Just the scenery
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Hello everyone, seemed to have got a realization and since AEN asked me to share my experience, here's a long post starting from the first "sighting" of awareness. Any advice, admonishments, please do post a reply. Please definitely post if this realization is delusion in disguise. Thanks in advance!
I was originally just keeping bare attention on all sensations trying to see if there's a "self" anywhere. Somehow though, I experienced from time to time something underneath these sensations, a "something" (that I realised was what people referred to as awareness) that's seems to be receiving and acknowledging sensation.
This awareness eventually became felt as being switched on pretty much all the time. There's no getting away from it at all because it's always present. Essentially, if I had to say what I was, I was this awareness, and this awareness is constantly looking out into the world waiting to acknowledge all sensory input. Eventually there was another development where I realised everything experienced was in the here and now. Time and distance was only inferred through a series of experience via awareness rather than directly i.e. a string of "now"s and "here"s processed into time and distance. All past experiences can only be invoked from here and now.
Also at this point, the experience of awareness is something like this: "Aware of muscle tension", "Aware of the song of the birds", "Aware of the sound of the cars driving past". Essentially I was breaking things apart, where "awareness of this sensation" was not "awareness of that sensation".
The separation of an awareness "receiving" sensation was gradually removed starting from one day when my back started acting up while showering. I began to wonder "which part of being aware of the backache is not in being aware of water on skin?" And then, eventually it just became "There is just one awareness, and every sensation is in this awareness". Awareness encompasses the backache, as is the water on skin, the blinking, forming only one picture. The experience of "awareness receiving sensation" also became "awareness IS sensation", because there are no gaps at all separating the experiencer and the content of experience. Awareness has now become some kind of source where everything is the work of awareness.
Throughout the whole ordeal I had refused to believe in an actual source, an agent. There is no source in any form, so even if the experience tells me otherwise, there was no reason to believe it was true. So I begin looking at the question: "Is there an awareness outside of these sensations?" which led to this a few days back:
Without sensation, there is no awareness. Awareness is not a solid entity, rather it is like a quality of sensations, just like saying that water is wet. Which also explains why I have never experienced being aware of literally nothing. Even in the dead of the night I hear some kind of "low frequency noise" (hopely you all know what I mean here), even with my eyes closed I see blackness. Even while dreaming, awareness is there, if not it's impossible to recall dreams. Can't remember I've dreamt? That's ok, doesn't mean there was no dream and awareness wasn't present, it's not like liberated people will suddenly develop photographic memory and can remember every waking experience.
Sensations are always changing moment to moment, and thus awareness is changing moment by moment. Not a source, just a quality, forever changing. Everything happening is now seen as scenery, and life is just scenery after scenery playing now, becoming like a movie. A pretty great movie too! -
Very nice, thanks for sharing. You have a very clear style of writing too.
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Great jui! Great work well done... and very nicely expressed.
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Hi Jui,
Congrats :)
Thank you for sharing.
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Thusness said your initial insight should complement with stability of experience.
I personally think it may be a good idea to spend time meditating and practicing. Vipassanic clarity in all six senses, and non-dual opening.
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Nice, help me thank Thusness will you? :D
Can you explain practicing "vipassanic clarity in all six senses and non-dual opening"? Not quite sure of what is mean here. I was thinking that Thusness's advice pretty much meant that I should be meditating anyway, either sitting or just in active daily life.
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Yes practice in both sitting and daily activities.
http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.sg/2007/05/different-degrees-of-non-duality.html
1. Perception still lingers but there is a clear understanding that there is no-self apart from manifestation. Practice clarity from insight meditation will help. Clarity from all 6 doors – eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, consciousness.
http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.sg/2008/01/ajahn-amaro-on-non-duality-and.html
Has always been so! Fearlessly and completely open up to forms, shapes, colors, sound, scent and so forth. No 'You', just that! :-)
http://www.sgforums.com/forums/1728/topics/419870?page=1
Ck: john, how to practise vipassana in daily life?
Thusness: just observe every sensation.
