end of suffering laid out by the
Buddha, called the Noble Eightfold Path. It involves wise (or skillful, or
appropriate) cultivation of eight elements: understanding, intention, speech,
action, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, and concentration.
The Role of Mindfulness
Mindfulness plays a central role in Buddhism. In a major teaching on the
foundations of mindfulness, the Satipatthana Sutta, the Buddha taught that
mindfulness is a direct path to freedom from suffering (Anãlayo 2003). By
bringing mindfulness to four fields of experience—(1) your body; (2) the
“feeling tone” (pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral) of your experience; (3) your
emotions and mind states; and (4) your subjective reality as experienced
through the lens of key Buddhist teachings—you can gain liberating insights.
You can come to see the true nature of all experience as changing,
impersonal, and unreliable. This insight will lead to the end of clinging and to
freedom from suffering. Rather than being in conflict with your situation or
experience (that is, wishing things were different), you can “dance with life,”
in the words of meditation teacher Phillip Moffitt (Moffitt 2008).
Mindfulness, then, leads directly to liberation—to freedom from clinging and
an end to the afflictions of greed, aversion, and ignorance.
A Buddhist Understanding of Habits and Ways to Transform Them
The Buddha taught that a key determinant of our happiness and well-
being is how we meet the present moment. If we meet the present moment by
trying to hold on to pleasant experiences and avoid or escape unpleasant
experiences, or trying to distract ourselves from neutral or “boring”
experiences, we’ll suffer. Not only that, but a preoccupation with avoiding
unpleasant, neutral, or “boring” experiences will naturally keep such
experiences in the forefront of our minds.
As the Buddha said, “Whatever a bhikkhu [monk, or practitioner]
frequently thinks and ponders upon, that will become the inclination of his
mind” (Bodhi 1995, 208).
Also, the more we repeat thoughts and actions, the more likely we are to
keep repeating them. It’s easier to think and do things that you’ve thought
and done before, even if those thoughts and actions lead to suffering. Thus
every thought you have and every action you do that leads to suffering keeps
you on the road to suffering, making it harder to live according to your
intentions and goals. If you think angry, jealous, or cruel thoughts, you
incline your mind in that direction, sowing seeds of future afflictive thoughts
and actions. But every time you go against your habits or make a mindful
choice, you’ll find it a little easier to do the same thing again in the future. If
you think a kind thought or carry out a generous action, you incline your
mind in that direction, sowing seeds of future positive and kind thoughts and
actions.
This is the meaning of karma: you reap what you sow. It might sound
deterministic, except that you can break the cycle through mindfulness.
However heavily the past weighs on the present, you have the potential to
end the cycle here and now by saying yes to whatever is present, including
painful bodily sensations, intense emotions, and insistent thoughts and urges.
Many of the Buddha’s teachings—such as focusing your mind, cultivating
wise intentions, and practicing loving-kindness—are methods, or skillful
means, of helping you be open to what is.
Mindfulness is a key to ending unhealthy or harmful habits, because the
practice of mindfulness addresses the underlying urges and triggers of
habitual behaviors. What’s more, mindfulness offers ways of being open to
your urges, experiencing their impermanence, and letting them arise and pass
without clinging or resistance.

Mindfulness and Changing the Brain—
Neuroplasticity
In the past two decades, scientists have made great advances in understanding
the human brain. Though it used to be thought that our brains essentially
stopped developing once we reached adulthood, we now know that our brains
change throughout our lives. In other words, what we do and how we use our
attention changes our brains and can make an enormous difference in our
lives. Mindfulness training has been shown to have a significant impact in
this regard, including bringing about positive physical changes to the brain.
A 2011 study showed that the practice of mindfulness was associated
with certain changes in the brain. Among participants in an eight-week
mindfulness meditation program, the density of neurons and other cells in
areas of the brain linked to self-awareness, compassion, and introspection
increased; in addition, the density of neurons and other cells in an area of the
brain associated with stress and anxiety decreased. These changes in
participants’ brains were the result of spending an average of only twenty-
seven minutes a day in meditation practice over the eight-week period
(Hölzel et al. 2011).
The potential for improving your neural structure through what you do
and how you pay attention will be particularly important in helping you
balance out your brain’s negative tendencies.
Your Brain’s Negative Bias
The brain you have inherited is the product of tens of millions of years of
evolution. It’s an extraordinarily complex organ capable of great wonders,
but it can also get you in trouble, if you’re not paying attention.
Your brain and nervous system are primed to focus on the negative—on
what could kill or harm you. This focus on threats helped your ancestors
survive and pass on their genes, and this defensive faculty of the brain has
been called the “survival brain.” From a survival standpoint, it’s more
beneficial to be hypervigilant about imminent dangers and comparatively less
concerned about achieving positive goals, which can wait until the threat has
passed. Thus, your brain pays much more attention to negative stimuli and
experiences than positive ones. For example, if one person says something
positive about you and another person says something negative about you,
which remark do you tend to obsess about?
Neuropsychologist and meditation teacher Rick Hanson has described the
brain’s bias as like “Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive
ones,” so that overcoming the effects of a single negative interaction typically
requires no less than five positive interactions (Hanson 2009, 41). Think of
the price you pay for your “survival brain’s” negative bias when your stress
response becomes activated in reaction to a potential challenge: Stress
hormones (including cortisol, the primary stress hormone) are released.
Blood is pumped to your arm and leg muscles to help you fight or run. Bodily
functions that aren’t essential to your immediate survival, such as those
associated with digestion and reproduction, are shut down. Continuously
thinking about a potential challenge can keep you locked in this state of stress
and anxiety in which you’re ready to respond to perceived threats. And this,
in turn, can trigger unhealthy habitual responses that you resort to for comfort
or relief.
Difficult emotions, such as anger, shame, and sadness, which enable you
to respond to threatening or painful situations in the way described above,
can also get you into trouble. This happens when, instead of treating your
emotions as signals containing useful information, you identify with them
and continually revisit them.
The good news is that, through practices of mindful awareness, you can
take advantage of your brain’s capacity to change. You can, as Rick Hanson
encourages, balance the negative bias of the brain by “taking in the good”—
consciously cultivating and appreciating emotions that are conducive to well-
being, such as gratitude, joy, love, and compassion (Hanson 2009, 67). And
you can train your mind, through mindfulness practices, to experience all of
your mind states and feelings—including the sensations, urges, and cravings
associated with habits—as impermanent and impersonal. You can stop letting
them define you. This will allow you to make choices and respond in ways
that truly serve you.
How Mindfulness Works
 The renowned Zen Buddhist teacher, poet, and peace activist Thich Nhat 346–47). Companies spend billions of dollars to spur consumer spending
Hanh titled one of his books The Miracle of Mindfulness (Nhat Hanh 1975). habits and perpetuate a sense of wanting. This wanting can make it hard to
The “miracle” lies in the transformation that comes from being willing to simply notice your surroundings without wanting something you don’t have
meet your experience without resistance, without struggle, and with an open or wishing things were different, whether you’re at home or out and about.
and accepting heart. What seems painful, scary, or too much to endure can So, being mindful isn’t easy; it takes practice to be present. But when
become a path to growth and healing when met wholeheartedly. As spiritual you’re mindful of your moment-to-moment experience, you’ll cultivate a
teacher Eckhart Tolle said, “Whatever you accept completely, you go variety of skills that recent studies show affect different parts of the brain and
beyond” (Tolle 2003). thus contribute to physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual benefits and
When you resist or avoid any part of your experience, it’s as though you changes.
put a psychic wall around it. Paraphrasing Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous Contemporary scientific research into mindfulness is helping clarify how
statement, you live in fear of the fear itself. When you avoid an experience, a mindfulness works and how particular aspects of mindfulness training may
feeling, or an emotion, that experience, feeling, or emotion doesn’t go away; lead to specific outcomes. Mindfulness may help different people in different
rather, it’s fueled by your resistance, ready to return when conditions are ways. For example, it may help people with attention-deficit/hyperactivity
appropriate. What you resist persists. disorder improve their focus, it may help people with addictions tolerate their
It’s the willingness to be fully open to an experience that allows it to cravings, and it may help people with psychological disorders experience
“self-liberate,” a term from Tibetan Buddhism; without the fuel of resistance, negative feelings without being overwhelmed by them.
without struggle, any feelings come and go. The path to freedom from
suffering is, ironically, willingness to experience suffering. The challenge is
to have the courage to meet your pain and your suffering without either
identifying with it or resisting it.
Mindfulness is simple in that you need only “be here now”—be open to
your experience just as it is. That includes the sights and sounds around you,
as well as your sensations, your emotions, and your thoughts.
But mindfulness isn’t easy, because there’s so much that can pull you
away from the present moment. You may be used to spending much of your
time lost in ruminating about the past, comparing yourself to others, or
worrying about the future (we’ll discuss this in chapter 6). You may have had
painful or traumatic experiences that have left a legacy of vigilance and fear
that, if not addressed, make it difficult to be fully present. Ironically, the
technological advances that enable you to be in constant communication with
others and access information instantly tend to separate you from the world
around you and can distance you from the people right next to you. And
finally, through advertising and other tactics, you have been primed to want
things you don’t have. For example, as Michael Moss has noted, “There is
nothing accidental in the grocery store…the gentle canned music; the in-store
bakery aromas; the soft-drink coolers by the checkout lanes” (Moss 2014,

How Mindfulness Can Help You Change Unwanted
Habits
The practice of mindfulness has been shown to be a highly effective approach
for alleviating stress, anxiety, and depression, as well as a host of other
conditions. Applying mindfulness to harmful or unhelpful habits offers
similar potential. Mindfulness brings stimuli, urges, or cravings—and the
habitual behaviors they trigger—into your conscious awareness. For 2,500
years, meditators have practiced mindfulness as a path to letting go of
painful, afflictive, and habitual mind states and emotions. This history is now
supported by a growing body of scientific research that points to the ways in
which mindfulness can be a key to habit change.
Studies on applying mindfulness to habitual behaviors, including
addictions, have shown great promise. In a smoking-cessation study, 36
percent of participants who received training in mindfulness had quit
smoking at the end of a four-week program, compared with 15 percent of
participants who received standard smoking-cessation training. The
abstinence rates at the seventeen-week follow-up were 31 percent for those
who received training in mindfulness, versus 6 percent for those who
received standard smoking-cessation training (Brewer et al. 2011).
A study of inmates in a correctional facility showed that those who took a
vipassana (“insight” or mindfulness) meditation program reduced their
substance use, as well as had fewer alcohol-related problems and diminished
psychiatric symptoms (Adams et al. 2014).
The changes brought about by mindfulness can have wide-ranging
positive effects, as the following case study illustrates.
Thomas’s Story
Thomas had practiced meditation on and off for many years. As his
aging mother’s health deteriorated and she developed dementia, his
mindfulness practice kept him, in his words, “sane and relatively
compassionate.”
After his mother’s death, Thomas felt a surge of psychic, physical,
and creative energy. But he also had fallen into some unhealthy habits
of procrastination, distraction, and impulsivity. He wanted to write, but
he found himself doing anything but sitting down to write.
Thomas came to a six-week class that I was teaching on harnessing
the power of mindfulness to support habit change. Two things helped
him make a shift that led to real change in his life: First, his earlier
training in mindfulness had taught him to practice in a particular way
and assume a certain posture while meditating. The different approach
presented in the class, that of “find what works for you,” opened space
for Thomas to make changes in his posture that allowed him to sit in a
way that was comfortable and relaxed. As he shared with me, “For
decades, discomfort while meditating had meant that the practice had
rarely been fruitful, had generated an ongoing sense of failure, and
rather than becoming a self-reinforcing habit, had remained an
unappealing chore. Once I found a posture that worked, I found myself
sitting more and more, enjoying simply being there in the silence, ‘just
sitting.’”
Second, while meditating, Thomas had been unable to let go of
concerns about how long he had been sitting and how much time
remained in his period of meditation. A chance conversation with a
fellow student led him to download a meditation app that allowed him to
begin and end his meditations with the pleasant sound of a bell, freeing
him from his preoccupation with time. It also established a kind of
electronic accountability (by tracking how long he meditated each day
and providing information on others who were meditating at the same
time).
For the first time in over thirty years, Thomas began meditating
consistently for twenty to forty minutes a day. He shared how he had a
greater sense of calm overall: “My mood is lighter. I respond to
setbacks more quickly. Humor is nearer at hand. But the most palpable
outgrowth of the daily meditation practice has been greater consistency
with regard to physical exercise, with thirty minutes or more of yoga a
day. One positive habit seems to emerge from the other, along with
 commitment in one area fostering greater commitment in the other.”
Thomas shared that the positive shift in his meditation practice
influenced just about every area of his life. “Eating mindfully, I am
aware of feelings of fullness, and, as a result, eat a bit less and enjoy it
more. I am noticing my own actions more, aware of my surroundings,
less lost in thought, and less likely to abandon tasks before completing
them.”
Researchers (for example, Gardner, Lally, and Wardle 2012) also have
noted this “positive domino effect”: one healthy habit can trigger other
healthy behaviors, even where there’s no obvious or direct connection
between them. For example, someone who starts exercising may begin to eat
more healthily without consciously deciding to do so. Thomas summarized
how this dynamic affected his life: “Greater energy has fostered even more
energy. Increased hope and optimism have fostered more vivid and
enlivening optimism. Mindful alertness in some areas of my life (for
example, awareness of sounds, visual details, and tactile feelings) has led to
more awakened consciousness in many other areas—with respect to world
events and the natural world.”
Different kinds of habits have different feelings and energies associated
with them, but all can be experienced and changed when met with a kind,
interested, and accepting awareness. In the chapters to come, we’ll explore
and work with four main kinds of habits:
Habits of wanting, including craving or habitually seeking food,
drink, drugs, sex, or any other object of desire
Habits of distraction—moving away from your present-moment
experience toward something that seems more attractive, interesting,
or exciting, such as social media, text messages, e-mail, or TV
Habits of resistance—wanting to avoid something you find unpleasant
or painful. (Anger, frustration, judgment, and impatience often signal
that you’re resisting.)
Habits of doing, stress, and worry—feeling as if you’re always on
your way somewhere, without enough time to get everything done; or
always checking items off a “to-do” list, with a stressed, often frenetic
sense of disconnection from the present
Whether you engage in mostly one type of habit or all of them,
mindfulness can connect you with your deepest intentions, shine a light on
behaviors that don’t serve you, and help support your intention to make
changes.
The mindfulness practices to come will help you bring awareness to your
habit urges at three distinct times—before they arise, while you’re
experiencing them, and after they have passed. The practices will also nurture
attitudes of kindness, acceptance, and curiosity, which are conducive to habit
change. Finally, the practices will provide skillful ways of relating to
challenging emotions and mind states, so that you can safely experience the
emotions and mind states your habitual behavior helps you avoid. This will
help loosen your identification with thoughts and beliefs that fuel unhealthy
habits.
A key element of mindfulness as a path to habit change is that
mindfulness helps you get to the root of the habit, beneath the behavior itself.
As a friend and colleague of mine discovered, it’s easy to replace one
unhealthy habit with another. “I stopped drinking in the evening, but I often
wind up craving some food ‘reward’ for not drinking,” she said. “Even
though the food is healthy, it’s still too much. To distract me from that
craving, I started playing games on my computer as a way to make time pass
before I was tired enough to go to bed. That keeps me from having to be with
my feelings. But being on my computer late in the evening affects my
sleeping. It made me realize I’m exchanging one unhealthy habit for
something not quite as bad, but still something that distracts my attention.”
Her experience opened her eyes to the importance of going to the source of
the habit pattern: “When I saw this pattern, I realized that if I don’t open to
the underlying energy of wanting this moment to be different, my suffering
will continue, but in a new form.”

Seven Skillful Mindfulness Practices to Transform
Habits
In this book, you’ll discover for yourself how mindfulness supports changing
unwanted or harmful habits and/or cultivating more healthy and helpful ones,
through the following seven practical skills:
Learning to identify unhealthy or unwanted habits, seeing how they’re
not serving your needs, and consciously establishing an intention to
change and a course of action to effect change
This skill will help you connect with your deepest wishes for
yourself, see the harm caused by unhealthy habits, and bring your
actions into alignment with your intentions.
Relaxing, being open to your experience, and welcoming the good,
the bad, and the ugly aspects of that experience
Cultivating a relaxed and nonjudging awareness in your body,
heart, and mind will help you simply feel the cravings and
challenging emotions that—if pushed away or, alternatively, allowed
to take over—can lead to unhealthy or unwanted behaviors.
Cultivating attitudes and qualities that support mindfulness,
particularly attitudes of kindness, curiosity, and acceptance
When you bring these attitudes to your established habits, you’ll
simply acknowledge your behaviors and thoughts as they are without
making them “wrong” or “bad,” and you’ll avoid adding judgment
and harsh criticism to habitual behaviors, which often perpetuates and
reinforces them.
Focusing your attention through mindfulness of breathing (or of
another object of meditation) and learning to return to your breath
when you find yourself on autopilot or lost in thought
Developing focus and concentration will help counter your mind’s
tendency to go on autopilot and into habitual patterns of thought—and
returning nonjudgmentally to your object of meditation will help
create new, healthier patterns.
Bringing awareness to the thoughts and beliefs that often underlie
established habits
This skill will loosen the grip of the often deep-seated beliefs and
narratives that can undergird habitual patterns of thought and action,
and it’ll allow you to accept your thoughts without identifying with or
getting swept up in them.
Learning to “ride the waves” of difficult experiences and developing
the capacity to stay present with challenging bodily sensations,
emotions, and mind states
This skill will help you learn that you can be open to unpleasant or
difficult experiences without getting pulled into unhealthy or
unwanted behaviors.
Developing beneficial states of heart and mind—particularly loving-
kindness and self-compassion—that will help you create space for
difficult or painful experiences
This skill is essential for working with challenging experiences—it’ll
help you make room for painful experiences and develop the skills
and capacity to deal kindly and wisely with challenging emotions and
mind states.
A caveat: Although mindfulness can be helpful in any situation,
mindfulness or specific meditation practices may not always be the best place
to start. There may be times when being present with what you’re feeling is
too much to bear. For example, if you’re experiencing a panic attack, rather
than sitting still and bringing awareness to your breath, it may be better to
take a walk or to talk with a trusted friend or health professional. To be able
to meet pain or challenging emotions with kindness, you need a certain
degree of stability and resilience. The practices provided in this book will
help you calm your body and mind, but you’re the best judge of whether a
particular practice or approach will be useful to you at any given time.
Mindfulness will be a great support in developing and cultivating this kind of
discernment. are present, with acceptance.

Also, keep in mind that mindfulness is not a magic formula that Respond mindfully—make a choice to respond in a way that supports your deepest intentions.
immediately transforms long-established patterns. It’s a training and a Whatever is happening in your mind and body, know that you have a choice in how you
practice that, over time, leads to change through awareness and conscious respond.
choice. And it may be only one of several complementary approaches to
working with complex conditions or patterns. For example, in the case of (Adapted from Bowen, Chawla, and Marlatt 2011, 90)
trauma or addictions, mindfulness can complement and enhance the
effectiveness of therapy, medication, 12-step programs, and other
approaches.

Practice 2: SOBER Breathing Space

This mindfulness practice, taken from mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), is one that
you can do almost anywhere. It can be particularly helpful whenever someone or something
triggers you to respond in a reactive way or whenever you’re anxious or stressed and feel the
urge to soothe yourself with food, drink, drugs, tobacco, or some other unhealthy habit. All you
need to do is remember the acronym SOBER, which stands for Stop, Observe, Breathe, Expand
Awareness, and Respond Mindfully.

Stop. Slow down, and bring awareness to your mind and body in this moment.
Let’s say you have just had a difficult encounter with a coworker, in which you both got angry
and defensive. When you stop and bring awareness to your experience, you might notice that
your body is tense, your face is flushed, and your thoughts are racing.

Observe what’s happening in your body, emotions, and thoughts with acceptance and without
judgment.
If you’re feeling angry, allow yourself to feel the tightness in your chest and the heat in your
face. You may experience some relaxation as you do so. Notice the thoughts that come up,
without latching onto them.

Breathe. Take a few deeper breaths and then focus simply on the sensations of breathing.
Allow yourself to feel your breath as you breathe in and out, perhaps feeling some release as
you exhale.

Expand your awareness to include your whole body and the overall situation and context with
a kind and accepting attention. Let yourself take in the feelings, thoughts, and emotions that
 The Basics of Mindfulness—Summing Up
Being mindful means intentionally paying attention to your moment-to- PART 2
moment experience with acceptance and without judgment. Mindfulness is a
universal human quality of awareness that is present in all major religious
traditions, as well as many secular practices. It has been most fully developed
PUTTING WISDOM INTO PRACTICE
and investigated in Buddhist teachings, as a direct path to freedom from
suffering. Much of the current interest in mindfulness comes from the
adaptation of Buddhist teachings and practices to a secular context—for
example, in mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR)—and from the
research studies that have shown the benefits of mindfulness.
Mindfulness is a simple practice of being open to your experience just as
it is, here and now. Yet it’s not easy, because there’s much in our evolution,
culture, conditioning, and habits that takes us away from our present
experience. For example, the focus of our “survival brain” on defending
against perceived threats can generate unhealthy patterns and habits that lead
to stress and suffering.
The good news—as both ancient wisdom and modern neuroscience
demonstrate—is that the practice of cultivating awareness with kindness and
acceptance supports greater well-being and a lessening of stress and anxiety.
Mindfulness is a key to changing unhealthy habits and developing more
positive and helpful ones. In bringing awareness to what you’re largely
unconscious of, you can make the invisible visible. This involves bringing
awareness to patterns of thought and action that have become automatic and
unconscious through repetition.
A series of essential skills and practices designed to help you change
unhealthy habits and develop more helpful ones are laid out in the chapters
ahead.
 moment actions with your deepest values.
Chapter 3

The Power of Intention: What Matters

Most?
If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll end up someplace else.
—Attributed to Yogi Berra

All the great transformative advances in our world—from ending slavery

and segregation to traveling to outer space—began with an understanding
either that something was wrong and needed to be changed or that there were
new possibilities waiting to be explored. Next came the intention to make a
change.
If you look at your own life, you can probably think of important changes
you have made—perhaps to live in a more healthy way, or to be more kind
and thoughtful in intimate relationships. You may recall realizing that your
old ways weren’t serving you. And so you set an intention to make a change,
and then put that intention into action.
Intention is the inner compass that sets you on your journey. Without
clear intentions you’ll drift, acting out old habits, like flotsam swept on the
water. You’ll be carried along by thought patterns and behavioral patterns
that may have become so familiar that they seem as much a part of who you
are as the color of your eyes or hair. You’ll become so accustomed to
identifying with your anger or worries that you’ll think, I’m an angry or
fearful person. You may even believe it’s not possible to change these
patterns.
Clear intentions are essential to bringing about meaningful change. As
you learned in chapter 1, because habits operate through fast-moving brain
processes, you may respond automatically to certain events, even when you
intend to act in a different way. In order to change entrenched habits, you
need to develop strong and clear intentions that connect your moment-by-

How to Set an Intention
It’s helpful to take a three-step approach to setting your intentions:
Clarify and connect with what matters most in your life—and commit
to these deepest aspirations.
Identify the habits that prevent you from living out your deepest
intentions—and commit to take action to change these habits.
Align your thoughts and actions moment-by-moment with your
deepest intentions by asking yourself: Does this
thought/action/response serve happiness? Does it support my deepest
aspirations?
Let’s walk through each of these steps.
Connect with What Matters Most
To transform unhealthy thought patterns and behavioral patterns, start by
connecting with your deepest intentions and values. When I ask myself, What
matters most to me in life? the answer is peace and loving relationships.
When I ask myself, What’s my deepest longing for myself and the world? the
answer is a more compassionate world. What comes to mind when you ask
yourself these same questions? There are no right answers, but at times you
may be satisfied with less than you deserve. For example, if your deepest
wish is for more money or a job you like, ask yourself whether these wishes
point to a deeper aspiration.
When you have decided what it is you want—when you can express what
matters most to you—visualize yourself fully embodying this wish for
yourself. Let yourself experience the emotions, sensations, and feelings of
living this intention. How does it feel in your body, heart, and mind? Close
your eyes, and as you breathe in, reflect on your intention, using a word or
phrase, if it’s helpful, such as “peace,” “happiness,” “love,” or “an awake
life.” Write down your intention, and revisit it regularly. You may wish to
begin each day with a reflection on your deepest intention and your aspiration
for the day. You can also use ordinary experiences throughout your day as
reminders to pause and remember what matters most to you. For example,
whenever you’re driving and you come to a red light, rather than waiting
impatiently or checking your phone, you can take a couple of full breaths and
reflect on the intention you want to embody.
Recognize What’s Getting in Your Way
Next, think about thought patterns and behavioral patterns that may
hinder your realization of your deepest intentions. Is there an activity, such as
being so consumed by work that you have little time for your family, that
keeps you disconnected from yourself or your loved ones? Do negative self-
judgments or thoughts of unworthiness prevent you from believing that
meaningful change is possible? When you think about these patterns, how do
you feel? What bodily sensations, emotions, and thoughts are present? You
might notice tension in your belly or chest or tightness in your breathing. If
you do, try to meet these sensations with kindness, interest, and acceptance,
letting them come and go in their own time.
Sometimes the habits that prevent you from getting closer to what matters
most may not be dramatic or very obvious but still cause stress,
dissatisfaction, suffering, or a feeling of not being fully connected to
yourself.
A number of years ago, I had a habit of drinking a couple of glasses of
wine at home each evening after work. It seemed relatively innocuous. The
wine wasn’t burning a big hole in my budget, and the few drinks didn’t seem
like a “problem.” But as I paid closer attention, I felt a kind of “leaning in” to
the drinking in the evening. I would look forward to it as a release after a full
day. And there was also some anxiety—as I left work, I would wonder: Do I
have a bottle of wine at home? Do I need to stop to buy one? I also had the
feeling that an evening without a glass or two of wine would be less pleasant,
that I would be missing something I enjoyed.
The sense of anxiety accompanied by some bodily tension pointed to the
need to pay attention. There was a feeling of unease, and some clinging—the
first two of the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths (suffering, and clinging as the
cause of suffering).
 Over time, with intention and attention—and initially some discomfort at Do you think peace will come some other place than here?
not having my regular habit to lean on—I ended the habit of drinking in the Some other time than Now?
evening. I would have a beer or glass of wine only occasionally, and out of
In some other heart than yours?
conscious choice rather than mindlessly or out of habit. Looking back, I
believe that what I gave up wasn’t the wine as much as the wanting—the Peace is this moment without judgment.
feeling that I needed to have a couple of glasses of wine to feel relaxed and at That is all. This moment in the Heart-space
ease in the evening. The change in the habit brought me a sense of ease, as if where everything that is is welcome.
I had put down a burden I had been carrying. I felt more at peace in the
absence of the habitual wanting to drink in the evening. Peace is this moment without thinking
What stops you from feeling fully alive and connected to your deepest that it should be some other way,
intentions? that you should feel some other thing,
that your life should unfold according to your plans.
Connect with Your Intentions Moment to Moment Peace is this moment without judgment,
this moment in the heart-space where
Each of your voluntary actions is preceded by an intention. Often,
however, you may not be aware of your intentions when acting mindlessly or everything that is is welcome.
out of habit: You scratch an itch without being aware of the intention that (Hunt, n.d.)
preceded the movement to scratch. You say something as a reflex or reaction, In this, or any, moment, what action or response serves your deepest
unaware of the potential impact of your words. You find you have gone to the intention and can help you abandon an unhealthy habit or cultivate a more
freezer and eaten a half pint of ice cream without ever having made a helpful one?
conscious choice.
What you experience in any moment is the fruit of past intentions and
actions, as well as external factors. Whatever is present is here; you can’t
change what’s here now, be it a feeling of excitement, a headache, a sad
mood, or a sense of peace. But you can choose how you respond to what’s
here and sow the seeds of future well-being—or, alternatively, sow the seeds
of suffering—by how you meet this moment. If you meet this moment with
presence, with mindfulness, you’ll cultivate future happiness and well-being.
And if your deepest intention is peace, you can bring peace to this moment.
Dorothy Hunt expresses this quality of presence in her poem “Peace Is This
Moment Without Judgment”:
Do you think peace requires an end to war?
Or tigers eating only vegetables?
Does peace require an absence from
your boss, your spouse, yourself?…

Intention—the Buddha’s Quest
In chapter 2, I described key elements in the life of the Buddha. Siddhartha’s
journey to becoming the Buddha provides one of the clearest and most
inspiring examples of the power of intention.
All of his actions—leaving home, becoming a wandering mendicant,
studying under well-known teachers, practicing rigorous austerities—were
aimed at answering the question “Is freedom possible?” His studies did not
resolve the question, and his ascetic practices only reinforced an inner
duality. But he learned from those experiences and continued his search with
diligence. Sitting in meditation under a tree in northern India, he realized that
freedom comes not from outside of us but from letting go of clinging to
anything. Henceforth, he was known as the Buddha, one who through his
own intention and effort has realized the end of suffering.
Practice 3: Cultivating Intention in Working
with Habits
Over the next week, take some time each day to reflect on what matters most to you in your life
—your deepest wish for yourself, your life, and the world. Write down your intentions, and find
times to reflect on them during the day.
Here are two practices to help bring your actions into alignment with your
intentions. If you like, you can do them as guided meditations using the audio
tracks available for download at the publisher’s website:
http://www.newharbinger.com/32370.
Bringing Awareness to Habits That Hinder Peace
and Happiness
As you go through your day, notice whenever a situation, a person, a news story, a world event,
or anything else triggers you to think or act in a way that’s out of alignment with your deepest
intentions or values. Are there any similarities in the kinds of situations you find challenging, or
when you behave in ways that you would prefer not to? For some people, watching cable
television news leaves them feeling angry or righteous or judgmental. For others, having to wait
for something spurs feelings of impatience or frustration. And for some, feelings of stress or
anxiety generate a desire to eat, drink, smoke, shop, or engage in other habitual behaviors to
alleviate the uncomfortable feelings.
What are the typical ways in which you respond to the urges or triggers
you experience? When faced with a difficult situation, emotion, or decision,
do you get caught up in thoughts that seem to seize control of your mind—for
example, anxious, fearful, angry, or judgmental thoughts? Or do you
procrastinate, “space out,” go online, or watch TV? When you have negative,
painful, or difficult feelings, it’s natural to want comfort or relief. Do you
seek comfort in food, drink, sex, work, or some other mode of self-soothing?
Choose one of these patterns of responding, and become as familiar as
you can with the sensations, emotions, thoughts, and beliefs linked to it.
Sensations: First, what do you notice in your body when you feel compelled to respond in this
way? It can be helpful to name what you’re aware of—“tightness in my chest,” “shallow
breathing,” “muscles tightening,” “wanting to move, do something.” Simply be aware of these
feelings and meet them without judgment.
Emotions: Next, what emotions or mind states do you experience when you feel triggered to
respond in this way? Name them, if it’s helpful—“worry,” “judgment,” “anger,” “frustration,”
“wanting,” “boredom.” Notice how these emotions or states of mind feel in your body. Notice
the thoughts that accompany them, and allow them to arise, meeting them with kindness and
acceptance.
Thoughts and beliefs: Finally, what thought, belief, or story arises when you feel the urge to
respond in this way? Try to untangle the thought from the bodily sensations and emotions. It
might be This feeling is overwhelming; I’ve got to have x, or I’ll feel much better if I have y,
or If I don’t keep working/planning/moving, then something really bad will happen. Meet this
thought or belief with kindness and acceptance. If you can note the thought, bow to it
(metaphorically), and let it go, it’ll begin to lose its power over you.
 What specific action can I take to honor this motivation?
Cultivating a New, Healthier Habit
When, where, and how am I willing to take this action?

Reflect on your deepest intentions and how developing a new goal, such as losing weight or What’s the biggest obstacle to taking this action?
exercising regularly, supports this intention.
What action will I take to prevent or overcome this obstacle? (McGonigal 2012)

Make a specific plan to achieve this goal or cultivate this new habit. What will you do? When?
How? Where? For example, if your goal is to lose weight by avoiding unhealthy food, eating
more nutritious food, and exercising regularly, think of the specific steps and activities that
will help you achieve this goal. For example:
I’ll make a list before I go shopping and only include healthful foods, and I’ll commit
to buying only what’s on the list and not purchasing anything on impulse.

Each day when I return from work, I’ll feed the cat, then put on my sneakers and take
a thirty-minute walk through the neighborhood or in the park.

I’ll bring healthy snacks to work each day so that when I feel the urge to eat, I won’t
get a candy bar from the vending machine.

Visualize how you’ll feel when you’re carrying out the healthy behavior. What do you see,
hear, smell, taste, feel, and think when you imagine yourself engaging in this activity that
aligns with your intentions? Allow yourself to take in these feelings, sensations, images, and
thoughts. Studies (for example, Morris, Spittle, and Watt 2005) show that when we visualize
ourselves carrying out a particular action, we activate the same areas of the brain as when
we’re actually engaged in the activity. For example, imagining themselves getting the ball in
the basket helps basketball players create new pathways in the brain.

Imagine in as much detail as possible a potential obstacle to carrying out this new healthier
behavior, and imagine how you’ll overcome this challenge, if and when it arises. For example,
if your goal is to lose weight by eating more healthfully, an obstacle might be walking down a
particular aisle in the supermarket and seeing your favorite sweets. Visualize yourself meeting
this obstacle by choosing to avoid that aisle or by bringing awareness to your breath and body
as you walk down that aisle, then moving on.

Stanford University psychologist Kelly McGonigal suggests six useful

questions for cultivating a new habit and meeting a goal you have set:

What’s my most important goal?

What’s my deepest motivation for realizing this goal?

 Chapter 4
The Power of Intention: What Matters Most?— Welcoming Your “Guests”
Summing Up
“Clearing”
If you wish to change unhealthy or unwanted habits, your intentions are key.
Do not try to save
Unless you’re clear about why you want to make a change in your life and
how making a change will align you with your deepest aspirations, your old the whole world
thought patterns and behavioral patterns will prevail. or do anything grandiose.
In order to change deeply entrenched habits, you need to be clear about Instead, create
what matters most to you and about the thought patterns and behavioral a clearing
patterns that present obstacles to your deepest aspirations, then commit to
in the dense forest
taking action to initiate change.
of your life
Three steps can help you change unhealthy habits:
and wait there
Think about what matters most in your life, and identify your deepest patiently,
intention. Commit to aligning your actions and your life with that until the song
intention.
that is yours alone to sing
Identify the habits that get in the way of what matters most, and falls into your open cupped hands
commit to the intention to make a change—bringing mindfulness to and you recognize and greet it.
changing an old habit or cultivating a new, more helpful one.
Only then will you know
As you bring awareness to your moment-to-moment experience, how to give yourself
establish—and return to—the intention to move toward your deepest to this world,
aspiration. Choose to stay with your present-moment experience,
so worthy of rescue.
rather than defaulting to habitual thoughts and actions.
—Martha Postlethwaite

When you act in a way that’s out of alignment with your deepest values and
aspirations, you’ll experience stress and suffering. When you do something
you know is unhealthy, such as eating unconsciously or losing yourself in the
wasteland of electronic distractions, you’ll feel a gap between what you’re
doing and how you want to live—and that’s painful. Add self-criticism and
self-judgment, and you may even believe you’re a flawed or bad person
because of your actions.
There’s a story of a man who wanted to go to Newcastle and asked
someone how to get there. The person responded, “If I wanted to go to
Newcastle, I wouldn’t start from here.”
Often we wish we could start from somewhere else. If only we had the
Dalai Lama’s equanimity or Nelson Mandela’s forgiveness or Mother
Teresa’s compassion, it would be so much easier to be peaceful, forgiving, or
kind. But if we want to know peace and freedom in our lives, we have no
choice but to start from where we are.
As you learned in chapter 2, the first of the Four Noble Truths teaches the
importance of acknowledging your suffering. This recognition is essential if
you’re to find a way out. Similarly, acknowledging your harmful or unwanted
habits by bringing awareness to them is the first step to changing them.
The move from thinking This shouldn’t be happening to recognizing that
This is true (and painful) can bring profound insight and is an important step
toward greater freedom.
But changing your habits is challenging. To create new thought patterns
and behavioral patterns, you need to first notice your triggers, the things that
encourage you to act out. Once you learn to notice your triggers, you’ll have
two choices any time you feel the urge to engage in a habit:
One is to carry out the habitual behavior.
The other is to let yourself experience the feelings, sensations,
thoughts, and emotions that are present, then choose not to carry out
the habitual behavior.
This latter choice may not lead to any external action, but may simply
involve tuning in to your experience and letting the impulse pass in its own
time. Or, it may involve choosing a healthier response, such as replacing a
walk to the donut shop with a walk in the park. In this way, you’ll create a
new thought pattern or behavioral pattern that’s in alignment with your
values and intentions.
A helpful question to ask yourself when you feel the urge to act out an
unhealthy habit is What would I have to experience if I were not to eat this
cookie or smoke this cigarette? What would I have to feel?
Training in mindfulness begins with opening to your experience as it is.
But, mindfulness is much more than a technique for cultivating awareness of
your experience. It’s an attitude of relating fully, with an open heart, to life as
it is—recognizing what you’re experiencing and meeting it with kindness and
acceptance.
The willingness to inhabit your feelings—to feel sadness without
escaping into distraction by checking e-mail, to experience a craving without
resorting to short-term relief by lighting a cigarette—is what will allow you
to change an unwanted habit.
This willingness will help you see that all experiences, however difficult,
are temporary. In addition, it’ll help you see that the things you experience
ultimately don’t define you. If you can let yourself feel pain and sadness and
shame without telling yourself that these difficult emotions and sensations
mean something about you, you can simply experience them and let them go,
like weather systems passing through and moving on.
Cultivating a welcoming attitude, saying yes to what is, is key to
changing unhealthy habits. The thirteenth-century Sufi poet Maulana Jalãl al-
Din Rumi captures this welcoming attitude in his poem “The Guest House”:
This being human is a guest-house
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you
out for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
 and invite them in. nowhere fast, but once she accepted that this was the reality, she
Be grateful for whoever comes, realized it didn’t need to be a source of suffering. The rest of the day
was the future and could be dealt with in its own time. She looked over
Because each has been sent
at the driver in the next lane. He was busy texting. She laughed—not at
as a guide from beyond. him but at the way our human minds can lead us to peace or,
(Jalãl al-Din Rumi 2004, 109) alternatively, to stress and worry. “I know I’ll forget this insight
When you welcome your experience in this way, you’ll take refuge in the sometimes, but I’m so grateful to know that I can always come back to
truth. You’ll no longer struggle with your experience, or with life. Anthony the present moment, knowing there’s freedom here and now when I let
de Mello, the Jesuit writer and philosopher, said freedom or enlightenment is go of the stories and of the future,” she said later.
“absolute cooperation with the inevitable” (cited in Adyashanti 2008, 157). In
other words, although you might have wished this moment to be different,
this is how things are right now. To fight with this truth is to suffer. To be
open to this moment—this feeling, sensation, mood, emotion, or thought—
without judgment or resistance is a doorway to freedom and a path to ending
unwanted habits.

Martha’s Story
Martha, a member of my weekly meditation class, was caught in a traffic
jam on her way to work. She had a busy and difficult workday ahead,
with back-to-back meetings and some challenging talks with staff
members. She felt nervous and anxious. Without even being conscious of
her intention, she felt her hands moving toward her phone to check her
e-mail. But her practice of mindfulness allowed her to pause. She
brought awareness to the urge to check her messages and paid attention
to her bodily sensations and emotions—the tightness in her stomach; a
restless, confined, and anxious feeling that the distraction of her phone
might soothe—and she chose to stay with the feelings. They weren’t
pleasant, but she noticed that they didn’t last long. Her mind moved to
thoughts about the day ahead at work, but she chose to come back to her
bodily sensations and her breath. She breathed into the feelings and felt
the waves of sensation come and go.
In the process, Martha relaxed. She was stuck in traffic, but nothing
was wrong. She was warm and comfortable in her car. She was going

Relaxing Your Body and Mind
When you open yourself fully to your experience, life will become much less
problematic. Whatever arises, you can meet it with equanimity. Challenging,
difficult, or painful experiences won’t stop being challenging, difficult, or
painful, but you can meet them as a challenge rather than as a curse—as
something that shouldn’t be happening.
The realization that your freedom and your peace depend more on how
you meet and respond to your experience than on what happens to you is a
profound insight of spiritual life. Viktor Frankl, the renowned psychologist
who survived the Nazi concentration camps, expressed how even in the most
extreme situations we have the freedom to determine how we respond:
We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who
walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last
piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer
sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one
thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any
given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. (Frankl 2006,
86–87)
But to come to this realization without the catalyst of an extremely
traumatic experience is a journey, a training in meeting your experience
courageously, welcoming the guests.
The “guests,” however, are often tempestuous, rowdy, and insistent. The
message from your “survival brain” to your nervous system may be to run,
fight, or freeze. And a countervailing message from your prefrontal cortex—
the more advanced and evolutionarily recent part of the brain—that
everything is fine may carry far less weight than the urgency of the fight-or-
flight message. Think of a panic attack, in which intense bodily sensations of
tension and a racing heart combine with feelings of fear or terror and
thoughts about bad things that might happen. It’s far from easy to simply sit
with such “guests.”
So it serves you to begin a practice of mindfulness meditation by relaxing
your body and your mind as much as you can and creating conditions that’ll
help you be open to your experience with calmness and equanimity. The
practices that follow will help you relax, settle, and be open to what arises.
You can practice them in sequence at the beginning of a period of meditation,
or, if time is limited, you can practice one or more according to your
preference. Most of the guided meditations are about fifteen minutes, and
that’s how long I normally recommend beginners meditate for. Once you
have established a regular practice, you can set a timer and sit for fifteen,
twenty, or thirty minutes or longer.
Practice 4: Calming and Welcoming
For each of these practices, find a quiet place and sit comfortably on a chair (or bench or
cushion). Keeping your back straight, relax your shoulders and rest your hands in your lap (or on
your knees or thighs), with your chest open so you can breathe easily. Allow your eyes to gently
close. Or, if you prefer, leave them open, and let your gaze rest, soft and unfocused, a few feet in
front of you.
Let your attention come into your body. Feel your breath in your nostrils
and with the rising and falling of your chest and belly. Feel your body’s
contact with the surface beneath you.
Deep, Relaxed Breathing
Take a full, deep breath, filling your lungs. Pause for a few seconds before breathing out, then
slowly breathe out until all your breath has been released. Breathe in deeply again, filling your
body with breath, then slowly release; as you breathe out, imagine all of your stresses and cares
are being released. As you breathe in deeply again, invite a quality of calm to your body and
mind. You can silently say Calm as you breathe in and out, or say Breathing in, calming the
body; breathing out, calming the mind. Take another couple of deep, relaxing breaths, in and out,
and then let your breath settle into its own natural rhythm.
Progressive Relaxation of the Body
Bring your attention inward and scan your body, beginning at your scalp and moving down
through your face to your torso and lower body. If you feel tension in any area as you do so,
invite that area to relax.
Breathing in a relaxed way, pay particular attention to those areas where
many of us tend to hold tension: the eyes, the face, the tongue, the jaw, the
shoulders, the back of the neck, the upper back. Then drop down to the chest
and belly, which we often clench when we’re tense or under stress. Invite
your belly to relax and soften, and let your breath come into a relaxed, open
belly. Shift your attention down through your abdomen and groin to your
legs, thighs, calves, and feet, and invite each area in turn to relax. Then
slowly move your attention back up your body. If there’s an area where
you’re still holding tension, pause there, and, breathing in a relaxed, easy
way, invite a natural softening, letting go of any tension. Now bring
awareness to your whole body and be at ease, receptive, and relaxed.
Inviting a Smile
Sitting in a relaxed and comfortable way, see how it feels to invite a smile to your face by
activating the muscles at the corners of your mouth and your eyes. You don’t need to be feeling
particularly happy or joyful to relax and de-stress through smiling. Inviting a smile sends a
message of safety and well-being to your brain and nervous system.
It can help to bring to mind someone who makes you feel happy, or a
place where you feel peaceful and at ease. Allow yourself to sense any shifts
in bodily feelings that come from your smile. Now, let your smile be the
expression of how you wish to greet whatever arises for you. Smile into the
tension in your shoulders; smile to greet an anxious thought; smile at the joys
and the sorrows that come up. Welcome the “guests.” And come back to the
smile anytime in meditation—and in daily life.
“I am aware of…”
Many of us spend large swaths of our time lost in thought and disconnected from our bodies and
emotions, from our aliveness. The Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa described our
everyday human condition as “a huge traffic jam of discursive thought” (Trungpa 1999, 66). A
simple and effective practice that can help you be more aware of your direct experience and live
more fully in the present is to note what you’re aware of from moment to moment.
This is a meditation that you can do almost anywhere—sitting
comfortably and bringing awareness to whatever you notice, and naming or
noting the sounds, sensations, emotions, thoughts, tastes, odors, and images
that come into your consciousness. You can say, “I am aware of x” or simply
note whatever is present—“tightness in belly,” “sound of traffic.”
Here’s the transcript of a five-minute “aware of…” meditation I practiced
on a plane coming back from London: Aware of engine sound…tightness in
chest and belly…deep breath…swallowing…tightness around my eyes…
taking a deep breath…child’s voice…someone coughs…tight throat…sound
of a voice…rumble of engine…relaxing…hands on keyboard…coolness in
air…feeling confined…cough…relaxed breath…darkness in cabin…lightness
of screen…snippet of poem comes into my mind…thoughts about getting
home…thought about seeing my mother…sadness around my eyes…
swallowing…cool air in nostrils…voice…random letters typed from hands in
confined space…sleepiness.
And one I practiced in a coffee shop: Aware of tightness in my belly…a
song on the radio…pleasant feeling in response to the song…aware of
voices…dryness in my mouth…taste of coffee…creaking of the door opening
and closing…thought that “they should oil the door”…high voice of
barista…someone asks if she can sit down…I nod and smile “yes”…pleasant
song on radio…wondering who the singer is…creaking door…tightness in
belly in response to creaking…song…pen pressing against fingers…
creaking…looking at other customers…thinking how quickly the coffee shop
has filled up.
What’s great about this practice is that nothing is “wrong” if you can simply be aware of it and
note it. It helps you see that everything arises, stays for a time, and then passes. And if you can
bring awareness to whatever is present without clinging or pushing away or judging, you can
experience peace and well-being and alleviate stress and suffering.

