Undoing. Unwinding. Unlearning.
“It seems important to know something about the medium of meditation and its application. According to the basic Buddhist teachings, in order to learn how to meditate and to learn the basic philosophy of meditation, you must know how the confused mind—the ego, the self, or whatever you’d like to call it—operates. So we could begin by looking at confusion, or samsaric mind, and then look at how meditation is applied and used as a part of the pattern or the path. Meditation is basically an unlearning process. It is undoing and unwinding karmic chain reactions generated by psychological neurosis.” – Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche
What is the samsaric mind? In Buddhist cosmology, we have been reborn and reincarnated for countless eons. This cycle of birth and death is called samsara - and it is perpetuated by our ignorance of who we truly are. However, much of Buddhist cosmology can also be seen as psychology. As such, the samsaric mind is the mind that is caught in loops of thought, constantly babbling and commenting on your surroundings. Meditation is unlearning insofar as you begin to stop getting habitually caught up in your mind, and start simply being present. You unlearn this collective pattern of mind-identification. It’s okay for thoughts to be generated - but you lose much your power when you indulge in every elaboration. Summarized succinctly by Alan Watts: “In a certain sense, Zen is feeling life instead of feeling something about life.”
It is as it is.
-Sasha