Lars' Practise Log - Discussion
Starting a practise journal, it seems preferable to asking questions or describing practise in other's threads. It's also been an interesting last few days and could use a little feedback and advice, and don't want to dump this long post somewhere inappropriate.
Quick Summary
Decades ago I practised a fair bit zen style (or whatever I thought was zen style) and hit what i'm guessing was A&P, which I mistakenly thought was "the big one". Crazy bliss, compassion and joy and all the rest for 4 days, followed by 15 years of popping in and out of dark night. Since I had no idea what was going on, wasn't exactly fun. Finally got back into practise a few months ago and hit A&P again using vipassana. Progress of noting went something like this:
1) Sensations are solid and constant
2) Sensations have a beginning and an end
3) Sensations have a beginning, middle and end
4) Sensations have a beginning, middle and end, each of which also contain a sub-beginning, middle and end.
5) Sensations break up into pulses/particles/vibrations
6) Sensation (rarely) ceases to be normally perceived and instead there is an almost repellent "screech" alternating with gaps (in the case of hearing)
I've essentially been on home retreat for the last few months (though i'll admit I didn't practise as much as I had time to). Read TMI, MCTB, Thanissaro Bhikku, Shinzen Young, etc. This time when I fell into DN again I had some idea what was going on. Figured out how to navigate it and made it to EQ, bouncing between low and high, had some help from some of the folks here.
Had some interesting sits where it felt like something was pushing its way up my spine and forcing my spine/neck/head into alignment, followed by strong energy and seeing light. Was able to get into 1st and 2nd jhana, occasionally what i'm guessing was 3rd. Average sits increased in duration from 15 minutes to an hour. A month or so ago I also realized more deeply that intentions etc arise fully formed, I don't create them consciously.
Recent Practise
A few nights ago I decided to play around with the "nada sound" or tinnitus or whatever it is. Instead of breaking it up in my right ear as usual (usually strongest in right ear, but now equalizing) I decided to alternate between left and right as quickly as I could. This worked surprisingly well and noting (no labels) quickly became unbearably fast. My body and mind started reacting with strong aversion to what was occurring and I started feeling what felt like a rubber band snapping against the middle of my brain from the back of the head, maybe 5-10 times a second. Then it started happening in my body as well, all my muscles were individually contracting and releasing multiple times a second, totally out of phase with each other. I was actually a little worried I was having a psychotic break/stroke etc, but I just settled into it and relaxed. It eventually started to subside with some residual muscular twitching.
Next night I tried again, and almost immediately it began again. Muscles began twitching randomly like crazy. I noticed a few tiny gaps occuring in the sensory stream, and then suddenly it felt like all the various muscle contractions were aligning and the vibration of it started noticeably syncing. It felt like an engine that was out of alignment suddenly started shaking itself back into sync and running perfectly. I felt this tremendous energy and very fast vibration just filling the entire body, way beyond what piti has ever felt like. It felt like the whole body/mind was humming and blissful. When I woke up this morning the body was already humming and in sync like it had been doing that all night.
Today I did another sit, feeling the humming and my fingers twitching within seconds. Then my face started twitching, constant vibration in my eyes, cheeks and forehead, like I was getting out of sync again. When sitting a second time a little while later I felt the physical vibrations sync up again within a couple minutes, but this time I distinctly heard the nada sound also sync up with it so that every sensation in my body and mind seemed absolutely harmonized and I can only describe it as "smooth" lol. The facial twitching didn't occur this time. A&P territory energy felt very rough (occasionally flowing), this feels very smooth.
Sat again later and as soon as I noticed that the bodily vibrations were slightly out of phase (and nada sound was wavering) they aligned again. All I need to do is relax and it happens on its own. Also just tried it while walking to the store for coffee filters, the syncing occurred and then I had a brief "gone" in mid step, which I wasn't expecting at all. When I finally went to bed to get some sleep, just as I got totally relaxed my face started twitching again, I lol'd.
Any suggestions on practise at this point would be appreciated, I don't want to make any assumptions about what this was or how to proceed. Thanks to everyone for their help so far.
Quick Summary
Decades ago I practised a fair bit zen style (or whatever I thought was zen style) and hit what i'm guessing was A&P, which I mistakenly thought was "the big one". Crazy bliss, compassion and joy and all the rest for 4 days, followed by 15 years of popping in and out of dark night. Since I had no idea what was going on, wasn't exactly fun. Finally got back into practise a few months ago and hit A&P again using vipassana. Progress of noting went something like this:
1) Sensations are solid and constant
2) Sensations have a beginning and an end
3) Sensations have a beginning, middle and end
4) Sensations have a beginning, middle and end, each of which also contain a sub-beginning, middle and end.
5) Sensations break up into pulses/particles/vibrations
6) Sensation (rarely) ceases to be normally perceived and instead there is an almost repellent "screech" alternating with gaps (in the case of hearing)
I've essentially been on home retreat for the last few months (though i'll admit I didn't practise as much as I had time to). Read TMI, MCTB, Thanissaro Bhikku, Shinzen Young, etc. This time when I fell into DN again I had some idea what was going on. Figured out how to navigate it and made it to EQ, bouncing between low and high, had some help from some of the folks here.
Had some interesting sits where it felt like something was pushing its way up my spine and forcing my spine/neck/head into alignment, followed by strong energy and seeing light. Was able to get into 1st and 2nd jhana, occasionally what i'm guessing was 3rd. Average sits increased in duration from 15 minutes to an hour. A month or so ago I also realized more deeply that intentions etc arise fully formed, I don't create them consciously.
Recent Practise
A few nights ago I decided to play around with the "nada sound" or tinnitus or whatever it is. Instead of breaking it up in my right ear as usual (usually strongest in right ear, but now equalizing) I decided to alternate between left and right as quickly as I could. This worked surprisingly well and noting (no labels) quickly became unbearably fast. My body and mind started reacting with strong aversion to what was occurring and I started feeling what felt like a rubber band snapping against the middle of my brain from the back of the head, maybe 5-10 times a second. Then it started happening in my body as well, all my muscles were individually contracting and releasing multiple times a second, totally out of phase with each other. I was actually a little worried I was having a psychotic break/stroke etc, but I just settled into it and relaxed. It eventually started to subside with some residual muscular twitching.
Next night I tried again, and almost immediately it began again. Muscles began twitching randomly like crazy. I noticed a few tiny gaps occuring in the sensory stream, and then suddenly it felt like all the various muscle contractions were aligning and the vibration of it started noticeably syncing. It felt like an engine that was out of alignment suddenly started shaking itself back into sync and running perfectly. I felt this tremendous energy and very fast vibration just filling the entire body, way beyond what piti has ever felt like. It felt like the whole body/mind was humming and blissful. When I woke up this morning the body was already humming and in sync like it had been doing that all night.
Today I did another sit, feeling the humming and my fingers twitching within seconds. Then my face started twitching, constant vibration in my eyes, cheeks and forehead, like I was getting out of sync again. When sitting a second time a little while later I felt the physical vibrations sync up again within a couple minutes, but this time I distinctly heard the nada sound also sync up with it so that every sensation in my body and mind seemed absolutely harmonized and I can only describe it as "smooth" lol. The facial twitching didn't occur this time. A&P territory energy felt very rough (occasionally flowing), this feels very smooth.
Sat again later and as soon as I noticed that the bodily vibrations were slightly out of phase (and nada sound was wavering) they aligned again. All I need to do is relax and it happens on its own. Also just tried it while walking to the store for coffee filters, the syncing occurred and then I had a brief "gone" in mid step, which I wasn't expecting at all. When I finally went to bed to get some sleep, just as I got totally relaxed my face started twitching again, I lol'd.
Any suggestions on practise at this point would be appreciated, I don't want to make any assumptions about what this was or how to proceed. Thanks to everyone for their help so far.
Whatever this is seems to be deepening, woke up this morning with the body humming again. I noticed that even these synchronized and pleasant vibrations were very slightly "rough" and they started to fade. Now it quickly settles into a stillness i've never experienced before. The body/mind becomes incredibly still, even though there is breath and a heartbeat it feels like the body almost isn't there. Breath becomes very subtle and outbreaths take a long time, followed by what seems like a long gap before inbreath starts again. It seems like my only job at this point is to be aware, the less effort I use the deeper it gets.
Changed focus to mental activity and suddenly the face muscles started twitching very subtly again.
Sat again, body synced quickly but then started going out of sync again and "stuff" started forming. It didn't feel like muscular tension, or vibrations, but like a very vague fog in the chest. It eventually dissolved and I noticed that breathing was very subtle, both in and out breath and sometimes stopped for a few seconds before starting again. Then noticed that there was mild tension/pain in the neck and immediately it started relaxing and then dissolved. It feels like the body has changed in the last few days, like it just optimizes itself and automatically syncs anything that's dissonant, returning to stillness by itself because it likes it.
Another sit, after being still for a while I noticed I was starting to think about this stuff intellectually, and dropped it. After sitting in the stillness again for a few minutes I began feeling a very strong piti-like energy, but one-pointed and located in the spine at about heart level. Usually I feel piti in the whole body, but this felt like all the usual energy was bundled up into a single point and it felt orgasmic, and lasted for a few minutes. It was almost too much. When I noticed that my breathing was being effected and there was a slight tension around my spine it faded.
