sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/30/12 1:32 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 1/30/12 10:22 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/30/12 1:05 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 1/31/12 1:41 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/31/12 9:37 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 1/31/12 9:54 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/31/12 11:58 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 1/31/12 7:02 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/31/12 8:46 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 1/31/12 10:46 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/5/12 1:46 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 1/30/12 1:25 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Stian Gudmundsen Høiland 2/5/12 5:32 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/6/12 6:27 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations josh r s 2/6/12 10:26 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations josh r s 2/6/12 5:03 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Daniel M. Ingram 2/7/12 3:00 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/5/12 10:24 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/20/12 1:22 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/7/12 7:13 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/7/12 7:40 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Stian Gudmundsen Høiland 2/7/12 11:29 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/8/12 3:50 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/10/12 3:10 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/12/12 8:34 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Andrew . 2/12/12 8:40 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/13/12 1:32 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/15/12 1:27 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/15/12 6:45 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/15/12 11:38 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/16/12 9:39 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/16/12 12:17 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Daniel M. Ingram 2/16/12 3:36 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/16/12 6:01 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/16/12 6:45 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/20/12 7:38 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/20/12 11:55 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/7/12 8:23 PM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations Change A. 2/7/12 6:40 AM
RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations katy steger,thru11.6.15 with thanks 2/8/12 3:28 PM
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 1:32 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 6:20 AM

sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
[this post was initially a reply to another thread Terry's Curious Where I am, and I'd like it to have its own space where it can be discussed, if anyone else wants]

I'd like to make clear a distinction between paying attention to the five senses and sensateness. Then, I'd like to consider the vibratory aspect of sensation as somewhat distinct from open sensateness (aka: open awareness , except that "awareness" may be incorrectly interpreted as to cause a sense of central observer and that is not intended nor to be deliberately applied) of the sense-objects (objects of sight (via the eyes), objects of sound (via the ears), objects of exterior tactility (a broad category that can be experienced on the ear drums, skin surface, throat lining in swallowing (as conventionally distinct from interoceptive tactility like stomach and muscle cramps, headaches/pressures, and various vibrations or tingling (as can arise with too much vitamin B6))),etc.

Considering five-exterocepective senses can be understood to occur in two gross styles (and this framing is not actual, but functional):
[indent]1. open awareness wherein there is no focus, there is just - if meditating on the cushion - inherent reception of sense-objects by virtue of having sense receptors. Getting into this may start briefly with being aware distinctly via the "five" sense-faculties which can receive respective sense-objects (breeze, sun setting registering through eyelids and on the skin, distant and close sounds (and to get fussier: distance and proximity are said to be proprioceptive senses or aspects of the sense faculties), etc). Over the course of meditating in open awareness (not noting, not deliberately looking at vibrations, not deliberately studying a single sense-faculty and its registry of sense-objects), perception of senses ceases to be felt as sight or sound or hearing or smell (touch is a little different, in my view as yet, and I attribute this to the broad array of objects the tactile sense encompasses).

In this open awareness, if I take a moment to perceive how the head feels in general, I will sense that sensation in the head has formed at the back of the head at the occipital plate.

This open awareness can be applied when moving about. I sometimes use open awareness with the sight-faculty while driving, because generally everything on the main road and out in front of my face is easily framed by the consistent asphalt, and I find it useful to have wide peripheral vision engaged in order to pick up movements on the road sides (animals, other cars)...it's a balance.

Now occasionally, especially with sudden sounds (water dripping irregularly in a nearby sink) or loud sounds (pot lid dropping) or forceful sounds (a high-up helicopter rotor's sinusoidal pressure-and-sound) vibration sensations come into awareness without any deliberate shift I make in my attention. My attention just goes to the rippling in the nerves of the skin and muscles (drip and pot lid) or to the sinusoidal sweeping perceived on the ear drums (rotor downdraft).

This sensation can be perceived with openness (again, also known as: open awareness, except that "awareness" may be incorrectly interpreted as to cause a sense of central observer and that is not intended nor to be deliberately applied) and skin-muscle vibrations may be barely perceptible. This, I think, is what happens when long-term meditators have little detectable startle response to strong stimulus (e.g., this is confirmed by what Lama Oser did with Daniel Goleman in UC Berkely's psychophysiological laboratory lab while in what he calls "the open state"). If you read the link, you may note that Oser describes strong sense stimulus as becoming softer and that he perceived the open state as being the most effective in rendering startling stimulus neutralized "If you can remain properly in this state, the bang seems neutral, like a bird crossing the sky." No facial muscle movement was detected.

To Daniel Goleman, the external observer of Oser's fMRI data, the single-point concentration was slightly more effective in neutralizing any physiological and neuroligical signals of the startle response. Facial muscle movement was detected but other physiological signals decreased.

The shambala article describes open state as "refer[ing] to a thought-free wakefulness where the mind, as Oser described it, "is open, vast and aware, with no intentional mental activity. The mind is not focused on anything, yet totally present—not in a focused way, just very open and undistracted. Thoughts may start to arise weakly, but they don't chain into longer thoughts—they just fade away." This is what I learned in soto zen and this is what I understood from Tarin's explanation's of pure consciousness experience in actualism. When I get into this openness, there is often the intermittent awareness of childhood memory (laying the grass looking up at the sky, sitting in the back of the car watching the road side, laying down in bed hearing-feeling my own breathing and feeling the weight of the blanket)- This open state is wherein I am trying to extend my experience (because it seems relaxing), even as I write now and perform cognitive tasks. ("State" can be confusing in that it implies a fixed condition, when it is not fixed, however it is stilling like watching mist in a street-lamp can seem like a fast cacaphony or like slow drifting individual particles (Thank you, Beoman, for that shared experience!).

For a moment, think of this openness (aka: open state, open awareness) as particles being received by exteroceptive nerves receptors (here I deliberately avoid use of the phrase "five-senses", because there is a practice threshold after which, in my experience, the five senses cannot be confirmed as distinct units and certainly not as just five senses, (even total blindness resulting from optic neuropathies does not eliminate perception of space (is space a sight-sense or a sound-sense of its own sense, or other? How about time-sense? It gets very interesting and open state awareness makes these intellectually heady descriptions apparent simply and experientially to the practitioner).

Why particles? Because in open awareness (aka: open state, sensateness), the mind is doing what it naturally does, being aware of many many stimuli (sense-objects) fairly randomly (unless a particular sense-object causes alarm and strong attraction/aversion, then that sense-object jumps in the brain processing order of awareness). So, in the brain of open awareness, the brain is not directed to consider sense-objects nor is the person reflecting on the sense-objects, so there is brain doing its basic awareness without having to coordinate another level of aggregating the incoming data and directing it (i.e., concentration practices) nor personalizing it. Some well-familiar activity (i.e., driving, tai chi, walking, etc) can easily be done in open awareness, or a slight level of directing up from open awareness in what is often called "flow".

2. Now, to get into vibratory sensation and attention wave - beyond (but not different than) those sensations that occur spontaneously when a startling sense-event occurs; these remind me of jhanas and, in conjunction with the above particulate-ness of open awareness, of Bell's two-channel test in physics. For a moment, think of these sensations as waves.

When particles of sense-objects land and are put under the lens of deliberate attention, this attention links the particles and these creates a relationship and the sense of a wave of their newly-related-as-a-result-of-attention movements (this is "locality" in the physics vocabulary of Bell's two-channel test; the particles are newly related to each other and are now brought into each others locality and create a moving locality (e.g., a wave)). We could say that suddenly particles are influenced by attention to form a wave. (And the particles are in a wave formation as a result of ebbs and flows in the quality of attention - like "hard" or "soft" jhanas)

Thus, to the person who deliberately affects the attention, this influence of particles seems like a wave or waves (the person causes the particles to relate locally to one another and that relationship is a wave which mirrors the ebb and flow of single-point attention). Piti - bodily pleasure - is like this. I think, "let's have some piti", then suddenly the molecular activity in my body seems to arise as waves of augmenting/diminishing pleasurable sensation.

In this way, deliberate attention seems to effect what distinct particles are doing by aggregating them under attention and actual sensations can be formed and sustained based on the quality of ebbing and flowing attention.

