The Gate

Thanks a lot for letting me in.
My Guide I'm looking for you. The wait the preparation the pain has brought me here.
Please hold my hand and take me over.

Lots of regard
Namaste

Hi stillwarrior and welcome,

My name's Pete and I live in Somerset in England.

There are a few things that we need to go over so that I know the best way for us to continue.

Please tell me a bit about yourself and your story, how you came to LU and what it is that you're looking for.

Pete

Dear Pete
Namaste!
I'm Vishal from India. I'm 36 years of age. Most of the adult life I'v suffered deep anxiety and panic attacks which were triggered by various events like a hostile boss at work, assignments i didn't liked and so on. Now I could relate even in my childhood i have been very shy and introvert in fact afraid of communicating with people i dont know. Then during one such period of extreme fear I was drawn to spiritual teachings of Osho. though I coldn't get the deeper meanings but just reading those consoled me a lot and I felt at peace. This period continued for a while and I read various people and hindu scriptures like Gita as well. Though i was unable to grasp the content but i felt at peace through these. After everything turned normal for a while fear came back in my life more intensely giving me sleepless nights and once again i was drawn to teachings from masters like osho, eknath easwaran, tolle, ramana maharishi, deepak chopra, wayne dyer, neale donald, paramhans yoganand and on and on... and my fears would go away for a while. I started meditation and yoga practice and mindfulness practice getting glimpeses of my inner peace. And my fears started vanishing when i acknowledged them fully. Different fears and phobias of different kinds came to me but i was able to just see them and allow their presence instead of resisting them and they disssolved. Most profound impact has been made by tolle, jed mckenna and raman maharishi' s words.

I ve learnt to see through my resistance and it has reduced a lot. now i no longer react resist or feel the fear and feel at peace . but still the journey seems incomplete. A frustration comes up at times. there is knowing that journey is not complete. Ramana Maharishi's method of enquiry of who i am has helped me be aware of the awareness itself and see me different from my mind body. But i'm feeling that knowing and realising are two different things. I know there is a deep awareness within me which is all that is but i haven't realised it fully.

The teachings have come to me at times when i have needed those and perhaps thats how i've landed to LU. i have been praying for the guide and thats how i ve came here. guidance have always came in the form of words names and following those i have came to teachings ive required at that moment.
My quest is for the everlasting knowing for being which is not a concept but something which when seen cannot be unseen. when done cannot be undone.
Please help me.
thanks a lot
With regards

Vishal

And above all thanks Pete for responding to my request.
:)

Hi Vishal,

Thanks for being so open and letting me know about yourself and how you've arrived at this point. Is your time zone about four hours ahead of UK? No worries, that's easy to work with.

Here are a few standard ground rules before we start:

You agree to post at least once a day, even if only to say that you're still around, and I'll do the same. Sometimes it might just not be possible for one of us to post substantively and of course we'd find a way to work round that.

I am not your teacher, all I can do is point and you look, until clear seeing happens.

In general, I will ask questions and you look deeply and respond with 100% honesty.

Responses require simple, uncontrived, honest looking. There are no wrong or right answers.

Responses are best from direct experience (the physical evidence of seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, prior to the story or explanation about them). Long-winded, analytical and philosophical or stream of consciousness answers are best avoided and may even hinder progress. Just listen very closely to the answers that arise in you, and answer to the very best of your ability at that time. (Read the article at http://liberationunleashed.com/articles ... xperience/ for more help on distinguishing what is direct experience.)

Put aside all other teachings, philosophies etc. for the duration of this investigation. Really put all your effort and attention into seeing this reality, as it is. (If you have a daily and essential meditation practice, it's ok to continue with that. And it's fine to read threads in this forum and the Gateless Gatecrashers book.)

Please learn to use the quote function, see http://liberationunleashed.com/nation/v ... ?f=4&t=660 for instructions.

If you haven't already seen it, there is intro info at http://www.liberationunleashed.com/, together with our disclaimer and a short video.

