the Watcher

the Watcher

The woodsmen, on this day as any other, dragged his found logs from the forest, on a small cart, into the village. Winter was coming and like his father before him he would need to gather a lot of wood to fend off the coming cold. He patted his children on the head and headed back into the dark cool forest for another load of wood. Deeper and deeper he searched for trees that had fallen and split so that he may break them with his hands and fill his cart. Deadfall wood was getting hard to find, his need was great but his prospects were dull.

The quiet of he woods engulfed him, a feeling came over him, a worry about tomorrow, an apprehension.

And then he saw it.

Bright, shine, hard, heavy, sharp, edge, cold, Steel.

He picked it up. No one had ever seen anything like it in his village. It drew his presence. It held his gaze.

It was an axe.

The woodsmen quickly learned to use the axe, slowly at first but then with more vigor, chopping and chopping, he cut a swath through the forest, raping and pillaging the land of his forefathers. He rarely went home now, often spending days at a time cutting wood. His fierce blows echoing in the valley a constant reminder to his children that he was lost to them in a world they didn’t understand. There was soon far more wood in the village than they would ever use but still the woodsmen cut and brought more. He was lost to his world as if possessed, cutting, always cutting more wood.

One night in the fall an alarm rang out in the village. Fire was ravaging the small cottages and the cries of the children carried in the wind.

Stopped, awakened, frightened, present.

The woodsmen looked up from his work, his hands blistered on the axe, wood cuttings everywhere, lean, gaunt, exhausted he was suddenly awakened from a dream, a dream of life, a dream of cutting wood, not as a man but as an axe.

The woodsmen dropped the axe.

His presence deepened, he could see and hear everything in slow motion as he made his way to the village and gathered the children to safety. All of the villagers were thrilled to see him, free at last of his strange curse and when asked he told them of his strange fate:

“I found something, something special. It was a tool, an axe. I picked up the tool and I used it. It made my work easier or so I thought, but in reality the tool picked me up, the tool used me! I was no longer a woodsman, I was an axe!”
The villagers wished to know how the spell was broken, how was he set free?
“when I heard the cries of our children I stopped, I was transformed. Instead of chopping and chopping, I could see myself, I was actually looking at myself chop wood when I knew I should be coming to help, I watched myself, I became the Watcher”

YOU

In this story the woodsmen is you.
A perfect being at one with his world.
The axe is the tool that engulfs him and separates him from his world, but in your world the axe is your mind, your thoughts.
He actually becomes the axe. He thinks that he is a woodsmen but he has actually become a tool pretending to be a man.
In this same way you can become thoughts pretending to be you.
You become lost to the real world, the more you worry and think about it, the more lost you become. You are possessed.
He is able to finally see the axe as a tool in his hand and he releases it, he stops chopping, he Watches.
You too can become the Watcher. You can learn to Watch your mind as it creates an ongoing stream of often negative thoughts and you can learn to halt those thoughts.

Of course as you read this, your thoughts may disagree. You may think; ya but…blah blah blah.

This is simply because your mind, your thoughts, are refusing to give up there hold on the real you.
All you need to do is to learn to watch your thoughts.

Even now as you read this keep an eye on your thinking responses to these words.
Strange isn’t it?
You can think, and you can Watch yourself think.
How can that be?
If you are thinking, then who is Watching you think?

Again:

On this site I often see you all proclaiming to the world how much you hate yourself.

Ok I’m fine with that, but.
If you really hate yourself I want to ask you a few simple questions;

Who do you hate?
(me you might say, me as in I hate me)

Ok fair enough, next question;

Who hates you? Who is actually doing the hating?
(me again cause I hate myself?)

Are you one person? Or two?

Weird isn’t it? How can you hate yourself if you already are yourself? Are there two of you in there? One who does the hating and one who gets hated?

And if there are two of you in your body is that how you are able to think something and then Watch yourself thinking it in your minds eye?

Remember I said to keep an eye on your thinking as you read? Well whose eye is it?
And if there are two of you in your head? Which one is the real you?

Let me give you a clue:
One of you is the woodsmen
One of you is the axe

One of you is a perfect peaceful person, what we call “a being”
One of you is just the stream of thoughts in your mind, pretending to be you.

YOU ARE NOT YOUR MIND
YOU ARE THE WATCHER

There are important differences between the mind and the real you;
The mind loves time and thinking, the mind is always regretting the past and worrying about the future, the mind dwells on pain, second guessing your every move and creating anxiety.

You, however, do not care about the past or the future, your natural state is to live in the present moment. You, the real you, instinctively know that you can only actually BE in the here and now, this is why you are a BEING.

The mind engulfs the real you by separating you from your real world, the NOW. It does this by constantly drawing your attention to the pain of past regrets and the worries of the future. Your mind possesses you like an evil spirit, drawing you down in depression until you finally become suicidal. Often, the smarter you are, the more you think, the more possessed you become.

You can stop this depressive cycle and live a peaceful life free of suffering by stopping your mind from possessing you.
It is so simple to start;

BECOME THE WATCHER

Watch your mind think, listen to your own thoughts.
learn to recognize your mind for what it really is, a tool, a tool you can use to prepare, atool created by our bodies in early human history to help us prepare. laugh at it when it tries to trick you into believing that you are worthless. Start to see the natural boundary between your mind, it’s thinking and the real you, the Watcher. Learn to stop your mind from thinking, even for just a moment. Try to relax, sitting in peace without thinking. Be the Watcher, as soon as you start thinking, break free, slow down, stop your thoughts.

This is the true meaning of meditative practice.
All meditation, all paths to enlightenment, are the embodiment of this simple practice;

BE THE WATCHER
CLEAR YOUR MIND
BE HERE NOW

I am the Guardian.
My time here is brief.
Soon I will leave this place, but not before leaving my legacy;
the Circle Path
The full collection of posts lighting the path from suffering to peace.

Om shanti
I am a peaceful soul