Welcoming the “Guests”—Summing Up

Mindfulness invites you to start where you are—to acknowledge that this
moment, this experience, is “like this.” There’s a power and freedom that
comes from being open to this moment just as it is. The image of your
experiences, sensations, and thoughts—whether painful or pleasant, joyful or
sorrowful—as “guests,” who come to visit you for a time, can be helpful. If
you can bring a welcoming attitude even to your more challenging
experiences, they’ll become less personal, less of a problem, and more like a
weather system with patterns that may be intense but are also transient.
You’ll see that you can experience urges, strong emotions, challenging bodily
sensations, and difficult thoughts without escaping into habitual and
unhealthy behaviors.
Taking some time to calm your mind and body, cultivating a sense of
ease and tranquility, can also help create the conditions to meet whatever
experiences arise.

Chapter 5
Cultivating Attitudes of Mindfulness
If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing
itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any
moment.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Focusing attention on your direct experience, which we’ll discuss more
fully in the next chapter, is at the core of mindfulness and is essential in
transforming unhealthy or unwanted habits. But attention isn’t enough. You
can be very alert and attentive and wait for the exact moment to make a biting
or hurtful comment that might leave you feeling remorseful or end a
relationship. A pickpocket or burglar may have exquisite focus and attention
to commit his crimes successfully while being indifferent to the harm caused
to his victims and himself. A diligent meditator might be able to develop
deep states of concentration, but if she didn’t cultivate acceptance and self-
compassion she could become disillusioned or doubt-ridden if painful or
challenging emotions or mind states arose that she couldn’t resolve simply by
focusing her mind.
Your intentions are crucial, since they align your thoughts and actions
with what you care about and aspire to most deeply. And your intentions and
actions must be guided by an ethical understanding and approach to life—a
commitment to living and acting in a wise, compassionate, and mindful way.
Otherwise—if mindfulness was just about focused attention—you could
continue to act out harmful habits, but in a more focused way. At the deepest
level, you must ask yourself, Does this thought or action lead to well-being,
benefit, or happiness to myself and others, or does it lead to suffering and
harm? Then you can make choices that are likely to lead to well-being,
peace, and harmony and avoid those choices that will likely lead to harm.
Also essential are the attitudes and qualities you bring to your experience.
Key questions you can ask yourself at any time in meditation and daily life
are: How am I meeting this moment? What are the qualities of heart and
mind with which I am responding to my experience here and now?
In psychology, attitudes are seen as learned tendencies to evaluate certain
things—for example, people, places, or situations—favorably or unfavorably.
Therefore, attitudes can change. In Buddhist understanding and mindfulness
practice, too, attitudes are seen as changeable. You can cultivate attitudes that
support greater happiness and well-being and abandon those that lead to
stress and suffering.
As you have learned, the core of a mindful approach to your experience is
an attitude of receptivity to this moment as it unfolds. This receptivity is
expressed variously as “welcoming your experience,” “accepting,”
“allowing,” “saying yes to what is,” “not resisting (or judging or clinging),”
“being open to,” “being with your experience,” and “letting be.” All of these
words, phrases, and images point to the same attitude or quality of mind—
ending your conflict with this moment’s experience, opening to this moment
as it is. This constitutes not passivity, but rather a creative and dynamic
engagement with your experience.
Some time ago I noticed something had shifted in the way I was driving. I
was driving impatiently more often, seeing other motorists as “in my way,”
honking my horn more frequently, and arriving home more tense than usual. I
wasn’t aware of any particular reason for or event that explained this change.
But since I was teaching a course on bringing mindfulness to unwanted
habits, this pattern seemed like an area of my life that called for attention.
When I explored my intentions, it became clear that my main goal had
been to get to my destination as quickly as possible. When I brought
awareness to a deeper intention, I connected with a wish to be a kind and
thoughtful driver, committed to arriving safely at my destination and wishing
the same for other drivers.
Then when I examined my attitude, I saw that it was generally one of
resisting what I was feeling in the moment and leaning into the future, which
at the time seemed more important and pressing than the present. Being
unaware of my attitude and my relationship to my experience, I was
unconsciously acting out whatever urges or emotions were operating under
the surface of my consciousness. And the more I continued not paying
attention to my direct experience, the more habitual my pattern of impatient
driving became, and the more it became my default mode.
Seeing the ways in which my intentions and attitudes weren’t aligned
with my deepest intentions or the attitudes I wished to bring to my experience
and my life, I was able to establish a clear intention to drive thoughtfully and
safely, with an attitude of kindness and acceptance. This allowed me to reset
my “default” approach to driving. Now, when I find myself triggered by
another driver’s actions or by unexpected traffic, I come back to my
intentions and return to the attitudes of friendliness and acceptance that
embody those intentions.
Seven Attitudes of Mindfulness
Jon Kabat-Zinn, in his classic book on the practices of mindfulness-based
stress reduction, Full Catastrophe Living, highlighted seven essential
attitudes as the soil for cultivating mindful awareness (Kabat-Zinn 1990).
These seven qualities provide a useful starting point for exploring the specific
approaches to meeting this moment that are conducive to well-being and
happiness:
Nonjudging is the quality of meeting your experience impartially,
without evaluating it as good or bad, right or wrong, better or worse.
Patience is the attitude of allowing things to unfold and be
experienced in their own time, without rushing them and losing your
connection with the present moment.
Beginner’s mind is the willingness to meet this moment with
curiosity, as something fresh and never before experienced. As the
Zen teacher Suzuki Roshi said, “In the beginner’s mind there are
many possibilities; in the expert’s there are few” (Suzuki 1998, 21).
Trust is honoring your own authority, inner wisdom, and potential for
growing and learning, as well as feeling confident that you can find a
refuge in the present moment and meet life as it unfolds.
Nonstriving is cultivating an attitude of wise and balanced effort and
seeing how you lose connection with the present moment and with
yourself when you lean into the future to get somewhere or
something.
Acceptance is being open to this moment and experiencing things just
as they are without judgment, clinging, or resistance.
Letting go is cultivating an attitude of being open to your experience,
seeing where you’re clinging or attaching to an experience, and
 releasing your hold on it.
Kabat-Zinn’s list of qualities is a helpful elaboration of important
attitudes to develop consciously in mindfulness practice. Other qualities we
might add include kindness, humor, ease, and determination. There’s clearly
no correct or complete list of qualities that support mindful presence, and
there’s significant overlap between these qualities, which complement and
support each other. The key to their value lies in how effectively they help
you wake up out of unconsciousness and find greater peace and freedom in
your life.
What are the qualities of mind that best allow you to accept your
experience—to be present, alive, and fully engaged?
Three Core Qualities That Support Mindfulness
In my own meditation and mindfulness practice as well as my work with
others, I have found three qualities or attitudes of mind and heart to be
essential:
Kindness—toward yourself and your experience, as well as others
Curiosity or interest in what you’re experiencing
Acceptance of what’s unfolding—the good, the bad, and the ugly
Let’s look at each of these qualities, how they support mindful presence, and
how they can help you work with unhealthy habits.
Kindness
Because many of us are prone to self-judgment and self-criticism, you
may need to nurture and develop kindness toward yourself and your
experience.
I met recently with a student who remarked on how difficult it was to be
kind to herself. Whenever she tried to be kind to herself, she said, “What
comes up right away in my mind is, ‘Who am I to deserve that? I haven’t
earned it.’” If you, similarly, tend to judge yourself harshly or feel a lack of
self-worth, the practice of meeting with kindness whatever arises can help
you be open to and see the impermanence of these harsh voices of self-
criticism. In later chapters, we’ll look at skills to help you investigate these
deeply rooted beliefs (chapter 7) and meet your experience with self-
compassion (chapter 9) to give you some additional support in working with
self-judgment and harsh self-criticism.
Kindness directly counters negative patterns of thought. So, if while
you’re meditating a self-judging thought comes up—I’m so lazy, or
unfocused, or judgmental—you can name that as “judging” and meet it with
as much kindness and self-compassion as possible, perhaps putting your hand
on your heart and saying “forgiven” or “peace.”
If you can continually meet your habits of self-judgment and criticism in
a field of kindness that doesn’t make the thoughts and judgments wrong, but
recognizes them as conditioned and impersonal movements of your mind,
their hard edges will begin to soften and dissolve.
As you bring kindness to your own experience, space will open in your
heart, allowing you to meet the suffering of others with compassion as well.
Naomi Shihab Nye expresses this in her poem “Kindness”:
…Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
You must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive…
(Shihab Nye 1995, 42)
Unless you practice kindness toward yourself, mindfulness can reinforce
the sense that you’re a flawed person, and you’ll keep trying to get rid of or
change the “bad” parts of yourself. Changing your habit will become a self-
improvement project. With kindness, mindful awareness will help you be
open to the fullness of your humanity and see your experiences less
personally. It’ll allow you the space to forgive yourself when you lapse into
old habits or fall short of your objectives and to begin again—to come back
to your intention to change your habits—without the baggage of guilt and
self-recrimination.
Curiosity
Curiosity is the quality of being interested in what’s occurring. It arises
naturally out of paying attention to your experience in a nonjudging way, and
it’s a quality that you can consciously cultivate as well.
Curiosity is an antidote to boredom. When you’re bored, it means you
have lost contact with your direct experience and have bought into a story in
your mind, such as This isn’t interesting; I wish I was doing something else.
Instead of believing the story your mind tells you that this moment should be
different, you can investigate the feelings that are present. Let the thought
that whatever is happening is boring go, and see what happens when you pay
close attention to your emotions and bodily sensations.
As psychologist Fritz Perls said, “Boredom is lack of attention” (cited in
Goldstein 1993, 80). Meditators sometimes feel bored when focusing on their
breath in meditation, but when they focus on their breath more closely—
experiencing the subtly different sensations in their nostrils or torso, or the
feeling of release that can come with a deep exhalation—their breath can
become much more interesting. In the same way, anything that seems
humdrum or banal can reveal hidden depths when you shine the spotlight of
your attention on it. The writer Henry Miller described this shift in attitude:
“The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it
becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself”
(cited in Chang 2006, 67). Mindfulness and investigation are the first two of
seven qualities that the Buddha taught as “factors of awakening”—qualities
that lead to freedom or enlightenment. (The other five are energy, joy,
tranquility, concentration, and equanimity.)
Try bringing curiosity to your experience now, by bringing your
awareness fully to three breaths and noticing with interest whatever
sensations and feelings come up—coolness, tightness, relief, expansion,
whatever is present.
Another simple practice is to open your hand and gaze at your palm for
one minute. What do you notice when you pay close attention: lines, colors,
texture, contours, folds, veins, wrinkles? Is it more interesting than the
thought or concept of looking at your palm?
The next time you’re experiencing a difficult emotion, try turning that
same curiosity toward the way you feel. Rather than getting swept up in the
emotion, examine the strong energies that are present. How do they manifest
in your body—as tightness, tension, heat, or flushing? Do they flow and ebb
slowly, like the tide, or do they land with successive crashes, like waves? Do
they become stronger or weaker, or do they stay pretty much the same? Do
they move around, metamorphosing from one feeling into another?
Becoming familiar with uncomfortable or unpleasant feelings is a key
skill in overcoming unhealthy habits. Bringing awareness to your experience
changes your relationship to it. For example, after Roy, whom you met in
chapter 1, tried bringing curiosity to his habit of eating sweets, he reported: was something I needed to see and know that I wasn’t seeing and knowing—
“The initial intense focus the first few evenings on [my] late-night sugar and and once I “got” what I was missing I would experience a deep freedom.
carb bingeing was incredibly fruitful. There’s a lesson there for me, one that I Somewhere around the sixth day I let go of the searching—or, more
have learned before and will probably need to learn again: when desiring to accurately, the intense searching fell away. What remained was an experience
break an addiction or change a habit, study it with some intensity at first, of deep peace and serenity. I hadn’t “gotten” anywhere, but ending the
bring your concentration to bear, be fearless, have the detachment of a struggle to be somewhere that I was not brought inner peace and happiness.
naturalist studying an animal, and stick with it long enough to get some Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa put it this way: “There is no
insight. Seems so obvious now…but in the beginning it feels like quite a need to struggle to be free; the ending of the struggle is itself freedom”
revelation and very hard to do.” (Trungpa 1999, 46–47).
When you bring these three attitudes of awareness to your experience—
Acceptance kindness, curiosity, and acceptance—you’ll create the conditions for
transforming established patterns of thought and behavior.
Acceptance of your experience is at the core of mindful awareness. You
can’t be mindful if you don’t accept your experience, if you’re in conflict
with it. And for acceptance to be freeing, it must be genuine and
wholehearted rather than conditional or partial. Meditation teacher Tara
Brach termed this radical acceptance (Brach 2003). If your attitude is I’ll
accept this pain as long as it goes away in the next five minutes, it’s one of
bargaining rather than acceptance. When you bargain, your focus is on a
future outcome—in this case, the end of the pain—rather than your
experience as it is. The focus on when the pain will end takes you away from
the present moment. So, if you become aware that your acceptance is partial
or conditional, be open to the resistance, meet it with kindness, and establish
the intention to meet whatever sensations, emotions, or thoughts arise with
full acceptance.
To give you an example of acceptance, let’s say you’re meditating and
you have the thought Something terrible is going to happen. You don’t have
to believe this thought, but you don’t have to try to get rid of it either. You
can accept that this thought exists and meet it with kindness and interest. You
can analyze it, asking yourself Is this thought really true? Or Is this thought
helpful to me right now? Or you can simply observe the thought and let it go,
returning to awareness of your breath or your body.
In the mid-1990s I participated in a silent meditation retreat at a Thai
temple in India, a short walk from the site of the Buddha’s awakening. I
practiced sitting and walking meditation for five or six days, and my
prevailing feeling during that time was that I had to “get somewhere.” There

Bringing Attitudes of Mindfulness to Unwanted
Habits
As discussed briefly in chapter 2, different kinds of habits have different
feelings associated with them, but all can be changed when met with a kind,
interested, and accepting awareness. I highlighted four main categories of
habits—habits of wanting, habits of distraction, habits of resistance, and
habits of doing—that incorporate many of the most common behaviors that
people seek to change.
Habits of Wanting
Habits of wanting, craving, or addiction have an energy and “feeling
tone” of moving toward something that you desire. Your body and mind
focus in on the object—be it a drink, drugs, food, cigarettes, sex, or any other
object of desire—and your sense of well-being and happiness becomes tied to
getting what you crave. Working mindfully with habits of wanting means
being fully open to the feeling of wanting as it manifests—in your body, your
emotions, and your mind. If something triggers the urge, you can be open to
the sensations, feelings, and emotions, say yes to them, and meet them with
kindness, interest, and acceptance. If a thought arises such as I’ll feel better if
I have a smoke/drink, meet that thought with kindness. Choose to
acknowledge what’s happening in your body and your emotions without
acting on it. When you learn to recognize and allow the uncomfortable,
unpleasant, or difficult feelings, you’ll weaken the hold that the craving has
over you. You’ll become less identified with the habit—“I’m a drinker” or
“smoker” or “compulsive eater”—and the urges and habits will become less
“me” or “mine.”
Habits of Distraction
With habits of distraction—such as checking your phone every other
minute or spending large amounts of time on social media or watching TV—
the initial challenge may be to know that your attention has wandered and
you have lost contact with your intentions and plans.
When you become aware that your attention has moved into an unwanted
or unhealthy habit—or if you can catch yourself before moving into it—bring
a close attention to your bodily experience and emotions. Is there an
uncomfortable bodily feeling that you want to escape from—perhaps some
tension or agitation in the body? Stay with these sensations and feelings, then
bring to mind the question: What must I experience if I don’t turn toward my
habitual behavior? Perhaps the answer is a feeling of tightness, numbness, or
restlessness. Meet the experience with a kind, curious, and accepting
attention. See how, when met in this way, the feeling will come and go in its
own time.
You can meet emotions such as fear, anxiety, and anger with the same
receptive attitude. And when thoughts of moving away from what feels
unpleasant toward immediate gratification arise, reflect on what matters most
to you. Will you be happier with a feeling of temporary relief that reinforces
the unhealthy habit? Or do you wish to move toward greater well-being,
health, and peace? Then, choose to stay with what’s present without acting
mindlessly or out of habit.
Habits of Resisting
Habits of resisting, which manifest as frustration, annoyance, impatience,
anger, judgment, and similar emotions and mind states, tend to have a
different “feeling tone.” You feel as if you’re defending yourself, resisting a
threat, or protecting yourself from something that will harm you. Often you’ll
feel tightness, tension, contraction, agitation, heat, or other “fight-or-flight”
sensations. The accompanying thoughts or beliefs may urge you to act in a
way that will change this unpleasant situation or experience. Think about
feeling impatient in a store when someone seems to be taking “too long” to
finish a purchase, or being stuck in traffic when you’re running late. You’ll
typically feel a tightness in certain muscles—often the chest or belly or face
—linked to thoughts like This person/situation/experience shouldn’t be like
this, I need to do something to change this, or I need to solve this problem.
You can meet habits of resistance in the same way that you respond to
habits of wanting and distraction: by bringing your attention back to what
you’re experiencing right now, then meeting what’s here with a kind, curious,
and accepting awareness. Bringing awareness to your breath will help ease
feelings of tightness and tension. Putting your hand on your heart can help
bring you back into awareness of your body and temper thoughts of needing
to do something. Sending a wish of peace and well-being to yourself, perhaps
whispering “May I be peaceful,” can create a sense of inner space to hold the
difficult experience and sensations. Here, too, the practice is to bring a kind,
curious, and accepting attitude to what’s present—choosing to stay with your
direct experience rather than moving into habitual behavior. The Tibetan
Buddhist teacher Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche stated the choice clearly:
“Ultimately, happiness comes down to choosing between the discomfort of
becoming aware of your mental afflictions and the discomfort of being ruled
by them” (Yongey Mingyur 2007, 250).
Habits of Doing
Habits of doing typically involve feeling as though you’re always on your
way somewhere, as though something bad will happen if you don’t keep
moving and getting things done. You may think, Things will be okay if I can
just accomplish the next task. You may feel frenetic, agitated, intense, or
stressed out.
You can respond to these habits with the same attitude of kind, interested,
and accepting awareness. Begin by coming back to what you’re feeling now
—physically, emotionally, and mentally. Invite yourself to experience all the
sensations and emotions associated with that frantic energy without
identifying with that energy. Mindfulness practice will help prevent you from
getting swept up in the story of “I need to get this done or things will fall
apart.”
These four kinds of habits aren’t mutually exclusive. A craving for
something that you think will make you feel good, such as eating something
sweet, is often accompanied by a desire to avoid an unpleasant feeling—for
example, tension, worry, tightness, or numbness. Similarly, when you
disconnect from the present moment by spending large amounts of time
online, there’s often a feeling of discomfort, anxiety, or tension that you’re
subconsciously seeking to escape. With each of these habitual patterns, the
remedy is the same: return to your present-moment experience and meet it
with interest, friendliness, and acceptance.
Practice 5: Meditation on Attitude
This is a meditation that involves being aware of the attitudes you’re bringing to your
experience. It involves asking, Am I meeting this moment in a welcoming way? Or with
resistance or judgment? It’s a practice you can incorporate into formal meditation periods, as
well as at different times in your daily life.
Sit comfortably, and allow yourself to relax and settle. Close your eyes,
and let your attention rest in your body. Take a few full breaths, on each out-
breath releasing any tension you might be holding. Invite your body to relax,
slowly moving your attention down and up your body, inviting a softening of
any area where you’re holding tension.
For fifteen minutes or until the end of your meditation period, be open to
whatever you’re experiencing in an accepting and nonjudging way. If it helps
ground you, maintain a relaxed awareness of your breathing.
To help bring awareness to your moment-to-moment experience and
cultivate kindness, interest, and acceptance, attitudes that support well-being
and happiness, periodically bring awareness to your experience and notice
your attitude at that moment. Is there a feeling of being on your way
somewhere? Are you tensing or defending yourself against something? Are
you resisting your experience? Does your relationship to this moment feel
friendly and kind? Is there a quality of welcoming or allowing what’s present
to be here? Or an attitude of pushing away? If your attitude is one of
resistance, clinging, or judging, consciously evoke an attitude of kindness to
yourself and your experience. You can put your hand on your heart and wish
yourself well: “May I be at peace…may I be happy.” Invite an attitude of
interest to your experience. What am I aware of? How does it feel?
Consciously say yes to whatever you’re experiencing by accepting,
welcoming, and allowing what’s present to be just as it is. Bring a half smile
to your face, relax the muscles at the corners of your mouth and eyes, and
offer the welcoming attitude of a smile to whatever arises.

Cultivating Attitudes of Mindfulness—Summing Up
Mindfulness involves paying attention, but paying attention in a particular
way. How you meet your experience is a key element of mindfulness. So are
three qualities or attitudes you bring to your practice: kindness, curiosity, and
acceptance. Together they’ll help you be present for your experience and
counter your tendencies to move habitually toward what you like and resist
what you don’t like.
Kindness will counter negative or judging patterns of thought and open
space for you to be able to experience challenging sensations, emotions, and
mind states. When you bring curiosity to your experience, you’ll no longer be
swept up in or so identified with your experience. Being curious will allow
you to step out of your mind’s story or narrative and into your direct
experience. And acceptance will invite you to meet your experience
wholeheartedly and without resistance. When you accept your experience
fully, you’ll no longer be caught up in it or defined by it.
You can bring these attitudes to different kinds of habits, including habits
of wanting, resisting, distraction, and doing. Any time you bring awareness
to your experience, you change your relationship to it. When you meet
habitual behaviors with friendliness, interest, and acceptance, their hold over
you will tend to weaken, enabling you to abandon unwanted or unhealthy
habits and cultivate more beneficial ones.
Chapter 6
Harnessing the Power of Attention
The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention over and
over again is the very root of judgment, character and will… An education
which should improve this faculty would be the education par excellence.
—William James, The Principles of Psychology
Over the years, many of my students have shared that mindfulness has
helped them change long-standing habits, and more than a few have reported
that it saved their life.
Steve’s Story
At a weekend silent meditation retreat I was teaching, one day Steve, the
retreat manager, asked whether he could have a word with me after
breakfast. “I know I shouldn’t talk, but I want to share with you what I
realized today: it’s okay to be still!” Steve said he felt a deep sense of
relief and well-being in knowing that there was nothing to fear in
stillness.
I first met Steve in late 2006. He had contacted me for individual
mindfulness counseling after attending a daylong meditation workshop I
had taught. Steve had recently retired after twenty-seven years as an
army officer, having served in Iraq and many other zones of conflict. He
had been in the Pentagon in the part of the E-Ring—the outer area of
the building, occupied by senior officials—that was struck directly by a
hijacked plane on September 11, 2001. Two minutes before the plane
hit, he had been with the general, who died when the plane crashed into
his office. When the plane hit, Steve was knocked down by debris, lost
consciousness, came to, and was helped out of the building through the
smoke, ash, and water. For some years afterward, he had no wish to
attend memorials or other events related to the attack or even discuss
his experience.
But the patterns that created stress and trauma in Steve’s life began
long before the events of September 11. His working-class, ethnic
upbringing in New York taught him how to be tough. He learned that it
was not manly, and could be dangerous, to show his feelings. The way
you survived and made it in the world was to “suck it up.” Joining the
army was a natural choice.
Steve did well at West Point and was promoted to captain, major,
then colonel ahead of his classmates. The army taught him how to
suppress his fear and respond automatically under threat. What the
military never taught him was to feel or express emotion.
For two decades, Steve’s army career flourished. He was trusted by
his superiors, and he was liked and respected by those under his
command. But his marriage fell apart, and his relationship with his kids
grew distant. The pressure to “stuff” his feelings intensified. In the first
Iraq war (Operation Desert Storm), Steve drove down the Highway of
Death from Kuwait into Iraq and witnessed the carnage. “The only way
I could deal with this horror was to believe it was a good thing, that it
had to happen, and that our enemies were less than human,” he said.
As the pressure built, particularly after 9/11, Steve took refuge in
alcohol and the prescription drugs that gave him temporary relief. He
was able to leave the army honorably, but addicted. For a year and a
half, he isolated himself before seeking help by checking into a recovery
program.
In the years we worked together, Steve practiced opening himself to
the feelings that he had suppressed for decades. He learned that even
the most difficult emotions lasted for only a time and that it was possible
to ride even intense waves of sensation and emotion. “I learned that I
could let myself feel what I’m feeling. Sometimes it felt like my whole
body was going to explode, but I learned that I could stay. I really
believe this practice has rewired my brain. I can feel pain and be with it
in a different way.”
Steve shared that what most inspired him about mindfulness was
learning that change is possible. “When I began this practice, I couldn’t
get on an elevator or sit in a room without being anxious and fidgety
and wanting to run out. Now I know that even when old habits and
patterns return, I have the tools to stay with the feelings and see that
they pass. I know peace and stillness are possible even in difficult
times.”
As of this writing, Steve has rebuilt a warm and loving relationship
with his kids. He recently graduated from a two-year meditation
teacher–training program I co-taught, and he’s working on a PhD in
psychology. “At times I forget and get pulled back toward old habits,”
he says, “but I always know I can come back to awareness, to the inner
stillness I have touched, and can begin again.”
Paying attention to your direct experience is at the core of mindfulness. In
Buddhist teachings, suffering arises from not seeing things as they really are.
Freedom from suffering comes from taking refuge in reality, in the truth of
how things are, by being open to your experience as it is. In the words of the
Buddha: “In the seen there will be just be the seen, in the heard just the heard,
in the sensed, just the sensed, in the imagined just the imagined” (Kornfield
1996, 67).
To illustrate, imagine a friend walks by without greeting you. If you have
a habit of judging yourself harshly and believe that others have a low opinion
of you, you might interpret your friend’s lack of acknowledgment as a
deliberate slight. You might fall into a spiral of negative thoughts and
judgments about your friend’s unkindness or your own unworthiness. But if
you can meet those thoughts and judgments with kindness, you’ll see them as
nothing more than passing phenomena. If you can be open to any unpleasant
bodily sensations or emotions that you’re experiencing as a result of the
perceived snub, you can offer yourself compassion and wish yourself well.
You can reflect kindly about your friend and consider the possibility that she
didn’t see you or was preoccupied. And if your friend might have been
sending a message by her silence, you can commit to having a conversation
with her about any difficulties or misunderstandings in your relationship.
As you train yourself to pay attention by focusing on a particular object
such as your breath or sounds in your environment, you’ll strengthen your
faculty of mindfulness. With practice, you’ll be more able to bring this kind,
nonjudging attention to your habitual behaviors, such as eating compulsively
or checking social media whenever you’re bored.

Paying Attention Before, During, and After

You can work on undoing an unhealthy habit by exercising present-moment
awareness at three distinct times: before the impulse to engage in the habit
arises, during the impulse to engage in the habit, and after the impulse to
engage in the habit has subsided (or been indulged).

Before: You can explore what leads you to engage in the habit and
make choices that can help prevent you from doing so.

During: You can pay attention and choose to be open to the urge,
craving, or difficult feeling that typically spurs the habitual behavior,
gently focusing on that feeling and allowing it to come and go rather
than engaging in the habit.

After: If you engaged in the habit, you can consciously extend

yourself kindness and forgiveness, rather than compounding an
unhealthy habit with negative judgments or harsh self-criticism.

Practice 6: Awareness of Habits—Before,

During, and After

Here are some examples of ways you can work at changing a habit at these three different points.

Before: Bring awareness to the habit that you want to change, and think
about the situations or conditions that trigger the habit. Are there
actions you can take to avoid acting out of habit? What might be an
alternative, healthier choice? For example:

If at home you frequently snack on sweets when you’re feeling anxious, uncertain, confused,
or lonely, ensure that you don’t have sweets in the house. Purchase healthier foods, such as
 nuts or fruit, to have on hand when you wish to snack.
If you typically drink more alcohol than is good for you when you get together with a
particular friend, propose meeting for a hike or coffee rather than for happy hour.
If you have a habit of procrastinating when you think about working on an important project,
make a commitment to yourself to work on it for a limited time each day—say fifteen to thirty
minutes, twice a day.
If you often find yourself driving impatiently or aggressively because you need to be at work
or at an appointment on time, plan (if possible) to add a ten- or fifteen-minute cushion to your
travel time, and commit to driving in a conscious and relaxed way as you begin your journey.
Once you bring awareness to the habit urge and notice how and when it
typically arises, you can take steps to keep it from arising. And you can be
prepared with alternative, more positive responses if it does arise.
During: Pay attention to the context or environment in which the habit
urge typically arises—the place, time, people, sights, sounds, and smells.
For example, perhaps you find the smell of sweet, sticky buns in a mall
or airport irresistible and find yourself buying and eating them without
consciously deciding to do so. If so, whenever you’re in a mall or airport,
pay close attention to what you’re experiencing. Then, when you first
become aware of the craving for a bun, take a few deep breaths and
bring awareness to your internal experience. Perhaps your stomach is
tight or your mouth is watering. Make a conscious choice to remain
aware of your direct experience, rather than acting on the craving.
tightness, shortness of breath, pressure, heat, racing heart
After: If you successfully resisted the impulse to engage in the habit, let
yourself feel whatever comes up. Perhaps it’s a feeling of relief or release,
or gratitude that you were able to respond mindfully, or a feeling of
optimism that change is possible. Take these feelings in. Appreciate any
positive bodily sensations, emotions, or thoughts. Take in the good
feelings. If negative or neutral feelings arise, meet them too with
kindness and care.
If you failed to resist the impulse to engage in the habit, meet whatever
feelings come up with kindness. If self-judgment or harsh criticism arises,
hold these feelings and thoughts with care and compassion. Similarly, if
frustration or pessimism arises, meet it with friendliness. You can put your
hand on your heart and say, “I care about this suffering” or “forgiven.”
As a way of learning from this experience, think back to the conditions
that led you to act on the urge and explore whether there was a point at which
you might have made a different choice. Did you suffer a lapse in awareness?
Did a change in the situation or the arrival of a strong emotion lead you to act
on the impulse to engage in the habit? Did the craving feel too strong to
resist?
What might have helped you make a choice that was more in alignment with your deepest values
and intentions? Revisit what matters most to you and how working to abandon this unhealthy or
unwanted habit supports your deepest intentions. Remember, you can begin again in any
moment, and choose to begin again.
Roy (who you may recall from chapter 1 has a sugar craving) practiced
bringing awareness to his experience before, during, and after his cravings.
Roy’s Story—Continued
Knowing the temptation of walking past the mini-mart that sold packs of
delicious chewy cookies, Roy sometimes took a different way home.
“Some nights, I’m choosing to stop at the supermarket and buy carrots
and hummus as an alternative,” he said. “Some nights I still binge.”
Also helpful for Roy was to see his craving in the larger context of
his life. “I have never before thought so regularly about things like Is
my weekly schedule balanced? Does it have the right kinds of things in
it? Is the mix right? Whom am I seeing too much of? Whom too little?
And on a daily basis I try to meditate for forty-five minutes, get some
exercise that makes me sweat, do some yoga, do something outside of
work with someone or a group of people who are good for me to hang
out with, read and listen to something good, and look for ways I can be
focused on others and possibly help someone out. I don’t worry much if
I can’t tick all those boxes. If I’m getting most of them most of the time
and not starving any one of them in particular, I’m all right.”
As noted earlier, Roy chose to focus closely on the direct experience
of craving when he felt compelled to binge on sweets late in the evening.
One of the strategies that he found most helpful was to substitute
something healthy (or at times, less unhealthful) for the sweets. “I’m
letting go of ice cream more of the time—sometimes substituting
nothing, sometimes meditation or yoga, sometimes something less
damaging than an entire pint of high-fat ice cream yet still pretty awful,
like a bag of chocolate candies. With cigarettes and alcohol I could just
put them down and work on substituting something else into my life.
With sweet bingeing, if I can’t substitute something else in a complete
way, I look for something less harmful, then just enjoy it while trying to
keep self-kindness in mind.”
Whenever Roy did succumb to a craving, he met his lapse with
kindness: “I am now able to more readily and frequently ride the wave
of self-flagellation with a bit of detachment and find some kindness and
friendliness toward myself.”
Roy recognized that bringing greater awareness to his craving for
sweets, and living more consciously and healthfully, is a journey rather
than a destination. Supportive friends, increased consciousness of his
schedule and diet, and a daily practice of meditation and yoga were all
aids to greater awareness. “I’ve lost five pounds and gained a notch in
my belt. Yet some nights are still a struggle—but I’m meeting them with
more lightness, humor, and equanimity.”
The Two Forms of Self-Awareness
In the past decade, neuroscientists have discovered that mindfulness training
changes the structure and functioning of the brain. Among the most
interesting and relevant to the understanding of the role of mindfulness in
habit change is a 2007 study by Norman Farb and colleagues.
Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), Farb and
colleagues studied the brain activity of a group of participants who were new
to mindfulness and compared it to the brain activity of a group of participants
who had attended an eight-week mindfulness course. The researchers found
two distinct forms of self-awareness: a narrative focus—which they called
the default mode network—that was associated with rumination, self-
referencing, mind-wandering, and more negative feelings; and an
experiencing focus: seeing moment-to-moment experiences as transient
events, which was associated with more positive feelings. Those participants
who had been trained in mindfulness were better able to access the
experiencing mode and uncouple from the narrative mode (Farb et al. 2007).
This and other studies (for example, Mason et al. 2007) point to two
different ways of being aware of your experience. In a resting state, if you’re
not paying attention to your direct experience, you typically default to
narrative mode. In narrative mode, you’re comparing yourself with others,
thinking about the past or future, and generally ruminating. But if you can
bring awareness to what’s present, you’ll be less subject to mind-wandering
and rumination, and experiencing mode will become your default mode.
Farb and colleagues suggest that the present-centered, experiencing mode
may have been the original mode of self-awareness of our ancestors and that
the narrative mode of self-reference may represent “an over-learned mode of
information processing that has become automatic through practice” (Farb et
al. 2007, 319). One way to characterize the narrative mode of self-awareness,
then, is as a downside of modern humans’ ability to process information and
imagine future possibilities.
Studies on the default mode network of the brain are important in
understanding the role of mindfulness in transforming unwanted habits. They
point to the ways in which mindfulness training can help you overcome the
habits of rumination and mind-wandering, which can spur unhealthy
behaviors and thought patterns. Training in paying attention to the present
moment can free you from the suffering that comes from being lost in
discursive thought, opening you to the freedom that’s here in each moment. The Art of Paying Attention
In meditation, there are many different objects of attention, or “anchors,” that
you can use to sharpen your focus and deepen your concentration. For
example, you can use:

A mantra—a word or phrase that you focus on and return to

An external object—such as a candle, sounds, or images

A bodily sensation

A visualization or mental image

A koan (a paradoxical question in Zen Buddhism), such as “What’s

the sound of one hand clapping?”

A philosophical question, such as “Who am I?”

In mindfulness meditation, your object of attention is typically an aspect

of your direct experience—your breath, your bodily sensations, sounds in
your environment, or (in walking meditation) the movement of your body.
If you’re like most people, given the tendency for the mind to wander and
get caught up in the content of your thoughts and emotions, it’s important to
train your mind in focused attention by concentrating on one thing, such as
your breath. In this way, you’ll learn to deepen your capacity to stay focused
and to return to your object of meditation when your attention gets pulled
away.
One of the most common objects of attention in mindfulness and other
forms of meditation is your breath. Your breath can be an excellent object of
attention, for several reasons:

It’s readily available—as long as you’re alive, you’re breathing.

It’s a relatively neutral object. People don’t tend to feel overly

 positive or negative about their breath.
It’s a good barometer of your overall level of stress or relaxation.
Your breath tends to be short and tight when you’re under stress and
fuller and deeper when you’re relaxed.
Focusing on your breath often has a calming effect.
Practicing mindfulness of breathing is relatively straightforward: You
bring conscious awareness to the experience of breathing. The Buddha’s
instructions on mindfulness of breathing begin, “mindful he breathes in,
mindful he breathes out. … Breathing in long, he knows, ‘I breathe in
long’…breathing in short, he knows, ‘I breathe in short’” (Anãlayo 2003,
126). The challenge is to sustain your attention on your breath rather than on
anything that might feel more compelling—a memory of a discussion you
had recently, your to-do list for the day ahead, images from a movie you saw
recently, or fantasies about a new relationship or an exciting job. So, the
practice of mindfulness of breathing involves:
Focusing your attention on the object of awareness—your breath
Sustaining your attention on your breath in the face of other
experiences (whether internal or external) that compete for your
attention
Monitoring where your attention is and noticing when it has drifted
Withdrawing your attention from thoughts when you become aware of
being caught up in thinking
Redirecting your attention to your breath without judgment
This last item is key. When practicing mindfulness of breathing, it’s
important that you meet any “lapse” of attention with kindness and
nonjudgment, acknowledging that creating distracting thoughts is simply
what the mind does. Think of your mind as a restless puppy. A puppy loves
to scamper around, but you can train it (with kindness and diligence) to sit
and respond to directions.
As with training a puppy, neither harshness nor laxness is effective in
training your mind. Rather than seeing your wandering mind as a problem,
try to celebrate the fact that you can wake up out of your plans, memories, or
daydreams and experience this moment of wakefulness. And then come back
to your breath—in-breath, out-breath—again and again.
Learning to stay with your breath or another object of meditation will
strengthen your capacity to be open to difficult experiences, including strong
impulses, cravings, and challenging emotions. Unless you practice opening
yourself to strong emotions, powerful moods, or uncomfortable bodily
sensations, they’ll sweep you into habitual patterns again and again.
To sustain your focus on your breath, it can be helpful to open yourself to
the feeling of your breath in your body and see where the sensations of
breathing feel most relaxing to you. It might be your nostrils, where the
coolness of the air coming in gives you a sense of well-being, or your chest
or belly, where breathing out gives you a sense of ease. Make this your
“home base” to which you can return whenever you become aware your
attention has drifted.
If your mind is active and it’s hard to focus on your breath, try counting
breaths. One method is to count by one for each out-breath until you reach
ten, then begin again at one—and any time your mind drifts into thought, or
you lose count, just return again to one.

How Can the Art of Paying Attention Help You
Change Unhelpful Habits?
Once you learn to pay attention more closely to your experience through
mindfulness practice, you’ll begin to see the ways in which cues and triggers
in your environment or in your mind and body lead you to engage in habitual
patterns of behavior. For example, perhaps it’s loneliness that often leads you
to reach unconsciously for a cigarette. With awareness, rather than smoke a
cigarette, you can simply observe that feeling of loneliness until it passes. If
you can be open to the experiences, such as feelings of loneliness, that
typically trigger your habit urge, you can make choices that are more in
alignment with your values and goals.
A friend and colleague of mine emphasized how much the benefits of
mindfulness depend on practice: “If there’s one thing I’m hit over the head
with repeatedly it’s that [mindfulness] is a practice—a long-term
commitment that takes time and repetition for changes to occur. I might not
realize that changes are happening until much after the fact, but boy, are they
happening. In the process, things sometimes feel worse before they feel better
because I’m so much more aware that I’m feeling anything at all. Things that
I had pushed away—habits of eating and drinking to relieve stress that I
wasn’t paying attention to—I’m now more willing to look in the face. And
that’s difficult at times. But I know the way out, as someone said, is
through.”
In a recent study (Moore and Malinowski 2009), researchers compared a
group of mindfulness meditators with a group of non-meditators using a well-
known test of attention—the Stroop test. In the Stroop test, subjects are
shown color words (for example, “red”) that are sometimes actually a
different color (for example, blue). When asked to identify the color of each
word, most subjects take longer to respond when the color doesn’t match the
word. This is because their brains automatically process the meaning of the
word, which interferes with their ability to say what it is they actually see (the
color of the word).
The study found that meditators performed better than non-meditators on
all measures of attention, as well as demonstrated greater cognitive flexibility
—the “human ability to adapt cognitive processing strategies to face new and
unexpected conditions.” This suggested that, through training in mindfulness,
cognitive processes that had become automatized could “be brought back
under cognitive control and that previously automatic responses could be
interrupted or inhibited” (Moore and Malinowski 2009, 182–83). In other
words, with mindfulness, even decades-old habits can be brought into
awareness and changed.
Practice 7: Mindfulness of Breathing
Meditation
Take a few moments to relax your body and mind, letting your awareness come into your body.
Take some full, deep breaths; on each out-breath, relax and let go of the stresses and cares of
your day.
Invite a half-smile to the corners of your mouth and eyes, and visualize
meeting everything you experience with the welcoming expression of a
smile.
Sit in a way that’s both relaxed and alert. With your eyes closed, if this is
comfortable for you, or with your eyes open and your gaze soft and
unfocused, bring your attention to the sensations of breathing—the feeling of
breathing in and breathing out. As you breathe in, know that you’re breathing
in, and as you breathe out, know you’re breathing out. Allow your breath to
be just as it is, without trying to deepen it or change it in any way.
If it’s helpful, mentally note In as you breathe in and Out as you breathe
out. Or silently say Rise and Fall as your chest and belly rise and fall.
Establish a “home base” wherever your breath is most noticeable or feels
most relaxing. It might be at your chest or belly, or at your nostrils where the
cool air enters and the warm air is released. Let your attention rest in the
direct experience of your body breathing.
Any time you become aware that your attention is no longer on your breath, if self-judgment or
annoyance comes up, meet it with kindness. If it’s helpful, silently label whatever mental activity
 it was that drew your attention—if you were planning your day, remembering a conversation, or
daydreaming, note planning, remembering, or daydreaming—and gently bring your attention
back to your in-breath and out-breath without judging or criticizing yourself. Do this for fifteen
minutes or until the end of your meditation period.
In meditation, once your attention is stabilized on your breath or another
object of meditation, you can be open to all aspects of your experience as
they arise and pass—everything that enters your awareness through your five
senses, as well as thoughts, emotions, moods, urges, and mind states. The
following meditation will help you practice expanding your awareness.
Practice 8: Body Awareness Meditation
Pause whatever you have been doing and come into stillness, sitting comfortably. Let your eyes
gently close, or keep them half open with a soft gaze a few feet ahead of you. Bring awareness to
your body and whatever sensations are present.
Feel your body’s contact with the surface beneath you, being open to
whatever sensations are present—hardness, pressure, heat, tingling, pulsing,
and so on. Feel the contact of your feet with the floor and the contact of any
part of your body with another part—for example, your hands in your lap or
on your knees. Feel the sensations in your chest and belly, breathing with
whatever is present.
Bring awareness to your breathing, and notice whether your breathing is
relaxed or tense. Meet your breathing as it is, and invite your breathing and
your body to relax.
As you bring awareness to your body, let yourself feel whatever sensations are present. Watch
them come and go; watch them ebb and flow. If the sensations cause you any stress or tension or
anxiety, meet it with a kind and friendly attitude. Do this for fifteen minutes or until the end of
your meditation period.
Eating is an area in which unhealthy habits are strong for many people.
Perhaps you have a habit of eating in response to emotions or strong cravings
rather than consciously and from need, or perhaps you have a habit of eating
without awareness, scarcely aware of the taste of the food. A formal eating
meditation practice can help you bring greater awareness to the experience of
eating by slowing the process down and paying close attention to the details
—touch, aroma, taste, sensations, thoughts, urges—of eating.
Practice 9: Eating Meditation
Begin by taking a simple piece of food, such as a raisin or grape, in your hand. Hold it in the
palm of your hand or between your forefinger and thumb.
Imagine you have never seen this type of food before. Focus on it, taking
time to really see it. Give it your full attention, examining its lines, its color,
its shape, its folds, and any unique features. Notice any thoughts that come
up, and simply be aware of them.
Feel it between your thumb and forefinger, exploring its texture (with
your eyes closed, if you like).
Place it beneath your nose and take in the aroma, noticing any
anticipatory response in your mouth or stomach.
Bring it to your lips and place it in your mouth, but don’t chew it yet. Feel
the sensations and taste of having it in your mouth, exploring it with your
tongue. Notice if you have the urge to chew it. Be aware of anything that
comes up—thoughts, anticipation, liking, disliking. Be aware of whatever
you experience.
When you’re ready, consciously chew once or twice, and notice what
happens—notice the taste, the texture, the sensations of chewing, and
anything else happening in your mouth and stomach. Take as long as you like
to chew the food.
When you’re ready to swallow, bring awareness to the intention to
swallow, and consciously experience swallowing and digesting the food.
Bring awareness to any lingering taste, the feelings of digestion, and the
overall sensations in your body. If you wish, repeat this practice with another
piece of food.
As you finish this practice of mindful eating, note one or two things that stood out about it.
Perhaps it made it clear to you that much of the time you don’t really think about what you’re
 eating. Perhaps you realized you have a tendency to get ahead of yourself, anticipating the next
bite of food before you have finished the current one. Or maybe you experienced eating in a way
that was entirely new to you.
Explore bringing this mindful approach to eating one of your meals.
Mindful doesn’t have to mean slow, but slowing down can help you be more
present for your experience.
Harnessing the Power of Attention—Summing Up
Focused attention is a key element of most meditation practices, not just
mindfulness meditation. Focusing your attention is essential to changing
unhealthy or unwanted habits, because it allows you to bring into your
awareness behavioral patterns and thought patterns that were previously
automatic and unconscious.
There are many different objects or “anchors” that you can use to focus
your mind in meditation. One of the most commonly used and readily
accessible is your own breathing. You can train your attention by bringing
your awareness to the sensations of breathing and by returning your attention
to your breath, with kindness and without judgment, any time you become
aware that your attention has shifted.
Strengthening your faculty of attention or focus will allow you to bring
awareness to an unwanted habit before you feel the urge to engage in it,
during the compulsion to engage in it, and after you have engaged—or not
engaged—in it. Bringing awareness to the habit at each of these points will
help you avoid triggers, meet your urges with kind attention, and show
compassion and forgiveness to yourself when you do engage in the habit.
The art of focusing your attention will help you see that whenever you’re
mindful, you have a choice about how to respond to what you’re
experiencing. And with training, you can make your default mode a present-
centered awareness rather than one in which you’re lost in plans, memories,
or distractions—and choose to respond to urges and cravings in healthy ways
that are aligned with your deepest values and intentions.