Sat again later and after getting into stillness again the energy started bubbling at my feet and going up my spine in a thick current, but stopping at around the same point just above the heart. I focused on the nada sound and it started moving up into my head and got quite strong.
There seems to be more sensitivity to nerve tension in addition to muscles now. There's a nerve that got damaged in surgery a few years ago that's been painful ever since. After feeling some subtle tension there and really getting into it, it "clicked" a few times and then released and I felt strong pulses of pleasure from the nerve cluster for a few minutes (this was a few days ago and it hasn't come back). The area that felt oversensitive and "wrong" before just feels like normal flesh now.
More sits, the vibrations are getting more subtle as I keep syncing back to stillness again (though they were so heavy while lying in bed last night that it felt like my apartment building was shaking). Vibrations etc sync, stillness for a while, then some subtle vibrations or muscle tension starts again and I go through the cycle once more. My body seems to prefer the stillness and sometimes does the syncing thing when i'm thinking about something else. Usually the first vibrations that start interfering with the stillness on the way back out is in the heart/chest, or between the eyes. It feels like the heart has a vibration to it that's seperate from the physical sensations, and it is one of the last things to sync, and first to desync. It's also interesting that the feeling of heart and eye tension help to create a feeling of personal space or location.
Had two dreams on successive nights which were very similar and seemed to be making the same point. In both dreams there was a strong emotional response to something (in the first someone close to me died, in the second a black widow spider crawled across my abdomen). At the moment when the emotional response was strongest, I suddenly awoke and it was incredibly obvious that the strong emotional/physical reaction that I was feeling was based on something that wasn't actually occurring, that I was freaking out over fabricated drama. Watching the suffering drop to almost nothing after being caught up in fabricated drama only a moment before was interesting.
Changed focus to mental activity and suddenly the face muscles started twitching very subtly again.
Sat again, body synced quickly but then started going out of sync again and "stuff" started forming. It didn't feel like muscular tension, or vibrations, but like a very vague fog in the chest. It eventually dissolved and I noticed that breathing was very subtle, both in and out breath and sometimes stopped for a few seconds before starting again. Then noticed that there was mild tension/pain in the neck and immediately it started relaxing and then dissolved. It feels like the body has changed in the last few days, like it just optimizes itself and automatically syncs anything that's dissonant, returning to stillness by itself because it likes it.
Another sit, after being still for a while I noticed I was starting to think about this stuff intellectually, and dropped it. After sitting in the stillness again for a few minutes I began feeling a very strong piti-like energy, but one-pointed and located in the spine at about heart level. Usually I feel piti in the whole body, but this felt like all the usual energy was bundled up into a single point and it felt orgasmic, and lasted for a few minutes. It was almost too much. When I noticed that my breathing was being effected and there was a slight tension around my spine it faded.
Sat again later and after getting into stillness again the energy started bubbling at my feet and going up my spine in a thick current, but stopping at around the same point just above the heart. I focused on the nada sound and it started moving up into my head and got quite strong.
There seems to be more sensitivity to nerve tension in addition to muscles now. There's a nerve that got damaged in surgery a few years ago that's been painful ever since. After feeling some subtle tension there and really getting into it, it "clicked" a few times and then released and I felt strong pulses of pleasure from the nerve cluster for a few minutes (this was a few days ago and it hasn't come back). The area that felt oversensitive and "wrong" before just feels like normal flesh now.
More sits, the vibrations are getting more subtle as I keep syncing back to stillness again (though they were so heavy while lying in bed last night that it felt like my apartment building was shaking). Vibrations etc sync, stillness for a while, then some subtle vibrations or muscle tension starts again and I go through the cycle once more. My body seems to prefer the stillness and sometimes does the syncing thing when i'm thinking about something else. Usually the first vibrations that start interfering with the stillness on the way back out is in the heart/chest, or between the eyes. It feels like the heart has a vibration to it that's seperate from the physical sensations, and it is one of the last things to sync, and first to desync. It's also interesting that the feeling of heart and eye tension help to create a feeling of personal space or location.
Had two dreams on successive nights which were very similar and seemed to be making the same point. In both dreams there was a strong emotional response to something (in the first someone close to me died, in the second a black widow spider crawled across my abdomen). At the moment when the emotional response was strongest, I suddenly awoke and it was incredibly obvious that the strong emotional/physical reaction that I was feeling was based on something that wasn't actually occurring, that I was freaking out over fabricated drama. Watching the suffering drop to almost nothing after being caught up in fabricated drama only a moment before was interesting.
Took a break for a while to integrate whatever the above was. Getting back into it has been relatively quick, 20 minute sit first day, 30 the next couple days, an hour the next, hour and a half the next etc. Access concentration happens almost immediately and the breath becomes calm and slow. Flowing piti and sukha become obvious within a couple minutes, eventually the piti fades and is replaced by a light humming through the whole body. Sometimes there are obvious nanas that I pass through relatively quickly, sometimes they pass so quickly I barely notice. Usually at this point my spine and neck straighten up on their own and there is white light at the crown, like there's a white fire burning on top of my head. Then this also fades somewhat and there's just a peaceful stillness in body and mind.
It's amusing though, the "narrator" still shows up sometimes, even when all other thoughts are largely gone. It's as if the narrator has admin priviliges, though the narrator has switched from a hero narrative to more of a commentator. When I notice something like a nana passing, or piti fading, it sometimes shows up to do a running commentary, and I don't always notice until it's already talking. Most other thoughts are recognized and fade before they even fully form.
I'm not currently trying to access any particular jhana or state, I just watch awareness itself. When reviewing the cessations that occured previously, awareness seems to be the most interesting aspect about it. At that moment there was no eye, ear or thinking etc consciousness, only "black". But for there to be even an awareness of that, awareness must have still been present. If awareness was still present with no object to make contact with then it can't be dependently originated. If it's not dependently originated then it shares the same characteristic as nibbana. It's hard not to infer that awareness itself is nibbana. However this also causes me to wonder why there was awareness of "black", but when in a deep state of sleep or under anesthesia there's not even that, instead you're only aware afterwards that you were unaware during that time. I'll just keep sitting with "awareness of awareness" and see what happens, I know this is about direct experience, not trying to figure it out intellectually.
Update: Did another sit, this time the light humming in the body I mentioned before became much thicker and intense (it felt like someone duct taped a big vibrator to the back of my chair lol). I suspect the strong vibrations from last month are coming back now that i'm practising again. Should be interesting.
Update2: Yes, it's back. Went to bed last night and almost immediately the face vibrations from last month started. Did the "syncing thing" and the body became still again. It's interesting that stopping practise for a month either caused the vibrations to go away, or caused me to be unable to recognize them. A few days of practise again, and *bam* vibrations in the face lol.
It's amusing though, the "narrator" still shows up sometimes, even when all other thoughts are largely gone. It's as if the narrator has admin priviliges, though the narrator has switched from a hero narrative to more of a commentator. When I notice something like a nana passing, or piti fading, it sometimes shows up to do a running commentary, and I don't always notice until it's already talking. Most other thoughts are recognized and fade before they even fully form.
I'm not currently trying to access any particular jhana or state, I just watch awareness itself. When reviewing the cessations that occured previously, awareness seems to be the most interesting aspect about it. At that moment there was no eye, ear or thinking etc consciousness, only "black". But for there to be even an awareness of that, awareness must have still been present. If awareness was still present with no object to make contact with then it can't be dependently originated. If it's not dependently originated then it shares the same characteristic as nibbana. It's hard not to infer that awareness itself is nibbana. However this also causes me to wonder why there was awareness of "black", but when in a deep state of sleep or under anesthesia there's not even that, instead you're only aware afterwards that you were unaware during that time. I'll just keep sitting with "awareness of awareness" and see what happens, I know this is about direct experience, not trying to figure it out intellectually.
Update: Did another sit, this time the light humming in the body I mentioned before became much thicker and intense (it felt like someone duct taped a big vibrator to the back of my chair lol). I suspect the strong vibrations from last month are coming back now that i'm practising again. Should be interesting.
Update2: Yes, it's back. Went to bed last night and almost immediately the face vibrations from last month started. Did the "syncing thing" and the body became still again. It's interesting that stopping practise for a month either caused the vibrations to go away, or caused me to be unable to recognize them. A few days of practise again, and *bam* vibrations in the face lol.
Sat for about 3 hours yesterday, one sit being 1.5 hours long and got very deep. I dropped into what felt like 4.5 jhana, some odd mix of 4 and 5 (I can only guess about the 5 part since this is my first taste of anything resembling formless jhanas, with the exception of some OOBE etc in my youth).
