The Gate

Welcome home, Izzy.

I felt tears of gratitude when I read this. Thank you so much Staci.
I feel wonder and also just keep taking breaths "can this be so?"
yes I'd like to attempt the questions if you think it's the right time

You're so welcome.


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

2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you see it now.

3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.

4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?

5) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

Describe intention & give examples from experience.

Describe free will & give examples from experience.

Describe choice & give examples from experience.

Describe control & give examples from experience.

What makes things happen? How does it work?

What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

6) Anything to add?

Loving,

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

so when I look carefully I can't find this separate self anywhere. I haven't somehow 'got rid' of it, it just isn't and wasn't ever there. things happen, but there's not a separate 'me' controlling from outside.

2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you see it now.

the illusion of a separate self seems to me to be a way of interpreting experience. a sort of series of thoughts which cause a stepping back from actual experience and just getting caught up in the content of thoughts and imagining they are something real. So for example I can think "oh that's made me angry" but when I relax into just seeing what is there, there is just some physical sensations and a lot of fast-moving thoughts. in that moment I can see that the only thing causing discomfort is the thought itself, nothing to do with another, just believing the content of those thoughts. it's as if the illusion of a separate self adds a 'layer' of something tangled on top of just experiencing what is happening. Feelings, thoughts, the "me-ness" of things are still there as they were before, but I don't have to get caught up in these things in the same way

3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.

I think the biggest feeling is relief to really to see this. Before I started this dialogue I'd had moments of seeing but didn't know how to do that in a more ongoing way. The past few days I've just felt that life is more 'real' and also that it is in many ways also the same. the changes seem to be subtle, like what I am is part of things, not someone who experiences and affects things from the 'outside'. At the start of this dialogue I somehow thought that "I" would see through something and change. Now I feel that I am part of change, if that makes sense. As if before I had taken some aspects of experience and tied them up into a bundle and made them solid. What I notice now is that familiar, thoughts and behaviours still happen, but instead of getting caught up in them and drawing lots of conclusions, they feel more like billows of smoke rising from a fire which then blow away, leaving things just as they are. I don't know if this will make sense, but I feel as if the world has been trying to show itself to me but somehow I've been trampling over the top of it while thinking about something else. It's as if I've been able to stop, look around, see and hear the beauty of what is there. Another way of describing it would be to say it's as if I have been in a train travelling through beautiful countryside and I've been trying to reach out the window and grab on to branches as we go, but now I am sitting in my seat appreciating the view!

4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?

Well looking back at the dialogue I think it was the pointer where Stacy you asked me to look at the word 'GREEN' and say what I saw. I knew intellectually what was being asked but when I actually LOOKED then so many things just fell into place. The difference between the IDEA of something and the EXPERIENCE of something.

5) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

I'd describe decision as an interaction with the world that involve thoughts and actions moving in a particular direction, like this morning making the decision to try and finish answering these questions, just the thought coming, then following that with seeing, reading, considering, typing .....without adding to it. Not so much "me" making the decision as interacting with what is there.

Describe intention & give examples from experience.

wow this is difficult to say! so it's not like I have stopped doing things or am just lying watching the sky. It's awarenessag of an interaction with the world, a directionality. Seeing how things can move in a certain direction but there's nothing added to that movement. The movement is just the movement. simple. So in a way intention is part of all that happens today, like making oatmeal for breakfast including holding the spoon, hearing the oatmeal boil, tasting the sugar, thoughts about what might taste good that were a part of that.

Describe free will & give examples from experience

.
Free will is just those things above. Like moving through the world in a particular way. I could have had toast for breakfast and not oatmeal! A different thought, a different set of seeing, touching, tasting etc. It's not like there is no choice, things arise, thoughts arise, they just come and that doesn't feel like a choice, but within all that there is a directionality, a responsiveness to what happens that could be described as free will. There's a freedom not to have to get tied up with the content of the thoughts that come.

Describe choice & give examples from experience.

It seems to me this is really the same as free will. Choice seems like the ability to move in a particular direction given what is in current experience (I can see I am being a bit repetitive here, I think it's because it's hard to describe it) Like this morning I could say "I chose" to put on these clothes, but what happened is there was seeing the clothes, thoughts about the clothes, touching the clothes....... just quite quickly one after another.

