When we sit in meditation, we need to be willing to experience ‘truth’ in order to get to the ‘Truth. Let me explain.
The big ‘T’ Truth is ultimately what we are looking for as seekers. Our teachers can point to the direction of the Truth, but ultimately it is something we need to experience for ourselves. We’re told that what is True is, we are already perfect, whole and complete beings, and that it is not only possible but completely natural to live balanced, healthy, fulfilled and joyful lives. How do we experience this Truth for ourselves?
Most of us experience life through the conditioned self, which has been created over the course of our lives by deeply ingrained survival instincts. We create patterns of being that keep us safe. We adopt the values of those around us to feel like we belong, and we act in ways that will give us approval from our parents, teachers and friends, even if that means disregarding more natural and heart-centered tendencies. Often, certain aspects of our True nature are ignored or rejected by the world around us; so we begin to hide them beneath a mask that ensures acceptance, society-defined success and emotional safety. So over time we give up what is True for our most evolved life and begin to operate from the patterns that make up our personal survival complex, which is often called the ego or the conditioned self.
True nature is alive in each one of us, but it is sitting in the back seat while the conditioned self drives our lives for most of us. In our spiritual pursuits, we often by-pass our True nature instead of looking directly at egotistical patterns to dissolve them. As a result, we create a new conditioned spiritualized self, which can be even more seducing, illusory and numbing.
Conditioned patterns are best dissolved through direct seeing. This is what is meant by seeing what’s ‘true’ in order to get to the ‘Truth’. When we sit in meditation, we allow ourselves to see what’s really here now, whether they’re thoughts, emotions, or sensations in the body, rather than trying to create a spiritual experience or the perfect meditation. For one, it doesn’t’ work and for another True meditation is beyond the ability of the mind to construct. Meditation is the domain of spirit which is a constantly unfolding mystery. It is already here and accessible and therefore doesn’t need to be created. Why try to construct something that is already fully formed? Any efforts to manipulate ourselves into the meditative state generally take us farther away from it.
When sitting in meditation, be aware of sounds, thoughts, emotions and sensations that make up the foreground of this moment. This is the small ‘t’ truth: the details of our lives that are constantly changing. By opening our awareness to all of this rather than by-passing it to manipulate ourselves into meditation, we come to realize that the presence that is noticing details is True nature itself. We see what is arising with openness, when we let go of control. This is what I like to call intimate indifference. Intimate indifference arises from willing to deeply see everything: the smart and the crazy thoughts, the pleasurable and challenging sensations, the comfortable and disturbing emotions, but remaining unaffected because we are identifying with something more real and True. There is a presence beyond the details of this moment that isn’t affected by the current personal story. We have a choice as to what we identify with, the conditioned self and our story, or True nature which powers the evolved life.
A meditation practice is a safe environment, free of the usual distractions, where we can experience our ability to steep ourselves in what’s true this moment in order to be open to what’s really True always and all-ways.
