YOU DO NOT EXIST!

Now that's a provocative title for a blog post, if ever there was one.

Well, do you exist or don’t you? ‘Of course, I do, you silly fool,’ I hear you say.

Well, it all depends on what we mean by the word ‘I’, ‘me’, and ‘you’.

One of the themes—if theme be the right word—of my blog posts is what is known as self illusion. It is a teaching of Buddhism but the idea is by no means exclusively Buddhist. Indeed, when I was in rehab many years ago, the psychologist-in-charge, Jim Maclaine, taught self illusion therapy. I have been expounding its virtues ever since. Why? Well, it worked for me! It still does.

Now, when I say that self is an illusion, it is important to bear in mind what I mean by the word illusion. It simply means that the ‘thing’ in question is not what it seems. We tend to think that our sense of self (‘I’ and ‘me’) is something that is real and permanent and stable—perhaps even something that is separate and distinct from the person that each one of us is. The truth is otherwise. Our sense of self seems to be incredibly real. In a sense, it is, although it is not a ‘thing-in-itself’, so to speak. However, there is now a wealth of scientific evidence attesting to the fact—yes, fact—that the notion of an independent, coherent self is an illusion, that is, it is not what it seems.

Dr Bruce Hood

Bruce Hood, pictured left, a developmental psychologist, and Evan Thompson, pictured below, a philosopher and cognitive scientist, are just a few experts who propound the non-existence, that is, the illusion, of the so-called self. I thoroughly recommend their books The Self Illusion: How the Social Brain Creates Identity (2011) [Hood] and Waking, Dreaming, Being (2015) [Thompson].

According to Hood, our brains generate, that is, construct, this illusion of a self—it’s a kind of a matrix—to deal with and respond to ‘a multitude of different processes and decisions that are often in conflict with each other, often occurring below our level of consciousness’. Our sense of self emerges during childhood and is built up andconsolidated thereafter. Thompson refers to an ‘enacted self’ (that is, ‘I’ as a process) and explains that we confuse the interplay of our ever-changing mind—which is a body-brain continuum of sorts—as a supposedly stable, core ‘I’ or ego. He writes:

… the mental repository is a subliminal data bank, not an ego, and it’s constantly changing process, not a substantial thing. Hence this impression that there’s a self is a mental fabrication and what the fabrication represents doesn’t exist.

The bottom line is that there is no a distinct ‘I’ or ‘me’ in charge of our thoughts, feelings and actions. In the words of Hood:

[O]ur brain creates the experience of our self as a model—a cohesive integrated character—to make sense of the multitude of experiences that assault our senses throughout a lifetime and leave lasting impressions in our memory. 

In other words, the self is an illusion created by our brain.

Now, you may ask, ‘Well, so what? Why is any of this important, assuming that it is?’

Well, let me explain, but first listen to these words of J. Krishnamurti:

The very nature of the self is to create contradiction.

Dr Evan Thompson

Krishnamurti also wrote:      

You know what I mean by the self? By that, I mean the idea, the memory, the conclusion, the experience, the various forms of namable and unnamable intentions, the conscious endeavor to be or not to be, the accumulated memory of the unconscious, the racial, the group, the individual, the clan, and the whole of it all, whether it is projected outwardly in action, or projected spiritually as virtue; the striving after all this is the self.

If you have ever struggled with an addiction, you will know all too well that there is, for example, the ‘self that wants to drink [or smoke, etc]’ and the ‘self that doesn’t want to drink [or smoke, etc]’. The two selves—and we generate hundreds of these selves every day of our lives, some of them becoming very persistent over time—are in conflict. At any moment of the day, one of them is fighting for supremacy.

Recovery begins when you come to the realization that none of these selves are what they seem to be. Yes, the so-called ‘self’ is nothing more than an aggregate or heap of perceptions and sensations. It is, in reality, a non-self. What is real is the person that you are. A person can change. You do what is appropriate for a person in your condition. You do not try to change the self that seems to you to be the problem.

