I recently started reading Dharma books/sutras a couple months ago and have started rooting myself in daily practice. I've tried noting at described in MCTB2, but it has been frustrating at times because while it feels like I can be mindful of a couple dozen things in a single moment (including my noting attempt) I can only note one. I've often felt like I've had better results with more loose discursive techniques, asking myself things like "Who is the I who does X?" when my mind starts to wander and directing minfulness towards the sense of self and perceiving no-self in it, or trying to focus on things like the details of the sensations of space and time. Often I seem to have more success outside of formal meditation, having an experience which I think might have been entering into the Knowledge of Mind and Body after a long drive during which I was thinking about a lot of these things and I've noticed a stranger feeling to reality generally and I seem to notice more.
I know I likely just need more time practicing to develop more insight, but I was wondering if anyone had any particular advice in regards to this while I'm just starting out on the path.

Sit, breathe and notice your experience. 

There are thoughts, interesting. 
There are emotions, interesting. 
There are judgements and preferences, how interesting. 

There are thoughts about meditation. There are comforts and discomforts. There are judgements and preferences about all this too. How interesting. 

Sit, breathe and become familiar with the activity of the mind. 

That's it. That's the whole thing. There isn't anything more to it than that. 

i assure you any confusion one might have about it has little to do with the technique and much more to do with the mind practicing it. 

Out of curiosity... what are you practicing for Simon?

First and foremost I want to know for sure... I want to understand the world and it seems that starting from the root is important. Part of me wants to say I'm practicing to enter the stream, and it's not untrue but I'd be lying if I didn't acknowledge how exhilarating the feeling of perceiving and focusing more clearly is sometimes after I meditate, the feeling of uncovering something new about how reality presents itself... And I want to know if awakening is possible.

I get it. Good stuff.

Definitely take the attitude of "gentle exploration". There is indeed a lot to discover. Basically this whole awakening stuff is real... BUT, it's not the magic cure all that will get you 24 hour pleasure, performance, insight, awareness, mastery and cult-leader status. So this stuff is good to explore, but don't make into a big deal.


"I recently started reading Dharma books/sutras a couple months ago and have started rooting myself in daily practice. I've tried noting at described in MCTB2, but it has been frustrating at times because while it feels like I can be mindful of a couple dozen things in a single moment (including my noting attempt) I can only note one. I've often felt like I've had better results with more loose discursive techniques, asking myself things like "Who is the I who does X?" when my mind starts to wander and directing minfulness towards the sense of self and perceiving no-self in it, or trying to focus on things like the details of the sensations of space and time. Often I seem to have more success outside of formal meditation, having an experience which I think might have been entering into the Knowledge of Mind and Body after a long drive during which I was thinking about a lot of these things and I've noticed a stranger feeling to reality generally and I seem to notice more.
I know I likely just need more time practicing to develop more insight, but I was wondering if anyone had any particular advice in regards to this while I'm just starting out on the path."


Okay, so some answers/advice...

Yes, reality occurs very fast so in any moment there are many things that could be noted. No big deal, just note one of the things. The purpose of noting is not to narrate the entirity of experience, it's just a tool to keep you interested and paying attention in real time. The noting is just a little way to see if we're still paying attention. What happens a lot is that we note, then get overwhelmed, then go into our head and do a lot of thinking, then we realize we haven't been noting for a while ---- perfect! Now just note something about what you were thinking. "planning thoughts" "judging thoughts" "comparing thoughts" something like that. And as soon as you do that, you are not lost anymore. 

It's a very simple tool to give feedback on whether we are being mindful and participating with experirience... or actually mostly in our head thinking "about" experience, 


Sure, ""Who is the I..." is a good inquiry practice that can also be done. A different technique, but still a good technique. It tends to show how the body/mind kind of does it's own thing without needing the "I" to tell it what to do. In the book "The Inner Game of Tennis" -- great book! -- it talks about this as Self 1 and Self 2. Self 1 is that part of the mind that is always talking and thinking. Self 2 is the body/mind that actual lives our life, drives our car, washes our body in the shower, walks without needing to think about it. Inquiry can help soften the identity around being an "I". 

Focusing on the sensations of space and time can also be interesting.

In general, direct experience of the actual sensations of experience tends to be the doorway to insight. "Thinking about" things tends to just be thinking about things. 

But be careful with this stuff, as MCTB says, insight can be very disruptive. So it's important to know that doing these practices is kind of like playing with fire --- are you sure you really want to do this stuff?

Take your time and think about it. Is this really what you need to be doing right now in your life? Are you avoiding other responsibilities? Or is this an honest, heart-felt interest?

I'm not joking about this. Insight practice can reall f**k up your life. (This is something that most dharma books don't talk about, unfortunately.)


So it's important to be very intentional about what we choose to pursue in our life. Sometimes meditation/dharma stuff is the right answer... but many times it's much much better to work on health, exercise, friends, employment, education, psychotherapy, financial planning, etc etc etc. 

Unfortunately, a lot of spiritual teachers/traditions want so say that spirtuality/meditation is the answer to everything... but it definitely is NOT.

Hope this is helpful in some way, feel free to disregard anything I've said that doesn't seem right to you.

