How Do I Know Who I Am?

This talk and meditation explores theories of the self, including the core dharmic concept of 'anatta,' often tranlsated as 'not self,' based on the observation that internal experience is constantly in flux. As the importance of maintaining a sense of identity to develop self-confidence and resilience after setbacks is well established in a variety of therapeutic modalities, how do we maintain a healthy sense of self while allowing for impermanence, fluidity and spiritual growth?

Transcript

Well, Headlines of CNN, Brides Panic, As bridal store Alfred Angelo closes across the country. Wedding planning is tough, But for hundreds of people, It just got tougher. This is the front of CNN. Thank you, Alfred, For giving me the worst day of my life. We are a full service Dharma shop. You can't buy cheaper Dharma right now. And tonight or today, We're having our closeout sale, Two for the price of one. That's right, You can't buy cheaper Dharma. So one of these talks I will transmit to you via my brain, And the other I will actually say aloud to you. And you get to choose because I can't. It's before 10. I can't make any decision. So the first sort of explanation on forgiving the unforgivable, The process of forgiveness. And the second one is, How do I know who I am when I'm not even allowed to ask the question? Who wants to know about forgiveness? Raise your hand. OK, It's a narrow vote. And actually, I will give the talk on forgiveness and post it on probably Tuesday or Wednesday, So you can hear that as well. I don't even like listening to my brain first thing in the morning, And I'm familiar with it. So my heart goes out to you. So before I go into this talk, I'm going to read something that will help, I think, Deepen your understanding of some of the ideas that I'll be expressing. And I'm also reading this because I think it's amongst the most important insight that has been produced in psychology in the last, I don't know, In my lifetime. What I'm going to read is by a guy named Ian McGilchrist, Who is a British neuropsychologist. And don't worry, It's actually easier to understand that that might suggest. McGilchrist wrote one of the most important books in contemporary psychology called The Master and His Hemisceria. And it's a book that essentially breaks down why we all have twin hemispheres in our brain, What each hemisphere essentially does, And how it creates two radically different forms of attention. And I'll just read you a little bit. And I think hopefully, As then I give the talk, It'll give you an idea why this is such an important moment in the development of insight. Like us, Birds and animals have divided brains. And they have to solve a problem every moment of their waking lives. In order to make use of the world, They need to be able to have narrowly focused attention. A bird needs to be able to pick out a seed against a background of grit on which the seed lies. And it needs to be able to pick out certain twigs to build a nest and so on. So what he's saying here is that we have to have a very focused attention that can pick out detailed objects and manipulate them. But if that was the only attention we were capable of paying, We would all wind up as someone else's lunch. Because we also need, At the same time, To pay quite different attention to the world, A broad, Open, Sustained, Vigilant awareness without having any preconceptions. We have to be able to look out for predators and mates, Foes, And friends. So while we have one attention that's very focused and looking for objects to amass and accumulate, We also have to have another mind that's open and spacious and is looking around and seeing the world as it actually is, Looking out for anything that might harm or might provide an opportunity for us. How do we pay such contrary types of attention to the world at the same time? It's like patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time. One consciousness can't be committed to two types of attention simultaneously. So the brain attends to the world in two completely different ways and brings two different worlds into being, One largely more conscious than the other. When we are young, We live in the first, The broad, Sustained, Open, Spacious, Seeing the world as it is without any focus or fixation. That's right hemispheric. But eventually, The left hemisphere, Which essentially turns everything into language and representations, Takes over in our right hemisphere, The broad, Spacious, Open, Seeing things as they actually are without any preference, Without any focus or detail, Moves into the background. As he says, One form of attention sees the world as alive, Complex, Embodied, Forever in flux, A net of interdependencies, Forming and reforming holes. And he's not a Buddhist. He's simply laying out what one hemisphere of the brain is doing over that again. One form of attention sees the world as alive, Complex, Embodied, Forever in flux, A net of interdependencies. This is what the Buddha almost identical to the Buddha's description of the citta and of the sort of trans mundane awareness of seeing past the artificial breaking of the world into ideas and concepts and labels and actually seeing it as this interdependent