I want to understand.

[Jack'n'theBox]

I couldn't find any boundary between me and everything else. 'Me' was superfluous. There is just experience. I can see that rationally but no great realisation as yet.

Ok great. So just to check -- let's put this another way: In experience can you find some things that are "me" and some things that are "not me"?

Take two objects, for instance -- say your hand and your phone. Does one seem to be more "me" than the other? What is it that makes some sense arisings seem to be "me" and others "not me"?

Check this out with other sensations -- say the sound of breathing vs sound of a bird or a car passing -- "me" or "not me"? Are these distinctions still being made, and if so what is making them? What is the mechanism that makes some sense arisings more "me" than others?

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark
I am wondering what country you are in, another time zone perhaps, as you posted at 4.30 am, or are you an insomniac?

The sense arising that are 'me' are things that I use and have a sense of ownership about. My hand is attached to this body -mind and my phone, glasses clothes etc are used by it. Even though I have not found a self in the body -mind I still have this sense of ownership, these are mine, they belong to me. I don't have a sense of ownership about a bird or its song or the road even though I walk or drive on the road. I don't have a sense of ownership of the sound of breathing as breath is just the wind coming in and out.

This all sounds ridiculous as I have said that 'me' was superfluous in experience and I've said there are no objects if there's no self, but that's where I'm at. I'm struggling with this.

Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

Hello Gardenia, my job involves working n a computer so I tend to log in at all times of day (and night!)

Even though I have not found a self in the body -mind I still have this sense of ownership, these are mine, they belong to me.

Right. Not to worry. The purpose of me asking questions is to bring out beliefs like this so that they can be investigated -- so let's have a look! It's no surprise that the mind struggles with this as it is the activities of mind (thought in particular) that set up duality in the first place. It's partly a trick of language:

We say "It's raining" but where is the "it" that is doing this? In direct experience there is simply water falling. Or,
We say "The weather is nice today" but where is this "weather" that is being nice? All we find in direct experience are blueness, brightness, the gentle flow of air and pleasant sensations.

Where is the "it" that rains?
Where is the "weather" that is being nice?
Where is the "I" that owns body parts?

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark
I am not getting this so here are my musings:-

Experience is just sights, sounds, thoughts, smells, tastes and tactile sensations. But the organs/sense bases are located in this body-mind. I cannot find a self/I that experiences these appearances.
I was in an aquafit class this morning and was noticing that 'I' was following instructions and 'my' body was moving appropriately. I could see that an 'I' didn't need to be there as everything happened in response to something else. Same driving a car, just a series of responses to happenings. Decisions are made unconsciously, just as responses.

BUT it still felt like 'me' there as other people recognised 'me' and said hello. So I think I am identifying with the body-mind. My reflection in the mirror says it's 'me'.
The body-mind is the psycho-physical organism. namarupa. Organisms have a life force. Am I identifying with that or is that just energy? Energy just goes towards things or away from things. I saw that as 'ego' when I did a direct pointing process before.
Apparently one always has a sense of self even when one has seen through the 'self'. I have heard that anyway. So do I just have a sense of self that owns things and body parts? That doesn't make sense as a sense of self is momentary and just there as needed.
So it must be just a thought that thinks it owns things. But we have ascertained that thoughts don't think!
Is it just convention that we think we own the things around us? But that would just be a thought too.
So I cannot find an 'I' that owns body parts but still have that feeling. It seems that I am identifying with something that isn't there! Ho Hum!

[Jack'n'theBox]

Hello Gardenia, there’s a lot here so let’s go through it little by little, OK?

Firstly I’m mindful of your original post entitled “I want to understand” – please relax about this and just allow for the possibility that “understanding” in the sense we are looking for it here, often called “insight” in a Buddhist context, is not a mental event – it doesn’t take place in thought. “Mind” is the wrong tool for this job. So the questions and speculations you ask above – although valid on the level of mind – can’t help us here.

Just trust your intuition that you are "identifying with something that isn't there" -- let's have a look to see if we can find what is actually going on.

Let’s look at a couple of things from your post, mindful of the fact that you have recognised an enduring identification with “body/mind”:

Experience is just sights, sounds, thoughts, smells, tastes and tactile sensations. But the organs/sense bases are located in this body-mind.

Is this your direct experience or is it an assumption that sense organs are located in a specific place?

