| | I took some notes on "noting" and the Three Characteristics as a guide to get started with some insight practice. I took material from Dan's book, from Ken's website, from Ron Crouch's website, and the wiki on this site and put some of the core theory and explanations and exercises together in one (for me) handy bunch. For anyone interested, here it is...
The Core Teachings
NOTING
NOTING By Dan Ingram There is an exercise that you might find helpful called “Noting,” and it has its origins in the Pali Canon in Sutta #111, One by One as They Occurred, of The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha (very worthwhile reading). It is used primarily in the Mahasi Sayadaw insight tradition from Burma, though related exercises are found in various Zen traditions, notably Soto Zen and Korean Chan, and probably in Tibetan Hinayana traditions as well.
The practice is this: make a quiet, mental one-word note of whatever you experience in each moment. Try to stay with the sensations of breathing, noting these quickly as “rising” (as many times as the sensations of the breath rising are experienced) and then “falling” in the same way. This could also be considered fundamental insight practice instructions. When the mind wanders, notes might include “thinking,” “feeling,” “pressure,” “tension,” “wandering,” “anticipating,” “seeing,” “hearing,” “cold,” “hot,” “pain,” “pleasure,” etc. Note these sensations one by one as they occur and then return to the sensations of breathing. Here are some valuable tips for successful noting. Don’t get too neurotic about whether or not you have exactly the correct word for what arises. The noting should be as consistent and continuous as possible, perhaps one to five times per second. Speed and an ability to keep noting no matter what arises are very important. Anything that derails your noting practice deserves aggressive and fearless noting the next time it arises. Note honestly and precisely. So long as you note whatever arises, you know that you were mindful of it. What the sensations are doesn't matter one bit from the point of view of noting practice. What is important is that you know what they are.
The Buddha gave his analogies names, and I have named this one “The Analogy of Shootin’ Aliens.” In this analogy the aliens are all of the little sensations that make up our experience. Shooting them is paying attention to them and seeing their true nature, perhaps with the aid of noting practice (like a gun with laser sight on it). The aliens shooting us is what happens when we do not see their true nature, as they become a hindrance, binding us on the wheel of suffering for the duration of our inability to shoot them. Some may even take us out of the game (cause us stop practicing entirely). The aliens that take multiple hits to kill are our big issues, those things that are difficult for us to break into their composite sensations. Being penalized for shooting wastefully is what can happen if we note sensations that we didn’t actually experience because we fell into repetitive, imprecise, mantra-like noting habits.
Further, the speed, precision and playful attitude required for video games is exactly like the feel of well-done insight practices. This is exactly the sort of dedication and passion that helps with insight practices. When our mindfulness and investigation are on hair trigger, being aware of every little sensation that arises and passes, we are bound to win sooner or later. The motto, “Note first, ask questions later,” is just so helpful if we are to keep practicing precisely without getting lost in the stories. “Note ‘em all, and let God sort ‘em out!” Where the Analogy of Shootin’ Aliens breaks down is that all these aliens want is attention and acceptance. They come to us so that we will greet them clearly and openly, but if we fail to do this they can get very troublesome. Their little alien hearts are being broken when we don’t get to know them as they are, so who can blame them when they get mischievous and try to trick us into paying more attention to them by causing trouble. Sure, it’s a bit childish of them, but we don’t always get to meet mature and well-adjusted aliens. Thus, rather than killing our aliens by shooting them, we give them what they want by noticing or noting them. We don’t invite the pretty ones to stay with us forever, nor do we ignore the boring aliens. We don’t kick the ugly ones from our door either. Like a politician on the campaign trail, we extend a hand to all, say, “Hello!” and then quickly do this for lots of others. When we meet them, greet them, get to know, accept and even love them, they go away happy. I realize that I’ve just gone from being excessively violent to being excessively sentimental, but somewhere in there is what insight practices are all about.
I recommend that the foundation of your practice be investigation of the Three Characteristics of the sensations that make up your reality. If you find it too complicated to try to investigate all Three Characteristics at once, then I recommend quick and precise investigation of impermanence. If this seems too difficult, I have found the simple practice of noting very quickly to be more than sufficiently powerful for gaining clear and direct insights into the true nature of thing. Should you find that the numerous instructions and avenues of inquiry I present to be too confusing, remember this paragraph and stick to these simple but profound practices. “When in doubt, note it out!”
