Ep. 254 – The Mystery of Consciousness
Insight Hour with Joseph Goldstein
Be Here Now Network
4.8 • 864 Ratings
🗓️ 31 October 2025
⏱️ 67 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Responding to a variety of dharma questions on meditation, effort, and impermanence, Joseph Goldstein explores the mystery of consciousness.
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This week on Insight Hour, Joseph Goldstein responds to questions on:
- The benefits of doing walking meditation versus traditional seated meditation
- Cutting through our conceptual overlay and simply having raw experiences
- Passive voice construction: removing the self as subject when narrating the world around us
- Changing “let it go” to “let it be” when we are struggling to let go
- Being in the flow of changing experiences, the natural arising and passing away of all things
- The fine line of wholesome energy/effort versus striving and struggling
- Realizing the emptiness of thoughts and the suffering they bring to us
- The first experience of nirvana, ‘the zero’, and uprooting the view of self
This talk was originally published on Dharmaseed
“This is the mystery of consciousness. There’s nothing there tangible to find; no color, no form, it can’t be found. Yet, the knowing is happening. It’s this union of emptiness and knowing.” –Joseph Goldstein
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This show is brought to you by BetterHelp. There's always that friend everyone means to grab |
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| 0:21.9 | It can feel hard to start, but once begun, many find themselves wondering, |
| 0:26.0 | why didn't I do this sooner? |
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| 0:38.3 | And our listeners get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com slash insight hour. |
| 0:45.1 | That's BetterHELP.com slash Insight Hour. |
| 0:57.1 | This is the mystery of consciousness. |
| 1:03.0 | There's nothing there tangible to find, no color, no form, no. |
| 1:08.4 | It can't be found, and yet the knowing is happening. |
| 1:16.2 | And it's this union of, we could say, emptiness and knowing. Welcome. Welcome to the Joseph Goldstein Inside Hour. |
| 1:35.1 | This podcast is an expression of our shared interest in self-discovery. |
| 1:41.1 | Join Joseph as he shares his deep knowledge of the path of mindfulness. |
| 1:46.5 | If you are interested in supporting this podcast, please go to beherenownetwork.com |
| 1:52.8 | slash Joseph. |
| 2:02.7 | Hi, everyone. |
| 2:13.8 | This is Joseph, and Joseph has agreed to come for an evening of questions, which the participants here have submitted over the last 24 hours. |
| 2:21.2 | There were way more questions than we could ask Joseph in the space of an hour. So a couple of the teachers went through the questions and pulled out about 12 or so. We probably won't even get to |
| 2:27.2 | 12, but I've got 12 to ask Joseph. And just really, I'm so honored and happy that you've come to be with us tonight, Joseph. Joseph |
... |
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