I went to visit Trent for a weekend. It definitely cleared a few things up. Here are my notes in case my experiences are useful to others, and in case others have comments that can clarify some of my reasoning. It might be a bit haphazard and repetitive... i've thought about these things from a few different angles.

Just to be clear, these are my own words + thought processes written out as I've thunk em, unless otherwise noted specifically in the post. So I look forward to any comments or clarifications people might have, or if some of the reasoning seems weird then ask questions so that I can improve upon it and maybe discover something new in the process.

---

What is naivete?
Naivete is something like it being OK to "not know" for a while. this manifests in two ways i can currently identify. one is sensually, in not knowing what you're seeing. you're literally seeing and sensing everything for the first time, as there's no other moment you can sense in. when you feel a twig - you're literally feeling it for the first time. getting into that groove is helpful for PCEing.

the other is affectively, or: All those concerns, worries, fears, anxieties? it's OK for them to not be there for a while. a metaphor: the psyche is a plane. the self finds something it doesn't like and digs a furrow.. and keeps going over it back&forth, making it deeper and deeper. eventually you have tons of furrows, tons of issues that prevent you from being happy&harmless (smooth). yet all those furrows aren't really there, it's just the shape the self is taking. so one can be naive like treating that plane as flat, smooth, unperturbed.. and from there, wandering off into a PCE and having the whole thing vanish entirely (albeit temporarily, until AF). knowing that it will all disappear anyway might be good way of allowing yourself to treat them as inconsequential.

I couldn't get myself to do that though (and still haven't fully, yet), but the biggest reason was that 'I' would buy into each feeling.. and indeed as long as a feeling is being bought into it will continue to be there - when it's finally seen for what it is, it dissipates (why attentiveness is so important). So for each feeling I'd have to figure out "a way around it", almost I felt like I was tricking myself into "figuring out why it's ok to not feel it" - namely, starting from an assumption that the feeling is valid, and trying to figure out why it isn't. I felt like 'I' was trying to convince 'my' self, to win 'it' over w/ arguments. I wasn't, really.. when i did figure out an issue, it was not tricking myself, but for good, and then it finally vanished, but it didn't "feel right". and that came from a lack of understanding of intuition.

What is intuition?
One understanding really makes it all much simpler: "the self is what it doesn't want to be".

What does that realization mean, really? Well, notice how a belief kind of dulls your thinking? it causes you to go through all these irrational hoops to keep it alive.. and when you finally see through it, that's just what it is - a seeing through it, a seeing it for what it is - additional knowledge which, when comprehended (literally "completely grasped" by your mind), shows the belief is no longer necessary.

So, a feeling-being with many beliefs will have a really stunted intellect, as many chains of reasoning and logic will be reacted to by the self before they are further processed. There does seem to be a general correlation with "self-awareness" vs. "iq" (using both terms very roughly, hence the quotes). generally, it seems someone completely led by their impulses and emotions won't really think about what they're doing.. yet more "intellectual" types who focus, have logical ways of dealing with their own problems, even teach themselves how to learn (find effective study methods, etc) seem to be more "intelligent" in a way. i should say "less limited by their self".. as you remove more limitations the intellect operates more freely.

Ok, so self -> less knowing, roughly, since less room to think about stuff. What does the self actually want to do? What is intuition, really? (the feeling, as opposed to "intuition" the sudden flash of understanding - not felt, but known - like you know what 10*10 is). It's the feeling that you know or that you don't know. It's the self's attempt to figure things out.. it really loves knowing (e.g. satisfaction, conviction (imagine an angry priest preaching), pride), and it really hates not knowing (e.g. fear). it's tough to face your fears cause your intuition tells you to not go there - there's scary stuff there, who knows what it is? best to stay where it is safe. and that's also why it's so easy to cling to beliefs - you feel them to be right, and you don't want to question that cause what if you're wrong? gah! that's just scary.

so 'intuition' tries its best to know.. yet that intuition is the very thing that is preventing the knowing! the self really doesn't want to know.. yet it itself is the not-knowing! it fears not-knowing if it's gone.. yet the flesh&blood body avec intellect already knows, and the self comes and arrogates that knowing and makes itself seem important via intuition. Isn't that so ridiculous?!? I actually just burst out laughing as I realized that, and i definitely felt a physical shift in my head as the understanding clicked.

intellect vs. intuition
'i' had a suspicion that without 'my' self, 'i' would just be subject to some other feeling-intuition, "the intellect", one that 'i' won't have control over, this time. what if that intuition gets "stuck" into a set "belief" that is "wrong"? there won't be "me" to ferret it out! well, the intellect can't refuse to look at facts.. that's simply not one of its faculties, that denial being a faculty of the self. it's actually the intuition itself that refuses to look at facts, that gets "stuck"! notice a pattern yet? it really doesn't want that to happen.. yet it is the happening of that.