Know this. Your sense of self is a constructed narrative that your brain has created. Do not try to change your ‘self’ or the particular little self that seems to be the source of your problem (eg the ‘self that wants to drink’). Work on the person that you are. Give your pesky little self no attention. Give it no power over you—for it has no power in and of itself. You, the person that you are, have power—the power to change your life for the better.

RELATED POSTS

THE ILLUSORY MIND [Part 1]

 

THE ILLUSORY MIND [Part 2]

GIVING UP SMOKING WITH MINDFULNESS

MINDFULNESS, THE "SELF" AND SERENITY

 

KRISHNAMURTI AND THE TRUE ESSENCE OF MINDFULNESS

 

ARE YOU IN PRISON? (CHANCES ARE YOU ARE BUT DON’T KNOW IT)

SNOW-WHITE AND ROSE-RED—OR HOW TO BECOME THE REAL PERSON THAT YOU ARE

Fairy tales are rarely about fairies and generally have an inner meaning. I have looked at several famous fairy tales in the past including Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs by the Brothers Grimm. Here’s another fairy tale—from Germany—involving a character called Snow White: ‘Snow-White and Rose-Red’.

The tale goes something like this. A poor widow lives in a small cottage by the woods with her two young children, Snow-White and Rose-Red, whom she adores. There is a garden in front of the cottage in which there are two rose bushes. One of the roses bears white roses, and the other red roses. The symbolism of that is revealing. The rose represents the individual's unfolding consciousness although, depending on the context, it has a myriad assortment of additional meanings associated with it, such as purity, passion, heavenly perfection, virginity, fertility, suffering and sacrifice, death and life. 

In the context of this fairy tale, the white and red roses represent the thinking and feeling aspects of our consciousness respectively. Now, the two young children, who play together and love each other dearly, are just like the above mentioned roses. Rose-Red is outspoken and cheerful and loves to play outside whereas her sister Snow-White is quiet and shy and prefers doing housework and reading. The two girls love to go out into the forest where they like to sleep. On one occasion, whilst sleeping unknowingly on the edge of a precipice, they are awakened by a figure in shining white apparel (apparently, a ‘guardian angel’, variously a symbol of power, guardianship, inner guidance and personal transformation).

One winter night, there is a knock at the door. Rose-Red opens the door to find a bear. At first, she is terrified, but the bear tells her not to be afraid. ‘I'm half frozen and I merely want to warm up a little at your place,’ he says. They let the bear in, and he lies down in front of the fire. The girls beat the snow off the bear, and they quickly become quite friendly with him. They play with the bear and roll him around playfully. They let the bear spend the night in front of the fire. In the morning the bear leaves, trotting out into the woods. The bear comes back every night for the rest of that winter and the family grows used to him.

When summer comes, the bear tells the family that he must go away for a while to guard his treasure from a wicked dwarf. On parting, the bear catches his fur on the door-hook, and it seems to Snow-White that she sees gold glittering underneath.

During the summer, when the girls are walking through the forest, they find a dwarf whose beard is stuck in a tree. The girls rescue him by cutting his beard free, but the dwarf is ungrateful and yells at them for cutting his beautiful beard. He seizes a bag of gold which lies behind him and hurries off angrily. The girls encounter the dwarf several times that summer, each time rescuing him from some peril each time, but the dwarf is always ungrateful. On the second occasion the dwarf runs off with a bag of pearls. On another occasion he hurries off with a bag of precious stones. Then, one day, they meet the dwarf once again and he is seen counting his treasures. This time, the bear rushes out of the forest and strikes the dwarf dead.

Instantly, the bear’s skin falls from him, revealing a handsome prince. You see, the dwarf had put a spell on the prince by stealing his precious stones and turning him into a bear, but the curse is broken with the death of the dwarf. Snow-White marries the prince, and Rose-Red marries his brother. And yes, as in all fairy tales, they all live happily ever after.

