INTRODUCTION
Unclarity prevails regarding thinking and meditation.
Many assume meditation to be simply a lack of thinking. They reduce meditation to just the absence of thought. But meditation is much more dynamic and even incorporates thoughts and encompasses them.
In this blog post, we’ll uncover the difference between thinking and meditation.
1. Meditation Is An Experience
Meditation is much more than thinking because it is an experience. It is not limited to concepts, philosophies, or ideas. Instead, it is the blossoming of all these things into a lived experience that leaves a trace in the memory and reveals the fact that there exists a self who experiences.
Thinking, on the other hand, need not necessarily transform into existence.
Thus, there are many thoughts people have all their life, but many of them don’t manifest on an experiential level. They exist only as thoughts, living in the plane of the mind and intellect and never evolve into anything beyond thoughts. They remain trapped in the mind and exist as mere potential — as seeds that have never been sown.
Meditation is the flowering of experience in the spring of the seasons, revealing the sweet fragrance of existence arising from the beauty of one’s own consciousness.
2. Thinking Occurs In The Past
Experience is always fresh. It is always alive. It happens always in the present moment, and it ends in the present moment as well.
Life is a stream and you cannot step into the same river twice, because the water is always flowing.
Meditation is the flow of existence, deeply synchronized with the reality of experience, and evolves from one moment to another. It is deeply connected with the present moment, and cannot exist anywhere else.
Thinking, on the other hand, is a phenomenon of the past. It is often born from an experience and rises up as a distorted shadow of the experience. Many times, the experience becomes the basis of thoughts, acting as the source from which all the thoughts keep pouring into the mind, and this may happen even years after the original experience.
But the thought of an experience is not the same thing as the experience, just like dreaming about something is not the same as doing it. These thoughts are closer to dreams than reality because they are a shadow and reflection of reality — they are an illusion. Just because an illusion is beautiful does not mean that it can replace the real.
In order to think properly, one must take a pause, disconnect from the present moment, and dwell in the mind. Thus, phrases like ‘getting lost in thoughts’ become valid because whenever we are lost in thoughts, we have moved away from the world of experience and dwell in an imaginary place which is a bit disconnected from the real. Eventually, all thinking must climax into experience, but if it doesn’t, then it leads to neurosis.
Meditation bypasses the realm of thinking and synchronizes the practitioner with the eternal flow of the real. Thus, meditation blossoms as an experience — not as philosophy or thoughts. Thus, all those who have a liking for deep philosophies and ideologies may not understand meditation immediately, because unlike intellectual items, meditation is not so dry — it always manifests as a ripe experience.
3. Meditation Is Real
Experience is real, due to which it can never be countered or argued about. If you have experienced fear in life, then the experience is stitched with the very fabric of your existence, but the same is not true for thoughts.
Thoughts and thinking are nebulous. One moment you can think left, and the other moment you can think right. Thus, thoughts can never be trusted. A deep thinker might end up contradicting their own thoughts and philosophies in the course of their thinking.
Thus, thinking occurs in an unreal plane and it is disconnected from reality. The disconnection allows the thought to go in any direction, due to which in thoughts, the thinker can bypass the laws of realities, and think anything. However, the dangers of always remaining in the mind and thoughts are that it can promote delusions, leading to a violent disconnection from reality and nurturing of illusions. Thus, thinking should always be synchronized with experience.
Meditation unites the stream of thought with the stream of experience. It brings us into the reality of the present moment, because of which even our thoughts acquire depth and context. They start stemming from a place of truth and experience rather than being too abstract or conceptual. Meditation strengthens our connection with reality.
4. Meditation Is Harmonious
All the activities of the human mind which create a sense of peace, beauty, and exhilaration are reflections and resonances of meditation.
Thus, the rhythm, melodies, and harmony of music, the melting of colors in painting, the evocation of imaginary characters in drama and poetry are aspects of the human mind which can delight and enchant it. All of them are an expansion of meditation, because all of them create a sense of wholeness through the artifacts. One of the reasons why these arts are so endearing to the human mind is that they create a deep sense of unity in the mind through the art.
Since meditation is real and blossoms in the form of an experience, it unites us with the totality of existence and enables us to experience the cosmos as a whole. Instead of dwelling with parts and reducing life to fractions of what it is, meditation opens us to experience and absorb the entirety of the cosmos in ourselves. It dissolves all the boundaries created by the mind and the senses and develops a unity between the living individual and the Universe. We are not disconnected from the Universe — we are one with it, and exist as an organic part of the whole, much like how our cells exist inside our body and are one with it. Meditation creates this deep synthesis.
Even thinking can result in the development of symphonic ideas which resonate with the whole and develop a sense of unity. Many of our thoughts and ideas strive to create this unity amongst everything, due to which people attempt to develop a theory for everything.
But the very nature of the mind is to cut things into parts and reduce them to fractions. The mind as a device is not designed to deal with the whole — it can process and digest only in parts, due to which it ends up cutting reality into smaller units. You go to the atom, and even though the name suggests that it cannot be cut, the mind succeeds in cutting down even the atom. It can go deeper and deeper, and whenever it finds the smallest unit, it can cut it down as well. Thus, the mind and thinking result in fragmentation.
Meditation unites things. It is the great synthesizer. It compiles and connects things. Thus, it develops a strong sense of unity and connection. It synchronizes us with the great flow of life.
5. Meditation Encompasses Thinking.
Meditation cleanses the mind. It wipes away the canvas of the mind, refreshing it and preparing it for the arrival of fresh thought. Thus, meditation develops a clean inner space for the manifestation of new thoughts which pour directly from the source. It promotes creativity and original thinking by removing the age-old and rusty thoughts clogged up in the drainpipe of the mind. It cleanses the inner space.
This cleansing results in the arrival of fresh thoughts that spring directly from the lived experience of the present moment. These thoughts color the mind with the beauty of truth and manifest in the form of creative works like poetry, stories, drama, painting, music, dance, or anything else. Meditation closes the gap between thinking and experience, and connects the two, such that the experience ends up shaping and guiding the thought and leaves a beautiful trace in the mind, in the form of a fragrant impression. Thus, meditation cultivates thinking and develops the space for thoughts. Thus, thoughts can exist with meditation.
Thinking, on the other hand, cannot understand meditation. Since meditation is dependent upon experience, it demands a small distancing from the thoughts, especially if thoughts are disconnected from reality. Thus, people who think a lot and remain stuck inside the beautiful cage of their mind cannot understand meditation, and they even argue that meditation does not exist.
It is acceptable for a prisoner to argue that freedom does not exist because the entire life of a prisoner is dictated by imprisonment and bondage, but just because they have not experienced freedom does not mean that it doesn’t exist. In the same way, many thinkers deny the reality of meditation simply because they approach to understand it intellectually. But the irony is that meditation cannot be understood by the mind alone — it is known through experience.
A person who meditates can understand the nature of thoughts, but a person who just thinks cannot understand the true nature of meditation. Thus, the practices of meditation rely on techniques which bypass the thoughts so that a human being can encounter the profundity of meditation directly through experience and not just through thoughts.
CONCLUSION
Meditation is an experience that transcends the boundaries of thought. It creates a space of awareness which promotes and cultivates thoughts. It synchronizes the practitioner with the reality of the present moment and connects them with the great flow of life. Meditation synthesizes things and develops a sense of unity between the self and the Universe. It encompasses thoughts and develops the inner space, prompting fresh visions and creative thinking.
People cannot understand meditation by just applying the intellect. Meditation can only be grasped through experience, and once it’s done, then it becomes clear that the whole life is nothing but a deep meditation.