Alex's experiment with the grounding of emotions

"What I am doing now is basically the 2nd and 4th part of Satipatthana, namely mindfulness of feelings and mindfulness of dhammas focused on co-dependent origination and its relation with the 5 aggregates of clinging. I realize that Theravada Buddhism is very precise and practical when it comes to seeing subtle things, especially for dharma invetigators and mad scientists.
"

Wow Alex, we are on the same page these days. I'm doing something very similar in terms of practice (and teaching it to anybody who will listen). Mindfulness of feelings - what was earlier thought of as emotional states - _is_ simply body awareness from the perspective of being in the body. I've been experimenting with getting my body awareness built up as much as possible and using it to do a binary note of "resisting experience/ not resisting experience". This aids investigation of mind objects immensely. It's damn simple so I can't screw it up to much and it has the added benefit of not letting me get away with anything.

Doing this for long periods makes it clear that the body sensations and mind objects (another layer of glomming ) that compose the sense of a separate self are simply resistance to or ignorance about what is. When the resistance drops via the note, the body is very, very happy about it and will eventually see them as phenomena needing to be let go of (factor of enlightenment). It's a skinner box!

Similarly, Kenneth has encouraged me to setup the condition where by I am aware of the body continuously (especially in the way of emotional energy). He calls this "the carrot and the stick." Over time I am noticing a gradual, but noticeable drop-off in emotional re-activity. I have been using a "do nothing" note in a similar way to your resisting/not resisting note (your practice sounds like it may be more specific to the problem at hand, and perhaps I'll adopt it as well).

I'm interested in hearing more about the mind object aspect as I am focusing much more on the body aspect at this point.

Apperception cuts through ignorance like a diamond. But ignorance again arises and suffering with it (sense of "being" in all possible manifestations). When there is the sense of "being, there is ignorance established. Ignorance of what? Actuality (or suchness if you equate the terms) due to a lack of apperceptive awareness. But you could still observe the flow of "being" without it dissapearing. Doing this taught me alot about what the sense of "being" was made up of and led to a lot of dispassion for it. Both practices of watching carefully the flow of "being" (reality) AND what underlies that flow (actuality) work hand in hand. The former, if done right, leads to the latter.

Yatha buta.

A Pali scholar friend pointed out to me that in the translations of yatha buta both reality (the flow of being) and actuality (no flow of being) are addressed. I am sure my friend wont mind me sharing what he said.

Continued below:

@Owen - great! the depth and simplicity of Pali Buddhism will never cease to amaze me. In one of his videos -I think about what he decided to call the 7th stage of enlightenment- Kenneth speaks about something similar, ie., to simply note "clinging" / "not clinging" (or something like that). I loved his rat conditioning analogy, btw. I guess after a while, the mind finally get the point and understands that "clinging" means suffering.

More than a year ago, I was struggling with my inability to surrender when I knew that this was absolutely needed. Dan Rizzuto had also advised me to focus on body awareness and see how this "wanting to do something" was expressed and experenced as physical sensations within the body. And it worked like a charm.

From what I can tell, the fourth and last mindfulness of the Satipatthana Sutta is mostly helpful after technical 4th path, where the main focus in not anymore the arsing and passing away of phenomena, but their interaction, i.e., how the six senses lead to contact, how contact leads to feelings, how feelings leads to craving, how craving leads to clinging and how clinging leads to becoming, birth, death and suffering.

To stop the vicious circle, all that is needed is therefore to note how the mind craves towards pleasant feelings and has aversion towards unpleasant feelings, leading in both cases to the arising of an illusory sense of self.

START OF QUOTE: For most people, from the standpoint of practice and ordinary experience, the "flow of 'being'" is reality "as it is" or "as it exists." Until said flow disappears, this is the world "as it is," things "as they are." This is why I like Richard's distinction between reality and actuality.

