I love a phrase of Mircea Eliade: The first duty of the practitioner is to think, that is, not to let oneself think. At first reading it can be interpreted as the intention to free oneself from imposed opinions, to think for oneself. But the idea is more drastic than that.

Anyone who devotes himself to observing his own thoughts eventually develops the capacity to be an external observer, a witness to his own thoughts. The feeling that these are not one's own, that they are not chosen, becomes clearer and clearer. And this is what the phrase refers to.

Let's do a test. Let us try to observe the image below, without allowing other images to surface internally.

Blue lines on yellow, that's all we should have seen. There should have been no reason for a color to appear in our mind. Much less the image of an orange animal, who ever saw that?

Yet the image surely surfaced in consciousness, the thought arose spontaneously.

This innocent exercise shows how difficult it is for us to see something purely, without interpretation or association. It also shows us how thoughts arise without our choosing them or being conscious of them.

Another exercise, this one a bit more productive. Now let's try choosing what we want to think about. Direct the thought to something specific, for example a geometric image, a square. Let's try to keep the focus on the square. Think only about that. After a second or two we will perceive that there are other thoughts coexisting with the image. After a few more seconds the square will probably vanish completely.

We notice again that the thoughts emerge without choice. They sprout, grow and multiply. It does not seem to be one who thinks, we are thought by the mind. And this is a more interesting interpretation of Mircea Eliade's phrase, we should think, not be thought.