The Gate

This is challenging. I've been reading and writing a lot lately on "Chris" not existing. However, I don't think this is my direct experience quite yet.
I can't really find "Chris." I can experience my stories. I look down and see my body, my clothes and the stories they tell about me. I'm visiting my parents right now, and am having many conversations this morning. They see me, and respond to me, so they are having an experience of me. I don't know who that me is. I can only assume it's their stories about me, which may or may not relate to my stories about them, or my stories about me and how I relate to them. Those stories influence how I see them, how I feel around them.
I am going to a reunion today. I will see old friends, and I'm guessing revisiting old stories. I wonder right now which "Chris" will be there.
This is difficult. I'm not sure who Chris is. I could say he doesn't exist, because that is what I read, but who is experiencing this moment right now.

Chris,

Good Investigation. Let's check out what you found and reported.

This is challenging. I've been reading and writing a lot lately on "Chris" not existing. However, I don't think this is my direct experience quite yet.

Don't compare your Experience to writing. Use your writing to get stuff out, etc etc. But ALWAYS refer to Experience. It's not about making you have a certain Experience. The Truth is Chris, it's always your experience, you are just believing THOUGHTS and taking them as Truth. I can help you see this, if you are sincere and willing and will refer to Direct Experience, which will bypass the addictive self-referencing story-telling nature of THOUGHTS.

I can't really find "Chris."

GOOD. That's because there is no such thing!

I can experience my stories. I look down and see my body, my clothes and the stories they tell about me. I'm visiting my parents right now, and am having many conversations this morning. They see me, and respond to me, so they are having an experience of me. I don't know who that me is. I can only assume it's their stories about me, which may or may not relate to my stories about them, or my stories about me and how I relate to them. Those stories influence how I see them, how I feel around them.
I am going to a reunion today. I will see old friends, and I'm guessing revisiting old stories. I wonder right now which "Chris" will be there.

Chris. Are you are of how you are taking the 6 sense streams and creating STORIES out of them?
Basically what I see about is Experience, and THOUGHTS about it. Can you see that too?

I would just like to introduce what a STORY is. Since you have already confirmed through your direct Experience there are 6 sense streams, or Experience, and Thoughts about it, which is also experience, I can introduce this concept to you.

A STORY = THOUGHTS which ties together other THOUGHTS + SENSATIONS.

So "there is a separate self" is a story.
"I am reading a sentence" is a story.
"I am on this site to Awaken" is a story

Just be mindful in your own experience how stories are created. This is not to say stories cannot be used, and they will and continue to do so, but they are understood and seen for what they are, a skillful and communicative use of THOUGHTS + SENSATIONS :)


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So Chris... we can try this again, to get you more used to this Shift in your SEEING.
Where is Chris? Can you locate this Chris? Find this Chris for me please. Where is this "I"? Where i this "me"? Write out how you find this Chris, this separate self.

Get back to me with your report, and use our model.

I can't find Chris.

Chris,

Cool. Yeah, there really is no such thing.

What is your understanding of what the "I" or "me" is?

A few experiments that we can do.

1) get up. walk slowly. are you walking, or walking happening?

2) move your hand up and down. is moving just happening, or are you moving it?

3) take an object, look at it. are you looking at, or is seeing just happening?

4) regardless of your response to #2, is there a difference between seer, seeing and the seen?

Please check your Direct Experience, and refer to our model for this.

Hope you are well.

pardon me, I made a mistake, CORRECTION for exercise #4:

4) regardless of your response to #3, is there a difference between seer, seeing and the seen?

This has been challenging. "I" walk and raise my hand, because it's my thoughts, or my direction that tells my body to do it. I did it with very little thought though. In that state, I just felt like my body was moving. I don't know who moved it.
The objects "I" viewed, were "my" perceptions of them.
I don't know who is doing what.
I need to keep looking.

Hey Chris,

When you respond, please respond to each question separately and you can use the quote function to separate the responses.