I started by making a resolution to enter the 5th during that sit, and to then be able to exit it easily and comfortably when I wished to do so. I'd tried before (without resolution), but had no success. This time the sit went as usual, eventually reaching a soft 4th. I tried to tune into the spaceousness of it, but it didn't make much difference. I got distracted in thought for a few moments, and then I noticed it was suddenly more wide. After getting distracted noticing that it again got more wide until I suddenly found myself floating in what felt like a huge grey-ish sphere that I couldn't see the boundaries of (though there was a vague sense there was a boundary out there beyond what I could see, in a way it felt like I was floating in a giant holodeck so big I couldn't see the edge). What was odd was that there was "stuff" in there, i'd expected the 5th to be a completely empty space. There were what looked like pebbles and rocks suspended in the space, and at one point some reaaaaally odd little "creature" came flying up to me, made a gesture and then flew away. Its body made no sense, and was made of what seemed like random objects that weren't connected (including what looked like a slice of an orange lol). The visual aspect was both very clear and vague. It was very stable and detailed, but looked a little like watching a high resolution movie with a little vaseline smeared on the screen (colors were also very washed out). Eventually I got distracted by the "oh wow, this is crazy" type narration and the session ended soon after.
At one point I checked in with the body to see if it was truly formless, and I had barely any sense of the body, though I could hear the sound of traffic (it's always very loud, I live in a big city on a major street), but it was like I was wearing earmuffs and the sound was muted and far away. So, I don't think this was a "real" 5th jhana, but some odd mix of the spaceousness of 5th combined with the clear visual aspects that can sometimes occur in 4th. Instead of fractal 2d/2.5d shapes, this time it was 3d within a large space.
The relationship between intent and letting go is becoming a little more clear. I used to have a more binary view of it, ie - you either need to strongly intend something, or recognize agencylessness and let go completely. Now it seems more profitable to define an intention, and then also let go of it, allowing it to either happen or not without attachment/aversion to either result.
Was speaking with someone else here last night and they mentioned "action potential", had no idea what that was. Did some reading on axons and action potential etc and it really blew my mind lol.
If you change "stimulus" to "contact" it looks a lot like the arising and passing away of phenomenon. With no contact (or too low an action potential) there is no arising and passing away (depolarization, repolarization), just the resting state. If you look at the "refresh rate" that different types of neurons and muscle fibres are capable of, it looks a lot like the number of cycles per second that can be seen during a concentrated vipassana session. Perhaps keeping action potential below the threshold required to fire neurons etc (so it remains perpetually in rest state) is nibbana from a physiological perspective? Yeah yeah, speculation.
I started by making a resolution to enter the 5th during that sit, and to then be able to exit it easily and comfortably when I wished to do so. I'd tried before (without resolution), but had no success. This time the sit went as usual, eventually reaching a soft 4th. I tried to tune into the spaceousness of it, but it didn't make much difference. I got distracted in thought for a few moments, and then I noticed it was suddenly more wide. After getting distracted noticing that it again got more wide until I suddenly found myself floating in what felt like a huge grey-ish sphere that I couldn't see the boundaries of (though there was a vague sense there was a boundary out there beyond what I could see, in a way it felt like I was floating in a giant holodeck so big I couldn't see the edge). What was odd was that there was "stuff" in there, i'd expected the 5th to be a completely empty space. There were what looked like pebbles and rocks suspended in the space, and at one point some reaaaaally odd little "creature" came flying up to me, made a gesture and then flew away. Its body made no sense, and was made of what seemed like random objects that weren't connected (including what looked like a slice of an orange lol). The visual aspect was both very clear and vague. It was very stable and detailed, but looked a little like watching a high resolution movie with a little vaseline smeared on the screen (colors were also very washed out). Eventually I got distracted by the "oh wow, this is crazy" type narration and the session ended soon after.
At one point I checked in with the body to see if it was truly formless, and I had barely any sense of the body, though I could hear the sound of traffic (it's always very loud, I live in a big city on a major street), but it was like I was wearing earmuffs and the sound was muted and far away. So, I don't think this was a "real" 5th jhana, but some odd mix of the spaceousness of 5th combined with the clear visual aspects that can sometimes occur in 4th. Instead of fractal 2d/2.5d shapes, this time it was 3d within a large space.
The relationship between intent and letting go is becoming a little more clear. I used to have a more binary view of it, ie - you either need to strongly intend something, or recognize agencylessness and let go completely. Now it seems more profitable to define an intention, and then also let go of it, allowing it to either happen or not without attachment/aversion to either result.
Was speaking with someone else here last night and they mentioned "action potential", had no idea what that was. Did some reading on axons and action potential etc and it really blew my mind lol.
If you change "stimulus" to "contact" it looks a lot like the arising and passing away of phenomenon. With no contact (or too low an action potential) there is no arising and passing away (depolarization, repolarization), just the resting state. If you look at the "refresh rate" that different types of neurons and muscle fibres are capable of, it looks a lot like the number of cycles per second that can be seen during a concentrated vipassana session. Perhaps keeping action potential below the threshold required to fire neurons etc (so it remains perpetually in rest state) is nibbana from a physiological perspective? Yeah yeah, speculation.
seth tapper:
In my experience, once you have seen that the whole experience of human meaning is just a mental process, the mind can begin ignoring the apparent meaning in it all and begin to consider the unchanging nature of This. To be truly free of craving is as stupid and simple as realizing what you have realized about the mind just being a meaningless process - and being perfectly ok with it. If you pay attention just to the nature of reality - This, the mind will stop craving meaning at all. Upon inspection, This is manifestly perfect as it is. Does that make sense?
Yes, this whole thing follows the previous realization that everything i've ever experienced is mind, and it's devoid of a seperate self. There is less and less aversion to the process, i'd just like to understand it better and I know i'm not "done" yet. Even if you subscribe to the "there's nothing more to be done" model (or have reached arahant) there's still so much to learn.
Regarding This, as mentioned above "awareness", "stillness" or whatever you'd like to call it is my primary practise lately, and yes the perfection of this moment is getting clearer every day. Though apparently i've been doing too much intellectualizing during my experimental periods (I devote a certain part of each session to just screwing around).
After the last shift I stopped sitting for a few months, a combination of integration and laziness. This seems to be a cycle that repeats after every shift, but this is the longest gap in a while. There was still practise, but not formal sitting. This time there was no significant DN, except for a short one caused by a friend here on the site when challenged to a "sila duel". 
As mentioned in other threads, there are occasional "hearing things where they are" perceptive moments, but not as often as right after the last shift. There are also visual changes, including a beautiful glow that I get when looking at light reflecting off objects, or strong light sources. When looking at the glow as a whole, it looks like a spray of particles coming out of and back into the light source. The particles seem to be tinged like a rainbow, there is at least white, blue, red and green and most likely more subtle hues as well. When I zoom in on them they appear to be thousands of tiny cells moving about turbulently. It's like the light source is illuminating the cells in my eyes and I see them like looking at a microscope slide (as opposed to the usual floaters/gunk that appear in vision). This doesn't require staring at a light source, it's pretty much constant, though staring does change the movement of the particles. I can also often see the "refresh rate" of visual perception. It's like looking at a video on the internet that's slightly choppy because it was captured at 15 versus the usual 30 frames per second. Maybe i'm just getting old and macular degeneration is setting in.
Stress has diminished to a point that i'm almost waiting for the ball to drop, it's been so long since I freaked out at anything. I'm in a pretty much perpetual EQ'ish state, just aware of what is occurring with minimal volition. A few weeks ago a friend asked me to cover a few shifts as a cashier since one of his employees was being flaky. After working a few shifts they fired the flaky worker, and hired me full time. They've since promoted me to assistant manager, which I find amusing. I'm making about 1/2 what I made in my last job as a programmer and I don't care, my rent is paid and there's food on the table.
How is this related to practise? I'm approaching this job as basically meditation/service and it seems to be working really well. I just move about as necessary, am aware of things that the boss wants done, and they get done. Customers arrive and I deal with them with as much compassion, care and humility as i'm capable. There's no need for opinions about those tasks, ownership of those tasks, pride or dissatisfaction at those tasks, etc. Of course, those concepts do arise and I do my best to just be aware of that and continue flowing with whatever occurs. There's a really simple joy in just doing the job with no drama, and seeing both the customers and the other employees being happy at the result. I've had every employee and manager I work with thank me for not being a drama queen like the previous employees. What makes me laugh is even just a few years ago I was the drama queen employee. There are still hindrances of course, but they're as empty as anything else and will work themselves out in time.
After sitting for a few days again i'm somewhat surprised by how quickly concentration dropped, but is also coming back. The first sit was like being a total newb again (with awareness of that lack of concentration), the second was still pretty scattered but I stuck with it for over an hour without even intending to. What's amusing is i'm more equanimous off cushion now than on, perhaps because that's been my primary practise now for a while (no division between on and off cusion, being mindful of all activities).
I have to say Seth, you were right. It's all just stuff, and it just happens, and it's perfectly beautiful.
There's also so much still to do, even if none of it needs doing, and there's no one doing it.
As mentioned in other threads, there are occasional "hearing things where they are" perceptive moments, but not as often as right after the last shift. There are also visual changes, including a beautiful glow that I get when looking at light reflecting off objects, or strong light sources. When looking at the glow as a whole, it looks like a spray of particles coming out of and back into the light source. The particles seem to be tinged like a rainbow, there is at least white, blue, red and green and most likely more subtle hues as well. When I zoom in on them they appear to be thousands of tiny cells moving about turbulently. It's like the light source is illuminating the cells in my eyes and I see them like looking at a microscope slide (as opposed to the usual floaters/gunk that appear in vision). This doesn't require staring at a light source, it's pretty much constant, though staring does change the movement of the particles. I can also often see the "refresh rate" of visual perception. It's like looking at a video on the internet that's slightly choppy because it was captured at 15 versus the usual 30 frames per second. Maybe i'm just getting old and macular degeneration is setting in.
