Dreambus Driver

[Devissimus]

What brings you to Liberation Unleashed?:

It happened... as everything else, I guess. I was looking for videos by Lisa Cairns and then I stumbled upon Lisa Kathleen. I watched her videos and heard her mentioning some process. I was drawn to explore more. Don't know. I guess it somehow resonated with me.

What are you looking for? What do you expect from this?:

I had something that could be called "experience of no self". However, at that time it evoked sheer horror. It took me quite a long time to get accustomed to the idea and feelings that arose out of it. In the meantime, I tried to put the experience in some perspective, to understand what actually happened. I guess I am flip-flopping at the brink of the experience... and I want to step over.

What is your background in terms of seeking and inquiry?:

Transcendental meditation, Yoga, The Work of Byron Katie. Being attracted to Nonduality, both Eastern and Western.

How ready are you to question your beliefs about who you are and see the truth no matter what? On a scale from one to ten (ten being most ready). : 10

[Tao]

Hi Devissimus.

I'm happy to guide you on the basis that:

You are committed to enquiring/posting everyday (except when impossible to),
You answer the questions from direct experience,
You see enquiry through to the end, however long it takes.

Sound good? If so let us begin.

When you say 'I', what is that 'I' referring to? What is it that has experiences?

Tao

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,

I am glad that we started, and thankful.

I agree to all of my commitments, though I can't promise everyday posting due to technical reasons, but will do my best to do so. If that is OK with you, let's proceed.

I took a time. When I look inside, I cannot find any solid "I". It is more something of a fuzzy feeling mixed up with blurry thoughts. As a bodily feeling it feels tight. It kind of exists, it is kind of there, though I cannot really find it.

Dev

[Devissimus]

Adding to above post, there is also a sense of locality, of being behid the eyes, of being specifically here "on this side".

[Tao]

Hi Dev,

That's excellent thank you. Great looking, let's sharpen things a little.

So let's begin with the bodily feeling. It feels tight. If it is tight it must be constricting something, or have some kind of core right? You say it kinda exists but you cannot really find it.

So the job is to find it. Look deeply into the feeling. Let's not assume one way or the other but look until you can be sure. Please answer the following questions from direct experience.

Is there a centre to the feelings?
Is there a someone the feelings are happening to?

Tao

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,

Just to add to my previous post: Spent a day going deeper in your question

When you say 'I', what is that 'I' referring to? What is it that has experiences?

There is a sense of being the receiver of pain.
When it hurts, it hurts locally, hurts "here".

The best I can came up with is that "I" is the name for a sense of localization, the sense of being local, being (in?) "here" where the body is, or being behind the eyes, looking from the perspective of the body. This sense of being local is what I am accustomed to call "I" or "my existence".

A point of awareness.

It feels temporal only when equalized with body that gets older and/or with mind that gets more rigid and structured (I guess due to repetitive use of certain pathways or patterns of thinking... like when someone borrows me a tool and does not ask it back for years, I somehow get a habit of thinking about it or assuming it as "mine").

A feeling of having a centre, here, local.

The sense of being localy here.

The sense of existence.

Dev

[Tao]

Hi Dev.

Here is an exercise:
Close your eyes.
What EXACTLY is it that tells you that 'you' are located behind the eyes?
In fact, with your eyes closed, what do you know about location at all? What do you know about eyes?

Feeling like you have a centre is not good enough, you have to find that centre in DE. So please when you are ready, answer my first two questions:

Is there a centre to the feelings?
Is there a someone the feelings are happening to?

Tao

[Tao]

like when someone borrows me a tool and does not ask it back for years, I somehow get a habit of thinking about it or assuming it as "mine").

An unconscious assumption, yes. Similar to the assumption of a separate self. Yet it only takes a moment of awareness to see that the tool is not yours.

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,

I did the exercise yesterday.

The attempt have put me in a meditative state.
I could not find someone that experiences are happening TO.
There was only the field or awareness that experiences are happening IN.

There was a subtle sense of searching there, like a kind of polarity, of a difference between what was searching and what was searched. Like the field was in a state of attentivness.
I cannot recall now was that attentiveness OF the field or a happening within the field. (I'm writing this from memory, the day after.)

Today I repeated the exercise.

I noticed that the thoughts tends to jump in trying to re-create the previous experience and sell it as the current one, like trying to prevent the freshness of the new experience to occur.

I had to interrupt the exercise because of some outer disturbance.

I'll try it again.

Dev

[Tao]

Hi Dev, good stuff.

Yes continue the exercise and throw this question in:

Does this 'field' of awareness have any borders or boundaries? Can you find them?

i cannot recall now was that attentiveness OF the field or a happening within the field. (I'm writing this from memory, the day after.)

Good this is important. Keep looking, which one is it?

I noticed that the thoughts tends to jump in trying to re-create the previous experience and sell it as the current one, like trying to prevent the freshness of the new experience to occur.

Yes indeed. Allow the freshness of direct experience to reveal your answers.

Tao

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,

"Is there a someone the feelings are happening to?" is quite useful pointer.
At first, I could not go so deep in exercise like a first time. Repeating it (vs. doing it first time) definitely have some added elements. Mind tries to draw from the memory and substitute real with the map. It tries to fake the seeing, like saying "OK. It is seen; let's go home" when it is not seen really. But when those tricks are recognised, acknowledged, allowed to happen and not resisted it goes better.

Does this 'field' of awareness have any borders or boundaries? Can you find them?

Cannot really say about the borders. There is this slight polarization that seems to be created by the very intention to find the "someone-the-feelings-are-happening-to". That is the polarization OF the field. When it happens, it kind of sucks in or shifts the identification from the person (ex subject, which is now objectified i.e looked at) to "that which is searching/looking".

I think the exercise could be repeated, as that which searches (and to which experience is happening to) as well as that which is looked at are both each time becoming a grade subtler. Hopefully not indefinitely...?

Dev

[Tao]

Hi Dev,

Please explain exactly what you mean by polarization. Isn't this just an assumption of thought?

And what EXACTLY is it that is searching / looking?

If you can't find it / explain it, then keep looking until you can.

I need more conclusive answers to the questions I have already asked you.

Tao

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,
OK.
I'll keep looking.
Dev

[Devissimus]

Hi Tao,

I cannot find any solid "someone" to be a centre to the feelings. The "someone" is a kind of thought/emotion/body-sensation (tightness) I habitually refer to as myself. If they itself are taken as a happening, then I cannot really say what exactly is searching or seeing that (beside poetically calling it awareness or consciousness etc.).

The best I can answer is from a memory of experience I had in 2006 when everything I ever thought or felt as being "me" was suddenly seen as from outside, as something that is having no relation whatsoever with what was seeing that. What have seen that? I never found out. It was nothing, not-a-thing, and it was totaly and absolutely impersonal. It didn't have any boundaries. The "experience" then was horrorful. Since then I'm slowly getting acustomed to melt into that and fade away from the personal, which I since then regard as a construct or an energy bundle, that is constantly fed and re-affirmed by every sentence of the language that we use.

Dev

[Tao]

Hi Dev,

Thank you for your reply. A few questions:

Was it horrorful during the experience? Or only horrorful in afterthought?

What is it that would find it horrorful?

What boundaries does THIS (here and now) have, that the 2006 experience didn't have? Break this down for me if you can.

Tao