When I first had this thought in might, it felt paradoxical and even little bit poetic. I am not sure what will come out of this. But, let's explore above statement like a Theist would do. Imagine you have something to hide. Something, you would like to keep to yourself. And you need this thing so hidden that nobody in 1000 years would reach this. And what would be a safe place that nobody can reach? Is it top of a mountain in Himalayas? Or is it in depths of Mariana Trench? As you can see something of that Sort would not be safe even on Mars. As humans have this remarkable ability to search for things if they really want. They would build Metal detectors, Radars, Ultrasonic receivers and seismograms. Even Gigantic Telescopes with precise curvature to detect any emissions from your precious hidden Item. And you just have to give them the will, and eventually in 1000 years after you die, they will still detect this. Hide Why Mind is the best place to Hide something? I would not trust humans with even at the depths of the universe. Even outside the universe in a para Universe. But I know a place where any human cannot occupy in this time-space continuum. And obviously that is the mind within this body. If the "Thing" I should hide is something which is so powerful and unique, I would Hide this in the mind of a person. And that seems to be the best place to hide something no matter human inventions, can never reach. The moment they try the, secret will disappear. And to make it more secure, I will make sure the person who holds the truth, doesn't know about this. As otherwise they will give it away for some personal benefit or fear of torture. Secret of life within Heavenly Secret Now, Let's imagine you are the God. You need to hide the secret of your creation somewhere. Even if you are nature. Where would you hide your secret. You can try the depths of the universe or the earth. But, I suggest you would come to the same conclusion that we arrived. The best place to hide the truth about your creation would be non other than within the creation itself. No, matter what other beings, do, they all would not find this truth in a mass scale and reach to heaven in uncountable numbers to fill it with heads. You will never run out of resources in heaven if you do that, as there will be only handful of individuals who would look inside themselves to arrive at a truth to reach you. Cunning right? Looking inside. As, poetic impossible and imaginary it may sound. I can see why I struggled in the past with this life solving mediocre problems society wanted me to solve. They will only bring me temporary peace and happiness and triumph, which disappears in matter of days, when I am presented with another problem to solve, which is even harder than the previous, the happiness will disappear. Instead I should be sitting on a chair and examine the mind where the truth is hidden by default. The Origin, the Root or the Heart of the Problem. I am sure this is what the great wisdom from all the religions, and non religious would agree. And it is Genius. Would you? Dare to search inside?

Disclaimer : This article discuss philosophical question of Existence. Neither it promote, Nor it gives solutions to alcohol addiction. Seek professional Help if that is your problem. It often fascinates me why People take alcohol. I am not talking about drinking a Pint of beer daily, to help with sleeping or something. I am talking about who drink like a Fish. Obviously some goes to sleep and others would talk through their Hats, all night, Mostly about problems of life, and funny stuff. I cannot unseen the similarity between this and a Monk meditating on a mat, in peace and quiet. Their approaches seems to be totally different but the question they try to solve by means, seems to be so obviously similar. It's the question of existence. The Art of Disappearing Let's compare and Alcohol Addict and a Monk approach the same problem. An alcohol addict would keep on drinking, due to tolerance, and addictive nature of the alcohol. They would crave the mental experience of the reality altered, by the substance. Most often they seek pure pleasure out of this. I do not assume, they would do it for "Forgetting problems". But it seem the alcohol seems to be a means to escape the reality, otherwise be too painful to bear. Addiction to this feeling will be more, when there are obviously enough problems in life, which are unsolvable, and painful to deal with. Alcohol seems to give a temporary easy solution to solving our daily problems, by giving us an opportunity to totally forget about it. "The art of Disappearing". What does a monk do? A monk seems to have seen the same problems. And identified some of them are not solvable. I am sure they have enough reasons to get into Alcohol or substance use. But they do not do that. As they have seen the solutions given by Alcohol and substance seems temporary. Instead they try to get to the core of the problems. Which is within oneself. The problem which is universal to all the living beings, with a consciousness. I am not sure about plants, but every tiny creature on earth seems to posses one and I can see all their problem is the same. They feel exist, without knowing why? It seem to be unsolvable. So, easy solution is try to escape by other means, by Alcohol substance. The Art of Disappearing Compared to the monk and The alcohol addict, an ordinary man who is unaware of such a problem exist would just start solving them. One by one, and might even gain a large sum of money, or live a "Happily Married life". Until they reproduce, and decay. I consider this the natural means of living. For most of the practical purposes this would be fine. But, the ones who are seeking a truth in life, and value this more than anything else, will become spiritual at some point, as they can see there is no difference between going to work everyday and becoming a drunker and broke anyway. No amount of money will make us understand truth in life. Final remarks to the Art of disappearing If you generalized this idea, I would say every problem in every living being try to solve, roots from the question of existence. And Monks and Alcohol addicts are trying to solve this by practicing the "Art of disappearing" by Either permanent or Temporary measure. An ordinary man would just follow the animal wisdom of solving the problem when it arise, as he cannot see the problems which did not arise, except in immediate future.

