0:00 There are many ways we use the term self. And not all of these selves are illusory. I can talk about myself in terms of my personal history, or with respect to my location as a body and physical space. I can think of myself in various social roles as a writer, or as a father, or as a customer in a store. And there's nothing wrong with thinking about ourselves in these terms. Most of this is unavoidable. There is, however, one sense of self that is confusing. And that produces a tremendous amount of unnecessary suffering for us. And happily, this sense of self can be dispelled through meditation. It can be discovered to be illusory, through meditation. And this self is the feeling in each moment, that we are subjects internal to our bodies, the feeling of being inside our heads. It's almost as though we feel that we're passengers in our bodies. And it's this feeling that is also referred to as the ego. If you're like most people, what you are calling i is this feeling of being the internal subject of your experience. I does not refer merely to the body. And it certainly doesn't refer to the totality of experience, I appears to be the center of experience. It's that which is appropriated experience. This feeling that we call AI is itself the product of thought. Having an ego is what it feels like to be thinking without knowing that you're thinking. It's the feeling of being identified with thought. Imagine that you run into someone you know, and like a lot. And when they see you rather than smile, as they usually would they look very unhappy. Right? And the first words out of their mouth is I can't believe you would do that. Now assume you have no idea what they're talking about. So your first thought is, What? What did I do? Imagine your friend looks at you with real mistrust. And says, seriously, and all you can think at that moment is what what did I do? What What are you talking about? Now, these are just thoughts. And yet they completely subsume you. They seem to be what you are, in each moment of their horizon. You have no perspective on them. There's no space around them. Your consciousness has been almost entirely reduced to a string of sentences, enter the feeling of urgency that created them, and which they create in turn. But how could you actually be a thought? To How could consciousness be trimmed down to a sentence? Whenever their content, thoughts vanish, almost the instant they appear. They're like sounds or sensations in the body? How could this next thought, however urgent, define consciousness at all? consciousness is the prior condition of its horizon? Is the state of being identified with thought of there being no space? No perspective, where each thought is just you know, one, what did I do? Thoughts are rising in each moment. And you don't even know that you're thinking. It's like dreaming when you're asleep, and you have no idea that you're dreaming. That experience of full capture by the contents of consciousness is the ego. It is the self. That is the target of deconstruction, by the practice of meditation. And this self is a burden. Even when things seem to be going well. Sort of the feeling of pride. Let's say you've just done something great. And you've been praised for it in high places. How good does that feel? You know, the feeling, some part of your mind is just lapping it up with its little cat's tongue. But this is the same part of you that is always poised to be miserable. This is the part of you that's always comparing yourself to other people. This part of you, even when it's riding along at full gallop can be unhorsed with a single sentence, or even a glance, the rewards of the ego are not good enough. And again, we're just talking about patterns of thoughts. One thought following the next. And the selflessness that can be realized through meditation is not a deep feature of consciousness. It's right on the surface. And yet people can meditate for years without recognizing it.
