This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Deep Thoughts; Introduction to Mindfulness (18 of 25) Thinking and Emotions. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Guided Meditation: Deep Awareness of Thoughts; Dharmette: Introduction to Mindfulness (18 of 25) Thinking and Emotions - Gil Fronsdal

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on February 07, 2024. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Guided Meditation: Deep Awareness of Thoughts

Good morning, everyone. Have a good day. I appreciate very much the chats, and I know that the people who chat are a small percentage of the people who are attending right now and who listen and watch these teachings. I take those of you who chat with wonderful good mornings and greetings as kind of representative of the goodwill that exists in this wider group of people who are part of this YouTube community. So thank you. And also, I delight in seeing names that I recognize, either because you regularly do a greeting on the chat or because I know you from earlier other places, other retreats and things. And it's really, really nice. Thank you. It makes it kind of come alive a little bit more for me to be doing this teaching.

There was a time years ago where I would have thought this was really strange and maybe impossible to teach this way in an empty room, but I feel very connected and appreciative of all of you and this chance to be able to communicate this way. So thank you, and the chats make a big difference for that.

The topic is mindfulness of thinking, and today I want to connect thinking to our emotions. For some people, there's almost no difference between the two, and for some people, they are quite distinct, but there's also a strong bridge, a strong connection between the two. To find a way of not identifying so strongly with our thoughts or our emotions so we can see them more clearly gives a possibility for new things to arise, new ways of processing, new discoveries deep within ourselves.

One of those is we can discover that when thinking is closely wedded to the emotions, closely connected, then if the emotions themselves are difficult emotions, the thinking itself is influenced by that mood. And if thinking is difficult and challenging—that undermines us in some way or other—then the emotions that come from those thoughts can be difficult to be with and can continue to undermine us or have a kind of negative influence on us. So it can go both directions. Sometimes thoughts influence thinking, sometimes thinking influences thoughts, and sometimes they just seem to be one big ball of things together.

What we're looking for in the Dharma¹ is not necessarily to stop thinking, but to think from a deeper place. To think from a place where a lot of the difficult emotions are not influencing how we think, or where thinking is not the place that we're challenged and angry or afraid or something. There is a source of thinking that is deep within us, and we've been talking this week about the source from where we think. Are we thinking mostly from the head or some location in the body?

As we relax more and more deeply, the source of the thinking can be in a new place. If it stays in the old place, you can't solve a problem with the problem sometimes. But if we think from a new place, a place that's more free or less identified or feels like it has more of a calm intimacy from deep within, then it's a lot easier to track and see the connection between thoughts and emotions. So we're not necessarily getting rid of thoughts and thinking, but we are learning to think in a different way, a simpler way, a deeper way.

So we'll see in this guided meditation. I'll try to keep it simple, but to do this, assume an upright, alert—not necessarily upright, I use that as a metaphor, it doesn't have to be literally upright—but an aligned posture. A posture that maybe is adjusted so there's a little bit of dignity in the posture.

And gently close the eyes. As you are right now, before doing anything else, become aware of your thinking. How would you characterize your thinking at this point? Is there a source from where your thinking is coming from, where it appears? Is there any mood or emotion or state of mind that comes with the way you're thinking, how you're thinking, what you're thinking?

And then gently, as you exhale, relax in your body. Almost as if gravity is letting water flow, or melting butter flow downward. Let it almost as if gravity lets your place from where you're aware, your awareness itself, flow downwards into your torso. Maybe into your belly. Certainly out of the head. And so then being aware becomes closely associated with the sensations in your torso.

Continue now with awareness of breathing. The rhythm of breathing, the expanding and contraction of breathing, the alternating sensations of inhale and exhale. Ride those sensations. Especially on the exhale, relax and settle in. A homecoming to deep inside.

And if you're thinking, rather than letting go of your thoughts, don't give them any attention. Instead, tune into the breathing in your body. Almost as if breathing is music. As if it's music which is attractive to listen to, attractive to feel. So that there's very little competition to stay with your thinking.

Find a deep place of sensing, of knowing, feeling, being aware, that doesn't require a lot of thinking. It's more of a quiet, silent receptivity to sensations and movements. Relaxing on the exhale without ambition. Just not trying too hard.

And then finding deep inside, is there some place that's soft, or calm, or quiet? Somewhere within, anywhere at all. And from that quiet or soft place, be aware of thinking. Maybe almost as if you're happily, peacefully underwater snorkeling, looking up at the surface, seeing the moving waves above, but below it's peaceful.

