Oakville Zen Meditation
According to neuroscience, including imaging, our mind is processing around 110,000thoughts/feelings 24/7.Their contents, representing around 50 to 70 Gigabytes of data,* are a blend of factual, concrete realities(R), and virtual ones (VR).
How much reality vs. fiction is produced? ……VR seems to be the dominant output.
Does this ratio Reality / Fiction affect our societal , emotional life, and serenity ?
Absolutely replies Zen.
Thoughts & feelings based on truthful realities are coming from many sources such as:
Material from:
Direct, non-conceptual physical experiences of our current material world such as:
Our environment using our 5 sensorial receptors,
Where and what our body is doing,
Immateral from thinking but also electronic inputs:
Thinking using concrete, truthful, factual evidences from memories, knowledge, and also
from proven, wireless databases truthfully sources.
Thoughts & feelings made of fictional content are coming mostly from our mind but also external worlds.
The number of thoughts and feelings made of fictional content coming from our mind is probably far greater than its genuine reality- based content counterpart.To site only few:
Daydreams, creative/conceptual ideas, opinions, judgments, expectations, illusions such as “ I am in control” , hypothetical future scenarios, fears, anger, etc…all of them are too often fiction- content based rather than coming from absolute proven truth.
However, these fictional / conceptual components of our thinking may help with creativity, planning, and problem-solving, even if they don't correspond to any actual concrete events or factual reality.
Unfortunately now, fake news and misinformation should be added here as fictional sources..
Mind-made interaction between Reality and Fiction:
Our thoughts / feelings blend reality and fiction in continuous dynamic ways all day long.
For instance:
When planning for the future, we use real knowledge but also imagine many other possible outcomes that haven't yet occurred.
Also, we have the tendency to believe in our thoughts and feelings making them a triumphful reality, whereas such truth cannot be proven 100% i.e. “John Doe is weird” Is he really ?
Zen perspective: >>>>>>our mind is a great deceiver as far reality is concerned; be careful
According to Zen, we are “day sleepwalkers” , mentally navigating in an imaginative conceptual world away from the realities of the current moment. Such daylight fictional dreams can be an escape, a tool, and even a therapy but also can be a dangerous trap because our mind is a master deceiver in tricking us between what is real / true and what is fiction. This confusion can have significant detrimental effects in our societal and emotional life.
Being able to differentiate both is absolutely critical not only to avoid mistakes, to achieve serenity, but also to discover our innate, intrinsic Awakened state always present.
Zen practice: >>>>>>Being mindful to genuine, proven, concrete realities.
Even if mental interplay between reality and fiction is essential for learning, creativity, societal interaction, and emotional processing, don’t be attached too much to the tricks of this magnificent illusionist called the mind which is generating too much thinking, too many feelings. Always try to differentiate between mind-made reality and mind-made fiction, between truth and untruth.
This is why Zen is advising to experience, as much as possible, the reality of the current moment in a mindful way, therefore avoiding illusion /delusion. This is, in fact, the main purpose of meditation since we are focusing on a concrete reality: our breathing.
Conclusion:
Is it reality or is it fiction?" is the cornerstone of Zen philosophy, daily practice to achieve serenity. (see Dharma text next week )
Trying to stick with our rational mind is not as exciting as being in our fictional one but, eventually, it will bring serenity if not Awakening. Not easy, unfortunately.
REF: amount of data in human brain
*https://medium.com/@askwonder/how-much-information-does-the-human-brain-learn-every-day-92deaad459a6
