‘NO-mIND’ — GOING WITH THE FLOW

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             Nom De Guerre: Soldat Inconnu 1990                                   

DISCLAIMER: This ‘Work’ has no-author and is not-written as a post-creative, aim-less exercise in a state of  ‘no-minded’ non-thinking-doing involving a condition of action-less action, effort-less effort and doing-less doing in a ’no-mindness’ state of will-less willing, intent-less intent and mind-less mindfulness bearing no-trace , no-sense of thinker-doer-seer-knower-owner …while being in-accord-with the Great Unknown. A beatific condition of doing nothing, intelligently, in which no-action is taken but nothing remains undone, no-thought springs yet nothing remains unrevealed, no-word is spewed but everything is understood, no-field is ploughed but crops fill the land — with the sole, humble hope of arriving at a personal ‘non-understanding’ of the Great Impersonal. 

WARNING: This ‘Work’ in no way recommends its practice by the untamed Monkey Mind at the peril of losing its connect with reality, its hold on normality and grip on sanity …and actualizing the mindless fear of connecting with the non-sense-ical dream-place- you’ve-dreamt-of-all-your-life in a state of non-knowing (KINGDOM OF ‘NO-mIND). 

NOTE: This ‘work’ has not been vetted-mandated-sanctioned-approved by any ‘Authority’ above or below the Sun and represents an individuated subjective viewpoint. 

SUGGESTION: Read Only For Entertainment Not Illumination.  

Man was created to have fellowship with God; but, because of his stubborn ‘self-will’, he chose to go his own independent way, and fellowship with God was broken. This ‘self-will’, characterized by an attitude of active rebellion or passive indifference, is evidence of what the Bible calls sin. 

• We can only learn to know ourselves and do what we can, namely, surrender our will and fulfill God’s will in us.                                                                              St Teresa of Avila 
• There are only two modes of the heart. We can struggle, or we can surrender. Surrender is a frightening word for some people, because it might be interpreted as passivity, or timidity. Surrender means wisely accommodating ourselves to what is beyond our control (namely, the Life Flow).                                                                            Sylvia Boorstein 
• Don’t seek God in temples. He is close to you. He is within you. Only you should surrender to Him and you will rise above happiness and unhappiness.           Leo Tolstoy 

These two dimensions represent two kinds of lives:

• 1. The Self-directed life

MY WILL   (self-mind States) 

Self is on the throne. Interests are directed by self, God is outside the person’s life, resulting in discord and frustration. 

• 2. The God-directed life

GOD’S WILL   (NO-mIND State) 

God is on the throne. Self is yielding to God. Interests are directed by God, resulting in harmony with God’s plan. 

It’s all so simple really, so direct, immediate and clear, only our muddled ‘thinking’ makes it complex and murky. 

The secret is: never, never — while flowing in the stream-of- life — pause ‘to think’, to use and assert ‘your own particular individual petty mind or will’ (defined as the selfish/parochial/partial-thinking ego-mind/will), your own limited half-baked thoughts, ideas and plans based on subjectively coloured interpretations and imperfect understandings in the vain effort to exercise your own limited ‘my will’ and put ‘your own personal preferred stamp’ on your particular existence and the larger world-life, in general. For the very act of so doing, of hesitating /pausing/stopping ‘to think’, ‘to decide’ — like the proverbial ‘spanner-in-the works’ — throws your whole, natural, evolutionary ‘life-flow’ out-of-whack. 

The solution? The secret mystical attitude: The non-dual ‘No-Mind’ state of being. 

In other words, don’t stop to scheme – to think, prioritize, strategize and decide what ‘you’ want from life instead, Just Go With ‘The Flow’ of your life-stream — spontaneously and merrily — no-mindedly  taking whatever comes your  way  along with you and flowing on effortlessly without pause (no-thought). Just as the effortlessly flowing river unhesitatingly embraces and no-mindedly sweeps away the broken branches that fall in its path or the wind gaily carries away the unbound kite. 

To achieve this graced, mystical state of ‘no-mind’ and connect with ‘The Flow’ is far quicker ‘done’ than ‘said’, it is easier ‘to do’ than ‘to think’, far simpler ‘to apply’ than ‘to understand’, far more effortless ‘to be’ than ‘to verbalize’, far more straightforward ‘to live’ than to ‘communicate’ its ‘Reality’. The moment we cast ‘It’ into thoughts-words-action (involving the partial ego-self/mind/senses), we compartmentalize and limit ‘It’ — thus losing the essence, its Spirit …unless we do-it-without-doing-it i.e. no-mindedly. 

Thus, in describing this unique ‘no-mind’ state, does Ashvaghosha say, “We use words (mind-states)  to get free from words until we reach the pure wordless essence (‘no-mind’ state)”, or as Beyazid Al Bistami enigmatically announces, “That which we speak of can never be found by seeking (through ‘mind-states’), yet only (‘no-minded’) seekers find it” or as Adi Shankara potently indicates, “Supreme, beyond the power of speech (mind-states)  to express, Brahman may yet be apprehended by the eye of pure illumination (‘no-mind’ state). Pure, absolute and eternal Reality such is Brahman, and Thou Art That!” or as Tao Yijan Ming, 365-427 CE poetically put it, “The mountain air sparkles as the sun sets, /Birds in flocks return together. /In these things there is a fundamental truth (the eternal flow of the ‘no-mind’ state), /But when I start to explain it (through mind-states), /I loose the words (its essence is lost)), or as a Persian saying informs, “It is good to know about the Truth and to talk about it (‘no-mindedly’), but it is better to know about Truth (‘no-mind’ state) and (when immersed in mind-states) to talk  of palm trees”. The Bhagavad Gita 6. 22-23 enunciates it succinctly, Perfection is characterized by the ability to see the (eternal) Self by the pure mind (‘no-mind’) and to relish and rejoice in the Self (Supersoul). In that joyous state (of ‘no-mind’) one is situated in boundless spiritual happiness realized through transcendental senses (supersensory state). Established thus, one never departs from the Truth (Imperishable Soul) and upon gaining this (ultimate knowledge of the Eternal Spirit), thinks there is no greater gain. Being so situated (in the ‘no-mind’ state), one is never shaken even in the midst of great difficulty. This (state of ‘no-mind’) is the actual (the Real and True) freedom from all miseries (contaminations) arising from material contact (with the lower realm of nature and its qualities where mind-states reside). Similarly did Guru Nanak assert, “All the world is liberated (attains the ‘no-mind’ state), O Nanak, by embarking on the boat of truth (knowledge of the Eternal Spirit)”. 

D T Suzuki explains, “The contradiction so puzzling to the ordinary way of thinking comes from the fact that we use language to communicate an inner experience which in its very nature transcends linguistics,” for as Sri Aurobindo affirmed, in this ‘inward-bound’ mystical state “All things in fact begin to change their nature and their appearance; one’s whole experience of the world is radically different. There is a new, vast and deep way of experiencing, seeing, knowing, contacting … much more subtle, holistic and organic (in spirit)”. This is so because, as Ramana Maharishi explained, “The world is perceived as an apparent objective reality when the mind is externalized, thereby abandoning its identity with the (eternal) self. When the world is thus perceived the true (cosmic) nature of the self is not revealed: conversely, when the (true) self is realized (atman siddhi), the world (of matter) ceases to appear as an objective reality. (And is seen for what it truly is – mere figment of subjective fantasy and illusion.) 

Through this inner mystical experience the ‘no-minded’ person arrives at a state which transcends not only intellectual thinking but also sensory perception. For as the Katha Upanishad questions, “What is soundless, nor palpable, formless, imperishable, likewise tasteless, constant adoreless, without beginning, without end, higher than the great, stable…” and the Kena Upanishad concludes, “There the eye goes not, speech goes not, nor the mind. We know not, we understand not. How could one teach it? 

‘It’ – the mystic state  that is to set us free of all our misery (the world of samsara), which after all is the final purpose and ultimate ‘end’ of enlightenment/liberation, is a direct ‘inner’ illumination, one that is to be perceived without dependence on name and form, understood without the use of thoughts and words, realized without the mediation of spiritual books/exercises and gurus simply by activating the natural Zen-type ‘no-mind’ attitude of ‘direct seeing into the inner reality of things’ … and being freed. ‘It’ can only be known (for want of a better word) through an undeniably palpable inner experience of a super-sensory, directly-lived, immediately-experienced, mystico-intuitive epiphenomenal revelation into one’s ‘Original Nature’ ethereal in essence. “Special transmission outside the scriptures; / No dependence upon words and letters; / Direct pointing to the soul of man: / Seeing into one’s own nature and / Attainment of Buddhahood”, is how Bodhidharma, the First Patriarch of Zen, c. 6oo CE, described it; clearly indicating ‘The Truth lies within’. 

Q. But what exactly is meant by ‘Going with The Flow’ and how can we recognize it? 

A. Quite simply, it means ‘letting go’ the world of our partial-individual petty senses, mind and will, discarding all our doubts, worries, hopes and fears and placing one’s trust in ‘The Flow’ of the undeniably larger ‘current’ in which we all collectively find ourselves immersed and which relentlessly sweeps us all along downstream through varied landscapes – benign and hostile — towards a destination unbeknownst to us. 

