Hi there, I'm planning on doing a 10 Day Goenka Reteat at the end of November then at the start of January I'm going to be going to retreat at Panditarama.

I was wondering if people would recommend that I secretly note at the Goenka Retreat instead of Body Scanning? Or am I worrying to much about mixing techniques?

So far most of my practice had been in anapanasati, however these last couple of weeks i've been noting and found it very fruitful.

If it helps to know where I am on the map, I believe I've crossed the A & P.

Thanks for your help guys,


Tim.

Hi Tim,

I understand your question about secretly doing another technique than the one taught.

It has been my experience, though, that I am best served by following instructions exactly as given (presuming relative safety of teaching/environs).

If I do not follow instructions exactly as given, I see a few unhelpful mental states may arise: aversion/fear, conceit. Concentration is concentration is concentration; sati-samadhi. If focus is not trained in any way, it is really a limited gimmick of limited scope. In fact, then focus may become a corrupted tool that can focus unwholesomely because it has inadvertently learned to co-arise with fear-aversion-conceit.

It's your choice and you could experiment. You are unique; you and I are distinct with different previous supporting conditions. But I -- sometimes having been a stubborn self-taught type --- have learned: follow the teacher's instructions.

Best wishes =)

Hi Tim,

I have noticed that sometimes meditators go to the Goenka courses just because it is free and take undue advantage of it by breaking rules set for the meditators own benefit and continuing to do practices that they feel are superior to what is taught.

Having been a practitioner in this tradition for almost 2 years, my sincerest advice to you is to follow the rules with complete honesty, to your fullest ability. When you join, you are asked to keep all your other practices aside for 10 days to give this technique a fair trial and after the course you're free to do as you wish.

Based on the experience of thousands of students, it has been observed that people who continue to follow their own practice or rituals inside the dhamma center end up in a huge mess. They sometimes cause immeasurable harm to themselves and it becomes extremely hard for the assistant teachers to spot or rectify the subtle problems that consequently develop. This is also not conductive to others who are meditating along.

This technique of Vipassana is so deep and so subtle that you cannot really understand it other than by sincere practice. It's like a deep surgery of your mind and at several points in the 10 day course you might have huge mental resistance that will urge you to the opposite of whatever needs to be done. At such times, ignore these urges and keep following the instructions.

Please understand that the organization only wants to help you grow in Dharma, and these rules are set for your own benefit. They have literally nothing to gain by holding you back or making rules that are not really needed.

Helpful read:

http://www.vridhamma.org/Question-and-Answers

"You can combine as many techniques as you like, but don't combine them with Vipassana. Vipassana is unique technique, and combining it with anything else will not help you. It may even harm you. Keep Vipassana pure. Other techniques only give a veneer to the surface of the mind. But Vipassana makes a deep surgical operation; it takes out complexes from the depth of the mind. If you combine it with any other technique, you are playing a game which may be very harmful to you."

This quote doesn't apply to Tim's case because Mahasi noting, like U Ba Khin body scanning, is an effective form of vipassana. The Goenka organization line appears to be that U Ba Khin body scanning is the one true vipassana method passed down from the Buddha without adulteration. In reality we don't know exactly which techniques the Buddha taught, and for what it's worth, noting or freeform mindful awareness seem to work well for a lot of people. As long as you're mindfully aware of the three characteristics in moment-to-moment experience, you will make progress.

It's worth experimenting with the awareness of body sensations as a primary practice, but personally I've found the full Goenka "body scanning" technique too forced and artificial. Instead of willfully moving attention to certain parts of the body, I mindfully let attention wander wherever it wants to go within the bounds of the body.

Just be sure before you attend the retreat that you're well-established in the noting practice and actually moving through the stages by noting. I know you suspect you're past the A&P, which is great. Whatever technique got you to the A&P will work the rest of the way to stream-entry if you continue to practice. Don't be afraid to replace verbal noting with wordless mindful awareness of the 3Cs if your attention becomes too refined for verbal noting. This typically happens around equanimity.

