Guidance needed

[Freddi]

Can't find a "me" "I" the produces intention, or thoughts, but focus/attention seems to follow intention.

OK so you can’t find a ‘me’, just thought, intentions, focus etc, that appear to be linked, follow each other.
So if the body goes hungry and the thought comes up ‘I want a fruit now’, who or what is ‘I’, who or what produces that thought ‘I want’?
You ask where the intention comes from. Can we ever say where it comes from? Where do thoughts come from and disappear to?

I would like you to go somewhere and sit still. Out in nature is good, but it does not have to be.
Take a notebook with you. Give me a ten-minute slice of Life. Write down all that is experienced. Just what is happening, what is alive right in this moment. Notice the seeing, the hearing, the smelling, the tasting, the touching. Write it all down, without selection, from a place of choiceless awareness.
If a thought pops up, just write it down as ‘the thought that …’, don’t get involved with the content of it, that is not the purpose of this exercise. Just let it pass like a train that you do not board.
Let me have what you write.
You see, Alessandro, all that buzz and tingle of this moment, that's WHAT IS, everything else is imagined, unreal.
In this event, this happening, can you see/find a separate entity, a ‘me’, experiencing the world from behind the eyes? Or is ‘Alessandro’ part of this unfolding of the moment?

Thanks!

Fred

[kiltro]

The thought is a consequence of the intention to eat, that seems to come from nowhere. However it can also be an unfelt message from body to mind informing of the need for food...then the intention is formed.
It seems there is not an I that control all of this.

Thoughts seems to come from nowhere but are often related to other present perceptions and viceversa.


15 minutes sitting on the bed:
Earing the cat cleaning its body
Earing sound of fridge
Earing neighbour toilet flush
Earing car passing
Seeing hand writing
Feeling the breath
Feeling tension in neck
Earing car passing
Feeling tension in upper back
Earing car passing
Feeling notebook weight
Feeling tension in back
Earing car
Seeing cat moving
Thinking Am I doing the exercise in the right way?
Earing car passing
Earing sound of pancil on paper
Earing sound of fridge
Earing a bip out of window
Seeing cat relaxing
Thinking about looking at cat
Feeling of sheet in hand
Earing hip out of window
Thinking what is that bip?
Earing crickets singing
Earing car honk
Earing car passing
Feeling air passing in nostrils
Earing car passing
Seeing wardrobe
Seeing cat
Earing train passing
Seeing pen writing
Thinking whatever I write is thought
Earing car passing
Thinking about time passing
Earing door closing
Seeing this list
Earing car passing
Thinking there are a lot of car passing
Feeling tension in hip
Earing alarm

There are other things happening when writing..

[Freddi]

Thanks for this glimpse into Life at an address previously known as ‘Alessandro’!

Thinking whatever I write is thought

Yep. All that is translated into words to be written in here is label. It’s not really direct experience. Direct experience would read a bit weird: Something like bump-bump-bump. Wooosh. Bing. Meow. Bzzzzzzzzzz, and so on. And even that is just squiggles on a screen. No meaning apart from what we have given it.

1) So, Alessandro, in all this happening here and now, can you see/find a separate entity, a ‘me’, experiencing the world from behind the eyes? Is there an ‘Alessandro’? Or is it more like ‘Alessndro-ness’ as an expression of Life doing what it does?

2) What about the body? Are ‘you’ the body? Is the body experiencing or is the body experienced?

Thanks!

Fred

[kiltro]

1. No there was not a separate entity, there are perceptions related to body and thougts (more strictly related in respect of other events), all this is labeled as me

2. The body is the body. The body is experiencing and experienced

[Freddi]

The body is experiencing and experienced

Let’s delve into this a little further.
1) Please consider this for a moment. Scan your direct experience to take a good look. Describe ‘body’ in direct experience. Close your eyes, feel the physical sensations around what we call the body. Maybe a tingling sensation here, maybe a contraction there. Look and describe. Where is all that experiencing happening? Our habitual thinking is interpreting it as ‘my arm’, ‘my back’, ‘my head’. Or even ‘fingers’, ‘tummy’ etc. But, in the actuality of experience, where is this experiencing happening? Is it all in the same ‘space’? Can you feel the limits of this space? Can you feel the limits of the body?

