Finder Fran

[FranD]

LU is focused guiding for seeing there is no real, inherent 'self' - what do you understand by this?
I understand the Buddhist teaching that there is not continuous, permanent "entity", only fleeting perceptions that are mistaken as a self that is doing the perceiving.

What are you looking for at LU?
A guide for integration, deepening of understanding/ experience in day to day life; a personal back and forth with someone. Someone committed to the process of inquiry and getting the results. Someone I can relate to

What do you expect from a guided conversation?
A personal guide who might provide individual pointing, specific to my own experience, blind spots, etc. Inquiries that are varied and incisive as needed, again, results oriented based on their experience with many others.

What is your experience in terms of spiritual practices, seeking and inquiry?
Decades of meditation, direct experience of non duality, only minimum experience with DI during The Finders COurse

On a scale from 1 to 10, how willing are you to question any currently held beliefs about 'self? 10

[Matthew]

Hi Fran!

Let us walk these last meters on this non-existent path together, shall we :-)

direct experience of non duality

Could you elaborate on this?


With kind regards
Matthew

[FranD]

Thanks, Matthew, for your kind and encouraging welcome.

I'm not sure what I meant when I wrote it, but right now? I know I can't function as when I experienced no time, space, or person. Lost in the Absolute won't get me to the grocery store. But maybe more functional versions of that - a thinning of self-identification, and instead increased identification with and as everything, not just the localized character. Flow that seems to happen outside of time. A sense of always being "here".

I think of times when I've experienced no sense of doer-ship - flowing, doing things that arise as the next right thing to do, with occasional "thinking" as might be needed for a task, but largely without thought or "self-direction". Mostly a sense of inner quiet and awareness of present perceptions. That would be nice more of the "time"!

I realize that in this there's still a seeker/seeking for something other than what is. Can we release that too:)

[Matthew]

I realize that in this there's still a seeker/seeking for something other than what is. Can we release that too:)

We can do that, so to speak :)
But there is nothing to release. There is no seeker. There's just an idea of a seeker.


What is the first thing to do to "achieve" this?

I'm not sure what I meant when I wrote it, but right now? I know I can't function as when I experienced no time, space, or person. Lost in the Absolute won't get me to the grocery store. But maybe more functional versions of that - a thinning of self-identification, and instead increased identification with and as everything, not just the localized character. Flow that seems to happen outside of time. A sense of always being "here".

This is a massive wall of expectations.
These very expectations stand between you and this simple recognition.

But maybe more functional versions of that

That is so funny. You will laugh about it soon also :o)
I'll quote that again later.
There are no versions. There is either "here you are" or "here you aren't".

Anyway. What is about to be discovered here can not be expected. Not in 1000 years.
It is just not possible. Hence these expectations are a great hinderance.
Since expectation will say "This is not IT". While "It" is actually true already. Always has been.

Can you drop those expectations? And any other expectation, that might be lingering?
Expect nothing. Expect everything.

I understand the Buddhist teaching that there is not continuous, permanent "entity", only fleeting perceptions that are mistaken as a self that is doing the perceiving.

This is a very sound understanding.

To SEE, whether this is true or not, what we are going to do from now ONLY is to look at things.
Thinking is over. Studying is over.
What we look at is experience. Direct experience. Actual experience.

When you STOP now and look at what is here now.
What is "I".
How is "I" experienced.
Can it be found in sensation?
Does it have anything to do with the seen or the heard?
Are there thoughts about an "I"?

Looking forward to your reply.

[FranD]

When I stop and look at what there is, there are sense perceptions. There is some intention about answering the question, there is memory of our prior exchanges, feelings of appreciation and curiosity. There are occasional sounds from outside, and the sight of my fingers moving on the keyboard…

There are no thoughts about an “I”. “I” in this moment is mainly the intention to explore and respond, and then the process of responding happens. It seems to be happening naturally, organically, in a flow of thoughts and movements.
There’s no “I” to be found in the sensations. They are seem to be happening on their own.

[Matthew]

Good good good.

There are no thoughts about an “I”

This would be surprising.
Are there maybe thoughts about a dream character labelled "Fran"?

“I” in this moment is mainly the intention to explore and respond

What does "I" have to do with intention?
Is "I" to be found in intention, or is "I" prior to intetion?
If so, is that true? Can that be directly observed? Or is that just an idea.



Is there something special about the letter "I"?

Does "O" have anything to do with intention?
Can "E" or "U" be intetion to explore and respond?

If not, how exactly then "I"?

[FranD]

What I meant is there are no thoughts about an I, as your earlier question phrased it.

The memories, feelings, intention, etc I mentioned are definitely about the character “Fran”. They make up a sense of identity and doer-ship – they seem to become “owned” by Fran or identified as him (I, Me, Mine…). They are sometimes experienced as more or less “solid”, more easily seen through or not.

There’s nothing special about the letter I, it’s just a convention we use – created, trained and reinforced as having a meaning. A Fran character could still be a character with all that stuff going on with any string of letters. It’s the belief in it all that’s binding. And I think intention and agency are two things that feel especially binding. “I want to do this or that. I am doing this or that”

Fran has many intentions in a day, most of them mundane – cooking, shopping, going to a meeting… Having an intention seems to result in greater likelihood the intention will be fulfilled, so how am “I” not an actor.? Other times, flowing along without intentions, things get done but more with that feeling of a spontaneous doing as things arise to be done. And I can intentionally "pull back from", dis-identify with the character to an unconditioned awareness (for periods of time).
I can look at past, memories and “who I used to be”, and feel them as flimsy, unreal. The sense of intention and doership in the present feel more real.