In the dream, dream Gardenia may go for a walk in a beautiful garden, looking at the flowers, smelling the roses, listening to the birds and feeling the breezes – but is it dream Gardenia’s eyes that see, ears that hear, skin that feels?

Just be aware of sensation as it is happening now – do you have direct experience of eyes seeing and of ears hearing and of skin feeling? Or are there just sights, sounds and sensations turning up “somewhere”?

Where are sense arisings “received” as it were – do sights appear in the eyes? Does sound appear in the ears? Does sensation appear in the body? Please reflect on the “space” in which experience shows up – is that space the “body/mind”? Just take a look.

My reflection in the mirror says it's 'me'.

Sorry, but this made me laugh – can a reflection talk?
What is it that says the colours and shapes showing up in a mirror are “me”?

So today’s koan is: Where is anything happening?
Don’t try to figure it out conceptually – just look.

xx

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark

I don't mind you laughing at all, better than making you cry! It was just a figure of speech not to be taken literally.

But I can see I am trying to think my way to insight. I told you I was more a head type. I found it difficult to be in direct experience before. I'm probably trying too hard so thanks for the advice to relax. That helps. x

As to where anything is happening this was very interesting to notice. Things happen everywhere with no particular location. Experience is just full of appearances. There are no boundaries of anything. It took me a while to see this and then I felt a bit stunned. I suppose I saw it before when I said there was no inside or outside but it seemed clearer this time and there was definitely no room for me and no sense organs!

Don't know what to say about dreaming though.
Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

Hi Gardenia -- feeling stunned is good! The mind likes to be in control and it does this through believing in its stories. What we are doing here is turning up evidence from direct experience that shows these stories to be fictions. At some point the mind gives up and then it is seen.

Things happen everywhere with no particular location. Experience is just full of appearances. There are no boundaries of anything.

OK great.

So the above begs the question "Is there someone here who is 'having' these experiences?"

Open your eyes and look at the shapes and colours that spontaneously appear -- are they appearing to "someone"?

Notice the ambient sounds in the room as they arise and pass away -- is there a "someone" listening to them?

Allow attention to rest on the sensations arising in "the body" -- is there an owner of these sensations?

If there is still the belief (or perhaps sensation) that there is a "someone" who is the recipient of all this stuff going on -- try to locate that "someone" within an inch or two of its exact location. Where is it?

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark

I'm afraid to all those questions I am getting a small voice saying ' yes me'. It seems to come from my heart.

I feel a bit confused about it as what I have said doesn't accord with my earlier experiences. I don't have a very strong sense of 'I' generally unless I am reacting to something. I suppose it's such an unconscious belief that I don't notice it.

Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

Hi Gardenia,

I'm afraid to all those questions I am getting a small voice saying ' yes me'. It seems to come from my heart.

OK! That's fine. Here at LU we don't try to persuade you of anything -- the belief "there is no self" is just the same as the belief "there is a self" if you see what I mean -- it's not about belief (i.e. thoughts) but about directly seeing/experiencing something.

So this "small voice" -- is that a thought? Is it thought that is protesting? Or have you "found" an actual self that talks!?

Before carrying on let's get completely clear about the difference between thought and direct experience (DE)

Our approach here does not rely on what thought might say about anything. We look to ‘direct experience’ (DE) – this means the sensations and the feelings/emotions that arise from moment to moment. Thoughts are included in DE too – but thoughts as mental objects – not their content. For example you may have a tingly, rumbly sensation in the stomach area and the thought ‘time for lunch’ may arise – the thought is a mental object – it is observed happening – but if you were to start thinking about what to have for lunch, where to go for lunch, who to have lunch with – you are ‘elaborating’ – lost in ‘thought story’ (papancha). It is important that you stay with DE and not get lost in mental elaboration.

To get a sense of what I mean here – try this exercise:

Now I’m going to ask you to get right into your experience of the moment. Sit in a chair and bring awareness to all the contact points your body has with the chair and the floor. Feel the sense of pressure in your feet, move up to the pressure in the backside and the back. Close your eyes and focus just on the raw experience – ignore the ‘inner picture’ that has constructed the experience as ‘my body sitting in a chair’. Can you feel where the body ends and floor/chair begins or is the experience itself seamless?

Without using thought – before thought intervenes – what is the nature of the experience? Where is the experience taking place? What are its qualities? Is there a ‘centre’ to this experience? Is there a ‘thing’ separate from the sensations that the experience is ‘happening to’? When thought tries to intervene, don’t follow it, allow awareness to remain in the raw experience. Do this several times for at least ten minutes. Report back what you find.

