Antero's practise journal 3

40 min sit

I form the imaginary bubble around the inside of my skull and start to notice any thoughts inside the bubble. 'I wonder what my next will be.'

At the start it would seem that there are no thoughts around, but soon I detect subtle hypnagogic imagery, proto thoughts and strobing of the mind space. There is a feeling of pressure inside the head, which is not pleasant.

@10 min
Strobing and proto thoughts are getting more noticeable, otherwise no thoughts present. At times there are some analyzing thoughts at work in the background. I notice a very high frequency vibration at the chest area which is also felt at the shoulders.

@20 min
My focus is deepening and all mind activities are felt as very fast vibration. The vibration and pulsing of the mind space is filling my entire focus at this point. It feels like I have zoomed in on the thought generating process. There are no hypnagogic activity or proto thoughts present, everything is just vibration. It is easy to stay focused on the vibration as opposed to more the elusive technique: 'I wonder what my next thought will be'. Analyzing thoughts can still operate in the background normally.

@30 min
There is feeling of letting go and bright rapture wipes the mind totally empty for a moment.

During the rest of the sit there is a feeling of opening and expansion, which seems to be centered on the chest area. The mind feels very clear afterwards.

An Experiment

Yesterday I talked with Kenneth about the Stages of Enlightenment after 4th path (5th Stage) and how easy it is to get caught in believing that somehow freedom is dependent on those skills and features that can be developed after the initial awakening.

I certainly have seen this in my own practise. Every time there has been a shift in the baseline of my practise, the mind is content for a while until the next project begins. This happened with the project of disembedding from emotions, then with the project of disembedding from the self contraction. Now I am seeing it happen with the project of disembedding from discursive thinking.

Mind eagerly starts to build the everyday practise to acquire yet another skill. As this project starts, all the limitations of the earlier stage are seen in detail and the next stage seems indispensable for being free. The mind is sucked in by the project and does no even realize how embedded it has become once more.

Today I ran an experiment. I did not get up before everybody else to do my practise like I would normally do. In the train I did no formal practise, instead I just looked around and paid attention to the moment.

How delightful it can be just to walk home the usual route from the train station while paying attention to all the senses.

How not-me the sensations feel.

How unnecessary it is to even think about concepts like 'me' or 'not-me'.

It is nice to have projects like meditation or getting enlightened but one shouldn't confuse them with being free.

[Edited to add: Thank you Kenneth for putting things into perspective!]

35 min sit in the evening

I start by imagining a bubble inside my skull and observing what is happening inside of it. To keep the mind from wandering I remind my self every now and then 'I wonder what my next thought will be'. There are some proto thoughts and a gentle strobing of mind space present.

As the concentration deepens, there is a feeling of zooming in on the area at the centre of the head. A couple of times tension is released and as a result concentration is strengthens.

I am experiencing fast vibration at the centre of the head and nothing else. The attention is flowing into that area like a river and I can see with my mind's eye a sine wave like pattern flowing in space. The mind is pulled into the object like a magnet. The separation of subject and object is gone and there is just this experience of being in the middle of whirlpool of energy and vibration.

Everything is let go of, the physical and mental structure that I am calling 'me' could be obliterated for all I care. There are no thoughts as I seem to experience the process of thought generation from the inside.

This state is very similar to falling asleep. I let go of the object and let the mind become unconscious.

At times I am seeing longer spontaneous gaps between thoughts. It may happen on its own when for example I am cooking or washing my teeth. On the other hand, sometimes being mindful of thoughts when sitting can be all but impossible. The mind wanders and before I know I realize that I have been daydreaming and following some pointless train of thought for some time.

This morning when I was doing my daily Ashtanga yoga posture series, the absence of mental background noise helped to create a state of heightened body awareness that I have very seldom experienced. For a while the mind was almost exclusive turned to the flow of predetermined movements and postures synchronized by breathing (ujjayi pranayama), energy locks (bandhas) and gazing points (drsti). How simple and clear everything was for a moment.

I am walking down the street and feeling miserable for no apparent reason.

My body feels heavy with unpleasant sensations everywhere and there are tears at corners of my eyes. There is a feeling of utter unworthiness or low-self esteem, but that is felt only in the body. When I turn my attention to my mind states, I find equanimity and some compassion. There are no thoughts present; no story telling happening and this lack of background noise seems to enhance my awareness of this condition.

It is as if body sensations, mind states and thoughts are all operating independent of each other. All of them are having their own agenda. The logical conclusion of this does not leave much room for 'me' to exist, even theoretically.

My practise being mindfulness of thoughts have changed recently. Instead of tight focus centred at the head area, my focus has become broader. There is less forcing and more accepting and letting go. I no longer care if I am experiencing annoying discursive thinking or not and strangely this is resulting in a more expanded state with less distractions and more moments of being awake.

I am seeing more clearly how in this point of my practise unwanted story telling is pulling me away from being awake continuously.