What makes things happen? How does it work?

Things happen by themselves! There is an arising of sense experience and thoughts, a movement within that, like an unfolding of experience. No one needs to "make" it happen. It just happens, all the time, even if we try to break it into chunks and label it.

What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

I'm responsible for believing or not believing the content of my thoughts. So this morning for example I read a text from a friend with some news that was unwelcome. I could see those fast-moving thoughts arising, opinions about my friend, about the causes of what happened, unpleasant and unwelcome. I found I was able to ask myself if those thoughts were true, related to anything real. I felt I dropped back into seeing directly what was happening in my mind and body.

6) Anything to add?

Gratitude for having someone freely give their time and knowledge to help me in this way - what a gift, Stacy. What a gift in this beautiful world.

Beautiful! I love #3

Just a little clean up on "intention" & "free will."

It's not like there is no choice, things arise, thoughts arise, they just come and that doesn't feel like a choice, but within all that there is a directionality, a responsiveness to what happens that could be described as free will. There's a freedom not to have to get tied up with the content of the thoughts that come.

Are you sure there's a "choice?" or "intention? " or "free will? "

I probably should have given you some of this before I gave you the question.


Try this:


Drink Exercise

The aim of the following exercise is to discover whether the function of choice can really be found or confirmed in actual experience. The idea of making ‘choices‘ is a very clear example of a function that we wrongly identify as the basis of our identity.

Here's what’s needed - a chair, a table and two different drinks. Any two drinks you like are okay for this: coffee, tea, milk, water, juices, smoothies, beer, wine, etc.

Preparation - Place the two drinks side by side on the table in front of you, sit comfortably on the chair and mentally label them as drink A and drink B.

Experiment - Finding the function of choice

Sit for a few moments, take a few relaxed breaths and let the dust settle. When you feel ready:

1. Look at drink A and at drink B. Think about their respective qualities, the things you like about them, compare and weigh the pros and cons of each. See if a preference is manifesting for one or the other.

2. Count to 5.

3. Choose one of the drinks. Pick it up and take a sip.

Questions:

Remember that we’re looking for some kind of function, a something, an ‘I’ which is doing the ‘choosing’.

In step 1 when thinking about their respective qualities, did you ‘choose’ the qualities? Or did they kind of appear by themselves? If some preferences manifested, did you ‘choose’ these preferences? Or did they just pop up by themselves?

In step 2 when you counted to 5, if the preferences took the back seat while the numbers took the front seat, did you ‘choose’ this sequence of event? Did you ‘choose’ to shut down the preferences to give way to the counting?

Did you directly experience a mental function or faculty doing the ‘choosing’? Have you seen this function in action?

In step 3 where you made a choice, did you actually witness or directly experience a mental function or faculty doing the ‘choosing’? Did anything arise that announced, ‘I am the chooser’? If so, what does this function look like?

Sometimes we describe this sense of choosing as a ‘feeling’: It feels like ‘I’ did the 'choosing’. But the question is, can a feeling ‘choose’? Is it in the nature of a feeling to 'choose’?

Loving,

By the way...

Vince's meeting is tomorrow.

There are 3 meetings & a set of 5 videos you're invited to attend:

Thursday Meetings.

Hi Guys,

we are Luchana & Lubo, guides at LU.

Here is an invitation for you:

Join us each Thursday, 6 pm CET, UTC+1
and let's explore together what is already here.
Let's enjoy together this beauty called Life
MEETINGS ARE ON ZOOM and LIVE on youtube.

To participate in the meetings, send a request to luchanauzunova@gmail.com

You will receive an e-mail confirming your participation and a link to join.

Looking forward to seeing YOU!
Luchana & Lubo
__________________________________________________

Meet up with vince (For LU seekers & guides)

Monday August 14

6 am Sydney (est) Australia
Every 2 weeks after that.

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86991485768?p ... 12Um5DQT09

Meeting ID: 869 9148 5768
Passcode: 083035

Let him know if you want email reminders.

