This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Nothing Extra; Insight (31) Mine Without Craving. It likely contains inaccuracies.
The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.
Hello, welcome to our virtual meditation hall broadcast from this wonderful room here, the meditation hall at Insight Meditation Center.
As we begin this meditation today, I’d like to offer you the principle that what we’re looking for in mindfulness meditation is to be aware of what’s happening. In the simplest of terms, to not add anything extra. And if we add anything extra, to know that in the simplest terms, not building and adding more on top of that.
So what can be extra to the simplicity of sitting in meditation? That’s not really needed, it’s not inherent in the meditation during this time at this place, is to think about the future, to think about the past, to go off into fantasy. What’s extra is to spend time judging oneself or the meditation and get wrapped into that. What’s extra is to try to make something happen, to be goal-oriented, like if I do these steps one, two, three, then this will happen. It’s okay to sit down with a sense of purpose and maybe even a goal, but once we sit down, the radical simplicity is just to be here with this experience in the simplest terms.
So to center yourself on the breathing, and it’s just breath. It’s just breathing. It’s not comparing yourself to another breath that you had in the past. It’s not holding that breath accountable to some ideal standard you have. It’s not even needing to judge the breath. “Oh, that breath was too short. That was too long.”
This also applies to the mindfulness practice itself. Maybe the mindfulness is not very strong. A simple way of being is, “Oh, the mindfulness is not strong right now.” Keep it that simple. Don’t recognize that mindfulness is not strong and then say, “Wow, maybe I shouldn’t be meditating now. I need to try harder. I’m a lousy meditator. Maybe I should try doing loving-kindness instead.” To some degree, those kinds of reflections can be useful. But for this meditation, I’d like to encourage you to discover what it’s like to have a radical simplicity with nothing extra added on top of the experience, the simplicity of the experience. Maybe we can even call it the pristine simplicity of each thing in and of itself, free of any comparisons to anything else, without the extra of a past and future. Just this, at this moment, arising and passing, being here.
So to assume a meditation posture, finding a comfortable, alert posture that you can hold for these minutes that we’re meditating is part of finding this simplicity, simplicity of body. Not needing to move the body, or not needing to move it much, only if it’s a real need.
And as a movement towards simplicity, for some of us, it might be to close the eyes, so the eyes don’t have to be involved in seeing.
A movement towards simplicity is to relax the body. Tension represents how we add something extra to the present moment.
On the exhale, softening the muscles of the face.
On the exhale, softening, relaxing the shoulders. Sometimes a small adjustment to where the hands are can make more room for the shoulders to relax. Maybe if you have your hands on your knees, your thighs, bringing the hands back a little bit, an inch or so towards your hips. Does that help the shoulders to relax?
Softening the belly.
And then the primary place where we add something extra is through our thinking, through our reacting. And to relax the thinking mind, soften the tension and contraction associated with thinking.
And then lowering yourself into your body like you’re lowering yourself into a comfortable pool of water. Lowering yourself down to where you experience the breathing, the physical sensations of breathing. Maybe the movements of the chest or the belly.
And maybe there are slight ways as you inhale you can relax around the inhale. On the exhale, relaxing around the sensations of exhale.
And then noticing the breathing body in its simplest possible way, as simple as possible for you. Allowing the inhale to just be the inhale. No need to associate it with anything else, including meditation, or associate it with accomplishing something. Allowing the exhale to be known in its simplicity.
In whatever way that you’re knowing, sensing, feeling, breathing, or any other experience, know it, feel it as if you’re adding the word “just.” Just knowing. Just feeling. Nothing extra.
Letting go of what you’re thinking for a few moments. Resting in the simplicity of being present in your body. The present moment simplicity of a single breath.
And notice if there’s anything extra that has to do with how you define yourself, think about yourself, judge yourself, are concerned about things having to do with yourself. In the radical simplicity of the moment in the meditation, there’s no need to be thinking thoughts of self-concern. No need for self-referencing in the simplicity of the moment. Can you notice how that’s extra, not needed?
It’s enough for the next few minutes to be living intimate with the simplicity of the body, of breathing, of being here.
