Forgetting Myself

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

The main realization was that there aren't voluntary and involuntary thoughts at all.

That’s great! :)

So if thoughts are not voluntary or involuntary, then how they appear? With control or without control?
Is there any control over thoughts?
Is there anyone making them to appear?

No. If anything, I am the space that the thoughts happen to.

And how do you know this? How do you know that you are the space that the sensations happen to?
Where does this information coming from?
Is there a visual image showing a space to which thoughts are happening?

Isn’t the saying that “I am the space that thoughts happen to” part of the thought story of me?

V: How do you decide what to think next?

G: A thought appears telling me to. And a thought appears that I chose the thought.

So thoughts are talking to you? So there is a you OUTSIDE of thoughts? Outside of the thoughts/words I/me?
Where is this outside ME?

WHERE is the ME that is OUTSIDE of the story about Gabe?
Is there an outside me at all, or this outside me is PART of the STORY about me/Gabe?

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

So if thoughts are not voluntary or involuntary, then how they appear? With control or without control?

Without.

Is there any control over thoughts?

No. Thoughts appear as a reaction to some kind of stimulus. Sometimes that stimulus is another thought, so it seems like I'm controlling/directing it, but I'm not.

Is there anyone making them to appear?

Not that I can sense.

And how do you know this? How do you know that you are the space that the sensations happen to?
Where does this information coming from?
Is there a visual image showing a space to which thoughts are happening?

Isn’t the saying that “I am the space that thoughts happen to” part of the thought story of me?

A better way of putting it might be that directly perceived thoughts/sensations I call "mine", and ones that aren't directly perceived I call "not mine".

So I don't know this. I am simply aware of some things and not aware of others.

So thoughts are talking to you? So there is a you OUTSIDE of thoughts? Outside of the thoughts/words I/me?
Where is this outside ME?
WHERE is the ME that is OUTSIDE of the story about Gabe?
Is there an outside me at all, or this outside me is PART of the STORY about me/Gabe?

I don't know. If I could sense the "me" it wouldn't be me, it'd be something outside of me or a part of me.

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

V: And how do you know this? How do you know that you are the space that the sensations happen to?
Where does this information coming from?
Is there a visual image showing a space to which thoughts are happening?

Isn’t the saying that “I am the space that thoughts happen to” part of the thought story of me?

G: A better way of putting it might be that directly perceived thoughts/sensations I call "mine", and ones that aren't directly perceived I call "not mine".

Gabe, it’s not about changing your words, and giving another intellectual definition.
You cannot get anywhere if you just changing your words, definitions.
This is a dead-end.
You failed to look into the direction those questions are pointing, because you took this on only intellectually, and thought that a different definition might be better.

I’m saying it again, this is a dead-end.

Are you afraid of investigating the questions? Are you afraid of looking at experience?

Or what is the reason that you thought that a different definition would be better than investigating in experience what those questions are pointing to?

So I don't know this. I am simply aware of some things and not aware of others.

You are saying things, without actually investigating them if they are true.
This reply is coming from thinking. You just wrote down what you think.

But what we are doing here is to examine your thoughts, if they stand up to scrutiny of experience. If your thoughts are actually telling the truth. Or they just have been accepted at face value, without every investigating their validity. Is this clear?

V: So thoughts are talking to you? So there is a you OUTSIDE of thoughts? Outside of the thoughts/words I/me?
Where is this outside ME?
WHERE is the ME that is OUTSIDE of the story about Gabe?
Is there an outside me at all, or this outside me is PART of the STORY about me/Gabe?

G: I don't know. If I could sense the "me" it wouldn't be me, it'd be something outside of me or a part of me.

You didn’t look. You say you don’t know. But it’s not about knowing or not knowing. It’s about looking at experience.

I’m wondering what is going on.
Either you don’t see the difference between reality (experience) and thinking (believing) or you are afraid of looking at what is, you are afraid of investigating the validity of your thoughts.

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

Vivien,

Either you don’t see the difference between reality (experience) and thinking (believing) or you are afraid of looking at what is, you are afraid of investigating the validity of your thoughts.