fluid hole where you can't break off any part. And as McGilchrist says, This mind is drawn to nature, To the flow, To the embodied, To the felt. The other awareness, We experience a representation of the world, Which is static, Bounded, Broken into fragmented entities, Grouped into concepts upon which predictions can be made. This attention isolates, Fixes, And makes each thing explicit by bringing it under the spotlight of attention. It makes things inert, Mechanical, And lifeless. But it also gives us the power to know and consequently to learn and make things. And as he goes on through his writing, He talks that our culture has become predominantly left hemispheric, No longer seeing the world for what it is, But seeing the world through the scrim of ideas and concepts. And that's why we believe that we can take little bits or we can take things from nature and we believe we can isolate it without affecting the whole. And that's why we are almost blind to the interdependence of the way our actions affect others, How we feel that we live in opposition and disconnection. And this explains why our conscious, Thought-based goals and beliefs almost constantly push us towards self-reliance, Isolation, Lack of trust, Lack of connection. And why there is a continual emphasis in the Dharma and in the practice to reconnect with the embodied, To reconnect with the natural, To reconnect with a broader awareness. Because it's not just a matter of balancing the mind in such a way to reconnect us with each other and the world. But if we keep on a singular path of left hemispheric, Looking at the world through dead concepts, Ideas that isolate and fragment, Then it leads us on a direct path towards a kind of annihilation. There's a very important teaching that Heather has pointed to every time Heather has said, Don't take things personally. She's referring to a very core dharmic insight, Which is called anatta. And the basic of anatta is essentially that if you observe any of what's called the components, Aggregates, Condas of your experience, If you observe them really, Really closely without the left hemispheric kind of attention, But the overall patient long-term attention, You will see that there is nothing in your internal experience that could possibly provide you with a lasting ongoing self or a true self that doesn't change, A lasting identity. I'll say this again. If you observe your thoughts, Your feelings, The sensations of your body, Your perceptions of the world, Your consciousness, Anything you observe long enough changes so much in such radically different ways, Sometimes even goes away and sometimes comes back, That you can't find, As the Buddha said in the Anatta Lekana Sutta, Which is the first sutta where he actually transmitted the dharma in such a way that it led to enlightenment. In this profound realization, Well, Maybe in the Dhamma Chakrapavatna, Some one or two listeners, But this sutta where he talks about the lack of a lasting identity or true self is where he first had his big success in transmitting and everyone who was there had enlightenment. This sort of realization that everything in our experience is undergoing so much flux and flow and change, For example, Our thoughts, We very often cling to our thoughts with the idea that that's who I really am. And in a lot of movies when they science fiction movies where characters die and they're transported into some kind of artificial brain and they're supposed to continue to live on in a machine, The self is identified with people's thinking, Their thoughts. So very often in our culture, Which is so cognitive, We believe at the end of the day, Sure, You could take away my body. You could take away some of my perceptions of the world, My feelings, But deep down inside those thoughts are who I really am. But if we really take the time to sit back and observe our thoughts, And believe me, I've spent entire retreats doing just that, We can find that they can take us on a whirlwind tour from I'm the greatest to I'm the worst piece of shit in the course of a few minutes. And we are actually doing nothing in the time. It's just a roller coaster ride that takes us on unending circles, Stating completely incompatible statements and beliefs back and forward, Back and forward. So if you're looking for a sense of who I am that's lasting, That gives me a sense of this is my true self. This is my identity. Looking at thoughts won't work. And if you also tried to find it in feelings, Good luck. We can go from feelings of elation and excitement to sudden downcast just in moments when we encounter a sudden change of expression on somebody's face, Or when we remember that we forgot to do something. We left something that we were supposed to bring with us at home. I do that all the time when I'm leaving for retreat. I'll just remember. Ah! How could I forget that? And this happy excitement goes directly into this plummeting sense of I'm just this complete mess of a human being. And so essentially, My feelings can go from one extreme to another based on the slightest stimuli, Or sometimes even for no reason that's discernible. The same goes from our bodies. We can have bodies that feel really comfortable and light and at