My Thoughtless Son

No, this isn’t a post where I grip about my son.

Quite the opposite, in fact!

Sure, “My Son Who Has No Word-Based Thoughts,” might have been a more accurate title for this post, but it just doesn’t sound right.

My son is ten months old at the time of this writing and he hasn’t spoken his first word yet. He babbles, and a lot of it might sound like familiar words, but he’s not quite there yet.

That’s significant, because humans use words to create “intelligent” thoughts. He still thinks, of course, but not about the past or some imagined future. His thoughts are immediate reactions to the present.

He can cry and smile and laugh, all within seconds. He’s completely unbound by the past and unafraid of the future, both of which don’t even exist as a concept to him.

He doesn’t know his name, or sex, or color, or race, or age, or any of those labels humans attribute to themselves. He just exists. And he’s completely blissful in the simplicity of the present.

He smiles all the time. In fact, he’s been smiling in his dreams since he was a few days old. No judgment there, just the bliss of being.

Of course, all human beings come packaged with some basic programming. That programming can trigger “negative” reactions.

The automatic response to pain is an obvious one, but even something that tastes bad can trigger a reaction. There’s no judgment there, however. It’s more of a safety trigger than anything else.

For instance, I tried giving my son some antipyretic medication and he made the funniest disgusted expression I’ve ever seen. That’s instinct telling him he shouldn’t drink the fluid because it tastes bad and so it’s probably not good for him.

Naturally, he cries. He cries when he’s hungry, when he’s really tired, or when he hurts himself. He cries because there’s no other way to communicate.

But he’s not sad about breaking up with his girlfriend, about not getting into an Ivy-League college, losing his job, or any of the things that can bring older, more “mature” people to tears. People lost in the story about themselves. Stories about an individual; separate from everyone and everything else.

These stories and the associated misery they bring might eventually come to him, but only after he starts thinking with words. Words in their very nature create separation. A sense of you and me. Yours and mine. With word-based thought comes judgment and with judgment comes suffering.

For now, my son is free of all that.

He won’t remember these early months in his life. That kind of memory comes a year or two after the beginning of word-based thought. But perhaps some part of him will retain some sort of subconscious connection to these experiences. Perhaps he too will yearn for freedom from attachment to thought. Maybe he will one day use thought as a tool so that it serves him and not the other way around.

For now, everything he sees, hears, touches, feels, and smells surprises him and fills him with love and awe. Everything that we take for granted, he does not. Everything is beautiful to him.

He can make you happy with just a simple smile. It’s always genuine. Always full of love.

I feel the deepest gratitude for having the honor of being in the presence of this baby—the greatest teacher I have ever known.

Who has been your greatest teacher?