I wrote something, some exploration of ideas.
It was not meant to be meditation related, but it ended having a lot to do with meditation.
It's not supposed to be accurate, again, only exploring ideas.
THE IDEA OF THE USEFUL LIE
Many times we feel that the world is against us. Many times we feel that the world is aligned with us.
Sometimes it feel that everything is out of control and sometimes that we have control of everything.
But how does the idea of control is created?
The idea of control is created from another idea, the idea that we are separated from the world.
Of course, that is only an idea, we are "glued" to the world, we are part of it.
Our minds have the capacity to conceptualize, separate, abstract.
But that is not all, our minds are EVEN MORE POWERFUL.
Our minds have the ability to believe, to convince itself that those conceptualizations, separations and abstractions EXIST AND ARE REAL.
The thing is, it is not enough to "create" an idea, concept or separation to be able to act with conviction based on it.
You can act based on a lie, but not REALLY, TO THE END.
All this seems philosophical, but in reality is something we do all the time.
When we focus, the world disappears, we create the idea that the world is gone and IT REALLY DISAPPEARS.
All the time we separate things with our sight, our hearing and the rest of our senses. Table, chair, walls, door, building, people.
And we believe them to be separated.
Of course we have other beliefs or ideas. Nationalities, rules about how the world works, morality, religion, passions, hobbies, etc.
But are those "ideas" bad? Of course not!
Imagine if you couldn't read a book because you couldn't stop hearing the sound around you.
Even more, our body has millions of sensations all the time, and all the time we create the idea that only the "important" or the ones we focus on exist every moment.
But there is a catch:
Creating an idea is not so difficult for our minds, but making the mind believe it is. Because to believe in it, the idea has to be without glitches.
The mind has to find the limits of the idea, all contradictory information about the idea, everything outside the idea.
And make it dissapear.
Making it dissapear is not the hard work, but finding the limits, the contradictions is. Its a search, a job.
When there are more contradictions, there is more effort.
All the time, we live in illusions, but while we are in them, they ARE NOT ILLUSIONS.
Reading a book, watching a movie, playing a videogame, or focusing in a study or job.
We dive in the idea that the world has rules and we know most of them, and the ones that we don't know are not that important.
That our body is separated from the world, our house is separated from the world.
That people and things (family, friends, work, belongings) are predictable, we may miss some details, but not the important ones.
We create the idea of control and our minds seeks and filters whatever contradictory information as crazy.
There is lots of effort, it's hard work, but it's useful, we wouldn't be able to do many things without the idea of control.
We would be overwhelmed, paralized.
Sometimes we create the idea that we have no control at all, which is also an idea, a lie. We can do things.
But that is a relief from the responsability of doing things.
But is all this "good"? Does the "useful lie" exist?
Many things of our lives are based on lies.
Our minds are littered with layers and layers of "useful lies", conveniently mixed with truths.
Truth feels different than lies. Our minds can make us believe in lies, but YOU CAN FEEL the effort, the tension, the search for contradictions.
Any idea we create, it is better if it is based on truths instead of lies.
And we better not "solidify" it or keep believing in it for long, because it is a lie and it's too much effort.
If you keep still, you force the mind to be still and force it to have ONLY ONE IDEA (breathing, mandala, mantra, candle, music, book), something simple, pleasurable, the effort is reduced.
That is because the idea of the self, the duality, a fundamental lie, is difficult to mantain when we are moving or doing things.
Instead of thousand of lies, the mind only has two (the idea of breathing, etc) and duality.
Inmersed in the pleasure of focus, the mind attacks duality and it's contradictions.
The "all-moving" watcher, sensations, the solidity of the body.
It starts to feel the effort of duality, and decides that it is not worthy.
Lying isn't that bad. Lying to oneself fom time to time isn't that bad.
Lying to yourself all the time is pretty bad.
And living a lie (like the movie Memento) is definitely bad.
Any idea IS A LIE.
Is it a useful lie? Does the useful lie exist?
Evolution has given us lots of ideas based on survival. And they were definitely useful in their time.
The desire for pleasure, and avoidance of pain.
The idea of duality.
Detecting the lie requires effort, because our minds are REALLY POWERFUL. But lying to oneself, creating ideas of things that do not exist also requires effort.
Deep down, really deep down, we always know the truth. Lies can't get to our core.
The biggest lie, the one nearest to the core, is the idea that LIES ARE USEFUL, THAT LIES ARE WORTH DOING.
That is the foundation of all the building of the duality lies.
But that is not true, THAT LIES ARE WORTH DOING IS A LIE IN ITSELF, and deep down we know it.
How does truth feels?
That's easy, if you watch a lier, you will find him moving all the time, trying to bury evidence, nervous.
Truth is felt like tranquility, peace.
Truth FEELS BETTER.
As people, the search for truth is a lie, because there isn't a person looking for truth, the "seeker", the solidity of the "search" also doesn't exist, they are all ideas.
But maybe the search for truth is a good idea.
MAYBE THE ONLY GOOD IDEA, THE ONLY USEFUL LIE.