ease, And then suddenly have this twinge. If anybody's had sciatica, You know you're moving fluidly through life. And then there's that one moment where you get out of a chair. You're doing something that you do thousands upon thousands of times a day. And then suddenly, There's this information from your body that you will no longer be getting out of a chair with any ease for the next three months or walking around. So our bodies can change. Consciousness, Of course, Can be there and not be there. Roughly eight hours or seven hours a day, We're not even conscious. So certainly, Consciousness doesn't provide us with any lasting identity. Perceptions of the world can change radically. The way we see things, Experience, The way we even classify, Experience people that we think of as friendly and kind can suddenly be changed in our perception to unfriendly, Difficult, And then back and forth. This is such an important observation and unique. It's pretty much actually one of the core differences between the Buddha's Dharma and every other spiritual philosophy, If you boil it down to it. There's great similarities between Buddhism and Hinduism and Jainism and so forth, Brahmanism. But when the Buddha had his recognition that there is no lasting core internal experience that could provide us with a lasting self, Atta, So he produced the insight of anatta, He landed on an insight that separated instantly Buddhism from every single spiritual philosophy that had come before. And in fact, In the following, I would say, 2300 years, There was nothing similar to this insight until a British philosopher named David Hume stumbled upon the same recognition in his treatise on human nature called the Bundle Theory, Where he said, If you look at any experience, You observe your thoughts, Feelings, Body states long enough, You see that they change in such incompatible ways that you'll never be able to find what Hume called a soul or a lasting core identity. And certainly, Many Buddhist teachers over the millennia have taught, And in many ways quite true, That if we let go of the sense of a true self, This lasting core identity that animates us from childhood to adult life, If we learn to let go of that quest of identifying who we are in ideas and thoughts, That it's very liberating. Because so many of the stories we construct about who I am, If you put them aside for a little while, You realize how limiting they are, How much they are actually more like balls and chains than they are anything that helps us take flight in the world. Certainly, My stories about myself that I created to try to figure out and fit in in the world were all based on this idea that I might not be as athletic or cool or suave or whatever, But I told myself as a kid that I was smarter than those schoolyard bullies and that I would somehow have to rally and survive based on my schmarts, Which was OK. But then you actually, In your life, Run into people who are even smarter than yourself, Where you have days you wake up like today and you don't feel like the sharpest knife in the drawer. Some days I have outright days where I'm capable of putting together even a coherent thought, It seems. And so who then am I if I'm not a schmarty pants? So it would be great if that's where I could end the story. And a lot of Dharma talks just ended pretty much there. Just let go of yourself. You'll be fine. You'll move on through the world. You don't have to have a true identity. You just look at each moment of your life and find where you're at in suffering and so forth and so on. And if only it were that simple, But it's not. You see, The Buddha didn't only teach not self. He also constantly referred to finding yourself. Well, That's confusing. There's a wonderful sutta, The Mahavaga, Where these guys who've been robbed, They were bathing. And someone came along. They believe it was a woman who took their wallets. I guess even back then they had wallets and possessions. And so they're running around apparently naked. And they stumble upon the Buddha because in all these stories people stumble upon the Buddha. And they say, Sir, While we were not paying attention, A thief ran away with our possessions. Did you see anything? And the Buddha said, Wouldn't it be more worthwhile for you to search for your true self than for a thief? And there's a wonderful group of teachings in the Dhammapada called yourself, Where the Buddha says, You'd be better off taking care of yourself than getting caught up in trying to amass too many possessions and too many things in the world. So on some level, It sounds like there's a deeply incompatible set of teachings here. On the one hand, We're told you can't find a true lasting identity. Even if you did, It would be a ball and chain. It wouldn't allow you to find liberation. It would tie you down. Your core beliefs about yourself, No matter what they were, Would in some way constrain you. And even deeper, Though, They say that search is stressful. And the Buddha in so many suttas says that looking for that true core identity, My true self, Is a stressful waste of time. In the Subhasa, He says that. And yet, In other suttas, He says, Look after yourself. Your actions lead to future states of self. You want to