[Matthew]

The memories, feelings, intention, etc I mentioned are definitely about the character “Fran”. They make up a sense of identity and doer-ship – they seem to become “owned” by Fran or identified as him (I, Me, Mine…). They are sometimes experienced as more or less “solid”, more easily seen through or not.

Look at the dream character you seemed to be in last night's dream. Or in another vivid night dream.
What is the difference to the current identity "Fran"?
Is there a difference?

Is the currently experienced dream character more "solid" than a night dream character?
If so, what exactly makes it more "solid"?

Fran has many intentions in a day, most of them mundane – cooking, shopping, going to a meeting

Is it really "Fran", which HAS the intentions?
Where exactly is "Fran" in "intention"?
Is "Fran" needed for intention to be?

Where is "Fran" in cooking?
What does "Fran" have to do with shopping?

Is there truly a "Fran" in "going to a meeting"? Or is it just thought telling this story about "Fran" alongside the happening?

[FranD]

Overall, dreams occur without the stronger sense of “reality” that they have “here” in this reality. The dream Fran operates in a world where things are very different than “here”, events seem to just happen, with much less sense of agency or intention about responding to them, sometimes with confusion, and inability to get what he wants. Scenes and environments change without logical transitions.

Yes, this current character has a much more solid sense, can touch itself and other objects with a feeling of contact, sense of continuity, memory, intention and agency. Dream Fran is not nearly as distinct and solid.

Intentions arise in/ with Fran and seem to be initiated by him in response to other experiences.

“Fran” is the body character doing the cooking. He thinks about what is needed from the store, drives there, etc. “Fran” is the one operating in the relative “world” taking care of things “here”. We can talk about “everything is happening in consciousness alone”, but isn’t part of what’s happening in consciousness the relative world, including the characters, bodies, etc? While it may be REALLY, REALLY TRUE that everything happens in Consciousness, isn't relative reality also thereby permeated with Consciousness, an expression of Consciousness? Is there a duality between the seeming two?

[Matthew]

Consciousness, Relative World, permeated with Consciousness, duality and so on...

These are some heavy terms right there!
What we do here is much simpler than all these learned concepts can offer.

What I'm asking you to do is not easy, I know. But it is your necessary thing to do right now.
Please forget about all this learned stuff.
It brought you to a point, where you can look for yourself what is true and what is not true.
It was good. It may now subside.

Because that's all what we are doing here.
We look at what is here now. And by that, we recognise what is here now.
And we also recognise, what is absent.



Let's also forget about "real bodies" and "dream bodies" for now.
Let us look at identity.

What makes this identity YOUR identity.?
How is the thought story about a character called "Fran" YOUR story.?

You would likely not say, that the story of the character labelled "my work colleague" belongs to you.
How then does the story about "Fran" belong to you.

Are they not both equally stories told by thought?


Drop your apparent knowledge. Ignore thoughts about the past for awhile. And look only at what is here now.

[FranD]

Sorry for the delay.
Focusing as we have been with questions asking me to assert or explain my sense of identity, etc seem to reinforce identification.

"What makes this identity YOUR identity.? How is the thought story about a character called "Fran" YOUR story.?"
It's MY identity because of the sense that the thoughts, images, etc are happening here, in this apparent "head"/ mind (the only place they could where I would know of them - in my phenomenal world). It's a thought story about Fran/ Me because of same reasons, and ultimately my identification with them - kind of circular...

"You would likely not say, that the story of the character labelled "my work colleague" belongs to you. How then does the story about "Fran" belong to you." "Are they not both equally stories told by thought?"
There are physical and psychological boundaries between me and others, so I don't experience someone else's story as mine. I only experience someone's else's via words or external pictures/objects, but that's not as "real/ compelling" as direct internal thoughts, memories, images - the more real movie of "me".

[Matthew]

Focusing as we have been with questions asking me to assert or explain my sense of identity, etc seem to reinforce identification.

That's fine. When looking at these things, it can become uncomfortable when it gets hot.
It is important not to avoid, not to hide from it.
But to go through it with a certain momentum.
Let us keep up this momentum by writing at least once a day.

What makes this identity YOUR identity.? How is the thought story about a character called "Fran" YOUR story.?"

It's MY identity because of the sense that the thoughts, images, etc are happening here, in this apparent "head"/ mind (the only place they could where I would know of them - in my phenomenal world).

So there are all sorts of ideas, which make this identity MY identity.
But when leaving the realm of thoughts, ideas, assumptions and looking at what is here now.
What in experience makes an identity MY identity?

Let's see how to look at experience instead of concepts:

When you STOP and LOOK what is here now.
Can the entirety of actual experience be described with the terms
seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, sensation and observed thought
?

Is there more to direct experience?
Is there something beyond or besides these terms?

If so, what exactly is it?
And how is it experienced?

[FranD]

"When you STOP and LOOK what is here now. Can the entirety of actual experience be described with the terms
seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, sensation and ... thought?"

Yes.

"Is there more to direct experience? Is there something beyond or besides these terms?"

When there is "observed thought", as you asked, there is something that observes, knows, not just the thoughts, but the other sensations too.

[FranD]

Sometimes I experience being "thoughts without a thinker", or see images without a seer. There's a flow of activity without narrative or comments "in the head". Doing things without a doer.

[Matthew]

When there is "observed thought", as you asked, there is something that observes, knows, not just the thoughts, but the other sensations too.

There is knowing of thought. Yes.
There is knowing of sensation.
There is knowing of experience.

A thought is present and there is knowing of this thought.
Observing of that thought happens.
This is clearly here.

something that observes, knows

What about this "thing", which knows,
What about this "thing", which observes?

Is this so called "something" here now?

If so, where exactly is it located?
How is it experienced?

Is this "something" really doing the knowing?
Or isn't this "something" also known?

Is this "something" really doing the observing?
Or isn't this "something" also observed?