Yes, welcome Andrew.
Andrew Todd:
Hi, I am new here. I had a couple of back to back experiences earlier this year that have set me off searching for something. I found MCTB and am reading it for the second time. I would be grateful for help diagnosing the following experiences:
I stopped drinking alcohol earlier this year, breaking a long term dependency. I felt great until a vacation a month later, when I became stressed then rapidly depressed and paranoid, to an extent that I had not experienced since my late teenage years. The depression intensified over a few days until it became almost unbearable.
Then suddenly, it seemed that my mind or consciousness split in two. My original mind shrank into a small ball and I saw it for what it was, a bundle of fears and delusions thrashing about with no maturity, like a child.
The new mind that had appeared was detached and wise. Although detached, it was also engaged and it seemed to sooth the child mind and put it to sleep. The new mind was both me and more than me at the same time. I felt suddenly calm and was filled with a tremendous confidence, as if with this new mind I could achieve anything, that I need not worry about anything in the future because with it I could manage any situation with ease.
This situation persisted for a few days, and was so real that I believed things would stay this way forever.
On the way to the airport on my return home I was traveling calmly in a bus at sunrise. I vaguely remember deciding to meditate, although I had not meditated for years.
At some point in the journey I was gazing out of the window at a fairly ordinary coastal scene bathed in the golden dawn sun when I experienced a vastly altered state for a short time, seconds at most. For this short time everything in my experience was perfect and connected. There was an incredible sense of peace and that everything was in its rightful place and events were unfolding exactly as they should. Words cannot describe the sense of perfection and peace in this experience.
Do you see any connection between these two experiences?
Feedback is one thing; but figuring things out for yourself is more compelling and a thousand times more satisfactory (if you know what I mean; because it is
your story and
your reality that you are looking at and analyzing; in other words, it has significance!).
What do you think the significance is of these two experiences? Brief though they may have been.
Let me give an example. Do you think your subconscious might have been playing games with you, showing you what might
be if you put your mind to it?
Andrew Todd:
Since this point I have been driven to discover and have been meditating and reading as much as I can. Since reading MCTB I have been wondering if my experience was an A&P event.
If you're looking for a label to put to your experiences, obviously, from your description, there was an arising and a passing away. What is more important is: What did you learn from the experiences? Did it create any aspiration within you to be able to achieve such a stable view and outlook? (In other words, did it provide you with an idea of how things
might be if you were willing to put the work into it?)
If so, you've come to the right place (the Buddhadhamma) to begin studying and learning how to achieve that state on a continuing basis.