NEW STUDY SUGGESTS MINDFULNESS IMPROVES DECISION-MAKING

Decisions, decisions, and more decisions. Such is life.

As someone who has spent much of his working life in the practice and teaching of the law pertaining to the making of decisions by administrative decision-makers and others, not to mention making more than a few such decisions of my own, I read with great interest the results of a recent study suggesting that mindfulness improves the quality of decision-making.

Yes, according to new research from researchers at INSEAD and The Wharton School even one 15-minute focused-breathing meditation may help people make smarter choices. The findings are published in the February 2014 issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

People have trouble cutting their losses. This behaviour, often described as ‘throwing good money after bad,’ is driven by what behavioural scientists call the ‘sunk-cost bias.’

‘Most people have trouble admitting they were wrong when their initial decisions lead to undesirable outcomes,’ says lead researcher Andrew Hafenbrack (pictured left). ‘They don't want to feel wasteful or that their initial investment was a loss. Ironically, this kind of thinking often causes people to waste or lose more resources in an attempt to regain their initial investment or try to “break even.”’

Across a series of studies, PhD candidate Hafenbrack and his co-authors found that mindfulness meditation may help to counteract this deep-rooted bias. ‘We found that a brief period of mindfulness meditation can encourage people to make more rational decisions by considering the information available in the present moment, while ignoring some of the other concerns that typically exacerbate the “sunk cost bias,”’ explains Hafenbrack.

The research team conducted 4 studies to test the idea that mindfulness meditation could improve decision-making by increasing resistance to the sunk-cost bias.

In one online study, American participants reported about how much they typically focus on the present moment, and also read 10 sunk-cost scenarios---such as whether to attend a music festival that had been paid for when illness and bad weather made enjoyment unlikely---and then reported how much they would let go of sunk costs in each of them. The results revealed that the more people typically focused on the present moment, the more they reported that they would ignore sunk costs.

To test whether mindfulness caused an increased resistance to the sunk-cost bias, the researchers conducted an additional three experiments. In each, participants listened to a 15-minute recording made by a professional mindfulness coach. For one group of participants, the recording led them through a focused-breathing meditation that repeatedly instructed them to focus on the sensations of breathing. The other group of participants listened to a recording that asked them to think of whatever comes to mind, a practice that is not a form of meditation. Participants then responded to sunk-cost scenario questions. In the final study, participants also answered questions about the time period on which they focused -- that is present, past, or future -- and the emotions they experienced.

The results show that mindfulness meditation increased resistance to the sunk-cost bias in each of the three experiments.

‘The debiasing effect of mindfulness meditation in sunk-cost situations was due to a two-step process,’ said co-author Zoe Kinias. ‘First, meditation reduced how much people focused on the past and future, and this psychological shift led to less negative emotion. The reduced negative emotion then facilitated their ability to let go of sunk costs.’

‘This tool is very practical,’ said co-author Sigal Barsade. ‘Our findings hold great promise for research on how mindfulness can influence emotions and behaviour, and how employees can use it to feel and perform better.’

Post source. This post is based on materials provided by the Association for Psychological Science. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

Resource: Hafenbrack A C, Kinias Z, and Barsade S G. ‘Debiasing the Mind Through Meditation: Mindfulness and the Sunk-Cost Bias.’ Psychological Science, 2013; 25 (2): 369 DOI: 10.1177/0956797613503853

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‘WHAT AM I TO DO WITH MYSELF?’

‘What am I to do with myself?’ said one of my clients to me. Let's call her Mary (not her real name). ‘I feel so helpless,’ Mary said.

My reply to Mary startled her at first, then quickly began to annoy her, and then frustrate her immensely. (I can have that sort of effect on my cIients, not to mention others as well.) I said to her, ‘That’s absolutely wonderful that you feel that way. Now we can get somewhere. I was hoping you would eventually come to feel this way.’

