POLL: Watching thoughts

[JonW]

There is a huge difference between observing the thinking process and being caught up in the content of thoughts.
Jon

[trendy123]

Yes, at times I can, but not always.

[theoldman]

I was going to send the message to our admins, to introduce myself and tell that I'd like to contribute something to the forum. It turned out that I could not send my message before I post something first. So, here's is something on my message:

I was thinking about Copenhagen interpretation, Schrodinger's cat and Wigner's friend in Quantum physics. It's about the superposition. So is in mindfulness. In brief, if you are thinking, you are not aware of your thought. Hence no mindfulness, But if you have been aware of your thoughts that just arose, you were not watching them, as you are in the mindful state, and no thought to see in that very moment. The paradox is, if you are watching your thoughts, they will never arise. And if they arise, you will never see them in that very moment (because you've just lost your mindfulness, the ability to watch them). Here's its superposition. And the key might be you have to do the mindfulness participation. To let your thoughts arise, participate in them, then step back to observe them. However, this is just its explanation. Practice is only the key, whether you know its explanation or not.

[JonW]

There's absolutely no reason to invoke quantum physics to explain mindfulness. The practice is really very simple. A young child could easily understand the concepts underlying the practice.
You write, 'You are watching your thoughts, they will never arise. And if they arise, you will never see them in that very moment (because you've just lost your mindfulness, the ability to watch them).' That's not my experience. Thoughts arise whether I am attentive to them or not. In being mindful, we are not attempting to stop thoughts. We are relating to them in a different way, accepting that they come and go just like any other part of our experience. We can choose not to be so attached to them.
It's easy to get too caught up in the idea of observing thoughts. That's just one of many approaches. Shifting attention from our thinking to another area of our present moment experience (breathing, body sensations etc.) is arguably a far more effective way of avoiding being overwhelmed by the thinking process. That comes naturally with practice.
Jon

[theoldman]

Hi Jon,

I'm not good at arguing. But I'll try it anyway, to show my sincerity. I know that you might met so many annoying posts here before and I honestly want to assure you that I'm not one of them.

I'm sorry about quantum physics. I just didn't want to take the credit for myself. That's all.

What I tried to say is not about thought observation but thought participating observation. I more than agree with you that "Thoughts arise whether I am attentive to them or not." I believe I never said about stop thoughts, didn't I? My point is whether you practice mindfulness or not, thoughts still always arise. The difference is ability to observe them. And as you wrote, if we focus too much on observing thoughts, somehow we might block their naturally ways.

I was going to post this on another thread but let me post here instead:

What is seeing thought like?

Freud (1959) once told of a patient who was walking down a street and suddenly, inexplicably, broke into tears. Being psychologically-minded, the woman quickly reflected back on her state of mind just prior to the crying jag. Although she had not noticed it at the time of its occurrence, the woman now recalled having been preoccupied with a highly organized and morose daydream in which she had been first seduced, then impregnated, and finally abandoned by a local pianist who in reality did not know her at all.
-Kenneth S. Bowers

I believe that is the very good way to explain (to those who don’t know about mindfulness) the way how mindfulness seeing your own thoughts. The important thing is, no need to wait for that long time like the woman mentioned above; mindfulness can help you immediately reflecting on thoughts that just have risen in your mind.
Then what? Normally, your mindfulness is like a cat, your thought a mouse. Once a mouse sees a cat, it will stop (running away). But that's not always the case. We (still have to) use some (good thoughts) in everyday life and abandon some bad thoughts. Sometimes we honestly don't know which are which (good or bad). Or even we know they are bad, we still cannot resist them. The mice is too big to be scared by the cat. Then what?
A knife is still knife. Its purpose is to cut. When that knife could not cut something, maybe it was not about the knife but the hand holding it. The hand is too weak. So the solution is make that hand stronger and stronger. That is to say to practice more and more.

[JonW]