Please confirm that you have seen these, that you agree to the disclaimer, and that you'd like me to be your guide and then we'll begin.

Let's start with a summary of what you're looking for and what you expect to find. I know you've already answered some of these, but please forgive any overlap and just fill in the gaps where you haven't, and we'll get started.

What are your expectations for this process?

What is it that you are searching for?

How will you know that you found it?

How will this feel?

How will this change you?

Finally, here's a couple of helpful points:

1) You can press 'subscribe to this topic' in the blue bar at the bottom of this page and receive a notification email every time I post here.

2) The site has a nasty habit of logging you out while you write a reply, which can mean you lose what you have written. One way to avoid this is to write elsewhere, then just paste the message into the 'reply' window when you're ready to send.

Don't worry, I don't intend to send any more posts this long, if I can help it! This is just to set things up for you nicely.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Pete x

thanks for the reply. I've been waiting for it infact. thanks. yes I've gone through the disclaimer (couldnt find the vdieo though) and agree to post atleast once a day.
I'll try to dissociate from the all the intellectual learnings and teachings but if they do creep in my replies then you will know and you can point it out to me.

To summarise

What are your expectations for this process?

I don't know what to expect from the process.

What is it that you are searching for?

my search is for the truth- truth that will set me free. I've learnt intelectualised many concepts and got some glimpses here and there and maybe calmed down my anxiety or fear but the real knowing doesn't seem to have happened as there is still the craving for it.

How will you know that you found it?

can't say but maybe whats telling me that i haven;t found it will change and tell me that its found.

How will this feel?

like completion of long pending task.. like having done.. maybe or maybe nothing can't say for sure

How will this change you?

full of life, more available to life

i don't know whether these answers will remain the same till the process continues.

Thanks a lot
namaste

Hi Vishal

Thanks for accepting the disclaimer, the various conditions and all the other stuff.

Just so you know, I tend to post once a day, round about the time I'll send this, mid to late afternoon. But sometimes earlier, sometimes more than once. So, it's far from written in stone :-)

The introductory video can be accessed using the link I provided http://www.liberationunleashed.com/ and then on 'Videos' down the side. It is the first clip - Welcome to Liberation Unleashed.

I don't know what to expect from the process.

My search is for the truth- truth that will set me free. I've learnt intelectualised many concepts and got some glimpses here and there and maybe calmed down my anxiety or fear but the real knowing doesn't seem to have happened as there is still the craving for it.

Thanks also for sharing your expectations (part of which I've quoted above) and your understanding of what seeing that you have no separate self might be like. It's natural, of course, to wonder and speculate about what this liberation/awakening will be like but, by its very nature, I can assure you that it's just not like anyone expects, although it does differ for each one of us. I'd just stress that the work we do is definitely not intellectual or thought-based. That being so, it's best to put aside any expectations, as they reside in thoughts about the future and so are not within direct experience.

Rest assured, that when you see that there isn't and never has been a 'you', a self-entity, with my guiding to help you see that fact for yourself, you'll just know. In exactly the same way that you know that unicorns aren't real, Batman doesn't exist, and there's no Santa Claus. It isn't fundamentally at all difficult, amazingly simple in fact, but only if you don't rely on trying to figure it out by thinking it through but, instead, just LOOK, LOOK, LOOK in direct experience.

Actually seeing for sure that there is no separate self, and never has been, is different for everyone. It can come with a definite pop of realisation, or it might creep up gradually until it is seen. Also the effects on life lived after liberation can vary widely.

It’s worth mentioning at this early stage that what can hold a lot of people back, and something that we can perhaps knock on the head now, are assumptions around what one would 'be like' or what life ought to 'look like' once it’s seen that there’s no self-entity. There is a view that 'getting it' is tantamount to kind of somehow seeing it all the time, or being in some kind of state in which negative emotions or problems don’t arise.