Stress has diminished to a point that i'm almost waiting for the ball to drop, it's been so long since I freaked out at anything. I'm in a pretty much perpetual EQ'ish state, just aware of what is occurring with minimal volition. A few weeks ago a friend asked me to cover a few shifts as a cashier since one of his employees was being flaky. After working a few shifts they fired the flaky worker, and hired me full time. They've since promoted me to assistant manager, which I find amusing. I'm making about 1/2 what I made in my last job as a programmer and I don't care, my rent is paid and there's food on the table.
How is this related to practise? I'm approaching this job as basically meditation/service and it seems to be working really well. I just move about as necessary, am aware of things that the boss wants done, and they get done. Customers arrive and I deal with them with as much compassion, care and humility as i'm capable. There's no need for opinions about those tasks, ownership of those tasks, pride or dissatisfaction at those tasks, etc. Of course, those concepts do arise and I do my best to just be aware of that and continue flowing with whatever occurs. There's a really simple joy in just doing the job with no drama, and seeing both the customers and the other employees being happy at the result. I've had every employee and manager I work with thank me for not being a drama queen like the previous employees. What makes me laugh is even just a few years ago I was the drama queen employee. There are still hindrances of course, but they're as empty as anything else and will work themselves out in time.
After sitting for a few days again i'm somewhat surprised by how quickly concentration dropped, but is also coming back. The first sit was like being a total newb again (with awareness of that lack of concentration), the second was still pretty scattered but I stuck with it for over an hour without even intending to. What's amusing is i'm more equanimous off cushion now than on, perhaps because that's been my primary practise now for a while (no division between on and off cusion, being mindful of all activities).
I have to say Seth, you were right. It's all just stuff, and it just happens, and it's perfectly beautiful.
There's also so much still to do, even if none of it needs doing, and there's no one doing it.
Now isn't a thing any more than the past and future are. Silly meditator, go sit some more.
The "ball has dropped" so to speak, i'm in a state that feels very DN'ish at the moment. Many of the usual sensations I would associate with it like doubt, shame, stress, confusion etc are there, but they don't seem like a big deal like it did years ago. They are just temporary impersonal sensations and recognized as such. What's interesting is the intense volume, this feels like panic attack levels of mental anxiety. I can feel physiological responses as well, but it doesn't feel like it's happening to me. It's like watching a very loud and chaotic thunderstorm from a distance.
I suspect the DN was caused by a sudden onset of aversion today. One of our "toxic" customers showed up in the store, and instead of dealing with it compassionately as I have for months now, I just said I was taking my break and ate some ice cream in the break area with a co-worker and let someone else deal with them. I deliberately waited until they left (they waited around for a while to see if i'd return) before I came back out again. I recognized the aversion as it was occurring and did it anyway. A few hours later, they called right as we were closing and when I saw who was on the caller ID, I didn't pick up (and again recognized the aversion yet ignored the call). Later that night a drunk ex girlfriend called me up and tried to rope me into some drama with her latest ex boyfriend and heavily hinted she wanted me to loan her some money. Again my response was nope.
Neither of these were horrible offenses, but i've been deliberately "leaning into the knife" recently so it was noticeable that I just politely disengaged. It's interesting to watch the mind retrieve the memory of these things and then build it into drama, then it falls apart. Then it reconstructs it a different way, and again it falls apart. (DN sensations have now faded, mind and body are calm)
I wonder if this is just another subtle selfing thing. If over the last few months i've created a "nice compassionate guy" identity that I cling to at some level, and today's events contradicted that, it could cause the stress described above. I've also been becoming more aware of "aversion to aversion" lately, which is twisting my noodle a bit. Or maybe I just had a bad day....
I suspect the DN was caused by a sudden onset of aversion today. One of our "toxic" customers showed up in the store, and instead of dealing with it compassionately as I have for months now, I just said I was taking my break and ate some ice cream in the break area with a co-worker and let someone else deal with them. I deliberately waited until they left (they waited around for a while to see if i'd return) before I came back out again. I recognized the aversion as it was occurring and did it anyway. A few hours later, they called right as we were closing and when I saw who was on the caller ID, I didn't pick up (and again recognized the aversion yet ignored the call). Later that night a drunk ex girlfriend called me up and tried to rope me into some drama with her latest ex boyfriend and heavily hinted she wanted me to loan her some money. Again my response was nope.
Neither of these were horrible offenses, but i've been deliberately "leaning into the knife" recently so it was noticeable that I just politely disengaged. It's interesting to watch the mind retrieve the memory of these things and then build it into drama, then it falls apart. Then it reconstructs it a different way, and again it falls apart. (DN sensations have now faded, mind and body are calm)
I wonder if this is just another subtle selfing thing. If over the last few months i've created a "nice compassionate guy" identity that I cling to at some level, and today's events contradicted that, it could cause the stress described above. I've also been becoming more aware of "aversion to aversion" lately, which is twisting my noodle a bit. Or maybe I just had a bad day....
The DN'ish sensations haven't returned, and I noticed something about suffering during the experience. It's been obvious for a while that clinging/aversion is the primary source of suffering, but this put it in contrast in a way that was very clear. The level of stress that I experienced from being intentionally aversive was far worse than the stress I would have experienced from simply experiencing the original situation without aversion. It also likely caused stress for those I was aversive to (while I wasn't explicitly rude, I did disengage). Obviously unskillful behaviour, and seeing that clearly will hopefully make it easier to behave more skillfully.
It's funny how it wasn't some huge thing that caused the "ball to drop", like someone screaming at me or being threatening etc. (which does occur at my job). Instead, it was my own moderately aversive internal reaction to a fairly mild stimulus.
Aversion to aversion. In theory aversion to being aversive is good since aversion causes suffering, but if i'm being aversive to aversion then i'm still being aversive, so i'll still suffer <ad nauseum>. But if I let go of aversion towards aversion, then will I act aversively and still suffer?
Gut reaction tells me to drop aversion to aversion and let aversion function freely as required with the simple recognition that it's empty. Perhaps easier said than done.
It's funny how it wasn't some huge thing that caused the "ball to drop", like someone screaming at me or being threatening etc. (which does occur at my job). Instead, it was my own moderately aversive internal reaction to a fairly mild stimulus.
Aversion to aversion. In theory aversion to being aversive is good since aversion causes suffering, but if i'm being aversive to aversion then i'm still being aversive, so i'll still suffer <ad nauseum>. But if I let go of aversion towards aversion, then will I act aversively and still suffer?
Gut reaction tells me to drop aversion to aversion and let aversion function freely as required with the simple recognition that it's empty. Perhaps easier said than done.
Linda: The spine aligning thing is actually fairly common at certain stages from what I understand. I'm glad you're encouraged, just don't make the same mistake i've made repeatedly (going hero mode and then burning out, then repeating that cycle). Consistent practise seems to be more beneficial.
Milo: Thanks, i'll try to be more clear about what practise i'm using during a particular sit. Part of the problem is I seem to enjoy "breaking things up", so whenever I notice impermanence showing itself in a sense door (even during samatha) I instinctually focus on that and start vipassana instead. Someone mentioned in another thread that the mind can "chase after bliss like a puppy", in this case it seems to be chasing after stillness in a similar way.
Milo: Thanks, i'll try to be more clear about what practise i'm using during a particular sit. Part of the problem is I seem to enjoy "breaking things up", so whenever I notice impermanence showing itself in a sense door (even during samatha) I instinctually focus on that and start vipassana instead. Someone mentioned in another thread that the mind can "chase after bliss like a puppy", in this case it seems to be chasing after stillness in a similar way.
Lars:
Linda: The spine aligning thing is actually fairly common at certain stages from what I understand. I'm glad you're encouraged, just don't make the same mistake i've made repeatedly (going hero mode and then burning out, then repeating that cycle). Consistent practise seems to be more beneficial.
Milo: Thanks, i'll try to be more clear about what practise i'm using during a particular sit. Part of the problem is I seem to enjoy "breaking things up", so whenever I notice impermanence showing itself in a sense door (even during samatha) I instinctually focus on that and start vipassana instead. Someone mentioned in another thread that the mind can "chase after bliss like a puppy", in this case it seems to be chasing after stillness in a similar way.
Milo: Thanks, i'll try to be more clear about what practise i'm using during a particular sit. Part of the problem is I seem to enjoy "breaking things up", so whenever I notice impermanence showing itself in a sense door (even during samatha) I instinctually focus on that and start vipassana instead. Someone mentioned in another thread that the mind can "chase after bliss like a puppy", in this case it seems to be chasing after stillness in a similar way.
Oh yeah, stillness is nice so of course the mind wants to chase it! =D
I'll second that consistent practice is more beneficial than cycles of going hero mode, burning out, and quitting. I personally think a critical step in the cultivation of a deep practice is making it just something that you do every single day, period. No matter what. As the saying goes, the only bad meditation is the one you didn't do. It may be that the ones we don't want to do but do anyway are some of the most important.
Thanks, I appreciate the kind words. It's really not a big deal, it's just part of getting older, and good practise fodder.