A destination wherein lies – though we, inebriated by the arrogant ego-self, misled by the mirages of the senses and confused by illusions of the mind do not realize it — our own larger good/goal as ordained in the greater scheme-of-things; a good/goal far, far better than what we could have ever thought-out, planned or achieved for ourselves by ourselves — based on our own parochially-conditioned mind, flawed thinking and limited prowess of understanding. A good/goal that lies beyond our limited human faculties of imagination-perception-conception — calling for implicit, unbounded, conviction-rooted trust in mankind and faith in the universe, a faith from which arises the impervious courage to fearlessly jump — without thought (‘no-mindedly’) — into the swiftly flowing torrent of ‘The Flow’ …only to unexpectedly find ourselves at the gates of paradise; (akin to Zen’s ‘Maniacal Leap into the Abyss of Extinction’.) 

This is the beatific state of absolute surrender of the ego to a force higher and greater than itself. 

As David Truman points out, “To some people surrender suggests the loss of power. Looked at in another way: surrender could be an expression of freedom – the freedom to let inspiration flow, the freedom to love. After all, we can’t love if we can’t let love flow. In that sense, surrender is a way of gaining tremendous power, and using power effectively in the world.” 

Be clear. This surrender in no way represents a form of hard-wired determinism or resigned fatalism but stands out as the highest exemplary example of liberated expression and exercise in individual self-transformational creativity and freewill in quest of re-establishing the lost freedom of the soul through its divine merger with the Supersoul. 

But man, instead of wisely and effortlessly ‘Going with The Flow’, the easiest, smoothest most productive and effortless way through life, foolishly expends, wastes and exhausts all his mental-space, time, energy and resources in asserting himself, frittering away many lifetimes in vain by arrogantly-stupidly trying to fight the ‘current’, struggling to go ‘against The Flow’ under the self-delusion that ‘he’ knows better what he wants (needs?) in life and the direction in which he should be headed. Thereby ignorantly-arrogantly trying, albeit in vain — to set his ‘own particular’ directions, to further his ‘own selfish ambitions and parochial agenda’, to imprint ‘his particular special stamp’ on his own life and the larger world in general — as determined by his petty, partial-mind with its limited capacity for thinking, planning, willing and understanding based on its parochially-conditioned imperfect view of things. 

This vain effort of asserting my (self-will) and seeking to go ‘against The Flow’ (God’s Will) is akin to trying to hold-back the incoming tide. Man always, without exception, ends up exhausted and defeated — back at square-one, when he is not in-resonance-with ‘The Flow’. 

Q. So then, how can we live our life so as to ‘Go with The Flow’ – ‘The Flow’ of this creative, dominant, energy stream that carries the universe and all life towards a destination unknown? 

A. Truly simple.

 First, cultivate the ‘basic natural attitude’

 1) Unwavering Faith in God

 2) Unshakable Trust in Oneself 

 3) Unbounded ‘Agape Love’ for one’s Fellowmen and the World-Life at large 

4) Unfailing Sense of Optimism and World-Life Affirmation 

     and then, simple 

    …just ‘let go’ the partial-ego and dive in to the larger universal life-stream without stopping to think — even for a nano-moment — whither or not you should hold your breath? 

‘Just Do It!’ ‘Just Connect’ (with your ‘gut’ to the natural force-of-The-Flow) without allowing ‘the intrusive-invasive-interfering mind’ to pause or hesitate in order to think, deliberate and analyse its situation (thus disrupting the smooth life-flow). Be benign, spontaneous, and transparent in your innate beliefs, your intents, actions and behaviour, attitudinally released from the prison-bars of duality, freed in spirit from attachment to expectations or fear of consequences, always actively, directly and instantly responding, ‘no-mindedly’ — from the (pre-cognitive) gut-center (Hara) which channelizes the creative flow of the universal Life-Force (Chi) — by by-passing the trap of the complex, millennia-old-conditioned process of mechanically activating and interfacing with the scheming, inhibiting, interfering, ‘petty ego-mind’. 

This is the only way one can attain this unique condition of being ‘at-one-with The-Flow’ and actualize the acme of spiritual achievement – the ‘no-mind’ state.  This really easy to actualize condition of ‘Going with The Flow” and arriving at the exalted ‘no-mind’ state is truly child’s play and yet is rarely achieved; this is the paradox of reversals; of being in the right place but mistakenly looking in the wrong direction as A H Clough elucidates in his poem ‘Say Not The Struggle Nought Availeth’, “And not by eastern windows only, /When daylight comes, comes in the light, /In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly, /But westward look, the land is bright” …or of having the choice but being focused on an erroneous option as Lao Tzu reminds, “…we may see who cleaves to fame rejects what is more great; who loves large stores gives up the richer state”. 

Q. How then can one activate this grand cosmic process of connecting with ‘The Flow’ and actualizing this exalted status of ‘no-mind’? 

A. The above form of ‘connected-living’, i.e. ‘Going with The Flow’ comes ‘no-mindedly’ — as effort-lessly and thought-lessly as breathing — to world-life sensitive, battle-scarred, veteran thinkers-doers who from early age have grown in conviction and faith by seeking out and welcoming the gauntlet of life’s challenges …and emerging unassailable; forged and tempered in the white-heat of existential struggle by living without thinking (‘no-mind’), doing without intending (‘no-self/ego’) or doing without acting (‘no-action’) and thus achieving the impossible by doing nothing, intelligently. 

Such ones arrive — through their personal spiritual struggle ‘to be’ — at the experience-based, conviction-tested attitude/state of wisdom that, in the final reckoning,  

1) God knows best 

2) Whatever happens, happens for the best 

3) We all get what we deserve (our ‘just desserts’) and is best for us 

4) We must courageously welcome and unreservedly embrace the inevitable 

5) Life is never as dark as it seems even at its worst and 

6) The Universe is fundamentally life-promoting, rational and benign in its workings…  

…as the 6-central pillars of their worldview, their belief-system and value-structure. Once these guiding principles are thoroughly imbibed, digested and internalized one instantly connects to ‘the Flow’ and the ‘no-mind’ state dawns spontaneously, without thought, intent, will or effort …becoming your primary, inalienable nature. 

Q. But what exactly is this mysterious state of ‘Flow’, this strong, indiscernible but undeniable ‘stream of energy’ that sweeps every being along in its path towards its own pre-determined end?  What exactly is this inescapable ‘torrent force’ with its unfailing, continually flowing, evolutionary cycles of creation-sustenance-dissolution irrevocably carrying the universe with all things in it towards its inevitable, super-logical conclusion/destination? 

A. Again, it is simple to understand. There are two basic energic ‘flowing streams’ in the world-life.

1) The Major (‘Thy [God’s] Will’) Flow, belonging to the Cosmic Order/Transcendent Reality 

and

2) The Minor (‘my [individual] will’) flow, belonging to the Created Order/Historical Reality. 

Dr Radhakrishnan clarifies this in his book ‘Eastern Religion and Western Thought’, “The heart of religion is that man truly belongs to another Order (Transcendent/Eternal) and the meaning of man’s life is to be found in more than historical (temporal/transient) reality.” 

The uninitiated, being short-sighted and tunnel-visioned are enamoured by and absorbed in the flow of the latter – the minor, immediately-sensed, illusory-transient flowing stream of ‘my will’, completely ignorant/unaware of the existence and influence of the other, more potent — easier, smoother, swifter moving, bounty-endowing flow of the former – the real-eternal – major stream of ‘Thy Will’. George Macdonald reasons “It is because we are not near enough to Thee to partake of Thy liberty that we want a liberty of our own different from Thine,” or as Marguerite Porete suggests “As long as I will nothing … I am alone in Him without myself, completely unencumbered. And if I should will something… I am with myself, and … I have lost freeness. So,  as John Nicholas Grou highlights “The single motive (of the simple heart) is to please God, and hence arises total indifference as to what others say and think, so that words and actions are perfectly simple and natural, as in his sight only. Such Christian simplicity is the very perfection of interior life — God, his will and pleasure, its sole object,” or as D T Suzuki avers “Perfect freedom is obtained only when our egoistic thoughts (my will) are not read into life and the world is accepted as it is (Thy Will), as a mirror reflects a flower as a flower,” or as Dante succinctly stated it “His will is our peace.” In short, as prayers of all the world’s faiths pronounce, “Thy Will be done…” 

D T Suzuki clarifies “The will is the principle that lies at the root of all existences and unites them all in the oneness of being. There is absolutely nothing in this world that has not its will. The one great will (Thy Will) from which all these wills (individual self wills), infinitely varied, flow is what I call the Cosmic Unconsciousness,” or as D E Harding agrees, “The whole man is the Whole: nothing less is viable. However you look at him, then, whether from inside or outside, he is (in the last resort) that all-inclusive One which organizes the diverse wills of all its members into One will which we call God’s will — which is none other than your will when you know Who you really are and what you really want, when you are all there and wholly yourself. Seeming to yourself and others to be a part of the Universe, you intend that part; being all of it, you intend it all.”

