What if THIS is all there is?

This has been going through my mind lately:

For a while now, I've been able to count on meditiation practice to provide a steady stream of drama and pseudo-Meaning to my daily life, through practice techniques and their multivarious interesting consequences. But for the last couple of months, I don't get that dramatic feeling. Insights come, but without as much of the strong, obvious feeling of discovery I used to feel.

I think am still dealing with a strong hope that I will see exactly why I practice, some tangible fruit that says "yes! you have arrived!". I am still waiting for an angel to come down and tell me it's the right thing to do. This is not a lack of motivation- far from it. I still practice, and I know there is still a lot ahead of me.

But I've got to grasp that the phase of feeling I am "getting benefits" is over forever. There is something that I am sad to see go away, even if it is simultaneously a relief.

So- before this turns into just a journal entry- the point I am opening to the floor is this: are you still looking for something from practice? Would you do it if there was no carrot - stream entry, arahatship, actual freedom, or whatever you want to call it?

What if "now" was all there was? Would you keep going?

"What if this was all there was ever going to be and there was nothing you could do about it?"

This is a fantastic question to sit with. My own teacher gave it to me several times. It's a far more amazing question than you might think. Sit with it and let it percolate.

It's awesome to notice how you want things to be a certain way, like feeling something dramatic or exciting or even bad. As if that confirms you are indeed "getting it." But in fact that wanting things to be a certain way is just a rather gross level of grasping, right?

In my own practice I had a long period of very rowdy side effects - altered states, visions, crazy energy, etc. It has really settled down and I rarely have such effects anymore. I have had days when I miss all the excitement! I will be totally honest, there was something kind of fun about that period, even when it was horrible. But none of that is the point of practice. It's just side effects. I find it helpful just to gently notice: grasping, wanting, seeking, etc. I find it's a really useful thing to pay attention to, that looking for something that is not what is actually going on.

Is that helpful?

This is a relevant question for me, because I think it's actually entirely possible that the stream entry I have been practicing for over the past couple of years will never actually happen. We'll see. This would be a very funny cosmic joke. I would have spent X number of years missing out on the very real and perfect THIS in search of the projected, non-existent, and therefore dukkha-inducing, THAT. (I know, it's the THIS that leads to THAT, but you take my point.) But because I've been doing goal-oriented practice, I've come to appreciate the value of practice itself and so, actually, I think I would continue to practice even without having any attainments as a goal. Would I practice as diligently? I'm not sure about that. I used to work with a Shambhala instructor, kind of an old veteran of the practice, who didn't sit anymore. I couldn't tell if it was because he no longer saw the point and was what we'd call a dark night yogi, or if it was because he had actually learned to be present all the time and didn't need to sit formally anymore. I actually think it was probably the former.
Some friends of mine just came back from a Thich Nhat Hanh retreat where there was no sitting--the point was to practice being present in daily life, and that was it. Kind of interesting. Could people make Mahasi-style progress that way?

What a fantastic question indeed. I'll be writing this down:

"Would you practise if there was no carrot - stream entry, arahatship, actual freedom, or whatever you want to call it? What if "now" was all there was? Would you keep going?"

I don't know any cool quotes on how the Buddha related to this question, but I do have this:
thehamiltonproject.blogspot.com/2011/08/...estyle-approach.html

Seems to be spot on!

The more I progress the more I realize - "now" is all there is! Honestly, even the idea of getting AF is losing its appeal. It's just about paying attention, now.

"What if "now" was all there was? Would you keep going?"
"Now" is all there is.

THIS is the only moment I can practice, the only thing I've got. This is where any fruits will arise. This IS it.

Lifestyle approach indeed... for me it's about learning to be here now, cheesy as that sounds, and that definitely involves seeing how I absolutely do hold all kinds of standards up to the present moment and judge it all day and all night long... and learning just relax, here and now, without the standard evaluating THIS --- then this shows itself as quite a wonderful thing, ever unfazed by the dramas, ever unscathed by difficult experiences.

This is always fresh, and if i'm willing to peek around my expectations I can have the fruit of appreciating this freshness and openness right now

If now is *all there is* why aren't we just frozen in a never changing matrix of... whatever? How do things change? Or are you guys inferring that things don't change?

When does change happen?

Spot on.

"
If now is *all there is* why aren't we just frozen in a never changing matrix of... whatever? How do things change? Or are you guys inferring that things don't change?

"

'Now' isn't one thing. It is everything that is happening, instantly changing the moment it happens.

