Tarin wrote:
what experiences did you have, and what were you able to verify specifically?
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Well, there are the flashing lights of the jhanas, the being able to see through one's eyelids at outside objects. As a Goenka meditator I'd never really heard of the jhanas at all and after reading Daniel's book I sort of sat down in meditation just to see if what I experienced corresponded with them (esp the first 4) and they did. I took my body dislocation thing to be some kind of A&P event. Immediately after, while still at the meditation retreat, I had a truly horrible time and I correlated that with a Dark Night type of event, though it didn't last as long as what some people here describe, so perhaps it wasn't Dark Night. I suppose it is possible I've passed these things on previous retreats as getting to what Goenka calls "Bhanga" or dissolution is very easy for me and has been achieved at every retreat I ever sat. What happened at this retreat, in addition to all the lights and bells and whistles (literally), is also that sitting became incredibly easy so that at one point I sat almost continuously for 7 hours.
Tarin wrote:
given your description, it does seem to me like it could have been either. was there a sense of 'i' (or a feeling of being) during the experience? how did you experience time?
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hmm. i don't really remember being conscious of time. maybe this is a clue, though: when i was leaving the cemetery one of the docents came up to me and said, "wow, you've been in here a long time!" and i was like, "i was?" but this might just be because i didn't have anywhere to go or be, so i don't operate "on time" as most people do.
as for a sense of me, no, not really. there was a sense of movement and external stimulus, like the sun, like the sound of feet on gravel, etc., but no, there wasn't really a sense of "me" experiencing it and this happens more and more. so, i feel like a part of the landscape quite often, as something "happening" in space, but not really as "I." it is apt to say that while there are specificities to the experience which have to do with my having a body (like the feeling of legs moving), the experience of it is not at all centralized mentally.
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Tarin wrote:
how do you think being in a pce (or ee) affects your ability to be an appropriate and functional parent to your daughter?
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Initially I found it difficult to experience a PCE/EE while parenting or to maintain one if I was in that space upon the commencement of parenting. (I am divorced and share 50/50 custody w/my ex, so I have what seems like quite a lot of "solo" time.) But I started going for walks with my daughter around sunset and this was a helpful integration of "parent" mode and pce/ee mode. In fact, while on one of these walks, the way I saw her really shifted. I ceased to see her as "mine," and so there was really nothing to "do" in terms of shaping her behavior. Approaching her in this way has destabilized much of the usual parent/child tension. It is really so simple...I just let her be. I am sure the parents who read this will cringe and maybe that will be perceived by some as uncaring or irresponsible, but analytically speaking, I would have to disagree.
I think being in that mode makes me a much better parent. In much the same way that when I am in that space I don't feel a centralized identification with "Stefanie," I also don't feel that identified with my daughter. I also see her as something "happening" so nothing she does can anger me (including say, "I hate you," or smearing BBQ sauce on the couch) because while I am in that space she can't really insult "me," or make me upset about "my" couch.
Lately she has picked up the habit of spitting (she is 4, btw) while at summer camp from some older kids. And of course I've told her repeatedly not to spit, but she sort of ignores me. I tell her not to spit not because it irritates me, but because I know this is a violation of social norms and I need to instruct her. There is no passion in my instruction, it is very rote actually.
Scene:
Child: spits.
Mother: Sweetie, don't spit.
Child: Ok.
(Some tme later.)
Child: spits.
Mother: Sweetie, don't spit.
Child: Ok.
(Repeat ad nauseum.)
End scene.
When I went to pick her up at my ex's house, she spit, and he flew off the handle and I was kind of watching him, her, the spit, etc. etc. unfold and he was like "Hello?? Aren't you going to do something?" So I just turned to my daughter and looked her in the eye and said, "Please, don't spit anymore." (Of course this had no long term results.) But I have a very good memory of childhood and of having had an abusive, very reactive parent. So I know that while 4 year old children will definitely outgrow the habit of spitting, they will quite likely hold on to the memory of an irate (and scary) parent for a long time. A non-reactive attitude, which is my norm, even out of PCE/EE mode, is much better in the long run. I just don't see the super-clingy, overly reactive way of parenting as a good thing.