And if there are thoughts about what you're thinking, see if those secondary thoughts about the thinking can come from that soft, quiet place deep within. Very simple thoughts, not trying to figure anything out or judge anything. Mostly simple thoughts of recognition, maybe bordering on appreciation for what is happening. Knowing that you're thinking.

Discursive thinking—telling stories, analyzing, commentary, planning—is kind of like clothes we put on that we can take off and put on new clothes. We think one thing and then another. And those thoughts, discursive thoughts, if they are occurring now, are they connected to any emotion? And if so, the emotion or mood, it's like clothes that you wear. They come and they go. We put them on and we take them off. No need to identify with them. Know them from some place deep inside, watching what's happening on the surface. Knowing thinking that's just thinking. Knowing emotions or moods just as emotions or moods. Maybe seeing how they influence each other.

And now, after these minutes of meditating, we'll go back to how we began. Become aware of your thinking. How you're thinking, the source from where you're thinking, what you're thinking. You're allowed to think, just see it clearly. And how might you be different now than at the beginning? How is thinking different? And how is awareness of thinking different now than at the beginning? Is the connection between thinking and emotions—has it changed at all?

And might there be a place deep inside where thinking is characterized by peace, quiet, calm? Maybe an intimacy that's below the surface of the usual thoughts and emotions that come and go. And what is it like to be aware of thoughts, thinking, and emotions from this deep, peaceful place?

And then as we come to the end of this sitting, is there a way of now turning your attention outward into the world where you don't get caught in the world or reactive to it? Because being caught and being reactive, that comes and goes. That's part of the surface experience of life, even though it might feel deep. But is there a deeper place, a quieter place, a place of safety within or refuge within, from which you can gaze upon the world kindly? Be still and gaze upon the world kindly.

So in that gaze, in that orientation to the world around you, there is conveyed goodwill, kindness, love, maybe peace. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free. A freedom that begins in their own hearts. May we care for everyone's heart. Thank you.

Dharmette: Introduction to Mindfulness (18 of 25) Thinking and Emotions

Hello, and we come to the third talk on mindfulness of thinking. Stepping back and looking at an overview of this mindfulness practice, I've learned many important things by teaching it. One of them I learned was that when I started teaching, the only reference point I had for the practice was really my own experience, so I thought that was what everyone was experiencing. Then, as I started to teach and talk to more and more people about their practice, I realized what a wide range of ways people practice, what a wide range of ways in which people's minds work, or processing works. How they organize and understand their inner processes, and what they call emotions, what they call thoughts, what they call awareness itself.

So now as a teacher, it isn't that I have a clear idea that "this is what you're supposed to do"—maybe this is more aspirational than what I actually do—but rather I'm trying to offer you different elements, different pieces, different ways of practicing in different circumstances to see if you can adapt some of it for yourself. To see if some of it fits into how your mind and body work, how your experience of life works, and your inner landscape. Because I think eventually all of us become our own teachers. All of us have to become familiar enough with our own mind, heart, and body to know what supports us to find peace, what supports us to find freedom and wisdom.

A lot of this practice that I'm teaching is to get you present enough, attentive enough to know, so you can learn how it works for you. This is true for the world of thinking. Many people think a lot. They might know what they think about, but very few people step back and really are aware and familiar and investigate: what is thinking? What's going on while we think?

I like to think of thinking as an ecosystem of many factors that come together. The simple word "thinking" implies a known and unknown ecosystem that contributes to whatever it is you think thinking is. It's possible that many of us have slightly or very different ideas of what thinking is. For example, thinking in words or thinking in images. For some people, the primary processing way is through their emotions or somatically, and somehow that is where the deep understanding and recognition of what this world is about lies, less so than in words or in images. So, we need to really stop and see: "This is how it is for me now, given this is how my processing is." Can I settle? Can I find some way to not be reactive to that, not be judgmental of that, not be caught in it, not be pushed around by it, but find some balance, some grounding, some stability with how it is?

One of the things some people will learn—I can't say for everyone that it should be this way—is that we'll see that there's a strong connection between thinking and emotions. Sometimes it's the emotion which is the factory for the thoughts. I think of it sometimes as if the thinking is just a messenger. We might be thinking a lot and caught in our thoughts, but I think of it more as a messenger for that factory, for that deeper source of emotions that is really producing these thoughts.