AF is counter-intuitive
After all that, i think i understand what is meant by AF being counter-intuitive. you literally have to go against the intuition that feels it knows, and go to actual knowing.

"that feels so wrong, though!" it really does. here's the kicker - the self doesn't actually know anything. how can the self possibly feel a fear? the body has to have already comprehended the potential for danger. that knowing of the potential for danger was taken by the self and manifested into fear. with the fear gone, that's all that goes - the fear. the knowing will still happen, and of its own accord, just like before. it feels like you are losing knowledge, but you're really not - hence counter-intuitive.

intuition feels like a guiding light, looking around at what is right and wrong, figuring life out, learning how to survive and live well, etc. without intuition, you feel like you'll be in a dark room with no where to go. however, it's more like the intellect is the guiding light, and intuition is a big opaque obscuration which has little holes in it that move around to guide the intellect in a way it feels is right. with it gone, that light will shine fully, with nothing in the way.

so that's what intuition is, as i understand it.. the self taking what is already known and attaching feelings of knowing and not-knowing to it.. and viciously resisting any attempt at understanding. some examples:

• caring: when you feel like you should care, or feel like you don't.. that's a feeling. the understanding that caring may or may not be appropriate is already there.
• being ashamed: this is also why you should feel excited at the chance of feeling foolish/ashamed. the self might feel foolish as a belief is seen through - "how could i possibly have missed that?" but that's wonderful! note how the foolishness is completely overtaken by the relief at having taken care of that.
  
  what seems more of a problem to me is feeling ashamed.. as i touch upon some beliefs, i get a sense of shame like "oh no I can't be thinking that! that's wrong! that's counter-AF!" and that has stopped a more thorough investigation there. but really that means that's exactly what i should investigate! and once it's done with, how free i will feel.
  
  the self is not perfect - important here is realizing that the self can never be perfect. things can only be not-perfect as a result of the self. so of course as you go along you will feel ashamed/silly as you discover more and more.. but that's great! the whole process is a rational way of proving that the self is wrong and therefore eliminating it, bit by bit. maybe one can set that motivation up into a positive feedback loop - even being eager to feel foolish as you know the relaxation that will result. (hey, there's a happier inevitability than "Dark Night follows A&P like thunder follows lightning" =).
  
  inevitability helps. if you know you'll get AF, anyway.. you know that whether the self likes it or not, whatever belief it currently has will go away.
  
• fear &c: one can apply similar reasoning with any feeling. for example, fear is trepidation about the future. but the comprehension of an unknown is already done, as the fear has arisen. there's no further understanding to be gotten from the fear.. and in fact, further understanding is prevented as one is scared instead of reasoning rationally. not only that but it also:
  1) doesn't change the outcome for the better. imagine two scenarios. in the first, someone is afraid of event X happening, afraid, afraid, then X happens, then terror/horror/relief even, whatever. in scenario two, happy&harmless, happy&harmless, then X happens, then..? i don't know! whatever is appropriate
  2) might make the outcome more likely. think of stories where someone has desperately tried to avoid a situation but their actions only precipitated it.
  3) "sucks, and sucks big-time at that"!

enlightenment is intuitive
also this is a good place to draw a distinction with Enlightenment.. Enlightenment seems to be really full-on intuition. consider how literally intuitive and feeling-filled the jhanas are, if you've practiced them. you feel your way into them the first time, get a sense of them, know how to find your way back, they fill you with bliss, you can literally mold them with your mind!

Enlightenment feels good, seems right, no?

He doesn't question whether it's an addiction, but since it feels so good and he feels happy and fulfilled and is better than at least some alternatives, he assumes it isn't. (not to dig on his way of life; just pointing out his reasoning is intuitive.)

i don't think you'll ever hear an AF person say that they can't explain why their state is better than before [1]. yet i've had some trouble showing that my enlightened state is unequivocally better than others.. so far it's just served as a good impetus to continue, which is good i suppose, but not the end goal. but perhaps richard is right when he says AF is 180-degrees opposite from enlightenment. also might explain why so many realized folk found this thread useful. (not to say stream-entry et. al. aren't useful.. don't know enough about that to say one way or another.)

