Mateo Tabatabai - The mind-made prison: radical self help and personal transformation

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Copyright 2011-2013 by Mateo Tabatabaiy

C over and internal design Mateo Tabatabaiy

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Contents

Once you start awakening from the mind-made prison, you will inevitably start wondering whether you have become insane or whether you have just started seeing how crazy your interpretations of the world have always been. It is a deeply surreal thing to start realizing that you have been living in a huge illusion and it is very fascinating how quickly you forget about the sleeping person you used to be.

I was 6 years old when I first realized that something just wasn't right. I couldn't yet put words on what it was that I felt; I just had this inner knowing that I never wanted to live life like everyone else did when I grew up. Life for grown-ups seemed so serious and, unlike most other children, I was in no hurry to grow up and become an adult.

As I became older, I slowly forgot about the insight I had felt when I was 6 years old. I jumped right into the mind-made prison just like most other people tend to do.I started believing that my worth as a human being was based on my achievements, that people had to like me and that life was unfair. Of course, I didn't realize that I actually believed these things until much later.

I was so caught in the mind-made prison that I no longer understood I was a prisoner. It took some rather dramatic events for me to wake up to my true nature again and remember the vow I had taken when I was just 6 years old. I once again remembered that a life of captivity and suffering was not an option for me in this lifetime.

As I am writing this book I am sitting on a balcony on the second story and watching the Mediterranean Sea. Right now it has a beautiful turquoise color to it and as the sun casts its reflection on the still water, I take a deep breath and look at the palm trees between the sea and me.

My feet are resting on the edge of the balcony and, for a moment, I become aware of how relaxing it is to just let them surrender to gravity while the heat of the sun gently caresses them.

There is a young shepherd dog sleeping in the grass beneath the balcony and, as I look to my left side, I notice a cat suddenly waking up, alerted by the sound of hammering in the distance. I take another deep breath and thank divine source for where I currently am. I not only thank him for where I am physically, I also thank him for the perspective from which I am viewing this moment.

Today I realize that the question lies not in whether or not we are caught in the mind-made prison. The real question to ask is, ''To what degree am I a prisoner of my mind?'' We are all living an illusion and mistaking it to be real.

This illusion is the cause of all our suffering in life. It is not the cause of some of our suffering or the majority of our suffering; it is the sole cause of all the accumulated suffering we have experienced since our first memory and up until this present moment.

I know you think you have free will and that you are a conscious being acting exactly the way you want to act. I understand that you think you are logical and only go for the things you really want.

I know this and still I am here to tell you that what you perceive as free will is nothing but an illusion designed to cover up that you are in constant reaction to whatever happens. What you perceive as conscious choice is nothing but an automated response.

As you are reading this you are even reacting to it in a certain way without being aware of why you are doing so. You might be feeling frustrated, curious, shocked or, perhaps, you put aside this book because you don't like it.

Your suffering doesn't come from having an opinion; the suffering comes from not realizing that everything you experience is nothing more than an interpretation you have made. One of the signs of being a prisoner of the mind is constantly having to label things and determine whether they are true or not.

We have all these 'true' stories about who we are, what we can achieve, how our life is, how the world is and how people treat us. We have all these stories and yet we have no idea that we are prisoners of our minds. We are constantly mistaking our subjective interpretations of the world as truth and it is causing us immense suffering.

We are so sure about who we are that we get offended when someone questions it. We are so sure about our beliefs that we defend them and have arguments over them. We are so sure of the correct way to live life that we look down on others who live differently.

We like the people who support our beliefs and dislike the ones who don't. If someone doesn't like how we look, we will resent them. We seek and defend the truth because we think such a thing really exists! We argue, cry, get depressed, fight and kill for the truth!

You want to know why we don't have peace here on earth? Because of people who "know" the truth and want to shove their reality down the throats of others.

It is time to put down your weapon and shield because what you are trying to defend is not really the truth. No concept, theory or word can ever contain the whole truth. Everything is, and always will be, relative.

"Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.''

Marcus Aurelius

I understand that you might feel you know the truth and that I am just the idiot claiming to know better. But, what if you just let go of your knowing for a short while? What if you could forget everything you know to be true about yourself and started exploring parts of you that you had never explored before?

You can't explore what you already know and most people think they know everything about themselves. Since you are reading this book, there must be something you want to improve in your life. The only way you can find what you are looking for is to stop knowing so much.

When was the last time your mind wasn't controlling you?

When was the last time you just listened to someone instead of thinking about what you were going to reply or whether or not they were right?

When was the last time you did what you truly wanted to, without letting what others thoughts of you affect you?

I want you to come back to these 3 questions after reading this book and answer them again.

When you realize that everything is nothing but a perspective, you become free for the first time in your life. It gives you peace and it removes the burden of having to act according to who you "are". It removes the burden of having to constantly defend what you believe in and you no longer have to get defensive when someone doesn't agree with your perspective. I know your perspective on life seems so real, but it is simply made up by your imagination.

Soon you will see that there is no good or bad, only an interpretation of what is. You will realize that your whole experience is based solely on your interpretation of external events that are completely neutral. You will understand that you have nothing figured out and that all the things you thought you knew are nothing but imaginary constructs of the mind. You have so much talent and potential inside you that is not coming through because your mind has imprisoned you.