Thus, the startle reflex is an attention wave formed by the attention of self-preservation (originating in the brain stem to cause a rapid muscular response to a threat - e.g., jumping back, blinking, twitching**).
[/indent]

**About twitching, one thing I noticed in myself when I had a chance to visit with Tarin Greco last summer is that a muscle around my right eye started twitching when he asked me questions about mindfulness and sensateness and I tried to explain (I was explaining how I was newly alienated from sensateness (after having been in this open state regularly) and he was offering questions probably to help me return to open state sensateness). I knew this twitching was some aspect of fear (nervousness), but I couldn't understand why it was arising. Recently, in discussing this open state sensateness with three other people I noticed they developed similar facial muscular twitches while explaining back what they thought of as sensateness or what they would call Pure Consciousness Event (PCE) - it is as if that open state (being shown to and discussed) causes anxiety/fear for some aspect of mental faculty (one that aggregates experiences and trusts a contiguous self, /distrusts anatta-concept) until one gets experience with and/or familiar, then trusts-and-goes-beyond-trusting with dropping everything away and entering open awareness/state (see above conceptual caveats about "awareness" and "state" as words). It is a very simple state and it is me. I know I am here. It is natural and simply unencumbered by surfeit deliberate self-conditioning like restlessness, delusion (such as negative/positive mental states) -- I have plenty of encumbered self, so I am describing my preferred experience of living, not a continuous "way" as yet. I get to see my surfeit additions (hindrances) better now and can thank many people for this. This me knows itself as an ongoing being with some general temperaments and personality and it cannot un-know anatta and that freeing knowledge and open awareness as well as the ability to place attention somewhere (jhanas, sensations, housework, listening, etc).


So, I think of #2 as "body jhana" like the mental jhanas: to know the sensation aggregation of sense-objects is useful for seeing what the body-mind can cause or interpret (and this is very useful for mitigating pain, though I cannot do that as yet). The mental jhanas show the practictioner what mental states can be caused (i.e., altered states) in attending to the mental faculty. Knowing some of the vast variability of the mental faculty and knowing that mastery is exhibited by a stable jhana of 2-3 hours points to the challenge of arraying particulate, disparate, un-unified "matter" into a steady or quasi-steady form (like a wave). In this way, anicca and anatta are experienced and suffering (not necessarily pain) ceases by one ceasing to take up fixity as the stable nature of some permanent actuality; perceiving temporary fixity allows me to see my desk as a good, useful place to put a hot tea).

Thus, when I offer sensateness I refer to open state sensateness - opening into it in daily life especially. I think that open state is a good, gentle balance to the centralized, cognitive wave of something like ebbing and flowing in psychotherapy. To stay gentle, do not think of the open state as something you can accidentally make permanent and "lose" yourself. Truly, fear will prevent that and full-time open state is not necessary. see Aman's points and reply below. Thanks It is a vacation from centricity.

Is either #1 or #2 better or worse? I don't think so. I have the capacity to train attention on something and effect its conditions (e.g., attention wave) and I have the capacity to open into open awareness. I am both of these capacities (again, this framing is not actual, but is used to cause some gross useful framing of senses/sensateness). And they are also not really separate. As in the Bell test (maybe I mean the Observer Effect here, my physics is about a zillion years old - I'll work on this, but I am referring to the test that shows light as both particle and wave depending on the presence of attention (observer)), both particle and wave can be evidenced to have occurred.

So attention to sensation is a form of concentration and relates occurrences to other occurrences (giving them a relatedness and causing a shared locality or space, like a wave). I generally feel that sensation in the forehead when I do such a concentration practice. My eyenbrows can even furrow. Open awareness/state (again caution to these words "awareness" and "state") do not forego knowledge or memory (water can still be "understood" to be a form-with-familiarity, for example), however, the open-state mind (which I feel in the occipital plate area if I briefly place attention on the head generally) creates a kind of relaxation (can be anxious event at first) and a window into anatta (no inherent self, yes mutably existing in mutability). Concentration and open awareness*. Both useful.

I know that was long, but I hope it is generally clear.

[edit: spelling, possible clarity, and link added]
[Edits after dialogue with Aman]
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 10:22 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 10:22 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
To stay gentle, do not think of the open state as something you can accidentally make permanent and "lose" yourself. Truly, fear will prevent that and full-time open state is not necessary.


What if you use the capacity to train attention on fear itself which prevents making open awareness permanent and "lose" yourself? If you do that, can you "lose" yourself and make the open awareness permanent? Why is full-time open state not necessary? You say it results in relaxation, won't it be worthwhile to be relaxed always? One definition of enlightenment is reaching progressive state of relaxation. So full enlightenment would be to be fully relaxed always and no inherent self.

katy steger:
however, the open-state mind (which I feel in the occipital plate area if I briefly place attention on the head generally) creates a kind of relaxation (can be anxious event at first) and a window into anatta (no inherent self, yes mutably existing in mutability).


If you still feel the open-state mind in the occipital plate area, try using the capacity to train attention at that area and see if it opens up and open awareness becomes more open and you feel it at the whole body instead of just the occipital plate area.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 1:05 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 1:04 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Aman,

Thank you for pulling aside that comment on fear of reifying the "open state/awareness". Primarily, this thread began as a reply to someone else's thread and my comment on fear and permanency of the open state was a extraneous-to-the-thread memory I have from another thread. So, I expressed an unrelated, latent personal memory that encumbered this thread. Clung-to elaboration arising as an extraneous comment (thus a fabricated fixity notion): check!

In moving the post to its own thread (here), I considered this broad two-class (functional, not actual) division to be available for experiential feedback on A) open sensateness (I will settle on "open sensate state" now as i) Oser expresses the "open state" well (linked above in first post), and ii) I have clarified the caveat of the word "state", and iii) I personally found it useful to consider "sensateness" (but not deeply going into or creating sensations/vibrations)) and B ) sensation concentration and/or creation.

To your other points, perhaps my long write-up made it unclear that I do not consider concentration a strained state, but that open-state awareness can be such a change from predominantly using the mental faculty as a narrow-focusing concentrating tool (that includes generation of concentrated periods of emotions, concentrated periods of cognition like studying, concentrated periods of jhana, concentrated periods sensation, and so forth) that this open sensate state may seem relaxing to one who is doing a lot of focusing (for example, meditators whose foreheads are starting to have a lot of tension). The openness of open state sensateness may also trigger fear (like agoraphobia, for example); it is not an inherently "good" tool (as with concentration, or meditation in general).

The reason I am not concerned nor interested in making the open sensate state permanent is that, as mentioned, brains are inherently flexible and are causing such openness and narrowed foci all the time; open sensate state and concentration (e.g., paying attention to, and even causing, sensations) are not truly distinct. These are aspects of the mind and seem to occur simultaneously, sometimes with a dominance of concentration, sometimes with a dominance of openness, and sometimes somewhat balanced (as in the "flow" of doing a habitual activity (e.g., the 10,000 hour metric, something routine like walking,etc). The brain is naturally capable of this rapid flexibility (and can be improved/sustained with practice/use just like other organs and muscles).

A sense of personal self can be added to any "state" (and I also think personality is natural (and obviously apparent) and I do not try to override it when it is not encumbering with extraneous, unrelated or imposing stuff - and I continue to learn where I am adding unnecessarily, such as your first excerpt of my words), however, I find my own agency is more apparent in a distinctly concentrated state wherein I am deliberately placing mental attention (generally for some outcome purpose) and calling upon a personal will to sustain the effort. Thus, I find that a lot of concentration and concentrative effort can re-inforce a sense of permanent self. This is really useful re-inforcement in some regard, because a big sense of self can also be deflated when a fixity notion it has is dispelled; this dispelling can also dispel trust in a fixed sense of identity.

For example, I was reading recently an article of a self-identified legislatively conservative father who has a transgender daughter; she was born as a son and has, through teen years, always insisted that her male birth is a birth defect, as such she will be granted gender modification when she turns 18; the father is the point of this example - he is now an avid supporter of such kids and does not have fixed notions about gender anymore; he expresses joy in having a daughter who is still inclined to hold his hand, unlike her twin brother who has, for the moment, aversion to such parental affections.

An possible benefit of concentration practices is the gradual revealing of one's own mutability (anatta) without losing a person to spacey nihilism/self-caching (a willfull hiding out in open sensate state).

One definition of enlightenment is reaching progressive state of relaxation. So full enlightenment would be to be fully relaxed always and no inherent self.
This is beyond my experience, so I can't comment experientially.