Chapter 7
Untangling Yourself from Habitual
Thoughts and Beliefs
With our thoughts we make the world.
—Buddha
Buddhist teacher Martine Batchelor noted: “Often we are more afraid of the
idea of something happening than the actuality of it. When we are actually
confronted with it, we are able to deal adequately with the direct impact of
the situation” (Batchelor 2007). This certainly fits with my own experience.
When I have actually been in challenging or painful situations, I have been
able to summon the resources to respond effectively, even though I feared I
would be overwhelmed.
My Story
Not too long ago, I was experiencing a period of stress and anxiety. I
had taken on more commitments—teaching, writing, and organizational
responsibilities—than seemed possible to carry out in a way in which I
was fully present for myself and others. I found myself waking in the
night worried about everything that I had to do and the lack of time to
do it all. It was hard to get back to sleep, because my thoughts were so
insistent and anxious—There’s too much to do… How am I going to do
it all? And my difficulty falling asleep increased my anxiety—If I’m tired
and lacking energy tomorrow, it’ll be even harder to get everything
done—and these anxious thoughts made sleep even more challenging. I
would wake in the night with my heart beating fast. Doing some mindful
walking or tai chi movements helped me relax, but not much.
It became a spiral—my worried thoughts triggered tense bodily
sensations and a racing heartbeat. That spurred more intense, anxious
thoughts, and in turn increased my bodily tension. And the more tense
and anxious I was, the more difficult it was to relax and fall asleep.
I found myself asking, What’s the root of this problem? And what’s
the path to greater ease and well-being?
I knew that mindfulness was key to finding greater peace, but it
wasn’t easy to simply be aware of my experience. My racing heart was
sending an insistent message to my brain: Do something; find a way out
of this, and it was really hard to sit still and observe my experience in
the midst of this intensity.
Over the days and weeks that followed, I found it was helpful to
investigate what I was thinking and believing about my situation and to
see how identifying with my thoughts was helping perpetuate my stress
and anxiety.
When I brought awareness to my thoughts and beliefs, I found that
the recurring theme was There’s too much to do… I’m never going to be
able to get it all done. Underneath these thoughts was a belief that I
would be letting myself and other people down if I “dropped the ball” or
failed to handle my many responsibilities, and people would think less of
me.
I recognized that as long as I kept treating these thoughts as true,
they easily led into ever-worsening scenarios: I wouldn’t be able to
make a living. I would lose my home. I would lose my relationship. I
would be alone. I was reminded of the Zen story of a monk in a cave
who painted a tiger on the wall and became terrified each time he
looked at it. I had painted my own tiger with my anxious thoughts, and I
became fearful each time I got caught in my cycle of worries.
When I investigated my mental narrative of There’s too much to do, I
saw that, yes, I did have a lot to do and had taken on many
commitments, but the stress and anxiety came less from all that I had to
do and more from believing the narrative that I had created through my
habitual thought patterns. I recalled other times when I had had many
responsibilities but carried them out without anxiety because the inner
There’s too much to do narrative hadn’t been present.
 When I brought awareness to my thoughts and beliefs, I recognized
that I had bought into a fear-based narrative that left me in a defensive
state of “fight or flight.” My attention and energy were exclusively
focused on a defensive response. How am I going to get all this done?
How can I prevent the negative consequences of failing to get things
done? This narrow focus left very little space for making creative
choices or seeing the many ways of moving forward.
As I investigated further, I saw that my worries and fears, though
caused by my habitual thought patterns, were not completely “mind
created.” I recognized I had a tendency to say yes to requests, which
came from a desire to please others and be liked by them, as well as
from a wish to avoid the unpleasantness of disappointing anyone. And
the growing number of yeses had led to overcommitment, which set the
stage for the narrative of There’s too much to do to feel like the truth.
As I paid wiser attention to my thoughts, it became easier to see
them as thoughts rather than truths. I was able to stop buying into my
mental narrative of There’s too much to do. I could identify and note
such a thought as an “anxious thought” and let it go. As I identified less
with such thoughts, more space opened up for creative ways to make
changes in my life—by discontinuing certain nonessential activities, by
inviting others to take on roles that I didn’t really need to perform
myself, and by practicing saying no to requests that weren’t priorities.
Much of the stress, anxiety, and suffering in our lives comes from not
bringing wise attention to our thoughts and beliefs. Instead of questioning
them, we treat them as true. We buy into and get swept up in the stories we
tell ourselves.
Your habits play an important role in perpetuating the kinds of thoughts
and beliefs that can cause you to suffer. To give you an example, if you have
a habit of drinking beer to lift your mood when you feel bad, you have
probably concluded I feel better when I have a couple of beers. An
association develops in your mind between the drinking of the beers and the
temporary relief that you feel, which leads you to believe you have to drink in
order to feel okay. Similarly, if you have often smoked a cigarette to avoid
feeling sad or lonely, you have probably come to the conclusion that you’ll
feel sad or lonely if you don’t smoke a cigarette. As psychologist Donald
Hebb observed more than sixty years ago, neurons that fire together wire
together (Hebb 1949). Your mind associates the behavior (drinking beer,
smoking a cigarette) with a reprieve from the unpleasant feelings, and as a
result you generate thoughts that reinforce the behavior.
Bringing mindfulness to your thoughts is essential if you hope to loosen
your identification with negative patterns of thinking. If you look at the four
different kinds of habits—habits of wanting, habits of resisting, habits of
distraction, and habits of doing—you can see the patterns of thoughts and
beliefs that most often underpin and fuel them. Any time you’re caught up in
unhealthy habits of wanting—craving food, drink, tobacco, sex, recognition
—the underlying thought is typically I’ll feel better, if only I can have . And
underlying this wanting is the belief Things will be painful or unpleasant if I
can’t have . Habits of resisting or aversion—in which you express
frustration, anger, impatience, and harsh judgments—tend to have the
underlying thought This needs to be different for me to feel okay. Or If I don’t
change this, something really bad will happen. With habits of distraction—
such as constantly checking your phone or spending excessive time watching
TV—the underlying thinking is typically that your present experience is
boring or unpleasant and that doing something familiar will be more
interesting or enjoyable. Habits of doing—when your energies are always
focused on the next thing you need to get done—tend to have the underlying
thought Something bad will happen if I don’t keep moving. All of these habits
are accompanied by an underlying belief that the present moment is
insufficient. I’ll only be happy if this changes, or if I have that…or if I get
these things done.
Mindfulness practice can loosen your identification with thoughts,
helping you see that the content of a thought is not inherently true. If you can
pay closer attention to your thoughts, you’ll act on those thoughts more
wisely, rather than in habitual ways. For example, when discomfort,
loneliness, or boredom triggers the thought Some ice cream would be nice
now, you can observe this as “wanting” or “wanting thought,” rather than
automatically going to the freezer and scooping yourself a bowl of ice cream.
You can deepen your awareness of the emotions and bodily sensations
that often underlie and spur your habitual thought patterns and behavioral
patterns. And if you have beliefs that perpetuate unhealthy habits, you can
investigate these beliefs and untangle yourself from them. Following are
three approaches for working with thoughts and beliefs.

Observing Your Thoughts, Letting Them Come and

Go
One of the most powerful realizations that you can come to in mindfulness
practice is to see that you can bring awareness to your thoughts and beliefs
rather than being lost in them or ruled by them. There’s all the difference in
the world between, on one hand, bringing awareness to feeling angry at
something a colleague said—feeling the tension and heat in your face and
chest, paying attention to and observing your feelings of annoyance and your
thoughts of what you might say—and, on the other hand, being swept up in
the anger and the accompanying mental narrative of how mean or wrong your
colleague is or what you’ll say to him.
If you bring awareness to your thoughts—including your opinions, ideas,
and beliefs—you can determine how to behave wisely and appropriately.
Choices will open up for you—including the choice not to believe or identify
with your thoughts. If you fail to bring awareness to your thoughts, however,
you’ll have little choice but to act out old thought patterns and follow them.
The unexamined thought A bowl of ice cream would be nice right now can
lead you to the freezer before you know you have made a choice. A story
often used to illustrate this point goes like this: A horse and rider are
galloping along at great speed when a bystander shouts out, “Where are you
going?” and the rider responds, “Don’t ask me—ask the horse!” Much of the
time, your horse, in the form of your habitual, unexamined thoughts, decides
where you go.
So, an essential mindfulness skill is to develop a healthy relationship with
your thoughts—seeing thoughts as ephemeral products of your mind rather
than as the truth. Whenever you practice mindfulness of breathing, or
mindfulness of some other object of awareness, you may notice that your
attention is frequently drawn away by your thoughts. You may get caught up
in planning, worrying, daydreaming, or remembering the past. When you
become aware that your attention has shifted to your thoughts, it can be
helpful to make a mental note (as mentioned in practice 7, “Mindfulness of
Breathing Meditation”), such as thinking, planning, daydreaming, or worried
thought. The practice of naming your thoughts or noting thinking can help
you observe thoughts as passing phenomena, rather than getting lost in the
content of those thoughts.
An attitude of kindness and nonjudgment will help you develop a healthy
relationship with your thoughts; there’s no need to try to get rid of thoughts
or empty your mind, even during meditation. If you have thoughts that you
consider to be problematic in any way, this is an indication that your
relationship with those thoughts calls for wise attention. If you can
experience your thoughts without resistance, clinging, or judgment, those
thoughts will cease to be a problem.
Seeing your thoughts as only thoughts, and choosing to come back to the
present by letting go of your mental narratives, will help you loosen your
identification with the thoughts and beliefs that can keep you locked in
unhealthy habits.
Untangling Your Thoughts from Your Bodily
Sensations and Emotions
Bringing awareness to your present-moment experience and returning your
attention to your “anchor” when you become aware that you have drifted into
thought is an essential mindfulness skill.
At times, however, your thoughts are tied to sensations, emotions, and
urges that can perpetuate unhealthy habits if you don’t bring awareness to
them as well. For example, a wistful memory might bring on sadness and a
feeling of heaviness in your heart and around your eyes, and these feelings
might trigger an urge to space out by going online—particularly if this is an
established pattern for you. You might find yourself going from site to site on
the Internet without a clear purpose or any awareness that you have
consciously made a choice to “check out.” This habit doesn’t serve you. But
if you allow yourself to experience the sensations, emotions, and urges that
accompany your thoughts, you can untangle the complex web of your inner
experiences and choose to act in ways that do serve your deeper happiness
and well-being. You can explore this practice of untangling in formal
meditation periods, and it’ll support awareness of your habit urges as they
arise in your daily life.
If you’re using your breath as your meditation object or “anchor,” you
can simply return your attention to your breathing when you become aware
that you have been lost in thought. However, if you find that you keep being
pulled back to a recurrent thought—for example, a painful memory or a
fearful or anxious thought—then, rather than simply returning your attention
to your breath, bring awareness to whatever sensations or emotions are
present in your body. If there’s tightness in your chest or belly, be fully open
to those sensations. Direct your attention to the location of the painful or
uncomfortable sensations, and, as you do so, breathe in a deep and relaxed
way so that the difficult feelings are being held, as it were, by your relaxed
breathing (this is known as breathing into the sensations, as if you’re
breathing directly into specific parts of your body). Breathe into the
sensations, meeting them with kindness and acceptance, and let them go in
their own time. If it’s helpful, note tightness or tension or heat or numbness.
Be open to whatever emotions are present, making a note (for example,
anger) if it’s helpful. If worried, sad, or fearful thoughts arise, simply bring
awareness to them, noting thinking or sad thought.
Let each part of your experience be simply what it is—allow thoughts to
be thoughts, allow emotions to be emotions, and allow sensations to be
sensations, each coming and going in its own time.
Investigating Beliefs and Narratives
If you’re used to thinking and acting in particular ways, over time you may
come to believe that you don’t have any choice in relation to these thoughts
or actions. You may even believe This is who I am.
If you have developed a habit of responding angrily to small annoyances
or slights, you may easily believe I’m an angry person or People are stupid
and think that you have no choice but to get angry when someone does or
says something that rubs you the wrong way.
If you have smoked cigarettes for many years, you may believe I’m a
smoker or I don’t have the willpower to quit—and these beliefs can help keep
you addicted to cigarettes.
If you aimlessly surf the web for the first hour of work, you may believe
I’ll never be productive at work and that you can’t be mindful when you sit
down at your desk in the morning.
If you’re in a constant state of stress, rushing to get everything done, you
might believe I’m never going to be able to keep up or Things are never
going to change. And this belief helps fuel your stressful state.
It’s important to investigate such beliefs and narratives and to see the
ways in which you’re identifying with them. Seeing that these narratives are a
creation of your mind rather than absolute truth can allow you to untangle
yourself from them so that they cease to fuel unhealthy patterns of thought
and behavior.
You can begin by asking yourself, Is this really true? Is it true that “I’m
an angry person” or “I don’t have the willpower to quit” or “I’ll never be
able to get all these things done”? Or is this a mental narrative that I have
developed and identified with over time and which, as such, is not concrete,
is not “me,” and can be let go of?
You can counter negative beliefs and narratives (which often feature the
word “never” or “always,” as shown above) with examples that call your
mental narrative into question. For instance, if the belief underlying your
unwanted habit is I’m indecisive and unfocused, you might recall a Saturday
morning when you were up early and focused for a long hike in the
mountains.
A meditation that can help you work with deeply entrenched beliefs is
known by the acronym RAIN (Recognizing, Allowing, Investigating, and
Not identifying). This meditation can help you dissolve deep-seated beliefs
about yourself and your limitations. The version below is influenced by Tara
Brach’s teachings of RAIN and builds on the work of Byron Katie (Brach
2013; Katie 2002). In this practice, first, you bring to mind an unhealthy
habit. Then you recognize what’s present in your body, emotions, and
thoughts and allow it to be just as it is—to come and go in its own time.
Then, the more you investigate the beliefs and narratives that perpetuate the
habit, the more you can not identify with them and abandon them.
Practice 10: RAIN Meditation on an
Unwanted or Unhealthy Habit
Sit in a comfortable, relaxed posture with your back straight and your shoulders relaxed. Take a
few moments to settle your body and mind as you take some deep breaths, and on each out-
breath letting go of any tension or stress you might be holding.
Then, with a relaxed attention, be open to whatever is present. Meet it
with kindness, curiosity, and acceptance.
When you’re ready, consciously bring to mind an unhealthy or unwanted
habit that you wish to investigate. As you think about this habit, turn your
awareness to your bodily sensations. Notice what’s present. If there’s
tightness in your chest, or your face is hot, for example, be fully open to these
sensations. Be interested in them. Notice how they come, how they stay for a
time, how they change (if they do), and then how they pass. If it helps you be
accepting, inwardly say yes to whatever you experience: yes to tightness…
yes to numbness…yes to heat. Allow each sensation to be as it is, to come
and go in its own time.
Meet any emotions in the same way—naming them, if this is helpful—for
example, shame, anger, grief—and say yes to these emotions, allowing them
to come and go in their own time.
Bring awareness, too, to any thoughts, beliefs, or narratives that are
present. For example, I’ll never be able to change this, Nothing ever works
out for me, or I’m a loser—I have no self-control. Hold these thoughts and
beliefs in your awareness with kindness, saying yes to their presence.
As you sit with the sensations, emotions, and thoughts that are present,
ask yourself, What am I believing about this situation? You might notice the
thought No one really cares about me or Nothing’s going to change or I’m
always going to be alone, accompanied by a sinking feeling in your heart and
the urge to comfort yourself in a familiar but unhealthy way. Meet these
feelings and beliefs with kindness and care. Examine one belief at a time,
asking yourself, Is this really true? As you sit with this question, situations
that counter the belief may come to mind—for example, memories showing
that people do care about you. If your belief is a negative belief about the
future, remember that no one can predict the future with 100 percent
accuracy, because the future is unknowable. Reflect on the fact that it’s
impossible to know how events will unfold.
Ask yourself, What’s it like to live with this belief? Has this belief served
you? Does it enhance your well-being, or does it lead to suffering? How has
it affected your life? Has it narrowed your options? Cut you off from friends,
family, yourself? What sensations and emotions go with this belief—a feeling
of heaviness? A feeling of being small? Disappointment? Sadness? Say yes to
the feelings while continuing to investigate the belief.
Inquire further into the belief, asking yourself, What’s preventing me
from letting go of this belief? You might find that beneath the belief is fear.
Perhaps you fear that letting go of the belief will leave you vulnerable, that
something bad might happen. Holding on to the belief may provide a sense of
control or self-protection. Be as fully open as you can to the feelings beneath
the belief. You might place your hand on your heart and ask these feelings—
of tightness, or fear, for example—What do you need or want from me? Open
to whatever response arises—it might be kindness, or acceptance, or love.
Meet whatever arises with kindness and care.
As you continue to closely investigate this belief—and the sensations and
emotions that accompany it—ask yourself, How would it be to live without
this belief? Imagine living without this limiting belief affecting your body,
heart, and mind. Imagine you have let go of this belief, and bring awareness
to how that feels. You might experience a sense of relief or of spaciousness.
Or it may be hard to even imagine letting go of the belief. Keep investigating
with kindness: How would it be to live without this belief? And who would I
be without this belief?
It may feel unsettling to lose your sense of certainty about who you are and what will happen as
you explore the possibility of living without this limiting belief. This is a normal part of the
process of non-identification with your beliefs. Keep in mind that the less sure you are about
yourself and the world, the more opportunities are available to you in any given moment.
As a simple mindfulness practice, any time you’re drawn toward an
unhealthy habit, ask yourself: What am I believing right now? Do I believe
that I need to (for example, have sex, watch TV, or drive aggressively) to be
happy or to feel okay? If so, what would it be like to live without this belief?
Or do I believe that I need to to get rid of a certain thought? If so, can I
experience this thought as simply a thought, label it (for example, “anxious
thought” or “angry thought”), and let it pass? Or do I believe that I need to to
get rid of a certain emotion? If so, can I experience this emotion as simply an
emotion, label it (for example, “boredom” or “sadness”), and let it pass?
Finally, Can I choose to bring my awareness back to my breath or body?
Untangling Yourself from Habitual Thoughts and
Beliefs—Summing Up
Beliefs that justify and perpetuate unhealthy habits tend to become stronger
over time. It’s a vicious cycle: The repetition of the habit helps strengthen the
belief that you have to engage in the habit to feel okay, which further fuels
the habit. Over time, your habits and beliefs can become so strong that they
seem to be simply part of who you are.
The mindfulness practices in this book provide ways of working with
thoughts and beliefs and letting go of beliefs that keep you mired in
unhealthy habits.
First, the practice of bringing awareness to your thoughts and choosing to
bring your attention back to your breath (or some other “anchor”) will help
loosen your identification with thoughts and develop a more healthy
relationship with them. You’ll begin to see your thoughts as simply thoughts,
not necessarily truths.
Second, mindfulness practices will help you untangle your thoughts and
beliefs from your sensations, feelings, and emotions, so that certain
sensations don’t automatically trigger painful thoughts and beliefs, and vice
versa.
Finally, you can investigate your beliefs that help perpetuate unhealthy
habits. You can ask yourself:
What am I believing?
Is this really true?
How is it to live with this belief?
How would it be to live without this belief?
Who would I be without this belief?
Working with your thoughts through these practices of mindfulness and
inquiry will weaken any long-standing beliefs that fuel and perpetuate
unhealthy habits, enabling you to live more freely. Chapter 8

Riding the Waves of Emotions, Urges,

and Cravings
You can’t control the waves, but you can learn to surf.
—Zen saying

To be mindful is to take refuge in reality by being open to your experience

without resistance, judgment, or clinging. Any time you meet your
experience wholeheartedly, with kindness and acceptance, you’re in
alignment with the flow of your life as it unfolds here and now. But any time
you let your thoughts, worries, and stresses dictate how you experience this
moment, you inevitably suffer, because you’re in conflict with reality, with
truth. Rather than dancing with life, you’re in a wrestling match—and the
outcome of the struggle isn’t in doubt.
This moment may be an extremely painful one. Your bodily sensations
might be urging you to find comfort or release in food, drink, drugs, sex, or
some other craving. Your thoughts might be telling you you must have this
thing, or person, or experience, otherwise life will be intolerable. Or you
might be experiencing intense pain of loss, worry about the future, or
physical pain. But even in these intense situations, mindfulness provides a
path out of craving, stress, and suffering. The way out is by going through the
experience, being fully open to all its dimensions—feelings, sensations,
emotions, thoughts, cravings, urges—and seeing that all these eventually
pass.
In the previous chapter, I related my experience of working with anxiety
and how my thoughts and beliefs helped perpetuate the painful emotions. As
mentioned, examining and letting go of certain thoughts and beliefs helped
me reduce my stress and anxiety. But the other key to freedom from the habit
of anxious thinking was being fully open to the experience and saying yes to
whatever was present—being willing to feel the unpleasant bodily sensations
(such as muscle tension and a racing heart) and emotions (such as worry and
fear) that accompanied and underlay the anxious thoughts.
My Story—Continued
Any time I was caught up in a state of anxiety, I felt that something bad
was happening to me and that I needed to do something to make it go
away. The more I resisted my anxiety, the more time I spent locked in
struggle. One night, when I awoke and couldn’t get back to sleep, I
resolved to do something different. I decided, I’m going to let myself feel
whatever I’m feeling without resistance. Over the next forty-five minutes
or so, I paid close attention to the fears and anxieties as they welled up
in my body. I felt my heart pounding like a drum, and I said yes to my
pounding heart. I felt the tension in my stomach, chest, and throat, and I
breathed into it and felt it soften a little. I was aware of thoughts of
There’s too much to do, and I let them go. I practiced riding the waves
of sensations and emotions, and I said yes to each wave. The more I was
open to the waves of sensations, feelings, and emotions, the more they
felt simply like waves of experience—more impersonal, less about me
and more like a common human reaction to pressure and stress. As each
wave passed, I experienced a period of ease before the arrival of the
next wave. And as time went on and I kept saying yes to my direct
experience, the waves settled and I rested in a state of deep peace and
well-being.
In the preceding chapters, I presented skills and practices that can help
you be open to your experience—by clarifying your intentions, saying yes to
your experience, developing wise attention, and cultivating attitudes of heart
and mind that support mindful awareness. In this chapter, we’ll discuss ways
of bringing mindfulness to experiences that are particularly challenging and
intense.
The practices of mindfulness in this book invite you to be open to your
experience—the joys and the sorrows—and experience the freedom and well-
being that come from being fully open to life, rather than escaping into habits
to avoid unpleasantness.
But how do you work with emotions, cravings, and urges that are so
strong that your brain is saying “hell, no” to staying with your experience?
For example, how can mindfulness help you respond wisely and kindly in the
following situations?
You’re walking down a quiet street, enjoying the sunshine, when
suddenly a car backfires loudly. You’re a war veteran, and your
instinct is to react as if you were under fire. Even though you know
you’re no longer in a combat zone, your “survival brain” is panicking:
Do something! Get out of here!
You’re in recovery from drug or alcohol addiction, or you have
recently quit smoking, and you’re feeling an intense craving. You
know that acting on the urge will be harmful and strengthen the habit
or addiction, and yet you find it very hard to resist.
You’re in a tense conversation with a family member or friend, when
he says something that pushes a familiar button in you. You feel
defensive and have a sudden urge to lash out verbally.
Any time a wanting or craving is triggered (by a specific environment, a
particular time or place, or certain feelings), your brain sends you the
message I have to have to feel better or Things will be terrible if I don’t have
.
Through habit, over time, you have come to associate getting or having
what you crave with feeling okay, even if you know deep down that the
craving leads to suffering and that getting what you want won’t provide true
happiness. Your primitive “survival brain,” which we discussed in chapter 2,
is sending you an urgent message to take action. And the wiser message from
your prefrontal cortex, This is not healthy or helpful, will feel less compelling
and can be overridden if you’re not paying attention. What Walter Mischel
calls the “hot” brain system can easily overpower the “cool,” the slower and
rational process (Mischel 2014).
Similarly, if you feel a strong emotion—fear, for example—the message
from your survival brain is typically to do something—fight, flee, or freeze—
rather than open yourself to the feeling. So, for example, if you have a habit
of becoming fearful any time you feel as if the world is making too many
demands on you, when that emotion arises it may be difficult for you to
observe it as simply an impersonal energy that comes and goes.
A mindfulness practice that can support you in working with strong
emotions and urges is learning to ride the waves of your experience (also
known as “surfing the urge”). This practice involves understanding the
temporary nature of emotions and mind states and learning to open yourself
to the many aspects of your direct experience—your sensations, emotions,
thoughts, and desires—without acting on them.
It can be difficult to experience a strong craving or emotion without either
acting on it or repressing it. Sometimes the reason for this is a belief that if
you don’t do something, the feeling will last forever. As overwhelming as the
craving or emotion may seem, this simply is not true. Unlike moods, which
can continue for hours, emotions are “more in the realm of minutes and
seconds” (Ekman 1994, 56). If you understand that emotions—as well as
thoughts, urges, and sensations—stay for only a while, this can encourage
you to let yourself experience them.
The poet Anne Morrow Lindbergh has said of physical pain:
Go with the pain, let it take you… Open your palms and your body to
the pain. It comes in waves like a tide, and you must be open as a
vessel lying on the beach, letting it fill you up and then, retreating,
leaving you empty and clear. With a deep breath—it has to be as deep
as the pain—one reaches a kind of inner freedom from pain, as though
the pain were not yours but your body’s. The spirit lays the body on
the altar. (Cited in Kornfield 2008, 114)
Sarah’s Story
Sarah was a student in one of my mindfulness-based stress reduction
(MBSR) classes. She told us of how one day, as she was settling into a
meditation practice and bringing attention to her body, she got a
tingling sensation on her skin that was oddly similar to a sensation that
she associated with panic. In fact, the tingling seemed to be triggering
feelings of panic.
She had experienced a full-blown panic attack only once before, but
she remembered enough from that experience and its aftermath to
recognize what was happening. So she used some mindfulness practices
to help her get through the next few minutes. “I watched my mind and
body as the symptoms of panic attack set in. I consciously slowed my
breath and brought a smile to my lips. I breathed and watched for
maybe fifteen or thirty seconds, saying to myself, These are just thoughts
and feelings. Then I said, I am feeling panicky, but my awareness is not
panicking. I wasn’t just giving myself a pep talk; it was true. Whatever
was watching this panic attack was doing so from a place of calm. With
that statement, I chose to identify with the awareness rather than the
panic.” As a result of that realization, the panic attack subsided quickly
and Sarah felt a sense of triumph and relief.
The experience returned at other times that day and over the
subsequent months. Each time, the anxiety subsided as Sarah held it in
her awareness, just as it had the first time. At times, she would avoid
meditating, afraid that the anxiety would appear unannounced. But then
she remembered that in meditation, since you’re sitting and watching
your mind, there’s less opportunity for something to just “sneak up on
you.”
The key to riding the waves of a challenging experience is to rest in the
awareness that, as Sarah described it, is watching the experience (the panic,
fear, anger, craving, or other difficult feeling) from “a place of calm.” The
awareness is not panicking or fearful but is observing the feelings that we call
“panic” or “fear.” To find freedom and peace amid the storms and turbulence
in your life, remember that the waves (of emotion, craving, and so forth) are
impermanent. They’re not a part of you; they’re impersonal energies that
come and go. You can work with them and find freedom through resting in
your awareness and engaging in practices that help you ride the waves.
You can use the following meditation when working with a strong
craving or other difficult urges or emotions.

Practice 11: Riding the Waves of Intense
Experience
Find a comfortable, relaxed sitting posture, with your back straight, your shoulders relaxed, and
your eyes gently closed. Or, if you prefer to keep your eyes open, look ahead with a soft,
unfocused gaze.
Take a few deep breaths, inviting a calming of your body and mind as
you breathe in and a release of tension as you breathe out.
Bring your awareness into your body. Moving your attention down your
body, invite any area of tension—facial muscles, eyes, shoulders, chest, belly
—to relax.
Sit in a way that’s relaxed and alert.
Bring to mind a time when you felt a strong urge or craving for
something that you knew wasn’t healthy or a wise choice. Or recall a time
when you experienced a strong emotion that felt difficult or painful. (Start
with a situation that was moderately challenging, rather than one that was
very intense.) Be open to whatever you’re experiencing; commit to staying
with your direct feelings, rather than pushing them away or acting out the
urge, emotion, or craving.
Bring awareness to your bodily sensations, and feel what’s present. For
example, if there’s tightness or tension in your chest, open yourself to it and
breathe into the feelings; say yes to them—saying Yes in your mind, if that’s
helpful. Pay close attention to the feelings, and notice whether they change.
Do they get stronger or weaker? Do they go away for a time? Do they
metamorphose into other kinds of feelings? For example, does tightness
slowly turn into pulsing or throbbing? Can you experience these sensations as
waves that build up, crest, and then subside?
Bring the same kind and accepting attention to the energies of strong
emotions—fear, sadness, anger—or feelings of wanting. Recognize how
these energies also come and go, rise and fall, crest and subside, often
bringing with them strong urges that you might typically respond to by acting
on the urge or resisting a painful emotion. If it’s helpful, visualize the intense
urges, cravings, or emotions as waves, and see yourself riding the waves.
Bring awareness to your thoughts, and see how these too come and go if you don’t act on them.
Continue to ride the waves of these challenging experiences—saying yes to whatever arises. You
can continue this practice for a set time, say ten or fifteen minutes, or, if you prefer, continue
until you feel ready to end the meditation. Then, open your eyes and bring your attention back to
your surroundings.
You can also ride the waves of craving or challenging emotions any time
you’re in the midst of a difficult or painful experience, if you can pause
whatever you’re doing and take some quiet moments to open yourself to your
direct experience in the way outlined here.
The following meditation practice is derived from Somatic Experiencing
(SE), a mind-body approach to healing trauma developed by Peter Levine
(Levine 1997). This meditation can be particularly helpful any time you’re
working with experiences that feel too painful or intense to stay with. The SE
approach—of which this is just one important element—provides skillful
ways of opening to intense experiences as they manifest in your body but
shifting your awareness to an experience of greater peace, calm, or well-
being before they become overwhelming. The key is to consciously shift your
attention to a “resource”—a place of ease, safety, or greater peace, such as a
pleasant bodily sensation, a positive memory, or an image of a loved one—
and then, from that space of greater balance and resilience, gently bring your
awareness back to the intense experience. Gently moving your attention back
and forth (called “pendulation” in Somatic Experiencing) between the
“resource” and the challenging experience can help release stored energies of
trauma that get locked in your body. This can also be a helpful practice for
working with other nontraumatic but intense experiences.
Practice 12: Touching In and Touching Out
of Intense Experiences
Begin this meditation in the same way as the “riding the waves” meditation by taking some time
to arrive and settle into a comfortable posture, relaxed and alert.
Take a few moments to bring to mind something in your life or your
direct experience that feels like a source of support or a refuge—something or
someone it gives you a feeling of peace, connectedness, strength, or well-
being to think of. It could be a place you used to go on vacation that brings
back loving and peaceful memories; a beloved family member, friend,
mentor, or pet; your spiritual beliefs or practices; or anything that gives you a
feeling of peace, well-being, or support. Let yourself experience how it feels
in your body and emotions to bring this special person or experience (referred
to in therapy as a “resource”) to mind. Feel yourself held and supported. If
it’s difficult to find a positive resource, try to locate a neutral feeling—for
example, sensations in your feet, seat, or hands.
If there’s something painful or difficult that you’re currently dealing with
that arouses intense or painful feelings, invite the feelings into your
consciousness in a kind and friendly way, then let your awareness come into
your body. What do you feel in your body? Where do you feel it? If you feel
tightness in your chest and throat, be fully open to these sensations. Imagine
their details: Do they have a shape, a color, a texture? What’s the area around
these tight feelings like? Explore your bodily sensations, offering a kind and
curious attention to them. Notice how they change and move, how they come
and go. Do the same for your emotions and thoughts. You may find that
when you bring kind and intimate attention to the painful or difficult
experience, the difficult feelings come and then go in their own time.
If, however, the experience becomes intense and it’s too difficult or
painful to stay focused on your bodily sensations, emotions, or thoughts,
gently think of your “resource” and rest in the sense of ease, peace, well-
being, or connection that arises when you do so. Stay with these feelings as
long as necessary to bring yourself back into balance. Then, when you’re
ready, gently return your attention to the intense experience. Notice how it
feels as you bring your attention back to the place of difficulty, and bring
awareness to what, if anything, has changed. Find the place where the
feelings were most intense, and hold it within the feeling of peace, resilience,
or well-being. Do this for fifteen minutes or until the end of your meditation
period.
You can use this practice of moving gently back and forth between the intense experience and
your “resource” as a way of opening yourself fully to the underlying energies that are triggering
the strong feelings, then allowing them to dissipate. You can also use this practice any time
challenging or intense experiences arise unbidden in meditation or in daily life.
Riding the Waves of Emotions, Urges, and Cravings
—Summing Up
Any time you intentionally bring awareness to your direct experience with
kindness, curiosity, and acceptance, your experience changes. As the spiritual
teacher Krishnamurti said, “If you begin to understand what you are without
trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation”
(Krishnamurti, n.d.).
At times, however, you may encounter feelings that are very difficult to
be open to—panic, fear, strong cravings or addictions, or painful emotions.
Specific mindfulness practices can be very helpful in building the skills to
work with these intense situations.
A key to transforming intense experiences is learning that you’re not your
bodily experiences, your emotions, your cravings, or your thoughts. For
example, rather than being angry (and being caught up in the story of what
led you to be angry), you can be aware of your anger; rather than being sad,
you can be aware of your sadness. You can observe your experience without
becoming swept up in it or completely identified with it.
If you can learn to “ride the waves” of the intense experience, being open
to the sensations, emotions, and thoughts that accompany it, you’ll see that
even the most challenging moments have a limited life span. They come, stay
for a time, and then pass. This realization can bring you great freedom and
peace.

Chapter 9
Taking In the Good: Cultivating
Emotions That Support Well-Being
and Happiness
May all beings be happy.
May they live in safety and joy.
—Buddha
When you want to meet a need for comfort, safety, or well-being, or to
avoid an unpleasant feeling, such as fear, loneliness, or sadness, you find the
best available means of assuaging the difficult feelings or getting what you
think you need. You may take refuge in alcohol, drugs, cigarettes, shopping,
sexual activity, online browsing, or myriad other ways of finding short-term
relief. As you know by now, if you do this behavior repeatedly and under
similar circumstances, it may turn into an unhealthy habit. Habits are difficult
to change, but mindful awareness can be a vital path to abandoning unwanted
habits and developing more beneficial ones.
Another skill that helps bring your life into harmony with your values and
intentions is the cultivation of beneficial emotions and states of mind. These
include contentment, joy, peace, compassion, and loving-kindness, all of
which are conducive to your well-being and help limit the impact of afflictive
emotions and mind states.
Throughout this book, I have approached emotions not as inherently
“good” or “bad,” “positive” or “negative,” but rather as natural responses to
conditions and situations whose impact depends on how you meet them. So,
although people often think of anger as a negative emotion, if you meet the
energy of your anger with mindfulness and self-compassion, it doesn’t need
to have a negative effect; it can simply come and go like a powerful weather
system passing through. Anger can also be a call to appropriate action—for
instance, when you respond wisely and with compassion to an injustice that
you witness. The same is true of other challenging emotions, such as shame,
guilt, sadness, and fear.
Conversely, emotions we think of as positive can have painful
consequences if not met with mindfulness and wisdom. Joy can become
mindless exuberance. Love without awareness can lead to craving or
unhealthy attachment. Equanimity can become indifference or disconnection.
Emotions are signals to respond to events or situations (or your own
thinking). So-called negative emotions, which have their origins in millions
of years of evolution, were crucial to the survival of our ancestors (Hutson
2015). Fear, which arises in response to perceived threats, activates your
body and mind to escape danger or protect yourself. Anger motivates you to
take action to protect your welfare. Shame and guilt spur you to be conscious
of your situation and your actions and to respond appropriately.
Fear, anger, shame, and guilt are thus extremely valuable when taken as
helpful signals. But when you respond to these challenging emotions in
unskillful ways, the consequences can be negative even if the emotions
themselves are not. So, if someone acts in a way that makes you angry and
you respond with a narrative about what a terrible person he is, perhaps
compounding that story with fears about other harmful things he might do,
you may justify harming him to protect yourself. We see this throughout
history wherever groups and leaders have called for attacking others as a way
of responding to fears, unleashing great avoidable suffering.
A frightening situation that metamorphoses into a story in your mind that
the same thing might happen again can lead to chronic anxiety or post-
traumatic stress. Guilt or shame can lead to powerlessness, depression, or
self-harm, if you don’t meet it mindfully. The key lies in how you respond.
One important difference between emotions that are often called
“negative” (fear, anger, shame, sadness) and those typically referred to as
“positive” (for example, joy, love, and contentment) is that the former narrow
your focus, whereas the latter broaden your range of options. Consciously
inviting into your awareness emotions that expand your range of options can
help you work skillfully with challenging emotions that narrow your focus.
This is particularly the case when you’re working with anger, sadness, and
fear, which often trigger unhealthy or harmful habits.
 Barbara Fredrickson, a psychologist at the University of North Carolina
and an expert in the field of positive psychology, has demonstrated this
principle in her lab. Though I don’t share her use of the terms “positive” and
“negative” to describe emotions (for reasons already discussed), the research
is compelling, and I’ll retain her terms while discussing it.
Fredrickson and her colleagues showed, in studies, that activating positive
emotions allowed individuals to undo the cardiovascular effects of negative
emotions. In one study, participants were shown a film clip that elicited fear
and brought about increased cardiovascular activity (measured by heart rate,
blood pressure, and other measures). Participants who then watched a second
film clip meant to elicit a positive emotion (as opposed to a film clip meant to
elicit sadness or a film clip meant to elicit no emotion) showed the fastest
cardiovascular recovery, supporting the hypothesis that positive emotions
undo negative emotions (Fredrickson and Levenson 1998).
Fredrickson concludes that cultivating positive emotions can counter the
narrowing effect of negative emotions. Positive and negative emotions are
fundamentally incompatible. As she describes it, an individual’s “thought-
action repertoire” cannot be both narrow and broad at the same time, and this
incompatibility accounts for the undoing effect of positive emotions
(Fredrickson 2000).
The implications of the work of Fredrickson and her colleagues are
significant for transforming harmful habits. Very often when we’re
experiencing a painful emotion, mood, or mind state, we gravitate toward
unhealthy patterns of behavior. When you’re feeling sad, lonely, angry, or
afraid, it’s very easy to reach for the easiest or most accessible way to
comfort yourself, but usually this won’t be what’s best for you in the long
term or reflect your deepest intentions.
Buddhist teachings support what Fredrickson discovered in her lab. For
example, cultivating loving-kindness is an antidote to anger and hatred, and
inspiration is an antidote to doubt. Here are some ways you can respond to
challenging emotions and mind states with emotions that broaden your
options:
If you’re feeling bored or numb—and may be susceptible to
distracting yourself by spending large amounts of time online—begin
by opening fully to the experience of “boredom”: How does it feel in
your body? What are the thoughts and beliefs going through your
mind? Meet your experience with genuine acceptance, recognizing
what’s present and allowing it to be just as it is. Then, invite an
attitude of interest and curiosity toward the challenging feelings and
toward your experience as a whole. Incline your mind toward interest,
investigation, and curiosity, and see how your experience unfolds.
If you’re restless or agitated and feel pulled into a habitual mode of
“doing,” moving toward the future, or soothing these uncomfortable
feelings in an unhealthy way, open yourself with full acceptance to
what you’re feeling. Then, when you’re ready, bring to mind an
image of peace. Remember a time you felt calm and at ease, and send
a wish of peace or ease to yourself: May I be peaceful…may I live
with ease. Cultivate peace or calm as an antidote to restlessness or
agitation.
If you’re feeling sad or blue and pulled toward habitual eating,
drinking, or distracting yourself, meet these feelings and associated
thoughts with kindness and acceptance. Then, when you’re ready,
invite into your heart and mind feelings of joy and happiness. You
might bring to mind a time when you felt happy and joyful. You
might think about someone who evokes these feelings in you or
reflect on everything in your life that you’re grateful for. Allow these
joyful feelings to arise naturally.
If you feel angry or fearful and sense the urge to say or do something
harmful to yourself or another, or to soothe yourself in an unhealthy
way, meet the feelings of anger or fear with kindness and acceptance.
Then, when you feel ready, incline your mind toward loving-kindness
or compassion. If you’re reacting to something unkind or thoughtless
that a friend or family member has said or done, first, meet your own
experience with kindness and compassion. Acknowledge the pain
you’re experiencing by putting your hand on your heart and saying, “I
care about this suffering,” or send a compassionate wish to yourself,
such as “May I be free from pain and suffering.” If and when you feel
ready, you can reflect on the other person’s wish to be happy,
consider the conditions in her life that might have given rise to her
 unkind or thoughtless behavior, then wish her well: “May you be free
from pain and suffering,” “May you be happy.” Continue this practice
for as long as it feels helpful.
One of the most important things to bear in mind when cultivating
beneficial and expansive emotions as an antidote to painful feelings or mind
states is that you’re not doing it to avoid, resist, deny, or in any way escape
from the difficult feelings. Resisting your experience paves the way for
difficult emotions and mind states to persist. Bringing emotions like joy and
contentment to painful feelings such as fear and anger is more akin to
creating a surrounding space of peace, tranquility, kindness, or love in which
you can hold the difficult feeling or allow it to dissolve.
We’ll now explore two long-established practices that have been shown
in recent scientific studies to lessen people’s stress and anxiety and improve
their well-being and quality of life. These practices are loving-kindness and
self-compassion.
Loving-Kindness
The practice of loving-kindness has its origins in the teachings of the Buddha
as a way to mitigate fear and anger, as well as cultivate feelings of
friendliness, kindness, and happiness toward all beings. In the Buddhist story
of the origins of loving-kindness meditation, a group of monks went to the
forest to meditate. The spirits of the forest resented their intrusion and
emitted fearful sounds and odious smells that greatly disconcerted the monks,
who went to the Buddha and asked for a more serene place to meditate. The
Buddha said no, but he taught them the practice of loving-kindness. When the
monks went back to the forest, the spirits felt their love and friendliness and
welcomed and protected them.
Sharon Salzberg, a leading meditation teacher, commented on this story
of the origins of loving-kindness practice: “The inner meaning of the story is
that a mind filled with fear can still be penetrated by the quality of
lovingkindness. Moreover, a mind that is saturated by lovingkindness cannot
be overcome by fear; even if fear should arise, it will not overpower such a
mind” (Salzberg 1995, 21).
Loving-kindness is a quality that is described as “boundless” and
“immeasurable” because, with training, there’s no limit to the kindness and
love you can feel for yourself and others and no boundary to those whom you
can include in your wishes and intentions.
Loving-kindness is one of four qualities that in Buddhism are called
“divine abodes”—or our natural and best home. The other qualities are
compassion—the response of an open and loving heart to the suffering of
another or oneself; sympathetic or appreciative joy—being happy in
another’s happiness; and equanimity—evenness and balance of mind in the
face of pain and pleasure, joys and sorrows, and all life’s vicissitudes.
These open-hearted qualities arise naturally when painful or afflictive
mind states aren’t present. When you abandon painful states like anger and
greed, you’ll open to your natural goodness and loving nature. You can also
cultivate these qualities by consciously wishing yourself and others well.
The practice involves intentionally wishing for the well-being of all
sentient beings, expressed in phrases such as “May I/you/all beings be safe…
happy…healthy.” Traditionally, the practice begins with sending wishes of
safety, happiness, and well-being toward yourself—“May I be happy”—since
it’s very difficult to genuinely wish others happiness if you’re closed and
judgmental toward yourself. You then include dear friends and loved ones,
neutral people, difficult people, and ultimately all sentient beings. Through
opening your heart to those to whom it’s easiest to feel kind and loving, you
can build your capacity to wish well to more difficult people in your life.
You can use words, images, and feelings to invite qualities of kindness
and friendliness to arise in you. However, you don’t need to feel kind or
loving as you do this practice; it’s enough to have the intention to wish well
to yourself and others. In doing so, you’re planting seeds of kindness and
love, but you can’t predict when they’ll blossom. And if negative feelings
come up—for example, annoyance, frustration, or anger—meet them with
kindness and continue sending wishes of friendliness.
Practice 13: Loving-Kindness Meditation
Begin by finding a comfortable and relaxed posture, whether in a chair, on a cushion or bench, or
lying down. Let go of plans and memories you may be contemplating, and allow yourself to be
here. Take two or three deep breaths, feeling your breath moving through your chest and the area
of your heart.
Begin with yourself: silently repeat the following phrases, or use your
own words or phrases that best express your wishes for yourself:
May I be safe and free from harm.
May I be happy.
May I be healthy and well.
May I live with ease.
As you repeat the phrases, hold an image of yourself in your mind and
heart, wishing yourself well. If positive or pleasant feelings arise in your
body or mind, take in these feelings and appreciate them, allowing them to
grow as you repeat the phrases.
If feelings of resistance come up, meet them with kindness and
friendliness. You can place your hand on your heart and acknowledge the
resistance or difficult feeling. If it’s difficult to wish yourself well, you might
bring to mind an image of yourself as a baby or young child, who wants to be
safe, loved, and happy, and continue to send wishes of loving-kindness to
yourself. Hold whatever arises in a spirit of kindness and care.
After directing loving-kindness toward yourself, bring to mind a dear
friend or loved one—someone who has cared deeply for you—and let his or
her image come into your heart and mind. Slowly repeat the loving-kindness
phrases for this person, as if you were speaking to him or her:
May you be safe and free from harm.
May you be happy.
May you be healthy and well.
May you live with ease.
As you repeat the phrases, take in and experience any feelings that arise.
Use the words, the images in your mind, and the feelings that arise to deepen
your intention of wishing well to this dear friend or loved one.
When you feel ready, expand your field of loving-kindness outward—
first include other friends and acquaintances; then people you don’t know;
then those with whom you have some difficulty or conflict; then others near
and far, including creatures of the air, land, and water; and finally all beings.
Loving-kindness meditation is an art rather than a set formula. You can use whatever words,
feelings, images, and practices allow your heart to open to yourself and others. This might
include beginning with a loved one and then sending wishes of loving-kindness to yourself. Or
you can drop the words completely and simply rest with the intentions and feelings.
I recommend that you practice loving-kindness meditation for fifteen
minutes daily or as often as you’re able, gradually extending the length of
your meditation to thirty minutes or longer. (A downloadable loving-kindness
practice is available at the publisher’s website:
http://www.newharbinger.com/32370.) You can also bring the practice into
your daily life: you can send wishes of loving-kindness and well-being to increased feelings of social connection and positivity toward strangers
your fellow passengers on a bus, train, or plane, or you can send wishes of (Hutcherson, Seppälä, and Gross 2008).
loving-kindness and well-being to a work colleague who pushes your buttons.
In recent years, scientific studies have shown that loving-kindness
meditation has significant benefits. Emma Seppälä, of Stanford University’s
Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education, highlighted
eighteen science-based reasons to try loving-kindness meditation (Seppälä
2014). Here are some examples:

People who practiced loving-kindness meditation increased their

positive emotions, which, in turn, produced increases in their personal
resources (for example, more purpose in life, social support, and
decreased illness symptoms) (Fredrickson et al. 2008).