NOTING by Ken Folk
Detailed Noting When doing noting practice, preferably aloud, you have to decide whether to do a very detailed noting or a more sparse or skeletal noting. A skeletal noting technique, for example, would be to just choose from these six notes: seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling, and thinking.
Detailed noting, however, is better than skeletal noting. That's because detailed noting "uses up" the available processing power of your mind, and that is exactly what you want to do. If you are noting in a way that requires all of your attention, your mind will not wander and you will not suffer. It's that simple. If, on the other hand, you use a noting technique that only requires 30% of the processing power of your mind, what are you going to do with the other 70%? You're going to suffer! Try it and see! :-)
Here is a systematic way to use your own mind to best advantage in waking up:
1) Note body sensations, e.g., pressure, coolness, warmth, tightness, stretching.
2) Note "pairs" (body sensations + feeling tone), e.g., "pressure-neutral, coolness-pleasant, itching-unpleasant."
3) Note "triplets" (body sensations + feeling tone + mind-state), e.g., "pressure-neutral-investigation; coolness-pleasant-contentment; itching-unpleasant-aversion."
If doubt arises, note "doubt." If speculation arises, note "speculation." If comparing arises, note "comparing." Everything goes in the hopper. There is no such thing as a hindrance. Whatever arises, including distraction, agitation, anger, doubt, etc. can be noted. Co-opt your enemies. You will find that that scariest monsters in your mind can be allies in your own awakening as soon as you note them.
You do not have to be concentrated to note. Note "agitation, dullness, unhappiness, dissatisfaction, doubt, anger, distrust, frustration, exasperation, confusion, fear, self-loathing, judging."
You don't have to figure this out in advance. Every moment that you spend making love to ideas is a moment you could have been noting. Imagine a surfer who thinks he has to understand wave theory before he gets in the water. Just get in there and surf!
Basic Meditation Instructions Sit comfortably cross-legged on the ground or in a chair. Become aware of your breathing. You are breathing in and out. Do not control or manipulate the breath; it was doing fine before you sat down and it will continue until your death without your active participation. Notice that when you breathe in, your abdomen rises. When you breathe out, your abdomen falls. This is the basic nature of the breath; it's a cycle. Let your mind synchronize with this simple cycle of rising and falling. As the abdomen rises, make a silent mental note to yourself, "rising." As the abdomen falls, note "falling." The mental note should be concurrent with the event. You'll have to say it slowly to make the note take the same amount of time as the action: "riiiiiiiisiiiiiiing, falllllllllliiiiing."
Continue in this way, letting your mind settle into the simple act of breathing. Become aware of the sensations associated with the rising and falling of the abdomen. Don't strain, just notice what is there. Maybe your clothing is rubbing against your skin. You may feel softness or warmth. Or you may feel expansion, contraction, tightness, hardness, heat, cold, tingling, itching, etc. There is no right answer; whatever you feel is what you feel. Your job is simply to become aware of what is happening in your experience. If you are able to notice the sensations while maintaining the mental note, "Rising, Falling," do that. This is the preferred method. In this technique, concentration (samadhi) and investigation (vipassana) are being developed together. Progress is made by keeping these two aspects in balance. If your concentration outstrips your investigation, you will get dull. If your investigation overwhelms your concentration, you will become agitated. See if you can maintain the rise and fall of the abdomen as your primary object of awareness, while continuing to note "rising, falling." If you are unable to maintain the focus on the sensations of the rising and falling of the abdomen, you can move your attention to whatever is predominant in your awareness, as detailed below. However, keep in mind that eventually you would like to be able to stay with the rise and fall without being called away, noticing sensations as they occur, but using the rise and fall as an anchor, and noting "rising, falling." Your ability to stay with the abdomen as your primary object will be an indicator of progress over time.
Ron Crouch – You do not have to keep the mind on the breath, so let it wander, but use the breath as an anchor object and return to it periodically.