However, I will note that there was an extraordinary tension in some of my muscles (hand and forearm) when I was gripping a rope and being dragged along the ground by a spry animal on Friday, yet the mind was tranquilly observing the bumpy gravel and much of the body was relaxed, but for the hand gripping (and tension involved in gripping). Perhaps, had I been of "full enlightenment", I might have relaxed and let go immediately, but such a mental notion of "full enlightenment" assumes that there was a perfect outcome which would have been effected by full enlightenment, and that there is a base ideal (relaxation) for which to strive; I don't think such a fixed condition (substrate relaxedness) exists, nor do I feel an urge to make it dominant. I am trying to cause it more now based on my own temperament (and, to me, it is relaxing and useful to consciously launch into a merged concentration with open sensate state, or more open sensate state). I am inclined to think that perfection is a fixity notion (nicca). Letting go and holding on were two options and I got to do them both. Tension and relaxation were two states, and I got to do them both at the same time in different parts of the body. I have no reason to imagine that "full enlightenment" is a progressive state of relaxation with substrate absolute relaxedness.

Lastly, I have no idea where I remember the observer effect being attributed to Bell's work, so I think I need to review and probably amend that.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 1:25 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/30/12 1:24 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
One of the oscillations that seems to me to occur in such threads like this one is that the effort to create a practical delineation is also a little silly when seen more from open sensate awareness, i.e., some"thing" mutable is being too elaborated upon and/or overly delineated. So, to keep posting in this I remind myself that the delineation should aim to be useful in practice:

[indent]open sensate state can diminish sense of agency and develop anatta, but can also create a hide-out for a person who is averse to facing their own mind's notions (e.g., suppressing) and thus hide from personally created notions and continue to have them but suppress them; and

concentration can augment a sense of agency (and personal power) in that it is a willed concentration and effort and even creates new sensations by simply putting attention on (thereby influencing) the disparate data, yet concentration can anchor a person's journey to understanding anatta and show the mind creative capacities.[/indent]

So, if I practice open sensate state, the sense-objects take on an even quality, and there is a neat opportunity to experience things with minimal elaboration (e.g., sight-sound can be taken in without much mentation), "as they are" - though, this idea of "as they are" can lead to a sense of a substrate genuine nature, which I do not think exists.

If I practice concentration on sensations of the sense faculties, then, like jhanas, I find that there is a creation of sensations that is not there with out that attention of concentration (thus, the observer effect mentioned earlier). This can show a person useful skills (e.g., inner heat) and can also be cautionary about getting too wrapped up in creating sensations.
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 1:41 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 1:41 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
“To your other points, perhaps my long write-up made it unclear that I do not consider concentration a strained state....”

“In this open awareness, if I take a moment to perceive how the head feels in general, I will sense that sensation in the head has formed at the back of the head at the occipital plate.”

What you said above shows that concentration (a moment to perceive) is a strained state (sensations at the occipital plate).

“A sense of personal self can be added to any "state".”

A sense of personal self can't be added once one has taken care of what you say as 'creation of sensations that are not there without that attention of concentration'.

“The openness of open state sensateness may also trigger fear (like agoraphobia, for example); it is not an inherently "good" tool (as with concentration, or meditation in general).”

If the openness of open state sensateness triggers fear, then more work is needed to be done so that it doesn't create fear. Open awareness is not a method as concentration is, it is the result. Though concentration itself may not be a powerful enough method to take care of the 'sensations that are not there without the attention of concentration'.

“One of the oscillations that seems to me to occur in such threads like this one is that the effort to create a practical delineation is also a little silly when seen more from open sensate awareness, i.e., some"thing" mutable is being too elaborated upon and/or overly delineated.”

I know it is silly to draw lines from open sensate awareness. As open awareness grows, the effort to delineate is seen as even more silly than before.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 9:37 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 9:20 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
How interesting: I tried to post a reply to your first post, and it interacted with your delete/edit of it and my reply would not preview nor post, only a blank "discussion" header came up.

So, to your new post:
Aman: What you said above shows that concentration (a moment to perceive) is a strained state (sensations at the occipital plate).

Well, this occipital plate region is not inherent. This occipital location of sensation was created deliberately because of an opening-book image I sometimes use to dispel forehead tension after some cushion-sits, or to trigger open sensate state: the spine of an upright book sitting at the atlas-axis joint and the closed book fore edge would be at my forehead (where muscular tension of concentration or analytical thinking would sometimes be (i.e., 1st AN 5.28 jhana); I would visualize that book opening and sensation spreading across the parietal and temporal bones, and, from here, attention would go wide and disperse me into open sensate state - wherein aggregated information becomes more particulate (the degree of granularization is a function of whether I am sitting on the cushion (most granular) or also doing an activity (less granular; to sustain an organized activity (like walking) requires some aggregated awareness (attention)).

So, there can be - when I gather up attention (and re-group myself from open sensate state) in order to look at sensation in the head, sensation will be anywhere I choose.

This is the point in this thread: applied attention (such as is done in jhana) influences the afferent and efferent particles into a wave whose quality is a function of the attention.

Like the observer effect of photons, there is a disparate array of countless particles which attention will influence (manipulate) into an organized wave.

In the Theravadan system, concentration (sustained attention) is recommended as a beginner's practice in order to see the vast capacity of the creative mind and how that creativity can be organized (by itself, its own powers of manipulation) into specific states (jhana levels) as attention becomes more and more capable of focus (concentration). This is why jhanic reports are so fantastical and this is why siddhis are described as part of concentration practice (not vipassana).

Jhana is self-willed and influences particles. Thus, too much jhana becomes a sickness of self-attachment, desire to and belief in this influential capacity.

And, as one's concentration is adequate, the practice of "clearly seeing" (vipassana) begins. Open sensate state is a clearly seeing practice (without or beyond worded noting), not a concentration practice.

Therefore, in the DhO, when people speak of sensate practice, they may intend different "states": one that is an open state "clearly seeing" (unencumbered) practice and one that is a self-sustaining concentration practice (requires self-application and will to sustain the particles as a cohesive wave (or vibration elaborations)).

Nevertheless, a balance of capacities seems useful.


[edit: format, grammar, hyperlink, clarification]
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 9:54 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 9:54 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Nevertheless, a balance of capacities seems useful.


Very well, it may be so for you. In my case, open awareness seems to be more useful.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 11:58 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 11:44 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Aman,

Aman:Very well, it may be so for you. In my case, open awareness seems to be more useful.

I can relate to that view. In my case, when I was first learning to step away from analytical and evaluative concentration (which I use(d) for so many engagements in my life) the effect of open sensate awareness was very new and relaxing. All of a sudden, data could seem almost gentle like snowfall. I exerted no effort to organize the data and my body took care of not letting me drive off the road, fall in a well, etc).

Now, I consider the concentrative practices from the view of compassion. Sometimes, I am responsible for keep another being in a particular state (of exercise, of calm composure, of work task, etc). My whole composure effects the other being's willingness to join in the state, and if they join in the state then the being is view favorably (is performing as expected/needed) and is less likely to be given adverse conditions (for not performing as needed). Thus, my any skill of concentration can have an effect on another. There is also the utility to me. In taking a cold shower or ice bath, for example, concentration on cold (or breath) is an anecdote to the upwelling concentrated mind of "get out of the cold" and I can save on my heating bill.

[Edit: for example, when I wrote of being pulled along the ground by a rope attached to a large animal, I was in open state awareness. Moments before my brain was sending up little flags about the body language of the animal but I stayed in more of an open state, then I followed the other animal's energy and started to jog (that is a receptive aspect of open sensate state). The other's energy - very much concentrated on running - set forth to running! Bouncing along the ground by the animal's rear feet was still open state (and there is no bruising or ache there). The risk in this - my not collecting myself around (concentrating on) composure and calm, was that I may have taught that animal how to behave on a lead line with a human. If that animal continues to pull people along the ground its life expectancy will go down and probably its remaining quality of life will be likely lowered). Whereas if there is learning to trust in its caretakers and job, then the animal can have exercise, great housing (I would enjoy their housing), good meals, free roaming in the outdoors and companionship.) So concentration here would have been useful to us both.]
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 7:02 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 7:02 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Now, I consider the concentrative practices from the view of compassion. Sometimes, I am responsible for keep another being in a particular state (of exercise, of calm composure, of work task, etc). My whole composure effects the other being's willingness to join in the state, and if they join in the state then the being is view favorably (is performing as expected/needed) and is less likely to be given adverse conditions (for not performing as needed). Thus, my any skill of concentration can have an effect on another.


Ok, now I think I understand you better as to where you are coming from.

katy steger:
[Edit: for example, when I wrote of being pulled along the ground by a rope attached to a large animal, I was in open state awareness. Moments before my brain was sending up little flags about the body language of the animal but I stayed in more of an open state, then I followed the other animal's energy and started to jog (that is a receptive aspect of open sensate state). The other's energy - very much concentrated on running - set forth to running! Bouncing along the ground by the animal's rear feet was still open state (and there is no bruising or ache there). The risk in this - my not collecting myself around (concentrating on) composure and calm, was that I may have taught that animal how to behave on a lead line with a human. If that animal continues to pull people along the ground its life expectancy will go down and probably its remaining quality of life will be likely lowered). Whereas if there is learning to trust in its caretakers and job, then the animal can have exercise, great housing (I would enjoy their housing), good meals, free roaming in the outdoors and companionship.) So concentration here would have been useful to us both.]


