Meditation without MemoryDYING FOR TRUTH, YET AFRAID OF DISAPPEARING
Mind fears the Emptiness
that is itself our freedom.
THE EMPTY TRUTH
When our mind is looking for Truth, especially the truth about its Self, it seems to come up empty-handed again and again. We have imagined we will find something our intellect can know and define, something beautiful that will be seen and admired by others. However, we keep bumping up against what cannot be defined with words or known by the mind of thought. When this happens, we believe Self-inquiry has failed, or we substitute an intellectual answer that we have read or heard about—even though it does not deliver liberation. We stand at the edge of the unknown, ashamed to admit we do not know and frightened to look into the empty truth.
A children’s book called The Empty Pot tells the tale of a Chinese emperor who was getting old and had no successors, so he devised a contest to determine his heir. He loved flowers, and so he gave all of the children in the land special seeds and told them that whoever could show him their best in a year would be chosen. One little boy named Ping also loved flowers and was sure that he could grow a beautiful flower. He planted and tended his seed very carefully, but the seed did not sprout. He watered it, tried a bigger pot, richer soil, but still nothing. When the year had passed and Ping’s seed had never even sprouted, he was sad and ashamed of his empty pot. As the other children made fun of him, racing with their big, beautiful flowers to see the emperor, Ping did not want to go with his empty pot. But his father encouraged him, reminding him that he had done his best.
The emperor was frowning as he looked around at the flowers; then he saw Ping’s empty pot. Ping began to cry, telling the emperor that, despite how hard he had tried to care for the seed, still it had not sprouted. It was the best he could do. Smiling, the emperor told the crowd that he had found the person worthy of being the next emperor. He said he did not know where the others had gotten their seeds, for all the seeds he had given them the year before had been cooked, and so it was impossible for them to grow. He admired Ping’s courage to appear with the empty truth and rewarded him with his entire kingdom.1
I love this story for many reasons. When we are looking into what is important in our search for Truth, telling the truth is imperative, especially telling the truth to ourselves. So often the spiritual ego pretends to be somewhere it is not, to “know” something it does not, and so repeatedly misses opportunities to look deeply into the moment or into one’s feelings, missing the ways awareness has of liberating difficult emotions or thoughts when we expose them consciously to the light. Ruthless honesty—seeing clearly and without judgment—is required in the spiritual search. Spiritual egos want to be seen in a certain way. Egos want their “truth” to look a certain way, to feel a certain way, to look like a big, beautiful, blooming flower. Egos do not want to admit they do not know, and so intellectual knowledge is substituted for experiential knowing.
When the ego looking for its Source realizes it does not know and comes face-to-face with the unknown, it often makes a hasty retreat. Egoic thought is quite certain that Self-inquiry is not working because it has not delivered an answer to the intellect. It would rather continue its identity as seeker than to disappear into what has no name. What has no name is empty of definition. Who am I if I cannot think myself into existence?
Nowhere does the ambitious ego feel more out of its element than when faced with an unknown emptiness. To the ego, emptiness means being alone rather than “all one.” It means being unloved rather than being the empty Mystery out of which love flows. In the moments when one’s inquiry or one’s stillness erases the familiar, revealing as empty the many ways we have held on to definitions of our “self,” the ego often becomes quite frightened.
The process of awakening and beginning to embody what may have been realized is a process of emptying our pockets, emptying our minds, emptying ourselves of separation. The truth of what we are cannot be gained or lost; nothing can increase it or decrease it; we are being lived by a Mystery we cannot know as an object, because it is what we are. What, then, is left for the ego?
THE TRUTH THAT SETS US FREE MAY ENGENDER FEAR
If you are a true spiritual seeker, there is a part of you that is dying to know the Truth. Somehow you intuitively know that “the Truth will set you free.” And you want it badly. Now, everyone desires happiness. In this way, all of us are spiritual seekers, regardless of the means we may imagine will bring about the happiness we long for. But the so-called spiritual seeker cannot imagine a lasting happiness unless she discovers the Truth about her most important existential questions.