‘What do you mean? What are you talking about?’ Mary retorted. ‘Look,’ I said to her. ‘Feeling helpless, hopeless, and powerless is the foundation stone for real, lasting self-change. Now that you've worked out you're  beaten, you're ready to discover, and then start living from, your real power centre, which is the very ground of your being as a person among persons.’

Well, it took me quite a while to convince her, but Mary is now an entirely new person. She has peace of mind, and her old, tired, worn-out, negative ‘false selves’ have been dissolved. Well, most of them anyway. She is working progressively on the rest of them. You see, Mary is now living, one day at a time, and one moment at a time, from her ‘True Being,’ that is, as the real person that she is.

Pathway in ornamental garden,
Greater Tokyo Area, Japan.

Photo taken by the author.

We use the word ‘self’ in two different senses. Firstly, 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 our conscious mind. Over time, beginning from the very moment of our birth, sensory perceptions harden into memories formed out of aggregates of thought and feeling. In time, the illusion of a separate 'witnessing 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. Also, genetics has a bit to do with it as well. 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'---or, as we will see, lots and lots of 'selves'---that are little more than bundles of memories from and out of which thought arises, or rather reacts to stimuli whether internal (eg other such bundles of memories, that is, 'I's' and 'me's') or external.

Now, it is through this perception of an internally generated sense of 'self' that most of us ordinarily experience, process and interpret all external reality. For example, if you see yourself as inferior to others, you will invariably find that life takes you at your own estimation of yourself, so don’t be surprised if you find yourself being treated as a doormat. Your every experience will tend to confirm what you fear most---‘I am indeed inferior to others, and others think so, too.’ Ditto if you perceive yourself as full of fear. Your life experience will be one long self-fulfilling prophecy, and you will find yourself identifying with Job in the Bible who uttered those immortal words, ‘For the thing that I fear comes upon me, and what I dread befalls me’ (Job 3:25). In other words, we tend to become the embodiment of all the negative self-images we have of ourselves. 

Lake Ashi, Hakone, Japan.
Photo taken by the author.

These negative self-images and misbeliefs, when we identify with them, dominate our daily lives, thoughts, feelings, and actions, operating as some sort of unseen enemy. They haunt and hound us, and rob us of peace of mind and emotional equanimity. The funny thing is these self-images have no power in and of themselves except the power we, the persons that we are, give them by, firstly, our belief in them, and secondly, the attention and time we give them in our mental and emotional life. Who or what is this 'I' or 'me' that is inferior or fearful? Call out to 'it.' Does it answer back? If it does it's more than likely it's another 'I' or 'me' doing the answering. It's all quite tragic ... and silly ... and unnecessary. There is a much better way to live. There is a way out!

Unfortunately, the mental construct of ‘self’---indeed, hundreds of ‘selves,' that is, 'I's' and 'me's,' in the form of our (often negative and destructive) likes, dislikes, attachments, aversions, cravings, habits of thought, prejudices, beliefs, opinions, and so on---which we have each built up over many years by thought and habit, and then reinforced by words spoken as well as memories of the past, imposes severe limitations on how we see life. All too often, life’s experiences are filtered through a distorted lens comprised of the totality of our various self-images. We fail to see things as they really are because of this distorted lens. You see, how you experience what happens to you in life will be determined very largely by your self-image, that is, how you see yourself.

Now, this is the really important part of what I have to say. Your self-image---actually, you have a multitude of self-images in your mind---is not the real person that you are. These self-images, although quite persistent because we choose to identify with them and hold onto them, and mistakenly believe that they are the ‘real me,’ are false and illusory. That doesn’t mean these mental images don’t exist in your mind. No, not at all. It simply means that these images are brought about by memory, and thus thought, and therefore have no separate, independent, and permanent existence in and of themselves from the real person that you are . Get the picture?

Well, I almost hear you ask, as my client did indeed ask as well, 'What can I do about this state of affairs?' The answer is---a lot. 