It's really helpful to be clear that it's not any kind of state - it's simply direct knowing, insight. The Santa example puts it very well - 'seeing through' Santa, i.e. knowing for sure that there is no Santa, doesn't mean that little kids then spend the rest of their lives constantly thinking, 'there's no Santa'! Nor does it mean that Santa isn't apparently spotted in shopping malls in December. It's just that the story has been seen through. The direct knowing of no-self may be recollected at any time, but states still continue to come and go - pleasant, unpleasant, 'positive', 'negative'. However, that said, changes will be noticed, some possibly quite dramatic, including in relation to suffering arising from a pre-occupation with a separate self that simply doesn't exist!

I hope that's helped to clarify the background stuff a bit. Don't hesitate to ask me about any of this.

Moving on towards the core of this work - just look at the following statement, and ponder it every which way you can:

Nothing exists outside the present moment.

Can you find anything, anything at all, that does?

And next:

How do you conceive the 'self' or 'I'/ 'me' that you hold 'yourself' to be?

Now look directly at the flow of experiencing. Where in that flow does the 'self' that you conceive reside? Can it be found, at all?

Pete x

Ps.It's helpful during our thread for us both to use the quote function; it keeps the various items and topics separated. To do so, please simply highlight the relevant sentence(s)/paragraph(s) that you're replying to in my previous post and press 'copy', then press the 'Quote ' button in the bar above the section you're typing in, then place the cursor in the centre of the two bracketed quote words and then press "paste".

Good morning Sir

Thanks for understanding my state and the step 1. I'll ponder over these and come back with my experiences.

lots of regards

Hi Vishal,

Ok, great.

Looking forward to hearing from you later on today.

Pete x

Namaste

Nothing exists outside the present moment.

I have pondered over this but something seems to contradict with this and react to it strongly.

Can you find anything, anything at all, that does?
Yes, my fears, my memories, my ambitions, seems to exist outside the present moment. They seem to come out of nowhere and bring along emotions, feelings which make them very real. They must be existing somewhere out of the present moment from where they come and then go back after creating their effect.

And next:

How do you conceive the 'self' or 'I'/ 'me' that you hold 'yourself' to be?

The Self or I/me which "I" conceive to be, what "I" hold "myself" to be is bundle of labels like - body, name, relations, thoughts (which i think are my thoughts). Predominantly its with the body which carries so many labels which form my I.

Now look directly at the flow of experiencing. Where in that flow does the 'self' that you conceive reside? Can it be found, at all?

Looking at the flow of experience the Self conceived seems to be residing in the body or maybe body itself. digging deeper it maybe the agent that causes reactions emotions or feeling in response to experiences of the senses or the thoughts which may also produce similiar emotions or feelings.

Just sharing with you after studying some of Advaita/Ramana Maharishi I have made another Idea of self that seem to be witness to all happening around, witness to all thoughts. There seem to be awareness which is always there whether my eyes or open or shut which seems to be waiting for all experiences of sense or thoughts and still remain unchanged by it but there is another which gets affected by all these experiences/thoughts and reactions are registered in the body as more experiences/thoughts/feelings. This stillness I thought is I. But this also seems to be just another thought now.

Thanks.
hope i made some sense or maybe not, but i wanted to be as honest as possible after removing all the learned concepts. Lot of learning seems to create another set of thoughts to replace those it has destroyed.

lots of regards

Hi Vishal,

Can you find anything, anything at all, that does?

Yes, my fears, my memories, my ambitions, seems to exist outside the present moment. They seem to come out of nowhere and bring along emotions, feelings which make them very real. They must be existing somewhere out of the present moment from where they come and then go back after creating their effect.

Interesting Vishal. Do you not agree that all feelings, emotions and thoughts occur in the present moment? If they don't, how can you ever be aware of them, and where and when do they occur if not here and now? Also, aren't fears, memories and ambitions comprised of feelings, thoughts or emotions, or a combination of these?

The Self or I/me which "I" conceive to be, what "I" hold "myself" to be is bundle of labels like - body, name, relations, thoughts (which i think are my thoughts). Predominantly its with the body which carries so many labels which form my I.

