Our brains are conditioned from childhood to draw conclusions. We observe a food item and quickly conclude whether it is tasty or not. We encounter a person and quickly conclude whether he is good or not. We undergo some experience and quickly conclude whether that experience was good or bad. Our brain constantly categorizes everything into good or bad, right or wrong, depending on our conditioning. We are in such a hurry because we have defined the purpose of life in terms of certain achievements, and any and everything that supports those achievements is good, and the rest are bad.
When conclusions become primary, observation becomes secondary. We are always in a hurry to conclude and therefore miss the most crucial part of the observation. Why Ravana is not able to listen to Vibhishana is because his mind has already concluded that he is not going to let go of Sita. His mind wants to possess Sita at any cost. That's why his mind just closes down on any advice to let go of Sita. That's why whenever Vibhishana rises to speak, his mind already concludes that Vibhishana is an adversary and stops listening to him, and therefore reacts aggressively. The same thing happened to Duryodhana. When Krishna comes to meet him as a messenger of the Pandavas to stop the battle, he just does not listen because his mind has already concluded.
Whenever our mind has a strong desire to get something, it will close down. It will not observe and just conclude. We have a strong desire to live comfortably, and somebody tells us to go for a 10-day Vipassana camp, our mind will not listen and conclude that "I am not interested". We will close our ears to whatever the other person tells us about the camp. We have a strong desire to be certain, and the mind will form different beliefs about God and reality. It will not observe anything that contradicts those beliefs. If somebody has a strong fear, they will feel desperate for security. Babas and Astrologers are sitting equally desperate to get hold of these people and offer them some remedy in the form of a ring studded with some stone, and once such a person wears that ring, he concludes that the ring is protecting him, and after that, there is no scope for observation.
We have a strong desire to get settled and, therefore, conclude that a particular job is better than the other. Once we take that decision, we just close our minds to observation. We have a strong desire to "be happy" and therefore conclude what makes us happy. We keep running after those objects of happiness without ever examining whether the fundamental conclusions about the correlation between these "objects of happiness" and "true happiness" are right. We want to have the peace of mind desperately, and conclude that being insensitive to the ecosystem will make us peaceful, or not thinking much about the ecosystem will make us peaceful. We enter into a self-imposed hallucination that everything is fine. Just like the pigeon closing its eyes when it is being attacked by a cat.
Choiceless awareness requires a very different understanding of life. When we see pain and pleasure in a very different way. One can observe each and every scene, setting, and act on the movie screen when one is not overwhelmed by the hero. Choices are made by a conditioned mind. However, it is almost impossible for a conditioned mind to observe its conditioning. That's why most of us are in a hurry to conclude, depending upon our conditioning. There are hardly one or two in the movie hall who can observe each and every scene being played on the screen, noticing the minutest details. The rest are just desperate to see the climax. Most people have concluded that X or Y will give them happiness and are desperate to reach there. They fail to realize that the more they are desperate, the tighter they hold life in their hands, and the quicker it slips out of their hands.
Comments