But the initiated far-sighted person having discerned between the two ‘flows’, knows different and self-volitionally chooses to surrender his individual will (self-will) and immerse himself in the former (Thy Will). Thus, over time, gradually cultivating and ripening a holistic, non-dual state of ‘no-mind’ until the instant of ‘Sudden Awakening’. The initiated discerns only ‘one’ dominating real-eternal ‘flowing stream’ (Thy Will) and willingly-joyfully surrenders his ego (my will) and submerges himself in its larger flow; neither cognizing nor acknowledging any other ‘flow’ such as the illusory-transitory my will. 

Christ exemplified this pure state of total surrender to the Greater Will in the garden of Gethsemane, knowing well that the Roman soldiers were coming for him and the great suffering and humiliation that was to befall him, praying: “Father if that is possible let this chalice of suffering pass away but not my will but thine be done.” And then again, when Jesus in the angst of his dying moments appealed for forgiveness of his tormentors saying, “Father forgive them for they know not what they are doing.” Only an act of ‘Ishvara-pranidhana’, the final ‘Niyama’ can generate the resolution and energy to utter such words of agape love at the height of his personal agony. Thus, paradoxically, through this condition of united will Christ had entered the final state of ‘Anandamaya-kosha’ (the blissful body) for his cry for forgiveness itself was a cry of Joy and Resurrection at the victory over his mortality, over sin and death. 

Similarly did Muhammad affirm, even in the depths of his angst, “O Lord, I complain to You of my weakness, of my useless efforts. I am insignificant in the eyes of men. O You Most Merciful, Lord of the weak! You are my God, forsake me not! Leave me not prey to strangers and enemies. I am safe if You are not displeased. I seek refuge in the light of Your face, which dispels all darkness, and bestows peace now and forever. Resolve my problems as you (Thy Will) so please. There is no power, no strength, but in you.” 

Thus, Basil the Great advices, “Examine closely what sort of being you are. Know your nature — that your body is mortal, but your soul immortal; that our life has two denotations, so to speak: one relating to the flesh and this life is quickly over, the other relating to the soul (realm of spirit), life without limit. “Give heed to thyself” — cling not to the mortal (my will) as if it were eternal; disdain not that which is eternal (Thy Will) as if it were temporal”. 

Hence all thought/speech/intent/willing/action/effort/doing undertaken by one in this state of ‘no-mind’ — in-identity-with the Divine, in-accord-with Tao — is referred to as ‘actionless action’, ‘effortless effort’, ‘doingless doing’, ‘intentless intent’, ‘will-less willing’  as it is no longer initiated by the individual ‘my will’, it no longer involves you (the partial mind with its parochial intents and selfish motives) but instead involves the graced, holistic-universal ‘no-mind’ state rooted in the larger imperative of ‘Thy Will’. 

Thus the Gita 4.20 states: “(The no-minded) One, who renounces the results of work, being self-content and self-sufficient (awareness of higher Self), though fully occupied in (worldly- contaminating) work, does nothing at all (remains unsullied as there is no ego/self-will involved)”. So too does St Paul point out, “T’is not I who speak but God who speaks through me” or as Meister Eckhart enunciated, “The eye by which I see God is the same as the eye by which God sees me. My eye and God’s eye are one and the same – one in seeing, one in knowing, one in loving”. 

Thus, for the ‘no-minded’ person ‘…in-accord-with the Flow/Tao/God’s Will’ no particular mind is involved even when immersed in the depths of scheming, no personal energy is expended even when embroiled in the heat-of-action, no self components are stressed or worn-out even when apparently engaged in a state of continuous, intensive effort and doing. For as Lao Tzu confirms: “Those who flow the way life flows, know. / They need no other force; / They have no wear, they have no tear, / They need no maintenance, no repair” or as  Rumi affirms, “When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.” 

When ‘going with the flow’ the issue of dualities, polarities and dichotomies doesn’t really arise e.g. the negative-positive resolves into its ‘neutral’ state of ‘no-mind’, the same is for indifference-obsession which resolves into its neural state of ‘dispassion’ (i.e. a ‘no-mind’ state), the same is for subjective-objective states which fuse into their unitive ‘Omnijective State’. So too, the Hegelian dialectic of thesis-antithesis (i.e. man-world) which merges into its ‘synthesis’ (God). But keep in mind, as Jean Pierre de Caussade pointed out, “Perfection consists in doing the will of God, not in understanding his designs.”  

The empirical world of dualities – of left-right, positive-negative, fear-hope, good-bad, saint-sinner, success-failure, honour-shame etc belong to the illusory world of senses and mind, the mirage world of qualities and substances and only afflicts the uninitiated individuals who live at the shallow-level of the untrained senses and untamed mind, driven by their own self-deluded ‘mind-states’ composed of partial-selfish agendas, motives, intents and powered by their limited, individual ‘my wills’. 

But for the initiated individual immersed in the self-less, intentless, motiveless, will-less ‘no-mind’ state  — a state ‘in-accord-with ‘God’s Will’ … none of these worldly illusions or mental delusions exist as ‘real’ and thus does not influence or affect them at all. But not so for the uninitiated who find themselves easily swayed and swept away by a tidal wave of imaginary sensations and objects erroneously producing a host of illusory ‘mind-states’ — sentiments, doubts, fears etc — all various forms of debilitating mind-states, which in turn hurl us back into the lower world of matter.  

A quotation from a Tung-Huang document belonging to the Zen sect serves to exemplify this: 

Q “I am afraid of hell, I want to confess, and discipline myself in the Tao. 

A. Where is this “I”? What does it look like?  

Q. I know not where!  

A. If you do not know where your ‘I’ is, who is it that falls into hell? If you do not know what it looks like, this is no less than an illusively conceived existence. Just because of this illusion (of a ‘self’ generated by your own petty mind), there is hell for you. 

Q. If the Tao itself is an illusion, how is this illusion formed? 

A. The Dharma has no magnitude, no form, no altitude. To illustrate: 

Here is a big stone in the court attached to your house. You sit on it, sleep on it, and have no feeling of fear (or reverence in relation to it). One day you suddenly conceive the idea (a ‘mind-state’) of painting a picture on it. You hire an artist and have a Buddha’s figure painted on it and you take it (i.e. ‘think’ of it — a ‘mind-state’) for the Buddha. No longer dare you sleep on it, you are fearful of desecrating the image, which was nothing but a huge rock. It is due to a change in your mind (attitudinal state) that you no more sleep on it. And what is this so-called mind too? It is but your own brush pieced out of your imagination (subjective thoughts and feelings –‘mind-states’), which has turned the stone into a Buddha-figure. The feeling of fear is your own creation (‘mind-state’); the stone itself is indeed devoid both of merit and demerit. All is mind-made. It is like a man painting a devil, a creature from hell, or a dragon, or a tiger. He paints it, looks at it, and is frightened. There is however, nothing at all in the painted figure itself which is fearsome.  All is the brushwork of your own (limited) imagination your own (petty) discrimination (‘mind-states’). From the first, not a thing there is except what you have made out of your own illusive mind”.

Thus as D T Suzuki says, when the ‘I’ (mind/self/ego) itself is an illusion, all that goes on in the name of this agent must be an illusion too, including its religious piety and transgressions, moral sins, various kinds of wholesome and unwholesome thoughts, feelings and desires, and its ideas of hell and the land of bliss. But, with the removal of this illusion of ‘I’, the world of fantasy generated by our particular, limited senses and mind with all its duality, relativity and multiciplity disappears and if there is anything, any entity left which can act, this one will act with utmost freedom, with absolute fearlessness, like the Dharma-King/God himself, indeed as ‘the One’. But there are very few who will recognize such a one for as Ramana Maharishi reveals: “The ‘I’ casts off the illusion of ‘I’ and yet remains as ‘I’. Such is the paradox of self-realization.” 

In the teachings of the Illusionist School of Zen – our very mind with all, its thoughts, imaginings and discriminations about the world-life is entirely based on erroneous conditioning, rooted as it is in the outward unreality of a sense of self, a sense of  ‘I’ embedded in a condition of particularity, subjectivity and partiality. It is the creating agency of all kinds of divisions, discord and evil. It is the root-cause of the illusory world of matter, of memory, maya and karma that leads one astray from the centre – ‘the Dharma’, back into the lower world of rebirth. But ‘Dharma’, in-and-of-itself, as an inward reality remains absolutely unaware (‘no-minded’) of any kinds of physical, psychological and moral distinctions, differentiations or dichotomies as ‘it’ nonchalantly continues to abide in the unitive, undifferentiated state of the Great Unconscious beyond all ‘this worldly’ concerns and care. 

So the mind which is ‘no-mind’, in order to function to its true potential, must first and foremost be entirely bereft of the subjective sense of a separate ‘self’, free of all parochial biases and discrimination, independent of all forms of intellection, imaginings and mental formations, shorn of all thoughts, words and sense of doership-ownership, purged of all scheming, calculations, artifices and contrivances, emptied of all ego-machinations and manipulations, detached from all narrow-minded motives, ambitions and expectations, devoid of all personal desires, attachments, expectations, obsessions and preferences for things and states of the outer world of matter  … and is thereby, liberated from the shackles of avidya (ignorance,) maya (illusion/fantasy), karma (spiritual credit-debt balance) and rebirth (into samsara —  the world of becoming and misery).