A twenty-minute loving-kindness meditation led to a 33 percent

decrease in pain and a 43 percent reduction in emotional tension
among chronic migraine sufferers (Tonelli and Wachholtz 2014).

A study of people with chronic low back pain showed significant

reductions in pain, anger, and psychological distress among
participants in an eight-week loving-kindness program (Carson et al.
2005).

A twelve-week loving-kindness meditation program significantly

reduced depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
symptoms among veterans diagnosed with PTSD (Kearney et al.
2013).

A pilot study of individuals with schizophrenia-spectrum disorders

found that loving-kindness meditation was associated with decreased
schizophrenic symptoms and increased positive emotions and
psychological recovery (Johnson et al. 2011).

Other studies have linked loving-kindness meditation to greater

relaxation and less stress (Law 2011); increased empathy (Klimecki et
al. 2013); decreased bias against minorities (Kang, Gray, and Dovido
2014); and reduced signs of aging in women (Hoge et al. 2013) and
have shown that even a few minutes of loving-kindness meditation

Self-Compassion
One of the most important qualities you can cultivate to help change
unhealthy habit patterns and develop more helpful ones is self-compassion, a
quality of meeting your experience with kindness and without judgment
while recognizing that your difficulties are part of the suffering shared by all
humans. Interest in self-compassion has grown dramatically in recent years as
research has demonstrated the benefits of compassion toward self and others.
In 2009, Google Scholar reported 37,500 scholarly citations to publications
containing the term “compassion,” up from fewer than 5,000 in 1990
(Jazaieri et al. 2014, 23–24).
If you’re pulled toward a habitual behavior—say, wanting something to
satisfy an urge or moving toward distraction—the practice of self-compassion
invites you to cultivate feelings of kindness toward yourself and to meet your
experience nonjudgmentally, recognizing that you’re not alone in
experiencing these feelings and wishing to alleviate your own suffering.
Self-compassion can also help you respond constructively to “lapses,” or
when you revert to old habits. For example, if you’re trying to give up
smoking and you smoke a cigarette under stress, you might feel judgmental
toward yourself, but you can choose to respond to the lapse with self-
compassion and commit to refraining from acting on the urge the next time
the temptation to smoke arises.
Kristin Neff, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin and a
leading writer and researcher on self-compassion, defines self-compassion as
entailing three key components:
Self-kindness—being gentle and understanding toward yourself rather
than critical and judgmental
Recognizing your common humanity—feeling connected with others
rather than feeling isolated and alienated
Mindfulness—holding your experience in balanced awareness rather
than either identifying with it or avoiding it
Neff has developed a scale that measures individuals’ ability to treat
themselves with compassion, based on responses to questions related to these
three key components.
Using Neff’s scale—called the Self-Compassion Scale, or SCS—studies
have found that higher levels of compassion were associated with lower
levels of mental health problems. A review of twenty studies involving 4,007
participants found “empirical evidence for…the importance of self-
compassion for developing well-being, reducing depression and anxiety, and
increasing resilience to stress” (MacBeth and Gumley 2012, 550).
Other studies have found that self-compassion has the following benefits:
It deactivates the body’s stress response and activates the caregiving
response (Gilbert and Procter 2006). This may lead to an increased
feeling of being supported, as if by a loved one, contributing to
emotional resilience.
It’s “associated with psychological strengths such as happiness,
optimism, wisdom, curiosity and exploration, personal initiative and
emotional intelligence” (Neff and Germer 2013, 29).
It decreases cortisol—a stress-related hormone—and heart-rate
variability, which is linked to less rumination, less perfectionism, and
less fear of failure (Neff and Germer 2013).
It promotes health-related behaviors such as sticking to one’s diet,
exercising, reducing smoking, and seeking needed medical treatment
(Neff and Germer 2013).
The good news is that self-compassion, like mindfulness, can be
developed and deepened through training and practice. Kristin Neff and
Christopher Germer found that an eight-week mindful self-compassion
program they developed raised participants’ self-compassion levels by 43
percent (Germer and Neff 2013).
Practice 14: Self-Compassion Meditation
 Take in any feelings of kindness toward yourself that arise, and if no feelings come up, or if you
This meditation follows a similar format to the loving-kindness meditation, but with the experience negative or difficult emotions, meet these with kindness and acceptance, appreciating
emphasis on cultivating compassion toward yourself. the effort and intention you have brought to this practice.

Begin by sitting in a relaxed and comfortable posture—or you can

practice this meditation walking in a quiet place. Take some moments to
relax and let go of any tension in your body and mind by taking some full
breaths, relaxing any areas of tension, and inviting a smile to the corners of
your eyes and mouth.
Bring a kind attention to any suffering you may be experiencing—
sadness, loneliness, fear, hurt, or worry—and meet your feelings with
kindness and care. Let go of any story or mental narrative about why you’re
feeling sad or lonely, and be open to the feelings you’re experiencing.
Open yourself to the bodily feelings that are present with kindness and
acceptance. You can place your hand on your heart and hold the painful
feelings that are present with kindness. Set an intention to meet the painful
feelings with care, compassion, and understanding.
Know that you’re not alone—that even at this moment, others, too, are
experiencing difficulties, pain, and loss. Whatever you’re feeling is a shared
human experience. Now repeat these phrases to yourself with kindness:

May I be safe.

May I be happy.

May I be kind to myself.

May I accept myself as I am.

As you repeat the phrases, be open to whatever bodily sensations arise,

meeting anything you experience with kindness and acceptance. Whenever
your mind wanders, gently bring your attention back to repeating the phrases
or to the bodily feelings that are present.
If this practice evokes intense feelings or emotions, come back to
awareness of your breathing, and when you feel ready, return to the phrases
of self-compassion.
Finally, sit quietly for a few minutes, being open to whatever feelings or sensations are present.
 Chapter 10
Taking In the Good—Summing Up Breaking Harmful Habits in Your
Challenging emotions, such as sadness, anger, fear, and loneliness, can
trigger habits that don’t serve your well-being. Such emotions can spur you to Relationships and the Wider World
eat or drink in unhealthy ways, smoke, check out from reality, or get lost in
stressful thoughts as you seek ways to avoid the difficult emotions. No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or
his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can
Studies show that “positive” emotions can neutralize the effects of
learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the
“negative” emotions and can help you be open to a broader range of
human heart than its opposite.
responses to a given situation, allowing you to overcome stressors and
become more resilient. Cultivating emotions that broaden and expand your —Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of
range of options, such as compassion and forgiveness, will also help you Nelson Mandela
change your habits, because they’ll help you not view a “lapse” as a failure
and thus not give up.
For thousands of years, people have used the practices of loving-kindness
and self-compassion to cultivate kindness and care toward themselves and In this chapter, we’ll discuss harmful habits that can arise in your
others, as well as to counter the effects of painful emotions and mind states. communications, particularly in situations of conflict, and collective habitual
Recent scientific studies support these age-old meditation practices, showing patterns of thought and behavior (that you may absorb) that can lead to
that they provide benefits for a wide variety of people and promote healthy suffering.
behaviors such as exercising and quitting smoking.

Bringing Mindfulness to Habits in Your
Relationships
As ways in which your individual brain and nervous system have made
certain patterns of thought and behavior automatic through repetition, your
habits are highly personal. But habits also are deeply relational. We’re
quintessentially social beings, and our thoughts and actions develop in
relationship with others—our caregivers, our family, our friends, our
community, and the wider world. As such, our habits are often rooted in our
childhood experiences. For example, in response to not feeling loved or
emotionally nurtured, some children develop a habit of soothing themselves
with food. Children who fear their parents will be angry if they tell the truth
sometimes develop a habit of lying or evasion and then maintain this habit
when confronted by any authority figure or whenever they feel under
pressure. Children raised in a family where gossip about neighbors or
outbursts of anger are the norm may find themselves as adults falling into
these same habits of speech.
What’s more, unhealthy habits are often strengthened and perpetuated in
relationships. For example, if you have a habit of drinking excessively with
particular friends, this habit may be triggered whenever you’re with those
friends. Not only that, but people who share a close relationship (for example,
partners, spouses, and family members) often know what buttons to push in
each other and can trigger predictable and habitual responses that perpetuate
strife.
Using the skills and practices presented in the previous seven chapters,
you can transform these patterns—for example, by learning to stay with
difficult feelings, rather than acting them out, and by bringing awareness to
and choosing not to identify with beliefs that perpetuate an unhealthy habit.
Mindful Communication in Situations of Conflict
A particularly important area where unhealthy habits can cause suffering
in relationships is in your communications: how you use language to express
your feelings and get your needs met.
Unhealthy habits of communication can deepen conflict rather than
generate harmony. We can use words to generalize, criticize, judge, blame,
make demands of, and attack one another rather than make specific
observations, acknowledge our own emotions, and work together. You can
transform your own unhealthy habits of communication by bringing
awareness to these patterns and using language that contributes to harmony
rather than to conflict and division.
An approach that I find powerful and effective for transforming habits of
communication and cultivating harmony and understanding in relationships
—particularly where there’s conflict—is the practice of nonviolent
communication, developed by psychologist Marshall Rosenberg (Rosenberg
2003).
Nonviolent communication provides a framework for cultivating wise
communication and involves:
Using the language of observation rather than evaluation or judgment
Rather than telling a friend who’s late for your weekly lunch date
“You’re always late,” you might point out that this is the third time
she’s arrived more than fifteen minutes after your agreed meeting
time. When you speak in the language of observation, you can discuss
what actually happened or is happening rather than focusing on the
other person’s character or making broad generalizations.
Expressing what you’re feeling
For example, “I felt embarrassed and annoyed when you made
that remark about me to the group,” rather than “You humiliated me
in front of the group; I’ll never trust you again.” When you express
what you’re feeling, you speak about your direct experience rather
than blaming or attacking the other person. This allows the other
person to know how you’re feeling without putting him or her on the
defensive.
Recognizing what your needs are
In any situation of conflict, you have needs that you’re trying to
meet. The other person also has needs that he or she is seeking to
 satisfy. Your need might be for connection, clarity, safety, self-
respect, or something else you wish for. Nonviolent communication is
a way of working toward meeting both parties’ needs. When you
investigate your own needs, you can get below the level of your
habitual views and judgments to connect with what you’re seeking in
the situation. And when you acknowledge the other person’s needs,
the other person will feel heard and understood, and there’s a greater
possibility of both of you getting your needs met.
Making requests—asking for what you want, rather than making
demands or being vague about what you’re seeking
For example, “Would you be willing to call me and let me know if
you’re going to be home late?” When you request what you need, you
give the other person the opportunity to say yes or no. And if the
response is no, you can explore other ways of meeting your needs.
When you reflect on your own habits of communication, can you see
patterns that lead to conflict and division with others? In a political
discussion or debate, do you attack the other person instead of engaging with
his or her ideas or policies? Do you find yourself using the language of
“never” and “always” when describing the actions of your partner, spouse, or
family member—for example, “She’s always late” or “He never follows
through”? Do you speak in the language of judgment rather than observation
—for example, “He’s so unreliable” or “You can’t trust her”? Do you make
demands or issue ultimatums (which can lead people to become defensive or
resistant)?
Using a process of mindful and compassionate communication such as
nonviolent communication can help you transform unhealthy habits of
communication that can otherwise fuel conflict, misunderstanding, and
division in your relationships.
Because your patterns of communication have developed over a lifetime,
changing these habits takes dedication and patience. It’s fundamentally a
practice of mindfulness supported by compassion toward yourself and others.
You can use the skills you have learned in the previous seven chapters for
transforming habits, supported by the skills of nonviolent communication,
which are honed to bring mindfulness to your communications.
Applying Mindfulness to Shared Habits
The habits that we have discussed and worked with in this book so far have
mainly involved choices you have made, in attempts to meet your needs, that
became habits when repeated in consistent contexts. If these habits run
counter to your true interests and intentions, it serves you to change them,
and we have explored, at length, mindfulness skills that can help you change
unhealthy habits.
But what about habits that form not as a result of your choices or your
efforts to meet a particular need but because you have absorbed them—in the
water we all drink, as it were?
From time immemorial, cultures and societies have passed on their
traditional wisdom, religious practices and rituals, laws, moral norms, and
histories from one generation to the next. Like healthy personal habits, many
of these views, norms, and practices aren’t a problem, and most children who
grow up absorbing these views and behaviors become relatively well-
balanced, compassionate citizens. But what if the socially sanctioned laws,
moral norms, and behaviors perpetuate harm? Can you change these
collective patterns of thought and behavior through mindfulness? For
example, if you had been born into the dominant group in a slave-owning
society or born white in South Africa under apartheid (the system of racial
separation), you would have grown up in a society where the laws, norms,
assumptions, and everyday behaviors legitimated inequality and injustice.
Unless you had been raised in a family or subculture that questioned the
dominant norms, you would have absorbed ideas and beliefs that perpetuated
these unjust arrangements. Even the victims of social injustice sometimes
internalize their oppressors’ beliefs about their “inferiority.”
Bringing awareness to unconscious collective habits, such as those that
lead to suffering, can be more challenging than bringing awareness to an
unhealthy personal habit. If you have a strong craving for something, your
body, emotions, and thoughts will usually tell you that something is off-
kilter, even if you have ways of shutting down or overriding that recognition.
Similarly, if you have a habit of escaping into fantasies to avoid an
unpleasant feeling, or of being caught up in incessant worrying or planning,
signals from your body and mind—and often from people who are close to
you—will typically let you know that something is amiss. It’s much easier for
collective patterns of thought and behavior to operate “under the radar.” The
views and beliefs you share with family members, peers, or society as a
whole can be so deeply internalized that there’s no clear signal that
something is wrong. Because such habits, and the behaviors that they
underlie, are “the sea we swim in,” the views and behaviors of people around
you will tend to reinforce the harmful collective view.
I used the examples of slave-owning societies and the apartheid system to
illustrate how even extremely unjust societies can pass on norms of thought
and behavior that are portrayed as “natural” or religiously sanctioned. These
are extreme cases—and with the ease of worldwide communication today
and prevailing international norms of human rights and social justice, it’s
more difficult for these kinds of systems to maintain legitimacy and for
people living in these societies to remain oblivious to the prevailing harm.
But in many cases, the suffering may be less obvious but no less real.
Take the issue of racial justice and equity in the United States today. As
members of the dominant racial group, many white people today have been
raised to believe they live in a “color-blind” society where there’s equal
opportunity, the “playing field” is relatively level, and racial domination and
injustices are a thing of the past. But increasingly these views have been
called into question, particularly in the aftermath of recent killings by police
of black men.
When you possess privileges that come from being a member of a
dominant group—whether due to your race, ethnicity, social class, gender,
sexual orientation, mental or physical ability, or other characteristic—the
natural tendency is to be unaware of the benefits and take them for granted.
You’re brought up to see these privileges as normal, nothing special. You
may be oblivious to the fact that others don’t receive the same benefits or
advantages you do, because the laws and social norms proclaim equality for
all. (For members of subordinate groups, however, the disadvantages they
face are all too clear.) Or you may internalize the belief that you “deserve”
different or better treatment than others—based, for example, on religious or
quasi-scientific views that seek to explain and justify your privileged
position. You may believe your success is due to your merits or efforts, rather
than unseen privilege—as with someone who was “born on third base and
thought he hit a triple.”
Peggy McIntosh, a researcher at the Wellesley College Center for
Research on Women, pointed to the “invisible knapsack” of privileges that
come with being born white in the United States. She noted, “I was taught to
see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems
conferring dominance on my group” (McIntosh 1988).
In a 1988 essay, McIntosh identified fifty privileges that she received by
being white: “As far as I can tell, my African-American coworkers, friends,
and acquaintances…cannot count on most of these conditions.” These
privileges included (in her words):
“I can go shopping alone most of the time, pretty well assured that I
will not be followed or harassed.”
“I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and
see people of my race widely represented.”
“I can be sure that my children will be given curricular materials that
testify to the existence of their race.”
“I am never asked to speak for all the people of my racial group.”
“If a traffic cop pulls me over or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can
be sure I haven’t been singled out because of my race.”
“I can be late to a meeting without having the lateness reflect on my
race.”
“I can arrange my activities so that I will never have to experience
feelings of rejection owing to my race.”
Unseen privileges help perpetuate harm and may be particularly
challenging to identify and abandon. But any situation in which there’s
inequity and injustice harms members of both dominant and subordinate
groups. If you want to cultivate inner peace, as well as greater harmony in the
world, you need to bring these collective habits into the light of your
awareness. The first step is humility—acknowledging that you don’t know
what you don’t know. You can begin by bringing awareness and a spirit of
inquiry to what you believe and asking yourself the questions that follow.
Is this belief true?
Am I acting in ways that are based on assumptions that lead to harm
to others or myself?
Does this belief or action lead to well-being, or does it lead to harm?
and can let them go.
The practices of mindfulness in this book will give you the skills to bring
awareness to habits that cause harm, to stay with the feelings that are present
(rather than resisting or running away), and to choose actions that promote
your own and others’ well-being and harmony. In the case of harmful
collective habits, you need to engage in a broader level of investigation to
bring the harm into awareness and transform it.

Be mindful of what may be going on outside the frame of your

awareness. Curiosity and investigation are essential. Read, watch, and listen
to opposing viewpoints, and ask yourself:

What am I not aware of?

What am I missing?

Where is there suffering? And what is its cause?

It’s also important to search out voices and opinions that may be less or
rarely heard, especially those coming from marginalized or excluded groups.
You can use the skills of mindfulness and practices of self-compassion and
forgiveness to help you hold, with kindness, painful reactions that may arise
when you open yourself to what was formerly hidden from your view. You
can work with others who are also seeking healing and reconciliation,
supporting one another in deepening the inquiry into how to awaken from the
trance of harmful collective habits. As an example, in my meditation
community we formed a white awareness group, dedicated to inquiring into
privilege and racial justice and seeking to be part of a process of healing and
reconciliation.
Mindfulness leads to wise and compassionate action. In an old Zen story,
a student comes to visit his dying teacher. The student asks, “What is the
teaching of your entire lifetime?” The teacher replies, “An appropriate
response.” Any time you become aware that your ways of seeing and acting
are leading to harm, mindfulness will help you determine a wise and
compassionate response. For example, if you notice you’re stressed out and
believing your stressful thoughts, with mindfulness you can bring awareness
to your thoughts, choose to see them as thoughts rather than as “the truth,”

