As many of us begin our meditation practice and spiritual journeys, we may start out with an agenda of silencing our thoughts, muting all our inner chatter, if only for a little peace and quiet. Naturally, such an attempt fails, as thoughts are an inevitable product of language and communication skills; indeed, they provide us with key tools that insure our survival, both individually and as a species. Without thoughts, our moment by moment experience would be overwhelming, confusing and impossible to learn from or share with others. And so thoughts are a necessary function of the mind, and its not surprising that they continue to jabber away, creating a distracting stream of content during those moments we've set a side for tranquility. This, of course, can lead to periods of frustration and disappointment for the new practitioner. Yet such a reaction is a needless detour on the path, as eliminating thoughts is not only impossible, its far removed from the goal of spiritual en...
info related to: dharma punx, buddhism, meditation, mindfulness, vipassana, neuroscience, dharma, karma, theravada buddhism, josh korda, against the stream, noah levine,