Digging my own well

 

 

During the last weekend, I participated in the coursse „Mindfulness is the Source of Happiness“ with thay Phap Nhat. On the last day, he draw a picture of a pond and a well. Looking at the pond, it first seems that there is a lot of water in it; we can even take some water out of it and bring it somewhere to share it with others. But when the sun is shining, the water will evaporate and the pond may dry out. When we are looking at the well, we see that it is smaller than the pond on the surface, but it is very deep. When we take water from the well, we take it from deep down from the stream. This source of water will never be empty, because the stream continues to flow down there under the soil. Thay Phap Nhat explained the meaning of this picture for our practice. We can accumulate a lot of knowledge by studying. But if we stop at that point, we will be like a pond that can easily dry out. If we want to go deeper, we have to really become a practicioner; we have to dig our own well by developing the energy of mindfulness so that we are able to draw the water directly from the source.

I had heard Thay Phap Nhat speaking about this analogy several times before, but this time it really hit me. I have the impression that I am often jumping in other people’s well. Not that there is anything wrong about this. It is a helpful experience to jump in, taste a little bit he fresh water; this is very enjoyable. But at some point, if I want to make it sustainable, I truly have to dig my own well, meaning I have to get the insight out of my own experience. Of course, it is very helpful to be around people who already have a deep well, because by their presence they can remind you of what is possible. But the digging itself has to happen right here inside.

Recent times, I often ask myself what or whom I can trust. Is there anything I really know for sure? It seems that I cannot rely on the thinking mind, because it is producing so many different, sometimes even contradicting thoughts. Even, when I have a clear insight, when I feel something very clearly in my heart, it may happen the next day that my mind is doubting that experience saying that might have been an illusion. I usually meet that doubt by saying to myself: „I dont’ have to believe that thought, it is just a thought, I can just observe it… and I am convinced that my experience was true.“ Now I see that this conviction is just another belief, it is just another thought that I bring in in order to „protect“ myself from the doubts. Now I feel, I don’t have to believe the doubts, but I also don’t have to believe that „protecting voice“. It is not necessary to mark any experience and call it „true“ or „wrong“. 

Also if that experience was true, what would be the use of that statement? That doesn’t mean anything if I cannot bring back that insight into the present moment – which is of course never possible. I can only have a new insight (even if the content is the same) – by continuing to dig the well :)). An „old insight“ is not an insight anymore, it is just a rememberance of an experience of the past. There is another thing I can ask myself: If that experience was true, there must be something right here and now inside myself which is knowing that already. It is better to ask myself right here what I can see in the present moment instead of asking the mind for information about a memory of the past.

What has really become clearer for me during the weekend is the intuitive recognition of something in me that I feel I can rely on. I have felt it quite strongly a few times, yet most of the time it is still a vague feeling. For example, I can feel it when I become aware how intelligently my body is working. Even in the past, when there was a great amount of negative and destructive thinking going on in my head, that force of life worked steadily, my heart always continued to pump the blood, and so on. I feel there is a great intelligence working in the human body, it is an intelligence that does not even require any thinking, it is working completely subconsciously. 

Seeing that makes me convinced that there is much more power inside myself – and in everyone – than just that which can be observed in the thinking mind. And there is something, even I cannot name it, that I feel I can trust. It is something deep inside; I don’t know how to describe it. So I feel through digging my well, I can sink in there more deeply, instead of relying on knowledge from outside. I feel this picture really helps me in my practice, and I will keep it in my heart.

In Gratitude,
Vanessa
Fearless Exploration of the Heart