Breaking Harmful Habits in Your Relationships
and the Wider World—Summing Up
Habits are personal and unique to each of us in that they’re ways in which our
patterns of thought and behavior become automatic through repetition. As
you have seen, mindfulness can help you transform habits of all kinds
through meeting your experience with a kind and nonjudging awareness.
Two additional areas call for particular attention and can also be changed
with mindful awareness: habits that develop in relationships, particularly in
communications in situations of conflict; and shared habitual patterns of
thought and behavior that we’re very often oblivious to.
An approach to habits of communication that can be particularly valuable
in situations of conflict is nonviolent communication, an approach developed
by the late Marshall Rosenberg. Nonviolent communication provides a
framework for cultivating wise and compassionate speech and involves (1)
using the language of observation rather than evaluation or judgment; (2)
expressing honestly what you’re feeling; (3) recognizing what your needs are
and seeking ways to meet these and the other person’s needs; and (4) making
requests rather than demands.
Using a process of mindful and compassionate communication can help
you transform unhealthy habits of communication that can otherwise fuel
conflict and misunderstanding in your relationships.
You can also bring mindfulness to shared habits that you have absorbed
from the broader society or groups that you’re a part of. These habits can be
particularly hard to change, because they’re due less to personal choice than
to the norms, values, and ideas of the groups that you’re a part of. Harmful
patterns of thought and behavior are often rooted in the benefits and
privileges that come with being a member of a dominant group. Bringing
mindfulness to what you’re oblivious to calls for compassionate awareness,
humility, curiosity, investigation, and working closely with others who are
committed to healing the shared suffering that arises from social inequity and
injustice.
Conclusion
Making Mindfulness Your Default
Habit
Throughout this book, I have emphasized that you can change unhealthy
habits and that mindfulness is a key to change—to living a life free of
unnecessary stress and suffering.
Mindfulness will help you discern whether your habitual pattern of
behavior or thought will serve your best interest or whether it will lead to
harm. This opens up the possibility of choosing your response to your urges
rather than acting mindlessly, out of habit.
Without awareness, you’ll continue to be a prisoner of your old choices
and your entrenched habits, repeating shop-worn patterns. Using the skills
and practices presented in this book, you can train your mind so that
mindfulness becomes your default mode, replacing conditioned habits as
your way of being in the world.
Mindfulness is available to anyone, anywhere, at any time. All you need
is to know that you can “come home”—to your direct experience, here and
now—and build your capacity to be present by training your mind.
To bring mindfulness to any situation, you can ask yourself three
questions:
What am I aware of—what am I experiencing right now?
Can I say yes to this moment just as it is?
What’s a wise and appropriate response?
You can then choose to respond to the situation—or simply choose not to
act—in a way that leads to genuine happiness rather than reacting
automatically and habitually. All of your harmful habits can be transformed
when met in this way with kindness and awareness.
 That’s not to say it’s easy. It requires practice. Someone once said,
“There’s no such thing as a one-walk dog.” That is, walking the dog isn’t
something you do once and never have to think about again. Dogs need to be
walked daily if they’re to stay healthy, and it’s the same with your brain and
practicing mindfulness.
Your habits have developed through repetition over time, and your brain
has formed neural pathways that encourage further repetition. So, to retrain
your mind, you need healthy repetition: letting old paths fall into disuse and
forming new ones based on healthy choices that serve your true interests.
The fruit of mindfulness is that you can live as you truly wish to live. You
can go beyond feelings of neediness or the illusion that things need to be a
certain way for you to be happy. You can live with a quality of ease that you
never thought possible amid life’s challenges.
Here are six tips to help you make mindfulness your default habit in daily
life:
Establish a daily meditation practice.
Begin by reflecting and writing down why establishing a daily
meditation practice is important to you. You might consider telling a
family member or a friend that you’re making a commitment to
meditate every day, so that you’re accountable to another person for
being true to your word. Commit to meditate each day for a week, and
then commit for another week. Find a consistent time and place to
meditate—this supports making the practice into a healthy habit. You
can begin with ten or fifteen minutes and increase the amount of time
as you feel ready. Set a timer or alarm so that you don’t have to be
concerned with how many more minutes you have left to go. Use the
guided meditations in this book (or others) to help support your
practice.
Use a notebook to keep a record of your meditations—how long you
sat for, as well as what was most notable in your experience (for
example, restlessness or tiredness or feeling calm and peaceful) or
what you noticed during the meditation period.
If difficulties came up, you might reflect on how you’ll meet
similar challenges if they arise in the future. Use the meditations in
this book to work with specific difficulties as appropriate.
Take time during the day to pause—bringing awareness to your
breath, your bodily feelings, and your overall state of body and mind.
You might pause for three full breath cycles, bringing attention to
whatever is present and saying yes to it. Or take five minutes to come
home to yourself, simply recognizing and allowing whatever is
present. You can set a timer (or download a “mindfulness bell”) on
your smartphone or computer to remind you to pause at regular or
random intervals.
Envision moments you know will come up in daily life, and be
prepared to use those times to be fully present.
For example, whenever you’re driving and you’re stopped at a red
light, take a “mindful pause.” Whenever you’re waiting in line at a
store, be grateful for the opportunity to pause for a moment and bring
mindfulness to your breath and body. If you’re on a bus or other form
of public transport, you can use the “I am aware of…” practice in
chapter 4 to note what’s coming up—sights, sounds, sensations,
thoughts—or practice loving-kindness to all who are sharing the
journey with you.
For a week, choose one activity to do mindfully and consciously each
day.
You might choose walking to your workplace or home, cooking or
eating a meal, driving to work, washing up, or taking a shower.
Whatever you choose, give this activity your undivided attention. See
how you feel when you engage in this activity with full awareness.
Find a community of people to meditate with regularly—at least
weekly, if possible.
Attend a regular meditation class or sitting group. Cultivate or deepen
spiritual friendships with like-minded people who are committed to
living with awareness. If there are no such groups near you, try to find
one or two other people to meditate with regularly. You can also find
meditation communities online.
 Finally, one of the deepest truths of mindfulness—and life—is that you
can begin again in any moment. You can open to this breath, this feeling, this
moment, with a beginner’s mind, letting any residue or baggage from the past
or thoughts of the future fall away.
You can come back to the present—to these practices—at any time,
anywhere. May these skills and practices that have served so many through
the centuries help you find inner peace and freedom.
our minds—​a sort of waking dream.
In an ever-​shifting world of abstractions, we are in need of direct connection
with the essence of life, as it appears moment to moment. If we are to refind
our humanity, our connection, our essence, it must start exactly where we are,
with the ground underfoot and the sky overhead, and our direct and
immediate experience of being. It’s possible to awaken from the world of our
endless and conditioned inner narratives and reconnect with the immediate
and wordless experience of being, pausing the button on our waking dream to
breathe in the fresh air of this unfathomable existence.
This Extraordinary Moment is not only a good title for a book, it is an
invitation into a profound experience of being that is, quite literally,
unimaginable. It is a way of perceiving that is direct, immediate, and rich
with wonder. What John has written here is really a guidebook for breaking
the spell of conditioned thinking and the distorted perceptions that it creates.
Its aim is to wake us up from the dream of our conditioned thinking and
perceiving, to what lies on the other side of our imagination, to reality beyond
words and an experience of being that is beyond the known. Read this book,
but even more, contemplate it. And perhaps it will evoke within you
something greater than can be imagined.
Preface
For the past two decades, I have been exploring, writing, and teaching about
many of the themes found here in the pages of This Extraordinary Moment.
In my first book, Too Intimate for Words (2005), I investigated the nature of
the “self” and how it is not fundamentally distinct or separate from the whole
of reality. My second book, This Is Always Enough (2008), explored the
ways in which what we are searching for is already present, that every
momentary perception, every experience, is full and complete beyond
measure. Finally, in Searching for Rain in a Monsoon (2013), I invited the
reader into an experiential investigation of awareness as the ever-​present,
naturally open ground and basis of every moment.
A theme running throughout all of these books, however, was this growing
recognition that no matter how I might attempt to frame or articulate or
model the nature of moment-​to-​moment experience, it was simply not
possible to pull it off. It became clearer and clearer that by its very nature,
experience radically transcended any and all efforts I might make to put it
into some coherent conceptual or linguistic framework.
A couple of years after the publication of my last book, a student of mine told
me about a teacher he’d been studying with, Peter Brown, who he said my
own sharing reminded him of. I’d never come across Peter’s work before but
began to investigate it and found him to be one of the clearest, most
compelling voices I’d come across in a long time. My ongoing encounter
with Peter’s beautifully lucid articulation of the inconceivable nature of
reality continues to deepen my own understanding of this same truth. Here is
a quote from him that encapsulates what This Extraordinary Moment is
fundamentally about:
Let go of all descriptions, and then what is this?
You cannot say… but it is not nothing,
and is wonderful beyond imagination.
Introduction
I teach a graduate course at Santa Clara University titled “Evidence-​Based
Approaches to Therapy.” In the class, we explore a number of psychological
therapies and review the scientific evidence concerning their effectiveness.
Many of the students are struck by how unimpressive the results actually are:
even those approaches which have been deemed “most effective” actually
benefit only about a third of the clients, and many of them appear to have
been helped only marginally. Given this modest evidence, at the end of class
I pose a provocative question to my students:
“Why do you think this might be? Why, after a century of scientific
psychology, have we more or less failed to identify consistently effective and
lasting means to support people to flourish psychologically? Are we missing
something?”
After the students spend some time discussing and reflecting on these
questions amongst themselves, I drop the following bomb on them:
“Could it be that our failure to find truly effective means to liberate human
beings from challenging states of mind stems from the fact that we don’t
actually know what those states are?”
The students look at me somewhat dumbfounded. “What do you mean we
don’t know what our own mental-​emotional states are?” they understandably
ask.
“Well,” I say, “let’s take one of the more common experiences that people
struggle with, anxiety. Clients come to therapists, coaches, doctors, healers,
and spiritual teachers because they want to feel less anxious, and teachers and
practitioners suggest all manner of strategies to help them manage their
anxious states of mind more effectively. Yet underlying this whole scenario
are two key assumptions: first, that we actually know what this thing called
“anxiety” is, and second, that so-​called negative states such as anxiety are
problems that must be solved. Could it be that these states we’ve imagined
for millennia to be problems in need of solutions aren’t what we have
imagined them to be?”
If we wish to investigate what some material object, say a piece of metal,
consists of, through inquiring into its nature we can determine that rather than
being merely a “piece of metal,” it is instead composed of various molecules
arrayed in a particular way which in turn consist of all manner of atoms,
subatomic particles, quantum fields, and so on. This book invites a similar
investigation into our own subjectivity by asking a fundamental question:
What are experiences made of, beyond the conventional descriptions and
mental interpretations we bring to them?
Through a series of brief essays, explorations, and guided meditations, I
invite you to investigate this question firsthand, peering around the edges of
what you think your experiences are, particularly those conventionally
labeled as problems (anxiety, fear, insecurity, depression, confusion), and
exploring what your own experiential moments are actually composed of. As
a complement to this process, there is also a host of materials available for
download at the website for this book: http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
(See the very back of this book for more details.)
Through this inquiry, you may find that all experiences, from the most
painful to the most sublime, transcend any and all attempts at mapping or
modeling them. Far beyond what language and conceptualization would have
us believe, every experience, no matter its conventional descriptive label,
turns out to be ultimately unfathomable and inconceivably rich. Happiness,
sorrow, pleasure, pain, joy, anger, jealousy, gratitude—​no matter how we
might categorize or define them, every experience is an utter free fall into
endless openness, subtlety, nuance, lusciousness, and depth.
I invite you to enter into and enjoy this inquiry.
Suggestions for How to Approach This Book
One way to approach a book like this is with the hope that by engaging with
its material, you will find some resolution of whatever personal issues you
find yourself facing. Along with this focus on solving one’s personal
problems, there is often the accompanying belief or at least hope that the
methods and ideas will somehow also help address the myriad social ills we
see in the world today.
It’s of course quite understandable that one would come to a book such as
this from within this familiar human frame of reference. However, the
problem with approaching it in this way is that the starting point for orienting
to any experience as if it were a problem is the presumption that we actually
know and are able to define what that experience is.
For example, let’s say you’re experiencing insecurity in your life and are
wanting to find a way to overcome and be free of that state of mind. But,
seeing insecurity as an issue that must be healed presumes that you actually
know what “insecurity” is; otherwise how would you even know it was
something that needed to be overcome? It is this very assumption—​that we
know what experiences actually are—​that the inquiries in this book invite us
to question.
And so, I encourage you to approach these writings more in the spirit of
lighthearted, playful curiosity, not in order to fix whatever experiences or
circumstances you imagine are broken about you or the world but instead to
simply find out what these supposedly problematic experiential,
circumstantial phenomena actually consist of. I invite you to approach this
investigation into the nature of experience with no presuppositions about
anything you might encounter in this inquiry. The conventional notion of
being a person dealing with certain problems that must be resolved is one
such assumption. Instead, just start with what’s actually present, prior to any
abstractions about its apparent implications—​what it is, what it might mean
about you, what it might say about life, or anything else. Start right here with
whatever’s appearing, simply feeling the presence of it, seeing how it is, how
it moves, how it appears, how it vanishes. Be curious, as a child might be,
about whatever is presenting itself, exploring the countless never-​before-​seen
wonders we encounter each moment of life.
By investigating the immediacy of experience in this way, you can discover a
liberating truth: in order for something even to exist as a problem that
requires some solution, you must first be able to define it as an actual
problem in the first place, something that turns out not to be possible owing
to the ultimately indefinable, inconceivable nature of all experience.
Two Approaches to Happiness
There are, we could say, two basic approaches to manifesting a happier, more
fulfilled life.
The first and most familiar to us is to try to maximize the quality of our day-​-
to-​day experiences and circumstances as best we can. This involves such
things as engaging in activities and work we find fulfilling, cultivating
healthy relationships with others, increasing positive states of mind, and
improving our physical health and appearance. We could call all of this
learning to live life artfully or skillfully. If you liken life to a dream, this first
approach can be thought of as learning to dream the best dream possible—​the
most enjoyable, most fulfilling, most exciting, most enriching dream you can
envision, based on what you most value.
But there is another approach to happiness and fulfillment and that is to
investigate what the dream is actually made of, rather than reflexively trying
to create a more desirable one. Whether we call it a happy one, a sad one, an
exhilarating one, or a terrifying one, in this second approach, we simply
inquire into the nature of the dreaming itself, and through this, discover that
no matter its content, no matter what the dream may look like, it is all life, all
reality, appearing in the many guises life can appear.
It’s important to understand that this second approach doesn’t preclude
engaging the first and trying to create the happiest, most fulfilling life in as
skillful a way as possible. However, one of the inherent challenges of trying
to engineer or control our experiences and circumstances so as to maximize
well-​being is this: Life is invariably filled with all manner of experiences and
circumstances we find difficult, challenging, or unpleasant and many of these
are not very amenable (if at all) to control or change. Whether internally
(thoughts, feelings, sensations) or externally (situations and circumstances),
things often don’t go the way we would like them to go, despite our best,
most artful and sincere efforts. In other words, when it comes to manifesting
the best possible waking dream, there appear to be significant limits. Which
brings us back to approach two...
In an actual sleeping dream, we imagine that what’s happening in the dream
is in fact happening. Whether we’re dreaming of having sex with a gorgeous
man or woman or being chased by a monster, it all seems quite real to us until
we wake up and realize it was all made of consciousness, the lover and the
monster both conjured into existence by the dreaming mind.
We don’t exactly know how consciousness is able to generate the nighttime
dreams that it does, but it clearly has this extraordinary capacity. And that
imagined dream world surely does seem real, at least while we’re dreaming
it! But could it be that our waking lives are not as different from the dream
world as we imagine? Just as we can wake up and realize that the anxiety and
fear experienced in the dream state is made of dream stuff, we can also “wake
up” right in the midst of our everyday lives by inquiring into what the
experiences we imagine we are stuck in or otherwise struggling with are
actually made of. While we’ve evolved this extraordinary capacity to
interpret, categorize, parse, and define things, careful investigation reveals
that our moment-​to-​moment experience is not actually definable.
We imagine that we know what experiences are because we have names for
them. However, through more carefully exploring the texture or felt sense of
experience, we can discover that all experiences, whether they’re conceived
of as mundane or sublime, lie beyond the reach of our conceptualizing
faculties. Feel into any state—​fear, anxiety, joy, exhilaration—​and what
becomes apparent is the inadequacy of our descriptive labels, the failure of
our conceptual maps to convey the unthinkably vast, subtle, and nuanced
territory of experience.
So what does all of this have to do with our search for well-​being? Approach
one—​learning to live life as skillfully and artfully as we can—​is based on
things actually being what we imagine them to be according to our
definitions and interpretations. From this perspective, we would of course
prefer to experience more of the mental, emotional, circumstantial moments
we conventionally label as “positive” and have fewer of those we define as
“negative.”
But remember, things aren’t merely what our descriptions tell us they are.
They are much more than the labels we give them. And this is the liberating
thing we come to realize through approach two, the discovery that those
experiences conventionally labeled as happy/unhappy and
fulfilling/unfulfilling are actually expressions of an ultimately indefinable,
unfathomable mystery.
We can certainly try to manifest more of what we conventionally think of as
“states of well-​being.” But the second approach reveals another order of
well-​being altogether, one that is discovered to be present in every moment of
experience, irrespective of the conventional labels we may give it, a well-​-
being that is just as present in sadness as it is in joy. This is a stable,
indestructible well-​being that can neither be given nor taken away because it
is reality itself, the same ever-​present reality that appears as each changing
moment of life, a field of fathomless mystery and well-​being that is beyond
our capacity to definitively label or describe.
How to realize this? By becoming curious about our experience, exploring
the unanswerable question of what experiences are made of, feeling and
tasting the inconceivability of it all, waking up to the astonishing fact that
experiences can never be adequately conveyed or captured by any of our
descriptions or interpretations. It’s fine, of course, to continue trying to live
life as skillfully as you can, minimizing those states of mind and
circumstances conventionally thought of as undesirable while maximizing
those considered (based on your descriptions) to be more desirous. But while
you engage in this more conventional approach to well-​being, you can at the
same time take up the second approach and begin to discover that the very
experiences you’ve imagined yourself stuck in or troubled by are in fact
infinity itself, the inconceivable, miraculous display of reality, shining forth
as each instant of life, no matter its conventional label.
The Impressionistic Nature of Experience
You’ve undoubtedly seen some of those remarkably beautiful Impressionist
paintings. From a certain distance, one sees what appear to be discrete
objects, like the floating water lilies found in several of Monet’s paintings.
However, the closer one gets to such paintings, the more those seemingly
clear and coherent images and forms (water, flowers) reveal themselves to be
patternless and incoherent points of color and light.
We find a parallel in the world of science. When the physicist examines the
world, it appears at first glance to be a solid, material realm but turns out
upon closer examination to be far more indefinite, ambiguous, and
immaterial than was initially thought.
In much the same way that a scientist might examine the nature of molecules,
atoms, and subatomic particles, we can look at our own subjective experience
to see what it is “made of.” Human experiences that appear quite coherent
and structured from one perspective, upon closer examination, disappear into
greater and greater ambiguity and incoherence.
When investigated closely, every detailed part, every aspect and tangible
dimension that makes up a given experience reveals a seemingly endless
array of subtler and subtler wavelike aspects, dimensions, and parts. It’s an
interesting paradox, isn’t it, that the closer we look at the world of
experience, the less clear, fixed, or definite it becomes? Just as Monet’s water
lilies are revealed to be points of color and light, by exploring the nature,
structure, texture, and form of your present experience, you will find that it
too dissolves into a vast, structureless field of vibrancy, a subtle dance of
information and energy.
Ironically, even though our lives are made up entirely of experiences (what
else is there, really?), rarely do we ever ask what would seem the most basic
and fundamental question: “What are experiences actually made of,
experientially?” We’ve tended to take it for granted that we know what things
are. But like the Impressionist paintings, things aren’t always as they appear.
This is my invitation: to take another, closer look at the experiential painting
you call your life. You may be surprised at what you find!
The Misinterpretation of Experience
Our tendency is to view certain experiences such as fear, anxiety, worry,
insecurity, and confusion as problematic and then set about to overcome,
avoid, heal, transcend, or otherwise improve upon them. However, there’s
another choice. As we’ve been exploring, in any moment, we can simply look
and see what these supposedly negative states of mind consist of, beyond the
oversimplified versions of them provided by language. For despite the myriad
words we’ve evolved to describe what’s happening experientially, we cannot
actually say what anything is, at least not definitively. Try out the following
practice to experience this for yourself. You can listen to a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
As an example, try to capture in words or concepts what is being felt and
experienced right now and see if that’s even possible.
You might say, “Well, this is a thought,” or “that’s a feeling or a sensation.”
But when you call something a thought, a feeling, or a sensation, what
exactly are you saying? What is the experiential reality those words are
pointing to?
You might answer, “Well, thoughts and sensations are ultimately made up of
energy or consciousness.” But this begs the question: “What in turn are the
phenomena referred to as energy and consciousness made of, beyond the
dictionary definitions used to describe them?”
As you investigate your experience in this way, something quite remarkable
becomes apparent—​every phenomenon that’s encountered, no matter how it
might be conventionally labeled or described, turns out to be far more than
we may have imagined it to be.
Check it out for yourself. Take any descriptive label you might use…let’s say
it’s the word “energy” or maybe “consciousness.” Just feel whatever it is
those words are referring to experientially. What is actually present that you
describe as energy? What does the experience you call “consciousness”
consist of?
As you look in this way, you’ll begin to notice something extraordinary—​-
every experience, when investigated this way, opens up to reveal more and
more of itself and its nature. Feel into any experience and what’s discovered
is that there’s so much more there—​more texture, more subtlety, more depth,
more mystery. As you continue exploring in this way, delving further and
further into the nature and texture of experience, notice how this “moreness”
that was revealed just continues to open up into even more and that it does so
endlessly…
In life, we often feel as if we’re somehow stuck in or confused by some
experience or circumstance and then proceed to try to free ourselves from this
supposed bondage and confusion. But what we call “being stuck or confused”
is literally defined into existence because, when investigated, the conceptual
categories of “stuck” and “confused” are seen to be neither stuck nor
confused, but a swirling dance of miraculous, wide-​open, inconceivable
depth, intelligence, and energy.
And if such experiences are as radically open-​ended and ultimately
indefinable as they are, how can they possibly bind or limit us in the ways
we’ve imagined? To put it bluntly, we suffer psychologically, not because we
have certain experiences, but because of what we imagine those experiences
to be through the miraculous interpretive power of concepts and language.
So, the next time you find yourself faced with something difficult or
uncomfortable—​a sense of lack, a feeling of confusion, a moment of upset—​-
instead of reflexively trying to flee from or transform that state, simply
inquire into or, better yet, feel what it is made of experientially.
There’s really no answer to that question, which turns out to be the most
profound of answers!
Cognitive Fusion
“Cognitive fusion,” an emerging construct in psychology, refers to the belief
that our thoughts about whatever is being experienced are essentially
equivalent to that experience. For example, let’s say I have a friend named
Dave. To the extent I am fused with my thoughts about him, I will imagine
Dave is who I think he is and in so doing, fail to appreciate that my thoughts
about him are just that, thoughts. In short, through the mechanism of
cognitive fusion, I will end up mistaking my mental interpretations of Dave
for Dave himself. Practically speaking, I’ll relate to my friend not as he
actually is, but based on who I imagine him to be according to my mental
caricature of him.
When we are cognitively fused (which we tend to be a great deal of the time
without even realizing it), we fail to recognize that there are two distinct
experiential realms:
1. the actuality of whatever person, place, or thing is being experienced
and
2. our conceptualization or interpretation of that actuality.
Cognitive defusion entails recognizing that our thoughts about whatever is
happening are not the same as the experience itself because those thoughts
represent a gross oversimplification of whatever is occurring experientially,
just as my ideas about a person like Dave (or anyone else, including myself)
could never capture that person’s complex, multidimensional nature.
Dave is a vast ocean of qualities and characteristics and the notion that my
ideas about him accurately represent the entirety of Dave is tantamount to
taking a thimbleful of water and imagining I’ve somehow captured the whole
of the sea. The actuality of experience and our ideas about that experience
can clearly coexist with neither impinging on the other. But the important
thing to realize is that they are not one and the same thing any more than our
ideas about what a sunrise is are somehow equivalent to the actuality of color
and light dancing in the morning sky.
In many traditions, we are told that our problem is one of a lack of focus. To
remedy this, we are given various meditative practices to develop greater
mental focus, thereby countering the mind’s tendency to become dispersed or
distracted. However, what I’m suggesting here is in many respects the
complete opposite. The problem of cognitive fusion is not one of too little
focus but actually one rooted in excessive focus. For example, in any moment
you find yourself seemingly caught up in some torrent of thinking or
worrying, there are untold numbers of other phenomena occurring—​flickers
of energy, washes of sound, sparkles of color and light, all of which have
absolutely nothing to do with those mental narratives.
And so, one of the keys to freeing yourself from cognitive fusion is to see
that the narratives and interpretations about what is happening are
infinitesimally small compared to the vastness of experience itself. By feeling
the ways in which direct experience is inconceivably subtler, more complex
and multidimensional than your ideas about it, you begin to uncover a
profound depth and richness in everything that is encountered.
PRACTICE
Imagine for a moment a vast underwater world that stretches out before you
as far as the eye can see, a world filled with unthinkable beauty and diversity
—​thousands of exotic creatures large and small, psychedelically colorful fish
and coral, magnificent formations of rock and sand, a phantasmagoric display
of life everywhere you turn…
Now imagine that your gaze suddenly falls upon one little corner of this
underwater scene. You spot a tiny yellow fish swimming around in this vast
oceanic world and become captivated by the fish, your attention drawn into
the orbit of this colorful little creature, like a moth to a flame. You begin
following the little yellow fish around. And as you do so, the rest of this
scene you’ve been beholding begins to fade from view. Eventually, your
sense of the reality of this vast underwater world is seemingly reduced to the
little yellow fish.
Our everyday experience is very much like this underwater world—​an
infinite array of sights, sounds, textures, colors, images, and feelings filling
every instant. So rich, so colorful, so deep… Presented with the vast,
underwater world that constitutes our moment-​to-​moment experience, we
invariably try to make sense of it all. We interpret it, map it, model it,
conceive of it, describe it. And while all of this is completely normal and
natural, the problem is that we become cognitively fused, believing our
interpretations of the vast, mysterious, unfathomable world of experience are
somehow equivalent to it.
It’s completely understandable that we would latch onto and believe in our
conceptual rendering of things, given that these interpretive frameworks
bring us some measure of comfort and security, a feeling of greater certainty,
a sense that we have a handle on what’s going on here, how it works, and
what it all means.
But just as we found ourselves doing with the little yellow fish, we become
captivated and ultimately blinded by the interpretations, taken in by the
narratives that claim to know what reality is. We become transfixed by the
bright light of our descriptions of things, orienting so powerfully to them that
we temporarily lose sight of the rest of the scene, forgetting that the
interpretations are but one tiny part of an ocean of experience that is simply
too vast, complex, and richly detailed to be captured by any definition or
mental schema.
Bear in mind that the little yellow fish of our interpretations needn’t go away;
after all, such “creatures” are part and parcel of the vast and beautiful
underwater world that constitutes experience. But what we can begin to do is
feel whatever is here, sensing what is actually present, the exceedingly subtle,
rich, and fathomless watery depths of experience that lie beyond the reach of
anything we could ever define or conceive.
The Map Is Not the Territory
One way to understand the function of human thought is to see it as a way the
organism tries to model reality. Our mental representations give us the sense
that things have a kind of solidity and stability, thereby allowing us to
seemingly make sense of them. Thinking is essentially an interpretive
process, a natural functioning of consciousness in which mental frameworks
are spontaneously generated in an effort to map the territory of experience.
For example, the many ideas I might construct about who you are essentially
function as a kind of map that I can use to make sense of you. But just as I
might use a map of Paris to navigate around the actual city, maps, no matter
how useful or detailed, can never fully capture or convey the richness and
complexity of the terrains they seek to describe.
Thoughts, whether about people, places, or things, are very much like maps.
What I imagine or conceive about you, however accurate that may be, is not
the same as what you actually are; what I think or say a given experience is
—​that’s happiness, that’s fear, that’s a tree, that’s loneliness—​is never the
same as its incomprehensibly rich and complex nature.
In and of itself, the fact that we are conceptually and linguistically rendering
experience is not the problem. However, what creates the lion’s share of
unrest and suffering we experience is mistaking our interpretations and
resulting definitions of reality for reality. In short, we believe the
interpretations accurately portray things, imagining our ideas about
experience actually represent it when in truth, those ideas are merely ideas,
approximations, or conceptual oversimplifications of something that simply
cannot be reduced or collapsed into any interpretive map, no matter how
seemingly accurate, elegant, or true it might be.
So, there is the reality of direct experience and then there are the conceptual
frameworks and mental maps we bring to it. And that right there is the
investigation I am inviting you to take up—​to appreciate that the actuality of
experience is distinct from its conceptual rendering and in so doing, cease
confusing the two. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with generating
interpretations. It’s what our perceiving intelligence appears to do quite
naturally. But that same intelligence can also recognize, through inquiring
directly into the nature of experiencing itself, that while the frameworks are
able to approximate reality, they are never able to adequately capture its
vastness, complexity, subtlety, and depth.
As you look into this, you may find that your interpretations deviate not just
somewhat but completely from the actuality they endeavor to define. And
while you don’t need to stop interpreting, you can see the interpretations as
interpretations and stop mistaking them for truth.
What Is Experience Made Of?
If I were interested in learning what some material object, say a rock, was
made of, I could study it and through that investigation discover that the rock
is composed of a complex array of cells which are in turn made of unique
configurations of molecules composed of billions upon billions of atoms that
are themselves composed of all manner of known and unknown subatomic
particles, waves, quarks, and so forth.
But just as we seem naturally inclined as human beings to explore the nature
and substance of material things, we can also ask the same questions about
subjective experience. To be sure, we have a seemingly endless number of
ways to describe and categorize the vast array of experiences we encounter.
We’ve even developed complex psychological and neuroscientific models to
explain how these different dimensions of subjective experience correlate
with and influence one another.
However, the problem with language is that it’s a little too facile in so far as
it leads us to believe that simply because we have words to describe our
experience, we actually know what those experiences are.
Sure, we may have many words to describe the things we experience from
moment to moment. But what are those words actually made of? What, for
example, is fear made of, experientially? What is consciousness, memory,
desire, sorrow, or any other experience actually made of? Just as with the
example of the rock, if an answer arises, such as, “Well, fear is made of these
particular sensations and thoughts,” can we look again and ask ourselves the
same question: “What are those things I call ‘sensations’ and ‘thoughts’ made
of?” You can listen to a recording for this chapter at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, simply feel whatever is here.
It matters not what it is, how it may be appearing, nor how you might be
describing it.
Just feel what’s present experientially. Now, ask yourself the following:
“What is this experience actually made of?”
Don’t try to answer it conceptually.
Just feel your way into the question in much the same way that you might
feel the texture of wood with your hand or the wind as it blows upon your
face. Relax any effort to try to figure out what this flow of experiencing is
made of and simply feel the presence of it.
Notice that experience is really too slippery, too unstable, and too transient to
ever get a conceptual handle on. And because of this, see that the only thing
we can ever actually describe is a memory of what was.
For now, just relax any effort to remember how things were appearing an
instant ago or imagine what they might be like in the next instant and instead,
simply feel what is here, right now—​reality, as it is, unencumbered by
whatever we imagine it was or might be. Feel that. Revel in it. Allow yourself
to drink deeply from its miraculous waters…
See that there really is no final answer to this question of what experience is
made of but only ever this endless free fall into the unfathomable mystery of
it all.
The Partiality of All Explanations
Neuroscientists are fond of saying that the sense of being a “self” is created
by the brain’s activity (Klemm 2011). Now, I’m not saying this view doesn’t
have some value or utility as a perspective. In fact, it can be quite
transformative to realize that this self we’ve believed to be a substantial thing
that can be threatened is actually being spontaneously generated by
biochemical and neuronal processes. But the “brain creates self” model is still
ultimately a conceptual rendering of an experiential reality that cannot be
collapsed into any explanatory model, be it scientific, materialistic, spiritual,
or metaphysical.
I’m not suggesting that all frameworks are necessarily created equal. But
frameworks are equivalent in so far as their being necessarily partial or
provisional. For example, take the view that the firing of neurons is what
creates a sense of being a “me” and that the organism evolved this capacity in
order to facilitate its navigation of reality. It sounds, at one level, like a very
reasonable and rational explanation. But who is to say the world is even like
that? Maybe life is far more chaotic, nonrational, and nonlinear than our little
human-​centric perspective imagines it to be.
As a causal explanation, we can argue based on the current, limited, and
rudimentary understandings of consciousness and human experience being
offered by neuroscience that it is the activity of neurons that gives rise to the
experience we call being a conscious, separate self. But why stop there? Why
not then examine what, if anything, is causing neurons to do what they’re
doing? In answering the question of how a sense of self comes about, isn’t it
arbitrary to stop at neurons when we know that what we call a neuron isn’t
merely what we imagine it to be, composed as it were of all manner of atomic
and subatomic particles which are themselves made of who knows what?
Sure, it seems that the self-​sense is generated by a brain and its mysterious
dance of neurochemical fireworks. But the operative word here is seems. Any
interpretation of reality is just that, an interpretation. So to say something is
this way or that way is to fall prey to the only real illusion, which is to
imagine that our interpretations, no matter how scientifically sound, represent
actualities. Well, let me qualify that—​an interpretation is an actuality in so far
as being something that is felt, something that’s experienced as being present.
It’s just not the “truth,” since we can never get to the final truth about
anything, never arrive at the bottom of what anything actually is, and this is
the case whether we’re talking physics or ​subjective experience.
The experience of being a self is no less transcendental and indefinable than
the realization that the self is a mental or biochemical/electrical construction.
All there is, is experience. And experience cannot be collapsed into any
framework of knowledge, at least not definitively. All we can really say is
that things seem to be this, that, or the other thing. One hundred years ago,
things seemed, according to Newtonian physics and other sciences, to be a
certain way. Now, as knowledge and understanding have evolved, they seem
to be another way. And in another 100 years, who knows how it will all
seem!
It’s Not What You Think It Is
Words represent our understandable attempt to characterize the moments of
experience. But any description—​fear, joy, worry, sorrow, happiness—​is
inherently limited and imprecise. For while our descriptions are remarkable
in their capacity to approximate reality, they can never fully capture it. As
natural as it may be for us to utilize language as a way of orienting ourselves
and communicating with one another, the problem is that we mistake our
linguistic, conceptual approximations of reality for reality. We imagine that
we know what experiences are, forgetting that we are doing just that—​-
imagining! In other words, we mistake our verbal map for the experiential
territory.
PRACTICE
Take any experience and look directly into its nature.
What is fear, what is joy, what is worry, what is awareness, beyond the labels
you give them?
Look at your experience, feel the presence of it, and see whether the words
you use to describe what’s here adequately capture or contain the moment’s
multidimensional, multilayered, multi-​textured nature and character.
Beyond what you think or imagine them to be, what are experiences,
actually?
We use language like a kind of shorthand, a useful way to simplify
experiences that, in reality, belie easy classification or simplification. And as
natural as it may be for us to utilize language and concepts to orient
ourselves, create frames of reference, and communicate with one another, the
fact of the matter is that our linguistic and conceptual frameworks represent
characterizations of a reality that is, by its very nature, impossible to fully
characterize.
The myriad frameworks we employ represent interpretations of something
that is ultimately uninterpretable, descriptions of things that are essentially
indescribable, finite and bounded definitions of experiential realities that are,
by nature, infinite and unbounded and therefore incapable of being fully or
definitively characterized.
Dialogue: The Uses and Limitations of Language
Dave: You encourage people to live more in the “actuality” of their
experience rather than relying on their conceptual and linguistic descriptions
and interpretations. But aren’t you implying that we should stop trying to
communicate about our experiences, since it’s not actually possible to convey
them? What bothers me about this is that it seems we have to use language.
After all, if we don’t communicate with others about our experiences, aren’t
we just going to end up living inside these little subjective cocoons, harboring
our own private, nonverbal realities?
John: To be sure, I’m suggesting that the descriptions and mental
interpretations we bring to experience and then share with others through
language are limited. Words can’t capture reality’s complex,
multidimensional nature. At the same time, I’m not negating the value and
usefulness of trying to describe reality from our limited points of view and
then communicating those descriptions to others. Heck, that’s what I’m doing
with you in this dialogue!
What I am saying is that even while we continue to use language to talk about
our experience, we can also begin to widen our experiential lens. We can
open ourselves to the dimensions of experience that lie beyond words and
concepts. We don’t need to stop using language. But even as we continue to
describe things and share those descriptions with others, we can also begin to
appreciate the inherent limitations of our concepts, recognizing that human
experience cannot be definitively categorized or captured by any of our
frameworks.
Just because we have names for things doesn’t mean we definitively know
what those things are—​reality is beyond the reach of our characterizations of
it. Life is forever wider, deeper, vaster than our finite concepts and language
systems are capable of accommodating. And by recognizing the ways in
which reality transcends our notions about it, we can discover something that
we often overlook—​a profound depth and richness intrinsic to all experience.
Dave: That’s very helpful. I find that sharing and speaking with others about
my experiences is one of the great pleasures of life. And I don’t want to lose
that, simply because I’ve come to discover the limitations of language.
John: As I was saying, part of being language-​using creatures is discussing
our experiences. And the nature of language means that we use concepts to
characterize how reality appears to us. But even as we do this, we can
appreciate that experiences are far more open-​ended, ambiguous, and
ultimately indefinable than language would suggest. And by seeing that we
can’t pin down reality with any philosophy, meaning-​making framework,
religion, ideology, or belief system, we discover a profound freedom.
Dave: Freedom? What exactly do you mean?
John: Well, to be stuck in an experience or circumstance, we first have to
know what it is. And what I’m saying is that the states we imagine ourselves
caught in—​fear, anxiety, insecurity, confusion—​transcend any and all
definitions we might bring to them.
Dave: But what does that have to do with freedom?
John: As we come to taste more directly the multidimensional, nonconceptual
nature of every state, we discover that the experiences we thought were solid,
fixed things are actually open-​ended and indefinite. We find freedom from
the experiences that trouble us by seeing they’re not actually the bounded,
discrete things we imagined them to be. In short, we clarify their nature. We
see that we can never get to the bottom of what experiences are. And the
more we awaken to the indescribability of everything, the more we begin to
taste the inherent freedom and open-​endedness of every experience.
Dave: Sure, I think I get what you’re saying. But again, aren’t you implying
that we should somehow stop trying to use language to define and describe
things, since that’s not actually possible?
John: Actually, there is nothing wrong with using language; it’s a rich and
important part of human interaction. The problem is not that we use words
and concepts to describe things, it’s that we imagine those descriptions
represent absolute truths rather than mere approximations of reality.
Dave: I see.
John: I don’t believe humans will ever stop interacting, loving, playing, and
learning together, and language will likely continue to be central in all these
endeavors. But if we can recognize the fundamental limitations of language,
we can be more open and flexible and less defended about whatever we may
believe, and increasingly comfortable with the inherent ambiguity,
uncertainty, and indefinability of everything.
As I see it, the point of spiritual or psychological inquiry is to find out what’s
true about experience, to encounter reality as it is rather than merely our
fantasies, projections, hopes, beliefs, and ideas about it. Every moment, from
the subtlest to the most obvious, transcends any effort we might make to
characterize it—​which doesn’t negate the characterizations or descriptions,
though it places them in a much vaster context. Language and concepts are
facile. “Oh, yeah, I know what that is, it’s anxiety or it’s joy…”
The conceptual frameworks we use to characterize experience point to
something that is concretely present. The question is, what exactly is that?
Reality, the Greatest Drug of All
Not too long ago, a client said to me during a Skype session, “It sounds from
the way you are describing the nature of experience that you’re on ayahuasca
or something.” I had to laugh, letting her know that the last drug I ingested
was probably some 35 years ago! I said to her that we are, in a very real
sense, already “tripping” on the greatest drug of all, experience itself. To be
sure, we may imagine otherwise, that this reality we find ourselves
experiencing is anything but an inspiring trip; it may even seem quite dull or
boring at times (or much of the time). It may appear as if nothing is going on
that we would call extraordinary or awe-​inspiring. But could it be that we’re
not looking carefully enough? Maybe we have just grown accustomed to
defining experiences in particular ways, blind, as it were, to the inconceivable
miracle that is unfolding as every momentary experience. Is there a way to
see this more clearly, to awaken more fully to the astounding, remarkable
nature of everything?
Try out the practice below or listen to a recording for this chapter at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few minutes, I invite you to peer around the edges of your
descriptions of things, just beyond the horizon of your seeming certainty and
knowledge of what things are. Just let yourself explore whatever is presenting
itself experientially—​the sounds of traffic, the splashes of flickering color
everywhere, the sometimes gentle, sometimes chaotic flow of thoughts and
feelings rushing by. It matters not what is actually here; just let yourself trip
on it, marveling at the way everything moves, the way experience unfolds,
the way each perceptual phenomenon dances and sparkles and shines—​the
color, the light, the shape, the texture, the flavor, the energy that appears
spontaneously as each flash instant of life. Let yourself trip on the way that
experience never holds still. Notice how the moment is instantaneously
present, suddenly here with no clear beginning or end.
Allow yourself to be taken in, captivated, and entranced by even the most
seemingly unimportant or meaningless things showing up in the field of
experience—​a crack in the sidewalk, a glint of light on your armchair, the
dance of shadow and light playing on the wall, the grains of wood on the
kitchen table, a tiny, insignificant blade of grass or dead leaf that has fallen to
the ground. Let yourself trip on all of it, falling into the endlessly amazing
nature of everything that’s being experienced—​every thought, every sound,
every sight, every feeling, every sensation, all of it a complete marvel, every
moment a trip into bottomless infinity.
Through this kind of investigation, you can begin to taste the way in which
experience—​without the aid of any mind-​altering substances—​is always and
already a total trip, an infinitely diverse, kaleidoscopic array and mix of
color, light, texture, nuance, energy, and consciousness…an indescribable,
richly textured, wildly unpredictable, dynamic flashing forth of phenomena…
a ceaseless, ungraspable, unnameable flow of sparkling sensations, feelings,
thoughts, perceptions, memories…a shining, flickering, shape-​shifting,
morphing dance…a presence that is always here, always now, yet never the
same…a singular, seamless, undivided reality that is, at the same time,
unimaginably colorful and diverse. Experience, as it is: the greatest drug of
all!
The Confirmation Bias
One of the most important discoveries made in the field of psychology over
the past few decades is the confirmation bias. This perceptual bias refers to
our tendency to search out information that confirms our preconceived
notions about the world and ignore or overlook those bits of data that don’t fit
our prior assumptions. The confirmation bias reflects our deep-​seated habit
and inclination to defend whatever we believe to be true regardless of any
disconfirming evidence we might be presented with.
The reality is that in any given moment, we don’t really experience life as it
is; we experience our beliefs, interpretations, and descriptions of life. We are,
in a very real sense, hypnotized by our beliefs and ideologies about
everything, caught up in the web of our own descriptions, living inside a
virtual world made of concepts, not reality. We believe our descriptions,
imagining they represent reality when, in fact, they are necessarily crude
approximations of this unfathomably rich, multidimensional complexity we
call life.
It’s all very innocent and natural, this impulse to create explanations and
develop various models of reality. It’s understandable that we humans would
desire to create some sense of order, certainty, and predictability in the face
of the sea of uncertainty and unpredictability we find ourselves swimming in.
The problem, however (and human history illustrates this quite clearly and
painfully), is that we all too often become personally and emotionally
invested, imagining our conceptual maps and interpretive renderings to be
true representations of reality. And it is right there where we can see the
power of the confirmation bias at work, making it that much harder for us to
see beyond our cherished notions, frameworks, and explanatory models,
hesitant to truly open ourselves up and consider the possibility that things
may be far richer and far more nuanced and multi-​dimensional than we’ve
imagined them to be.
It’s fairly easy to see the ways in which the confirmation bias has served to
perpetuate such things as racial and gender stereotyping and prejudice. Its
powerful role in human conflict is also quite clear. Whether religious,
political, or ideological in nature, our resistance to having our points of view
challenged seems to know no bounds. But not only do we cling to and defend
our viewpoints regarding the world, politics, religion, and so forth—​we also
subscribe to all manner of beliefs and ideas about our own subjective
experience, taking for granted that the words we use to describe what appears
are somehow “true” characterizations of whatever may be occurring.
Let’s take the term “tired.” Tired is really an abstraction, a conceptual
rendering of what is essentially a momentary, fleeting set of perceptions and
sensations. The use of any word, including “tired,” represents an
understandable yet ultimately futile attempt to capture in language the myriad
textures and patterns that constitute human experience. To be sure, the use of
language can function at one level to help distinguish one type of patterning
of life energy (“tired”) from another (such as “exhilarated”). But if we
investigate any experience, in this example feeling tired, we’ll find that
“tired” isn’t exactly what we imagine it to be. Beyond the label we give it,
beyond the verbal descriptor, what exactly is this flow of experience we
describe as “tired”? Can we really say? When we inquire into it
experientially, when we dive directly into the raw energy of this thing called
“being tired” rather than reflexively referring to the conceptual label to tell us
what the experience is, we are left with something far less definite, something
in fact quite elusive, a set of experiential phenomena that, while totally
present and undeniable, is at the same time impossible to grasp hold of or pin
down definitively. To be sure, things appear, and we have descriptive labels
that we use to refer to them. But the reality is that each momentary perception
utterly transcends any effort to define or characterize it.
Another way to understand this is that every moment is both conceptual and
nonconceptual in nature. Everything that is experienced has its descriptive
label, such as “tired,” “fearful,” “happy,” or “anxious,” on the one hand and
yet at the same time, each of these phenomena is, in fact, utterly beyond our
capacity to describe it fully. Put another way, we could say that every
experiential phenomenon has two aspects—​its sheer existence or presence
and its description. At a descriptive level, such things as fear, tiredness, and
joy certainly exist. However, these things are, at the same time, unknowable,
beyond any possibility of being fully captured descriptively. In other words,
we can never quite get to the bottom of what things are.
Now this may all sound terribly abstract and lacking in any sort of practical
relevance to our lives. But consider this—​the very states such as fear, sorrow,
insecurity, anxiety, discomfort, and uncertainty that have plagued and
tormented human beings for millennia are not, in fact, merely what they
appear to be. We’ve imagined that these momentary flashes of experiencing
labeled as fear or anxiety require some remedy, fix, or cure. But what fuels
this persistent view is our belief in the substantive nature of such states, the
idea that they are actually “things” that can harm us. And this belief is a
direct product of the ways in which such experiential patterns are
characterized, conceptually and linguistically, including the myriad stories we
layer on top of such phenomena, most notably the idea that such states are
problematic in the first place!
Because we have words and definitions for things and experiences, we
imagine that we know definitively what these actually are:
“Oh yes, I know what tired is. It’s, well…a feeling.”
“Okay, but what is a feeling?”
“Well, it’s a set of distinct sensations in the body.”
“All right then, but what is a sensation?”
“Well…hmm…I’m not exactly sure. It’s kind of hard to define or describe,
actually…”
“Exactly!”
At one level, reality is precisely what we say it is. Tired is tired. Fear is fear.
Happiness is happiness, and so on. At the same time, our experiences are
forever transcending any effort we might make to explain, define, or
otherwise characterize them. And so we find ourselves smack dab in the
middle of this beautiful, awe-​inspiring paradox—​we know what things are on
the one hand (their descriptive labels), and yet we also don’t know what they
are, for everything is inherently uncertain and indeterminate. All that exists is
pure, wide-​open, ungraspable mystery, through and through.
Understandably, we cling to our explanatory models and labels, falling prey
to the confirmation bias, because they give us some sense of safety, security,
and certainty. It can no doubt be a somewhat scary, even terrifying
proposition to consider that we could allow our points of view to be held
lightly as frames of reference, rather than absolute truths existing in their own
right.
PRACTICE
For a moment, consider that despite all our seeming knowledge, all the
mental interpretations we habitually bring to the moments of our lives, the
ideas, beliefs, opinions, speculations, philosophies, conceptual maps and
models, we don’t actually know what experience is, at least not definitively
(which is a euphemism for not at all)!
Experience is simply too complex to be understood by the thoughts that are
generated about it; there is just too much detail, too much information, too
much complexity, too much nuance, too much subtlety to accurately render
this moment via the mechanism of thought.
Let yourself feel the truth of this unknowability, the impossibility of being
able to say precisely what this moment of experience actually is.
Let yourself feel the ways in which your thoughts about what is occurring fail
to capture the inconceivable depth that is actually present.
For a brief moment, just let all your knowledge, all the definitions, all the
mental maps and interpretations fall away. The seemingly firm, predictable
ground of knowing that you once imagined could be counted on—​just let that
give way, for it can’t really hold you or this moment anyway.
The concepts, definitions, and descriptions we bring to this are partial at best.
Of course we long to know what this is, to stand upon the firm ground of our
thoughts about reality. And yet the truth is that we’re in an exhilarating free
fall of indeterminacy and multidimensionality, never quite landing anywhere
firm.
And yet right there is our greatest liberation, the freedom from any and all
fixed frameworks. Our labels, definitions, and conceptualizations may have
brought us an imagined security. But the true security, the true ground, is
really no ground at all. This is a groundless ground, every miraculous instant
known yet unfathomable, experienced yet ungraspable.
Distinguishing Thought from Experience
As I’ve been saying, we live, in a sense, in two worlds, the world of direct
experience and the world of our thoughts and ideas about that experience.
And our tendency is to confuse the two, lumping them together and
imagining that experience is what we think it is. This mistaking our
conceptual rendering of reality for reality turns out to be the source of much
of our confusion.
To further highlight the difference between these two realms—​experience
and the interpretations we bring to it—​here is a meditation. You can also
download a recording of it at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For the next few moments, simply feel the experience conventionally labeled
as “breathing.”
Just sense all that is present, the incredibly rich array of textures that
constitute what we call the breath.
Now go ahead and let yourself formulate whatever concepts the mind is
inclined to generate about the experience of breathing—​what it is, how it
works, its various qualities, for example its depth or shallowness. Just notice
whatever characterizations of the breath may be present, including the name
we give it.
Next, simply notice both the direct experience of this thing called breathing
and any thoughts you might be having about it. And now, notice the way in
which these two dimensions—​the direct experience and your interpretation of
what it is—​function independently of one another.
For example, the set of experiential textures and qualities that make up what
you call the breath are what they are, irrespective of how you might describe
them. Similarly, the direct, raw, unfiltered experience of these textural
qualities in no way interferes with the mental interpretations you bring to
them.
See that the experience called breathing does not actually come with any
label attached to it.
No definition or description is intrinsic to the experience. The experience and
the thoughts about it exist side by side, with neither intruding upon the other.
Now let yourself feel the complex, intricate set of phenomena we call “the
body.” Notice the swirling array of sensations and energies that are present.
And now bring awareness to the ideas you may be having about this dynamic
display. See that the label itself (“body”) is merely an idea, a way of
conceptually designating whatever is being experienced.
Again, notice these two realms—​the direct experience and the thoughts you
have about it—​and see the way in which they do not interfere with one
another but exist, in a sense, in their own separate domains.
The intricate, complex dance of energies we conventionally label as “body”
are what they are, irrespective of whatever we might think about them.
Lastly, if you were to characterize what is happening right now, you might
say something along the lines of, “Well, I’m sitting here, reading or listening
to these words and practicing this guided meditation.”
See that description as a description, an effort to make conceptual sense of
what’s happening.
And now feel what is actually present in the field of experience, this
explosion of light, color, sound, and energy, this wildly unpredictable,
uncontrollable dance of flickering sensations, memories, thoughts, feelings,
and images.
See the narrative about what you imagine is happening here. And now feel
the actuality that description pretends to capture, appreciating the ways in
which the one is not the other.
Categories
Essentially, categories don’t exist, at least not as actualities; they are
conceptual abstractions. For example, take the category “flowers.” Flowers
represent a class of things which share certain characteristics. However, in
order to place the obviously unique objects we call a rose, a marigold, and a
tulip in the same conceptual category, we must overlook those distinctive
features such as shape, color, and texture we consider to be nonessential
elements of the category. This perceptual censorship enables us to create the
myriad abstract, conceptual categories we are all quite familiar with.
Let’s look at another category of phenomena, a rose. If you were to take any
two objects conventionally labeled as “roses,” they’d undoubtedly share
certain features that allow us to group them together conceptually. However,
if we look carefully, it can be seen that even if the roses are very similar in
terms of size, shape, color, petal formation, and so on, no rose is ever
precisely the same as another.
And so, that beautiful red object you see growing in your garden—​even if
you might have a conventional word to describe it, a closer look reveals that
you can’t say precisely what it is owing to its distinctive nature; it’s literally
in a class by itself. Even if there exist other objects that appear to resemble it,
there is nothing quite like this one. Given that this thing we call a “rose” is
uniquely itself, to place it in some general category of things is to
oversimplify the unthinkable complexity that it actually exhibits. When we
look at what we conventionally call a rose, the reality is that we’re not really
looking at a rose; we are looking at something we’ve never actually seen
before. For no matter how closely it may appear to resemble other things, that
which we’re viewing is an utterly unique configuration of shape, color, and
texture. And so only by censoring or overlooking its uniquely distinctive
features are we able to categorize anything.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, try to characterize, in a word or two, your predominant state
of mind at this moment. Whatever your word is (calmness, agitation, elation,
confusion, fatigue, joy), just note it silently to yourself.
Now, let’s say your word is “fatigue.” Like every other description, fatigue
represents our attempt to characterize what is ultimately an inconceivably
complex pattern of perceptual phenomena. An experience appears, which we
then recognize in some way as having arisen before: “Oh, I know what that
is, it’s fatigue (or whatever your word was).” But actually, while the pattern
we’re experiencing is certainly reminiscent of something we’ve encountered
before, it is not the same as any previous perceptual moment. At least not
exactly…
With that notion in mind, just feel your present experience, however you may
be labeling it.
Sure, it may seem as if you can place it in some category as I suggested. But
can you sense how complex and multidimensional, how ultimately
uncharacterizable and utterly unique this experience actually is?
Can you feel how, even if it has certain familiar features and characteristics
that remind you of other moments like it, the experience is unlike anything
you’ve ever felt or encountered before?
The reality is that each experience is unique. It belongs to no category, owing
to its completely original nature.
So what does this all mean? Well, it points to the fact that because no two
moments are exactly alike, there is no actual reference point to know what
anything or any experience is. This flash instant that’s appearing has, quite
literally, never come into existence before, at least not exactly like this. Every
moment is a complete original! And so experiences cannot be known, cannot
be named, cannot be conceptualized or categorized without overlooking so
much of the depth and detail that makes each instant the utterly unique
expression of life that it is.
Yes, we can name and categorize things in order to make sense of ourselves
and the world and communicate with each other. But even as we continue to
do this, which we likely will until our final breath, we can appreciate that
experience cannot fit neatly into any of our categories or concepts. It’s simply
too big, too complex, too multifaceted for that.
And just as objects (such as roses) and experiences (such as fatigue) are too
vast and multidimensional to be held by our categories and names, so too are
we. We are not what we were a year, a month, or even a second ago; we are,
like every other phenomenon, ever-​changing from moment to moment, even
if in barely perceptible ways. And because of this, defining or categorizing
ourselves is not actually possible without overlooking our inherently dynamic
nature.
Who we are is literally not who we were even a nanosecond ago. Any
definitions of who and what we are could only ever be based on memory, on
some image or idea of ourselves. But that is simply not what we are now.
Because reality is inherently unstable and impermanent, we are, quite
literally, beyond definition, beyond any possibility of being categorized
according to any set of seemingly stable qualities or characteristics. What we
are is this actuality, this reality arising right now in a way it has never before
arisen.
Dialogue: Discovering the Common Denominator
Ingrid: I was listening to an interview in which you were describing the
existence of “another order of well-​being.” Can you explain what you mean
by that term?
John: Sure. Ordinarily, we equate a sense of well-​being with the presence of
certain body-​mind states such as happiness and pleasure and the absence of
others such as fear, sadness, and anxiety. Given human beings’ seemingly
universal desire to experience well-​being, it’s not surprising that we would
try to arrange our lives in such a way as to maximize those states and
circumstances we associate with well-​being while avoiding or minimizing
those we deem to be lacking in it.
Ingrid: Yes, that makes logical sense and certainly describes my own
experience trying to realize greater well-​being in my life.
John: Yes, this approach to well-​being certainly has a strong intuitive appeal.
However, it also has a number of significant downsides. Foremost among
these is the fact that despite our best efforts, we’re frequently unable to
effectively control our experiences and circumstances. As a result, we end up
encountering all manner of things that lead us to feel we’re somehow lacking
in well-​being, experiencing either too many moments that are not to our
liking or not enough of the ones that we like.
Ingrid: Are you saying it’s wrong to seek circumstances that bring us
pleasure and avoid those we’d rather not experience?
John: Not at all. That search is fine and natural, as far as it goes.
Ingrid: As far as it goes?
John: There’s certainly nothing wrong with taking whatever steps we can to
secure more of the states we enjoy and less of those that we’d rather not
experience. But it’s arguably a fool’s errand to imagine we could realize any
degree of consistent, stable, or predictable happiness through such a strategy.
Ingrid: Why do you say that?
John: Because it’s not really possible to find anything truly stable and lasting
in experiences and circumstances that are by nature unstable and
impermanent.
Ingrid: I see. But does that mean we’re doomed to this hamster wheel
existence, chasing after experiences and circumstances that feel good, trying
our best to avoid those that don’t, and failing to consistently achieve either?
John: Well, as I like to say, there are really two ways to approach this. The
most familiar is what we’ve been discussing, doing what we can to maximize
pleasurable and fulfilling experiences while avoiding those we find lacking in
pleasure and fulfillment. As I said, we’re free to continue to engage with life
this way. But there’s another way and that is discovering what doesn’t come
and go but is continuous.
Ingrid: I’m confused. You frequently say that experiences are constantly
changing, that it’s not really possible to hold on to thoughts, feelings,
sensations, and circumstances owing to their dynamic, impermanent nature.
But if experiences are always changing, what do you mean when you say we
can discover a well-​being that is unchanging or continuous?
John: You’re absolutely right that a well-​being described as continuous can’t
be found in things which are, by nature, discontinuous. In that realm, we
imagine well-​being depends upon what’s being experienced and the way in
which that is being defined. But there’s another place we can go, a realm or
dimension of well-​being and fulfillment that is not dependent upon what’s
happening.
Ingrid: Not dependent upon what’s happening?
John: As we’ve been exploring, experiences do not last and as a result, it’s
simply not possible to find any sort of lasting happiness in them. However,
despite their inherently unstable, impermanent nature, experiences, from the
most pleasurable and enjoyable to the most difficult and painful, do share a
common denominator. And it is there where we can go to find this other
order or dimension of well-​being I’m speaking about.
Ingrid: But you also talk about the way in which every experience is utterly
unique. So how can experiences have a common denominator?
John: Good question! It’s true that every moment that appears is utterly
distinct from anything else that has come before it. So yes, each experience,
each appearance of life is indeed like no other. But every moment shares one
thing in common, and that is its very existence.
Ingrid: Okay. But what does that have to do with well-​being?
John: We could say that every experience has two fundamental dimensions.
There is the description of whatever appears, and then there is the sheer
presence or existence of it. The experiences we define as joyful and clear are,
without question, distinct from those we describe as sad or confused. And it’s
fine and understandable to prefer some states over others and then seek to
have more of the ones we prefer. But what I’m suggesting is that there’s
another dimension of well-​being that resides in the sheer presence and
existence of things rather than in their descriptions.
Ingrid: I don’t get it…how can the presence of something painful and
difficult be a source of well-​being?
John: The answer is that we only discover this other dimension of well-​being
by leaving behind the world of descriptions, if even for a brief moment.
Ingrid: You mean we stop describing things?
John: No, I’m not suggesting we should or even can cease labeling and
defining things. That’s a natural function of human consciousness, it would
appear! But this other domain of well-​being I’m talking about lies entirely
beyond the realm of human description. Unlike the well-​being that’s tied to
the world of descriptions and labels, this is a well-​being that has no opposite.
Ingrid: No opposite?
John: The states we describe as “happy” and “fulfilled” are essentially
defined in terms of their opposites, that is not happy and not fulfilled. The
realm of the described is, we could say, the realm of opposed frameworks.
It’s the realm of distinctions, the domain of this versus that, of happiness
versus unhappiness, clarity versus confusion, joy versus sorrow, and so on.
But as I said, all states and circumstances, while absolutely distinct at the
level of their description, are at the same time completely equal in terms of
their existence. This is the common denominator I’m pointing to. Regardless
of the myriad ways we might characterize the moments that visit us, they
share one common feature and that is the fact of their presence, the fact that
they are. And that turns out to be a powerful, astounding fact.
Ingrid: Powerful? How so?
John: Unlike the realm of the described which is constantly coming and
going, not to mention wildly unpredictable, the dimension of presence
doesn’t come and go. Experiences and circumstances are constantly
changing; sometimes we like them, sometimes we don’t. But they are always
present. The presence of things never changes; we can count on that fact.
Presence is, we could say, the one thing that is reliable, the one thing that is
constant. Something is always present, always here, even if that which is
present and here is forever changing!
Ingrid: But how do we access this other realm, the realm of the undescribed?
John: In the realm of the described, we have to employ all manner of
strategies in order to realize moments we equate with well-​being while
simultaneously doing whatever we can to keep at bay those we consider to be
lacking in well-​being. But in the realm of sheer presence, there exists no
opposite. There is only ever the presence of what is, and while its particular
flavor is forever changing, presence remains as it is: present…
For this reason, no effort is required to change either our experiences or
circumstances for presence to be. Presence is, no matter the form it may be
taking. And so rather than teaching methods to get ourselves more connected
to presence, I’m simply pointing to the fact that it’s impossible to ever leave
it!
Ingrid: That’s powerful, to know that there is something that is always here,
always present.
John: Yes, it is! Now many people get confused and imagine that feeling a
sense of presence is a particular experience they can either have or not have.
This is a subtle but important point I want to emphasize.
We can certainly recognize that the moments of life are present, regardless of
how we might describe them; we can see that presence is not dependent upon
whatever experiential content may be showing up. We can realize that sorrow
is no less present than joy or that frustration is no less present than
satisfaction. And as an experience, this is a powerful and liberating thing to
realize, to discover that existence continues to exist, that presence remains
present no matter how it may appear or be defined.
In a moment of insight, we can feel the presence of presence and recognize
that presence can never be absent for it is the fundamental nature of
everything that appears, including experiences we might label as lacking in
presence! However, like every other experience that may arise, the moments
of recognizing that presence can never actually disappear will themselves
disappear. It’s quite paradoxical!
Ingrid: But you just said that presence is continuous, that it never comes and
goes. So if that’s true, how can it ever disappear?
