| | [This post is long, and I feel a little afraid to post it, but hey... you don't have to read it if you don't want to. And if this post brings my foolish to light, well better now than never.]
I spent the last few days on meditation retreat at home with the intention to do rigorous noting practice morning to night with an aim toward actual freedom. This is a report of some of what I experienced in my practice over the last few days, and some of the apparent obstacles and questions I have on the path to actual freedom. I realize that I am certainly going against the advice, given by some, to not “mix techniques,” and that this kind of mixing may have negative side effects, or lead to confusion and/or delusion. But, above all, my guiding principle is sincerity, and I sincerely endeavor to make sense of this human situation that I find myself in and to make best use of this life that is here now, while it lasts. The following comments reflect my current understanding – which is admittedly incomplete... so any advice, comments, or feedback of any kind is most welcome and requested. Thanks.
NOTING PRACTICE:
With regards to the noting practice specifically, I read some posts from tarin recently regarding noting practice, and specifically the phrase “keep going with this single-minded no-brains-required noting task.” After reading that, I decided to try dumbing-down my noting practice a bit – to really suck all the brains out of it, so to speak. Doing this, I had a new perspective on noting practice and was able to make it more mechanical and less personal – which is what I gather it is meant to be. More specifically, I had an initial experience that single-minded no-brains noting (when repeated over and over and over) eventually led to some experience or another being noticed objectively and dispassionately (whereas it would have previously been noticed very subjectively, passionately, personally, and with a sense of self embedded in it – or not noticed at all). This result was equivalent to noticing the three characteristics in that given experience on those given occasions.
My noting practice moves incredibly slow, as I find the actual skill of creating verbal notes in my mind to be one which probably must be developed like a muscle. I would say that I was able to note at a rate of about 1-2 notes per second for about 60% of the day on day 1. That number fell to about 30% of the day on day 2, and about 40% of the day on day 3. The rate never went much slower than 1-2 per second, unless I got restless, tense, or stressed in which case I would lose focus so much that I would slow down as much as to 1 per 10 minutes or so. But, luckily my actualism practice has really cut back the amount of time I spend being restless, tense or stressed. And, that enabled me to enjoy the process enough to be able to maintain this more rapid noting pace (1-2 per second). Any attempt to go faster than 2 per second usually resulted in a blur where I would again lose focus and my noting would have no correlation to what was actually being experienced.
This was for what I might call my “formal” or “conscious” noting practice. Now, also in the “background” so to speak, I was often noticing at a rate of perhaps 10-20 per second. And what I mean by that is that, given my training in meditation thus far and training in mindfulness, there are moments where my mind automatically becomes mindful of experience at a very rapid pace. But, I could hardly say that “I was noting.” It seems more accurate to say that experience arises and I notice it with some clarity and precision at a rate of about 10-20 notices per second. Perhaps I could call this “noticing” practice. And, it's similar to the “hitting with awareness” technique mentioned here in other threads. Goenka (who was my main Vipassana teacher) was clear that one should never make a verbal note, so this is more of a background, and automatic awareness practice that's a blend of Goenka and a lot of the other awareness stuff I've done in the past.
Overall, it still seems to me that the most effective vipassana practice that I've done so far isn't noting or body-scanning, but more along the lines of what Christopher Titmuss taught when I was on retreat with him, and that was to take a genuine interest in what's happening right now. I say this, because I try to really inquire what is working here and what isn't? What is the actual vipassana technique? How can I actually get Vipassana to work – and not have it just be some lifeless task?
And, for me it comes back to sincerity again. Vipassana seems to be a certain blend of awareness and involvement which leads to the moment in which experience is just seen for what it is – completely, and clearly. And, it seems that getting that blend just right is a matter of sincerity more than a matter of technique. I could be wrong, I suppose, but I just can't seem to figure it out any other way. To put this into context, I'd say rather than I was noting 60% of the day on day 1, it'd be more accurate that perhaps I had a sincere alignment with Vipassana for 60% of the day on day 1.