The first thing to do is to accept that you are a ‘person’---a vital and integral part of life's self-expression. That is what you are. You are not that 'I' or 'me,' whether under the guise of your so-called 'witnessing self,' ‘transcendental self,’ or ‘ego-self’---all of which are essentially the same thing---that are nothing more than the aggregation of the hundreds and thousands of ‘I-moments’ you have manufactured in your lifetime. Nor are you any of the other false selves with which you habitually identify (and thereby perptuate) and which you mistakenly believe to be the ‘real you.’ However, the reality is that this supposed 'real you' is nothing but (to use the words of the Indian spiritual philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti [pictured above left]) 'self-centred activity, the self that is always asserting, the self that demands fulfilment, the self that perpetuates itself through identification, the self that is constantly in action and creating its own centre and therefore isolating itself.'

The second thing to do is to recognize that you are always in direct and immediate contact with internal and external reality---that is, with what is---except when you put barriers between yourself---that is, the person that in truth you are---and reality.

Once you have fully accepted that fact, you can start to live differently. To do that, you need to observe life as if there were no observer. A familiar theme of the Indian spiritual philosopher Krishnamurti was the need for observation 'without the observer.' Why? Because where there is an 'observer' there is a conditioned mind and a conditioned point of view. In other words, where there is an observer, there is a distorting lens which experiences, processes and interprets---and distorts---all that happens in our lives through an amalgam of thoughts, feelings, images, memories, beliefs, opinions, prejudices and biases---all of which is the past and for the most part conditioning. And for goodness’ sake never, never, never try to ‘throw out the window’ or directly expel your ‘false selves.’ That will only drive them more deeply into your mind. ‘What you resist, persists,’ as the saying goes.

I offer no methods or techniques (heaven forbid) for getting rid of your false selves, except to say that self-observation is the key to successful living. It is the ‘handle’ by which you become and live from the reality of your ‘True Being,’ that is, the person that you are. I love these oft-cited words from author P D Ouspensky (In Search of the Miraculous), who is quoting his teacher George Gurdjieff [pictured below right]:

'Self-observation brings man to the realization of the necessity for self-change. And in observing himself a man notices that self-observation itself brings about certain changes in his inner processes, He begins to understand that self-observation is an instrument of self-change, a means of awakening. By observing himself he throws, as it were, a ray of light onto his inner processes which have hitherto worked in complete darkness. And under the influence of this light the processes themselves begin to change.'

You cannot change or reform your false selves, but there is no need to do so in any event. What needs to be done is to ‘dissolve’ your false selves. The first thing to do is to understand the process (an unfortunate word, for it makes it all sound far too mechanical) of formation of the false self/selves. The next thing to do, and keep on doing, that is, practising each day and throughout each day, is self-observation---letting it (whatever it may be) be as it is in you, but being willing for it to move and change.

Self-observation of your thoughts, feelings, and actions as they arise or occur---if undertaken with passive detachment and choiceless awareness (that is, with no judgment, justification, analysis, attitude, comment, interpretation, interference, criticism, or condemnation) of what unfolds as your inner and outer reality from one moment to the next---will in time break down your identification with your false selves as a result of the insight gained from the process of self-observation itself. When you truly observe the process of your thinking, and cease being ‘an observer apart from the observed’ (to use Krishnamurti’s words), which means you see the whole movement of your thoughts, and your feelings, as well as your actions, choicelessly in the sense explained above, then the very act of self-observation puts an end to thought. The result? The false selves are dissolved because they are simply the creation of thought, habits of thought, and conditioning---all of them thought. No thought, no false selves---and over time a psychological mutation occurs that is of tremendous depth and profundity. You have become a light unto yourself. Yes, it’s a wondrous thing to behold. Self-change from self-knowledge from self-observation. (Note. The reference to 'self' in the expressions 'self-change' and 'self-knowledge' is a reference to what we actually are as persons among persons. As to the expression 'self-observation,' the word 'self' has an expanded meaning as described above.)

