The mind has memories of the past and imaginations about the future. It even has ideas about the present moment. But all of these are just thoughts and have no reality beyond the mental realm. Real life doesn’t take place in the mind, although thoughts are part of life. Real life unfolds moment to moment as an experience, and experiencing doesn’t belong to the mental realm. The mental realm, however, often clouds and colors experience, sometimes so much that all we experience is thought. Our thoughts remove us from the experience of life rather than enhance that experience. The egoic mind (the aspect of the mind that serves the ego) isn’t interested in experiencing this moment but in talking you out of experiencing it and bringing you into its realm.

This may sound rather diabolical—the egoic mind sabotages our ability to experience life; and yet, that is the setup. It kidnaps us and takes us into its world of imaginations, dreams, memories, desires, fantasies, stories, opinions, judgments, and evaluations. That is what the mental world is made up of. It also includes feelings because every feeling you have stems from a thought about the past, present, or future. Feelings and the suffering related to them come from the mind—from how you think about whatever you are experiencing, not from the experience itself. Any lack of peace, happiness, and contentment is caused by this mental activity—by how you think about life, yourself, and others.

We are meant to discover the falseness of the ego and its egoic mind. Those on the spiritual path eventually discover this because that is what the spiritual path is all about. It is essentially the journey out of identification with the ego, which ends in the discovery of our true Self, or essence. But the journey doesn’t really end there. The journey has a purpose: to express essence in the world rather than the ego. This only happens when we are present to the moment rather than to our thoughts about it or about some other moment. When we are just here—without all of our ideas about who we are and what we would like our life to be like—our artificial identities are dropped and who we really are is able to play, work, love, and create in this world.

Who we really are is alive and experiencing this life through our body/mind, and this has always been the case, but this is obscured by the false self. Who we think we are is not who we really are! But unless you come into this moment and experience the moment rather than think about it, you will not discover this.

This is essentially everyone’s spiritual practice. You practice ignoring the mind’s chatter, negativity, opinions, fantasies, memories, desires, and judgments and give your attention instead to what is really going on right now in this ever-changing moment. What is arising now in this moment besides what your egoic mind is producing? What is it bringing about in this moment? Only by bringing your attention into the moment will you discover this, and only by expressing your essential Self will you find true happiness.

by Gina Lake
Gina Lake has dedicated herself to writing and teaching about awakening and finding one’s life purpose. She is the author of Radical Happiness and five other books. Find out more at radicalhappiness.com