Shanmugam

@Snick I agree that it is not juicy... But this book can be said as a guide for a seeker in finding a good teaching and teacher rather than a guide for enlightenment itself... Even though he is a hardcore skeptic, he talks about spirituality in unbiased as well as scientific way.. He has covered all problems that a seeker will have in choosing a legitimate authority and also he talks about teachers in very realistic way.. A completely balanced unbiased stance without leaning towards rejecting everything or accepting everything blindly.. He also uses valid examples to make a point. So, this book is basically like a scientific introduction to spirituality and the path to enlightenment. I also completely agree with the fact that enlightened people have cultural bias as he states. He states an example of Poonjaji who gave an advert for her niece's marriage in the personals column of the newspaper but asked the photographer to lighten her dark skin photographically. He states this not in an intention of finding faults, but just to show that the enlightened ones are not perfect in every way. I have seen many people who call themselves skeptics but they are not even ready to accept the benefits of mindfulness meditation in spite of the available scientific evidence. They are not really skeptics, but believers of total rejection of any value in spirituality. If you have any such friends, you can suggest this book to them.

"Perfectionism is a neurotic idea. Infallibility is good for stupid Polack popes but not for intelligent people. An intelligent person will understand that life is an adventure, a constant exploration through trial and error. That´s its very joy, its very juice! I don´t want you to be perfect. I want you to be just as perfectly imperfect as possible. Rejoice in your imperfections! Rejoice in your very ordinariness! Beware of so-called "His Holinesses" – they are all "His Phoninesses." If you like such big words like "His Holiness" then make a title such as "His Very Ordinariness" – HVO, not HH! I preach ordinariness. I make no claims for any miracles; I am a simple man. And I would like you also to be very simple so that you can get rid of these two polarities: that of guilt and that of hypocrisy. Exactly in the middle is sanity." Osho, The Goose is Out, Talk #5

This guy Sam Harris is very honest... Read this (I don't intend to post the whole book, but I can't help sharing some passages with everyone... I like his approach.. He is a 100% skeptic, criticizes the stupid myths of many traditions but fully acknowledges what we are trying to do here... I would recommend his book to everyone here): Poonja-ji’s influence on me was profound, especially because it came as a corrective to all the strenuous and unsatisfying efforts I had been making in meditation up to that point. But the dangers inherent in his approach soon became obvious. The all-or-nothing quality of Poonja-ji’s teaching obliged him to acknowledge the full enlightenment of any person who was grandiose or manic enough to claim it. Thus, I repeatedly witnessed fellow students declare their complete and undying freedom, all the while appearing quite ordinary—or worse. In certain cases, these people had clearly had some sort of breakthrough, but Poonja-ji’s insistence upon the finality of every legitimate insight led many of them to delude themselves about their spiritual attainments. Some left India and became gurus. From what I could tell, Poonja-ji gave everyone his blessing to spread his teachings in this way. He once suggested that I do it, and yet it was clear to me that I was not qualified to be anyone’s guru. Nearly twenty years have passed, and I’m still not. Of course, from Poonja-ji’s point of view, this is an illusion. And yet there simply is a difference between a person like myself, who is generally distracted by thought, and one who isn’t and cannot be. I don’t know where to place Poonjaji on this continuum of wisdom, but he appeared to be a lot farther along than his students. Whether Poonja-ji was capable of seeing the difference between himself and other people, I do not know. But his insistence that no difference existed began to seem either dogmatic or delusional.

From the same book: "Perhaps you can see the same effect in the above illusion. It certainly looks like there is a white square in the center of the figure, but when we study the image, it becomes clear that there are only four partial circles. The square has been imposed by our visual system, whose edge detectors have been fooled. Can we know that the black shapes are more real than the white square? Yes, because the square doesn’t survive our efforts to locate it—its edges literally disappear. A little investigation and we see that its form has been merely implied. In fact, it is possible to look closely enough at the figure to banish the illusion altogether. But what could we say to a skeptic who insisted that the white square is just as real as the three-quarter circles? All we could do is urge him to look more closely. This is not a matter of debating third-person facts; it is a matter of looking more closely at experience itself. In the next chapter, we will see that the illusion of the self can be investigated—and dispelled—in just this way."

