The Gate

That is fine.

Ok, I've been looking at this awareness thing. Well, the more I tried to find an actual awareness, the more it wasn't there. :) At one point I came to a very simple insight: the idea of the existence of "an" awareness is just a thought about being aware. I'm not fully certain about this yet, but it seems that there is simply being aware. Then the word awareness comes up and the thought awareness, making it an inaccurate thought about it. In reality, there's simply being aware. The thought about it that there is a thing called awareness is simply an incorrect thought.

The problem is, I'm still not quite certain about that. I find this one far more difficult to see than the no-self part.

What are you not certain about?

I wanted you to explain what awareness is, does it have a location, etc - and you seem to have answered that there's just being aware. I also wanted you to explain how you, in the "I" (or agent) sense control "your" awareness, and you answered that (indirectly).

If you feel uncertain or restless, I guess I should ask if that's just a habit of thinking and feeling that cokes up in various circumstances (eg when your body is tense), or if it exists in a solid or persisting sense. Please take a look and explain.

What are you not certain about?

If my conclusion is correct. It seems to me that there is no such thing as an awareness. Instead there is just being aware. But I'm not quite certain if that is an accurate conclusion. I haven't seen it clearly yet.

I wanted you to explain what awareness is, does it have a location, etc - and you seem to have answered that there's just being aware. I also wanted you to explain how you, in the "I" (or agent) sense control "your" awareness, and you answered that (indirectly).

Well, since there is no I, there is no me to control it. But it is possible for it to be controlled. There just isn't a controller. When it's shut off intentionally, there is deciding, intending, shutting off. But there is no doer behind those things.

If you feel uncertain or restless, I guess I should ask if that's just a habit of thinking and feeling that cokes up in various circumstances (eg when your body is tense), or if it exists in a solid or persisting sense. Please take a look and explain.

I wouldn't call it restless. It's just being uncertain about something until you see the answer. Like when solving a math problem. Until you've solved it, you can predict to varying degrees what the outcome will be. But that is uncertain until it's fully solved.

It might be nice if you tried paying closer attention to the stuff you mentioned here:

Well, since there is no I, there is no me to control it. But it is possible for it to be controlled. There just isn't a controller. When it's shut off intentionally, there is deciding, intending, shutting off. But there is no doer behind those things.

And it would be nice if you could explain, moment by moment, how you "pass out at will". That is in reference to this stuff that you wrote before,

No. But... regarding the going to sleep, through intensive training I can switch off my awareness at will and fall asleep instantly. I can also pass out at will. Of course there is no me doing that, but the ability to do so is there.

Ok, let's say I'm lying in bed and it's time to sleep. Before I learned this, I would just lay there, drift off and eventually fall asleep.

Now I lie down and trigger the falling asleep part myself. The way I do it is best explained by how I found out about it. Since I'm very good at lucid dreaming, I was able to observe the moment you fall asleep. Usually people don't remember that part because it does not get stored in memory. But with practice I stayed conscious enough to see exactly what happened.

Turns out that the actual falling asleep isn't a gradual process. There's a moment where in an instant you "switch off" into sleep. It's a fraction of a second where you switch from not being asleep to being asleep.

Once I learned that, I practiced triggering that switch myself. So now when I go to bed, I lie down, trigger the switch and sleep right away. And if I wake up during the night, I just trigger it again and sleep on. Never had any insomnia since.

I'm just asking you to do it again and notice if it is any different from things like walking, typing, etc.

As I type this, sometimes the fingers move and sometimes they don't. I can't explain how I make them do it - but somehow it happens. I can't find a "self" controlling the fingers.

I'm wondering if the falling asleep is the same or if it is somehow different.

I don't expect you to be able to give me an answer about it now; I'm only interested in your direct experience, not whatever it is you happen to recall right now - so I would guess you'll need to pay attention at bedtime, not during your day.

As for the other stuff (about deciding, intending, shutting off) -- I would hope you could try to pay attention during your day and explain what that is like in direct experience. Deciding/intending seems to be the essence of being an agent - I'm just wondering, moment by moment, what that is like.

I find it difficult to explain. Before, I thought "I" made decisions. Now it's like decisions are made. Without anything behind it. It's like in many cases, elements cluster together to generate a behavior. Deciding, controlling, assessing input, considering possible actions, thinking. All these are there, but without the decider, controller, assesser, considerer, thinker, all words for this I that never existed.

So when you say you can't find a "self" controlling the fingers, I would agree. I can't either. But the element called controlling is there. That's how I experience it.

The same is true for the falling asleep. It can happen in two ways for me. But neither have a self behind it. The difference lies in the elements that are active during it.

Ok. So it sounds like there's some stuff you wonder about, despite the fact that your clear on their being no self.

What woupd you like to do now? You can investigate hat stuff further or you could say you are done and I ask other guides for help checking what you've reported so far. Or if there's something else you'd rather do please just say.

The thing is that this liberation thing has more work to it after it. There's a lot of illusion-of-self conditioning that needs to be corrected. At this point I'm confident that I can figure it out on my own. You've given me everything I need to progress.

So I think it's a good moment to have the other guides have a look at this.

OK.

Well, I'm sorry if this seems repetitive, but could you give these a fresh look and answer based on direct experience? Please avoid giving canned answers - please take a look now and answer based on what you see.

I'll ask other guides to look at your responses.


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, intention, free will, choice and control. What makes things happen? How does it work? What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

6) Anything to add?

I think the answers are going to be very similar to the previous time. Or not. :)

In any case, I'm not sure if I can get to it today, so I might respond tomorrow. I want to have the time to really get into them instead of rushing through it because I'm in a hurry.

Nice.

Before you hit submit, you might want to read your answers and ask yourself, "is this answer in terms of direct experience?"

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind.

I have a massive migraine coming up. It isn't responding to medication which means that it's going to be a big one that can last a couple of days. I will spend most of the time in bed, dark room, no sound. Anyone who gets migraines knows what it's like...

I won't be able to tolerate the pc screen, so I will post again in a couple of day when I'm better.