This has been challenging. "I" walk and raise my hand, because it's my thoughts, or my direction that tells my body to do it. I did it with very little thought though. In that state, I just felt like my body was moving. I don't know who moved it.
The objects "I" viewed, were "my" perceptions of them.
I don't know who is doing what.
I need to keep looking.

So in your previous investigation you said you could not find Chris, and I assumed all you found were the 6 sense streams, am I correct?

Now you are reporting that "I" was walking and raising your hand?

And then you say "it felt like my body was moving. I don't know who moved it"?

There seems to be some confusion and some assumptions. Just CHECK using the model of the 6 sense streams that we established. It should be clear in your Direct Experience then. Report from that please.

Let us add a little nuance and angle for investigation.

Could it be that walking is just happening, and that the hand is just moving, without a doer/agent? Or is there an agent/doer? If there is, can you locate it in your Experience using the 6 sense stream model we have?

You also say that objects were viewed by "I", and they were "my perceptions of them". You have to refer to our 6 streams here. Is there a difference between the "I" watching the object and the object that is watched? Could it be that there is just Experience of SEEING and it is divided by labels in to "seer"+"seen". Could it be that there is just Perception and it is divided by labels in to "myself"+"my perceptions"? CHECK. Does there really need to be a viewer/watcher/seer for SEEING to happen?

So Chris... check the above considerations.

Then answer again, 1 by 1, the following questions after you have done some investigation and REALLY CHECKED:

What is your understanding of what the "I" or "me" is?

1) get up. walk slowly. are you walking, or walking happening?

2) move your hand up and down. is moving just happening, or are you moving it?

3) take an object, look at it. are you looking at, or is seeing just happening?

4) regardless of your response to #2, is there a difference between seer, seeing and the seen?

Please check your Direct Experience, and refer to our model for this.

1) get up. walk slowly. are you walking, or walking happening?

I feel the movement. It is almost voluntary, but it comes from a suggestion. The physical walking is happening, but it is spurred by a thought.

2) move your hand up and down. is moving just happening, or are you moving it?

Similar to the walking, there is the thought of moving my hand up and down, the decision to do it, then the movement is just happening.

3) take an object, look at it. are you looking at, or is seeing just happening?

Seeing just happens.

4) regardless of your response to #2, is there a difference between seer, seeing and the seen?

Seeing is active, an experience. There is no "I" to experience it, only the experience. There is no object, just the experience.

I feel the movement. It is almost voluntary, but it comes from a suggestion. The physical walking is happening, but it is spurred by a thought.

Similar to the walking, there is the thought of moving my hand up and down, the decision to do it, then the movement is just happening.

Hi Chris, just for you to check. What I see here is, there is a READING of the Experiment, THOUGHT, and then HAPPENING, and then maybe another THOUGHT about it ("there was a decision... it was spurred by thought"). Check carefully what you label as 'decision' and tell me which one is more accurate in your experience honestly:
1) there is a decider, and there is a decision made
2) there is just a decision, then just movement
3) there is just a happening that is labelled several things in succession
WHICH ONE IS MORE ACCURATE FOR YOU (TEST IT)?


Another little test:
- Can you Think & Choose a thought?
GO!

1) there is a decider, and there is a decision made
2) there is just a decision, then just movement
3) there is just a happening that is labelled several things in succession
WHICH ONE IS MORE ACCURATE FOR YOU (TEST IT)?

There is the reading of the task, which is an experience, then a thought to try it, then the action and the experience of the action. It seems that # 3 is the most accurate.

- Can you Think & Choose a thought?

Thoughts occur whether I choose them or not.
This is my experience as far as I can articulate it.
Thanks again,
Chris

Alright Chris, focus on those thoughts you can choose, and tell me how that works. Try to think the thought bottles. Choose which one is more accurate in your experience:
1)there is a reading of this, you choose to think about bottles, a thought chosen is bottles.
2) there is a reading of this, maybe some movement or sensation, a thought appears "I can choose a thought about bottles", then another thought about "bottles" appears.