A while back I mentioned in a post that from a fundamental point of view the sense of self "doesn't exist". Someone else was kind enough to clarify that it's more that it's impermanent and doesn't exist in the way we previously thought. I find it difficult to say it exists anymore after seeing it flux and pop in and out etc (then again exist doesn't mean what I previously thought either), but it was a very valid point.
For some reason I felt compelled to write down my current thoughts on it as clearly as possible, if anything it might be good for a laugh in a year when I read back through this thread.
Don't worry, i'm not in DP/DR. I'm still Lars, I still like ordering Combo D at the local sushi joint, I still like stupid fart jokes and playing my guitar. Feel free to kick out a few load bearing 2x4's in my shaky conceptual framework.
A while back I mentioned in a post that from a fundamental point of view the sense of self "doesn't exist". Someone else was kind enough to clarify that it's more that it's impermanent and doesn't exist in the way we previously thought. I find it difficult to say it exists anymore after seeing it flux and pop in and out etc (then again exist doesn't mean what I previously thought either), but it was a very valid point.
For some reason I felt compelled to write down my current thoughts on it as clearly as possible, if anything it might be good for a laugh in a year when I read back through this thread.
The sense of self appears to be a constellation of temporary sensory "arisings" which appear to have no specific or stable location, are dependently originated, and contain no agent or witness (any sense of agent or witness is itself an empty sensory arising).The sensations of self arise with awareness/awareness arises with the sense of self, and sensations of self pass away with awareness/awareness passes away with sensations of self. This tends to lead to the "I think, therefore I am" idea. Thinking does not require a thinker, awareness does not require someone to be aware. When conditions are met for a sense of self to arise, there are the sensations of a self (and awareness of them). When conditions are not ripe for them to arise, they don't (and thus no awareness of them arises).
Don't worry, i'm not in DP/DR. I'm still Lars, I still like ordering Combo D at the local sushi joint, I still like stupid fart jokes and playing my guitar. Feel free to kick out a few load bearing 2x4's in my shaky conceptual framework.
Lars:
Thanks, but I have a gut feeling that awareness hasn't seen awareness with enough clarity yet.
curious:
Are you sure you are looking in the right place?
Don't just tickle that load bearing 2x4, kick it. Do you mean the section I quoted in your thread? I think I read too much today lol, my mind is tired.
I'm gonna guess seeing dependent origination with more clarity is what you're hinting at. If not, sitting some more can't hurt. Thanks for the help even if i'm not grokking it yet.
Just a quick update on the medical front, they determined what is causing the eye issues. Turns out the eye problems are a side effect of a larger systemic issue:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcoidosis
A bunch more tests over the next few months, switching from a opthalmologist to a rheumatologist etc.
It's not so bad, but it's actually influencing meditation now lol. When I sit I can see a "structure" floating in my eye even with eyes closed. It's somewhat distracting, so i'm tempted to make it an object. Then again the visual disturbances it causes with eyes open show impermanence in a very direct and obvious way (and it's beautiful lol).
It is what it is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcoidosis
A bunch more tests over the next few months, switching from a opthalmologist to a rheumatologist etc.
It's not so bad, but it's actually influencing meditation now lol. When I sit I can see a "structure" floating in my eye even with eyes closed. It's somewhat distracting, so i'm tempted to make it an object. Then again the visual disturbances it causes with eyes open show impermanence in a very direct and obvious way (and it's beautiful lol).
It is what it is.
Yeah it does, but this isn't my first encounter with medical issues. Botched surgery a few years ago taught me a few things that are applicable here. No amount of bargaining, drama, aversion, clinging, deflection, self medicating or any other attempt to "fix" things will change what's actually happening. Best I can do is do the tests, take the recommended medication(s) and continue living my life. The tough part is maintaining practise, it's easy to use it as an excuse.
curious:
Hey Lars, how is your practice going?
Aimless.
Still sitting somewhat randomly, not daily. I seem to be going repeatedly through dissolution to low EQ and back again. EQ doesn't seem so special anymore, and dark night stuff doesn't seem so dark. It's all just very blah and I don't have a strong desire to practise, though I know I "should". The mind keeps trying to find happiness in things I know don't work, but I do them anyway. My sex drive alternates between strong lust in DN and complete indifference when I get back to EQ (and it's odd seeing such a contrast in a relatively short time). Sometimes time wasting stuff like video games consumes me (and again I know even as I do it that i'm burning time as a distraction) and then I go through periods where I have no interest in that activity. Sometimes fear/shame/anger show up, they don't really stick (sexual desire seems to be the one i'm wrestling with lately, that sticks for a while before it fades). I've noticed the DN aspects present themselves more and more the less I practise, and yet I don't much care. Sometimes I feel like kicking myself in the butt and putting more effort in, but that just seems like desire for deliverance yet again, and that just leads to re-obs and realizing I was being aversive/clinging without really changing much.
Perhaps this medical stuff is having more of an effect than I thought. If I was a ship sailing across the ocean, i'd be in the doldrums, though not particularly stressed by it.
So I'm guessing you are getting video game kasina? Spontaneous visualisations of parts of the game in your mind's eye at night? That can undermine practice. It could be a good time to balance your vipassana with some more external and emotional practices. Sometimes you need to let what you have learned embed itself in your sub-conscious, before you take the next step - particuarly if you are living a western lifestyle and not going on retreat.
Video games do offer a kind of flow state that is a simulcram of what we are after, but video games activate craving and clinging and anxiety far too much to be a skilful practice. But mindfulness of physical sensations, emotions, mental states can offer a similar flow sate while being far more productive. Just feeling the flux of sensations across your body, or across the states of mind, during the day. Working on metta too. The flow state of existence and love.
Walking in the dawn light and twilight is often really good too. Walking to get that flat negativity out of your body, but also walking in forests, or varied cityscapes, so that your consciousness can move a little into the interleaved light, and into the fractal shapes and spaces of the landcape. There is a joy in the space between the leaves of a tree at dusk, or in the angles of light shining through buildings at dawn. A glimpse of a kind of vivid illuminating beauty. Look for that.
Where's the damn heart emoji on this platform anyway?
Malcolm
That can undermine practice. It could be a good time to balance your vipassana with some more external and emotional practices. Sometimes you need to let what you have learned embed itself in your sub-conscious, before you take the next step - particuarly if you are living a western lifestyle and not going on retreat.Video games do offer a kind of flow state that is a simulcram of what we are after, but video games activate craving and clinging and anxiety far too much to be a skilful practice. But mindfulness of physical sensations, emotions, mental states can offer a similar flow sate while being far more productive. Just feeling the flux of sensations across your body, or across the states of mind, during the day. Working on metta too. The flow state of existence and love.
Walking in the dawn light and twilight is often really good too. Walking to get that flat negativity out of your body, but also walking in forests, or varied cityscapes, so that your consciousness can move a little into the interleaved light, and into the fractal shapes and spaces of the landcape. There is a joy in the space between the leaves of a tree at dusk, or in the angles of light shining through buildings at dawn. A glimpse of a kind of vivid illuminating beauty. Look for that.
Where's the damn heart emoji on this platform anyway?
Malcolm
Recently I allowed my practise to completely stop (on cushion anyhow) and observed how this influenced day to day life. At first it didn't make much difference, but then clinging and reactivity began to increase steadily. I then started practising again and observed how that influenced things. There was an immediate change, clinging and reactivity decreased and general level of stress is dropping quickly. Interestingly though, there are small "storms" of emotion that are worse than what occurred when not practising. They start suddenly and end suddenly, like tiny panic attacks, but they don't cause much actual stress since they're so transitory. They're usually accompanied by vibrations of different kinds, so I try to focus on the vibration instead of the content of the storm.
Something Shargrol said in another thread resonated recently. He mentioned that the mature phase of a nana can feel like EQ, and that sounds like what I have probably been doing with misery for a while (and other nanas). Misery can be comforting in a funny way, but the mature stage of misery is even more comforting, though there's a reluctant awareness that you're taking the easy route and shortchanging yourself. It's like eating horrible junk food when you have good food in the fridge, despite knowing the junk food is bad for you. Practising again is making that comfort less appealing, and understanding the maturity phase thing a bit better will hopefully make navigating the nanas a little more clear. Just because i'm temporarily equanimous towards something doesn't mean i'm actually in EQ, and it can be a sticky trap if I mistakenly think so.
Though it's a little Desire for Deliverance'y, I put some effort into improving my meditation setup. Previously I meditated in my room, which is right beside a major street in a big city. Traffic noise is constant, and people walk by chatting/screaming/laughing at all hours. Now i'm using a smaller room in the back of the building that is much quieter. It's making a difference, as distractions are much less frequent so I get a chance to go deeper. Dealing with distraction is part of meditation, but previously it was a bit like trying to meditate with someone poking you in the shoulder every second or two. Focusing on metta has also been of benefit. Getting some strong vibrations when doing metta, which makes it eaiser to transition into jhana afterwards.
Just want to say congrats and best wishes to curious and Polly. Very happy for you both, may you continue to practise well for the benefit of all sentient beings.