Vinceschubert@gmail.com

__________________________________________________

Ilona's Meetings

Next group meeting on Zoom is on the 4th of September. (There was one October 9. Not sure when next one is. )

To register send Ilona an email to

admin@ilonaciunaite.com

Looking forward :)


__________________________________________________

(videos)

Hi everyone.

Starting on 15th of October for 5 weeks I will post a new video of guiding sessions we had with Jim.
Here is a link to the first one.

https://youtu.be/gb6FwZ6PlI4

Liberation Unleashed Direct Pointing - The Gateless Gate

Ilona

__________________________________________________

Have fun with these. Looking forward to next reply.

Loving,

Ah yes!

Are you sure there's a "choice?" or "intention? " or "free will? "

No but I tried to answer the questions anyway! :) I think there was a tangle here, what I found myself doing was trying to 'reframe' a situation that I would have called "choosing" before. but all this took me a step back from the experience itself into abstraction. same for all the questions on choice, intention, free will
the drinks question was good! I'll try with the new questions:

In step 1 when thinking about their respective qualities, did you ‘choose’ the qualities? Or did they kind of appear by themselves? If some preferences manifested, did you ‘choose’ these preferences? Or did they just pop up by themselves?

ok so the qualities definitely just popped up by themselves, no sense of choosing

I

n step 2 when you counted to 5, if the preferences took the back seat while the numbers took the front seat, did you ‘choose’ this sequence of event? Did you ‘choose’ to shut down the preferences to give way to the counting?

no, this is just what happened. thinking about the qualities, then counting

Did you directly experience a mental function or faculty doing the ‘choosing’? Have you seen this function in action?

no, what happened just happened. I thought about the qualities, I counted, I picked up one of the drinks, I sipped it. Just now, imagining a mental function of 'choosing', I can feel a tension around my jaw. this, I recognise, is sign for me of moving away from direct experience into abstraction.

In step 3 where you made a choice, did you actually witness or directly experience a mental function or faculty doing the ‘choosing’? Did anything arise that announced, ‘I am the chooser’? If so, what does this function look like?

no! nothing arose saying 'I am the chooser'.

Sometimes we describe this sense of choosing as a ‘feeling’: It feels like ‘I’ did the 'choosing’. But the question is, can a feeling ‘choose’? Is it in the nature of a feeling to 'choose’?

no, it didn't 'feel' like 'I' chose. anything of this nature was a thought, not a feeling. and that thought was nothing to do with picking up that drink, it was something else.

Stacy, I feel this has really clarified the different experience of just noticing what is happening and trying to 'twist' it mentally into a story about "me" doing that thing. there's a particular sort sensation that I'd describe as 'dull' or 'tense' that happens when those thoughts arise and I believe them.

there's a particular sort sensation that I'd describe as 'dull' or 'tense' that happens when those thoughts arise and I believe them.

Yes, that "dull" is the lie feeling.

Here is how to distinguish truth from lies.


We often lie every day & don't realize it.

For example, the grocery clerk asks, "How are you?" You reply, "I'm fine." While, yes. there is a sense in which we are always fine, even in the middle of suffering, at that moment, you were grieving the death of your dog, you had a slight sore throat & you had a headache, but you didn't feel like sharing all of that with the grocery clerk, so you lied, "I'm fine."

Also, it matters none at all how "distant" the remembered lie is. Besides the fact that time itself is fictional, a kind if lie, as we recall the lie it becomes present in this moment, as if it were happening now. This brings the body Sensation that accompanies lying.

Lies can be intentional or unintentional, conscious or unconscious, even so automatic that we ourselves are fooled.

The story of a separate "self" is a lie.

This is the lie you came here to see through. Therefore, it is helpful to notice the body Sensation of lying as one of the tools for finding the truth of no self.

You want to be in touch with body Sensations & able to clearly express them in words. This will help.

Lies are usually felt in the heart or solar plexus as a contraction that we may label as tight, heavy or tense.

In contrast, truth is usually expansive. We may call it loose, light or relaxed.

First, can you remember a time when you lied to someone you loved?

Here we count anything, lies we think of as "big" or "small" that "matter" or don't "matter."

