Meditation & Searching for The Self | Dr. Sam Harris & Dr. Andrew Huberman
Summary
TLDRThe transcript discusses the illusion of self and the futility of seeking it directly through meditation. It uses analogies of a tourist who joins a search party looking for herself without realizing it, and someone asking for directions to a destination they cannot logically reach from their starting point. The key insight is that the subjective 'self' constructed in our minds does not make the journey to enlightenment intact - it comes apart through properly inspecting our moment-to-moment experience. Like a fist trying to become an open hand, the contracted sense of self releases rather than progresses in the traditional goal-oriented sense.
Takeaways
- 😀 The script discusses a story of a tourist bus where an Asian woman changed clothes and was then searched for by her fellow travelers who didn't recognize her
- 😮 The woman joins the search party looking for herself without realizing it due to language barriers and confusion
- 🤔 The metaphor is used to illustrate aspects of the meditative journey - looking for the 'self' but not finding it as expected
- 💡 There is a false assumption in believing there is a solid, fixed 'self' that is the root of unhappiness that must be found and transformed
- 🔍 Meditation reveals the illusion of this subjective self when examined closely enough
- 😶 Just as the tourist realizes she is what the search party seeks, there is a similar dropping away of the illusion of self in meditation
- 🧘♂️ The self or subjective center is actually constructed out of uninspected thought rather than being an inherent existing thing
- 📝 The logic and expectations around meditation finding and improving the self are inaccurate
- ⏳ There is no fist or fixed self that gets better, but rather a coming apart of the constructed sense of self
- 😌 The self evaporates unexpectedly rather than being fulfilled or transformed into something better through practice
Q & A
What is the parable the speaker references about the missing tourist?
-The parable is about a tour bus with about 30 people that stopped at a rest area. An Asian woman on the bus changed her clothes while there. When everyone got back on the bus, they realized the Asian woman was missing. However, she had just changed her clothes and no one recognized her. She joined the search party looking for herself without realizing it.
How does the parable of the missing tourist relate to the process of meditation according to the speaker?
-The speaker argues there are parallels in the structure and logic between the experience of the missing tourist searching for herself and the meditator searching for the self or center of experience in meditation. In both cases, what is being searched for is already present in the searching itself.
What false assumption does the speaker say people often make about the process of meditation?
-The speaker says there is often an assumption that through meditation, we start out with an unenlightened self with problems, and we search for and finally discover the enlightened self. He argues this logic is actually backwards or flawed.
What does the speaker say actually happens as we practice meditation?
-The speaker says that rather than the sense of self being brought along and transformed through meditation, it actually 'evaporates' or drops out unexpectedly. He uses the analogy of a fist trying to become an open hand - the fist itself does not transform, but comes apart.
What is the purpose of the analogy about asking for directions to Central Park?
-This analogy highlights the absurdity of the idea that there is nowhere you can't get to from where you start. The speaker relates this to how the subjective sense of self does not get brought along the meditative path to enlightenment in the way we expect.
What does the speaker say is the actual object of inspection and looking in meditation?
-He says rather than there being an actual self that we inspect, it is the thoughts and the sense of being a subject located somewhere that should be investigated. This sense of being a localized subject is revealed as just more thinking.
What is the relevance of the tourist being Asian, according to the speaker?
-The speaker says the relevance is that there were likely language barriers that contributed to her not realizing the search party was looking for her.
Where does the speaker say this parable of the missing tourist originated from?
-He says he came across this story on the internet about 12 or 13 years prior, and believes it took place on a tourist bus in northern Europe, possibly in Norway.
What does the speaker say happens from the tourist's point of view?
-He says from her perspective, she joined the search party looking for the missing tourist, not realizing that missing tourist was actually herself.
How does the speaker relate the fist analogy to the sense of being a subject?
-He relates the fist trying to become an open hand to the sense of being a localized subject - just as the fist itself does not transform, the sense of being a subject does not get brought along the meditative path in the way we expect.
