The Gate

FYI if you're interested.

Seeing Through The Self Illusion

20th of August
90 min long

4 pm London
5 pm Paris
8 am San Francisco
11 am New York

Link to all monthly Zoom Meetings

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9143364592?pw ... VEMHg2Zz09

Monthly group meetings are free. Just come.
If you would like to donate, I would appreciate it. You can do that through PayPal here.

With love,

Ilona

Thank you for that! I got Ilona's email, too. I've put it in my calendar and intend to go

"Enlightenment is an accident. Meditation makes us accident prone."

Sunryu Suzuki

I've been reflecting on this quote and your words. I can really see the suffering in trying to make something happen, in the mind forcing through thought. Letting go has the opposite energy, is so peaceful and happy, the whole body relaxed. When operating from that "place" emotion and intuition flow.

Last night in my dream I was semi-lucid. I was dreaming of a different partner/job/home than I have now. And try as hard as I could I did not know what my current partner/home/job were. Maybe it's obvious that those things are not self, but in this experience it was all the more obvious that not remembering them, I am still here aware of not remembering. They can't be me.

Meanwhile, in real life my husband experienced in a meditation "breaking into a million little pieces and being everything." He's not even trying to awaken, hmmmmmmmmmmm guess I should not even try, too hahahahaha.

should not even try, too hahahahaha.

Yes sometimes if you're trying too hard taking a break can actually help.

Loving,

Meanwhile, in real life my husband experienced in a meditation "breaking into a million little pieces and being everything." He's not even trying to awaken, hmmmmmmmmmmm guess I should not even try, too hahahahaha.

If he is seeing there is no "self" he can sign up here & answer our checkpoint questions.

Loving,

[/quote]
Yes sometimes if you're trying too hard taking a break can actually help.
[/quote]

Yeah I think that's where I'm at but like you said, balance. Working with just natural meditation, not pushing anything. But not falling into just thinking and suffering from the self view.

If he is seeing there is no "self" he can sign up here & answer our checkpoint questions.

I asked him the questions and he wasn't really interested... He mostly said it's not permanent but very fascinating and he's just interested to see where it takes him. He doesn't want to put labels on it. He also said he experienced something like "stepping out of the [name] skin." And he has experiences of zero distance with sound and vision...

I've been talking his ear off about Buddhism and awakening for years, it's so wonderful to see whatever is happening unfold.

[No response needed]

Hi Stacy,

Is this a common experience, for someone to individually see and understand all the pointers but not "get it?"

I fell asleep listening to an Angelo playlist on No-Self. I woke up to one video about seeing impermanence.

My direct experience of time listening to that video was that there is only one moment, this moment. Momentarily (ha) there is the feeling of just experience. Sound, light, breath, tummy gurgles, etc. When there's no thought, those little gaps between the "I am* thoughts or even just labels or to do's or whatever, then there's just experience. That's it.

It seems like all the other pointers of direct experience of the body, boundaries, feeling, labels, all come back to this absence of a " me who knows," or where I've been hung up on " but I am the perceiver "

My experience of this though is so fleeting, it's like it hasn't stuck long enough to make a big bang. That's my intuition ....that all the ingredients are there but the cake isn't baked.

What do you recommend?

(here's the link to Angelo's video "What is the experience of Impermanence?"

https://youtu.be/b2xI8JHEbXk?si=oLZ21xxuIEq0eNoG

Is this a common experience, for someone to individually see and understand all the pointers but not "get it?"

Yes, unfortunately, because understanding doesn't cause awakening, It isn't needed at all. I think it was Werner Ehrhart who said, "Understanding is the booby prize."

We help you with pointers that should help you to LOOK not understand.

And since it is spontaneous and not controlled by us that probably doesn't really help.

Loving,

Yes, Angelo is very good.

I have a couple of relevant pointers. And did you do the DropBox pointers?

Try this one. Report how it FEELS to SEE.

Doership Exercise

You see that there is no self to be found. Now let’s have a look at the feeling of being a 'doer’.

Take a few relaxed breaths to let the dust settle for a while, and then: Look on your right.

Then look on your left.

Finally, bring your head back to centre, close your eyes and look in front.

Okay, so when you look on the right, the view on the right is seen (whatever that is).

When you look on the left, the view on the left is seen (whatever that is).

And then, when you look in front of you with eyes closed, the view in front is seen (ie ‘black space’).


