Category: General

“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” is a line from the 1939 film Gone with the Wind starring Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh. It was spoken by Gable, as Rhett Butler, in his last words to Scarlett O’Hara.

I probably would not use such a profanity statement in my vocabulary, but if I have ever said “I don’t care” I can be sure that statement evolves around a convoluted expression of what is truly in my mind – I don’t give a damn. I am just not being real.

Whatever it is, can I don’t care? Can I don’t give a damn? I can’t not don’t care unless I do not know its existence. I can’t not say I don’t care about the world, as I need to know its existence before I can not-to-care. The moment I know about its existence it has already entered my space, so to speak. How can I not-to-care?

When I said I do not want to see you anymore, can I? You have never left me, though physically you did. I carry the anger towards you and thus I can’t not care, simply because that don’t care is stuck in my mind. The more I do something to get rid of it, the more it hangs on to me – the good news is that it cannot be get rid of. Like a boa constrictor, the more I resist the more I get strangled by it. Each time my anger increases, I am holding on to you more. But it is the other way round, my dear – my holding on to you is the cause of my anger. Arrrggh…. ! I may even resort to harming you in an unwise way. If I did, I would have got it all wrong. It is my anger that I am not seeing. It is my holding on to you that I have mistakenly see you as wrong. If I harm you I would have harmed an innocent being. I am actually harming myself. You did what you have just did and that is perfectly what it is. It is only my reasoning that I think what you did is wrong. And what has my reasoning got to do with you? My reasoning created my pain. How can you be responsible for it? When I held on to you, I am holding on to my sorrow.

Talking of holding on, when I love you I am also holding on to you. When I don’t love you, I am also doing the same. My attention is always 100% on you. What a delusion. Is there truly love in it? Can I caused you pain? Or can I cause others pain, except myself? The more I see myself, the more I see how ridiculous and comical the mind can be.

What I am running away from, I am exactly doing what the dog tries to do – chasing after its tail, not realizing the tail is its own. Whatever I don’t care, I am already caring it, unconsciously until I wake up to it.

The world has never left me. If I think an earthquake is a problem, the problem is me. There is no problem in earthquake, neither is there problem in death. As Byron Katie puts it aptly – whenever there is a problem I am always there. Nothing can escape my mind, unless I am oblivious to it. But the irony is this – whether I am oblivious or not, it has never left me as the world is me. Just like I will never know whether I will get jealous or not, until someone comes along. The jealousy is not caused by someone out there but rather a latent state awaiting its arising which I am holding on to. So when I am oblivious to what is, it does not mean that I am totally vulnerable to it.

The mind has no walls, neither are there windows. The mind is totally open to picking up everything that comes through the sense doors. There is no filtering, neither is there censorship. What changes is how I response to it. Since I can’t beat it, let me have peace with it.

I, the goldfish, amidst my friends, live happily each day, enjoying every moment of our time. One day I started to notice that the “one” that feeds me food is not like me – not in the sense of appearance, as shapes are obvious to me by observing the friends that comes and goes around me. This “one” that feeds me seems to be in touch with the ground wherever he goes – whereas I don’t. I need not be at the bottom all the time but yet this “one” seems to have the need to fix himself to the ground. Hmm.. I start to realize I am floating and he is not.  That keeps me wondering why. I checked out with my friends and they too starts to see the obvious. Some are interested and some are not. Some just brushed me aside. Some are intrigued but did not go further than that. Me, being me, become curious and wanted to know why. The “one” out there seems oblivious to my calling, no matter how hard I tried. Is he deaf?

I looked around me and find that everything is familiar. Suddenly it strikes me that I have never gone further than where I am in. What I saw afar is only as close as I can see but not there. Strange, I never thought of this before. I wondered why. As I move around I find that I have never left where I am though I thought I am around the space where I can see. There seems to be some kind of boundary that separates me from what is around me “out there” What is it that I do not know?

I become frantic and start moving around more and more and out of a sudden I realized that there is a space between where I float and above me. I took a peep out and felt that I am out of breath. Weird, why is it so, I wondered again. A few trying convinced me that I am in some kind of material that helps me to float, and out there, there is none. So I am actually being supported by this material rather than thinking that I am floating. I am getting more curious. Why am I being supported by this material?  What is this material than I am dependent on?  And what material is this that I can’t see but only knows when I felt the contrast without it.

