This is more than just a general thing to do with ideas. The deeper, more compelling and more accurate the idea you let go of, the more intense the effect.
And if you can get really deep, and let go of that, you can permanently undercut, in one moment, the fundamental structure of pain itself.
The effect of this is very striking. You can't do it, and not notice that something has happened. What letting go of real truth does, from the perspective of someone who does it, is to add a quality to all thought, and all feeling. That quality is simple, and can be summed up in a single word. Impermanence.
It's not something you need to remember to do, every time pain occurs. It's different to that. From the inside, what happens is far simpler, far smaller, and far more powerful.
It's just that the quality of impermanence becomes far more strikingly apparent in all pain — and all insight. You don't need to train yourself to think in terms of impermanence, because the impermanence is always there, right there, right up front, in everything the mind is generating, and indeed, the mind itself.
What happens then? Well, as we have seen, there is something else out there (or ‘in there’, if you want) that is not generated by the mind, and is not the mind itself.
When grasp fades, and pain fades, what is left? Well, you could call it consciousness, or awareness, or observation — but as we've seen, that's the old way of looking at it, and from the new depth we've struck, we can see that it's not really accurate to call it any of those things.
The experience of life, of existence as such, the experience of the present moment, the aliveness of it, the endless possibilities of it, the smoothness of it, the exuberant generosity of it, flowing out, an endless fountainhead of newness, freshness, and life.
The fundamental infinity of being that we experience as the deepest love and intelligence of reality as such.
Love is how the right hemisphere (which, as we've seen, maps things in terms of quality) describes the quality of reality itself. The oneness of it, the oneness that underlies all experience. The generosity of being, of all people and things. The brotherhood and companionship of that which has no division, and can never have. That which is always pure, and always new, and always simple, and always clean.
You don't become devoid of emotion. Your life doesn't get less meaningful in the absence of needless pain, because in the absence of needless pain, something else arises, from which all meaning comes, anyway.
And yes, pain will still happen — but it won't stick, and as you cultivate this new way of handling knowledge, it will come back less and less, and be weaker and weaker when it does. Anger will also still happen, but it will pass, and no longer consume. The base level fluctuations of the display will still remain, and will remain as long as blood is being pumped into the brain. That's what it's there for. That's what it does.
But with anger, it's the difference between a torchlight and a firestorm, and with fear it's the difference between a tang of sharpness to add taste to a dish, and bathing in a bath of sulphuric acid.
With sadness, it's the difference between a song that moves you, and a heartbreak that destroys you forever.
This lets you feel deeply, and live fully, without fear of being consumed. You never have to live in a constant or extreme state of fear, sorrow, rage, despair or pain, ever again.
This is the new understanding, and the power of deep insight. How to generate it, how to handle it, and how to use all of this to live a life free of pain, frustration, sadness and fear. The deep, hidden core of the human condition, opened up, and with it, a new option, that you are, of course, free to ignore, or hold at arm's length and analyse, or shelve away.
I hope that you don't though, because you really should see what happens when the pain falls away.
The one song that is the cry of every human heart. Just to love, and be. Not shrill, or cheap, or frantic. Not forced, and not blind to the troubles of a deeply troubled world. Alive, real, and always there, waiting for you, waiting for you to stop making noise, and make the revolutionary decision to let go of what you want to believe in, and find out what's really there, all the time.
This is the one song that every wisdom tradition that has survived from antiquity has sung.
And underneath all the noise and drama, dogmas and doctrines, postures, ceremonies, rituals and roles, there is something real. Something that we have lost in our grasping, and something which, if we release our grip, can come again.
If you have found this work useful, I hope you make the decision to share it. It won't spread unless people like you decide it's important enough to spread.
And I hope you do.
Thank you for reading.
Yours
Ciaran
PS. I wrote you a poem:
There is no lock on Heaven's door
No stern and counting angels stand
To block the path and bar the way
With shining sword and burning hand.
Both bright and wide the lintel sits
And well-oiled hinges sweetly glide
So all you need's a tiny push
To open it, and step inside.
But even so it's hard to pass
And even so few enter in
For truth itself stands nose to nose
With all your pride and all your sin.
We cannot pass the things we grasp
And selfish hearts will seek to own
For selfish hearts are what we have
And all we have, and all we've known.
Our hungry fingers lock that gate
We try to grip it, rip it free
And take it with us, back to Hell
To hate it for eternity.
There is no need for guards or locks
No need for judges in the sky
To ponder scowl and name the price
Of every little crime and lie.
There is a justice, deep and real
In ruthless being it will stare
And all your sorrow, rage and tears
And will not flinch, and will not care.
So mock, or shout, or cry, or beg,
Or fake shrill love with lying heart —
You might as well pick up an axe
And try to cut the sea apart.
Reality will not be swayed.
It does not hear your weeping call.
It does not suffer when you scream.
It will not catch you when you fall.
But even though these things are true
And though the truth can never budge,
It has no cruelty, has no hate
And never, never, bears a grudge.
So stow your greed as best you can
And throw your pride upon the floor,
For whether woman, child or man,
There is no lock on Heaven's door.