Witness State Questions

Hi,

Alongside a routine of other spiritual practices (spinal breathing pranayama, breath-watching, some self-inquiry, lot of meditative reading of Nisargadatta Maharaj and other direct path sages) I've recently started to practice 'turning attention back on itself' for the duration of the day. I would also call this, the witness state, awareness watching watching awareness etc.

This is really just a noticing of what comes before any object of perception - thought, emotions, or senses. There is noticing that with the arising of any object of perception, there is an awareness of that arising, hence the attention is turned towards the awareness, instead of the perceptible object.

Question one: Does this sound like I'm getting it right?

Question two: Results.

So this practice initially tends to lead to a deep inner silence, and a kind of radiance to perceptions. It's as though the perceptions light up from inside. It's very subtle, but there's something different. This is fairly pleasant, and tends to be a fairly joyful / ecstatic experience. I feel as though I'm resting as a joyful awareness, and all perceptible phenomena are like pleasant waves washing through my consciousness. It's a very subtle experience, this is not some dramatic change, just a subtle, pleasant change. Even during these perceptible changes, I gently turn the attention back to the awareness of these perceptible phenomena.

Then about 3/4 of the way through a day of continual practice of this, it starts to become very unpleasant, brain fog, headaches, dullness of mind and general discomfort tend to arise. In some cases, much depression comes. At this point, I feel like I can no longer practice - the mind is too dull and head achey.

What is going on here? Please advise.

Josh

Josh, how long have you been meditating? Why not just notice things as they arise?

Josh: I think it is great for practice momentum for awareness to fall in love with itself - keeps things juicy.

I would guess that you are adding a layer of conceptualization about the state itself that is then resulting in this falling from grace.

Is there a sense of a witness or observer? This witness or observer sense often creates an additional tension that can make a "state" feel very solid and real.

If you are in a "state", then desire to maintain that state may start to cause tension because you are no longer focused solely on exactly what is arising, but rather focused on the concept/desire of the target state.

To be honest though, you'll probably have to just beat your head against this wall a number of times before your brain starts to figure it out. If things are getting really tough, then just switch to noting or mahamudra noting.

Lastly, are you getting enough sleep?

Hi Josh

I think that striving to generate a state generally leads to discomfort and a ****** time. Hell, it's one of the major dynamics of suffering- we sentient beings (especially ones which can conceptualize ourselves and time), all wanting happiness, and knowing our world as a temporal and conditional kind of place, think that if we only had ____, then and only then would everything be all fine and dandy.
Don't get me wrong, I know that second gear is a part of the structure here, and I do think that it's a very common if not inevitable part of most people's journeys to cut suffering at the root. We've been told all these fancy and fascinating things about awareness, and so naturally most of us are going to go down the same road that we go down when we hear about anything that we want to get... trouble is, awareness is not a thing, and, related to that, awareness is not something we can get. Awareness is not something you can perceive, watch, or experience. Awareness is what "does" these things- but even this is too dualistic, since it has no form of its own and is utterly inseparable from your present moment to moment "sensations" "thoughts" "emotions" "world", etc. Check it out for yourself! Is knowing an object of any kind? Aren't all objects known?
Let's just take a look at what we're going for here: do we want a permanent state of mind? Is that possible, sustainable, or even desirable? Or are we looking for the true goodness that has no opposite, freedom that is not dependent on anything and doesn't look like anything in particular, and is simply present in every moment without having to be maintained- so that we could go on with our lives and even help out others?
I'm not saying "nothing to do, nothing to attain," just that, seeing as this time our journey for happiness is radical, rather than something like getting

a new car, a nice feeling, funky vision of light, or any of the other fleeting things and experiences which have vanished through our fingers in the past, we probably have to go about it differently and be very conscious of our motivations and goals.
Also I'm not trying to dissuade you from what works! If you're getting insight and joy from this, keep feeling it out and it'll take on a life of its own. It's truly helpful to learn about our situation in a direct and experiential way, but from my own experience, awareness can all too easily become a burdensome conceptual structure which we grasp in an attempt to pop through into some forever blissful kind of place.
I'm mostly writing this because it sounds like you're experiencing discomfort with this practice, and I've been there man.
Some questions to consider:
aren't "the awareness of an arising" as well as "attention turning back on itself" already known, with no effort whatsoever?
when the practice seems to be working, and you experience a perceptual change, is that "awareness," or is it just another experience? isn't everything, whether a state of subtle beauty, "witnessing", or terrible depression, just another experience?
if you stop trying to be aware, aren't you still aware? have you ever had an experience where you weren't aware? can you stop being aware?
is awareness separate or separable from experiences? are experiences separate or separable from awareness? Yet: is awareness, cognizance, ever affected? in this always here and now stable clarity, aren't all experiences fleeting and ungraspable?
is any experience better or worse for awareness, or are better and worse themselves just stories that are known, like every other "problem"?
when will you know you can stop the seeking? what are you expecting? won't that be just another known experience?

why not rest all opinions for a moment!
I would love to hear your thoughts on that stuff, but the real point of this somewhat lengthy message in terms of advice would be that you might find these videos incredibly helpful!
I've found Bentinho to be one of the clearest and friendliest articulations of the dzogchen / essence mahamudra / third gear view. I wouldn't plug anyone's work here if I didn't sincerely feel it would be helpful at this point in your practice!
<3 Jeremy

Hey guys

First of all, thanks for all your feedback.

CMARTI - Josh, how long have you been meditating? Why not just notice things as they arise?
-I've been meditating for 3 years twice daily, sporadically for 3 years prior to that.
-Notice things as they arise: I've been trying to follow the advice of Ramana Maharshi & Nis. Maharaj (few quotes: "giving attention to attention, aware of being aware", "the only true and full awareness is awareness of awareness", "instead of looking outward at objects you observe that looking")

Orasis - thanks I agree, I think there is a layer of conceptualization being added. There's this trying to be aware of awareness, which is perceptible, and futile by default.