Outlines
😕 False assumptions underlying the logic of meditation
The paragraph discusses some false assumptions in the logic underlying meditation practice. It uses an anecdote of a tourist bus where an Asian woman goes missing but later realizes she was the missing woman to draw an analogy to the meditative journey. Just as the search party's logic was erroneous, assumptions about finding the self through meditation are also misguided. The self or center of experience cannot be found through seeking, similar to how the search party does not find the woman as expected.
😌 The illusion of a seeker or looker separate from experience
The paragraph further analyzes the illusion of a seeker or looker separate from present moment experience during meditation. When you pay attention to the breath or sounds, the notion that there is a 'you' over here doing that is just thought. This undercurrent of thought creating a subject/object duality goes unseen. The practice involves continually looking for this assumed mind/center of experience and recognizing the error in its formation, leading to an unexpected dropping away rather than a fulfillment through seeking.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡meditation
💡self
💡attention
💡search
💡logic
💡process
💡enlightenment
💡thought
💡subject
💡perception
Highlights
There are false assumptions in the logic of the meditative process that are worth addressing
The story of the missing Asian tourist illustrates the flawed logic of seeking enlightenment
The Asian woman unknowingly joins the search party looking for herself
At some point the Asian woman realizes the search party is looking for her
The problem is not solved through the expected logic of the search
There is an analogy between this story and the structure of the meditative journey
Meditation often starts from a place of seeing oneself as the problem needing a solution
The logic and angle of seeking enlightenment is inherently flawed
What you are seeking is right on the surface, not somewhere to be found
There is no separate 'you' doing the seeking or paying attention
The sense of a subjective 'you' is actually just uninspected thought
The search party is formed in error, based on a false premise
The problem evaporates unexpectedly, not through fulfilling the original search
The metaphor of directions shows the absurdity of 'getting there' from the starting point
The sense of subjective 'you' does not make the journey to realization
Transcripts
I mean there's some fundamental there's
there's some false assumptions about
the underlying logic of this process
which I think it's worth addressing and
there's actually there's a kind of found
object in the news that I I talk about
at one point I forget where it is in in
the waking up app but there's a story
that I stumbled on on the internet
um I think it's about 12 or 13 years old
of a um a tourist bus in I think was
Norway it was somewhere in
northern Europe
and I had about 30 people on it and one
person was it was described as an Asian
woman uh and they all they went to a
rest stop and everyone got off the bus
uh and they you know shopped and had
lunch and and this Asian woman changed
her clothing uh for whatever reason and
they all got back on the bus
um I think the relevance of it being an
Asian woman is you know there were
language barriers that that explained
what later happened
um so everyone gets back on the bus the
Asian woman has changed her her clothing
and the bus is about to leave but then
someone notices hey there's a there was
an Asian woman who got off the bus who
isn't it hasn't come back yet and they
tell the driver this
um and this poses a problem so now
everyone's waiting for this person to
return but in fact everyone was on the
bus that this woman had just changed her
clothing and was not recognized by her
fellow Travelers
so everyone gets concerned as this
tourist doesn't you know show up and
they start looking for her right and
they can't find her and so a search
party is formed and the Asian woman
because of the whatever language barrier
um
thought heard that there was a missing
tourist so she joins the search party
which in fact is looking for her right
and this goes on into the night and
they're ready in helicopters that you
know for a dawn patrol to find the
missing tourist
um now at some point along the way I
think it was at like three in the
morning
this tourist realizes that she is the
object of this search right and
obviously the whole thing unravels she
you know she confesses that she changed
her clothes and you know that the
problem is solved but the problem is not
solved by the the logic that the Seeker
is expected right so it's like it's not
true to say that the missing tourist was
found in in the way that was expected
right because the missing tourist was
never lost the missing tourist was part
of the search party right and so when
you think about it from her point of
view like what happened she's part of
the search party she's looking for the
missing tourist not knowing that she in
fact is the missing tourist so what
happens at the moment she realizes
that everyone's looking for her right
like what what is it the the search
isn't consummated
in the way that is implied by the logic
of everyone's use of attention
um and yet the problem evaporates and
there's something deeply analogous about
the structure of that
and the the meditative journey in in