Standalone Happiness I was looking at a Cricket match. Before the formal coin flip Toss, the two teams were introduced. And all the Playing 11 in each group were displayed on screen. Pakistan vs India. Although I wasn't focused on the Players, Because I was not focused on the Players, I saw that there is a similarity in both groups. Except them being males, I saw some of them were smiling in each group, while others were not. 4 or 5 of the men in Each group, were smiling, showing their teeth like horses, and looked cheerful and Happy, while others were either blank face or frowning. I could see the stress that they feel overflowed into the camera. I am sure, if we looked closely at their lives, my observations may be wrong. As, some of the smiling guys may be having intolerable attitude, and anxious life, while others may be reasonably happy in their life. Maybe smiling vs not smiling to a picture, may just be an isolated observation. Yet, at that exact moment when they took the picture, there is no denial to the fact who was happy. Standalone Happiness Paradox of work life This reminded me the fact often I would like to tell myself multiple times throughout the day. Which is, if I am not happy at this moment, I would never be happy. As future is not present. What we can touch, control, be is now, and happiness is not a future event . It may sound like hedonistic. But it is a simple truth. And this creates the paradox of work. The simple question, should we sacrifice our current immediate pleasure while sacrificing our future well being and happiness? To me there is no paradox. As an example, I chose to write this article, which surely be difficult rather impossible task for some. Just like Vincent Van Gogh would not enjoy solving Goldbach's Conjecture. Some would not enjoy writing an article and thinking about things. But this article will give me a future potential to earn a few cents. Or even be happy when I see someone read and get my point. In practice I am doing work which feels like Play to me, but looks like work to others. And that is the only way someone can break the paradox of work life. Work life paradox Standalone Happiness at work So, to have standalone Happiness, while during work, we must be doing some work which feels like play to ourselves. The good news is the working world is so diversified today, if searched enough we all will find such enjoyable tasks, that will pay for our time. Even if it is half the amount that we get for being stuck in a place which we do not feel comfortable. As there is always we can improve on what we do. This can be the reason, some cricketers were smiling while others were not. Even if it is not, I like to assume it is. Maybe someone would do compare the happiness index of the players and come to conclusion in the future, as it is just a hypothesis at this point. But, it doesn't matter to you. If you feel like what I am telling is true, you can simply put it into your practice and adjust your schedule so, you will have standalone happiness more. That would be a good, achievement in this Year 2026 - Happy New Year.