Follow the program, otherwise you won't know whether the technique works for you. Also, if go into this with the intent to use the course to practise another technique, you will be lying at the outset, as it is requirement of the course that you agree to practice the technique offered and not other techniques.

Have you been on a 10 day Goenka course and followed their instructions precisely ? You cannot judge the technique without giving it a fair trial.

When we willfully move attention around, we are using authority to become masters of our subconscious mind. This feels artificial because we have never done this before and always hopped wherever our monkey minds took us. When the master is not at home for a long time, the servant thinks he is the master. The whole work is to overturn this nature of the mind and become it's master, taming it and using it consciously as we desire.

When sufficient progress is made with this technique (usually a year or two based on practice), the "body scanning" happens on its own automatically simultaneously with the flow of the breath. This is probably Mid or High Eq and from here on very little effort is required other than to sit.

Not to ignite argument, but to simply add my experience to the mix,

I sat in equanimous states for 8 years and nothing majorly changed until i switched to mahasi noting. Though you do have Jill as an example of someone who did well with purely the Goenka approach. Though it seems rarer for Goenka yogis to talk of cessation and the perceptual shifts as talked of here by yogis who took the mahasi approach to heart. I feel I was spinning wheels for years until I simply started paying attention to more than just sensations (and noting such phenomena).

Nick

In those 8 years, I am assuming you may have done the Sathipathana course one or more times. I have heard that in that course the instructions are different and you are asked to observe more than physical sensations. Just out of curiosity, did you sit in any of the longer courses such as 20, 30 or 60 days ? I suppose in these courses also there are variations and much "deeper" things happen (in the inconspicuous Goenka terminology) than ordinary 10 day courses.

Regardless, I am not against Noting at all. I am against breaking rules. You cannot break such a simple rule unless deceit or greed arises in the mind and doing so will only result in regress. If someone wants to note they shouldn't sign up for Goenka retreats and let others who will follow the rules get the chance instead.

You're right that it's a rare to hear a Goenka yogi talk about Cessation or even Bhanga. This may be because the technique is slow and inefficient; or this may be because it works in a different way and gives different results; or this may be because those who attain such states dont wish to talk about it with other practitioners for any number of reasons.

There is only one good reason not to do noting at a Goenka retreat: it's not respectful towards the organisation to use its centres for room and board while you do your own thing.
But there is no "immeasurable harm" that students can cause "to themselves" by using a technique rather than another, and you aren't really explaining why he shouldn't besides restating almost word-by-word the tautological justifications that Goenka gives in his tapes.

Hi Andrea,

I agree that what I have said sounds tautological to those who do not share the same beliefs as me, and I'm sorry for that.

I do not think that Goenkaji had any good reason for needlessly preventing people from engaging in wholesome spiritual practices at the organizations premises. He could have easily made it a "free for all" meditation retreat where people are free to do whatever they are leaning towards.

Trying not to hit off too many bullshit alarms,

From my humble experiences thus far I feel that there is a "group consciousness energy thing" in these retreats. All mediators share that field from the first day onwards, and everyone influences it in some way. The Dharma seat and assistant teachers seem to have some sort of control over the process. This is why as a group, most people go through similar phases during similar periods of time. This is also why the process as a whole is much more intense when more number of experienced mediators are present than inexperienced ones.

When someone is not following instructions, then they are not in complete sync with this work "flow" as a whole and they become the "odd ones" out. This can be im-balancing for them emotionally and spiritually and I know a couple of people who have had this happen to them.

The explanation I have given is just my own personal guess and if you do not find it satisfactory, feel free to discern for yourself. It's certainly better to be safe than sorry.

Lastly, I firmly believe that a strong moral foundation is absolutely necessary for progress, especially on retreats.
It would be impossible to pull off the noting practice without lying to the assistant teacher and simultaneously giving birth to guilt and deceit, both of which will hinder progress.