"Now' isn't one thing. It is everything that is happening, instantly changing the moment it happens."

If there is nothing ever but now how can now be more than one thing? Can you explain that in more detail, please? If things are always just as they are now then how can there be change? See, I think it's a popular idea that there is *only* now, but it's a limited view in my opinion. It's limited because we actually do experience change and yet at times experience states of "only now."

And to the point of this topic, if there was literally no hope of change or any development on the path of practice, who would practice? Probably no one. Without the clear and sometimes urgent motivation to develop different views I would have stopped years ago. So... without change (now *and* then) there can be no development, right?

cmarti: "If there is nothing ever but now how can now be more than one thing?"

Things happen, but they only happen now. Things happened in the past, but when they happened, it was now. Things will happen in the future, but when they will happen, it will be now. Nothing ever happens not-now, not even thinking about the past or the future.

It isn't a concept. There isn't something you can point to, specifically, and say - look, that is Now! It is just the total appreciation of the characteristic of impermanence. The totality of what is actually happening at this moment. You ask how can there be change - how can there be anything besides change? Understanding that it is only now is the embodiment of the experience of change.

cmarti: "And to the point of this topic, if there was literally no hope of change or any development on the path of practice, who would practice?"

I didn't mean that there was no hope of change or development. Things do happen, for sure! Else, why do anything? Yet, the moment you are released - when that moment happens, it will be now. So what maximally increases your chances of release? Pay attention to what is happening now!

Here's how I would phrase it:

There is time. Time has the property of manifesting at one "point," so we appear to live in a little bubble that moves along a continuum like a needle on a record player. We can only experience directly the present moment, that which we call "now." Yet we see change occur and for change to occur there must be a past, a present, and a future. Through either the physics of the universe or the mind's way of perceiving the universe, we have access to the past through memories that occur now. We do not have any experience of what comes next. So what we humans are left with is the mystery of time and how it works. We can see change happening all the time and yet through dedicated practice, stilling our minds and hearts, we can also learn to see the timeless aspects of experience. So our existence is mysteriously comprised of both time passing and timelessness.

So things do indeed happen, and development is possible

Time is relative. I like to think that the reason we get together here is not to learn about the relative, but the absolute. Time doesn't make sense in the absolute. It is, as you just said, timeless.

Not only do we get together here to learn about the absolute, but also how to integrate knowledge of the absolute in the relative. Your description of time in the relative seems to me to be as good as any other correct explanation, and that is how we need to relate to time in the relative.

"But what if THIS is all there is?" This is a realization of the absolute timelessness, and this thread seems to me to clearly be a question of how one can integrate the absolute timelessness with the relative. It's paradoxical, but not nessecarily unsolvable.

I'll suggest another of way of looking at this question...

It's interesting how one little question, which can seem quite profound for some and really quite vague for others, can conjure up so many different meanings and stories.

The answer to this question depends on what one means by "THIS" and "is".

What is "THIS"?

What does it mean if something "is" or "is not"?

I'm not actually looking for answers. Quick answers wouldn't serve us well anyway, since they are likely to conform to our already deeply held conclusions about the way things are.

What would happen if one were to pick one of these questions and take it to their practice? What happens when the question arises? What happens when an answer arises? (Depends on the answer, right?) What happens we continue to return to the question without allowing any answers to stick? How does that feel?

Sometimes the most expedient way to learn about something is to use it. Use your illusion and see if there's a point where illusion and reality no longer intersect.

Good times!

-Jackson

"What if "now" was all there was? Would you keep going?" -Rob_Mtl

For me, this cuts to the very heart of the realization vs development question. If one can be free in this moment, development through time is meaningless. So, the only reason to work on development would be if we find that it is NOT possible to be free in this moment. Development is a kind of "settle-for."

Still, development is necessary precisely because most of us are not able to reliably find freedom in this moment... sometimes we can, other times not. The more we develop, the easier it gets to see that we need not develop. A paradox, perhaps.

I would go further to say that pure development will never "get you there." We are dealing with the law of receding horizons; no matter how far I develop, I will never be perfect. I will never be the primordial buddha of the dharmakaya. For perfection, we must rely on grace: the always already. At some point in our development, it becomes possible to see that this is already done; there is nothing to fix or improve. We need only recognize that this moment is beyond perfect just as it is. We have never been other than the primordial buddha of the dharmakaya. At first, it's a fleeting glimpse of perfection, then another, and it happens more and more often.

