Blank page

A blank page. That's what you start with when you sit down to write. But, in contrast, the mind is full of all kinds of thoughts. At any point of time, the mind could be occupied with thoughts about what happened yesterday, what could happen in future, what should be done today, and so on. The mind is like a crowded street with traffic flowing non-stop. On the street, one can easily watch the traffic, but can we watch our own mind and the traffic of thoughts it is carrying?

I remember reading about "real-self or pure consciousness" in spiritual books several years back, but, at that time, I was not able to appreciate as to what this "real-self" was. Many books and years later, I accidentally came to a Web site on meditation, which prescribed one simple exercise: See if you can count up to 40 without allowing any thought to enter your mind. Once I did that exercise I realised it was not easy to count without a thought crossing my mind. But the greater realisation was that there is someone who can watch the mind itself like a security guard and witness whether any thought crossed or not. And this guard is what is real-self or consciouness, which is conscious of what's going in the mind.

After that exercise, recently, I came across another exercise, this time in the book, Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. A simple exercise again: Just say to yourself, "From this moment onwards, I will catch the first thought that crosses my mind." Again, some arbitrary thought will flash in the mind, but the greater reality is that someone is watching that thought. Normally thoughts come and go, and this "someone" is asleep, but, it seems, with practice, it is possible to stay more and more alert to what's going on inside the mind.

As my current understanding goes, in the end, we're neither the body nor the mind, which is full of thoughts, ideas, opinions, memories, etc. What we are simply the consciouness, just an awareness. Something like a blank page!