In some spiritual traditions this whole process is referred to as ‘surrender’ or ‘letting go,’ with the idea that there needs to be a re-surrender and further letting-go whenever one becomes aware of something---in particular, some false self---that is holding us back from fully being the real person that we are. It doesn’t matter what you call it. The only important thing is that you dissolve your false selves through ongoing---yes, it must be undertaken on a progressive basis---self-observation.

I suggest there is no better place to begin than … now! So, start right where you are. Now.

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SO, YOU THINK YOU HAVEN’T BEEN BRAINWASHED?

Some thirty or forty years ago, when I still considered myself a Bible-believing Christian---ugly self-serving words they are---I all too often heard Christian evangelical preachers rail against the ‘dangers of the cults.’ ‘Beware of the cults, the occult, and all that,’ was their rallying call. 

Actually, these preachers did me a very great service. They protested so much, and so loudly, against these so-called cults that they aroused an interest and a curiosity in me to learn more about them. I even joined a couple of them along the way---and it widened my mind considerably ... something I very much needed. Come to think of it, I even became---and still am---an ordained minister of one of them. Yes, I'm proud to be a heretic. By the way, the word 'heretic' means one who chooses to think differently. We need more heretics in the world---more people who are prepared to think differently. Bring it on.

True, there have been some evil and truly dangerous cults along the way. I think of Jim Jones, his so-called Peoples Temple, and the Jonestown Massacre [pictured above] … and I think of many others, some just plain wacky, some mere money-making shams, others more sinister in nature and effect, some of which are still active today, one of which I’m too scared to mention by name in this post lest I be sued. Say no more.

The thing is, nearly all of us have been the victim of cults of one sort or another. Now, let’s get down to basics. What is a ‘cult’?  The word cult, from the Latin word cultus, refers to a faith-based community of likeminded people who come together on a regular basis to worship; more specifically, the word refers to the specific form of worship, together with the body of beliefs and related practices, of a particular sect. (Note. The word ‘sect,’ like the word ‘cult,’ is very much a pejorative word, but every religious organization or group is a ‘sect’ in the eyes of the law, even if the word more rightly refers to some subgroup or offshoot of a larger organization or group which has its own different set of rules, doctrines, and principles.)

Now, a cult, in the religious sense, is simply a system of religious beliefs that replaces one’s own beliefs with its own, and gives legitimacy---sometimes blatantly, and sometimes quite subtly---only to its own teachings, such that, if a person cannot or does not conform, they are excluded whether by formal excommunication, censure, or other means. More often than not, a cult gives the impress of finality, if not infallibility, to any one or more of the following---its founder, its current leader(s), and its so-called holy book(s). Get the idea? The Roman Catholic Church is the largest single cult in the world today.

Let’s say you were reared a Baptist, or a Roman Catholic, or an Orthodox Jew … or perhaps a Buddhist of one sort or another ... or maybe a Humanist or an atheist. Well, you were part of a cult, and you were subjected to brainwashing of one sort or another. Yes, the conditioning---the beliefs and values inculcated into you---was nothing less than brainwashing, and it’s rather ironic that the religious groups doing the most brainwashing are almost invariably the ones screaming the loudest against the dangers of brainwashing.

When I was a Baptist, I was taught that only certain people---those Bible-believing Christians who held similar beliefs to those inculcated into me---would go to heaven. There was little or no hope for the vast bulk of humanity, including people such as Roman Catholics and other non-evangelical ‘Christians.’ (The people with whom I worshipped did not consider those so-called Christians to be Christians at all. Roman Catholics, in particular, taught a 'false gospel.' Get the picture?) One of my Baptist ministers---actually the one who married my wife and I  (i.e. was the officiant minister) way back in 1980---would often say in his sermons, ‘God has spoken His final word in Jesus Christ,’ and ‘If Christianity is right, all other religions are wrong.’ (I have attacked the silliness of those sorts of statements elsewhere.) 