If we don't understand the factory, then the factory will keep working overtime. It will just keep producing, producing, producing these thoughts. You can let go of the thoughts forever, but new thoughts, similar thoughts, will just keep being produced because the factory is working non-stop. But if thinking is kind of like the messenger for something deeper going on, sometimes that deeper thing is the emotions. For example, thinking about the future a lot. For a high percentage of time, I think for people, there's some kind of apprehension, some kind of worry or fear operating. That is what needs the attention. That's what the messenger is pointing to.

So then we learn how to practice mindfulness of emotions, like we talked about last week. And then we don't have to think so much. We're not caught in the grip as much because we're now attending to what's really going on and what's driving the thinking and giving it power. Even so, if there are angry thoughts, then feel the anger underneath it, the emotion, the factory that it's coming out of. And as we feel the anger, maybe then we can drop even deeper. Maybe the anger comes from fear, or from hurt, or from feeling somehow threatened. So, to notice the emotion that comes along with thinking is very useful because maybe that's what needs our attention.

And sometimes it's good emotions. The future thinking might be happy anticipation for something, and why not continue doing it? It makes me happy, it's a good thing, so that's okay. Sometimes in meditation we have a deeper purpose, something more valuable to do, which is to drop in more and more deeply into some deeper source within. There is a source within us of peace, where things come out of that peace, or out of that groundedness, or out of that calm, or out of that deep intimacy within. Something emerges from there.

Here we have a distinction that I think comes more or less from the Buddha: there are thoughts which are constructing things, making things up. A lot of thinking is making things up. And then there are thoughts that arise from a deeper place inside that are not constructing and making stories, making plans, making judgments, but rather something deeper inside has a feeling of emerging. There's an emergence of certain thoughts that do not seem like they're creating something; they're expressing something. Wisdom, care, love, kindness... something deeper.

This ability to notice we're thinking, being mindful of it enough that we can start asking questions—"What is this? How is this? How is this being experienced?"—is a way of stepping away from being in the grip of thoughts. To use a capacity we have for observation, reflection, to not be in the grip of the thoughts and lost in them. And then to ask ourselves, "What is the emotion that's connected to it?" And then do mindfulness of emotion. Or, as we did yesterday, to ask, "How's this thinking expressed physically? Am I tight or tense or activated someplace in my body? Is it possible to relax that?"

So these are ways of reflection, kind of like thinking, but maybe from a deeper place, or from a place of more independent thinking. Thinking that's not caught in discursive thinking, in the story-making mind, the scared mind, the angry mind, or the discouraged mind. It steps back, and in a kind way, in a relaxed way, in an independent way, is able now to engage: "What's happening here? What's going on here?" That engagement and those questions are done very calmly, peacefully, with very little at stake. Not trying to fix anything, not trying to be in a hurry to make something go away.

It's almost like, as we step back and reflect and become aware from a freer place, it isn't that we're trying to solve the thinking. We're trying to almost grow this place of liberated awareness, free awareness, into a deeper awareness of our life. So it doesn't matter so much what the consequences of that practice are, as much as it is how that grows that practice, that ability to see clearly and openly. But we do it by looking at thoughts, and I think it's very, very powerful.

A lot of the problems that we run into for ourselves, chances are thinking has some role in them. Thinking might not be the deepest source—maybe there's an emotion that's deeper that's feeding the thoughts, an attitude that's feeding them. But the way we think can have a very deleterious effect on our mood, our emotional life, our experience of ourselves. For a lot of people, their thinking is undermining their own well-being. We believe the stories, we believe the judgments that there's something wrong with us, that we're somehow not quite right or something. That there's shame or blame, or a lack of fame, or all kinds of things that go on. So to start not being influenced by those thoughts, not being caught by them, not perpetuating them, is part of the power of mindfulness.

So just step back and see. How are you thinking? From where are you thinking? What is the emotional source? What's the factory for it? What happens if you bring loving attention to anger or fear that's producing those thoughts or fueling them? What happens if you relax the body that's activated, that's connected to those thoughts? And over time, what happens if you can observe, or recognize, or know, or even with very calm thoughts, recognize what's happening from this deeper emerging place, this deeper place of refuge that can exist deep within?

Maybe that was a lot of ideas for 15 minutes, and hopefully some of it supports you. If you'd like to continue this exploration for today, until we meet tomorrow, you might become more cognizant of the relationship between thinking and emotions. Emotions and thinking: do they come together? Are they completely wedded? Are they slightly two different things? And as you consider that, both by simple thoughts asking, "What is this? How is this?", but also as you sit back and relax and just observe this, can you feel some freedom from that complex of emotions and thoughts?

So thank you very much, and I'll continue tomorrow.