DeTales

[DeTales]

"on analysis.."
is this another way of saying "after thinking about it." ?
Coming back to a description of direct experiencing, would you say "there is awareness (of) seeing" ?
Can you say where seeing happens ? Is it at the Seen or is it in the See-er ? or something else ? (from experience not thought..) and if you say "in awareness", i 'know' that you don't mean that awareness is a thing, so is "in awareness" just conceptual ? (you can describe Seeing as a happening, but you can only describe awareness as about a happening - maybe ?)

This one is important, as indicated by noting that there is a degree of avoidance and resistance about it. This one demands work and some honest looking beyond the facile assumptions of ordinary attention, which is usually a lack of same. Too much "from thought;" not enough "from experience." Juggling concepts isn't going to hack it here. Yes, awareness is always "about," or "of." Awareness requires an artificial separation: subject/object. But they are both equally "seen." Your capitalizations play in here, but I'm not getting it so far. There seems to be a crack, however tiny, in the concepts now, even if it is only a greater willingness to take it more seriously to look with greater intensity. It looks like the believed facility with language about all this is a detriment to clarity.

[vinceschubert]

Anton, just bear with me for the next couple of days. This body is having some post operative complications that's screwing with the mind a bit.
In your signature link below for the blog, you need to replace the @ with a .

love vince

[DeTales]

Anton, just bear with me for the next couple of days. This body is having some post operative complications that's screwing with the mind a bit.
In your signature link below for the blog, you need to replace the @ with a .

love vince

That kind of stuff happens. It is my sincere hope in many ways that your recovery is quick and smooth. Know any Bowen therapists near you? And if you don't mind my asking, what part of Australia are you in? I've a pen pal in Alice Springs, and study the Bowen method originated in Geelong, across the Bay from Melbourne, by Tom Bowen. My wish for you is a speedy recovery.

My experience of post-op weirdness was after they treated a double aneurysm they serendipitously found on the bifurcated artery to one of my kidneys. The initial reason for the hospital visit was for an assessment after I'd managed to run myself over with my car, having been knocked down by the door while trying to jump in to stop it as it rolled towards an embankment. That happened in the haste of getting something for my tackle box and not setting the brake with the shift in N. Had a bruise from groin to collar bones, and would have been very badly off, or even dead, if this body was any thicker, lol! They checked for damage to the liver and spleen, but all that was ok. So the doctor comes in, after some very ominous and vague statements the nurse made much earlier, giving my imagination LOTS to worked with, and when he came in, he asked if I knew that I had a whopping aneurysm. Of course not, and asking how I would have known, he just said that I would have bled out. As it was, he thought that that would happen within a few months, give or take. Made me feel like a walking time bomb.

But the procedure was scheduled, and it was done by a excellent surgeon. Being ignorant that many anesthetics are made from shell fish, I had had a bowl of clam chowder the night before. Long story short, they had to do quite a dance with the chemicals they were adding to my bloodstream while I was on the table, that poor decision on my part effecting things, and they needing to alternately have me awake and out. It took two days at the hospital for follow up and a week of extraordinary night sweats to clean the system of the anesthetics. During that time my faithful caregivers were treated to everything from hallucinatory outbursts to mere damned crankiness. I even called the hospital, it seems, accusing them of leaving an iv in my leg. Quite entertaining, all of it, for sure. Yeah, right. Maybe the story will give you a bit of a laugh. Who runs over themselves with their own car, thus saving their life?

But it seemed to me that you were just letting me cook for a while with the questions, and that is actually good. You do all that you need to do to take care of yourself and get better. And if this is a strain on you, I'm sure that someone else will take my case. It is most important that you recover as fully as possible. A votre sante, egesegedre, and K'plah.

Love,

Anton

[DeTales]

Don't know how you are doing, Vince, but I hope you are well. I'm hanging in there, reading the book and some threads, and looking. Right now I'm just hoping you are OK and getting better.