In the last months, I don't know that there has been a day that hasn't had some part of it devoted to this question in one way or another. Hopefully you're still around to guide.

I'm afraid of it the inquiry working--and not liking what is found. I know I talked about this before, but the fear is still persistent. "I" want to be fully involved in experiencing this life with as much meaning and joy as can be squeezed from it. I'm not doing a stellar job of that at the moment, and I'm afraid that this will somehow make it worse. If this doesn't make it better, or point towards what could, then okay, but I really don't want it to be worse. I realize that if it works, then the "worse" won't be taken personally, but that's cold comfort to a very present sense of self.

I'm afraid of it not working--of failing to experience no-self, or of having a false experience. Of embarrassment or frustration? Obviously, if it works, then there'd be no embarrassment or frustration, because there's nobody to be embarrassed or frustrated. If it doesn't, then the I that isn't there anyway gets to imagine it experiences those things that feel awful, even though they shouldn't.

But, examining those fears thoroughly... if those happen, they can be dealt with. If they don't, no problem. The curiosity to see this thing is stronger than the fear.

I hope you're willing to guide me from this point, of understanding the difference between reality and thoughts/beliefs. You tell me whether I see a difference between reality and thinking; here's what I found in investigation. Reality = experience = direct apprehension (thinking/sensing). The contents of what is apprehended might be true or false upon investigation. But that thinking happened, that perceiving happened... that is unquestionable and immediately known to be true.

Gabe

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,
It’s been 4 months since my last post to you. You really took your time :)

and I'm afraid that this will somehow make it worse.

But how do you know that it will make things worse?
Is there any proof for this?
How do you know that this thought is telling the truth?

If this doesn't make it better, or point towards what could, then okay, but I really don't want it to be worse. I realize that if it works, then the "worse" won't be taken personally, but that's cold comfort to a very present sense of self.
It seems that you really hold to the idea that seeing that there is no separate self makes thing worse.

But it’s just a pure fantasy. You are afraid of your own imagination.
People come here for the purpose of feeling better. Many people believe that seeing no self would make all their unpleasant emotions vanish, and they will float in a constant state of bliss, which is the other extremity of your stance, that it will make things worse.
None of them is true.

I'm afraid of it not working--of failing to experience no-self, or of having a false experience. Of embarrassment or frustration? Obviously, if it works, then there'd be no embarrassment or frustration, because there's nobody to be embarrassed or frustrated. If it doesn't, then the I that isn't there anyway gets to imagine it experiences those things that feel awful, even though they shouldn't.

You have lots of fantasies around this topic. And the problem is that you take these fantasies at face value. You believe that they are facts. But they aren’t.

And you fall for these fantasies since you are not seeing clearly the difference between thoughts and experience.
Thought contents are never ever real. They are always conceptual fictions.

And you are not even thinking these thoughts. They don’t belong to you. But since you believe so, they are causing suffering.

You tell me whether I see a difference between reality and thinking; here's what I found in investigation. Reality = experience = direct apprehension (thinking/sensing). The contents of what is apprehended might be true or false upon investigation. But that thinking happened, that perceiving happened... that is unquestionable and immediately known to be true.

No. Since we looked at this several times before, I’m thinking that a private video session might work better, when we can look at this in real time. I’m sending you a private message about this, so you can decide if you are up for it.

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

But how do you know that it will make things worse?
Is there any proof for this?
How do you know that this thought is telling the truth?

I don't know any of these things. They are just fears. Contents of thoughts that only point to more contents of more thoughts ad infinitum.

How could seeing no-self make anything better or worse? If there's no self, there never was--so it couldn't ever have made anything better or worse before, and it can't do it after the illusion is seen through, either. If the self isn't real and never was, then the fears are just happening. Just one of the gagillion experiences the brain is creating all the time, right?

But it’s just a pure fantasy. You are afraid of your own imagination.

Yes. It has felt like "I" urgently needed to resolve that fear before moving on, but it can only be resolved after. This is not new information--you've said as much, I've read as much in other experiences, etc.