Overall, my experience is that the noting technique is useful, perhaps even more so than body-scanning, but the biggest barrier to success doesn't seem to lie in which technique is used, but the barrier to success is in actually doing the technique. That is still the greatest mystery for me... how to actually do the doing of the technique? I find it incredibly frustrating. And, right now, it seems that I just seem to go through some kind of natural cycle where all of a sudden, things align and boom... I'm actually doing the technique... and then all of a sudden boom... it's gone and I'm just trying to do the technique. And, then I try and try and try and nothing works and then all of a sudden boom... I'm doing it.... and then boom... I'm not doing it. What I would love is to be able to just turn it on, let it go and do the thing until it's done. But, I haven't yet discovered how to do that. Maybe I'm way off here – any comments?
Although my goal is to attain to the end of the path (the end of this human condition within this individual). I also have a secondary goal to master the technique such that there is no limit to my ability to progress and all I have to do is keep going until I hit the end. If I use a bike ride as a simile, it's like I spend so much time falling off the bike, learning to ride the bike, figuring out what the bike is, then falling off again. I'd like to just be able to ride the bike so I can get to the end. But, maybe that's not a useful way of looking at these things? Comments? Maybe mastery of the technique is equivalent to reaching the goal, and maybe the technique itself is to figure out the technique itself?
Another thing to mention... I didn't notice any of the characteristics of any of the insight stages, or any progress through them in any way. For the most part, my experience was pretty constant throughout with a few sorta energetic phenomena which felt somewhat druggy or altered in nature. They didn't last long. I didn't have any of the the solidity of pre-A&P , none of the manic bliss of A&P, very little of the suffering and no distortion common to the Dark Night. Perhaps this is consistent with the theory that I'm still in equanimity nyana. Although, it also seemed that the entire affective quality of my experience had diminished (due to actualism practice). So, none of the affective qualities of experience stood out as pronounced as in the past. My experience was more akin to the stillness and directness described as the result of actualism practice. That's not to say that I was in a PCE either, as I still don't know what a PCE is. I'm just saying it was less affective, and therefore, the nyanas (if present?) were much less pronounced. This could also be because I had no interest in progressing through the nyanas nor making any specific attempt to discern them. Or it could, perhaps be because the nyanas don't have any actual existence?
ACTUALIST INSIGHT:
With regards to how insight practice in general has/hasn't been useful in my actualism practice, I'm still not totally sure. It seems that the goal being eventual self-immolation, or eradication of the identity in it's entirety.... then any practice which brings the movement of the self under scrutiny seems to be a useful practice - to become more aware and more intimate with the very operation of “me” and all the mischief I get up to. Along with that, the goal is to dispel illusion so as to gain (or regain) sensibility and salubrity.
So, it seems that insight practice (noting or otherwise) has helped me to reveal (and dispel) illusions, and to gain awareness of this self in action. Not being caught in the illusions of the self, leads to that freedom which is at the goal, a freedom in which the self no longer operates in this human body (or does it lead to that goal?). To some extent, I can see the difference (180 degrees opposite) between a freedom from the demands of the self while the self still operates (enlightenment) and the complete ending of the operation of the self (AF). To some extent also, in practice I can see the difference between noticing the operation of the self as not-self (insight), and the practice of going to the very root and asking why did “I” arise in the first place?
I guess it's still unclear to me what place insight practice has in the goal of actualizing freedom from the human condition.
ACTUALIST CONCENTRATION:
As a side note, I can see how the act of concentration (focusing on a given task) is crucial for success in any of these endeavors. Without being able to stay with the task at hand, I doubt success would be possible. My practice over the last few days shows me once again that concentration can lead to an incredible quality of mind. The mind becomes cleaner, quieter, more penetrating, more peaceful, happier, blissful even, and more capable of intelligence and discernment with whatever task is presented.
Also, a concentrated mind seems to have the ability to produce some pretty altered states of consciousness, and the associated delusions with those states of consciousness. Perhaps another way to put it seems concentration can bring a much greater sense of realism to the imagination. An ordinary imagination becomes a vivid 3-D full body fantasy with some strong concentration. And, an ordinary passion becomes a vivid mind-blowing ecstatic passion with strong concentration. So, concentration seems to have more of an intensifying effect which may or may not be helpful depending on how it is used.
