How to get out of your head and into life

Meditation practice teaches us to feel the difference between thoughts and awareness.

When we meditate, we are watching not only our breath but also our mind. If you haven’t meditated before, you might find this absurd, so let me explain.

There’s a difference between the mind and consciousness. The mind is where thoughts occur — where we bring up memories, use logic, and daydream. It’s constantly changing, but it’s also where we spend most of our time — that is, much of the day we’re caught up in thought, churning over the past or planning the future.

During meditation this morning, I somehow got from thinking about what a friend said to me yesterday to a conversation I had with a girlfriend five years ago. Once I realized I was thinking, I brought my attention back my breath — in and out, in and out. Then I checked the timer on my phone. Suddenly, I started planning my day — I couldn’t help it. “The nature of mind is restless, completely restless,” wrote the Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa.

Consciousness, or awareness, is that in us which doesn’t change, which is not restless. While the scientific community differs on what exactly it is and where it resides, consciousness can at least be assumed to exist. In the present moment, who are we? Certainly not a “self” — consciousness has nothing to do with how other people see us. Consciousness is the ground on which the energy of life dances. It is the black that makes white white, the nothing that allows things to make sense. In Buddhism, consciousness is sometimes referred to as emptiness. American Buddhist monk Thanissaro Bhikkhu explained it this way:

“Emptiness is a mode of perception, a way of looking at experience. It adds nothing to, and takes nothing away from, the raw data of physical and mental events. You look at events in the mind and the senses with no thought of whether there’s anything lying behind them.”

Meditation practice is more or less resting as consciousness: we watch what comes up, our breath, tightness in our body, sounds, and even our thoughts (Thanissaro’s “events in the mind”), and let everything pass without trying to hold on or turn away. If we notice that we’re thinking, we bring our attention back to our anchor, the breath. In this way, we are practicing non-attachment — we stop believing our thoughts are 100% true and we come back to what’s actually true, the present moment. “We do not react against the displays that [mind] has provided us: the discursive thoughts and subconscious gossip,” wrote Trungpa.

The real value of meditation is how it prepares us for life off the cushion, particularly the really tough moments. Our fears and desires become temporary displays rather than seductive voices. Because we know the difference between thoughts and consciousness — and have practiced letting thoughts come and go — we have a shot at intervening in our habitual patterns, like our tendency to drink too much around new people or to get quiet when someone says they love us.

Getting out of your head is a big step towards living a more mindful life in connection with others and your surroundings. Resting as consciousness, rather than chasing after thoughts, is a powerful way to be in the world — and that’s to say nothing of the heart.

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