So, when the view on the right is seen, do you have the ‘choice’ not to see? I’m not asking can you ‘choose’ to see something else like another view or ‘black space’ if you close your eyes. The question is; can you turn seeing off?

Can you NOT see what is seen?

Same thing with the view on the left, can you NOT see the view on the left?

Same thing with the view in front with closed eyes, can you NOT see the ‘black space’?

Can you turn off seeing?

What did the 'chooser' choose?

Did a 'self' choose something?

If you are unable to choose what you're aware of, then what else is there to choose?

Thank you for your email.

Loving,

And while I'm thinking about it, this one. Take your time


Explore ‘Sense of Self’

Let’s say that you have lost your keys and you swear that you left them in your coat. You go to look and check all the pockets - the keys are not there. You swear they must be as that was the last place you remember them. You have a vivid memory of putting them there after you left the house. But when you check they are not there. At this point you can keep believing that the keys are in your pocket, or you can admit you were mistaken.

This is just like that. You may see clearly that the self is an illusion but still feel a sense of self - just like the keys. But feeling something to be true and seeing that it is or is not is different. This is why we may find ourselves coming back to your expectations at the start and at the end.

Now, I’d like to ask you to explore this SENSE of self very-very thoroughly. Not by thinking about it, but by FEELING it. Keep the focus of attention on the sense of self and inquire:

Does the sense of self have a location?

Does the sense of self have a shape or a size?

Does the sense of self say or communicate anything?

If the answer is yes, how does the sense do this exactly?

Does the sense of self have any characteristics or attributes?

What is the sense of self ‘made of’? An image? Sound? Taste? Smell? Sensation? Thought?

What is found?

You don't have to do them again, but LOOK. What do they point to? [/color]

Loving,

Oops lost the draft I was working on Saturday evening, redid this now.

Doership Exercise

So, when the view on the right is seen, do you have the ‘choice’ not to see? I’m not asking can you ‘choose’ to see something else like another view or ‘black space’ if you close your eyes. The question is; can you turn seeing off?

No, choice not to see, seeing is automatic. I can't at-will turn this is off. It feels mundane to see that.

Can you NOT see what is seen?
Same thing with the view on the left, can you NOT see the view on the left?

Same thing with the view in front with closed eyes, can you NOT see the ‘black space’?

No. What is seen is seen. I cannot NOT see it. If the eyes are open light looks one way, closed it looks another or black, but it's all autimatically seen, I cannot choose not to see.

Can you turn off seeing?

The sense organ working or not is not controllable consciously. I can go into an altered state in meditation and no longer process sense input but even that is not really a choice, just something that happens.

What did the 'chooser' choose?

It doesn't seem like there is a true chooser. It does seem like there is choice about what to do, like engage in the exercise, follow the directions, turm the head left or right. But I don't know how choice is made. It's not a mechanism made or truly controlled by a chooser.

Did a 'self' choose something?

No. There isn't anything independent to make a choice. It's all conditions and mechanisms existing in nature. The tree doesn't "choose" to drop its leaves. The monkey doesn't "choose" to like fruit or share it with another monkey. The Maya doesn't "choose" to do an exercise There's a story told about agency, about an agent, but how can there be one?

If you are unable to choose what you're aware of, then what else is there to choose?

It is nonsensical. I can see the lack of choice in when the hand moves, the head moves, what the eyes see, in experiencing sound. I can even see the lack of choice in craving certain foods, getting hungry, having a mood...but somehow think that "I choose" more complex things like what partner to have? Actually, that was definitely not me, I had an intuitive voice that said "that's my husband" same with entering the spiritual path. I want to say I chose to study or chose to accept a job etc but again each of these things is so built up on prior conditions, the choice actually makes itself.

The choice makes itself. I can't see a choice that doesn't make itself.

This struck me when I did the exercise Friday: I've been thinking that because there are choices or there is wil) that there must be a self. But why? It could all just be happening. Denying a self doesn't deny that things are happening. I could already see that preferences, abilities, the bodily functions, moods, feelings, thoughts simply emerge. Simply are. But the sense of choosing, of having will etc seems like they require an agent to *have* it. But why? The system could simply operate that way. No agent required.

I don't FEEL some big thing, but this does feel like once big block down.

don't FEEL some big thing, but this does feel like once big block down.

Good. No chooser. No choice. No free will.

No "self" doing any of these things.

Relax into that.

Loving,