Thinking About It

Introspection involves 5 steps: notice, detect, negate, substitute, and grow. Today we focus on the first 2. We start by attentively seeing our mind, noticing different nuanced thoughts and details. With the next step, as we look at ourselves, naturally, we detect. But to do so in an objective, practical and pragmatic manner is essential. So as we think back, remembering our day and its sequential happenings, we observe and assess “How happy am I with this action/thought/feeling that I experienced?”

Our BMI tools provide a structured way to think about ourselves. Through the body, we look at how we are perceived and at the qualities of our actions. With our mind, we notice all the varied feelings we feel and the degrees to which we feel our mixture of emotions. With our intellect, we check our voice of reason and the stock of knowledge we use to make sense of world and ourselves. Today, we introspect on the exact same question as yesterday, but going through our actions, feelings, and thoughts instead.

Over the next 8 days, the technique of introspection, or mindfulness, will be outlined. We start with preferably writing something down via the old-fashioned method of pen and paper. Compared to writing on an electronic device, this is less structured, allowing more freedom and flow in the way we express ourselves and our thinking. Writing things down also helps us better identify our thoughts and connect with ourselves. Today, we introspect on the question, “How happy was I, all throughout my day?”

Introspection is a powerful technique to understand and regulate our mind-intellect unit. We start by observing the thoughts and reactions we had throughout the day. Then, we evaluate them and can detect the different types of thoughts we had. As we identify our thoughts, adjusting and negating, replacing them comes naturally. The repetition of this process empowers us to understand ourselves and our motives better. This clarity and growth makes us happier and more free as we make more purposeful choices.

Our body, mind and intellect are our purposeful equipment to be worked around or be improved. Via the body and its senses, we act and engage with the world and people in it. The mind pulls us outside, enabling us to enjoy and fulfill our wants. Conversely, the intellect pulls us within, towards our spirituality, empowering us to evaluate, appreciate and understand. Maintain clarity of the specific functions they serve to objectively accept the tools as they are and not identify with them.

Success can be achieved in the world both outside and inside. We successfully explore and understand the world outside at large, like via science, economics, or politics. Conversely, we find success inside as we reflect and pursue goals related to our personality and wellbeing within. Unfortunately, as we try to find happiness and peace more or only in one world, we dampen the success of the other world. So neglect neither. Maintain a balance between worldly and internal success and thrive in that balance.

For each one of us, success is the ability to be found within and brought out in efficient action, skill, or knowledge. Using religion to turn inwards, we can find that latent potential before awakening it to be actively used and experienced. As we constantly choose to use and think about that discovered wisdom or talent, we become proficient at it, can easily repeat it, and develop it into a habit.

Hinduism and our scriptures are kept alive by relevant reinterpretations that are applicable to us, our temperaments, and our lives. One of such redone works is “The Manual of Self-Unfoldment”, authored by Swami Chinmayananda. This book provides seekers with the perfect foundation to be building on, for it is written as if Pujya Gurudev committed to paper his own notes on Vedanta. Also, self-unfoldment itself is the spiritual journey, as we unfold to discover who we are in essence and rise in our awareness.

Our tapas is practiced all day long and the greatest tapas is the remembrance of our divine nature – “I am Sat. I am Chit. I am Ananda.” We’re not only intellectually understanding this, but also, remembering, experiencing, and radiating divinity as our being while we feel, think and do. To abide in our nature is actually meditation, and everything else we do on the way there is building up to this powerful tapas of Gyaana Yoga.

Oneness is when we see that the root cause of all creation goes back to one thing, call it “an explosion in space”, “energy”, or “God”. It is all-pervading, and as this divinity, I am all-pervading. There is no distinction, division, nor any difference. Oneness is also in the interconnectivity of everything around us. We are linked, affected by and dependent on everything in creation. But we often fail to see this logic for our ego, or the “i”, asserts differences and individuality. So, surrender the ego.