I investigate further and came to a conclusion that the material that supports me and the space out there can only be found above me but not around. There seems to be some kind of separation between where I am and what is out there. Could it be I am contained by this material? If that is so, am I in some kind of a space, never gotten out of it – am I trapped? Is there something that I am not knowing? What is it like to live without this material around me?

. . .

I am that goldfish. The water is the mind. And the glass that separates me is the delusion that separates me from the world. In the beginning of time, the one million dollar question of who am I does not arise in me. I live each day oblivious to this thing call “mind”. I have never known what is the mind, except to experience its function like feelings, thinking, etc. Like the goldfish, it will never know what is water until it gets out of it. Breathe is the same too. I never know I am breathing in air except breathing alone until I am told about it. In the beginning I never question what the mind is except being with it. Only later do I realized that the mind is another.

Have you ever seen a dragonfly trying its best to fly out of the glass window? Or a bird looking puzzled why it could not get out to the “other side” – the trees that is outside the house, separated by the the glass window. Consider that the goldfish is not aware that it is in the glass bowl, separated from us. The fish may not know that there is such a thing call water, neither does it know that there is no water surrounding outside the bowl. More importantly it does not know that it is separated by this thing call glass. To the goldfish vision, what it sees is what the world is all about. If I put the goldfish in a small room, it see the room as the entire world – nothing beyond that. Worst, it is not even aware that it is in the glass bowl looking out – as wherever it swims it only sees the room but not the glass. Metaphorically, it is in the room but yet it is not, except in the glass bowl. Who cares? That is the conspiracy of delusion.

I thought I am with the world. But in truth I am with the mind. I have never left the mind. I am playing out all my actions with the mind. I have never, never, touches the world. The mind touches me.

Until one day I am being told to be aware of myself, I start to observe what the mind is. I have never left the mind. Only when I am aware can I notice the mind. Without awareness there is only one – me.

When I am unaware of the mind, I am one with myself. When I am aware, the situation becomes two – me and the mind. And when I am able to be aware of myself and the mind, there are three. Each situation allows me to look at the world differently.

Once I get to know the mind well, I begin to see the nature of delusion – the goldfish need to know the existence of water first before it knows the bowl that contains it.

Delusion is not an option. Delusion separates me from the world. When delusion is realized, Truth reveals. In truth, delusion does not exist. It exist because of the mind. There is no need for the bowl if not for the water. There is no need for the water if not for the fish.

The mind has no need to exist when “I” ends – not only at death, but in the Now.

Answers or realizations comes a calling when I open up to inquiry. It may not be immediate, it may not be later, but that is none of my doing. My “doing” in the Now is to remember to be here, in the now, so as to facilitate observation instead of allowing the mind to be idle in status quo, taking everything that comes its way for granted.

And that needs proactive attitude in me – to see things afresh and anew. Not just giving attention on the objects but also keep guarding myself from falling into the complacency attitude. I learn to be ahead of time, so to speak, to keep recognizing what has just arisen in me. Am I judgmental? Am I concluding? Am I wanting? As I observed, I don’t make them wrong – I use them as an opportunity to understand their nature – how they arise and why they arise. The more I observe in this way, the more I will recognize a consistent pattern in all of them, thus understanding the mechanics of the mind work.

I observe the play of conditioning in each pattern – the cause and effect of it. Recognizing this, the wise part of me chooses what is to my highest good – the good that brings about peace, love and freedom. I don’t choose them – wisdom chooses. My job is just to keep recognizing the unwholesome attitude that is detrimental to my wholeness. My job is just to inquire openly through observation.

Ignorance chooses too but out of a perceived idea of the past – hence judgment and conclusion. I am on guard to recognize whether wisdom or ignorance is present. I may not be able recognize both in the beginning and my tool is only to bring in more information from those whom have gone through this pathway. With those background information as my tools, I watch for any pattern of resistance or holding on to what is. I have to be authentic with myself. Authenticity reveals the truth that may not be sightly to me, from years of ignorance, but I trust that there is always an opportunity of transforming what I experienced to understanding. I just need to bear witness without stepping into the process of unfoldment.  The more I observe the more I see the causal relationships of mind states – how each states are conditioned by what I intent. This insight is the beginning of seeing light at the end of the tunnel.

Creating new pathways become easier once I know what is detrimental to my peace, love and freedom. Before that can come into my space, I open up myself to inquiry, appreciating each moment of awareness and inquisitiveness to what I am observing in life. I am on my inward journey home.