Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 2:26 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 2:25 AM

Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
Hi. My first post here.

I've been practicing now for two and a half years. I practice satipatthana off the cushion heavily in conjunction with the three lakshanas. I observe myself and reality with - what I have come to learn - an astonishing depth quite apart from how most people practice. This has gotten me very far. I'm going through some amazing Pure Land jhanas but I'm still left dissatisfied as the self process continues to roll on. I observe, with some great diligence, the movement of the aggregates also. My meditation sessions are currently 70 minute sits per day each beginning with plunging deep into the body seeking tranquillity no matter how small the sensation. Once established I begin watching arising and passing or I meditate on nothing which is just my perception of nothing. My perception of nothing also arises and passes (one of the aggregates). I can go into all manor of bodily phenomena seemingly at particle level and have been doing this for over a year. I study dependent co-arising alongside watching my aggregates and the aggregates of others. I can see how they create substance from their minds using name and form and how this creates solidity in the world around them. When they speak it's as if those words are three dimensional objects falling out of their mouths (I find that quite fun to watch!) The bulk of my practice is through everyday awareness and observations which I understand may not be fitting for the theme of Daniel's approach which mostly focuses on meditation (As it happens, meditation is just awareness practice but we hang all manor of bells and whistles on it). I've read his first book and love his technical implementation especially in his descriptions of formations, the three doors and the formless realms but most of this stuff happens outside of meditation for me. I can enter altered states even in the most active and noisy environments.

Things have taken an interesting turn recently. Dependent co-arising is becoming meaningless. In fact, there are times where I cannot even see it operate. Instead, worldly objects seem disconnected from each other. Everything appears to have a subjective independence in accordance with nothing in its seeming environment. After watching my aggregates phase in and out from this experience I observe that it is human consciousness that stitches it all together and finds meaning and relationship with it all. I often cannot even locate a present moment. There is a sense of anticipating something quite significant but strangely quite ordinarily insignificant. People and objects are rainbow-like meaning that they possess no substance. It's quite painful catching myself lost in thought. Paracetamol doesn't work. My mind is grasping at all sorts of oddities. I find old wrinkly women very sexy (hmmm?). 

I have the approach that there is something but simultaneously there is nothing. It's very odd to walk around in a universe lacking in substance. I ask myself "why would the universe create this? But from a perspective beyond forms. Forms or materiality seem extremely peculiar when I'm in this place but then it occurs to me: it is my 'I' that creates all of this; my consciousness creates space and time through the stimulating of the senses (firmly hitting the aggregate of consciousness). The reason for it all seems to be... funk, fecel matter, flowers, snot, a wheelbarrow full of bread or 1943. 

My mind is chattering very heavily with some unusual head pressures and kundalini type symptoms. It sounds like a brass band but all out of sync like children are playing the instruments but vigorously. Outwardly I'm calm but inwardly the mind activity dominates. It's like walking the streets in the silent dead of the night, and then entering a night club.

I've been getting most of my guidance through sutta readings. I'm currently studying the khemaka sutta in which I believe khemaka is describing formations in his analogy of the scent of a flower. I fear that if I concentrate any harder my forehead will form a pointy bit. 

Most of what I wrote is conceited: "I had this and that experience. I can see these things. I can do this and that thing" and so on but I need to paint some sort of a picture. 

I wondered if anyone could say something about this phase of things as it seems like I cannot see through the clumps and tangles at this moment.

Thanks
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Milo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 2:50 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 2:47 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 371 Join Date: 11/13/18 Recent Posts
How about observing the tightening and loosening of the sense of self? The moments where it fades completely? Then let those moments become just a bit more expansive without the need to analyze? It sounds like you've done a lot of zooming in to the micro level processes of self (Good), but sometimes it's also helpful to zoom back out and just view things from a macro, intuitive, and less intensely meta-cognitive level. My 2 cents anyway.
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Santiago Jimenez, modified 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 12:01 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 12:01 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 75 Join Date: 1/9/12 Recent Posts
I think your mind is just doing what minds do, trying to find some sort of meaning to experience, something to hold on to, and it freaks out because it can't even find it in the Buddhist teachings. This is normal and happens all over the place, I can surely remember this phase, and I can't say that it won't happen again. 