Something Shargrol said in another thread resonated recently. He mentioned that the mature phase of a nana can feel like EQ, and that sounds like what I have probably been doing with misery for a while (and other nanas). Misery can be comforting in a funny way, but the mature stage of misery is even more comforting, though there's a reluctant awareness that you're taking the easy route and shortchanging yourself. It's like eating horrible junk food when you have good food in the fridge, despite knowing the junk food is bad for you. Practising again is making that comfort less appealing, and understanding the maturity phase thing a bit better will hopefully make navigating the nanas a little more clear. Just because i'm temporarily equanimous towards something doesn't mean i'm actually in EQ, and it can be a sticky trap if I mistakenly think so.
Though it's a little Desire for Deliverance'y, I put some effort into improving my meditation setup. Previously I meditated in my room, which is right beside a major street in a big city. Traffic noise is constant, and people walk by chatting/screaming/laughing at all hours. Now i'm using a smaller room in the back of the building that is much quieter. It's making a difference, as distractions are much less frequent so I get a chance to go deeper. Dealing with distraction is part of meditation, but previously it was a bit like trying to meditate with someone poking you in the shoulder every second or two. Focusing on metta has also been of benefit. Getting some strong vibrations when doing metta, which makes it eaiser to transition into jhana afterwards.
Just want to say congrats and best wishes to curious and Polly. Very happy for you both, may you continue to practise well for the benefit of all sentient beings.
Tried to replicate the "cookie cutter" thing from the other day, not surprisingly trying to do it wasn't very successful. That there was a burst of pride probably didn't help lol.
Something about trying to replicate it was interesting though, the fact that the sensations are known without effort is apparent though obviously not fully mature. I don't need to try to be aware of it, the sensation occurs whether I try to notice or not. Trying just gave me another headache (even though I was being as gentle as I could). The tension seemed to be all bundled up in a tight knot right where people tie up a ponytail. It felt like that pride and striving was contracting into a little ball in the back of my head.
The echo is feeling odd though, something about it is confusing and stressfull, and it's harder to see clearly (i'm using sound, maybe I should use something slower for now). The amount of work the mind must be doing to constantly echo sensation is crazy. The analogy of the kazoo player makes more sense now. I could appreciate previously how it applied to "big" things like thoughts/emotions, but of course it's more subtle than that. In my imagination he used to be a quiet, shy kazoo player trying to mimic the symphony occasionally, missing notes and wanting to play along. Now he seems more like a stressed out sleep deprived kazoo player madly trying to keep up and duplicating every note while wondering "why the hell am I doing this?!".
At one point I stopped doing the "cookie cutter" exercise and just listened calmly to hot water flowing through a pipe in the room. At first it sounded like normal, but then it began to take on depth, like I was inside the pipe and I could hear the many subtle noises involved and the space between them. It was like listening to a microphone inside the pipe versus listening to one placed where I was sitting. In that case since I wasn't trying the exercise above there was no tension and I seemed able to just sit and just hear the sound and "feel" that space inside the pipe.
Something about trying to replicate it was interesting though, the fact that the sensations are known without effort is apparent though obviously not fully mature. I don't need to try to be aware of it, the sensation occurs whether I try to notice or not. Trying just gave me another headache (even though I was being as gentle as I could). The tension seemed to be all bundled up in a tight knot right where people tie up a ponytail. It felt like that pride and striving was contracting into a little ball in the back of my head.
The echo is feeling odd though, something about it is confusing and stressfull, and it's harder to see clearly (i'm using sound, maybe I should use something slower for now). The amount of work the mind must be doing to constantly echo sensation is crazy. The analogy of the kazoo player makes more sense now. I could appreciate previously how it applied to "big" things like thoughts/emotions, but of course it's more subtle than that. In my imagination he used to be a quiet, shy kazoo player trying to mimic the symphony occasionally, missing notes and wanting to play along. Now he seems more like a stressed out sleep deprived kazoo player madly trying to keep up and duplicating every note while wondering "why the hell am I doing this?!".
At one point I stopped doing the "cookie cutter" exercise and just listened calmly to hot water flowing through a pipe in the room. At first it sounded like normal, but then it began to take on depth, like I was inside the pipe and I could hear the many subtle noises involved and the space between them. It was like listening to a microphone inside the pipe versus listening to one placed where I was sitting. In that case since I wasn't trying the exercise above there was no tension and I seemed able to just sit and just hear the sound and "feel" that space inside the pipe.
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
I could have written this! This is exactly how my practice enfolded right before stream entry.
Lol, don't say that!
I've had sensations of expectation, anticipation, like something is about to happen for the last week or so. Had similar sensations previously when in this territory, but then regressed. Trying not to let it get to me, it just gets in the way.
Lars:
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
I could have written this! This is exactly how my practice enfolded right before stream entry.
Lol, don't say that!
I've had sensations of expectation, anticipation, like something is about to happen for the last week or so. Had similar sensations previously when in this territory, but then regressed. Trying not to let it get to me, it just gets in the way.
Right. Yeah. Sorry! I should have thought of that because that’s all too familiar too. Anyway, it’s beyond your control. It may regress several times and there’s nothing you can do about it. It happens when it happens, probably not at all when you expect it.
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
Right. Yeah. Sorry!
No worries, like you said, it unfolds at its own pace. Just happy to be along for the ride, so to speak.
New equanimity test today, got an injection directly in the eye. I've had them before right below the eye, but this was the first one directly in it. Wasn't actually that bad, but seeing blood filling half my eye afterwards was a little unsettling (yes I noted it). I was reminded of Mads Mikkelsen in Casino Royale, dabbing a silk handkerchief at the blood drop in the corner of his eye. 
I only had a kleenex, and no tailored suit.
Two things though, one was the reaction from other people. I saw how I looked in the mirror before I left the opthalmologist, but I was still amazed at the reactions from people on my way home. When I dropped into the grocery store a girl who is usually very flirty and sings along with the radio while she checks my stuff out was totally silent and only looked at me once before looking down at the counter for the rest of the transaction. The charity donation guys who usually enthusiastically greet me and everyone else looked away and didn't say a word. Not a single homeless guy asked me for change. Only the pharmacist acted like it was no big deal (he saw from my antibiotics eye drops script that it was due to an injection). I was still dressed as a middle aged professional guy in glasses, but that one detail made me functionally invisible to most people.
The other is that i'm currently seeing colors that "don't exist". When I look at grey text on a black background I see smudges of red, blue and green between the text that I know aren't really there, yet experientially it's vividly present. When I see it, thoughts arise that it's not actually there and logically it can't exist. Then there are thoughts that so called consensus reality doesn't include it, but then how do I know what consensus reality looks like? It's interesting watching mind struggle to understand it, it's seen no matter what thoughts have to say about it Makes me wonder what else I see that isn't part of "consensus reality". When I used psychedelics I could always discount visual changes as just being due to the drug. I don't know why this feels different, like there's an insight lurking somewhere in this.
I only had a kleenex, and no tailored suit.
Two things though, one was the reaction from other people. I saw how I looked in the mirror before I left the opthalmologist, but I was still amazed at the reactions from people on my way home. When I dropped into the grocery store a girl who is usually very flirty and sings along with the radio while she checks my stuff out was totally silent and only looked at me once before looking down at the counter for the rest of the transaction. The charity donation guys who usually enthusiastically greet me and everyone else looked away and didn't say a word. Not a single homeless guy asked me for change. Only the pharmacist acted like it was no big deal (he saw from my antibiotics eye drops script that it was due to an injection). I was still dressed as a middle aged professional guy in glasses, but that one detail made me functionally invisible to most people.
The other is that i'm currently seeing colors that "don't exist". When I look at grey text on a black background I see smudges of red, blue and green between the text that I know aren't really there, yet experientially it's vividly present. When I see it, thoughts arise that it's not actually there and logically it can't exist. Then there are thoughts that so called consensus reality doesn't include it, but then how do I know what consensus reality looks like? It's interesting watching mind struggle to understand it, it's seen no matter what thoughts have to say about it Makes me wonder what else I see that isn't part of "consensus reality". When I used psychedelics I could always discount visual changes as just being due to the drug. I don't know why this feels different, like there's an insight lurking somewhere in this.
In the last few days since the injection a new object is present in the visual field. It appears to be the iris, with a transparent circle in the middle being the pupil. I suspect some blood has entered the iris, and I can basically see the distortion it causes. With eyes open it causes a greyish/white distortion that blurs anything in front of it. With eyes closed after looking toward a light source, I see a kasina version of it, which fades over time in the usual way. I started playing with it yesterday, seeing how long it would remain etc. At first it faded pretty quickly, but I decided to try with a candle in a dark room and it got a little more consistent. After a while I blew out the candle and just sat in the darkness and it faded. However after about ten minutes of do nothing meditation it suddenly reappeared, then faded, then reappeared, pulsing on and off every couple of seconds. There were also lots of little sparks in vivid color in the center of it, which would shoot outwards. Occasionally they would grow into very distinct fragments of images in bright color. Any attempt to do anything with it caused it to fade, just sitting seemed to allow it to flourish. Eventually I went to bed.
Today I played with it again, didn't use the candle because just the light from my monitor seems to work. This time the sparks and kasina were more intense and distinct (at one point the kasina went brilliant white) and after a while it suddenly turned into a rainbow kaleidoscopic quickly flickering light show. It was very vivid and constantly moving, morphing like i'd taken a large dose of psychedelics lol. The flickering was very fast. Really wasn't expecting the intensity or how it just exploded from a few sparks into detail and texture (though it only filled the kasina, the rest was still murk).