take kind, Wholesome actions because you, Yourself in the future, Will have to bear the results of your actions. Furthermore, Almost every great contemporary psychologist of the 20th and 21st century all agree that having a sense of self is essential to being resilient, To being able to survive in the world happily. I'm talking about the greats, Carl Rogers, D. W. Winneka, Masterson, Heinz Kohut. Not having a sense of self is associated with disunity, Poor impulse regulation. If we have a lack of a sense of who we are when we meet challenges and stressful setbacks in life, We won't be able to pick ourselves up with any sense of confidence and go about trying to face our challenges. So we need to have some coherent sense of self to thrive in the world. And yet, At the same time, The Buddha informs us that that coherent sense of self cannot be static, Defined, Or in any way, Something that you can report with any confidence that will be the same from one moment to the next. So if you're not confused by now, You've not been listening closely enough. My job is not here to give you the easy answers, But first to throw everything up in the air and cause some sense of confusion. And that's because in a certain way, Our left hemispheric desire for quick conceptual definitions of who I am, Who the other person is, Viewing people in terms of easy concepts, Good, Bad, Evil, Genius, Lovable, Unlovable, Friendly, Unfriendly, That conceptualizing, That needing to have things fit into dead, Lifeless categories is not the way forward. Neuroscientists cannot locate any part of the brain that's always firing that could possibly provide us with an ongoing identity that is essentially fixed, Static, Reliable. There just isn't any part. Susan Blackmore's books goes into this in some quite great detail. Or is it Rita Carter? I read so many neuroscience books, I began to, I think it's Rita Carter. I'm sorry. And yet at the same time, The great neuroscientists, Panksepp, Antonio de Masio, And Joseph Ledoux say that while there's no single part of the brain or region that could provide us with a self that's ongoing, A sense of who I am that animates us, There are these embodied selves that are created by very deep neural regions. The sense of who I am based on my body is created by the right temporal parietal junction. We have a collective sense of group self, Which is the medial prefrontal. And we also have a sense of a ongoingly shifting autobiographical self in the dorsal lateral prefrontal. Not that you need to know any of these regions. But the cool thing about this part, Which is what we most identify with our sense of self, That story about who am I, That we carry around as an autobiography. And we go back to and update constantly as we have successes or failures in our life. As we have challenging times, We update our story of self with some, Well, I'm overall a great person, But I have some challenges here and there. Interestingly enough, This area of the brain that constructs the autobiographical self in language only really lights up when we're not thinking about ourself. It also lights up when we overhear other people talking about us or when we consider what other people think about us. And so Matthew Lieberman, A neuropsychologist, Proposes that the sense of self is not, And I repeat, Is not about locating anything that's true or lasting. It's an ongoing strategy of where we consider how can I best fit in to the world of other people knowing what they think about me, Knowing what they believe my skills and attributes and who I am. How can I best fit in? So the self is not about constructing something that is about what makes me different or what makes me unique or what I can rely upon in the future to give me some sense of ongoing coherence. The self is actually this continuing, Worrying strategy that unless I continually figure out what my strengths and weaknesses are, I'll be rejected by the world. And so it's a strategy of survival. Interestingly enough, A team of psychologists noted that this autobiographical self can change in the blink of an eye. Morrison-Gurgen did this wonderful study where they had people go to what they were told were job interviews. I guess at this time they could be a little bit cruel in their clinical studies. And so in one job interview, They would have somebody sit across from a male model who would be wearing an expensive suit with an expensive briefcase and would be reading a very thick book on a very difficult topic. And then they would have this person move into another room after they gave them a short quiz. And then they'd have them move into another room where they would sit across from somebody who was unkempt, Unshaven, Wearing a t-shirt, Ratty jeans, And reading a comic book. And when they asked them again questions about themselves, People's views of themselves shifted completely in that short period of time. When they sat across from the model who looked really put together in the expensive suit reading the challenging book, People had negative views of themselves and almost invariably thought, I'll never get this job. I'll never amount to much. I don't know why I even bother. But then when they'd go into the room of sitting across from