The Gate

Hello Tintu,

In actual experience are there objects “hidden behind the hand”?

in Actual experience, only the "color of the hand" is seen. there is no hidden object in actual experience except the logical inference.
(The thought that if I move my hand out I would see the object would prove that the object existed when my hand covers the object is an inference). in case of a fan by my bedside which generated sound while hiding with the hand, I could see the color and hear the sound.

Lovely – nice looking! Thought either points to actual experience or to thoughts about AE and/or thoughts about thought.

Let’s say, for example, that the object ‘hidden by the hand’ is the TV remote. So in that moment the colour labelled ‘TV remote’ is not AE, there are only thoughts about a TV remote that are appearing – so ‘TV remote’ it is imaginary/story. When ‘hand’ moves, colour labelled ‘TV remote’ is seen…then the AE of COLOUR labelled ‘TV remote’ is the actual experience and is not imaginary. Can you see the difference?

I want you to pretend that everything that your ‘mind is thinking’ ie EVERY thought that arises is being spoken out loud by a person following you around.
Let me know how you go and what you noticed.

Thoughts come to awareness and then can be repeated. This means that I cannot repeat the content until the awareness of content takes place.

And how is this known that you are going to repeat the content, until the content starts to be repeated?

There are thoughts which arise out of nowhere (which feels completely out of control) and there are thoughts which seems to be self-driven (similar to start thinking about it, say asking a question how am I seeing, I am i thinking now etc).

And from where did you go to retrieve the thoughts that are “self-driven”? ) Describe in detail, the process by which you create a thought, or make a choice of which thought you are going to choose. You have been doing it all your life apparently - so you must know exactly how you do it. So how do you do it? How do you create a thought? How do you think?

while traveling in a train to work, noticing the trees and lakes, there seems to be a time of no thought (as if some knowledge of the trees and lakes are already there).

Look again and see if thought comes in after ‘trees and lakes’ are seen. If no thought appeared in that moment, how could it possibly be known that there was an inference were trees and a lake? Where can an inferring thought possibly hide?

I am not even sure whether the labeling works faster than I can perceive or is it that there are no thoughts. but the feeling of seeing something new which is never seen before (or nothing to compare against) and seeing of something which is seen before is different, leading me to speculate that there may be some kind of pre-perceptive comparison going on.

Without thought, how is this known?

I came back home and sat in a quiet place for sometimes. in that environment thoughts are very rare and when looking for thoughts one forgets oneself, and even become aware of the prolonged silence only after I am out of that silence ( maybe that in silence one does not even understand that they are in silence). not even sure whether this is some kind of sleep :-).

Without thought, how is it known that the silence is silence or that the gap is a gap?

I am not sure what is the intention of this exercise. but I could manage to do only a few times to repeat what is conceived as thought.

The intention of the exercise is to become aware of thoughts and how they appear, how they sound, what they say….just to become aware of all thoughts. We will look further at thought in the next post

Kay

Hi Kay

Let’s say, for example, that the object ‘hidden by the hand’ is the TV remote. So in that moment the colour labelled ‘TV remote’ is not AE, there are only thoughts about a TV remote that are appearing – so ‘TV remote’ it is imaginary/story. When ‘hand’ moves, colour labelled ‘TV remote’ is seen…then the AE of COLOUR labelled ‘TV remote’ is the actual experience and is not imaginary. Can you see the difference?

Yes, I can see that when direct sensory experience does not involve the color of the TV Remote when hidden by hand, yet thought actually infer and take it for granted.because of habit, the inference becomes faster and faster to a point where the inference seems almost instantaneous. I also noticed that when the hand is removed there is a sense of actuality to the object, and if I want to know the minute details of the object, I always need to look at it rather than think about it ( such as a painter look at a real leaf to draw it).

Look again and see if thought comes in after ‘trees and lakes’ are seen. If no thought appeared in that moment, how could it possibly be known that there was an inference were trees and a lake?