The great sages assure us that it is possible to find stability in the recognition of the perfection of this moment, the "un-improvability" of our true nature, at which point we can abandon the self improvement project entirely. This is not the culmination of development (which never happens), but rather the continuous recognition that there is nothing here that needs to be changed.

"Quick answers wouldn't serve us well anyway, since they are likely to conform to our already deeply held conclusions about the way things are."

Important, this one, methinks.

Kenneth said: "I would go further to say that pure development will never "get you there".

Interesting way to think about realization. I agree, but it sounds in my ears like you are saying that development doesn't heighten the chance of instant realization, which I don't think is what you mean to say. Just wanted to point out.

"The more we develop, the easier it gets to see that we need not develop. A paradox, perhaps."

IMHO that's about as good an explanation as there can be. It's kind of parallel to the discussion about time, isn't it?

On second thought, maybe the word "development" is flawed as a way to describe what we're doing by practicing. Maybe we should explain what we're doing using words like "refining our view." While it appears that we were changing, learning, "developing," what we are really doing is slowly putting on a pair of metaphysical and spiritual eyeglasses so that we can see this moment as it is, in all its perfection.

Yeah? No?

cmarti: "...what we are really be doing is slowly putting on a pair of metaphysical and spiritual eyeglasses so that we can see this moment as it is, in all its perfection."

I would say we are slowly taking off multiple pairs of view, delusion, belief, attachment, and suffering eyeglasses, in order to see the moment as it is, in all its perfection. The goal is not to add anything to what is already there, but take away until there is nothing left (but what is already there). This can be terrifying (see: Dark Night), yet ultimately rewarding in a way it is impossible to imagine (as imagining it would just be a view/belief/delusion). Take off those spiritual and metaphysical glasses, too! Leave nothing out.

This is what it seems I have to do: let go completely, totally, utterly. Trust in what is already happening. Not as a matter of belief in the usual sense... but in the sense of: reality is what is still there when you stop believing in it. Scary, scary, though. Lots of resistance.

For what it's worth, I don't like this talk of the timeless. It implies a lack of causality. Everything is causal. If you experience timelessness, that experience is also causal (as something happened before, to lead to it, and something happened after, leading away from it). Maybe not dependently originated, but still causal. (e.g. a rock falling is not dependently originated - there is no ignorance which must happen for the rock to start falling, just matter interacting with matter - yet it is still causal.)

"I don't like this talk of the timeless. It implies a lack of causality."

I'm kind of surprised, beoman -- you were one of the ones who said there is only now. That is timelessness. And... isn't the conundrum "solved" by recognizing that the relative and the absolute exist together, ineffably?

cmarti: "I'm kind of surprised, beoman -- you were one of the ones who said there is only now. That is timelessness. And... isn't the conundrum "solved" by recognizing that the relative and the absolute exist together, ineffably?"

Hmm... in that case, we might be saying the same thing, but using different terms. Keeping that in mind, I'll try to explain why I don't like the term "timeless".

I'll attempt to use an analogy. We have three spacial dimensions. Consider time to be the fourth dimension.

When I see the word "timelessness", I understand that to mean there is no fourth dimension. This means exactly what you were asking earlier: "... why aren't we just frozen in a never changing matrix of... whatever? How do things change?" There would just be one frozen state of the universe, with nothing happening. No time. Sounds boring! =P.

I think there is a fourth dimension. There is time. However, we normally think that *the fourth dimension moves*. The dimension itself is something that is shifting, changing, and we can travel back or forward in time if we only had sufficiently advanced science. I think this is an inaccurate view: the view that *time itself passes*.

What I think is actually the case is that things move *within the fourth dimension*. Time itself does not move - but things move within time. The word "Now" is just a short-hand for the current configuration of the universe. It isn't ever configured other than how it is right now. So it isn't accurate to say there is no time - just that there is no time *other than the time it is right now*.

I don't think there are any timeless aspects to experience, just aspects pointing to the fact that time doesn't move... which seems to be exactly what you mean when you say "timeless".

Does that help any?

Perhaps one might say then, that Time is permanent, never-changing, uncaused, just things happening within it. My take is that there is no Time separate from the things happening within it, which are all impermanent and causal. The permanence of impermanence.

Does that make any sense?

P.S.: Practice tip: if anything implies a sense of time moving or of something happening past, present, or future - that is something to look at, that is 'me', dependently originated, suffering, attachment, etc.

"Hmm... in that case, we might be saying the same thing, but using different terms."

(Considering your objection to me saying "it is always now" - how can anything happen? - is the same as my objection to you saying "timelessness" - how can anything happen? - this might be just what is happening.)