Identifying with thoughts...

Saint Teresa of Avila said, "You can't keep a bird from landing on your head, but you can keep it from building a nest there."

Funny quote! We can all laugh at this and tremendously lighten up, and see how this can describe our relationship to thoughts.

We cannot keep "mental formations" from beginning to form, but we do not need to allow the words to gather, take up permanent residence there, and take over our head!

It is possible to change our relationship to thoughts and when the words start to gather in a huge flock that seems to want to take up permanent residence in our poor little heads, we do not need to identify so heavily with them (allow them to build a huge and solid nest!)

When we allow them simply to come and go (which they just naturally do when we do not cling to them) and feel no necessity in identifying with them, we will discover that we are that which remains after all the words fall silent....

..we are the silent, still presence in the heart, alert awareness without words here and now in this eternity of the present moment. Even in the midst of many words, this presence at the core of our beingness is always silent and still.


Francis Bennett