Some people have to paint or make music. Their lives would have no meaning for them if they could not create their art. Happiness, for them, depends on allowing the creative spirit free rein to express itself. However, if you find yourself on the path of knowledge, you are being drawn to eliminating, which means, to the ego, some sense of dying. If you find yourself on the path of devotion, you are being asked to surrender yourself to God (or Guru), which means, to the ego, the same thing. And for most of us, losing any sense of separation, autonomy, or imagined control involves a visit with fear. Fear is a very difficult demon to invite in for tea.
Our experience is usually that fear does not knock gently. And yet fear is always knocking as long as there is a sense of separation. In fact, fear is a powerful instrument of separation. You may not know until there is no longer a sense of separation, but then you may realize that fear and separation arise together. I am not implying that there is anything the “me” can do to ensure the end of fear. Fear will come when it comes; it will go when it goes. It is a stern teacher at times, overwhelming at times, barely noticeable at times. But it appears to be part of the action of separation. Of course, I am not speaking about an instinctual fear that arises in the face of bodily harm; I am talking about the psychological fear of losing a sense of being a separate “somebody.”
This particular body-mind has not much acquaintance with terror. There have been moments of extreme fear: when an airplane appeared to be going down in the Irish Sea with myself and my family on board; when the automobile in which my husband and I were passengers stopped within inches of spinning off a cliff on a winding, rain-drenched dirt road at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center; when my husband shared that he had just been held up at gunpoint right outside of our house in our supposedly safe neighborhood; when I was a child passenger in a car driven wildly by a drunken uncle. But apart from these incidents, my experience of fear has been milder, sometimes so subtle that I did not even notice it was there until it wasn’t anymore—fears about how I was seen, how I was performing, if I was making the “right” decision, whether I could ever “perfect” myself in order to be worthy in my own eyes.
Even though there may be a point in the spiritual journey when you realize it has a life of its own—quite apart from anything you are doing or not doing—fear may still be a steady accompaniment to the times of your “disappearing” out of separateness. Despite my thoughts that I was a willing victim to the spiritual search, fear arose on a regular basis as “I” was being surrendered to the process. By the time your head is in the tiger’s mouth, there is no retreat possible, although there may be apparent reversals in what your mind imagines is its progress toward liberation.
During those first times in meditation when I felt the sense of a separate “me” dissolving, the fear was that I was dying. I prayed to every god I knew—God, Jesus, Shiva, the Buddha, my teachers—to save me. I was terrified. But when there was a jumping into the chasm of no-thing, there was exquisite peace. The ego is not in charge of jumping, for in truth nothing jumps; and while “you” have disappeared, there is no fear. But as soon as the sense of separation returns, so does a fear of disappearing.
Sometimes I would talk to Ramana Maharshi about this fear of dying, and he would “tell” me with utter conviction and utter love, “You absolutely will die.” I knew he was not just speaking about this body. Gradually, as the “disappearing” and “returning” alternated more frequently, there was a lessening of fear that the body would disappear and never return. When there was a sense of life simply happening, there was no effort and no anxiety. Life lived itself and connected to itself in ways too numerous for the mind to even fathom; it just seemed to flow easily from one thing to another, without a sense of separation. But then something would always happen that brought the separate “me” back to life. That something was the fear of disappearing.
