Without a body, a mind, (if it is a mind at all) and hypothetically if such “body independent mind” exist, by our realm's definition, is blind, directionless, “smoky” and very prone to be delusional. These hypothetical “minds” include but not limited to, which a man can imagine are the following: mind of the 1) the dreams, 2) deeply unconscious, 3) “out of the body experience” induced by meditations, psychoactive drugs, brain pathologies (epilepsy, strokes etc.) or extreme stress, such as near death experiences 4) collective unconscious (of Jung), or the repressed mind (of Freud), 5) third eye ( of new age), 6) the “heart’s mind” 7) spirit’s mind as envisioned by occultist/alchemist 8) divine mind or soul’s mind of religions, 9) kundalini or tantric mind (of Shiva), 10) mind of Ein Sof. To illustrate the concept you can imagine the following: How many times you had a dream (out of all the dreams that ever had) of which you are completely satisfied with its nature, content, as well as its interpretation and you had a full dose of certainty or “highs” that you can get by doing the same thing in real life? Dreams are vague, inconsistent, self-contradictory, and distorted in terms of natural laws. You cannot have a concrete interpretations out of your dreams to confirm or disconfirm anything. You have only smoky, vague ideas while you are dreaming, but once you are awake, only then you can have a better and concrete ideas about those dreams and their meanings, if there are any. You often need a “professional” dream (pseudo)interpreter to give you a concocted interpretation, which are often a sort of fairy tales that typically incorporates repressed sexuality or fear theories as prescribed by their masters. The bottom line is the fact that your dreams are still tied to your brain, which is still a material, although not fully functional. Now imagine, what will your dream look like, if it is not tied to with any material objects at all, whatsoever. It will be so meaningless (if not horrible) and chaotic that we cannot even imagine it (fortunately). The function of the body and the brain is to eliminate all those delusions and vague dreamlike imageries, except the one, which is a consistent, reliable, reproducible and accurate i.e. a true representation of the reality while you are awake. Your body and brain is a device to pave the way for making the reason to emerge to eradicate the delusions. Only that reason has any hope to offer you any certainty or knowledge and hence peace (or in religious terms, salvation).

Although the source of our knowledge classically categorized as “The Four Ways”, it does not mean that there is only 4 ways of knowledge. But for the purpose of this essay, I will stick with the classicist and that will suffice for now. 1). Sensory perceptions (empiricist), 2). Reason or intellect (rationalist), 3). Intuitive understanding (Idealist) and 4) Revelations (Prophets). Although the original masters never saw any reason to separate the ways you can have a knowledge, but now the existence of those distinct groups only suggests that they failed to see that all four are interconnected and different gradations, originated from the same source, stating from most concrete (the sensory perception) to most abstract (revelation). The first reaction to this statement is the utter denial from the rationalist (because they do not have the equipments to see the connection between reason and sensory perceptions*, see footnote below), from the empiricist (who cannot see the connection between observation or sensory perception and intuition), from the idealist (who cannot see the interdependence of matter and the ideas) and from a theologian (who cannot see the connection between reason, or sensory perception with revelation). Finally, the existentialist or absurdities will deny everything altogether, without giving any clues. But just like a heroin addicted person is in denial that they have an addiction problem, which is obvious to those who are not addicted, I understand the cause of such denial ( i.e. not using the tools correctly that they already have) and will proceed anyway. 

Material objects are a recorder or depository of information. Similarly, your body is a recorder of information that actually happens within it and outside it, not just possible information in “phase-space” field. Body contains what is true out of all delusional ideas that can exist in bodiless mind (see the list above). Body is the witness of Truth. Without the body, mind has a tendency to be delusional, just like the water tends to be shapeless without a grail. Body gives the mind a shape (platonic forms or ideals). And the body and the information it contains are reliable, reproducible, and accurate, but extracting the information is not necessarily easy. The birth of reason (the ability to see the truth out all many scenarios given) is tied to body. Without a body, no reason exists in this world. Without the reason, there is no way to be sure of anything. Without certainty, there is no peace and no happiness in anybody’s mind. How can you see that the reason that you already see existent is tied to your body? This is subtle and often difficult to see unless you have developed a keen perception. How can you see the way by which reason emerges from the body? When you start to observe yourself while you are doing something such as trials and errors. What you call a “cultivated reason” is actually a derivative of your own observation of the outcomes of trials and errors, but those trials and errors are not a formal experiments or experiences hence would have been easily gone unnoticed and forgotten, unless you are not really observant. Your observation power grows when you did something, but that did not work as you wanted to be and now thinking what exactly went wrong. You try it next time more sincerely and more carefully and this time, your are more observant of yourself and started to notice the relations between your actions and your reasoning power. This way, throughout the history, it has been suggested that only a virtuous life can make you happy because with all those actions, your are learning the fact that your body's action is the source of your reason and that opens the door to the next level that has far bigger and grand consequence than you had ever imagined. If you continue your journey and learn from your body, you will see that your body is the source of ALL KNOWLEDGE including revelation, although it comes much later, if ever, and unfortunately, most people, cannot even see the necessary and sufficient connection between sensory perception and reason, including the "elites" such as Hume, Kant etc. Once you started to see those connections learnt from your VIRTUOUS acts, you start to appreciate why your body is your only assets and why you have decided to give up all of your powers for the sake to have a body in order to avoid the inherent tendency of bodiless mind's confused delusions and/or uncertainty and to enjoy the certainty offered by carnality.