Thought contents are never ever real. They are always conceptual fictions.

Let me see if I can restate my understanding of this. The contents of thoughts may refer to real things, but they are never the things themselves.

A feeling arises, and the brain automatically labels it "negative/positive" "joy/fear" or whatever. The feeling that is labelled is a real thing happening, because when it's happening, it's known directly. The thoughts/labels about the feeling are just concepts added on top of the real experience. Feeling is happening/real. Thinking is happening/real.

But the actual content of thought is just layers on layers on layers of, yes, fiction. But "fiction" without the negative implication. "Fiction" can be useful the same way lines of latitude are useful. And it can affect the real world (indirectly) like a powerful piece of writing, right? The content of thoughts can be attached to real things, or on other non-real things. And it will continue to be so--there's no stopping it, because that's what the brain does (and if there's no me in real life, how could "i" affect the brain's function).

The point, though, is that the content of thinking is irrelevant to this task. It'll keep happening, but it doesn't have to be focused on or resolved or engaged with. What needs to be done is to find out whether the thoughts and sensation of self are connected to anything I experience--in reality, before my labelling/interpretive/conceptual brain gets ahold of it.

Is this the right track, or am "I" still on "my" bullshit?

Headed to the inbox now to reply to your message.

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

A feeling arises, and the brain automatically labels it "negative/positive" "joy/fear" or whatever. The feeling that is labelled is a real thing happening, because when it's happening, it's known directly. The thoughts/labels about the feeling are just concepts added on top of the real experience. Feeling is happening/real. Thinking is happening/real.

But the actual content of thought is just layers on layers on layers of, yes, fiction. But "fiction" without the negative implication. "Fiction" can be useful the same way lines of latitude are useful.

Yes. But it’s important not to mix conventional reality with ultimate truth. In everyday life concepts / thoughts can be very useful, but when we are investigating the self, they are in the way.

Since it’s thoughts that create the illusion of the self in the first place.
And the source of suffering is believing thoughts to be true, and not seeing them only as fictions.

Since 4 months have passed, I would like to ask you to go back to the beginning and read the whole thread again. But you don’t have read your posts, only mine. But, make sure that you don’t just read my comments, but actually LOOK and investigate with ALL of them, one-by-one.

This will take some time. When you are ready, please come back and tell me what you’ve discovered.
There might be some gems hiding there :)

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

Could you please tell me what are you really looking for? How would your life change if you find that?
What are you hoping for to change?
What do you hope that should happen?
Do you have an image in mind how seeing through the self-illusion would be like or feel like?

I am looking for the truth. If there is no self, I want to know it the same way that I know that my arm is itching from a bug bite right now.

I don't know how my life will change. If there's no self, then there's never been a self, so nothing will necessarily change.

I have lots of fantasies and hopes and imaginations about what seeing no-self might be like, but I recognize that those are all tied into building up the concept of self in some way. Making my "self" special, or good, or kind.

I know that is completely wrong, even if I can't stop the thoughts from coming. But, at this point, what is driving me is that I'd like to just get this over with so I can stop spinning my wheels and go on to the next thing.

The image I have of seeing through the self-illusion is of waking up from a very involved dream, and knowing immediately that I had been dreaming. Nothing about the dream changes, but the point of view changes permanently.

Before starting, please read my above comments carefully a few more times and tell me what comes up by reading the comments about the expectations.
Is there any resistance to any of it?

I wouldn't call it resistance, at this point. It feels obvious that nothing can be known about it until after it's experienced. "Aw, man, an eternal problem-free bliss state sounds great!" But I laugh about it even as I feel the slight disappointment that that's not going to be the result of inquiry.

There is worry that I will, as before, struggle to "look" and will instead think and think and think and think.

I also wonder: how common is it for seekers to see through the self-illusion and regret doing the inquiry? If it's very uncommon, then there's really nothing to lose (which I imagine will be a very funny thought if I get through the gate, since I'll know there was nothing to lose and no one to lose it).

As you go about your everyday life, how does the self/I/me show up?

Don’t go to the story about the me, rather look at the me itself.