The best way to deal with trash is to learn to ignore it. Second best way is to try and clean, it is messier, and will make you dirty. Ok, I confess. I am not good with trash. I think most of us are not. That is why the Great garbage patch is keep getting bigger in the middle of Pacific Ocean. I have been thinking about this problem when I started to share some posts on FB. Not all of them were appealing to everyone. As some of them were infact controversial. Things like "Ego is the biggest hindrance to understanding second only to lack of information." Some, did not take this pleasantly, even making angry comments. Looks like trash talk to me. And I had two options to deal with this kind of trash. Either I could just ignore or try to make them realise in which aspects their arguments were wrong. Guess which pathway I took. It made me realise its just like dealing with physical garbage. Picking up trash When dealing with physical garbage, it seems like removing, recycling is the option we should take. As it makes sense. We can make natural fertiliser, or reuse plastic or metal. But first we have to remove them from our house and backyard. If not they will start to stink. And the place would soon become inhabitable. But, the question is why we cannot ignore? Now reading following passage you should not look at me like a mad man. As it is only a philosophical argument. It is unhealthy to live with garbage and no sane human is supposed to do that. But for the argument to work, let's say you have no nose, and you do not get sick of garbage. Let's say naturally you have immunity to garbage. In this scenario, unless it interfere with your work, best way to deal with it is ignore it. Just like what I did with trash FB comments. There is no point even trying to remove trash as it's not just worth your effort. Infact, everything which doesn't stink, and rotten and messy, we do this. We just leave them alone, although they serve no purpose, they will not be labelled as garbage. This article is not giving advice to how to manage garbage. But provide you wisdom how to manage your mental garbage. Similar to I am not going to listen or even respond to trash talk, when we look at ourselves we see not everything going through mind is positive. Some are just trash. And you already know what is the best response when the mind starts trash talking. That is to ignore. Trying to counteract these with positive or even opposite thoughts can make it messy. Just letting them run it's course with awareness would just make them last no more than their lifetime. Ignoring trash. More importantly we should know why trash became trash in the first place. What is the difference between trash and unused television in your garage. Or when does a television becomes trash? Obviously it's not when it started not working for the first time. It is when you decide it has no more use. And hindered the space which can be used for some other valueble item. I call this having a "negative value" as you need it gone. Similarly there are some negative values that we do not want in our lives. Sadness, anger, anxiety, stress are some. Just like a TV, the problem is not with the trash, it is our attitude of not wanting that creates uneasiness and suffering. So, with this intuition I can say that still, the best way of dealing with trash is to learn to ignore, if can. And second best way is try and correct it. Let's try both and see.

It seems this is simple advice. After all, in life, nobody needs Aristotle to say that what we need to be looking for is happiness. We are all looking for happiness whenever we do anything. Even a robber steals because he wants to be happy. A policeman catches the robber for the same reason, and the judge prosecutes him for the same reason. Everyone is looking for happiness, but their means are different. I am sure Aristotle did not mean that everyone should rob everyone else to feel the highest good. It looks like he expected this everlasting happiness to come from living a virtuous life — with competence, care, compassion, self-confidence, ethics, and so on. However, there is no guarantee that such a life will eventually lead to happiness. Life seems to have an inherent unpredictability attached to it. Although these uncertainties seem to arise from reasons far beyond our control, there are still a few things we can influence to get a desired outcome in the future. Peaceful Life seems like giving someone a bicycle and expecting them to go faster than the speed of light. We simply cannot, by design, overcome all the problems of life. So, how can someone be expected to live a virtuous life when outcomes are not guaranteed, even for actions done with good intentions? I would not try to trick myself by saying that I will get a better life next time, with a body that can last ten thousand more years in heaven. Instead, I might ask, “Then what?” Even if I gain immortality, I would still ask, “Then what?” These questions may sound mundane or mediocre to some, and unlikely or impossible to happen. But then again, the world has repeatedly shown that there are hidden dimensions to it that we simply cannot comprehend. We might just be like trees in someone’s garden, without the ability to move or see. Let’s step back from these hypothetical scenarios and think about life. What creates our problems anyway? This question reminds me of a quote from a film. A Walk in the Clouds  is the film, and Julian’s father says, “Boys, they do have expectations,” when she is given a sweater as a gift. It made me realize that he is going to have his expectations crushed when he finds out she is going to die in a few years, because the girl has a terminal illness. If happiness is highest good how can we achieve this? Good Yes — the reason for our problems or sorrow is our expectations. Our expectations to become what we are not yet. We all have this expectation without knowing it, and it is called the will to live. We are not satisfied simply being in this moment. We want to move to the next moment with more happiness, gaining some advantage over this one. No wonder we are not happy: this attitude toward life is a guaranteed way of losing this moment, which is where happiness would exist if it exists at all. Here is a thought. Even if happiness is not present in this moment, this moment is still all we have. Let it be anger, sadness, or boredom — if you choose to fight these fundamental feelings in favor of happiness, you will never win. I am sure this makes sense to someone who understands themselves deeply. If not, it is not because what is being said is wrong; it is because we have not looked inside ourselves long enough to observe what is going on. So, the key to living a virtuous life is expecting nothing from it — not because you cannot expect anything, but because that is the only success we can truly achieve by living it. And it costs nothing in this moment.