5:00 How can something be right on the surface and yet be difficult to see? well consider the optic blind spot. By analogy, you've probably been shown this in school, where you close one eye and then stare at a fixation point on a piece of paper. And then you're asked to notice that a.in, the periphery of your visual field disappears when you're just the right distance from the paper. If you close one eye, now, there's certainly something in your visual field that falls into your blind spot, and you don't notice it. And surely, most people in human history have been totally unaware that the blind spot even exists. And many of us who know about it go for decades, without thinking about it. Much less notice. The absence of the self is also there to be noticed. As with the blind spot, the evidence for it is not far away, or deep within, it's almost too close to be observed. And for most people experiencing the absence of self requires considerable training. And that's what we're doing here. Okay, it is possible to notice that consciousness that in you, which is aware of your experience, in this moment, does not feel like a self. It does not feel like AI. Rather, whatever feels like AI is itself another appearance and consciousness. Whatever you can feel, is being known by this prior condition, which we're calling consciousness or awareness. How can we know that the conventional sense of self is an illusion? Well, the most compelling way is to get yourself in a position to really look for it, and then find it absent. And that's the point of meditation. When you really look for this thing that feels like AI, it vanishes. And this is compelling in the same way that the disappearance of any illusion is compelling. You thought something was there. But upon closer inspection, you can see that it isn't getting in this case, you can feel and know that it isn't. There's a general intellectual and epistemic principle at work here. Whatever is there, when you're paying the closest attention stands a better chance of being real than what seems to be there, when you're not paying attention. What doesn't survive scrutiny cannot be real. Now, as you get further in the practice of meditation, you will discover that there is no thinker, apart from your thoughts. There's no one producing these thoughts. And there's no one receiving them. There's just consciousness and its contents as a matter of experience. There's no one who's choosing the next thing you do. Thought and intention and choice, just arise and become effective or not, based on prior causes and conditions. The feeling that you are in the driver's seat, able to pick and choose among thoughts, is itself a thought that has gone unrecognized. This feeling of being a self that can pick and choose is what it feels like to be thinking without knowing that you're thinking
0:00 The most common source of frustration I've heard about from users of the app relates to the practice of looking for what's looking, looking for the self, looking for your head, looking for the seat of attention, there are many ways this concept comes up. And some of you find it quite paradoxical. Somehow, it seems impossible. You don't know what to do, when I suggest you do such a thing. And this feeling of uncertainty frustrates you. Over the years, we've heard from many of you, on this point. So I want to say something to address this. First, let me say your frustration is totally understandable. Because in the context of any meditation, where you're following your breath, or listening to sounds, or noticing other sensations in your body, when I give you this instruction, to turn attention upon itself, to see if you can find your mind, I seem to be suggesting that there is more here to discover and experience, then what you already have in hand.
1:23 If you can't follow this instruction, you're getting the message that there's something that you're missing. And there might be. And that's why there are two stages. To this practice, there is what I've called dualistic mindfulness, or ordinary mindfulness, the mindfulness everyone has at the beginning, and non dual mindfulness, mindfulness that is synonymous with the recognition that there is no subject behind attention. In the middle of your head, there's no center to consciousness, the place from which your knowing your experience, is not on the edge of experience. Rather, you are identical to experience. And that really is the insight into selflessness, and emptiness, and many other arcane concepts that I've talked about in other contexts. It is the fruition of a certain stage of practice. But it is the basis for a subsequent stage. So in those moments, when I'm asking you to turn attention upon itself, that is an advanced instruction, which comes somewhere around the middle of the introductory course. So again, let me say that your frustration here is totally understandable. But it's not helpful. And it too, can become just another object of mindfulness in the next moment. Right. So if you feel frustrated, that you can do it, or you've seen something, but you're not sure what it was, the resolution of that experience, is not to think more and more about it, and get wrapped around the axle of discursive thought, rather, is to drop back and recognize this new state of mind, frustration, feel it as a pattern of energy, and let it go. And then in a very relaxed way, experiment again, with looking for what's looking, turning attention upon itself, looking for your head, if your eyes are open, and see if in that first moment, you recognize a shift with a feeling of there being a center to consciousness falls away. And if it does, just let that experience persist, for however long it does. And in the beginning, it will just be a moment or two. There is something to glimpse here. But you do need a certain degree of mindfulness and concentration, to follow the instruction. And to have your attention become available to