What is it like? What is it made of? Does it have a shape or a color? How big it is? And where is its exact location?

What does the word I actually point to? If you take a finger (literally) and land it on I, where does it land?

Can you see, smell, hear, taste, touch the I? Try it, with each sense.

The "me" shows up as a thought that seems to get attached to everything "I" experience.

It's attached to bodily sensations. There is a feeling of itching, and then a thought about itching: *my* arm itches. A feeling of hunger, and then the thought: *I* am hungry.

It's attached to emotions. A feeling of frustration: *I* am frustrated. A feeling of being slighted by something/someone: *I* have suffered an offense.

It shows up in judgements like "*I* am lazy for not going running this afternoon when I had the time."

It shows up through other people's reactions to "me". *I* disappoint *my* daughter when *I* give her raisins instead of prunes. *My* partner is grateful to *me* for the dinner *I* cooked.

All of these things, though, are parts of the story about the me, right? Not the me itself, but simply thoughts. My story about me, seems to claim basically whatever is happening as happening to "me" to enhance the feeling of it being a thing. Other people's stories about me seem to reinforce it even more strongly.

What is the self like... I don't know! I can't point to it or experience it with my senses or assign any definite qualities to it and say "this is me!" I keep going back to the concept of a line of latitude. It's only a convention of thought. It isn't a thing in the real world. Or maybe a concept like "community"--it's not a concrete thing, but a label placed on a whole variety of things that exist in the real world. But the real-world things that make up a "community" aren't *just* a community--they are also "people" and "buildings" and "infrastructure". From another point of view, the real world things I label a "community" could also be labeled something totally different, like a "ghetto".

But! I recognize that all of these are concepts. Does my self exist outside of an agreed upon convention: that this body, this brain, and the things it does and says and thinks and feels are a "me"? I don't know. I haven't found it, if so.

---------------------------------

I want to stop here for a moment, before continuing on, to get a bit of feedback, if I may. Is this track going somewhere, or am I still going in circles? If the latter, I want to go back and look again before moving on to the difference between reality/experience and thought/imagination/belief.

Tell me: should I go back, or keep going further with the thread?

[adrivenleaf]

Today, when thinking on this, I came up with another way that the feeling of being a self shows up in a particularly strong way: voluntary actions and choices. When a choice is made, it feels like it had to be made by a chooser. A person. A "me".

*I* am choosing to look for no-self. *I* am choosing these words, and guiding my fingers to type them.

I have seen, though, that I don't *really* control my thoughts. If I can't control my thoughts, I'm not really choosing my words or actions. I don't even know *how* I think, or *how* I type.

It felt worth mentioning, since I think it's one of the Biggest Objections my sense of self has to being told it's not real.

What is the main difference between real and imagination?
How does the food taste in the imagination and reality?
How does water feel in imagination and reality?

What happens to the imaginary kitchen when you stop imagining it?
Can you make the real kitchen disappear just like an image can disappear?

Perceiving things in my imagination is an active process of thinking. In imagination, I can only perceive as many features as I can hold focus on at once. If I'm not thinking about it, it disappears without a trace. The whole experience of the imaginary kitchen involves only my mind, never my physical senses. Imagining sensations like touch and taste brings up more thoughts (memories); it's a lot like using words to try to convey those things to another person--you can't make them experience them directly, but only bring up thoughts about other similar experiences the listener has had.

Perceiving things in reality is a passive process of sensing. In reality, I can perceive as many features as come into contact with my physical senses, though there's only so much I can hold in conscious attention at any time. If my physical body is in the real kitchen, I'm still perceiving it, even if my mind is miles away, and I can't disappear it by not attending to it. The experience of the real kitchen always involves my physical senses, and may or may not involve my mind.

Which feels to be truer:
- I = body
- I have a body?

As you go about your life, does it feel that I am the body? Or does it feel that I am somewhere inside the body, protected by the skin, probably somewhere in the head, and looking out through the eyes and seeing the world out there?

So you are saying that you are not the body, rather the body is part of you. Is this how it feels?