This is what has helped me:

1. Be very very compassionate with yourself through out the day, treat yourself how you would treat a vulnerabe baby. Also, help others
    whenever you can, a simple smile to a stranger is a good thing to do.

2. In meditation (and also off the cusion if possible) experiment with Shikantaza (just sit) don't "try" to do, see, understand, realize anything,
    just sit, just be. And if your mind starts spinning, that's ok too, just let reality manifest in whatever way it wants for a while.

3. Be very very compassionate with yourself through out the day, treat yourself how you would treat a vulnerabe baby (can't emphasize this
    enough)

Sending light and love,
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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 11:18 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 11:18 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
Milo:
How about observing the tightening and loosening of the sense of self? The moments where it fades completely? Then let those moments become just a bit more expansive without the need to analyze? It sounds like you've done a lot of zooming in to the micro level processes of self (Good), but sometimes it's also helpful to zoom back out and just view things from a macro, intuitive, and less intensely meta-cognitive level. My 2 cents anyway.


This was a helpful read. My tendency is to separate micro components of experience. Today I was at the beach while holding to the macro field of experience. The beach is a perfect place for that. I'm grateful for your input. :-) 
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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 11:28 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/14/19 11:28 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
Santiago Jimenez:
I think your mind is just doing what minds do, trying to find some sort of meaning to experience, something to hold on to, and it freaks out because it can't even find it in the Buddhist teachings. This is normal and happens all over the place, I can surely remember this phase, and I can't say that it won't happen again. 

This is what has helped me:

1. Be very very compassionate with yourself through out the day, treat yourself how you would treat a vulnerabe baby. Also, help others
    whenever you can, a simple smile to a stranger is a good thing to do.

2. In meditation (and also off the cusion if possible) experiment with Shikantaza (just sit) don't "try" to do, see, understand, realize anything,
    just sit, just be. And if your mind starts spinning, that's ok too, just let reality manifest in whatever way it wants for a while.

3. Be very very compassionate with yourself through out the day, treat yourself how you would treat a vulnerabe baby (can't emphasize this
    enough)

Sending light and love,

This is a very nice non-technical human approach. In my efforts I can often miss this side of things. The idea of holding myself like I would hold a baby is beautiful. Would you be able to say a little more about allowing compassion into this noisy mind space? 
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Not two, not one, modified 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 5:59 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 5:59 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 1038 Join Date: 7/13/17 Recent Posts
Dear Bardo Cruiser,

It reads as if you are leaning into a non-dual frame of reference, and your mind finds it confusing and doesn't quite know how to handle it. All this is quite 'normal'. You have to go through these phases, and dwell in them deeply, and squeeze the honey out of them.  So my advice would be to enjoy and explore it for what it is, but expect it to eventually evolve or pass. It is just a frame of reference. If you have had enough of it, try some difference frames of reference (by all means, like compassion, or simple equanimity).

Usually there is no need to rush through these kinds of phases. But if you want to move on, you could try contemplaying how self and other are formed out of this field, and how dependent arising can be used to explain some aspects of the frame of reference without having to explain everything. Or you could try flipping it around, and instead of thinking how you have a relationship to this frame of reference, you could think about how the frame of reference has a relationship to you. You need to kind of look around the corner of this experience to see the hidden assumptions. Examine it from different angles to find the point where it is anchored to a sense of self.

Good luck!
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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 11:37 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 11:37 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
Hello Curious... Thanks for your reply. 

This caught my eye: "you could think about how the frame of reference has a relationship to you."

Sometimes everything appears to be mind. When I leave the house it makes complete sense that I'm going into mind but I cannot say where mind is. Sometimes I turn glassy and there's nobody walking anywhere if you get that. How can I infer a relationship from these moments? Perhaps the whole point is that there's no relationship to realise but strangely we have to study relating patterns of phenomenon to arrive at that realisation? It all seems very silly but a significant kind of silliness. 




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Not two, not one, modified 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 5:59 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 5:59 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 1038 Join Date: 7/13/17 Recent Posts
Bardo Cruiser:
Hello Curious... Thanks for your reply. 

This caught my eye: "you could think about how the frame of reference has a relationship to you."

