Hi All,

I wanted to toss out an idea about a simple way of measuring the rate at which formations occur, with an aim toward seeing whether these subjective phenomena correlate with known neurological phenomena such as brain waves. 

The procedure is simple: when you start perceiving formations, press a button on a timer. Count some number of them (say, 100 or 1000 or so), and then stop the timer. Ideally, repeat this process over several different sittings to get good statistics.

However, I am an inexperienced meditator (have not even hit A&P yet), and so I do not know whether or not the act of counting would interfere with the occurence of formations, or if having to pay attention to stopping and starting a timer would break the meditative process.

My questions are then:
1) Would this procedure work?
2) If it would not work, is there a more feasible way that we could measure the rate at which formations occur?
3) Would you be willing to try this?

Hi, Adam,

Could you give a working definition, or at least wholly experiential subjective description, of what you mean by "formation"? 

I ask because I have a number of loosely related questions still formulating themselves for a separate post; one of these has to do with my utter confusion over this term. In MTCB, the term is not introduced until the chapter on Equinimity, and in relation specifically to High Equanimity. This fact made me think at first that "formations" are not perceived at all until the stage of insight called "Equanimity." Elsewhere, however, I have seen progress-of-insight maps use the term at the A&P stage, perhaps even earlier. In these instances, "formations" appear to be used interchangeably with "vibrations."

Daniel, in MTCB, does say that Equanimity is more about something in the relationship to phenomena than in the phenomena themselves; however, because formations are not mentioned and dealt with until this chapter, that fact begs the question, What the heck are formations and how do they differ, if they do, from the fine vibratory stuff?

I recently pulled out of a months-long Dark Night and maybe got somewhere into Equanimity. But currently I don't know where the heck I am. I'm just trying to keep practicing, gently curious and accepting. I am seeing something different from fine vibrations--and it is a visual experience, as the auditory and tactile I would still describe as finely vibratory. What I'm seeing is a more macro level of fluxing. It is three-dementional. Wow, it is so hard to describe, though it is very vivid and so astonishing that sometimes I get a rapturous or vaguely threatened vibe off it. It is like things are bubbling out, waving, swirling. The shifts are smooth, with patches arising and passing away in overlapping fashion, but I cannot clearly see the actual arising; nor can I clearly isolate in my perception the instant of passing away. I just see movement, space, and sequentiality. 

PS: I forgot to mention that I've also seen "formations" referred to, I think, as "fabrications." That is an interesting opposition, because "formations" suggests objects taking shape; the other suggests subjects making something of things. Thanissaro Bikkhu uses the word "fabrications." Interestingly, he also refers to the Three Characteristics as the Three Perceptions, actually rejecting the former term. Maybe someone will come along and efficiently set me straight. I don't mean to divert your thread. I should probably move all this to a new one.

So some people see the formations?  If so yeah, I'd like to know what they look like too?  Yes and I too do not understand the description for those.  I once read somewhere that you could see 'light and moving forms' but that wasn't explained either.  Is it common to be able to see these things visually?
-Eva

Formations are a subtle thing, in that they are so ordinary, in that they are the ordinary phenomena that make up your world, the room, the body, space, thoughts, and plenty of people don't notice they are perceiving them, even very good meditators.

It is that the field integrates, but as everything is otherwise largely the same, most people don't notice that much is different. Things are more flowy than vibratory, and counting formations is really not the point, as that involves something that is very much going in the wrong direction. You will notice that in MCTB it mentions nothing about specific frequencies in Equanimity, and that omission is intentional.

If you want to try it, which I don't really recommend, open your eyes and count the number of times you notice the space you are sitting in, but be sure to include the count in the counting, as the whole point of formations is that they begin to include everything, including effort, meditator, meditation, analysis, and anything and everything that seems to be on this side.

It is like the flowing pulses of attention/manifestation/space/phenomena begin to recognize that they perceive themselves all the way through, as an integrated fluxing volume with various qualities that we can pick out as being what we ordinarily think of as the six sense doors but now are actually starting to notice things in a put-together, integrated, all just as and where they are sort of way, which, as it is no different in specifics from the standard way we perceive things, is missed entirely by most people.

