This is true only when your knowledge is sufficient to find a direction. If you’ve never had the experience of insufficient knowledge and you can’t imagine it, you’re lost.
Why do we escape from the present moment to the past, to knowledge, to authority?
Sometimes it’s escape, and sometimes it’s appropriate. Sometimes we need knowledge from the past, and sometimes we need complete attention, to be-here-now.
When we observe the present moment, we learn immediately how lonely we are.
Insight “is not dependent on our thought or attention”, but affects only the mind vulnerable and receptive to it. That is, unless the mind is uncertain enough to lose its grip upon encountering what cannot be held, it holds onto to what it knows.
That is what this thread is asking us to do. What is Insight? If you haven’t thought about it much, let’s go into it now together, if it interests you.
What is insight?
When we have thought and mind in their rightful place as limited and fragmented machine that records time, we suddenly face a fact of timelessness. We face a field of existence where is no knowledge, and no thinking.
Seeing the whole structure of the matter we are concerned in our inquiry is an insight, an observation and awareness of what is, actuality. With this seeing, or insight, there is intelligence which is complete. With this seeing and intelligence there is right action which is not divisive or fragmented.
Are we looking into this together? Do we all see this?
We are still talking about this matter psychologically, correct? Can we look more into when or rather in which situations psychological escape is appropriate with or without knowledge from the past? What do we mean by appropriate?
When we see the impact psychological escape has to the world, is it not extremely clear to stop escaping immediately at all cost? If I have a choice to escape or not, it means that I have not fully seen the structure of the mind and its conditioning. What I have done is an idea or theory of the psyche/ego/mind and then I play and speculate with that idea - all actions of the mind.
Having Insight affects the mind, the biology and the human consciousness. It does not “require” a specific type or quality of mind. Do we see this together, or is it too big of a leap?
There is no method to have Insight. If we see that, then we can also look into what are the implications of that fact.
What does it mean that there is no method to have Insight?
Does it not mean, that there are no qualifiers or conditions to have Insight? It means that we cannot - through rationalisation or analysis - identify any qualities that the mind needs to do or be in order to have insight.
This is not what I meant by tabula rasa. It’s filled with preconceptions and conclusions about how things work. I meant something more like:
This word, insight, what in the most simple terms does it point to for you?
For me, from the insighter’s point of view: An insight is a leap of understanding. Something previously unknown or misunderstood is known/understood deeply. Whether or not this knowing/understanding is ‘correct’ is another matter.
If you are interested in looking this way, from the bottom up, let’s go for it!
If it means that there is a conclusion, a response or an answer then it would imply time, experience and knowledge. This would mean that the investigation has been a mental process, hence limited and fragmented. Like a police investigation is completed at some point when a reasonable conclusion is achieved.
If by completion we mean that the problem or concern put forward to the investigation loses its meaning through insight, then we can also rationalise that investigation can be completed. The quality of the completion is naturally completely different from the previous situation. Completion with insight implies seeing the whole without time and experience and conclusions.
Do we see the difference between investigation by the mind, and investigation through inquiry?
I follow you, and technically I am not saying anything different. My writing is not from the insighter’s point of view, my inquiry is without inquirer. There is observing without observer. Obviously on this unfortunate forum we need to use words to communicate, which makes reading (and writing) limited by language and knowledge. Everything we write appears as a conclusion because we use a limited technology, language.
Can we see that, and continue inquiry together? Not providing definitions and conclusions, but thinking and inquiring to Insight together.
There is no other matter if we have insight. Insight is, there is no right or wrong. Insight is right action. We get caught up and confused with correct/incorrect only if we are thinking. Thinking is not inquiry. Thinking cannot have Insight. You can’t think your way out of a problem you thought your way into.
Thanks for clarifying, it helps me understand you better. (At least I hope so!)
I’m a definition and conclusion guy. But … I don’t take definitions and conclusions (mine or anyone else’s) as etched-in-stone expressions of Truth, they’re relative and impermanent, dynamic stepping stones.
It is your approach, not mine. I am here to inquire, and to have conversations on topics that I’m really concerned about. I am not here for entertainment or definitions.
Shall we continue the inquiry on Insight, or continue talking about our self-images?
I think it’s risky to dive into an inquiry without first having agreed to basic guidelines for how we’ll inquire, especially since our inquiry styles seem to be so different. And yes, I’m willing to leave my self-image out of the discussion to the extent that I can, provided that you are willing to do the same. Are you?
Whether we talk about our self-images or not, self-image is revealed in what purports to be inquiry. Some pretend to know and understand more than one actually does, and are here to sound authoritative. Others are modest enough to acknowledge what they don’t know or understand, and are seeking clarity and resolution.
Then we should first ask what we mean by inquiry, right?
Is inquiry a method, a process to be followed? What do we mean by different styles of inquiry? Are there different approaches or definitions to inquiry? Or is inquiry something different?