All of these things can be objectified and transformed into meditation objects that the mind simply watches without getting caught up in them. This is the essence of Vipassana: you objectify whatever you experience in the moment, watch it dispassionately, and don’t get caught up in it. By doing this, the awareness that is doing the watching becomes “disembedded” as my teacher describes it. As disembedding happens you begin to experience liberation from all the things that the body and mind are normally caught up in.
Be a scientist. Take a real interest in the fine detail of your experience, as though you were a engaged in a scientific study. Start a notebook of your experiences. After a sitting, write down as much detail as you can remember about the sensations that arose in the body. What was the sensation and what happened to it? Here is the format:
I noted "rising, falling." I felt warmth, softness, expansion, coolness, and contraction. I was distracted from the primary object (the rise and fall of the abdomen) by a pain in my leg. I moved my attention to the pain, which then became the object of meditation. I noted "pain, pain." The pain changed to burning. I noted "burning, burning." The burning disappeared and was replaced by stinging. I noted "stinging, stinging." The stinging broke up into tingling. I noted "tingling, tingling." The tingling broke up into vibrations. I noted "vibrating, vibrating."
This is how you deconstruct an apparently solid object into its constituent parts. Don't strain to see something that isn't there; just see what is there and DARE it to stay the same. It will not. It cannot. Be there to catch it when it changes.
This is a procedure. Think of it as algebra. You cannot skip steps and obtain the results. Apply the formula and you will get the "right answer." (There is no right answer. You are doing it right if you are seeing clearly. Vipassana means "seeing clearly.")
If you can name it, you know you are contacting it. This is the true value of noting; it keeps you honest. If you are noting, you are doing vipassana. You cannot note without doing vipassana. That does not mean hypnotize yourself into noting "rising, falling," and pretend that you are awake, mind you. You have to know something about the object. Go ahead and note "rising, falling," but know that you are experiencing coldness, warmth, softness, hardness, stinging, burning, aching, pulsing, throbbing, or whatever it is. Noting (knowing clearly what you are experiencing and naming it) is biofeedback.
As a general rule, note until things become very subtle. At that point I would let go of noting as it is unnecessary and can disturb subtle states of concentration.
Walking Meditation
Formal walking meditation is just one step away from awareness during daily life activities, so I love the utilitarian aspect of it. I walk fast, I walk in the woods, I stop, I squat down, I stand still, I stare off into space... what I rarely do, though, is pay attention to my feet. I do breath-counting 1-10, starting over when I get lost, or I notice the breath at the mouth and nostrils, or I play with putting the locus of awareness outside the body, and watching as from above; I love walking meditation.
The walking can be done outside, preferably when few people are around, or it can be done in your own living room. You just need 15 feet or so to pace back and forth. Walk at whatever speed is comfortable for you. Stop and start whenever you feel like it. Follow your gut, there are no rules. Ron Crouch – The Nature of “practice” When we sit in meditation we are building up skills that we will use all day long. During a period of sitting meditation you are practicing concentration and practicing Vipassana, but when you get up from meditation you are no longer practicing them – you’re using them. Noting seems awkward at first and you are likely to only do it during sitting meditation, but the goal is to note your experiences throughout your day, to be more mindful, more aware and awake, during each moment of our lives. This transition, from practicing the technique “on the cushion” to using the technique “off the cushion”, is an important turning point for a meditator. When this begins to happen, first with great effort, then with more and more ease, the effect of the meditation becomes very powerful. One makes swift progress along the path, and soon insights begin to arise during wakeful moments throughout the day. If you have managed to take your sitting practice and use the skills in daily life, you are well on your way to waking up.
Three Characteristics Impermanence Unsatisfactoriness No-Self
The Three Characteristics are the stuff from which ultimate insight at all levels comes, pure and simple. The big message here is: drop the stories, find a physical object like the breath or body or pain or pleasure or whatever, and look into the Three Characteristics precisely and consistently! Drop to the level of bare sensations!
IMPERMANENCE All things are impermanent. This is one of the most fundamental teachings of the Buddha and the second to last sentence he uttered before he died: “All phenomena are impermanent!”
