Edward’s Diary Entry 123: Mind Map 2: The Problem-Solving Life

Whereas the “Automatic Operation of Mind – S-A 2” was described as the “Problematic Life”, the initial state of the Seeker or Student of the Mind with increased Awareness provides for a life that is freer from normal everyday problems, although there are also many “issues” to deal with! 

Let’s see where things can go wrong in this re-trained state of existence where an incipient separation has been achieved in the Mind-Stuff. 

Semi-Automatic Operation of Mind – S-A 3 According to one’s “type” (more thinking, feeling or doing) the mind-body complex still often works in automatic mode, receiving sense impressions from “outside” and pushes from “inside” in the form of:
Awareness (Chitta) More frequent realisation of “I” as Awareness, due to the formation of an initial separation in the Mind-Stuff, and motivation to seek and understand the operation of the Mind, or find “Oneself”.	Awareness is “problematic” in that it requires Energy or fuel to remember our aim, our goal – which is to increase Awareness – but the Mind often lapses into a lower state of automatic functioning. How to fuel Awareness is something that we are working on and finding answers to. It seems that exercising Awareness does not use up this Energy, but actually increases its supply, i.e., practise makes perfect.
Intellect Greater discrimination of occurrences in the mind, and tracking of the thinking or thought process (which may or may not produce feelings), and incipient ability to control thoughts (repetition, breathing, self-observation, reasoning).	Thinking may now be of various kinds: 1) Intentional thinking = contemplation, when we actively direct our train of thought along certain lines to try to ascertain and keep up with Reality, or try to cut through Falsehoods or attitudes indicative of false thinking, or unproven assumptions. 2) Automatic thought trains = wandering, or mental monkey-business, when our Awareness detects the movement of the mind along habitual grooves or channels, dipping into Memory (manas) and receiving inputs from Identity. 3) Corrective thinking or thought-train stoppage, when our Awareness detects process 2) and brings us back into either process 1) or strives for 4) Non-think, which is detention of thoughts through greater Awareness or via non-think techniques: a) awareness of breathing, b) awareness of sense impressions, c) occupying the automatic thought-process with a mantra, counting, Vichara or prayer, d) becoming meditative and doing sadhana, etc. When the “closed loop Thinking-Identity-Memory” problem occurs, Awareness kicks in to remedy the situation. The greater responsibility of our Intellect now prevents most “normal” problems from being seen as such, i.e., through right attitude and right thinking, we solve most life problems, as these problems are created by the mind itself due to wrong attitude to Life. With this, our feelings – what modern-day science calls our “nervous system” – are freed from many of the sympathetic reactions and tends to more parasympathetic reactions, i.e., we are liberated from the “bad” and ”negative” emotions due to Right Thinking, and therefore have more room and opportunities for experiencing the “pleasant” and “positive” emotions of joy, delight, thankfulness, love and compassion, etc.
Identity Greater recognition of past conditioning, and rejection of engulfment of “I” in thoughts, feelings or actions, with greater separation in the Mind-Stuff of Intellect, Identity and Memory.	Identity, or our “sense of me”, is no longer allowed to become problematic, because right Thinking and right Intellect already tell us that this “sense of me” is a product of past conditioning at best, and a fictional entity in any case. We are actively still investigating all of this “me” and searching for the so-called “I”. So criticism or rejection by someone from outside is taken as an opportunity for applying Awareness. Self-criticism is directed by intentional thinking 1) as above. Occasional diving into Memory (manas) is checked by Awareness as required, whenever the Intellect “remembers” its aim of directing mental affairs and disallowing automatic and semi-automatic operations.
Memory (manas) Automatic “Image picturing” and “Word thinking”, of which one is increasingly aware, but still sometimes unaware (unconscious origin), not always triggering more of the same or sparking off feelings considered (by the Intellect) to be impractical or useless (the negatives or vices, occurring due to wrong thinking or wrong outlook).	Awareness strives to observe the upsurge of Memory as triggered by internal (Thinking) or external (input) (chance) sources. Intellect then attempts to either accept or reject the Memory, as required by the situation. This may happen at any time: 1) During Intentional Thinking: The Vichara technique is used to detain the Memory and redirect the Mind back to its Source. Another Memory comes? Question the Source. A thousand Memories come? Always question back to the Source. 2) At low-awareness times, Automatic thought trains will occur, wandering, or mental monkey-business. Same technique as above. During 3), same technique. 4) During Non-think times, Awareness is newly applied depending on what we are doing: a) breathing, b) sense impressions, c) mantra, counting, Vichara or prayer, d) meditation or sadhana, etc.

Let's now look at the list of “problems” we gave before, with the solutions found in state S-A 3 and S-A 3+ below. Hope you're following.