So, all substantial/physical/corporeal reality of the outer, objective, sentient-material world of nama-rupa (names and forms) is a fantasy of the uncontrolled senses and an illusion of the untamed mind as the quotes below affirm. 

• All composite beings are impermanent, / They belong to the realm of birth and death; / When birth and death is transcended, / Absolute tranquillity is realized and blessed are we.                                                                Affixed at the end of the ‘Mahayana Sutra’

• All composite things are impermanent, / They are subject to birth and death;/ Put an end to birth and death, / And there is blissful tranquillity.          The Gatha of Impermanence

• Who seeks me by form, who seeks me in sounds, perverted are his footsteps on the way; for he cannot perceive the Tathagata.                                                             Lord Buddha

• A corporeal phenomenon, a feeling, a perception, a mental formation, a consciousness, which is permanent and persistent, eternal and not subject to change, such a thing the wise men in this world do not recognize: and I also say that there is no such thing. 

                                                                                                                          Buddha Sakyamuni

• The triple world (of creation) originates from the discrimination of unrealities and where discrimination takes place there is duality and the notion of permanency and impermanency: but the Tathagatas (enlightened beings) do not rise from such discrimination of unrealities.                                                                 Lankavatara Sutra 

• Whatever takes form is false. Only the formless endures. When you understand the truth of this teaching, you will not be born again.                                Ashtavakra Gita 1.18.21 

• Empty your mind, be formless… When one has reached maturity in the art, one will have a formless form. It is like ice dissolving in water. When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style. 

                                                                                                     Bruce Lee, Iconic Martial Artist 

• Reality (as we know it) is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one. Albert Einstein 

• If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is – infinite. 

                                                                                                                                   William Blake

So, to put it in a highly simplistic-reductionist terms we can say that for the ‘no-minded’ person of unified vision, the ‘world-life as we know it’ is an illusion and all the happenings occurring in it are a passing mirage too. If so, where arises the issue of dualities, of negatives and positives? 

 Let us, for example, take a highly negative concept – ‘to slay/kill’, a great ‘sin’ that incurs the wrath of the gods. Is it, in an unqualified sense, an ‘absolute’ negative to slay another being or is it relative to ‘the Flow’ of the situational truth-reality and the ‘no-mind’ state of the concerned individual? 

The esoteric quotes below should help cast daylight into the cave of the mind.

• Some think that striking is to strike: 

But striking is not to strike, nor is killing to kill. 

He who strikes and he who is struck– 

They are both no more than a dream that has no reality.

No thinking, no reflecting, 

Perfect emptiness: 

Yet therein something moves, 

Following its own course. 

. . . .

Victory is for the one, 

Even before the combat, 

Who has no thought of himself, 

Abiding in the no-mind-ness of Great Origin.                                   Quoted by Suzuki 

• The uplifted sword has no will of its own, it is all of emptiness. 

It is like a flash of lightning. The man who is about to be struck 

down is also of emptiness, as is the one who wields the sword. 

. . . Do not get your mind stopped with the sword you raise, 

forget about what you are doing, and strike the enemy. 

Do not keep your mind on the person before you. 

They are all of emptiness, 

but beware of your mind being caught in (attached to) emptiness.                         Aitken 

• The universe dissolves into me. Wonderful am I! Adoration to Myself! For when the world, from its highest god to its least blade of grass, dissolves, that destruction is not mine.                                                                                                          Ashtavakra Gita 

• If the red slayer thinks he slays,/ Or if the slain thinks he is slain,/ They know not well the subtle ways, I (Eternal Soul) keep and pass and turn again./ Far or forgot to me is near;/ Shadow and sunlight bare the same; / The vanished gods to me appear; / And one to me are shame and fame. / They reckon ill who leave me out; / When me they fly, I am their wings; / I am the doubter and the doubt, / And I the hymn the Brahmin sings./ The strong gods pine for my abode,/ And pine in vain the secret seven; / But thou, meek lover of the good! / Find me, and turn thy back on heaven. 

                                                                                    Ralph Waldo Emerson, Poem – ‘Brahma’

• Welcome to Thee O’ Sword of Eternity (wielded by the no-mind) / Through Buddha and through Dharma alike/ Thou hast cleft Thy way.                                               Zen Mystic

• With this (no-minded) sword of mine, the Buddhas and the Patriarchs I kill. 

                                                                                                                                Zen Poet, Rikyu

• The Solitary Sword of Emptiness (no-mind) flies Heavenward / (No-mindedly) Killing both, the Buddhas (positive beings) and Maaras (negative beings). (Unified state beyond duality.)                                                                                                        Zen Meditation

• Buddhas and Fathers cut to pieces–/ The Sword (of no-mind) is ever kept sharpened! / Where the Wheel turns, / The Void gnashes its teeth.          Daito Kukushi’s ‘Last poem’

The Bhagavad Gita enunciates this ‘no-mind’ state beautifully, saying, 

• There never was a time when I, you, and all these warriors did not exist, and there will never be a time when any of us shall cease to be (immortality of the soul). As the self moves in this body from childhood to youth to old age, so the self passes into another body at death (transient phases). The wise are not confused (no-mind/clear-mind state) by this (illusion of) change (occurring in nature on the material plane). 

                                                                                                             Lord Krishna, Gita 2.12-13 

• The unreal (the mind and the constantly changing illusory world of ideas and matter it generates) has no permanent existence, whereas the real (the non-dual, ‘no-mind’ soul and the immutable, eternal world of spirit in which it abides) exists forever without change. So conclude seers of the truth who have studied the nature of both. 

                                                                                                      Lord Krishna, Gita 2.16

• That which pervades the body is indestructible. No one can destroy the imperishable soul (which belongs to the realm of eternal spirit). The body in which this indestructible and immeasurable soul lives must come to an end (as do all things beholden to nature). Therefore fight, Arjuna.                                                           Lord Krishna, Gita 2.17-18

• Some think the soul is slayer, some think the soul is slain. Both are wrong, for the soul is neither slayer nor slain (illusory states of duality). The soul (beholden to the eternal spirit) exists forever in the present (the eternal here and now), having no birth or death. The soul is the oldest, without beginning or end, and is not killed when the body is killed. 

                                                                                                             Lord Krishna, Gita 2.19-20 

• When one knows the soul to be indestructible, eternal, without birth or change, how can one possibly kill or induce anyone else to kill (the imperishable)? 

                                                                                                      Lord Krishna, Gita 2.21

• As a person exchanges old clothes for new (due to their getting faded and frayed), so too the soul abandons old bodies to enter a new one.                         Lord Krishna, Gita 2.22

• The soul cannot be cut by weapons, burned by fire, drenched by water or withered by wind. This soul cannot be pierced, burnt, wet, or dried. For the soul is everlasting, all pervading, unchangeable and immovable, staying eternally the same It is said that the soul is invisible, inconceivable and unchangeable. Knowing this (inviolability of the soul) you should not lament. (The soul is immune to being hurt by arms, unaffected by the elements or conditions of nature, impervious to change, so why fret.) 

                                                                                                             Lord Krishna, Gita 2.23-25

• The one who lives in the body (soul/spirit) can never be killed. Therefore you should not lament for any living being (who are but a composition of nature and so must naturally decompose.                                                                                    Lord Krishna, Gita 2.30

• The transcendent self, beginingless and imperishable, is beyond (the influence of) material qualities. Though dwelling in the body, the self does nothing and is unaffected by matter.                                                                                    Lord Krishna, Gita 13.31 

• Even one who slays all these people – if acting without ego and with clear intelligence (no-mind state) — slays no one and is not bound (by the dictates of karma and rebirth). 

                                                                                                                Lord Krishna, Gita 18.17

• Fight for the sake of fighting (as duty because it is so right to do, regardless of the rewards to be gained in this world or merits in the next). Look equally (without attachment or preference) on happiness and distress, gain and loss, victory and defeat (illusory states of duality). In this way you will not incur sin.     Lord Krishna, Gita 2.38

• But he whose mind dwells beyond attachment (to worldly things), untainted by ego (no-mind’ state), no act shall bind him with any bond:  though he slay these thousands he is no slayer.                                                                                       Lord Krishna, Gita 2- ?

• If the red slayer thinks he slays, /Or if the slain thinks he is slain, / They know not well the subtle ways, I (the Eternal Soul) keep and pass and turn again. /Far or forgot to me is near; /Shadow and sunlight bare the same; /The vanished gods to me appear; / And one to me are shame and fame. /They reckon ill who leave me out; /When me they fly, I am their wings; /I am the doubter and the doubt, /And I the hymn the Brahmin sings. /The strong gods pine for my abode, /And pine in vain the secret seven; /But thou, meek lover of the good! /Find me, and turn thy back on heaven. 

