Mind and consciousness with Ajahn Chah

Ajahn Chah (ajahnchah.org) via Ven. Sujato, Ellie Askew, Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

It's all about the heart/mind that knows.

Coming inwards, what watches over the body is consciousness – just this "that which knows," this single awareness.

1. If it receives through the eye, it’s called seeing.
2. If through the ear, hearing;
3. the nose, smelling;
4. the tongue, tasting;
5. the body, touching; and
6. if it receives through the mind[-door of the heart], it’s called thinking.

This consciousness is just one, but when it functions at different places, we call it different things.

Through the eye, we call it one thing, through the ear, we call it another.

However, whether it functions at the eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, or mind, it’s just one awareness. [These are the "consciousnesses" of Buddhist analysis: eye-consciousness...mind-consciousness.]

Following the sutras we call these the six consciousnesses, but in reality there is only one consciousness arising at these six different sense bases.

There are six "doors" but a single awareness, which is this very mind.