I appreciate the advice. One of the things I've been contemplating recently is the goal of spirituality... I have so many Christian friends who believe if they do the right thing in this life they can be freed from suffering in the next. I've never been the type to take that kind of thing on faith, and it seems that often progressing in any form of knowledge, even in more mundane fields, requires a willingness to acknowledge unpleasant things, and this seems especially relevant on a Buddhist path that asserts (quite rightly from my observation) that everything in life is dissatisfactory. I think good things will come in the end from insight, even though the degree of spirituality I've had in life even when my meditation practice was very light and on-and-off has at times made me more dissatisfied with life. You have to experience fear before you can become brave. But I want to know regardless, even if nothing good comes at the end of it. There's a metaphor I've been ruminating on lately that describes my project: That I'm trying to stare the devil in the eye until he blinks and gives me happiness.

If you were told that in order to look the devil in the eye and claim your happiness, you had to take a psychedelic drug every single day for years, even decades—its effects often mild though sometimes brutal, ranging from the blissful to the downright horrific, with no way to predict where any given trip might take you—would you do it?

Nobody asked me that question when I was starting off. I wish they did, it wouldn't have changed anything, I would of done it anyway but the context would have been nice. 

It may not be necessary to look the Devil in the eye to get your happiness. It may be enough to look at the world. You can put the focus on suffering, or you can put the focus on the end of suffering. Any path is going to have a little bit of both, but the way you structure your practice will impact the blend.

I think it's really helpful to consider the four noble truths, which I like to phrase as four things that smart people know. The first is that there is suffering. It's part of life. But the second is that suffering is not random and is not an inescapable part of experience, but rather comes about for specific reasons. The next is that you don't have to suffer: there is an end to it. The fourth is that there is a program for bringing about the cessation of suffering. It's a fairly complex program that involves a lot more than just doing noting meditation. The eightfold path is not the only way to the end of suffering, but it is a way that bypasses a lot of the more extreme suffering that a "look the Devil in the eye" approach might produce. 

Nice to meet you Simon. Dharma Overground is a funny place to be at. It's probably a good thing if i invite you to something at the first time meeting you (adding a note of sarcasm for you to note). I'm doing three ITTO sessions with a group of 4 people from the 4th to 6th July. ITTO means Inner To The Outer. it's a deep exploration, free curiosity and radical questioning process. one spot is reserved for a friend of mine, so there's two open spots left. it's just going to be an online group chat discussing stuff, and you're free to join.

now i'm gonna give a bunch of unusual advice...
- BE YOURSELF. what does that mean? accept no authority other than yourself. your experience is yours, not to say that you own it, but this is your perception. there is a saying, truth is a pathless land. because truth is everything that is. what you see is what you see, what you hear is what you hear. this is the first principle.
- PAY ATTENTION. everything is attention. can you lift your finger, just for a single moment? try it. now do it again. do it twice. can you observe the process that is going on when you do that? in perception there is action. think of it as "all doing" or "no doing" - i prefer "all doing". what you do is what you do, and you do all that you do. you perceive all you perceive. it's simple. do you perceive the movement of the muscles?
- ASK QUESTIONS. what does it mean to define something? there are names. this is a word. what is not a word? a circle is not a word. you can observe groups. what is a circle? a square is not a word either. what is a square? those are shapes. are shapes words? shapes are not words. but groups of shapes can be words. WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU ASK QUESTIONS? there is a top-down process. bottom-up means creating concepts, from phenomena to concepts. top-down means from concepts to phenomena. you, the "conceptual mind" is in a feedback loop with the fundamental truth, the perception, the phenomena of reality.

don't give authority to people telling you how to be, or what to do. when you listen to me, am i asking for your authority? i am writing words, i am sharing. when you perceive that, these words, when you listen, when you read, you have that as an input. you don't need to say "i will follow exactly as you tell me". but you can have an idea, "this makes sense to me" or "this is confusing" or "i disagree". you don't need to have these ideas consciously, maybe it just happens for you, maybe you intend to interpret it.

you only need to see what is and how to deal with it. and how you deal with it is how you are. do you see the beauty of these statements?

when people say "be kind to other people", do not give authority to them. when people say "don't be violent", don't give authority to them. now, that doesn't mean to encourage violence. that is not to say "be violent" or something like that. if you are kind to other people, you can observe the consequences of that kindness. if you are violent, the same is true, you can see the consequences.

but your life is yours, and that means the truth is yours to create. do you like the consequences of violence? do you like the consequences of kindness? do you like being generous, open, honest, or do you prefer to live in solitude? that is to see yourself as you are.

people often have the idea of "doing one thing". that is, concentration. most people live in a default state of concentration, constantly reducing themselves, constantly reducing their own consciousness, being in conflict with reality. what is it to live in conflict with reality? it is to be occupied and to be obsessed with an idea. like "i have to get rid of this". it is to be obsessed with desire. there can be a state with desire, but not all is desire, there is more than desire. there can be anger, but not all is anger. is there compulsion to "destroy" anger, or to escape from it? can you see that within yourself? can you be free of that? can you say "i am angry" instead of "i must escape from that anger". observing that you are angry is not the same as choosing to be angry, not the same as concentrating on anger, not to try to be angry. in the very perception of anger, there is action.

can you see how the mind works, with its consciousness, with its concentration, its own reduction mechanism, to prioritize one input over another?

today was a beautiful day.

Maybe just resolve to honestly stare the devil in the face, and see what happens. I find that goals with no results in mind work best in this territory. Be prepared for anything, because anything can and will happen. 

I'd say enlightenment exists, but it almost certainly isn't what you think it is. Not because you particularly are wrong, but because it isn't what anyone thinks it is, or what anyone says it is. It's door number four in a choice of only three doors.