If we get into the habit of watching our thoughts, we shall soon see that the ‘mind’ is mainly involved in a very sterile process of turgid recapitulation or preparation. I call this the ‘Repetition and Rehearsal’ syndrome.

We find ourselves constantly mulling over (and over and over, ad nauseam), past events and conversations to no purpose. And these are often of a negative nature, mental grumblings, or endlessly turning over affronts to our sense of ego: “He/she was unkind to me... How could he be like that? I don’t deserve this. What I should have said to her…” etc. Or, we are preparing ourselves for possible (or unlikely) future events and conversations: “What I shall say next time… What I shall do if…?”—and so forth.

Misery-go-round

This is the life and energy-draining ‘repetition and rehearsal’ misery-go-round. Nothing is spontaneous. We choke the vitality of life before it arises. In this way, we are compounding the habitual enfeeblement of our constitutional mental atmosphere. But where is the necessity to be involved in this tedious mental shuttling from past to future and back again? Who obliges us to listen in to the interminable discussions the ‘mind’ is always having with itself? The two halves of the brain appear to be playing endless psychological tennis with each other. When we begin to become aware of what is going on, we can realise how ridiculous it is.

This is the first step.

Becoming conscious of the pathetic nature of our normal ‘mind’ is the first step towards freedom from it. If we can come to disbelieve in its validity we are not so easily caught up in it. Then we can gradually begin to deny the mind its supremacy over us. Everything we recognise as ‘repetition or rehearsal’ we can releasingly disown and discount.

No substance

Thoughts, like the mind, have no substance in themselves. They only exist by the credence you give them. They are no more than passing currents of ‘psychological weather’ in the vast Open Sky of Consciousness.

Why not just acknowledge them, and smile at your gullibility in getting caught up with them? Just watch them float away while waiting for the sun to come out?

Never mind the mind: let it chatter on if it so desires, but have no part of it. Many times you will find yourself caught up and involved in the thought stream again. But be indulgent with yourself. Murmur ‘nonsense’ at the mental waffling and concentrate on whatever you are doing or on the thought-free observation of your surroundings.

At first, you will be able to observe things without thought for only a few moments at a time. Try to extend the period between one thought and the next. This demands constant attention and application in the beginning. As you continue to give the ‘mind’ no credence or attentive interest, little by little, its habitual flow weakens. With perseverance, eventually, the movement of the mind will evaporate altogether. Where its turbulence once was you will find a wondrous healing peace and stillness which was always there underneath.

‘Pregnant calm’

This is by no means a vacant or alarming condition. A great many inventions and scientific discoveries have been made during this ‘pregnant calm’ when the movement of the mind was absent. When gazing thoughtlessly into the fire, or idly at the sky, the solution to a mind-baffling problem has come in a flash of inspiration to certain scientists. The answer has been ‘given’ rather than elucidated by an arduous process of thought. We have the possibility of always being in this state, by the constant refusal to give credibility to the wasteful ramblings of our habitual stream of thoughts.

This I call my ‘carpet-pulling’ method. Whenever any unbidden thought arises—whoosh! I whip out an imaginary ‘carpet’ from under it and let it fall.

I can promise you that untiring effort in this practice is the shortest road to samadhi—or Universal Consciousness.

You don’t need hours, or years, of meditation.

Samadhi

As you may (or may not) know, samadhi is the state of pure, primal awareness, untainted by thought, in which the ‘mind’ is absorbed in your own true nature. This is the spiritual ‘ground-of-being’, known to sages as the Self. This primal state may be experienced on many deepening levels, according to your level of development. At its profoundest, it results in the uttermost existential experience and the total fulfilment of human existence. In its early stages, too, the samadhi experience is not something to be fearful of, or too far away from our possibilities.

But it rarely occurs simply by ‘doing’ a daily meditation session. We have to be constantly vigilant in debunking the authority of the mind flow by our carpet-pulling practice at all times. And in this way, a taste of the samadhi state can come in a relatively short time.

Credits: Supplied Image;

At least, it was for me.

One New Year I made an inner resolution to rigorously refuse every unnecessary thought which came into my head. For the next three months, I toiled away at my carpet-pulling tactics, refusing to participate in any of my ‘mind games’. Every time an irrelevant thought cropped up, I decided —‘It’s only the mind (doing its damn-fool thing to make me miserable)’, and let it go. Fortunately, at the time, I was mainly occupied with putting the last finishing touches to my cottage, which I was in the process of renovating. So the work needed little thought and simple concentrated effort. When things I had to remember spontaneously popped into my mind, I immediately wrote them down on a list, so there was no necessity to have to think of them again. This practice paid dividends in the end.

One morning in April I suddenly woke up to find my mind-flow had ceased altogether.

The next instalment will be published soon…

www.muzmurray.com

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Author

British mystic, author, psychotherapist, spiritual counsellor, mantra yogi, fine artist and illustrator, theatrical set and costume designer. Founder-editor of Gandalf’s Garden magazine and Community in the London Sixties, and 3 years as columnist for Yoga Today magazine, BBC 4 Scriptwriter, author of four spiritual self-development books and two storybooks for children. 

Muz Murray