What we think we are is mind originated, our whole world is only a product out of it.

The world is only a picture in our mind. Thoughts and feelings create our life. Thinking and feeling are our motor and motivator. We follow our thoughts and call this freedom. We follow our feelings and call this happiness. But do they really make us free and happy? And who is this, who thinks and feels within our body? Is this really me?

Our mind is not our friend!

Our mind dictates our life. Thoughts analyse what must be done. Feelings let us search for pleasure and avoid the difficult or the dangerous. This is as useful as it is efficient. But sometimes our mind stands in our way. If we want to sleep but we worry. If we want to forget but can’t let go. If we want to relax but can’t stop thinking. Our mind sometimes takes its own path and sometimes it seems not to be our friend.

Occupied by our daily matters we are sometimes too busy to be aware of it but in meditation, we offer our mind a kind of theatre and observe it. In meditation, our mind can’t hide behind distractions. Therefore, we see everything it does.

While meditating we develop concentration. This concentration is our anchor. We draw our attention to our breathing. If our mind shifts away, we bring it back to this anchor. By breathing in and by breathing out, on and on. The more intensely we observe our breathing the more intense becomes our concentration! But at the same time, we develop awareness as well. Fully aware, we open up to all our senses. We are totally within the here and now. Mindfully we notice our body and our surroundings. Every detail is important. The breathing through the nose, birds screeching, a pain in the left knee, mindfully we become conscious of every feeling.

To concentrate and to be open at the same time seems to be contradictions, but only through higher concentration, we develop the necessary stability not to get distracted from all perceptions. In mindful concentration, our mind is not able to hide or escape or cling on to something, because contrary to ordinary life we do not only observe the mind, nor do we concentrate on it, but we do so on the anchor!

In meditation, we observe our mind like in a theatre. Perceptions come and go. Thoughts come and go. Feelings come and go. We are in the centre of it. We see everything crystal clear. Nevertheless, we keep a distance, there is nothing that we cling on. We only observe, like being in a theatre. We let go all thoughts, and feelings come and go, none of them remain persistent. They are entirely unstable. This is an important insight! Everything is in continuous change. We call this instability. Nothing stays as it is, even if we would not wish it to. If we let our thoughts and feelings as they are, we can observe them in detail. Have we seen them before, or are they memories? Or ideas for the future? Where are they coming from? Where will they lead us? Do they make us happy? Or do they end up in endless loops of anger and worry? Some thoughts are happy or pleasurable. But whatever happens to us or whatever makes us feel happy, it is unstable. It does not stay with us. This can be called non-satisfaction.

In an unstable world, there isn’t any sustainable satisfaction. We cannot trust anything. We can’t hold onto something, even if we wish to. In the end, we will experience non-satisfaction and we will suffer. At the very end we must let go, even we do not want to. Because our mind does not want to let go at all. If we observe it long enough, we can see what our mind does. But we also realise that we are not able to control it. We cannot decide what it thinks or feels, and we cannot decide not to think or not to feel. We realize that we are only spectators. We do not direct the game on stage. Our mind works on its own accord. We cannot have it at our disposal. Of course, we can tell it what to play, and most of the time the mind follows what we tell it, but sometimes it does not. We cannot decide when. Interestingly but true, we cannot freely direct our mind. We call this egoless, or “not I”. As we do not have an entire control over our mind it does not really make sense to call it I or myself. Because we do not direct it on stage.

If we continue further in meditation “the missing I” will get even clearer. The meditation calms down the mind. The continuous flow of thoughts and feelings slows down. And sometimes it will stop. The mind becomes empty. Nothing remains on stage. If there is nothing to observe, the observer stops observing and disappears. Then there is no mind, no I, nothing left, only emptiness. No sorrow no happiness. But entirely emptiness.

Now we can see beyond our mind.

It is noteworthy that this state of emptiness does not last a long time. But even it is only for a glimpse of time, some people say, in such a moment we recognize our true self.

With meditation we develop concentration and awareness. It helps us to understand some of the most important points in life. There is nothing constant, there is no endless satisfaction, there is no controlling of self or ‘me’. We cannot only observe this within our mind but also in the entire world.

We are speaking about the three “be there” features. If we can understand these three “be there” features, we can also better understand our mind. In meditating we observe our mind, we observe how our thoughts and feelings come and go and discover what is beyond them. So, we learn to better handle our mind and in due course, can find our true self.

Because our true self does not need a mind!