{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"The Ten Thousand Things","title":"Just One Thing - Jack Kornfield","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":236,"description":"What we take to be a self is tentative, fictitious, constructed by clinging, a temporary identification with some parts of experience. Self arises, solidifying itself, like ice floating in water. Ice is actually made of the same substance as water. Identification and clinging harden the water into ice. In a similar way, we sense ourself as separate. Jack Kornfield - The Wise HeartThis realization that the separate self is an illusion must be one of the most useful things I've ever learned. I spent most of my life assuming that I was a separate self-contained unit and I felt disconnected from those around me. From the universe as a whole. But where exactly is this seat of the self? Where's the little Joe who's up there in my head, directing everything? Where is the seat of attention? If I look for myself, where do I find myself? I find a constant flow of sense data, sights, sounds, smells, temperature. I find thoughts. But who are these thoughts occurring to?As Jack Kornfield says, identification and clinging harden the water into ice. The closest thing I can find to a separate self is this contraction in my chest that seems to create some kind of locus in time and space. But actually I am in no way separate from the flow. This has been seen through for me in meditation. What I find in meditation, if I have a good session, is I drop into a much larger, possibly infinite, ocean of awake awareness. Which mostly has a fairly neutral quality, but there's actually a lovingness there. A gentle sense of support. And I find this encouraging to say the least.Of course, I have a social self and I need to function. And go to work and perform my roles in society. But there's no need to constantly reify the separate self, this particle, somehow split off from the rest of the universe. What I actually find is an openness, a sort of infinite openness, where I used to imagine my separate self to be. Jack Kornfield talks about ice and water. I've heard it talked about in terms of...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/2JAtfDhLe02gUO4tZQPGVO8knrF2fc46Ed_F40DCEtk/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS9zaG93/LzQzNzU5LzE2OTEw/MjExMTItYXJ0d29y/ay5qcGc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}