I agree with everything you say, at least the ideas. I need to wait for the rest of me to catch up with them.
I was just thinking this morning that dividing sensation up into seeing, hearing, tasting, etc. is nonsense. There's just sensation.
what knows this?
Re: what knows this?
It's very strange looking for "I" and both finding and not finding it. (I'm trying to just report what things seem like to me and not just get the "there's no 'I'" answer from the back of some Non-Duality book.)
I look for "I" and find those sensations--the ones I have felt were "I" all my life.
I find them. They're very present.
But are they "I"? In what sense are they "I"? Why do I think they're "I"?
There's a state of confusion about what those sensations are.
I look for "I" and find those sensations--the ones I have felt were "I" all my life.
I find them. They're very present.
But are they "I"? In what sense are they "I"? Why do I think they're "I"?
There's a state of confusion about what those sensations are.
Re: what knows this?
Where are those sensations?
Re: what knows this?
Some of them I'm written about here before: those "centered" feelings.
When I look for the "self," I have a sort of knee-jerk responses, which is to go to physical sensations, sometimes in the chest or arms, but most-often in the mouth, chin, and lips.
I observe these body sensations, and then usually have the thought "How can they be the self when there's awareness of them? What is awareness of them?"
And then it feels like there's take a step back, and I become aware of something much subtler, of what seems to be aware of the mouth-region sensations. It's hard for me to tell what it is in the body. It feels like ... alertness. Like alertness is what's aware of the mouth feelings. (But what alertness is is hard to say. What makes me think it's alertness? I don't know. That label-thought appears.)
If alertness is body sensations, it's maybe some stuff in the head region. It almost feels like the muscles in my eyes are making them open super wide, like an owl. Maybe they really are doing that somewhat, when "alertness" appears in consciousness.
It then often feels like "alertness" can't be the self, because there's awareness of the alertness. So what is it that's aware?
At which point everything becomes extremely murky. I can't tell what's a thought, what's a body sensation, what's both happening simultaneously ...
There's often a loop of this all happening, when I do inquiry. After that last "phase," when I get lost in murk, I return to "What is the self?" and have the knee-jerk sense that it's my lips and mouth. And then back to "That can't be it! There's awareness of them. What is it that's aware? ..."
Periodically, I have a thought about the "answer in the back of the book," e.g. "There's no self." But these are just thoughts.
When I look for the "self," I have a sort of knee-jerk responses, which is to go to physical sensations, sometimes in the chest or arms, but most-often in the mouth, chin, and lips.
I observe these body sensations, and then usually have the thought "How can they be the self when there's awareness of them? What is awareness of them?"
And then it feels like there's take a step back, and I become aware of something much subtler, of what seems to be aware of the mouth-region sensations. It's hard for me to tell what it is in the body. It feels like ... alertness. Like alertness is what's aware of the mouth feelings. (But what alertness is is hard to say. What makes me think it's alertness? I don't know. That label-thought appears.)
If alertness is body sensations, it's maybe some stuff in the head region. It almost feels like the muscles in my eyes are making them open super wide, like an owl. Maybe they really are doing that somewhat, when "alertness" appears in consciousness.
It then often feels like "alertness" can't be the self, because there's awareness of the alertness. So what is it that's aware?
At which point everything becomes extremely murky. I can't tell what's a thought, what's a body sensation, what's both happening simultaneously ...
There's often a loop of this all happening, when I do inquiry. After that last "phase," when I get lost in murk, I return to "What is the self?" and have the knee-jerk sense that it's my lips and mouth. And then back to "That can't be it! There's awareness of them. What is it that's aware? ..."
Periodically, I have a thought about the "answer in the back of the book," e.g. "There's no self." But these are just thoughts.
Re: what knows this?
Open your eyes wide and close them. Repeat this multiple times. Is that sensation of the muscle behind the eyes working what you're referring to when you say alertness?
Alertness is as observe-able as the mouth sensations which are as observe-able as foot sensations. They're all "out there", none being more "in here" than the others. But if they're all out there, then what's in here? If everything there is is "out there", what's "in here"? Is "in here" anything more than a thought that's observe-able and "out there"? Isn't the very looking for a self as observe-able and "out there" as the rest?
It doesn't matter what you classify as thoughts, sensations, or whatever. It doesn't matter what you classify as self, not self, in here, or out there. All of it is as observe-able as each other. Even the classification of things is as observe-able as the things being classified. So, if it's all out there, including "in here" and "out there", is it really out there? Doesn't the discrimination stop making sense? No distinction between "in here" and "out there", no distinction between self and not-self. There was never any separation in the first place. All the separation that there seemed to be or that there still seems to be is not separate from everything else.
The ideas of "that which is separating", "separation", and "the things being separated" are no more or less observe-able than each other, are they?