What about sincerity?
Sincerity is necessary as a precursor to any of this, simply to admit that something is wrong. this is what i needed when starting to feel ashamed at a belief being potentially 'wrong'. if i just admitted to myself (as i have by now) that that issue was a problem, then i could start looking at it. simple!

also this is useful for being OK with whatever faults you have. that sense of shame only arose cause i wasn't OK with me having that belief. being OK doesn't mean letting it be.. it means not beating yourself up over it. accepting it feels good when you do, and then a few moments later you'll find yourself just dealing with the belief, directly. it's kind of like "oh it seems i actually did believe this!" definitely a necessary first step.

you also must be sincere when you are naive.. and the reason it's OK is cause of how messed up and unhelpful intuition really is, as i described above.

pure intent vs. being driven
this one i'm only starting to fully get a grip on, now...

there has been, for a while now, this kind of drive in the background. i identify it most readily as a spot of focus or attention somewhere in my head which kind of pushes at some knot there. constantly pushing.. constantly trying to figure out what is wrong so that i can continue on the path. this caused me trouble before with enlightenment, here. Dan's advice was spot on. but why? i couldn't see why. surely i need to want it.. i even read up on the AF site about pure intent and they said "you must want this more than you've wanted anything else." i didn't really understand what they meant...

there were hints that the drive wasn't good, though. first, the people saying it wasn't.. second, feeling ashamed at certain flaws.. it was like "oh no, if i'm feeling that i must not be on the path.. ah ill deal with it later, lemme try to PCE first!" third, feeling ashamed at not being attentive.. like "oh i wasn't attentive to the senses for the past X minutes, crap im wasting time". luckily that wasn't my full-on mentality the entire way but it showed here+there. i didn't really notice how much more relaxing it was when i wasn't focused on that.

and the crux is, of course, belief in the drive.. "without this drive, how will i progress on the path? how will 'i' know that something is wrong?" does this sound familiar, yet? maybe like intuition? same story, here. when something actually is wrong, 'i' notice and address it.. and it's intellect that supplies the processing power and the processing necessary to realize that. the self is just a superfluity on top of that. and when nothing is actually wrong (like no belief in the forefront).. well, 'i' felt something must have been wrong cause hey it wasn't a PCE, yet! so 'i' was looking, ever vigilant.. but the actualist method is not to ask "What is wrong with the moment that is now preventing me from a PCE?" it is to ask "How am I experiencing this moment of being alive?" and that's the point.. now "How am I feeling this moment of being alive?" it's meant as an appeal to the intellect and not the feelings.

also might be good to look at every day life. while pondering what i would ever do without my precious drive, i got up from my seat in the airport, took my things with me, walked to a map, looked up the food places nearby, stopped by and made purchases at two of them, went to the bathroom, then arrived back at my seat. i hardly thought about all that as my mind was occupied with wondering about the drive.. yet there i was doing all those complicated things without an incessant drive to do it.. just an understanding that i'm hungry and won't be able to eat well on the plane (or at the airport - salad from starbucks, meh - but i digress).

how do i know i can get rid of the drive? how do i know i can be harmless+care-free and it'll be OK? how will anything get done?! by now i realize how nice it is to be rid of beliefs, how nice it is to feel happy, harmless, careless... i have my goal in mind, i know how to go about it. if something comes up, then without this drive, the intellect will simply notice it and proceed from there, effortlessly without shame or rush. i think that knowing is pure intent, an orientation towards the goal (EDIT: i fleshed this out more).

Restlessness
the drive also causes restlessness. lots of it.. like the one i experienced when arriving as i checked my email and all the comics and started typing this post (a long one, eh?) so i've got to work on it.

restlessness while in solitude is actually a good indicator that something is wrong. there's no external factors, so nothing really needs your attention, so.. why are you fretting? it's a good time to sit down, relax, "observe the stillness" as Trent put it (or was it the silence? it was very quiet there). i just did it now and there was definitely an underlying factor which i was simply overlooking via being restless. i did it a few hours ago and there was another factor there, too. hey the rest of the path should be easy - if restless, calm down and see why. rinse & repeat!

---

well that's me, fleshing out these thoughts as i write them. any questions/comments are welcome!

[1] for the theory that Buddha may have been AF, considering his quote: maybe he was being coy for whatever reason. i can't find the sutta, and out-of-context he could be saying anything. maybe he was being literal and by 'I' he meant the self or the Self. That s/Self would literally have gained nothing as it disappeared. maybe he was being literal and by 'I' he meant the flesh&blood body - the flesh&blood body has always been here, having a blast, as Richard puts it, so that too, I suppose, wouldn't have 'gained' anything - actually it would have 'lost' a whole bunch. in any case one 'gains' nothing by AF, in a literal sense, as the self simply vanishes. or maybe AF isn't Buddha's Enlightenment. but in any case, observe the distinction between his quote and Bill Hamilton's.