Sometimes everything appears to be mind. When I leave the house it makes complete sense that I'm going into mind but I cannot say where mind is. Sometimes I turn glassy and there's nobody walking anywhere if you get that. How can I infer a relationship from these moments? Perhaps the whole point is that there's no relationship to realise but strangely we have to study relating patterns of phenomenon to arrive at that realisation? It all seems very silly but a significant kind of silliness. 




This is good BC.  When you get to a certain level of insight and purification, your subconscious tries to tell you that world is different to the way you had thought, and somewhere deep in the pre-processing your mind tries on different ways of looking at the world. This includes the perception that everything is just your mind. Another possibility is to think that your mind is just everything.  emoticon

Welcome these perspectives and enjoy them while they last. By dwelling in these frameworks you will help to burn in the purifications and changes that lay groundwork for other deeper experiences.

One thing I found interesting at this stage was to try looking at the most munane things, and to see the beauty and interconnectedness present even in those. Another was to look at things that might have seemed like threats (e.g. speeding cars) and think how absurd it would be for one part of my mind to 'want' to hurt another part of my mind.

Just keep it going until it naturally fades.
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Milo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 11:33 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/15/19 11:33 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 371 Join Date: 11/13/18 Recent Posts
Bardo Cruiser:
Milo:
How about observing the tightening and loosening of the sense of self? The moments where it fades ompletely? Then let those moments become just a bit more expansive without the neeto analyze? It sounds like you've done a lot of zooming in to the micro level processes of self (Good), but sometimes it's also helpful to zoom back out and just view things from macro, intuitive, and less intensely meta-cognitive level. My 2 cents anyway.


This was a helpful read. My tendency is to separate micro components of experience. Today I was at the beach while holding to the macro field of experience. The beach is a perfect place for that. I'm grateful for your input. :-) 

Glad to hear it. It can be profoundly helpful to make some space for integrating those insights into natural 'just sitting/being' experience once you get them IMHO.
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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 12:56 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 12:56 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
curious:
Bardo Cruiser:
Hello Curious... Thanks for your reply. 

This caught my eye: "you could think about how the frame of reference has a relationship to you."

Sometimes everything appears to be mind. When I leave the house it makes complete sense that I'm going into mind but I cannot say where mind is. Sometimes I turn glassy and there's nobody walking anywhere if you get that. How can I infer a relationship from these moments? Perhaps the whole point is that there's no relationship to realise but strangely we have to study relating patterns of phenomenon to arrive at that realisation? It all seems very silly but a significant kind of silliness. 




This is good BC.  When you get to a certain level of insight and purification, your subconscious tries to tell you that world is different to the way you had thought, and somewhere deep in the pre-processing your mind tries on different ways of looking at the world. This includes the perception that everything is just your mind. Another possibility is to think that your mind is just everything.  emoticon

Welcome these perspectives and enjoy them while they last. By dwelling in these frameworks you will help to burn in the purifications and changes that lay groundwork for other deeper experiences.

One thing I found interesting at this stage was to try looking at the most munane things, and to see the beauty and interconnectedness present even in those. Another was to look at things that might have seemed like threats (e.g. speeding cars) and think how absurd it would be for one part of my mind to 'want' to hurt another part of my mind.

Just keep it going until it naturally fades.

OK. So I dwell in those. What does BC refer to? 

Many thanks. 
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Chris M, modified 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 7:49 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 7:49 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 5117 Join Date: 1/26/13 Recent Posts
I'm betting that BC = Bardo Cruiser

emoticon
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Not two, not one, modified 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 4:37 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/17/19 4:37 PM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 1038 Join Date: 7/13/17 Recent Posts
Chris Marti:
I'm betting that BC = Bardo Cruiser

emoticon
Yep!
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Bardo, modified 4 Years ago at 9/18/19 5:03 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 9/18/19 5:03 AM

RE: Ceasing of dependent co-arising?

Posts: 263 Join Date: 9/14/19 Recent Posts
curious:
Chris Marti:
I'm betting that BC = Bardo Cruiser

emoticon
Yep!

I see. I thought it may have been abreivating something spiritual or techinical; something special to stroke the self with like a trophy or a badge or some other shiny thing. Turns out it was really simple! (Fortunatly!) ;-)