Not Thought

[Xpansion]

I'm not sure about anyone else but I'm always a bit baffled when I read of people who have begun meditating and are amazed to discover they are "not their thoughts"   This doesn't seem profound or insightful to me because I never even thought that in the first place. I don't understand how it's possible to think you are your thoughts. A thought is just a thought. How can you think you are one?

[ajasatya]

@Xpansion it's not that people think that they're thoughts. they just find themselves being victims of thoughts and meditation teaches them to detach from the train of thought. so they go like "wow, i've been suffering because of thoughts all this time but i didn't notice they're just thoughts".

[Leo Gura]

@Xpansion So then what are you?

Do you realize yet that whatever you think you are, that's a thought!

[cetus]

A dream dreaming of being awake and realizing it's all just a dream.

A dream state perpetuated by thought.

Edited October 19, 2016 by cetus56

[Xpansion]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

@Xpansion So then what are you?

Do you realize yet that whatever you think you are, that's a thought!

Q1 I don't know the answer to that and never will while I'm living in this mind/body organism but according to the Buddhists the sense of I or self is an illusion created by the 5 skandhas.   Beyond that all there is is emptiness.  I prefer to keep an open mind about it. I think it's a mistake to think you know all the answers. 

Q2 yes I do

Edited October 19, 2016 by Xpansion

[Xpansion]

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1 hour ago, iago iriarte arhatha said:

@Xpansion it's not that people think that they're thoughts. they just find themselves being victims of thoughts and meditation teaches them to detach from the train of thought. so they go like "wow, i've been suffering because of thoughts all this time but i didn't notice they're just thoughts".

No I keep reading people saying that they literally  realised that they aren't their thoughts. Maybe they are just explaining it poorly. 

[Leo Gura]

@Xpansion So in other words.... you can -- with lots of careful investigation and hard work -- one day discover that you're not your thoughts

[Xpansion]

12 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@Xpansion So in other words.... you can -- with lots of careful investigation and hard work -- one day discover that you're not your thoughts

I dont get your point. I already know this.  

[Leo Gura]

7 hours ago, Xpansion said:

This doesn't seem profound or insightful to me because I never even thought that in the first place. I don't understand how it's possible to think you are your thoughts.

Read your own question above.

Cause apparently you don't know it yet.

You THINK you know it. But you're not conscious that that's just another thought.

[Xpansion]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

Read your own question above.

Cause apparently you don't know it yet.

You THINK you know it. But you're not conscious that that's just another thought.

Um yeah I am. I already told you that before.  You asked me  "Do you realize yet that whatever you think you are, that's a thought" and I told you yes I do.

[Dodo]

1 hour ago, Xpansion said:

Um yeah I am. I already told you that before.  You asked me  "Do you realize yet that whatever you think you are, that's a thought" and I told you yes I do.

You're arguing with yourself i think.

Or you've always known that you dont know who you are? Sorry if i was assuming too quickly.

Ps: do you see how its easy, though, for people to think they know who they are and believe they are that (thought.)

Edited October 20, 2016 by Dodoster

[Xpansion]

1 hour ago, Dodoster said:

You're arguing with yourself i think.

Or you've always known that you dont know who you are? Sorry if i was assuming too quickly.

Ps: do you see how its easy, though, for people to think they know who they are and believe they are that (thought.)

Yes I do understand how easy it is for people to not understand what they are but I guess not as far as being thought. My understanding of self is aligned with what Buddha taught on Annatta and the 5 skandhas or aggregates.  It has been a subtle and slow change of perspective over the last 5 years for me. When I first started to take my practice more seriously I couldn't grasp it at all but it makes perfect sense to me now. Having said that I have never seen thought as who I am. Perhaps I once identified with the mind more but I always saw thought as something happening in the mind and not mind itself. Now I identify with neither.