Love,

Anton

[vinceschubert]

Doing well today Antonio, had a horror couple of days where even large doses of morphine didn't help the pain, but am thankful that i can now romanticise that as i already can't remember the hurt, just that it existed. Amazing thing this organism...
i still need a couple of more days, but the juices are flowing again.
Loved your story of the car. Was it your body that stopped it going over the edge ? Australians have weird sense of humour. Once it is clear that you survived, it becomes hilarious. i can see Charlie Chaplin doing it, hahaha...
Before we get back to 'work', we need to get you out of your comfort zone with language.
So i propose that you keep answers to only your experiencing of the now when considering the questions. That any reference to past input be ignored, and replies are limited to a few lines.
This might reduce the tendency to get caught in concepts. (story)
It's a pre-verbal discovery that we are looking for, and barely enough words to describe it.
It is not an experience, it is the realising of what already is, and always has been.
i know that you know it intellectually, but that path can only take you away from IT (which is not a thing)

back soon

love vince

[DeTales]

Dear Vince,

Ouch! But it makes me smile that you are well on the way to repair. Yes, I'm sure you are right about the language. Agreed. Present tense and short. Whenever you are ready, just be well.

Love,

Anton

[DeTales]

Hi Vince,

I do sincerely hope that your condition is improving. Mine seems to be, if that can be said. There's been a definite reduction in reactivity and story telling. There's definitely a lot less reaction to things that happen on the road, in the news, with friends and neighbors. Less feeling of personal affront and need to fix what's "out there." Definitely less tendency to make up stories or scenarios, but can still see possibilities, mostly without desiring a particular outcome. There's more peace within as I've questioned who it is that is making the comments or judgments about my actions, and there isn't anyone there to answer. It is easier to simply dismiss thoughts and move on than to get involves with arguing. The world feels quieter, even though the I thought still comes up, but it seems more in the way of seeing conditions and dynamics than me as a doer, if that makes sense.

The last few days there's been a disinterest and even frustration at looking for someone who isn't there. It doesn't feel like I'm giving up, but the question comes, "what's the big deal???" Not sure where things are with me, and it seems like thought there is a linguistic habit going on, it gets caught a lot more often and it's like "oh, there it is again." Not too good or confident about self assessment, so I'm looking forward to hearing from you again sometime. I do hope you are doing better in any case. Doing less "Gatecrasher" reading, but still questioning. Avoidance? Hmmm... Glad I wrote, more questions coming! Be well.

Love,

Anton

[vinceschubert]

Ah Anton. The report on your experiencing looks pretty good.
It seems that you see the processes and there is space that allows for new responses.

Not sure where things are with me, and it seems like thought there is a linguistic habit going on, it gets caught a lot more often and it's like "oh, there it is again."

Yes, it's the space that enables the "catching". Once you are no longer identified with the (impressive) language competence, you will be able to use it again with a degree of wisdom (so as not to alienate the less literate) when appropriate. i suspect that you are SEEing this already ?

Glad I wrote

me too.

Be well.

Thank you. i will be better than before soon. i have certainly developed a greater appreciation for the (seemingly) simple things of life. How wonder full to shit or walk.

Anton, Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?

love

vince

[DeTales]

Hi Vince,

The idea of a me as a discreet entity is less and less tenable. Intellectually it is pretty much a given, but as thoughts parade, experiences go by, there seems to be both a lessening willingness to buy in, and more of a space to catch--"hey--that's a presumption that there is something to 'get'!" It occurred to me that if there is no object to discover, there can commensurately be no person ever to not get or get that there isn't. So there's a big interest now in seeing what the relational sub-text of language implies in terms of supporting, or not, the subject/object delusion, while trying to see how even that is just what is when it happens.

To that end, I must thank you for the gateway to insight, joy, laughter, and "whoa! That's right on!" moments derived from viewing your blog and the links that have led me to joyful discoveries. And I'm grateful for you sticking with this despite the challenges your body has presented. Yes, it seems that there is an infinite depth in the simplest of things, and there is no need to look for something outside the moment to appreciate an expanding Universe, a constant creation. All is new when you look through the label and feel the experience.

Namaste,

Love,

Anton

[vinceschubert]

Morning Anton.
In order to move the notion of 'no I' from intellectual understanding to a 'knowing', it is a good technique to focus on the body and its' motivation.
Lift your left hand.
Now staying in direct experience. (no theory)..
Was there an I involved anywhere ? or did it just move.
As you go about your day, continue to observe how the body does what needs to be done and each time it occurs to you to do this, ask the question; "was an I involved anywhere ?"

love

vince

[DeTales]

Hi Vince,

...ask the question; "was an I involved anywhere ?"