noticing what again may be a very brief break in the clouds. And when you do notice it, then you can become more and more familiar with it. And then can become the basis for your mindfulness of anything that arises. It's also possible to have this glimpse of non duality, and to not see or feel its significance. And this is something I spoke to Richard lying about in our conversation. In his series on the app, this practice is framed In terms of looking for your head, and not finding it, and this is the way his teacher Douglas Harding, always introduced this experience. And as I believe Harding said, somewhere, the voice of the devil says, so what? Right, some people don't see that this is the answer to all or any of their problems. And I'm sure this is one of the reasons why in the Xhosa tradition, they tend not to teach beginners this practice. One, it can be hard to do. And to even those who accomplish it may not get the point, initially. And this is because unless you've spent enough time, practicing meditation, for the purpose of recognizing the illusory ness of the self, unless you've gone down the path of ordinary mindfulness long enough, you might not notice how this brief glimpse of centerless openness, answers, all of the contemplative or spiritual tests you would put to It is almost like you've been given the answer to a riddle that you weren't trying to solve. But if you've been struggling to find a solution for days or weeks, or months, or years, then when you get the answer, it snaps into place. So I just want to encourage you whether you are someone who is struggling to glimpse the non duality of awareness, and getting frustrated, or you're someone who thinks you've glimpsed it, and you're not sure that it's anything more than a cognitive curiosity, will encourage those of you who are in either of those camps, to simply relax and keep practicing. Because there really is an insight to be had here. And it's not far away. And it can seem to be of minor significance in the beginning. But the more you explore it, the more you notice. That it is the way consciousness always already is. the more you'll discover that the difference between being distracted by thought and being undistracted is absolutely profound. This is the stage at which the relief of mindfulness becomes undeniable. In fact, at that point, mindfulness no longer seems like a practice at all. You're simply enjoying the freedom that is intrinsic to the nature of mind.
7:50 The thing you're looking for, is already the case. The thing you're looking for is that which is doing the looking. And at a certain point in the practice, you will fall more naturally into a recognition that ordinary consciousness already enjoys the freedom that you would otherwise seek
0:00
I've spoken a lot about the illusion of the self in this course. However, as I made clear in a previous lesson, it's not that every notion of the self is illusory. What you discover in meditation is that you're not a thing. You're a process. We experience states of self. And how we feel as selves, seems to vary remarkably, depending on the context. I remember that when I was finishing graduate school, I had the experience of being a semi famous author and a lowly graduate student simultaneously. So I could literally feel my sense of who I was change drastically, by my walking from one building to the next on campus. I remember once meeting with my advisor, who was understandably worried about my progress, and feeling like a total loser. And then I met his boss for dinner that night, because he wanted my advice on how to launch his book with the same publisher and I was a much bigger author, it was just a crazy juxtaposition. And who I was in those conversations seem to be governed by my sense of how the other person saw me, really how I imagined the other person saw me. But we're all in this situation. Generally, we all have encounters with people, which seem to destabilize us, where we don't feel we have access to our full capacities as human beings, to our best selves. So many encounters with other people are less than satisfying. And what makes them less than satisfying, is generally the degree to which we're encumbered by neurotic self concern. Let's say you're going home for the holidays, and spending an extended time with your family. Now, your family will tend to see you as continuous with who you've always been for them. So there's often a special dynamic there. No matter how much you've changed, your family will find a way to fit you to the pattern of who you used to be. And then as if by magic, you might begin to feel rather like who you used to be. Now, there's no question that mindfulness can help free you in social situations like this. But you don't want it to become a source of greater self consciousness. When you're with others, your meditation practice shouldn't make you more aware of yourself. It's not a mode of inwardness, that causes you to recoil even further from relationship. Ideally, mindfulness should free you to pay more attention to whoever you're talking to. And if you've broken through to the kind of mindfulness which is synonymous with losing your sense of self, with the feeling of helplessness to use, Douglas hardens analogy, then social situations become occasions where this change can be appreciated most vividly. When someone is looking at you, what are they looking at, in your experience, you are not a thing being looked at, you are the condition in which they in the world are appearing. Again, I'm not speaking metaphysically I'm describing the actual character of conscious experience. You don't see your face, the only face you see belongs to the other person. If you follow that person's gaze back to where you think you are, you might suddenly experience that consciousness is just the space in which everything is appearing. If you look for yourself, in that moment, you might find that only the world remains.
