All is Mind by David Samuel, The Entrepreneur Monk - HTML preview

TP Twaig Publications

Montreal -- Auckland

All Is Mind

David Samuel

Twaig Publications 19 Clairville Crescent Unit A Auckland, NEW ZEALAND

First published by Twaig Publications, 2008

 

Copyright © David Samuel, 2008

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

David Samuel has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this Work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents act 1988.

 

First published in New Zealand in 2008 by Twaig Publications.

 

THIRD EDITION December 18, 2008 Contents

 

Introduction 4

 

Understanding Words 5

 

Event 9

 

Identification 11

 

Fragmentation 16

 

Buffers 24

 

Three Natures 27

 

Three Minds 30

 

Reaction 34

 

Decision 34 Conclusion 35

Introduction

The intention of this book is to expand on the principles of the All Is Mind model that is available as a free PowerPoint slide show or PDF version in addition to the recording of the one and half hour talk available on the web site, www.davidsamuel.net all that material is free of charge.

Although I have attempted to put in as much information as possible to give an indepth explanation of each aspect of the Mind, the written word cannot fully express the finest points that come up when teacher and students interact.

However due to the limitations of time and location, I hope that this book in combination with the slide show will give you enough information to make significant progress in mastering your Mind and life. You will understand a lot more of what is going on and in time, perhaps, these principles will be absorbed and give you more than you perceive at the moment.

I suggest that you forget everything you know, anything you have read or learnt, and do not compare these concepts to previously accumulated information.

In order to work with any medium, the artist must understand its nature. Be it wood, paint, clay, chemicals, plastic, animal training, or anything else. Understanding how it will react to temperature, humidity, stress, cutting and any other interaction is vital to making the end product as perfect as possible.

The human mind is one of the most difficult mediums to work with because the mind itself has common factors to all minds. We can think we understand it, yet each mind is so individual that one will react completely differently to another in the same situation. All minds can be dealt with the same but only to a limited degree.

The analogy is a motorway with hundreds of lanes. Each lane has its own speed limit and road surface, yet all go in the same direction. Before one can start the journey, the vehicle’s limitations and abilities must be understood so the most appropriate lane can be selected.

This book is about understanding that vehicle, the human mind and personality. What the basic nature of the machine is, how it came to be in its current condition and how any defects can be corrected for it to function according to its potential rather than sputter along watching others speed by, or crash into it from behind.

When you read the first chapter, Understanding Words, it may sound interesting, and you may feel you understand what I am saying, but only at one level. Finish this book, take time to understand these concepts, and then read the chapter again. You will find much greater depth to it as you will see the principles applied in the examples. This will help your mind come to a realisation of how subtle, tricky and truly complex the mind can be.
I will leave you with the following story and hope that you enter this study with an empty mind.

A university professor with went to Japan and sought multiple

 

out a Zen PhD’s and extensive studies master who was known to have great knowledge of the sublime. The Master welcomed the Professor tea. As the Master was preparing his degrees and experiences and the how much he knows. The Master stayed quiet all and invited him in, offering tea, the Professor listed all studies, going on and on showing this time, attentively preparing the tea and listening to the monologue.

As the professor kept talking, the master poured the tea, filling the cup, and kept on pouring. When the professor noticed the tea

of master are overflowing from the cup he cried out; “What kind you, can’t you see the cup is full?”

 

The master replied; “As the cup is full, putting more tea in is only a waste. It must be empty first to receive and hold what it gets.”

1Understanding Words

We speak with words and listen to them, but what are words? They are sounds that convey ideas. If I say the word horse, it may immediately conjure up in your mind an image of the animal you have come to know as a horse, or without any context or spelling, perhaps you may think I am talking about the sound of my voice. But to someone who does not speak English the word will fail to bring any image to mind. Hence while either speaking or listening, it is of no use to get lost in words themselves; instead, we need to focus on the meanings behind them, on the ideas they are conveying.