What about "that which is aware", "awareness", and "what there is awareness of"?
Alertness is as observe-able as the mouth sensations which are as observe-able as foot sensations. They're all "out there", none being more "in here" than the others. But if they're all out there, then what's in here? If everything there is is "out there", what's "in here"? Is "in here" anything more than a thought that's observe-able and "out there"? Isn't the very looking for a self as observe-able and "out there" as the rest?
It doesn't matter what you classify as thoughts, sensations, or whatever. It doesn't matter what you classify as self, not self, in here, or out there. All of it is as observe-able as each other. Even the classification of things is as observe-able as the things being classified. So, if it's all out there, including "in here" and "out there", is it really out there? Doesn't the discrimination stop making sense? No distinction between "in here" and "out there", no distinction between self and not-self. There was never any separation in the first place. All the separation that there seemed to be or that there still seems to be is not separate from everything else.
The ideas of "that which is separating", "separation", and "the things being separated" are no more or less observe-able than each other, are they?
What about "that which is aware", "awareness", and "what there is awareness of"?
Re: what knows this?
It makes no sense at all.Doesn't the discrimination stop making sense?
That challenge for me is that it makes no sense at all intellectually, and yet still there's some kind of ... clinging, I guess.
I really don't get what's going on. I still feel like a self. But when I delve into what "feel like a self" means, when I question it, when I observe the physical sensations and the thoughts that are involved, they make no sense. They are just random sensation and thoughts, not a "self."
But then ... I feel like a self.
I don't even really know what that means. How can I "feel like a self?" When I look at what I mean, I keep coming back to those arbitrary sensations and thoughts again. I guess it's just some sort of habit of tagging them as a self.
I tried the eye-opening exercise you suggested. If those muscles are what I'm tagging as "alertness," they're only part of it. Or they coincide with it.
Damn I wish this all wasn't so murky.
Re: what knows this?
Could feeling like a self be what it feels like to be trying to figure something out?
Re: what knows this?
Sorry I've been non-communicative. It's been crazy ramping up for Christmas here.
Sometimes. Feeling like a self feels like whatever it feels like in the moment. Which is to say, my mind is very clever about interpreting a wide variety of sensations as a self. What it thinks is a self at one point in time can have very little relationship to what it thinks of as a self at another point in time. It makes no sense.Could feeling like a self be what it feels like to be trying to figure something out?
Re: what knows this?
I seem to get every more confused by the day, which I suspect is a good thing.
I believe some sort of shift is possible, not just because I've heard about it from so many people, but also because I've experienced it via psychedelics. What people call "ego death."
But if it's a shift from X to Y, I no longer know what X or Y are.
Ignorance about Y isn't strange, because I've only experienced it once, on a drug trip, and I can't really remember what it was like.
What's weird to me is I no longer know what X is.
People use all sorts of words for it, like "believing in the illusion of the self," "identifying with thought," "feeling like an 'I'," and so on. But those are just labels. The truth must be something like shifting from one sort of rhythm to another, or one sort of color to another, or one sort of temperature to another.
Isn't it impossible for those of us stuck in an everyday ego state to really understand what it is we're stuck in? That would be like a fish that had never been out of water understanding that he's "in" water.
I believe some sort of shift is possible, not just because I've heard about it from so many people, but also because I've experienced it via psychedelics. What people call "ego death."
But if it's a shift from X to Y, I no longer know what X or Y are.
Ignorance about Y isn't strange, because I've only experienced it once, on a drug trip, and I can't really remember what it was like.
What's weird to me is I no longer know what X is.
People use all sorts of words for it, like "believing in the illusion of the self," "identifying with thought," "feeling like an 'I'," and so on. But those are just labels. The truth must be something like shifting from one sort of rhythm to another, or one sort of color to another, or one sort of temperature to another.
Isn't it impossible for those of us stuck in an everyday ego state to really understand what it is we're stuck in? That would be like a fish that had never been out of water understanding that he's "in" water.
Re: what knows this?
There's no difference between THIS and awareness of THIS.
I kept thinking (not totally consciously) that there's a tree and awareness of the tree, a dog and awareness of the dog. But that's wrong. Awareness is the tree. Awareness is the dog. There's no "being aware of" that's different from the object of awareness.
This means that there's no such thing as awareness.
It also means everything is awareness.
Knowing this feels like being inches away from a shift, but I can also feel the resistance. I can feel it energetically, in the body. In the chest. Like some sort of armor protecting the system against fully knowing.
I kept thinking (not totally consciously) that there's a tree and awareness of the tree, a dog and awareness of the dog. But that's wrong. Awareness is the tree. Awareness is the dog. There's no "being aware of" that's different from the object of awareness.