John: As I said, this is a very subtle point. Yes, presence is continuous for it
is the nature of every experiential moment to be present, by definition. But
the experiential recognition that this is the case, that presence is here and can
never depart, can and will fade, just as all experiences inevitably do. And
when that occurs, when we find ourselves feeling as if presence has somehow
vanished, that we’ve lost touch with it, we will naturally seek out ways to
regain that experience of presence we imagine has been lost.
Ingrid: I see. But the experience we describe as lacking in presence is still
present, right?
John: Exactly! Even the feeling that we have somehow lost contact with
presence is fully, one hundred percent present! This is what begins to dawn,
that even though described experiences are forever coming and going—​for
that is their nature, to never last—​presence remains, existence remains,
appearing in all the infinite guises that it does.
What’s crucial to realize in all of this is that presence (call it life or existence
if you prefer) is not dependent upon the myriad ways it can appear. That’s
what makes it so powerful! Simply put, presence does not depend upon
whatever happens to be present, for it is the nature of all things to be present.
Ingrid: That’s amazing! Are there any other ways this can be pointed to?
John: Yes. I often use the word “being.” Regardless of how something is
described, it is. Everything exists, everything is, even if this that is, is forever
on the move. We could call this the beingness or isness of everything.
Another word that could be used is “now.” Now continues to be now,
irrespective of how it may be showing up. Now is invulnerable; it’s
impossible to destroy it, even as it is continuously dying and being reborn as
the next instant, the next now…
Another word I sometimes use is “experiencing.” As we’ve been discussing,
experiences are forever coming and going. But the fact of experiencing itself
is continuous. It never stops. Experiences are constantly appearing and then
disappearing, but the light of experiencing itself never turns off.
We can also use the word “knowing.” Whatever is being known—​that’s the
realm of the described; sometimes we know what we could call happiness
and sometimes we know sadness. But the knowing is constant; knowing is
the ever-​present, common denominator underlying whatever is being known.
The content of what’s known is forever changing. But the knowing itself
remains, fundamentally untouched and unchanged by whatever is being
known.
Ingrid: So then, all of these different words are really just synonyms for this
common denominator you’re speaking of?
John: Yes. And as we become increasingly familiar with this common
element of every experience, another realm of well-​being and fulfillment is
revealed, one that is realized to be independent of whatever is occurring. We
come to see that while finding any sort of stable well-​being in that which is
inherently unstable (the coming and going of experience) is a dicey
proposition, stability can be found in that which doesn’t come and go, the fact
of experiencing itself.
So, just let yourself play with all of this, allowing yourself periodic moments
during the day to gently shift attention from the content of whatever is being
experienced to the simple fact of its presence, the fact that it is. Revel in this.
Feel how liberating it is to know and touch this presence of experiencing that
remains, no matter how it may be appearing.
Interpretive Frameworks
A caption placed beneath a picture tells us something about what we’re
seeing. But no matter how clever it might be, captions can never hope to
convey the infinite depth and detail of information contained in any visual
image. Thoughts, whether about people, places, or things, are very much like
captions. For what I imagine or conceive about you, however accurate that
may be, is not the same as what you actually are; what I think or say a given
experience is (“that’s happiness, that’s fear, that’s a tree, that’s loneliness…”)
is never the same as its incomprehensibly rich and complex actuality.
You can listen to a recording of the following practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, notice that without any real effort on your part,
interpretations and descriptions of experience are being generated
spontaneously.
Just let yourself feel whatever is being felt, sense whatever is being sensed,
notice whatever is being noticed and as you do so, appreciate that the mind is
trying to wrap its head around what’s here, trying to characterize it, trying to
make sense of and determine what it is by labeling and defining it.
But as you appreciate this natural function of consciousness to interpret
experience, see if you can also notice how impossible it is to fully capture
experience in any of the definitions or descriptions being generated about it.
Feel what is present, notice the effort to make sense of and interpret it and
then see how inadequate those interpretations are, how impossible it is to
really say what this is that’s occurring, the profound mystery that is every
momentary perception.
Experience Deviates from Our Interpretations
There are many things that we believe, that we take for granted as being real,
whether about the world or ourselves. Call it conventional reality, if you like.
We imagine that things have a kind of stable, static nature, that there is a
permanence, a continuity, a coherence to things, that the people, places, and
things we experience are more or less what they were a moment ago. We
don’t, for example, question whether time is real, believing wholeheartedly
that the categories of past, present, and future actually exist as real,
discernible, irrefutable things.
And just as we have no doubt that time exists, so do we believe in this thing
called space, never really questioning the presumption that we are “here”
while the world which is not us exists over “there.” But let’s take a moment
and investigate these largely unquestioned assumptions, exploring the ways
in which the world of immediate, direct experience actually deviates from so
many of our conventionally held notions. You can find a recording of the
following practice at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Look in your immediate experience… Can you actually find an “inside?” Can
you tell exactly where “here” is as opposed to that which we conventionally
label as “there?”
If so, where is the dividing line? Where does this supposed inside (here) end
and the purported outside (over there) begin?
To be sure, we believe these distinctions to be true and actual. But are they?
Look at experience itself: Can any lines or seams actually be found? Are the
apparent divisions actually there or might these seeming lines between inside
and outside be merely imagined?
Now let’s look at this thing we call time. Look in experience… Can you
identify a clear beginning to any experience that appears? Can you locate an
actual past?
Where does that supposed “before” exist other than in this mysterious thing
we call memory? Where does what we call the past end and the “present
moment” begin? And where does what we call “now” cease to exist and start
to become the next thing (the future)?
We imagine that experiences have continuity, that they endure over time. But
look and see if anything actually lasts.
Notice that experiences never actually repeat themselves, that each flash
instant is utterly distinct from the next. Notice that experiences don’t actually
have duration, that every thought, feeling, and sensation vanishes no sooner
than it appears. Appreciate how dynamic experience is, how whatever is
appearing is forever changing, never holding still for even a second.
The Vast and Indescribable Nature of Experience
Experience does not come with a label or name tag pinned to its lapel,
announcing what it is. The dance of light and color in the evening sky does
not say, “I’m a sunset.” The clear, sparkling liquid racing down the
mountainside doesn’t announce to us, “I’m a river.” No, it is we who supply
the labels. Experience arrives as it is, presenting as various qualities,
characteristics, attributes, and textures. And those very qualities that make up
what we call experience also come with no narrative attached. They arrive
naked and unadorned by any ideas we might entertain about them.
Now, most of us have experienced the way in which certain moments such as
listening to music, making love, or seeing some awesome display of nature
are beyond the reach of words. We recognize that such moments are simply
too vast, too rich, and too multifaceted to be captured by any of our
descriptive frameworks. But as it turns out, this is the case with all
experience. Let’s explore...
PRACTICE
As you sit here, pick any aspect of experience—​the feeling of the breath
moving in and out of the body, the complex array of sounds you hear, the
intricate play of light all around you—​whatever is presenting itself most
noticeably, just feel how vast and indescribable it actually is.
Notice the ways in which your ideas about whatever is being experienced, the
labels you apply to each moment, are so limited, so much less rich and
detailed than the experiences themselves.
For example, the thing sitting here that we call “the body”—​notice how that
concept could never hope to contain the vast kaleidoscope of sensations
cascading through consciousness each instant.
Feel the unthinkably complex dance of energies that constitute each moment
of experience and appreciate the ways in which no words, no concepts, no
descriptions can encompass the actuality of whatever is here.
Dialogue: Are You Saying That Suffering Isn’t Real?
Tim: When I hear you speak about experience, it sometimes sounds like
you’re denying the reality of human suffering. You seem to be implying that
the pain we experience in ourselves and see happening in the larger world
isn’t actually real but is merely imagined, defined into existence through the
medium of language and conceptualization. But what about things like
torture, abuse, and severe psychological trauma? Are you saying those don’t
really exist, that their negative effects and implications are merely the result
of interpretation? Isn’t this dismissive of people’s actual suffering?
John: In all that I write and speak about, I am certainly not suggesting that
whatever is presenting itself experientially or circumstantially isn’t at times
exceedingly difficult to navigate.
Just to give a personal example, several months ago, totally out of the blue, I
developed severe pain in my wrist. While I’m still not entirely clear what
caused this flare-​up, it was probably the most severe pain I’ve ever
experienced in this life. It literally brought me to my knees in tears, several
times over the course of the weeks it was occurring. Nothing that I did
seemed to reduce the pain, including taking very powerful steroids. Needless
to say, if someone were to ask me at the time what that experience was like, I
would have described it as a very challenging and painful situation. It
certainly wasn’t anything I would have wished on another, nor was it
something I hoped to experience in the future!
And so in part because that experience was as intense and unrelenting as it
was, despite my best efforts to resolve it, I decided to spend some time
exploring what it was.
Tim: What do you mean, what it was? You just said it was intensely painful
and difficult to deal with. So, isn’t painful and difficult exactly what that
experience was?
John: Well, yes and no. I’m not denying the reality of the pain that was being
felt. That word certainly conveys, at least at one level, what was being
experienced. However, what I was investigating during that time, and invite
others to explore in my work, is what the “raw material” of experience is.
Tim: The raw material?
John: Yes. When a circumstance conventionally labeled as painful or difficult
arises, what exactly are those labels referring to? Some complex array of
phenomena is undoubtedly present, which we then label as pain or
discomfort. But while these descriptors indicate something about what is
happening, the words don’t tell us much about the details that make up such
descriptions. And so the question I asked myself and am asking you now is,
what is pain actually composed of, experientially? What is the raw material
that constitutes pain, whether physical or emotional?
Tim: Well, it’s hard to describe. To be honest, I’m not really sure what pain
is exactly. I just know it hurts!
John: Fair enough. But when you say, “it hurts,” what is the it in that phrase
referring to?
Tim: I guess I would say it refers to a set of feelings or sensations that I find
uncomfortable.
John: Okay. But let’s probe a little further. What is it that makes that
sensorial experience uncomfortable? Put another way, what is the word
discomfort pointing to in direct experience? To be sure, pain and discomfort
are interpretations of something that is happening. The question is, what
exactly is it that’s occurring that we subsequently label as “painful?”
Tim: I’m not really sure.
John: I can very much appreciate that answer as I’m not really sure myself!
When I pose that question, I’m inviting you to examine what you might call
the non-​narrative dimensions of experience. We’re all very familiar with the
narrative dimensions, those descriptive labels we use to tell ourselves and
others about what is happening.
But what do the descriptions we use refer to? The answer to this question
reveals the non-​narrative, nonconceptual dimensions of experience, those
aspects of reality that lie beyond the reach of words, concepts, and labels. For
example, if you look at the set of phenomena I was experiencing with my
wrist, there was on the one hand the narration about what was happening: “I
can’t believe how uncomfortable this is; this pain is excruciating; I’m not
sure I can deal with it much longer; why is this happening to me; when is it
going to resolve itself,” and so on.
But even as there was this ongoing commentary about what was happening,
as I explored the more nonverbal, textural dimensions of the experience, I
saw that what was being called pain was not merely what I thought it was.
What I was describing no doubt had its own unique signature, we could say, a
certain qualitative feel and texture that was distinct from what I might have
called pleasure or comfort. At the same time, I could see that this thing I was
calling pain really wasn’t a fixed, bounded thing at all but a dynamic, ever-​-
morphing, wavelike movement of energy and information, a universe of
inconceivable depth for which there were no words.
Tim: Okay, that sounds intriguing. But did it still hurt? I mean, you may have
opened up to another dimension of the pain. But it continued to be
experienced as painful, didn’t it?
John: Well, it’s paradoxical. In many respects, there was still what I would
characterize as pain being experienced. And yet, I recognized that what I was
calling pain was also far subtler, more nuanced and open-​ended than that
label typically implies. Yes, I would say my wrist still hurt. At the same time,
venturing into those sensations I was describing as painful was like traveling
down a deep, dark, bottomless well of indescribability.
Ironically, the more carefully I explored the pain, the less clear I became
about what precisely it was. Something was obviously there. But what
exactly that was, I cannot really say for it’s not really possible to pinpoint, in
words or concepts, where or what the wavelike “particles” that constitute the
pain experience are composed of. In the end, what we call pain is, like every
other experiential phenomenon, an unfathomable, ungraspable mystery,
through and through.
Tim: So discovering this other non-​narrative, nonconceptual dimension of
pain may not have made the pain go away. But it altered your overall
experience of it in some way?
John: Yes, very much so. Here’s one way to understand the pragmatic value
of this inquiry I’m describing. How we see and experience a given
phenomenon depends on the particular interpretive frameworks we bring to
it. And any experience we encounter in life can be seen from a multitude of
perspectives. What I’m suggesting is that along with the myriad ways we can
view or make sense conceptually of experiences, we can also become
acquainted with what might be termed the view of inconceivability.
Tim: The view of inconceivability? I don’t understand.
John: Well, one common view of pain is that it’s an awful thing that we wish
would just go away. Another interpretation might be that the pain is
providing us with important information about aspects of our bodies or minds
that may be out of balance.
However, there is another view we can bring to bear upon the difficult to
navigate experiences of life, one that lies completely outside the realm of any
interpretive framework. As I’ve been saying, this view can be realized by
inquiring into the non-​narrative dimensions of experience and discovering a
kind of perspective-​less perspective, one that is radically open-​ended and
ultimately indefinable.
Through this inquiry, we come to see that pain is, at least from one vantage,
utterly inconceivable. For despite the many ways we humans make sense of
and characterize the difficulties encountered in life, we can never quite get to
the bottom of what any of those experiences, including pain, are. From one
perspective, we know and can describe what physical or emotional pain is.
But from another vantage, we can’t really say what it is…
Tim: And why again is discovering this “perspective-​less perspective” so
valuable in terms of helping us navigate difficult experiences or
circumstances?
John: Well, discovering the ways in which phenomena such as pain transcend
our conceptualizations of them frees us up to encounter them much more
open-​endedly, more flexibly and less rigidly. The feeling of being stuck,
trapped, or imprisoned by difficult circumstances or experiences starts to
loosen up as we discover the ways in which those challenging states,
conventionally thought of as “things” that we can actually be stuck in or
victimized by, are not actually “things” at all owing to their ever-​changing,
dynamic, indefinable nature.
Tim: So, while you’re not denying the existence of pain, you are suggesting
that pain is much more than what we conceive it to be and through opening
ourselves to its more transcendental, indefinable dimensions, difficult or
painful experiences become easier to navigate. Do I have that right?
John: Yes, that’s precisely what I am saying. By seeing that the pain could
not be captured by any of my conceptual frameworks, I touched that
dimension of the pain experience that was free of being a problem.
Tim: No longer a problem? I’m confused. It still sounds like you’re denying
its reality somehow.
John: Again, it’s paradoxical. From one perspective, yes, the pain in my wrist
was most certainly still a problem, one that I continued to seek out solutions
for. However, from another vantage, I couldn’t actually define what that pain
was. The experience was quite literally beyond comprehension, an
inconceivable mystery, a lightning storm of intermittent flashes of…well, I
can’t really say what. I guess I’d say that pain is a kind of complex energy
presence. But like all descriptors, those words utterly fail to capture the subtle
nature and essence of it.
The point is that when pain or any other challenging experience is recognized
to be beyond all possible conceptualizations, it ceases to be a problem, even
if paradoxically we might continue to take steps to resolve it as I did with my
still hurting wrist.
Tim: That makes sense. Thanks…
John: Let me add one more thing here. As we open up and begin exploring
the non-​narrative dimensions of experience, we can also begin to appreciate
that in any given moment in which we’re encountering some difficult thing,
countless other phenomena are occurring within the field of experience that
have absolutely zero connection to the event we’re labeling as painful or
difficult.
Tim: What do you mean?
John: Well, imagine yourself experiencing some painful situation. Let’s say
that a very significant relationship, one you’ve invested a lot of yourself in,
suddenly ends. In the immediate wake of this, you find yourself thrust into
emotional turmoil, feeling the very raw loss of this important relationship,
and the reality of no longer having this person in your life as an intimate
friend and partner.
Now, picture the flood of these confusing and painful thoughts and feelings
like a whirlpool but as you do so, see this swirling pool of difficult energy as
one infinitesimally small, really microscopic part of a vast and boundless sea.
This is the reality of our situation; we live from moment to moment in a vast
ocean of experience. In every instant, countless phenomena are arising and
passing away—​light, color, sound, flashes of thought, memory, and energy,
flickers and shimmers and sparkles of sensation and feeling along with a host
of other experiential phenomena for which there is no language.
Tim: But recognizing all the other things happening in the experiential field
besides the whirlpools of emotional or physical pain doesn’t make the pain
go away, does it?
John: No, the whirlpool is still there, as part of the vast and boundless sea.
But now you’ve awakened to its larger context, a context that we could say is
infinite in its depth and scope. Of course, because the mind orients to the
parts of the experiential field that it deems more important or meaningful, it
may at times feel as if the difficult state being experienced is still
overwhelming. But what begins to dawn is that relative to everything else
showing up in the experiential field, any particular mental, emotional, or
bodily state we might be encountering is still quite small, really
infinitesimally so, in relation to the full field of experience.
And so yes, painful situations and circumstances can be there and we do
whatever we can to address them. But even as we do what we are able to
most gracefully and skillfully navigate the turbulent waters that visit us, we
can also explore what those whirlpools of experience are actually made of
and open ourselves to the vast oceanic contexts within which those swirling
currents exist.
Relaxing All Effort
Many, if not most, contemplative practices are defined by at least some
measure of effort, some attempt at control, even if barely perceptible, some
striving, even subtly, to arrive some place other than where we presently find
ourselves, experientially. Otherwise, why even meditate in the first place?
Why do anything we might call meditating or inquiring unless we believe at
some level that where we currently find ourselves is somehow needing to be
made better, enhanced, transformed, or even simply noticed?
With that in mind, here is a meditative approach you might enjoy
experimenting with. You can listen to a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Relax all effort to arrive somewhere else.
Relax all effort to define what you are.
Relax all effort to figure out what anything is.
Relax all effort to control what’s here.
Relax all effort to make something else happen.
Relax all effort to keep anything from happening.
Relax all effort to direct the flow of attention.
Relax all effort to control the flow of anything.
Relax all effort to change what’s here.
Relax all effort to keep what’s here from changing.
And now, relax all effort to relax, and simply be…
Don’t Do Anything About This
Generally speaking, we tend to believe that something must be done about
what we’re experiencing. To give but a few examples, we think we must find
ways to make it less painful or more fulfilling, to understand why it’s
occurring, or to somehow manage or control it.
Now if you’ve had any exposure to practices such as meditation, you’ve
undoubtedly been invited to enter into a different, less unconscious, less
controlling, less judgmental relationship to your experience. Yet while such
ways of interfacing with experience can no doubt be illuminating, there
remains in such instructions an underlying belief that something still must be
done about whatever is arising experientially—​you have to notice it, remain
aware of it, stay open to it, clarify its nature, let go of struggling with it,
witness it, keep track of it, accept it, or allow it.
But maybe there’s another option. Maybe you can experiment with doing
absolutely nothing about experience other than letting it be enough. You can
listen to a recording of the following practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For now, consider that there’s no need to try to engage with or relate to or
interface with experience in any particular way. There’s no need to try to
understand or explain it. No need to elaborate upon it. No need to try to fix it.
No need to keep track of it. No need to try to control it. No need to obtain
pleasure or meaning from it. No need to figure out where it came from or
anticipate where it might go.
For now, let it be completely okay to not do anything about whatever may be
appearing—​no need to notice it, remain mindfully aware of it, describe it,
accept it, or whatever you imagine ought to be done.
As you experiment in this way, I invite you to consider something quite
remarkable—​the experience you think you are remaining aware of, accepting,
understanding, or making sense of? It has already vanished! Experience is
that transient, that impermanent, that dynamic. And so, whatever experiences
you imagine you are doing something about are actually no longer even here
to do something about!
For now, instead of doing something about the experiences that are
appearing, simply let them appear, which they are doing anyway, with or
without your consent! Just let the fact of their appearance be enough. That’s
all.
Things appear and are complete and full in their very appearance and
subsequent disappearance. And so nothing need be done about them;
phenomena appear and dissolve spontaneously and effortlessly. This is the
magical, miraculous, inexplicable display of reality.
Refer to Nothing
Even if this is all a dream or we are characters in someone’s virtual reality
game, something is undeniably present here. For simplicity, let’s call this
experience.
Now over the course of our lifetime, we have acquired not merely a host of
ideas but a fairly sturdy conviction about what experiences are, as evidenced
by the countless ways we have come to name and define whatever we
encounter experientially.
Our capacity to build this seemingly secure base of knowledge about the
world and ourselves rests in many ways upon the miracle of memory, this
capacity consciousness has to refer back to previous experiential moments as
a way of making sense of and characterizing, via language and concepts,
what is presently arising. In short, when we encounter something, we
essentially refer back, even if unconsciously, to what we have been taught via
parents, friends, teachers, and the culture—​what the phenomenon is, what it
means, why it is arising, whether it is something to be sought after or avoided
and so on.
As useful as it is to refer back to some idea or theory we may have about
what we’re experiencing, it can also be illuminating to let all of that prior
knowledge fade into the background for a moment and in so doing, allow the
vitality of whatever is present here to speak to us directly, in its own voice,
on its own terms, unmediated by whatever we might think it is. Try out the
following practice, or download a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Right now, see what it’s like not to refer or defer to any prior understanding,
knowledge, belief, or theory you may have regarding what reality is or why it
might be happening.
All the meaning-​making frameworks you’ve ever been taught or adopted
—​“I’m a human being, trying to live by the principles I’ve been taught; I’m a
little vulnerable primate running around attempting to stay safe on this rock
flying through the vast expanse of space; I’m a meditator in search of greater
peace and enlightenment; I’m a socially conscious being trying to create a
saner, more humane and loving world…”
Whatever they may be, just let all of these ideologies, all these cosmologies,
all these frames of reference fall away, if even for a brief moment…
See what it is like not to try to make sense of the moment by referring back to
what you may have been told about it, whether from parents, religion,
science, or culture.
Instead, just see what it is like to meet the reality of whatever is present here,
on its own terms, without reference to any prior beliefs you may have about
it.
What is this that is here? Feel the reality of what’s present, without
referencing memory to tell you what it is, without referring to any notions
you may have about it.
The Continuous Discontinuity
We search for love, for happiness, for well-​being, for peace. At times, we feel
as if we’ve found whatever it is we’re aspiring to realize, experiencing a
moment where all seems unimaginably well, a moment of great vitality,
happiness, or ease. And then it slips away, doesn’t it? For this is the nature of
experience, to disappear no sooner than it has appeared. Experiences always
come. And they always go. It’s unavoidable. The waves of perception are
temporary, rising up and then returning from whence they came, only to be
replaced by the next perceptual wave that appears.
And no matter how hard we may try to sustain those states that we typically
equate with happiness and peace, we’re simply unable to do so. At every
turn, we find ourselves faced with the stark reality that despite our best efforts
to obtain and then hold in place our positive states of mind, we are powerless
to realize any kind of actual permanence or continuity because discontinuity
is all there is. The river of experience never holds still. There are no frozen
frames in the movie that is life, even if language gives us the impression that
there are discrete moments with clear beginnings and ends. Life never
remains the same but is always on the move.
Now conventionally we equate well-​being with particular types of
experience. We believe that happiness is dependent upon the flow of life
looking a certain way (“comfortable,” “happy”) and imagine that when it
appears differently (“uncomfortable” and “unhappy”), well-​being is
somehow absent. But what if there is another order of well-​being altogether,
one discovered not in the usual way we label our experiences, but rather in
the flow of experiencing itself? What if well-​being could be found not in
particular, seemingly discrete perceptual states that are by nature fleeting, but
in the continuous flow of perceiving itself, a flow that is by its very nature
uninterrupted?
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, make no effort to try to manage or manipulate
the flow of experiencing; simply relax the habit of trying to control the
movement of life—​twisting it into particular perceptual states you imagine
will bring greater happiness.
Instead, let yourself discover that regardless of how the mind might be
describing it, the river of experiencing flows continuously and effortlessly
and is, by its very nature, at ease. Ever-​changing, yet without interruption, a
continuous discontinuity, a never-​ending stream.
Mindfulness Is Unavoidable
In spiritual teachings and more recently the field of psychology, the
distinction is made between moments of mindfulness and moments of un-​-
mindfulness. However, this turns out to be a misleading distinction, for with
the possible exception of moments of deep, dreamless sleep or anesthesia,
there really is no such thing as a moment without some degree of mindfulness
or awareness present. Let’s explore this…
PRACTICE
Students of meditation will typically be given some object to focus attention
on, say the breath. The instruction will be to maintain focus there, to remain
present with, say, the sensations of the breath. However, as every meditator
knows, what invariably happens is that attention tends not to hold still but
instead dances around, eventually moving away from the intended object and
becoming engaged with some other aspect of experience such as the stream
of thinking or imagining. The practitioner is then instructed, once he or she
realizes awareness has been temporarily interrupted, to return to the original
object of attention.
However, consider the following question: Is mindfulness or awareness ever
really lost or diminished? Would it even be possible to know that we’d
suffered some moment of so-​called inattention, some lack of mindfulness,
were mindfulness or awareness in fact absent?
How could we possibly know we’d been unaware without awareness being
present in that moment to know the experience characterized as “being
unaware”? How could we possibly know we’d failed to be present for much
of a given meditation session, lost in a whirlpool of thinking, worrying,
planning, or whatever, without mindfulness being present at least to some
degree to register the supposed lack of mindfulness and the presence of
thinking, worrying, and so on?
Are you in fact ever truly lost or entirely absent from the moments of your
life?
Are you actually ever completely caught up in or distracted by some current
of thinking or fantasizing such that there is no awareness that is even
occurring? Or is some awareness always present, a mode of consciousness
that is never completely absent and as a result, is able to report on its own
purported absence?
Given what I’m suggesting here—​that mindfulness or awareness is never
actually absent—​rather than practicing to find or develop more of something
that we already naturally possess in spades, we can allow whatever practice
we engage in to be an appreciation of the fact that mindfulness or awareness
can never actually be lost because it constitutes the unavoidable reality
underlying all moments of experiencing.
No matter how experience may appear and subsequently be characterized—​-
clear, confused, dull, bright, aware, unaware—​the very fact of its appearance
is, you could say, the proof of mindfulness and its ever-​present nature.
Sitting on a Chair Isn’t Merely Sitting on a Chair
If someone were to contact you right now and ask what you were up to,
you’d probably say something along the lines of, “I’m sitting here on a chair
(or couch or bed), reading this book and experimenting with a meditation
practice.” It’s a simple, straightforward and perfectly useful and reasonable
way of categorizing or conveying what’s happening experientially. But let’s
look a little more carefully at what is actually happening, beneath the surface
of this conventional description.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, let yourself feel the actuality that “sitting on a chair
meditating” is referring to. It’s a concept, right? The question is: What is that
concept pointing to in direct experience?
What’s actually happening here that we then describe as sitting on a chair?
Allow yourself to explore the rich textures and subtleties of energy moving
and dancing as this experience called “sitting on a chair.” Just fall into
whatever is here, feeling and being touched by what’s present, noticing that
the way you are characterizing this moment conceptually conveys almost
nothing of the depth and detail that is actually present.
Let yourself enter into the depths of whatever experiential qualities are being
felt and sensed right now. Something is here. Just feel the presence of that,
much as you would feel the summer breeze as it caresses your skin or the
warmth of the sun upon your face.
Now notice how your description of what’s happening in any given moment
can never encapsulate the inconceivable richness and fullness that is present.
A simple phrase—​sitting on a chair meditating—​contains universes upon
universes of sparkling, shimmering vitality and dynamism.
See that sitting on a chair meditating is just sitting on chair meditating and at
the same time, so much more than that…
Let Yourself Be Astounded
Despite how amazing it is that anything even exists, we often take this simple
fact for granted. Light, color, sound, touch, thought, feeling, sensation—​we
are so accustomed to the dazzling array of experiences bombarding us
moment to moment that we often seem to lose sight of the astounding nature
of everything, numb to just how remarkable, how miraculous, how
inexplicable it all actually is.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, just let yourself be stunned by life, stupefied by the
intelligence that is everywhere:
the functioning of billions of neurons strung together in a network of galactic
proportions,
the unthinkable complexity of cellular metabolism,
the intricacy of the immune system,
the circulatory mechanisms that allow for the delivery of nutrients and
oxygen to the body’s tissues and organs,
and the capacity to create and understand language, to form thoughts and
concepts, to hear sound, see light, to feel the infinitely subtle,
multidimensional array of textures that present themselves every instant.
And all of it happening without a single thought or intention to make it so!
Drink in the mystery and inconceivability of it all; stand in awe of this
awesomeness that is everywhere, the power, the presence, the vitality and
dynamism that is appearing as every single flash instant of experiencing.
Revel in this miraculous, inexplicable presence, the intricacy and complexity
and inconceivable functionality of everything, all of it utterly beyond the
realm or reach of human comprehension.
Dialogue: The Room
Michelle: I find myself experiencing moments of greater openness, clarity,
and ease, but it feels like I lose touch with those moments so easily.
However, whenever we have our sessions here in this room, it’s as if those
feelings return and I’m able to reconnect with this sense of greater openness,
presence, and ease.
John: No matter how wonderful a given “room” of experience may seem, we
can’t stay there. We’ll be cast out of every one of those experience-​rooms,
however much we like them. Why? Because that’s the nature of experience,
to ceaselessly transform itself into something else.
Of course, not only do we try to remain in the rooms that we like, but we try
to leave the experience-​rooms that we don’t like and find ones that we
imagine will be more satisfying. But as we know all too well, things
frequently don’t cooperate with or conform to the way we wish they would
be!
And yet, we have another choice: instead of constantly seeking to be in
certain experiential rooms and avoid others, we can discover something that
is present in every room of experience we may encounter.
Michelle: What do you mean?
John: Well, at the level of our descriptions, clearly no two rooms are alike.
Every experience is utterly unique—​pain is not pleasure; white is not black;
happiness is not sorrow. But all experiences have one thing in common: their
sheer presence. However we categorize it, experience may be many different
things but it is always here, always simply present. And that is the common
denominator of everything—​its presence.
Michelle: Yes, but I find that when we meditate together during our sessions,
that presence seems to come alive. I feel more aware, more awake, more in
touch with just how amazing and miraculous the moment actually is, as
you’re fond of saying.
John: It can certainly seem that way. But actually, we’re always meditating.
Michelle: How so?
John: Well, there may be many ways to conceive of what meditation is, but
fundamentally, meditation is about being awake to what’s here. And there is
nothing but that.
Michelle: Nothing but meditation? Nothing but being awake? I don’t
understand.
John: All that is ever happening is experience, even though we can describe
its tone and texture in a thousand different ways. While the moment might
feel and be described as dull, uninteresting, or unpleasant, we can only ever
experience and know we are experiencing these less than desirable qualities
because we are awake to them. Meditation is often talked about in terms of
being more present to what is. But presence is all there ever is! Whether we
like them or not, experiences are, by definition, always present. And so from
this vantage, meditation or presence is the continuous, uninterrupted state of
affairs.
Michelle: So, why even meditate then?
John: Good question! Meditation, as it tends to be taught and understood, can
bring a variety of benefits. But in my view, the supreme benefit and purpose
of meditating is to recognize that meditation isn’t necessary because we’re
always already doing it. Paying attention and noticing experience is the only
thing that’s ever actually happening.
Michelle: But are you denying that some experiences are more (or less)
enjoyable, fulfilling, and inspiring than others? That certainly seems to be the
case, at least to me.
John: At the level of description, all experiences are unique and distinctive.
In any given moment the sense of being fulfilled is not the same as the
feeling that we are somehow lacking. However, the way we define
experiences is not the whole story. Let’s take something neutral that we’re all
familiar with, the touch of our hand on skin. For the next few moments, place
the palm of one hand on the top of the other hand. Just feel or sense what’s
there. What does the touch of your skin actually feel like?
Michelle: Well, it feels like the touch of my skin.
John: Fair enough. The sensation of touch has its own distinctive quality. We
know it, which is how we’re able to call it by name. But what is it, really?
What is that particular texture we call “touch?” Feel the presence of it, the
felt sense of your one hand on the other. Notice the dynamic nature of what’s
being sensed. Dive into whatever is present there, experientially. Submerge
yourself in the complex kaleidoscope of sensations we call touch and ask
yourself, what is this experience actually composed of?
We tend to take for granted that we know what an experience is simply
because we have a name for it and can identify it as something distinct from
other things. And yet, we can’t quite put it into words, can we?
Even though we have a name for it, we can’t definitively say, what touch is
because it contains such an array of experiential qualities, a universe of
indescribable nuance, subtlety, and depth. Touch is simply touch. And yet it’s
also so much more than that label can convey. The experience we call touch
is actually an endless free fall into mystery. But what’s so remarkable and
liberating about all of this is that it doesn’t apply merely to touch but is the
hallmark of everything that is experienced.
Michelle: What do you mean when you say that it’s liberating?
John: We might define certain experiences as desirable or undesirable,
fulfilling or unfulfilling, captivating or boring. But if we stop for a moment
and simply feel what is present, we’ll discover, just as we did with the
sensations of touch, that regardless of what we imagine things to be,
experiences cannot be definitively described because they’re infinitely
complex and continuously changing.
Whether it’s the sense of touching or being touched, a sound, a feeling, or a
visual image, the reality is that experience appears without any labels. The
definitions, the conceptual categories, the linguistic descriptions…these are
all superimposed on a reality that is undefined. The myriad narratives we
entertain, as compelling as these may be, are not intrinsic to experience. They
are imagined, defined into existence.
Michelle: I don’t understand. Let’s say I experience an uncomfortable
mental-​emotional state and find it difficult to get myself unstuck from it. Are
you telling me the emotion and the feeling of being stuck in it are not actually
present, but merely imagined?
John: Yes, that’s precisely what I’m suggesting. When we explored the
example of touch, we found that what seems relatively easy to identify and
categorize is in fact an indefinable mystery. At one level, it’s experienced as
something structured, coherent, and definable. But when we attempt to locate
some definite structure or coherence, we come up empty-​handed. What
seemed to be something definite turns out to be beyond any possibility of
being defined. And so, we can explore any experience we imagine to be a
problem, a source of bondage or limitation, and discover that that very
experience is, by its nature, utterly free, unbound, and unlimited.
While it may seem as if we’re moving in and out of various rooms, consider
this: we really live inside a single room, the room of experiencing. There is
no entering or exiting this room but only the constant changing and shifting
of whatever we might find there.
Let the Winds Blow
Sometimes (maybe even often) the mind can feel like quite the hurricane.
Now, many teachings encourage the aspirant to employ all manner of
strategies to make that restlessness and commotion settle down, to find a
place of calm and rest somewhere, apart from or beyond the tumult. It’s
understandable that we’d be drawn to follow such guidance and engage in
different practices to go from a state of noise and unrest to one that is quieter
and more peaceful. But look at the universe itself, of which we are obviously
a part—​stars exploding, galaxies expanding, meteors colliding, storms
erupting—​it isn’t really a quiet or peaceful place, is it? Given this, could it be
that the effort to calm all this wild activity down is a fool’s errand?
However beneficial it may be to try to calm the turbulence that often visits us,
there is another choice, one that requires no effort, and that is to simply let
the hurricanes rage and in that discover that those oftentimes ferocious
mental-​emotional winds may not be the problem we imagine them to be.
PRACTICE
For these next moments, simply allow the winds of experience to blow,
however they wish to blow. Whether a gentle breeze or a powerful gale force,
make no effort to control the winds of life surging within, around, and as you.
No need to try to stand apart from the swirling energies of thought, feeling,
and sensation to find some sanctuary of peace. You can’t really separate
yourself from experience anyway!
Just let go of applying any effort to try to manage the winds.
You’ll begin to discover that all that dynamic energy and oftentimes chaotic,
unpredictable movement was never actually the problem you imagined it to
be. It’s just the nature of life to be that alive, to spin and whirl and dance with
complete freedom and abandon, uncontained and explosive.
Life is never at war with itself, but only ever at ease and at rest with even its
fiercest expressions, for it is those very expressions, as are you.
Boundaries
Most of us take for granted that we are bounded creatures, that there is a clear
point where “we” come to an end and the world outside of us begins.
However, let’s explore this whole question, investigating our own direct
experience to see if we can actually find any direct evidence to support the
substantiality of these apparent boundaries we’ve come to believe in so
unquestioningly. You can listen to a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Look and see if you can locate a line, something demarcating what you call
self from not-​self. Can any clear boundary be found?
“Well,” you might say, “yes, my skin separates me from the world.”
Okay, but let’s examine that apparent boundary.
Feel into the experience of what you call “skin”—​is there an actual edge to
it? Can you identify where the skin comes to an end and the world on the
other side of that skin line begins? It’s blurry, isn’t it, this supposed
distinction between inside and outside, this borderline we imagine exists
between self and other?
If you find what you believe to be some clearly identifiable boundary line,
something separating inner from outer, explore the specific details of this
apparent dividing line.
Ask yourself, “Can I find the edge of it? Can I locate specifically where this
purported boundary comes to an end?” Feel into the existence of this
presumed border—​what do you find there, not as an idea of something that
must be separating one thing from another, but as an actuality? Can any real,
discernible line be found?
Now let’s explore another boundary, the one we imagine exists between past,
present, and future.
Look very carefully and sensitively at your experience—​can you identify the
precise instant when this moment comes to an end and what we might call
“the future” begins? Can you find any clear demarcation there?
If such a division actually exists, you ought to be able to locate it, right? If
it’s real, it should be findable, this line we imagine is separating one moment
from the next.
But can any such line or demarcation be found? Where, if anywhere, does
this moment end and the next begin? Look not to your concepts to answer
this question but to your direct experience… What do you find there?
Finally, let’s examine one more supposed boundary, the one between the
perceiver and the perceived.
With eyes open, look at some object in your field of vision, maybe the view
of a tree or flower outside your window.
Conventionally, we would regard the tree or flower as an object that’s being
perceived by us, the perceiving subject. But let’s have a closer look at that
presumed distinction between what’s perceiving and whatever is being
perceived. To be sure, we imagine there exists and might even argue that we
experience an actual line separating us from whatever it is that’s being seen,
heard, tasted, or touched. But again, let’s examine that presumed separation.
Take the object you’ve chosen; whatever it is, simply look at it. See how it
appears. Notice that as much as this object seems to be “out there,” existing
outside of yourself, it’s impossible to tell where you as the perceiver end and
the object being perceived begins.
Conventionally, we may make a clear distinction between whatever is being
seen and the one who is seeing. But look again…
Can any such line be found? Can you locate the place where you as perceiver
come to a stop and the object being perceived begins? Or is there only a
seamless flow of perceiving occurring?
Notice the paradoxical nature of all of this, that the perceiver and perceived
co-​arise, appearing as a singular, undivided whole with no clear boundary
line separating one from the other.
And yet despite this inability to locate any clear border or boundary, the
perceiver and perceived, the subjective and objective poles of experience
appear to us as distinct and separate. While this paradox may seem
contradictory to the reasoning mind, it is nevertheless our direct experience, a
world of apparent subjects and objects that appear recognizable and distinct
from one another while at the same time no clear lines of division are
anywhere to be found.
Reality: Virtual, Actual…or Both?
As we look not merely at the ideas we hold about things (“that’s a tree, a
computer, a joy, a sadness…”) but at their sheer actuality, the raw, felt sense
or presence of whatever is being perceived, it begins to dawn on us just how
impossible it is to capture or convey things linguistically. What appears in the
field of experience is beyond any and all descriptions or conceptualizations,
even if aspects of language are able to hint at the myriad qualitative and
textural dimensions of things.
What I’m suggesting is that the way the world is conventionally seen and
understood is itself an abstraction—​we have, in effect, been living in and
relating to a kind of virtual world, a conceptualization of experience rather
than its actuality. This conventional, consensus reality says, “the wind is
blowing on my face.” But in truth, each of the dimensions of this familiar
experience—​wind, blowing, face—​all contain inconceivable perceptual and
sensorial universes within them. Put another way, what is a face, the wind, or
the activity of blowing, beyond the mere concepts used to characterize or
label such phenomena? Let’s explore just one of these aspects, the face.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, I invite you to close your eyes and simply feel your face.
Notice the rich array of experiential phenomena that are present; immerse
yourself in whatever is there, whatever it is that constitutes this reality you
call your face. It’s astounding how much is actually present—​flashes and
flickers of energy, shimmers of sensation, deep dark canyons of subtle
phenomena for which there really are no words.
Of course, the mind’s job is to reduce all of this unthinkably rich complexity,
depth, and detail into a single word or concept. But just notice what an
impossible task that actually is. Feel the worlds upon worlds of experience
contained in this one body part we call the face.
Now there’s no need to negate the mind’s labeling and describing of things.
It’s not actually a problem, plus you can’t really turn that automatic process
off anyway! But it is possible to see that the mind’s conceptual rendering of
things is just one way of experiencing reality. As we’ve been exploring,
there’s another way to encounter things, one that doesn’t merely collapse the
apparent patterns of life into fixed categories or mental frameworks, but
instead recognizes that the vast, unbounded nature of every momentary
perception cannot, in the end, be convincingly reduced or collapsed into any
definition.
The simplest way to discover what I am pointing to here is to just feel
whatever is present. That’s it. To be sure, reality is being thought about or
conceived. And that is totally fine. But experiences are also being known or
felt, nonconceptually. Simply feeling what is present here and how it
transcends our notions about what it is reveals just how astonishing and
ultimately unfathomable reality actually is.
Everything Is Present
Our attention is typically focused on the qualitative differences we encounter
in life—​that’s hot, that’s cold, that’s easy, that’s difficult, that’s clarifying,
that’s confusing, that’s exciting, that’s boring, that’s comfortable, that’s
uncomfortable, and so on. But, however natural it may be for us to do this, an
unintended consequence is that we end up expending considerable effort
trying to secure more of the moments we equate with our definitions of
happiness and avoid or escape those we imagine will keep us from it.
Unfortunately, we’re frequently unable to create or to hold in place the
moments we consider positive or keep at bay those we deem negative or
undesirable. But there’s an alternative to this all too familiar dynamic…
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, rather than emphasizing the particular content
or flavor of experience, simply feel the presence of it. If what you label as
comfort is there, feel the presence of that. If discomfort is what’s arising, then
feel its presence.
There’s no need to favor one thing over another.
Quiet mind? That’s what is present.
Busy mind? Then that is what’s present.
A sense of unease? Present.
A sense of feeling unbounded and free? Present.
See the bird in the tree? Present.
Hear the roar of traffic outside? Present.
Feel as if you’re somehow not getting this? No problem—​that is just what’s
present! See, there’s no doing this right, there is simply what’s present. And
that can never be lost, even if what’s present is forever slipping away,
becoming the next thing that is present…
For these next few moments, instead of emphasizing how things are
appearing, just notice the fact that they even are appearing, the simple but
astounding reality of their presence. It doesn’t matter how the moment is
showing up; simply notice that it is showing up, that it is present and that this
presence is continuous, even if its permutations are forever changing.
See that you never have to bring yourself back to presence because wherever
you may venture within the vast field of experience, presence announces its
presence as that very experience.
Presence need not be achieved or practiced but simply noticed as the
unavoidable reality of every instant. And should you feel as if you have
somehow failed to notice this, well, then that’s exactly what will be present!
The Phenomenal Nature of Phenomena
If you have ever attempted to sit quietly and do absolutely nothing for some
extended period of time, what is sometimes called “meditation,” you may
have discovered an interesting thing. In such moments, even without any
external demands being placed upon you to do or solve or fix anything, you
can often feel as if there is still something not quite right or okay about
whatever is being experienced.
In response to this sense that something is out of place, our impulse is to try
to do something about whatever we imagine is wrong or problematic so as to
improve upon the moment’s apparent lack or insufficiency. This sense that
something is not quite right about what’s appearing experientially and our
efforts to then fix that apparent problem can take many forms—​feeling as if
we should be experiencing something more fulfilling or exciting, that we
should be more mindful or aware, that we should be experiencing less
distraction, less agitation, more ease, less thinking, more acceptance. And on
and on it goes…
But maybe the only thing that makes an experience into an apparent problem
we must solve is viewing it as such. Could it be that we literally define
problems into existence by virtue of the ways we frame or interpret them?
Let’s explore this, experimenting with the possibility that from a certain
perspective, there are no problems but only experiences.
PRACTICE
For the next few moments, there’s only one thing to do: don’t make anything
you might be experiencing into a problem. Even if you notice yourself
turning experience into something you think must be fixed or resolved, let
that not be a problem either.
In this meditation, let nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, be a problem,
including the belief that something is a problem!
Struggling with experience? No problem.
Feeling at ease with experience? No problem.
Experiencing states conventionally labeled as positive? No problem.
Being visited by so-​called negative states? No problem.
Quiet mind? No problem.
Restless mind? No problem.
Feeling that no experience is ever a problem? No problem.
Thinking some experiences are problems? No problem!
Let no experience be wrong or out of place; let no moment be anything other
than the perfect, inescapable expression of life that it is in the instant of its
arising.
Personal growth “technologies” (be they self-​help, psychological, or spiritual
in nature) are typically aimed at eliciting certain experiences, experiences
imagined to be more important or special than the ones presently occurring.
However, the most interesting and liberating approaches are those that reveal
the profundity and specialness of all experience.
It’s fair to say that the fact that experience is occurring at all is the greatest,
most stupefying of miracles. And yet the only thing that keeps us from
recognizing the extraordinary, remarkable nature of every momentary
perception is the way in which we define and limit phenomena that are by
nature indefinable and unlimited. The reality is that every moment of
experience, regardless of its conventional descriptive label, is an
inconceivably rich and profound expression of crackling, sizzling, dynamic
energy and intelligence.
Behold the phenomenal nature of all phenomena, even the ones we
conventionally label as problems!
The Mystery of Intention
Our seeming capacity for agency, this conviction that we’re capable of
making free choices, of exercising our intention and self-​will is, by and large,
completely taken for granted by most of us. However, a careful investigation
into these conventional assumptions reveals the entire question of free will
and our apparent ability to exercise choice and intentionality as far from
being resolved. Let’s have a look…
PRACTICE
In a moment, I’m going to invite you to choose some simple activity, and
then ask you to carry that out. It doesn’t matter what you end up selecting; it
could be anything really, maybe moving your hand a certain way, opening or
closing your eyes, stretching your body, standing up, or thinking about
something. Again, the choice you make is not what’s important. You’ll
simply decide to do something and then do whatever it is you’ve intended to
do. That’s it!
First, before you decide, pay very careful attention to your field of
experience. Just let yourself be aware of whatever is here experientially,
feeling the raw presence of it.
Now, go ahead and choose your intended action, and then carry it out.
Considering your original intention, which you believe was freely chosen and
initiated by you, ask yourself: Where did that intention actually come from?
Are you able to find its beginning, the origin or source of it? How was it that
you happened to choose the action that you did?
Whether it was to move your arm, stretch your legs, open your eyes, or
whatever, from where did the impetus to do that emerge?
Out of the virtually infinite number of possible actions you could have taken,
how was it that you happened to choose the one that you did?
Look very carefully: What led to or initiated the choice that you made?
Can you identify the genesis of it?
Was it a thought that began it all and if so, how was is that that particular
thought and not some other arose? Did you really choose to have the thought
to do whatever you did?
Right now, you are reading this book and you probably believe that you
freely chose to read it at this particular time. But consider this: Where did that
decision to read at this moment actually come from?
This most familiar and taken-​for-​granted of human experiences—​the feeling
as if it is we who are the agents of whatever we’ve chosen or intended to do
—​turns out upon closer examination to be a vast, fathomless mystery,
impossible to locate, impossible to pinpoint, impossible to grasp hold of or
define.
Not Privileging Thought
Whenever we find ourselves caught up in some painful web of thinking,
countless other phenomena are also being experienced—​the blue of the sky;
the dust on the windowsill; the sound of wind in the trees. However, our
tendency is to view these other phenomena as somehow less consequential or
maybe even completely insignificant compared with the uncomfortable
thoughts that sometimes visit us.
And yet, this privileging of thinking over other modes of experiencing such
as hearing, seeing, feeling, or sensing is completely arbitrary. In any moment
that we might find ourselves thinking about something that’s occurred or has
yet to occur, sounds are still appearing, light is still present, colors are still
exploding all around us, and untold sensations are still arising. Could it be
that these other aspects of experience, none of which have anything to do
with the mental narratives going on, are of equal value and import?
You can download a recording of the practice below at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For the next few moments, place no greater weight or significance upon the
movement of thought than you would any other dimension of experience.
That little itch you’re feeling on your arm? Equally as relevant as the most
sublime or most disturbing thought that might arise.
The sounds of traffic outside? As full of meaning as any thought that might
be appearing.
The subtle presence of sensations and feelings in the body? No less important
than whatever you might be thinking right now.
For now, just put thinking in its proper place, on equal footing with
everything else being experienced, recognizing that thought does not merit
more attention or devotion than anything else for everything is equal: equal in
its importance, equal in its richness and meaningfulness, equal in its
miraculous, unfathomable vitality and presence.
Let your attention be wide open, noticing not merely the waves of thought
but also the countless other phenomena that make up the vast and boundless
sea of experience.
What’s True About This?
We’ve learned so much from others—​parents, friends, teachers, our
community, science, religion—​we’ve been taught how to make sense of it all,
how to understand and interpret what’s here, what experience is, who we are,
what life is, and what it all might mean. But what if instead of deferring to
what others have told us about what the reality of experiencing is, we simply
let experience itself tell us what it is? The practice below gives you a tool for
directly experiencing this. You can download a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, simply let all the knowledge you’ve
accumulated about the world recede into the background, meeting what is
here freshly, without any presuppositions about what it might be or mean.
You may have a hundred different thoughts about what’s happening right
now.
But for these next few moments, just let all of that fade away and simply feel
the nature and presence of whatever is here, beyond what anyone else may
have told you about it.
Allow yourself to be touched by the actuality of whatever is showing up in
experience.
Rather than you telling experience what it is using the many labels and
definitions you’ve learned along the way, simply let experience itself tell you
what it is, speaking to you in its own unfathomable yet ever-​present
language.
This Is It
If I had to sum up the central theme of this book, I would do so with the
following phrase: “This Is It.” Let me unpack those three powerful words…
“This” refers to whatever is showing up right now, whatever is being seen,
heard, noticed, experienced…This.
“Is” refers to the presence of This, to the simple, undeniable fact that This
exists right now, that This Is.
Finally, “It” points to the reality that This is all there is. After all, what else
could there ever be but This? It might be argued that there could be
something other than This, at least hypothetically. But the only way to know
that for sure would be to have some experience of that other something. And
once we have an experience of that something else, it ceases to be something
else and becomes This! In other words, anything other than This could only
ever exist as an abstraction.
PRACTICE
This Is It…let’s explore these three simple words…
This, just This.
Whatever is arising, whatever is showing up, whatever is appearing
spontaneously as the field of experience, just feel This. Feel the myriad ways
This moves, the way This dances around, the way This changes from one
instant to the next.
Feel how dynamic, how slippery, how ungraspable and ultimately
indescribable This is.
Now simply appreciate that This Is, that This even exists. Feel the presence
of This, the aliveness of This, the vitality of This, the actuality of This.
We cannot know for certain how or why This is here. But that it is, is
undeniable.
Feel the miracle of that, the miracle that This Is.
And now, just appreciate that This Is It, that it’s simply not possible for there
to be anything but This.
This must be everything you could ever hope or dream of since there could
never be anything but This.
In all its infinite variety, the untold ways it can be, This Is Always It.
Resting as the View
In some traditions, the practitioner is instructed to “rest in the view.” The
view refers to that which is aware of every fleeting instant and is often
described as an unchanging stability, a vast and spacious clarity within which
all experience arises and passes away.
Based on the way the view is often taught, we conceive of it as being
something distinct from whatever is being viewed. However, if we think of
the view as some privileged domain, some special state or realm we must
first locate and then rest in, we will miss the fact that this very moment is
already the view. To be sure, that which is being seen or viewed is forever
changing. But the seeing itself is constant; something is always being
experienced, always being felt, always being viewed…
And so to “rest as the view” is simply to see that there is only resting in the
view, only ever the knowing of whatever is being known, the seeing of
whatever is being seen, the feeling of whatever is being felt. This isn’t about
finding and then resting in the view but rather seeing that there is no
possibility of ever being out of the view! Resting is not something we do; it is
simply noticing that the view is inescapable, ever-​present as this very
instant…and the next.
PRACTICE
We needn’t rest in the view so much as see that the view is already present,
as each fleeting moment of experience. Nothing need be done to bring the
view about. It is spontaneously present, with no effort required.
Whatever your gaze may happen to fall upon, know that right there is the
view, the view of whatever is present. Rest effortlessly right here, here in the
heart of this knowing, the steadfastness and constancy of the view.
Seeing something? That is the view.
Feeling something? That is the view.
Experiencing something? That is the view.
Thinking something? That is the view.
Feeling something? That is the view.
There is only the view, the view of whatever is appearing!
The Ease of Being Here
Many teachings advise the student to engage in various practices to become
more aware of the present moment, awake to the here and now. But the funny
thing about it is that what we call “the here and now” is spontaneously
present as the only reality. Here is always here. Now is always now. Presence
is always present, without any striving, doing, or meditating required.
Since here appears effortlessly, nothing need be done to create or sustain it. It
is relentlessly present. Any apparent absence of it, any supposed loss of
contact with the here and now is simply another of the here and now’s
countless and ceaseless manifestations.
What we call “losing contact with the present moment” is simply another
present moment, another here and now. In other words, here is inescapable!
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, simply notice and appreciate the simple fact that
here is already here, that now is always now, regardless of anything we might
be doing to realize that.
Here remains here, no matter the form it may be taking. Here never departs
from itself, even as it is constantly transforming into the next thing.
See that no matter what is arising, no matter what is being experienced, here
is here.
No effort is ever required for this to be true.
No doing is needed to make the miracle that is present be present.
See that you are powerless to make this here and now disappear.
The Miracle of Perceiving
As humans, we long to experience a sense of fulfillment that we can count
on, that is stable and reliable, a well-​being and happiness that is not
constantly coming and going. And while we imagine this enduring well-​being
will somehow be found in particular types of experiences or circumstances,
the problem is that no experiential pattern ever endures. And so, our efforts to
secure any sort of lasting well-​being in phenomena that are by nature
unstable and impermanent are doomed to fail.
The undeniable reality is that every experience is here for a brief instant and
then it vanishes, giving way to something else. What is being seen, heard, and
felt is in a state of constant flux. This is the dynamic, non-​static nature of
everything.
Given the impermanence of experience, the natural question arises: Is there
anything that will bring us constancy or stability? The answer is “yes.” For
while experiences come and go, experiencing itself does not. The flow of
experiencing is ongoing. It is the sole constant. To be sure, perceptions are
forever changing. But the perceiving itself never stops. You can download a
recording for this chapter at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
While our tendency to emphasize the content of our inner or outer weather—​-
is it cold or hot, sunny or cloudy, stormy or calm?—​is quite normal and
natural, for the next few moments, I invite you into another experiment.
Rather than orienting to the content of whatever is being experienced, how it
feels, what it sounds like, the particular shape, color, and texture of it, simply
appreciate the fact that experiencing is even happening at all.
Notice that something is here, something is present, something is being
perceived. But don’t worry about what that something is or how it is being
labeled or described.
Instead, just revel in the fact that it is even here.
Let your emphasis be on the fact that something is present rather than trying
to figure out what that something is, which really can’t be done anyway!
While the experiences are impermanent, here and then gone in a flash, notice
that the flow of experiencing itself never comes to a stop.
Feel its constancy, the relentlessness of experiencing, how it never turns off,
even if the content of it is forever in flux.
See that nothing need be done, that no effort is required to make the flow of
experiencing constant, for that is its nature, never to cease.
Marvel at its presence; let yourself be astounded by it, this miraculous light
of experiencing that can never be switched off.
Expressions of Energy
A recurring theme throughout this book is the invitation to shift our emphasis
from the content of experience, the labels, descriptions, conceptual
interpretations of it, to the sheer presence or existence of it. One powerful
way to get a sense of the liberating impact of this change in how we orient to
experience is to feel each moment, no matter how we might be characterizing
it—​fear, sorrow, joy, anger, elation—​as an expression or manifestation of a
kind of basic, fundamental energy—​the energy, we could say, of life itself.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, imagine your thoughts, feelings, and sensations
as different forms or expressions of life energy. If what you call joy is
present, feel it as the movement of a kind of energy. If confusion or agitation
is arising, see or feel that as energy. If peace or tranquility is present, then see
those experiential textures as yet another form that the energy of life can take.
With your eyes open or closed, simply let all these energetic expressions
move and dance and swirl, however they wish. Make no effort to alter,
control, or direct the ceaseless unfolding of life’s energetic flow.
Now see that you yourself—​the one sitting here meditating—​are yet another
one of these energetic expressions, and simply allow this unfolding of energy
that is you to move and dance and swirl, however it wishes.
Simply feel the raw presence of whatever is here. Listen to the ceaseless hum
of being. You can’t help but hear it for it is the sound of everything, being
itself.
Hear the sound of traffic outside? That’s it, the hum of being.
Hear the gurgling of your stomach or the beat of your heart? That’s it too…
the hum of being.
Hear the sound of thoughts racing through your mind? The hum of being…
For now, let it matter not what’s appearing but simply appreciate and savor
the fact that it is. Let yourself be awestruck that anything is even happening
at all, that this existence, this presence, this energy and aliveness is appearing
in all the wildly colorful, dynamic, and unpredictable ways that it does.
We Have Not Been Here Before
The conventional view is that there is a kind of stasis or regularity to things
and experiences and that this stability defines our lives. We imagine that
things are, for all intents and purposes, more or less the same from moment to
moment. This is how the world of experiences and circumstances appears
recognizable. Some mental-​emotional state arises and we recognize that
pattern; it feels familiar: “Oh yeah, I know what that is. It’s fear… .”
Similarly, we see some object or return to some place and recognize it as
more or less the same object or place we’d previously visited: “Oh sure,
that’s my car or my house or my friend or the neighborhood I live in…”
However, true as it may seem that experiences and objects have a kind of
persistence or continuity to them from moment to moment, that they are
essentially what they were when we last encountered them, the fact is that
they are not, at least not exactly. Your friend or that emotion you’re being
visited by may look, feel, or behave in such a way that makes it seem
recognizable to you. But the fact is that we have never actually experienced
this moment before. Yes, experiences appear and feel very familiar to us. But
true as that sense of familiarity may be, the reality is that we’ve never
actually felt this particular moment, at least not in this exact way. No
experience, no moment, no person, place, or thing is ever quite the same
owing to its radically dynamic, non-​static, alive nature.
PRACTICE
Imagine being transported to another world, a planet that is utterly foreign to
you. Not a single thing about this extraterrestrial world could possibly be
familiar or known to you because you’ve never actually seen, felt, touched, or
tasted any part of it before.
Now imagine your everyday experience to be this hypothetical foreign land.
Whatever way you might conventionally describe what’s happening—​-
holding a glass of water in your hand, seeing a cloud-​filled sky, hearing the
sound of traffic on the street, feeling the wind upon your face—​just go ahead
and notice whatever is present here, traveling through this heretofore unseen
world, exploring the remarkable experiential landscape that lies before you.
Since everything is new to you here, don’t bother referring to any previously
learned names or descriptors to make sense of what you’re seeing because
those categories no longer apply. You’re literally in a different world now!
Just behold the infinite detail, depth, and dimensionality that is here, not one
iota of which you have ever seen nor will you ever see again.
Let the truth of this sink in, this astounding fact that you cannot possibly
know what this world is that you are experiencing right now, for one simple
reason: you have never actually been here before!
Everything Slips Away
No matter how hard we may try, there’s really no way to determine what this
moment is. While we’re constantly drawing conclusions about experience,
we can’t actually pull it off for as soon as we engage in some interpretation,
the very thing we imagine we’ve defined has shifted into something else
owing to its ever-​changing, dynamic nature. The fact is that everything is in a
state of constant, unstoppable flux and flow, incapable of being held in place,
impossible to keep from vanishing and becoming the next instant, the next
appearance… You can listen to a recording of the practice below at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, simply notice how everything slips away.
Thoughts appear and then vanish in an instant. Momentary eruptions of
feeling arise and then dissolve, transforming themselves into the next thing.
Sounds and sights emerge and then fade away. Like a river, experience is
forever on the move, never holding still, always becoming something else.
Thoughts, feelings, and sensations appear, then disappear in a single,
indistinguishable movement, a dance of endless dynamism and unstoppable
change.
Notice how it is simply not possible to hold anything in place, to keep what is
from mutating.
We speak of trying to let go of what troubles us, but the reality is that letting
go is already the nature of things. Nothing need be done to make this so. The
release of things is effortless and spontaneous; it requires no doing for it is
the unavoidable nature of everything to let go of itself, every instant.
Feel the reality of this. See how there can be no holding on to experience
owing to its relentlessly transient nature, every moment slipping away,
regardless of how we may try to orient ourselves to it.
Our experiences disappear of their own accord. We needn’t do anything to
bring this about.
With the perception you are having right now, just try to keep it in place, try
to hold it here, see if you can stop it from morphing into the next experience.
It cannot be done. Feel the wondrous freedom of this, the impossibility of
ever holding on to anything.
The Knowing of This Moment Is the Feeling of It
Contemplative traditions the world over speak about awareness as that which
is most central to human experience; without it, without this capacity to
know, there would simply be no experience (see the chapter “What is
Awareness?”).
When pointing others to awareness, the argument frequently goes something
like this: “How do you know you are having the experience of happiness or
sadness? How do you know sounds are being heard, sights are being seen, or
that you exist? You know these things because awareness is present.
Awareness is the light that illumines everything, the light that makes
everything known.”
While this way of speaking of the knowing function of consciousness can be
very powerful, for some people, the term “awareness” can at times come
across as overly abstract and difficult to understand or grasp experientially.
So, here’s another way to understand what awareness is—​awareness is not
merely that which illumines or makes things known, though it is certainly
that. Awareness is also that which feels experience.
PRACTICE
Look in your experience right now and ask, “Are thoughts occurring in this
moment?”
If they are, how is that fact being known? How is it that you can say thoughts
are arising and be so certain of that? Well, thoughts, like everything else,
have a certain distinctive texture, we could say. And it is that unique quality
or texture that is being felt and which reveals the presence of this
phenomenon we call “thought.”
Are sounds being heard right now?
If you answer “yes,” again, how do you know this? Well, because of the
particular texture that constitutes sound and nothing else. And that distinctive and the rush of watery emotions
textural quality is what is felt as this thing we call “sound.”
as they splash and surge upon our shores.
Seeing light? How do you know that?
Whether obvious or hidden from view,
Again, it is because the experiential quality we call light is being felt. In other
words, we know things are because they are felt. Awareness and feeling are here we are, feeling everything,
really synonyms, for to be aware is to feel whatever appears. And so just as
we might explore the miracle of awareness by inquiring into what it is that the unfathomable mystery of it all,
knows experience, we can also ask the question, what is it that feels the
presence of anything and everything? the unknowable, inconceivable reality

