Meditation and Control

 

 Meditation and Control

Meditation is a very complex business. The word meditation implies not only the brain concentrating on a certain subject but also a great deal of attention. But primarily meditation means to measure. The whole question of becoming is involved in it, which is to measure: I am this, I will be that. I am greedy, but I will gradually become non-greedy, which is a form of measurement, which is a form of becoming. Both becoming in the affairs of the world and psychologically becoming. Measurement is comparison, to compare what is with what should be, the fact and the ideal, the fact becoming the ideal. All this is implied in the word. Indian gurus have brought this word into the West and made a lot of money out of it. They are multi-millionaires. I have met some of them; they are appalling beings, all out for money.

To inquire into meditation, you have to inquire not only into measurement but also this constant becoming something, psychologically. Human beings are violent, and the ideal is to be in a state of non-violence, which is to become. Also in meditation is implied the meditator and the meditation. Who is meditating? In most systems of meditation, Japanese, Indian, Tibetan, and so on, there is the controller and the controlled. The controller tries to control thought, quieten thought, shape it according to a purposeful direction. Who is the controller? All this is implied in meditation, not merely to control one’s thought as is generally understood in meditation. Whether it is Zen meditation, or the most complex forms of meditation in India, there is always the director, the entity that controls thought. Psychologically, they have divided the thinker and the thought. The thinker separates himself from the activity of thought and therefore in meditation is implied the controller controlling thought to make thought quiet. That is the essence of meditation, to make the brain quiet.

Who is the controller? Very few have asked that question.

So there is a division between the controller and the controlled. Who is the controller? Very few people have asked that question. They are delighted to meditate, hoping to get somewhere—illumination, enlightenment, quietness of the brain, peace of mind and so on, but very, very few have inquired into who is the controller. The controller is also thought. The controller is the past, is the entity or the movement of time as the past and measure. So there is the past who is the thinker, separate from the thought, and the thinker tries to control thought. Human beings have invented God out of their fear and try to reach God, the ultimate principle, Brahman, through meditation.

So meditation is very, very complex. It is not just merely meditating for twenty minutes in the morning, twenty minutes in the afternoon and twenty minutes in the evening—which is like taking a siesta, not meditation at all. So if one wants to discover what meditation is, one has to ask: why does one have to meditate? One realises one’s brain is constantly chattering, constantly planning, designing—what it will do, what it has done, the past impinging itself on the present—it is everlastingly chattering, whether scientific chatter or ordinary daily life chatter. So the brain is constantly in motion. Now the idea of meditation is to make the brain quiet, silent, completely attentive, and in that attention find that which is eternal or something sacred. That is the intention of those who really have gone into this question. The speaker has gone into this for the last sixty years or more. He has discussed this question with Zen pundits, with Hindus, Tibetans and all the rest of the gang, and he refutes that kind of meditation because their idea of meditation is to achieve an end. The end being complete control of the brain so that there is no movement of thought. Because when the brain is still, deliberately disciplined, deliberately sought after, it is not silent. It is like achieving something, which is the action of desire.

So one has to ask also, if one is interested in all this, what is desire? Not to suppress desire, as the monks and sannyasis do, or identify desire with something higher—a higher principle, higher image, if you are a Christian identify with Christ and so on. So one has to understand desire if one wants to find out what meditation is.