Please help me to see the simple truth of it

[Lawrence]

Good early morning Willing

Wonderful words falling from your hands

I haven't been investigating my experience very intently, just enjoying it.

That is the perfect investigation...just getting out of your own way. Letting it shine through. Now there is the internal knowing of what needs doing. Just Looking. That IS the investigation. That is it. Simple, isn't it ? The more you do it , the more it flows. The more you think, the more it falls. Here is my favourite quote from Russel Williams book Not I, Not Other than I- and probably my favourite quote of all time :

Unless there is feeling there is no understanding.When you learn to feel, then you have understanding and can work with it, but if its just "upstairs"its just confusion. Feeling is the key to appreciating consciousness because consciousness only knows things through feeling....It's good to learn to allow feeling to take place, in the sense of being conscious, rather than demanding to see or know something.If you look at a seeming blank wall, a blank wall is all you will see, but if you quietly gaze at it without anything in mind, you'll see a lot of little impressions in the wall which you never knew existed. When you are conscious, it will show itself to you, as other things will show their nature to you. If you demand something, you'll only get what you demand and it won't be what is really there.

So this inquiry you see is NOT about thinking on what is happening, it is simply Noticing.

I feel a kind of wellbeing. Part of it is tenderness, or love. It's not very prominent or strong feeling, it's quite in the background, but definitely there.

Everyone's experience is different. Some feel it as an explosion, some laugh out loud, some just gently fall into a knowing and "coming from a different place. It is the door opening- the sun shining through. Let it shine. It will vary in intensity, sometimes go completely, but once seen you will not unsee this.

As to pointers in the coming week or so. Just notice your own feelings and emotions, any physical, mental pains and worries. They are no different to the trees, the clouds and the stars at night. Notice the action of your body and your thoughts ( Not WHAT you are thinking). The sights, smell, the colours.
I smile at everyone that catches my eye and 90% smile back. Of course, as Woman this may be problematic. If it is not appropriate- just look and notice them and smile inside. They are all aspects of you. However, you are on retreat so it is the perfect gift at the perfect time.It's been nearly three-quaters of an hour since I started writing this..half..reading, writing, contemplating myself. My cat is demanding strokes. I can't think of anything else appropriate at the moment. Try and check in every 24 hours or when you can when you go on retreat-or simply write it down every 24 hours and share them later.
Good night
In Loving
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

Good normal time in the morning

I just reflected on a little more

it feels like a strange time to go - but there again perhaps it's a chance to devotee much more time to this looking

Everything and everyone is a pointer. You will receive what you need. Awareness/ Universal Consciousness/Life gives what is needed in the moment.

I'd be grateful for some of your lovely pointers, if there's anything you would suggest on - what now?

Here is Rumi on Existence :
Praise to the emptiness that blanks out existence-
Existence:
This place made from our love for that emptiness!
Yet somehow comes emptiness,
this existence goes.
Praise to that happening, over and over!
For years I pulled my own existence out of emptiness.
Then one swoop, one swing of the arm,
that work is over.
Free of who I was, free of presence, free of dangerous fear, hope,
free of mountainous wanting.
The here-and-now mountain is a tiny piece of a piece of straw
blown off into emptiness.
These words I'm saying so much begin to lose meaning:
Existence, emptiness, mountain, straw:
Words and what they try to say swept
out the window, down the slant of the roof.
Rumi

Notice you are just either Looking/Noticing or Thinking. As soon as you think and do more than just Notice/Look, another thought arises about the thought. Notice that this is thoughts about thought. Thought tries to labels everything. Once you remove the labels. Remember that labels were not what you were born with. You are not your name, your label. All that you "know" is from colour, shape, form and smell. However it is all just thoughts.
You cannot know anything at all.
That which is "out there" is also "inside".
There is no seperation between the two.
Notice are you the observer or the observed.?
You know everything is just happening.
But you are Aware arn't you? If you were not Aware you would not know it.
So there is simply Awareness knowing itself as Awareness with thoughts arising.
What do you truly know about what appears to exist that actually exists.
It is all thoughts arising within Awareness.
As it is thought, none of it has any reality, in the accepted sense. It is no different to a dream is it, except we wake up from the dream.