Looking at what happens, the body/mind seems to respond/react without "me" telling it what to do or directing things. When that watching is going on, the questions keep coming up, "OK then, why do I see things, or why does it look like there's someone/something doing the looking? Why, if there isn't "me," is everything mentally referenced to this point of view and it's associations?" "Who's deciding?" "What about 'agency?'"

And yet, there's no objective person I can pull out of the hat to call me or I. There's a cognitive dissonance and the increasing sense that I suck at doing this. But then the question comes, "Says who???" Comments come as unbidden as actions or any other thoughts or perceptions. Is life that involuntary? Is this sense of having something to do with decisions and choices so fake that I'm not noticing what this is? Well, no, as "I'm" here. Yet sometimes I see something or read something and it all just stops. There's just a blank, silence and perception. There's the feeling of some kind of clarity missing.

Sometimes it feels like I'm just making stuff up. Or that what I'm doing as this inquiry is insincere and not committed enough. But all that also sounds like someone else talking about me. But it is all automatic, involuntary, and distracting from just noticing about what the body is doing. It looks like you are spot on about the "intellectual" bit. So, back to looking at the body and it's motivation. I see that the left hand just moves. Invariably there seems to be a story that comes with it. It feels like there is someone in my head who won't shut up. But when it shuts up, there's no one there, just what's. It's like looking throws a wrench in the works and there's just noise. And now I'm/it's just blabbering. Jeez.

Love,

Anton

[vinceschubert]

"OK then, why do I see things, or why does it look like there's someone/something doing the looking? Why, if there isn't "me," is everything mentally referenced to this point of view and it's associations?" "Who's deciding?" "What about 'agency?'"

The mind seems obsessed with labeling and finding meaning. Is this the 'job' of the mind ? ..or is it conditioning ? Is it doing it with the intention of maintaining the illusion that an actual I exists ?
Does it matter ?
Is there purpose ?
Does that matter ?
Anton, i have come to (behave as if i) believe that there are three main elements to Reality.
There is what i am experiencing (this is the whole of Reality)
There is Story, which is a real story, but whose content is only about things, purely conceptual. They might or might not be accurate. They happen entirely at a mental level.
There is Everything else, which i call the 'great Unknown'. This rightfully includes the content of the stories above, what matters (if anything does), purpose, whether there is actual "agency", and etc, etc, etc.
Anton, how did the I thing come into existence ? How does it start and how is it maintained ?

love

vince

[DeTales]

Hi Vince,

Anton, how did the I thing come into existence ? How does it start and how is it maintained ?

Good question. thats been a point of interest for me and a conundrum in a way. The I thing must come from a sense of separation. It is a label of discrimination. It discriminates between what is identified with as "self." and what's "out there." But that is a gross assessment. There can't really be a strict division between "I' and "not I" because there is too much "bleed." It doesn't even work on a fairly superficial level of anatomy and definitely not with physics. I mean, yeah, lol, that any examination of boundary shows that there can't be one other than an arbitrary and permeable localization. And there can be no argument that whatever substance this body is composed of, it is indistinguishable from other mass in the respect that it is totally obedient to exactly the same rules as all other matter. This seems to be a point of surprise, I'm sure, when someone realizes they are mortally wounded. I saw someone on the pavement on the way home about an hour ago, in one of the middle lanes, apparently ejected from a car. People around death will tell you that at one moment "someone" is there, and then they are not, and there is just meat. But even that isn't a strict distinction, and not having experienced it that I recall, other than going to sleep, I'm not competent to say what happens to whatever it is that called itself I when it was walking around and healthy. One guess is that they discover they were never there to start with.

So I remember clearly sitting at the low wall of the viewing area at the Yosemite end of the Wawona tunnel. I defy anyone to forget that experience, looking into the valley. Dad had given in to my very young and ceaseless imploring to go with him and my Mother on this vacation. We even had exactly the flat tire I predicted before we took off. But that isn't what was interesting for me about that trip. What gets my attention to this day is that at one point he looked out across that lush and spectacularly framed valley and said "Isn't that beautiful!" It completely startled me. I asked "What?" He said "The view; the trees, the valley, the cliffs. It's all beautiful." It hit me hard: there was something out there that I was to understand as "beautiful." Before, I was just experiencing it, and now there was something to look for called "beautiful" and I couldn't quantify it. Is the tree or some or all of them beautiful? The cliffs? The sky? My mind was in a quandary. I really don't know how to describe it, but looking back, it seems to be the first time I felt separate from something, becoming very aware of the undefinability of a label, and yet being given to understood that it had a referent. Somehow that was a landmark moment for me, as the result seemed to be that from then on I was self conscious, that is to say, aware of myself relative to "out there." Before that it was just what was.