Having done a 10-Day Goenka, I'll agree that it's probably not the place for noting.

My experience is that you already get fairly little support from the teachers there during what can be a intense experience (getting up at 4am, on the cushion 9 hours a day, less food, noble silence, etc.). Body scanning can be a good way to build concentration, but I think that it only reveals a small amount of insight (my experience). That's great for a center that is moving as many people through in many different states/levels.

Noting, in my experience, can lead to more intense experiences. If you should hit some noting road bumps along the way you're not going to be in a state of noble anything when you're turning to the instructors for help, especially if you're lying about your experience.

Tim

My first retreat was a goenka retreat, and being the naughty little punk rebel that I am, I played with techniques other than those supplied on the retreat.
Looking back, the mindset with which I played with them was bullish, arrogant, "I know better", as well as a subtle discomfort for "cheating" (lying saying that I would stick to their tech). I now realise I would have been better to just CONFORM - stick to what they prescribe and run with that for the period of time I was there.

Doing that will most likely expand your awareness, equanimity, ability to set several hours a day, etc - which ain't going to do you any harm if you go and do another retreat in another style of vipassana. I remember when i went to MBMC and told them I'd done Goenka's stuff they were just like "oh cool! they practice good stuff" (pretty sure the Goenka chaps wouldn't have had the same attitude had I come from mahasi to their system, but each to their own).

On a side note - I really don't see how the goenka stuff is *NOT* 'noting'. Sure, there's no labelling, but the principal is still the same - saturating full-minded equanimous awareness into the object while examining the 3-characteristics. Besides the labelling factor - how is that any different?

Apologies for digging this up.

Just to answer your query about Scanning being same as noting : 

I agree that both techniques are similar in theory. However, I feel scanning has a powerful purifying effect  because:

1) There is no labelling. Labelling is a conscious activity on the surface level of the mind. Pure - equanimous observation is a deeper activity. 
2) Scanning is indiscriminate. We tend to note feelings or sensations that are stronger - whereas while scanning we deeply observe everything that comes in the path which we have resolved to follow and do not let the strength of sensations dictate the path, or dictate what is observed first. 

Since I have never tried noting, I will not compare the two in terms of practical usefulness.

Before I went on my first Goenka 10-day I asked Daniel what he thought I should do, and he said "Follow the instructions to a T."  So that is what I did.

For all the days where I was asked to follow the sensations of the breath, I followed the sensations of the breath.  When we switched to scanning, I did scanning.

As a result, I blew through the A+P and rocketed up into High Equanimity.  I then fell back down into Dark Night territory for a couple of days until I started getting persistent Equanimity using the scanning technique.

As I got into Equanimity, it felt perverse to continue to focus on my body as my attention wanted to go high and wide, and so at that point I switched to noting and/or choiceless awareness.

From that point forward in my sits [even once I'd returned home, and to this day], I always start my sits by concentrating on the breath, then switching to a very tight and very focused scanning [which works wonderfully to get my up through the A+P].  Then once I'm in Equanimity, I switch to some combination of noting and choiceless awareness.

Therefore, in other words, for me personally, learning scanning has been invaluable, as it builds up my concentration in a way which out-of-the-gate-noting was never able to achieve.  But once I'm in lala land and my concentration is rockin,' you gotta broaden the focus to include all phenomenon, and other techniques feel more appropriate for that stage.

Using a different meditation technique other than the one they are teaching at that center is breaking sila.  It is breaking sila in the dhamma department meaning that the consequence you receive back will hurt your dhamma in some way.  Understand that the entire meditation center is filled with vibrations of using their technique and straying would damage that.

I would not worry about switching techniques when you go to the other center.  Eventually you will want to stick with one but if you are just starting then dabbling a little bit into the different techniques won't hurt you.