Let's take, for example, a standard description of the Buddha's liberation from the Vinaya:

``so evaṃ samāhite citte parisuddhe pariyodāte anaṅgaṇe vigatūpakkilese mudubhūte kammaniye ṭhite āneñjappatte āsavānaṃ khayañāṇāya cittaṃ abhininnāmesiṃ. so `idaṃ dukkhan' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ dukkhasamudayo' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ dukkhanirodho' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ dukkhanirodhagāminī paṭipadā' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ; `ime āsavā' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ āsavasamudayo' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ āsavanirodho' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ, `ayaṃ āsavanirodhagāminī paṭipadā' ti yathābhūtaṃ abbhaññāsiṃ. tassa me evaṃ jānato evaṃ passato kāmāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccittha bhavāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccittha avijjāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccittha. vimuttasmiṃ vimuttamiti ñāṇaṃ ahosi. `khīṇā jāti, vusitaṃ brahmacariyaṃ, kataṃ karaṇīyaṃ, nāparaṃ itthattāyā' ti abbhaññāsiṃ. ayaṃ kho me, brāhmaṇa, rattiyā pacchime yāme tatiyā vijjā adhigatā, avijjā vihatā, vijjā uppannā, tamo vihato, āloko uppanno."

Continued from my post above Alex's:

"When the mind was collected, pure, clean, without blemish, free of subsidiary defilements, malleable, workable, attained to imperturbability, I inclined it towards the knowledge of destruction of the fluxes. I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is suffering.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the arising of suffering.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the cessation of suffering.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the path leading to the cessation of suffering.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'these are the fluxes.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the arising of the fluxes.'

I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it ocurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the cessation of the fluxes.' I fully understood according to reality/in its true nature/as it occurred/according to the process of becoming: 'this is the path leading to the cessation of the fluxes.' When I cognized (jānato; knew) and perceived (passato; saw) in this way, my mind was released from the flux of desire, the flux of being, and the flux of ignorance. With respect to [this release], there came the knowledge 'released.' I fully understood: 'birth is destroyed, the holy life is lived, the work is finished, there is no more of this worldly state of affairs.' In the final watch of the night I realized (adhigatā) this third knowledge (vijjā). Ignorance was struck down, knowledge arose, light arose."

My Pali Scholar Friend continues: "Now, I just translated this on the fly and one might disagree with some of my choices. However, the point to be made here is that the use of yathābhūta in this passage no doubt refers to seeing things "as they are," however you want to translate it (I do agree that here such a translation does not work well simply because of the syntax of the sentence). If people would actually read the context of such passages, the translation problem becomes less acute, as the context usually informs the reader of how to understand what the translated term might be getting at. This passage points to the fact that the general state of affairs for most beings involves being in a state of becoming, in which one is subject to the fluxes, which manifest as suffering. The experience of such fluxes present to the 'experiencer' in a certain way, and their appearance, for all intents and purposes, is reality "as it is," until such suffering ceases to appear entirely. Why the 'flow of being' should be understood to be any different from 'things as they are' is puzzling to me, unless one is speaking from the final point of the path. Note here that the term yathābhūta does not appear in the description of final realization. Rather, it is employed when explaining the process of engagement with the phenomena of suffering. From the standpoint of practice (insight or actualism), it is only the process of letting things be 'as they are/according to what has become,' knowing things 'as they are/according to what has become' that allows for 'being' to disappear.

My Pali scholar friend continues: "Here Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation elegantly displays the difficulty of the term bhūta, and the different ways it is used in Pāli. In any case, I think his interpretation of the term yathābhūta is perfectly correct, and again, the context of the passage makes the issue clear. Seeing things with proper discernment means that one sees them "as they are." This entails understanding that whatever comes to be (bhūta) is subject to cessation. Such knowledge, when momentarily applied to all experience, is liberating because it allows one to dismantle the nutriment of what has come to be. Then, what has come to be must necessarily disappear.