Another excerpt from the same chapter.. "My consciousness is “mine” only because the particularities of my life are illuminated as and where they arise. For instance, I currently have an annoying pain in my neck, the result of a martial arts injury. Why is this “my” pain? Why am I the only one who is directly aware of it? These questions are a symptom of confusion. There is no “I” who is aware of the pain. The pain is simply arising in consciousness in the only place it can arise: at the conjunction of this brain and this neck. Where else could this particular pain be felt? If I were cloned through teleportation, an identical pain might be felt in an identical neck on Mars. But this pain would still be right here in this neck. Whatever its relation to the physical world, consciousness is the context in which the objects of experience appear—the sight of this book, the sound of traffic, the sensation of your back against a chair. There is nowhere else for them to appear—for their very appearance is consciousness in action. And anything that is unique to your experience of the world must appear amid the contents of consciousness. We have every reason to believe that these contents depend upon the physical structure of your brain. Duplicate your brain, and you will duplicate “your” contents in another field of consciousness. Divide your brain, and you will segregate those contents in bizarre ways. We know, from experiments both real and imagined, that psychological continuity is divisible—and can, therefore, be inherited by more than one mind. If my brain were surgically divided by callosotomy tomorrow, this would create at least two independent conscious minds, both of which would be psychologically continuous with the person who is now writing this paragraph. If my linguistic abilities happened to be distributed across both hemispheres, each of these minds might remember having written this sentence. The question of whether I would land in the left hemisphere or the right doesn’t make sense —being based, as it is, on the illusion that there is a self bobbing on the stream of consciousness like a boat on the water. But the stream of consciousness can divide and follow both tributaries simultaneously. Should these tributaries converge again, the final current would inherit the “memories” of each. If, after years of living apart, my hemispheres were reunited, their memories of separate existence could, in principle, appear as the combined memory of a single consciousness. There would be no cause to ask where my “self” had been while my brain was divided, because no “I” exists apart from the stream. The moment we see this, the divisibility of the human mind begins to seem less paradoxical. Subjectively speaking, the only thing that actually exists is consciousness and its contents. And the only thing relevant to the question of personal identity is psychological continuity from one moment to the next."

There are certain things in Psychology which will actually help you to see through some of the games your mind is playing.. Look up for 'list of cognitive biases' in Google, you will see a whole list of biases, which are basically errors in thinking.. And these biases serve the ego.

@Afonso It varies depending on the individual and the two common influences on him: nature and nurture.. So, if it occurs to you that youth is the best time to get enlightenment, it may be true for you... There are people who have been brought up and live in situations where there are always other people who reinforce their assumptions and beliefs about reality. These people may never see through them and begin a genuine search no matter how old they are.. But when someone is too young, his ego is still developing.. One's ego should be completely developed before he starts seeking.. There are exceptions to this, but usually this is the case.

If a fly on your nose can bring it back, then it is definitely not nirvikalpa samadhi... There were people who were in Nirvikalpa samadhi and didn't have any consciousness even when the termites were biting their skin. But, yes no one stays in Nirivikalpa samadhi indefinitely.. It has to become Sahaja samadhi...

When I was a young boy, I heard about this from many books, especially from the Gospel of Ramakrishna Paramhamsa.. But it only made sense to me when I started reading Osho

I expanded the above poem and made it as a part of a story. The story is metaphoric and has a conversation between a seeker and an old man.. Read this and let me know your comments: You are the Truth Carrying the weight of past in my head And dragging the scenes which were old and dead, I ran to grab the bliss of the future; The more I ran, the more was the torture.. The torture of the hedonic treadmill Followed me as I continued uphill; I was caught in the prison of craving With tedious thoughts, my mind was raving. I met an ugly old man on the way who had a long thick beard with shades of grey. His face was shining with heavenly bliss; In his eyes I saw an endless abyss! "What makes you so happy in this rat race?", I asked him as he slowly turned his face. He replied,"The answer is within you! The grand kingdom of God is within you!" "That's a joke", I said "Are you kidding me?". "No!" He said, "Turn inward, you'll become free! You've made your own boundaries inside your mind, You've closed your eyes and think you've become blind". I said, "How can I get out of this trap? I want to find the way, give me the map" He said, "You're the way, the truth and the life! Be still and know you're that, and end this strife! You’re not your body and you’re not your mind; Not knowing the timeless truth makes you blind; You’re not your story and you’re not your thoughts; You’re not those age old, buried mental knots. You’re not that chattering voice in your head; You’re not anything that you did or said; You’re not anything that you have or know You’re the truth that is watching all this show! You’re not anything that can be perceived; You’re not an object that can be observed; You’re the screen where the world is being played; You’re the emptiness where the form is made. You’re the one witnessing the mind and breath; You’re one without two, beyond birth and death; Like the air trapped in a small round bubble, You feel separate which brings all the trouble. Inquire inside and wake up from this dream! Let truth alone shine like a bright white beam! By inquiry, your illusions will break; You’ll stop mistaking the rope for a snake" Hearing these words stopped my thoughts for a while. Looking in, I slowly began to smile. I watched my thoughts as they slowly passed by; I observed my mind like a secret spy. For years, I contemplated on his words; I watched my thoughts fly like a bunch of birds. One day, I woke up and realized the truth; Since then my life has been peaceful and smooth!