Thusness: until one day u are able to experience "emptiness as form".
Thusness: then it becomes effortless.
Thusness: Truthz u cannot imagine the bliss when one clearly experiences that.
Thusness: but there is no point to over stress anything.
Thusness: :)
Ck: Thusness just observe every sensation... give me an eg?
Thusness: when u breath, u don't have to care what is the right way of breathing, whether u breath hard or soft, smooth or fine...just experience as much clarity as u can...just that experience...regardless of what it is like.
Thusness: same for all other experiences.
Ck: wot abt sound? hows it?
Thusness: when u hear, just the sound...the totality of the sound. There is no how but just to do away with all abitrary thoughts. Hear the sound as clear as u can be.
Ck: then wot abt thots?
Ck: thots r v sticky :(
Thusness: thoughts seldom arise if the practice is correct. If it arises, then not to chase after its meaning. Not to answer urself what it means, not to dwell in 'what'...then u will resort to just the moment of awareness.
Ck: when i try to be just openly aware, i notice that i jump from sense to sense
Ck: like one moment hearing, then touch, etc
Thusness: that is okie.
Thusness: our nature is so.
Ck: wots the rite way to do it
Thusness: don't think that u should concentrate.
Thusness: ur only duty is to sense with as much clarity as possible.
Ck: and for all the sensations, i dun dwell in the 'what'?
Thusness: ur mind is looking for a way, a method
Thusness: but what that is needed is only the clarity.
Thusness: however because our mind is so molded and affect by our habitual propensities, it becomes difficult what that is direct and simple.
Thusness: just stop asking 'how', 'what', 'why'.
Thusness: and submerge into the moment.
Thusness: and experience.
Thusness: i prefer u to describe.
Thusness: not to ask how, what, why, when, where and who.
Thusness: only this is necessary.
Ck: ok
Thusness: if u practice immediately, u will understand.
Thusness: if u entertain who, what, where, when and how, u create more propensities and dull ur own luminosity. -
p.s. the practice of non-dual opening is my advise, though that was also Thusness's advise for me.
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Just a sharing: Shobogenzo Kai-in-zanmai: [Note: three periods, ‘…’ , indicate omitted material] The Buddha said: Only of real dharmas is this body composed. The moment of appearance is just the appearance of dharmas; The moment of disappearance is just the disappearance of dharmas. At the moment when these dharmas appear we do not speak of the appearance of self. At the moment when these dharmas disappear we do not speak of the disappearance of self. An instant before, an instant after: instant does not depend on instant; A dharma before, a dharma after: dharma does not oppose dharma. Just this is called samadhi, state like the sea. The concrete moment of this “sea-like samadhi� is just a concrete moment “only of real dharmas,� and it is expression of the truth of “sole reliance on real dharmas.� This moment is said to be “this composed body.� The integrated form that is “composed� of “real dharmas,� is “this body.� We do not see “this body� as “an integrated form�: real dharmas compose it. This composed body has been expressed as the truth as “this body.� “The moment of appearance is just the appearance of dharmas.� This “appearance of dharmas� never leaves “appearance� trailing behind. … “Appearance� is inevitably a concrete “moment� having arrived; for “the moment� is “appearance.� … It is “appearance� that is itself already a “moment,� and it never fails to disclose the naked skin, flesh, bones, and marrow.
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Originally posted by Jui:
Sensations are always changing moment to moment, and thus awareness is changing moment by moment. Not a source, just a quality, forever changing. Everything happening is now seen as scenery, and life is just scenery after scenery playing now, becoming like a movie. A pretty great movie too!
Sadhu.