The philosophy of artificial and natural begins with a simple question: what is artificial? Natural If you look at dictionary definitions, the distinction between natural and artificial appears very clear. However, when we look at the world more closely, this demarcation is not correct at all. We need a deeper understanding of what is natural and what is artificial, and that could even be the key to understanding truth itself. Let us look at languages and numbers. Any language is formed from letters. For example, in the English language, there are 26 letters. These letters are used in different arrangements to make sounds and words that represent the same meaning. However, these sounds and symbols are secondary constructs used to represent our environment. If we see a “tree,” we call it a tree. But for a biologist, a tree is not just a tree. There are many more important details missing when we just approximate our observation to letters, which are called “tree.” Someone might write an entire book about a specific tree. But fundamentally, we can never represent a tree in written format like this, whatever we are writing would just be an abstract construct. That is an inherent problem with language. So if someone says a tree is natural, I wouldn’t agree. Nobody can accurately describe what a tree is by using artificial words of the English language. Similarly, numbers are artificial too. There are no natural numbers, and there are no imaginary numbers. I wrote an article some time ago on why there are no natural numbers. So everything expressed in English and numbers is artificial and abstract. Then there is a problem. What is artificial? If there is an objective truth which is identifiable, it cannot be within words and numbers, as both are human-made. One has to look beyond words and numbers, directly into experience itself, to see and develop understanding while the observation happens. This is the main focus of the blog. Mindfulness is the name for this process, which is looking at the observation while it is happening, without giving it a name or a number. Artificial terrain Once we do the observation, it is fundamentally wrong to try to describe it in words, as it will always not be the thing we observed that we are describing. What we will observe are processes, which are naturally changing at rapid speeds. Yet, it would take one a lifetime to see this in their own understanding. Just like it was mentioned in F. Wallace’s speech: “Where is water?” Liberation is within, not without.

This is a philosophical argument. Not advice for shopaholics. But if you are one, then you will have an easy time understanding this. This will make sense to anyone who is in the buying and selling equation. What are you going to buy today? A car? A dress? A book? A painting? Real state? Stock? Blog?. Newspaper? A ship? Some Gasoline? Grocery? On Sale Apart from items of food and travel, most of the things that we buy have a narrative. Most likely you will encounter these narratives in unexamined places. If you watch television, these are called advertisements. From the seller side they are called marketing strategy.  When you buy an apple phone, you are not just buying a phone. You are buying into their narrative. This is very obvious in luxury brands. These items which are five six, ten times more than their real production cost, yet still people buy them. And that inflated cost is nothing but the brand value, or the narrative. You are not just buying a pair of shoes, but Luis Vittoon. As everyone wants a pair of these, they are extremely costly. There mat actually be  a little more comfort in wearing them. But to check that you have to give a pair to a blind person and ask them to compare these shoes. Without any prior information on the brands. That is for someone to experiment on. But let's look at why you always buy narratives but not the goods. Selling of narrative is very obvious when we consider famous brands. Everyone agrees they are overpriced, but still buy them if they have enough money. But its hard to identify this when you buy a packet of milk. What is the narrative of a packet of milk? You go to the grocey store and buy a packet of milk. Have you ever examined the thought process going on? You may have one of these thoughts. You may have seen cows being fed to produce milk. You may have remembered old macdonalds farm. You may have seen how they milk a cow, or done it yourself. You may have heard that cow milk is good for your health. You may have remembered you enjoyed drinking milk. You may have seen an advertisement on specific brand. You may compare prices of different fresh milk packets and choose one which is just fine for your need. You will plan to drink it today. Tomorrow or over the course if next week. Now here is a summary of how it happened. You saw milk, or remembered milk -> developped a need for it -> bought a milk packet to use it in future. A packet of milk As you can see we use a lot of past experiences and information available to generate a need, and we buy to fulfill this in the future. So essentially the narrative is created by your own thought process. "I am gonna be happy drinking milk in the future" is the conclusion of this narrative. But here is a thought. If you just stick to the facts there is no gurentee that narrative is gonna work. It is likely it will work but there are so many possibilities. Basically you're just buying a narrative which created by your own head. I'm not asking you to stop drinking milk.  But better understand ourselves. The milk can be expired. It can spill, all of it. You may not be alive time you go home. You may not like milk taste You can get allergic to milk. Someone might drink it all while you're busy There are many more which can happen, other than your narrative. And life is full of endless possibilities. So, let's be aware of our narratives, so that we can not stick with them when we fail to see them becoming true. So, we do not cry for some spilled milk or get angry with  cat for drinking your milk.