Have you ever noticed how many fairy tales involve a widow? A widow represents those who are cut off, so to speak, from their true being as a person among persons. They are people who have lost connection with their inner potentiality. In this tale, however, there is still some contact with the elemental world represented by the garden and the rose bushes.

Snow-White and Rose-Red represent two different aspects or sides of human experience. Snow-White (cf the white roses), who likes to stay indoors, represents the thinking part of us that is introspective, introverted contemplative and meditative. Rose-Red (cf the red roses), who likes being outdoors, symbolises the perceiving, more extroverted part of us that is more interested in the outer world of sense impressions. The fact that the two girls play together and love each other is highly symbolic. It means, among other things, that these two sides of our nature are equally important. Both are needed and belong together. In other words, they are complementary. Never forget that.

The bear is an out-picturing of us—body, mind and soul. There is the outer, physical part of us and the inner mental and spiritual ‘parts’ of us. The dwarf represents negative, evil forces, both within and outside of ourselves, that make for separation, division and strife. These forces or tendencies within us must be overcome if we are to grow into the persons we are capable of being and which, in truth, we really are. The gold, pearls, and precious stones referred to in the tale represent spiritual riches and wisdom—the non-physical things ‘not made with human hands, eternal in the heavens’ (cf 2 Cor 5:1). The dwarf is seen seizing, appropriating and running of with these gifts, not realizing that they are not yet his by right of consciousness. There are things that we must give up in order for these gifts to be rightfully ours. That is an important lesson we all must learn. Our false selves (the little ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’), in the form of our various likes, dislikes, views, opinions, biases and prejudices, seek to appropriate these treasures even though they are not yet ours by right of consciousness.

Now, the bear is not what it appears to be. Inside of it is a prince, that is, a higher self—our true self. Here’s a famous Zen story on the point. A distraught man approaches a Zen master and says, ‘Please, Master, I feel lost, desperate. I don't know who I am. Please, show me my true self!’ The master just looks away without responding. The man begins to plead and beg, but still the master gives no reply. Finally giving up in frustration, the man turns to leave. At that moment the master calls out to him by name. ‘Yes!’ the man says as he turns around toward the master. ‘There it is!’ exclaims the master.

Our true self is the person that each one of us is. However, when we see and experience ourselves we do not ordinarily see and experience the person that in truth each one of us is. Instead, we tend to see and experience any one or more of a number of self-images (those ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’ held in our mind). At one point in time we may see and experience the ‘little me’, or the ‘frightened me’, or the ‘inferior me’. At another point in time we may see and experience the ‘confident me’. 

These ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’ are nothing more than self-images in our mind. They are images felt and experienced as real, that is, as the real person that we think we are. Jointly and severally, these ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’ constitute in varying degrees our sense of who we think we are, and whichever image is most dominant in your mind at any point in time will constitute your sense of ‘me’—that is, what to you, in you, is you—at least at that particular point in time. There is a feeling component to these mental self-images, with the result that many of the images can be quite strong and persistent over time and their persistency over time only reinforces the mistaken belief that these images are really us. This also makes change seem very difficult indeed. However, none—I repeat none—of these felt self-images are real. They are not the real person that in truth you are.

Fulton J Sheen wrote, ‘Death to the lower self is the condition of resurrection to the higher self.’ That is what this fairy tale is all about. We must die to our false selves so that we might become the real person that we are. Some call that the ‘higher self’, but please don’t confuse that with those little, false selves of which I spoke. The ‘higher self’ is the real person that in truth you are. I am referring to a power and presence ‘not-oneself’. You see, we are much more than just those pesky false selves—all those waxing and waning ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’—with which we tend to identify, in the mistaken belief that they constitute the ‘real me’.

Freedom from the bondage to self comes when we get real, that is, when we start to live from our true being as a person among persons. We come to know our higher or real self—symbolised in the fairy tale ‘Snow-White and Rose-Red’ by each of the marriages that take place—as a result of thinking (Snow-White), perceiving (Rose-Red), and overcoming the evil spirit of separateness (symbolised by the destruction of the dwarf by the bear).