3:33
But whatever the character of your mindfulness at this point, its role isn't to prevent negative states of mind from ever arising. You should go into these situations, absolutely knowing that you will feel negative states of mind, self judgment, self doubt, annoyance, anxiety, go in like you're playing a video game, you absolutely know that certain challenges are going to appear on this level of the game. And this is the level of negative emotion. So simply feel them and then let them go. Don't act on them. Don't inscribe them in your life by saying something totally counterproductive. Let these states of mind wash over you. If that's too hard, just let one of them wash over you. In your next social situation. just become interested in noticing one negative emotion and not doing anything with it. Just let it arise and pass away. But if things get bad, it's helpful to remember that the people you're dealing with are suffering. Almost everyone you meet is practically drowning in self concern. Just look at them. Listen to them. They're broadcasting their own self doubt and anxiety and disappointment. They're worried about what others think. them. If you get out of yourself for a moment, if you can just take a step back from feeling implicated in what's happening around you, you will generally see that you are surrounded by a carnival of human frailty. So compassion is available. We are all on the Titanic together. This might sound depressing, but the flipside is also true. This brief life together is a beautiful miracle. This is the only circumstance that exists to be enjoyed. Whatever is true out in the cosmos, this is it for us. And wherever you are, whatever circumstance you find yourself in, however, strained the conversation. This is the only life you have in this moment. And you might as well enjoy it. At a minimum, you can become interested in your changes of state. Why is it that you feel so comfortable with one person and so awkward with another? How is it that other people have that much power over your mind? These changes are fascinating. And of course, none of these changes are who you really are. There is no one who you really are. There's a flow of experience. There are patterns, of course. And you can surely predict how you're likely to feel with certain people. But you're only tending to conform to these patterns. You are not condemned to be the same person you were the last time around. And whatever happens when you leave a social situation. Mindfulness allows you not to carry it around with you. You don't have to keep finishing whatever argument you had with your sister in your head. You can let thoughts go. The time to talk to your sister was when she was standing in front of you. The moment you leave, you're now talking to yourself. And if you find yourself doing that, which you will, you should confront this paradox of self talk. You know how that conversation went with your sister. You were there. So who are you telling now?
0:00
Sometimes you sit and are quickly engulfed by thoughts of what happened recently. Perhaps you went to a party the night before, or dinner with people, you don't know all that well. Or you had an argument with someone close to you. And you find that when you're sitting, you begin to replay the experience in memory. You attempt to have the conversation you were having before again, in your imagination. You think of the things you wish you hadn't said, You recall the look on that other person's face, when you said them, you begin to feel in yourself the motive that caused you to say that thing you shouldn't have said, the self regard, the anxiety, the desire to impress, the fear of being misunderstood. Whatever it was, and you're now witness to this horrible cascade of neurotic rumination. Now, this is going on all the time, in some sense, but when you're trying to meditate, when you're trying to just follow the breath, and it begins to happen, it becomes unusually salient. And you can begin to see the layers of it, the logic of it. And you glimpse the the self concern to which it is anchored. In all of these tendencies of mind have a an evolutionary history. Obviously, you are, after all, a primate. You're a social animal. And your concern about how others view you is not an accident. In fact, it has been prepared for you. Over the course of millions of years. We have succeeded in large measure as a species, because of this sort of concern. In fact, we have evolved to be able to detect the gaze of others, the whites of our eyes are as prominent as they are. Because we are this deeply social, it's important to know where someone is looking at glance you caught, or the glance others caught you making right is meaningful. We're continually advertising what we care about the goals to which were purposed by merely looking around. And you notice this and others. And they notice it new. And you can even however, dimly notice others noticing what you notice. It's like a hall of mirrors. And this is something that is happening whenever you're around people all day long. These micro moments, micro expressions in the face, little glitches in our interactions, and they affect our state of mind. They affect how we feel about ourselves. And this, in turn affects how we're able to behave in the next moment. And some people have a very easy time of this. Some people have very smooth interactions with others. They're comfortable in their own skin. And there are many for whom this almost never happens. Where socializing with others is an ordeal almost always. So wherever you are on this spectrum, and you probably sly back and forth across it, depending on who you're with, and how you're feeling at the moment. But wherever you are, in this instant, it doesn't matter. In this instant, there is no reason