Recently I wrote a quote on FB stating that Everything observed is a verb. Not a Noun. Nouns are just man made problems in the world. Here is a detail explanation of the argument and according to some a "Failed attempt at proving the Principle of identity is wrong". Imagine Your Partner, is a noun. Whenever there is a noun we attribute certain characteristics to it. Its spartial dimentions, of weight, height, length, width, color complexity. In this special case voice, haircolor. There are thousand different nouns which discribe the noun "Your Partner" We can think more. Look at the "Height of your Partner" which is another noun. As you can see over a short period of time Apperent height of your partner is a noun. But, If we meassure it monthnly, I am sure it fluctuates around a median point, and there is a trend as well. I can compare this to a graph of a BTC - crypto price. There are tiny fluctuations each moment which we cannot even see, but only can meassured by height of atoms. So, the Height of your partner, is not actually a noun. But it is a verb, a function, which's output fluctuates moment to moment. A goat, is a collection of verbs What is the problem with this? All our lives, our mind looks for nouns. Where things appear stable. Life doesn't have a meaning if things are continously changing. We want to live with a stable partner. We need to look young all the time. We need stable income. We need this and that, which are nouns. But, When you know these so called nouns are a collection of tiny functions which can be described with non other than continous functions, you will realise, expecting a Car, to be a car in 10 years is impossible. Cracks will accumilate in a faster rate than the earth travelling around the sun, in meters per second. So, really speaking, it will not produce the same, happiness and emotions it created in the first place. If what is true for your partner, is true for yourself. Hence, things are going to change over time. This attitude is great for the mindfulness student as it creates a framework of understanding nature, with another dimention that, when someone talk about a tree, you wouldn't see a fixed thing without change, but a dynamic, verb with constant change. And, the previous expectation of making it a happy experience will nolonger be there, instead there will be a better understanding. Attachments to such objects will loosen creating space for less dissapointment. Time as a varible Principle of identity is wrong Principle of Identity states, that Object A, is similar to Object A itself. But there is an inherent problem in this statement. Let's imagine a hypothetical Object A, Which exist at time T. If everything remains stable with this object A (Its 3D structure and weight etc, which is unlikely) We are travelling through time to time T+t. Even if everything remained same the "Time Object A existed" Is a property which can only be described as a continous variable. Hence Object A which existed at Time T is not similar to Object A existing at Time T+t. It has changed atleast from one property. And that is my simple proof that Principle of identity is wrong and only universal thing about objects is their "Change". I am not sure what are the secondery implications of these observations. But I would not care. Understanding is the only thing which we should seek in life.

