Two Fingers To Dr. Ingram

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Tommy M, modified 13 Years ago at 12/3/10 1:46 PM
Created 13 Years ago at 12/3/10 1:46 PM

Two Fingers To Dr. Ingram

Posts: 1199 Join Date: 11/12/10 Recent Posts
And with that title for a posting, I actually mean this......

In MCTB, Daniel gives an example of a useful way, amongst other useful ways it must be said, to begin noting by observing the index fingers on each hand and noting which finger our attention is on moment by moment. This is basically a posting to suggest that anyone new to noting, or hasn't read MCTB or Mahasi Sayadaw's 'Progress Of Insight' or realised this for themselves, to try this technique in your next meditation session as it will most certainly get you in the mood to, as Daniel so dude-ly puts it, "bust some vibrations".

Hopefully that's of some help to fellow new starts!
Rich H, modified 13 Years ago at 12/15/10 4:19 PM
Created 13 Years ago at 12/15/10 4:19 PM

RE: Two Fingers To Dr. Ingram

Post: 1 Join Date: 11/26/10 Recent Posts
When I've tried this I keep running into the same problem that I do with the 'regular' noting practice: I never know quite where to note.

I always feel like there's a tiny but distinct gap between the physical sensation, the mental "echo" of it in conscious experience, and often a sort of 'secondary' physical sensation that seems to come from a combination of pattern matching and my attention going to that spot on my body. In between these two or three parts to every sense experience, I'm never sure where to do the noting -- anywhere I do it I feel like I'm either missing or artificially creating things -- since I only seem to be able to catch any of these sense experiences at the second or third stage. This whole process is extremely clear for sudden sensations, but I can sometimes catch the same action going on in more sustained ones.

Just as a concrete example, my finger might twitch while doing this, and a split-second later there's the mental awareness of "my finger twitched" which gives me the understanding that the twitch itself is already in the past. Then almost immediately -- unless I stop it -- my attention jumps to the finger and sort of re-assesses the whole experience in light of the idea that "my finger twitched" which is almost like another sensation of it. In the meantime, there's a whole host of other physical sensations that never quite make it into awareness, but I still feel like I can go back and 'review the logs', so to speak, and thereby call up the second and third stages of this process.

I never seem to be able to note before the mental awareness stage, but if I stop and just note only things that come fully into awareness, then there's also all those physical sensations that don't quite make it into awareness, but I can still go check on if I want to. If I try to get ahead of them and note at the 'physical sensation' stage, I always show up too late to catch the actual sensation, and I basically just compress the second and third stages. At the extreme end of this, I end up anticipating the next sensation, and essentially creating it by looking for it (I remember that there have been sense inputs from my right fingertip, so I put my attention there, and sure enough, I feel pressure; was the sense-input there before I looked for it?).

I have a nagging feeling that I'm doing something wrong. Any suggestions on how I can refine this practice, and specifically where in all this mental ping-pong I should be focusing?

(Aside: this is my first post, and I'd like to offer my sincere thanks to all of you for this great resource; I've learned a lot just lurking, and my practice has definitely been enriched by the conversations I've read, so thanks.)