And then as we come to the end of the sitting, take a few moments to appreciate whatever way you can sense, feel, understand the benefits, the pleasure, the peace of not adding anything extra on top of this moment, in addition to this moment. Even if you can’t do it, can you have a feeling, an intuition, an understanding of the goodness of being, resting with the simplicity of now, here, and not stirring up here and now with self-preoccupation? Where the simplicity of being is not overlaid with self-concern, self-preoccupation.
So the heart is open, the gaze is open to see others with a different kind of clarity, to see others without a lot of extra that we add on top of it. We don’t have to automatically add memories, ideas, judgments, to see the pristine simplicity of each person. Meaning seeing people without putting extra on top of it.
And with the eyes of seeing in such a simple way, a clear way, wishing others well.
May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.
Thank you.
So hello and welcome to this Monday where we’re continuing a longer series on insight, what the meaning of insight is in insight meditation. And the core meaning has to do with having three profound observations, three profound ways of seeing deeply into our experience that are called insights. The one we’re focusing on right now is the insight into not-self, which is so easy to get more complicated than it needs to be because the self is a hugely important topic for most people who have one, who have some sense that they exist as a unique individual who is somewhat autonomous and makes choices for yourself.
So I want to continue as we get closer and closer to the core idea of the insight into not-self, is to take a little different tack the next few days, and that is to emphasize how much extra we add on top of self. So I don’t want to posit that there is a self or there is not a self right now. But what I want to do is to emphasize that even if there is a self, even if there isn’t a self, there are layers and layers of extra ideas and reactions that come with having these opinions, having these ideas that there is a self or there is not a self. There might be innocent ways of understanding that, but most of us are not so innocent because we pile things on top.
It’s a little bit like if you’re going for a backpacking trip, or maybe a long day hike, and you would like to travel as light as you can. You try not to take anything extra with you. Any extra weight puts more stress, makes it more difficult. So you try to reduce anything that’s extra. There are some people who do thru-hikes, it’s called, who go for long days, maybe months at a time backpacking, and they’ve managed to buy the lightest possible backpacking gear. They really try to reduce their weight radically; the ounces count as they sort through this.
So imagine that instead of that, you feel like you need to bring everything along for all possible contingents, maybe even for a two-hour hike in the mountains on a clear, nice day. And so you bring a few suitcases with you with your raincoats and your rain boots and umbrellas, and maybe you should have a sleeping bag and extra food and lots of water because who knows what’s going to happen. And so you’re carrying four different suitcases, and after a while, you realize that’s too heavy. But what you do is you carry two for a while, you go back to get the other two, and you bring them along. And you’re kind of going along with all this, but the suitcases are, you know, each suitcase is maybe 50-60 pounds, and you’re trying to make your way on a nice little two-hour hike in a nice park where there are lots of people and the roads are nearby and you can easily get out. All that stuff is not needed.
In fact, to be able to go on a hike and put aside ideas of “I should have brought more,” “I should have had this and that,” “Next time I’m going to bring more,” “This I’m going to do this and that.” It can be so preoccupying what we bring with us on the hike that we don’t really enjoy the hike. Part of the joy of hiking is to drop all our concerns, to just be in the natural world and just be present in a very simple way without a lot of extra thoughts, ideas, associations, relationships we have to take care of, duties we have to do at home or something. It just becomes simple. It’s so nice.
So this idea of self, independent of whether there is or is not a self, it can come with a lot of baggage. It can come with a lot of luggage we carry along with it. And one of them that the Buddha emphasizes is that he says if we have opinions about the self, that’s a burden. That’s baggage, in my language. He called it suffering. And as a philosophical concept, opinions about self just get you mired in quicksand. It just makes things so much more complicated, especially if you make a very strong opinion. For the Buddha, a strong opinion that there is a self is suffering. It’s extra. A strong opinion there is no self is extra. And it’s an opinion, and it’s suffering, the holding on tight to these ideas.