"Now suppose that a magician or magician's apprentice were to display a magic trick at a major intersection, and a man with good eyesight were to see it, observe it, & appropriately examine it. To him — seeing it, observing it, & appropriately examining it — it would appear empty, void, without substance: for what substance would there be in a magic trick? In the same way, a monk sees, observes, & appropriately examines any consciousness that is past, future, or present; internal or external; blatant or subtle; common or sublime; far or near. To him — seeing it, observing it, & appropriately examining it — it would appear empty, void, without substance: for what substance would there be in consciousness?"Seeing thus, the well-instructed disciple of the noble ones grows disenchanted with form, disenchanted with feeling, disenchanted with perception, disenchanted with fabrications, disenchanted with consciousness. Disenchanted, he grows dispassionate. Through dispassion, he's released. With release there's the knowledge, 'Released.' He discerns that 'Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for this world.'
Phena Sutta -
Hi Pegembara, what you quoted is on Sunyata, but Jui is expressing his initial insight into anatta.
That means his experience is still resting on the first two points of this: http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.sg/2012/06/advise-for-taiyaki.html
As Thusness pointed out to you here http://sgforums.com/forums/1728/topics/424358?page=2
There are 2 additional points that I think are important:
1. Anatta is not Sunyata
2. Although whatever arises is empty of inherent essence, it must also be understood that it is vividly clear, present and luminous. The passing scent, the taste, the scenery, the arising sound, the arising thought...these magical appearances are themselves primordially pure, they are the Dharmakaya.
Just my 2 cents.
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...And more things to read. Haha!
It's been slightly more than a week since the realization, and I realised that it's actually possible to not do anything with it, i.e. still act dysfunctionally/selfishly/dick-ishly, just that now that there's much greater clarity that the dysfunctional momentum doesn't get too far before it's stopped. Old habits die hard I suppose. There's so much work left to do.
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Yes. It is a gradual process, it may be good to revisit some of the posts and advises by Thusness in this forum from October 2010 onwards, as those advises are relevant for me after the initial insight, and should also be relevant for you as well.
He also discussed about how to remove the remaining fetters.
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This article is also good and prevents one from falling into certain pitfalls: http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.sg/2011/08/disease-of-non-conceptuality.html
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Tommy McNally writes quite well and also talked about the body-mind drop off that I told you that day:
Tommy McNally Inges, I didn't mean to imply that you or anyone else on here had only experienced an intellectual cognition, I was indicating that such a level of understanding is quite easy to come upon but that it's very different, as you know, from experiential realization.
When I say that "duality breaks down further", I mean that literally; although you've seen through the illusion of a self, there is undoubtedly still a subtle, or perhaps not-so-subtle imputation of a subject/object which is created, at it's most gross and obvious level, by a lack of clarity with regards to the arising of emotion/affective feeling. In comparison to how you experienced the world "before", this current level of clarity and non-dual awareness seems incredible, but it becomes 'normal' after a while; those habitual tendencies to reify a subject to the apparent objects will recur until you’ve eliminated the fundamental ignorance which leads to their arising. Note too, when I use the term “ignorance”, I don’t mean it in a insulting way, I’m using it in the sense it’s used in Buddhism to indicate a lack of insight into the nature of things.
Continuing to examine and investigate your experience, just as you have, will continue to reveal more and more layers of belief, conditioning, volitional formations and unquestioned assumptions about experience to be dissected and seen for what they are: Mental fabrications. I know that my suggesting that, somehow, you’re not “there” yet might seem insulting or arrogant, and perhaps it is, but I’d ask you to look closer at who or what it is that’s “insulted by” the suggestion.
“Then you write:
---"Yet it seems possible to go beyond even that! "--
but you don't explain where, what and how. Can you say more about that?”