I have read on this forum some debates from anti-AF people that they think PCE's make one more prone to danger because one wouldn't be motivated to avoid it. Well, yesterday I was in PCE/EE mode and I was at the park with my daughter and another woman and her daughter. And storm clouds rolled in. It was magnificent! They were so dark and gray and fat, and there was a lot of lovely, strong wind, which once the children were assured that no tornado was coming, they relaxed into it and let the wind blow them around. Well, about 10 minutes into this lovely pre-storm activity, lightening struck a tree and an electric line right next to the park. A fire started and the electric line made these bass-like booming noises. Well, my friend that I was with started running away frantically, with her child. (Which was also funny because I drove and had the car keys...but I digress...) I just sort of calmly gathered up my daughter and walked away. She was incredibly shaken up and afraid, and I felt nothing except maybe some intense interest about the sound of two forms of electricity meeting (the line and the lightening). But no one was harmed, or even close to harmed, and it was fine.
S Kyle:
So my sense of suffering is incredibly, incredibly feeble. Nor do I feel any kind of giddiness. I use the word "giddy" because the word "happy" is appropriate for what I often feel but it is not like the way children feel "happy" when they get a toy. But this is the kind of happiness I think many people feel and understand as happiness. It is a different thing.
how does the word 'clarity' fit?
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yes, it does.
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Tarin asks:
S Kyle:
and generally have no needs to be fulfilled of any kind...
without those needs, what motivates you in the things you do?
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it's funny but i don't even feel like there are any decisions to be made. there is a schedule of things that get done without my having to exert any effort (like my daughter's daily routine). i will use a scatalogical analogy now. there are things that need to be done...like, going to the bathroom, and so you do them but it's not as if one is like "how will i summon the energy/desire/courage to poop?" needs exist, so...you meet them. (the courage part was a joke...)
otherwise, there is nothing i "have" to do these days. i am an academic, with tenure, who is on sabbatical in the fall. so as far as work is concerned, there is really nothing to do. (ok, i am supposed to be working on a second book...but it's sort of 'optional' whether or not one writes a second book at my institution.) i am unattached, so there is no other adult making demands upon me that i have to meet. so i just do what needs to be done...and, what else is left? nothing really. if friends summon me to a gathering, i go. but i find that i do not initiate anything superfluous to what needs to be done because i don't feel any need to do that stuff (socialize, for example). it has also occurred to me that a lot of what needs to get done requires no thought and hence no effort, but i'm not sure about this and will have to explore it more as things unfold.
i do find that things i used to like to do--like run, for example, now no longer hold any interest for me. i used to run half-marathons and now, i can't muster the energy to run long distances. i went for a run post-retreat and it was fine but it was also like, "well, but why?" so i haven't run since.
i also find it difficult to talk in social gatherings in the way that i used to, which i realize now was actually very pedagogical in the sense that i was often offering intellectual/pop cultural/informational tidbits as fodder for conversation, because i don't feel motivated to either please people or win their approval, and i don't want to take my attention away from my experience of the moment by talking, which is mostly about things that don't actually exist so most conversations often to me seem like talking about unicorns as if they actually exist and i have nothing to say about that, though i am perfectly happy to listen to other people talk. i don't know if that makes sense but i can say more about it if needed...
S Kyle:
I must admit that some of these behavioral changes started after the last meditation retreat, though not to the extent they have now taken hold. These were not changes I was particularly "going" for in either my meditation practice or in my attempts to work with AF, they were just side effects. The issues or concerns that worried me then no longer do and the lack of any discernible "craving" on my part in regards to (what I consider to be) fairly innocuous things is interesting.
could you elaborate on this some? what things are they which are (considered by you to be) fairly innocuous for which you can no longer discern any 'craving'?
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oh i meant: sweets, sex, eating a lot of food, wine = innocuous things.
thanks for the welcome, tarin.