DYING FOR TRUTH BUT AFRAID OF DYING
The spiritual seeker is in a quandary. He or she is dying for truth yet afraid of dying, dying for truth but afraid of disappearing. The ways the sense of separation is triggered are endless. Expansive awareness will appear, followed by a thought about what you forgot to do yesterday or what you need to do today. You will be going along feeling open, loving, connected, when suddenly you remember the sister who drives you crazy. You will have a flash of intuition from your deeper knowing about how illusory the panic is you are experiencing over “time,” and then you will judge that knowing to be a defense keeping you from getting your taxes done! As Kabir said so well, “When the mind wants to break its link with the world, it still holds on to one thing.”2
But the funny thing is, it is only when the mind wants to break its link with the world of separateness that aspects of human life appear to be problems! None of these thoughts are actually ending expansiveness, or openness, or our knowing. When our perspective changes, there is simply the witnessing of it all without the involvement that takes it to be something about a “me.” The ego uses thoughts, feelings, and events to remind itself of its separateness all of the time. But when the sense of separation is gone, those same thoughts, feelings, and events are simply thoughts, feelings, and events. That is what is so crazy making for the thinking mind. It thinks, “Well, I’m supposed to get rid of the ego, right?” But one sage says, “Love the ego; it, too, is God’s reflection!” And another says, “Destroy the mind!” And another says, “Nothing is up to you!” What is one to do?
Our thinking mind is very industrious. It may spend hours or days going around in circles of its own making; it keeps moving because if it ever stopped still in its tracks, it would disappear. But the only thing that disappears in stillness or silence is the sense of separation. Personality, functioning, body, mind, life—they all continue, but without identifying with a separate self.
One of the biggest factors we use to maintain the illusion of a separate self is our memory. It retains not only the experiences of our living but the stories we have attached to those experiences as well. We imagine that the life or story we remember is who we are. And living so much in the mind of memory and projection based on memory means we often pay little attention to our present perception, the open awareness that is here now.
Douglas Harding designed a lovely experiment that I have adapted slightly for use with meditation groups and others. I call it “Meditation without Memory.”3 Harding’s experiment asks a series of very simple questions that you answer silently to yourself on the basis of your present perception and not on memory. Since it is important to experience these questions with your eyes closed, perhaps you can ask a friend to slowly read this to you, pausing when he or she sees the ellipsis (. . .) at the end of a sentence or paragraph. Here is how the adaptation goes:
I would like to invite you to find a comfortable way to sit, close your eyes, perhaps take a deep breath or two, and come present, deeply present now. . . .
I am going to ask you some questions that I’d invite you to answer to yourselves as we go along. These are all questions based on your present experience, your present perception, without the benefit of memory. Obviously, memory may arise, but I would ask you to investigate these questions on the basis of your present experience without going to memory for answers.
We’re going to investigate our experience without benefit of vision—just focusing on what is given now, when we don’t import into the situation things we imagine or remember or foresee. Answer the questions on the basis of what you can actually perceive at this time. We’re not talking about our feelings or understanding or memory, but what you can actually perceive in this moment. . . .
Without benefit of vision (remember your eyes are closed, dear Reader), and without going to memory, what is given now? What can you actually perceive in this moment? . . .
What shape is given now, if any? Do you have a shape now, if you do not go to memory for an answer? You can imagine, or remember, a human shape here, but is it given now based on present evidence? . . .
Of course, using imagination you could be anything here. But is it given now, on the basis of present experience, without benefit of memory or imagination? . . .
Is there an interface now between you and your environment? Based on present experience, without the benefit of memory, where do you stop and the world begins? . . .
On the basis of your present experience, without benefit of memory:
• How old are you? . . .
• How tall are you? . . .
• How many toes do you have at this time?
What toes? . . .
• Without memory, what sex are you? . . .
Based on your present experience, without benefit of memory:
• What color are you? . . .
• What is your nationality? . . .
• What is your name? . . .
Without going to memory, what is your address? . . .
What is your marital status, if you do not go to memory for an answer? . . .
What is your job? In this moment, without benefit of memory, do you know? . . .
All these things that we base our identity on—our skills, attainments, possessions, characteristics—can you find them in the present moment if you don’t import things from memory? . . .
On the basis of present evidence, without benefit of memory:
• Where were you born? . . .
• Were you born? . . .
As you sit, there may be sounds, sensations, thoughts that arise. You sense them arising and dissolving in you, but what ARE you in this present moment? . . .
