The answer is always here?
We all have many questions and the world does not seem to have simple answers, there are plenty of facts, science is full of them, but they are limited to what is observable, what we can all look at and agree upon. However our questions are not bound just by what we can sense through our eyes, ears and touch, we also have access to a mirror world inside us where each of the senses have an internal counterpart, which raises it own questions that requires answers that are not obtained by general agreement of shared observation.
The power of this internal world is that it a consequence free dress rehearsal for the real world, it also gives us a window to our future and it haunts us with our past mistake so that we do not make them again, this opens up a world of abstraction unrestricted by physical reality that allows us to imagine what is beyond our own world. As appealing or distressing these adventures in the human imagination are, the only point of contact that matters between these two world is the current moment, this knowing internal construction that is the stronghold which contains our personality reacts to our current external circumstance in the only way that it has learnt to do so, physical reality is the only place where actions can have an effect, it is where all the answers that we need are contained and it might be one of the hardest places to reach in the world.
Which is strange as the present moment seems to be all around us, it seems to be lingering, it is always here, never passing, never reaching the future, it is just present, of course this moment has pasted before you have even understood it has happened. If a bird flies by unexpectedly, it does not really register until the seagull already has your sandwich and is running for it, you remember it straight away, you process it, the seagull has your sandwich, therefore it must have been a seagull that stole it, it is a reasonable interpretaion of what you can seen, so that is what happened. It fits into a story that becomes the truth so quickly it feels like it happened, but if you actually witnessed it as it happened you would have move the sandwich out of the way, it is easy if you see it coming, seagulls are sneaky but not lighting quick, it is just that your mind reconstructed the moment and it became reality.
If a lost sandwich was the worst effect of the mind filling in the blanks there would not be a problem, but bandit seagulls are the least of our problem out there or in here depending on your point of view. Then mind is full of convenient short cuts to make you into a valuable member of your tribe, a group of philosophiser should be called an argument of philosophiser, thinking you know the truth does not make you friends, that is why the mind lies to you, to make you useful as a person of action who acts with mindfulness as to how their actions effects others, and understanding that co-operation with others is in their interests.
It is not an easy trick to pull off, you have to believe that you are a being of action to begin with, and that is not really true there are a series of desires and needs that require satisfying for your continued existence, but that is true of a second hand car, what is different is that you are a car that can act on it's own, change it's own oil, wash itself down on a Sunday. We can place ourselves in a story that has a beginning, middle and end, or past, present and future, but being a narrator does not make a person, telling the story does not make you the hero or even a person, even if that tale is the story of who you are.
There is definitely a watcher of the story, it is the one who listens to the question of “Who am I?” that you can repeat in your mind for as long as you like (and I would recommend doing so) and you will not get an answer just a silent observation. If you are looking for answers there is only here and now, there is no future where it is, and it is not lost in the past, there are no books or wise monks that have them hidden away, there is only your observation of the moment and every answer is there. Joy is there, happiness, purpose, meaning, worth and flow they are all possible in the present moment, in fact they are always there, and right now, there is also suffering, pain and sadness, but that is the rub and choice that we all face, as to what do we pay attention to.
We have two ways of knowing the world, by our attention or awareness, and whilst we might all be capable of doing so, it is a rare person who actually have control of how we use these ways of knowing the world or even what the difference between the two is. As most of us just follow our attention as it bounces around everything within our awareness, we might be able to concentrate by brute force but it requires a huge amount of energy to do so, our real experience would be closer to our attention being a rubber ball bouncing around a tin box that is being continuous shaken by changing circumstances, and the world is always changing, nothing is permanent. That is one of the joys of meditation, literally called meditative joy that occurs when your attention starts to come under your control, as when it under your control, you get to choose what you pay attention towards.
As when there is a choice about what you get to pay attention, most people chose to pay attention to the ever present joy that is in your body rather than the suffering, though you can make the same choice with deliberate effort so that you can explore that it is possible. First you have to relax your body, tension in your body blocks joy from being noticed, and where there is tension in your body, there is tension in your mind, the body and mind whilst not being a single things, they are so interdependent that they can not exist without the other, which is the same as the whole world, everything is interlinked, it is base reality demonstrated by our own body, and it kind of wonderful that absolute reality is experienced everyday through the reality of our own biology, all the answers are in front of us. As is joy, it is physically present in our spiritual heart in the middle of our chest, and by bring our attention to the feeling that is there, that is joy, noticing that presence, there is nothing more difficult or easy, however resting there by habit requires a lot of meditation practise, as there is so much to distract us.
Which is why we take advantage of our ability to set our intentions whenever we want, we can set them to remain open and relaxed in the face of whatever the external circumstances that we encounter, it is not easy, especially when you have the habit of a lifetime of tensing up when something makes us uncomfortable. It is perfectly natural to have this habit, it protected us when we were young and did not have the judgement as to whether something is dangerous or not, we cried at everything and it kept us safe (or at least our parents did but a baby does not know this, it just cries and the problem goes away!). However at certain point we have that judgement and we can even have the experience that doing hard uncomfortable things are good for us, but we might retain the habit that we tense up when we dislike something.
It only with intention that we can relax into the moment, and intention over a long period of time becomes habits, by being in the present moment we get to see what is actually happening in front of us, we stop slipping into future anxiety and past regrets, we stop criticising ourselves as we are doing things, we cease people pleasing, mind reading the reactions of other, we see the spectrum of results rather than simple all or nothing thinking. When we stop, look and listen, the information we have is vast we can see the truth of things, our lives are deeper, more meaningful as they are happening, and our working memories are richer and more colourful, and that is why the answers are always here and now, we can only ask question of the universe when we have the band width to listen to them. That is because the answer do not come in words or thoughts, they are deeper than that, they are contained in silence that we contain within us.
That is the silence that is where the heart is, it talks without the sense, of hearing, listening, touching, it is where our judgement is, where the silent witness dwells, it is our spiritual heart that has the answers. It is the most wonderful guiding light, it uses a sense that connects us to everything, everywhere and every time. The religious might fear it vastness and call it god, the Buddhist name it oneness and interconnectedness, the wise just say it is, but it available to everyone at anytime, you just have to listen without listening, by being without being, which might seem impossible. That is because I am describing an experience that we have no words for. The closest we can get is to remember a good day in your childhood and you were warm and free, where you just laid on your back in field of grass with nothing to do and you watched the clouds dance on the stage of blue sky and just relaxed into the moment, time disappeared, you disappeared and there was just the watching of the clouds. That is where your answers are, you just forgot to ask them and that is just fine, they are waiting for you as they have always been for you to ask the questions that will bring you peace and it will gladly answer you.