I know there is a lot of words here. Fall into them. Lots of pointers. Lots of time on retreat to consider
Tell me what arises.
Notice again this is just thoughts about thoughts

In Loving
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

Oh...and a little experiment that fell through me a few months ago

Close your eyes. Put your hands high on each side of your face. Notice the sensation of hand and skin...and nothing in between the two and how peaceful it is

[willing]

Lawrence, a joyful thank you!! There is so much I love in these posts, I hardly know where to start. It is all making a different kind of sense, but the feeling mainly is one of flux, and unformedness. Nothing has really crystallised yet, so all there is is patience and appreciation of this.

All that you "know" is from colour, shape, form and smell. However it is all just thoughts.
You cannot know anything at all.

I see this. All the more reason not to try - it just gets in the way. There's something about the kind of deliberate effort I've seen myself making in the past that makes the "I" sense even stronger. And it's all been in vain. Now I'm trying to let myself melt into what's happening, curious to see how that turns out..

If you look at a seeming blank wall, a blank wall is all you will see, but if you quietly gaze at it without anything in mind, you'll see a lot of little impressions in the wall which you never knew existed. When you are conscious, it will show itself to you, as other things will show their nature to you. If you demand something, you'll only get what you demand and it won't be what is really there.

Yes. This is wonderful. I'm starting to feel into an appreciation of this, although it's not crystal clear at the moment. I know it's true, though. These past couple of days I've had images from other times in my life popping into awareness, images showing me how mistaken beliefs and wants have sculpted situations and relationships in unhelpful ways. These kinds of flashbacks - and just scenes from other places I've lived, apparently inconsequential details - have tended to happen at times of more intense or focused meditation practice. It feels, if anything, like a kind of loosening or relaxation, but those words aren't really right - that's as close as I can get at the moment. I'm really ready to see my habits and distortions of interpretation.

That which is "out there" is also "inside".
There is no seperation between the two.

I realise my sense of physical beingness is also a function of perceptual limitations. This body has apparent physical boundaries, but that's just vision. I can intellectually appreciate that pores and respiration allow total mixing with "outside", but there is something else that happened this morning, when I was sitting in a short meditation. When I sank into just experiencing, which took a few minutes, I felt a wave of energy passing through me, downwards, something dense and grounding. There was just the beginning of a fluttering, swirling sensation in my chest, not very stable, and joy. There were no edges then. It was almost totally absorbing, very few wisps of thought about. You've used this phrase at some point I think: it was like "coming home". Total being, just still and content.

It is the door opening- the sun shining through.

Perfect analogy, just beautiful.

I feel like I want to write more, but whatever it is that needs expression isn't quite formed yet, maybe it'll come tomorrow. I will be able to post until Friday, and then while I'm on retreat I'll keep notes because there won't be internet access. It is an absolute gift to have this time to just be with all this, but I will miss our dialogue. It's only a week, though. The theme is 'dependant arising'. The universe provides...

with love
willing

[Lawrence]

Good evening Willing

I think I burnt myself out between last night and this morning and have few points of guidance to help you today.
I am pleased that the work of the pointing is moving you, but you still seem trapped
Have a look at what you have written and decide what is just thoughts rabbiting on about nothing and what is Looking. Stop TRYING too. It is the complete opposite that will get you through. Didn't you appreciate fully what Russel Wlliams was saying ?
Please keep trying to Look though and stop thinking.
All this talk of past is just memory. Memory is just a thought. It has no reference in time.Again note this is just a thought about a thought.

Sleep well and look forward to your posts

In loving
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

HellO again Willing
I think I may have been over-judgemental when I wroteStop TRYING too. It is the complete opposite that will get you through. Didn't you appreciate fully what Russel Wlliams was saying ?
Please keep trying to Look though and stop thinking.

I think I am falling into word-traps as you are. I say dont TRY and then "try". All I mean is just to relax and that is what you seem to be doing most of the time.