                                                                                    Ralph Waldo Emerson, Poem – ‘Brahma’ 

Therefore the Gita advocates,

• Perfection is characterized by the ability to see the (eternal) Self by the pure mind (‘no-mind’) and to relish and rejoice in the Self (Supersoul). In that joyous state (of ‘no-mindness’) one is situated in boundless spiritual happiness realized through transcendental senses (supersensory state). Established thus, one never departs from the Truth (the Imperishable Soul) and upon gaining this (ultimate knowledge of the Eternal Spirit), thinks there is no greater gain. Being so situated (in the ‘no-mind’ state), one is never shaken even in the midst of great difficulty. This (state of ‘no-mind’) is the actual (the Real and True) freedom from all miseries (contaminations) arising from material contact (with the lower realm of nature and its qualities of discrimination, duality, desire, attachment etc where other such mind-states reside)”.                 Bhagavad Gita 6.20-23 

• …The wise do not lament (‘no-mind’ state) for the living or the dead (illusory ‘mind-state’ of duality).                                                                           Lord Krishna, Gita 2.11 

Why is it then that ‘to slay’ another thus, is of no ‘real’ consequence and generates no negative karma? Because, 

• In Zen, one would say, the completely enlightened being no longer rests on any external moral code, but naturally does good and refrains from doing evil, out of the very depth of the heart.                               D. T. Suzuki (1870-1966) from ‘Essays in Zen Buddhism’ 

A no-minded person with such a conviction displays a calm demeanor, a composed, balanced mind and a compassionate heart, even as he slays the one asking for it, so that he does not continue vitiating his soul and generating more negative karma. So, 

• One who obeys the will of Heaven (Tao/Dharma/Brahman) will practice universal love. 

      Military Thinker-Strategician Mo Tzu (Warring States Period — 475 – 221 BCE)

In this blessed state of ‘intentless intent’ of the ‘no-mind/no-self/no-ego/no-being’, one exists in the Collective Unconscious, beyond the pale of worldly forces, qualities and categories, beyond the laws of tradition, convention and morality, completely free of all outer and inner constraints that otherwise severely limits and depotentiates the lower, individualized state of mind/self/ego.  

In this New Order of Being one is beholden to no gods of the world, existing beyond all terrestrial-celestial standards, values and measures; living and acting without care (no-mindedly) in a state of  total fearlessness and freedom — even when apparently/transgressing the laws of nature, convention and morality — without generating any new karmic impulses (positive  or  negative) whatsoever. 

D. T. Suzuki in his book, ‘The Zen Doctrine of No Mind’ suggests that this state of ‘no mind’ is akin to a force of Nature, “It is like a fire in the field burning up all the vegetation, like a gale blowing down all the trees before it, like the earth sliding own the hillside, like a flood drowning the animals; when your mind is attuned to this, all is swept before you. If, on the other hand, there is a ‘mind’ in you, which makes you hesitate, and deliberate and feel uneasy, then even the destruction of a mosquito will surely tie the knots of karma for you … .

It is like the bee sucking the flower, like the sparrow pecking at grain, like cattle feeding on beans, like the horse grazing in the field; when your mind is free from the idea of private possession, all goes well with you. But as soon as there arises in the mind the slightest thought of “mine” and “thine” (discrimination/duality) you become slaves to your karma.”

The ‘Great Unconscious’ (Tao/Brahman/Asha/Dharma) cannot be held responsible for its deeds as it is above moral judgments, for there is no thought, no deliberation, no discrimination, no intent – no form of emotion or intellection at all involved in it. The valuation of good and bad presupposes discrimination (mindness), and where this is absent, as in the forces of Nature and Spirit, no such valuation is applicable. Such valuation is only applicable to and afflicts those who erroneously cherish and use the faculty of ‘mind’ — of thought, intellect, consciousness, analyses, discrimination etc, all apparently so critical to engaging in ‘this worldly’ affairs which, as the cognoscenti well know, is no more than living in a bubble of vanity and illusion. 

Whereas those living in the Dharma share the nature of the Dharma, or rather as they are of the Dharma itself, they are the One, the Free Spirit, they live in an entirely different world consecrated for the sake of God/Dharma and cannot be measured by the mundane standards used for things finite. Being thus detached in spirit from material influences, immersed in a state of ‘no mindness’, they are completely blameless and devoid of any guilt or culpability in the eyes of Dharma — regardless of the ‘apparent’ immorality of their actions in worldly terms — in every sense of the word and thus escape the inescapable laws of karma.

[Putting aside this philosophical clap-trap, a short, simple, popularly recounted story lucidly illustrates this exalted ‘no-mind’ condition vis-à-vis the debilitating condition of ‘mind-states’ .  

Two holy men were journeying on foot across a hilly tract to the next village. On the way, they came to a fast-flowing river on whose banks stood a comely young maiden desperately seeking help to get across the seething currents. The older adept, conditioned by years of training to avoid all contact with the opposite gender and blinded by dogma, callously walks past ignoring her pleas for help in crossing the river. While the younger adept, closely following on his senior’s heels, hearing her entreaties, nonchalantly picks her up in one sweeping motion without hesitating in his stride, hitches her across his shoulders, struggles across the river and gently putting her down safely on the opposite bank moves on with a polite obeisance. The two holy men then resume their journey walking in silence as was their practice. 

As they trudged along, the elder adept found himself internally disturbed and distressed, very upset and angry at the younger adept’s effrontery in daring to touch the pretty young woman; more so, since he had himself so religiously struggled against and consciously avoided making such unholy contact with the impure gender, at least outwardly, all his life. 

After walking on a few more miles in silence, the elder adept – internally seething and roiled by a host of marauding ‘mind-states’ of self-righteousness, envy, disappointment, anger etc – unable to further contain his raging state of mental boil suddenly exploded in a furious torrent of angry words scolding and condemning the younger adept, “You have committed a sin. You well know touching a woman’s body is a sin for us holy men; even then you dared to touch the pretty woman’s young body. ”  The younger adept, at first quite taken aback by surprise at his fellow traveler’s raging outburst, understood in a flash the elder adept’s dilemma and lack of spiritual maturity and replied “Brother, I dropped the lady off a few miles back but it seems that you are still carrying her”.  He gently and compassionately pointed out to his senior, “Yes! Though touching a woman’s body is proscribed by our vows and is considered vile, the mere blind obedience of such at the cost of service to our fellow brothers and sisters in suffering and distress, is erroneous thinking. For service to beings in distress, whether human or animal, is our paramount duty and overrides the tenets of our monastic vows.” 

The morale of the story is, though the younger adept performed the apparently vow-violating ‘sinful’ act of touching the woman, he did so in-truth in a ‘no-mind’ state – spontaneously, without any conscious thought or self-intent (sin-merit generating ‘mind-states’), acting purely in accord with the Tao (Thy Will), ‘the Flow’ of events and the needs of the situation truth-reality per se …without the interference of any ego-motives or selfish desires (my will). And thus, having exercised no self-will and having ‘no-mind’ — in the matter of lifting the woman — he remains completely unaffected by any contaminants that may accrue and is free of sin. 

Whereas the elder adept, blinkered by dogma and bound by the ‘word’ (outer form) rather than the ‘spirit’ (inner essence) of his sect’s teachings, though outwardly seeming calm and chaste in his manner of action had not yet, in-truth, inwardly cleansed his mind off his desires and was still mentally attached to the world of objects and dualities and had thus fallen prey to a whole raft of sin-generating ‘mind-states’ viz. self-righteousness, anger, envy, disgust etc, causing himself great distress and burdening himself with ‘the sin’ associated with the younger adept’s ‘no-minded’ action. 

In short, the illusory, transient world of ‘mind-states’ — whither positive/happiness or negative/distress — are self-caused, sin-accruing delusions (my will) that hurl us into the lower worlds. Whereas operating on the sublime ‘no-mind’ plane (Thy Will) absolves us of all impurities and gifts us the heavens. The point is to avoid falling prey to the illusory ‘my will’ induced ‘mind-states’ in everything you do in living your life. Instead, simply, just do it ‘no-mindedly’ and enter the open Pearly Gates. Well, cutting to the chase, the old man got the point.] 

Another classic example on the ‘Thy Will – my will’ plane emerges in an interview with the US President Barack Obama by Rick Warren, a leading American religious leader published in the Reader’s Digest, Feb 09. 

The first question Rick asks is, “Looking back, what would be the greatest moral failure in your life? … .” 

Obama answers: “Well in my own life, I’d break it up in stages. I had a difficult youth. My father wasn’t in the house. There were times when I experimented with drugs. I drank in my teenage years. And what I trace these to is a certain selfishness on my part. I was so obsessed with me, and the reasons that I might be dissatisfied (my will), that I couldn’t focus on other people. When I find myself taking the wrong step, I think a lot of the time it’s because I’m trying to protect myself (my will), instead of trying to do God’s work (Thy Will).” 