Thanks for explaining it in detail because what I understood from your first post where you gave this example was that it is clearly an open sensate awareness and was bit confused as to why you don't think it as beneficial.

So what I understand now is that open sensate awareness is good for oneself but it may not be of much use to others. To be of use to others, concentration is more useful. Viewing concentration practices from compassion point of view sounds good to me.

But as you say that both open sensate state and concentration are useful and they are natural states of mind to varying degrees, then why do you think we need to practice? I have an idea about this but I want to hear your answer.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 8:46 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 8:06 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Aman,

As an aside related to my earlier post, I use "compassion" with some concern for the actual meaning (Stefanie D included a useful etymology on the DhO somewhere), but I use it in the conventional sense of how tibetan translators use it, as in "compassion and wisdom". Perhaps there is another word, but I am ok with using it until I learn a better, accurate word. For the time, I have to be approximate something like "with regard for another's well-being". Metta?

Aman: So what I understand now is that open sensate awareness is good for oneself but it may not be of much use to others. To be of use to others, concentration is more useful. Viewing concentration practices from compassion point of view sounds good to me.

Yes, so long as I am clear that I don't have as a rule that concentration is more useful in regards to others. For example, a friend and I commuted home tonight, together in the open sensate state, returning from a trip. On the way to the destination, we joked a lot about a class. She has worked outside of the buddhist system, but her life seems to have resulted in something like a major release recently that could be called "stream-entry" by an Insight onlooker (or not...). When she and I visit together we don't need anything from the other, so we have a fun time or a co-listening time or a quiet time, etc.

However, at various times I benefit or someone else seems to benefit from a metta-reception. This may be a very light type of concentration, pulling in just a little from the open sensate state and adding just a little encouraging/supportive reception to good listening (concentration), but not often habitual for me to do. By the time I realize that very light metta-attention would be apt, I've usually elaborated with so much concern that I've found it hard to stop. This is very apparent to me this week and hopefully making the need for a release of this habit more apparent.

Clearly, I also need to concentrate if I hope to learn something (though I also learn in open sensate state and differently).

So, concentration and open sensate state are both useful in my opinion.

Aman: But as you say that both open sensate state and concentration are useful and they are natural states of mind to varying degrees, then why do you think we need to practice? I have an idea about this but I want to hear your answer.

If I want to learn to walk, I need to apply attention. As to open sensate state, I think children have a lot of this and this is a way of taking in the world when everything is still new to them. When I first began open sensate state last year (cultivate PCE under the actualist lexicon) many scenes from childhood came up (i.e., laying on the grass, seeing a great grandmother use all sorts of tools in her old kitchen to make biscuits&gravy, hearing the metal of training wheels on the bike, remembering night air during summer hide-and-seek) - so I think open sensate state is the primary learning mode and learning to walk may be one of the first 1st Jhana practices! and that perhaps societies now emphasize concentration (at younger and younger ages) due to popular politico-social structures. Frankly, there are consequences to being a species that survives, and concentrative states may increase survival (though this concentration can cause destruction as well).

Why? For me, living among others and living as just myself, developing these mental capacities (and clearing out useless/harmful mental states) just feels better. It is also a curiosity to see what continues to come of it.

What do you think?

[edits: spelling, format,clarifications...and elaboration : ) ]
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 10:46 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 1/31/12 10:46 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
Hello Katy, (this comes out of concentration)

Katy: As an aside related to my earlier post, I use "compassion" with some concern for the actual meaning (Stefanie D included a useful etymology on the DhO somewhere), but I use it in the conventional sense of how tibetan translators use it, as in "compassion and wisdom". Perhaps there is another word, but I am ok with using it until I learn a better, accurate word. For the time, I have to be approximate something like "with regard for another's well-being". Metta?

I understand what you want to convey.

Katy: When I first began open sensate state last year (cultivate PCE under the actualist lexicon) many scenes from childhood came up (i.e., laying on the grass, seeing a great grandmother use all sorts of tools in her old kitchen to make biscuits&gravy, hearing the metal of training wheels on the bike, remembering night air during summer hide-and-seek) - so I think open sensate state is the primary learning mode and learning to walk may be one of the first 1st Jhana practices! and that perhaps societies now emphasize concentration (at younger and younger ages) due to popular politico-social structures. Frankly, there are consequences to being a species that survives, and concentrative states may increase survival (though this concentration can cause destruction as well).

I didn't want to use the actualist language though I was aware that a PCE is what they mean by open sensate state as it had brought unnecessary debates.

What I think is that somewhere along the way while growing up, we start to emphasize a lot more on the concentration and less on open sensate awareness. And that is what causes problems in life (concentrating to a point where things start to get hazy so that one can neither concentrate nor get to open sensate awareness). Maybe because of this, intellectuals suffer more than an average person.

Katy: Why? For me, living among others and living as just myself, developing these mental capacities (and clearing out useless/harmful mental states) just feels better. It is also a curiosity to see what continues to come of it.

What do you think?


Why I practice is because I was emphasizing more on the concentration and less on open sensate awareness. I also practice to bring flexibility and speed to move between the open sensate state and concentration state. Also practice helps me fine tune as to how much of the two states is needed in a particular instance. For example it can help in a situation which you describe:

Katy: However, at various times I benefit or someone else seems to benefit from a metta-reception. This may be a very light type of concentration, pulling in just a little from the open sensate state and adding just a little encouraging/supportive reception to good listening (concentration), but not often habitual for me to do. By the time I realize that very light metta-attention would be apt, I've usually elaborated with so much concern that I've found it hard to stop. This is very apparent to me this week and hopefully making the need for a release of this habit more apparent.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 1:46 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 1:28 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
HI Aman,

Aman:Why I practice is because I was emphasizing more on the concentration and less on open sensate awareness. I also practice to bring flexibility and speed to move between the open sensate state and concentration state. Also practice helps me fine tune as to how much of the two states is needed in a particular instance.

Hmmm. The compassionate aspect of concentration is also shown in Angulimala's story (of whom a sutta is often also used to illustrate how the life of an arhat is not necessarily without fruiting consequences of prior actions). Angulimala, the highwayman who (before becoming a monk) saved a finger of each life he took and added it to his necklace of fingers, is said to have become troubled by his past as a killer once he became a monk. His severe remorse prevented his practice.

The story goes that a woman was suffering through childbirth and Angulimala asked Gotama how he (Angulimala) could help this endangered pregnant woman in childbirth. Angulimala was given a recitation to repeat to the woman: the recitation demanded Angulimala's concentrated composure and she is said to have safely given birth, and Angilimala then valued concentrated composure as capable of benefiting others.

[language edits]

[Edit: this post is not to augment concentration over open sensate awareness or noting or mindfulness, only to provide a paradigmatic story of concentration having compassionate effect. Again, my sense is that practices like open sensate state and concentration are on par and are distinct skilled applications.]
Stian Gudmundsen Høiland, modified 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 5:32 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 4:53 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 296 Join Date: 9/5/10 Recent Posts
Best thread on the DhO in a long, long time.

I recently had a serendipitous experience: I stumbled upon the open state while having great clarity of mind (I'm pretty sure it was an A&P). Since, I have written long notes on this 'state', its uses and more specifically how it relates to the PCE of AFT.

I'm very happy to read your thoughts about this state, Katy. Please share more if you will. As for my notes: they are very detailed and elaborate, and I have yet to put them together in a presentable form. I do believe that this specific form of attention can radically increase well-being, even within days, and it is currently my sole subject of development and exploration.

How do you see this state relating to the Open Focus method, dzogchen semde/mahamudra practice, shikantaza, the 11th stage of insight ('Equanimity')?

I'm curious how this wide-open attentional 'state' relates to a pure consciousness event/experience (not of the AFT), the one where one abides as pure, luminous, objectless awareness/consciousness (maybe this is the 'themeless' concentration). To me they are clearly different, but maybe the open state is conducive to achieving this objectless consciousness (as well as the PCE of the AFT).

Also, in short, do you believe that this open state is what is meant by 'sensuousness' by Richard of AFT?

