In meditation I have been instructed to "be", Be "present", and to "Silence the Mind". To many people throughout the world and especially in the United States silencing the mind seems very difficult. I have heard from many intelligent, yet ignorant, people, "I don't think I could ever silence my mind." I have often found that I have had countless, constantly spawning thoughts and also music arise and fall in my mind while attempting to harness silence, and this is very common. It is not easy at first, but it is simple in the actual doing of it. These ideas and techniques of this simple meditation are presented so abstractly that people's minds become stunned at the shear impossibility of attempting this silence. These objections to silence are made even harder by the many ways the mind's imagination can present fears of non-existence, and no-thought. It is in the complexity of the teaching, the mind's initial understanding and the abstractness that the absolute simplicity of what we are attempting to do is lost. I have had many teachers that declare many types and sources of bliss that can be reached through mediation. However, I have learned the majority of bliss is a manifestation of the mind, the very part of the mind that one is attempting to silence. The very part of the mind that is expelling energy for the creation of words for this very article. The exact part of the mind that I hear inside my head reading over what I have written. One of the reasons I have pursued meditation so diligently is because my mind, my imagination, my third eye as the Easterners call it, is highly overactive, far more active than most people's. It makes me very creative, but it can be difficult to deal with, especially if I thought it was real or important. Fortunately, when I had a near death experience at the age of fourteen and all thought and illusion vanished from me I lost the illusion of my mind's own importance. Although my image producing area of my brain is more active than most, all minds are trapped by this production of illusions and hallucinations. It is because of this common loss into the imagination by many spiritualists that I have often been forced not to follow gurus with direct and unwavering faith. I have carried out most of my research into mediation myself.

While sleeping, I have recently found myself experiencing moments of full consciousness and I am completely aware of the normal passage of seconds and minutes and of the exact position of my body. The first time I experienced this I was not sure how it happened. It happened instantly when my mind and body converted to the sleeping mode. I thought to myself, very clearly, "Am I asleep. I can feel pressure on my arms. That's right, I am laying on my arms, on my stomach," I pulled on my arms and thought, "I cannot move them. I am asleep." I knew exactly how I was positioned in sleep. I have been able to lay perfectly still while sleeping for several years, since the age of about fourteen, so perhaps subconsciously I have always been aware of my exact position. But this was certainly different, this was very conscious. I have learned to observe my body with precision and detail using my mind. It is something that I have been practicing for many years. Transferring my consciousness out of the eyes, out of the imagination point (The Third Eye) and down and throughout my body. Paying close attention to what each individual area of my person was feeling like in whatever position I happened to be in. I believe that this has aided my new discovery. It is a technique one can learn through the study of stillness and silence. These two words "stillness" and "silence" are both part of the same technique, meditation itself. While in this state of conscious sleeping, I don't think I can over emphasize the point, that my thoughts were as if I were completely awake. I heard the voice in my head thinking of the position of my body, reasoning out the sensations and pressures I could feel on certain parts of my body, i.e. my arms. At this point, I realized that I was fully capable of thinking, and then a dream started. I stopped it. I made it whatever I wanted. It was as simple as imagining it. From time to time, throughout my initial experience in this dream state I lost control of the dream, I lost control of my observing consciousness, and a normal dream would happen.

In dreams that I have been in trouble in, for quite awhile, I instantly pull myself from them. I am instantly aware that I am in an illusion. And I have the option to awake. My eyes can be forced open. It is always hard to force them open. The weight of sleep is very heavy. But it can be done. When I was younger. Much younger. A boy. I could notice I was asleep in a nightmare, but I could not leave the hallucination of dreaming. But I could scream. I would scream so loud in the dream that the sound would stop. And my body would know that I could wake up. I would trick my mind, because it knew that I should be screaming, and it would realize the illusion. And then I would pry my eyes open, or force myself to sit up.

While I am coming down from major hallucinogenics, such as alcohol, I have often found my third eye out of control. It can be vicious and cruel. My imagination is very powerful. My imagination used to be able to force the exact thought that I did not want to have into my brain, this happened because I was focusing to greatly on not having the thought that I naturally thought it. When I first began smoking marijuana I would get lost to the imagination and experience "bad trips". But these "bad trips" were only my mind trying to figure out complex philosophies that I have always studied. By using the drugs, the pursuit of these philosophies could become much more visual and challenging. It is because of this reaction I have that I smoke marijuana today. It is an essential part of my meditation. However essential it is not necessary and most people would find themselves becoming more lost to illusion by using drugs, at least this is true to what I have observed. It is enjoyable to reach silence while in the current of hallucinogenics. It has often times drove me deeper into my physical and spiritual consciousness. While returning to my normal, sober state I can find it very difficult to sleep. My mind simply won't shut up. So, I begin to meditate. It was in a circumstance like this that I discovered why I could control my dreams. Before I simply did it. The first time I basically stumbled into the experience. I was not sure why. I have often heard that Buddhist monks don't dream, but I could not figure out why. I thought it was the silence of their minds, and indeed it is the silence of the mind, but more specifically than was ever explained to me. I have often heard "silence your mind," but have never been given exact instruction to do this. I knew the basic techniques, focusing on breathing, etc, but it has always been vague.

For the first few years of my meditation I thought that I was not going far enough into the silence, because what I was doing seemed too simple and it seemed as if the people around me were having a much harder time of it. I thought I needed to shut down more to reach more silence, but I have come to find out now that I was on the exact path when I was first starting out at the age of fourteen and gurus I sought only complicated my path by over mystifying a simple action of my body. What I am doing in meditation is silencing the illusions my perpetual imagination can constantly produce. I am relaxing my Third Eye and then using it when I desire, because in these instances the imagination is not controlling me, but my true self, that is separate from the mind, is controlling the imagination. I have always began dreaming even before I was fully asleep. I have always dreamed throughout the course of my entire sleep. I have been told that this is impossible, people don't dream all through the night. I have also been told some dreams that I think last two hours only last a few seconds, but I know this now to be fully wrong. I am completely conscious of the passage of time while in these silent states when I can control my dreams. I have also been told that people cannot read in their dreams. I have always been able to read in dreams, since I was a child. I have read street signs, newspapers, and once, and only once I read an entire novel that does not exist. The story was well written and completely logical. I know that my overactive imagination is exactly as I perceived.  Trust in yourself and you will far exceed the limits people place on themselves and everything around them. All the answers to peace and silence are kept directly inside of you. I know that my overactive imagination is exactly as I perceived. A lifetime of science cannot dispute a simple fact, especially in the realms of meditation where the laws and limits of science can be greatly surpassed, but for the existence of absolute and factual simplicity, like "I am laying on my arms".  Men are gods only of themselves, they do not understand their futility in the control of the outer (physical or social, non-mental) world.  

If you seek freedom from your slave driving mind I will tell you what I have always been told. "Be", be "Present", and "Silence the Mind". If you do these things, that are all the same thing, and you stay constantly devoted to humility, so that you can avoid the exaggerated illusions of the mind, you will find simple, unbiased, dreamless nothingness. And while in that nothingness you will know that you are still there, in the form of the Simple Silent Truth, more full and more in control than you could ever think.  If you want to take this further focus on the body as an empty shell.  This is severe meditation that can yield heat in your belly and offer many advantages if you pursue the spiritual arts.  (Read the Six Yogas of Naropa for much more knowledge on this.)  When finished, refocus yourself in the here and now by remembering you are present now, right where you are.  Or else, it may be hard to think and remember certain things, but don't worry they will not be gone, you just need to ground yourself.     

By Philosopher Stephan Pacheco