Disclaimer: this is a philosophical article. Do not get disappointed looking for easy ways of getting rich. Having said that, if you really want to get rich by metrics of dollars, I think you should become owner of assets early in life. Get it wrong young, and start experimenting. Learn the fundementals of money and people, as values are created in the minds of people. It sounds easy, but there is lot of work to be done. If you have the prospects of being rich, you'd be already doing this anyway. Unfortunately society have created so called traps. Where individuals stuck at certain unhappy loops, where they cannot break themselves free from. Yet its very simple, as barriers are only within minds. When given right information all the minds are capable of freeing themselves from imaginary barriers. As you can see this is one way of getting rich. But there is a problem. Enormous pile of money is not going to make your inherent problems go away. Your mind thinks in a certain way. It behaves in a certain way. Body reacts to the enviornment to a certain way. As an example, money can help you to buy a good nutritious meal. But it cannot stop you from getting hungry. Money can buy you a better car, but it cannot give you power to teleport. Money can buy you medicine, but it cannot expand your lifespan to 500 more years. So, inherent human constrains of the mind and the body would remain no matter how much you earn. A tree After a certain point, even things you can buy also become limited , as boring. Comfort will become a logarithmic function against your total wealth. As science cannot keep up with innovation, to the speed of your pile of money grows, comfort you can buy will level out. Hence you might have to choose a different way of expending, and you might just become a rich Philanthropist. A fake one of course. So, there are two ways of getting rich. The second way of being rich is understanding rich is a feeling. Although you have a million dollars in the bank its just a number. A potential. You're not gonna carry it in your pocket. Hence its a feeling. You already know how to generate a feeling. And our mind kind of knows this intuitively. A child will feel happy when she is given an apple than a dollar bill. As in child's mind having an apple is rich than having a million dollars. In the same way, if you chose to be happy with something which is achievable for your abilities, then you can be rich. There is no difference between this and having a million in the bank. Smile Instead of trying to accumilate physical thing to create a feeling of fulfilment, you can chose to find out knowledge and understanding about the mind. Where those feelings are created in the first place. The good thing is, once you know yourself you can recreate these feelings with few adjustments of your enviornment. As an example you can chose to have a walk, or have a warm bath, in the afternoon. Which will create a sense of peace and happiness. You can chose to be happy eating same food from same Restaurent and still feel happy. After all nothing is gonna change the way you feel about the world other than understanding. And understanding cost nothing other than the time for you to look at yourself.

Imagine you have a cat. The cats name is David. David, is a good cat. A great companion to your lonly life. David will do all the nasty things that other cats do. It will drop the vass from the table, chase a mouse and knock a radio, or bring mud into the home. Yet David will be the first one to come and greet you when you come after a vacation. So you take a good care of David. But let's stop this hypothetical scenario for a moment and think about a bit of practical philosophy about cats. David Philosophy of cats You may wonder, is there any philosophy at all about cats? I will say good amount indeed. But non of that is labeled as cats. So if someone asked you who is David. You would point to your cat, not your husband Peter. As for you David is the cat. If I asked you what is a cat, you would again point your finger to David. Not husband, as your husband is a human not a cat. But have you ever thought why he is a human and not a cat? What makes a cat a cat? Now we can list out characteristics of a cat, without ever wanting to point out to any. What is a cat? So what is a cat has a definite answer. Well I asked chatgpt. A cat is a small, domesticated mammal known for its agility, sharp senses, and independent nature. Cats are commonly kept as pets for companionship and for their ability to control pests, especially rodents. They have soft fur, retractable claws, and expressive behaviors such as purring, meowing, and body language to communicate with humans and other animals. You may or may not have thought about everything which mounts to a cat. But the fact that I am trying to illustrate is that it is just an abstract idea. A cat is just an abstract concept. Abstract concepts do not exist outside human mind, yet you might disagree as David is in front of you. And everyone of the humans in the world would agree it is a cat. What you are seeing is just one instance or application of more general idea of a cat. Although cat is a collection of characteristics, individual cat is different from another cat. Further proving the point. If we had no prior knowledge about cats, we would never be able to see any similarity between two David's. They would be two things. Now we don't have to go far to see this phenomenon at work. It's just few decades ago that we were toddlers. And as a toddler we didn't know what is edible and what is not. There was nothing called food. It was just an abstract concept. But we learned that by experimenting by putting everything in mouth indiscriminately. A mouse How to know a cat? Phew... that was a lengthy discussion about hypothetical cats. As this blog is dedicated to philosophy and mindfulness, I will leave a message. At this point if you're confused to a level that you ask yourself "do cats really exist then?" I am glad. You have made progress. Yes cats do exist. But not in the form our mind says that they do. David is your cat, a unique one. Similar to David other cats exist, but they are just unique. As for cats in general it's just a concept. The reality is not a concept. To know what truly mounts to a cat, one has to forget all the learned concepts about cats and look at David. That experience you get while mindfully observing is the only thing which can be named as a cat. And the name even doesn't matter. You are just one step away from using this wisdom. We just have to generalise this thinking to everything else we observe through our mind. It may be a tree, a hen or anger or time. And that is a fine way to magical mindful living.

