What, really, is "The Witness"?

In another thread about my concerns over what practice to...uh...practice, Kenneth wrote:

Your fine, Tomo. There's nothing to be nervous about. These practices aren't mutually exclusive, and there are lots of hours in a day. While you are in the car or the train on your way to work, ask yourself, "Who am I?" While you are working at the assembly line, or digging a ditch, or sitting at your office desk, feel your feet against the floor, or your palms against the shovel handle, or your behind against the chair. While you are sitting at your computer, in this moment, notice that knowing is awake to itself and revel in the fresh perfection of this moment. When you get a half-hour to do some formal sitting, forget about it all and settle into the sensations of your body. Your time is not wasted as long as you are paying attention to something.

So if I start to embrace "The Witness" practice off-cushion, like while walking the dog, I need to understand more of how this works. I presume that it is *not* as simple as merely repeating the question as a mantra, and that I do in fact want to get some meaningful answer out, right? And if (intellectually at least) "I" know the answer is ultimately going to come out as "there is no 'I'", how am I to genuinely and honestly penetrate the question?

I see the words describing this practice, but little of it is sinking in.

When I tried this a while ago, here is some of my inner dialogue:

"Who am I? Well, I am clearly not my body because, technically, someone could be surgically made to look just like me. What about my twin, if I had one? Again, he would look like me but not be me because while we would be genetically alike (equal?), the chances of us having exactly the same life experiences is virtually impossible, and our brains would therefore necessarily be wired slightly, or significantly, differently..."

(cont'd)

"...Could we be raised, as an experiment, in precisely the same conditions? Would we then be the same people? Good question...dunno. But why am I trying to figure out if I can get someone exactly like me? Does that help understand 'me'? Dunno."

So you can see how I cannot seem to escape intellectually examining the thing, which is why, in the final analysis, I am an engineer and not a philosopher. Can someone help me understand?

"...I am an engineer and not a philosopher. Can someone help me understand?"


I feel your frustration brother!

I think you're supposed to use the question as a reminder and a pointer to your sense of self. It's not a question to be figured out but just to draw your attention to the self.

Have you looked into the "Great Freedom" website which Adam has posted in a thread? You might find their teaching easuer to grasp.

This was the case with me, but people are different even if they are engineers.

Amr

Hi Tomo,

Your engineering background is more useful here than any philosophy. This is a procedure, not a dialectic. When thoughts arise in response to the question, "who am I?" the important thing is not the content of the thoughts, but the fact that the thoughts are known. Who knows about this? Develop a meta-view that is capable of wondering about awareness itself. Any answer you can come up with is just another thought and is therefore not relevant to this exercise. You just keep knocking the legs out from under the thoughts by saying, "okay, fine, but who knows about *this*?"

You may eventually get to the point where there is a sense of "I", as in "It is *I* who know about this." For the purposes of the Witness exercise, this is where you stop. You just stay with this sense of "I". It feels like there is a "knower" looking out of your eye sockets. But that knower or "witness" is not Tomo. It's just this impersonal or transpersonal sense of knowing. The exercise is to dwell as this "witness." This is not rigpa. It is a transitional step, halfway between our ordinary sense of self and recognition of the unconditioned. Some traditions (e.g., see the explanation of hua-tou practice by Stuart Lachs:

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/33...mination+and+Hua-Tou

)

warn against the Witness, considering it a dead end. Other schools, e.g., Advaita Vedanta, however, explicitly teach the Witness, calling it "the stick that stirs the fire and is eventually consumed by it." I favor the Advaita approach, because I've seen how the Witness can be a solid foundation from which to surrender to rigpa. My sense is that it is more difficult to stabilize access to rigpa without having first stabilized the Witness, which I consider to be an important developmental phase.

I would recommend reading "Raja Yoga" by Ramacharaka for a series of guided (written) meditations that will lead you inevitably to the "Witness".

