The Gate

We need to examine what is meant by "interrupted the imagined practitioner"

Yes, mostly right. But one correction matters.

Do not imagine an “imagined self” being poked.

That still gives it too much substance.

There is no hidden fictional self sitting there, waiting to be exposed. There is only a current construction:

thought + sensation + image + tension + future + ownership language.

That construction says:

“I am hoping to grok this very soon.”

That sentence is the imagined practitioner.

Not because it contains the word I, but because it smuggles in a whole structure:

someone here now
lacking something
doing inquiry
moving toward future grokking
expecting a shift
evaluating progress

That is the practitioner-self forming in real time.

Interrupting means catching that formation before it is believed.

Not destroying it.

Not weakening it.

Not shattering it.

Just seeing: Oh — this is a thought-structure appearing now.

Take your own sentence:

“The nonexistence of which I am hoping to grok very soon.”

Now slow it down.

“I” — what is that in direct experience?
A word? A felt center behind the eyes? A body contraction? An image of K? A narrative?

“am hoping” — what is hope actually?
Maybe chest lift, leaning forward, anticipation, thought-image, slight ache?

“to grok” — what is that?
A future imagined moment? A fantasy of certainty? A click? A release?

“very soon” — where is soon?
A thought. A pressure. A subtle demand.

Now where is the practitioner?

Not the components.

The one who owns them.

Can it be found?

That is the interruption.

The practitioner-story wants to run as one smooth unit:

“I am close; I need to keep going; maybe soon I’ll get it.”

Direct looking breaks it into actual pieces:

word
sensation
image
anticipation
thought
pressure
memory
evaluation

No practitioner found.

The interruption is not a new practice done by a better practitioner.

That is the trap.

The interruption is the collapse of the assumption that the practice needs a practitioner.

So when you say:

“I’m understanding the imagined practitioner as one manifestation of the imagined self…”

Fine, conceptually.

But closer:

There is not an imagined self with many manifestations.

There is selfing happening now as understanding, hoping, future-making, trying-to-grok, and being clever enough to notice the trap.

Even “Yes, there I go…” is selfing, but subtler. It creates the one who sees herself selfing.

Now interrupt that too.

“There I go, putting it in the future.”

What is actual?

A thought about future.
A thought about being caught.
Maybe amusement.
Maybe frustration.
Maybe a little self-consciousness.
Maybe pressure in the head.

Where is the I who went?

Not found.

So the phrase “direct interruption of the imagined practitioner” means:

The moment a self-improvement movement appears, look for the one at the center of it.

Not someday.

Not after more practice.

This exact movement.

Right now:

“I want to grok this soon.”

What is here besides thought, sensation, image, and wanting? (answer this one in bold)

vince

Right now:

“I want to grok this soon.”

What is here besides thought, sensation, image, and wanting? (answer this one in bold)

Of course, I know the "right" answer, but it doesn't seem useful to simply write, "Nothing."

And I think: This isn’t like passing a test but like passing a kidney stone.
But then the thought: It’s not like a kidney stone. It’s not a thing I have to get out of my system.
More thoughts: OK, what is it? It’s not an it. “It” is the process of selfing. It doesn’t need to be “expelled.” That image doesn’t even make sense.

OK, so, connect with the sentence, “I want to grok this soon.”
What’s actually here?
- Impatience. But what’s that? A little constriction in the chest. A sense of mentally (maybe even physically?) leaning forward, like a dog straining at its leash, wanting to move. Maybe a little tension or contraction in the face.
- Thoughts imagining a satisfying future:
- (Task interrupted by thoughts, once again, about how it’s odd and surprising that this process involves so many words and so much thinking, albeit words and thinking about direct experience. This is more like the Hindu path of jñana and going to satsang than like Buddhist meditation and listening to dharma talks.)
- Right, so: “I want to grok this soon.” What’s actually here? Thoughts imagining a satisfying future: More at ease. Relief of this particular frustration of trying to grok no-self. Freer flow of life. Sense of having “achieved” something (even though mind understands that it probably doesn’t feel that way and that “achieving” doesn’t even quite make sense when it comes to awakening).
- Oh, this is a fun one: Image of the enjoyment of emailing a Zen teacher I’ve kept in touch with, who was a monastic but not yet a full-fledged teacher when I lived at the monastery, to tell her I’ve finally seen the rear end of the ox. (Are you familiar with Zen’s “oxherding pictures,” depicting stages of practice?)

(I’d love to continue with this until I feel done, but I really have to do some work now. I think of the videos I’ve noticed addressing people’s worries that if they wake up, they’ll have trouble doing their jobs. I’ve never had that worry. But right now, I have a work deadline, so I have the ordinary issue that I’d rather be doing something other than my work.)

******************************************

(Continuing, about four hours later.)

Heading into afternoon meditation time, was thinking that the way I’ve been using meditation most recently is not much like any form of Buddhist meditation I’ve ever done, Zen or Tibetan. It’s like I’m leading my own guided self-inquiry.

