The Gate

Maybe what didn't communicate well is that I don't really intent you to debate or agree with what I'm saying, but often rather to use what I'm saying as a pointer to look at experience in a new (less conceptual resulted) way, so certain concepts/ideas/assumptions will be undone. The pointing isn't really meant as a truth or so (because I can only communicate with concepts), but more of a temporary tool (such as the 'bunch of color' thingy). Yes, sometimes indeed I felt some frustration when I saw an answer that to me appeared more mind-based than I was intending for.

Thank you. This is much clearer. You are just wanting me to try on a different set of spectacles without endorsing the spectacles or the change in what I might see! I get it.

If you look for something (an experience thus) which you stick the label a you/person/self on, then do you find such a thing/experience? In all that's experienced/found here, is such a thing here/found?
Pretty much the same question, but delivered a bit differently: can you find any place or thing where a separate you/self lives?
If not -and I know the answer is no- then that is the same as saying no separate self/person/I is actually experienced, yes? Maybe thoughts of one, perhaps feelings aligned with the thoughts of there being one, but not actually one, right? Has it ever been?

rather than do this quickly and immediately I'll do what I usually do and ask this of myself over a couple of days and at different times to see what I can discern... wish me luck!

Thank you. This is much clearer. You are just wanting me to try on a different set of spectacles without endorsing the spectacles or the change in what I might see! I get it.

Wow yes, nice way of phrasing! What's experienced, is what it is and is obviously not what it isn't. So THIS/what's experienced is not the words/concepts or ideas we have about it/for it. Yet as humans we are quite lost in mixing it all up. Whenever we are thinking that what THIS is, is the concept of experience/perception/awareness/consciousness/life/universe/etc we are a bit mistaken what this is for what it isn't (the concepts). It maybe seems too obvious to be profound, but we blunder in this deeply anyway. I won't ever mean in this conversation that there really is something such as experience/awareness/life/reality/seeing/colors/perception/etc, as a statement of truth, but sometimes such concepts can be a useful temporary tool, or useful spectacles as you say.

rather than do this quickly and immediately I'll do what I usually do and ask this of myself over a couple of days and at different times to see what I can discern... wish me luck!

Sure, whatever you like. Yes, wishing you much luck!

Thank you. This is much clearer. You are just wanting me to try on a different set of spectacles without endorsing the spectacles or the change in what I might see! I get it.

Wow yes, nice way of phrasing! What's experienced, is what it is and is obviously not what it isn't. So THIS/what's experienced is not the words/concepts or ideas we have about it/for it. Yet as humans we are quite lost in mixing it all up. Whenever we are thinking that what THIS is, is the concept of experience/perception/awareness/consciousness/life/universe/etc we are a bit mistaken what this is for what it isn't (the concepts). It maybe seems too obvious to be profound, but we blunder in this deeply anyway. I won't ever mean in this conversation that there really is something such as experience/awareness/life/reality/seeing/colors/perception/etc, as a statement of truth, but sometimes such concepts can be a useful temporary tool, or useful spectacles as you say.

rather than do this quickly and immediately I'll do what I usually do and ask this of myself over a couple of days and at different times to see what I can discern... wish me luck!

Sure, whatever you like. Yes, wishing you much luck!

Thank you. This is much clearer. You are just wanting me to try on a different set of spectacles without endorsing the spectacles or the change in what I might see! I get it.

Wow yes, nice way of phrasing! What's experienced, is what it is and is obviously not what it isn't. So THIS/what's experienced is not the words/concepts or ideas we have about it/for it. Yet as humans we are quite lost in mixing it all up. Whenever we are thinking that what THIS is, is the concept of experience/perception/awareness/consciousness/life/universe/etc we are a bit mistaken what this is for what it isn't (the concepts). It maybe seems too obvious to be profound, but we blunder in this deeply anyway. I won't ever mean in this conversation that there really is something such as experience/awareness/life/reality/seeing/colors/perception/etc, as a statement of truth, but sometimes such concepts can be a useful temporary tool, or useful spectacles as you say.

rather than do this quickly and immediately I'll do what I usually do and ask this of myself over a couple of days and at different times to see what I can discern... wish me luck!