I was exploring the concept of universal truth statements vs conditionally true ones in discrete mathematics. And even before going through the first chapter I thought of putting this concept into practice by asking myself what is universal about a thought? Have you ever thought about it? Let's explore together. My first intuition is the knower. Every thought has a knower. There is no thought of a tree without someone who knows about it. And everything we observe can be funneled into a thought. These mental objects all has a knower. But there are some more candidates. Think about the following. Thought Candidates for what is universal about a thought. Every thought is unique. There are no two thoughts alike. Every thought is subjective, there are no two thoughts which converge into a one in two minds. Every thought eventually destroys, vanish completely from existence, no matter how hard you try. There can be many more. But I will only discuss about the first, here in this article. What are the consequences of every thought having a knower? This closely resemblance the duality of nature. If there is a knower for every thought, and it seem both of them arise at exact same time, then can we assume these are two different things? It's like asking weather a reflection is separate from the mirror. But there is a problem in this too, as a mirror would have nothing to do with what it reflects. If the circumstances are aligned it will reflect anyway. So, then there is the question of free will. If we are having a free will we should be able to create thoughts. But it appears, we can know only about a thought only at the time it appears. Technically speaking we are not the real reason that the thought is there. I know, we cannot function in the society if we are firm to believe in this as a theory. But if we examine ourselves and come into realisation about thoughts this way, our minds will have an opportunity to be liberated from the constant clatter of the universe. Knower Another way to explore the same phenomena is to ask the question is there a thought without a knower? I cannot point out to any. Book is just a valueless thing unless it has the ability to generate thoughts in a person. So, the value of the book is not in its pages, but in the thought of a person who reads it. Similarly, a thought which is not raised in a knowers mind neither does exist, nor does it has an inherent value. Knowing is the thoughts, thoughts are the knowing. So, living is thinking. Thinking is living. If you want to stop thinking we have to stop knowing, which is impossible and out of the question. On the other hand if we can observe and identify there is only knowing, that can liberate us from underlying value system. As value is a secondary phenomena unique to the knower. But most of our problems if not all of them are there is not due to knowing. But due to valuing what was known. Let's take a break. I do not expect 1 in a million to understand exactly what I wrote. That is not the objective. Thoughts are generated, because of everything which came before tracing upto the origin of the universe. Yet I have nothing to do with this. Let's observe life and note down our observations. Just because that is.

"The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. Neither love without knowledge, nor knowledge without love, will lead to the good life." - Bertrand Russell I was thinking about life? Following are generally how people think about life. Just have a look at the list and note whether what you describe is there. Life can be. A good life. A successful life. A rich life A complete life. An exiting life. An adventurous life. A full life. A disastrous life. A poor life A pathetic life. A criminal life A Saint life. A spiritual life A peaceful life. An academic life. A simple life. A minimalist life. ... the list goes on. Life. Now look at the quote by Mr. Bertrand Russell. Without agreeing or disagreeing to his statement. I like to look at the statement objectively. We can argue all day, whether he was right or wrong about knowledge and love. To me it feels like a jumble of words, we can derive any meaning. Most importantly I like to ask the question "What is life?" If I ask you the question What is life? You wouldn't have a direct answer. Most likely you wouldn't even be able to comprehend what you feel the life is. Yet, whenever we talk about being successful, rich or spiritual, we embark on pathways thinking that these will lead us to somewhere. You can chose one item from the list given above and write a book about how to be that one and get there. Infact most of the books in our libraries are filled with thousands of those books. Yet, we miss the fundemental question. The good life Fundemental question being, "what is life?" Without satisfactory answer to this question. There is no point even thinking about " successful, rich or peaceful " as these are just adjectives. Not even worth focusing on. So, for a wise man or a women, the only thing which matters is finding out answer to the question, "who am I? What is life?". Rest is irrelevant. Don't get me wrong. I'm not asking you to stop working and be poor. But let it be, if that is what it takes to find answers to the fundemental question about life. Good life So, for me, a good life, is a life which is used to find the answers to the question, what is life? Even if we do not arrive there before death, that is a good life. As that is there to it. We are not animals, just to chase food and sex all our lives. We are intellectual pinnacle of nature. Let's not focus on mediocre tasks too much in our lives, that we have no time to examine our own lives. We can do them to survive just enough so that we get there. You should exercise, to be healthy, so you have few more years to answer the question about life. You eat and work for that same reason. Then my friend is a life worth living. I think Socrates is spot on this. "An unexamined life is not worth living"