When this happens, you become what the American psychologist Carl Rogers, pictured left, referred to as a ‘fully functioning person’. The mystics refer to this as coming to ‘know the Self as One’. Yes, we are one with all Life, even though few know or understand what that truly means.

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HANSEL AND GRETEL—OR THE STORY OF YOU AND ME

JACK AND THE BEANSTALK—OR HOW TO CLIMB INTO THE SKY

WHY MOST SELF-HELP BOOKS DON’T HELP

‘Who is the “I” that is going to change it? The “I” is also a habit,

the “I” is a series of words and memories and knowledge, 

which is the past, which is a habit.”

J. Krishnamurti, The Impossible Question.

Go into any book shop, or look online, and you will find self-help books galore. I have bought quite a few of them myself over the years. Most of them are a total waste of money. They don’t work. Why? Because most of them rest on an assumption that is completely false, namely, that what we call the self can change the self. It can’t.

We use the word ‘self’ in two different senses. First, we use the word to describe the ‘person’ each one of us is---the ‘real you,’ so to speak---and that is a most legitimate use of the word. However, we also use the word to refer to what we mistakenly perceive to be our real identity. Let me explain.

We perceive life through our senses and by means of our conscious mind. Over time, beginning from the very moment of our birth, sensory perceptions harden into images of various kinds formed out of aggregates of thought and feeling. In time, the illusion of a separate 'observing self' emerges, but the truth is that our sense of mental continuity and identity are simply the result of habit, memory and conditioning. Hundreds of thousands of separate, ever-changing and ever-so-transient mental occurrences—in the form of our various likes, dislikes, views, opinions, prejudices, biases, attachments and aversions, all of them mental images—harden into a fairly persistent mental construct of sorts. This construct is, however, nothing more than a confluence of impermanent components (‘I-moments’ or ‘selves’) which are cleverly synthesized by the mind in a way that appears to give them a singularity and a separate and independent existence and life of their own. The result is the ‘observing self', but it is little more than a bundle of remembered images from and out of which further thought and new images—yes, more of them—arise.

As mentioned, this ‘observing self’ consists of hundreds of other selves, each of which is an image that we build in our mind over time and in time. There is, for example, the angry false self (‘I am angry’), the jealous false self (‘I am jealous’), the fearful false self (‘I am fearful’), the unworthy self (‘I am a miserable sinner’), and so on. These selves—lots and lots of psychological ‘I's’ and ‘me's’ that collectively manifest as our ego-consciousness) are called false because they are not the real person each one of us is, but we mistakenly believe that one or more of these false selves---which are nothing more than self-images in our mind---are the real person that we are. In truth, all of these 'I's' and 'me's' have been created by thought. Indeed, they are thought--thought images, if you like.

Now, these false selves are illusory, not because they do not exist--for they do indeed exist as images in our mind--but because they have no separate, distinct, permanent identity from the person that we are, the latter being a mind-body complex that is ontologically real (the 'physical "I"'). Only the person that you are---a person among persons---is ontologically real.

We are self-conscious beings, and not only is there this ‘observing self’ in our mind—along with many other mind-invented selves—there is also an ‘observed self,’ in that the observing self (a subject) is able to ‘split,’ so to speak, and become an ‘observed self’ (an object). So, we have the ‘I’ subject and the ‘I’ object. But that’s not the end of it. Every like, dislike, view and opinion hardens over time into a little ‘self’, so we have hundreds of these selves in our mind at any one point in time. The ‘observing self’ can easily morph into the ‘judging self’, deciding which likes and dislikes we will keep, and which ones we will discard. Ditto views and opinions. The ‘observing self’ can and does also morph into an ‘analytical self’ which analyses our other false selves. At the risk of repeating myself, none of these little selves, has no separate, discrete, or independent existence apart from the person each one of us is. In that sense the ‘observing self’ is false and illusory. Worse, it is the very same self—any other false self---that is being observed. This is what it means to be trapped in the illusion of self---a false self, lots and lots of them, in fact. Listen to what the Indian spiritual philosopher J. Krishnamurti [pictured right] has to say about the matter. These lines come from chapter 12 of his book Freedom From the Known:

