Self-Enquiry: Before Thinking, What Are You?
Self-Enquiry: Before Thinking, What Are You?
Hi Soh, I have been reading up on self-enquiry on the Awakening to Reality website and in the guide.
Several times, when explaining how to do self-enquiry, you say that “non-conceptual and non-verbal exploration/investigation” is the key to self-enquiry. But you do not explain exactly what that means or how to do it. Could you define it?
It means that you examine and investigate what you are before thinking.
Before thinking, what are you?
You do not find the answer in words. All words miss the point; they are precisely what you are not. You negate all conceivable and perceivable phenomena as neti neti — not this, not that. I am not these thoughts, nor any perceivable phenomena.
So what are you?
In the past, there was a master who contemplated, “What is the original face before my parents were born?” He contemplated for many years but did not awaken. Later, he encountered a great noble person and requested compassionate guidance.
The noble one asked, “What koan did you contemplate?”
He replied, “I contemplated: what is the original face before my parents were born?”
The noble one replied, “You contemplated too far away. You should look nearby.”
He asked, “How should I look nearby?”
The noble one replied, “Do not look into what is before your parents were born. Instead, look at this: before a thought arises, what is it?”
The Zen practitioner immediately attained great awakening.
Everyone sitting here, please look: before a moment of thought arises, what is this? It is radiating light in front of everybody’s sense doors. Its brightness illuminates everything, yet it is without the slightest clinging. Nothing is known and nothing is seen, yet it is not like wood and stones. What is this?
It is right here, shining in its brilliance. This is awakening to the Way. Therefore it is said, “The great Way is not difficult; just cease speech and words!”
- Yuan Yin Lao Ren
The knee-jerk answer for many people, when asked what they are before thinking, is: “Oh, nothing.”
But you are clearly not a void or nothingness. You are clearly still conscious, present, existing, and aware. What exactly is that?
If thought says, “Oh, Awareness!” that is just another thought — and again, precisely not what you are.
So you keep investigating, non-verbally, what you actually are before all words, definitions, thoughts, and labels. Before all conceivable and perceivable phenomena, what are you actually?
This is also helpful:
What is your very Mind right now?
Do read it in its entirety.
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