Words are among the most dangerous powers a person can wield. When what you hear is not what the other person is trying to say—and conversely, when what you want to say is not what the other person is hearing—a conversation can quickly turn into a confrontation. The best precautions are first, not to take the words we hear literally, and second, not to trust your own interpretation of others' statements. If you are in a bad mood and looking for trouble, you may interpret a comment negatively, whereas if you are in a peaceful state of mind, your interpretation may be the opposite, resulting in an altogether different conversation. You cannot enter into anyone else's mind and know exactly how they are thinking at the moment, nor can you expect anyone else to know what is going on in the maze of your mind. You alone are responsible for your reactions to the words of others.

Many arguments erupt because we interpret words according to what they mean to us rather than to the speaker. However, once you understand that words are nothing more than concepts with a meaning understood individually and not necessarily identically by everyone, your perspective will quickly expand. You will discover that words are only the beginning—a means of opening the mind to receive a thought. To bring this expanded perspective to the messages you convey, imagine that every word has a hundred meanings. Accepting that your words have different meanings to different people will greatly improve your ability to communicate without conflict because that concept will force you to choose your words carefully. Conversely, remember that when you listen, you have that many meanings combined with the same amount from the speaker. misunderstanding is effectively.
infinite. It is only by chance that we

The potential for can communicate

 

A monologue is talking to oneself. A dialogue is two people, talking to themselves.

Problems can arise when you make the false assumption that since we speak the same language, all words have the same meaning to each of us. Illusions like this are the cause of conflicts. Objective acceptance that things are not as clear as they appear and that the rest of the world does not necessarily think the same way you do will solve many problems before they begin.
If you would develop an immunity to words by using presence of mind to examine all words for their validity and objective power, you could not possibly get insulted, hurt or upset by anyone's words. This is a simple quality that is developed with the exercises taught here.

The objective reality of words is their inability to have any effect on their own. They are not solid objects that have power over anyone. If one were deaf, words are absolutely harmless. Words to a deaf person don't exist, if they did not read lips of course. Therefore if words can only affect some people and not others proves that in themselves they have no real existence. If something had an existence of its own it would have an effect on everyone, as does a stone dropped on your foot. If a stone is thrown at someone regardless of who they are, it will have an effect. The power of words lies in the listener, not the speaker or the words themselves.

Words are our main form of communication. Words have the greatest power to make us happy or sad, aggravated or elated. How can something that has no actual material reality have such a powerful effect over us emotionally and physically?

Words themselves have no more power than the breath coming out of the speaker's mouth. It is when they reach the listener's mind and get interpreted that they acquire a value and power. The power of words is in your mind alone. This is the reason we must learn about the machine we call our mind. Without understanding its methods, functions and defects, we are perpetually subject to a life that changes course daily.

The strength of words is entirely subjective and personal. They are a knife that you pick up and stick directly into your own heart,
through your mind.

If someone put a knife on the table, and you did not pick it up, then it could do you no harm. But, if you did pick it up, and then stick it in your own heart, who is to blame? The bizarre question is why do we continually pick up that knife and stick it in deep then twist it around some more.

If someone gives you a gift and you don't accept it, who does it belong to?

How you interpret the meaning of words is based on your own opinion, which in effect is your subjective view of the world. Your subjective opinions are the veil which hangs between you and your interactions. Every word, sound, smell, sight and event that reaches your mind and intellect passes through this subjective veil of interpretation.

Your imagination feeding it the specific is the chef to your mind, food to get certain reactions.

This subjective veil forms from your first breath until you stop learning about the subject in question. You stop learning as soon as you are certain you understand something, and your mind is then closed to that subject. As long as you keep learning with a subjective mind, your learning is distorted to your beliefs. Once your mind is satisfied that it understands any item, including the definition of a word, then it closes down the learning function and places that in a box labelled 'understood'. That is a subjective mind, it knows something and is satisfied that its opinion is correct, and then pulls out that definition any time the item appears. If your mind is objective, then it is open to questioning all things in context of the current situation, including words. The subjective person lives looking through boxes of past experiences, the objective person has no boxes to carry around. A subjective person is a prisoner to their thoughts and opinions, an objective person is free to choose what they think and adjust or adapt spontaneously.

This veil is basically our personality, who we are, who lives each day and determines our experiences in this life, good or bad, filled with conflict or harmony. This personality can change and grow, or it can stay the same. It is a matter of understanding how it works, and putting in the effort to refine it.