I agree. We continually label our experience and then believe the labels are separate entities or fixed objects don't we? The separate self is a collection of these labels concocted by thinking.

Just sharing with you after studying some of Advaita/Ramana Maharishi I have made another Idea of self that seem to be witness to all happening around, witness to all thoughts. There seem to be awareness which is always there whether my eyes or open or shut which seems to be waiting for all experiences of sense or thoughts and still remain unchanged by it but there is another which gets affected by all these experiences/thoughts and reactions are registered in the body as more experiences/thoughts/feelings. This stillness I thought is I. But this also seems to be just another thought now.

You're right, it's all just thoughts once we formulate it into concepts.

Thanks for your initial input and thoughts here; I've really enjoyed it. These initial questions were really just to see where you stand in relation to seeing whether there's a separate self, and what you've said shows you've got a good feel for what we're just about to start looking at. Now I'll start to point towards looking in 'your' actual experience to see what can be found. It's probably obvious, but anything I ask in bold (like the questions above and below) means I want an answer from you.

My job as your guide during this enquiry will be simply to point out to you where and how to look in direct experience so that you can see for sure for yourself whether there's a separate self-entity anywhere doing or being anything. I really like to maintain a specific skeleton structure to this process, which then allows us to explore much more loosely within each and every area within experience where a separate self might be found.

As you'll have seen, the initial questions point you towards looking into your experience, which is, as I say, where I'll be frequently pointing you to look, and where this investigation will take place. That's as opposed to thought content. Experiencing is the very core of what we're doing here with this. Essentially, and utterly fundamentally, all there is, and can ever be, is here right now in this moment. So looking to see whether a separate and separating self is to be found can only take place within the experience of this. Now. There's nothing else. It follows therefore that all of our work to realise and actually know that there is no separate self is done by investigating experience. To this end, we can divide experiencing into thought, sensations (seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, feeling [tactile and kinaesthetic] and an unmistakable sense of Aliveness (presence/being). I referred to the useful article on direct experience in the introductory post, and you might want to have another look at that.

As I keep saying, the whole of this investigation centres around looking in experience to see if a self-entity can be found anywhere there. This is accompanied by seeing that it is in thoughts and only in thoughts that 'I' ever 'occurs' and that 'I' doesn't actually occur there either because thoughts, or at least their contents, are neither reliable nor real in any sense.

So, let's start at last investigating where a self-entity might be by looking at sense arisings and the self as experiencer:

When you look at something, a book, a tree outside or whatever, can you find an 'I' that is looking or seeing, or is there just seeing?

If there is an 'I', where are the boundaries between what is being seen, the seeing process itself and the seer?

Please do the same with hearing: birdsong, music, a pneumatic drill or whatever; and similarly with each of: tasting, tactile feelings and smelling.

Pete x

Dear Pete
Namaste
Thank you for your reply. I'm going through the articles you mentioned. I'll come back with my experiences.

With Lots of regards

Dear Pete
Thanks a lot for being so patient with me. I'll try to post daily as expected from me. Thanks for you concern. I'm experimenting with

"When you look at something, a book, a tree outside or whatever, can you find an 'I' that is looking or seeing, or is there just seeing? "

Sometimes i feel there is an I inside of me that is looking at an object of focus say a tree. Sometimes there seem to be only seeing happening. When i close my eyes there still seem to be some presence and seeing of darkness seem to be happening. I've tried this with touching also and same results.

"If there is an 'I', where are the boundaries between what is being seen, the seeing process itself and the seer?"

The "I" which "i" feel as presence doing the seeing seems to be confined to my body particularly head. Upon closing my eyes and looking for this i can feel a presence only , as mentioned above also (seeing darkness), but cannot find its boundries. But who is this I looking for I ? can't say.

but earlier I had satisfied myself with the presence within me as "I" the knower, the seer of all that is. But now I could see that also as a thought and then that too vanishes. After reading the article on DE at http://liberationunleashed.com/articles ... xperience/ it was observed that this presence or being also an aspect of investigation.
Though this contradicts a lot with all previous learning wherein I had felt at times that more looking is required on this presence but now that belief has also been destroyed.
Now the distinction between the Looker, looking and looked is reduced to looking and looked. the looker seems to be a thought.

dont know what i'm saying lots of confusion but some peace inside i'm feeling.