Here is my recent poem about non-duality or advaita, which has some pointers to contemplate for anyone who is seeking the truth: You’re not your body and you’re not your mind; Not knowing the timeless truth makes you blind; You’re not your story and you’re not your thoughts; You’re not those age old, buried mental knots. You’re not that chattering voice in your head; You’re not anything that you did or said; You’re not anything that you have or know You’re the truth that is watching all this show! You’re not anything that can be perceived; You’re not an object that can be observed; You’re the screen where the world is being played; You’re the emptiness where the form is made. You’re the one witnessing the mind and breath; You’re one without two, beyond birth and death; Like the air trapped in a small round bubble, You feel separate which brings all the trouble. Inquire inside and wake up from this dream! Let truth alone shine like a bright white beam! By inquiry, your illusions will break; You’ll stop mistaking the rope for a snake. – Shanmugam

@Annetta @egoeimai Thank you ... I have made an image with the poem... If anyone is good in making music and singing, then please compose a tune for it, sing it and upload it in Youtube... I know there are people with good composing skills looking for some lyrics.. And I am one of those guys who have lyrics but love to hear it in music..

I didn't read the book but there is a movie about that book and the life of Neal which I watched. I liked the movie very much and it was very touching. People can hear voices for sure and it can impact the person either negatively or positively. When the negative symptoms are predominant, it is diagnosed as Shizophrenia. But the experience of hearing voices and its impact can be positive as well and Neal Donald was a great example. This might also have happened in the life of Mohammed. When he says that he talked to God,I don't think he actually talked to a separate individual entity called God who rules this world with conscious thoughts, intentions and actions. God comes from his own mind. A person who never heard about God in his life may also hear such voices but the voice will probably introduce itself as somebody else but not God. (Because the word and the concept of God doesn't exist in his memory). Any such creation of mind, such as auditory and visual hallucination can be very vivid and seem very real but the information presented through these hallucinations will be always based on the information which is already stored in the memory or subconscious. It is possible to hear voices and see visuals in deep meditation or contemplation as well. This is exactly how Ramakrishna talked to Kali.

@Dan Arnautu Not at all... It is like fearing to travel in the road just because accidents happen..