And so part of what we do in mindfulness practice is not rush to understand not-self. The whole idea of insight into not-self is not a belief. It’s not something you need to understand, just like reading a book about swimming. You don’t need to only understand swimming; you have to swim. You have to learn to float. It’s what you need to know about swimming. You have to learn for yourself. And maybe the analogy isn’t perfect, but hopefully it’s well enough that we’re looking for a deep insight, not an understanding. So don’t struggle with the understanding of the concept of not-self, but rather for today, understand what’s extra, what you add onto this idea of self.
And one of the earliest teachings of the Buddha, as far as we can tell, he didn’t emphasize this teaching on not-self. The comparable thing that he emphasized is not being selfish, because being selfish is suffering. Suffering for ourselves, and it might be suffering for others as well. Selfishness is a clinging, is a preoccupation with something. There’s a lot of extra baggage when there’s a kind of a gathering together and holding on tightly to me, myself, and mine, and being excessively preoccupied and not being able to see the full picture because we’re so self-consumed, the conceit of self.
So, the Buddha emphasized that this is what we want to let go of, this extra selfishness. More often than teachings about not-self, the Buddha taught that we want to understand and be very careful not to add craving on top of any ideas of self, not to add conceit on top of any ideas of self, and not to add any kind of metaphysical opinion or view or doctrine on top of the idea of self. So the way he said this, he refers to this little teaching that if you say “this is mine” and there’s craving involved in that, this possessiveness, that’s suffering, stress. If you have the idea that “this I am” and there’s conceit around the I-am-ness, that is suffering. And he said if there’s this opinion, this view, this doctrine, “I know what this is, this is the self, this is the true self, like the soul,” if you hold on to that view, that’s extra baggage, that’s suffering.
Rather, when the Buddha taught, he said it’s more useful to see things through the lens of “this is not mine.” “This is not who I am.” “This is not myself, my soul, my essence.” And why is that useful? Because of all this craving, conceit, and opinionatedness that we add on top of things.
So the first one, “this is mine.” And what’s really brilliant about this, when the Buddha was teaching this, he was always pointing to something specific. He was always pointing to something in detail, something concrete. “This thing is not mine,” as opposed to saying “nothing is mine.” The Buddha tended not to make these broad abstractions. He was always very particular, concrete.
So, this bell that’s here next to me that I use, I could easily see this bell and not say it’s mine. It belongs to IMC. I know who gave it to us, and it was a gift, and I appreciate it, and it’s not mine. So, because it’s not mine, I’m not going to take it home with me. I’m not going to be concerned about how I’m going to pack it and all the wonderful things I’m going to do with it as I take it home. It’s just a bell that sits here that I can use, and I don’t make it into my own.
There are innocent ways in which we can see things as being mine. But the idea that we possess it, we own it, comes along with also the idea that we control it, that we can manipulate it, we can make it as we want it to be. So for example, “this is my joy,” “this is my meditation.” “How can people be interrupting and disturbing my meditation?” “The neighbor has their leaf blower going one more time. Don’t they know that they’re disturbing my meditation?” So, I’ve claimed it for myself, the meditation. This is my thing to have control over, to run, to take care of, to protect. And it starts to be these layers of complications that are extra, as opposed to just sitting here breathing with a loud leaf blower going, and just kind of being very simple with it. This is the present moment, and to learn to let go of the extra layers, the baggage we carry along with it. And part of that baggage is the idea of “mine.”
So you might, as we go through the day today, do some study of this issue of “mine.” This whole idea of the Buddhist teachings of not-self, it’s best if you slowly ease into it through a deep self-study. You really understand how your experience is right here, as opposed to just listening to the words and the ideas and arguing with them or just thinking about them.
And so the personal experience that lays the foundation for this deeper insight is to spend the next 24 hours looking and seeing if you can understand where the concept of “mine” comes into play. My emotions, my feelings, my opinions, my car, my things, my time. There’s all this “my, my, my, my” that we do. And it might be innocent the way you do it, but see what’s extra. See what you add to it. See if there’s any attachment, any craving, any stickiness that this idea of “my” and “mine” comes along with for you. And then tomorrow we’ll continue easing our way into the insight into not-self.
Thank you.