I should probably apologize, i've made some posts on here about kasina, and have had some interesting optical effects. But this is something else entirely, I realize now that I had no idea what I was talking about previously (and still don't). If the Dunning-Kruger effect is a thing, i've been hanging out on mount stupid for a while.
Going to keep playing with it and see what I can actually learn.
Today I played with it again, didn't use the candle because just the light from my monitor seems to work. This time the sparks and kasina were more intense and distinct (at one point the kasina went brilliant white) and after a while it suddenly turned into a rainbow kaleidoscopic quickly flickering light show. It was very vivid and constantly moving, morphing like i'd taken a large dose of psychedelics lol. The flickering was very fast. Really wasn't expecting the intensity or how it just exploded from a few sparks into detail and texture (though it only filled the kasina, the rest was still murk).
I should probably apologize, i've made some posts on here about kasina, and have had some interesting optical effects. But this is something else entirely, I realize now that I had no idea what I was talking about previously (and still don't). If the Dunning-Kruger effect is a thing, i've been hanging out on mount stupid for a while.
Going to keep playing with it and see what I can actually learn.
Thanks, good to know i'm not wandering off into the weeds with this.
Played with it some more last night and i'm surprised how quickly it's developing. Last night the kasina was a green/purple outline and solid white inside and then faded. Then it was solid green, and faded. Then green but full of 2D detail and some sparks, then faded. Then it turned into the full psychedelic lightshow. Was able to go through this cycle in a minute or two, watched the cycle a few times and then went to bed. When lying in bed I remembered Daniel stated that he was able to focus on colors in the murk (he used white) so I tried the same thing. Worked really well, I simply said "white" mentally and within a few seconds the white aspect of the murk became more apparent, and I could see much more detail in the murk in general. Did the same thing with green and red. They eventually turned into the same sort of sparks I got from the kasina, and then did the lightshow again. Tried it with the sparks and sure enough the sparks took on a more white appearance with subtle blue undertones. Eventually the lightshow had images "underneath" the kasina, some of them vaguely 3D. It was like there were magical sigils and other obects floating around within the lightshow (I was into sigils etc when I was young, but not for decades). Also noticed that the flickering isn't consistent, it's like different colors flicker at different rates, which makes it seem alive. It's a bit like a mass of coral snakes made out of LED's all slithering over each other. For you old folks, it also reminded me a bit of a very high resolution Lite Brite where the pins are moving around and flickering. It's making meditation fun again, it had gotten a little boring for a while, like I was doing the same exercises over and over for no obvious reason or benefit. Apparently it kept concentration at a reasonable level though.
Update: This now occurs with eyes open if I defocus and just look straight ahead. First there are the sparks, and then it becomes the lightshow. It's not as clear as with eyes closed, but it appears to be the same thing. Hard to tell sometimes if this is "valid" or just a side effect of ocular damage. That said it requires some level of calm and concentration to occur, so it's more likely to be practise related. Either way, something new to play with during those long waits at medical appointments.
Played with it some more last night and i'm surprised how quickly it's developing. Last night the kasina was a green/purple outline and solid white inside and then faded. Then it was solid green, and faded. Then green but full of 2D detail and some sparks, then faded. Then it turned into the full psychedelic lightshow. Was able to go through this cycle in a minute or two, watched the cycle a few times and then went to bed. When lying in bed I remembered Daniel stated that he was able to focus on colors in the murk (he used white) so I tried the same thing. Worked really well, I simply said "white" mentally and within a few seconds the white aspect of the murk became more apparent, and I could see much more detail in the murk in general. Did the same thing with green and red. They eventually turned into the same sort of sparks I got from the kasina, and then did the lightshow again. Tried it with the sparks and sure enough the sparks took on a more white appearance with subtle blue undertones. Eventually the lightshow had images "underneath" the kasina, some of them vaguely 3D. It was like there were magical sigils and other obects floating around within the lightshow (I was into sigils etc when I was young, but not for decades). Also noticed that the flickering isn't consistent, it's like different colors flicker at different rates, which makes it seem alive. It's a bit like a mass of coral snakes made out of LED's all slithering over each other. For you old folks, it also reminded me a bit of a very high resolution Lite Brite where the pins are moving around and flickering. It's making meditation fun again, it had gotten a little boring for a while, like I was doing the same exercises over and over for no obvious reason or benefit. Apparently it kept concentration at a reasonable level though.
Update: This now occurs with eyes open if I defocus and just look straight ahead. First there are the sparks, and then it becomes the lightshow. It's not as clear as with eyes closed, but it appears to be the same thing. Hard to tell sometimes if this is "valid" or just a side effect of ocular damage. That said it requires some level of calm and concentration to occur, so it's more likely to be practise related. Either way, something new to play with during those long waits at medical appointments.
I suspect the quick progression of the kasina stuff is simply due to the fact that the retinal bruising that's causing a kasina to form is present 24 hrs a day in the center of the visual field with eyes open or closed. It's similar to staring at a candle flame all day, every day. I'm also playing around with it quite a bit. Not surprising that the kasina is vivid and also present most of the time. Tried to go to sleep and it followed me to bed lol. Eventually the bright flickering was a bit much so I got up again hoping the light might wash it out a little (which it did). Saw all kinds of odd stuff, at one point it got a bit repetetive so attention loosened a bit and the murk started going white. This reminds me a bit of the kundalini awakening a couple years ago. I'm not doing this, it just does itself whether it's convenient or not.
I may have been wrong about the flickering rate being based on the color, sometimes it seems to be related to the intensity of the color instead. When the kasina fades, right before it disappears the flickering is noticeably reduced. When it's bright and vivid the flickering is much more pronounced.
The term sparks may not be the best description. Sometimes it does look somewhat electrical or like sparks from a fireplace, but sometimes it looks more like smudges of bright paint with texture. It's like there's an image behind it, like i'm looking at a window completely covered in dark mud, and the smudges are someone wiping the mud off the window from the other side with a finger, allowing me to see the scene outside the window. Tough to describe some of this stuff, and it keeps changing.
Twice today the kasina with eyes closed became a creature. First one was when all the sparks went rainbow colored and a purple outline surrounded them in the shape of a 3D man 'o war jellyfish. Right below the jellyfish was a green flame. It was at angle which really showed the 3D aspect of it. The flame was also very defined and had depth. Second time the sparks were less rainbow and more just primary colors, but this time instead of an outline they organized into what looked like a spider. It was 3D but not as much as the jellyfish since there was no distinct outline. The spider was moving its legs and it was a little creepy. No flame that time.
If i'm babbling on too much about this, feel free to post a "it's time to stop posting" meme.
Update: It's now no longer constrained by the shape of the original kasina object. The entire visual field with eyes closed is now going 3D. As an example at one point there was a bright white full visual field flickering, which then turned on an angle and looked like fancy embroidered tablecloth with multiple light sources on it and lots of shading and detail. There were also balloon animals of various kinds, and then the pulsing began again. This time instead of the kasina shape pulsing, I saw a sci-fi tank. Each time it reappeared it was a different design. At first it was on a static isometric angle, but after a while it began to rotate and move around the visual field. The tanks were pretty fuzzy, but some of this stuff is higher resolution and better detail than I can see with my eyes.
I may have been wrong about the flickering rate being based on the color, sometimes it seems to be related to the intensity of the color instead. When the kasina fades, right before it disappears the flickering is noticeably reduced. When it's bright and vivid the flickering is much more pronounced.
The term sparks may not be the best description. Sometimes it does look somewhat electrical or like sparks from a fireplace, but sometimes it looks more like smudges of bright paint with texture. It's like there's an image behind it, like i'm looking at a window completely covered in dark mud, and the smudges are someone wiping the mud off the window from the other side with a finger, allowing me to see the scene outside the window. Tough to describe some of this stuff, and it keeps changing.
Twice today the kasina with eyes closed became a creature. First one was when all the sparks went rainbow colored and a purple outline surrounded them in the shape of a 3D man 'o war jellyfish. Right below the jellyfish was a green flame. It was at angle which really showed the 3D aspect of it. The flame was also very defined and had depth. Second time the sparks were less rainbow and more just primary colors, but this time instead of an outline they organized into what looked like a spider. It was 3D but not as much as the jellyfish since there was no distinct outline. The spider was moving its legs and it was a little creepy. No flame that time.
If i'm babbling on too much about this, feel free to post a "it's time to stop posting" meme.
Update: It's now no longer constrained by the shape of the original kasina object. The entire visual field with eyes closed is now going 3D. As an example at one point there was a bright white full visual field flickering, which then turned on an angle and looked like fancy embroidered tablecloth with multiple light sources on it and lots of shading and detail. There were also balloon animals of various kinds, and then the pulsing began again. This time instead of the kasina shape pulsing, I saw a sci-fi tank. Each time it reappeared it was a different design. At first it was on a static isometric angle, but after a while it began to rotate and move around the visual field. The tanks were pretty fuzzy, but some of this stuff is higher resolution and better detail than I can see with my eyes.
