Unmasking the
Self
Toni Packer SPRING 2013
tricycle
Unmasking the Self
Awareness cannot be taught, and when it is
present it has no context. All contexts are created by thought and
are therefore corruptible by thought. Awareness simply throws light
on what is, without any separation whatsoever.
Awareness, insight, enlightenment,
wholeness—whatever words one may pick to label what cannot be
caught in words—is not the effect of a cause. Activity does not
destroy it and sitting does not create it. It isn’t a product of
anything—no technique, method, environment, tradition, posture,
activity, or nonactivity can create it. It is there, uncreated,
freely functioning in wisdom and love, when self-centered
conditioning is clearly revealed in all its grossness and
subtleness and defused in the light of understanding.
Can the inner noise be entirely left alone
while attending? When the changing states of body-mind are simply
left to themselves without any choice or judgment—left unreacted to
by a controlling or repressive will—a new quietness emerges by
itself.
Sitting motionlessly quiet, for minutes or
hours, regardless of length of time, is being in touch with the
movements of the body—mind, gross and subtle, dull and clear,
shallow and deep—without any opposition, resistance, grasping, or
escape. It is being in intimate touch with the whole network of
thoughts, sensations, feelings, and emotions without judging them
good or bad, right or wrong—without wanting anything to continue or
stop. It is an inward seeing without knowing, an open sensitivity
to what is going on inside and out—flowing without grasping or
accumulation. Stillness in the midst of motion and commotion is
free of will, direction, and time. It is a complete letting be of
what is from moment to moment.
Sitting quietly, doing nothing, not knowing
what is next and not concerned with what was or what may be next, a
new mind is operating that is not connected with the conditioned
past and yet perceives and understands the whole mechanism of
conditioning. It is the unmasking of the self that is nothing but
masks—images, memories of past experiences, fears, hopes, and the
ceaseless demand to be something or become somebody. This new mind
that is no-mind is free of duality—there is no doer in it and
nothing to be done.