One image, as the observer, observes dozens of other images around himself and inside himself, and he says, 'I like this image, I'm going to keep it' or 'I don't like that image so I'll get rid of it', but the observer himself has been put together by the various images which have come into being through reaction to various other images. So we come to a point where we can say, 'The observer is also the image, only he has separated himself and observes. This observer who has come into being through various other images thinks himself permanent and between himself and the images he has created there is a division, a time interval. This creates conflict between himself and the images he believes to be the cause of his troubles. So then he says, "I must get rid of this conflict", but the very desire to get rid of the conflict creates another image.'

So, I hope you can see by now that self is indeed the problem. The self that wants to change is the very same self that doesn’t want to change. The self that observes is the self being observed. Self is always self and nothing else but self. As a former Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple [pictured left], pointed out, ‘no effort of the self can remove the self from the centre of its own endeavour.’ The self that wants to get rid of the self that is causing problems in one’s life is the same self as the one causing the problems. Self cannot change self. The only way self can change is by morphing into some other self, but you still end up with a self, and what good is that, I ask you? In any event, a self, being nothing more than a mental image in our mind, has no power in and of itself in any event. That is why we need to rely upon some power-not-oneself.

Let me say it again. Self can’t change self, and that’s where most self-help books go horribly wrong. However, the person that you are can change, but where does the power to change come from if it doesn't come from one's negative, conditioned ego-self? Is it some person, some god or god-like figure who will step in and change everything for us? Well, there are some who assert that is the way out, but I beg to differ. One of the many things I like about Buddhism is that it says, in effect, ‘Only you, the person that you are, can get yourself out of the mess you have created for yourself.’

Here’s some more wisdom from Krishnamurti, again taken from chapter 12 of his book Freedom From the Known:

Any movement on the part of the observer, if he has not realized that the observer is the observed, creates only another series of images and again he is caught in them. But what takes place when the observer is aware that the observer is the observed? … The observer does not act at all. The observer has always said, 'I must do something about these images, I must suppress them or give them a different shape'; he is always active in regard to the observed, acting and reacting passionately or casually, and this action of like and dislike on the part of the observer is called positive action -- 'I like, therefore I must hold. I dislike therefore I must get rid of.' But when the observer realizes that the thing about which he is acting is himself, then there is no conflict between himself and the image. He is that. He is not separate from that. When he was separate, he did, or tried to do, something about it, but when the observer realizes that he is that, then there is no like or dislike and conflict ceases.

For what is he to do? If something is you, what can you do? You cannot rebel against it or run away from it or even accept it. It is there. So all action that is the outcome of reaction to like and dislike has come to an end.

Then you will find that there is an awareness that has become tremendously alive. It is not bound to any central issue or to any image -- and from that intensity of awareness there is a different quality of attention and therefore the mind -- because the mind is this awareness - has become extraordinarily sensitive and highly intelligent.

The answer is self-awareness—choiceless, non-judgmental awareness. You look. You observe. You are alert and aware. When you truly come to see—and know—that all of those false selves in your mind are illusory and have no power over you except the power you choose to give them by identifying with them—note carefully that word ‘identify’—you, the person that you are, will have become free of their grip upon you. 

Yes, you can and will be relieved of the bondage of self when you come to understand that you need no longer be a slave to self. Stop trying to change or eradicate your false selves. Freedom comes when you are no longer for or against whatever self is the supposed problem at the partiuclar time—that is, when you are no longer fighting against that self being in your mind nor are you trying to hold on to it. This is what is known as letting go. Others call it acceptance. Krishnamurti calls it ‘choiceless awareness’. The words don’t matter, only the reality behind those words.