Sure, whatever you like. Yes, wishing you much luck!

Hi Floris,

So... an interim "report".

After a few days of reflection ... spontaneously and not actually at a point where I was reflecting on my experience - I could see my hands in front of me and my feet beyond them (I was sitting on a couch)... Except... it wasn't the usual experience. How can I explain?
I experienced the hands as 'obviously' mine but it was almost like they could have been someone else's. I suppose the best way would be to refer to the kinds of shlocky sci-fi movies (maybe you've seen them 🤓?) where someone awakes for the first time in a new body and you see a first-person view of the character looking at their new body and 'trying' on the idea for the first time... For the record, no I wasn't intoxicated by anything.
I did ask myself whether I was in some weird alienated state and whether this was actually a 'bad' thing... I wasn't as far as I could tell. How? because it seemed spontaneous and there was no lead up of anything disturbing. On the contrary, it was a completely normal evening.

I've now had this 'perception' twice within 48 hours.

More anon.

J

Hi J,

Thank you for your share, that was an interesting read! Perhaps we could say that experience of life being personal, is pretty much what the person/identity is, and that you had a bit of a depersonalisation/disidentification. You might usually identify with the bodyappearance and therefore you experience it as personal.

So what is this person, is it real.. can this thing called a person be found? Perhaps this experience allows you to grasp better that the sense of being a body/person comes from believing to be that/identifying with it. I was just repeating the question already asked. Love to see your next post:-)

Floris

This "person" is to be found most clearly in decision points: "No, I won't do that, I'll do this"...

So can it be found? Well... this is when it's experienced at its max....

J

Hi Joan,

This "person" is to be found most clearly in decision points: "No, I won't do that, I'll do this"...

Okay, so when a decision is made, what is the experience like, in order that makes you interpreted it as you thinking of it as a person? Is there a specific feeling present, a certain warmth that feels personal in the body, a feeling of being separate from what's around the body, is there a 'strong' thought/thoughts of a you present there?

So can it be found? Well... this is when it's experienced at its max....

If that's the maximum that there is present, then again, whatever experience you're referring to as 'person', would you then agree it's not a real entity/isn't you? Perhaps rather a sense/feeling that comes up when a decision is made, resulting from a belief/thoughts of being a you that is separate from the bodies surrounding, that is deciding? Perhaps instead of thinking of it as a person, we could better call it personhood.

Just to push it a little further. When a decision point comes up, there comes up what we call label as identity, yes? There come certain thoughts and feelings. Is that felt sense of identity doing anything? Can that experience that we call personhood/identity do anything like making decisions? That would mean that an appearance/experience is creating/doing/influencing/controlling another experience/appearance, right?

Floris

Okay, so when a decision is made, what is the experience like, in order that makes you interpreted it as you thinking of it as a person? Is there a specific feeling present, a certain warmth that feels personal in the body, a feeling of being separate from what's around the body, is there a 'strong' thought/thoughts of a you present there?

I experience this as an internal voice. A question to myself ("well I could x but on the other hand ...y") or a statement ("I'll do that now because the weather will be worse later"). I think it's simply that I have no experience of 'someone speaking' without there being a speaker.... Clearly, I identify that speaker with "me".

If that's the maximum that there is present, then again, whatever experience you're referring to as 'person', would you then agree it's not a real entity/isn't you?

This is couched as an "if this, then that" argument but I'm not sure how you make the jump from the premise to the conclusion...

J

I experience this as an internal voice. A question to myself ("well I could x but on the other hand ...y") or a statement ("I'll do that now because the weather will be worse later").

Okay, but could this internal voice also be just a sound/thought happening? I don't mean that as a philosophical consideration, but rather if you can leave a space in your mind for 'yes, maybe it's just happening', so it might be easier to go further from there. Is there something there you can point to that is either doing that voice, or anything that voice is directed to/received by? Would you say that that you, that is either doing or receiving that voice, is not experienced, but assumed? And if it is experienced, then please describe that experience we could call 'someone talking', or 'someone receiving' as good as you can.

If you watch a movie, and on it is a dog running. Actually there isn't an object (dog) performing a function there (running), yes? In language, we however have gotten in the habit of create an object that is performing a function, where that is not experienced. I just say that in regard to my previous writing.

