Singer makes the bold assertion that happiness and freedom are the result of cultivating “witness consciousness,” a state of willfully observing one’s own mind, emotions, and behaviors rather than feeling that you are these things. He argues that focus and awareness are what makes disturbances real—a hammer falls on your toe and your awareness moves there, then you hear a bang and your awareness moves there. He implores the reader to experience pain as energy passing through before the eye of consciousness and tasks us with the imperative to relax and release, stay centered, and resist the
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