| | Hi Daniel
I came back to exploring vipassana a little yesterday after long periods of choiceless awareness type practise, and I am finding the chapter on the no-self characteristic extremely useful. It feels very effective to tune into the fact that no sensations can watch other sensations, that there is no controlling agency, and that sensations are simply observed (i.e. that sensations manifest aware where they are without any seperate observer). This can lead to a wonderful sense of surrender, lightness and refreshment where actions and reality are known to happen on their own without being controlled. Also, when practising this a couple of things happen: 1. There is no internal conflict in the form of seperating off from experience and trying to shape it and control it 2. There is no movement away to escape from what is and the longing for it to be something more.
Therefore, this tends to lead to a very high level of concentration because I am completely in the moment. I don't mean the concentration jhanas or concentration on a particular object, but a natural and effortless state of concentration. Yesterday, there was so much uncultivated and effortless concentration that reality wasn't just flickering but strobing in and out with high force, almost violently (in a good way).
Having said that, I am having difficulty understanding the usefuleness of investigating impermanence and suffering, as in my experience this tends to act against the no-self characteristic, almost as though they move in the opposite direction. No-self leads to surrender and effortlessness in which impermanence is seen anyway without purposeful effort, while attempting to investigate impermanence increases the sense that there is an entity who is doing it, who wants to deconstruct objects and try to force them into smaller parts than is naturally being seen. For me anyway this increases the sense of division and brings a heaviness to the practise. I wonder if you could speak a little more about the balance of effort and surrender.
The third characteristic, suffering, begs the question, who is suffering? It seems to imply that there is an entity which suffers and that suffering is therefore a problem. Investigating / tuning in to the no-self characteristic exclusively, brings the feeling of 'no self, no problem'.
Interested in your thoughts - Martin |