Thus, counting formation is a very 1st vipassana jhana way of looking at the 4th jhana, sort of like writing your college application essay in crayon, sort of like having to Fred Flintstone pedal your Ferrari, sort of like talking to someone on tin cans with string connecting them as opposed to video Skype: very primitive, very missing the point.

The point is that the whole thing, the whole field, begins to become and include the meditation. This is the lesson of the 4th vipassana jhana, and so we learn to flow with the whole shifting volume of attention and everything in it, front to back, in and out, this side and that side, doer and done, knower and known, Subject and Object, all part of the whole thing, together, and this is how, when the Three Characteristics of that are perceived naturally, totally, of the whole of everything in that moment of the sense field, then Stream Entry or Fruition or whatever arises.

What is the difference between the vibrations and the formations?  Are the formations the thing that vibrates and fluxes?
-Eva

Formations are what we perceive when space and everything in it is known to flux together, whereas I usually use the term vibrations to refer to smaller things, smaller parts if the sense-field, things that seem like individual, specific objects, objects that are selected out, like noticing the tingling on your nose, like noticing a sound break into pulses, like noticing every little syllabic blip of an auditory thought, but in a way that doesn't get wide, volumetric, and sense-door integrated in that formation-esque way.

What I notice is that everything flickers but I like the term vibration because if I concentrate and it gets stronger, I can kind of feel the flicker as well as see it, but the feel is not the same as regular air pulse vibrations one normally experiences, I just kind of feel it in my head or something like that.  The rate of flicker can seem to slow down for short periods with a certain effort.  If I think to look for the the consistancy of flicker over a wider field of vision, then there can look like a kind of flux warp across the whole field of vision, it has a kind of vague electromagnetic type look to it.  The thing is, I have for a long time had visual snow which is a visual anomoly that the medical community appears to not understand much but guesses there is something funky in the brain's visual processing system that causes it, since the problem does not appear to originate in the eye itself.  Seeing that kind of thing as well as other stuff is not uncommon for those with visual snow. 

Now if I try to think about the frequency of my thoughts about my awareness of what I am seeing, then a different thing happens and my thoughts seem to mostly stop, I don't think much of  anything, and I end up not looking for anything.  Seems like there is not enough thought left to lead to tightly focused observation at that point, instead it's more like a global spaceout and there is a feeling of glacial slowness. 

I am not sure where it is I am supposed to be concentrating on.
-Eva  

Daniel, what you have written here in this thread is super helpful. Maybe in MTCB2 expand the part about EQ/formations in this way?

The clearest event on the path for me has been the A&P. When I read descriptions of how that can occur in dreams--for months I had spontaneous lucid dreams in which I meditated--it reminds me how possible the rest of the path is.

But then all the crazy vibrations during DN were classic, too--and the rest of it. Now, yes, although I sense the particulate level of "flicker" early in my sits, after just a few minutes what I'm noticing is much more "macro," 3D, "volumetric," "flowy," as you say. If I pause and gaze in stillness during any part of the workday, same thing. However, "fully integrated" hasn't happened yet, in the sense that not all the sense doors seem to be included. It is predominantly visual. Auditorily, there is still vibrations, not "flow," not synesthesia. Just last week, I did start noticing that my body felt like it too was swaying, or flowing. I was momentarily astonished when I realized this had already been occurring without my noticing. I didn't know how long it had been happening or when it started. Then I looked down at my feet, legs, and hands: all flowing just as the carpet, the bedposts, the wall. . . .  There is still a sense of separate watcher; I think what I haven't investigated--maybe even turned a blind eye toward--is what I think of as myself. 

Today at supper, I was wondering--what DO I normally think of as "myself"? It is interesting that I've never even asked this question before. Then I did remember that somewhere in MCTB I think I read that a helpful thing to do is to ask, What am I still not looking at?