I am finding it a bit difficult to see how exactly the labeling works. many a time I am wondering whether I am really naming or not. sometimes it is clearly seen that there is a naming/labelling take place. but sometimes it is not clear. for example, I have again looked at the "lakes and trees", when the whole is looked together there is no recognizable naming, because of the beauty of the surrounding the eye is not fixated in one object or the another. The thought that it is beautiful comes somewhere later and then the naming starts again. I noticed that less beautiful things are named more regularly ( certain building, garages etc). I am thinking whether the thought involves only language and images or something more?. my idea was that without language and images it is not possible to think. I also tried to see how i recognize man and women. how instantaneously I see that a person is women or man from their attributes ( not sure whether i am naming or not). but logically something (thought) has to take place to convert an image to a concept of man and women. hmm, a bit puzzled :-).

Where can an inferring thought possibly hide?

Nice question. alas, I do not know the answer. my immediate response was that "it might be hiding in the inference" itself.

I will continue with the rest of the questions and will come back to you.
Thanks
Tintu

And how is this known that you are going to repeat the content until the content starts to be repeated?

Yes, Good one. it is not possible to understand that it is repeated until the content is repeated ( The recognition of repetition happens later). Looking in similar directions it seems that there is an intention to repeat and then when it repeats itself thought seem to associate the fact that there was an intention and there is a repetition and hence a willful act.

Without thought, how is it known that the silence is silence or that the gap is a gap?

The idea that there is a thought about gap or silence (due to the lack of a word which is something not known or not experienced before) appear afterward indicate that there was an activity of thought before?. it seems that it is possible for thought to express things which are unknown to thoughts are mapped to what is known to it. if this is not true then I think I am thinking all the time.

And from where did you go to retrieve the thoughts that are “self-driven”? ) Describe in detail, the process by which you create a thought, or make a choice of which thought you are going to choose. You have been doing it all your life apparently - so you must know exactly how you do it. So how do you do it? How do you create a thought? How do you think?

I do not think i have control over the thought process. if I look for a solution or try to solve a problem, I "wait" until a solution or relation appears. Actually, as i noticed before the intention/desire to solve/repeat/do something and then seeing that it happens to point to the possibility that it could be owned by self. it is not possible to create thought, it seems thinking just happens ( I become aware of thoughts, not created by the self, not chosen by self).

How do you think

I cannot say much about it except the fact that I earn a living with it :-).
This is how I seem to solve a problem, I have a problem whch need to be solved.
I put that question. give space and time. some thoughts pop up and some of them may suggest a relation of two more thoughts. from that, an idea of how the problem can be solved is derived (another thought). it is sometimes like an insight ( in cartoons it is often depicted as a light bulb suddenly lit up). The whole process seems to suggest that I have solved the problem but in fact, it is not the case.

Hello Tintu,

And how is this known that you are going to repeat the content until the content starts to be repeated?

Yes, Good one. it is not possible to understand that it is repeated until the content is repeated ( The recognition of repetition happens later). Looking in similar directions it seems that there is an intention to repeat and then when it repeats itself thought seem to associate the fact that there was an intention and there is a repetition and hence a willful act.

Intentions are thought form, a thought to do something. Intentions arrive like thoughts arrive.

Without thought, how is it known that the silence is silence or that the gap is a gap?

The idea that there is a thought about gap or silence (due to the lack of a word which is something not known or not experienced before) appear afterward indicate that there was an activity of thought before?. it seems that it is possible for thought to express things which are unknown to thoughts are mapped to what is known to it. if this is not true then I think I am thinking all the time.

Have you ever looked at thought? Really looked at it? Does thought have a voice? Does thought have sound? Does thought have an image? Does thought have a sensation? Does thought have a taste? Does thought have a smell? Does thought have a thought? Can you describe a thought?

And from where did you go to retrieve the thoughts that are “self-driven”? ) Describe in detail, the process by which you create a thought, or make a choice of which thought you are going to choose. You have been doing it all your life apparently - so you must know exactly how you do it. So how do you do it? How do you create a thought? How do you think?