So, what is the ‘power-not-oneself’? It is you—the person that you are—when, to quote Krishnamurti once again, ‘there is an awareness that has become tremendously alive’.

That, my friends, is the only kind of self-help that works.

Freedom From the Known.
J. Krishnamurti. Edited by Mary Lutyens. New York: Harper & Row.

Copyright © 1969, 2010 Krishnamurti Foundation Trust Limited,

Brockwood Park, Bramdean, Hampshire, United Kingdom.

All rights reserved.

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‘WHAT AM I TO DO WITH MYSELF?’

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WATCH WHAT YOU DO WITH YOUR ‘I’

WHO AM I? (A ZEN STORY)

THE ILLUSORY MIND [Part 1]

THE ILLUSORY MIND [Part 2]

HOW TO BE FREE OF THE PAST---OR WHY ANALYSIS DOESN’T WORK

THE ONLY WAY TO CHANGE WHO YOU ARE

MINDFULNESS, THE ‘SELF’ AND SERENITY

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HOW TO SEE THINGS AS THEY REALLY ARE

I hate the words ‘method’ and ‘technique’ -- as well as the 'how' word -- I really do. My use of the word 'how' in the title to this post, clearly implying the supposed need for a method or technique in order to achieve the sought-after end, is intentionally provocative ... not to mention mischievous. Read on.

Some of you will have heard the Zen story that goes like this. A disciple says to the master, ‘I have been four months with you, and you have still given me no method or technique.’ The master says, ‘A method? What on earth would you want a method for?’ The disciple says, ‘To attain inner freedom.’ The master roars with laughter, and then says, ‘You need great skill indeed to set yourself free by means of the trap called a method.’

Unless we empty ourselves of methods and techniques -- all of which are forms of conditioning -- we will never come to know truth. But how does one let go of conditioning, you may ask? Never ask how, because you are then asking for a method, a technique, and all such methods and techniques are nothing but, yes, conditioning. However, it’s even worse than that, as J. Krishnamurti [pictured right] has pointed out:

I think it is very important to understand that any effort made to free oneself from one's conditioning is another form of conditioning. If I try to free myself from Hinduism, or any other ism, I am making that effort in order to achieve what I consider to be a more desirable state; therefore, the motive to change conditions the change. So I must realize my own conditioning and do absolutely nothing. This is very difficult. But I must know for myself that my mind is small, petty, confused, conditioned, and see that any effort to change it is still within the field of that confusion; therefore, any such effort only breeds further confusion.

It’s the old, old story, namely, no effort of the self can remove the self. Don’t try to remove the self. It can’t be done. Indeed, don’t try at all, but rather look, observe … and let. Once you see the folly and illusion of all self-effort, and the futile attempt by one self to remove another self from one’s life (which is the basis of so-called willpower), you will come to know the truth as one. It’s as simple as that. Simple, but not easy. The good news is that the mind can free itself.

Here is a powerful phrase – powerful if you understand its truth -- ‘self is illusion’. The worst delusion of all is the belief in the existence of some supposedly permanent and substantial ‘self’ at the centre of our conscious---or even unconscious---awareness. The ‘self’ does not exist, at least it does not exist in the sense of possessing a separate, independent, unchangeable, material existence of its own. In words attributed to the Buddha, whether 'past, future, or present; internal or external, manifest or subtle ... as it actually is ... "This is not mine. This is not my self. This is not what I am"' (Majjhima Nikaya I, 130).

Ever since we were born we have been accumulating hundreds of ideas, concepts and notions -- not to mention beliefs – about who we are. Most of these ideas, concepts and notions are false. There are, in our mind, layer upon layer of mental and emotional adhesions and accretions. Many of these have come from our parents, our schooling, and religious conditioning. Others have been self-built, as a reaction to life experience. Over time, beginning from the very moment of our birth, sensory perceptions -- especially what we see [including read] and hear -- harden into memories and other thought-forms formed out of aggregates of thought and feeling. In time, the illusion of a separate self emerges. However, the truth is that our mental continuity and sense of identity and existence are simply the result of habit, memory and conditioning.