I realise my sense of physical beingness is also a function of perceptual limitations. This body has apparent physical boundaries, but that's just vision. I can intellectually appreciate that pores and respiration allow total mixing with "outside",

I just meant here you were lost in words and thought

but there is something else that happened this morning, when I was sitting in a short meditation. When I sank into just experiencing, which took a few minutes, I felt a wave of energy passing through me, downwards, something dense and grounding. There was just the beginning of a fluttering, swirling sensation in my chest, not very stable, and joy. There were no edges then. It was almost totally absorbing, very few wisps of thought about. You've used this phrase at some point I think: it was like "coming home". Total being, just still and content.

then clarity

Basically the Universal Conscious has placed you to have the retreat to mellow in.
I am not going to comment further.
If you wish to write anything before you go it will be a pleaseure to receive.
Otherwise I will leave you to just fall in with it all.
In Loving and have a beautiful experience
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

See. I am back again Willing

I realise my sense of physical beingness is also a function of perceptual limitations. This body has apparent physical boundaries, but that's just vision.

I kept looking at this and felt a need to try and get you to ove around this way of thinking

These two experiments come from the Direct Path. I have never used Direct Path stuff as I tend to prefer how I came to "see through self".
You may find it helpful if you are intent on examining structures and only able to judge "stuff" and see only conceptually.

SEEING THE ORANGE

The classic DP world experiment! In this experiment an orange is placed on the table in front of you and viewed. The inquiry then looks to see the following...

Do you experience a separate or independent seer?

Do you experience an orange apart from the colour?

Do you experience colour to be independent of seeing?

Do you experience shape to be independent of colour?

Do you experience seeing to be independent of awareness?

SMELLING THE ORANGE

This experiment proceeds in a similar way to the experiment on vision, but here we are looking to see whether you can experience a separate 'smeller'. Do you experience an orange independent of fragrance?

There might be the thought that you are smelling a smell that exists 'out there'. There might might be thought that smell occurs when chemicals in the air come into contact with various nasal processes. But what is the experience of these processes?

OK enough
Bye for now
Love
Lawrence

[willing]

Dear Lawrence. You've been such a wonderful guide, a heartfelt thank you for your thoughtful pointers and caring zen stick. I'm sorry this isn't a more substantive post - my entire journey to Scotland for the retreat has somehow been swallowed up by work, tying up loose ends and catching up with people before signing off for a week. And I wanted to thank you for your latest posts, I have read them all. Investigations now, at leisure. I think the 'orange' exercise will be very helpful. Keeping notes, and will report back soon.

With much love to you,
Willing

[Lawrence]

The Way It Is

There's a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn't change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can't get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time's unfolding.
You don't ever let go of the thread.

By William Stafford

[willing]

Dear Lawrence, hello again. I hope you're well and have had a lovely week. I've just emerged from the retreat. It was difficult and not at all the opportunity for expanding this investigation that I hoped and thought it would be. That'll teach me to have expectations, won't it.

This isn't going to be a substantive post, but it seemed like it might be useful to send a post on where I am now. During the retreat, the investigation we were making here has been thoroughly disrupted. It was a disheartening experience. I won't say too much about why, because I know it isn't relevant and it's just a construction anyway, but the part that might be useful to say is that the retreat had a 'study' component on the Buddhist teaching dependant arising. I thought this would be a deep, rich academic teaching from an expert scholar that would frame or complement, but not interfere with, my own experiential investigations. It wasn't, though. It was just a lot of discussion among a large group, mostly talking past each other in conceptual tangles, projections and exposition of cherished ideas. A huge mass of proliferation and confusion, and I was affected by it. I was also deeply, deeply tired and lacking mental clarity myself, so I relaxed the effort and just did what I could. I made some progress in making contact with direct experience through the body, but not in a very sustained or deep way.

What actually happened experientially was what I'd describe as a 'self attack'. Quite a lot of negative emotion, agitation, and a shrinking back of the expansion I'd experienced before going away, back into conventional separation and 'me-ness'. Very unpleasant feelings. I'd arrived exhausted but with a feeling of love and gentleness, now I'm feeling confusion, mild sadness and disappointment. Reading over the last page or so of our dialogue just now has been heartening. The narrative story of 'me' is seen for what it is still, but there is still this impression of 'I' clinging on, stronger now than before. I don't find it in sensed experience, it's like I observe it from my own behaviour like a reflex. I KNOW that's a thought, but it feels stuck. I'm with my partner this weekend so may not have too much time to try experiments, but I will do as much as I can from the suggestions you've already sent. Sorry not to have better news to send.

confusedly,
willing

[willing]

Sitting in the airport with some time on my hands, so why not jump back into this right now. I don't have an orange, but there's a convenient coffee cup so let me give this a go..