I do not think i have control over the thought process. if I look for a solution or try to solve a problem, I "wait" until a solution or relation appears. Actually, as i noticed before the intention/desire to solve/repeat/do something and then seeing that it happens to point to the possibility that it could be owned by self. it is not possible to create thought, it seems thinking just happens ( I become aware of thoughts, not created by the self, not chosen by self).

Yes, thinking just happens…or more so, thoughts just appear. Thinking is not the best tool for this exploration, looking is and the best way to look with thoughts is to simply observe them, as if you are a bystander observing another – just like the exercise was about…to pretend that everything that your ‘mind is thinking’ ie EVERY thought that arises is being spoken out loud by a person following you around.

How do you think

I cannot say much about it except the fact that I earn a living with it :-).
This is how I seem to solve a problem, I have a problem whch need to be solved.
I put that question. give space and time. some thoughts pop up and some of them may suggest a relation of two more thoughts. from that, an idea of how the problem can be solved is derived (another thought). it is sometimes like an insight ( in cartoons it is often depicted as a light bulb suddenly lit up). The whole process seems to suggest that I have solved the problem but in fact, it is not the case.

Yes, exactly. So here is another thought exercise to help you with more insights about the nature of thought.

Here is a thought exercise. Look carefully when doing this exercise and do it several times if necessary. Please answer each question individually.

Sit quietly for about 30 minutes and notice the arising thoughts. Just let them appear as they appear. Try your best to COMPLETELY ignore what they are saying and just notice how they appear, without you doing anything at all.

Where are they coming from and going to?

Did you do anything to make a particular thought or thoughts appear?
Could you have done anything to make a different thought appear at that exact moment instead?
Can you predict your next thought?

Can you select from a range of thoughts to have only pleasant thoughts?
Can you choose not to have painful, negative or fearful thoughts?
Can you pick and choose any kind of thought?
Is it possible to prevent a thought from appearing?
Can you stop thinking a thought in the middle?

It seems that thought has some logical ordered appearance, but look carefully and just notice if there is an organised sequence. Or is it just another thought that says ‘these thoughts are in sequence’ or “they take content from previous thought”, or that "one thought follows another thought"?

Kay

Hi Kay,

Have you ever looked at thought? Really looked at it? Does thought have a voice? Does thought have sound? Does thought have an image? Does thought have a sensation? Does thought have a taste? Does thought have a smell? Does thought have a thought? Can you describe a thought?

Thank you for the question. I took it for granted that this has to be words and images ( consequently made a conclusion that if I am not becoming aware of words, I am not thinking). I "thought" that I cannot think without words (language) and images. it is clear that I can only be "aware"( which itself is a word similar to thought, almost indescribable) of the "thing" called thought and its contents (which means that it cannot be perceived by any senses ( to see, to hear, to taste, to smell etc) and the description like inner chatter or self-talk is a misnomer). it still feels that the content of the thoughts are either appearing in language or is translated into words/images. not quite sure about it. otherwise it would be difficult to know whether i am having thoughts or not. whether thought has a sensation associated with is a harder question, as it seems as if the content of the thought and the sensation are related. but it can be seen that they are separate and the sensation happens immediately after a thought (say fear after a thought) does not mean sensation is happened due to thought or the other way around (thought followed by physical pain).
This question begs another question, if I do not recognize the words and images pointed ( made aware) by the "thing/no-thing" called thought, how do I know that I am thinking?

I will continue with the "thought" experiments further and report back later.

Hello Tintu...loved your post...will respond when you have done the thought exercise. Nice going though! :)

Kay

Hi Kay,

The Questions about thoughts took some time. As "I" do not want to rush on this.
"I" wanted to see each question as new instead of answering from previous experience/memory etc.

Where are they coming from and going to?

They come from somewhere unknown and goes back to somewhere unknown.