Hundreds and thousands of separate, ever-changing and ever-so-transient mental occurrences harden into a fairly persistent mental construct of sorts which is no more than a confluence of impermanent components (‘I-moments’ or ‘selves’) cleverly synthesized by the mind in a way which appears to give them a singularity and a separate and independent existence and life of their own. The result is a 'self' -- actually losts and lots of selves. At any one point in time, we mistakenly believe any one or more of these false selves to be the real person that each one of us is. 

Know this. The real person that we are is something other than those selves. You are a person -- a mind-body complex in respect of which both physical characteristics and states of consciousness can be ascribed. Yes, you are much, much more than those hundreds of little, false selves---all those waxing and waning ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s’---with which you tend to identify, in the mistaken belief that they constitute the ‘real me,’ that is, the person that you are. Only the latter is ontologically real. Personal freedom and real personal transformation come when we get real, that is, when we start to think, act and live from our personhood as a person among persons. We need to get our mind off our ‘selves’ and rise above them if we are to get real. And remember this---there is no human problem that is not common to other persons among persons.

Self-discovery and self-knowledge -- not to mention real self-transformation -- begin with the shattering of illusion. Ignorance or non-discrimination -- avidyā in Sanskrit -- is identifying yourself with any one or more of those false selves to which I have referred above. The real ‘I’ is the person that you are. So, the very next time you find yourself – that is, the person that you are – saying something like ‘I am angry’, ‘I am frightened’ or ‘I like [this or that]’, please understand that the person that you are is identifying with one or other of those many false selves to the extent that the false self takes over.

There is, in Hindu philosophy and spirituality, a small book of great wisdom titled Atmabodha (‘Self-Knowledge’), which is attributed to Sankarachara [pictured right] although he was probably not its author. It doesn’t matter for present purposes who was the author; it’s what is contained in the book that is important. The author gives a couple of very simple but useful illustrations:

The reflection of moon in water that is not still gives an impression that the moon is moving because of ignorance.

…       …       …       …

An ignorant person thinks that the moon is moving whereas it is the clouds that are really moving.

Ignorance (avidyā) arises from a lack of discrimination, that is, from not seeing things as they really are.

There is no ‘method’ or ‘technique’ for seeing things as they really are. In order to see things as they really are all you need to do is remove the obstacles to seeing things as they really are. The biggest obstacle is the illusion of self.

Seeing things as they really are. That is what the word vipassanā ('insight meditation' or mindfulness) means. The word is composed of two parts – vi, meaning ‘in various ways’, and passanā, meaning seeing. So, vipassanā means ‘seeing in various ways’ as well as seeing things as they really are.

The good news is that the mind can free itself from all of its conditioning. But for that to occur there needs to be a choiceless awareness of the presence of conditioning---that is, no condemnation, no judgment, no analysis, no interpretation, no evaluation, just a ‘total perception’ of life as it unfolds from one moment to the next. That’s where mindfulness comes in, for that is what mindfulness is. It’s all about developing and using what I've referred to elsewhere as a mindful mind of no-mind---that is, an empty mind, a mind that is always open to truth as it unfolds unceasingly, a mind characterised by openness and passive alertness.

Truth --- that is, life, also known as reality -- is never static. It is dynamic. Conditioning, including all belief-systems, is otherwise. A conditioned mind is a closed, conflicted, and divided mind.

Am I suggesting that you make it your New Year’s resolution to start seeing things as they really are? No, I am not. There is no need to ‘resolve’ anything. The very act of making a resolution implies a lack of power to do the thing in the absence of the resolution. Resolutions are nothing other than the imposition of one’s will over one’s thoughts and actions. In order to see things as they really are you simply … look … and observe … perceive … without condemnation, judgment, analysis, interpretation and evaluation. 

Go to it.