The vast majority of what you usually think of as making up your universe doesn’t exist the vast majority of the time, from a pure sensate point of view. I mean that sensations arise out of nothing, do their thing, and vanish utterly. Gone. Utterly gone. Then the next sensation arises, does its thing, and disappears completely.
Reality vibrates, pulses, appears as discrete particles, is like TV snow, the frames of a movie, a shower of vanishing flower petals, or however you want to say it. Just look into your actual experience, especially something nice and physical like the motion and sensations of the breath in the abdomen, the sensations of the tips of the fingers, the lips, the bridge of the nose, or whatever. Instant by instant try to know when the actual physical sensations are there and when they aren't.
Two kinds of sensations: physical and mental. Being clear about exactly when the physical sensations are there will begin to clarify their slippery counterpart that helps create the illusion of continuity or solidity: flickering mental impressions. By physical sensations I mean the five senses of touch, taste, hearing, seeing, and smelling. Coming directly after a physical sensation arises and passes is a separate pulse of reality that is the mental knowing of that physical sensation, here referred to as “consciousness” (as contrasted with “awareness”). This mental impression of a previous sensation (“consciousness” in Buddhist parlance) is like an echo, a resonance. The mind takes a crude impression of the object, and that is what we can think about, remember and process.
Each one of these arises and vanishes completely before the other begins, so it is extremely possible to sort out which is which with a stable mind dedicated to consistent precision and to not being lost in stories. This means that the instant you have experienced something, you know that it isn't there any more, and whatever is there is a new sensation that will be gone in an instant. The whole goal is to experience impermanence directly, i.e. things flickering.
How fast are things vibrating? How many sensations arise and vanish each second? This is exactly what you are trying to experience. Begin by assuming that we are talking about one to ten times per second in the beginning. This is not actually that fast. Try tapping five to ten times per second on a table or something. There are faster and slower vibrations that may show up, some very fast (maybe up to forty times per second) and some very slow (that are actually made up of faster vibrations), but let's just say that one to ten times per second can sometimes be a useful guideline in the beginning.
Don't worry if things look or feel solid sometimes. Just be with the solidity clearly and precisely, but not too tightly, and it can start to show its impermanence. It is also worth noting here that the frequency or rate of these vibrations may change often, either getting faster or slower, and that it is really worth trying to see clearly the beginning and ending of each vibration or pulse of reality. These are actually at least two different sensations! It is also useful to check out exactly what happens at the bottom, middle, and top of the breath if you are using the breath as an object, and to examine if the frequency stays stable or changes in each phase of the breath.
One last thing about vibrations: looking into vibrations can be a lot like any other sport. It can be thought of the way we might think of surfing or playing tennis, and this sort of game-like attitude can actually help a lot. We're “out to bust some vibrations!” as a friend of mine enthusiastically put it. You don't know quite what the next return or wave is going to be like, so pay attention, keep the mind on the pulse of the sensations of your world just as you would on the wave or ball, and keep playing! I highly recommend this sort of speed in practice not only because that is how fast we have to perceive reality in order to awaken, but also because trying to experience one to ten sensations per second is challenging and engaging. Because it is challenging and engaging, we will be less prone to getting lost in thoughts rather than doing insight practices.
If you can perceive one sensation per second, try for two. If you can perceive two unique sensations per second, try to perceive four. Keep increasing your perceptual threshold in this way until the illusion of continuity that binds you on the wheel of suffering shatters. In short, when doing insight practices, constantly work to perceive sensations arise and pass as quickly and accurately as you possibly can.
Exercise #1 In one of these exercises, I sit quietly in a quiet place, close my eyes, put one hand on each knee, and concentrate just on my two index fingers. Basic dharma theory tells me that it is definitely not possible to perceive both fingers simultaneously, so with this knowledge I try to see in each instant which one of the two finger’s physical sensations are being perceived. Once the mind has speeded up a bit and yet become more stable, I try to perceive the arising and passing of each of these sensations. I may do this for half an hour or an hour, just staying with the sensations in my two fingers and perceiving when each sensation is and isn’t there. I have found this to be a very useful practice for developing concentration and debunking the illusion of continuity.