Did you do anything to make a particular thought or thoughts appear?

There seems to be no way to do this.

Could you have done anything to make a different thought appear at that exact moment instead?

"I" cannot do this, as the choice of the "replacing thought" itself is not done by "me".

Can you predict your next thought?

This seems to be not possible.

Can you select from a range of thoughts to have only pleasant thoughts?

No, sometimes it is the other way around, the moment i "wish" to think about pleasant thought, an unpleasant thought surfaces.

Can you choose not to have painful, negative or fearful thoughts?

No, sometimes it is the other way around, the moment i "wish" to avoid negative, fearful or painful thoughts, exactly the same surfaces.

Can you pick and choose any kind of thought?

No

Is it possible to prevent a thought from appearing?

No

Can you stop thinking a thought in the middle?

interesting one. a thought is seen only when the content appears ( or the word thought is an abstraction of its content).
There are times where I got involved in a thought (content of thought), and the realization that I was "inside" another thought came only after I am out of it.so it is not possible to stop thinking in the middle. There are cases of daydreaming where I ride a continuous thought wave so to speak, broken by a sudden breaking bus or announcement from train etc.
This happens by itself and not a willful act by self.

It seems that thought has some logical ordered appearance, but look carefully and just notice if there is an organised sequence. Or is it just another thought that says ‘these thoughts are in sequence’ or “they take content from previous thought”, or that "one thought follows another thought"?

I do not see that one thought follows the other. somehow It never occurred to me that one thought follows the other.
so I do not see an organized sequence.
However, when one studies a subject (a system of thoughts), it seems as if that is added to the collection of thoughts which can possibly recur. when looking at the recurring thoughts I have, they are not as dramatic as some of the thoughts which appear out of nowhere and leave no clue as to how I got there.

There is seems to be a pattern with certain kind of thoughts, especially when associated with things which are known. say for example seeing a person whom I already know (creates a pattern of recurrence (may be affection, anger, hatred, love, or fear when seeing a snake etc.)). There are also daily patterns of behavior
such as brushing everyday/going to office, pointing that there is a recurrence of thought. this is to say they are not entirely random, but entirely random thoughts occurs too. This also does not mean that the recurrence thoughts are created by someone/somebody, but seems to be the nature of it. This does not necessitate a self as other natural phenomena are recurrent as well. Also, it is noticed that when looking for specific memories, say childhood (the thought appeared its own), but then vitalize a series of childhood thoughts, not in any specific order. It is also noticed that a group of thoughts specific to "me" repeats daily.

Thanks
Tintu

Hi Kay,

I was also thinking about this. "how do I know that I am thinking" and following exercise.

Sit quietly for about 30 minutes and notice the arising thoughts. Just let them appear as they appear. Try your best to COMPLETELY ignore what they are saying and just notice how they appear, without you doing anything at all

it occurred to me that the thought is recognized as thought only when the content is noticed, if that is the case then can we Ignore the content of thoughts at all?. do "I" have a choice to ignore this? can I possibly choose not to involve in a thought?

at that moment it seemed to me that if the above statements need to be at least logically valid, then "I" cannot possibly exist :-).

it felt like an insight(I really do not know the difference between a thought and insight, but to express what I felt I used that word, maybe it is just another thought :-)), but if it is not the case please point out.

Thanks
Tintu

Good morning Tintu,

The Questions about thoughts took some time. As "I" do not want to rush on this.
"I" wanted to see each question as new instead of answering from previous experience/memory etc.

You have done some wonderful looking and thank you for doing that. It benefits you greatly to see clearly what is being pointed at, rather than rushing through it as if there is some finish line to get to.

Can you stop thinking a thought in the middle?

interesting one. a thought is seen only when the content appears ( or the word thought is an abstraction of its content).

I don’t quite follow what you mean by “a thought is seen only when the content appears”. Can you give me an example please?