In daily living, it feels truer that I have a body than I am my body. That last sentence feels most accurate: that the body is *part* of me, but not the *whole* of me.

Can you satisfy your hunger by thinking of food and imagining eating? Or you actually have to eat, meaning you actually have to experience eating?

Does the urge to pee goes away by imagining it? Or you actually have to do it?

Eating and peeing have to actually be experienced to satisfy those biological needs. No amount of thinking can affect anything outside of thought.

How does a mind itself is experienced?
And where is the mind? How big it is? What shape it has? What color? What texture? How does it look like?
Does it have a smell? Does it have a temperature? Can you touch it?

Can you observe what you call ‘mind’ here and now?
What is it in the very moment you observe it?

And can you observe your brain actually (literally) creating a mind? Or is this something you’ve just learned?

Do you see why it’s so important to see the difference between experience and thought / imagination?

The mind is experienced through/as thinking. It's the label placed on thinking. When I observe it, it's as thinking about thinking.

I can't observe the creation of mind by the brain. It's something I have learned, and have accepted as the most likely explanation for mind/thought, but ultimately it's a belief--another thought.

I think that I do see why its important to distinguish between experience and thought.

It's tempting to say that thoughts can be "true" or "false" but that implies judgement that I find inappropriate, and is perhaps a false dichotomy? A line of latitude isn't "false" because it's an accepted convention (rather than a literal line around the earth), but it's also not "true" in the same way that a glacier refers to a thing that can be experienced directly.

But, if the self has the same level of truth/reality as a line of latitude, but not the same level of reality as a glacier, that's still a pretty earth-shaking realization.

Maybe a better way of describing it is that thoughts are referents. Thoughts can point to things that exist outside of thought, or they may point to things that only exist within thought/as concepts. The inquiry is, hopefully, to directly perceive that what I think of as *me* only exists as a concept.

It feels like I'm on the right track over here. Unless you tell me to go backwards, or give me another task, I'll keep moving through the thread.

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

But, if the self has the same level of truth/reality as a line of latitude, but not the same level of reality as a glacier, that's still a pretty earth-shaking realization.

Yes! That’s the whole point. The glacier is real, but latitude is just a useful concept, but not actual reality. This is what you have to see very clearly.

It feels like I'm on the right track over here. Unless you tell me to go backwards, or give me another task, I'll keep moving through the thread.

Yes, please do so. Feel free to write posts, but I won’t comment most of your post. However, I will read them, and make notes what to investigate when you get to the end.

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

Can the thought ‘sweet’ be tasted?
Can the thought ‘warm’ be felt?
Can the thought ‘fragrant scent’ be smelled?
Can the thought ‘beautiful sunset’ be seen?
Can the thought of ‘loud noise’ be heard?

Can the thought of drinking water make your thirst away?

Can the thought of ‘walking on a beach’ make your feet wet and sandy?
WHY not?

So what is the difference between real and imagined?

What is the difference between a chair and the THOUGHT OF a chair?

What I see in all of this is more clarification of how concepts/thoughts relate to the world of external experience.

The experience that the word/concept/thought/label "sweet" refers to is real--it exists outside of the content of thought. But "sweet" is not the experience of sweet. The thought "sweet" can't create the experience of sweetness. It can only describe. The experience of sweetness would still exist without being able to conceptualize it at all. The concept "sweetness" can exist without the experience of sweetness even existing in reality (i.e. as anything other than the content of thought)

Is there anything else than experience and thought/imagination? Anything else?
What else could be than experience + thought?

Can you even think or imagine anything else? – try, really try

If there's anything else in reality, it's literally inconceivable, but also beside the point since it's inaccesible. Everything that can be experienced has to be through physical sensations or through thinking.

Infrared comes to mind, suddenly. I can think about it. The only reason humans ever looked for it is because of thinking--the content of thinking led us to look for it in reality. But in order for us to experience it in reality, it has to be converted into something detectable by our senses.

And the question is, why is there a need to bypass and delve into? Is there a fear of not wanting to see or discover that the self is just an illusion?

The following is a lot of thought about thoughts, but it does feel worth exploring.

