Using normal language (what wise americans have called "forked tongue"?) I can say that I have seen the absence of a self to my experience. Although as you said, thoughts still come expressed this way, and are often acted upon as if there were a self, no-one needs to convince me that there is no self to this.
Does this need a settling in period? Is there a forum for this? Do I keep talking to you?
Thank you. Thank you for your persistence and for your impatience - which helped me to see that there was a thought saying: Hold onto the "self" perspective until it is ripped away, until it is impossible to hold - in other words, stick with believing thinking. The alternative decision would be to trust experience and assume that the odd thing was believing in an I, that to be a gated being (previously unimaginable) was actually just like this now, normal. This assumption would only "go wrong" when the thought of I, me, mine, is not recognised as baseless... but as soon as it is recognised again the "going wrong" was just a thought and is no longer there.
Maybe another factor was simply gaining greater clarity of distinguishing thoughts and DE, which is vital.
I identify you in grateful thoughts as "Mark", do you want to give me a surname or place to add to that?
Request for a Guide
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
Hey there, welcome back. Sorry not to have replied sooner but I haven't been logged in for a while.
I'm glad that it has all fallen into place for you. What we do now is I ask you some summing up questions. Please do your best to answer from what you have seen -- and not what you think! Once we have your answers I'll invite some other guides to look over our dialogue and they may have a few points they would like us to look at further. Then you are welcome to join our post-gate forums -- you can chat with me and others who've been on the LU road to nowhere there!
1) Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?
2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you seeit now.
3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.
4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?
5) Do you decide, intend, choose, control events in Life? Do you make anything
happen? Give examples from your experience.
6) Anything to add?
I'm glad that it has all fallen into place for you. What we do now is I ask you some summing up questions. Please do your best to answer from what you have seen -- and not what you think! Once we have your answers I'll invite some other guides to look over our dialogue and they may have a few points they would like us to look at further. Then you are welcome to join our post-gate forums -- you can chat with me and others who've been on the LU road to nowhere there!
1) Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?
2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you seeit now.
3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.
4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?
5) Do you decide, intend, choose, control events in Life? Do you make anything
happen? Give examples from your experience.
6) Anything to add?
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
Re: Request for a Guide
1) There is not and never was, nor could there be.
2) The illusion of a separate self is an assumption in thinking, which may start from learned thinking patterns from others. (Speaking in the language of this thinking:) Believing our world of thinking, the socially agreed thought-interpreted world, we fail to notice that this thinking does not match direct experience, and so our thinking remains unchanged. Actually we often operate naturally, living in direct experience, then as soon as we think about it we cast it in a mould of world and separate self. We create an idea of a past which is dualistic like this.
Being clear about distinguishing uninterpreted experience from thinking is vital to realising this mistake.
Another point to notice is that thinking creates an idea of past and future, a life with decisions and choices, a whole world, like a relatively stable dream, and this happens by itself, the thinking is not controlled or owned by anyone, this is not happening to any separate being. It may be hard to accept and realise that all this does not require a person at the centre, experiencing and responding to it.
3) There is more confidence, lightness in daily life. There is no struggle to "find again" this fact of selflessness, though there is a continuing interest in situations where thinking carries on its old ways - and into actions. There is at present no bliss experience, no earthquake-shift, no feeling of having attained anything, certainly not that every last aspect of truth has been seen. Sometimes there are arrogant thoughts about it, seen to be groundless. There are thoughts of gratefulness to those who shared this seeing.
There obviously were expectations that it would be more of a bombshell, because if this is it, it's so simple. Perhaps its effect will grow by itself.
4) The persistence of my Guide, through the sort of argument that it seemed to need, protesting all the objections of thinking and having them dealt with carefully, not dismissed - yet with a sense of impatience from the Guide which pushed me to examine harder. Then it became clear that there was a thought saying: "Hold onto the self-perspective until it is ripped away, until it is impossible to hold - in other words, stick with believing thinking". The alternative decision would be to trust experience and assume that actually the odd thing would be to believe in an I, that to be a "gated being" (previously unimaginable) was actually just like this now, nothing special. This assumption would only "go wrong" when the thought of I, me, mine, is not recognised as baseless... but as soon as it is recognised again, the "going wrong" was just a thought and is no longer there.
So that amounts to realising that it is possible to accept there is no self in the way I'd thought there was.
Another factor was simply gaining greater clarity of distinguishing thoughts and direct experience.
5) What would it be that could choose or control? It happens anyway, thinking is important and useful and leads to actions. It does not need to attribute this to a controlling self.
Things seem to happen with less sense of effort: the effort and what was thought to be making it are thoughts.
6) Gratefulness to anyone and everyone behind this venture, or to whatever is involved in this unfolding.
This is a point in a process, not an end. That is a thought, but could be a useful one.
2) The illusion of a separate self is an assumption in thinking, which may start from learned thinking patterns from others. (Speaking in the language of this thinking:) Believing our world of thinking, the socially agreed thought-interpreted world, we fail to notice that this thinking does not match direct experience, and so our thinking remains unchanged. Actually we often operate naturally, living in direct experience, then as soon as we think about it we cast it in a mould of world and separate self. We create an idea of a past which is dualistic like this.
