To honor Descartes, the sixteenth century French mathematician, scientist and philosopher, who coined the famous statement “I think, therefore I am” (Cogito ergo sum), the Mind-Body question (that is, whether mind and body are separate entities and if one can exist without the other) has been named after him as the “Cartesian Dilemma”.
Descartes was the first to contest, that the mind is a non physical substance. Consciousness, and self awareness, he argued exists separately from intelligence, which he believed was a faculty of the brain. In his view, a person does not ‘exist’ without self awareness and conscience: our thinking process, our mind creates the self and simultaneously an awareness of this self.
Our mind is more than a computing machine, a “ghost in the machine” that keeps the body running, and our existence existing. Our Self, that is the Entity known as “I”, is much more than the sum of our thoughts, yet it is constantly being created and re-created by our thoughts, emotions and feelings.
To demonstrate what our mind is or is not, I like to use the somewhat cliché computer-human analogue. Like the computer, we have a physical body (although according to ancient knowledge and modern quantum physicians, even the “realness” of objects is questionable, and all living and nonliving entities are nothing but a manifestation incredibly high frequency vibrations of light). Even though the computer already has a fully operational operating system programmed on its hard drive, and our body has a similar program contained in the DNA, neither the computer nor or body is “alive” and operational, before the electricity, or the Life Force is turned on. If there is no Power, there is no Life and there is no Internet. (wow…life without internet, contemplate THAT!)
The computer’s keyboard, mouse, touch screen, camera and other gadgets serve as “sensory system”, a way to gather input from the environment to process. The stimuli or “input” is transmitted through a mind bogglingly complex nervous system in a code that is much similar to a computer program: electronic impulses and chemical changes that signal the presence of changes in the environment inside or outside: changes in temperature, smell, touch, and so on.
These sensory inputs are decoded and interpreted by the brain, via further electronic currents and chemical changes into “meaning” by our perception. For example, there are a number of dots on your computer screen, (based on the resolution, there can be a LOT of dots), some of them lit, others aren’t, and these dots are formed into patterns of color and shape. These “dots” don’t really exist, they are just changes in light and vibration. Certain cells in the eye that are designed (by WHOM?!!!) to do exactly that, sense these changes, transmit them to the brain as electrical impulses where by employing further electrical and chemical changes, they are decoded, and perceived to be “letters”.
We recognize the letters, and provided we know how to read, provided we understand the language they are written in, we form words, sentences, paragraphs and make meaning of the dots on the screen. These words then might evoke emotions, memories, feelings that create further chemical and electrical changes that are interpreted using a code that is written in certain chemical and electrical changes and activate a “program” that is written in a code of electrical and chemical changes that will be transmitted to different parts of the body via electrical and chemical changes that will be interpreted by cells using chemical changes and electrical currents and activate actions or reactions that will result in electrical and chemical changes that the brain will sense through chemical and electrical changes……and so it goes. I am already brain dead from contemplating this.
Lets try an exercise. Consider this pattern of dots first, then close your eyes, and contemplate what the dots “mean”. Pay attention to your thoughts, to your Mind minding the dots…go ahead, start contemplating now.
LEMON
Your sensory system detected a certain pattern of light and transmitted this pattern to your brain, where it was deciphered to mean a yellow fruit, with sour taste. Not only did you read the word LEMON, but you created an “image” or construct of the fruit as you know it in your mind. It has also created associations, some strictly biological, recall of the taste, texture, smell of the lemon, and the all so famous Pavlovian reflex of increased saliva just at the thought of lemon. There might have been other associations, depending on whether you like or dislike lemon. You might have thought of having some tea with lemon, or a nice, cold bottle of Corona, with a wedge of lemon in it. This might have brought up memories of that perfect vacation in Mexico last year, the sight of beach, the weather, the sun, the breeze, the awfully cute bartender with the great body, the night the bartender was off duty….But perhaps you HATE lemon, because when you were a child, and were sick, you were always made to drink chamomile tea with lemon, and you associate being sick with the taste of lemon. Or perhaps, you resent the memory of being forced to drink the god awful concoction and you resent that you were made eat broccoli too, and you had an overbearing, controlling mother, she is a real bitch, she won’t stop controlling you now either, even though you are a grown up woman, and she is JUST like your husband, who is also a control freak, and you HATE being controlled, but what are the alternatives, really, go back to Plenty of Fish and internet dating?!
STOP your associations NOW Come back to the article, will you?!
See, what a seemingly innocent pattern of lights on and off will do?! None of this would have been possible without your Mind. Your mind is the part of you that thinks, associates, makes meaning of things, evaluates your actions, recalls your past, worries into the future, evokes further emotions and feelings, and it does it by…yes, you’re right. Interpreting and creating programs written in a code of chemical changes and electrical currents. Your mind is a creation of itself. It creates reality, YOUR reality, and it is the Universal interpreter, facilitator, mediator, actor and reactor between YOU and your reality. It is in your Mind that “out there” and “in here” meet and co exist. It is the place where the past, present and future coincide. Your mind is the product of your imagination and your imagination is the product of your mind.
The meaning of life is to make meaning out of your life. Contemplate that. You created your mind, and you are continuously creating your mind. Your mind created you and is continuously creating you. Therefore, if you want to change your reality, your mind, your self, your life, your job, your circumstances, your experience, you must start by changing your mind. Your mind however, even though it constantly changes, HATES change and resist with all its might. Why? Because it equates change with non existence.
Your Mind, paraphrases Descartes: I think this way, therefore I am. I am what I think I am.
Your mind is right, and your mind is wrong: You are this way, because you think this way. You are what or whom you are, because you think that is what or whom you are.
Change your thoughts, your emotions, change your mind, and you can change not only the way you are, but your entire reality, your life experience.
Who are you, really? Pay attention, be mindful of your mind, and you will find meaning to the question. Who or what way would you rather be? Pay attention, be mindful of your mind, and it will deliver not only the answer but the solution.
Mindful living, mindfulness is that simple and that complex: to change your life, all you need to do is to change your mind. To change your mind, you have to change the way you think. To change the way you think, you must be simultaneously aware of your thoughts and be able to be completely thoughtless. Without mindfulness, you are a slave to the thoughts, processes, associations, beliefs and limitations of your mind. Master your thoughts, to master your emotions and you will become Master of Your Mind.
Mind you later!