Exercise #2 You can pick any two aspects of your experience for this exercise, be they physical or mental. I generally use my fingers only because through experimentation I have found that it is easy for me to perceive the sensations that make them up. In another related exercise, I do the same sort of thing, sitting quietly in a quiet place with my eyes closed, but instead I concentrate on the sensations of the front and back of my head. With the knowledge that the illusion of a separate perceiver is partially supported by one impermanent sensation incorrectly seeming to perceive another impermanent sensation which it follows, such as the sensations in the back of the head incorrectly seeming to perceive the sensations of the front of the head which they follow, I try to be really clear about these sensations and when they are and aren’t there. I try to be clear if the sensations in the head are from the front or the back of the head in each instant, and then try to experience clearly the beginning and ending of each individual sensation.
Exercise #3 In another exercise, which is quite common to many meditation traditions, I sit quietly in a quiet place, close my eyes, and concentrate on the breath. More than just concentrating on it, I know that the sensations that make up the concept “breath” are each impermanent, lasting only an instant. With this knowledge, I try to see how many individual times in each part of the breath I can perceive the sensations that make up the breath. During the in-breath I try to experience it as many times as possible, and try to be quite precise about exactly when the in-breath begins and ends. More than this, I try to perceive exactly and precisely when each sensation of motion or physicality of the breath arises and passes. I then do the same for the out-breath, paying particular attention to the exact end of the out-breath and then the beginning of the new in-breath. In the last exercise, I take on the thoughts directly. I know that the sensations that make up thoughts can reveal the truth of the Three Characteristics to me, so I have no fear of them; instead I regard them as more glorious opportunities for insight.
Exercise #4 Again, sitting quietly in a quiet place with my eyes closed, I turn the mind to the thought stream. However, rather than paying attention to the content like I usually do, I pay attention to the ultimate nature of the numerous sensations that make up thoughts: impermanence. I may even make the thoughts in my head more and more intense just to get a good look at them. If my thoughts are somewhat auditory, I begin by trying to perceive each syllable of the current thought and then each syllable’s beginning and ending. If they are somewhat visual, I try to perceive every instant in which a mental image presents itself. If they seem somewhat physical, such as the memory of a movement or feeling, I try to perceive exactly how long each little sensation of this memory lasts. This sort of investigation can actually be fairly easy to do and yet is quite powerful. When I am done with this exercise, I return to physical objects and their arising and passing. However, I have found taking on the sensations that make up thoughts to be another very useful exercise for developing concentration and penetrating the illusion of continuity. It doesn’t matter if they are “good thoughts” or “bad thoughts,” as all mental sensations are also dripping with ultimate truth that is just waiting to be discovered.
Suffering or Unsatisfactoriness The suffering caused by continually trying to prop up the illusion of duality is fundamental suffering. This definition of suffering is the one that is most useful for insight practices, i.e. the illusion of an “I” and thus that everything else is “not I.” This is the illusion of duality, and the illusion of duality is inherently painful.
Investigate your experience and see if you can be open to that fundamental, non-story based aspect of your bare experience that is somehow unsettling, unpleasant, or unsatisfactory. It can be found to some degree in every instant regardless of whether it is pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.
Exercise My favorite exercise for examining suffering is to sit in a quite place with my eyes closed and examine the physical sensations that make up any sort of desire, be it desire to get something, get away from something or just tune out and go to sleep. At a rate of one to ten times per second, I try to experience exactly how I know that I wish to do something other than simply face my current experience as it is. Moment to moment, I try to find those little uncomfortable urges and tensions that try to prod my mind into fantasizing about past or future or stopping my meditation entirely. I turn on sensations of the desire to get results, turn on the pains and unsettling sensations that make my mind contract, turn on the boredom that is usually aversion to suffering in disguise, turn on the sensations of restlessness that try to get me to stop meditating. Anything with fear or judgment in it is my bread and butter for that meditation period. Any sensation that smacks of grandiosity or self-loathing is welcomed as a source of wisdom. A half hour to an hour of this sort of consistent investigation of suffering is also quite a workout.
Looking into unsatisfactoriness may not sound as concrete as the thing about vibrations, but I assure you it is. Even the most pleasant sensations have a tinge of unsatisfactoriness to them, so look for it at the level of bare experience. Pain is a gold mine for this.