The term yathābhūtaṃ is used thousands of times in the Pāli canon and in a variety of different contexts. Most of them are like the two examples above, and refer to the process of becoming. Nonetheless, there are many other usages and one should attend closely to the various meanings of the term in their various contexts. There is rarely one single way to translate such texts." END OF QUOTE

How about another passage from the Saṃyuttanikāya (Nidānasaṃyutta, 4. kaḷārakhattiyavaggo, 1. bhūtasuttaṃ; I give Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation below, pp. 566-567) :

``kathañ ca, bhante, saṅkhātadhammo hoti? bhūtamidanti, bhante, yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya passati. bhūtamidanti yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya disvā bhūtassa nibbidā virāgā nirodhā anupādā vimutto hoti. tadāhārasambhavanti yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya passati. tadāhārasambhavanti yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya disvā āhārasambhavassa nibbidā virāgā nirodhā anupādā vimutto hoti. tadāhāranirodhā yaṃ bhūtaṃ taṃ nirodhadhammanti yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya passati. tadāhāranirodhā yaṃ bhūtaṃ taṃ nirodhadhammanti yathābhūtaṃ sammappaññāya disvā nirodhadhammassa nibbidā virāgā nirodhā anupādā vimutto hoti. evaṃ kho, bhante, saṅkhātadhammo hoti. iti

"And how, venerable sir, has one comprehended the Dhamma? Venerable sir, one sees as it really is (yathābhūtaṃ) with correct wisdom: 'This has come to be (bhūtam idaṃ).' Having seens as it really is with correct wisdom: "This has come to be,' through revulsion towards what has come to be, through its fading away and cessation, one is liberated by nonclinging. One sees as it really is with correct wisdom: 'Its origination occurs with that as nutriment.' Having seen as it really is with correct wisdom: 'its origination occurs with that as nutriment,' through revulsion towards what has come to be, through its fading away and cessation, one is liberated by nonclinging. One sees as it really is with correct wisdom: 'With cessation of that nutriment, what has come to be is subject to cessation.' Having seen as it really is with correct wisdom: 'With cessation of that nutriment, what has come to be is subject to cessation,' through revulsion towards what has come to be, through its fading away and cessation, one is liberated by nonclinging. It is in such a way that one has comprehended the Dhamma.

Thank you all.
@Nikolai - great quotes and translations that I will need to digest and apply. I does show that the higher stages of the path are actually very close to the strategy (re)discovered by AF's founder. And the following quote does show that the Buddha's enlightenment was not *technical 4th path*, but had to do with "release from the flux of being":

"when I cognized (jānato; knew) and perceived (passato; saw) in this way, my mind was released from the flux of desire, the flux of being, and the flux of ignorance. With respect to [this release], there came the knowledge 'released.' I fully understood: 'birth is destroyed, the holy life is lived, the work is finished, there is no more of this worldly state of affairs.' In the final watch of the night I realized (adhigatā) this third knowledge (vijjā). Ignorance was struck down, knowledge arose, light arose."

The awakening that takes place with what we call *technical 4th path* was known in India and is still experienced by the followers of Advaita Vevanta. What the Buddha discovered was much deeper. I remember that Master Nan huai-chin mentioned one of his buddhist friend asking him "what did the Buddha awaken to?" Since it came from a senior practitioner and scholar, he was on his guard and answered: "to pratītyasamutpāda".

This is the Buddha's unique discovery. This is what he was after when he went through extreme asceticism in a desperate attempt to release from the flux of being and put an end to suffering.

Alex / Owen.

Do you think that direct mode, when applied to emotions (which results in an emotional change), could be also applied to the feelings that come in along with the witness in order to work with the sense of self?

"... mindfulness of feelings and mindfulness of dhammas focused on co-dependent origination and its relation with the 5 aggregates of clinging."

The more we can see this entire process in the light of codependent origination (and use language that reflects that model) the more sensible it will become. It's really just about realizing that and nothing more, IMHO.