EDIT:

Also, I wanted to add that you have come to some conclusions/had some observations that are remarkably similar to my own re: the open state, e.g. the fear-like reaction resulting from, among other causes, 'diffusing' the sense of self.
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 10:24 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/5/12 10:21 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
.....a muscle around my right eye started twitching ........to help me return to open state sensateness). I knew this twitching was some aspect of fear (nervousness), but I couldn't understand why it was arising. ........it is as if that open state (being shown to and discussed) causes anxiety/fear for some aspect of mental faculty ...........until one gets experience with and/or familiar, then trusts-and-goes-beyond-trusting with dropping everything away and entering open awareness/state ........ It is a very simple state and it is me. I know I am here. It is natural and simply unencumbered by surfeit deliberate self-conditioning like restlessness, delusion (such as negative/positive mental states) -- I have plenty of encumbered self, so I am describing my preferred experience of living, not a continuous "way" as yet. I get to see my surfeit additions (hindrances) better now and can thank many people for this. This me knows itself as an ongoing being with some general temperaments and personality and it cannot un-know anatta and that freeing knowledge and open awareness as well as the ability to place attention somewhere (jhanas, sensations, housework, listening, etc).


I have read your first post again and it was lot more clear to me this time. Although I have some doubt about the Bell's two-channel test analogy. Did you mean double-slit experiment?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment#Quantum_version_of_experiment

I think you meant double-slit experiment because later on you said "but I am referring to the test that shows light as both particle and wave depending on the presence of attention (observer)), both particle and wave can be evidenced to have occurred."

If that is the case, the analogy may be exactly opposite to what you have meant it for because in the double-slit experiment, the act of observation renders a wave to behave like particle and what you are saying is that the act of observation renders the particles to waves.

I want to say few things about what I understand of why the fear was arising although I think that you understand it yourself as well.

Open state sensateness means one has to let go of the usual instinctual guards that are there when open state sensateness is not there. When being shown to and discussing the open state sensateness, the mind gets a glimpse of the open state sensateness and that causes the instinctual guards to react which causes fear/anxiety/nervousness until there is enough trust between the group of people who are discussing about the open state sensateness.

If one is already in open state sensateness, an appearance of a newcomer can bring about an end to it because instincts may react and put up the guards again. This will entail more practice and more understanding of cause and effect.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/20/12 1:22 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 4:54 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
2/6/12 1:03 PM
[cleaning this up. don't want anyone to waste their time of deep, confusing text blocks, will re-post in a bit]

2/20/12 Edit
I am probably not going to get back into the analogy, because it can cause a lot of conceptual elaboration away from the purpose of this forum (and into a field about which I know much much less), but what I can restore to this particular post is the point that there is no wave (e.g., attention wave) such as one finds in some forms of concentration practice, when the observer (subject) is fully merged with their object, and attention itself it merged therewith. In daily life, I personally find, off the cushion, this takes time. I have no idea how much time.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 6:27 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 6:27 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Stian -

I did not read the AFT very much, I relied on DhO importers. If you can, go to the source. Since Richard has made comments on his site about misunderstandings perpetuated here, I'll refrain from making comparisons. It's not needed or useful.

Stian: Also, I wanted to add that you have come to some conclusions/had some observations that are remarkably similar to my own re: the open state, e.g. the fear-like reaction resulting from, among other causes, 'diffusing' the sense of self.

Yes, for me, a year ago this open sensate state could be nerve-wracking: I had some fears about what would happen to me. I cannot even imagine those today. And there remains plenty of clearing away for me to do, yet. It's been a fortunate and expanding experiment.

Stian: Is this similar to other states?
Maybe. Everyone has their own direct experience.

Best wishes,
Katy
thumbnail
josh r s, modified 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 10:26 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 10:24 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 337 Join Date: 9/16/11 Recent Posts
How do you see this state relating to the Open Focus method, dzogchen semde/mahamudra practice, shikantaza, the 11th stage of insight ('Equanimity')?


perhaps this thread particularly the posts by TJ Brocoli would be relevant

http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/2214102

TJ Brocoli
to me it would make the most sense to see to it that those affective or 'being' sensations are treated exactly the same way as every other sensation--no more, no less. no giving special attention or making them the focus, and no ignoring them or skipping over them to maintain felicity. this would best mimic the default panoramic and balanced attention of a being-less existence. if you give them special attention, you lose some of the panorama, and if you give them less attention you might be overlooking important stuff. this sounds like just giving them equal observation time as other sensations, but i also mean treating them with the same equanimity, appreciation, acceptance, non-condemnation, wonder and innocence as sensations of space, sight, sound, thought, touch, etc., so that you're constantly fusing those 'being bits' into the big panoramic sensation soup, whether you're 'pinballing' or chilling with everything at once. it doesn't make a difference if they feel suspended, solid, stuck, still, moving, heavy or subtle. if any sensations of being are there at all, there is some sort of unequal treatment of sensations going on, and that's what you want to de-condition. the more equal treatment, the more stuff gets seen, and the more stuff gets seen, the easier equal treatment becomes.


in the practice i described, the attention is applied much like the way it naturally works in equanimity ñana, so it would be hard to imagine pre-path, and even with the memory of a powerful pce it could still be difficult without concentration and attention having developed to the level of path. one could be intending and applying "equal panoramic observation" all day to no avail if there is a lot of blind reaction going on that isn't seen, reactions at a level of subtle sensations that haven't even started being perceived at all. so the type of vipassana i was able to apply and what worked for me evolved along with what i was experiencing.
thumbnail
josh r s, modified 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 5:03 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/6/12 11:15 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 337 Join Date: 9/16/11 Recent Posts
but such a mental notion of "full enlightenment" assumes that there was a perfect outcome which would have been effected by full enlightenment, and that there is a base ideal (relaxation) for which to strive; I don't think such a fixed condition (substrate relaxedness) exists, nor do I feel an urge to make it dominant. I am trying to cause it more now based on my own temperament (and, to me, it is relaxing and useful to consciously launch into a merged concentration with open sensate state, or more open sensate state). I am inclined to think that perfection is a fixity notion (nicca). Letting go and holding on were two options and I got to do them both. Tension and relaxation were two states, and I got to do them both at the same time in different parts of the body. I have no reason to imagine that "full enlightenment" is a progressive state of relaxation with substrate absolute relaxedness.


this does seem to be what is suggested by the "deathless" uncaused nibbana. the inherent quality of the universe of stillness (actualist terms) seems to be what is uncovered by progress, it seems quite desirable to me. the natural inherent quality is stillness and relaxation on top of which there is movement and tension.

I am inclined to think that perfection is a fixity notion (nicca)


since you are using that term, i'd point out that the buddha only used anicca to describe caused, fabricated things(assuming you are implying that a "fixity notion" is necessarily a bad thing). there doesn't seem to be a cause or condition resulting in that essential stillness/relaxation, merely the lack of other caused and fabricated things.
thumbnail
Daniel M Ingram, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 3:00 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 3:00 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 3268 Join Date: 4/20/09 Recent Posts
Many people for ages have been drawn to Dzogchen-like practices and these important and basic debates are extremely old and resurface again and again and again.

Wide-open formless practices, due to their obvious parallels with Equanimity and with the higher states of realization, and their emphasis on taking result as method, are obviously of value.

There are also many who have gotten quite lost in them, vague, spaced out, and attained nothing or not much though them.

So, it is very much a question involving goals, inclinations, talents, proclivities, and many other converging fractures what various focuses will lead to and how efficacious one or the other may be at any time, and each must do the experiment and see what works for them.
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 6:40 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 6:40 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
I was explaining how I was newly alienated from sensateness (after having been in this open state regularly)


What happened which made you to alienate from sensateness?

Did it happen after you came to know about Actual Freedom?
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 7:13 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 7:13 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
HI Aman -

Thank you for reading and re-reading the post, and especially calling up the problem of my analogy.

I will get back to you on the main points of this post, but first I want to address my own ignorance exhibited in this thread.

Not long after posting this, I wanted to delete the thread or heavily edit it, but I also wanted to avoid the work of being fastidious. By the time I returned, you and Stian (then Terry and others) had put in some time reading it and you and I began discussing practical aspects of applying open sensate versus concentrative states, so I continued to ignore some red flags in my post...

Without excessive self-reproof and with the wanting of making the most of this open-source forum, there are ignorances worth delineating here (and, generally I feel that many, if not all, of my posts have degrees of willful ignorance and/or ignorant ignorance).
[indent]1) Elaboration is one of them: long-windedness is not ignorance per se, but succinctness reveals self-study and understanding and I put this post up offering personal understanding - so, each word should matter and may even be "surgical" if we're going to take up the common medical analogy used in buddhism (Gotama as doctor, dhamma as medicine, and sangha as nurses), but in this case I fueled my mentation
2) without clearly understanding the analogy (ignorant ignorance) to which I was drawn (desire ignorance), and
3) I didn't bother to check the internet (just a few clicks!) to check about my memory of the experiment (willful ignorance: laziness), and
4) attachment to fast mentation without thoroughness of mentation (impatience ignorance).
[/indent]
A fusilade of ignorances I willfully applied. Whoa nelly.

