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Questioning

Good evening. Today, as you might tell from the guided meditation I offered, I'd like to talk a little bit about this idea of being curious, of having inquiry, questioning, or investigation. We could investigate these words and tease them apart to see some of the nuances and differences, but for the most part, I will use them as synonyms tonight and treat them all the same.

As many of you might know, investigation is one of the Seven Factors of Awakening^[1]. It is one of these qualities of the heart and mind that can be developed, cultivated, and balanced in such a way that it supports awakening. I'm not going to talk so much about it strictly as a factor of awakening, but more about how it can be an attitude, an approach, or a stance that we take toward our practice and our experience.

I want to start by distinguishing curiosity, investigation, and questioning from thinking or speculating. Yes, investigation is a mental process—a movement of the mind—but it is not the same as trying to figure something out, problem-solve, or precisely predict what is going to happen in the future. We might spend a lot of our time thinking and speculating, and we might have the idea that in our meditation practice, we shouldn't be thinking at all. Whether that thinking is recalling memories, speculating, fantasizing about the future, or trying to solve a problem, we might believe that all those types of thinking are problematic. Without being fully aware of it, we might throw inquiry or curiosity into the same bucket as thinking, leading us to believe we shouldn't have a sense of inquiry in our meditation practice.

However, the type of inquiry I'm pointing to is like a sensing with the body, a sensing with the heart, as well as a sensing with the mind. We could use the word sensing, or we could describe it as opening up to the experience—opening all our senses, including the mind.

Investigation as Intimacy

Another way to think about investigation or questioning is as intimacy. It is a way in which our attention and mindfulness draw close to the experience. We touch and connect with the experience, asking, What is this? Metaphorically, we bring our attention to peer at the experience and truly connect with it, rather than being with our experience in an abstract way, where we are more engaged with the idea of what's happening than the felt sense of it. Investigation asks what is actually going on here, as opposed to what my idea about it is.

Investigation is a type of intimacy with our experience, but it's also a way to differentiate the various aspects of our experience. Sometimes our experience might just feel like a big, uncomfortable, terrible knot. Usually, when we have those ideas, there is a feeling of overwhelm or a desire to shy away and turn away from it. But investigation gives us a way to look at what's really going on. We can start to see, Oh, okay, here's anger. But right there is also a feeling of being hurt, and a feeling of sadness. Before, it might have felt amorphous or just big and black, but then we start to tease apart the different elements.

Or, we might have pressure in our mind with recurring thoughts repeating over and over: I should have said this; I can't believe this person said that. I remember one time, quite some time ago, when I was really angry. It just took over my mind, going around and around: How dare they? I can't believe it. Don't they know who I am? You might have your own version of that. During that time, I was completely disconnected from the experience of my body—from the heat rising and my voice getting louder. But if we can bring a little bit of investigation into what's going on and tease apart the different elements and emotions—what's happening in the mind, what's happening in the body—it becomes a little bit more manageable. We begin to feel, Okay, I can work with this. I can work with the experience in the body, or I can be with the feeling of being hurt, or the feeling of not being seen.

Sometimes, when there is a sense of hurt, our attention can collapse entirely onto that one uncomfortable thing. Investigation is a kind of opening up. What else is going on? What are all the senses experiencing? Sometimes it can be really helpful to bring our attention to listening or hearing, simply because sounds are often neutral. When we are stuck in the feeling of This is too much, there can be some curiosity about what else is going on. There might be sounds, the neutral pressure of the chair, or the feeling of feet on the ground.

Uncovering Beliefs and Finding Resources

Through investigation, we might discover not only sounds or other bodily experiences, but also underlying beliefs or assumptions that are fueling or supporting the experience. We might believe, In order to be a good person, I should never feel anger, or, If that person cared about me, they would never say something like that. We might have underlying beliefs setting up the whole infrastructure in which we are experiencing whatever is happening. Perhaps we have the belief that meditation should always be pleasant, and if it's not pleasant, I'm doing something wrong, or it's somebody's fault. We can investigate these quiet thoughts—these little whispers that are persistent yet subtle.

Of course, with investigation, we might also discover that there are resources available to us. There might be a sense of energy in the body, a sense of aliveness or vitality that we can use as a resource. We might find, Okay, I do feel grounded or settled in the body. Maybe the mind is going quickly, but there is a sense of openness or warmth.

Investigating itself might bring some vitality and dynamism into our experience. This is especially important if we are feeling stuck, numb, or closed off. Sometimes there is an experience called a sinking mind, where the body might have a certain amount of settledness, but the mind settles into a cottony, fluffy, vague place where there is no energy. At the end of the meditation, there might be a feeling of being drained and wanting to take a nap, or a feeling that it's a dead end and not going anywhere. Simple inquiry—Oh, what is this?—can bring a little bit more energy in, as opposed to treating meditation as a way to become numb or hide from our experience.