This means that there's no such thing as awareness.
It also means everything is awareness.
Knowing this feels like being inches away from a shift, but I can also feel the resistance. I can feel it energetically, in the body. In the chest. Like some sort of armor protecting the system against fully knowing.
Re: what knows this?
There is thinking, no thinker
There is hearing, no hearer
There is seeing, no seer
In thinking, just thoughts
In hearing, just sounds
In seeing, just forms, shapes and colors.
There is no agent generating or observing thought. Just one thought then another thought. So it is always thought watching thought rather than a watcher watching thought.
Happy new year!
There is hearing, no hearer
There is seeing, no seer
In thinking, just thoughts
In hearing, just sounds
In seeing, just forms, shapes and colors.
There is no agent generating or observing thought. Just one thought then another thought. So it is always thought watching thought rather than a watcher watching thought.
Happy new year!
Re: what knows this?
Happy New Year!
"New Year" is a funny thing. Its context is time.
I cling tightly to time. I'd like to say my New Year's resolution is to release my grip on it, but I doubt one can use time to let go of time. And, anyway, it's not something I can just choose to do. Mostly, I'm unaware of how tightly I cling to it, but I got a window of insight into it yesterday.
A block for me is "needing" to awaken on a deadline.
There are two things that are scary about time:
- always
- never
As in "You'll always be like this" and "You'll never awaken."
It seems to me (as an intellectual idea, anyway) that I have to somehow embrace always and never. I might dissolve my sense of self in five minutes, tomorrow, in a month, in a year, in 20 years, or never. Though that of course also is time-based. None of it is direct experience, where there is no time. How can there be an "always"? How can there be a "never"? It's not that I need to embrace them. I need to embrace the fear.
"New Year" is a funny thing. Its context is time.
I cling tightly to time. I'd like to say my New Year's resolution is to release my grip on it, but I doubt one can use time to let go of time. And, anyway, it's not something I can just choose to do. Mostly, I'm unaware of how tightly I cling to it, but I got a window of insight into it yesterday.
A block for me is "needing" to awaken on a deadline.
There are two things that are scary about time:
- always
- never
As in "You'll always be like this" and "You'll never awaken."
It seems to me (as an intellectual idea, anyway) that I have to somehow embrace always and never. I might dissolve my sense of self in five minutes, tomorrow, in a month, in a year, in 20 years, or never. Though that of course also is time-based. None of it is direct experience, where there is no time. How can there be an "always"? How can there be a "never"? It's not that I need to embrace them. I need to embrace the fear.
Re: what knows this?
Just ideas. But knowing that won't help. So don't avoid how the ideas of always and never make you feel. But you already knew that
Re: what knows this?
What I'm aware of is frustration.
I watched a Q&A video with non-dual teacher Anthony Dilullo, in which a woman who had been meditating for many years expressed frustration that she still hadn't awakened. Dilullo advised her to go deep into that frustration.
I like that advice. It's hard, though. I think "frustration," which is what I'm often aware of feeling, is resistance. There's something "underneath" it, most-likely fear. Frustration is the body-mind's fight against that fear.
Which is all ideas.
At the moment, I feel neither frustration nor fear. I'm not sure how what's happening--or how long it will last--but I feel good. Good is unusual for me. I have moments of happiness and joy, but my baseline is discomfort. For the past week, I have not felt happy or joyful. I've felt content. It's a physical feeling, a sort of tingly relaxation.
For the first time ever, in ten years of practice, I enjoyed my meditation session, yesterday. For me, meditation is usually a dive into bodily discomfort. This was a sinking into relaxation.
I watched a Q&A video with non-dual teacher Anthony Dilullo, in which a woman who had been meditating for many years expressed frustration that she still hadn't awakened. Dilullo advised her to go deep into that frustration.
I like that advice. It's hard, though. I think "frustration," which is what I'm often aware of feeling, is resistance. There's something "underneath" it, most-likely fear. Frustration is the body-mind's fight against that fear.
Which is all ideas.
At the moment, I feel neither frustration nor fear. I'm not sure how what's happening--or how long it will last--but I feel good. Good is unusual for me. I have moments of happiness and joy, but my baseline is discomfort. For the past week, I have not felt happy or joyful. I've felt content. It's a physical feeling, a sort of tingly relaxation.
For the first time ever, in ten years of practice, I enjoyed my meditation session, yesterday. For me, meditation is usually a dive into bodily discomfort. This was a sinking into relaxation.
Re: what knows this?
Very beautiful. Meditation is one of the more enjoyable activities in life when there is no resistance. Feel what you feel now and feel frustration when it comes.
I've suggested sky-gazing to you before, right? If you try that again now it may feel different
I've suggested sky-gazing to you before, right? If you try that again now it may feel different
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