@Dan Arnautu I am very skeptical about the claim that a metal can stop someone from leaving the body during Samadhi.. And, I have done some research on this topic and so far I haven't found anybody else other than Sadhguru saying something like this. Also, I did extensive research on whether it is common for people leaving the body during Samadhi or even enlightenment. Osho once said that about 90% of people leave the body on enlightenment. Sadhguru just repeats the same from Osho though he never mentions Osho at all (I am pretty sure that a lot of what Sadhguru says come from Osho. I have elaborated on this in my story here. ) But Osho once stated exactly the opposite when he talked about Vedanta. And he has openly admitted that he often contradicts himself, he is infallible and what he says may be factually incorrect but his main intention was to guide people on their awakening. Anyway, I was wondering if anybody else said that enlightenment and death happen at the same time for most of the people. I found a book by Lakshmanaswami (he says he got enlightened in the Ramana Mahirishi's presence) who says in that book that his disciple Saradama might have left her body during her enlightenment if he was not there to stop it. Also, Ramakrishna Paramhamsa used to say that a person leaves his body after being in Samadhi for 21 days in a row, unless that person knows how to come back from Samadhi. But when someone asked Ramana Mahirishi about this, he denied it. Just compare these two: By Ramakrishna: "When the Kundalini rises to the Sahasrara and the mind goes into samadhi, the aspirant loses all consciousness of the outer world. He can no longer retain his physical body. If milk is poured into his mouth, it runs out again. In that state the life-breath lingers for twenty-one days and then passes out. Entering the 'black waters' of the ocean, the ship never comes back. But the Isvarakotis, such as the Incarnations of God, can come down from this state of samadhi. They can descend from this exalted state because they like to live in the company of devotees and enjoy the love of God. God retains in them the 'ego of Knowledge' or the 'ego of Devotion' so that they may teach men. Their minds move between the sixth and the seventh planes. They run a boat-race back and forth, as it were, between these two planes. - The Gospel of ramakrishna volume 1 (Sunday, August 3, 1884) By Ramana Mahirishi: TALK 286: Seeker: Sri Ramakrishna says that nirvikalpa samadhi cannot last longer than twenty-one days. If persisted in, the person dies. Is it so? Ramana Mahirishi : When the prarabdha is exhausted the ego is completely dissolved without leaving any trace behind. This is final liberation. Unless prarabdha is completely exhausted the ego will be rising up in its pure form even in jivanmuktas. I still doubt the statement of the maximum duration of twenty-one days. It is said that people cannot live if they fast thirty or forty days. But there are those who have fasted longer, say a hundred days. It means that there is still prarabdha for them. Talk 391: Seeker: It is said that one remaining in nirvikalpa samadhi for 21 days must necessarily give up the physical body. Ramana Mahirishi: Samadhi means passing beyond dehatma buddhi (I-am-the-body idea) and non-identifcation of the body with the Self is a foregone conclusion. There are said to be persons who have been immersed in nirvikalpa samadhi for a thousand years or more. I also found the following verses from the scriptures: When the ego-sense gets completely dissolved, the body,the product of ego, gets disintegrated too. (Yogaśīkhopaniṣad, I.34) When the root-cause of Avidyā is destroyed, the body must perforce fall away. (Yoga-Vāsiṣṭha, III.92.6) ............................ My take on this after going through all this: Enlightened people are not scientists.. By this I mean they didn't conduct any extensive empirical research and find out such things. All they know about is their own experience, what they have seen in others and what they have read. So, nobody can say for sure that 90% of people leave the body during enlightenment. To state it as a fact, we must have enough statistics based on some empirical research. Also, it may not be really common for people to leave the body during Samadhi, it may have happened during a few instances because their bodies were extremely feeble. Since historically we have seen many enlightened people perfectly alive after enlightenment and after any intense Samadhi experiences, you really don't have to worry about this.

@Visitor wow, beautiful!

Recently, I became very curious about bridging science and enlightenment. So, I went through many articles, books, scientific papers etc that have addressed this subject so far and tried to create a synthesis. I put together everything in one article, citing all the sources. You can read it here: https://nellaishanmugam.wordpress.com/2017/06/13/is-there-a-scientific-evidence-for-spiritual-enlightenment/ It is very long one but I hope you enjoy it.

@Fidelio There are certain things a seeker will intuitively understand as he proceeds with the journey. He doesn't have to wait until enlightenment to know all those things... Even when you listen to a true Guru, you will intuitively understand what he says is true.. Eckhart Tolle talks about this as well. He says that when you hear something which is true, the truth in you will respond to it and say 'yes, this is true'. When I heard him saying, I could immediately resonate to it. I did go through a spiritual awakening three years ago. But I stopped seeing enlightenment as serving any purpose way long before that. Seeing enlightenment as a means to something is a trap. We don't have to make it very complicated. If you see enlightenment as a means to an end, thats fine for now. That is how every one has to start his journey.. There is nothing wrong in it. It is a part of the whole process. But slowly, as a person goes through his journey, he starts to crave for enlightenment. This is natural.. At one point in life, I wanted to 'be' enlightened at any cost. It was a life or death question.. But then I came across the perfect teaching I needed on time.. I heard 'You are already that, there is nothing to change, nothing to do, nowhere to go... '..I came across many teachings of Advaita. I also understood that the very desire that I have for enlightenment was actually delaying the whole thing. If I have heard this teaching when I started the journey, It would not have made any sense to me.. But it took another 6 years after I heard this teaching for me to go through a transformation.