Hi there,
I didn't see your first post as annoying in any way. I just responded to the portions of it that I found myself in disagreement with. Apologies if I sounded a tad prickly. That was not my intention, assuredly.
We like to keep things simple here on the forum as we believe that mindfulness is a very simple practice. When I catch a whiff of mindfulness being over-intellectualised, I see a red flag.
Mindfulness has transformed my life in many ways. One of the ways is that it has presented me with an alternative to living entirely inside my head, which is pretty much how I lived until the age of fifty when I started meditating. In other words, mindfulness taught me how to simply BE. Rather than get caught up incessantly in thoughts about how the present moment SHOULD be, I can simply BE.
In my work as a mindfulness teacher, I'm always on the look-out for when clients begin to approach mindfulness conceptually, rather than experientially. This usually happens around the third week of the eight-week course and, usually, it happens to people who are avoiding their home practice and the body scan in particular. They start to become more comfortable with the idea(s) of the practice rather than the practice itself. Without realising it, they have turned mindfulness into yet another 'thing' to think about, get their head around. Part of my job is to gently lead them back to the actual practice: being with their experience from moment to moment as opposed to getting lost in thoughts about how this moment ought to be.
For me, the body scan is hugely important in terms of that. The mind is endlessly spinning narratives that have little to do with life, with experience, as it actually is. The body doesn't spin narratives. It simply is. There's no deception in that tingling we feel at the back of the knee. It just is. That makes body sensations exceptionally good anchors - objects of awareness that root us in this present moment.
Regarding thoughts, you use the example of the cat and the mouse, which is interesting and, possibly, quite telling. The cat and the mouse are natural adversaries, are they not?
In mindfulness practice, thoughts are not the adversary. The general idea is to befriend the thinking process, rather than set ourselves up in opposition to it. Thoughts are just thoughts, passing mental events. 'Mere secretions of the mind' as Jon Kabat-Zinn puts it. Thoughts come and go without us choosing them. With practice, we can be discerning - choosing whether to act on a thought ('I need to book an appointment with the dentist') or allow it to pass ('Why am I always such a loser?).
In terms of the thoughts that we might choose to let go of, little reflection is required, and even less Freudian analysis. We can notice the thought and let it go. Again and again and again. Eventually, at least in my experience, this 'letting go' becomes second nature. It doesn't require any thinking.
Not that there's anything wrong in reading around the subject. I read voraciously. I read a lot of quantum physics and a little of Freud from time to time. But I don't look to Freud or quantum physics to enlighten me about mindfulness. I look to books such as Jon Kabat-Zinn's Full Catastrophe Living and Coming To Our Senses for that.
Undeniably, Kabat-Zinn is a great thinker. But his books don't encourage us to get caught up in thoughts about what mindfulness is. His words are pointers and he is continually pointing towards the simple act of being - and so we learn, through practice, to cultivate the ability to stay with our immediate experience, rather than getting lost in rumination, regret, worry, speculation and all the rest of it. It's about waking up to the fact that THIS IS MY LIFE.
The way I see it from the perspective of a teacher is that we learn to embody the concepts underpinning mindfulness and then drop them. To borrow an idea from Zen, we don't need to carry the raft after we have crossed the river - we just keep walking.
Above all else, mindfulness has taught me to travel more lightly. Part of that 'journey' involves holding mindfulness lightly and reminding myself from time to time that this is a simple practice. If I catch myself getting caught up in complex thoughts about it, then it's time to drop those ideas like a hot spud. This is not about yet more thinking and conceptualising. This is about BEING. Just this.
It is wonderfully simple.
Best wishes,
Jon

[theoldman]

Hi Jon,

Thank so much for your post. I appreciate it. It shows that you really are a real deal (a long time mindfulness practice). You do know your thoughts and even knew mine.
As for cat and mouse, it was from one of my venerable teachers (Buddhist monks) who taught mindfulness for more than 40 years.
I got some reactions a lot when I talked about mindfulness on some other (spiritual) forums and made me wonder if they ever observed their own thoughts before writing and posting something so aggressive like that. Or even on some secular forums on mindfulness, one moderator shooed me away by saying that "this forum is not about any kind of mindfulness, it’s only only Jon Kabat-Zinn mindfulness". Okay, good to know and goodbye.
Thanks for telling me about your life story, I will mine in return below.

I do understand your point, as a mindfulness teacher. You have to bring your students back on track. As for me, it might be a bit different. To make my point, first Let me quote from a writer I've just read her book on mindfulness:

"However, traditional mindfulness-based practices are not the focus of this book. This discussion on what is mindfulness, presented within these chapters, is not about understanding mindfulness-based practices. The distinction and discussion of mindfulness is based on what is neurobiologically happening when we are in the state of mindfulness. Mindfulness-based practices are formed on a primary understanding of what is happening in a mindful state and how to achieve that state."

As for me, I started practicing mindfulness when I was a young man (even became a monk, and living in the forest once, for that very purpose). After I left my Buddhist monkhood, got family and worked (I have been a professional writer), I always wrote something about mindfulness in my books and articles. (my goal is opposite of the above writer. I have been trying to explain "how Mindfulness-based practices are formed, what is happening in a mindful state, and how to achieve that state." That’s why inevitable that I need to find more information to explain it.

In other words, I don't have any questions about mindfulness any more. I have been practicing mindfulness (with non-stop) for more than 36 years. I asked, read, researched AFTER I found my answers. This time not for myself but for helping others.
Though for earning my living, I could not do so much about it so I tried another way. I became a forumite of some (English) spirituals forums in the last two decades, posting more than one thousand posts (sure, not all of my posts were about mindfulness. It was inevitable). That time no one in the Western world knew much who Jon Kabat-Zinn (I never was his fan) was. Worse than that, as far as I found it myself on many spiritual forums, most people still thought that mindfulness was the same as meditation. Some even mistakably called it, "mindfulness meditation".