This is no surprise. I edit so much, that it has been a red flag to me that I am establishing a hindering habit of impatience. On the other hand, speediness is also a convenient (but risky) antidote to perfectionism, and I appreciate willingness to edit and to openly show a hindrance (like Dan's recognition of arrogance).

That said, I appreciate open-source; I don't mind putting innocent errors (ignorant ignorance) out there in my name in order that corrective/searching dialogue be initiated. Literally, more minds are better than one where a good productivity quotient is achieved (between not being too cozy and self-reinforcing and not being too argumentative without practical outcome).

So, when I post I hope I can make better use of and support the mentation of others (when reading my words) through succinctness and removal of willfully applied ignorance. When I wrote a long outlined reply to John Wilde about his views on Richard of the AFT, I was sincere that our posts are like our other actions and reflect our minds and our practice. My initial posts here have been impatient, willfully mixed with ignorance and do not make excellent use of the willing community of this forum. In fact, such willfully ignorant posting from one who knows how to be fastidious may, in a future, encourage perpetuation of the same willful ignorance and, in the present, its elaboration fatigues people for no apparent practical benefit. If people are routinely fatigued, they will do something else that is more rewarding. That chase-away does not support the vibrancy of a candid, invigorating, experiential learning forum such as the DhO.

It's hard to say how many words here should be deleted or whether or not they are surgically worthwhile and result in some preventative care. Maybe I should be put on a tweet-diet.
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 7:40 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 7:40 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Literally, more minds are better than one where a good productivity quotient is achieved


Absolutely.

katy steger:
Maybe I should be put on a tweet-diet.


lol.....maybe you are right on this one. I was able to read your post before you deleted it and seriously, I couldn't make anything out of it and began to wonder if I had understood anything you had said in this thread or not?

I had also deleted one post in this thread which didn't make much sense to me and which you tried to respond to but couldn't because I had already deleted it! Sorry for the trouble that I put you to.
Stian Gudmundsen Høiland, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 11:29 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 8:44 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 296 Join Date: 9/5/10 Recent Posts
When I am trying to make myself understood, I employ a host of rhetoric methods to bring the other party on the same 'page'/'wavelength' as me. This sometimes involves elaborate stories, narratives, usually chronologic, so as to 'implant' in the other person's short term memory the same questions and attitudes/perspectives that I had when I reflected or contemplated the subject at hand. In short: to bring about the same or a similar state of mind.

In the Reinin dichotomies, this amounts to my personality type being characterized by 'farsightedness' as opposed to 'carefreeness', especially this particular characteristic:

"The search for the solution is explicit in the answer." (this is the case for me)
as opposed to
"The search for the solution is implied in the answer."

A good example of this is the fact that I'm prefacing this whole post with the information above. And the reason why I do this with other people is because it is the way that I myself prefer to be 'brought up to speed' on the other persons thinking.

Considering this, I find that removing posts like you have done here Katy is not the best way to go about the problem you had with the post. I find that it hinders me in participating in your train of thought/engaging in 'mutual mentation'. Instead, I would edit the post to include an initial warning where you express your concerns.

In conclusion, what I'm trying to say is that I did not have a problem with your post (the one that was deleted), and to some degree it helped me engage with you in this discussion; if not for immediate practical benefits, then for 'vibing' with you - temporarily adopting your mindset/perspective.

EDIT:

Hopefully we'll be able to get this thread back to the practical aspects of 'the open state', a state I find immensely valuable and which might very recently have brought about a path moment for me.
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 8:23 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/7/12 8:23 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
It's hard to say how many words here should be deleted or whether or not they are surgically worthwhile and result in some preventative care.


If it helps to take the discussion about 'sensateness versus concentration on vibrations' further, I can delete my posts and we can start afresh. I think that the original post may need major editing and it may be easier to start afresh.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/8/12 3:28 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/8/12 3:14 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Aman:What happened which made you to alienate from sensateness?

When unfamiliar perceptions started to occur as a result of perceiving most of my waking state from an open sensate perspective for consecutive weeks, I eventually started asking from a logical perspective, "What is this? What is happening? What to do now?" [This asking was the alienation I chose.] Maybe it is like watching a boat list: listing one way until "I" felt unstable ("what are these perceptions occurring in open sensate state?"), listing the other way until "I" felt unstable ("what is the source of all this inconclusive asking?").

Edit: verb tense and [in brackets]
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/8/12 3:50 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/8/12 3:50 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Stian - thanks for your point about "mutual mentating" (I enjoyed that) and the effect of deleting posts.

Stian: Hopefully we'll be able to get this thread back to the practical aspects of 'the open state', a state I find immensely valuable and which might very recently have brought about a path moment for me.

Great. Maybe you can take the helm and describe your experience?
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/10/12 3:10 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/10/12 3:09 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Well, there isn't much for me to add here. I do still look at particles in the eye and ear faculties, and these more open sensate perceptions still tend to precede (or possibly cause) single-pointed concentration; I leave off noting that the awareness of ignorance (which began in mediation that morning) has left so far silence and practicality (which includes enjoyment). If previous shifts are any heads-up, then it may take about six months to see clearly what/if anything has happened. So, there is not much to say other than it is useful to hide from nothing in practicing mindfulness and meditation, to look at everything as clearly as possible at that moment. Best wishes.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/12/12 8:34 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/12/12 8:04 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Maybe there is something to add here:

There are three ways the open sensate practice has been useful or at least interesting to me in the past nine months or so:

1. By committing to it during the commute to and from work I found that pleasure arose and knowledges of suffering receded from the active forefront. I made sure to take in the open sensate experience in pleasant areas: parks, waterways, sunrise, sunset. (I was also working on other fronts with the knowledges of suffering: exercise, logic, sleep, diet, dedicated intention to get through those stages with understanding). At the time I recorded the experience as being like a glacier retreating (knowledges of suffering) and sukkha arising as the weight lifted. I was surprised that pleasure/delight/sukkha would arise without my intention.

So, in this regard, open sensate state (and I learned this from Tarin in his descriptions of PCE and friends in the tibetan tradition) lead me to a sense of/Equanimity.

2. Throughout the summer and fall, spontaneous single-pointed concentrated states then arose. Herein, it was as if I was reduced to a very small observer - frozen during the concentrated state, and as if my head-mind was replaced with a tunnel allowing for a binding to the object of concentration as well as the "space". (What was binding to the object? I'd have to say that "pure awareness" or something that felt like it magnetized to the object). Body became heavy and not of notice, comfortable in a weighted blobbish way. Neither time nor space had relevance. What I noticed each time before the single-point concentration occurred was that the visual faculty was splitting its attention with the object and the static particles in the air between the object and the eye. At some point, the lighting of the visual field also seems to brighten and darken, as if the pupils are opening and closing, opening and closing. Eyes seem to become very wide during the actual concentration (here is something "I" perceive so I am not reduced to such a small observer perhaps). The concentration has a sucking-into feel just before binding/magnetising, joining the object. The first time this occurred it was a surprise. I have not at all stabilized it. Object of concentration has been people speaking at length.

3. Most recently, for probably 1 to 3 seconds the open sensate state has not gone to single-pointed concentration, but has gone to what seems like a neutralized view almost as if there is death, but the visual field remaining. Obviously, time and space are gone, body passes through heaviness, then is irrelevant or as if dead,gone. This may be nirodh samapadhi with eyes open. I have no idea. I do think its arising is related to yoga practice (but not necessarily - its just that body becomes less tense, less able to distract/call up attention). I can't say it was a very useful state, (What?! This state is absolutely what caused awareness of ignorance and emptiness afterward...that is useful, but I see myself having recoiled from the experience for a few days now). I am also entirely new to it and have no sense of its stablized state. My object of concentration has been light on water. [By this I mean that I take up open sensate awareness and place the sight faculty on water and light on waves and particles in air between...so this steadies the eyes and what is afferently communicated to the brain when it picks up on sight again as the brain bounces around the senses being tripped by afferent signals).


So, I think I have used open sensate state the way people may use Mahasi noting: the mind becomes habituated to not lingering on a sensation and attention starts to move more and more quickly to the afferent signals, until attention largely subsides, At that point, the reduction in conscious attention removes enough of its own interference to permit the arising of single-point concentration and even cessation. The sensate experience itself either goes away (cessation) or becomes uniformly and comfortably heavy, blobbish (body).