Further, In one of the Tun-huang Zen MSS in Suzuki’s collection ‘Shao-shih- I-shu’ – ‘The Last Works of Bodhi-Dharma’, we have the following dialogue:

“If the Tao (Great Unconscious/Tao/Dharma/Brahman) universally prevails in all things, why is it criminal to destroy human life and not criminal to destroy a plant-life? The Master answers: To talk about the criminality of a deed is an affair of human imagination (involving ‘mind-states’), and concerns its effect in a world of events (self-generated illusions), and this is not at all the right way of viewing it. Just because a man has not attained the ultimate reason of the matter (understanding of the Big Picture), he says he has committed a murder. So he has a ‘mind state’, which bears karma, and he is said to be guilty of a crime. In the case of the killing of plant-life, he has no such imagination (remains ‘no-minded’), and hence develops no sense of ego-consciousness, and thus generates no karma. For he who destroys the plant-life remains indifferent or no-minded about it; he conjures up no ghost of imagination (illusory ‘mind-states’ of anger, guilt, remorse, etc) concerning it. The result is that no idea of criminality arises here (so no sin is attached to the act).”

“He who is free from the idea of self (limited ego) views the world of form as if it were the grass of the field, and treats it unconcernedly (no-mindedly) as if merely cutting the grass. Manjusri threatened Gautama with the sword and Angulimala applied his weapon on the body of Sakyamuni (an avatar of Buddha). But they all belong to the group of beings whose minds are in perfect accord with the Tao, and are one in the realization of the truth of no-birth. They all know that all things are empty like the creation of Maya. Therefore there is no reference to the idea of criminality,” sin or guilt, so no karma is generated. Lao Tzu affirms: “Heaven (spirit) and earth (nature) are not humane; they regard all things as straw dogs (straw dummies used for target practice in martial arts),” as does the person who has evolved to the ‘no-mind’ state of non-duality. 

Thus the non-dual ‘no-mind’ state remains entirely unconcerned, undisturbed and unaffected by all worldly affairs and things, free of all care, concern and consideration for its happenings. As Ann Bancroft in her book, ‘Zen, ‘Direct Pointing to Reality’ explains, “The Zen outlook has it that all is equally whole – even straw mats and horse dung – and to distinguish one of life’s aspects and make it of more importance than another is to fall into dualistic error rather than reality,”. 

In Shen-hui we have this: 

“He who has definitely attained the experience of Mind (‘Mind’ with a capital ‘M’ is the same as the ‘no-mind’ state) retains his no-thoughtness even when his body is cut to pieces in a melee between two fiercely contending armies. He is as solid as a diamond, he is firm and immovable. Even when all the Buddhas, numbering as many as the sands of the Ganga, appear, not the least feeling of joy moves in him. Even when beings equal in number to the sands of the Ganga disappear all at once, not the least feeling of pity moves in him. He abides in the thought of emptiness and absolute sameness (the ‘no-mind’ state).”

A newspaper article by the Dalai Lama in which he echoes the above sentiments, recommending a state of ‘no-mind’ (free of the blemish of selfish motives, intentions and self-willing, in benign identity with the collective), as an instrument of the Divine Will even when seemingly indulging in apparently outlandish or even criminal acts. “Ultimately it is important to observe one’s own motivations and that of one’s opponent. There are many kinds of violence and non-violence, but one cannot distinguish them from external (observable) factors alone. If one’s motivation (unobservable intent) is negative, the action (result) it produces is, in the deepest sense, violent, even though it may appear (apparent v’s real) to be smooth and gentle (i.e. projected in a benign guise). Conversely, if one’s motivation is sincere and positive but the circumstances require harsh behaviour (e.g. slaying another), essentially (in spirit) one is practicing non-violence. No matter what the case may be, I feel that a compassionate concern for the benefit of others – not simply for oneself (a ‘no-mind’ state in accord with the Divine Will/Tao/Brahman/Dharma) — is the sole justification for the use of force.”— The Dalai Lama, Times of India (Special Peace Edition), 25.11.08. 

This unique state of ‘no-mind’ though its self-nature is ‘Pure Stillness’ it is at the same time to be found in the whirlwind of motility, though its self-nature is ‘Pure Silence’ it is to be found at the very centre of the world-life din, though its self-nature is ‘Pure Secret’ it is invariably to be found revealed in all things (for those with in-sight). 

Therefore we must remain ‘no-minded’ in everything we think/say/do, everywhere we go by simply, effortlessly, intent-lessly ‘Going with the flow’ …and find ourselves in the Elysium Garden. Believe me, easier done than said.

[Dear Esteemed Reader, If this exposition has left you more muddled than before you started eschew the self, switch off the ego, cease all thought (the incessant internal dialogue), immediately! And let the Great Unconscious take over in the Silence of your Heart.] 

Do Not Worry, Just go with ‘the Flow’ – The Lord’s Will 

Jesus’ teachings expounded in his ‘Sermon on the Mount’ is another classic example of establishing the unique ‘No-Mind’ state, as critical to man’s redemption from the vale of tears. 

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moths nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also… 

No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate he one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despite the other. You cannot serve God and wealth. 

For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than raiment?

Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 

And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith! 

Therefore do not worry, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For, after all, these things the Gentiles eagerly seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Each day has enough trouble of its own trouble. 

Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. 

Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” and behold, the log is in you own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye. 

Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces. 

Ask, and it will be given o you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man is there among you who, when his son asks for a loaf, ill give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, he will not give him a snake, will he? If you the, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in Heaven give what is good to those who ask Him! 

In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for his is the law and the Prophets enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.”  ‘Sermon on the Mount’, St Mathew  

FURTHER BACKGROUND INFO 

This Holistic Non-Dual State of ‘No-Mind’, esoterically referred to as ‘Complexio Oppositorium’ in Latin finds its echo in the variously articulated concepts of different world cultures. In the Vedas-Upanishads, this supreme state is referred to as ‘Stitha Pragnya’ (‘stilled-mind’ state), or ‘Citta Vritti Nirodha’ (mind ripples ceased state), or ‘Samabhava’ (even-minded/same-minded/steady-minded state) or ‘Samadhi’ (‘silenced-mind’ state). Gita likens this state to the ‘Brahman Mind’ (Supreme Being). In Buddhism it is well known as ‘Nirvana’ (non-stirring/steady-mind), a state beyond affect by any worldly force, or ‘Pure Consciousness’ (the unconditioned-undifferentiated-unalloyed non-dual state). Tibetan Buddhism points to it as the ‘Other Shore’ (the liberated state); Sufism terms it as ‘Fanaa’ (the state of the ‘self’ having gone away — the egoless state). Zen variously articulates this state as ‘mu shin’ (‘no-mind/ego’), ‘mu ga’ (‘no-self’), ‘mu i’  (‘no-consciousness’), ‘mu nen’  (‘no-thought’), ‘mu so’ (‘no-form/posture’) and also, not-so-paradoxically, in some schools of Zen thought it is portrayed as ‘Mind Only’ or ‘Original Essence/Nature’ or ‘the Great Unconscious’. Japanese philosophy names it ‘Satori’, Taoism specifies it as the ‘Prajna Immovable’ (Immovable Wisdom). Martial arts, illustrates this unique condition as the ‘Inviolable Mind’. Authentic Oriental Warrior Tradition esoterically depicts this special state of ‘no-mind’ as ‘Still-Weather Mind’, ‘Calm-Water Mind’, ‘Clear-Sky Mind’, ‘Clean-Mirror Mind’  all indicating a highly developed, spiritually advanced (mind-less/self-less) state of symbiotic living in the world-life, at-one-with the Whole. Greek Philosophy expresses this Transcendent State of Mind as ‘Equanimity’, the Stoics describe it as ‘Invulnerability’ and the Epicureans explain it as ‘Imperturbability’. Esoteric texts announce this self-caused, self-contained, self-determining state of ‘no-mind’ as the ‘Wickless Flame’ – an absolute, independent state completely free of and unaffected by the inner forces of the libido-ego or the outer forces of the phenomenal world. Various Eastern mystic texts esoterically exemplify this non-conditioned State of No-Mind as the ‘Unimpeachable’, ‘Unaffectable’, ‘Invincible’, ‘Immeasurable’, ‘Impenetrable’, ‘Inexhaustible’, ‘Immutable’, ‘Imperishable’ Mind. 

The ‘Unique Individual’ who attains this Supreme Non-Dual State of No-Mind, this Sacred State of Individuality in world history is well described, defined and documented in the various Mythological-Theological-Philosophical Worldviews of many civilizations, spanning different climes and times, in a wide variety of terms — all basically denoting an ‘Exemplar’, an Exceptional Personality, a Human Being Par Excellance, a ‘Man’ among men. 