@Anna1 As I was reading this thread, I couldn't stop laughing.... I am the one who is posting in the other forum in the name 'borris'...Leave the pure guy Prabhakar alone .. And thanks for making me laugh... The funniest joke I have come across after a long time...

@cetus56 Yes.. Even the intention to break the karmic bonds created suffering... But it is that intention that starts the spiritual seeking in the first place.. It is a paradox in spiritual life, but it is not a problem.. The Pali word for intention is 'Cetana', the most significant mental factor involved in the creation of karma.. Everyone starts spiritual seeking with an intention (to end suffering). But at one point, the whole spiritual seeking continues without the factor of intention..

@Fidelio I agree that initially the quest to end suffering is what motivates people to pursue spiritual enlightenment... But there comes a point where even the desire for enlightenment itself becomes a barrier to enlightenment... It is not a question of right or wrong... By logical reasoning, it is correct to say that the purpose of enlightenment is to end suffering.. If you read my reply again, what I said was about the 'attitude' one should have... Logically, It may be right to say that the purpose of enlightenment is to end suffering, but seeing enlightenment as a purpose for something is not really a right attitude to have.. At some point, you will have to stop seeing enlightenment as a means to an end.. I don't parrot anyone.. I speak from my own experience..

It is true that enlightenment ends 'suffering'.. But when it comes to spiritual path, certain attitude is required.. Seeing enlightenment as a means to an end will not work and it will actually delay one's enlightenment. If A causes B, it doesn't mean the purpose of A is to cause B... The word 'purpose' implies enlightenment is something that you achieve.. Purpose is only in a person's mind, it is tied with intention. Intention is tied with karma. Enlightenment is all about getting rid of karma.