Same sort of pointers as yesterday during this afternoon’s sitting period: “Don’t grab onto thoughts.” “Is there an ‘I’ who’s seeing or just the seeing?” “This is it.” “Stay here.”

OK, so, back to “I want to grok this soon.”
Yes, I do. I feel that. I think that.
And you asked: “What is here besides thought, sensation, image, and wanting?”

What is here:
- Thoughts of longing for less suffering in the “future.”
- Thoughts of anticipation of feeling relief.
- Lump in the throat of longing/anger/frustration/desire.
- Lots of tightness in face, probably at least partially due to allergies and/or looking at screens, but perhaps some due to stress, striving, frustration.
- Some tension in jaw.
- Feeling of tears coming on again.
- Crying.
- (And: feeling my body sitting in this chair; hearing the birds outside and the blowing of the A/C; seeing the colors and shapes in my visual field. But mind doesn’t connect these things with “I want to grok this soon.”)

So, yeah, that’s it. No “self” is found who is the perceiver of sensations or originator of thoughts. In conclusion:

“I want to grok this soon.”

What is here besides thought, sensation, image, and wanting? (answer this one in bold)

Nothing.

But the mind says, with frustration, “So what? Already knew that. And knowing it hasn’t done me any good yet and doesn’t seem to be doing me any good now.”

So, vince, maybe you can tell me what I’m missing there or where I’m going astray.

It seems like I should be trying to get some insight into the selfing going on there, like I should review your message for hints. And feelings of weariness arise.

And the mind offers: Can I just experience the weariness?
Yes, I can.
Stay here.
This is it.
The lump in the throat, the tension in the face, the feeling of fatigue and wanting to cry, the crying.
Yes, I can just experience that.

The mind offers: What needs to be different?
The mind responds: Make it stop! Make the frustration stop! No more suffering! (Little temper tantrum about reality not suiting the “self.” More crying.)

OK, right now, sitting here with computer in lap, working on this post, can I go back to what I was doing during my sitting period?
Settle in with scan of bodily sensations (thanks, vince, for that idea) . . .
Now, pointers/reminders . . .
Immediately notice that the thoughts are offended that I just want to notice them and let them go and not take them seriously.

I’m going to stop the meditation experiment here. That seems like an important insight.

And I’m exhausted and ready for a nap.

P.S. Oops, maybe you wanted me to put all of that last post in bold? Or perhaps everything up through "Nothing"? Well, anyhow, I answered the question!

This is it!
This = the entirety of your current experience
Is it = all there is.

No matter what thoughts pass through.
No matter what sensations become apparent.
This is it!

Watch this from 1:06:40 & give your feedback.
https://fathom.video/share/7Th_L4EQgs4G ... 2MNZih7ymN

This is it!
This = the entirety of your current experience
Is it = all there is.

No matter what thoughts pass through.
No matter what sensations become apparent.
This is it!

Hmm. At this instant, that doesn't seem meaningful. I can't connect with that at all. But of course, in this instant, I just woke up (in the ordinary meaning of that!).

Watch this from 1:06:40 & give your feedback.
https://fathom.video/share/7Th_L4EQgs4G ... 2MNZih7ymN

Naturally, I kept wondering what in particular made you think of sharing this with me right now. (It feels like some sort of Rorschach test, that whatever I bring up from all of this mainly shows something about me, perhaps something peculiar.) And especially as I started watching it, my mind kept wanting to know, “What’s in this for me? How is this going to help me right now?"

I wondered if one thing that made you think of this was your comment that you didn’t enter at the first fetter — it wasn’t about self or no-self — but at the acceptance of “this is it.”

Misc. other thoughts:

- I was glad to hear the discussion of how the “fetter” model (which I only recently ran across) is not actually so tidy when it plays out in actual lives.

- I like the idea, and it makes sense to me, that at some point the “work” of awakening turns into play. (It mostly still feels like work to me.)

- I liked the idea that this is a path of constant discovery and, thus, constant humor.

- I have some limited experience of the sweetness in sadness.

- I had some trouble with the whole thing about just allowing others to feel sad. In the midst of some really intense suffering, especially in the past decade and the past few years, I filed it that however I end up feeling about my “own” life and my “own” experiences, even if I’ve come to some equanimity about whatever’s going on “here,” I don’t want to forget how horrible suffering can be. I don’t want to in any way dismiss or diminish others’ suffering. And I feel like I should be sure to be doing whatever I can to alleviate other people’s suffering, though that also feels like a burdensome moral obligation. And I find myself wondering why all the “awake” people aren’t engaged in perhaps challenging, unpleasant, and risky activities to help people in places where there’s war or famine or authoritarian regimes or whatever or to reduce the damage caused by certain political figures. But also, I’m immensely grateful to folks like you who are devoting time and energy to helping others to wake up, because that seems like the most fundamental way of alleviating suffering. OK, enough on that. And I’m honestly hoping you don’t choose to follow up on this particular musing.

- I appreciated your comment (and I've heard you mention something like this before, maybe in another recording) that the most likely trigger for your anger these days is your wife. That makes sense to me. I can definitely see that the longest-lasting triggers could be related to the people closest to you.