The Baptist minister of whom I speak also taught in a Baptist theological college for many years, and was later a president of the Baptist Union of Queensland, so he was highly respected in the denomination to which I once belonged. In sermon after sermon I was taught---yes, brainwashed---by one narrow-minded and bigoted minister after another a very narrow and exclusivist system of Biblical exegesis and conservative evangelical (and at times fundamentalist) doctrine. Indeed, the doctrinal system preached was an unwarranted imposition upon sacred scripture of a rigid ideology---yes, ideology---an artificial construct that was never part of the original teachings of the religion or its founder. 

While I am on the subject of evangelicals and fundamentalists, I like what the San Francisco journalist and columnist Herb Caen said about so-called 'born again Christians.' He said, ‘The trouble with born-again Christians is that they are an even bigger pain the second time around.’ How true! No wonder these sorts of religious organizations turn so many people into atheists. When I think of the inward-looking and for the most part financially very well-off Baptists in my old church---actually, I try not to think of them at all---I am reminded of some words written by the American Episcopalian priest (and de facto cofounder of the wonderful organization Alcoholics Anonymous) Dr Sam Shoemaker [pictured right]. He referred to people such as these as 'comfortable evangelicals, hugging personal salvation to themselves, living off the sweat of underpaid labour, blind to their own guilt for social injustice, and fattening their souls for heaven.' Great stuff! I wish I'd written that.

Back to Alcoholics Anonymous for a moment. Do you know that none of the Baptist ministers I have known---and I have known a lot---had ever stepped into an AA meeting-room? What's more, none of them had the slightest desire to go to one, to see the transformations that can and do take place in the lives of otherwise hopeless and powerless alcoholics. You'd think they'd be interested in spiritual healing. After all, the man they purported to worship as Lord went about the countryside healing and casting out devils. No, they had no interest in the subject at all. Perhaps they were frightened they'd meet a bunch of active full-on drunks. Far from it. Or maybe they still saw alcoholism as being a sin or moral weakness as opposed to a disease. Few knew anything at all about the subject. It's largely the same today, at least among evangelical pastors. (Catholic priests, to their credit, are generally better educated on the matter.) 

I say this: more miracles---and I mean true life-changing miracles---take place in AA [and other 12-step group] meeting-rooms than in churches ... on all days of the week. People wake up to the reality of their true selves, and discard all that is false, and a chronic, progressive and terminal illness is arrested. Now, that is real salvation. One last thing. I've even heard some Baptist pastors, and some from other conservative evangelical denominations as well, attack AA as being a 'cult,' or even 'of the Devil'---because of (quote) 'all that "Higher Power" and "God as you understand Him" stuff ... why, there's no mention of Jesus Christ at all in those Twelve Steps!' Speaking personally, I'm mighty glad there isn't. Get real, the lot of you. Wake up! Listen to what the greatest Baptist thinker of his time, Dr Harry Emerson Fosdick [pictured left], had to say about the life-changing power of AA: ‘I have listened to many learned arguments about God, but for honest-to-goodness experiential evidence of God, His power personally appropriated and His reality indubitably assured, give me a good meeting of AA!’

Now, if you think I’m being too hard on the Baptists I could tell you stories---some firsthand on my part---of some of the other religious organizations mentioned above. The stories would be very similar in key respects. For example, my many years' association with Humanists and atheists led me to conclude that many of them were as dogmatic, intolerant, and militant as the Baptists. Ditto the Catholics and even some Buddhists I've known. Yes, most of us have been brainwashed, if not by religious organizations then by political ones, our families, our educational and social institutions, and so on. We stopped thinking for ourselves, and were taught to think one way only.

Today, I am in the un-brainwashing business---if business be the right word (I make no money out of it). My ‘message’---a horrible word---to all who take the time to listen is a simple one. Life (i.e. Truth, Reality, God) just is. It---whatever ‘it’ may be---is all there is, and all we have and are capable of knowing, and it unfolds unceasingly from one moment to the next, and if you want to ‘know’ and ‘understand’ you must throw away all your beliefs (yes, all of them) and simply look, see, observe, and examine. Put no barriers, and allow none to be erected, between you and your own direct, immediate and unmediated moment-to-moment experience of Life as it unfolds as the Eternal Now. 