precisely in again not talking about all
the changes in the possible changes in
the contents of Consciousness that could
be good which again cut they come along
for the ride anyway when you when you
do the thing I'm talking about
it's not on this point of looking for
the self and not finding it and
there is this sense that okay the self
is here and it's a problem it is the the
string upon which all of my conscious
States mostly unhappy ones are strong
right it's the thing that is at the
center of my anxiety it's the it's it's
the it's the thing that I don't feel
good about it's a thing that one
criticized I sort of let implode
um it's the center of my problem and now
I'm trying to feel better and meditation
has been handed to me as a as a possible
you know remedy for my situation and it
and it's billed as a remedy in fact it's
it's it's I'm hearing from this guy that
this is the thing that is going to cause
me to realize that myself isn't where
you know or as I thought it was
um so now I'm going to look right and so
again you're you're the sense is I start
out far away from the goal here I start
out with a problem I'm now meditating on
the evidence of my unenlightenment right
I can feel my problem I feel that I'm
distracted and distractible and I feel
as this sort of cramp at the center of
my life it's me and I'm not as happy as
I want to be I'm not as confident as I
want to be I'm I'm more distractible
than I want to be and now I'm paying
attention to the breath right
um
this is what the search party feels like
this is what the the confused tourist
feels like in her own search party and
she's she's looking she's looking for
the missing person and so the the so the
the angle of of you know the inclination
of all of this
is and the logic of it is all wrong you
know understandably so uh given how we
we all get into this situation
but
you know it's useful to continually try
to under undercut it and
um
recognize that the thing that's being
looked for
is is actually right on the surface
which is you know the there is no one
looking there is no place from which you
are paying if you're paying attention to
the breath or to sounds or noticing the
next thought arise
this sense that you are over here doing
that thing
is actually what it's like to be
thinking and not knowing that you're
thinking you're not there's a there's a
thought there's an undercurrent of
thought that's going uninspected in that
moment and
um so there is just a there's a
continually looking for the mind looking
for the center of experience looking for
the one who is looking which again which
is the kind of the the orienting
practice here and there's a lot more I
say about this obviously
um over waking up but um
it's it's the experiment you have to
perform in order to get ready to
recognize that this whole the search
party you know was formed in in error
essentially and the the problem that
you're trying to to solve with this
practice does evaporate in in a similar
way which is like
you don't actually get there
in the way that you're hoping for right
it's like like you drop out the bottom
of this thing in an unexpected way it's
not um there's actually another uh kind
of a similar um
Parable or or anecdote that I don't
remember if it's Zen or Sufi or I'm sure
it's been reappropriated in many
different ways but or by many different
traditions
but there's a there's you know the the
case of somebody who's lost in a town
and they're asking for directions you
know you could put put this in in in
Manhattan you could let's say you're
wandering Manhattan and you're you're a
tourist you don't know where anything is
and you stop and ask someone you know
where is Central Park
and the person thinks for a second and
says oh yeah unfortunately you can't get
to Central Park from here
right now that is a very strange I mean
we you think about that for a second you
realize okay that's a
that's an absurd claim there is no place
that you can't get to from the place
you're starting you know on Earth right
that's a failure to describe the
physical uh relationships between
anything in the world yeah that's just
not the world we live in right so but
it's a funny thing but on some level
that is true
of meditation it's like you can't get
there from here like but the sense of
you the sense of you as subject
isn't brought along to this thing you're
looking for right like you're like
you're
you know it's almost like
it's almost like you're you're making a
fist and you're trying to get to an open
hand
the fist doesn't get to take that
Journey as a fist right like you don't
the fist doesn't go along for the ride
the fist
comes apart right and and on some level
our subjectivity is a kind of an an
intentional fist you know it it is a
contraction of energy again it's it's so
much bound up in thought for for
uh most of us most of the time that is
and again when when properly inspected
there's just this you know evaporation
of the starting point but there's not
this there's not this fulfillment of I'm
going to get this fist is going to just
gonna if I you know
if life gets good enough if I get
concentrated enough focused enough you
know if I austere enough if I renounce
enough if I desire less if I you know
you know enough with enough good and
intentions this fist is going to move
into some sort of sublime condition
right that's not
the logic of the the process
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