the unkempt person, They would report, I'm great. I'm talented. I can achieve anything I want. Their sense of confidence soared. Nothing about them had changed. Simply one stimuli they sat across with gave them a completely different sense of identity. So when we're looking for self in ideas and in words and in concepts and in things we can report to people, What we're going to come up with is this shifting strategy of just trying to figure out how other people will think about us. And it's always based on things that are external to ourselves, Actually. It's never a representation of who we really are. So what is it that we're looking for when we're looking for anything that could be called a deep sense of self? Well, It's not self-realization. Self-realization is the spiritual assertion that behind all of our actions, Thoughts, Perceptions, There's this transcendent, Universal, Interpersonal identity that unifies us. And you might say, Well, That sounds kind of Buddhist, Right? Except for the fact that the Buddha ridiculed that idea. He said that some people have a belief in a cosmic self that is not personal or subject to change. These are the people who grieve and weep and become tormented every time a tree falls. And he goes on to dismiss this because he says, While we should be compassionate for all beings, The idea that every being has the same self means that we would never be able to produce or move through the world with any ease because we would always be suffering, Because there's always beings dying around us. And if it was the same self as us, We would be caught up in unending ceaseless grief. And not only that, He believes that there is enough personal experience in our life that there are essentially elements of self that are different amongst all of us. We're not totally different. We're not totally unique. So we're not talking about self-realization, Finding some underlying inner manifesting flame. Sometimes in yogic practice, When we bow to the light in each other, It's a beautiful sentiment. But we're not looking for that transpersonal, Underlying cosmic unity. As the Buddha argues, It doesn't exist. And even if we did find it, We'd be suffering all the time. Self-consciousness is an unpleasant state triggered by extreme self-awareness, Where we essentially annotate and narrate our experience to such a degree that we feel uncomfortable. Most of us have had experiences in life where we go into foreign or strange social or stressful experiences. And we find ourselves hyper-narrating every little thing we do. And that doesn't bring us much joy and release. So I don't think any of us confuse the search of looking for some kind of deep self with believing that that deep self is our self-conscious inner stream of language narrating everything we do. Self-concept is probably even more pernicious than self-consciousness. Self-concept is the collection of ideas that we carry around about ourselves. And this is what the Buddha rejected in Anatta when he said there is no fixed idea or core experience that we could define, Point to, And say that's who I am. Our self-concept is, As we noted, The collection of beliefs and strategies that point to how we're going to get love and survive and get admiration in the world. It's essentially this ongoing thing of telling ourselves what our strengths and weaknesses are and how we best fit in and what people will like about us. It's an ongoing process. And the problem is that self-concept, The story about ourself, Is the origin of all of our anxiety. Why do I say that? You see, As Carl Rogers pointed out, We all have this self-concept, This story about who I am that we carry around. It's an idea of what I need to do to survive and get acceptance in the world. But then we also have this other thing called our felt experience. And that's what we've been tapping into every time we become embodied or we look beneath thinking and we mindfully connect with the way we're actually our embodied state, Not the stories, The thoughts we have about ourselves, But what I'm actually feeling right now. The problem is in adult life, The self-concept, The story we have, I have to be good, Likable, Smart, Pleasant. I have to be confident all the time. And our felt experience, Which is I'm angry today, I'm not very confident. I'm feeling kind of shaky, Tired, Nervous. The two don't mesh. And the more they don't mesh, The more anxiety we feel because we as human beings are more likely to try to keep the self-concept going and appear good to other people than to stick with and honor the felt experience, Which is how we actually feel what we're actually experiencing. The self-concept, If you haven't guessed, Is the left hemispheric, Dead conceptual representation of who we are. The felt experience is the right hemispheric, Embodied, True, Emotional experience. And what I'm going to propose to you is that while we can never find a self-concept that will ever provide us with a lasting identity, As the Buddha noted, And even if you could, It would cause you stress and would keep you locked in and bounded, You can, At any moment of your life, Come up with a sense of who I am, A sense of deep self that will help you make choices in your life and will help