When you sit down to meditate or just be quiet, notice what wants to think. Notice how you want to think, how much you like to think. This that wants to think is the ego, the false self; and this that notices is the true Self, or Essence. It really feels like you want to think when you are having this experience, but in fact, it is just as possible to realize that this Noticer (Essence) is perfectly content with just noticing, just existing, just being. This Noticer also might impel you to get up and do something, but it doesn’t use thought to do this; it just motivates you inwardly.

The Noticer is a more subtle experience than the ego, which is dominant in most people’s awareness. The ego has a noisy, authoritative, sometimes pushy, and sometimes chatty and friendly voice that catches our attention, like a television or radio program might. You want to know what it has to say, even if the subject isn’t really of interest, even if what it’s saying is untrue or scares you or makes you feel bad. You are interested in what this voice in your head (the egoic mind) has to say. You want to listen to it. This is the programming. You are programmed to want to listen to your thoughts.

This is the programming that needs to be seen in order to be free of the domination of the egoic mind, which isn’t the wise helper and mentor it pretends to be. It doesn’t have the answers for how to live your life, although it pretends to. Fortunately something else does, but it doesn’t talk to us like the TV set or the radio (in words) but more subtly. It “downloads” understanding and insight into our body, which shows up as a “knowing,” and it impels us to take action in certain directions—wordlessly. We just feel moved, and that feels right.

The only thing standing in the way of living purely from Essence is our love affair with the egoic mind. To fall out of love with this aspect of the mind requires seeing the truth about it—it isn’t wise, and it doesn’t have the answers. Rather, it is made up of information, opinions, and beliefs that have been gathered and passed down, most of which aren’t useful for living now, in this moment. In fact, what the egoic mind offers is more often limiting, prejudiced, negative, and just plain false. Following it takes us in directions that are ultimately unsatisfying and exhaust us and keep us out of touch with our true nature and with real life (the moment), where true guidance and happiness are available. The ego is a false master. Seeing this can help us break our love affair with the mind.

The other thing that needs to happen is to fall in love with the Truth—with what is real and true right here and now. What is arising from your depths? What is present in this moment other than thoughts? If you stop giving your attention to thought, and experience this moment purely, you discover gratitude, love, contentment, and joy, just waiting to be noticed.

As we evolve as a species, these more subtle states will become predominant, and the egoic mind will fall into the background or disappear altogether. This is where humanity is headed, and it will result in much happier people and a world at peace once and for all. This is what falling out of love with your thoughts leads to, and all it takes is seeing that the desire to get involved with the egoic mind isn’t a worthy desire. There’s nothing in it for the real you or for humanity, only for the ego. When you turn your attention away from this desire, you are gifted with everything you ever really wanted.