One of the reasons for much of the suffering that we go through in life is taking life too seriously. It is not uncommon though; almost everyone is so serious about the drama of life. So, everyone has assumed that there is no way out of it. But, there is a potential for a change in your attitude towards life which will make you to treat life as the lifelong movie in which we all are just characters. There is also a potential to remove all the unwanted suffering that we have imposed on ourselves by removing the serious identification with the character called ‘you’ and your story.. I went through a journey myself that helped me to realize this potential and make it possible. (You can read more about my journey here: The Journey of a Seeker). I will call that whole process as ‘Awakening Through Mindfulness (ATM)’. If you believe in God, you can use the belief itself as an aid towards changing your attitude. Many people consider themselves as a puppet of the God’s hands. That helps them change the way they react to the situations and stop taking everything personal. But it is just a coping mechanism; No one is actually sitting up there and directing your life. Life and the force of the life itself is a deep and interesting mystery. If you want to call that force God, you can. That is a beautiful personification. Warning! For many people, beliefs have actually been a hindrance in the whole process. There is a way to really experience life as a movie and to be not affected by your self-image. You can completely detach yourself from the identification you have with the self image. .. Changing the attitude is the first step to ending the self created suffering and experience the life impersonally.. Your personality and your ego that projects the personality are just a part of the mask that you, as the character of this movie, are wearing. What hurts the mask doesn’t hurt you anymore, once you start experiencing life this way. Not only your ego and personality, but every thought, emotion, experience and knowledge that you witness in your consciousness is a part of that mask. Remembering this analogy of the mask and contemplating on it can help you to change your attitude to be favourable in the process of awakening. As you proceed with this journey, you will eventually have to drop a lot of your beliefs and directly choose to know what you believed is true or false. Then, either you know or you don’t know. There is no need in believing something. The sense of security that we get from beliefs will not at all be needed anymore once you start experiencing the life devoid of self-created suffering. You don’t need any solace from the beliefs anymore. That life experience which stands apart and independent from your identity is what I call as an ‘awakened life’. What you Call as Self is an Illusion! The next step is just to realize and remember always that there is no self; I am not kidding! It is a scientific fact. What you perceive, think and experience every moment is the result of millions of neurons in your brain communicating with the neighboring neurons through electrochemical signals. This constant perceptual activity gives an illusion that there is a static self. This self which is experienced as being the one who inhabits the body, being the one who is thinking the thoughts, being the one experiencing emotions, being the agent of actions and having free will is an illusion. Also, every person you see is a complex network of forces communicating with each other in cell level, chemical level and atomic level. 2500 years ago, a man called Gautama Buddha revealed the truth of the no-self for the first time. Seeing this in neuroscientific perspective, what you experience as you and your story is just a result of activity happens in a combination of brain structures called Default Mode Network DMN). This network is active when you are mind-wandering,thinking about others, thinking about yourself, remembering the past, and planning for the future. Hyperconnectivity of the default network has been linked to rumination in depression. Studies have shown that meditators and people who claim spiritual awakening have less or almost no activity in DMN. This illusory self is not consistent and static; it is ever changing. But the only thing which is consistent and constant throughout your life is your existence; the conscious, moment to moment experience that you are alive. Three Aspects of the Absolute Reality There are three aspects to what that is consistent: Existence, Consciousness and experiencing. Existence can be defined as whatever that exists in the ultimate, absolute level. You perceive and know that objects exist because of this. It is the sense of being alive.The objects may keep changing but the existence itself is something that is constant. It is not a ‘thing’ though. It is the basis of anything that is subjective. Consciousness is like a light that shines up everything in the existence. It can be compared to the light in a movie screen using which your thoughts, emotions, perceptions and experiences are constantly being played. The movie screen is static all the time. It also exists in sleep, but there is nothing to show. Since consciousness is completely dark and since voluntary functions of the mind are shut off, there is actually nothing much is happening that is worth to be recorded in the brain and stored in long term memory. Experiencing is not about various experiences that you go through every moment. It is the base of all experience, which is naturally peaceful. Peace is always the first and last experience of the lifetime. Even in death, the final moment is peace; a lot of scientists believe that a neurotransmitter called Dimethyltryptamine or DMT released in the brain during the last moment of death which gives peace and bliss. You are so peaceful during the birth too. You can obviously see that in the new born babies. Even throughout the life, you go through a lot of peaceful moments where you are ultimately content, all drives seem to be temporarily satisfied and you experience the ultimate peace and contentment. That peace is not really something that comes and goes. It is the subtle backdrop of all the noisy perceptions happening in the mind and never changes too. It is the base experience of all the experiences. An awakened person may often go through peak experiences (rare, exciting, oceanic, deeply moving, exhilarating, elevating experiences that generate an advanced form of perceiving reality, and are even mystic and magical in their effect upon the experimenter – Abraham Maslow) when they touch the ultimate level of peace. During peak experiences, the boundaries of experiencer, experiencing and the experience dissolve and they all become one. The same happens with the knowledge as well. The knower, knowing and the known become one. Note that, when I say experiencing, I am talking about the ‘experiencing’ aspect of your existence; not about an independent experience. Any experience, including the peak experience com and go. But the ‘experiencing’ part of that which is consistent never changes. It would be better to use a different word than experiencing but I can’t think of anything that comes closer right now. So, whatever that is consistent which has the aspects of existence, consciousness and experiencing can