Quieting the Mind

“You don’t have to do anything with your mind, just allow it to rest in its essential nature.” – Niguma

Sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in all the voices in our heads, the monkey chatter … things to do, things not to do, things we “should” do. Finding a space of peace, understanding the nature of reality, expanding our consciousness, … correcting our thinking, solving problems …

Sometimes there’s value to be found in pressing comfort boundaries by putting effort toward thinking differently. Sometimes there’s value in thinking critically about ourselves or situations in our lives. When that becomes a burden, though, I find that it’s value disappears.

When the monkey mind chatter becomes shrill, I give myself permission not to care about the things it insists are problems. I watch those problems appear in my mind, put them in an imaginary rose out in front of me, and send them back out to the energy pool to dissipate. If even that becomes a habit of attention, I focus my attention on imagining my body and mind as light, as energy, just watching myself as I would a burning candle. From there it’s possible to rest in a spacious quiet. Often that’s when answers come drifting in. The impossible becomes possible.

Some things have no solution. When the mind quits looking for one, maybe that is the hard-sought resolution. No action.

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Afterword: sometimes it cracks me up that I write things like this because then within hours I find myself in a position of needing to use the knowledge in some rather challenging way – lol. Bring it on! Yeeha!