Here is a poem. Let it be a meditation on this miracle of feeling-​awareness shining forth as everything,
that brings each and every moment to life.
life feeling and knowing itself
No matter how seemingly subtle or gross
as the intimacy of this.
here we are, feeling everything,
Being Here Now
the light that shines upon the waking world
Ram Dass titled his iconic book Be Here Now, words that countless seekers,
and the deepest darkness of our sleeping nights. myself included, took as a kind of spiritual prescription or practice to take up.
But as it turns out, rather than being a prescription, be here now is really a
Whether roaring or barely heard, description of the way things actually are. In other words, there is nothing but
being here now. There is only ever the presence of what is. Being. And that
here we are, feeling everything, which is present is always present, always simply and effortlessly here and
now. Being here now need not be cultivated or contrived but simply seen to
the music of the birds and swaying trees be the sheer, unavoidable, ever-​present fact of existence itself.

and the songs of laughing, crying people everywhere. And while it is not necessary to practice being here now for it is already the
case, this fact can, paradoxically, be discovered by engaging in what one
Be it tangible or intangible might arguably call “practice.” As I see it, meditation is a trick we can use to
discover that meditation isn’t actually necessary! So with that in mind, here’s
here we are, feeling everything, a meditative trick to play with. You can download a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
the trillions of starlit thoughts flickering
PRACTICE
inside the vast and borderless sky
Notice that no matter where the mind might travel, no matter how seemingly
far into the past or future we may appear to venture, it is absolutely,
unequivocally impossible to exist in any time other than now.
There is no escaping the reality of this.
Notice how powerless we are to leave this moment. No matter what past or
future time we might seem to wander off into, it always remains now, a now
that is at the same time always new, always fresh, always remaking itself,
forever on the move, becoming the next thing…
Now, see that no matter where you might travel off to in seeming space, you
can never actually go anywhere for you remain forever in one place: here!
There is no escaping here, for whatever we might think of or call “there”
could only ever be experienced here.
As with time, just let yourself notice this fact, that regardless of what lands
you might venture off to, it is simply not possible to depart from here.
And so it turns out that here is not some “place” we must practice remaining
in. Instead, we can simply notice that it is not possible to be anywhere but
here! Here is the only place we can ever be.
Feel the reality of this, the astounding fact that here can never be taken away
for it is literally all that exists.
There is no possibility of ever being removed from here because wherever we
might be taken, one small step or to the farthest reaches of the universe and
beyond, we always remain right here. And so we are, quite literally, always
here and it is always now. This is the inescapable fact, the truth that no matter
what lands we may venture off to, no matter what states we may enter or exit,
what places we may visit and then depart from, we are forever being here
now.
Presence
“Presence,” a word we often hear in psychological and spiritual circles, tends
to be spoken of as if it were some rarefied state distinct from other states and
definitely not what we’re currently experiencing! Presence tends to get
framed as some special realm or dimension of consciousness that we must
somehow locate, cultivate, practice, rest in, commit ourselves to, and so on.
But rather than assuming this to be true, let’s look to see if it is actually the
case. You can listen to a recording of the following practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Consider the following: Has there ever been a time when presence was in fact
absent or missing? Is that even possible? Hasn’t something always been
present? Hasn’t something always been here?
Look and see if you have ever lost or been separate from presence.
Teachings may proclaim that such experiences as thinking or the sense of
being a separate person somehow veil or keep us from realizing presence. But
whether we call it “thinking” or “feeling a sense of separation,” the presence
of any experience is, by definition, still present.
The experiences we label as stuck, twisted up in knots, frustrated, lost,
grasping, or annoyed are nothing but pure, unadulterated, sparklingly alive
presence. The truth is that presence need not be sought or practiced for there
is nothing but presence, even if that which is present is constantly changing
from moment to moment.
Now while something is clearly present, notice that we cannot at the same
time say precisely what that “something” is, since what’s present is really
beyond any and all definitions.
Try it right now. Feel what is here, experientially. Feel whatever is arising in
this oh-​so-​fleeting moment. You may have many different names for it. But
see that no conceptual labels apply, for whatever is present cannot be
collapsed into any description or category.
Thinking? Sensing? Feeling? The seeing of light? The hearing of sounds?
The deepest sorrow? The greatest joy?
While undeniably present, none of these labels is capable of adequately
conveying the infinite, indefinable nature of what is actually here, the pure
presence and utter mystery of this.
The most obvious quality of “this” that is present is that it is. Whatever is
here, however we might conceive of it, is all pure vitality, pure aliveness.
While the diverse forms, shapes, colors, and textures this can take are
absolutely staggering, that it even exists at all seems the most astounding
mystery and miracle. This is. Wow! How is that even possible? How is it that
anything is actually present, that anything is?
Feel that. Whatever shape reality might be taking, feel the awesome power
and vitality that is its very existence.
Feel the undeniable, inescapable and potent presence of presence, the here of
here.
Notice that it’s not presence on one side, knowing, watching, or being aware
of something else “over there.” No, it’s all presence. No inside, no outside,
no here nor there but simply this that is present. There isn’t anything else. For
after all, what else could there ever be? If something else were to appear,
something else were to become known, it would still be just this presence.
Were we to become aware of some other dimension, some other realm or
reality, we would still be right here, knowing and feeling the presence of this.
We could travel to the farthest reaches of the cosmos, have the most mind-​-
boggling transcendental otherworldly experiences and it would still be just
this, this very presence.
Drifting Toward Reality
If you’ve ever practiced meditation, you very likely received guidance to
focus on some aspect of experience, maybe the process of breathing or body
sensations. When engaging in such practices, we quickly discover that
attention tends to drift from one thing to the next. And when this inevitably
occurs, one is typically instructed to keep track of this drifting of attention
and whenever it is noticed, simply redirect the mind back to its chosen object.
In both psychology and spirituality, the wandering of attention is frequently
portrayed as a problem we must work very diligently to overcome. However,
as valid as that perspective might be in certain contexts, I invite you into
another consideration: drifting is what experience actually does owing to its
inherently dynamic, transitory nature. The experiential field, which of course
includes attention, is constantly changing, continuously moving from one
state to the next, wandering as it were from one point of focus to the next.
Experience doesn’t hold still. It’s a shape-​shifter…
Given this, could it be that the drifting of attentional focus is not the colossal
problem it’s been made out to be? I realize of course that what I am saying
here flies in the face of conventional meditative wisdom. But as I said, the
very drifting that meditators have struggled for millennia to overcome or
keep in check is actually the natural state of things. “Drifting away” is, we
could say, reality’s signature mode! And so in placing ourselves in opposition
to that natural tendency through any degree of mental effort, even if subtle,
we may not only be fighting a losing battle but also reinforcing the notion
that some portions of the experiential field are somehow preferable or more
real than others.
With that consideration in mind, here’s a very simple yet powerful practice
you might enjoy experimenting with. You can listen to a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, just allow experience to do what it does. Notice the way in
which attention naturally drifts from one point of focus to the next.
Feel the way in which experience moves and wafts and undulates, like the
tides, shifting from moment to moment.
Now, as you notice this natural movement, if you suddenly find yourself
having seemingly “lost contact” or “being less present” with this ceaseless
drifting of experience, don’t worry. That is just the next place the drifting has
taken you!
Reality is just doing what reality does. Drifting…
This is life’s nature, never to hold still. Like clouds moving through the vast
and spacious sky, we are forever drifting, one state wafting into the next.
Some focus of attention appears; some experiential moment comes into view.
And then we suddenly find ourselves somewhere else, swept away yet again.
But this drifting is not some spiritual mistake; it is simply what life does!
And so, there is no drifting away from reality for there is only reality, forever
drifting into itself. Enjoy the drifting for there is really nothing else to enjoy!
The Problem of Oversimplification
As part of my work I teach graduate courses in research methods, so I
certainly appreciate the value and validity of science as a method for
inquiring into the nature of things. But so often, what we find in science,
maybe by necessity, is a kind of gross overgeneralization. For example, the
sciences with which I am most familiar tend to paint their explanatory
pictures in very broad brushstrokes. Read any headline reporting on some
finding in psychology or medicine and what you’ll invariably find are fairly
crude, oversimplified descriptions of the phenomena under study: “Eating
this food helps prevent this disease; Certain early childhood experiences are
correlated with particular behaviors later in life; Practicing meditation or
taking these prescription medications can reduce the symptoms of depression;
People who experience particular types of emotional reactions show this kind
of brain activity”…and on and on it goes.
In all these examples, what the scientific findings are essentially saying, in
one form or another, is that on average, if you do this, take this substance, or
practice this therapeutic technique, this other thing will tend to happen. But
of course, if you do therapy x or eat food y, you won’t necessarily experience
outcome z, because the explanatory models (“this causes that”) are simply
too overgeneralized, unsophisticated, and lacking in nuance. With or without
the support of science, we might be inclined to say that on average, if you do
this, that will happen. However, describing how things tend to behave, or
how they correlate with other things, says nothing about how and what they
specifically are, at least not in any definitive sense.
A great example of this type of imprecision is the phenomenon of personality
inventories. The many typologies that are out there—​the Myers-​Briggs Type
Indicator (The Myers & Briggs Foundation 2018) or the Enneagram (The
Enneagram Institute 2017), to name but two—​theoretically tell us something
about the way people tend to behave, on average. Imagine for a moment a
classic bell-​shaped statistical curve that represents one’s “personality”—​the
various qualities, characteristics, dispositions, and so on that make up who
they are. The qualities a person displays most frequently would be illustrated
by the midpoint and those areas that lie closer to the center of the bell curve.
Then as you ventured out from either side of that central area, you would
begin to encounter aspects of the person that diverge from his or her average
or “usual” tendencies.
However, even if the person on average tends to more frequently display
those qualities and characteristics that coalesce around the midpoint of the
curve, the complete picture of who they are can only ever be captured by
including the entirety of the curve—​that is, the sum total of that person’s
qualities, not merely those they are the most likely to exhibit. So if, as we are
prone to do, we categorize a person according to some personality typology
or characterize them by some other psychological or biological classificatory
system, we are by necessity oversimplifying who and what they are. I think
this is one of the reasons I’ve found myself resistant to such typologies as I
find them to be terribly unsatisfying in their generalizations, failing in the end
to fully capture the infinitely rich, nuanced, multidimensional creatures that
we are.
Whether we are scientists or not, it’s interesting to consider this seemingly
insatiable thirst to explain, reduce and, in the process, oversimplify reality. Of
course it is understandable that we would search out the possible causes of
our physical and psychological difficulties and in turn identify remedies to
counter those apparent causal factors. The problem, however, lies in
unquestioningly adopting any framework, whether it’s based on science,
philosophy, or religion. Interpretive frameworks represent incomplete and
ultimately misleading renderings of reality, oversimplifications of a realm—​-
human experience—​that is exceedingly complex and ultimately irreducible.
As an example of this popular as well as scientific tendency, I recently came
across an online article from Forbes, “The 7 Ways Meditation Can Actually
Change the Brain” (Walton 2015). The author argues that the ancient benefits
of these practices are now being confirmed by modern scientific methods
such as EEG and FMRI. However, in point of fact, the relationship between
meditative practices and brain activity is tenuous at best. The reality is that
meditation practice is associated statistically with changes in different brain
regions and networks but only in some people who practice and even in those
people, only to some extent. It is so far from actually being a one-​to-​one
correspondence (“do this practice and this change will happen in this
particular way in your brain”) that to talk about meditation being able to
“change your brain” in specific and predictable ways is, well, laughable. Of
course, this issue isn’t unique to meditation—​we find the same problem of
oversimplifying cause/effect relationships with other therapeutic modalities
as well, from psychotropic medications to psychotherapy.
Despite the amazing contributions neuroscience is making to our
understanding of the human brain, the idea that we can take exceedingly
complex phenomena such as thought and emotion and understand them
solely in terms of, that is reduce them to, basic neuro-​chemical activities and
interactions is a prime example of the problem with oversimplification so
rampant not just in science but everyday life.
Not surprisingly, language itself—​the very medium through which the
various forms of knowledge are transmitted—​is also, by its very nature,
reductionist. Regardless of the word—​happiness, sorrow, joy, grief, cloud,
mountain, pleasure, pain—​language functions as a kind of conceptual
shorthand, a way of collapsing exceedingly complex arrays of experiential
phenomena into single descriptors. Language has considerable utility in so far
as its capacity to convey a general impression of what is being seen, heard,
felt, or touched in any given moment. But the experiences themselves can
never be fully captured by the linguistic placeholders used to convey them.
Phenomenal experiences we attempt to convey with such words as beautiful,
delicious, painful, or infuriating can never actually be conveyed by those
words because the experiences are far too vast, complex, and nuanced to be
easily or accurately rendered by concepts and the language used to articulate
them.
For example, take the state of mind we call anxiety. What is it? To be sure,
we have a word and regularly employ that word to characterize a particular
type of human experience. But what precisely is it that we’re characterizing
when we use the label “anxiety”? As we look up in the night sky and see that
object called the “Big Dipper,” we’re essentially recognizing and then
naming a particular patterning of light. Similarly, we could say that the
phenomenon we label as “anxiety” refers to a distinctive pattern of
experience, energy, and information. But naming that general pattern
“anxiety” doesn’t actually tell us very much about it as it leaves out the
specific details, failing to capture the extraordinarily diverse and complex
array of energies that constitute such an experience in its actuality.
We try to convey what’s transpiring experientially by generalizing about
those experiences, saying such things as “I went for a walk today and had a
wonderful time,” or “I had class tonight but it was really boring.” And while
such conceptual/linguistic renderings give us a very general impression about
what took place and the nature of it, our experiences are made up of very
specific details and not generalities, which are always abstractions about
those specifics. When I say that I am “feeling anxious,” I am sharing a
generalized picture about what is being experienced and not its actuality,
which cannot be reduced conceptually. Our definitions of things and
experiences may represent a useful kind of communicational shorthand. But
the actual experiences themselves are utterly beyond the concepts used to
define them.
The bottom line is that human experiences and their putative causes transcend
any and all explanatory models. The concepts we utilize to point to and
describe the presence of specific experiences may be able to convey
something about those phenomena but like the aforementioned personality
inventories, the models will always fall short. In the final analysis, any
modeling of reality will necessarily be an oversimplification.
Incidentally, this is as true in science as it is in spirituality. For just as
neuroscience seems hell bent on reducing the complexity of human
experience to electrochemical firings in the brain, so too do most spiritual
teachings fall prey to their own brand of reductionism, taking the realm of
human experience, which is by nature indescribable and multidimensional,
and collapsing it into unidimensional concepts and descriptors such as spirit,
light, God, or awareness that are themselves experientially inconceivable and
irreducible.
In the final analysis, the territory we call experience is what’s real; the
scientific and spiritual maps, beautiful and elegant as they may be, are
nothing more than mere abstractions, conceptual renderings of an actuality
that cannot, in the end, be fairly rendered or conceived.
Signal and Noise
We tend to believe that reality is more or less coherent and structured. We
imagine that there are observable objects (people, places, and things) and
subjective states (thoughts, feelings, and sensations) that exist, and that can
be clearly defined and conveyed via language.
However, the reality is that in every instant, we are being flooded by an
inconceivable array of experiential phenomena. And while we tend not to
recognize or appreciate it, the lion’s share of what’s being perceived doesn’t
actually fit together logically or cohere into any structured narrative or
conceptual framework.
Because so much of what’s happening experientially doesn’t fit neatly into
any of the narratives that we’ve come to believe, we try to maintain these
apparently coherent ideas by essentially overlooking all the experiential data
that doesn’t fit those neat and tidy conceptual formulations.
In order to describe and seemingly make sense of things as things (that’s a
feeling, that’s a thought, that’s a human, that’s a bird) we have to attend
primarily to the “signal,” those dimensions of experience that stand out as
being coherent and describable, while censoring out and effectively treating
as “noise” the vast array of uninterpretable or seemingly unrelated
phenomena occurring every instant.
In a sense, we are signal snobs, believing those experiences that don’t
correspond to our structured narratives are essentially “noise in the system”
that we can more or less disregard. However, by censoring out these less
coherent, less structured elements of the experiential field that lie outside the
bounds of ordinary human discourse and description, could it be that we are
robbing ourselves of so much of life’s inconceivable richness, dynamism, and
vitality?
PRACTICE
As you sit here, just let yourself open to the full field of experience. Notice
how much is actually present. Despite whatever interpretations may be
operating, just appreciate how vast, how boundless, how endless the field of
experience actually is.
How many different colors and subtle shades are being seen right now? You
could never hope to count them all. How many different shapes are being
perceived? And what about the astounding play of light and form?
Notice the way in which everything that’s appearing in the visual field—​the
presence of light, shadow, reflection, shape, and color—​is not merely being
seen but also felt, even if subtly. Let yourself venture out to the very edges of
the field of sight; what is felt there? You can’t quite say and yet something
still seems present.
Notice how everything that is being seen is here for only a flash instant.
And since there really is no permanence or constancy to any of it, how are we
even able to create the sense that reality is somehow structured or coherent?
Look for yourself; is it actually possible to maintain a consistent plotline
when the experiential “story” keeps transforming into something else,
moment by moment?
Notice the full field of whatever is being sensed and felt. You may have
names for some of what’s appearing. But look and see if you can notice those
finer, subtler dimensions of experience for which there really is no language.
Feel the very subtle and oftentimes chaotic display of mental representations
we call thinking? Can you sense how nonlinear and nonrational so much of
that movement of mind is, the flashing, flickering, shimmering, ephemeral
nature of it all?
Maybe what we think of as the predictable, seemingly boring and uninspiring
structure and normalcy of our everyday lives is actually much more like a
Jackson Pollock painting—​mysterious, playful, colorful, exciting, carefree,
dynamic, and unpredictable, impossible to understand or make sense of and
yet astonishingly alive and exquisite in its incoherence and irrationality.
What Is Awareness?
Spiritual teachings frequently talk about awareness as a kind of special,
privileged domain, one that is free of the comings and goings of phenomenal
experience (see the chapter “The Knowing of This Moment Is the Feeling of
It”). Awareness is often described as that which notices all the stories the
mind generates and yet is neither defined by nor caught up in those mental
interpretations.
However, when we speak of awareness in this way, as something that
actually exists and is distinct from the arising and passing away of the
phenomena it notices or observes, this presumes that awareness is a clearly
identifiable, definable thing, distinct from other things. Let’s investigate this
assumption to see if it holds up…
PRACTICE
Right now, just notice the fact that you are awake and aware and see that this
capacity to be aware is here without exerting a single ounce of effort to make
it so.
Whatever is being experienced and however you may be defining it, you
know that experience is present for one simple reason: because you are
aware.
But here’s the question: What exactly is awareness? Simply because we have
a name for it doesn’t mean we actually know what it is. So, what is it? What
is awareness, not as an idea, but as an experience?
Whatever and wherever you feel that word awareness is pointing to, look
right there, right in your own direct experience, and see if you can find what
it is, what this word “awareness” is actually indicating experientially. What is
awareness made of, texturally?
One way we might describe awareness is that it is composed of countless
subtle experiential details which are themselves composed of more details
which are in turn made of more details.
Can you feel that, the way in which this thing we call awareness is ultimately
an inconceivable mystery, a mystery we can never get to the bottom of owing
to its infinite subtlety and depth?
This inquiry can reveal that the very thing we imagined and presumed
awareness to be is, in the final analysis, simply not knowable. Awareness is,
like every other experience, ultimately indefinable. Sure, we could say that
awareness has a particular feel to it, a qualitative texture that is distinct from
other dimensions of experience.
And yet, it’s really impossible to characterize what exactly that is. In fact, the
only real category in which we can safely place awareness is the “category”
of indescribability, the transcendental, category-​less common denominator of
all experience.
Dialogue: The Miracle of Everything
Sara: In some of your talks and writings, I’ve heard you describe the nature
of things as being “miraculous.” But what exactly do you mean by this? It
seems to me that while some things can’t be explained scientifically and so
could be called miraculous, to call everything in life a miracle seems, well, a
stretch.
John: While conventionally we think of miracles as those things that defy
explanation, the reality is that all phenomena defy explanation. If, for
example, you saw a human being flying around without the aid of any
mechanical device, you would say that’s a miracle, right? On the other hand,
people believe it’s possible to explain, technically and scientifically, how a
human being can travel above the earth with the aid of a helicopter or
airplane.
Sara: Exactly. We can explain how people can fly in an airplane but not how
they can fly on their own, without the aid of any flying machine.
John: It sure seems that way. But if we look a little deeper, it can be seen that
we aren’t actually explaining the things we imagine we’re explaining, at least
not comprehensively. The fact is that we don’t understand the root origin or
ultimate cause of any of the aerodynamic principles or engineering dynamics
that allow for that seemingly explicable phenomenon we call flying in an
airplane. Our explanations for the things we take for granted as normal and
natural only go so far. We can explain how we’re able to fly in airplanes…
but only to a point.
Sara: I don’t really understand. While I might not be able to explain it myself,
a physicist or engineer could tell you exactly how planes are able to fly above
the ground.
John: Fair enough. But let’s look a little more closely at what we
conventionally think of as the explicable or unmiraculous. In order to explain
how we can fly in an airplane, we’d have to account for every aspect of that
phenomenon, right? And yet we can’t do this because the existence of one
part of that equation, namely the one flying in the plane, can’t be accounted
for.
Sara: What do you mean that we can’t account for the person flying the
plane?
John: Well, what is it that allows for the existence of the organism we see
operating the controls of the plane? How do we account for the fact of its
consciousness, which is essential in order to fly the plane? The reality is that
with or without the aid of any flying machine, no part of the existence of the
person soaring above the earth can actually be explained, at least not
definitively.
Sara: I’m still not sure I understand. Don’t we understand how the body
works, how the brain functions that enables us to do something like operate a
machine?
John: Yes, and no. For example, for a mammal such as us to live, it must be
able to breathe, right? But for breath to exist, there must be air. And in order
for air to exist, there must be the right set of atmospheric conditions, which
are themselves dependent on various other forces, such as gravity, that are in
turn interacting with untold galactic and cosmic phenomena.
In other words, we can’t definitively explain even the most basic of human
realities—​breathing—​without also explaining the unthinkably vast planetary
and cosmic forces at play that enable such things as air and breath to be. And
because they’re inextricably linked to breathing, those universal forces would
have to be explained in order to know in a precise and comprehensive way
what breathing actually was. And yet no such explanations exist.
In other words, the actual existence of the breath is an absolute mystery and
miracle, which means you and I and everyone are also miracles, whether
we’re flying in planes or soaring above the earth on our own.
In the end, we’re left with the reality that there is nothing but the miraculous,
every aspect of this reality ultimately inexplicable by its very nature and
existence.
Wide Open
As humans we typically aspire to feel less closed and more open—​more
openhearted, open-​minded, and so on. We seek to feel a greater sense of
spaciousness in our lives, to feel less bounded, less shut down, less blocked
or resistant, more receptive, unguarded, and undefended.
Given this aspiration, it is not surprising that psychological and spiritual
traditions have developed an array of practices whose aim is to help people
cultivate a greater sense of openness. However, as beneficial as such
practices may be, they are typically rooted in a central and largely
unquestioned assumption, namely that there is actually something that can be
closed and subsequently opened up through some effort, cultivation, or
practice. The following meditation invites us to consider a different
possibility, that openness is always and already the nature of every moment,
even those we conceive of and experience as more “closed down.”
PRACTICE
As you sit here, simply notice how open everything is, how experience has no
borders, no edges, no lines delineating or distinguishing one thing from the
next.
Feel the swirl of sensations we call “body” and notice that they are pure
openness.
See how you cannot locate the precise place where this dance of sensation
begins or where it ceases to exist.
With eyes open, notice the field of vision, how wide open it is, how you
cannot tell at what point the field of seeing comes to a definitive end.
Feel the endlessness of whatever is being seen, the complete openness of it.
And now simply feel your own aliveness, the energy, the felt sense of what
you call “you.” Feel the presence of your own being, your own existence.
Notice it too is wide open, without border or boundary. See how there are no
clear edges to this life force and energy that you are. Notice how impossible
it is to locate where this presence of aliveness begins or ends.
Appreciate this natural openness that you are and everything is, a
seamlessness with nothing blocking or in the way of anything else.
No Hierarchy
In each instant, we are being barraged by a flood of experiential phenomena.
Based in large part on the ways in which we conventionally define and
categorize the many things we encounter in life, our tendency is to divide
reality up into those experiences we like, those we don’t much care for, and
those we’re kind of neutral about. But, for these next few moments, I invite
you to experiment with another possibility, that the experiential hierarchies
we’ve created and tended to believe in as givens are based on the ways in
which we conventionally characterize phenomena which, as we’ve been
exploring throughout the book, are in their essence undefinable. You can
download a recording of the following practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, I invite you to explore what it might be like to
play no favorites, to experiment with letting go of any hierarchy whatsoever,
relaxing the habit of privileging or elevating some experiential moments over
others.
But remember, no hierarchy means just that. So, if you should find yourself
evaluating, judging, or thinking that some things hold greater value or
importance than others, then that’s fine too! In other words, rather than
seeing judging or evaluating as being somehow inferior to a state of non-​-
judging or non-​evaluating, simply allow everything to be equal.
Let yourself entertain the possibility that no experience, no disposition, no
mode is intrinsically higher, better, or more meaningful than any other.
See what it’s like to come to your experience in this way, opening yourself up
to the possibility that everything you encounter, everything that’s
experienced is equal in its relevance, equal in its importance, equal in its
value and equal in its beauty, all of it an inconceivable miracle, simply
because it is.
Time
Time represents one of the most taken-for-​granted dimensions of the human
experience. As part of what we might call conventional reality, the existence
of time is more or less a given. It seems irrefutable that time exists. Of
course, we have plenty of evidence to support this conventional view that
time is real. It certainly seems to comport with our lived experience. But does
it? Do we actually experience something called “time?” Or, is it possible that
the notion of time and its passage depends upon a kind of abstraction, a
conceptual interpretation for which there isn’t in fact any supporting
experiential evidence?
It certainly seems that we have evidence of a past that has been and a future
that has yet to become. However, to create the impression of time, we must
literally imagine past and future into existence via the mechanism of memory
and thought. But experientially, we have never encountered anything
resembling a past or future. All we have ever actually experienced is this
flash instant, this ever-​changing, ever-​fluctuating now.
The following meditation explores this question of time and its reality, or
lack thereof. You can download a recording of it at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Beginning with this thing we call “the past,” can you locate something, some
experience that was? Where is the direct experiential evidence of that which
you call “past?”
Sure, we can imagine an apparent past via the miracle of memory. But as an
actuality, it doesn’t exist.
Try to put yourself there. It’s not possible, for the imagined past only ever
exists now, in this very instant, this moment of aliveness.
What we call the past is an abstraction, an idea. It exists as a thought, a
thought that is only ever appearing now. There is no then. We may peer into
what we refer to as the past but that looking is always occurring right now, in
the immediacy of what is.
Just as the past cannot be found, neither can what we call the future. To be
sure, we can imagine what will be. But we can never actually arrive there.
We are never able to experience anything resembling a future. All our
envisioning of some impending moment only ever occurs in the immediacy
of now. What we call the future is sheer fantasy. It does not exist as an
actuality.
There is only ever this flash instant in which the thought of what might be
can arise. As with what was, what might be is not an actuality for there is
only what is.
Now let’s explore this notion of what is, the so-​called now.
Look at your direct experience and see if something called the present
moment can actually be found. Look at what’s appearing—​something is
clearly here. But this here is in a constant state of flux, right? What we call
the present appears and then is gone in a flash.
Look and see how experience doesn’t freeze or hold still. Whatever
instantaneous perception we might locate and say, “Here it is, here is the
present moment. I’ve found the now,” that now has already disappeared and
become something else before we can even name or describe it. Notice the
way in which reality is in constant motion, never holding still, forever
slipping away as soon as it appears.
There really is no such thing as a discernible moment that is bounded, a
“now” that has an identifiable beginning, middle, or end.
And so, in reality, no past, present, or future can ever be found to exist.
Notice that in experience, there is no time for the very instant the moment
springs forth, it transforms itself, always being and yet forever becoming
something else. Feel this timelessness, the unstoppable, ever-​changing flow
we call reality.
The Freedom of Uncertainty
Many traditions hold the belief that to be free of the grip of conceptual
thinking and the grasping, identification, and suffering it purportedly gives
rise to, we must either quiet the mind’s activity or discover a part of us that is
already conceptually quiet and beyond the reach of thought. In such
teachings, one is frequently directed to notice and rest as the awareness that
knows or is awake to the movement of the mind but is neither caught in nor
defined by such activity (see the chapter “What Is Awareness?”). However,
as true as it may be that awareness is beyond thought, it turns out that all
experiences, including thinking itself, are by nature beyond the reach of
conceptualization and are ultimately indefinable. And because of this, there is
no reason to privilege one aspect of reality (awareness) over another
(thought) since both are equal in terms of their being unfathomable,
indescribable expressions of life. Here’s an experiment… You can download
a recording of it at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For a moment, think some thought, maybe the idea of what you will be doing
for dinner later tonight.
Once you have that thought in mind, just feel the presence of it—​something
is undoubtedly there and you know that it is there, right? Something is
showing up experientially which we label as “thinking.” But what exactly
does that word tell us about the specifics of what is being experienced?
What is thought, actually?
What is thinking made of, experientially?
We use this term “thought” to describe a particular domain of experience. But
while it may be indicative of something we encounter, otherwise we wouldn’t
have evolved such a word in the first place, whatever thinking actually is
cannot be neatly collapsed into any conceptual or linguistic category. The
word “thought” may convey some vague, general sense of the actual territory
it is endeavoring to describe. But that is all words and concepts can ever do.
Language is simply not capable of capturing with any sort of completeness or
precision the intricately rich subtlety and nuance that constitutes every instant
including the experience we call thinking. However helpful they may be as
pointers, the words we use to categorize and order the world of experience
don’t actually tell us very much about the specific details of anything.
To further illustrate this point, let’s examine another phenomenon, color. As
you gaze into a clear sky, you know there is a word—​blue—​to describe what
you’re seeing. But just as with the word “thought,” the conceptual label
“blue,” while indicative of something, conveys very little about what we
actually experience when we see something blue.
The experience of blueness cannot be characterized—​it’s so infinitely subtle
and deep. And just as with thought, we can ask the same question of the
experience of blue—​what is it? What does blue feel like? What is this thing
called blue actually made of experientially?
The exploration of these questions reveals that they are not ultimately
answerable because we can never quite get to the bottom of what anything is.
Simply feel the presence of any phenomenon and you will begin to notice this
—​that despite the immense vocabularies we’ve developed to characterize the
countless and diverse forms life can take, each and every experience is utterly
beyond any way we might imagine or conceive it to be. It’s quite
extraordinary, isn’t it, the ultimate indefinability of everything?
Can you sense the freedom of this, the freedom of not being certain about
what anything is?
Dialogue: The World Is Made of Verbs
Maria: I’ve heard you say that we can’t actually know what things are. What
do you mean by this? It seems I have all sorts of knowledge of what things
are or aren’t…
John: Well, if we want to know what a thing is, we must have some point of
reference to compare it to. But if things are as impermanent as they appear to
be and by virtue of that relentless dynamism, utterly unique, never repeating,
then there’s no way to definitively know what anything is. In other words, if
I’ve never seen or experienced this present phenomenon before, I can’t
possibly know what it is.
From this vantage, knowledge is essentially a pretense, an oversimplified,
overgeneralized association the mind makes between what’s presently being
experienced and something we imagine, through memory, has occurred
before.
Maria: I don’t know. It seems we have to act as though things and events
have a kind of permanence. And for most practical purposes many physical
things do, like the dollar bill in my wallet. Even periodic events like a sunrise
or an ocean tide can be treated as more or less the same as the previous one,
even though we may realize that each new one is in certain respects unique. If
it were any other way, there’d be no continuity to life, no flow, no time.
John: Maybe there is no actual continuity or time.
Maria: What do you mean?
John: To be sure, it seems as if time and continuity are actualities. But the
provocative question I’m posing here is, do they in fact exist as we imagine
they do?
We may not like the implications of what we discover when we look beyond
our presuppositions of what things are. However, things rarely conform to the
way we imagine or believe them to be. We may not like confronting the
possibility that what we think is true may not be the case. But whether it’s the
conventional notion that things have permanence, continuity, or anything
else, the question I’m interested in is, “Is what we believe to be true actually
true?”
I’m not suggesting there’s anything wrong with acting as though things have
some degree of permanence. Clearly we do this and it would appear to have
some pragmatic utility, maybe even necessity. At the same time, the reality
I’m pointing to—​that what we’re seeing now is not in fact the same as what
we were seeing a moment ago because of the inherently unstable, dynamic
nature of everything—​also has immense practical utility.
Maria: How so?
John: Well, for one, recognizing the uniqueness of each instant—​the
newness, the freshness of everything—​facilitates many of the things we
aspire to experience more in life, such as greater appreciation, gratitude, and
awe. Jesus purportedly said, “unless ye become like little children, ye cannot
enter the kingdom…” (Matthew 18:3). I think what he meant was that the
child is not yet burdened by knowledge of what the world is. For the very
young, everything is a wonder, an awe-​inspiring miracle, because it has quite
literally never before been seen. The newly born have yet to accumulate
knowledge of what things are. Because of this, they see with that profound
openness and innocence that we adults find so compelling and beautiful.
What the Zen Buddhists call “beginner’s mind” is natural to the child. And
while it may be more difficult to reach once we’ve developed the knowledge
of what things appear to be, it’s still quite possible to recognize the inherently
unique nature of every instant of perception. We have quite literally never
seen this instant before, nor will we ever see it again. And that’s a powerful
thing to realize.
Here’s another practical application of what I’m pointing to…
Human beings, as a rule, struggle with letting go of things—​the past,
judgments, beliefs, grudges, stories, and so on. And while we may experience
letting go to be difficult, maybe even impossible, we believe this as a result
of one innocent misperception, that experiences endure and have stability.
However, if we look a bit more closely, we can discover that letting go is the
easiest, most effortless thing because it’s the very nature of reality. Life is
quite literally letting go of itself each instant owing to its inherently unstable,
transient nature. We may speak conventionally about striving or struggling to
let go of this, that, or the other thing. But the truth is that holding on is what’s
impossible, not letting go.
Life has already taken the past away because that’s what life does. It
dissolves what was, gives rise to what is, and then dissolves that too, no
sooner than it appears. This is the unrelenting, ever-​changing nature of
experience. And so we don’t need to work or practice accepting and letting
go of things, since whatever occurred has already been let go of, already been
forgiven, already been allowed. As the Tibetans say, experiences “self-​-
liberate upon arising.”
Finally, through recognizing the discontinuous, impermanent nature of
phenomena, we discover that nothing is static, nothing remains the same.
This discovery reveals that the things we imagine we’re bound by, caught up
in, or troubled by don’t actually exist, at least not as the discrete, concrete
things we’ve imagined them to be. For something to exist as a “thing” that we
could be stuck in, there would have to be persistence, which direct
investigation shows is not in fact the case.
Since there is no endurance to phenomena owing to the ever-​changing nature
of things, the world is, in a very real sense, made of verbs, not nouns.
The Bottomless Well of Infinity
It seems reasonable to imagine that the closer we look at some object,
whether it’s seemingly external or internal to us, the more capable we will be
of discerning what that object actually is. We think, not surprisingly, that by
carefully examining a phenomenon, its disparate parts will somehow
converge, moving toward greater and greater clarity, coherence, and
definability, revealing the essence of whatever is being observed. We believe
that if we look close enough, eventually we’ll come to know what makes a
star a star, a cloud a cloud, a molecule a molecule, or a person a person.
However, it doesn’t actually work that way; it turns out that the more
carefully we examine things, the less coherent they become. Instead of
discovering greater resolution and specificity (“Oh, that’s what that is”), what
we find the closer we look is more and more information, detail, and
diversity. Paradoxically, the deeper we delve into the nature of things, the
less clear we become about what they actually are!
PRACTICE
Imagine your exploration of some phenomenon to be like traveling down a
deep well. You think that when you get to the end of your investigations,
you’ll find yourself standing on firm ground at the bottom of the well, having
finally come to a clear understanding of what that particular phenomenon
actually is. And yet it doesn’t work that way.
Take, for example, a tree. From one vantage, we see this familiar visual
object and recognize it as belonging to the category of things we call “trees.”
But as we travel down our metaphorical well and draw closer to it,
investigating what the tree is composed of, we discover it is made up of
countless details such as leaves, branches, bark, and color. If we then proceed
farther down the well, examining those details we’ve identified, we’ll find
those parts of the tree are themselves composed of more details (cells,
molecules, atoms, electrons). And if we look further into those details, we’ll
find even more of the same, ad infinitum.
While it may seem to defy common logic, the reality is that the closer we
look at objects or experiences, the less clear it is what exactly we’re looking
at. Choose anything that might be showing up right now in your field of
experience. It doesn’t matter what it is. For example, pick some emotional
state you’re experiencing. Maybe you’re feeling a little restless or agitated.
Or maybe you’re experiencing a sense of calm or ease. In either case
(agitation or calm), just feel whatever is present. Now, get very, very close to
it. Whether you call it agitation or calm, just look as carefully as you can at
whatever is happening. And now, move in even closer. What exactly is this
state? Agitation, calm…these labels are pointing to something. The question
is, what exactly is that? What are those words actually referring to?
As you continue to look very, very closely, exploring this question, you
might find yourself answering that the mental-​emotional state being
experienced is composed of various sensations. Okay. Now get right up as
close as you can to what you’re calling “sensations,” and ask the same
question: What are those made of? As you continue in this way, traveling
down the metaphorical well of your experience, you may begin to notice
something quite remarkable: that the closer you look, the more intimate you
become with whatever is happening experientially, the less clear it is exactly
what you’re looking at! It’s a strange and curious thing, isn’t it, that as we
draw closer to things, investigating what experiences are actually made of,
those experiences seem to move away from us, like a receding horizon that
we can never quite reach, no matter how many steps we might take toward it.
And so, to return to our metaphorical well, the more we investigate the nature
of things, the clearer it becomes that we cannot know definitively what any
object or experience actually is because everything is beyond the reach of our
definitions and categories. While at first glance, this may seem disorienting
or frustrating, it turns out to be a powerful and liberating discovery for it
reveals that all our imagining that we are bound up in, defined by, or limited
by experiences is just that—​pure imagination, because there is no bottom to
the well. We are forever falling through the indescribability that is
everything.
The Borderless Field of Being
By and large, the consensus human view is that we exist as separate
individuals, bio-​psycho-​social-​spiritual organisms encased in these physical
bodies that are clearly distinguishable from the outer environments in which
they appear to reside. Put another way, our tendency is to perceive ourselves
as separate subjects navigating a world of objects. We believe that these
bounded creatures we see ourselves as are somehow cut off and effectively
separate from the rest of existence. But maybe it only appears that way (see
the chapter “Boundaries”).
Let’s explore our own existence and see if we can find a clear point where
what we think of as “ourselves” ends and the world “outside” of us begins…
You can download a recording of this practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Notice that you are here, that you are alive. Let yourself feel this simple fact,
the undeniable presence of your own existence, the simple feeling of being.
Notice that no effort is required for this to be so—​no strategies, no
techniques, no manipulations are needed to create this sense of aliveness; it is
naturally present, existence streaming forth spontaneously, generating and
sustaining itself, moment by moment.
As you feel the presence of this field of being, let yourself venture out to the
farthest edges of it—​can you find anything there, any point where the field of
being comes to an end? Can you locate a line separating the field from
anything else? Or is there just an edgeless continuum of being, without
border or boundary?
Notice that no matter what might be occurring within this boundaryless field,
being remains as it is, unalterably alive and present.
Feel the way in which the field is not circumstance dependent—​a thousand
different thoughts, feelings, and sensations can appear and disappear and all
the while the field remains. Being continues to be, existence continues to
exist, no matter the shape or form it may take.
Feel the ease, the fullness, the rich lusciousness of being.
While we may imagine ourselves to be these isolated creatures, vulnerable
subjects in a world of objects and circumstances, see that, experientially, this
is not the case.
Feel the way in which the field of being, the field of experience itself is
actually seamless, an indivisible, all-​inclusive expanse, an edgeless space of
invulnerability that nothing can harm for there is nothing apart from it.
Here you are, sitting here. And yet there is no finality to you, no point where
beingness ceases to be, no place where the edge of “you” comes to an end.
Feel this.
Revel in the vast, luscious infinity that you are.
No Distractions
In most meditative traditions, the practitioner is encouraged to maintain focus
on some object or aspect of experience and then, whenever they find their
mind wandering off and becoming distracted by something else, bring
attention back to that focus.
While this kind of concentrative, focused attention can no doubt be
experienced as beneficial, it can also contribute to its fair share of frustration
and tension, given the mind’s propensity to become captivated by all sorts of
phenomena. Along with the experience of frustration that can often occur
when we make an effort to control or regulate the flow of attention, such
approaches can also end up reinforcing the idea that the mind’s tendency to
move from one thing to another is necessarily a problem that must be
rectified.
Approaches that emphasize attentional control can also lead us to conclude
that some states (such as being focused) are somehow preferable to others
(being distracted), effectively blinding us to the mystery and miracle that
underlies all experiences, regardless of how we might conventionally label
them.
Finally, since attention, like every other phenomenon, is never the same from
moment to moment owing to its inherently dynamic, impermanent nature, the
effort to keep it still and unmoving may turn out to be a literal impossibility.
You can listen to a recording of the following practice at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For these next few moments, I invite you to experiment with letting go
completely of any effort to control attention. Allow the mind to go wherever
it wishes to go. Notice that even if you try to keep attention fixed somewhere,
or stay focused on some aspect of experience, the mind doesn’t remain
anywhere for very long.
Given this tendency of mind, wherever attention may happen to alight,
simply let it be there, allowing it to linger however long it wishes. If the mind
naturally focuses on something, then let that focus be as it is.
And if attention feels completely dispersed and unfocused, jumping from
here to there, darting from one thing to the next, like a butterfly flitting about,
then simply allow that to be as well.
Let it be perfectly okay that the mind does whatever it does, goes wherever it
goes, moves however it moves.
Enjoy the pleasure, the ease, and the freedom as you let go of trying to direct
or control attention and simply allow the mind to be as it is.
Consider the possibility that there are no distractions. See that what we might
typically conceive of as a meditative distraction—​for example, thinking or
daydreaming—​is simply another moment, another phenomenon arising in the
field of experience.
To say that some experiences are distractions while others are not is really to
privilege certain moments over others.
So instead of viewing particular experiences as distractions that we must keep
ourselves from being distracted by, simply see that everything we might label
as a distraction is in fact a miraculous apparition, an astounding occurrence of
reality. See that there are no distractions but only different flavors, different
modes, different textures of experience.
For these next moments, simply let there be no distractions but only
experiences.
The Olympic Athlete Model of Spirituality
Humans are not born virtuoso musicians or world-​class athletes. No, they
must develop such capacities and mastery. But in the case of realizing the
indivisible, inseparable nature of things that many spiritual traditions speak
of, the Olympic athlete-​virtuoso model, which one frequently finds
championed in many of these same traditions, really doesn’t apply.
Why? Because inseparability isn’t actually a skill one must develop, like
playing an instrument or excelling in a sport. It is simply the way reality is.
One is not born being able to play the piano like Oscar Peterson or shoot a
basketball like Michael Jordan. No, one must practice for many hours a day
for many, many years to realize such virtuosity.
But when it comes to recognizing the singular nature of reality, no skill is
required. Instead, anyone can simply look and see that right now, with no
practice required, indivisibility is already given, already the case, already
fully, one hundred percent the way life is, the way you already are.
PRACTICE
For a moment, look for yourself and see if you can find a seam in the
universe of your experience, a clear line demarcating this from that, a
boundary separating one thing from another, dividing this moment from the
next.
Are there any such lines to be found? Is reality actually made of separate
pieces? Or is there only this vast, undivided field of experiencing, utterly
seamless by its very nature? Look and it can be plainly seen that all there is,
is inseparability.
And so, since it is already the nature of every moment and experience,
realizing that reality is undivided must be the easiest thing in the world,
right? See right now that nothing need be done to make reality what it is—​-
seamlessly whole, free of even one iota of separation or division.
If one wants to argue that it takes practice to realize this, then let the practice
be to simply see that this is already the case, to look and see that undivided is
simply the nature of things, the way reality has always been.
Dialogue: The Many Flavors of Here
John: While spiritual traditions are fond of telling us that we must strive to be
more present, more aware, more “here,” the reality is that here is all there is.
Raj: What do you mean, exactly?
John: Well, the one thing we can be certain of is that something is happening,
right? Call it life, call it experience. It doesn’t really matter. The point is that
something is always here. From this vantage, there can be no entering or
exiting here, no finding or losing it. Here is self-​sustaining and self-​-
generating, with each fleeting moment transforming itself into the next.
Raj: But what’s appearing, this “here” as you call it, is always changing,
right?
John: To be sure, each flash of experience carries its own distinctive flavor.
Sweet is not sour; light is not sound; thought is not feeling; blue is not red.
But regardless of the particular flavor on display, it’s all simply here. Look at
anything and ask yourself, “Where am I seeing this?” Listen to any sound.
Where is it occurring? Feel any feeling or think any thought and notice where
those are arising. Whether we imagine events to be occurring inside or
outside the body’s skin line, experience is always experienced, right here.
Raj: But isn’t there something “over there,” something that’s apart from us,
something that’s not here?
John: Well, even if we say something is happening “over there,” that
experience still happens here. In experiencing, there are essentially zero
degrees of separation between the subject or experiencer and the object which
is being experienced. Nothing could be more intimate than experience. It’s
closer than close. Nearer than near…
Raj: What exactly do you mean when you say “closer than close”?
John: For a moment, just feel into the presence of this “here” in which
experience is showing up spontaneously and continuously. As you explore
the space of here, notice how it has no identifiable borders or edges to it, no
boundary, no center, no circumference. We cannot, for example, tell where
here ends and not-​here, or “there,” begins.
The reality of experience is that it’s simultaneously here but also not here,
present yet not able to be found as any clearly identifiable, discrete thing.
This is the paradox of “here”: it’s not findable and yet it’s undeniably
present, exploding with infinite and unfathomable dimensionality, aliveness,
depth, and meaning.
Raj: I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying. It strikes me as kind of
abstract.
John: I can appreciate that the way I’m speaking about this may seem a little
abstract or overly philosophical, but it’s really not. What it is, is paradoxical.
Raj: What do you mean by paradoxical?
John: Every experience presents as distinctive; a rose is not the sun is not the
sea. But when we explore exactly what it is that constitutes each of these
unique experiential flavors, we discover something quite remarkable—​we
can’t seem to locate or identify exactly what is there.
Look for yourself at any experience. Let’s say it’s the feeling of being cold or
warm. Something is clearly present; the words are pointing to something. The
conceptual labels seem to refer to some specific pattern of experiential
phenomena. And yet paradoxically when we find or locate those specifics, we
come up empty-​handed. It can’t be said exactly what cold or warm is.
So, when I say that experiences are here but not here, present yet unfindable,
this is what I mean.
Just as you might feel the wind or the splash of cold water upon your face,
simply feel the vitality and power of whatever is here, this blazing aliveness
that is present as each experiential apparition, each spontaneous,
unpredictable eruption of life.
See the blue of the sky, the red of the rose? Here.
Feel the cold of the rain or the warmth of the sun? Here.
Listen to the roar of the sea, the deafening sounds of the city, or the quiet of
the night? Here.
Each experience that appears is simply the unique taste of reality in that
instant, the many flavors of here.
Everything’s a One-​Off
When we encounter some mental-​emotional state such as fear or happiness,
or some perceptual object such as a tree or a house, such phenomena are
recognized as familiar owing to their particular patterning or the elements
they appear to be composed of. It is through this mechanism of comparing
and contrasting the moment that is presently arising with previous moments
we imagine we’ve encountered before that we are able to place experiences in
some familiar category of knowledge.
However, as real as it may seem to us that we know what things and
experiences are and what descriptive categories or classification schemes
they belong to, this entire process rests upon a kind of hallucination that
overlooks the ways in which each momentary perception is utterly unique,
never before seen. This particular feeling, thought, person, place, or thing
may seem familiar to us. But is it actually the same or does it only appear that
way owing to the power of this unreliable though miraculous thing we call
memory? Let’s have a look.
PRACTICE
Notice that the present moment is here for a flash, and then gone. Appreciate
that you cannot locate what you imagine was appearing a moment ago, other
than as a memory.
And even if you imagine that what’s appearing this instant has been seen,
felt, or experienced before, the reality is that it has not. This moment is
utterly unique; it has never, ever happened. And it will never appear again, at
least not like this.
It is true that events can often occur that we associate, through memory, with
similar prior events. However, there will always be differences, not only in
the events themselves but also in the larger context within which they are
arising.
Notice that because this momentary experience has never been here before, at
least not like this, you cannot actually know what it is. See that there is no
category of knowledge to fairly place things in because any category could
only ever be based on what we imagine was previously experienced.
To be sure, we engage in this conventional defining and categorizing, but
only because we’re not looking closely enough. We’re assuming that what’s
appearing experientially fits some category of prior experience when the truth
is that it cannot, for it has never been registered before.
You see, everything is a one-​off and hence ultimately unknowable, at least as
far as referencing it to some other moment we imagine has come before.
Awareness Is Experience
Many teachings emphasize the distinction between awareness and its content,
instructing the practitioner to turn his or her attention away from the ever-​-
changing flow of thoughts, feelings, and sensations and notice that which
knows or is aware of all this coming and going (see the chapter “What Is
Awareness?”). This can be a powerful practice for through it, one can
discover awareness as a kind of stable, ever-​present, clear, and spacious
ground that is, in a sense, not affected by whatever content may be occurring
within it.
In this modeling of reality, awareness (that which knows) is frequently
portrayed as a special, separate, privileged domain apart from, untouched by,
and free of its perceived content (that which is being known). However, let’s
look to see if this purported separation between awareness and its experiential
content can actually be found.
PRACTICE
As you sit here, simply notice whatever is happening. Thoughts, feelings,
sensations, sounds, sights, colors, textures—​it matters not what specific
objects are appearing; just let yourself notice whatever is present.
Now let your attention or awareness shift its focus from the objects being
perceived to the fact of perceiving itself. Allow awareness to become aware
of itself, to appreciate its own existence.
While framing things in this way, distinguishing awareness from its content,
can bring about various benefits, let’s explore whether this apparent
distinction can actually be found.
Experience is happening, right? That seems undeniable. But how do you
know experience is here? Well, however the experience may be described,
you know it is present because there is awareness of it, otherwise you
wouldn’t know that anything was happening. Put another way, without
awareness, there would be no experiences to report!
Now some teachings claim that there exists a domain of so-​called “pure”
awareness that is somehow completely free or devoid of experience, an
awareness that has no phenomenal content present in it. But just as
experience depends upon awareness for its existence, could it be that
awareness depends upon the presence of experience for it to be? Let’s
investigate this question.
If I ask, “Are you aware?” and you answer “Yes,” how is it that you are able
to know this? How do you know you are aware? You know that awareness is
present because you are experiencing it. In other words, without the
experience of awareness, it effectively doesn’t exist! No experience, no
awareness. And no awareness, no experience!
You see, awareness and the experiences it reveals co-​arise. They are really a
single movement; you never find one without the other.
Look right now and notice this. See that you cannot tell where the awareness
that illuminates this moment ends and the moment itself begins. A thought
arises. But the arising of that thought is really inseparable from the awareness
that reveals it, right?
You could never know a thought existed without awareness present to notice
its existence. So in a very real sense, the arising of some experience is at the
same time the arising of awareness.
The appearance of some momentary thought, feeling, or sensation is at the
same time the appearance of awareness. The emergence of any experience is
the emergence of awareness. They are inseparable. It’s like a coin. On one
side is the description of whatever is presenting itself—​a happy thought, a
sad feeling, a blissful or painful sensation…And on the other side of the coin
is the awareness that reveals that particular experiential texture or quality.
But it’s always a single coin. Indivisible. The knowing and the known, the
subject and the object, the perceiver and the perceived, seemingly
distinguishable as two things and yet ultimately an indistinguishable whole.
This that is present—​should we call it experience or awareness? Well, maybe
it’s both. Or maybe we can’t really say what it ultimately is! It’s simply This.
This indescribability…
So, just notice right now that as you are experiencing whatever you’re
experiencing, you are at the same time experiencing awareness.
And because experiencing never comes to a stop, what we might call
“recognizing awareness” must also by definition be uninterrupted. In other
words, contrary to how it is often framed, there’s really no need to try to
sustain awareness, for awareness is self-​sustaining as the flow of
experiencing itself.
There is no actual place to go to “find” something called “awareness.”
There’s no need to quiet or stop thinking to be able to recognize awareness.
Awareness is simply this—​this perception, this thought, this feeling, this
sensation, this present experience. After all, what else could awareness
possibly be but this that is being experienced?
The Fullness of Experience
As a rule, we humans seem to be in a state of near perpetual seeking, driven
and at times plagued by this sense that we are somehow lacking. And so we
attempt to overcome this feeling of lack, this nagging sense that something is
missing by filling ourselves with whatever experiences, relationships,
entertainment, recognition, or possessions we imagine will fill the apparent
void.
Now while this relentless searching after things is frequently portrayed as the
spiritual bogeyman, there’s really nothing wrong with it. It’s just one of the
things we tend to do as humans. It’s completely innocent and, we could say,
totally natural to seek to bring into our lives whatever it is we feel inspired to
taste more of…
But even as we continue in this way, seeking whatever circumstances or
experiences we are inclined to realize more of in our lives, we can at the same
time notice something quite remarkable: This moment is already completely
full.
“What do you mean?” you might ask. “I definitely feel that my life is missing
not just some things, but many things. I definitely feel a sense of lack in my
life, so how can you say that this moment is already full?”
It’s a fair question, to be sure. But here is what I would invite you to
consider: regardless of how you might label it, your experience is always full
of whatever it is you’re experiencing. Feel a sense of what you might call
lack or emptiness? Then that is what you are full of! Experiencing great joy?
Then that is what you are full of. Feel a tremendous sense of sorrow or grief?
Just feel how full that is, full of that particular experience.
Here’s a short practice to explore this.
PRACTICE
Imagine your experience like a room without walls. The room may be full of
many different things—​it could be full of something we might label as
sorrow or joy. It may be full of what we would call clarity or confusion, lack
or fulfillment.
But no matter how the content or condition of this moment might be
described, the room of experience is always full, always complete.
“Full of what?” you might ask.
Full of experience itself…
See, there are no holes, no empty spaces, no sections of the room that are
somehow lacking in experience. There is only ever the presence of
experiencing filled with nothing but itself, as far as the eye can see. Just let
yourself feel how full this vast, borderless, wall-​less room of experiencing is
—​full of the presence, the vitality, the aliveness of whatever is here.
The Surface Is the Deep
In many teachings, we often hear things framed in terms of there being a
surface or gross level of existence which is then contrasted with some
supposedly deeper, truer, subtler layer or dimension of reality. But actually
the deepest, subtlest depths are not found behind, below, or beneath but
smack dab in the middle of the so-​called gross or surface level of things.
Infinity doesn’t lie in some realm beyond the apparently bounded or finite
world. No, right here in the simplest, most ordinary of sensations and
perceptions lies the most profound depth and boundlessness. All that’s
needed to realize this is to begin to appreciate that every experience, whether
we label it as gross or subtle, superficial or deep, is by its very nature infinite
and transcendental in so far as being beyond any possibility of categorization
or description.
PRACTICE
Notice that within every sensation and perception, there is an inconceivable
depth.
The taste of sugar on the tongue, the feel of wind on your cheek, the ocean’s
roar, the reflection of sunlight dancing on the morning dew—​these everyday
experiences are, each in their own way, completely beyond comprehension.
Simply feel the presence of your experience right now; can you sense the
ways in which it contains an infinite number of dimensions and textures?
The transcendent nature of reality is not veiled, hidden behind some grosser,
more surface-​level way of perceiving things. No, the most profound,
unfathomable depths are one hundred percent present in and as every single
perception. And so right now, there is no need to venture to some other place
or time to find greater depth because it is already here, present as the total
indescribability of even the most ordinary human perceptions and
experiences.
See that robin in the tree? There is no more profound truth, no greater
spiritual dimension to be found, no hidden depth lurking in some other realm
or plane of existence beyond whatever seemingly mundane, commonplace
experiences we may be having.
No, the deepest, farthest reaches of reality are present right here and now in
the most ordinary and obvious of perceptions, universes upon universes
contained in even the simple act of seeing a red-​breasted bird sitting perched
on a tree.
So you see, there’s no need to struggle to get beneath or beyond the surface
of things to realize some greater depth, because the supposed “surfaces” of
life are, themselves, immeasurably deep.
Overdramatizing the Path
I used to imagine that I knew what things were in some sort of definitive
sense. I had certain maps I invoked to make sense of and describe reality,
ways of framing either the spiritual path I was on or the one I was inviting
others to take up. And while I didn’t see it then, I now realize that I had
overly dramatized the spiritual journey and its purported goals (such as
enlightenment, realization, and awakening). In spiritual circles, it has become
near gospel that the process of human transformation is going to be an
exceedingly difficult, painful, disorienting, concept-​destroying one, an
arduous path in which we literally have to die to and surrender everything
we’ve ever believed to be true about ourselves or life.
It sounds so dramatic, doesn’t it, to give up everything for the sake of truth
—​all our desires, all our beliefs, all our control? The question is, is it really
true? Must we give up everything or let go in such an absolute, dramatic way
to achieve profound transformation? What if all of this dramatizing and
romanticizing of the spiritual path wasn’t necessary? What if we didn’t need
to surrender anything? What if it wasn’t required (or even possible) to give
up all beliefs, to stop thinking or interpreting and surrender the so-​called ego?
Could it be that it’s possible, and maybe even more effective, to engage in
spiritual practice and inquiry without this dramatic sense of urgency and
seriousness? What if we could come to it more in the spirit of lighthearted
curiosity and playfulness? Could it be that the overly romanticized, do-​or-​die,
“I must surrender and die to the separate self at all costs” mentality is
precisely what perpetuates the sense that we are, in fact, bound, stuck,
separate selves in the first place?
What I’ve observed is that this tendency to dramatize and absolutize what
must happen for people to wake up and remain awake spiritually has the
unintended consequence of perpetuating the fundamental illusion, the idea
that we were ever actually asleep or separated from reality (or God if you
prefer) in the first place. Telling seekers that they must “give up the false
self” or “rest unceasingly in awareness” ends up perpetuating as much if not
more misunderstanding than it clears up. Believing we must surrender
thoughts, beliefs, or the self-​sense serves to reify or concretize those very
things. Proclaiming that the spiritual aspirant must give up control, drop the
separate self, or abide in awareness serves to perpetuate the illusion that such
experiences are actually obstacles to reality rather than expressions of it.
What if we could have our proverbial cake and eat it too? What if we could
experience a sense of being an individual and continue having beliefs,
desires, and so on and at the same time, recognize that all these
characterizations of human experience are themselves utterly beyond the
ways in which we tend to characterize or define them? What if it wasn’t so
much letting go of all that we believe in, giving up control, or surrendering
ourselves but instead, simply seeing that these supposed “things”—​-
control/letting go of control, surrendering/failing to surrender, recognizing
awareness/failing to recognize awareness—​are, themselves, all already
infinite and wholly transcendental in their very nature and existence,
transcendent in the sense of being beyond characterization?
The conventional spiritual narrative is that we are confused human beings
trapped in some nightmarish illusion that we must, like heroic figures in some
grand drama, awaken and extricate ourselves from once and for all. However,
what if this simply weren’t true? What if rather than having to liberate
ourselves from bondage, confusion, or lack of awareness, we simply needed
to see, if we’re so inclined, that those experiences are not what we’ve
imagined them to be based on the limited and partial ways we’ve tended to
define them? What if we needn’t give up control or the self but, instead,
merely see—​in a playful, curious way and whenever we feel moved to—​that
the experiences we label as “needing to be in control,” “feeling we’re in
bondage,” or “losing contact with awareness” are themselves expressions of a
boundless, fathomless, inconceivable reality?
Could it be that no experience need be let go of or transcended, because every
moment of experiencing is already transcendental, already infinite owing to
its indefinable, indeterminate nature?
Identity and the Body of Experience
The list of things we can identify with in any given moment is a long one—​-
body, mind, religion/spirituality, politics, sports teams, our personalities, our
successes, failures, triumphs and tribulations, our social status, our careers,
our relationships…
Let’s look at one of these, the body, for it can serve as an instructive
metaphor, illustrating just how arbitrary and deeply conditioned the process
of identification is.
We’ve come to delineate certain portions of the body (fingers, toes, organs,
joints, tissues, cells) as separate objects. However, the body is actually one
indivisible thing, is it not? The body doesn’t have separate parts but is an
entire whole. For example, take the part of the body we designate as the
“wrist.” Where does that portion end and the rest of what we conventionally
label “arm” begin? And where does the arm end and what we refer to as the
“shoulder” begin? We of course understand that these designated parts are
connected to the entirety of the body. However, our tendency is to conceive
of them as having their own individual integrity and autonomous existence,
as if they were somehow separable from the whole.
Now just as we do with the body and its seemingly separate parts, we divide
the field of experience (what we might call the “body” of experience) into
seemingly separate things. We call the separate parts of experience by many
names—​thoughts, memories, perceptions, feelings, sensations, and so on.
However, these designated parts are not actually divisible from the entire
body of experiencing itself. Conventionally, we of course make such
distinctions, identifying the different portions of the body of experience as
separate experiential phenomena. And yet, we cannot actually tell where the
seemingly separate parts of experiencing end and the whole of the
experiential field begins. Like the ocean and its ever-​changing waves, the
parts and the whole are ultimately inseparable.
Now let’s return to the question of identity. The sense of who and what we
are is in many respects a function of what parts of the “body of experiencing”
we are focusing upon and in turn deeming as more or less significant. For
example, there may be a focus on certain thoughts, emotional states, or
personality characteristics and a corresponding sense of identification with
those. At other times, the attentional focus may shift toward some other
aspect or dimension of the “body of experiencing” such as our physical
existence, gender, race, political affiliation, or maybe our favorite sports
team. And when this attentional shift in emphasis occurs, a different sense of
identity or self-​sense becomes more predominant.
All of which raises a very provocative question: Exactly what part or parts of
the full body of experiencing are we? Are we these physical bodies? Are we
the myriad thought streams coursing through what we call “mind”? Or maybe
we’re the ever-​changing cascade of energetic qualities and emotions being
experienced? And what about all that we are seeing, hearing, touching, and
tasting? Are we not also those parts of the “body of experiencing”? Why
reduce or limit ourselves to just one part or parts? Wouldn’t that be
tantamount to looking at a finger or toe, a kidney or the brain, and imagining
those somehow represent the whole of the body?
Isn’t it somewhat arbitrary to claim we are only certain portions of the body
of experiencing and not others? Feel that little flicker of energy in your
stomach? Isn’t that also what you are? See the clouds floating in the spacious
blue of space? Maybe that’s you too! Hear the sounds of crickets at night,
feel that rush of love, the discomfort of uncertainty, the warmth of social
connection? Maybe it is all you…
What Are We?
We often think of ourselves in quite fixed, limited, close-​ended ways. The
image we hold of ourselves is as a time-​ and space-​bound creature, one that is
identifiable by a particular concrete, localized, physical body that houses a
recognizable and stable personality and mind.
But closer examination reveals something else altogether. For when we
actually feel what is present here (rather than assuming that we know what it
is), when we look at what is arising within the presumed boundaries of who
and what we think of ourselves as, we discover that we are far more dynamic
and ultimately indefinable than previously imagined. You can listen to a
recording for this chapter at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Right now, look at what’s arising experientially. Feel whatever is being felt.
This must be who and what we are for after all, what else could we be other
than what is being experienced? Look and feel what is presently happening;
what is it that’s being experienced?
In other words, what are you?
Just look at your experience right now, this vast symphony of sensations
continually arising and then passing away, the multitude of energies that
appear and then vanish in a flash, this kaleidoscope of flickering thoughts and
feelings, here for an instant and then gone, an infinite array of experiential
textures and qualities bursting forth and then disappearing, just like that…
Could it be that all of that is what you are?
Ask yourself if this matches the conventional notions you may hold about
yourself as a fixed, solid, bounded creature.
Look at what’s here and you may discover that you are not in fact fixed but
are forever on the move, always shifting, always being reshaped.
Maybe what you are is this ever-​flowing, ever-​fluctuating dynamism that has
no discernible edge or boundary to it, a ceaseless, unpredictable explosion of
life that never holds still for even a second.
Could it be that what you are is quite literally beyond any definition or
classification? Maybe the best we can say about ourselves is that we are
cosmic shape-​shifters, never resolving as any one thing but only ever a
universe of inconceivable, indescribable qualities and characteristics, like a
thousand million flavors being tasted each instant.
The Impossibility of Measurement
Even our most sophisticated tools of scientific measurement can only ever
approximate the qualities and characteristics of things. To be sure, some tools
are more accurate than others. A thermometer that is broken will be far less
capable of capturing our “true” temperature than one that is well calibrated.
Now, let’s say we have a very accurate, high-​tech digital thermometer and it
indicates that my temperature is 98.6 degrees, exactly midway between 98.5
and 98.7. However, suppose we locate an even more precise thermometer and
it reveals my actual temperature to be 98.59 degrees. Not quite 98.60, but
very close. From the standpoint of wanting to determine with greater
precision what my actual body temperature is, that’s great. However, what if
we develop an even more sophisticated measuring device and, lo and behold,
discover that my temperature is actually 98.589. Not quite 98.590. But again,
very, very close.
The point of this example is to highlight that no matter how precise our
measurement tools may be, we will never be able to determine with absolute
certainty the true quantity or size of anything because there are an infinite
number of possible points between any two values. While it’s possible to get
close, the true measure of things is always just beyond our reach. In other
words, the qualities and characteristics of things are indeterminate. And in the
same way that we cannot precisely measure the quantitative dimensions of
material objects, it is also not possible to determine the exact nature of
qualitative, subjective phenomena. Let’s look at the familiar state of mind we
call “anxiety.”
PRACTICE
Imagine a horizontal line, starting at “0.” Moving right, the numbers go up,
+1, +2, +3, and so on with each number on the line representing one “unit of
anxiety.” Now, pretend that a feeling described as “non-​anxious” or calm
falls at “0” on our imaginary line. As we move forward, we begin to head in
the direction of feeling less calm and more anxious.
Now, let us suppose that +1 on our number line represents a state we would
characterize as no longer calm, but “anxious.” By the time we get to +2,
we’re feeling intensely anxious and at +3, we start to experience a panic
attack.
But here’s the question: Is there an actual point where it can be determined
that we have now left one state and entered another? At what exact place
along our number line do we clearly move from one way of characterizing
reality (calm) to a different one (anxious)? If we say that once we get to +1,
we’ve now fully arrived at the state we can label as anxiety (and can no
longer be considered calm), are we saying that at 0.99 on our line we haven’t
quite moved fully into the anxious state?
Well, one might counter by saying, “okay, at 0.99 we’re starting to feel the
faint rumblings of anxiety even if it hasn’t taken complete hold of us yet.”
Starting to feel? What exactly does that mean? Can we not get more precise
about this? Imagining the line as representing increasing degrees of anxiety,
are we saying that it is exactly at 0.99 that the first murmurings of what we
might call anxiety have begun to emerge? What about 0.98999999? Were
there any faint hints of anxiety at that point?
If we imagine moving experientially from a relative state of calm to one we
would describe as lacking in calmness or anxious, the question I’m posing
here is, at what exact point on the line do we consider that we have
definitively left the land of calm and entered a new territory characterized by
a lack of calm? Can we clearly identify exactly at what point calmness has
ended and anxiety begun? No!
The reality is that whether we’re talking introspectively or mathematically,
we are not able to determine precisely when a given state of mind ends and
another presumably begins since there are, as in the above example of
measuring temperature, an infinite number of possible points between any
ending and subsequent starting point.
The point of all of this is to illustrate that just as it is not really possible to
determine the measure of something arguably more concrete such as body
temperature, so too is it impossible to say definitively that we are now
abiding in one state such as anxiety and not another. For if we see subjective
states of mind as dynamic, which they clearly are, and therefore as existing
on some sort of continuum illustrated by our imaginary number line, then
we’re faced with the same impossibility of determining when a given state
has actually ended and another begun.
We can never pin down the precise beginning, middle, or end of any
experiential state. And this is just as true subjectively as it is neurologically,
hormonally, or mathematically.
So what does this mean, practically speaking?
Well, just look at the immediacy of your present moment experience—​no
matter how you might attempt to describe what it is, the actual beginning of
that experience cannot be found or determined. In reality, separate or discrete
states of mind are an abstraction because everything exists as a seamless
continuum.
Many Flavors, One Taste
Experiences, no matter their distinctive nature, share several things in
common. First, experiences are present. Second, they are known. Third, they
are by nature dynamic and unstable. And fourth, they cannot be definitively
described or characterized conceptually.
Experiential moments described as “clear,” while obviously distinct
qualitatively from those moments characterized as “confused,” are at the
same time equal in that they are both present and known, they are both
impermanent, and they both contain infinite experiential depth; that is, they
cannot be pinned down as being one (de)finite thing. Every experience has its
distinctive flavor—​no question. But the fact of its presence, the fact that it is
here, that is the one taste, the taste of everything.
While we can certainly practice various techniques to move from one
experience interpreted as unaware or unenlightened to another labeled as
more aware, more mindful, or more enlightened, there is another choice…
PRACTICE
Notice right now that experience, regardless of its label, is always present.
That is its fundamental nature: to be present, to be here, effortlessly. All
experiences, no matter how they may be described, are present.
And so presence need not be cultivated or developed. Presence—​the hereness
of all experiential moments—​is already the case. It is inescapable. A moment
characterized as not being aware or mindful is just as here, just as present as a
moment described as being fully awake and mindful. You see?
From this experiential vantage, what we call clarity is equal to confusion;
mindlessness is equal to mindfulness; nonrecognition of awareness is equal to
recognition of awareness; believing we are a psychological self is equal to
seeing through that self-​identification, not in terms of the different flavors
and textures of such experiences but in terms of their presence.
Right now, as you sit here, see that all experiences arise and pass away, and
while they are distinct from one another, they are at the same time equal in
their existence, impermanence, and indescribability.
And so, you can relax; reality is already here, and presence is already present.
A moment of boredom or excitement, of sorrow or joy, it is all the ultimately
uncharacterizable presence of experiencing.
I invite you to feel the equalness of everything, the non-​difference in all
experience even as you savor the lusciousness of all its distinctive flavors.
Experience Doesn’t Matter
Here’s a radical proposition—​what you are experiencing doesn’t actually
matter. Of course, such a notion runs counter to just about everything we’ve
ever been taught or conditioned to believe. It’s pretty much a foregone
conclusion that we should try to secure certain types of experiences we’ve
come to define as “positive,” while avoiding those we consider to be
“negative.” And so to suggest otherwise may seem quite crazy, preposterous
even… But let’s just experiment with this for a few moments, the possibility
that it doesn’t actually matter what we’re experiencing. You can listen to a
recording of the following practice at http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
Simply allow yourself to consider that it matters not what the particular
qualities or characteristics are that you’re feeling.
Consider that your experience need not be one iota different than it is, that
it’s completely perfect, exactly as it is, that nothing about it is wrong or out of
place or lacking in any way whatsoever.
In fact, see that it is not even possible for you to be experiencing anything
other than what is presently being felt, seen, sensed, or heard.
Feel the profundity of this, that reality cannot be any other way than the way
it is…until it is…
Consider the possibility that no experience matters more or less than any
other for they are all present, all wildly alive.
For these next few moments, see what it is like to let everything be fine, to let
each and every experience be okay, to allow every thought, every feeling,
every sensation to be the unavoidable, perfectly miraculous, inconceivable
expression of life that it is.
The Magic Show
In many if not most teachings (including, ironically, those described as
“non-​dual”), the message is, more often than not, portrayed in terms of
opposed frameworks—​self vs. no-self, freedom vs. bondage, limitation vs.
unboundedness, conceptuality vs. non-​conceptuality, and so on. However,
while framing things in these terms may have some utility and value, our
direct experience encompasses both sides of the seeming dualistic divide they
suggest.
PRACTICE
A sense of being an individual, a person, a unique self separate from other
unique selves is unquestionably something that we have all experienced.
There is no denying the felt sense of individuality, the feeling of being a
subject encountering a world of other seeming subjects and objects.
And yet, see right now if you can actually find this seemingly substantial
thing you call “the self.” Yes, there can be a sense of being bound by these
bodily skin suits. And yet look to see if any clear boundaries can actually be
found, any concrete divisions separating self from other.
In whatever locale we imagine the separate, psychological self to exist, all
that we find there is a dynamic flow of thoughts, feelings, sensations, and
memories. And even those elements we say constitute the self cannot
themselves be found to exist either, at least not as bounded, clearly
identifiable, discrete “things.”
After all, ask yourself, what is a thought? A feeling? A sensation? It can’t
really be said, can it?
So, we experience the sense of being a separate, unique individual. And yet,
when we look for them, neither the phenomenon of self nor the sense of
separation it implies can be found. I call it the magic show of phenomena—​-
things appear to exist, and from one vantage do. And yet they cannot actually
be found when looked for. Experiential phenomena are here and at the same
time not here. I guess the fairest thing we can say is that phenomena,
including the self, neither exist nor don’t exist. In other words, the world is
non-​dual, “not-​two.”
To the dualistically-​inclined conceptual mind, the idea that there is both the
presence and absence of a self appears to be an unresolvable contradiction.
And yet it is precisely our experience. We seem to exist as separate selves,
but no such self can be found to exist. Here but not here, existence and
nonexistence co-​occurring.
It’s the same with the myriad states of mind experienced—​fear, joy, sorrow,
bliss—​like rainbows, they appear with great vividness but when looked for,
cannot be found, at least not as we imagined.
Think of the self like a point in the sky—​a distinct localization of
experiencing but at the same time, indivisible from the rest of the sky. Unique
waves…yet simultaneously, the vast and boundless sea.
Everything Is What You Want
Think for a moment about something you are aspiring to realize in your life.
What, for example, are you hoping to get from reading this book? Whatever
that may be—​a greater sense of freedom, love, happiness, openness,
compassion, harmony, ease—​it matters not. For these next few moments, let
yourself imagine that every single experience is actually a perfect expression
of whatever it is you are aspiring to realize.
PRACTICE
Let’s say it’s a sense of freedom you are seeking.
With eyes opened or closed, just consider the possibility that every
momentary thought, every feeling, every sensation, every memory and visual
image that might appear is in fact nothing other than freedom. What does this
freedom you are seeking look like?
Well, it looks like whatever is happening in experience! Regardless of any
beliefs you may be harboring about how freedom should, in theory look, for
now, let it look exactly like this.
Allow this freedom to be inclusive of everything. See every experience as the
very freedom you’ve been searching for. Let it be that radical.
From this vantage, realize that there can be no entering or exiting the vast,
radically all-​inclusive, all-​embracing nature of this freedom you’ve been
seeking for there is only this, only this vast open-​endedness, this great
freedom that moves as all things, dances as all things, shapes itself into all
things…
See that there is no place to arrive, no state to enter into, no particular
experience to achieve to realize this freedom, for freedom is every place,
every state, every experience.
The Indescribability of Everything
Traditions speak about the discovery of one taste, the realization that all
phenomena, all experiences are different versions or expressions of a
singular, undivided reality. But how, you might ask, could life have “one
taste” when everything has its own obviously unique and distinctive flavor?
How can one claim that the experience of, say, happiness has the same
“taste” as a state such as sorrow or anger? How can we say something soft
“tastes” or feels the same as something hard or rough? How can sorrow have
the same taste as joy, or pain the same taste as pleasure? While qualitatively,
these clearly represent very different textures or flavors of experience, the
single, one taste of everything is realized by discovering what all experiences
have in common. You can download a recording for this chapter at
http://www.newharbinger.com/41818.
PRACTICE
For the next few moments, cup your hands together very gently. Just feel the
sensations that are present as your two hands make contact with one another.
Feel into the innumerable energetic qualities and characteristics that are
showing up.
Now notice how impossible it is to characterize this.
Clearly there is experience occurring. But there is simply too much
information, too many details, too much richness and subtlety to be able to
place the experience in any kind of neat and tidy category or description. This
simple experience of feeling the contact between your hands is quite literally
beyond words, beyond concepts. You could spend a whole lifetime trying to
put what’s present into words, but you would never succeed. It’s simply not
possible.
Now, remaining in this position, squeeze your hands together tightly. Feel
how distinct the feelings and sensations are now compared to what was being
experienced a few moments ago when the hands were just lightly touching
one another. But just as you found previously, notice how the complexity and
density of information cascading through consciousness as you grasp the
hands together more tightly is again not describable. As before, the
experience is literally beyond description.
While these two experiences clearly have their own distinctive and
identifiable flavors or signatures, at the same time they share a common
“taste” and that is their ultimately indefinable nature. And this turns out to be
the case with every experience. Happiness, sadness, cold, warmth, sorrow,
elation…all different in their descriptions yet identical in their
inconceivability.
Feel this, the single, indescribable taste of everything.
It’s Exactly What You Think It Is…and So Much More
Throughout this book, I have been saying in as many ways as I can that our
conventional descriptions of things fail to capture their inconceivable depth
and complexity. However, at the same time that experiences are not what we
imagine or conceive of them to be, we could also say that things are exactly
what we say or think they are. Of course, it sounds like I am contradicting
myself. So, let me explain…
What we call “fear” is exactly that. It’s not sadness. It’s not anger. It’s not
joy. It’s fear! That descriptive label is indicative of something. If I tell you
that I am afraid, something about what is appearing experientially is being
conveyed to you. Similarly, if I say to you, “Look at how beautiful the clouds
are today,” those words direct your attention to notice those curious white
puffy objects in the sky and not the bright yellow orb nearby.
In other words, a cloud is exactly what I say it is. It’s not a dog or a mountain
or a sunset. It’s a cloud! As with fear, we could say that clouds have their
own distinctive textural quality. Everything has its own unique signature that
makes it what it is and enables consciousness to characterize it through the
medium of concepts and language. The mind’s capacity to discriminate one
thing or experience from another is truly remarkable. But how are we even
able to do that? How, in less than a nanosecond, can we see or hear
something, and then seemingly recognize what that object or experience is? It
is absolutely mind-​boggling just how this magical process of object
recognition and description occurs, without one scintilla of seeming effort or
intention.
Look outside your window at something, say a tree. The knowledge of what
that particular object is seems as if it is present, almost before we even look.
The seeing and the conceptualization of whatever is being seen appear to
arise together. Now imagine standing on a high ledge, overlooking the sea
hundreds of feet below and suddenly finding yourself visited by that familiar
experiential pattern we call fear. Again, the label seems to arrive coincident
with the experience.
So yes, the experience we call fear is very precisely what we say it is. It’s
fear! But, even though we have this extraordinary capacity to render
experience conceptually and linguistically, we cannot actually pin down what
our descriptive labels are in fact referring to. Yes, fear is fear and we know
that it is fear (as opposed to some other state). And yet, we cannot really get
to the bottom of what fear or any other experience actually is. Our ideas,
however indicative they may be, are simply not capable of capturing the
seemingly infinite, bottomless nature of experience.
It’s all quite paradoxical. We can say what things are; we can seemingly
distinguish this from that and communicate that knowledge of what a thing or
experience is, whether to ourselves or others. And yet, when we investigate
what our words and concepts are actually pointing to, we find that the
experiences themselves contain so much more depth, complexity, and nuance
than our interpretations would otherwise suggest. So yes, our experiences are
exactly what we say they are and at the same time, so much more than that…
Epilogue: This Life That Is Also Death
On a Saturday in October of 2015, my mom, who had been valiantly battling
pancreatic cancer for almost two years, took a turn for the worse. It was clear
to all of us that day that she wouldn’t be with us for much longer. Sunday
was a very rough day for her. But on Monday, she seemed to rally. So, I
decided to head back to my home in Northern California knowing that I
would return in a couple of days’ time but also concerned that she might not
live that long. I had the sense when we said what was the sweetest of
goodbyes to one another that it might be the last time I ever saw her again.
Sure enough, no sooner had I returned home that night than she became very,
very ill again. The next morning my brother texted me saying that he thought
Mom was dying—​possibly in the next hour or so. So, I began the six-​hour
trek back to Los Angeles.
When I arrived, she was somehow miraculously still with us. I walked into
my parents’ bedroom and my dear dad, who had been so tenderly holding her
hand for hours, said he wanted to give me the gift of holding it myself for a
few minutes. It was quite something to be there in those moments as she took
those long, slow breaths, very clearly beginning to make that mysterious
transition to what we call death.
Fifteen or so minutes later, my dad returned to take her hand and I then sat at
the edge of the bed, gently rubbing her feet, together with my brother, sister-​-
in-​law, daughter, and niece, all with their hands on her as well. As we sat
there, I found myself whispering silently to her that it was fine for her to let
go, to surrender into great peace and that we would all, especially Dad, be
fine. It was very powerful. I could sense the swirl of emotions in the room,
the rush of complex feelings and thoughts running through each of us: sons
losing their mom, a husband losing his beloved, granddaughters losing their
remarkable grandmother… The dramatic nature of it all was quite something
—​very palpable, gritty, and real.
As we were gathered together, feeling our dear Lena’s life slipping away and
the immensity of responses we were each having to that inevitability, I
remembered that beyond all the stories and narratives any of us might be
running about what was being experienced (none of which could ever
possibly capture the infinite, inconceivable nature of it), there was just this
simple naked presence of what is, extraordinary and at the same time, the
simplest, most ordinary thing. Buddhism refers to it as “suchness,” the sheer
existence or beingness of everything. I found myself just relaxing into that. It
was so obvious, so simple, and so real. No abstraction, but simple, pure
actuality, pure presence, pure unelaborated experience.
As I sat in the naked simplicity of what was being experienced, I could feel
my dear mom’s breathing becoming slower and slower, her death feeling
very imminent. (Mind you, all that I’m describing here really transpired in a
matter of seconds.) Then, in a flash instant, that naked, raw, indescribable yet
very tangible presence of reality seemed to grow brighter. And in the very
instant of recognizing that simple, unadorned presence of what is, and feeling
the power yet ordinariness of it, there was no more breath. My mother had
passed…