Just for sharing - when i stepped onto this site and decided that i've to do this a sudden surge of fear overcame me. But still I requested for a guide . And strange fear in me was wishing against it. But then one day it was all gone in an instant and a joy took its place. Now the fear of the process has not come up so far. but can't say where it comes from and when it comes. But in the past also lot of fear has been part of my life and gradually with witnessing presence I could feel it difusing when i decided to just be there for it and witness it fully. but another teaching which I've found here is expressing gratitude for the fear for what it is.

thanks a lot
lots of regards

Hi Vishal,

Thanks a lot for being so patient with me. I'll try to post daily as expected from me. Thanks for you concern.

Absolutely no problem Vishal. Please try and remember to use the quote function as it's really helpful for me when replying.

Sometimes i feel there is an I inside of me that is looking at an object of focus say a tree. Sometimes there seem to be only seeing happening. When i close my eyes there still seem to be some presence and seeing of darkness seem to be happening. I've tried this with touching also and same results.

Remember, when you're looking at any experience, don't try and do anything in particular. It's like when you're just gazing out of a window, you just relax and let seeing, or hearing or whatever just happen with no effort to change or make anything else happen. No more (or less) is needed.

So, regarding the times you're looking at a tree or an orange or whatever and you say you feel an 'I' inside, can you actually find that separate self in 'your' direct experience? If you can, please describe this entity and tell me how it functions. Or, if you can't, do you mean by feel thoughts or feelings, or perhaps a combination of both?

Please do the same with hearing, touching, tasting and smelling and tell me, in each case, whether you can find a self-entity doing the sensing.

The "I" which "i" feel as presence doing the seeing seems to be confined to my body particularly head. Upon closing my eyes and looking for this i can feel a presence only , as mentioned above also (seeing darkness), but cannot find its boundaries.

Again, solely from direct experience, i.e. seeing, touching, hearing, smelling and tasting, not from thoughts, when looking at something specific, can you find any separation or boundary between that which is seeing, the process of seeing, and that which is seen? If you can, please tell me how this boundary/separation appears?

But who is this I looking for I ? can't say.

We can use words like 'awareness' or 'presence' but that's just labelling in order that we might try to communicate that which cannot be truly expressed in words or concepts

Also, you say 'who is this I looking for I?' Is there an 'I' looking? Can you find it?

As I said earlier, any question in bold, please answer. So, from the previous post:

Interesting Vishal. Do you not agree that all feelings, emotions and thoughts occur in the present moment? If they don't, how can you ever be aware of them, and where and when do they occur if not here and now? Also, aren't fears, memories and ambitions comprised of feelings, thoughts or emotions, or a combination of these?

Just for sharing - when i stepped onto this site and decided that i've to do this a sudden surge of fear overcame me. But still I requested for a guide . And strange fear in me was wishing against it. But then one day it was all gone in an instant and a joy took its place. Now the fear of the process has not come up so far. but can't say where it comes from and when it comes. But in the past also lot of fear has been part of my life and gradually with witnessing presence I could feel it diffusing when i decided to just be there for it and witness it fully. but another teaching which I've found here is expressing gratitude for the fear for what it is.

I've guided quite a few folks who have experienced fear during this process, and that's hardly surprising given how fundamental the investigation is and how challenging it is for one's (mistaken) notion of what identity is. So, I admire you for embarking upon this, and I'm really pleased that fear is not disturbing you at present. You already know not to resist fear (or any other emotions) when it arises, but simply to let it be in awareness until it's done, which is great.

You're doing fine so far Vishal.

Pete x

Dear Pete
Namaste!
thanks a lot. I'll need some more time to work on this. I'll keep you posted on my experience.

thanks a lot
with regards