Is there a choice here? Or a seamless experience conceptualized as choice?

Is there an e experience, doer, agent, chooser, self, entity anywhere at all? Investigate with your own daily activities to confirm. Could it be that thee is just a seamless experiencing, an effortless happening, that is conceptualized in different ways?

Is there a separate self anywhere at all at any time in any situation or in any happening?

Look forward to your next response.

Is there a choice here? Or a seamless experience conceptualized as choice?

There is no choice. That would imply a chooser. It feels more like an experience of a thought.

Is there an e experience, doer, agent, chooser, self, entity anywhere at all? Investigate with your own daily activities to confirm. Could it be that thee is just a seamless experiencing, an effortless happening, that is conceptualized in different ways?

There is experiencing. Choices seem to come from the experience. In a flow, that's how it feels anyway.

Is there a separate self anywhere at all at any time in any situation or in any happening?

There are times when I feel frustrated, or threatened, and then that nonexistent self appears and wants control. If I notice it , I can often open up to experience again.

Good Chris...

There are times when I feel frustrated, or threatened, and then that nonexistent self appears and wants control. If I notice it , I can often open up to experience again.

At those times, notice who is frustrated, or threatened, and identify what this nonexistent self is? Is it one of the 6 sense streams (seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling, tasting, thinking) or a combination of them? or perhaps a sense of aliveness/being/presence? LOOK DEEPLY into it.

Would it be more accurate to say
1) I feel frustration and fear
2) frustration and fear happen, but they are not happening to anyone or anything

You say a 'self appears and wants to control'. As we have already determined, the 'self, i, me, mine' is only just a thought. it may point to other thoughts and sensations but that is it. As such... a thought cannot 'want control'. This is perhaps some sensations that are labelled as such?

To simplify,

there is Experiencing, seamless Experience.
but is there anyone Experiencing?
There are emotions, images, feelings, thoughts, sensations, but do they belong to anyone? are they personal? are they happening to anyone? is there anyone or anything feeling them?

You are having insight in to the self-referencing and looping nature of THOUGHTS. As you keep seeing that it is indeed self-referencing, and there is noone there that this is happening to, the 'clutch' or thoughts will naturally loosen. Best not to engage in the content of thoughts, or get in to stories. Simply keep seeing the Seamlessness, and the agentlessness, and the selflessness of all this Experiencing?

You have already confirmed it several times, and you are seeing it, yet thoughts appear to keep self-referencing. Keep showing yourself that there is no self/individual/i/me to reference in actual Reality, just other thoughts and sensations :)

Take some time to do this and get back to me. Your doing great Chris. Keep looking deeper.
Whatever THOUGHT-based-conclusion arise, ask "Is This TRUE?"

At those times, notice who is frustrated, or threatened, and identify what this nonexistent self is? Is it one of the 6 sense streams (seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling, tasting, thinking) or a combination of them? or perhaps a sense of aliveness/being/presence? LOOK DEEPLY into it.

I'm just seeing that self is an experience. I was labeling those "negative" experiences as "egoic." It's all just experience though.

Would it be more accurate to say
1) I feel frustration and fear
2) frustration and fear happen, but they are not happening to anyone or anything

So frustration and fear just happen. They are experiences. When "I" feel like they are happening to me, that is experience too.
There is a greater understanding now of what ego is, what I am. There's just an experience of them. When there's negative feeling, or emotions, that's experience, not evidence of a "me" This has felt like a "breakthough" in a way. I have felt stuck in the circular logic of what is ego and what isn't, but seeing everything as experience has felt very enlightening. Thank you.

You said there is a greater understanding of "what I am". Explain. What are you?

Is there a separate you,me anywhere at all? Was there ever? What about a self? Is there one? Will there ever be?