Anyway, it seems nowadays every has been changed a lot on the side of the writer I've mentioned above (what is neurobiologically happening when we are in the state of mindfulness) but on my side, sadly to say that it's still far from better.

That's why I'm so glad to find your forum. I don’t need to explain what thought observation is.
To be clear, I don't want to teach or sell anything on mindfulness. I learned it the hard way even on some Buddhist forums when talking about mindfulness. It was very bitter experiences. I'm old and just want to contribute something or help someone about mindfulness for the (short) time I have left in this world. It’s okay, if I could. It’s still okay if I couldn’t That's all.
I'll post something on the forum later but only after the questions were raised, not before that. My mindfulness always know if I post for help someone or just for my ego.

Thanks for reading this. And thanks for creating this forum. You and your teams have done a very good job.
Cheers from
monty

P.S. I'm a Thai old man. Not only English is not my first language, and I also went to university (law school) when there was no need to study English at all. That time, if anyone could speak or read English was more than smart. So I had to study it by heart, by myself. Yes, today everything already changes a lot. I've just wanted to apologize for any mistakes and errors in advance if I might made on this forum

[JonW]

Thanks for the comprehensive reply, Monty.
Your life journey sounds like a fascinating one and we'd love to hear more about it.
I'm the blog editor on this site. Our blogs can be found on our main page. We encourage people to write from a personal point of view. Essentially, what we are most interested in is someone's unique story and how mindfulness has transformed their life. As detailed as possible.
It would be fascinating to get the story of someone who has been practicing mindfulness for 36 years.
Feel free to run some ideas past me.
I can be contacted at jonwilliamwilde@gmail.com
Regarding Kabat-Zinn...I tend to use his teachings as my baseline and sometimes I have to remind myself that he does not have the monopoly on what mindfulness is and how it should be rolled out. He is generally held in high-esteem around these parts but we are open to discussions of other approaches provided they don't muddy the waters too much. One thing we are fairly consistent about is our secular approach. Gareth, the site's esteemed founder, set up Everyday Mindfulness as a secular concern and, generally speaking, we abide by that. That's not to say that 'spirituality' (whatever that means from day to day) is a forbidden subject. But we tend to discourage people from waxing too lyrical about Buddhism, Taoism, Zen, non-duality, mysticism and so on. That's not really what the site is about and, besides, we like to keep it as inclusive as we possibly can.
Anyway, please feel free to email me and we can take it from there.
All good things,
Jon

[theoldman]

Thanks Jon.

I was going to ask if I could do anything to contribute/help the forum. Writing about my personal of view on mindfulness might do. Anyway, it might take me some time to do so . But I'm glad that you will be my editor. Let me tell in advance that please feel free to edit anything (I've also been a book editor for 30 years. I understand how this works).

Yes, I do understand your point about "spiritual/religious jargon". I've myself tried to avoid them as much as I could. I do agree with what you said, "That's not to say that 'spirituality' (whatever that means from day to day) is a forbidden subject." Yes, I always wonder what "spiritual but not religious" really means? How could subset does not belong to its set?
I believe that those who already know about and practice mindfulness are not a big problem. Those who still don't know they cannot command their own thoughts might be a problem. I mean it might be so hard (if not possible) to point them about this. As from being born to be an adult, everyone is raised to believe in his/her own thoughts (which are secretly driven by their ego). They don't know this. To tell them not to trust their thoughts is like to tell them not to trust themselves (their ego).
Bests,
monty

[JonW]

'I believe that those who already know about and practice mindfulness are not a big problem. Those who still don't know they cannot command their own thoughts might be a problem.'

Ha! Yes. Mindfulness writers (and teachers) seem to skilfully dance around the subject of free will, including the question of how thoughts originate. In that sense, mindfulness can seem as though it is neatly fenced off from the big questions and, of course, there's usually a good reason for that.
On a personal note, my main reading is Zen, along with contemporary writers such as Joan Tollifson, Darryl Bailey and Robert Saltzman (a trio that might roughly be described as the post-non-duality crowd). But I keep that stuff well away from my teaching (unless I'm asked specific questions in 1-2-1 sessions) and keep quiet about it if I'm down the pub as it tends to clear a room quicker than if a fire broke out.
I'd be very happy to work with you on a piece. There's a fair bit of back-and-forth involved in many of the blogs we publish. Sometimes pieces go straight up but the way it often works is that I make notes and send back for the writer to tweak. I try to interfere as little as possible and encourage writers to let fly in their own voice. I worked as a journalist for 30-odd years so I'm not a big fan of editorial interference. The aim is always to bring to fruition a piece that the writer is happy with and that's also a good fit for us.
All good things,
Jon