To say that it seems “possible to go beyond even that”, is admittedly inaccurate as it implies that there is any sense of a “that” or “this” or anything involving location, direction, dimensionality or space. I’ll describe a brief overview of how things have progressed for me, experientially, since initially realizing Anatta:
Seeing through the illusion of self is like opening the door into wonder, but taking your first tentative steps into that amazing clarity and vividness leaves you blinded somewhat. You think that you’ve made it through and experienced “awakening” or “enlightenment” ‘cause it’s like you’ve woken up from the dream that “you” even existed in the first place...it’s like the seconds after you wake up on a sunny morning, not knowing who or where you are, or what the day holds, everything fresh and new...but your eyes become accustomed to the ‘light’ and you begin to see that, rather than being anywhere “else”, you’re still right where you were but with this new understanding and clarity. As you wander through this seemingly new world, you meet others and you start to reify this new “identity”, this “I without an I” if you like, like a hollow mould onto which you carve your new life as “liberated”, or “enlightened”. Slowly but surely though, the old habits come back and you find yourself getting pissed off at people, being annoyed by current events, emotionally perturbed by day-to-day disagreements, but all this while telling yourself, like a mantra, “there’s no “me” there to feel this way so I don’t need to deal with it”. Continuing to investigate my immediate sensate experience, seeing how there is no subject to be found, that permanence and change are only imputations of mind, and how clinging/craving any of ‘this’ just led to the same cycle of bullshit eliminated even that; thought, feeling, identity, Self, Soul, agent, do-er, feeler, no affective emotional qualities whatsoever, just this complete stillness, peace and absolutely no sense of mental ‘movement’.
But ‘further’ still, recently the entire construct of body and mind as having any sort of objective existence began to dissolve entirely! To experience the world as the world experiencing itself, so to speak, direct and intimate, like living life in High-Definition, even the sense of existing as this physical form drops off completely; not that the body isn’t still ‘here’ and doing it’s thing, but it’s experienced as a dance of instantaneous, self-liberated, luminous sensation, not as “the body” or “the mind”. Yet things continue to deepen, to develop and change without any effort on “my” part, just this dance of creation doing what it does. Please note that I am using these words literally, when I say that the mind and body ‘drop away’, they appear to do so and all that’s left is what I can only describe as 'pure experiencing'.
Does that give any sort of indication what I’m talking about? I’m not trying to say I’m any sort of expert, all I can ever know is my own experience but certain things in how others communicate their insights take on a completely different level of clarity after you’ve been there too. -
Perception could be described as the coming together of sense consciousness with it's corresponding point of contact and sense object, i.e. ear-consciousness, hearing and sound = perception of sound; it becomes apparent through observation that there is no distinction between the process of hearing and the sound heard, any division between the two is entirely implied by some thought via belief or some unquestioned assumption about what reality 'is'. If this is experienced clearly through direct observation, attentiveness or mindfulness (done properly) of this moment-by-moment process of sensate contact - not simply through an intellectual cognition or initial insight into what it truly means to experience no sense of a self/Self/Soul/agent/do-er/center-point/Astral Voodoo Dropkick Monster/whatever - then the duality breaks down further and another level of experiencing presents itself, vivid and immediate, just as it always has been. Yet even though that mode of experiencing is, in my opinion, far preferable to any other way of living, it seems possible to go beyond even that! Although by that point, such distinctions - not just intellectually but experientially, as actuality presenting itself, just part of this luminous interplay of sensations - no longer occur and so to even describe it as such would be misleading. Suffice to say, it's pretty fucking cool.
Please understand that I don't mean that comment about "intellectual cognition or initial insight...etc" in any derogatory or insulting sense, I'm just being upfront about what I see and read here sometimes. It's not as simple as having just "become liberated" or "awakened" or any of those labels for what is obviously a worthwhile realization; I've been there too and thought I was King Shit, how "I Am Everything & Everything Is Me" and all that bullshit where you think you've finally cracked it, only to have reality kick you in the ass with a lesson in why it sucks to have to deal with the push/pull of a continuing, albeit subtle at first, duality between subject and object. I’m not saying I’m anything special, an expert, authority or some super-enlightened teacher or whatever, I’m just a guy who’s been doing this for a while and found out that this shit goes waaaaaayyyyyy further than you might think. When I use phrases like “beyond imagination”, I mean them literally and with total sincerity; if you’re contented to be where you’re at, so to speak, that’s absolutely fine and I support that 100%, however my ongoing experience has convinced me that, although you’ve see that there never was such a thing as a self, the metaphorical rabbit hole is deeper than some smart-arsed comment I can’t think of right now.