Observing the Process and State of Deliberation in the Manas

Ru Chun: The night before last, before going to sleep, I contemplated: why is it that "the sea of suffering is boundless, yet a turn of the head is the shore"? I contemplated while writing, and the process was quite long. My final conclusion was: there is no true happiness in worldly dharmas; in the end it is all suffering, and all kinds of suffering form the sea of suffering, also called the accumulation of suffering. Worldly dharmas are all subject to change and impermanence; they are not real dharmas. If we cannot see through their falsity and instead greedily cling to and sink into them, that is the boundless sea of suffering. Conversely, if we rely on the false to cultivate the true, turn our minds toward the Path, and return to the source, that is called turning the head to reach the shore.

During this process of contemplation and writing, the mind consciousness was mostly in the lead, but I could sense that the manas was also participating, because the writing flowed smoothly, was very focused, and had inspiration; body and mind were joyful, and I did not feel tired. When I finished writing and checked the time, it was already 2 a.m.—time passed very quickly. After writing, I went to sleep, but it felt as if a thread of thought was still suspended, and my sleep became shallow.

Comment: If the process is very single-minded, it is the manas that leads; if it is done with a scattered mind, it is the mind consciousness that leads. Because of single-minded focus, inspiration arises ceaselessly, body and mind are joyful, and one does not feel fatigue. If you can distinguish which consciousness is engaged in diligent contemplation and which consciousness is in the lead, you can judge the state you are in and your level of cultivation.

Ru Chun: During morning sitting meditation, a line surfaced in my mind: "Originally there is no shore-bound edge to the sea of suffering; why need one turn the head to reach the shore?" I suppose this was the result of the manas continuing its diligent work last night. Could it be understood this way: what the mind consciousness contemplated earlier was conditioned dharmas, and after falling asleep, the manas's contemplation, building on that foundation, added a consideration from the angle of unconditioned dharmas. Can this show that when the mind is calm and obstructions are reduced, the manas has more wisdom than the mind consciousness? Is contemplation of this kind helpful for cultivation? I feel that recently my state during sitting meditation has been unstable: when the state is good, my whole body feels ethereal, as if suspended in empty space; when the state is poor, my legs are stiff and painful and lack strength. Although I have made some adjustments, I have not yet been able to identify the key point of the problem.

Comment: As I just said, you have not distinguished the states of your manas and your mind consciousness; you do not know who is doing the thinking, and you mistakenly assume that the mind consciousness's contemplation is in the lead. It may well be that the manas's deliberation (manana) is in the lead, with the mind consciousness assisting. Before sleep, the manas and the mind consciousness contemplated the suffering of worldly conditioned dharmas; after falling asleep, the manas contemplated on its own the emptiness of Mahāyāna dharma.
As for the good or bad state you describe, that refers to the body's qi meridians and the matter of meditative concentration (samādhi). If the qi meridians are unobstructed, the body feels light and tall; when the qi meridians' flow reaches a blocked spot and cannot pass through, the body becomes stiff. When the qi meridians circulate throughout the body, where there is flow there is ease, and where there is blockage there is pain—but after all, the qi meridians are moving, which is a positive, upward signal.

Why is it that when the qi meridians are unobstructed, the body feels light and tall? This is a matter of the body's energy becoming vaporized—a phenomenon of the four great elements undergoing change. The originally heavy, dense energy in the body, due to the cultivation of meditative concentration, has transformed into light qi that floats upward, so one feels the body is tall and light. If the energy vaporizes further, the body will become even lighter and taller, like that of a deva, and one's meditative concentration will then be close to the meditative concentration of devas.