  In the Gita/Upanishads ‘such a one’ is referred to as ‘Sampoorna Purusha’ (Complete Man) or ‘Adarsh Purusha’ (Ideal Man). The Yoga Vasishta identifies him as ‘Jivanmukta’ (Liberated Living Man), other Hindu holy texts mention him as ‘Aptapurusa’ (Self-Realized Man) or ‘Aupurusya’ (All Man) or ‘Purshotamam Maradya’. Tantra talks of him as ‘Sutradhara’ (Controller of Events/Situations). Buddhism celebrates him as ‘Tathagata’ (Liberated One). Jainism acknowledges him as ‘Mahavira’ (Enlightened One). Islam calls such a one ‘Insaan-I-Kamil’ (Unique Man) or ‘Fata’ (Perfect One); Prophet Mohammad is referred to as ‘Uswatul Hasanah’ (Ideal / Best Man), the Quran calls him ‘siraj un Munir’ (a Lamp of Divine Radiance). Christianity recognizes such a one as the ‘Anointed One’ (Chosen/Graced) or the ‘Son of Man’. Zoroastrianism describes him as ‘Ashavaan’ (Just Man) or ‘Naroish Narra’ (‘Man’ among men). The Hebrew titles such a one as ‘Elmataro’ (Ideal Man). Zen knows him as ‘Shinjin’ (Ideal/Perfect Self). Tao sees him as ‘Shijin’ (Perfect Man). Confucius identifies him as the ‘Complete Man’/‘Wise Man’/‘Gentleman’. Lao Tzu speaks of him as the ‘Sage’/‘Superior Man’. The Chinese refer to them as the ‘Immortals’.  In World History such a one is termed as the ‘Creative Individual’ (Toynbee). Indian History acclaims him as the ‘Chakravartin’ (Emperor of the World). The 20^th C philosopher Nietzsche and Modern Mythology label him as — ‘Superman’. 

This Ultimate State of Being and No-Mind-ness, experienced as ‘Shunyata’ (the Divine Void pregnant with infinite possibilities) in Buddhism, occurs spontaneously when Atman (individual-conditioned soul) and Parmatman (Universal-Unconditioned Soul) of the Vedas resonate in frequency, connect and merge. Put simply, when the individual ‘my will’ connects and sublimates itself, surrenders and unites with the Divine ‘Thy Will’ – the mundane mind’s circuit trips and the blessed non-dual, ‘no-mind’ state-of-being kicks-in and lights up. So it is exhorted: “Just Connect!”

In spiritual terms when this Blissful State of Union occurs one is said ‘to be one with’ or ‘in resonance with’ or ‘in-sync-with’… the God Mind (‘Thy Will’). One is then said to be ‘Connected’ or ‘Going with the Flow’.  This state of ‘no-mind’, a state in conjunction with the God Mind is also referred to as ‘Satori’ in Japan, ‘Samadhi’ in Hindu philosophy and ‘Nirvana’ in Buddhism. 

In various world cultures it is described as being — in accord with …the ‘Tao’ (the Way) — Taoism, …‘Asha Vahishta’ (the Supreme Law/Order) — Zoroastrianism, …‘Saddhamma’ (True Law) — Buddhism, …‘Dharma’ (Faith/Duty) – Hinduism, …‘R’ta’ (Cosmic Order) — Rig Veda, …‘Brahman’ (Supreme Soul) or …‘Parmatman’ (Absolute Self) – Upanishads, …‘Me’ (Lord Krishna as Personal God)– Gita, …‘Hukam’ (The Divine Will) – Sikhism, …‘Thy Will’ (Divine Will) – Bible, …‘Mandate’/’Will of Heaven’ – Chinese, …‘Great Unconscious’ (God) — Zen …‘Ash-Shari’ah’ (the way or road which God has established for the guidance of his people, both for the worship of God and the duties of life) – Koran, …the ‘Axiom’ – Mathematics, …the ‘Elan Vital’ (Life Force — chi/ki/prana/pneuma) – Biology, …the ‘Unified Field’ – Science, …the ‘Cosmological Constant’ – Cosmogony, …the ‘Invariable Dynamic’ – Sarosh (1974) as this commonly sought ‘God Dimension’ is variously termed in different worldviews. 

All denoting ‘The Flow’ the sole, all-governing ‘Onto-Teleological Principle’ continually generating, regulating, maintaining and directing the flowing, creative process of life — the eternal cycles of creation, sustenance, dissolution and evolution of all life inexorably moving through its various stages of development towards its gradient of highest potential – the Penultimate State of Mortality … and beyond (Immortality-Godhood). 

Hence, in order to live a meaningful and purposeful life and fulfill your destiny, it makes sound sense to align your being, with the help of your unfailing moral compass — the ‘Conscience’, difficult though it be, so as to always be ‘in accord …with the flow’ (’Thy Will’) — the all-determining, world-life-history ordering, civilization-flourishing imperative (the God Dimension) by achieving a holistic, non-dual, ‘no-mind’ state-of-being beyond all the partial states of becoming – right here, right now! 

[It may be of interest to note that today, the world’s scientists working on the cutting-edge of knowledge about the origins of the Universe and life refer to their quest for the same ‘holistic vision’ (the ‘God Dimension’ – so avidly sought and identified by the world’s sages of yore) though in different terms, as their quest for the ‘Grand Unification Theory’ (GUT) or the ‘Theory of Everything’ (ToE) or the ‘Unified Field Theory’ (UFT) or the search for ‘Singularity’. This is compatible with the essence of the Indian philosophy of ‘Advaita’ (Absolute Non-Duality) – a state beyond the empirical realm of phenomena, transcending the algorithm of cause-effect, where the ‘observer’ as the subject of knowledge, the ‘observed’ as the object of knowledge and the ‘act of observation’ merge into unison – i.e. arrive at the Holistic Vision of Knowledge per se (the state of Singularity/God Mind) — as postulated by the Vedantic sage Shankaracharya millennia ago.  Thus Yoga Vasishta reminds us, “When knowledge becomes the object of knowing, it is known as bondage. Liberation is when knowledge ceases to be such an object of knowing”. And the Ashtavakara Samhita 11.15 states, “Knowledge, the knower and the knowable – these three do not exist in reality. I am that Stainless (Pure) Reality in which this triad appears through ignorance”. 

For, as Asvaghosha points out, “The mind from the beginning is of pure nature, but since there is the finite aspect of it, which is sullied (limited) by finite views, there is also the sullied (partial) aspect of it. Although there is this (temporary) defilement, yet the original pure nature is eternally unchanged. This mystery the Enlightened One alone understands” or as Sri Ramana Maharishi echoed, “Mind is consciousness which has put on limitations. You are originally unlimited and perfect. Later you take on limitations and become (ego) mind”, or as Plotinus highlighted, “Man as he now is has ceased to be the All. But when he ceases to be an individual, he raises himself again and penetrates the whole world”. So it is that Lao Tzu could say “Realize thy ‘simple self’. Embrace thy ‘original nature’.  

This Blissful State of Integration with one’s ‘Original Nature’ is variously articulated as ‘Yojenta’ (blissful re-union) in Zoroastrianism or ‘Yoga’ (re-union of individual soul with the Universal Soul) in Hindu Philosophy or ‘merger with the Divine’ in religious philosophy, or simply ‘Unio Mystica’ as all mystics live it; The word ‘religion’ itself, in Latin, means ‘to re-join’… man with God. 

The core factor driving this unconscious, irresistible, innate thirst for ‘re-integration and completion’ in the human psyche is the existence of the ‘soul’ within all beings. The ‘soul’ (‘Atman’ in the Upanishads, ‘Bodhicitta’ in Buddhism) is the immutable-imperishable-immeasurable ethereal entity contained innate within all beings, a representative of the Divine Force that resides within our formal psycho-somatic structure and serves to drive and direct our embodied duality-ridden human consciousness – the penultimate ‘fruit of evolution’ and just one-rung below the ultimate State-of-Being on the ladder-of-evolution – towards that unified condition of being beyond-all-becoming – the exalted State of Pure/Super Consciousness, — the ‘State of No-mind’.  

This creative cosmic process – relentlessly, even ruthlessly, driving the evolution of all beings towards their peak point-of-actualization on the energic gradient of potential – the Godhead — finds creative expression in man’s intense fundamental soul-longing and spiritual-thirst for absolute identity/union/fusion/merger/at-one-ment with the ‘Godhead’, with the ‘Flow’. 

This deep, cosmic soul-aspiration for unity with the Divine is unmistakably documented and emphatically expressed in the various scriptures and holy books of our world’s cultures. 

In the Gita (18-61) Lord Krishna definitively decrees: “I am seated in the hearts of all.”  The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad reveals: “Aham Brahmsi” –‘I am Brahman’. The Veda pronounces: “Shivoham” – ‘I am Shiva’. The Chandogya Upanishad avers: “Tat Tvam Asi,”—‘That, Thou Art’.  Katha Upanishad announces: “The ‘I’ within me is One with Brahman”.  The Taitiriya Upanishad avers: “From Bliss we come and to Bliss we return” or “What Thou art, That, may I be”.  Zarathushtra aspires: “Grant me That Wisdom, O Ahura, that I may be one with Thee.” Jesus proclaims: “For I and my Father are one,” well aware that he would be accused of blasphemy and eventually crucified by the unholy nexus between the entrenched vested interests of a corrupt clergy and decadent ruling elite on one hand, and an unawake, apathetic mass on the other. Mansur Al Hallaj too, a mystic of Islam, had the courage of his spiritual convictions to boldly declare the higher truth: “An Al Huq” – ‘I am Truth/God’, well knowing that he would be denounced and butchered by the dogma-blinded Orthodoxy as a heretic because of it. And despite being tortured and put to death in a most painfully gruesome way he resolutely stood his ground to the very end. Thus too did Shabistari proclaim: “Rise above time and space, pass by the world, and be to yourself your own world,” and Socrates concur: “Man must rise above the Earth” and Nietzsche prophetically assert: “Man was made to be surpassed, I teach you the Superman.”