I think it's simply that I have no experience of 'someone speaking' without there being a speaker.... Clearly, I identify that speaker with "me".

Well, to me, clearly you do have an experience of speaking/sounding/sounds or thoughts happening, without an experience of something we could call a speaker.

I know that when you actually look for the speaker/talker/thinker, you don't find it. Nothing here that I would describe as a someone/something deciding/thinking/doing anyway. Are you in with me on this?

Wishing you well

Would you say that that you, that is either doing or receiving that voice, is not experienced, but assumed?

I would have to say it's assumed... Assumed on the basis that I cannot conceive of a decision without a decision-maker andy more than I can conceive of a watch without a watchmaker.

Of course, that last analogy is not random ... someone who believes that God created the world uses the same argument. I don't believe it's valid or even useful. So yes... I'm stuck with a vagrant assumption - something with no visible means of support at least from personal experience.

Are you in with me on this?

I am!

But if it's obvious and inescapable - why am "I" not accepting it?

I would have to say it's assumed... Assumed on the basis that I cannot conceive of a decision without a decision-maker andy more than I can conceive of a watch without a watchmaker.

Does the heartbeat or the growth of the body require a controlling/managing entity to make it happen? Perhaps when you're doing tasks that go without much thinking, like eating, driving, cleaning, just relax, let it happen and just be with the question 'is there a separate doer doing this?', or perhaps 'is a separate self necessary for this?' or phrase the question a way that resonates better with you. No need for jumping to conclusions, arguments or such there.

But if it's obvious and inescapable - why am "I" not accepting it?

What may be useful is if you write down what the person/self is to you. Just statements that feel true, like 'I feel like I'm a separate entity/person, that's separated from everything outside the body, that's going through life and perceiving everything around me', etc.

Okay, I think I've given an exercise concerning seeing and feeling once. Perhaps it's good to finish it with hearing. So I copied pasted the exercise underneath. Afterwards we can take this further with the intention of loosening the notion of there being an in- and outside a little further. I think that might be useful.

Normally we say something like 'I hear a bird/sound,etc', so, let's explore that. There are 3 assumptions there;
1. the I that is doing the hearing
2. a process that is happening we call hearing
3. a thing that is heard

So relax, sit down or whatever works for you, close your eyes, notice the sounds that are going on around you and inquire:
- can you find something which is doing the hearing? An I, ears, a body..
- can you find the sound going to the head where it is received and interpreted? Or is it rather, from the perspective of the body, just out there?
- can you find two things there, the number 2 (the process) and the number 3 (the heard)? Or can you only find one thing happening there in/as the experience we call hearing? I mean by that, do you find a thing called 'hearing', or can you just find the sound? Or perhaps we could turn it around, and say we don't find a sound, we only experience hearing? Or we could even label it as just 'sounding'.
- already asked this in a way, but am phrasing it a little differently here: can you find a listening/hearer/I that is separate from the sound?
- do you notice how images/thoughts are imposed onto the experience that label the sound?
- If I say that there actually aren't 3 things there. And not even two, not an observer and an observed, but that it would be more true to say that the observed and the observer, or the experienced and the experiencer, are all wrapped up as one.. does that resonate, does that seem aligned with your experience?

So in the initial statement 'I hear a sound', how would you rewrite that sentence just to make the sentence as aligned with your experience as possible with language?

Be well,

- can you find something which is doing the hearing?

sort of ... it's my head and not....! I can hear distant voices. They appear to be 'happening' between my ears. THe sound of the keys on my keyboard as I type... that sound is in front of me and down a bit. So... something doing the hearing?? not really. It just happens.

- can you find the sound going to the head where it is received and interpreted? Or is it rather, from the perspective of the body, just out there?

the latter

- can you find two things there, the number 2 (the process) and the number 3 (the heard)? Or can you only find one thing happening there in/as the experience we call hearing? I mean by that, do you find a thing called 'hearing', or can you just find the sound? Or perhaps we could turn it around, and say we don't find a sound, we only experience hearing? Or we could even label it as just 'sounding'.