There are times where I got involved in a thought (content of thought), and the realization that I was "inside" another thought came only after I am out of it.so it is not possible to stop thinking in the middle. There are cases of daydreaming where I ride a continuous thought wave so to speak, broken by a sudden breaking bus or announcement from train etc.
This happens by itself and not a willful act by self.

Yes. There is no ‘you’ who can control where focus/attention is placed.

Close your eyes and sit quietly for 10-15 minutes.
Watch what focus does.
Focus on focussing, attention itself.

Do you move it, or it moves by itself?
Hold focus on breath - see how it moves to thoughts, sensations, feelings, sounds.
Is this something you control?
What moves attention?
Is thought in control of attention?

I was also thinking about this. "how do I know that I am thinking" and following exercise.
Sit quietly for about 30 minutes and notice the arising thoughts. Just let them appear as they appear. Try your best to COMPLETELY ignore what they are saying and just notice how they appear, without you doing anything at all

it occurred to me that the thought is recognized as thought only when the content is noticed, if that is the case then can we Ignore the content of thoughts at all?. do "I" have a choice to ignore this? can I possibly choose not to involve in a thought?

The content of thought is more thought and it is these thoughts that give rise to the idea that thoughts have some sort of sequential order. As I wrote above, I am not sure what you mean by ““a thought is seen only when the content appears” and I don’t know what you mean when you write “thought is recognized as thought only when the content is noticed”.

The thought “I still believe that I am a “me” arises. So the thought is actual experience of thought. And other thoughts that arise with that thought about that thought are the content of that thought. Another example “I am not good enough" is the thought. The ensuing thoughts of what that means is the content. So the content of thought is simply further thought. You seem to be differentiating the content of thought with something else and I am not sure what…so can you please explain what you are actually referring to.

Kay

Hi Key,

Thanks again for the question.
I am not trying to do a theoretical discussion as this is actually important to see whether I have a false idea about thinking itself.It would be nice if I can clear some misunderstanding about one of the basic things in life called thought :-). I see a lot of "taken for granted"/ default thinking about thought itself. maybe they are not facts and artifacts of "my" imagination.

The thought “I still believe that I am a “me” arises. So the thought is actual experience of thought. And other thoughts that arise with that thought about that thought are the content of that thought. Another example “I am not good enough" is the thought. The ensuing thoughts of what that means is the content. So the content of thought is simply further thought. You seem to be differentiating the content of thought with something else and I am not sure what…so can you please explain what you are actually referring to.

I think the terminology "content of a thought" is understood and interpreted in a different/wrong way by "me".
somehow it did not occur to me naturally that there is a main thought in the beginning, and then a number of related thoughts related to the main thought.
This leads me to think that there is a way to know "thought arises" without "understanding what the thought says".

In the example given by you, There is a primary thought and a number of secondary thoughts and the description seems to say that the primary thought is the thought and the secondary thoughts are the content of the thoughts.
but if I look in "my" thoughts, I do not see a continuity like that.
I see that when i think about "I am not good enough", I may have a group of related thoughts in some unspecified order,
but also other thoughts completely unrelated to this can come up and become another primary thought?.
for me it looks each thought is completely unpredictable. There can be cases of related thoughts, but what pops up at what time is unpredictable.

There was a question as to how one would be able to recognize a thought. How do I know that I am thinking?.
I looked to see how I recognize a thought and what I see is that until the content is revealed, I do not recognize that I am having a thought.
for example, A thought suddenly arises "I am not good enough”. The recognition that "I am not good enough" is a thought occurs only after the content ("I am not good enough") is fully seen. This means that I cannot say I am thinking until I see this specific content completely.
in other words, the idea that I am having a thought is an afterthought after the content is fully revealed.
This also means that the recognition is absent, when thoughts are "unconscious" (say there is no verbalization of the thought, but logically it can be seen that thought is required, for example looking at the traffic without recognizing individual cars, looking at a group of trees without any verbalization which leads to the detection of a thought process.)

maybe this is self-evident for others. but I struggle to find out whether I am thinking or not (again how do i know that I am having a thought)
without verbalization can I Suppose that I am not thinking or is it that "unconscious" thinking is going on?.
in "my" observation, I see times where I verbalize and clearly distinguish "verbalized" thoughts.
but then there are cases where I do not verbalize at all, but difficult to imagine that I am not thinking (for example differentiating a man from women,this happens as if there is no verbalized thought process involved at all, but from an actual experience perspective it is just color and I have no idea where and how this thought takes place and hence decided to theorize it as "unconscious" thoughts).