No-Self Emptiness, for all its mysterious sounding connotations, just means that reality is empty of a permanent, separate self. The emphasis here absolutely must be on the words “permanent” and “separate.” It doesn't mean that reality is not there, or that all of this is illusion! Solidity is an illusion, permanence is an illusion, that the watcher is a separate thing is an illusion, but all of this isn't an illusion.
There also seems to be something that is frequently called “the watcher,” that which seems to be observing all this, and perhaps this is really the “I” in question. It seems to sometimes be our eyes, but sometimes not, sometimes it seems to be images in our head and sometimes something that is separate from them and yet watching the images in our head. Sometimes it seems to be our body, but sometimes it seems to be watching our body. This odd sense of an unfindable watcher to which all of this is happening yet which is seemingly separate from all that is happening, which sometimes seems in control of “us” and yet which sometimes seems at the mercy of reality: what is it really?
“If you are observing it, then it isn't you by definition!” Notice that the whole of reality seems to be observed. The hints don't get any better than this. Here are three more points of theory that are very useful for insight practices and one’s attempts to understand what is meant by no-self: 1. There are absolutely no sensations that can observe other sensations! (Notice that reality is made entirely of sensations.) 2. There are no special sensations that are uniquely in control of other sensations. 3. There are no sensations that are fundamentally split off from other sensations occurring at that moment.
The big, practical trick to understanding egolessness is to tune into the fact that sensations arise on their own in a natural causal fashion, even the intentions to do things. This is a formal practice instruction. Thoughts, the breath, and all of our experience don't quite seem to be in our control, do they? That's it! Know this moment to moment. Don't struggle too much with reality, except to break the bad habits of being lost in stories, poor concentration, and a lack of understanding of the Three Characteristics. Allow vibrations to show themselves and tune into the sense that you don't have to struggle for them to arise. Reality just continues to change on its own. That's really it. Investigate this again and again until you get it. Notice that this applies to each and every sensation that you experience.
If when meditating you can perceive the arising and passing of phenomena clearly and consistently, that is enough effort, so allow this to show itself naturally and surrender to it. Once you can tell what is mind and what is body, that's for the most part enough. So don't make stories, but know this: things come and go, they don't satisfy, and they ain't you. That is the truth. It is just that simple. If you can just not get to caught up in the content and know these simple, basic and obvious truths moment to moment, some other wordless and profound understanding may arise on its own.
A useful teaching is conceptualizing reality as six sense doors: touch, taste, seeing, hearing, smelling, and thought. It may seem odd to consider thought as a sense door, but this is actually much more reasonable than the assumption that thoughts are an “us” or “ours” or in complete control. Just treat thoughts as more sensations coming in which must be understood to be impermanent, unsatisfactory and not self. In this strangely useful framework, there are not even ears, eyes, skin, a nose, a tongue, or a mind. There are just sensations with various qualities, some of which may imply these things for an instant. Bare experience is just dancing, flickering color, form, energy and space, basically, and the knowledge of these (which is not as fundamentally different from them as you might suspect). Try to stay close to that level when you practice, the level of the simple, direct, obvious, literal.
One more little carrot: it is rightly said that to deeply understand any two of the characteristics simultaneously is to understand the third, and this understanding is sufficient to cause immediate first awakening.
Recommended Retreat Schedule
4:30 awaken 5:00 walk 6:00 sit 7:00 breakfast 7:30 walk 8:00 sit 9:00 walk 10:00 sit 11:00 walk 12:00 lunch, shower, rest, sit, etc. 13:00 walk 14:00 sit 15:00 walk 16:00 sit 17:00 walk 18:00 sit 19:00 walk 20:00 sit 21:00 walk 22:00 sit 22:30 recline
Retreat Reminders
1. Don't indulge in your crap! 2. When in doubt or struggling: note/hit and accept pain. 3. If you have a question, the answer is in the Three Characteristics. 4. Be mindful during transitions between activities. 5. Analysis is not the same as practice. 6. Practice at all times when awake. 7. Stick to the schedule. 8. Remember how precious these moments are and how much the Dark Night sucks. 9. When alone, practice just as hard; this is for you. |