EDIT: 4:30PM talked about restlessness more
EDIT: 4:31PM split off restlessness into new section
EDIT: 4:31PM checked my email
EDIT: 4:31PM re-arranged restlessness section a bit
EDIT: 4:32PM restlessness restlessnessrestlessnessrestlessnessrestlessness
EDIT: 6:27PM updated to show this is my own reasoning
EDIT: 6:44PM-7:00PM expanded the enlightenment section a bit

Nice one mate, that's a really nice piece you've done there and it's great to hear how happy you are. I like your analysis of this and I'll certainly be referring back to it!

Peace to ya brother,
Tommy

P.S. I'll mail you in the next few years or so....

Thanks for the post!

damn good. thanks.

so true.

Thanks

Nice timing Claudiu!!

Beo, I notice you have started to begin sentences without a capital letter. Does AF encourage this or did it happen without your awareness?

WOW! thanks, this is going to be a major help. William Blake, the renowned 19th century poet, could also have been AF. In the Marriage between Heaven and Hell, he discusses ideas extremely similar to AF constantly mentioning the senses as infinite.

hehe i actually first wondered why tarin typed all lower-case. was it cause AF made him a robot? then trent started doing it too.. it must be a subtle transformation indeed.. maybe when the brain gets rewired something inadvertently gets messed up!

luckily, the subtle and unstoppable effect is a benevolent one; it is easier to type without hitting the shift key all the time. good thing it dIdNt MaNifEsT DifErEnTlY

Beiber, I think all the ascended masters may have been AF but not known it. Christ, Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster, Mohammed, Krishna - they just weren't quite aware enough to know the words "actually free". Had they known, things would have been so different.

Beo, if you're happy, who am I to object? But "group think" and group behaviour triggers a few alarm bells in me.

This is true. But also observe when the feeling triggers the self. It is a feedback loop and sometimes the self triggers the primal instinct and sometimes the primal instinct triggers the self. For examples, 1) you are walking and you see an old Nissan Sentra and that triggers the memory of your first kiss which then triggesr longing (for simpler times, say) which will often trigger another memory (like remembering your pitiful credit score) which then triggers a primal instinct like Aggression. 2) A deep feeling rises on it's own accord. It triggers a specific memory of rejection which triggers Shame which can trigger yet another memory and another emotion, etc. 3) Sometimes the memory is an opinion that one has.





This is related to above. Seeing a feeling rise on it's own accord then arbitrarily interpreted by the Self to be related to this or that memory shows that they aren't to be bought into. The Self's sole job is to interpret feelings, emotions, memories and opinions and turn them into mood which leads to action. A highly functional self only recalls positive memories and the corresponding emotions leads to a positive mood facillitating successful action. A dysfunctional self (like mine) only recalls negative memories which leads to painful emotions, sour mood and unsuccessful outcomes and/or stagnation. This is why therapy focuses on improving the Self. The self is the switchboard operator of this feedback loop always in process. Notice when the Self is activated by the primal feeling as well as when the Self activates the primal feeling (or rather the process leading to a primal feeling).


And I'm curious Beo, have you felt your own feeling of being yet?

"feeling triggers the self.....Seeing a feeling rise on it's own accord then arbitrarily interpreted by the Self ....The Self's sole job is to interpret feelings, emotions,..."

it is the very movement, which is the feeling, the self, not something separate

Thanks. This is in line with a concern I pursued with Bruno. Sometimes, I see the process as Me and sometimes I see a Me as the arbiter of the process. When I observe a primal feeling and choose to let it dissipate it feels like I am said arbiter. Instead should I see that feeling of arbitration as another part of the process of me? Is that feeling connected to the feeling of being or is it a primal instinct like fear,nurture,...? Is there something specific to look for the next time it feels like I am observing my Feelings?

If I am my feelings and I am the observer then what links the two together? Can this link be directly observed?

since it wasn't obvious in my reply, there's no "group think" here, at least from my end. the more i typed i just noticed myself resorting less & less to putting in caps & punctuation, first on my own journal and then it spilled over into here. i don't know why the others do it but i suspect it's for similar reasons.

hmm i dnno, what do you mean? if you mean the sense that 'i' exist, that's always kinda there, tho i haven't felt it by itself. if you mean physical manifestations of the self, i notice that a few moments after i resist something (like getting closer to the actual world) i get a pang of pressure or somethin in my head.