Footnotes:
*Reason is a form of semantic memory that is transformed from the episodic memories (failure to see the connections is due to amnesia or blindness or ignorance of that transformative linkage) . The episodic memory is in turn transformed sensory perceptions with innumerable repetition from the sensory organs. You will not and cannot accept this because your mind is not calm and perceptive enough to see the subtle link. But if you focus and sharpen your mind (with discipline), you will begin to see it, only when your mind is free from contaminations. What is a contamination? That which is not real or genuine or original. Where does those contamination come from? From your choice of not doing the right things (failure to hold fast on the smaller truths) and not abstaining from harmful things. In simple words, you have to be "bible good" in order to get rid of those contaminants. Only then you can see the clear linkage and more deeper truths afterwards.

The Buddhist middle way is in between 1.) Extreme Action/Karma Yoga of Vedic Hinduism and 2.) Extreme self-renunciation of Jainism. The middle in between these two ancient Indian ways is the "Middle Way". Gurdjieff suggested a fourth way (fourth means being outside the way of fakir, monk, yogi, all of them are actually are the ways towards the same goal) but that fourth way cannot be other than the 3rd or middle way of Buddhism. Because there is no fourth way other than the middle way.

Mathematically when you collect a large groups of data you will see most of the data will tend to aggregate around a central mean. Outliers are only few and far in between. The tendency of the individual data points to go towards and merge with the middle, i.e. the average line has long been recognized by the statisticians and the scientists. This is the Juggernaut of "Regression Line". The average or the middle is the Grand Regression Line, acting just like the dark energy. You cannot see it but you can see its effects all the time and it will make everything conform to it. The middle way is the "The Way" because it conforms to the regression line of Grand forces of the nature, instead of fighting against it. The middle have the essence of both extremes. Middle is the perfect representation of the overwhelming majority. The middle is most common, like the data of normal distribution curve that have a central (middle) tendency. Middle is normal and normal is the norm or the standard. Normal is normal because they occurs more often, because they survive more, because there are the fittest, because they have the best functions. They are the perfect epitome of balance. They display the best of the both extreme worlds and hence best functionality. They are the representative ones because they are common, have the best of both worlds and they function the best, like ambidextrous craftsman.

The dream and the psychedelic induced conscious states are the examples of the opposite extremes. In your dream, the logical structures breaks down, time becomes asynchronous, and things becomes cloudy. The meaning itself mostly ceases to exist. No wonder, why we do not remember those dreams for long time. Because most of the dreams are self-inconsistent, logically contradictory and jumbled. Human brain cannot handle the meaningless, patternless, jumbled events for long time. The magical number is seven, plus or minus two for the number of independent data you can consider simultaneously, even consciously. During dream, it become even worse for sure. So, if you cannot understand and remember what is happening in the dream then who care about the meaning of and interpretations of dreams? If you base your life by the dream analysis (Freudian or Jungian psychoanalysis) it will not take you anyway until the end of time. Additionally you are awake more times than you are sleeping. So forget about dreams and pay more attention to what is happening here and now while you are awake during the day. In sharp contrast, if you try to artificially enhance your alertness with psychedelic/stimulant drugs, it will in fact work against you. You will never be sure what is real and what is unreal. You will mix up dream, hallucination with your real life experiences. At the end, you will stay confused, except few moments of ecstasy under the direct effects of those drugs. It will cost you in long run. The drug free intervals (which will be the most of your time, if you want to be functional) will be the living hell. The bottom line is the fact that the normal day-to-day, unadulterated/non-retarded/non-steroid boosted consciousness, reason or intellect is the best representative of both worlds.

After traveling all of those you are still stuck with old, ordinary, powerless you. The only tool you have against all those odds are your reason and intellectual power if it is unadulterated. You already have everything that you will ever need. So what are you waiting for? Jump in and explore the world to find the meaning of all these. You do not need any special power or revelator to guide you. You already have your best guide, which is your-Self. Do not pollute your thinking and reason by believing other peoples (including scientist's) claim without examination it independently, especially if that this is important to you and needs your attention. What are the things you ought to examine carefully? Don't worry, you will know. Just be honest with yourself and keep preparing yourself. When the student is ready, teacher will always appear and this teacher had always been sleeping inside you all these years because you never called him for assistance. Do not try to ask help while you have distorted your intellects either by sedative/hypnotics drugs or by CNS stimulants/psychedelics. If you do, they will teach you distorted truths. Use your usual day-to-day reason, observation, intellect, logic and intuition "normally" to start seeing things "as they are". This is "the middle way". There is no need to a fourth or fifth or any other way. Trust your middle self. Truth is not only the body, not only the mind but the Truth is your middle self. This is the only way, in the middle, you will ever need. And the good news is, you already have it. So, use it, wisely.