I think that the problem/the fear wasn't so much fear of perceiving no-self. What I was struggling with was this idea that the content of experience could be false, in the same way the content of thoughts can be false.

I worried that an experience of no-self could be a hallucination, for example. But over the weeks I thought about it, I realized that a hallucination *is* an experience--a "true" experience. That something is being experienced cannot be doubted by the person experiencing it--I can label an experience a "hallucination" or I can label it "spider crawling on my body". But what I wasn't fully understanding was that *both* of those things are labels/thoughts/concepts being layered on top of the actual, undeniable experience of sensation itself.

There are still so many questions, so many thoughts. How can the lack of something be perceived? How can the lack of an experience be unquestioned? What kind of experience is one that could ever be labeled no-self? What if, what if what if...

This time, though, instead of being afraid of a false experience of no-self, I'm curious about the false experience of self.

Do you see that regardless of thinking, experience is always on, always happening?

You are just ignoring it, since your focus is on thinking and not what is actually happening. Do you see this?

It’s not about stopping thinking altogether. No. It’s NOT FOCUSING on the thoughts that are arising. Rather SHIFTING your attention to the immediacy of experience.

Yes. Although it still seems like it's *me* that focuses on thought or experience, I can definitely see--as in the cup exercise--that the thoughts are just happening "to me" in the same way the experiencing of the cup is happening "to me". If the conditions are present, then both are effortless. Not only effortless, but beyond my control.

When you focus on the thoughts ABOUT the cup, the experience of the cup is in the background hardly noticed.
But if you shift the focus on experiencing, then thoughts go to the background.

And you just ignore the thoughts in the background by not giving attention to them, since your focus is on seeing and feeling and not on thinking.

The problem I have here is that my thoughts are SO LOUD compared to the raw experience of seeing and feeling this cup. And I have a hard time putting them in the background. In fact, I can barely perceive a gap in the experience and the thought-label of it. If I *try* to focus on the feeling of the cup in my hand, the thought machine is off and running, louder than ever: heavy, cold, wet from condensation...

[adrivenleaf]

What is a person? - define in your own words

Is a person an entity or a concept?

A "person" is a concept. It's a label I place on a this whole body-mind complex, that is always changing, but has continuity (through memory, and through interactions with other "body-mind complexes").

Isn’t a person supposed to be SOMEONE being INSIDE the body, thinking thoughts, feeling sensations and making decisions?

Yes. Person /= body. The person is, supposedly, an entity inside the body--driving the body, thinking thoughts, feeling feelings, deciding.

What is it that claims that “I have hands”?

Where is the I, which owns the hands?

Search for this I. Search through the whole body from head to toe, and look for the I, which has hands.
Let me know what you find.

A thought that says "Me!".

A thought that says: "I" make choices, and then the body obeys.

A thought that says: it's a silly question, because if I wasn't here, then how could there be any awareness of sensing or thinking?

A thought that says: the eye can't see itself. does that mean there's no eye?

Are you saying that the owner of the hands FEELS to be inside the head?

You say ‘MY head’ – so that thing inside is both the owner of the head and the hands?

Find the exact location of this owner inside the head. Pin point it with millimetre or a quarter of inch precision.
Where is its location exactly?

It's nowhere to be found. The feeling of self is so tied up with sight that it feels to be behind the eyes.

Knowing that everything experienced is created by the brain, and that the brain is inside the head, that belief/knowledge/thought reinforces it.

Can you experience the owner of the head / hands / body INSIDE the head at any way?

No. I experience the "I" directly only as a thought. I experience it indirectly, too, kind of--the "I" thought claims other things that happen even when "I" isn't being actively thought about. That it made choices, that it thought thoughts, that it voluntarily moves the body, that it has qualities and tendencies that "stick" to it through time (like that "I" am introverted, for example).