One who has found the power of words and
ease by which we are manipulated so subtly
by the words and events of every moment,
and has disarmed their power,

cannot be insulted or hurt.

Your subjective interpretation of a word is the real cause of conflict and arguments because you interpret what you hear based on your pre-formed opinion rather than what is relevant to the situation or speaker. There are so many factors which affect the true meaning behind a spoken word or the tone used, getting lost in the translation from one subjective mind to another subjective mind.

If a tree was about to fall and you move out of the way, you cannot get hurt. Your subjective view of the world, your fixed opinions, in a way a touch of arrogance, is the ‘you’ that must move out of the way. At the same time, it is your own imagination that gives air the power of stone. Air cannot hurt you; you have to put in the effort to be hurt. That is the cultivation of true humility, knowing you don't know and not reacting to what you think you know. Humility and objectivity are close cousins.

Any emotional reaction to another person's words stems 100% from the identification in your own mind
and has nothing to do with the words themselves.

Words have no power

 

other than that which you give them.

 

Conflict cannot exist for an objective person.

 

Exercise 1-1

This exercise is easier to do standing up but you can do it sitting or lying down as well, whatever works best for you. You should practice at least once or twice a day, but you can do it as many times as you wish. The more you do it, the faster you will become proficient.

It is based on the idea that when your foot hurts you bite your finger and that stops the pain in your foot.

Focus your attention on your stomach until you can feel any sort of sensation there. Once you feel something, then focus your attention on your forehead, again until you feel some sort of sensation, then move to another part of your body. Keep moving to other parts or even go back to previous parts as soon as you feel a sensation in the part you are focusing on.

Which part you focus on is irrelevant, the point is to focus on one point until you feel a sensation then move all your attention to another point.

 

Do this exercise for about five minutes or longer each time.

You interpret words based on your mental and emotional state at the moment. Someone who loves you says something to support you in a way that gets you upset or hurt. Why? Because you took it one way and they meant it another. Isn't this common? End this by developing an objective view of words rather than a subjective interpretation of their meaning based on your personal state. If the speaker says something then the words should be taken according to the speakers emotional state, not the listener's. If the speaker is not developed enough to know how to speak correctly or respectfully (which is normally the case), then why should an objective listener get upset with their words? The listener often reacts unnecessarily because they listen with their own subjective opinion of what is said, not really hearing what is said, or meant by the speaker. It could be intended as neutral, but taken as intentionally attacking, and that is the listeners mistake.

Exercise 1-2

Use precision in your speech. Refrain from using exaggerated words to describe the weather, or the traffic, the weight of a bag, the level of effort. Avoid 'I was about to die' or 'it was killing me', ‘It weighed a ton’.

Stop using automatic sayings. Exchange incorrect words for appropriate ones.

Reflect on how you speak about other people. If you cannot stop yourself before speaking, then think about it afterwards. Soon enough you will be able to think before speaking.

Words have no more power than the garlic in last night's meal. Learning to control how you speak

develops how you listen at the same time. Forget your experience and knowledge, result. see the current situation, and

2Event

Events trigger memories. Memories trigger identification.

Every moment you are being exposed to multiple stimulus through all your senses. There are always sounds, sights, smells and sensations of temperature and texture that your senses are registering.

Whether you are aware of it or not, your attention is constantly being called by different thoughts that have apparently nothing to do with the situation at the moment. In fact that is not correct, all thoughts are connected to a current situation, but the trigger was so quick or in the background that you did not consciously notice it.

When you smell a perfume that reminds you of someone from the past, your mood may change to the mood of that relationship, pleasant or angry, or sadness if you miss the person. You had not been thinking of them, but the perfume brought them to your mind.

When someone mentions a roller coaster or going horseback riding, your mind will go back to your past experiences, even if it was when you were 5 years old, and you will like or dislike the idea of going on that ride. You may even feel nauseous at the thought of a wild roller coaster ride even though you are sitting still.

An event could be a conversation and someone says something that triggers an emotional reaction, even though that person had no intention or idea that what they said would effect you.

That is the danger and power of how events control our life, we are unconscious of their workings.