^^THIS^^

I noticed this in personal emails - after which I went back and added caps, becoming a bit self-conscious. I also am wondering if my childhood accent is coming back - to which I respond(ed) with worry. I remember being informed that the accent sounds dumb!

I have had the concern about "group think" (the frequent use of the word "wonderful"), but not at present. (That word makes sense). I do appreciate that C C C's brings it up. It identifies an "elephant" which is always in this sort of room, one especially apparent for anyone new dropping in.

"If I am my feelings and I am the observer then what links the two together? Can this link be directly observed?"

There is no linking the two together they are one and the same. If you are observing your hand there is no something that links your hand to your hand. Looking at it another way. Attention is the action of directing the mind, of noticing. It comes from the latin root attendere, "to stretch toward". The act or movement toward that which is being noticed is feeling, a relationship created from interaction from noticing. This is the self, a creation whether belief or intuition. If we investigate this natural propensity to act we find the instinctual passions.

hmm some more stuff on pure intent, as i'm still trying to figure this out.

Drive doesn't seem good, but without it i'm "stuck"
so i have the drive, right? i'm really hard-pressd to do it. then i realize the drive isn't the best.

then i feel kind of down, generally not good, 'stuck' in a way.. and when i remember to try applying stuff i dont want to get into it cause "that way leads to the drive" and that's not pleasant. and the drive has caused lots of pain in the past w/ vipassana stuff so i have reason to avoid it. and indeed seems to be blocking progress with AF.

so i've been oscillating between drive and no-drive. but what is necessary is the 3rd alternative: neither drive nor no-drive.

it's really simple. i've tried asking myself "do i want AF?" like "will i get AF?" 'yes' "what is stopping me?" and always some resistance or other that i can't quite always define.. and when i can, i figure it out, but there's "some" blockage.

but thats like looking at the conclusion, which may be far far removed from the premises, and trying to figure out why it's good. "end of all suffering" sounds good but then you get into weird things like "well how can you have fun and thats not a feeling", "why would you do anything with no desire", "ill just be BORED. oh, boredom is a feeling? well then i'll be neither-bored-nor-not-bored, sounds LOVELY (not!)" etc... difficult questions to answer for sure, since one can't imagine not having a self. and they can be answered intellectually.. but while that may remove rational doubt it doesn't remove feeling-doubt (intuition). the only real answer is the experiential one, which can luckily be apparent before AF via a PCE.

Pure Intent is wanting to be happy
well i haven't had a PCE yet... but then i asked myself, "do i want to be happy?" far, far less resistance this time, though maybe some. i ask myself again, "do i actually want to be happy?" maybe some images come up of stuff that might happen in the future to make future moments unhappy. "but what about right now?" choosing between being happy and not-happy in a random no-particular-moment (e.g. sitting in the bathroom) seems like a straightforward and sensible choice. i can understand in like a really heated argument it might not (this is important!) but i was just sitting there, feeling not-happy.

so that really served to brighten my mood! i can absolutely see how if feeling stuck one just has to remember a PCE, but since i can't do that yet, ill just focus on being happy in this moment. so if i ask HAIETMOBA and nothing 'happens' (i remain feeling however i am even if it is bad) i'll explicitly ask myself "would i rather be happy right now than what i'm feeling?" and i think that will help me see the silliness of it, and from there be happy(er). and it's so simple.. i just gotta keep doing that and uplevel the happiness! and i think thats what's meant by pure intent - this simple, sensible desire to be happy in this moment.

what i said earlier:

one has to have that goal in mind! so this entire post is really an expansion on that section.

Why is one Driven?
and one needs no 'drive' to do that. why must one be 'driven' to feel happy? it's simply silly not to... so of course a lot of effort (read attentiveness) will be put in, but not as a 'drive' (an internal impetus to strive towards a goal, implying that there is resistance in the way and that it must be driven through), but simply as the apparent thing to do at that moment.

'drive's seem really compelling.. when talking with others, they soon enough bring up motivation and how without it none of us would do anything. and i've had trouble in the past describing why one would do things without desire. and i felt that was not good so i strove to understand how.

normally there's like, stuff in your way. you need a drive to study hard to whip your brain into shape for that exam. or you have to really push your employees to work hard against their wills (if you just left them there they'd waste time!) or something. a drive seems to imply resistance. it's one argument whether you can get things done "in the real world" without drive, striving against all odds, etc.. but we don't even have to talk about that. 'you' only exist in your head, really.. 'you' are all that's up there, so 'you' are entirely in 'your' control, in a way. so if 'you' are driving 'yourself' to be happy... that means there is some resistance that 'you' are attempting to overcome. that means that 'you' don't sincerely want to be happy - only some part of 'you' does, in an attempt to overcome the other parts that don't, and one can fight that battle for years and not win. so ironically, "wanting AF more than anything you've wanted", in a sincere way, actually fully eliminates the need for any "drive", as it's just simply what must be done.

but what's the resistance? it's just 'you'. so, how to overcome that resistance?