As you go about your everyday life, isn’t it seems that…

- I am the thinker of thoughts
- I am decider and chooser
- I am moving MY body
- I feel the body
- I feel sensation, I feel emotions
- I have a body
- and I am somewhere inside the body, behind the skin
- and I experience the world which is out there (outside of the body), and I experience it through the body’s senses
- I see with my eyes
- I hear with my ears
- I taste with my tongue
- I smell with my nose
- I touch the table with my hands
- I have a life
- life is happening to me
- when there is happiness, I AM happy; when there is suffering, I AM suffering
- I am the one going to bed in the evening, I am the one dreaming during the night, and I am the one who wakes up in the morning

Please go through these one by one. And see if this is what’s happening in your daily life when you don’t think about this topic.

Which points of the above list FEEL to be true in your everyday life? which ones feels the strongest of the above lists?

And maybe is there anything to add to the list?

All of these feel true as I go through my life, whenever I reflect on it. In other words, most of the time, seeing is happening passive without me thinking about it, so there's no "I" that comes into play. When I become conscious of the fact that seeing is happening, it becomes "I am seeing".

So, "I see with my eyes" is less strong, because I think it less often than "I am moving my body" or "I am deciding/choosing/thinking". The latter feel active--something that has to be done by a doer. The senses are more obviously passive and don't require my attending to them.

What do you exactly in order to think?
What do you in order for a thought to appear?
How do you make (or birth) a thought into existence?
Are you the thinker?

How do you decide what to think next?
As you are trying to decide what to think next, are those thoughts about trying and deciding is your doing?
Do you make them happen, or they just appear on their own?
Do you know what will be your next thought, BEFORE the thought appears?

I can't describe what I do to think, any more than I can describe what I do to move. I don't know how I bring forth a thought.

I do still feel so strongly that I am the thinker of thoughts. That I'm what the thoughts occur to.

I've seen that I don't decide what to think next, and I don't decide to decide. That goes on forever. Whenever I stop and think (haha) about it, I remember that all thought is involuntary.

Still, so much of it *feels* voluntary. Without active reminders, I slip back into thinking of "me" as the decider and thinker and controller.

So thoughts are talking to you? So there is a you OUTSIDE of thoughts? Outside of the thoughts/words I/me?
Where is this outside ME?

WHERE is the ME that is OUTSIDE of the story about Gabe?
Is there an outside me at all, or this outside me is PART of the STORY about me/Gabe?

All of it is thought. Thoughts about other thoughts which are also about thoughts.

It's very frustrating. I *believe* that there isn't. I've never *found* any evidence of a self outside of thought. I just can't shake it.

I realize that went through these rather quickly, though in my defense I've looked at them quite a bit and thought them through several times during the hiatus.

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

I realize that went through these rather quickly, though in my defense I've looked at them quite a bit and thought them through several times during the hiatus.

Yes, this was way too quick, especially that it still feels that you are the thinker, doer, etc.

It's very frustrating. I *believe* that there isn't. I've never *found* any evidence of a self outside of thought. I just can't shake it.
I do still feel so strongly that I am the thinker of thoughts. That I'm what the thoughts occur to.

Then this is your truth! You have to be super honest with yourself. Your truth is not what you think to be true, but rather what you FEEL to be true in a given moment.

So please don’t go to the next set of exercises.
Rather stay with this last post and look with them hundreds of times. Literally.
Spend several day, or even a whole week repeatedly looking at thoughts and the notion of a thinker.

Don’t rush. That won’t help. You don’t need more pointers. All you need is here. You’ve got all the pointers you need. You just have to look repeatedly, until the penny drops.

Vivien

[adrivenleaf]

You don’t need more pointers. All you need is here. You’ve got all the pointers you need.

That feels so discouraging and so frustrating! I'll absolutely continue to do the exercises, but I'd like to ask for clarification here. I feel that I've seen clearly the difference between real/experience and imagined/thought, and so I'm now working to on investigating which the "self" falls into. Is that accurate?

I'd also like to give an example of the kind of investigating I've been doing, to perhaps get some feedback? If everything is here, I must just not be looking correctly?

A thought appears: I am hungry.