Now, you may say, ‘Ellis-Jones, isn’t that---what you’ve just described---some belief of yours?’ I say, ‘No, not at all. I am simply describing and experiencing what is---as it unfolds. I offer no judgment, interpretation, or analysis of what is. I let ‘it’ speak for itself. Such is the nature of Truth. It is not a matter of opinion.’ I have no time for beliefs at all, whether those beleifs be religious, political, or whatever. I oppose all belief-systems. I like what the American author and speaker Vernon Howard [pictured below] said about beliefs. He said, ‘People assume that beliefs can open the highway to happiness, when in fact a man's beliefs keep him on endless detours. The reason beliefs cannot sustain anyone is because life's events do not believe in beliefs.’ You see, there's reality .. and there's beliefs about reality. I choose the former. It is more than enough. While I'm on the subject of beliefs, here's another gem of profound spiritual wisdom from Vernon Howard, a man who always told it like it is: ‘There is hope for whoever does not know what to believe. Human belief is a combination of superstition, gullibility and mental laziness. We need not believe anything; we need to find, to see, to know.’ 

Yes, I am very happy today. I have thrown away all of the beliefs I once held or thought I held. I have no beliefs, no illusions, and no delusions so far as I am aware, and I reject all so-called ‘methods’ and ‘techniques’, and ‘paths’ and ‘ways,’ to Truth. There is no ‘way’ to Truth. Why should there be? A ‘path’ or ‘way’ implies a distance, a separation, between us and Truth, and that simply isn’t the case. A 'method' or 'technique' is simply a form of brainwashing. You don't need any of them---at least not when it comes to experiencing and knowing and understanding Life, which, at the end of the day, is all that truly matters. No person---god, demi-god, messiah, saint, ‘holy one,’ guru, master ('ascended' [?] or otherwise), or teacher---is Truth or is the ‘way’ to Truth … despite what you have read or been taught by others in positions of so-called authority. Now, please don’t think I am a nihilist---far from it. I hold and affirm certain convictions and values, but all of them derive directly and objectively from Life itself, and from an ongoing experience of Life. The convictions and values I affirm as true are ‘things’ I have come to know and understand. They are not articles of faith or belief. Not at all.

I want you to think about just how much brainwashing you have been exposed to in your lifetime. I’m sure it’s much more extensive than you might have first thought to be the case.

Happy un-brainwashing, each and every one of you!

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‘To escape the self-trap, to be sane and decent and awake
and whole — that is all that matters.’ Vernon Howard.

You are the problem---on every occasion. Yes, you---and me for that matter. So, what is the problem, you may ask? Well, it can be any problem whatsoever, but the real problem is what the American spiritual teacher Vernon Howard [pictured left] referred to as the ‘self-trap.’ Please read this piece of wisdom from Mr Howard:

‘The attempt to escape a problem is the problem. There is logic in this. When a man tries to escape, when he moves away from the problem, he divides himself into one man with a problem, and another man who will escape the problem. In reality, there is no such division, so the escape must always fail, as the man sadly experiences. But, when seeing he is the problem itself, that he and his problem are one, he stops trying to escape because he sees there is no other course. In this state of intelligent acknowledgement of reality, he will not have the problem.’