Sincerity
that's the wrong question to ask. better to ask, why is that resistance there in the first place? thats the point of sincerity - to be a unified self aimed in one direction. if you're sincere, then you will simply want to be happy as that is the sensible thing. then the happiness happens almost of its own accord. and indeed that's the point of happiness and felicitous feelings, isn't it? they happen on their own, lessening the self's reins on itself, until maybe it can go into abeyance for a spell.

to flesh this out a bit more, as i didn't see the link between sincerity and being unified... if you intellectually think you want to be happy this moment, yet whatever resistance (read emotion) is still there, then 'you' are not sincere. 'you' are split in two: "the thinker" who wants to be happy, and "the feeler" who really isn't. what is necessary is sincerity.. get "the feeler" and "the intellect" to agree, not by browbeating one or the other, but by listening to it, figuring out what is wrong, realizing that it's all "you".. whatever method outlined anywhere else.

indeed , after all that stuff about intellect, one has to be careful to not take the intellect as a super-self.

Just Gotta Do It
i feel like im going around with circles with all this (like i've gone over this with myself several times before). but each time it seems to make more sense.. gotta focuuus.

Not true in my case. Remembering my PCE does not magically make me happy or clear the way to felicity.

what happens when you are feeling bad and you remember a PCE? what's the conversation that goes on in your head?

I know what you mean. the process seems to go something like:

• "What? This is crazy. And ridiculous. And a cult. They all sound the same. And they use words in really weird ways. I'm out."
• "People are still talking about that? They say they're happy? Weird people man. Why do they repeat the same words over and over?"
• "Hmm reading this and trying HAIETMOBA a little seems to help... "
• "What do they really mean when they use those words? Ohhhhh, that makes sense..."
• "Ohhhhh, that's what they actually mean by sincerity... that makes sense!"
• "Ohhhhh, that's what they actually mean by wonderful... that makes sense!"
• "Ohhhhh, that's what they actually mean by vibrant colors... that makes sense!"
• "Ohhhhh, that's what they actually mean by 'i' am 'my' feelings and 'my' feelings are 'me'... that makes sense!"
• "Ohhhhh, that's what they actually mean by pure intent... that makes sense!"
• Soon enough one is using those same words oneself.

So it's not so much a brainwashing procedure as each person coming to understand what the words mean... and true, because AF is presented using those words, once they make sense, there is little reason to change them. The negative might be that maybe those words aren't the best, since people keep running into problems with them.. but I don't think using random things ("mrfxc" instead of "pure intent") would be better, and I don't know what words would describe them better. I think the misunderstanding comes more from a lack of understanding than from a lack of better words. The positive is that among people who are practicing sincerely, a common vocabulary facilitates communication.

Double post!

Indeed. The proof is in the pudding and the PCE can really dispell those doubts. Continued cultivation can just leave you with no choice but to keep going, and that's when sincerity and pure intent get some wings.

Nick

Hello Claudiu,

Wonderful post! I could never arrange my thoughts in this manner and write a post about it or maybe I haven't due to a lack of confidence. Anyways I thought I would also chime in.

Pure intent is not just an intent to be happy, but an intent to be both happy AND harmless. The harmlessness part is just as important as an intent to be happy. With only the intent to be happy one remains "self"-centered. I didn't really notice this for a while.



[link]

Hey ManZ, thanks for pointing this out! I actually realized this a few minutes ago and was going to update my post, but i'll just put it here.

Harmlessness is just as important as happiness (if not more)
The intent is to be happy and harmless. ManZ put it well:



I didn't, either. It was first brought to my attention a while ago. I asked, what is meant by "harmless" exactly?


However, what really clicked for me (just today) is...

One must be harmless towards one's self as well as towards others
As Vineeto said, it's easy to feel like you are harmless, but cause harm via thoughts and actions that you don't particularly label as "harmful". So to be harmless requires remarkable attentiveness to all your actions whenever you are interacting with others.