It’s impossible to really describe that moment. There were, of course, the
very strong currents of emotion—​in a flash this beautiful soul I so loved was
gone. At the same time, her passing felt like a direct confirmation from her of
the inconceivable nature of everything including what we call death, a potent
reminder of the liberating power of moment-​to-​moment experience
unencumbered by all the necessarily limited ways we define and interpret it.
It felt that my sweet mom’s passing was reminding me of what she and
everything ultimately is—​an indescribable, uncharacterizable actuality, this
vast, mysterious presence that neither birth nor death can define for it
transcends all categories, all descriptions, all definitions.

Postscript

Nothing I have said here is the absolute truth, for as I’ve been saying
throughout these pages, and in as many ways as possible, it’s simply not
possible to convey in words or concepts what experience actually is, even as
the immense power of language and conceptualization leads us to believe that
we somehow can.

And since the reality of experience cannot be collapsed into any descriptive,
interpretive framework, the best I could ever hope for is that through these
words and concepts, I’ve been able to evoke something of the ultimately
inconceivable, mysterious, open-​ended nature of this great, unfathomable
reality we call life.

Acknowledgments

I offer this book in gratitude to all my teachers and to the inconceivable

mystery and intelligence that makes all teachings and things possible.

References

Klemm, W. R. 2011. “Neural Representations of the Sense of Self.”

Advances in Cognitive Psychology 7: 16–​30.

The Enneagram Institute. 2017. “The Enneagram Institute.”