Phagmo Drupa - THOUGHTS ARE AWARENESS (PDF-1722)

What follows is a little abstract, for which I apologize, but I hope you will find it more than worth the effort to slowly read through it until at least understanding occurs. This is about Vipassana, what is called "Insight Meditation."

Thoughts and thinking are an integral part of meditation, but they are often looked down on by even good meditators, but this (or so the great meditators tell us) is a big mistake.

In other words, thoughts are too often thought of as distractions that need to be eliminated in meditation, when in reality thoughts are what pull us out of our distractions, and only thoughts. Without thoughts we would permanently remain in a closed loop – a hopeless catch-22. The Tibetan Buddhists teach that thoughts are not distractions, but rather they are opportunities for awareness itself to break through the cloister of our mental firewall and wake us up. In fact the great meditation master Phagmo Drupa, a disciple of Lord Gampopa, said this:

"Thoughts are awareness."