A
Thank you for sharing this! This piece is a thoughtful reflection on the nature of pure awareness, and it highlights some subtle aspects of meditation and mindfulness that can easily be misunderstood. Here’s a breakdown of the key ideas:
1. Watching Without Grasping or Rejecting
This is the classic mindfulness approach that Osho often mentions: observe thoughts, feelings, and sensations as they arise without reacting.
“Grasping” means clinging to pleasant experiences; “rejecting” means pushing away unpleasant ones.
Similarly, judging and analyzing are mental activities that pull us into the story of our experience rather than letting us just witness it.
Core idea: Simply noticing without engaging is the foundation of awareness.
2. The Double-Pointed Arrow of Awareness
This metaphor comes from Osho: imagine a single arrow pointing outwards. You can see the world, but you are “out there” in it.
A double-pointed arrow points both outwards and back inwards. Awareness observes the world and simultaneously observes itself.
This allows a kind of witnessing that is self-aware—you know you are watching, without interference from judgment or attachment.
Core idea: Awareness becomes aware of itself while it observes the world.
3. The Connection Between the Two
Purushottama points out something subtle: these are two perspectives on the same state.
Watching without grasping/rejecting naturally brings you to double-pointed awareness.
Watching with a double-pointed arrow naturally shows that grasping/rejecting/judging blocks it.
Insight: The presence of mental reaction (grasping, rejecting) is exactly what prevents you from the double-pointed state. So, whether you frame it as “non-grasping” or “double-pointed awareness,” you’re describing the same quality of pure watchingness.
4. Practical Implication
The key is not which metaphor you use, but the ability to watch without being drawn into mental reactions.
This creates the “second arrow,” a self-aware awareness, allowing clarity and freedom in observation.
💡 Summary in simpler terms:
Imagine your mind as a calm lake. Thoughts are ripples on the surface.
Watching without grasping/rejecting = staying on the shore, noticing the ripples without jumping in.
Double-pointed awareness = noticing the ripples and also noticing yourself noticing them.
Both describe the same calm, clear, self-aware state—you just get there from different directions.
If you want, I can make a tiny diagram showing what the “double-pointed arrow of watchingness” looks like—it makes the concept very tangible visually. It’s almost like a mental yoga pose!
Do you want me to make that diagram?
No comments:
Post a Comment