2) Point with your finger to your foot. Really look at what we call ‘foot’. See its shape, colour, size, maybe smell (;-)). Is that experienced or does the ‘foot’ experience?
Repeat this with any part of the ‘body’, the arms, the chest, the legs, the nose. Are they experienced or experiencing? Which part of the body does the experiencing?

3) Who or what is experiencing what we call the body? Can you see an entity experiencing, or is there just experiencing?

Thanks!

Fred

[kiltro]

1. There tension in left pect, tension in jaw, pressure of wheigt on glutes, seeing of closed eyelids, itch in ankle, itch in left ear... The experiencing is happening in an variable space, its limits are defined by the experiences. Can't feel a real limit of the body.

2. All those things are experienced, but if talking about seeing the eyes are experiencing not nose or ears.. the experience of seeing is function of eyes, pull out eyes and seeing doesn't happen

3. There is various type of experience, in varios positions in space, that seems connected to body parts

[Freddi]

The experiencing is happening in an variable space, its limits are defined by the experiences.

Really? Is this what is experienced? Or is it an assumption, from years of learning?
Say I feel hunger in the centre part of what is called 'stomach', is that the limit of the body? If heat is felt on the tongue, is that the limit of the body?
Close your eyes again. Observe. Do you assume the limits of the body or do you actually experience them? Can you feel the skin? The tip of the hair? The end of your toes?

if talking about seeing the eyes are experiencing not nose or ears.. the experience of seeing is function of eyes, pull out eyes and seeing doesn't happen

Is that a fact, in your direct experience? How do you know that without the eyes there is no seeing? Have you experienced that? Or is it an assumption?
How do you KNOW for sure, not through second-hand ’knowledge’, that the eyes do the experiencing of seeing, that the ears do the experiencing of hearing, etc.
If you hear the sound of a bell, can you experience separately a sound of a bell, that exists apart from the hearing, and an ear that exists apart from the hearing? Or is there just hearing? Take a good look and let me know what you see, not what you think.
We are here to question all assumptions, Alessandro, so let's not leave any stone unturned. Only rely on your direct experience, your authority. don’t rely on any 'other' authority.

Thanks!

Fred

[kiltro]

1. I was talking about the limits of the space in which happens experience not the limits of the body.
As said I can't find a limit to the body. All I find are experiences that seems happen here and not there, if the experience is happing here the space is limited to here.
Body is a label too, as eyes, and so on..

2. It's hearsay of course. I experience seeing from a point of view.
There is earing and there is the bell, without the earing the bell is still there, the sound I don't know.
If I close my eyes and walk in the room I don't see the chair, there is not seeing. But I crash into it so the chair is there anyway.

[kiltro]

More looking into body limits:
Actually there are only feelings that are then labeled and elaborated by the mind, there is some kind of feelings and the minds label it as hand, foot or whatever. This can happen through language label or an image.
Feeling sensation.. the mind create the image of air touching lightly the skin to explain the sensation.
Is this sense there is no skin or air there is sensation and conceptualization.
Seeing a window, in a sense there is no window, only seeing that is then conceptualized

[Freddi]

More looking into body limits:
Actually there are only feelings that are then labeled and elaborated by the mind, there is some kind of feelings and the minds label it as hand, foot or whatever. This can happen through language label or an image.
Feeling sensation.. the mind create the image of air touching lightly the skin to explain the sensation.
Is this sense there is no skin or air there is sensation and conceptualization.
Seeing a window, in a sense there is no window, only seeing that is then conceptualized

Great, thanks ;-)

There is earing and there is the bell, without the earing the bell is still there, the sound I don't know.

Could you take another look. Can you, in your experience, point to two distinct ‘objects’, the ‘hearing’ and the ‘bell’?
What do you mean by ‘without the hearing the bell is still there’, in what way? Because you see it? Then it is ‘seeing’. What if you don’t see it either? How do you KNOW the bell is there when it is not seen or heard?

If I close my eyes and walk in the room I don't see the chair, there is not seeing. But I crash into it so the chair is there anyway.

How do you know, without referring to or leaning on your thinking and assumptions, that the chair is still there when you are out of the room? Could you ever know?