I often explain it this way. In each of us there are many selves, and they are all false—false in the sense that they are not the real person each one of us is. When we ‘have’ (an unfortunate word in this context) a problem, there is the ‘self that wants to escape the problem,’ and there are many other selves in our mind as well, including the ‘self that doesn’t want to escape the problem,’ as well as the ‘self that thinks it will escape the problem,’ and the ‘self that thinks it knows how to escape the problem.’ None of these selves have any power in and of themselves, none of them can rise above their own level, and many of the selves militate, and even fight, against other selves in our mind. You need to understand that all of these selves are simply mental images in our brains. They wax and wane, they come and go, they vary in felt intensity from moment to moment, but they are all transitory, temporary and for that reason illusory. None of these selves are separate or independent from the real person each one of us is. In his book Esoteric Mind Power Vernon Howard writes about what he calls the ‘self-divided man’ who ‘consists of dozens of "selves" which fight each other in taking him over for a few minutes at a time.’ Howard writes:

'Living in a state of psychic riot, he is thrilled one minute and dejected the next. One part of him is a danger to another part. So what can be trusted? Nothing. The self-knowing man has cleared his mental streets of these rioters, leaving him with a whole and healthy mind, which can be trusted completely.'

Let’s say you have an anger problem. There is anger in you, so to speak, but the reality is you are angry because you have so identified yourself with the ‘self that is angry’ and the ‘self that wants to be [and stay] angry’ that you have become at-one with the anger. You and the problem are one in that special sense and, as the onetime Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple pointed out, ‘no effort of the self can remove the self from the centre of its own endeavour.’ Many others have said more-or-less the same thing. A couple of centuries earlier the French Roman Catholic archbishop, theologian, poet and writer François Fénelon wrote, 'The entire root of your problem is that you cannot get out of yourself,' and many more centuries earlier Jesus said, 'I can of mine own self do nothing' (Jn 5:30). Truth is truth. It never changes. It cannot change. If it could it wouldn't be truth. 

The reason 'self can't change self' (and therefore can't solve the fundamental problem of self) is simple---the ‘self that wants to escape an unwanted self’ is the same thing as the ‘self that thinks it will escape the unwanted self,’ the ‘self that thinks it knows how to escape the unwanted self,’ and the ‘self that doesn’t want to escape the unwanted self,’ and all the other damn selves as well. All of these selves are false and powerless---they're just mere images in our mind. The trouble is, we believe in them and act as if they were real. Now read what Krishnamurti [pictured below right], the Indian spiritual philosopher, has to say about this dilemma:

'I am angry, is that anger different from me? Me, the observer, who says "I am angry." Or that anger is part of me. It seems so simple. No? And when I realize that, that the observer is the observed, that the anger which I recognize is part of me, not something apart, then what am I to do with that anger? I am not separate from that anger. I am anger.'

Dr Norman Vincent Peale wrote, 'There needs to be a shift in emphasis from self to non-self,' but how is that to be achieved given that self can't change self? Clearly, a major paradigm shift is needed---but how? (First, don't ask 'how.') The good news is that you, the person that you are, has power to change---when you see yourself as you really are, when you make a decision that you really want to live differently, and when you are prepared to ‘drop,’ so to speak, your strong identification with your false self or selves. Krishnamurti would often say, ‘Stop trying to escape from the fact of yourself.’ You can’t do it, but when you drop the false, that is, see the false as false, and stop hanging onto and identifying with the false, the real is revealed. In the case of anger, for example, you need to observe the anger without recognition---without even using the word anger, which is a form of recognition.

Self-observation is the answer. You need to see yourself as you really are, without identifying in any way with any of your multitude of selves, thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, or actions. Do not judge or condemn yourself. Be impartial and objective, and simply observe without reaction and identification. Only in this way will you, the person that you are, be able to deliver the person that you are from the bondage or burden of the problem of the false self. You, the person who has chosen to be at-one with the ‘self that is [and wants to stay] angry,’ and various other mischievous selves as well, must come to see clearly that all such selves are false… no matter how much attention, identification, and recognition you have given them in the past.

Vernon Howard would often say, ‘You don’t have to create your deliverance, your freedom. You can have it, right now. It’s there for you, right now. Who has bound you? Claim your deliverance and freedom, right now!’ All that is needed, on your part, is what Mr Howard refers to as a ‘state of intelligent acknowledgement of reality.’