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark
I have been quite busy today and am just back from my Buddhist chapter meeting. So I would like to take more time over your exercise and I also want to relook at the questions in your previous post again. I have done the exercise 3 times so far but feel too full up to write at length to you and I don't want to rush it. So I'll post about it tomorrow.
Regards Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

OK!

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark
When I do the exercise the chair disappears altogether. There is just pressure for a while.

Then the experience widens out, or I am just aware of more. The nature of the experience is open and spacious, timeless.

The experience is everywhere, all encompassing.

Its qualities are openness, warmth, inviting, expansive, freeing, tender, uplifting.

There is no 'centre' to the experience.

There is no 'thing' separate from the sensations that the experience is happening to.

It reminded me of one of my favourite poems by Shabkar:-

Without a centre, without an edge,
The luminous expanse of awareness, that encompasses all-
This vivid, bright, vastness;
Natural, primordial presence.

Without an inside, without an outside,
Awareness arisen of itself, as wide as the sky,
Beyond size, beyond direction, beyond limits-
This utter complete openness:
Space, inseparable from awareness.

Within that birthless, wide-open expanse of space,
Phenomena appear- like rainbows, utterly transparent.
Pure and impure realms, Buddhas and sentient beings
Are seen, brilliant and distinct.

As far as the sky pervades, so does awareness.
As far as awareness extends, so does absolute space.

Sky, awareness, absolute space,
Indistinguishably intermixed;
Immense, infinitely vast-
The ground of samsara,
The ground of nirvana,
To remain, day and night, in this state -
To enter this state easily - this is joy.
Emaho!

I can see that there is nothing there that could be called a self in my experience, but somehow I still cannot say there is no self! Does that make any sense?

I can infer it but that would be a thought and not DE.

I suppose I am resisting what is there or not there.

I tried the exercise 5 times to see if it would go deeper but it didn't. Disappointing.

Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

Thanks for doing the exercise so diligently Gardenia.

I can see that there is nothing there that could be called a self in my experience

Right.

but somehow I still cannot say there is no self! Does that make any sense? I can infer it but that would be a thought and not DE.

Yes. I see. The good thing here is that you have recognised the difference between a thought (inference) and direct experience. That's why I said earlier that the belief "there is a self" and "there is no self" are the same thing -- they are just inferences in thought and that's not what is being pointed to here.

I tried the exercise 5 times to see if it would go deeper but it didn't. Disappointing.

OK but remember insight into the absence of a self isn't a "state" that we dwell in. Can you dwell in the state of "no Santa"!? It's a change in orientation that makes some experiences more accessible but it has nothing to do with higher states of consciousness or anything like that. I think what Shabkar is pointing to is the realisation of non-duality. That comes a bit further down the path. Seeing through the self-view is a step in that direction.

So we've looked at "where" is anything happening?

Let's look now at "when" is anything happening?

What is your experience now of anything past?

What is your experience now of anything future?

Can you find the present moment? Does it have a duration?

[Gardenia]

Hi Mark
I meant to say yesterday that 'timeless' was one of the qualities of my experience in that exercise. I had it written in my notes that I jotted down after each try but somehow missed it out when writing to you as I was tired.

Also just to say that I have never believed that time exits. It is just a concept that is useful as a way of monitoring what happens in life. Language solidifies it.

My experience of anything past is a thought about past events experienced in the present.

My experience of anything in the future is an imagined fantasy thought in the present.

The present moment is ungraspable as it is gone in a flash, so fleeting it cannot even be identified. So really it is just a thought too.
regards Gardenia

[Jack'n'theBox]

Hi Gardenia,

I have never believed that time exits. It is just a concept that is useful as a way of monitoring what happens in life. Language solidifies it.

Great. Good to notice this.

As you said before:

The nature of the experience is open and spacious, timeless.

Right. But if we asked a regular person how they would define themselves then it is not these qualities that would spring to mind. Probably they would say that they were confined in a body in a specific place with a limited timespan. Is that your experience? Are you a person in a body?

As you sit quietly and notice the open, spacious and timeless nature of awareness -- have a look to see if it has any characteristics of the "person" -- can you find anything anywhere that has an age, a job, an opinion, likes and dislikes, a gender?

Can you find a thing or person that is "being aware"?

Is awareness a quality that the "I" possesses?

If so can you find this "I"?