" I'm doing something very similar in terms of practice (and teaching it to anybody who will listen). Mindfulness of feelings - what was earlier thought of as emotional states - _is_ simply body awareness from the perspective of being in the body. I've been experimenting with getting my body awareness built up as much as possible and using it to do a binary note of "resisting experience/ not resisting experience". This aids investigation of mind objects immensely. It's damn simple so I can't screw it up to much and it has the added benefit of not letting me get away with anything.
"

Hey Owen,

At the risk of highjacking Alex's thread - could you detail this a bit more? I'm feeling a bit stuck in this practice and am looking for a way to simplify it, especially when it comes to noting mind-states. Those damn things seem endlessly manifold. It seems like I never have a simple one, but always very indistinct compounds of many different ones. Noting them has been the sticking point of this whole practice for me. I can ground body sensations without a problem, but tying them to emotions, unless they are bright flashy ones like anger or excitement, seems way too difficult for me for some reason...

". Mindfulness of feelings - what was earlier thought of as emotional states - _is_ simply body awareness[...]getting my body awareness built up as much as possible and using it to do a binary note of "resisting experience/ not resisting experience". This aids investigation of mind objects immensely. It's damn simple so I can't screw it up [...] When the resistance drops via the note, the body is very, very happy about it and will eventually see them as phenomena needing to be let go of (factor of enlightenment). It's a skinner box!

"

Bingo! Perhaps due to being pre-4th pre-sakadagami I also find, along with the body-sensation of resistance, a "cognitive' component to suffering in the form of a reified representation (a representation which is apprehended by an attention too dull to notice it is a representation). I think of this combo as "freeze and squeeze", freeze being the cognitive component (a fixated/reified representation) and squeeze being the body sensations of resistance.

This twofold gesture seems to operate across a spectrum of representations from proprioceptive through images through high level narratives and abstract models and includes body sensations of any combo of flavors such as pleasant, unpleasant and neutral/vague/numb, generating the various modes of identification.

I would currently and tentatively say this combo of freeze-and-squeeze is what previously (and to some extent even yet, for brief moments) was naively taken to be "emotions" such as anger, sadness, boredom, and so on. Mainly my current experience lately has been massive reduction in prapanca, the proliferation of narratives driven by this combo-- yet the combos still arise and color experience.

Question to all: do you notice this representational/cognitive component to dukha as well as the body sensation flows? Or does that go away at TM 4th/ Sakadami?

"

Question to all: do you notice this representational/cognitive component to dukha as well as the body sensation flows? Or does that go away at TM 4th/ Sakadami? "

Hi Jake,

Previous to the shift I had 17 days ago, the cognitive/representational component of dukkha, which I am reading as the 'mental tension' that accompanied the body sensation flows was present. I got technical 4th a year ago or so.

Post-latest shift, there is no more mental tension whatsoever. The subtle gnarly mental tension was there up until 17 days ago after practicing the actualizing jhanas practice for about a month.That tension also seemed to trigger the papanca tendency. Is the mental tension what you mean by "cognitive/representation component"?

Edited to add, that mental tension could also be called the craving and clinging that accompanied flows of bodily sensations and which seemed to prop up the sense of "being'.

" Is the mental tension what you mean by "cognitive/representation component"?

Edited to add, that mental tension could also be called the craving and clinging that accompanied flows of bodily sensations and which seemed to prop up the sense of "being'. "

hi Nik!

Are your "mental tension" and my cognitive-representational component the same? Not sure. Sounds similar though. At this point I would distinguish a representation from a reified representation. Re-presentation is *like* a snapshot of something which arises in praesential immediacy. The term praesential refers to the immediacy of phenomena: their actuality, or actual quality, which seems to me (roughly put) always includes 1) the phenomenal aspect (the shapes, colors, textures, sounds, smells of this activity of typing) as well as the suchness quality which is the same for all phenomena: the stillness, completeness, clarity, perfection (of all those sense impressions), however you describe the unconditioned qualities of conditioned experiences.