to revisit any of that. In this instant, the memories of last night, or your anxiety about the next moment. These are just appearances in consciousness. As you begin to train this capacity for merely being aware of what's arising in consciousness, you'll see that it's almost like consciousness has become shackled to a monkey but it It is not the monkey, this monkey software that's being run of social anxiety and self concern. All of us just appearing in this space of awareness. And when we meditate, whether we're formally meditating, or we're just paying attention clearly even in the midst of our living, those can be moments where we cut the connection to all of these evolved tendencies, merely by paying close attention and recognizing the space in which everything is appearing in each moment. And that can be a profound relief. So whatever happened yesterday, and whatever may yet happen today. Take this moment and with clear attention to a sound or sensation, when arise in thought, simply cease to be a monkey
0:00
I've mentioned Douglas Harding a couple of times, I think in another lesson and in a couple of guided meditations. He is the architect and author who wrote the book on having no head, which contains a very useful insight into the practice of meditation. I wrote about him in my book waking up, so I will read that section to you now and then offer some additional commentary. Having no head. Douglas Harding was a British architect who later in life became celebrated in New Age circles for having opened a novel doorway into the experience of selflessness, raised among the exclusive Plymouth Brethren, a highly repressive sect of fundamentalist Christians. Harding apparently expressed his doubts with a fervor sufficient to get him excommunicated for apostasy. He later moved his family to India, where he spent years on a journey of self discovery that culminated in an insight he described as the state of, quote, having no head. I never met Harding, but after reading his books, I have little doubt that he was attempting to introduce his students to the same understanding that is the basis of zouk Chen practice. Harding later wrote several books about his experience, including a very useful little volume titled on having no head is both amusing and instructive to note that his teachings were singled out for derision by the cognitive scientists Douglas Hofstadter, in collaboration with my friend Daniel Dennett, a man of wide learning and great intelligence who it would appear did not understand what Hardin was talking about. Here's the portion of Hardin's text that Hofstetter criticized. So this is a quote from Harding. What actually happened was something absurdly simple and unspectacular. I stopped thinking, a peculiar, quiet and odd kind of alert. limpness or numbness came over me, reason and imagination and all mental chatter died down. For once words really failed me. past and future dropped away. I forgot who and what I was my name, manhood, animal hood, all that could be called mine. It was as if I had been born that instant, brand new, mindless, innocent of all memories. there existed only the now that present moment, and what was clearly given it to look was enough. And what I found was khaki trouser legs terminating downwards in a pair of brown shoes, khaki sleeves terminating sideways in a pair of pink hands, and a khaki shirt front, terminating upwards in absolutely nothing whatsoever. Certainly not in the head. It took me no time at all to notice that there's nothing this whole wear a head should have been, was no ordinary vacancy, no mere nothing. On the contrary, it was very much occupied. It was a vast emptiness vastly filled, and nothing that found room for everything. Room for grass trees, shadowy, distant hills, and far above them snow peaks, like a row of Angular clouds, right in the blue sky. Now this is me talking off book. I believe I know where he was when he first had this insight. I think he was at a place called nagarkot, which is outside of Kathmandu which offers a really vast view of the Himalayas. And the photo associated with this lesson on the app is of that few. So that's what Harding was looking at. When he realized that he had no head.
3:24
I had lost ahead and gained a world. Here it was this superb scene, brightly shining in the clear air, alone and unsupported, mysteriously suspended in the void. And, and this was the real miracle, the wonder and delight, utterly free of me. unstained by any observer, its total presence was my total absence, body and soul, lighter than air clearer than glass, altogether released from myself. I was nowhere around there rose no questions, no reference beyond the experience itself, but only peace and quiet joy, and the sensation of having dropped an intolerable burden. I had been blind to the one thing that is always present, and without which I am blind indeed to this marvelous substitute for a head, this unbounded clarity, this luminous and absolutely pure void, which nevertheless is rather than contains all things. For however carefully I attend, I failed to find here even so much as a blank screen on which these mountains and sun and sky are projected, or a clear mirror in which they are reflected, or a transparent lens or aperture, through which they are viewed, still less a soul or a mind to which they are presented, or viewer, however shadowy, who is distinguishable from the view, nothing whatever intervenes, not even that baffling and elusive obstacle called distance. The huge blue sky, the pink edge whiteness of the snows, the sparkling green of the grass. How can these be removed? When there's nothing to be remote from the headless void refuses all definition and location. It is not round or small or big, or even here as distinct from their end quote.
