Now we all have at least an experiential knowledge of what is called the Internal Dialogue. At the final or most conspicous level of manifestation it is the most obvious function (or malfunction?..) of the verbal mind, a part of the mind that deals with learned symbols of meaning (or words). While the inner dialogue itself is most conspicously noticed through the manifestion of the actual 'voices in one's head describing what is what', the entire phenomena of the Internal Dialogue as a world-strengthening (or attention fixating) and/or world-defining activity involves much more than just the verbal mind. It is actually a complex of differing activities that results from the most fundamental drive, desire and/or need of the very distinct presupposition of the separate-self (or ego, self-image, etc. etc.).
[The presupposition of the seperate-self is an extremely deep rooted activity that results from identification with the APPARENT personal body-mind-heart instead of identification with the field of awareness in which it arises.]
For most people, this complex of activities that make up the Internal Dialogue and the presupposition of the seperate-self reside at a very deep level of unconsciousness - except the most conspicous and familiar component, namely the mainfestations of the verbal mind.
This complex of activities involves (but is not limited to) automated and mechanically routine tensions and contractions of the body, as well as automated and mechanically routine emotional responses, and also even a sort of very limited "creativity" and/or logic in the patterning of the established or known data that can be formulated in words or groups of words. It is all structured in such a way that each activity strengthens the others in turn, each feeding off each other like a breeder reactor - or like a dialogue that goes back and forth. The end result of this complex of activities is therefore the further strengthening of such activities; which all serve to isolate a point of perception from the field of wholeness in which it arises and enforce such limitation through the further isolation and/or fixation of attention on that point.
The Internal Dialogue serves to fixate attention.
These voices in your head that seem to tell you what reality is actually have a severe impact on your total being in terms of perception and behavior. That is why silencing the internal dialogue can have such a transformative effect.
The manifestation of the verbal mind in the form of an internal dialogue of voices is also strengthened by a perversion and/or sublimation of energies inherent in the sense of hearing.
This means that many of the manifestations of 'voices in ones head' can be a partial negation of the totality of one's sense of hearing. It might help to understand that the sense of hearing is how we developed our ability to talk in the first place, through hearing and IMITATION. [Imitation is the most basic form of mechanical behavior - it is the basis of routines] Through this very powerful mechanical force of imitation we learned how to produce sounds in the throat of our organism, eventually resulting in the ability to speak words. In the process, we learned what these words symbolize and perhaps were attracted to the capacity for limitation that verbal expression represents since the endeavor to isolate and maintain a seperate-self is also an activity of limitation.
Whatever the case, some of the energy needed to uphold the verbal mind's activity originates (or is stolen) from the flow of energy applied to the sense of hearing. So if you withdraw the energy from the verbal minds activity, there is a natural and spontaneous reclamation and expansion of the sense of hearing in a much broader and wider range. Oddly enough, simply paying more attention and/or intentionally listening to things will naturally and spontaneously cease the manifestation of the verbal minds activity in a relative sense. The degree to which you experience 'voices in your head' is the degree to which you are not completely listening to your surroundings.
This is useful to undoing the process of the entire Internal Dialogue, because when you remove energy from the verbal minds layer of function, it amounts to throwing a monkey wrench in the whole process. Many other things will become apparent and you will learn much about this seperative activity as it winds down to an eventual cessation. Of course it would be much easier to release and/or transcend the presupposition of the seperate-self altogether (because this is the original cause for the activity of the Internal Dialogue), but most people do not have sufficient awareness of it as an actual reality to enable them to make such an effort.
So it is good to start somewhere, even if it must be from the outside going in. This will lead to self-understanding as the Internal Dialogue process becomes more and more loose and transparent. The objective of dealing with the Internal Dialogue as a process is to enable a clear view of the reality of the presupposition of the seperate-self. Those who have sufficient awareness and ability to release the actual presupposition of the seperate-self should endeavor to do this instead of concerning themselves with the remaining manifestations of the Internal Dialogue itself.
- rajajuju
12/03/00