Investigation can counteract inertia, not just in a particular meditation period, but inertia in our practice as a whole. Sometimes we meditate every day, but feel stuck and wonder where it's going. There may be a certain passivity in our meditation where we are just passively sitting with whatever is there, pulling into our shell like a turtle, or white-knuckling through it. Warm-hearted curiosity is a way to bring aliveness back to our practice.

Cultivating a Spirit of Discovery

When I was a research scientist, one of my favorite things to do was to have this sense of investigation and vitality. I felt so lucky that I could have a question, go into the laboratory, do an experiment, answer questions, or—as was often the case for me—just come up with more questions. We don't have to be research scientists and figure everything out precisely, but we can adopt the attitude or stance of a naturalist observing how an animal behaves or how a plant grows and blooms. Hopefully, this brings some delight and vitality to the act of curiosity.

Curiosity is often associated with childhood—being curious about why things are the way they are. Having this sense of curiosity can provide a supportive sense of play or experimentation. What happens if I do this? What happens if I don't do that? This counteracts any sense of passivity or the feeling that everything is completely out of our control. What happens if I rest my attention on the breath in a way that emphasizes the exhale? Does that make a difference? What happens if I notice the breath with a sense of warm-heartedness and kindness? How does the experience unfold then? Again, the precise answer may not be what's important; it's more about the stance.

Harnessing Restlessness for Breakthroughs

Having a sense of questioning or investigation can bring up a little bit—or maybe even a lot—of restlessness. It can bring a sense of, Oh wait, what is this? What is that? If we are going to ask questions, implicit in that is a little bit of restlessness, even if it is really subtle. And if we're going to ask bold questions, there might be even more restlessness.

I feel encouraged by the fact that restlessness is the last fetter^[2] to be abandoned before a person is completely awakened. As the Buddha described his own awakening experience, he was asking questions: What is the source of this suffering? And then he discovered that clinging was involved. What is the source of clinging? He inquired into that and discovered that ignorance was involved. What is ignorance? The Buddha himself did a lot of questioning to see what supported and underlined his experience.

This restlessness might be exactly what is needed to help us stay with the practice. The sense of wanting to lean in and discover can really support us. Can we harness the energy of this restlessness to support our practice, and can we be okay with a small amount of restlessness, perhaps even interpreting it as energy?

Coming back to the idea of the Buddha's awakening, we must recognize that big shifts in our thinking and experience require giving up assumptions, and it can be uncomfortable to give up assumptions. So this restlessness may be what is needed for some big breakthroughs. I think it was Socrates who said that the unexamined life is not worth living, and then someone else many years later said, "Yes, but remember the examined life is no bed of roses either." I wish I could say that bringing curiosity or investigation into your life means you won't have any discomfort or suffering. That's not the case. To have a human life is to have difficulties, but this practice is onward-leading and can lead us to more and more freedom.

Open-Ended Inquiry and Liberation

One way to ensure that our questions are onward-leading is to have a sense of open-endedness. It is kind of like science and art. In science, we assume that someday we will outgrow our current thinking; a hundred years from now, scientists will have a different understanding. We don't have the sense that we are going to have it all figured out and be done. There will always be something more. In the same way with art, there is an open-ended inquiry—a way of looking, peering, and seeing. When we think about great artists of the last century like Picasso and Monet, both of them looked and looked. Picasso looking at the role of time, and Monet looking at the role of light. These breakthroughs came with a certain amount of curiosity and the willingness to just be with the experience and look.

In some ways, to question is itself a certain expression of freedom. By questioning, we are demonstrating that we are not completely frozen, completely stuck, or completely in the blind grip of what is happening. We are asserting some freedom to ask, What's going on here?

The questions to ask are some of the questions the Buddha asked: What is going on for us? What are the conditions that are supporting this current difficulty, this current suffering, or this current well-being? What is being clung to, and where does the clinging come from? Is this movement toward greater freedom? These types of questions can really support us.

Some questions that might be helpful to ask, but that we often don't, are about liberation and freedom. What is it? Not so much that we have to find the definitive answer, but What is possible for me, and how do I get there? What would be required? Very often our inner critic gets in the way, and we don't even ask these big, bold questions. We might be thinking that liberation is for other people, or that we are unworthy or hopeless. We don't even entertain the possibility of asking, What does freedom mean for me? What would it involve?

We often emphasize meditation, but those familiar with the Buddhist path know there is an Eightfold Path^[3], as well as a gradual training^[4]. There are many more elements than just meditation. What are some of the elements we might bring to our practice to support greater freedom? One, of course, is having a sense of inquiry and investigation. If I'm not having a sense of inquiry, What is blocking that? What is getting in the way? What is preventing me from bringing this sense of curiosity to my experience?

We can bring this spirit of discovery to all aspects of our experience—what is happening in the heart, the body, the mind, and the beliefs we hold. Doing this in a warm-hearted, gentle way can support our movement toward greater and greater freedom. And as we discover greater freedom, we might be able to directly or indirectly support more and more people. Our capacity increases to be with the difficulties that are part of this human experience.

May our practice of inquiry, our spirit of discovery, and our curiosity toward all aspects of our experience be a support for us and for all beings everywhere. Thank you.