5:14
Okay, so that was from Hardin's text that was excerpted in offsetters and Dennis book says back to my text now, hardens assertion that he has no head must be read in the first person since the man was not claiming to have been literally decapitated. From a first person point of view. His emphasis on headless ness is a stroke of genius that offers an unusually clear description of what it's like to glimpse the non duality of consciousness. Here are Hofstetter his, quote, reflections on hardens account. Now this is Douglas Hofstadter, quote, we have here been presented with a charmingly childish and solid cystic view of the human condition. It is something that at an intellectual level offends and appalls us. Can anyone seriously entertain such notions without embarrassment? yet to some primitive level in us It speaks clearly. That is the level at which we could not accept the notion of our own death. And quote, is back to me. Having expressed his pity for batty old Harding, Hofstetter proceeds to explain away his insights as a solid cystic denial of mortality, a perpetuation of the childish illusion that quote, I am a necessary ingredient of the universe and quote, however, Hardy's point was that AI is not even an ingredient necessary or otherwise of his own mind. What Hofstetter fails to realize is that hardens account contains a precise empirical instruction. Look for whatever it is you are calling AI, without being distracted by even the subtlest undercurrent of thought. And notice what happens the moment you turn consciousness upon itself. This illustrates a very common phenomenon in scientific and secular circles. We have a contemplative like harden, who to the eye of anyone familiar with the experience of self transcendence, has described it in a manner approaching perfect clarity. We also have a scholar like Douglas Hofstadter, a celebrated contributor to our modern understanding of the mind, who dismisses him as a child, before rejecting hardens account as merely silly, you should investigate this experience for yourself. And so in the book, I include an exercise similar to ones I presented in some of the guided meditations. And I'll read that to you now. As you gaze at the world around you, take a moment to look for your head. This may seem like a bizarre instruction, you might think, of course, I can't see my head. What's so interesting about that? Not so fast. simply look at the world, or other people, and attempt to turn your attention in the direction of where you know your head to be. For instance, if you're having a conversation with another person, see if you can let your attention travel in the direction of the other person's gaze. He is looking at your face, and you cannot see your face. The only face present from your point of view belongs to the other person. But looking for yourself in this way can precipitate a sudden change in perspective of the sort that Harding describes. Some people find it easier to trigger this shift in a slightly different way. As you were looking at the world, simply imagine that you have no head. Whichever method you choose, don't struggle with this exercise. It's not a matter of going deep within or producing some extraordinary experience. The view of headless pneus is right on the surface of consciousness, and can be glimpsed The moment you attempt to turn about. Pay attention to how the world appears. In the first instance, not after a protracted effort. Either you will see it immediately, or you won't see it at all. And the resulting glimpse of open awareness will last only a moment or two before thoughts intervene. simply repeat this glimpse again and again, in this relaxed way as possible as you go about your day. Okay, so that's the end of the exercise I give there. And now back to the main text. Once again, selflessness is not a deep feature of consciousness. It is right on the surface. And yet people can meditate for years without recognizing it. After I was introduced to the practice of xo Chen, I realized that much of my time spent meditating had been a way of actively overlooking the very insight I was seeking.