However, what about in solitude? Surely you have vicious thoughts towards others occasionally, but you aren't being harmful to others.. and yeah you can realize it makes you unhappy so do away with them, but that wasn't quite enough for me. what did it was an off-hand remark by Richard:


I think that's the key point - one must be unable to induce suffering in oneself as well as in others. That's all suffering is, really: harm towards ones self. It isn't found anywhere in the actual world; it is all in 'your' head; it is 'you'. When you are aggressive towards another, that begins with a feeling of aggression, which feeling is equivalent to being harmful towards someone else. Who is someone else, though? You can't be harmful to an actual object just by a feeling, since that won't make it budge one inch (telekinetic folk, please PM me). So that aggression is really towards "someone else", that is, your mental image of them... which mental image is actually just 'you', be it part of your social identity (angry at your boss for not giving you a raise) or an instinctual identity (someone in a bar whistles at your girlfriend so you punch his lights out). So that act of harm begins with being harmful toward yourself.

So really all harmfulness is just toward yourself. And realizing this is true of any emotion - when you're feeling annoyed or anxious or angry - is a lot more overarching than just realizing this is true of 'harmful' emotions towards 'others'.

What it means, effectively, is to simply not put any affective energy at all into those harmful feelings and emotions. It's not that annoyance arises, then you avoid it by doing something else (causing restlessness). It's not that annoyance arises, then you deny it, making it worse (causing all sorts of issues). It's not even that annoyance arises, then you realize it's silly and it fades (proper application of HAIETMOBA). It's that your way of being is being harmless, thus when an "annoying" event happens, since by default you are harmless, you put no energy into that which would manifest as annoyance.. and hence you are not annoyed. I believe that's why Richard was able to eliminate anger within 3 weeks of starting to apply the technique - he really took the "harmless" bit to heart.

And indeed, a PCE is when you stop looking back.. when you simply don't continue selfing, i.e. putting energy into a self. So harmlessness might actually be the thing to focus on more. Perhaps, harmlessness with an emphasis on being happy, as opposed to happiness with an emphasis on being harmless.

The 'conversation' depends on which variation on the method I'm trying at that time. I've tried so many different recommended approaches and it changes every few weeks. Nothing consistently changes in terms of feeling.

In terms of what consistently happens: Remembering the experience provides contrast with what's going on now, e.g. the absolute solidity of the material world during the PCE versus the may-exist may-not-exist dream-like normal experiencing, the hollowed-out head versus 'me' being 'in here'.

You may be lacking in just what I was/am - sincere pure intent. If you ask HAIETMOBA and conclude you aren't feeling good, maybe ask yourself "do i want to be happy?" maybe the initial reaction will be "of course!" with a withering reproachful withdrawal ("why else would i be doing this?"). just ask yourself again. compare what you feel now with being happy - which is better? if you sincerely believe being happy is better, yet something keeps you from being happy, then you actually don't (sincerely believe being happy is better).

and once you feel good maybe work on the harmlessness (not putting affective energy into non-felicitous feelings).


I don't think remembering it as a contrast will do much (as you yourself have found). That'll likely just end with "sure that was better. woop-dee-doo!" and you might be quite far from that at a given moment of feeling not-good. so start smaller, "do i want to be happy?" or maybe even "do i want to feel good?"

If you lack "Mr Fxc", you simply don't yet need Mr Fixc in your life. Sure, you may be thinking of Mr Fxc when you're staring at your cereal or heading into work, but you and Mr. Fixc are still strangers passing in the night, the day, daybreak...

For me, Mr. Fixc* has landed.





_______
*Thank goodness we all understand this post! New words: refreshing and clear. Usually, I am hard to understand and a little unclear. With Mr. Fxc, I am mylar to your dust jacket**.





_______
**having a bout of the sillies, folks. Just put a babelfish across your monitor.



_______
Ok: Mr Fixc is playfully referring to the lexical emu's up-post, "Pure Intent". I need to see what font #1 size is anyway.

Beo, this was a huge thread, I mean crucial. I was attacking the "passions" and trying to investigate them but to be harmless, it seems just a matter of not giving them energy (so easy) as you said and investigate when the passions make themselves known. I was approaching them from the front end (giving them juice) instead of the back end. The intellect easily can tell when the passions arise. You unlocked a key for me to being harmless. "I" gotta work on being happy which "I" think is just to build up felicitous feelings and just keeping building them up and you'll be happy. Its the harmless part that WAS getting in the way. Thanks so much for the effort you put in to do this. Its huge!

i've been enjoying following this thread and appreciate this issue of words having been brought up. we see a lot of threads posted here where people seem to be very interested in AF--something about it really clicks with them--and yet they get stuck trying to make sense of things because it's the vocabulary that doesn't work for them, not the intended meanings.

in case anyone else (especially coming from a vipassana background) relates, here are some words that didn't work for me. although i get the intended meanings and am able to communicate using those words with people who prefer them, whenever i think to myself it would turn into my own vocabulary.

