Shinzen Young, in his own words.
In order to see the text with diagrams,
check pages 40-45.--&--&--&--&--&--&--&--
I’m going to describe a series of experiences that you might go through as your mindfulness skills deepen over time. Not everyone will pass through all or only these stages. I’m just using them to give you the general idea. Also, although it’s presented as a single linear progression, people typically cycle through these stages many, many times, with the process becoming clearer at each iteration. Finally, when I use phrases like “Absolute Now,” I’m not implying that you are literally experiencing a mathematical point on the continuum of time. I only mean that sensorially you seem to abide in an Eternal Present.
1. Just starting
2. Got the form
3. Detect coarse impermanence
4. Detect subtle impermanence
5. Detect underlying wavelets
6. Rhythmic arising and passing
7. Passing becomes rich
8. Arising becomes rich
9. Time begins to warp
10. Dance at the Source
1.
Just Starting You attempt to keep track of what’s going on but spend a lot of time wondering what you’re supposed to be doing. You get lost in thoughts and preoccupied with bodily discomforts. You do a lot of thinking about thinking about thinking about….
2.
Got the Form You’re familiar with the form of the technique. You can settle in and just do it. You track the sequence of
sensory experiences in a matter-of-fact way without “tripping out” on the process too much.
3.
Detect Coarse Impermanence You start to get a sense that experiences come and go.
4.
Detect Subtle Impermanence The individual sensory events are themselves ripply and vibratory.
5.
Detect Underlying Wavelets Each vibration and ripple has its own arising and passing. Sensory events are a sort of “Fourier Synthesis” of component frequencies.
6.
Rhythmic Arising and PassingPreconsciousness experience becomes conscious at this stage. Nothingness is noted, from which each wavelet arises and to which it returns.
7.
Passings Become RichThe Nothing to which each wave and wavelet returns becomes rich, providing: tranquility, safety, fulfillment, love. Notice also that less and less does experience need to be “born,” i.e., arise into surface events. Ordinary surface experience is less salient. Subtle preconscious experience now dominates awareness.
8.
Arising Becomes Rich Nothingness polarizes into expansive and contractive forces. Experiences arise when Nothing divides into future (expansion, yáng) and past (contraction, yīn). They disappear when that cleft collapses, reuniting future and past into the Absolute Present of Nothing. This special Nothing is known to contemplative traditions around the world (eg. śunyatā (Buddhism), xū (Daoism), etc).
9.
Time Begins to WarpAll arisings tend to coalesce into a single polarization. All passings tend to coalesce into a single neutralization. Subjective time begins to feel less like a linear extension. Very little is happening and everything is happening.
10.
Dance at the Source One abides in a metaphoric black hole outside time and space, participating in the pure flow of the Source. The One Nothing is metaphorically a gravitational singularity. The boundary between surface and deep consciousness (represented by the dotted line) is metaphorically the Event Horizon.