Awareness in Buddhist Meditation

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neither the ‘self’, nor the ideal have any meaning of their own. This
freedom from measuring, from comparison, from judging is not an
achievement, an acquisition, a virtue; it is there when there is no
identification, no desire for achieving, no will for becoming. And
that is the act of meditation in which the mind empties itself of all
conditioning, of all desires, hopes and fears, in which the mind does
not concentrate on a pre-chosen object or state, but just watches
with direct awareness what is. Without focussing on what should
be the ideal, without relying on memory as the foundation for such
an ideal, but by direct perception of what is without judgement,
there is an emptying the mind of all conditioning, of all distortion,
delusion, conflict, of all ‘self’ deception and hypocrisy. This meditation
is contemplation when thought is silent. It is not silence which
has a starting point in a centre; and it has no focus in the distance.
It just is, without movement, without quality, without purpose. It
does not come from somewhere; it cannot be produced, it cannot be
felt, it cannot be remembered. It does not go inward or outward,
it is just all-pervading, and there is no awareness of a ‘self’ being
involved. It does not resist and it does not reject; it does not disturb
and cannot be disturbed.
There is no feeling of happiness or joy or well-being; it is far
above and beyond all that is puny and ego-centric. There is no
centre, and there is no thought. There is no concentration, no focus,
no pointedness. It is just all and complete, with tenderness
and subtleness, always fresh and new, without memory and without
clinging, without hope and without fear, without projection in time
and space and without craving for continuance. There is no ‘I’ to
think, to cling, to become, to continue. It is just there, unborn,
unconditioned, independent. It does not involve the ‘I’, it does not
embrace the ‘I’, it does not absorb the ‘I’. There just is no ‘I’ no
‘self’, no other, no feeling, no sensation, no perception, no concept,
no image, no ideal.