Rating: 9/10
Synopsis
First thing’s first. The cover of this book absolutely blows. Horrible. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover – everyone know’s that dingus. Okay let’s get onto it …
This “book” is essentially a dictation from a conference given by Mello live somewhere (no idea where). I actually listened to the audiobook which I recommend over reading it – Mello is a funny Indian dude who speaks with emotion and is great to listen to.
Awareness is basically a spiritual / psychological work about how modern western society has been raised to be addicted to”drugs” such as approval, appreciation, and attention. We need to “wake up” (I interpreted this as meaning finding happiness and freedom from living for others) and realize that we are the only ones in control of our psyche. Awareness is understanding that we are not our emotions, our jobs, or even our names. We are something much more than this. And if we can detach ourselves from our thoughts and feelings, and simply observe them instead, we will learn to understand that no one other person or thing can dictate how we feel day to day, and how we experience life. It’s a thought provoking, harsh, yet practical guide to helping us move toward “awareness” This website does a great job explaining in more detail about the book and listing some great excerpts/
My thoughts
Generally I very much enjoyed the book. The idea that happiness is internal, and that we are in control of our own experience of life is a very powerful concept – no one should be able to make you happy, sad, depressed, overjoyed, etc. You are the creator and destroyer of your own happiness. Mello posits the idea that there is nothing wrong with nature. And instead, the problem is with our negative reactions to our external circumstances. He offers Very practical and useful tools for understanding the self, of getting out of the world of self absorption, seeking approval, and seeking short term pleasures.
I think it’s missing something. The book takes an underlying position (though not explicitly stated) that the purpose of life is freedom and happiness (“awareness”). That the purpose of life is to become “aware” or “awake” so as not to be altered by day to day passing emotions or people. Mello suggests that those who are awake are those who are 100% living in the present, enjoying the pleasures of life, completely detached from their emotions, not striving for anything more, embracing life as it is.
I mostly agree that to be aware of your emotions, and to understand your emotions is a worthy goal, and perhaps a prerequisite to true happiness. I do not think however that we live solely to be happy, content, or “aware”. While we should strive for these, it doesn’t stop there. No, we live for many other reasons indeed. We live to help other people improve their lives. We live to accomplish things, to progress as a society. To build things of value, to build things of beauty, to adorn art and music and nature. We do these things in order to understand who we are and to understand who others are, as individuals and as humans. So that we can fully progress to the next life. Whatever that is. It can’t just stop at awareness. If it stops at awareness, that is to say that the perfect world is one in which everyone is content. Or, if not content, content enough to stop when things get too hard or stressful, and overwhelm our primitive brains to the point of almost breaking. Perhaps it’s the balance between awareness (order) and blindness (chaos) that is the thing that allows humans to continue to progress and grow as a species, and a civilization. (*this is an idea I got from another book I’m reading now, more on that later). Perhaps we strive for awareness, but we need blindness, pain, emotion to push us to levels that we otherwise would not reach. To improve the lives of others, to push society forward, and to make us worthy of the lives we were blessed with.
Quick Takeaways (non-comprehensive)
- Happiness and fulfillment are inside of you. No one other thing, no one other person can or should be able to make you happy or sad.
- Likewise, all negative feelings are coming from you, not from the world. If we’re sad or depressed, it’s our own fault. It’s not the fault of anyone else. Even death is natural, it’s our internal reaction to death, and attachment to the person, that causes the pain.
- What you don’t understand, you cannot change. Stop trying to change yourself (or others), and start trying to understand yourself (and others) – the change will come.
- Day to day life is spent living on a scale – one side of the scale (lets say its the right) is pleasure. The other side of the scale (left side) is suffering. Most of what we do is optimizing to max out the scale to the right. We try to maximize the small (or large) hits of dopamine such as seeking approval in conversations (being “right”), seeking attention (ex: getting likes instagram) or seeking temporary pleasure (such as drinking alcohol, taking drugs or attending a concert). The other side of this scale is temporary suffering – being embarrassed at something you said in front of a large group, not feeling included in the popular social group, or feeling lonely / depressed. But these are just superficial, temporary emotions. We need to live outside of these temporary feelings, and instead get to a place where we can simply observe these emotions, without letting them affect our psyche. We must learn to live in the present and enjoy the world for what it is “namely, work, play, fun, laughter, the company of people, the pleasures of the senses and the mind.”
- People worry about if there is another life after death in this world, but they’ve never truly lived in this world.
Big ideas I agree with (direct quotes from the book)
- What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you.
- You were given a taste for the drug called approval, appreciation, attention.
- Part of waking up is that you live your life as you see fit. And understand: That is not selfish. The selfish thing is to demand that someone else live their life as YOU see fit. That’s selfish. It is not selfish to live your life as you see fit.
- The reason you suffer from your depression and your anxieties is that you identify with them.
- You don’t need to be loved, you need to love
- The reason you suffer from your depression and your anxieties is that you identify with them. You say, ‘I’m depressed.’ But that is false. You are not depressed. If you want to be accurate, you might say, ‘I am experiencing a depression right now.’ But you can hardly say, ‘I am depressed.’ You are not your depression.
Big idea I Don’t necessarily agree with (direct quotes)
- It sounds strange in a culture where we’ve been trained to achieve goals, to get somewhere, but in fact there’s nowhere to go because you’re there already.
Immediate actions you can take
Use this 4 step program anytime you have a negative feeling pop up. This can be anger, pain, suffering, loneliness, etc. (Google “Awareness 4 Steps to Wisdom” to read the full section)
- (1) identify the negative feelings in you;
- (2) understand that they are in you, not in the world, not in external reality;
- (3) do not see them as an essential part of ‘I’; these things come and go;
- (4) understand that when you change, everything changes.
Hope you enjoyed, sorry for the shitty Display ads at the bottom.
Time Well Spent? 