What are you without a name, an address, a shape, a gender? . . .
You don’t imagine that you have died or disappeared, do you? Even though in this moment, without benefit of memory, you may not be able to identify yourself with being this or that. . . .
Feel into what is left when the whole host of ways you have of defining yourself is dropped away, except as memory traces. When, without benefit of memory, you may not have a shape but sense yourself more like this awake space, awake silence for the dance of sounds, sensations, feelings, thoughts, experiences. . . .
Is there a sense of coming home, a sense of I AM, the sense of Being, of existing, of being aware? Let yourself have the felt sense of this I AM. Perhaps in this moment one cannot say “what” I AM, but simply that I AM. . . .
Sit as this I AM.
Now drop the “I”! . . .
What are you now? . . . [Long pause.]
And now, I invite you to very slowly open your eyes and begin to take in the sights of the world, but notice that you do not have to leave home ground. We don’t have to go to memory to define ourselves, even when memory returns. As you look around the room and begin to see what are apparent objects, notice that these are arising in the same space. We don’t have to go back to our heads to begin to see. . . .
Likewise, when we begin to speak, we do not have to leave the space of awareness to speak. We don’t have to identify with thoughts in order to use thoughts to communicate. 
Now, this exercise is definitely of the deconstructive variety, and often when I offer this to a group, one or two individuals will, at some point, begin to feel dizzy or experience some bodily discomfort, need to leave to use the restroom, or have a coughing fit. They may not call their reactions “fear,” but the fear of disappearing is being coped with in these ways, by these reminders that “I am the body.” When we begin to feel the sense of separation slipping away, the mind will sometimes react quite strongly to it. We do not have a choice. It happens if and when it happens. But you may be able to watch this phenomenon and become aware of how fearful it feels to think of disappearing into the stillness. At some point, you may experience a point when it seems there is a choice possible to remain present to your experience and its energy, rather than retreating from it, refusing it, or trying to manage it.
FEAR’S RATIONALE FOR MAINTAINING SEPARATION
Identified mind will give you all kinds of reasons why it might be afraid of disappearing. “Nothing will get done.” “I won’t be available to my job, my wife, my children because I will be loving everyone equally.” “It is such an inflation to imagine ‘I am God.’” (Indeed it is, from the point of view of the ego!) “I have lots more life to live before I retire to the cave and contemplate my navel!” “I’m afraid to ‘wake up.’” But whatever the mind is thinking, thinking is the activity of separation. That seems impossible to accept, doesn’t it? You imagine life as you know it would stop completely if your mind weren’t thinking about everything at every waking moment. The thinking mind is the mind that becomes involved in following thoughts, spinning them out, imagining they are true, riding wave after wave of memory, conditioning, judging, interpreting, liking, disliking, planning, or projecting.
When the mind becomes quiet, thoughts may still occur, but they are observed as thoughts instead of as your life. They appear when they are needed, guiding, directing, planning ahead when that is useful, and so on. But continual thinking is what keeps us imagining we are the stories that spin about our life instead of the life that is living it or the Consciousness that is aware of it. We have a deep emotional attachment to our conditioned body and mind, and it seems terrifying that this identification might disappear.
Somehow, without ego’s constant direction, we imagine life would stop unfolding. Probably most of us have also had the experience in which life, art, sports, writing, music—whatever—just flowed without efforting and yet, incredibly, the results were wonderful. The problem with those moments is our interpretation that “we” had something to do with our being in the flow. Life is always in the flow. It is the thinking mind that imagines otherwise.
I had periods of sadness as interludes of recognition occurred that the one I had always identified with was not who I was. It seemed like I was losing an old friend—myself. I thought I would be elated, but instead I was beginning a grieving process in anticipation of a kind of death.