When we are growing up and see something for the first time, we are told what everything is. We see something and our parent says, “Moo, cow.” If a parent is scared of spiders, they may instil a fear of spiders in you as a child by repeating to stay away from them, perhaps telling you that they are very dangerous. And so we learn and have our program set for how we will deal with life.

Question what you see.

This does not mean to doubt what you see, but rather to doubt your interpretation of what you see. Remind yourself that you are seeing through your programmed mind, which can easily be fooled, even by itself and your fragmentation. Any event, good or bad, is all in your mind based on how you see and interpret things.

Know that this is how your mind is functioning and question if what you think you see or hear is truly the reality of what you are seeing, which is just a reflection of light, rather than the thing itself.
Everything we see, and in a way hear, is just a reflection of light, which changes every moment with the changing light. If you look at your face in a mirror, and the light is from above, you look very different than if the light was coming from below or one side. Photographs are a good way to notice this as well, it all depends on the light, to make you look old, young, happy or sad.

An interesting experience is to watch a mountain or large object for a few hours from before sunrise or before sunset. Notice how different an object appears as the light changes, as if it is not the same thing at all. Do not take everything as it appears to you until you are capable of seeing objectively, in a clear undistorting light as if for the first time.

That light is the wisdom mind, clear thought. That light is obstructed by the veil of your personality, the fragments, buffers, self-lying and so on. The analogy would be that when you are awake, the light of your mind is on, when asleep, it is put to very dim or off. When the lights are off, you do not see a thing. So the brighter the light, the clearer you see.

As long as you live with those defects, the light in your mind, meaning your mind that is processing everything you see and hear, is obstructed like having your finger over the lens of the camera, you only see part of the image.

3Identification

Two
wind.
it was the flag.
wrong. Neither
people were in the garden discussing a flag blowing in the

One said it was the wind that was moving and the other said An old man walked by and said they where both wind nor flag, it is the mind that is moving.

Your attention, your mind, focuses on one object, then something flies by, even a shadow moves across the room, or you hear a sound and your attention, your mind, follows it. What you were fixed on did not move, it was your mind that moved from one object to another. This is the principle of identification, which has a large part to play in your mood changes.

Losing yourself in an object of thought or event, which ends up dictating your mood, is identification with that object. The process begins when you unconsciously identify with any event, unconsciously allowing it to affect your mood. Just as the lungs inhale clean air or polluted, so does the mind feed constantly on the impressions it receives, sight, smell and sound; hence in identifying with external circumstances, you lose your mind to your surroundings. When you are not identified with things around you, you are free to choose how you want to feel.

Identification is a simple concept. If you are in a room with people who have the flu, breathing their sneezes and drinking from the same glass, there is a good chance you will get sick. Your moods are affected much the same. The mood of the environment is contagious if you are not observing its effects on your mental and emotional state. The immune system of your moods is your ability to be aware of the potential for infection, being awake through self-observation.

When you are going into the room filled with people who have the flu, you wear a mask so you don't get infected. The same goes for mental and emotional identification. The mask for that is awareness of the probability of infection. To be so aware, you must be awake. If you are asleep, it is very easy to become infected.

One day several years from Spain to Rome. run-down village and depressed. Mediterranean. ago I happily boarded a train for a long trip

As the day progressed, we rode through one after another
Several hours
until I, too, began to feel run-down

later we were travelling along the People were playing on the beaches and enjoying the sun and sea. Instantly, I felt wonderful. This is a classic example of identification. At first, I identified with people in the slums and felt as depressed as their surroundings looked. When the scene changed to reveal a beautiful landscape and happy people, my mood became what I then saw.

Mood changes don't always happen so easily if something is really bothering you. This process is relative to the daily effects on your moods, the times when you realise you are feeling down and don't know why since you started the day feeling great.

We easily identify with events and people around us. For instance, have you ever felt suddenly tired after spending time with someone who was constantly complaining? Through self-observation, you can see how your moods are constantly manipulated by your surroundings and what you identify with. Each time you become conscious of this happening, you decrease the likelihood of its happening again under similar circumstances. Identification can only happen when you are not aware of it happening. Self-observation is looking at yourself and prevents identification. As an objective observer, you can eventually feel how you prefer to feel rather than what you unconsciously identify with. In this way, you will react appropriately to both business and personal situations.