-"notice how generating that negative emotion is silly"--i much prefer "unnecessary" because "silly" sounds like too much of an evaluation. not sure if this word came from the AFT site or later from DhO threads.

-the word happy or happiness did not quite click with me either--i prefer "well-being", or the feeling or sense of well-being. because emotional highs, those blissful ones where you become sort of drunken or pulled into pleasurable body sensations, can feel very "happy" but they are not it. after years of vipassana practice, what seemed "happiest" or "farthest along" moments were moments of (seemingly) perfect equanimity, not any sort of "high" heavily tinted by an emotional base.

-HAIETMOBA...even though i knew analytically or rationally that i was doing exactly that, in my mind it would always be other words, if any at all, like "attention now!" or "chill here" or "what's it like?"

-the 'I' or that 'identity' that =the feelings i prefer to think of as "the personal stuff" because the word 'I' in my mind sounds too much like something with some sort of shape or form or location, even if it's a cloud-shaped invisible thing somewhere in the chest, when actually this i=identity=feelings can come down to a matter of separate sensations or sticky beliefs bubbling up here and there.

thanks for sharing in such detail Beoman
-Hellfire Injester Jill Killer Liquid Medusa

A feeling of being without any passions or consciousness. I only asked 'cause I felt it for the first time that day. I got there by concentrating on a spot right above the sex center per Tarin's instructions. good for getting into a PCE.

Glad it helped! I think this is the key thing that has been holding me back, as well. It's all about what the goal is. You can either 1) seek to figure out yourself so fully that it vanishes, 2) be happy and harmless. Though I thought I was doing 2), what actually happened was that I assumed it was so basic that I just skipped right to it and was really doing 1), like you said, giving the passions juice while trying to figure them out (ok, my self feels this.. it must feel that for a good reason (giving it credibility), ok let's figure it out..)

but it really is as simple as cultivating happiness, harmlessness, and naivete.. and that really feels kind of wrong, doesn't it? intuitively it seems better to seek every little thing out and figure it out so it disappears.. i even was worried, after a random sorrowful episode, as the sorrow was fading, whether i wasn't somehow repressing it by not feeling the sorrow anymore. but that's why AF is counter-intuitive.

i think that explains the cycle of: "hey im feeling great! woo!" 2 hours later "man i gotta figure this out, that out..." 2 days later "and that out and that out..." 2 days later "and that out and - oh i should just be happy!" 10 minutes later "wow i feel great! i just have to do this and nothing else! woo!" 2 hours later "man i gotta figure this out" 2 days later "that out.." 2 days later "and that - oh the happy thing!" 10 minutes later "woot i feel great!" etc. etc.

like it's easy once feeling happy to realize that that's all you need to do, yet it's so easy to get caught up in the stuff that you forget that point.

something else i thought of... another reason that 'drive' doesn't really get you far

getting AF is not an "overarching" process
i think the tendency is to think of getting AF (or any of the MCTB Paths) as an "overarching" process. i think this is the wrong word, so i put it in scare quotes; what i mean is it isn't a thing that takes some amount of time, as a result of some effort involving the past and the future. like "ah well in a few months hopefully i'll have AF", similar to getting a good grade in a course - "if i put the work in then by the time the course is done i'll do well". then you start thinking about how to best organize your efforts.. it seems like a drive to do it is really important! gotta study for that course - gotta really drive for AF. chris ballhaus got it all in like 6 months.. what did he have that i don't? maybe his self really wanted it in some subconscious way and that propelled him.. ah if i really want it then that might help! ::cue drive kicking in::

but really, when does anything happen? as it's never not now, anything that happens happens now. therefore, the path to AF (just like anything else) is simply moment-to-moment process. any step towards it you take, you take it now. as the best way to go on the path is really to be happy&harmless as much as possible, then the goal for this moment is to be happy&harmless.. and that's the goal for the next moment as well, and the next, and the next. if that drive isnt making you happy or harmless (it might be easy to overlook it if you focus on happiness, but it's very easily caught if you focus on being harmless), then it has to go. and really, what's the point of a 'drive' if anything only happens now, anyway? understanding that this is the only moment of being alive really does away with the need for all that.

and thus i've worked my way from wherever i was to probably one of the first sentences anyone reads about AF: