Is insight meditation counter-productive (sometimes)?
The statement:


  "By developing a non-reactive awareness we begin to see why we think, speak and act the way we do"


When there is awareness, there is mindfulness and clear comprehension of the situation, which is, the thinking, speaking and acting, which continues the way it is because it is conditioned; but because there is this clear comprehension, there is this "pause", "space" to breathe before we commit to the thinking, speaking and acting, allowing the mind to depart from the conditioning.

It is just like a mother watching over the child, doing her thing and only making the child more aware of what she is doing, so she contemplates before doing anything. The mother (awareness, sati-sampajanna) is one thing, the child (mind, vinnana) is another, eventually. 

In the beginning of the practice, awarenes is patchy; and the thing that interrupts thoughts in the mind is not the awareness itself but the thought to re-establish awareness again and the act of re-establishing this awareness. So in the beginning these interruptions are distracting but soon they are reduced depending on one's progress.

One can learn, create and be absorbed with the awareness attending, and that learning, creating and absorbing is much more intense and wholesome.