For those reading this thread and are interested in haquan's advice, here is a link to download this book:

manybooks.net/titles/ramacharakay13651365613656.html

"My sense is that it is more difficult to stabilize access to rigpa without having first stabilized the Witness, which I consider to be an important developmental phase. - Kenneth

"


Kenneth, in my limited experience I found that if I, honest to God, focus on the witness I become it and it becomes a direct path meditation.

If I try to keep enough distance between me and the Witness in order to observe it as an object of meditation, the whole thing becomes contrived.

As a result I gave up on the Witness, and I'm going directly to the third gear. Is that bad thing to do?

Amr

"Kenneth, in my limited experience I found that if I, honest to God, focus on the witness I become it and it becomes a direct path meditation.

If I try to keep enough distance between me and the Witness in order to observe it as an object of meditation, the whole thing becomes contrived.

As a result I gave up on the Witness, and I'm going directly to the third gear. Is that bad thing to do? -Amr"

Hi Amr,

No, there is nothing wrong with going directly to Third Gear. In fact that is ideal. But let's make sure we are using the words in the same way. It could be that what you are calling 3rd Gear *is* the Witness. In the Witness practice, once you get in touch with the sense of "I", the goal is to dwell as that witness. In other words, you are *supposed* to become it, not hold yourself separate from it. You can tell the difference between the Witness and rigpa because the Witness is a heavily concentrated state with a distinct sense of a knower. Rigpa is light, fresh, doesn't require concentration, and you can't hold onto it at all.

Can you say more about your experience when you do these practices?

My experience with the third gear (if it's indeed third gear), is based on the lessons from the Great Freedom website.

The first step is to relax and rest. The second step is watch whatever comes to my awareness as if I am watching TV or a movie. Just watching with "ok, what's next" attitude. The third step is to discern what is constant in all the things that show and go. The last step is to keep discerning that constant.

I don't intentionally go through those steps when I do it. But when I analyze it now, this how it seems to happen.

Amr

OK, that sounds great, Amr. I think you should keep doing that, alternating it with your vipassana/samatha.

Kenneth

"The second step is watch whatever comes to my awareness as if I am watching TV or a movie. Just watching with "ok, what's next" attitude. The third step is to discern what is constant in all the things that show and go. The last step is to keep discerning that constant....
Amr
"

Hmm I just wrote to Kenneth:
"...There is this striving effort/attractive pull to dive into whatever is there, no matter how subtle. The natural response was to watch and see. Pleasant stuff? - watch and see. Nothing happening? - watch and see. Stillness? Nondistractedness? - watch and see..."

This feeling happened at the visceral level. I felt strangely resonating to what Keeiton said.

...Just a thought...

Andrew

Hey Amr!

You mentioned following the advice of Great Freedom, I wonder if you could post a link to where you found those instructions? They have a lot of audio and video links, and written pages and books - a lot! So I'd be interested in a link that takes me directly to the instructions you are referring to.

Thanks mate!

In kind regards,

Adam.

Hi Adam,

"I don't intentionally go through those steps when I do it. But when I analyze it now, this how it seems to happen. - Amr"

As I said above, those are not instructions I found listed somewhere on their website. This was just analysis of the process that I wrote in response to Kenneth question.

So far I've listened to the following:
1. Introduction to Awareness.
2. Instruction in Relying on Awareness Day and Night.
3. Instruction in Letting Points of View Flow on By.
4. Identification of Signs of Accomplishment in Everyday Life.

I happened to pull a muscle few weeks ago and I take hot bubble baths often while listening to Candice's fragile voice giving the instructions.

I found out later that she recommends doing just that!

Amr

Oh, ok. Yeah, those are great videos. Hahahaha... Candice's fragile voice, classic!

Thanks mate!

Read a ramana maharshi book or a nisargadatta book to really get the point of this method. The answer isn't intellectual, you are witnessing now.

Say who am I? If the mind answers "I" then one says (wordlessly) "to whom does this I arise?" No answer should be given (in words) and one should be at the witness point. This is the little technique one uses to keep the process going if one finds oneself attached to anything in particular. Again say "to whom does this sensation arise" or "to whom does this thought arise."

The answer is a wordless I or "I-I" as Ramana Maharshi calls it.

Try this.