So it seems to me that the I thing is a re-definition of experience from a wholistic experience to a relative one. One has to have that pawn or avatar to relate everything to in order to get along relative to everyone else, and turbulence ensues. It is a proposed hypothetical one seems badgered into accepting and participating with. Language, mores, attitudes, convention, everything supports it. The I thought becomes pervasive and usurps identity by means of divide and conquer. It's a real left brainer. And it gains the momentum of habit and has that re-enforced net of neurons giving it credence. In short, every time I is used and believed to refer to a separate self, the add-on, the mask, is maintained.

So I don't know if what's in front of me is the persistence of vision when the lights go out, linguistically speaking, or what. All I know is that as long as there is contradiction and struggle along with the energizing of the idea of something to be gotten, the I persists as an illusory self. How can something be found which is what is looking for it? How am I to find what isn't there, that idea of needing to find being the not finding? There feels like a lot of mental contortion is going on, probably needlessly.

It's been a long day, the thought now appears, and watching what has been a parade of autonomic activity is what? Bringing forth the idea that it is all verbiage. There's peace when there isn't a story. But Truth can't depend on a story going on or not. I feel frustrated and peaceful at the same time. Things are coming in new flavors, and my dreams are so weirdly un-me as to be not clear who they are about. There is stuff going on, and that is getting to be all I'm sure about. I feel the pulse in my temples and nose. What am I trying to prove? Do I need to? I can tell a great story, but it all feels like BS. It is harder and harder to type something that seems coherent. I don't know what to say. I need to look deeper.

[vinceschubert]

Evening Anton.
Too verbose.
Please do it again in 10 lines or less. (grin)

I need to look deeper.

No Anton, you don't need to look deeper. That is just the mind trying to hijack the show.
When you see a friend, is there any looking before recognition occurs ?
Even seeing is invisible. There is only recognizing.
Is there effort ?
Is there any intention ?
In Experiencing, there is only Recognizing.(not the label, but the process)
What you seek, is closer than your nose.
But don't look, because looking is really not an action, but an openness to seeing. But both looking and seeing are conceptual. There is only the result. The response to the seeing.

love

vince

[DeTales]

Hi Vince,

Motor mouth, huh? :)

No Anton, you don't need to look deeper. That is just the mind trying to hijack the show.

Yes, so there's not me and a mind and the "hijacked" story is what, just another movement of experience postulating a separation that isn't?

When you see a friend, is there any looking before recognition occurs ?

No, it just happens.

Even seeing is invisible. There is only recognizing.

Interesting. Seeing is invisible. You can't see seeing? So being aware of seeing is just another seen thought?

Is there effort ?

No, effort seems to be a function of resolving perceived incongruity. Is there a distinction going by me here?

Is there any intention ?

No, not in the presentation or perception of things, but there is the word, intention, which is relative to movement, or teleology. Intention is in process, not in perception.

In Experiencing, there is only Recognizing.(not the label, but the process)

Yes, in Experiencing there is only Recognition, and mind labels "as if" there is and overlay of a labeler, which seems to be in the area of your last note of "how does the I thing arise or how is it maintained?"

What you seek, is closer than your nose.

Cute. :) Only the buzzing nose. Shades of Peter Shickley. The only thing closer than my nose it the thought that I have one. "A thinker thinking thoughts." Which, ultimately is a thought itself. There is only perception. Included in perception is an over active labler advertising itself as me. Kind of like the pickle skinned alien with four arms hitching on Hwy 101 holding a sign: "Do not suspect that I am not a human being." Except that mind says, presents, "I'm ME!!! I'm ME!!! Look over here!!! Don't pay attention to the fact that there is no man behind the curtain!" The mind is the curtain. Damn. I think I've gone over ten lines.

But don't look, because looking is really not an action, but an openness to seeing. But both looking and seeing are conceptual. There is only the result. The response to the seeing.

I've always liked the Japanese print "Miyamoto Musashi open on all eight sides." Maybe that is portentous. It is subtle. Looking as openness, or looking as for an object. One is Presence, the other is subject/object. Original sin. OK. WAY over ten lines. Damn. Is there an editor in here? :)