Layers of Thought

Enso

Through my practice I've noticed gross (as in blatant or obvious, not as in vulgar) "surface" thoughts and then subtler and subtler "layers" of thought behind them. The obvious thoughts I find relatively easy to detach from and observe, but I'm finding it tricky to detach (disassociate) from and observe the more subtler thought forms. These thought forms tend not to be fully-formed internal monologues as such, more vague / less clearly defined but in a way more fundamental, less superficial than the surface layers. They feel like they're closer to the "core" "me" or self, like an essence in a way. I feel that I'm probably interpreting them this way because I'm finding it difficult to detach from them, but that could also work the other way, that I'm finding it difficult to detach because they are closer to this core sense of self/ego? I'd appreciate any seasoned practitioners' thoughts on this.

person

Working through our minds is said to be like peeling back layers of an onion. So I think your analysis is correct, it is also my experience that our habits and instincts are grosser and subtler. A more western way to think of it may be conscious and unconscious tendencies.

taiyaki

The seeker must be investigated.

There is nothing to throw out because everything is already throwing itself out.

You're looking for something. But nothing is found. Even the one who is looking cannot be found. This absence is emptiness.

Making something to detach from is aversion. Seeing that appearances of consciousness are void is wisdom. Nothing to grasp onto or push away. Such a mind rests.

Hope these words touch your heart.

Sabre

Subtle thoughts or coarse thoughts are both arising from the same process, how they are percieved just depends on how much importance and attention we give them. It is indeed because of attachment that we think so much. A lot of people are addicted to thinking, they are thougth-junkies. They have the feeling that when they stop thinking they will disappear. So, indeed this is the sense of self being challenged. But you can overcome this attachment by seeing how fruitless thoughts are and how they rattle on without you actually having anything to say about them. Also it is good to contemplate the beauty of silence, or find it within.

With metta,
Sabre

misecmisc1

The obvious thoughts I find relatively easy to detach from and observe, but I'm finding it tricky to detach (disassociate) from and observe the more subtler thought forms. These thought forms tend not to be fully-formed internal monologues as such, more vague / less clearly defined but in a way more fundamental, less superficial than the surface layers.

@Enso: can you give an example of such a subtler thought form?

My view: i think i have read somewhere the subtle thoughts at the latent unconscious mind, when they turn into a grosser level, then this can be thought at the conscious mind. so whatever thought we think in our conscious mind is already in a gross form. but the reasoning of the gross thought form can lead to a basic gross thought from where the whole thought pattern arose, and i think usually the basic gross thought ends up in the concept of 'I' because from the concept of 'I', the duality of 'I' (something which belongs to us) and Samsara (the remaining thing which is external to us) comes up.

Enso

Namaste all, thanks for taking the time to respond. _/\_

Taiyaki, yes, the Middle Way - neither cling nor reject. Thoughts arise, are seen and pass. When I'm particularly mindful & concentrated, thoughts often don't get a chance to form fully and coherently (maybe that's just it?) before they subside. Nothing is judged one way or the other, gentle mettā pervades all.

I'm not bothered by thoughts (at least during a particularly mindful & calm sitting!), just intrigued by my observations. Inquiry. However, I'm aware that I shouldn't over-analyze and/or conceptualize my experiences of practice. There's no need for the conscious, analytic mind to come to some kind of rational understanding all the time, putting things in neat boxes, in fact as I see it, this can impede the natural process of 'unbinding'. Like you say Sabre, a life-time of habitual reactionary thinking has caused addiction & clinging to thought.

That's not to say that thoughts per se that are the issue is it? They should not be grasped or rejected. The issue is deep-rooted and stagnated belief in the idea of "I" and other, of seeing things in a very rigid, predetermined way; a distorted lens. Like you say misecmisc1, and small mind is never going to solve that riddle! Only fuel it. So just practice diligently and earnestly and let it do its thing.

I read somewhere that the most profound realizations (not only spiritual... if that distinction is even necessary) and "eureka" moments of inspiration come when mind is not over-worked, or forced, when mind is calm and un-muddied and thoughts are allowed to bubble-up naturally from the subconscious depths, or when the mind is 'off-topic', and a realization is triggered by a sight or an event, when least expected. But also, if one is thinking all the time, closed and not open to awareness and experience of the moment, the mind has very little to work with (except ideas of self).

This is also true for the arts, I studied Fine Art and there was huge emphasis placed on the art of seeing, of being open to experience and sensory input. Meditation is extremely beneficial to creativity. I think a large part of writer's block for example comes from not seeing or being "open" to day-to-day experience, from not really listening to people and drinking them in, so the writer has nothing to work with, but also I think mental strain and exertion contributes to writer's block, relax, let-go and creativity will often flow, arising from a subconscious fueled by being aware and "open" to experience.

Anyway, speaking of great artists and writers, I'll finish this lengthy comment with an apt poem I heard the other day called Love After Love by Derek Walcott.

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.