I was in an educational social situation today. I felt intense unpleasant sensations in the head area combined with thoughts of irritation. Even though my mind states were calm and peaceful, the situation was really unpleasant.

This raises some interesting questions about the nature of suffering. If I say that I was suffering, I am not being truthful to my feelings. On the other hand, to say that I was completely free from suffering is also false.

Who wasn't suffering lol?

"Who wasn't suffering lol?"

Exactly! Could someone please tell me how can there potentially be any suffering when I can clearly see that there is no one present to suffer?

This paradox really seems to be the root of my problem at the moment.

"Exactly! Could someone please tell me how can there potentially be any suffering when I can clearly see that there is no one present to suffer?

This paradox really seems to be the root of my problem at the moment."

Me too! So what more is there to see?

Cutting edge of my practise at the moment

I extend an oval shaped diffuse field of awareness around my body to include all of my body sensations as a whole. Then a smaller field of awareness that is centred on my head is created to include my thoughts. These two attention fields merge and create an invisible field of awareness roughly shaped like a pear that extends approximately 10-50 centimetres all around my body.

This kind of attention enables me to be mindful of my body sensations and thoughts as a whole. As a result of this practise I feel more awake in this moment with no discursive thinking.

Today I have been experimenting with using a mental image of this invisible field of awareness as an anchor to stay present. I discovered that maintaining the mental image will give me a better handle for this practise and sustaining the mindfulness is easier in everyday situations.

"Me too! So what more is there to see?"

Not made 4th myself yet, but what's to be done after this point is something which interests me and which I've been thinking about lately. I read this quote from Aleister Crowley which seems to have some interesting possibilities...

"Let the Magus then contemplate each in turn, raising it to the ultimate power of Infinity. Wherein Sorrow is Joy, and Change is Stability, and Selflessness is Self. For the interplay of the parts hath no action upon the whole. And this contemplation shall be performed not by simple meditation -- how much less then by reason! -- but by the method which shall have been given unto Him in His initiation to the Grade."

The "method" in question is nirodha samapatti, which Crowley equates with shivadarshana from the Hindu traditions. I've often thought about this resolution of opposites, there's a lot of resolving of paradox which occurs for me in Equanimity during practice, and after a fruition. Is this relevant in any way, or am I just bumping my proverbial gums? Ha! It's great seeing what goes on post 4th path with you guys reports, thanks for posting.

Hi Tommy,

I created a new thread to discuss various practises after fourth path.

It can be found here:

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/4536238/-

Antero.

Being awake pre path is no different from being awake after any stage of enlightenment; it just becomes easier and happens more often. In any given moment you can either be awake or embedded in sensations, emotions or thoughts. I am seeing in my current practise that unwanted discursive thinking is getting in the way of being awake.

Could it be possible to be awake in every single moment? At least that is my working thesis.

I happened to read about Shikantaza and it struck me that it sounds very similar to my current practise.

'Shikantaza i.e. resting in a state of brightly alert attention that is free of thoughts, directed to no object, and attached to no particular content.'
- Dōgen Zenji

"While you are practicing just sitting, be clear about everything going on in your mind. Whatever you feel, be aware of it, but never abandon the awareness of your whole body sitting there. Shikantaza is not sitting with nothing to do; it is a very demanding practice, requiring diligence as well as alertness. If your practice goes well, you will experience the 'dropping off' of sensations and thoughts. You need to stay with it and begin to take the whole environment as your body. Whatever enters the door of your senses becomes one totality, extending from your body to the whole environment. This is silent illumination."
- Master Shengyen, Attaining the Way

Hi Antero,
The 'dropping off of sensations and thoughts' in my experience gets progressively deeper and easier as post fourth practice continues until one can do it with ease. The difficulty though is how to be in this during our daily interactions. 'Taking the whole environment as your body,' I think this is a very advanced, permanently 'no self' state. It appears to me that seeing through 'self', and permanently 'no self' are two separate states. I find now that my attention to 'mindfulness' practice is at a more subtle level now that I am aware that 'an attention' wave moves across the brain as movement occurs in the external environment, this includes emotions and thoughts arising in others. Most of the time now, i don't move with the attention wave, but when I get a strong emotional blast, I get caught on it and well....it all goes to hell. At this stage, constant returning to grounding and great patience and compassion are helpful building blocks to move us on the the next state. What do you think?
Paul

Thank you Paul for your response,

In my experience some veils still remain to be peeled off after 4th path. These layers are in the way of being awake at all times. Even though one can be disembedded without any attainments, doing so continuously gets easier with each path. At the 4th path (5th stage) the sense of self is seen through, but I agree with you that are very far from no-self state, that the definition of Shikantaza seems to refer to.

I can totally relate to 'getting caught to a strong emotional blast' that knocks off the mindfulness. Grounding the emotions together with noting mind states will eventually move the baseline of the practise to such a level where mind states can no longer affect the mindfulness.