be called with any name you want to use. You can call it XYZ if you want! Some words that have been used in eastern traditions are absolute, Om, brahman, Sat-Chit-Ananda etc… Some call it as your ‘true self’. The problem with all these labels is that you start to see this XYZ as some object, a thing; Something that can be either perceived, experienced or known. But it is actually like the space or the field in which everything is perceived, experienced or known. So, it is very important to not to get too attached to the word. Seeing the illusory self for what it is and completely removing the identification with it lets you to relax yourself in the truth of being alive and conscious. It will eventually let you free from hedonic treadmill and the pursuit of subjective self worth. You will feel liberated from the prison of this illusory self. This will give you a tremendous acceptance of what is; You will see life as a game with its own rules and challenges. But seeing that as just a game which will eventually end, makes you to play it with enjoyment and a great sense of peace. Many practises have been suggested which help you to go through this process of awakening; self-inquiry, contemplation of the truth and so on. The practise that I can suggest for you is the one which worked for me.. It is called Sati in buddhism, Shikantaza in Zen, Shakshi bhav in Upanishads and mindfulness by buddhists as well as modern psychologists. Mindfulness is used not only as a path to awakening, but also in modern therapies as a means to decrease depression and stress, increase well being, control addictions, slow down emotional reactivity etc. What is Mindfulness and How to Practice it? Mindfulness can be defined as focused nonjudgmental attention to experiences of thoughts, emotions, and body sensation in the present moment that is practiced by simply observing them as they arise and pass away. The paper ‘Mindfulness: A Proposed Operational Definition’ which was published by University of Toronto in 2014 suggests a two-component model of mindfulness: 1) Regulation of attention in order to maintain it on the immediate experience 2) Approaching one’s experiences with an orientation of curiosity,openness, and acceptance, regardless of their valence and desirability. When you try to observe your thought process, you may lose your attention many times. Once you notice that the mind has wandered, you just bring it back to the awareness of thought process or body sensations again. No matter how many times the mind wanders away, you must take it easy and accept it. You can do this while doing whatever you are doing, like walking, eating, working out, waiting in a queue etc. Notice the flow of thoughts as if you are watching a stream flowing or traffic moving. Eventually you can extend the time that you practise mindfulness to most of the waking hours of the day. This may take years and years of practise. When practicing mindfulness, don’t approach it as if you are working towards a goal. That would simply mean that you are enhancing the self-concept and strengthening the identification with it .Awakening is not an achievement. It is getting rid of the craving for any achievement that increases your self-worth or enhances your self-concept. Seeing mindfulness as a means for something to be achieved itself is a trap which may slow down the process of awakening. In a couple of months of practise you may start noticing gaps in your thought process.You may also notice reduction in the number of thoughts. Also, a lot of unconscious patterns and repressed thoughts may start to come up and appear in the light of your conscious observation. It is quite normal. Just pay attention to whatever that comes up without reacting to it. But if you do react to it, that’s ok. Just notice that and wait to see what comes up next. As you do it more and more, the gaps will be more frequent and you may even start to wait for the next thought or feeling to arise. In a few months, you will start to feel more peaceful and relaxed. Your emotional regulation would also have improved. While practising, become aware of the defense mechanisms of the ego whenever you notice them. Notice the repeated thought patterns and your attempts to maintain and protect your self-esteem. Reading the authentic sources of Zen and Advaita can help you a lot in moving through the process. Personally for me, reading the transcribed talks of Osho and J.Krishnamurti were helpful in understanding how mindfulness works and how to go about practising it. Osho called it ‘witnessing’ and J.Krishnamurti called it as ‘Choiceless awareness’. The names are different but the meaning is exactly the same. Once you have practised mindfulness for long term for a year or two, you may go through a crisis at times, usually called ‘Spiritual Crisis,’ a form of identity crisis where you experience drastic changes to your meaning system (your unique purposes, goals, values, attitude and beliefs, identity, and focus). It may cause a lot of disturbance, but don’t be alarmed. It happens to everyone but it will pass. The fruits of mindfulness always outweighs the disturbances caused by spiritual crisis. Benefits of Mindfulness I came across an interesting paper ‘How Does Mindfulness Meditation Work? Proposing Mechanisms of Action From a Conceptual and Neural Perspective’ published in 2011 by Association For Psychological Science. It lists 5 major benefits of mindfulness and also lists the details of studies which support them. Here are those five benefits: Attention regulation Body awareness Emotion regulation, including a. Reappraisal b. Exposure, extinction, and reconsolidation Change in perspective on the self. The fourth one, ‘Change in perspective on the self’ is very important, which explains in detail about a lot of what we discussed about ‘Self’ in this post. You can search for this paper in ‘Academia’ and download it for free. There have been many other studies done on mindfulness which show that mindfulness decreases suffering and increases subjective well being. Buddha prescribed mindfulness as the path to spiritual enlightenment. Whether you are looking for spiritual enlightenment or just improved well being, there is no doubt that mindfulness is the way to go. Also published in my blog: https://nellaishanmugam.wordpress.com/2017/05/26/awakening-through-mindfulness-bridging-science-and-spirituality/

@username yes, pretty much.. thanks for correcting.. I still have to work on the language

In my own experience, It took many years to completely unclutch myself from the identification with self.. There are a lot of unconscious patterns, old habits and unresolved issues which have to be worked on... But neo-advaita doesn't address any of these issues... It is not a practical solution to the problem we have on realizing our true nature. It is true that our true nature is accessible for anyone at this very moment, but a lot has to be done in order to remove whatever that is obscuring it. It is very tricky when we put these things in words because my last statement says that a lot of things to be 'done' in order to be enlightened, but enlightenment itself has to do with annihilation of the sense of a doer. To put it simply, Until you have lost the feeling that you are the doer,, you need to do something... Does it make sense?