Fred

[kiltro]

In both cases it's again mind that conceptualize the two objects.
Without hearing and seeing, or other sensorial events, all remains is conceptualization. Ultimately I can't know if the object are there with only conceptualization.

[kiltro]

If I close my eyes and walk in the room I don't see the chair, there is not seeing. But I crash into it so the chair is there anyway.

When I close the eyes there isn't seeing the chair, probably there is a mental process that assumes the chair is there.
If the assumption is not present, in the case of collision with the chair the mind translate the experience in "I have crashed the chair" (actually "shit, the chair") and instantly create the explanation that the chair was present even before the collision.

[Freddi]

In both cases it's again mind that conceptualize the two objects. Without hearing and seeing, or other sensorial events, all remains is conceptualization. Ultimately I can't know if the object are there with only conceptualization.

What is conceptualisation, in direct experience? Look and describe what you see. Is it a thought? Is it real?

If the assumption is not present, in the case of collision with the chair the mind translate the experience in "I have crashed the chair" (actually "shit, the chair") and instantly create the explanation that the chair was present even before the collision.

Exactly, in actuality, you can’t say or know whether the chair is there when you’re out of the room. That would require a way to experience it OTHER than with seeing, touching etc. So outside of seeing, touching, smelling, hearing, there is no chair, as fair as we can tell with absolute certainty. Only the assumption of one. The same goes for sounds, smells etc. Test it for yourself and see if this applies to other senses. For example: does the sound of a bell exist outside of the hearing of it? Does the taste of coffee preexist its experience on the tongue?

On to another pointing exercise. Let’s see if we can find a ‘chooser’.
Choose a drink, for example tea/coffee/another drink or between a couple of objects (blue pen/black pen/pencil). Then sit and see if you can find 'the self' who made that choice? If so, where exactly did that choice happen? Why was one option selected over another? Can you find a choice point (a location of choosing)? Try to describe the process of 'choosing'. Let me know what you find.

Thanks!

Fred

[kiltro]

What is conceptualisation, in direct experience? Look and describe what you see. Is it a thought? Is it real?

Conceptualization can be thoughts, words in the mind, or mental images that try to limits experiences in known terms. If with eyes closed some sensation is translated as hand, there isn't the world hand in the mind but something like a blurry image of the hand.
Yes, those processes are real but can point to something that isn't real.

Exactly, in actuality, you can’t say or know whether the chair is there when you’re out of the room. That would require a way to experience it OTHER than with seeing, touching etc. So outside of seeing, touching, smelling, hearing, there is no chair, as fair as we can tell with absolute certainty. Only the assumption of one. The same goes for sounds, smells etc. Test it for yourself and see if this applies to other senses. For example: does the sound of a bell exist outside of the hearing of it? Does the taste of coffee preexist its experience on the tongue?

No actually it's the same for all the senses.

Choose a drink, for example tea/coffee/another drink or between a couple of objects (blue pen/black pen/pencil). Then sit and see if you can find 'the self' who made that choice? If so, where exactly did that choice happen? Why was one option selected over another? Can you find a choice point (a location of choosing)? Try to describe the process of 'choosing'. Let me know what you find.

At first I can only see a thought come of for the decision. It comes from nowhere.
There is also mental reproduction of the actual experience of the group of object to choose from. For example in case of colors the mind try to reproduce the actual seeing of the colors.
Feelings take place too.
Have to dig more into this

[Freddi]

Choose a drink, for example tea/coffee/another drink or between a couple of objects (blue pen/black pen/pencil). Then sit and see if you can find 'the self' who made that choice? If so, where exactly did that choice happen? Why was one option selected over another? Can you find a choice point (a location of choosing)? Try to describe the process of 'choosing'. Let me know what you find.

At first I can only see a thought come of for the decision. It comes from nowhere.
There is also mental reproduction of the actual experience of the group of object to choose from. For example in case of colors the mind try to reproduce the actual seeing of the colors.
Feelings take place too.
Have to dig more into this

This reads a bit like you imagined doing the exercise. Can you do the exercise and describe what you see?
Really take the time to do this. There is nothing like seeing it in your actual experience. Tell me about the objects you place in front of you. Describe the process of choosing as it is unfolding.

Thanks

Fred