This is all there is to living a mindful life, a meditative life, a spiritual life.
If you can gain mastery over your thoughts, and remain unaffected by them, then what else is left to master.
To be enlightened is to be detached from all things in life, including your own thoughts, which are nothing but the waves created by the ocean of your own mind.
In an enlightened being’s mind, the thoughts come, the thoughts stay, and the thoughts leave on their own. He has got nothing to do with them.
He remains unaffected by them. They neither excite him, nor depress him. They don’t raise his mindful state or dull his mindful state.
They don’t teach him anything new, or take away what he already knows.
They come. They stay in his mind as long as they do. And then they leave his mind.
He doesn’t anticipate any thoughts, neither is he afraid to have them. He doesn’t participate in those thoughts once they come, nor does he forces his mind to get rid of them. And when the thoughts are leaving, he does not try to hold to them, cling to them, or bring them back. Nor he gets excited that the thoughts are leaving, or is sad to see them go.
He remains in the same state he was in, before the thoughts came. And he remains in the same state at all phases – when the thoughts arrive, when they stay in his mind, when they leave from his mind.
A thought can’t decide his state of mind; a thought can’t influence his state of mind; a thought can’t become his master; a thought has no power over him at all.
And that is because years, if not decades, of practice of living mindfully, practicing meditation, and practicing dharma, gives him the strength to become their master.
They give him the strength to be one with the purest form of consciousness there is, and there is nothing in this universe that can impurify this purity, so what’s a mere thought.
Now he understands that true mastery of mind is not in controlling what thoughts arises in ones mind, nor is it in having a mind that can quickly let go an unpleasant or an unwanted thought from the mind.
The true mastery of mind is in becoming independent of all thoughts, independent of how and when they arise, what are they telling you to do, and how and when they leave your mind.
Only a fully independent mind can be free. Because if there is even a tiny bit of attachment left to your thoughts, you will lose your mindful state again and again and again to it.
That is the nature of thoughts. It won’t like to exist on its own. It wants YOU to pay attention to it, to feed it further, to make it grow, to make it permanent if possible.
So you can’t let your mind be attached to even a single thought – be that thought be good or bad, right or wrong, pious or evil, new or old, happy or sad, chaotic or peaceful.
Just as the waves arise in the sea, stay in the sea, and dissolve in the sea, but the sea remains unaffected by them. The sea doesn’t identify itself with the waves. The sea is still the sea irrespective of whether the waves arise or not, irrespective of how long or how short the waves exist, irrespective of how many waves dissolve again into the sea. The sea is always the same.
The same way, let the thoughts come, let the thoughts stay, let the thoughts leave or dissolve in your mind, you try to remain unaffected by them. You don’t identify yourself with your thoughts. You are still you irrespective of whether the thoughts come or not, irrespective of how long or how short the thoughts stay, irrespective of how many thoughts dissolve again into your mind. You be always the same.
Let thoughts come, let thoughts go, what have you got to do with them.
You were here way before the thoughts existed, you will be here after the thoughts are long dead.
And the reality is, you have always been there and you will always be there. Because you are not just your body, or your mind, or your ego. You are way above them all. You are consciousness itself, which is higher than them all.
The thoughts can affect only the lowest form of consciousness. The higher is your level of consciousness, the lesser power the thoughts have over you.
I am sure you know someone who instantly gets angry if said something trivial, and you may also know someone who remains quiet even when shouted at. It’s all a play of what level of consciousness the person is in.
For a seeker, for an enlightened being, for a yogi, only the highest form of consciousness, only the purest form of consciousness is what one should always try to be in. And even when you aren’t one with the purest form of consciousness, you should act like it and try to live detached from all thoughts, as an enlightened being does, because practice will make you perfect one day.
Whoever said I think therefore I am, got it all wrong. I am, therefore I am is what it should be. There was never a time when I didn’t exist. There will never be a time when I won’t exist. I am not just my mind. I am higher than my mind and whatever it is that my mind does or thinks. I am higher than all my thoughts.
I am not confined by the limitations of my mind; I am beyond it and infinite. A thought can’t change or affect my infinite nature; a thought can’t impurify my purity; a thought that was just created and had no existence before, can’t affect my timeless nature; a thought that always has some kind of form, can’t affect my formless nature; a thought that always wants to attach itself to something, can’t affect my detached nature; a thought that is binded to something can’t affect my free nature; a thought that is always dual in nature, always partial in nature, can’t affect my non-dual and impartial nature.
For I have risen way above my thoughts, for I have become free from the bondages of my thoughts, for I have let go all my attachments to my thoughts, for I have stopped myself from identifying with my thoughts.
My thoughts are not me. I am not my thoughts. So why should I care about them. Of what use they are to me. What purpose do they serve in my life. Zero. Nothing. Utterly useless.
Let the thoughts come, let the thoughts go, let the thoughts do whatever the hell they want. I don’t care. They mean nothing to me. I simply stay as I was before they arrived.
I simply continue to exist in my mindful state, in my pure state, just as I was always meant to be. And therefore, I do.