you make a way where you can honor needs that are crucial and important and will bring you closer to happiness. This is called self-awareness, Not self-concept. It's not language-based. It's non-verbal. It's an awareness of what our state of being is constructed by all the underlying experiences, Such as the way our body feels, The emotional states we're in, The way we're breathing. Everything that lies beneath the field of language and chatter in our mind is the constituents of self-awareness. And why I posit that these are far more important than our self-concept is, One, The self-awareness points to emotions, Which points to. . . Emotions point us in the direction of what changes and adaptations we need to do to find anything remotely like lasting happiness in our life. If we're not aware that we're angry and disappointed in a certain relationship, Then we won't be able to set boundaries in our lives, And we won't be able to confront injustice in the world. If we're not capable of knowing when we're feeling sad, Then we won't be able to grieve wounds and losses and to reconnect where there is true attachment in our lives. If we're not capable of feeling fear and knowing when we're experiencing fear, Then we won't be able to navigate towards safer interpersonal situations and to take care of ourselves. And yes, While emotions can at times and states of being, Of course, Due to early experiences and emotional dysregulation, Sometimes our emotions can point us at times to extreme directions where we might avoid worthwhile challenges, But it's only through connecting with our underlying experience and connecting with some deeper sense of self that we can process and right-size those emotions so that they become our divine guides through life. I've found in my counselling work that almost all of the liberating experiences that people have come from when they finally let go of the stories they've been carrying around about how they need to be to get approval, All the things they've been told by their cultures, Their family systems, Their education about what they need to be, And they connect with those deeper feelings, Emotions, Qualities, States that lie in the heart in this non-verbal region of the body. And that, In fact, Then, On each given moment of our lives, Provides us with a self that is truer and has needs that we need to honour and will point us in the right direction. Furthermore, Emotion integration expands the sense of self. It creates a fluid self that can do and change and flow and adapt, And yet at times that self needs to withdraw, To rally, To seek shelter. This is not a self that we need to worry about in terms of what any moment's experience is, Because we know the more we connect with this deeper self, This embodied self, The self that is bespeaking our needs in any given moment, It expands the sense of our capabilities because as we observe it and connect with it, We begin to see just how fluid and how many different shapes and forms it can take, And simply that experience creates the sense, Yes, At any given moment of time, I have a self that has needs, That needs to be taken care of and honoured and trusted, But every day I must check in with it, Because some days I won't be confident, I won't be able to express myself well, I won't be able to go out into the world with any sense of conviction, And some days I will, And honouring it, Being able to disclose it to others, Is the most powerful healing tool we have. When we learn to get together with people and not go back and rely on those old stories about who we are, But instead report what we're feeling, Right now I'm feeling tired, Heavy, I'm feeling this surge of energy, I'm feeling a lump in my throat and a feeling of wishing I could run, I'm feeling like I want to lash out, I'm feeling like I want to hide, Whatever it is, The more we connect with others, And we honour this deeper self by reporting it, Disclosing it, Through all the tools we have, Not just words, But through non-verbal ways, Then we, I believe, Get closer and closer to any meaningful sense of who I am, Even though the Buddha says not to ask that question. So, Closing the eyes, Finding the balanced position, Taking a full, Complete in-breath, And as we do, Lifting the shoulders up, Like we're trying to touch the ears and holding them, And then dropping them as heavily. Full in-breath, Pulling in the abdomen, The abdominal muscles as tight as they can go, Holding them in, Soft belly, Relaxed, No holding. And finally, Deep full in-breath, Squinching the muscles of the face, Tightening the muscles around the eyes, Locking the jaw, Squeezing everything in the face, Then releasing, Letting the jaw hang comfortably, Relaxing the micro muscles around the eyes, Softening the forehead, And then cultivating a caring, Compassionate disposition towards your internal experience, And scan down the body, And if there's any sensation that you can address, To develop greater ease, Anything you need to adjust with your clothing, Your posture, Where you're holding your legs, Your hands, Just honor whatever your body indicates would make you feel more comfortable in this moment. And throughout the meditation, See if you can carry the spirit of