This! >> we don't find a sound, we only experience hearing?
- already asked this in a way, but am phrasing it a little differently here: can you find a listening/hearer/I that is separate from the sound? Nope. Slight caveat enters into my mind. My hearing is fine and I'm not neurologically impaired in any way. If I was though, in cerstin ways, I bet I would be much more aware of the effort - and therefore the effort by a 'me' - of putting together what I hear with say, a story about what I was hearing to come up with a convincing narrative. But yes, that is just speculation 🤪

- do you notice how images/thoughts are imposed onto the experience that label the sound?

Oooo. Should have read this one before replying to the last 😂 : YES
- If I say that there actually aren't 3 things there. And not even two, not an observer and an observed, but that it would be more true to say that the observed and the observer, or the experienced and the experiencer, are all wrapped up as one.. does that resonate, does that seem aligned with your experience? Yes. But see my caveat above... I think the brain is constructing reality "on the fly". It's really, really good at hiding its working which - point taken - is (absent any serious neurological deficits) - fully automatic and swift. If my ancestors "self" were to pause on the savannah to consider the reality of what he was seeing and deciding whether the constructed narrative was going to end well or badly he/she would have been eaten. Only the fully automated survived.

Hi!

Little later response from my end on than usual. I’ve living in a different place now, but it appears that I don’t have a WiFi connection in my room, but I can still do this via mobile.

Sort of ... it's my head and not....! I can hear distant voices. They appear to be 'happening' between my ears. THe sound of the keys on my keyboard as I type... that sound is in front of me and down a bit. So... something doing the hearing?? not really. It just happens.

it’s your head and not?? Is it true that this comes from your thinking and not from your experience? Oh but in the last sentence you say nothing found doing the hearing and it’s just happening, perfect. Also, are you sure those sounds happen between the ears, if that was true than how would you know they were distant sounds?

the latter

nice

If I was though, in cerstin ways, I bet I would be much more aware of the effort - and therefore the effort by a 'me' - of putting together what I hear with say, a story about what I was hearing to come up with a convincing narrative.

didn’t understand you completely here. But in the bolded part you are jumping to a conclusion. How do you know something takes effort? For example if you lift a stone, what experience takes effort there? Does the experience/sight of the stone raising take effort to generate? Do the sensations take effort to produce? Or perhaps could all experience arise effortlessly?

Oooo. Should have read this one before replying to the last 😂 : YES

haha, made me laugh:D


Here to take it into a little other direction. Sit down, relax, close your eyes. And focus on the sounds you're hearing around you. These sounds are usually called or thought of as outside of you. Now make an 'internal sound' in your mind. These sounds are usually called or thought of as inside you. Now if you go back and forth with your attention between these two sounds (the outside and inside sound), there should be a border of sorts that your attention passes if there really is such a thing as an inside and outside. It should be like a border or space where the inside space is left, and outside space starts. Check this, move your attention from what is called the inside sound, to the outside sound and see if you can find such a boundary or border. Is such a border found? Is there a place where the inside space stops, and an outside space begins, or could it be the same space? I mean, if there really were two separated spaces, could attention even move to the other space, shouldn’t it be stuck in the inside space?..

Take care,
Floris

Slight caveat enters my mind. My hearing is fine and I'm not neurologically impaired in any way. If I was though, in certain ways, I bet I would be much more aware of the effort - and therefore the effort by a 'me' - of putting together what I hear with say, a story about what I was hearing to come up with a convincing narrative. But yes, that is just speculation

Let me clarify. Our brain's ability to create the "controlled hallucination" that is consciousness is near seamless. We can though get an insight into its work behind the scenes when it gets 'broken' - by an accident say or disease. Then what was apparently effortless needs effort to either work around a problem or even re-establish it's former 'slick' state. It's like we walk into what we think is a large restaurant and notice a crack in a room-length mirror and realise that all the people on the 'other' side of the room are just reflections, they are not real. We're embarrassed and realise that our 'experience' is not always reliable.

Why do I mention this? The premise in these pages - if there is one! - is that experience is all. That just experience will deliver insight into something. But scientific research shows us just how the brain's apparent transparent window onto reality (our 'experience') is, in fact, a construction. An undisclosed and hard to see confirmation of prior assumptions rather than an accurate rendering of reality.

Back to the practical...

I shall focus on that boundary thing...