I am speculating here, but 'Taking the whole environment as your body' or 'no-self' as you called it, may refer to something that is beyond Kenneth's seven stage model. In my experience even the 7th stage in Kenneth's model still leaves one with an built-in attachment to certain thoughts that cause unpleasant body sensations as a result, even though self referencing and negative emotions no longer arise. There is no self present, but the system is still acting like there was one.

Antero.

Hi Antero,
I'm not very familiar with the model and on top of that I find it difficult to speculate about states I don't know, haven't accessed or don't understand. But if you could point me toward a thread which describes the outline I'll have a read and see what I do and don't relate to. Hope you're well.
Paul

"Hi Antero,
I'm not very familiar with the model and on top of that I find it difficult to speculate about states I don't know, haven't accessed or don't understand. But if you could point me toward a thread which describes the outline I'll have a read and see what I do and don't relate to. Hope you're well.
Paul"

Sorry Paul, I mistakenly assumed that Kenneth's seven stage model of enlightenment is common knowledge on this forum. Here you can find more information on the stages I referred to in my message:

Introduction of the seven stage model by Kenneth (post #14)

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/43...4th+Pathers+Unite%21

Youtube videos:



Discussion on the 7 stage model:

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/44...fset=0&maxResults=20

I hope these links will help to clarify my message.

Antero.

'Listening for the ships' type of Mahamudra practise that Kenneth teaches has opened a whole new level of practise for me. When I direct my attention to listening for imaginary sounds, the mind expands and quiets down immediately. There is a pleasant vibration all around the body, sometimes felt more clearly in some parts and sometimes just moving around. There is a sense of relief as thoughts and tensions are let go of.

When I am sitting in the train, there is just a constant stream of body sensations, feeling of contentment and no mental story telling or clinging. If I see something interesting, there may be a mental not about it, but the mind will not start commenting on it or start to pursue any possible associations. This seems to result in a new level of awakeness and peace. I am trying to cultivate this state as much as possible during the day and some of the awareness seems to continue also during the night making my dreams unusually vivid.

60 min asana practise and shikantaza

Like every morning, I started my practise with Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga style asana practise. I have come to admire the simplicity of Ashtanga yoga practise more and more nowadays. Combining breathing with flowing sequence of asanas with certain energy locks (muscle contractions at the perineum [moola bandha] and at the lower abdomen [uddiyana bandha]) and gazing points [drsthi] this practise really forces one to be Present if done correctly.

The Good thing about Ashtanga yoga is that it has been easy to integrate it with all the methods of mindfulness that Kenneth has taught me: noting, noticing, the Witness, 3rd gear, Direct Mode and Mahamudra. Even though I have been practising Ashtanga yoga for ten years, I am just starting to see that the essence of it is just being present moment by moment with nothing in between. I have been getting these moments of awakeness all this time, even though I have just recently started to realize it. Nowadays these separate moments of awakeness are being joined together forming more continuous experience of suchness [1].

As I go through my series of postures, there is just pure experience of being in this body, feeling the muscles move, feeling the breathing, seeing, touching, hearing, liberating feeling of existence. Sometimes I notice that some internal dialog is starting to pull me away from this awakeness. The mind is returned back to being present by gently inclining it towards imaginary sounds of ships in the harbour.

(Cont.)

(Cont.)

[1]

Tathata or Suchness is viewing things as they are.

'In one who is really overwhelmed by the consciousness of absolute nothingness, there is neither 'Me' nor 'God,' but just because there is absolute nothingness, the mountain is mountain, and the water is water, and the being is as it is."

Waldenfels, Hans. "Absolute nothingness: preliminary considerations on a central notion in the philosophy of Nishida Kitaro and the Kyoto school." p. 367

How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?

Am I awake now?

My experience during the past week has been for the most part unpleasant. The unpleasant body sensations have been centred at the throat and head area. When I am not feeling the discomfort, I am looking around fascinated by every little detail that I see in a state of no-thought.

I don't think it is a coincidence that zen masters are often gardeners in so many movies and stories. There is something about the combination of working with the plants, fresh air and smell of the earth that naturally orients the mind toward stillness. How different this is compared to my normal job at the office! There are very few things in that environment that promotes awakeness.

Today I did various chores in the garden for three hours while trying to maintain open awareness of Mahamudra and stay mindful of my thoughts. Recently the background noise in my head has become more and more subtle to the point that at times it is all but impossible to be sure if the commentary is going on or not. Every time I found my mind wandering, I gently anchored it back to body sensations of raking or movement of air on my skin.

Yesterday while walking in the city I saw something that was extremely fertile object for further internal speculation and the mind locked on it immediately and started spinning the story. To my astonishment a counteraction occurred without any conscious involvement from my part. The mind turned toward Mahamudra, effectively letting go of the subject and releasing the tension.

During the past couple of days intense unpleasant sensations in the throat and head have returned. Sometimes these heavy sensations may disappear for a moment and be replaced by pleasant tingling feeling all around the body.