Did you know that “knowing about something” is completely different from knowing something?
Let me tell you the story of a post doctoral student living in Alaska whose PhD Thesis was about Banana. She grew up in Alaska, a place where the banana plant cannot grow. She studied and researched the history of banana, the varieties and properties. She knew everything about bananas but surprisingly she had never ever eaten a banana. I live in India and my little grandchild grew up eating bananas as their staple food everyday.
The PhD person in Alaska knows all about bananas but my grandchild knows bananas. I have written an article about how conceptual understanding is actually a barrier to real knowing. Here is a link to the article if you are interested.
Conceptual Understanding: The barrier to real knowing We tend to analytically break up information and gain a logical or rational understanding of it. For doing this we try to measure it, compare it, find relationships to what we already know and then store it in our memory. Everything connected with our physical world can be understood like this and it is very useful and practical. What about things that we cannot see or perceive with any of our physical senses? Even in the physical world things like DNA, Virus, Atom, Proton, Neutron, Blackhole, Distant Galaxies, etc cannot be directly seen or perceived. We use analytical tools for numbering, measuring, comparing and relating to gain understanding of such things. The other thing is intrinsic knowing with or without a conceptual understanding. Let me use an analogy to explain the difference between the two. Imagine that there is a PhD research scholar in Alaska, writing her thesis on Bananas. Bananas do not grow in Alaska so let us say that she has never actually eaten a banana. She has thoroughly researched the subject and written a 500-page thesis on it. On the other hand there is an illiterate banana farmer in south India who has been growing all kinds of bananas all his life and half his daily diet comes from the banana plant. But he has never studied about the Banana. In this example the first person has a conceptual understanding and the second one has a knowing of the subject. You can even compare a Cancer Research scientist or an Oncologist who treats Cancer patients. Compare this person’s knowledge of Cancer with that of a Cancer survivor, who has actually suffered through the Cancer, deeply experienced it from the inside and survived from it. One has a conceptual understanding without a knowing and the other has an experiential knowing without a conceptual understanding. Learning about oneself, the spirit aspect of oneself, needs experiential knowing and I have seen that conceptual understanding actually acts as a barrier to getting a deep experiential knowing. When we seek to learn about Intuition or Emotions or Empathy or Awareness, we get carried away by the theory. We seek to read about it, write it down and memorize it and once we do that we think we know it. The thought that “I know this” closes you down from seeking further knowing or experiencing. If you are keen to embark on this ”Awareness Journey” and open up the spirit aspect of you to make your life journey smoother and richer, you need to be aware of this pitfall of conceptual understanding. Consciously drop the need to apply logical, analytical thinking and trying to understand and remember and instead seek to deeply experience from the level of feelings and sensations and from the level of extra sensory awareness or knowingness. When you open up like this with curiosity, a whole new aspect of yourself will uncover itself and be available to you. I invite you to journey with us into this knowingness. Join me on a journey into Awareness with the six month online course. Awareness Journey
To answer your question, I don’t know much about Vipassana meditation but I practice awareness of breath meditation almost all the time. Simply listen to the guided meditation audio linked below and sit with it as long as you feel comfortable. Gradually you will get better at it.
Selvans Guided Meditation – Awareness of Presence and Arising Breath
Selvans Guided Meditation – Awareness Of Presence And The Arising Breath
You begin with the four simultaneous activities to allow your mind to settle down into a quiet state. Then you invite your presence to sit with the awareness of presence. And then you settle down for