Follow-up musing:

I found myself wondering if you’re sensing that my first shift might turn out to be not so much about realizing no-self (as LU frames the process and as in the fetter model) but about realizing “This is it” (is that the tenth fetter?). (I would understand this not as “skipping ahead” but just as an example of how there really is no definite order.)

And if so, does that have any ramifications for how this process continues, e.g., for which pointers to focus on?

This evening's sit:
Started with pointers to myself along the lines of "This is it," "Stay here," "Is there a seer or just seeing?" Didn't need too much of "Don't grab onto thoughts" and "Let go of thoughts" after the first few minutes.
Morphed into mostly trying to experience the sensations, especially the visual field (I meditate with my eyes open), as all there is, trying to let go of any sense of seer or perceiver or of separation or distance from perceptions, with occasional reminders like "Let go" and "Just this."

This evening's sit:
Started with pointers to myself along the lines of "This is it," "Stay here," "Is there a seer or just seeing?" Didn't need too much of "Don't grab onto thoughts" and "Let go of thoughts" after the first few minutes.
Morphed into mostly trying to experience the sensations, especially the visual field (I meditate with my eyes open), as all there is, trying to let go of any sense of seer or perceiver or of separation or distance from perceptions, with occasional reminders like "Let go" and "Just this."

this bit got me…
Can you imagine the frustration here when I can see that what separates you from "having it" is so thin?
What screams out to me really loudly is that you simply need to single "shift" to where, instead of being the doer of all of this (stuff that you outlined) you simply are the watcher of it happening.
That's not quite right, of course. You are not a watcher. You will be watching happening.
So to reiterate - the shift is that nothing changes except the perspective from which it is noticed (or not noticed)
It doesn't matter if you identify as a watcher in the beginning. The important thing is that you adopt that perspective.
Once you are noticing from that "God" perspective, identification will fade pretty quickly.

So get this; everything that you now think you're doing (that is everything that's happening and is noticed) will continue in exactly the same way that it does. The only difference will be the noticing of it and the consequences of breaking habitual second arrow stuff. (Maybe some of it won't happen because it is second arrow stuff)

Start with imagining that this is happening. (The new perspective).
Once you have formulated the story, ask the body to adopt it. And watch what happens.



vince

Well, I'm glad to now be in a place where you're that frustrated. :-) Sorry, vince.
I'm a little surprised and relieved that I don't feel terribly frustrated at the moment.

Neglected to mention this aspect of the evening sit:
Spent a few minutes of it trying to imagine that I've gone through the gateless gate. My name has been turned blue. Whew! Yay! That's done. Just sit here and enjoy it. Relax. Just be here. This is it.

Echoing back what you said in order to help assimilate it:
Shift from being the (fictional) "doer" of what I described to being the watcher of what's happening or, more precisely, the activity of watching. Identification as watcher will fade pretty quickly.
Practically speaking: Start by imagining that the new perspective — being the watching — is happening, and ask the body to adopt it. (So I was kind of doing that in the bit I'd neglected to mention.)

P.S. I was trying to figure out your "You will be watching happening," and I think my "being the activity of watching" wasn't quite it. "Being the activity" sounds too much like doing. I think you meant being the watching, which is just happening, yeah?

So, the instructions again:
Shift from being the doer to being the watching, which is simply happening. Start by asking the body to adopt the story that this perspective has already been adopted. (But it's okay to begin with identifying as the watcher. That identification will fade.)

Tried that in my late-night sit, but got confused.

Settled into being the watching — with body encouraged to imagine settling into a seat in a movie theater, with bucket of popcorn in lap, and Coke in cup holder in armrest.

But then, while I was indeed letting go of the feeling of DOing, it seemed like I was watching the seeing, hearing, and feeling, rather than being the seeing, hearing, and feeling. So it felt one extra step removed, which seems like the opposite of what I’m aiming at.

What am I missing?

What am I missing?

there is the watching of the feeling of being the watcher.

Then there is watching the experiencing of being the watcher watching the watcher (seriously)

Well, OK. I’ll try again tomorrow to be the watching (and watching of watching, etc.).

Should I think of this as a meditation-time thing or an anytime thing?

But I’m still confused. Before this, I had been trying to see that there was just sensing, with no senser/self separate from the sensing. But this “being the watching” feels like it’s reinforcing a sense of a self that’s separate from what’s being watched.

I noticed that my verbal pointers/reminders to myself mostly fell away. It seemed like they needed a doer. So there was just watching of noticing that the mind had been caught up in thoughts and returning to noticing sensations. And then when I thought there might be watching of trying to let there just be seeing and not a separate seer, I think that’s where I got confused, because it felt like I was trying to watch not having a watcher — or something.

So maybe I can’t really try to be the watching of the kind of thing I’ve been doing for the past couple days during my meditation time. Maybe it’s basically what you talked about before: just watching where attention moves and how it gets pulled there?

just watching where attention moves and how it gets pulled there?

yes, good. Don't worry about how it gets pulled there, just notice that it gets pulled there and put the how in the mystery basket. Be wondrous about the how without the need for satisfaction.