Meditation: it's a funny hobby. Is there any use to discussing these things?

edits: grammar, clarity
thumbnail
Andrew , modified 12 Years ago at 2/12/12 8:40 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/12/12 8:40 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 336 Join Date: 5/23/11 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Is there any use to discussing these things?


Absolutely! I'm learning heaps. I was actually thinking about this thread over the last few days, and the difference between noticing a particular sensation and being immersed in the whole sensate field as much as possible. I've begun to find the later happening more since the distinction between 'paying attention' and 'being attention', or maybe better said; between thinking about noticing, and noticing before thinking about it. It seems to be the trap in all practices to think 'yes I'm noticing' and the mind clamps down on the 'I' bit. Good 'I', that's a good boy! as soon as I find this type of conceit rising the thought arises 'don't get to excited, you will die soon enough' snaps me right back to where I am, and not into 'wow, if I keep this up I might get somewhere'.

thanks for the thread. Perhaps I should have let you know it was helpful earlier, or maybe I'm misinterpreting your statement.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/13/12 1:32 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/13/12 1:14 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Andrew Jones,

You: thanks for the thread. Perhaps I should have let you know it was helpful earlier, or maybe I'm misinterpreting your statement.

A few things are happening: one is just the natural wonder of whether words can ever make good sense. To me, the best communication comes with body language - that, in conjunction with speech - shows a person's state.

I am glad to hear the thread has been useful, though, and appreciate you're letting me know how you receive the words.

Also, to your other point:

I think the "yes, I am noticing" is no problem whatsoever, unless it is taken with aversion. It has happened to me now during single-point concentration and I have no feeling for it whatsoever: it is the nature of the mind. Naturally, when it (self-reflection) elicits no strong response from me, then such self-reflection just taps the brain like any other sensation and concentration is not "broken". If I give that arising sensation a lot of attention, then the attention that would be absorbed in concentration is now forced to divert and be used in antagonizing self-reflection. I think "wow" is a common interruption until a mental state becomes stable or repeated though.

I like your "don't get too excited, you will die soon enough' statement and reference to conceit.

I appreciate that conceit has an etymology in "something formed in the mind", but which has become "vanity" in modern meaning.

Conceit's etymology and current usage reminds me of the connection of volition and consciousness in buddhism's dependent origination links and, in the Samkya traditions, perhaps the same is seen by Prakriti being composed of buddhi (discernment), ahamkara (self-identity, ego) and manas (mind connected to the sense faculties), all three being cosmogenic mental faculties given in order of their evolution (subtle to gross).

______


To my item 3 above, versus considering any name the state may be given (and I wondered it the experience described nirodh), I can better describe the experience without a label: as one that had no emotive (affective) gradient and almost no sensory gradient, but for vision itself (because my eyes were open). The visual field (a landscape) remained unchanged, but it was seen as if one could know what is vision through glazed dead eyes - there was no level of preference or recognition or unfamiliarity. The landscape just was. The experience was broken by my own consciousness noting something like, "Wow". What I got from it was that the experience seemed to be very brief, completely without feeling and, afterwards, I had the realization that what my own consciousness is is what makes that visual field what it is to my consciousness: beautiful or desolate or just a plural thing. Without my volition, it is was it is.

It showed me my volition and consciousness are tied to one another. That these two, when unknown, are effecting ignorant actions.***

So, as a living being with volition I have not only the capacity to create the landscape with volition and consciousness, but I have the inevitability of effecting it. Mental states create actions.

To be an actor, why over-act?

Thus, kusala action. Kusala is sensible comfort/contentment, akusala is painful ignorance.

In this specific case, the objects of the landscape are personally useful to me (they host water, land, plants and animals), and the landscape needs nothing from me. The landscape as I need it (and what/who it hosts) just needs more what I can not-do, e.g., live reducing pollutants, create useful excrement. Kusala.

So for people wondering how personal practice begets altruism, it seems to be clear:
We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.

As translated by T. Byrom (1993), Shambhala Publications

Why create fear, misery, aversion, ill-will? Why strive to over-create when the act of living requires actions be created anyway? Why not live lightly, add little, receive what is already there? We are animals with the genes of survival and can use those mildly, I suppose, or grossly.

***Edit: on this point is it useful to remember that when Ananda claimed to understand dependent origination, he was chatised by Gotama.: "Don't say that, Ananda. Don't say that. Deep is this dependent co-arising, and deep its appearance. It's because of not understanding and not penetrating this Dhamma that this generation is like a tangled skein, a knotted ball of string, like matted rushes and reeds, and does not go beyond transmigration, beyond the planes of deprivation, woe, and bad destinations."
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 1:27 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 1:27 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Why create fear, misery, aversion, ill-will? Why strive to over-create when the act of living requires actions be created anyway? Why not live lightly, add little, receive what is already there? We are animals with the genes of survival and can use those mildly, I suppose, or grossly.


Do we create fear, misery, aversion, ill-will or are they mostly beyond our conscious control so that it is not really us who create fear, misery, aversion, or ill-will but they get created almost on their own? How much volition do we really have?

Here I'm reminded of a quote which is something like "a human can do what it wills but cannot will what it wills" by Arthur Schopenhauer.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 6:45 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 6:45 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
HI Aman - At present, I'm alive and have relatively abundant options. I'll be forgotten when I am dead just as I am already forgotten by many right now...so I have life to spend personally. I am interested in Schopenhauer's volitional limits to the extent they can be expressed like James Taylor singing Jelly Man Kelly here. The human mind has as much felicitous and benign capacity as it has fear and ill-will; it's how an individual is manipulated/manipulable to use it. Maybe meditation helps that toggle switch be seen clearly and be used?
Change A, modified 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 11:38 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/15/12 11:38 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 791 Join Date: 5/24/10 Recent Posts
katy steger:
Maybe meditation helps that toggle switch be seen clearly and be used?


Yes.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 9:39 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 8:20 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
From the Lam Rim Chen Mo (2000, 1st edition, Tsong-Kha-Pa, Snow Lion, editors Cutler and Newland), on ignorance as first in the 12-links (p.315-16):
[indent]
"Ignorance is like animosity and falsehood.

Animosity and falsehood refer neither to the absence of friendship and truth, nor to what is different from these two, but rather to the classes of phenomena that are directly antithetical to and incompatible with friendship and truth.

Likewise, ignorance also refers neither to the absence of that cognition which is the remedy for ignorance nor to what is other than this, but to the classes of phenomena that are directly antithetical to and incompatible with cognition.

(...) the wisdom that knows selflessness is the principal remedy for ignorance".[/indent]


Even those few words can get complicated for me, but in practice, focusing intention on that which is compatible with friendship and truth has had the most effect in the past week since whatever the #3 experience (above) was last week. It is very simple, points to the four immeasurables and so forth. "Truth" can be a stickler (what is that?), but I can only say that the first two stanzas of the Dhammapada (I, 1-2) "We are what we think, with our thoughts we create the world." We.

A friend sent me those stanzas in 2008, but I was deep into the knowledges of suffering and far from equanimity.

So, while in hindsight, it looks like the step should be easy and quick, but I recall that for me it took profound misery for me to consider attempting to change my mind. And after that decision was made (a trashing elongated indecision that finally capitulated to Tarin's very simply instructions about actualism's PCE), to get to this moment (a place significantly different from two weeks ago or yesterday even) has taken a year and a half.

Like Harlow's rhesus monkeys showed, we primates have problems in the absence of or defilement of nurture. Hmmm, makes me look around at societal structures! Obvious emoticon Removing obstacles to simple nurture can probably speed up any transformation from misery to contentment quite quickly. We learn quickly by example and wide spread behaviour. The human condition can be misery or contentment depending on how each mind is applied. Further, as a mental basis to action, selflessness has some basis in the major world religions. For myself, I am getting to see, practically in daily life, why this matters well.

edit: hyperlink correction and added hyperlink: PBS' this emotional life film/series
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 12:17 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 11:39 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
In regards to #3, I will add something I also put in Daniel's NS thread the other day:

In Bhikku Bodhi's Abidhamma translation (BPE, 2000) I read some nights ago (page 364, guide to Section 43), that "Further [cessation (nirodhosamāpanno)] can only be obtained within the sensuous plane or the fine-material plane of existence. It cannot be obtained within the immaterial plane of existence."

AccessToInsight provides a definition of the sensuous world (a plane among 31 planes) - the Sensuous World (kama-loka) - "consists of eleven realms in which experience — both pleasurable and not — is dominated by the five senses."