9:31
How can something be right on the surface of experience, and yet be difficult to see. I've already drawn an analogy to the optic blind spot, but other analogies may give a clearer sense of the subtle shift and attention that is required to see what is right before one's eyes. We've all had the experience of looking through a window and suddenly noticing our own reflection in the glass. At that moment, you have a choice to use the window as a window and see the world beyond or to use it as a mirror. It is extraordinarily To shift back and forth between these two views, but impossible to truly focus on both simultaneously. This shift offers a very good analogy, both for what it is like to recognize the illusory pneus of the self for the first time, and for why it can take so long to do it. Imagine that you want to show another person how a window can also function like a mirror. As it happens, your friend has never seen this effect as quite skeptical of your claims, you direct our attention to the largest window in your house. And although the conditions are perfect for seeing her reflection, she immediately becomes captivated by the world outside. What a beautiful view, who are your neighbors is at a redwood or a Douglas fir, you begin to speak about there being two views, and about the fact that your friends reflection stands before her even now, but she notices only that your neighbor's dog has slipped out of the front door and is now dashing down the sidewalk. In every moment, it is clear that your friend is staring directly through the image of her face without seeing it. Of course, you could easily direct her attention to the surface of the window by touching the glass with your hand. This would be akin to the quote pointing out instruction of zoek chin. However, here the analogy begins to break down. It is very difficult to imagine someone's not being able to see her reflection in a window, even after years of looking. But that is what happens when a person begins most forms of spiritual practice. Most techniques of meditation are in essence, elaborate ways of looking through the window. In the hope that if one only sees the world in greater detail, an image of one's true face will eventually appear. Imagine a teaching like this. If you just focus on the trees swaying outside the window without distraction, you will see your true face. Undoubtedly such an instruction would be an obstacle to seeing what could otherwise be seen directly. Almost everything that has been said or written about spiritual practice. Even most of the teachings one finds in Buddhism directs a person's gaze to the world beyond the glass, thereby confusing matters from the very beginning. But one must start somewhere. And the truth is that most people are simply too distracted by their thoughts, to have the selflessness of consciousness pointed out directly. And even if they are ready to glimpse it, they're unlikely to understand its significance. Harding confessed that many of his students recognize the state of quote hairlessness, only to say so what it is, in fact very difficult to deal with this. So what that is why certain traditions like zoek Chen, consider teachings about the intrinsic non duality of consciousness to be secret, reserving them for students who have spent considerable time practicing other forms of meditation. On one level, the requirement that a person have mastered other preliminary practices is purely pragmatic, for unless she has the requisite concentration and mindfulness to actually follow a teacher's instructions, she is liable to be lost in thought and understand nothing at all. But there's another purpose for withholding these non dual teachings. Unless the person has spent some time seeking self transcendence dualistic Lee, she is unlikely to recognize that the brief glimpse of selflessness is actually the answer to her search. Having then said so what, in the face of the highest teachings, there's nothing for her to do but persist in her confusion.
13:13
Okay, so that is my discussion of Harding, as it appears in my book, waking up. And, as I've said, I've introduced this exercise of looking for your head, looking for yourself looking for your face, looking for the seat of attention, at various places in the guided meditations. And we will keep experimenting with that. This notion of glimpse in it and not seeing the point, essentially saying, so what, even after a legitimate glimpse of non dual consciousness, that's a an interesting problem to have. It is a possible problem. If you haven't spent enough time meditating, you might not actually see that this jaw is as significant as it is. And it may take some time for you to feel that you have clearly glimpsed the non duality of consciousness. This notion of headless ness is just one trick to get your attention moving in the right direction. But it's a very useful one, it really is possible to look for the feeling that you're calling AI, and to fail to find it in a way that's conclusive, and to have the center drop out of experience. So it may take years of observing the contents of consciousness, or it may take only moments. But it's possible to recognize that consciousness itself, prior to the feeling of self is free, no matter what arises, to be noticed. And meditation is simply the practice of finding this freedom directly. By breaking one's identification with thought and allowing this continuum of experience whether pleasant or unpleasant to simply be as it is. In my view, the realistic goal of meditation is not some permanent state of selflessness that admits of no further efforts, but a capacity to be free of self in this moment, in the midst of whatever is happening, if you can do that, on demand, you really will have solved many of the problems you will encounter in this life.