This story of ours blends with others’ stories until we think we don’t know where we begin and where others end. “Who am I?” and “What the fuck is going on?” These are questions you can ask — sure, go ahead — but they are best left well alone, unanswered. Words will never give you peace, but abiding in stillness can.

There is a wordless state beyond words, and it always has and always was there. You were in this free state. No one gave it to you, and certainly no one can take it away.

This is the you beyond the words.

The epidemic of undigested thought

What is the point of thinking the same things over and over — worrying, gossiping, competing, evading, blaming, complaining? Because that is your identity, tied to the stories of others. It is merely undigested thinking. You have been trained like a circus animal: a reactive, repeating machine, mentally farting and belching, not recognising that you have been disturbed by those who robbed you of your natural state. But they were only repeating the psycho-emotional word-bingeing of their own previous educators and seducers.

The simple fact is that we rarely sit alone, calmly, and just observe the speed and intensity with which thoughts rise and fall. By not doing so, we become bloated and inflamed by so much thought that we never get to finish one damn thought and let it go back where it came from. This psycho-emotional indigestion is very real — and if one gets used to it, one will believe it is normal, because everyone behaves the same.

It is not too difficult to see an epidemic of undigested, confused, and frankly hypnotised humans acting out a life of emotional dysfunction right before your very eyes.

The good news is that if we have a method we are taught and apply, we can get a real sense of how much indigestion we carry. We may discover that our minds are full up, blocked, so full of accumulated noise that we need a mental enema. But even a mental enema will not help if we remain unaware of our relentless, unskillful, and self-abusive thinking mind.

We cannot run away or avoid others, and we cannot change anyone — only our view. Meditation is the best remedy for the coercive and deceptive actions of others who do not have your best interests in mind, and for the sub-vocal self-punishment we dish out to ourselves. In fact, others control us because of our thoughts about ourselves. Meditation is the gateway to seeing our own self-games and the games of others.

Meditation is the art of calming down to the point where the shit storm of life does not capsize your boat — because the waves that batter you are the expression of the vast stillness from which the storm arose.

The shit storm of life is certainly real and yet temporary. When we calm down, the Ocean reveals its real nature.

Xin Zhai — the fasting of the heart-mind

This brings us to a very interesting idea in Taoist practice: the mental discipline of xin zhai (心齋) — the fasting of the mind.

The concept arises in the Zhuangzi (also written Chuang Tzu), Chapter 4 — “In the World of Men” (Ren Jian Shi, 人間世). Since xin in Chinese means both heart and mind simultaneously, the concept is better rendered as the fasting of the heart-mind. Zhuangzi lived approximately 369–286 BCE, placing the text in the 4th–3rd century BCE, during the Warring States period.

You can read the full chapter in Burton Watson’s complete translation at Terebess Asia Online:

卷 The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu — Ch. 4: “In the World of Men” terebess.hu/english/chuangtzu.html#4 ↗ Zhuangzi presents the teaching through a fictitious dialogue between Confucius and his favourite student, Yan Hui — a device typical of Zhuangzi’s irony, casting Confucius himself as the mouthpiece of Taoist wisdom.

Zhuangzi, Chapter 4 — trans. Burton WatsonYen Hui said, “I have nothing more to offer. May I ask the proper way?”

“You must fast!” said Confucius. “I will tell you what that means. Do you think it is easy to do anything while you have a mind? If you do, Bright Heaven will not sanction you.”

Yen Hui said, “My family is poor. I haven’t drunk wine or eaten any strong foods for several months. So can I be considered as having fasted?”

“That is the fasting one does before a sacrifice, not the fasting of the mind.”

“May I ask what the fasting of the mind is?”

Confucius said, “Make your will one! Don’t listen with your ears, listen with your mind. No, don’t listen with your mind, but listen with your spirit. Listening stops with the ears, the mind stops with recognition, but spirit is empty — and waits on all things. The Way gathers in emptiness alone. Emptiness is the fasting of the mind.”

Yen Hui said, “Before I heard this, I was certain that I was Hui. But now that I have heard it, there is no more Hui. Can this be called emptiness?”

“That’s all there is to it,” said Confucius.

Burton Watson (trans.), The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu
Source: terebess.hu/english/chuangtzu.html#4

The passage instructs Yan Hui to move through three levels of listening — from the ears, to the mind, and finally to the qi (spirit-breath) — emptying himself so completely that the Tao can act through him. It is one of the most cited passages in all of Daoist literature on inner cultivation and meditation.

The Heart-Mind: Xin

Xin (心) in Taoism can be confusing because of the assumptions we make about the location of physical organs. Think of it as a contraction of heart energy and mental energy. Xin refers not to the physical heart, but to the qi we sense in and around the chest cavity. The mind is not located in the brain, and yet we sense thoughts in and around the head. Science has not proven that the seat of consciousness is in the brain.

In practical terms, the Xin is the connection between emotional life and the life of the thinking mind — the faculty that obscures your real and present natural state. We overthink, and we feel pressure in the head; we feel another pressure in the chest. Emotions, however, when left alone, subside like bubbles in water, allowing the mind to be at peace.

We are constantly influenced by both our emotions and our thinking, and we create many unnecessary problems when we cannot relax. Instead, we try to change people and influence events. We can become quite self-righteous and upset. It is very useful — for ourselves and others — if we can loosen the grip of our identity and emotional attachments and stop acting out on others simply to prove a point to ourselves. It is a waste of our time and energy.

Resting in one’s real state, untainted by anyone’s opinions — that is the fasting of the mind in practice.