I will finish with this. 'No self. No problem,' said the Zen master when asked to explain the deeper meaning of Buddhism. 

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‘ENTER ZEN FROM THERE,’ SAID THE MASTER

There is a Zen story that goes like this. ‘Master, how do I enter Zen?’ asked the pupil. ‘Do you hear the sound of that little mountain steam?’ asked the master. ‘Yes, I do,’ replied the pupil. ‘Enter Zen from there,’ said the master. 

The pupil then thought for a while about what the master had said to him, before eventually saying to the master, ‘Master, I’ve been thinking … What if I had said I couldn’t hear the mountain stream? … What would you have said then?’ 

‘Disciple?’ said the master. ‘Yes, master?’ said the pupil. ‘Enter Zen from there,’ replied the master.

‘Enter Zen from there.’ What wisdom there is in those four English words!

If you ask, ‘What is Zen,’ you should not expect an answer---certainly not an answer that says something definite and intelligible to the conscious, rational intellect. You see, Zen is something inherently indescribable. Words fail to explain it or exhaust its meaning. However, if the Zen story set forth above says anything, it says this---Zen is to be experienced in the real and the ‘concrete’ as opposed to the abstract. 

In Western religion the Ultimate ('God,' if you wish) is sometimes referred to as Pure Being or something like that---a very abstract idea. In Eastern religion the Ultimate---Zen, the Tao---is more like Pure Be-ing-ness/Living-ness of life itself experienced as real, living things---something (actually, 'no-thing') much more concrete. Get the idea? (If you do, you can explain it to me. Just kidding.) In Western religion the Ultimate creates by making. In Eastern religion the Ultimate creates (not quite the right word here) by 'not-making.' The Tao, the very essence of life, is something growing and evolving. It is forever dynamic and not static. It must be found in the everyday things of life---for example, in the sound of a mountain stream, or in the absence of any such sound, or in those inexplicable and gratuitously unfair things of life such as the death of one of your children.

The Chinese refer to this Ultimate as wu-wei---wu (mu in Japanese) meaning ‘not’ or ‘non-’ and wei action, doing, striving, making, and busyness. So, wu-wei refers to a state of mind that is characterized by ‘non-graspingness’ or ‘non-strivingness.’ It is not so much non-action, non-doing, or not-doing, but the ‘action of non-action.’ It is a mindset that is totally and openly accepting of what is, of what unfolds from one moment to the next. It is a mind which is constantly moving, both spontaneously and effortlessly, with and in response to changes that occur both inside and outside the mind. It is a mindset that is not fixed on any particular object.

Both Zen and mindfulness have each been described as the ‘method of no method.’ Each is the ‘technique of no technique.’ (All so-called methods or techniques are forms of brainwashing by some other person. They are means of control and subjugation, as Krishnamurti [pictured below] often said. Avoid them. Eschew them.) Living mindfully requires no method or technique as such. You just do ‘it,’ whatever the ‘it’ may be … mindfully. You just drop your attachments---and look and observe choicelessly.

Do you want to know the 'secret to life'? Well, start with this. There is no secret to life, and no ‘way’ or ‘path’ to Truth other than the moment-to-moment direct and immediate and unmediated experience of life itself as it unfolds from one moment to the next. 

Yes, the so-called ‘meaning’ (such an ugly word!) of life is to be found in the living of your days, in the very livingness of life itself. You will not find true meaning in anything or anyone other than in the real and concrete things of life. Those things include, of course, human relationships which can be quite meaningful. The intangible is to be found in the tangible. Indeed, the intangible and the tangible are one and the same. The extraordinary is to be found in the ordinary. Again, they are one and the same.

So, look for the Ultimate in the so-called ordinary things of life and nature---yes, in the everyday things of life, whatever they may be. Forget all about striving, straining, doing, and making. Most importantly, forget all about grasping and clinging. Instead, live mindfully, spontaneously, and effortlessly.

Calligraphy: (top left) mu [not, nothing, no-thing]; (below) mindfulness.

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