| | I’m writing this post for various reasons, I’ve been away from the site for a while and have had a lot to deal with in my personal life which has taken its toll on me, physically and mentally, but has ultimately led me to where I’m at right now. That statement may seem surprising given my previous claims and talk of attainments, but the testing ground of the everyday – families, relationships, problems in work, financial difficulties and suchlike – has shown me that I’ve severely misjudged ‘my’ meditative accomplishments and so I want to lay my cards on the table:
Contrary to my previous claims, I do indeed still experience affective emotion; in the last four or five weeks, I had been lower than I can recall at any time in my life and actually ended up hospitalized with chest pains brought about by the stress of my current situation. I’ve also acted in less-than-skilful ways and hurt people, deliberately cut off communication with everyone around me and isolated myself...and I haven't even started trying to rebuild some of those bridges. I became bitter, resentful and angry with the world, saddened by the pain around me and within me, wishing I could just shut the whole thing down and start again. This was all exacerbated by an unexpected kicking from the dukkha ñanas, which confirmed for me that cycling is alive and well and that I’m certainly not an Arahat!
How all this maps up with the various models, I have no idea and couldn’t care less. I’ve gone from feeling like a fraud and considering abandoning the DhO completely - I felt like a twat and like I’d lied to people or something – to realizing that being honest about fucking up might set a good example for others who’ve maybe misjudged their own progress. I know it’s all too common for people to come to this site thinking they’ve gotten this or that Path based on their understanding of MCTB, and also how disheartening it is to be told you’re wrong. This isn’t the first time I’ve made what amounts to a public apology for potentially misleading people with inaccurate information in my posts and replies, and it doesn’t get any easier; it’s taken me a while to get my head together and write this so I hope that it demonstrates that, no matter what you think at the time, it’s not a big deal if you make mistakes. Nobody’s going to judge you for it and if they do then that’s their problem; shit happens and you deal with it.
As I’ve contemplated what’s gone on over the last four to six months of my life, it’s occurred to me that I used the whole AF/no affective emotion idea as a way to avoid facing up to the stressful and genuinely difficult situation I found myself in. Not that I didn’t pursue that outcome with complete sincerity, but my overwhelming desire to not have to feel the way I did led to me deluding myself and, through strong intent, creating a reality-tunnel for myself where I basically stopped registering emotions…temporarily. The mistake was entirely my own fault, no one else could possibly be blamed and I’ve suffered for it by my own hand, but I’ve also learned a lot and developed a new understanding of karma, compassion, and the interdependence of all things for which I will be eternally grateful.
I know this may all sound uncomfortably personal, but I figure if I’m going all out and starting the year afresh I may as well lay it on the line and say what’s actually going on in the everyday life of a suburban yogi. I have absolutely abandoned ideas of Paths as there have been too many qualitative perceptual and/or experiential shifts to align it with anything, and the emptiness of models is now so glaringly apparent that I can’t take them seriously anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I still very much enjoy studying, and recommend making use of, conceptual models to orientate your practice but, for me at least, they’ve become too cumbersome as everything gets too fractal; it’s like spiritual DMT, spirals of self-transforming information matrices, expanding into complex patterns of imputed connections when I turn the light of attention on them.
So, where does this leave me? I have no idea. All I know is that the importance of ending suffering for all sentient beings has become central to my life in a way I can’t even explain. I experienced such a hatred and disdain for the world when I felt really low, but when I looked at it directly and got to grips with it I realized I was sad and frustrated. I felt powerless to do anything to make the world a better place, and not with any sort of ulterior motive of self-glorification but with altruistic intent and a wish for an end to suffering. What I know for certain is that the Dharma is the only way for me to make it a reality.
For the record, I will no longer claim any attainments; whether I have or haven’t attained anything is no longer of any concern to me. There have been several very distinct, permanent, describable shifts in the way my perceptual experience, at all sensate levels, has ‘clarified’ over the last few years, but I feel like I’ve completely let go of the desire to call it anything.
As I read back over what I’ve written, I’m hoping it doesn’t come off as being either self-pitying or some other hyphenated combination of arsehole-ness. I’m just trying to present an honest and open description of the realities of life and practice, and show how awakening doesn’t necessarily solve the problems of the everyday. It can make it a bit easier, no doubt, but the risk of burying your head, as I did, in the sand of ‘spiritual’ or ‘actual’ conceptual models is always present. I basically did most of the things that Daniel warns against in the chapter on Dark Night in MCTB, partly because I thought I was beyond that and more advanced than I actually was. It’s been a painful and difficult time, but ultimately necessary for change to occur; like all things, impermanent flickerings in a frozen moment, but what a joy to behold with such clarity as emptiness brings.
So, there’s an update on what’s been going on with me and the reasons for my absence from the boards, and every other form of online communication lately. I know it’s just the report of one person but I’d like to think it’ll encourage people to maintain high standards in their own practice and remain ruthlessly attentive. I slipped up and so hopefully at least someone will be able to learn something from it; I owe so much to this community and I hope that seeing the lows, as well as the highs, will show that this process isn’t a cakewalk. It’s not an easy road, but it’s worthwhile for reasons words can’t describe.
Over a thousand words…one day I’ll learn to condense my writing. Ha!
Peace y’all.
T
P.S. The moral of the story: Shut y’er trap and practice. |