This Transcendent No-Mind State of Being – Unio Mystica, as Atman Self, Buddha Nature, Mohammad Mind, Christos Consciousness — exists above and beyond all the mundane experiences and influences of the world-life. 

‘IT’, is a transcendent state 

…beyond the state of relativity-particularity-duality (being an Absolute-Universal-Singular state) 

…beyond the conditioning of space-time-matter-energy-consciousness (ever-residing in the 

    Unconditioned State of Infinity-Eternity-Pure Energy/Consciousness), 

…beyond the imperatives of the phenomenal world (being centered in Noumena), 

…beyond the matrix of the empirical world (being Post-Empirical), 

…beyond the reality of the world of substance (being Ethereal), 

 …beyond the laws of physics and the constraints of matter (being Metaphysical), 

…beyond the principles of science (being Trans-Scientific), 

…beyond the rules of logic and rationality (being Super-Rational/Logical), 

…beyond the injunctions of ethics, morality and theology (being Ultra Moralis), 

…beyond the imperatives of causality and mortality (being Pan-Causal, Immortal), 

…beyond the turbulence of self/senses/mind-states (being ‘No-Minded’), 

…beyond the laws of fate, karma and morality (being Extra-Special), 

…beyond the influences and affects of the world-life (being ‘Above’ it all). 

…beyond the confines of social tradition, conventions and customs, 

…beyond submission to parochial ideologies, dogmas and doctrines,  

…beyond the limits of the outer world of form, sentience and volition,  

 …beyond the inner-world of the untamed, continually desiring, hedonistic libido-ego complex 

and yet, though ‘transcendent’ of  all worldly categories, ‘IT’, paradoxically, is at one and the same time perpetually ‘imminent’ in them all as their very Essence, their ‘Original Source’; even when apparently subject to the vagaries of their superficial reality, though never in spirit.  

Such ‘no-minded’ persons are primarily fueled, driven and guided by the ‘Awakened Individual Conscience’ (the Divine Spark), extant in all men — and beholden only to the ‘Universal/Absolute Conscience’ – the Godhead. It is also referred to as the ‘Cosmic Connection’ and is renowned – by those who partake of this state — as the ‘toughest armour’ and ‘softest pillow’ known to man; endowing him with a unique inner-state of grace, equanimity and sense of security — a joy indescribable and peace profound that surpasseth all understanding; even when tied-to-the-stake in the burning-centre of the flames – in theory and in practice. For, one who participates in this graced state is placed above and beyond the vagaries of weather, the adversities of life and the javelins of the herd. That is probably what Gandhi meant when he advised: “If you have faith in the cause and the means and in God, the hot sun will be cool for you.”

Through the practice of Shunya Samadhi on the ‘Prajnaparamita’, one must “just connect” with the central flow of the creative energy stream that powers the universe (‘Thy Will’), variously referred to in different cultures as ‘Prana’ (Hinduism), ‘Pneuma’ (Greek), ‘Fluidum Vitae’ (Latin), ‘Elan Vital’ (W. Philosophy), ‘Mana’ (Polynesian) ‘Ki’ (Zen), ‘C’hi’ (Taoism). 

This State of Connectedness with the universal flow-of-force bequeaths one an advanced mind-state of dispassionate objectivity and detachment, a state of disconnectedness from ‘this worldly’ distractions, sense-illusions and ego-delusions resulting in the emergence of a potently sharpened ‘no-mind’ condition — a State of One-Pointed-ness (ekagrata). This intensely focused ‘no-mind’ condition, in turn, facilitates one in attaining a heightened meditative condition that leads to the  Unitive State of ‘Super/Pure-Consciousness’ (Pure vi-a-vis the individual manifest/conditioned/ differentiated/alloyed/dual state of consciousness). 

Thus enabling one to penetrate through the veil of Maya and transcend one’s partial, parochial, limited conditions of subjectivity and ignorance, sublimate one’s Aham (beast/ego/lower self) along with all its millennia-old, historically-conditioned – individual and collective, personal and racial — emotional baggage, prejudices and illusions and expand one’s horizon beyond the world of particulars, thus endowing one with the grand spiritual vision and acumen to encompass, paradoxically, the Universal — the fathomless, seamless, boundless ‘Whole’. This creative cosmic process is described in the Upanishads as ‘Sat-Chit-Ananda’ – ‘Truth-Meditation-Bliss’, the 3-steps to Samadhi/Eternity. 

Such ones actualize this Gestalt State of No-Mind – the grandest prize the Cosmos has to offer, through an immediately-lived, directly-experienced happening of a mystico-intuitive ‘Revelation’, real-ize in less than a nano-fraction of a thought-moment the liberating powers of the ‘Eternal Soul’  — and attain ‘Atman Siddhi’ (real-ization of the Higher Self –Vedas), the ‘Bodhicitta (Buddha Nature – Buddhism), the ‘Divine Self’  (Christianity), ‘Essence-of-Mind’ (Zen), ‘Self-Nature’/‘Original Mind’ (Taoism) — that exists dormant within all human beings … and are instantly freed from the fetters of the unreal-illusory world of duality and relativity.

Real-izing this Truth, they are now liberated from all the traps and trappings of the illusory, phenomenal world of particularity, relativity and multiplicity and exist afresh ‘no-mindedly’ in a new Transcendent. Non-Dual, No-Mind State of Unified Being at the Noumenal roots of Super-Reality itself — beyond the illusory unreality and measure of the empirico-epistemological framework, beyond the dominion of deceptive physico-psycho dualities and conceptual ethico-moral polars – blissfully residing in the unified, unalloyed, undifferentiated Ontological Realm of Pure Being. Thus an ancient Sanskrit text asserts: “Just as the lion on emerging from its cage is freed from its bondage, so the sage on realizing his ‘true self’ is freed from the net of the world, from the shackles of caste, religion, stage of life, traditional morality and the scriptures.”  (Yoga Vashista VI a: 122.2) 

Likewise, the Chinese master Seng-t’ San in his Zen Sutra ‘On Believing in Mind’ enlightens us about this ‘no-mind’ unitive state beyond all duality, saying:” The ultimate end of things where they cannot go any further, is not bound by rules or measures…. This is where thinking never attains. This is where imagination fails to measure. For in the higher realms of true suchness (essence) there is neither ‘self’ nor ‘other’. So too, Lao Tzu advised: “Keep your mind free of divisions and disturbance. When your mind is detached, simple, quiet then all things can exist in harmony, and you begin to perceive the Subtle Truth (Absolute Mind/Godhood).” The One! – A super-state of no-mind/no-self/no-being simply beyond comprehension and compare. 

Thus a Buddhist Sutra gaily chants: “Gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, bodhi svaha!” (O’ bodhi, gone, gone, gone forever to the Other Shore, landed on the Other Shore, svaha!) 

The Gita too describes the unified ‘no-mind’ state of the yogi – the man whose actions are self-less, motive-less, intention-less, desire-less — liberated from enslavement to all world categories of relativity and duality, detached from his ego and its objects of  attachment, freed of all expectations for the fruits of action, desiring neither its rewards nor fearing its consequences, saying:“The man who is not troubled by pain and pleasure (being beyond dualities), who remains the same (being even/no-minded), he is wise and makes himself fit for eternal life,” or “He who is without affection (being impartial, non-discriminatory) on any side, who does not rejoice or loathe (being free of expectations and fears) as he obtains good or evil (being beyond the limits of duality)  – his intelligence is firmly set (in the God Mind).” or “He who is content with whatever chance events manifest in his life, who has passed beyond the dualities and who remains the same in success and failure, honour and dishonour – even when he acts is not bound (by the laws of karma),” or “In this world the yogin has no interest whatever to gain by the actions he has done and nothing to be lost by the actions that he has not done; for he is independent of all being.” The Gita shares the secret with us, clarifying: “Since I have no craving (a state of ‘no-mind-ness’ i.e. no desires/ attachments/expectations of reward, nor their opposite states viz: disappointments/doubts/fears of retribution) for the fruits of action, actions (seemingly positive or negative) do not contaminate me (affect my karma).” Thus too the Ashtavakra Samhita clarifies, “It is bondage when the mind desires or grieves at anything, rejects or accepts anything, feels happy or angry (all, various facets of partial ‘mind-states’ mired in the world of dualities) at anything”. 

                          WORK-IN-PROGRESS
        THIS WORK IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE-CORRECTION-DEVELOPMENT

For more light on ‘Going with the Flow’ refer Critical Role of ‘The Flow’ in Creativity (1976), Critical Role of ‘The Flow’ in Martial Arts (1982) & Critical Role of ‘The Flow’ in Everyday Life (1991).

For more light on the ‘No-Mind’ concept refer The Philosophy of the Strong (1982), The Philosophy of ‘No-Mind’ (1989), Gita – The Yoga of ‘No-Mind’ (1996) & ‘No-Mind’ Maxims (1978 …on-going).