A WILLINGNESS TO “DIE” FOR TRUTH
Who can explain the intensity some souls have to know Truth? It is a mystery, like the rest of life, but there came a point when I felt willing to surrender my life for Truth. It sounds melodramatic to speak of it at this point, and even at the time it was full of drama, but nonetheless, the whole process of committing to knowing Truth became so intense that I felt willing to let go of everything for this experience of Truth I had tasted only for moments. Do you think for a second such surrender is a surrender of the ego? When commitment comes like this, there is no question that it is not your own. A force much greater than the ego propels such a quest.
For much of my life, I had wanted to be seen to be a certain way—kind, loving, spiritual, giving—and tried to act accordingly. I wanted to become what I imagined I was not already. But now all I wanted was Truth, no matter what it looked like or what “I” looked like. I knew that I could never open to Truth as long as I thought it had to look a certain way or fit into someone’s vision of what it was—no matter if that vision was that of the Buddha or of Jesus or of any of the Indian teachers I had been drawn to.
Ramesh Balsekar’s writings appeared in my life at this juncture, and they seemed to be what was needed for my intense efforting to calm down. The peak of intensity in the seeking were days I was preparing to offer my “self” for some kind of realization of Truth. There would be wave after wave of grief as I remembered my life, the love of my family and friends, the world I imagined I would be giving up to know God. There was no desire to die—I loved my life—but something seemed willing to let go of everything. Was it a last-ditch effort, a bargaining in desperation, a sacrifice, a drama created by ego, true surrender, a grace? I do not know. The feeling was that I was offering the most I had to offer—my very life—for God. What more could I do? In retrospect, I can see that my life was never “mine” to offer, but that was not my understanding in those days.
NOTHING MORE EGO COULD DO
I remember distinctly the moment, in the midst of reading Consciousness Speaks, when I saw Ramesh’s words saying there was absolutely nothing the ego could do to attain enlightenment. I felt something soften and relax; it was really an enormous relief, a great unburdening. It felt like a healing balm to my soul. Right then and there, I began to accept that the understanding I longed for might never happen in this lifetime.
I accepted, more than I ever had before, that there was nothing this little ego could do on its own power to take me to enlightenment. If awakening never came, I had glimpsed it, and that was blessing enough. Some people go through life without even a taste. I began to feel contented and truly grateful for the blessings of my life as it was, and I saw how my intense wanting to be somewhere else had kept me from the feelings I was now experiencing. I began to accept that my life and the elusive thing I imagined was enlightenment was up to a Divine Mystery I could not create, manipulate, or control with my thoughts. My mind was beginning to realize its limitations, to relax its demands to “know.” It was beginning to accept, like the little chickpea in Rumi’s lovely poem, that “I can’t do this by myself.”
CHICKPEA TO COOK
A chickpea leaps almost over the rim of the pot
where it is being boiled.
“Why are you doing this to me!”
The cook knocks him down with the ladle.
“Don’t you try to jump out.
You think I’m torturing you.
I’m giving you flavor,
so you can mix with spices and rice
and be the lovely vitality of a human being.
“Remember when you drank rain in the garden.
That was for this.”
then a boiling new life begins,
and the Friend has something good to eat.
Eventually the chickpea
will say to the cook,
“Boil me some more.
Hit me with the skimming spoon.
I can’t do this by myself.
“I’m like an elephant that dreams of gardens
back in Hindustan and doesn’t pay attention
to his driver. You’re my cook, my driver,
my way into existence. I love your cooking.”
The cook says,
“I was once like you,
fresh from the ground. Then I boiled in time,
and boiled in the body, two fierce boilings.
“My animal soul grew powerful.
I controlled it with practices,
and boiled some more, and boiled
once beyond that,
and became your teacher.”4
There comes a time when our egoic mind realizes it is not the cook. As the chickpea, we are not asking to be “hit . . . with the skimming spoon” as some form of masochism; rather, we begin to see that whatever way life is “cooking” us, it is for a greater realization, ultimately for a greater service to the whole. We become willing to be “cooked” in the service of a love that leads to openness and compassion. We realize that our time in the soup pot is cooking the seed of separation that leads to the empty Truth.