Does no-mind mean not thinking?

[ROOBIO]

I see a lot of spiritual traditions talking about no-mind. What do they really mean by no-mind. Is it the same as no thinking?

I guess the place to start is what do people mean when they say mind. 

I looked at some definitions: 

"The mind is that which thinks, feels, perceives, imagines, remembers, and wills"

"The mind is the individual, subjective experiencing of “something” that is always changing, moment to moment."

Ok this made this contemplation a lot easier. 

Mind in analogous to the small self, small i that tricks it self that it is the do-er of life.

To me this question is the same as "Does no-self/no-ego mean not thinking?"

Not thinking is seen as quite a popular "goal" in spirituality. But is it actually possible? I don't know. My experience tells me it is hard BUT thinking is not the issue. 

Believing you are a mind that is doing the thinking is. 

We are saying that mind is the thing which is responsible for it's life, it is doing the thinking, it is doing the perceiving, is it doing the remembering. So mind is responsible for it's life.

But this is false, from direct experience there is no small doer of these things, you aren't responsible for thinking or perceiving. These things are happing inside of you. Reality is being, these perceptions are happening without an experiencer that is a thing. All perception has no perceiver.

So when you are realising no-mind you are realising the truth of what is happning in this moment.

When you think there is mind that means you aren't seeing reality directly.

So no-mind IS NOT the same as not thinking. You can be thinking ALOT and be in no-mind. A thought is just a thought, the meaning and abstractions can trick itself into many things. But it is a sub-set of reality that you as an ego have no control over. Thinking is a happening. Not thinking is a happening

Edited 8 hours ago by ROOBIO

[caspex]

Yeah it's like being the sky while your mind is the countless number of clouds taking various shapes. The entire reality becomes you so the whole world is your mind therefore the small mind you call your mind is not really yours or different. It's one thing that's existing among others, like a rock by the side of the road.

Yet it is important to note there is indeed also a state where there are no thoughts and your focus is steady. That is cool too.

[Ajay0]

In no-mind, one thinks consciously when one has to and not in an unconscious compulsive manner as most unawakened people do.

A female enlightened sage named Rajini Menon had remarked on the traits of the no-mind in an interview, which I had placed here in a thread..

Quote

 

 I would walk on the road with my no-mind; I would work in the kitchen with my no-mind. No thoughts whatsoever were coming. In the office, only where it was needed for me to think, such as when processing a file, would I think. 

 

 

[ROOBIO]

8 minutes ago, caspex said:

Yeah it's like being the sky while your mind is the countless number of clouds taking various shapes. The entire reality becomes you so the whole world is your mind therefore the small mind you call your mind is not really yours or different. It's one thing that's existing among others, like a rock by the side of the road.

Yet it is important to note there is indeed also a state where there are no thoughts and your focus is steady. That is cool too.

Interesting, have you been able to rest in a state with no thoughts? What did you do to rest there?

[Hojo]

I think it mean stop analyzing thought

[Mellowmarsh]

No mind is mind. Verb mind.

The mind is playing a great trick, in which it appears that the individual is the author of “their” life. Have you ever directly looked to find this “you” that is supposedly a separate entity that controls and directs your life? This “you” cannot be found. Life just happens by itself. You don’t exist separate from life as a whole. There is no loss experienced on seeing this.

[caspex]

25 minutes ago, ROOBIO said:

Interesting, have you been able to rest in a state with no thoughts? What did you do to rest there?

I just made a post about it

[Breakingthewall]

The goal in deep meditation is not to silence the mind; silencing the mind is a means.

Imo the first step is to place yourself in a position where meaning is deactivated. There is no meaning; any thought that arises is the same as any other. This isn't easy because we live attached to conceptual meaning since we survive thanks to it, but it is possible to deactivate it.

If meaning loses its power, thoughts begin to slow down until they almost cease. Then you are left in a position where your mind is a landscape completely devoid of structure; there is only presence, I am. But even here there is still contraction; you can perceive it in your breath, your body, and also in your silent mind (yes, you need some meaning to know this, dosting out exactly the necessary meaning is key)

 I am is like a safety capsule; it is closed. The goal is to open it. You focus on your fear, on perceiving the contraction, and then sometimes I am opens. There is no longer a sense of "awareness of," of a perceiving center, but rather there is reality, period. I and I am merge, and instantly the boundaries fall away; the contraction is zero. So what remains is an ocean of life, of being, without definition or limits, but that is exactly what you are. Absolute freedom without the slightest contraction. 

If you try to interpret, the contraction returns instantly. Interpretation must be zero to maintain openness. If you can do this for a few minutes each day, you will live connected.

Edited 4 hours ago by Breakingthewall

[Mellowmarsh]

Reality is when you stop labelling it reality.

The moment we stop overlaying our raw experiences with mental labels, judgments, and categories, we encounter reality as it truly is.

[gettoefl]

2 hours ago, Breakingthewall said:

The goal in deep meditation is not to silence the mind; silencing the mind is a means.

Imo the first step is to place yourself in a position where meaning is deactivated. There is no meaning; any thought that arises is the same as any other. This isn't easy because we live attached to conceptual meaning since we survive thanks to it, but it is possible to deactivate it.

If meaning loses its power, thoughts begin to slow down until they almost cease. Then you are left in a position where your mind is a landscape completely devoid of structure; there is only presence, I am. But even here there is still contraction; you can perceive it in your breath, your body, and also in your silent mind (yes, you need some meaning to know this, dosting out exactly the necessary meaning is key)

 I am is like a safety capsule; it is closed. The goal is to open it. You focus on your fear, on perceiving the contraction, and then sometimes I am opens. There is no longer a sense of "awareness of," of a perceiving center, but rather there is reality, period. I and I am merge, and instantly the boundaries fall away; the contraction is zero. So what remains is an ocean of life, of being, without definition or limits, but that is exactly what you are. Absolute freedom without the slightest contraction. 

If you try to interpret, the contraction returns instantly. Interpretation must be zero to maintain openness. If you can do this for a few minutes each day, you will live connected.

Yes excellent - except for me interpretation need not go all the way to zero but rather be truth aligned. For example, a tree rather than its encyclopaedic scientific meaning can now become a helpful living reminder of presence, beauty, innocence, God, interconnectedness, abundance or just plain being.

[Breakingthewall]

3 minutes ago, gettoefl said:

Yes excellent - except for me interpretation need not go all the way to zero but rather be truth aligned. For example, a tree rather than its encyclopaedic scientific meaning can now become a helpful living reminder of presence, beauty, innocence, God, interconnectedness, abundance or just plain being.

Agree, nothing wrong with logical mind, I mean just for meditation. As you said conceptualization can be aligned with the nature of reality, that's essential to be able to free the mind 

[Leo Gura]

It is not possible to live without thinking.

You can mimimize unncessary thinking and you can have small windows of no thinking.

[Michal__]

No mind is not "not thinking".

It is to raise above thinking - you are not the one doing the thinking.

"Thinking non-thinking" to use the words of Zen masters.

[Mellowmarsh]

34 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

It is not possible to live without thinking.

You can mimimize unncessary thinking and you can have small windows of no thinking.

It’s not possible to dream without a dreamer.

 

Dreamer, you know you are a dreamer. 

[Joseph Maynor]

3 hours ago, Mellowmarsh said:

Reality is when you stop labelling it reality.

The moment we stop overlaying our raw experiences with mental labels, judgments, and categories, we encounter reality as it truly is.

But in writing aren't you using lots of concepts and labels?