Being clear about distinguishing uninterpreted experience from thinking is vital to realising this mistake.
Another point to notice is that thinking creates an idea of past and future, a life with decisions and choices, a whole world, like a relatively stable dream, and this happens by itself, the thinking is not controlled or owned by anyone, this is not happening to any separate being. It may be hard to accept and realise that all this does not require a person at the centre, experiencing and responding to it.
3) There is more confidence, lightness in daily life. There is no struggle to "find again" this fact of selflessness, though there is a continuing interest in situations where thinking carries on its old ways - and into actions. There is at present no bliss experience, no earthquake-shift, no feeling of having attained anything, certainly not that every last aspect of truth has been seen. Sometimes there are arrogant thoughts about it, seen to be groundless. There are thoughts of gratefulness to those who shared this seeing.
There obviously were expectations that it would be more of a bombshell, because if this is it, it's so simple. Perhaps its effect will grow by itself.
4) The persistence of my Guide, through the sort of argument that it seemed to need, protesting all the objections of thinking and having them dealt with carefully, not dismissed - yet with a sense of impatience from the Guide which pushed me to examine harder. Then it became clear that there was a thought saying: "Hold onto the self-perspective until it is ripped away, until it is impossible to hold - in other words, stick with believing thinking". The alternative decision would be to trust experience and assume that actually the odd thing would be to believe in an I, that to be a "gated being" (previously unimaginable) was actually just like this now, nothing special. This assumption would only "go wrong" when the thought of I, me, mine, is not recognised as baseless... but as soon as it is recognised again, the "going wrong" was just a thought and is no longer there.
So that amounts to realising that it is possible to accept there is no self in the way I'd thought there was.
Another factor was simply gaining greater clarity of distinguishing thoughts and direct experience.
5) What would it be that could choose or control? It happens anyway, thinking is important and useful and leads to actions. It does not need to attribute this to a controlling self.
Things seem to happen with less sense of effort: the effort and what was thought to be making it are thoughts.
6) Gratefulness to anyone and everyone behind this venture, or to whatever is involved in this unfolding.
This is a point in a process, not an end. That is a thought, but could be a useful one.
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
OK great stuff here. Just a couple of points in Q5 that the other guides would probably want some clarification on so we may as well sort it out now. Firstly, people like you to make clear that it isn't just an intellectual seeing so could you give a couple of examples from recent experience of life just hapenning without 'you' directing it?
And you say "thinking is important and useful and leads to actions. It does not need to attribute this to a controlling self" -- we spent a lot of time looking at thoughts. Thinking just happens. No need for a thinker. But what is it that would know if a thought was "important" or not (another thought?). Do thoughts ALWAYS lead to actions? If not what is the difference between those that seem to and those that don't (like the thought get up get up when in bed in the morning and nothing happens)? When an action happens is it not just a thought that says it made it happen? What 'knows' thinking made it happen? (another thought?) Have another look at how thoughts happen and check if this really supports what you say here.
And you say "thinking is important and useful and leads to actions. It does not need to attribute this to a controlling self" -- we spent a lot of time looking at thoughts. Thinking just happens. No need for a thinker. But what is it that would know if a thought was "important" or not (another thought?). Do thoughts ALWAYS lead to actions? If not what is the difference between those that seem to and those that don't (like the thought get up get up when in bed in the morning and nothing happens)? When an action happens is it not just a thought that says it made it happen? What 'knows' thinking made it happen? (another thought?) Have another look at how thoughts happen and check if this really supports what you say here.
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
Re: Request for a Guide
Or is the question, How much is intellectual, and how much experiential, seeing?
1] Actions: Thoughts don't always lead to actions, no, and what leads to the thought anyway? Say a thought comes: Why don't I ring Esmerelda, whom I haven't talked to for years? If the phone call happens subsequently, could it have done so without the thought? But if the thought did not lead to ringing her, how could anyone say why not? Only by thinking about it, an after-the-event rationalisation.
To answer the "could it have done so without the thought?" would also require thinking (and be a thought) - but thinking exists, even if it is only thinking. It's not that thinking doesn't exist, it's that the things thinking takes as real are not, especially the idea of an out-of-experience self.
Where does that leave us? There being no director of thoughts, or of actions, we cannot say where thoughts or actions come from, or if they are connected, other than by thinking about it. So you're right, there is no experiential proof that "thoughts lead to actions". Thank you.
2] Importance: Looking at this again it's clear that saying that thinking is important must be a thought. Important is a conceptual judgement. But my statement reveals a lack of trust in experience which I brought up before, the thought that if thinking is undirected it could lead to regrettable actions or words; also that if thoughts are seen to be as unreal as dreams, nothing would matter, life would be random, nihilism etc.
Considering this thought now, thoughts ARE as unreal as dreams, they are undirected in the sense of there being no independent self to direct them, so the choice is to trust this truth or not (which would be to trust the thinking).
