I once met a monk through my work. I was in his presence for about 3 hours listening to him speak and tell his story.

He said he felt the "calling" to leave society to devout the rest of his life to God and went to the monastery where he would spent the next 10 yrs of his life. They were a "very small" community of monks. Each day, they had their chores to do ......then pray, then chores, then pray, then work, then pray....etc. Each had to contribute their share to the survival of the monastery. You just can't "show up" at the door and be welcomed in.....you have to be allowed in. Already being a religious figure (priest or something like that) was how he got in.

After 10 years he grew unhappy living the life of a monk, it wasn't what he thought it would be, and there were "RULES" and "RESTRICTIONS" he didn't like either. I forget exactly but they had to go into some kind of solitude "inside" the monastery for days or weeks of being by yourself praying in a small room, or something like that, and you couldn't come out until you did your time, and it was forbidden to talk to anyone during this period. So after much debate with himself, he left the monastery, and once you leave your not allowed to return.

Stepping off the bus in society.....he was "broke", but a least had a place to stay. He re-entered society and has done very well for himself.

Personally:

A year ago, last week, I almost died (due to my lifestyle and destructive thoughts) and when I got out of the hospital I was scared! confused! and had one "HECK" of a wake up call. It wasn't intentional but I started my own solitude during the past year trying devour as much information as I could. I go to work during the day and every evening (8 hrs) is spent reading and learning and getting to understand myself.

I broke away from social gatherings so I could have "peace and quiet"...."quiet!"......and more "quiet!" and "Peace"......so I could "listen" to my own thoughts!! So I could "absorb!"....without being disturbed!....and just try to figure out why I'm so unhappy.

The 1st few months I felt "strange?".....as I understand now that was just getting use to the "Shift" from the "old me" into the "new me."

Today, I feel fantastic! Most of the people who were in my life a year ago (except family).......are gone! My shift in vibration didn't match theirs anymore then "POOF!" they disappeared!....(good riddance to some of them.)

I "feel" I am at the point now where I can go back to the social life "much wiser" and know what those "funny feelings" are saying to me.

....Taking time like that wasn't a monastery but was very beneficial for me, my thoughts and understandings are clearer.

.....I'm going to be ok now!

There is thinking and there is listening.

As we grow up to become these complex-thinking beings, we eventually forget to pay attention to the details within the moment of existence.

The first place from which we are forced to take our attention away is from within the inner self.

It happens when our parents and teachers tell us to stop daydreaming and do something useful.

Within this moment of existence, there is a constant dance between listening and thinking.

We listen to the waves and flashes of inner information almost in the same way as we observe the reality that is surrounding us.

When we look at the world around us, we see what is immediately within the reach of our five senses. However, this information is but just a fraction of what is actually around us, because there is an entire neighborhood, a block, a village, a town, a city, a country, a planet, a solar system, a whole universe of information that is surrounding us at every moment.

The same way, all of creation is available to our inner perception; however, we cannot perceive it in the traditional sense of perception just as we cannot see beyond where we are standing using our five senses.

It seems that our species was designed to stay contained within a certain frequency of experience through a limited capacity of perception and the "system" of this containment is what we experience as "thinking"

Thinking, it seems, is not the "seeing" equivalent of engaging one's inner perception with the un-limited potential of creation.

Instead, it seems that "thinking" is a dis-engaged analysis from the flow of information of creation, in a way that is similar to studying the meaning of every spoken word in a dictionary in order to know the person who spoke those words.

The funny thing is that many who read the above statement will most likely not see anything wrong with that approach of analysis.

Yet, this constant analysis is the exact thing that keeps us from our own inner perception that was very much alive and vibrant in our childhood.

We have each gathered our massive databank of "analyzed" understanding of our inner perception over a lifetime to conform and satisfy the "expectations" that are imposed upon our existence.

Everything that we know as a species is a massive databank of "thinking" knowledge that is quantified and approved by various "authorities" who seem to know more that we do.

It never occurs to the ordinary individual to examine how the first "thinker" of the thought stumbled on that original thought.

How did that first original idea occur in the mind of the thinker?

In fact, we even use the word "occur" to describe the phenomenon.

All thinking is nothing more than the analysis of what "occurs" within us.

Moreover, by the time we are in the moment of analysis, we are automatically restricted to stay within what is "known" and what has been "approved" by the system.

In thinking, we are forever stuck within trying to make sense of our own inner perceptions using what we have understood so far.

It is like trying to comprehend and inner awakening using only modeling clay.

Thinking is always limited to what is already known.

Yet, every "thought" is initiated by inner perceptions that far exceed the breath and width that is comprehensible through analytical thought.

The need to "comprehend" is so overwhelming and habitual within each human being that we have become habitually addicted to stay stuck within constant thought.

We are forever thinking something or another.

Instead of being constant perceivers of inner information, we have become entrapped in being constant perceivers of the analysis of the inner information.

This entire answer is to convey this above sentence.

Instead of experiencing the inner information that is triggering the thought, we have become a species that is constantly stuck within the pre-packaged explanation of the inner information, (AKA "Thinking").

This inner information is not "thought".

It is "understanding"

It is not perceived in words and sentences.

It is instead perceived in flashes of understanding.

To perceive this one has to refuse to convert all inner understanding into thought.

To do that we have to learn to "not think" in the midst of listening to an understanding.

This is what silence and inner contemplation is all about.

All the other stuff that surrounds this activity in the form of religion, God etc. are necessary props only to the individual who believes that they are essential to the task.

Religions are, for the most part, designed to prevent the individual from interfacing with this information, (inner information), directly without the approval of those who designed the system of containment.

Even Hinduism that identifies the inner connection to the force of creation as God, prevents the individual from making that connection by forcing all kinds of rituals and expectations upon the individual as a pre-requisite for qualification to one's access to their own inner source.

Therefore, we have to learn again to perceive an understanding within inner silence and be comfortable in choosing not to quantify that understanding into a thought in order to comprehend it.

because it is the system of belief, and it also makes it easier for some to accept that they have to be away from sin and temptations in order for them to achieve enlightenment.

love n light,

rob

Humans are a hybrid of Spirit and animal. Of God and material world duality.

We need contemplative time to connect with the Divine, with Spirit to find guidance for our actions.

Even Christ spent a LOT of time in prayer. "Go into your closet and single your Eye."