Open sensate state is like turning each sense faculty into an entirely "receptive listener" - it highlights each notion of self-center that opposes the sense-object triggering the sense-faculty. In actual listening, with metta (self- and other-directed), I think it is useful.

[edit: It is also important (to me) to note that receptive, good, non-judgemental listening with metta is exactly what brought on the crap-storm (misery (but borrowing Daniel's noun from another thread b/c it makes me laugh) that landed me in the DhO. Wallowing in the knowledges of suffering I stopped practicing, so I had less and less self-awareness. Thus, while the open listening with metta to a particular person was not a problem, the actions I took thereafter were problem-causing. Has anyone seen Ram Das's autobiography "[something]Fierce Grace"? Among many things, it is, to me, a tender reminder to practice self-awareness, to meditate to clearly see one's urges. I need to practice.]
thumbnail
Daniel M Ingram, modified 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 3:36 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 3:36 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 3268 Join Date: 4/20/09 Recent Posts
NS only arises after a very specific setup, and he right, you can't attain it directly from immatrial states, particularly as in 8th you can't do such things as resolve

Again, one rises naturally by inclination from the 1st to 8th jhanas using a light mix of Three Characteristics and softer jhana, then comes out of 8th back into materiality, resolves to attain NS, hangs out, and, if conditions are right and you set it up right and you have the prereqs, it happens quite by surprise on its own

While I am on the subject, on some other threads there was criticism that NS wasn't blissful, and question about why one would even want to attain it if it was not blissful. It is true that it is not blissful, as it is has no qualities whatsoever, but why one would want to attain to it will have to be a mattermof faith born of contact with those who have done it, as it and its afterglow are profound in a way that very few things are, and no one attains to it that I have ever known that doesn't give it close to highest marks for remarkable things you can learn to do with your mind, and that includes me.

True, many people delight in denigrating things they can't comprehend, and this has been a perennial problem for the advanced meditation world, as it is much harder to understand than most things, and even here at the DhO, which has less of that than most places, there have been periods where there was serious and understandable questioning of core concepts and high attainments, as each person must struggle with their own doubts and benefits little from the previous struggles of others in the same territory.

However, regarding things like Fruition and NS, there is nothing like direct knowledge for one's self to answer the question, so I would say, if you really want to know, perhaps just as a wild and daring experiment, try slightly more faith and direct experience, and a little less critical analysis, just for long enough to reach the experiences in question, and then the debate will have more grounding in reality and be much more fruitful.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 6:01 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 6:01 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Hi Daniel,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

From 2/13/12
To my item 3 above, versus considering any name the state may be given (and I wondered it the experience described nirodh), I can better describe the experience without a label: as one that had no emotive (affective) gradient and almost no sensory gradient, but for vision itself (because my eyes were open). The visual field (a landscape) remained unchanged, but it was seen as if one could know what is vision through glazed dead eyes - there was no level of preference or recognition or unfamiliarity. The landscape just was. The experience was broken by my own consciousness noting something like, "Wow". What I got from it was that the experience seemed to be very brief, completely without feeling and, afterwards, I had the realization that what my own consciousness is is what makes that visual field what it is to my consciousness: beautiful or desolate or just a plural thing. Without my volition, it is was it is.


Whatever was this experience above, it began through open sensate mediation (sitting meditation with eye faculty loosely placed on the moonlight on water). Thus, as the brain darted between afferent sensations, periodically eyes moved to a bright wave of water to the reducing patch of moonlight. As day break (lightness before sunrise) came on I started a second sitting and used particles in the air and the open wide angle view on same large body of water. Thus, when the brain darted between afferent signals (chiefly sounds, but also tactilities), the eye faculty sometimes afferently sent some signal (e.g., crows in air). The second sit had been set up as a second hour and I took a few minutes in between the sits to stretch the legs and back and shoulders.

The second sit began in pleasure-sensation throughout (whereas the first sit was defined by both afferent triggers and some chattiness arising in the first 1/2 hour). Very quickly the eyes took up concentration on the particles in between eyes and water waves and the water waves themselves. A concept occurred, something like anticipating single-point absorption. Moments went on in this state of open-sensate teetering on single-point concentration. The being sucked-into single-point did not happen, though. The next awareness was like having the visual field switched on to complete blandness, with a brief blackness before hand (probably a blink). The landscape and its forms and daybreak grayish colors were there, but it was also as if seen from glazed lifeless. Then, a pulling out from this emptiness/empty-of-perceiver, "I" came back up quickly through mental states, feeling a small jolt of the eyes, then "seeing" the landscape with familiarity (which is affective in fine ways, even how color starts to become distinguished again), fully back into my-self: a conceptual 'guh' (wow) and the words "emptiness" and "great silence" came up, then the understanding that my mental state is what animates faculties, breath alone having sustained momentarily a sighted corpse. No memory of body. There was no I nor center, nor space, nor time in this experience. Nothing vast, nothing small. Emptiness is the best description. Great silence referred so something like, "Shit, everything I've ever said is ignorant." (That awareness continues!). There was visual field due to eyes being open, and that visual field was just more emptiness. The stanzas of the dhammapada came to mind (we are what we think, with our thoughts we create the world) and I got up from sitting (when I got up from sitting I remembered my body). From the time of whatever experience that was to getting up, probably three minutes occurred.

This has had an effect on the actions I chose - seeing the agency-autonmony that this 'I' can bring skillfully or unskillfully at any moment, but that six faculties (mind, sight, hearing, tasting, feeling, smelling) will act while they exist. Sukkha is very easily on-call or arising on its own (that was unexpected: to find myself in sukkha for hours on end without willing it) and there are an enormous amount of habitual propensities (vāsanā, bag chags (tibetan)

I don;t know how open-sensate awareness and its ability to unload self-identity and centricity (observer,witness, etc) fits into the jhanic arc you describe, but record here in the event it helps another person's path.
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 6:45 PM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/16/12 6:44 PM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
The sukkha arising also has to be managed skillfully. I sat down to dinner with one of my housemates and he mentioned, "What's up? You seem kinda blissful". It can be more skillful to clamp down on the bliss and focus energies on listening, otherwise the bliss can just be too much contrast, too self-centered. If there's an apt window for the bliss to arise and show, it seems to come out readily again.

In this way I am starting to see that there is agency and agencylessness. One one hand I see that the six sense faculties (the living expression of the sense organs) will happen of their own accord, whether I direct them or not [sukka will just arise and abide exactly as anxiety and misery once did]. On the other hand, I see clearly that I have tremendous autonomy at present and the best use of this autonomy as a social species seems to be to aim for skillful means (kusala).

So many words...

[edit: brackets]
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/20/12 7:38 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/20/12 7:01 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
Here is Shinzen Young on the "physiotherapy" of the pleasurable suffusion , creating it and habituating the brain-body to this as a normative way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abRaPYjb6mA&feature=related

[edit: these linked instructions are, to me a "sensation" and a vibratory practice (versus the receptivity of afferent "sensateness" I intended in starting this thread), and so these link instructions cause something different from open sensate reception...which open sensate reception just keeps terminating the narrative uses of mind by re-directing the mental and sense faculties back to the abundant afferent sensations (sunlight, odors, textures, etc). However, if open sensate is not going well or if it seems dull (and a dissatisfied interpretive narrative about any practice is pretty normal for a mind deeming itself to be suffering (e.g., miserable, averse, ill-willed, and/or fearful) versus being a mind deeming itself the study-faculty of the knowledges of suffering), then applying the linked instruction can help to neutralize the suffering mind by physically re-training it to generate comfort and pleasurable sensation. This changes how the mental faculty takes up open sensate awareness (increases the receptivity to the practice itself and the ease of re-directing the mind to open sensate), and eventually lets the pleasurable sensation be on-call as is useful. Before I could do either of these practices usefully, I focused quite a bit on analyzing and evaluating practices and conditions, and this analytical practice was also useful and showed its own finiteness.]
thumbnail
katy steger,thru11615 with thanks, modified 12 Years ago at 2/20/12 11:55 AM
Created 12 Years ago at 2/20/12 11:54 AM

RE: sensateness versus concentration on vibrations

Posts: 1740 Join Date: 10/1/11 Recent Posts
And, heck, since I'm having a Shinzen-kinda day, here he is on sensory events and objective behaviour changes.He advises noting the sensations arising at each faculty and how the mental faculty picks them up and causes the sensations to multiply and fabricate, to become 100 sensations versus five sensate events recurring to support the mental faculty's particular I-behaviour. He is also candid about his use of psychotherapy to dissolve one of his own habits recently (post-his enlightenment).

Breadcrumb