SEEING THE ORANGE

The classic DP world experiment! In this experiment an orange is placed on the table in front of you and viewed. The inquiry then looks to see the following...

Do you experience a separate or independent seer?

At first, yes. Then I realise I'm just SEEING a 'seer' - my body - and the coffee cup as two separate items within the whole field of view. SO they're both within the seeing. Then I experience my body "from the inside" so to speak, and think to myself that this is a different way of knowing that isn't possible with the coffee cup, suggesting difference and separation. Then I realise that I'd sense a buzzing alarm clock on the table through sound as well as vision, so the internal sense doesn't need to mean an independent seer. There's just sensing happening, it's the content of that sensing that's a 'me' and a coffee cup and some other stuff. This is still quite a cognitive sort of knowing, but I'm slowly tuning back into experience as it is.

Do you experience an orange apart from the colour?

Or coffee cup :). No.

Do you experience colour to be independent of seeing?

No, but there is a faint feeling of looking AT the colour, though. Like the colour and the seeing of it don't completely overlap. I know there's nothing I can know about colour but the experience of it, but just writing how it FEELS to me right at this moment so you can see what's going on.

Do you experience shape to be independent of colour?

No, they're more clearly belonging together in experience.

Do you experience seeing to be independent of awareness?

No.

And another thing is that in spite of the challenges of the retreat, there is still less 'baggage' attached to my experiencing. There's not much in the way of self narrative coming up in these moments, although there is some frustration, shame, disappointment and sadness so I guess it's implied in some way. I feel rootless. It's freeing and disorienting.

with love
willing

[Lawrence]

Hi willing
I awoke this morning with sore throat and now a cold, probably after going to London in crowds and my body is used to isolation. So not feeling too sharp this evening.
To read your honest words, and I thank you for your honest words, does not surprise me
Well the orientation of a Buddhist retreat would diametrically conflict with the approach Direct Pointing takes. Here we just Look in our own experience. Buddhist study is just a mind fuck as I have said so before though in not so blunt a form. You appear to have returned to the beginning by spending a week in Buddhist stuff.

I will try and ponder your other words but you appear to have lost all the work we have done.
You need to go back to the start of the posts because just about everything you are saying is what you said when we started this work.
Start from square one
Look at All the questions and go through them again.
Answer them all.
Query your answers
You must get back to Looking
The orange answers are fine but they were just supposed to be further add-0ns.
You have to decide whether you are studying Buddhism, Meta etc or dropping it and just start Looking again.
Look at the previous guidance and jump in and answer the questions again.

Once you are back to where you were before your retreat we will delve further

Love and Blessings
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

Good morning willing

When you can free yourself to move into experience

I want you to observe all the body reactions. Write down EVERY ACTIVITY that " body" does, physically or from thoughts. You note I say ...EVERY ACTION that "BODY" does...not "YOUR BODY" does.
NOTICE IT AS SOMETHING THAT JUST IS HAPPENING - "NO POSSESSION" to the words in future.
eg.
Eyes are Look at words..NOT "my eyes are reading" . Leave this possession out

Eyes are looking at this writing now and thoughts are coming up. You can tell me what thoughts are saying ...but not ANYTHING that has a possession to it.
Check it before you send me anything.

Then go back to the original questions at the beginning and answer them WITHOUT ANY "I"

Tell me also what comes up for you

Love and Blessings
Lawrence

[Lawrence]

Hi willing

Just checking in to see what is coming up for you ?
Are you having difficulties moving on ?
Love and Blessings
Lawrence

[willing]

Hello Lawrence, sorry to have gone quiet these last few days.

As I thought, it wasn't possible to get back into the investigation while I was away with my partner over the weekend - I just got back yesterday. Now that I'm back, to be honest I feel a bit daunted by the prospect of going through our whole dialogue and answering the questions again. I am still committed to doing this, but during the retreat I lost momentum and realised just how unfocused my experience is (or was) on direct bodily sensation, and also how unstable my attention - it was actually quite alarming to observe.

I will try the last exercise you sent me now, and see what comes out of it.

Back soon,
willing