The Mystery of Contemplative Practice (Vipaśyanā-caryā) and Chan Investigation

When eliminating the view of self, the mind consciousness must first supply the manas with all the evidence and data, then the mind consciousness should think less and exert less effort, accommodating the manas' psychological needs, letting go and allowing the manas to deliberate and weigh things on its own, letting Him verify certain facts Himself. If the manas feels the facts are still insufficient, the evidence still inadequate, or the data still not enough, then the mind consciousness engages in contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) again and collects more data to hand over to the manas, and the manas deliberates and weighs deeply once more. In this way, as the mind consciousness continuously supplies supplementary data from the side, the manas can continuously process and continuously refine its deliberation, and finally arrive at a solid, well-evidenced conclusion—and thus realizes the fruit.

If there are many matters that need to be dealt with and the mind consciousness must emerge from meditation to discern the six sense objects, the manas can still work diligently in secret, never leaving off investigation whether walking, standing, sitting, or lying down, and can even work whether dreaming or dreamless at night. When the manas truly feels a matter is of great importance, He may decide to forget food and sleep, neither sleeping nor eating, because when the manas wants to be diligent, these activities of eating and drinking interfere with His focused deliberation; He would be distracted by daily trivialities, so He will decide to reduce the other activities of the five aggregates (pañcaskandha) to ensure He is not distracted. When sleeping, without the mind consciousness assisting from the side, the manas lacks sufficient data and material and cannot begin the investigation, so the manas decides not to sleep and not to let the mind consciousness cease.

In the investigation of all dharmas, at first the manas cooperates with the mind consciousness's thinking and analysis, assisting the mind consciousness in gathering various data and materials; once the mind consciousness has gathered the materials sufficiently for the manas to make use of, the mind consciousness should then cooperate with the manas's deep and careful deliberation, cooperate with the manas's processing and integration work, cooperate with the manas's examination and filtering work, letting the manas expend more mental effort while the mind consciousness is less active—then the investigation can be completed quickly.

To make the mind consciousness engage in less active thinking and let the manas deliberate more, one must cultivate meditation (dhyāna); only in meditative concentration (samādhi) can the manas's focused investigation be guaranteed. Although He cannot be completely fixed on a single object, it is enough that He be concentrated on a very few dharmas: apart from the dharma meaning that requires focused investigation, other things need only be briefly discerned, without affecting one's investigation. Thus contemplative practice must be done within samādhi; the mind consciousness must not rely on emotional conjecture and intellectual interpretation, but should make greater use of the manas's deliberative nature, giving full and effective play to the manas's deliberation, so as to personally realize the non-self of the five aggregates. This is the secret of contemplative practice and Chan investigation.

Therefore, if the manas does not realize the dharma, awakening to the true mind and enlightenment are impossible, and likewise the elimination of the view of self is also impossible. In investigating Chan and practicing contemplation within samādhi, the use of the mind consciousness's thinking should be less, and the use of the manas's deliberative nature should be more—this is the secret of Chan investigation and contemplative practice.

Even without the cooperation and assistance of the mind consciousness, the manas can still investigate and deliberate on dharma meaning; it only takes a longer time, and who knows when it might be. But the prerequisite is that the mind consciousness must hand over the content of its thinking and the data to the manas; only when the manas has something to follow in its deliberation can it deliberate clearly and realize it. For example, at night one ponders a problem and, without solving it, falls asleep. After a night's sleep, the moment one opens one's eyes the next morning, inspiration appears, and one suddenly understands the previously unsolved problem. This shows that throughout the night, the manas was working and deliberating. Before sleep at night, a question was left for the manas, and upon waking in the morning the answer was obtained—many people have had similar experiences.

Another example: sometimes a problem one has pondered may not yield an answer at the time, so one goes off to attend to other matters. On the surface it seems the matter has been forgotten and the mind consciousness no longer considers it, but then at some unpredictable moment, an answer suddenly appears in the mind. This is because the manas has been silently deliberating behind the scenes all along, and finally deliberated out a result. Practice means making more use of the manas; only practice by the manas is true practice, and only then can one realize all dharmas and obtain all wisdom.