Maybe if you answer how one recognizes ones thinking, what is a thought ( is it the verbalization of the content?).
if it is something indescribable how do we recognize it as thought?.
how do we differentiate between thinking and not thinking?

I will reply about the Attention exercise soon.

Thanks
Tintu

Hi Kay,

please see the responses from the attention exercise.

Do you move it, or it moves by itself?
Hold focus on breath - see how it moves to thoughts, sensations, feelings, sounds.

Attention switches from one to another, from sound to thoughts to sensation without any involvement from me.
it moves by itself. even trying to force attention on something is also of not much help (almost like keeping an ua ninterested kid in classroom with a cane).
This is also true for inattention, it also not possible to willfully not attend something.
I cannot not understand what is heard etc.

Is this something you control?

This is not in my control.

What moves attention?

it is unknown to me what moves the attention, it seems that what i think as interesting attention stick to all of them.
if i listen to sounds carefully, there are so may sounds in a moving train (chatter of so many different people, sound of the train, wind etc etc)
normally attention goes to things which you are interested in, leaving the whole lot of other sounds as uninteresting.
but if I look bit more closely, it seems that attention attends to even things which are not interesting to "me", but somehow filtered by thoughts.eventually it seems as if i have only listened to few things i remember later.

Is thought in control of attention?

In the beginning I was thinking, what is attention, what does it mean to attend?, is it a form of thought saying I need to attend.
it seems to me that attention as in hearing, where thoughts are listened to is different from thinking.
sometime Attention can be quite interesting (complete Attention to the TableTennis ball while playing TableTennis, there seems to be only ball and the player does not exist, and the moment the player is aware of this the possibility for him to loose a point is much higher).
Thought as in self-willed thought is not in control of attention.
As trying forcefully to attend something does not work (the act of trying to listen hard actually hinders listening, the best listening happens when the listener is absent (completely immersed in what is heard)).
but interest and attention are seemingly connected. where there is interest attention happens.

Thanks
Tintu

Hello Tintu,

If I were to say the word 'flower'....what thoughts come up about flowers?

Kay

Hi Kay,

If I were to say the word 'flower'....what thoughts come up about flowers?

When i look at the word 'flower' an image of a flower is seen. When i try again a series of images of flowers is seen( not distinctively but as a series of images moving past). I tried with number of words to see how it goes.
Say words close to my heart like 'mother' or 'grandmother' generated much more images involving them. similar is the case with 'sea' ,'school','childhood' etc.

Thanks
Tintu

Where does the idea come from that thoughts are only images? The 'voice in the head' are thoughts. Images appear at times, but all that you have been writing, all that you think you think are thoughts!

Please tell me in your own words, what a rose is. Put AE aside for this and tell me what you know about a rose.

Kay

Hi Kay,
Sorry I think i did n't make it clear.
The quirk is that when i think myself such as 'voice in my head' or 'inner-chatter thought 'appears' mostly as words . When i hear or when someone else tell me a word, it appears mostly as images. I do not know whether words and images are the only means of recognizing a thought as thought. ofcourse i agree that what i am writing,what i have written and all these experiments involve huge amount of thoughts.

I do not know much about a rose. I recognize a pattern of petals which i call as rose. And when the color is different the rose is known in variouse names (red, white, rose etc). when it looks like a rose (which i previously seen and remember) then i call the new flower a rose.

Thanks
Tintu