Re-presentation is a mental act in which a sort of snapshot is taken, say, a generic image of "typing on this keyboard", a generic image of "my face and hands and chest". Reification is when a low-quality attention in any moment is attending to experience in such a way as to fail to differentiate re-presentation and praesential actuality. So the cognitive component of suffering is such a reification. When attention becomes pure/vibrant/actual enough, this discernment is default in those moments and thus no (coarse) reification in such a moment. Indeed it is like "mental tension" or cognitive dullness.

My practice/inquiry focused at first on discerning the praesential from the representational, as it was evident that illusory dualisms only exist in representation, never in praesential actuality. (con't below)

"Hey Owen,

At the risk of highjacking Alex's thread - could you detail this a bit more? I'm feeling a bit stuck in this practice and am looking for a way to simplify it, especially when it comes to noting mind-states. Those damn things seem endlessly manifold. It seems like I never have a simple one, but always very indistinct compounds of many different ones. Noting them has been the sticking point of this whole practice for me. I can ground body sensations without a problem, but tying them to emotions, unless they are bright flashy ones like anger or excitement, seems way too difficult for me for some reason..."

Hi Ron,
My suggestion would be to do everything you can to make your mindfulness of the body (within the body) damn near perfect during waking hours. Note the first foundation as if you had only one day remaining with a living carcass. When you notice a disturbance, ask "what was I just thinking about?". At first you get really gross and complex mindstates, but after a while they become more simple. A big help is willingness to drop your story and look around - if you start feeling some serious existential fear you are probably on the right track. After a while, it seems that hidden material which is invested with self gets dug up and brought into the light. This process while not without discomfort is rather direct. Be willing to weep and if need be, break.

(con't) Discerning thus over time weakened and finally broke the habit of reifying coarse (narrative and abstract conceptual) representations, thus making it impossible to any longer believe in those narratives and models in the same way, or the imaginary subjects and objects which live only in those narratives and models-- this is how I would describe my experience post SE approximately two years ago. Partial awakening.

Next the focus shifted naturally to looking more closely at the body-sensation part of that, and i would characterize these coarse body sensations of resistance which "anchor" the representational component of an identification/ moment of suffering as pleasant, unpleasant and vague/numb-- which here seems similar to your "mental tension". There seems to be more to suffering-- but another time!
Bare in mind the distinction between representation and reification: only a reification seems to be able to glom to a body-tension flow to enact suffering. There is a relationship between representation and perception, and between these body sensations and vedana i think.

I'm curious because the relationships between these bodily resistances and mental reifications could explain a lot. For example, if one focused practice on discerning representations from praesential immediacy of experience, one would debunk reification on subtler and subtler levels, and thus debunk the sense of "me" on those levels. Seeing clearly again and again would do it, presumably. But without addressing the bodily resistance via learning how to release/relax that resistance, one would leave one's emotional life relatively untouched except indirectly via that cognitive de-bunking. This could lead to a default state which seemed empty and impermanent, and where emotions which use long strings of prapanca drop, but which still gave rise to coarse afflictions of equal or even greater intensity to those pre-path.

"Re-presentation is a mental act in which a sort of snapshot is taken, say, a generic image of "typing on this keyboard", a generic image of "my face and hands and chest". Reification is when a low-quality attention in any moment is attending to experience in such a way as to fail to differentiate re-presentation and praesential actuality. So the cognitive component of suffering is such a reification. When attention becomes pure/vibrant/actual enough, this discernment is default in those moments and thus no (coarse) reification in such a moment. Indeed it is like "mental tension" or cognitive dullness.

My practice/inquiry focused at first on discerning the praesential from the representational, as it was evident that illusory dualisms only exist in representation, never in praesential actuality. (con't below)"

Your description is familiar to me. It was occurring always outside of a PCE until the last shift. It was still occurring after technical 4th.

