Sir Jac said:
... it's an incredibly difficult notion for me to grasp, but I suppose it might be possible...
Try it and see. You cannot philosophize yourself into an understanding of these things without experience. I am sure I said in another thread that you cannot see a system without being seperate from it, well that counts here too.
IMHO your internal working or perspective is different from other people, just like how the process of memory works differently for different people (and why one standard of teaching isnt good for everyone). You have various things going through your internal awarness like emotions, feeling, pictures, ideas, not just internal dialogue. But without awarness you may see all these things as the one internal dialogue, or maybe not, dont know how other people are aware of theirs.
In some people their internal dialogue can be very negative, and I think you'd need some control to balance it and switch it on/off. Also some mental problems may stem from being too rapped up in your internal disalogue and not being able to focus much on the external world. Anyway, my main point however is that if you turn off your internal dialogue you do not become a zombie or go into a coma, you actually free your mind. I'm not sure how to explain it all but its very important in spiritual practices and meditation. Its like your internal dialogue can suck up your energy, focus and awarness, so your not as in the 'now', but instead have your head in the clouds. And I think maybe a lot of internal dialogue stuff could be a type of static in continuous loops, in a way like random dream images, they just regurgitate data on you. There is also some connection between internal dialogue and ego. While most people know what ego is, I am not sure they are as educated about the practical processes of ego in their daily life, I know I aint.
Anyway, if you switch it off it will come back on. It takes a lot of effort and intent to switch it off pernamently, so if you try this and do it, you will gain a bit of experience and it will come back. One thing to remember is that with these things you are in total control, its not like drugs where once you take it you have to suffer the consiquences as long as they last. Without it your mind is calm and still, or at least that is my experience, and it does lead into other higher things like greater awarness and understanding. You cannot imagine how much time or energy some people spend each day in their internal dialogue, and it does go to waste, I mean you dont remember all the crap you were thinking over your life and very little was beneficial. Like I said, there are different things going on, so if you do get rid of internal dialogue you still have memory and consciousness and thoughts, ideas, ect. Its just all clearer like tuning into a radio station frequency to such a point that the static disappears. Its hard to understand how beneficial it is until you try and get a better sense of these things but it definately is beneficial.