Enlightenment is not something to be achieved, but to be experienced within. We must give up all that is keeping us away from the core of our personality. Put everything at His feet and offer every limitation to be devoid of ego. In this surrendering, we also come to see that we are self-effulgent, vast and infinite. We are Ishwara, not the limitations we put on ourselves. So why not actively choose to be who you are?

Consciousness is “Chit”, the brilliant light of knowledge, enabling us to see and know. Even more beautiful is we are this light that already understands and can infinitely know. Chit is also enlivening, giving sentience to our inert and inanimate tools. Just like Ganesha, our body, mind, and intellect are given life and any movement is the manifestation of Chit. We are that self-effulgent breath of life that does not need to be known. We just need go beyond the small ‘i’ to see the big “I” that is Chit.

Our likes, dislikes, beliefs, memories, judgements, and often negative self-descriptions all add up to become who we believe ourselves to be. But there is another ‘I’ thought free from all these limitations for it belongs to the very core of our personality, divinity itself. Because it exists and shines and is life and is love, I am. But we forget this divine “I” and drastically underperform. What are we holding onto that’s stopping us from who we want to be, and why? What could we be if we just let it go?

So often, we look to the world for answers to our questions and it echoes back to us what we already think and feel. This is because our Idam thoughts rest on the substratum of the Aham. The entirety of our thoughts isn’t about the world and ‘i’. There is only ‘me’, connecting all conflicting thoughts throughout the ages, letting ourselves feel who we think ourselves to be. Then, as we enquire where the ‘i’ thought comes from, “Ayi!”! The elusive personality disappears for it has no depth nor substance.

Our thoughts can be divided into 2 categories – Idam Vritti or Aham Vritti. In Aham Vritti, we have and identify with “i” thoughts, producing “I am” as related to our limited egocentric personality. Idam Vritti refers to thoughts of the world outside, which are all also based on thoughts of ourselves. So it can be concluded that “i” is a constant in our thoughts. Our mind can thus be defined as a flow of “i” thoughts that creates our individuality.

The focus of all paths is slightly different. Gyaana Yoga is understanding “who we are”. We start with understanding what we want to do in life and how to do it. Then more importantly, we understand what the mind actually is and how it works. Pujya Gurudev, Swami Chinmayananda, defines the intricate and complex mind as a term that is easy to understand – a flow of thoughts. Just like the flow of water, the mind is not one, but continuous thoughts that can be gushing and active or peaceful and still.

We all have created for ourselves the ‘i” or the personality layer. Made of traits, belief systems and social conditions, it is a barrier separating my individual entity from the world. In oneness, it is not that “i”, the limited entity, becomes one, but these man-made defining boundaries are foregone so that the differences dissolve. What is revealed is the essence of life that I am, is everywhere and in all creation. We establish in simply being, and not in the processes of ego. There is just oneness.

Oneness is the essence, goal, and truth of spirituality. When we are one integrated whole, we interact with the world and our relationships with beauty of character, joy, and love. Conversely, conflicts within our personality and in the world around us bring confusion and frustrations. We can create a vision of oneness by seeing the connectivity of all creation and focusing on how similar we are to others.

The mind has many aspects. We have the essential functional aspect that is used to interact in the world. There is also the emotional aspect related to our strong desires, likes and dislikes. The mind’s effective functional part is often overridden by the emotional layer, which colors our thinking. The solution is not to just give up on emotions altogether, but to rise above the emotional thinking or recognize it for what it is. We should also discontinue the momentum of biased and non-beneficial thoughts.

The breath and the mind are two branches of the same tree. Pull one and the other is pulled with it. Since it is easier to regulate our breath than the mind, controlling it is a great temporary way to still our constantly fluttering mind. Once the controlled breathing stops, the mind resumes thinking different things. Despite being short, this pause is powerful as we regain our balance, objectivity, and clarity. Self-experiment and notice the effects within your own mind.