"Your mind is all stories.”

 "Your mind is all stories.” 

Dipa Ma did not say that the mind is mostly stories; she said that there is nothing in the mind but stories. 

These are the personal dramas that create and maintain the sense of individual identity: who we are, what we do, what we are and are not capable of. Without our being aware of it, the endless series of such thoughts drives and limits our lives. And yet those stories are without substance capable of. Without our being aware of it, the endless series of such thoughts drives and limits our lives. And yet those stories are without substance.

Dipa Ma challenged students' beliefs in their stories, their attachment to the stories. When someone said, "I can’t do that,'' she would ask, "Are you sure?" or "Who says?" or "Why not?

She encouraged students to observe the stories, to see their emptiness, and to go beyond the limitations they impose.

“Let go of thinking," she urged. "Meditation is not about thinking.”

At the same time, Dipa Ma taught that the mind is not an enemy to be gotten rid of. Rather, in the process of befriending the mind, in getting to know and accept it, it ceases to be a problem. Dipa Ma knew the freedom that follows that process; she lived in a state of thought-free awareness. 

In a group interview, Jack Kornfield innocently asked, "What is it like in your mind?"

Dipa Ma smiled, closed her eyes, and quietly answered, 

"In my mind, there are three things: concentration, loving-kindness, and peace."

Jack, not sure if he had heard correctly, asked, "Is that all?"

“Yes, that is all,” Dipa Ma replied.

~ Dipa Ma: The Life and Legacy of a Buddhist Master