How are you? I'm fine. No, your knee hurts, but you don't feel like discussing it with the grocery clerk.

It's a lie. A seemingly "bigger" one will work better for this exercise.

Find the lie. I don't need the whole story, just a few key words to refer to it.

Then scan your body for any Sensation (DE or Direct Experience), particularly in the gut or maybe the heart. Check very closely.

What is found?

If you think the memory you used wasn't clear enough, find another one or lie to yourself right now, make something up.

1 + 1 = 14 is a lie.

I love eating worms is (probably) a lie.

Or call up a video of a lying politician & notice what Sensations arise as you listen.

I will give you a clue: it is not that peaceful Sensation you felt before when you omitted "I." (refers to an exercise I gave before this one)

Please report back with what body Sensations (not interpretations) you feel. Bodies can feel hot or cold, heavy or light, contraction or expansion, etc.

"Peaceful" is an interpretation of a body Sensation, not the Sensation itself, for example.

Do you see that?

Loving,

Ah yes I remember this.
So the lie was not telling someone a thing I thought they’d be annoyed about - an omission.I’m thinking of it now.

What is found?

A sensation of tension in the jaw. Pressure across the chest. A sort of ‘blank’ feeling.

Good.

So, pay attention & move toward open, relaxed, expansive truth & away from closed, tense, contracted lies.

Okay... will you please copy your answers that were true & re-answer #5 all in one place?

Do you feel you're ready to do that?

Much love,

Hi Stacy yes I can do that tomorrow. Thank you

Tomorrow is good, but of course...


Time Exercise

There is a general assumption that there is linear time that started (if started at all) somewhere very far in the past and advances to the distant future. The present moment (now) is considered to be a very small fragment of time, or an event that is moving forward on a linear line, coming from the past and advancing to the future.

But is there an experience of the ’now’ moving along the line of time?

Any experience of one ‘moment’ giving way to the next?

Is there any actual or direct experience of one event following another?

How fast is the ‘present moment’ actually moving?

Just look at 'this moment', can you find a point where it began?

How long does the ‘now’ last?

Where does the ‘now’ start, and where does it end?

When does the ‘now’ exactly become the 'past'?

What is the ‘past’ in actual experience?

So is there actual experience of ‘time’ or thoughts about ‘time’?


Just had to throw this in for fun.

Loving,

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

so when I look carefully I can't find this separate self anywhere. I haven't somehow 'got rid' of it, it just isn't and wasn't ever there. things happen, but there's not a separate 'me' controlling from outside.

2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you see it now.

the illusion of a separate self seems to me to be a way of interpreting experience. a sort of series of thoughts which cause a stepping back from actual experience and just getting caught up in the content of thoughts and imagining they are something real. So for example I can think "oh that's made me angry" but when I relax into just seeing what is there, there is just some physical sensations and a lot of fast-moving thoughts. in that moment I can see that the only thing causing discomfort is the thought itself, nothing to do with another, just believing the content of those thoughts. it's as if the illusion of a separate self adds a 'layer' of something tangled on top of just experiencing what is happening. Feelings, thoughts, the "me-ness" of things are still there as they were before, but I don't have to get caught up in these things in the same way

3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.

I think the biggest feeling is relief to really to see this. Before I started this dialogue I'd had moments of seeing but didn't know how to do that in a more ongoing way. The past few days I've just felt that life is more 'real' and also that it is in many ways also the same. the changes seem to be subtle, like what I am is part of things, not someone who experiences and affects things from the 'outside'. At the start of this dialogue I somehow thought that "I" would see through something and change. Now I feel that I am part of change, if that makes sense. As if before I had taken some aspects of experience and tied them up into a bundle and made them solid. What I notice now is that familiar, thoughts and behaviours still happen, but instead of getting caught up in them and drawing lots of conclusions, they feel more like billows of smoke rising from a fire which then blow away, leaving things just as they are. I don't know if this will make sense, but I feel as if the world has been trying to show itself to me but somehow I've been trampling over the top of it while thinking about something else. It's as if I've been able to stop, look around, see and hear the beauty of what is there. Another way of describing it would be to say it's as if I have been in a train travelling through beautiful countryside and I've been trying to reach out the window and grab on to branches as we go, but now I am sitting in my seat appreciating the view!