I would maybe call it the attention wave/bounce which seemed to make objects cognitively perceived as dull. Not sure. But your description rings a bell. Whatever was causing that dullness, disappeared 17 days ago. Now an awareness is continuously clear and luminous (lack of dullness). PCE-like, yet slightly different.

Interesting experience tonight - EE, PCE or something else?

After about 20 minutes of apperception, going back and forth between 5th jhana and actualized sensations and feelings, the body felt more and more transparent with less and less sense of self. Then something strange happened: everything became very bright, sharp and crispy. No thoughts, nor affective feelings, no sense of self at all. But blissful pulsing sensations. Not like the 2nd or 3rd jhana. Something else. Everything felt magical, vibrating with this bright bliss that seemed to infuse the totality of what is. It was so surprising and intense that I soon lost it, getting back to apperceptive mode.

"Alex / Owen.

Do you think that direct mode, when applied to emotions (which results in an emotional change), could be also applied to the feelings that come in along with the witness in order to work with the sense of self?"


Yes of course. Same thing on a subtler level.

"Your description is familiar to me. It was occurring always outside of a PCE until the last shift. It was still occurring after technical 4th.

I would maybe call it the attention wave/bounce which seemed to make objects cognitively perceived as dull. Not sure. But your description rings a bell. Whatever was causing that dullness, disappeared 17 days ago. Now an awareness is continuously clear and luminous (lack of dullness). PCE-like, yet slightly different. "

Okay, thanks for hashing that out with me. You description of your latest shift reminds me a bit of maha boowa's description of Anagami, the luminous citta. This is familiar to me as a state (not yet a stage) again if we refer to the same thing. For me I would say the reified representations are at the top of the chain, next level down are the flows of body sensations of pleasent, unpleasent and vague/numb, and below these there is a very subtle seed which at first appears to be an incredibly subtle awareness that, free from coarse and subtle defilements, is deeply appreciative of the clarity, openness, purity, stillness and so on of the Natural State/PCE. On closer inspection it surprisingly revealed itself to be an incredibly subtle version of that very tension that is suffering, as if two miniscule atoms were tensing against each other, the subtlest possible tension/resistance. When it drops there is PCE/complete relaxation in the natural state. For Dzogchen fans, I believe this distinction may correspond to the son light (appreciation/felicity) and the mother light (complete relaxation, dharmakaya). This would explain the difference in Dzogchen teachings between rigpa as recognition/appreciation of Dharmakaya and Rigpa *as* Dharmakaya.

As I say Nik I'm familiar with this as a state but not a stage. Sounds like you are very close indeed my friend! Glad for you and thanks for you support and advice. What do you find when you investigate your new baseline awareness?

Hi Jake,

Luminous is probably a misleading term. I just meant it as in the absence of dullness. The baseline is more or less a PCE, but with a stability that wasn't there in the past PCEs with "me" on the sidelines so to speak ready to raise its head.

There is room to investigate as there is no sense that the baseline will end like with past PCEs. No 'me' on the sidelines so to speak. There are also some vibrations that do arise depending on and triggered by familiar situations that would have maybe interrupted a PCE previously by being a factor in the arising of "me". Now those vibrations do nothing of the sort. There is no compounding of sense of "being" like before, at least so far. Maybe it will show up again so I'm paying attention.

So far, it's been quite clean but for the arising of some flows of vibrations (without tension) and the occasional thought that arises without affect forming around it. Apperceptive awareness and absence of a sense of "being" is the continuous theme, that and the absence of any mental tension. There seems to be a deepening occurring of the continuous base line. We'll see in a few months what to make of it.

Thanks very interesting In my understanding "luminous" is not to be taken literally in this context, but refers to clarity or purity of attention/awareness rather than anything like a phenomenon of luminosity. What about the "out from control" aspect? In the state experience I am referring too which is ultra subtle appreciation of the natural state, there is a distinct feeling that bodily movements and vocalizations happen spontaneously on their own, like in the full blown natural state. Does this out-from-control aspect characterize your current baseline?