Typically, that'd be that, and it'd be onto the next thought or action. But if I recognize that I'm having an "I" thought... when I look behind it, this is what happens:

Actual experience (before any labelling): awareness of raw sensation
Thought: That sensation is "hunger!"
Thought: When the sensation labelled "hunger" is felt, it's happening in the body (which is another label, but a label of a phenomenon that exists in reality)
Thought: When something is happening in/to the body, it is happening to "me"
Thought: Is there a "me" experienced within or alongside the undeniable experience of the sensation labelled "hunger", or is that just an unquestioned association of body with the supposed "self" that owns the body?

Thought (conclusion of investigation): the only thing that actually happened is a *sensation* (no self there!) and *thinking* (definitely self in the content of thoughts, but not in the reality of direct experience).

What am I doing wrong?

[Vivien]

Hi Gabe,

That feels so discouraging and so frustrating!

I hear you. But redoing all the exercises is meant to be done alone. I sometimes ask clients to do this, and it always mean to do it alone. Since at the first time, you didn’t really look. You had resistance. And they are meant to be done without even writing to me at all. You are the first one actually writing. I understand that you are frustrated. But you have to understand, that I have about 20 clients, and limited amount of time each day. And when you disappeared 4 months ago, I took on another client instead of you. And now you are back, which means more clients to me, but the amount of time is the same. And you are not the only one disappearing and then coming back, so I have more and more clients, but the same amount of time. And don’t forget that here we are all volunteers. So I cannot spend my whole day on guiding, since I have to earn a living.

But, it’s not just about time. You are running through the questions way too quickly.

I'd also like to give an example of the kind of investigating I've been doing, to perhaps get some feedback? If everything is here, I must just not be looking correctly?

I already gave you a feedback that you understand the difference between thought and imagination well. But the thing is that it’s not enough to understand it when looking, while in your everyday life you still confuse thoughts with reality. And the solution of this is to implement this investigation into your daily life. And for this to happen, you don’t need more pointers.

Many people believe that it’s about the number of pointers they get, while it’s about the depth and persistency of their looking.

Actual experience (before any labelling): awareness of raw sensation
Thought: That sensation is "hunger!"
Thought: When the sensation labelled "hunger" is felt, it's happening in the body (which is another label, but a label of a phenomenon that exists in reality)
Thought: When something is happening in/to the body, it is happening to "me"
Thought: Is there a "me" experienced within or alongside the undeniable experience of the sensation labelled "hunger", or is that just an unquestioned association of body with the supposed "self" that owns the body?

Thought (conclusion of investigation): the only thing that actually happened is a *sensation* (no self there!) and *thinking* (definitely self in the content of thoughts, but not in the reality of direct experience).

What am I doing wrong?

You don’t do anything wrong. This is a nice description. In my previous post I didn’t imply that there was anything wrong with this. Rather it’s about these:

So, "I see with my eyes" is less strong, because I think it less often than "I am moving my body" or "I am deciding/choosing/thinking". The latter feel active--something that has to be done by a doer. The senses are more obviously passive and don't require my attending to them.

And this:

I do still feel so strongly that I am the thinker of thoughts. That I'm what the thoughts occur to.
I've seen that I don't decide what to think next, and I don't decide to decide. That goes on forever. Whenever I stop and think (haha) about it, I remember that all thought is involuntary.
Still, so much of it *feels* voluntary. Without active reminders, I slip back into thinking of "me" as the decider and thinker and controller.

So please don’t be satisfied with these answers. If it still FEELS that you are the thinker, then don’t go to the next post, since you are not done with this one.

When I said to stay with it for a week then I meant to stay with it until these beliefs are seen through or at least lessened.
When I say you don’t need more pointers, I mean that you already have these pointers to see through this. You might feel disappointed, I get that, but it’s really not about how much pointers I give you. I know that the intellect can feel disappointed. But this is how it is. Only just one single pointer could be enough if you really-really look. If you go very deep.

Like these ones.

What is being done exactly in order to think?
Is there a thinker?

When I investigate something, I often stay with a few or just a single question for days or even weeks. And I look 50-100 times a day, with each question again and again. Until the belief falls away.
So it’s not about the amount of questions.

Vivien