4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?

Well looking back at the dialogue I think it was the pointer where Stacy you asked me to look at the word 'GREEN' and say what I saw. I knew intellectually what was being asked but when I actually LOOKED then so many things just fell into place. The difference between the IDEA of something and the EXPERIENCE of something.

5) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

So 'decision' seems like an abstracted way of describing something that just arises - feelings, thoughts, and actions. Like this morning before I might have said 'I made the decision' to have toast for breakfast, but what actually happened was just the thought coming, then touching the bread, tasting the bread .....this is just what happened. No need for a "me" to "decide".

Describe intention & give examples from experience.

this seems to me to be like 'decision'. it's not that there is an 'intention' that is somehow separate from what actually happens. Was there an 'intention' to do anything separate from the experience of doing it? How could that be. Describing somethings as 'intention' feels like taking a step back into a story.

Describe free will & give examples from experience.

'free will' seems like another way of saying 'decision' or 'intention'. It's just a thought really. What would the opposite be? Determinism? Also just a thought? Both don't exist. I don't really know how to give an example. The free will to 'decide' what to wear today? But actually what happened was there were thoughts about clothes, seeing/touching etc clothes. It all just happened. 'free will' wasn't required!

Describe choice & give examples from experience.

'choice' seems like a way of saying 'there's a variety of things that happen'! But who or what makes a choice? all the examples I could give sound like the ones above. The word 'choice' also implies that there were things that DIDN'T happen. But where are those things? The clothes that weren't put on today? That putting on didn't happen!

Describe control & give examples from experience.

mm control.... just now I can feel thoughts coming into my mind, my fingers on the keyboard as I type, the brightness of the screen. Who could be controlling that?

What makes things happen? How does it work?

well nothing 'makes' things happen. they just happen!

What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

I think 'responsible for' implies some sort of control. Life happens and it is not nothing. I guess I'm learning to see how life unfolds, to feel more deeply into life, to LOOK at the contents of thoughts and to try and see if they are true. I'm not responsible for it, it just happens and I can see that if I try to look.

6) Anything to add?

it seems there is always just a little more letting go that can happen, situations where it feels more as if there is a "me" doing things, controlling things. But looking more deeply there are just familiar patterns of thinking, acting, feeling. There's such a huge freedom in not having to 'go' with that. I can feel a deep relaxation as I type this. There's more to see I am sure!

TIME!!

But is there an experience of the ’now’ moving along the line of time?

'the past' and 'the future' - all just thoughts! I can see how I've related to time as a sort of 'line' with 'me' moving along it (and much better in the future of course!)

Any experience of one ‘moment’ giving way to the next?

There's nothing that 'gives way', just changing experience.

Is there any actual or direct experience of one event following another?

where's an event if it's not happening? how can something 'follow' something. There's this happening and part of 'this' is thoughts about other things that happened, all happening now.

How fast is the ‘present moment’ actually moving?

what could it be moving IN?

Just look at 'this moment', can you find a point where it began?

not at all!

How long does the ‘now’ last?

it's just now. it doesn't 'last' it sparkles!

Where does the ‘now’ start, and where does it end?

I have a memory of when I was a kid lying looking at the stars and trying to grasp the concept of 'infinity'. It's like trying to have an experience that doesn't exist. even 'now' doesn't exist. just the typing, sound of the wind etc.

When does the ‘now’ exactly become the 'past'?

it seems 'the past' is simply present thoughts about experience happening. same with the future.

What is the ‘past’ in actual experience?

thoughts.

So is there actual experience of ‘time’ or thoughts about ‘time’?

there's no actual experience of 'time'. just experience. It seems like 'time' is an abstract way of saying that there is change.

Welcome home, Izzy!

That is one of the most beautiful set of replies I've read. I will now show these to other guides who may have questions. Watch this space and watch your private messages at the top right.

Loving,

Thank you Stacy. Again, I really want to express gratitude for what you’ve given here. A huge amount!