Jeremy - thanks a lot for your supportive advice, and your questions.

As an update, I just surrendered. I reached breaking point this morning and decided to let everything go. Back to my usual level, which is involves a lot of peace and ecstatic bliss. Peace and ecstatic bliss tends to be my usual state, but it's just an experience, and there's desire to go beyond that.

And I'll definitely check out Bentinho - that name has been showing up a lot recently.

<3 Josh

Josh, good stuff ! Happy to hear about ecstatic bliss; that's usually pretty nice, to say the least
Is it possible to go beyond experience?

I suppose not!

Great! so if this is it, let's take a closer look...
this knowing that is here right now, which is the single constant throughout our lives whether or not it is recognized, can never be a perceived object with a form of its own- the form of knowing in each moment is the moment itself.
This is the meaning of nonduality- pure immanence, simultaneity, and intimacy of knower, knowing and known. Experience itself is neither subjective nor objective - what we consider the subject is just another object, a set of feelings or concepts, occurring with a sense of interiority (since thoughts are really very subtle "inner speech", and sense organs seem to be experienced "from inside"). Conversely, all objects, even the seemingly solid and substantial ones, are simply appearing as present moment perceptions with a conceptual overlay. Is it your hand, or an experience of your hand- color, feeling, thought?
An objective world outside of experience can never be known- it would by nature be just another experience. Travel to the distant reaches of the galaxy or break down any object into even the smallest constituent parts; they'll still just be known experiences, the stuff that dreams are made of.
"we" as the knower of all that is known, would seem to be unscathed by any experience; a hideous image does not affect seeing, a stinky smell does not affect smelling, a feeling of anxiety and utter despair won't affect the basic sanity and open clarity of your mind! Like a cloud doesn't affect space, and doesn't exist apart from space.

You're free to experience anything that comes your way. The thought that you can't stand it is only a thought. The feeling of pain is only a feeling; when you look directly at these they have no true substantiality or endurance. They only show up in your presence.
Is anything outside of present moment awareness? With a real independent identity? Can you point to a single thing which is not experienced right now? It's a cliche in spiritual circles that the past and future are actually nothing more than a present thought, but check it out for yourself. Is it ever not now? Every single thing which you can and ever will experience is lit up in the unchanging but ungraspable clarity of here and now. This is the meaning of luminosity, the fact that appearances are always here and now in their isness, nowness. A feeling of totally dazed confusion is still known with perfect clarity. Aren't you already awake, without any effort at all?
And yet, is it ever truly the present? No! As the present is utterly insubstantial and impermanent, it endures for no time at all. As soon as you try to point to the present, it's already the next moment, and so on. It releases itself and leaves no trace whatsoever, "like the path of a bird in the sky". Where is one second ago now? And now? It was so real then... this ceaseless flow of experiences, which is all that we can ever know, is wholly empty!
Causality, being thoroughly related to time, is also empty- who's to say why anything is the way it is? We can point to proximate causes and conditions, but do any of us really know what the hell is going on? Or are maps just angles, assumptions, limitations we settle on at some point? Human, nirvana, earth, are all just words, pointers to felt vibrations of meaning in the chest/solar plexus, gut, or throat, which reference sense perceptions. But here we are. Look at experience itself- ever fresh, alive, and unendingly explorable.

Is anything separate from this reality? Since it's all one single event, doesn't every single thing cause everything else? Maybe the reason the universe exists is so that you could be reading these words right now! who knows? existence is on a whole other level from our ideas about causality, enlightenment, anything. A butterfly flaps its wings in texas...
And looking again, directly at experience: can it ever be different from exactly how it is? Literally, things could not be any different whatsoever from how they are in this moment, and this moment. It's already come and gone, it takes care of itself. this is perfection! Not some constant bliss out, but that doesn't even make sense anyway. It's life, what could be better than being alive? We're really going to pretend like we know? It's such an inexplicable gift.
Since who, what, when, where, and why do not truly apply to experience, it's a relief when we drop the grasping, manipulating, interpreting, and constant tension to engineer and direct experiences..these are part and parcel of the lousy behavior pattern we picked up somewhere along the line that everyone bashes as "ego". Does tend to come in handy in day to day life, but knowing better regarding the truth of these conventions is, well, knowing better!
Experience is already the nondual immanent mystery happening perfectly as it is from moment to moment, so what happens if you don't try to understand anything, accept anything, change anything, get anything, figure anything out, for just a second? Completely undirected attention. No expectations- don't know anything about anything. Drop all focus, relax all descriptions and labels, be like a newborn infant and whoosh! nonreferential relief and joy.

The more we come to rely on the fact that this is always naturally available, the more we open to total fearlessness, wisdom, uncontrived and unconditional empathy... a life full of love! But the best part is, life is just this way whether we bask in it or not
We don't have to be "spiritual" or be "more aware" or be "aware of awareness," especially if it's always already here! We can just relax any need or desire to change our present experience, to concoct a strategy to find joy, to put any conditions on this right now. Not for hours on end, but just for a moment, again and again throughout daily life, whenever it spontaneously occurs to us to do so...
It doesn't make us cosmic demigods who don't feel pain or fear. What an (albeit, totally understandable) act of arrogance and confusion it is to want that! Awareness is simply our birthright as living organisms, through which the only partially knowable causal nexus of the universe peeks out at itself. And just try having a single ounce of insight, bliss, or compassion without it!
It's all just like a dream, the only real shift is one of becoming lucid- recognizing that THIS is freedom.
At least, that's how it seems to me so far

<3

I'll have what s/he's having

we all already are!