By Daniel Scharpenburg
The techniques of quieting the mind allow our awareness of reality to shine in the moment.
When we are dwelling in this awareness, the paradigms and preconceptions that go on in our minds cease. When we are really in the moment, we are no longer plagued by thoughts, ideas, and views. When we are truly dwelling in mindfulness, we experience ourselves and the world as they are. Our false notions of separation, of self and other, fall away.
This allows us to awaken to our true nature.
Learning how to practice mindfulness isn’t hard, but it does require determination and repeated practice. Mindfulness only requires us to stop the incessant flow of thoughts so our true awareness, which is luminous and free, can be unleashed.
We have to put aside our entangling dualistic thoughts. We have to step away from all the ways we divide reality, our ideas of self and other, good and bad, gain and loss. When thoughts come, we just let them be what they are. We are not our thoughts. We can do the same thing with ideas, preconceptions, and points of view.
If we are diligent in our practice we can stop dwelling in delusion and instead awaken our true identity.
Stopping delusion means our minds don’t have to be entangled in dualistic ideas, even while we are engaged in regular activities. When we are free from delusion we discover that our nature is one with the nature of all things. When we awaken to our true nature we realize that we have always been luminous and free. This is called Enlightenment. There is not some special or mysterious teaching that is apart from the awakening of our minds.
Before we glimpse our true nature, we are dwelling in delusion. When we identify ourselves with the labels that we, and the world, have created that is delusion. We are not whatever labels we put on ourselves. We are not even our thoughts and views.
Our true self is the shining void.
Empty of labels, but luminous and free. We are loving awareness, the same loving awareness that is the whole universe. We can realize this only by putting down the things that hold us back, our views of ourselves.
If you want to awaken, there is no need to seek outside your own mind right now.
If we can set aside delusion, then our true self, which is pure, clear, and luminous, will emerge.
Editor: Ty H Phillips
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He specializes in bringing meditation practice and Buddhism to people in a practical way that applies to real life.
Find out more about Daniel here and connect with him on Facebook
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