So thoughts still come which are not seen in the light of direct experience, the full force of post-gate seeing has not yet emerged!
3] Examples: As I said, it's not an earth-shattering difference - is it only a change in thinking? Thinking: well that just happened, didn't it? Or: well I guess it will just happen one way or the other, won't it?
I used to have a book of meditation notes and little insights which came to me, I called it "Everything I write is a thought" Everything I write here is too. Surely thoughts have to be informed by direct experience of selflessness for it to be more than intellectual? There is no doubt that no self is experienced, only thought of - how can this not affect the way life is perceived?
Is it just intellectual 'seeing'?
1] Actions: Thoughts don't always lead to actions, no, and what leads to the thought anyway? Say a thought comes: Why don't I ring Esmerelda, whom I haven't talked to for years? If the phone call happens subsequently, could it have done so without the thought? But if the thought did not lead to ringing her, how could anyone say why not? Only by thinking about it, an after-the-event rationalisation.
To answer the "could it have done so without the thought?" would also require thinking (and be a thought) - but thinking exists, even if it is only thinking. It's not that thinking doesn't exist, it's that the things thinking takes as real are not, especially the idea of an out-of-experience self.
Where does that leave us? There being no director of thoughts, or of actions, we cannot say where thoughts or actions come from, or if they are connected, other than by thinking about it. So you're right, there is no experiential proof that "thoughts lead to actions". Thank you.
2] Importance: Looking at this again it's clear that saying that thinking is important must be a thought. Important is a conceptual judgement. But my statement reveals a lack of trust in experience which I brought up before, the thought that if thinking is undirected it could lead to regrettable actions or words; also that if thoughts are seen to be as unreal as dreams, nothing would matter, life would be random, nihilism etc.
Considering this thought now, thoughts ARE as unreal as dreams, they are undirected in the sense of there being no independent self to direct them, so the choice is to trust this truth or not (which would be to trust the thinking).
So thoughts still come which are not seen in the light of direct experience, the full force of post-gate seeing has not yet emerged!
3] Examples: As I said, it's not an earth-shattering difference - is it only a change in thinking? Thinking: well that just happened, didn't it? Or: well I guess it will just happen one way or the other, won't it?
I used to have a book of meditation notes and little insights which came to me, I called it "Everything I write is a thought" Everything I write here is too. Surely thoughts have to be informed by direct experience of selflessness for it to be more than intellectual? There is no doubt that no self is experienced, only thought of - how can this not affect the way life is perceived?
Is it just intellectual 'seeing'?
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
OK thanks for this. I'll invite some othre guides to review our time together and we can see if they have any things they'd like to bring up.
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
Hello, just a couple of requests for some clarification around thoughts from other guides:
You say "So thoughts still come which are not seen in the light of direct experience, the full force of post-gate seeing has not yet emerged!"
When you look, are you able to see the difference between these thoughts and direct experience, to see the stories AS stories?
Is seeing this something that can gain momentum? What would full force post-gate seeing be like?
When you say in Q2, the "illusion may start from learned thinking patterns from others" what is your actual experience of others? (How do ‘others’ appear to you in direct experience. How is it known what others think)?
You say "So thoughts still come which are not seen in the light of direct experience, the full force of post-gate seeing has not yet emerged!"
When you look, are you able to see the difference between these thoughts and direct experience, to see the stories AS stories?
Is seeing this something that can gain momentum? What would full force post-gate seeing be like?
When you say in Q2, the "illusion may start from learned thinking patterns from others" what is your actual experience of others? (How do ‘others’ appear to you in direct experience. How is it known what others think)?
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
Re: Request for a Guide
Somehow when I checked the site for your reply I did not find this reply of 18 feb, and didn't get or see an email notifying that it was there. Now I was going to contact you to see what's up, and there it is.
Yes, sometimes only after a while, and somehow the difference between stories and experience is 'black and white', chalk and cheese, it's everything.
The seeing could not change, no. The thought was - only a thought - that any selfing thoughts which come habitually would be undermined in the light of the clarity of direct experience. Actually that does happen, maybe that is something that gains momentum?
re Q2 I have just looked back at all the questions before seeing this, and that bit stood out. It's just an idle thought, a story, a maybe.
Yes, sometimes only after a while, and somehow the difference between stories and experience is 'black and white', chalk and cheese, it's everything.
The seeing could not change, no. The thought was - only a thought - that any selfing thoughts which come habitually would be undermined in the light of the clarity of direct experience. Actually that does happen, maybe that is something that gains momentum?
re Q2 I have just looked back at all the questions before seeing this, and that bit stood out. It's just an idle thought, a story, a maybe.
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
Ok thanks for your replies let me check with other guides. Please 'watch this space'.
Mark
Mark
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
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Jack'n'theBox
- Posts: 749
- Joined: Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:55 am
Re: Request for a Guide
No more questions from other guides. Please check your PMs for a message on how to join groups (this may take a day or two to come through). Most groups are on facebook so if you don't have an account you may want to start one. See you on the other side. Mark.
People see it far away. What a pity! They are like a man who, standing in water, complains of thirst -- Hakuin
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