self-care, Compassion, And non-judgment. So let's just breathe for a few moments, And if you're tired, You can of course take some deep full in-breaths and hold them as long as you need, And then as you breathe out, Open one eye or the other, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. On the other hand, If your mind is bouncy, Unsettled, Jumpy, Extending the length of the out-breath to twice, The duration of the in-breath is known to essentially cut off the release of stress hormones, And the set of choline will allow you to relax, Settle for long out-breaths. Once you find a breath, See if you can let go of manipulating it and just allowing the breath to be, And just know when you're breathing in, Know when you're breathing out. A very old practice is to think buddha in-breath and do on the out, Buddho. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. So, Let's just breathe for a few moments, And then breathe in deeply, As you breathe out, Open the other eye. Okay, At this time, Drop the awareness of the breath into a little bit into the background. At first, The awareness of the breath was like the character at the front of the stage, But now that character has shifted a little bit. Yet, It's still in the light, So we can observe it, But it's not the foreground of the stage. And into the foreground, Just a very simple reflection that we are in our final day of the gathering here at Garrison. And knowing this, I want you to first process this fact the way we might process it as an idea, In words, In figuring out, In solving, Letting your left hemisphere process that information for you. I have a day left. What do I need to do to make this a worthwhile experience for me? Just allow, Without any holding back, Just allow your mind to tell the story of what you need to do. Okay? So see if you can encapsulate whatever thoughts arose knowing there's a day left to the retreat. What do I need to do? What should I accomplish? What have I not done? All the, Any thoughts, Ideas, Inner chatter that came up, Just see if you can summarize what you thought as you processed that information. See if you can summarize it as a sentence. I need to, Etc. , Etc. Just put that into one sentence. I need to do this or that. And then I'd like you to put that aside in the back of the stage, And now I'd like you to process that information in a completely different way. Just without any eye in the story, There's one day left in the retreat. How does that feel? There's one day left here. How does that feel? And just go into the body, Especially the front of the body. Be with that information without solving it, Figuring out, Turning it into words. Just how does it feel? One day left. Okay. Connecting with whatever we're feeling in the body as an emotion or a feeling or just a state of being. Just asking a very simple question. What do you need? What do you need to feel safe? What do you need to feel connected? What do you need to feel a sense of grounding here? What do you need to move on in life? Whatever question feels the most resonant for you, Doesn't have to be in any of those I just mentioned. Just ask this embodied state that lies beneath all the words and ideas. This part of you that is aching for attention. This deeper self, What does it need? How does it want to go through this day? How can you honor it? How can it navigate you? So very gently releasing the question, Thanking the body, Any feelings that have appeared. And then when you're ready, Just gently open the eyes and look at the ground in front of you, Taking in light and color, But not objects yet. Honoring the dominated hemisphere that sees the world as a whole, Not objects. A realm of interdependencies, The embodied. And very slowly then look around, Taking in objects, But bringing the body and any feelings with you. So we each have to develop, Or we're not have to, We each are invited to develop our own ways of checking in and seeking guidance beneath all the stories about what we should do, What we should accomplish, Who we should be. And instead seeking something that's far more, I would argue, Authentic and deep and truer, Something that arises from all those powerful experiences, Memories, All stored in the deepest recesses of the emotional mind. At the very least, While we will always continue to figure out, Solve, And not just who we are, But what we need to do in life and ideas, The more we can develop a second approach, Which is felt, Our felt experience. What does it want? What does it need? How can we take it into consideration? We will have a far more varied and I think useful approach to working our way through life.

Reviews

Brilliant!!
Josh didn't sound bored at all. He was highly engaged. The topic tremendously interesting combining neuro science and dharma. Josh is very well read and studied on all these matters. I'm listening again today as there was so much to learn. Thank you for this great talk.

Helpful guidance. Thank you 🙏

As always, this teacher’s talks are designed for self-investigation, with a theoretical first half and a practical second. Thank you for the clarity you bring around each topic

Excellent discussion and guided meditation.

Your talks and meditations are such a gift. Thank you.