If everyone was in a panic and you joined in, then you would be of no help. But if you could stay calm and not panic with the others, then your stability would drastically alter the situation. This goes for a group or individual environment.

We easily identify with all sorts of world events, not only what we are directly in contact with. What you read in the newspaper, watch on TV, many things that have no direct or even indirect influence on your life, will affect your mood because it is so easy to be influenced by events and let your mind go. It is a sort of hypnosis that we willingly subject ourselves to.

Exercise 3-1

Spend one month without watching TV, newspapers. Cut yourself off from all media. in the negative, the world will still go on. If anything important happens, you can be sure that lots of people will be talking about it, and you will be informed by someone.
listening to the radio or reading One month will not change your life

When you first start this next exercise, it may take minutes or hours until you realise your mood changed. Sometimes you may not remember the exact time or situation when the mood swung. Keep practising and within a week or two you will be able to find the mood shift and cause of the shift almost instantly.

Exercise 3-2

Whenever you notice yourself in a down mood, depressed or angry, anything negative, try to find the moment that you got into that state. Since I assume that you are not permanently in a negative state every moment of the day from your first waking breath until you snore away, there must be a moment, if not today, then any number of days back, that you were not in a bad mood.

Find the moment that the mood switched and remember what you were doing, where you were, who with, as many details as you can until you find what triggered your negative state.

The problem with identification is that we are totally unaware of it happening, as we are unaware of the events that trigger it. Sometimes you may know what changed your mood, yet are unable to do anything about it. This happens because we do not see the connection of the event to the past experience and its further connection to the present moment.

Being unconscious and therefore at the mercy of identification with events, we constantly live in the past and live with moods that are not our choosing.

We can break this bind by practicing self-observation. That is simply to be aware of our thoughts and feelings as often as possible. Take some time when you are not busy and walk down a busy street. Pay attention to how the different sounds, sights and smells trigger thoughts. Then further notice your feelings change if they do. Eventually you will be able to notice when your mood changes to negative and be able to spot the event and the memory or desire that it identified with. When you can do that, you will gain control over your unconscious mood changes.

The mind prevents itself from acquiring new knowledge if it has already learnt something similar. This is efficient energy conservation and a good principle IF it had learnt it correctly the first time AND if the current situation was TRULY the same.

If you hear something and know you understand, remind yourself that you do not understand and that this is new despite what you may think.

 

When you know you are right you have very little potential to learn. Because if you are right, why learn something different?

 

Thinkingyou are right, but knowingyou may be wrong, gives the opportunity to retain what you have but are still open to improve, correct or expand on it.

‘ Thinking’here means that you are identified with and experience through a fragment, thus it is limited and therefore false in view of the reality that this information may be different. ‘ Knowing’is an emotional experience that is inexplicable, you just know.

Identification is like living in a large house with many rooms and floors, yet never having left one of the lower floors and staying in only two of the rooms neither of which have any windows. Comfortable with what we know, and ignorant of the rest of the house, we can live our life quite comfortably. But there is so much more in the rest of the house, not to mention what is outside the house, that we will not experience. Due to the lack of experience of the rest of the house, we live our lives limited and in ignorance, yet content that we know all that is necessary. That is true ignorance.

In this programme, we use the word imagination as a negative state which includes day dreaming and false beliefs about yourself and the world. You imagine a thing or person to be something even though it is not. You may imagine yourself capable of a certain task, yet you are not capable of doing it, or not as good as you imagine yourself to be. You see yourself as incompetent and inadequate, yet you are by no means such.

We miss the majority of life in imagination which triggers identification. Observe how much of your time is spent in imagination and how that triggers emotional states, positive or negative. Imagination takes you away from what is happening in the moment because it puts you in a dream state, unaware of the full reality. Negative subjects of imagination create negative emotions and that wastes energy. Positive subjects of imagination give you a nice feeling and you stay in that dream state missing what is going on in front of you. Either way, you are in the realm of being a machine, automatically doing what is in front of you and sleeping while you do it. This is where you miss opportunities, misunderstand people and situations causing loss and conflict. This is also the cause of all negative situations. I say all negative situations and I mean that because a thing is on