The ordinary every day concentration born of sincere interest and genuine intent seems sufficient for actualism practice so far, as well as for insight practice. While I can see that alignment of strong concentration with skillful sincere insight practice leads to deeper and more penetrating insight, it also seems that aiming strong concentration at the enthusiastic enjoyment of this moment of being alive can provide easy access to the stillness and wonder of this moment.
RANDOM RETREAT NOTES:
Just some notes from my retreat... The first day was perhaps the easiest to maintain the noting practice. I kept at it for a good portion of the day with some occasional wandering mind into random thoughts.
The second day, I woke up very tired and groggy and my mind was wandering for a good portion of the morning. I decided to watch a dharma talk around noon and watched a video of Adyashanti which happened to be about having an orientation toward life of asking “what is true?” Perhaps I should've picked a more Theravadan dharma talk to go with the noting practice, but like I said above... I am a self-admitted technique mixer. Although clearly he has some experience which I don't have, I couldn't make sense of what Adyashanti was saying in relation to noting, or to actualism, or to freedom from the human condition. Strangely, just a few months ago, I think his talk would've been right up my alley. So, this didn't help my practice, and probably threw me further off track with noting. So, I decided to read up what Richard has to say about “truth.” Wow. It was insightful, and pretty much made Adya's talk look like a silly childlike fairy tale. At this point, my mind became inclined toward thoughts of actualism, and lots of thinking in general, so I had some difficulty getting back to noting practice.
By day 3, I was back at noting practice with a second wind. My mind was much more restless, however, and I was spending so much time thinking, planning, rehearsing, discussing with myself, reporting, etc... that I considered making that my primary object instead of my breath. But, after a few minutes of trying to do that, I saw that it was a silly attempt and I decided to return to the breath as the primary object (mostly at the nostrils, but occasionally I would switch to the abdomen if I noticed a specific strain around the nostrils.)
Both the night of Day 2 and Day 3, I had some very emotionally intense dreams, which came as some surprise as I haven't had as many of these lately since practicing actualism. Two of the dreams were romantic/sexual in nature and one was an adrenalin filled high speed chase. I didn't make much of them other than some evidence that the meditation retreat was having some kind of effect on my psyche.
OTHER THOUGHTS, QUESTIONS, ETC.
I realized that I have a ton of questions about actualism and actual freedom which I would love to know the answer to and perhaps this forum will help shed some light on them at some point. I won't try to list them all out here, as this post is already monstrously long.
I also have a new enthusiasm to return to HAEITMOBA with some gusto and see if I can't make it work. Still that question really challenges me, as I still don't seem to get what it is supposed to mean. In general, when I try to use HAEITMOBA, it is similar to noting practice in that I can get it to work at most just a portion of my day, and often it takes up to a half an hour just to ask it once.
Desperation – I still often feel a desperation that I really really really want and need some way out of this mess I'm in. I think the insight approach would be to note “desperation, desperation...” the actualist approach might be to question why I'm wasting my only moment of being alive on being desperate. But, neither of these seems to address the real crux of the desperation for me, as it comes back again and again, and it seems like that crux won't go away until this thing is done completely.
Confusion – Actualism practice has certainly helped with confusion, simply by the awareness that confusion is an affective state. The statement “I feel confused” is what gave me a clue here. So, instead of feeling confused, I feel happy and harmless and then take a look at the facts. Still, I must say that not everything is making sense though. And, that's different from confusion, but it still leaves me wanting something.
What to do with my time? This question remains unanswered, as I previously set my life up specifically so that I could do a three-day meditation retreat each week until I became enlightened. I had no other plans, other than to live a simple life, contribute to society through my job, and just plain enjoy being here. And my plan was basically that if 3 days per week wasn't doing the trick, I'd move into a monastery or something. Then, actualism came into the picture, and I still don't know what to do with all this retreat-time that I have set aside. I would love to spend it all practicing actualism, and I guess I'm still just finding out what that means exactly.
Facts are an utter delight, wouldn't ya say? Wow.
Thanks for anyone who takes the time to read and respond to any and or all of this post. I would sincerely like to bring an end to this mess called the human condition.
- Daniel J. |