Thanks for the feedback. Instinct tells me it's all good, but whenever practise suddenly leaps forward like this I get a little weirded out and wonder if it's really happening lol. Previously it would often cause me to hit the brakes and start seeking stability in worldly things, but I seem to be pushing through that this time. And yeah, i'm having fun with it.
It's starting to effect other sense doors. At one point I saw a very detailed landscape, it looked like a dark mountainous forest. A voice started talking to me, but I didn't recognize the language or understand what was being said. Also getting a lot of eye imagery, it looks like my own eye looking back at me (but no fruitions). Flames are also more common now, and not just green but orange, yellow, blue and white.
The last few days I had minimal interaction with other people, which probably helped. Went out to do some shopping today and tried it at various points while waiting for various things. I was able to do it while out walking, but when I was getting food there was someone speaking very loudly right beside me and I could get the kasina, but it didn't become the lightshow. Now that i'm home again I can get to the rainbow sparks phase within a few seconds. I'm aware that this will eventually fade, enjoying it while it lasts.
It's starting to effect other sense doors. At one point I saw a very detailed landscape, it looked like a dark mountainous forest. A voice started talking to me, but I didn't recognize the language or understand what was being said. Also getting a lot of eye imagery, it looks like my own eye looking back at me (but no fruitions). Flames are also more common now, and not just green but orange, yellow, blue and white.
The last few days I had minimal interaction with other people, which probably helped. Went out to do some shopping today and tried it at various points while waiting for various things. I was able to do it while out walking, but when I was getting food there was someone speaking very loudly right beside me and I could get the kasina, but it didn't become the lightshow. Now that i'm home again I can get to the rainbow sparks phase within a few seconds. I'm aware that this will eventually fade, enjoying it while it lasts.
I should have made it more clear that I was saying that in a joking tone. It did initially weird me out a little, but it's all good. I'm doing my best to just report what's happening in as much detail as possible for as long as this continues. I know Daniel would like more "data points", here's another one. If anyone gets some benefit out of it, it's worthwhile.
Listened to the rest of the FAQ, I love how it ends on a joke about actualism. I lol'd. Time for bed.
Listened to the rest of the FAQ, I love how it ends on a joke about actualism. I lol'd. Time for bed.
Lol that deep breathing may have just been related to something else. While I was on the walk I was suddenly hit with some of the strongest nausea i've gotten yet from the chemo drugs (they doubled the dose of one of them on Wednesday). It was like someone poured a 2 litre bottle of battery acid into my stomach within a few seconds. I kept feeling weak, and like I was going to puke. I kept breathing deeply and it mostly passed before I got home. Maybe I needed a reminder that all states are impermanent, good and bad.
Played with the kasina a few times at my desk, and lying down for a while. At first the vibrations weren't apparent but then they started coming back along with the fluttering eyelids. It felt pretty close to last night, but no fruitions. I could feel some aversion to the vibrations when they get stronger, and some striving. It feels a little dark nighty but I know from experience that if I just relax and keep practising i'm liable to cycle again. Either that or I have a vivid imagination. I'll find out either way.
It feels like the kasina is matching my curiosity again. When I was interested in colors, they grew. Interested in creatures, creatures showed up. Interested in eyes, lots of eyes. Interested in 3D, it went 3D. Interested in space, space grew. Now i'm interested in the formless aspects, and it's like the kasina is going formless.
Update: I just realized that it's not that the kasina is matching my curiosity. It's more like the kasina is curious, the same curiosity as my own. It reminds me of when I saw my face and eye vividly looking at me with presence. It wasn't just the face, presence and eye that felt like me, the look in the eyes and expression seemed to mirror my own "is that me?" curious and slightly creepy feeling.
Played with the kasina a few times at my desk, and lying down for a while. At first the vibrations weren't apparent but then they started coming back along with the fluttering eyelids. It felt pretty close to last night, but no fruitions. I could feel some aversion to the vibrations when they get stronger, and some striving. It feels a little dark nighty but I know from experience that if I just relax and keep practising i'm liable to cycle again. Either that or I have a vivid imagination. I'll find out either way.
It feels like the kasina is matching my curiosity again. When I was interested in colors, they grew. Interested in creatures, creatures showed up. Interested in eyes, lots of eyes. Interested in 3D, it went 3D. Interested in space, space grew. Now i'm interested in the formless aspects, and it's like the kasina is going formless.
Update: I just realized that it's not that the kasina is matching my curiosity. It's more like the kasina is curious, the same curiosity as my own. It reminds me of when I saw my face and eye vividly looking at me with presence. It wasn't just the face, presence and eye that felt like me, the look in the eyes and expression seemed to mirror my own "is that me?" curious and slightly creepy feeling.
Thanks, I appreciate it. I'm very grateful for this community and I hope I don't come off as conceited. It's more of a desire to "make hay while the sun shines". I'm not really doing any of this, it's only when I try to DO anything that I struggle. Wishing you all the best as well. 
You don't come off as conceited at all. Sometimes I'm afraid that I do, but it's just like you said: it really isn't anyone's attainment. I'm not going to blame the universe if I'm mistaken about my assumed awakening, though, haha. Not that it wouldn't be just as agencyless, but I think I'm more likely to behave if I assume some kind of responsibility, because my assumptions, however pragmatical, are also part of the dependent origination. Just speculating, though.
Thankyou!
I'm deeply grateful for this community too. It has made my life so empty... in a good way.
Thankyou!
I'm deeply grateful for this community too. It has made my life so empty... in a good way.
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
Not that it wouldn't be just as agencyless, but I think I'm more likely to behave if I assume some kind of responsibility, because my assumptions, however pragmatical, are also part of the dependent origination. Just speculating, though.
Yeah I think it's best to take responsiblity for your actions (and thoughts) at the conventional level, while also recognizing it's all empty at the fundamental level. That said, have fun with it. But i'm just speculating too.
Sat again tonight and repeated the cycle up to the dark state twice, didn't repeat the new state from tonight. Then I got up again and had a coffee, read the MCTB2 section on formless realms to see if I could understand what that new state was, and went back to bed. I did have a hunch but wanted to wait it out. Without really meaning to it got back up to the dark state again pretty quick, things got a little dreamy and suddenly there was an unknowning moment (pretty sure it wasn't fruition). However right after that I suddenly saw a bright detailed image (it looked like a scroll or paper with writing on it) with a bright kasina behind it and then *blip* and I snapped back again. I recognized it from before so I just relaxed and waited to see if it would repeat and then the heater turned on with a click and *blip* and snapped back again, this time with a pretty strong bliss wave. That time it was noticeable that the visual field had suddenly changed after the blip, the kasina was brighter, more colorful and different. This seems to confirm the fruition thing, feel free to disagree if anyone thinks i'm overcalling. The blip felt a bit like daydreaming and then being slapped playfully in the face by the invisible man. Sudden clarity and a "what, who, where?" kind of feeling. At the risk of overcalling even more I have a feeling I know what's happening here:
The first phase of the kasina practise improved ability in 3rd and 4th jhana, and eventually brought aspects of 5th which inverted the practise from vipassana style to a more relaxed and open style. When I sit now I see an eye with whirling colors in the iris, which fades within seconds (4th). Then I focus on space and it expands and surrounds (5th). Then there's a white flickering (6th), but then I invert that by focusing on how that can also be perceived as black flickering. Focusing on the black flickering causes both the white and black flickering to fade, which leaves nothing (7th). But even nothing is something (to put it in programming terms, even NULL is a variable/value), so eventually I let go of that and relaxed enough that I got pulled into a state that I can't remember specifically, and can't say how long I was there, but know I was "in" (8th). This resulted in a very strong state of concentration that allowed me to finally relax enough to repeat fruition again. Entirely possible it's "just" vj4.j5, vj4.j6, etc .... or i'm having the most mind blowing A&P ever.
As before i'll just keep going and see if it proves this to be correct or not.
The first phase of the kasina practise improved ability in 3rd and 4th jhana, and eventually brought aspects of 5th which inverted the practise from vipassana style to a more relaxed and open style. When I sit now I see an eye with whirling colors in the iris, which fades within seconds (4th). Then I focus on space and it expands and surrounds (5th). Then there's a white flickering (6th), but then I invert that by focusing on how that can also be perceived as black flickering. Focusing on the black flickering causes both the white and black flickering to fade, which leaves nothing (7th). But even nothing is something (to put it in programming terms, even NULL is a variable/value), so eventually I let go of that and relaxed enough that I got pulled into a state that I can't remember specifically, and can't say how long I was there, but know I was "in" (8th). This resulted in a very strong state of concentration that allowed me to finally relax enough to repeat fruition again. Entirely possible it's "just" vj4.j5, vj4.j6, etc .... or i'm having the most mind blowing A&P ever.
As before i'll just keep going and see if it proves this to be correct or not.
It's interesting that some of the states that have been presenting lately require such a lack of self based striving and effort, and yet pride and conceit still come back afterwards. Part of the greed for certain states is pride (and excited anticipation of that pride) of finally experiencing them. In nothingness the slightest grasping or excitement causes it to fall apart, and yet sometimes there is pride afterwards. When it comes to the things i've been chasing after like certain forms of kasina, states, fruitions etc it's always accidental when they present. Yet pride and conceit try and take credit afterwards despite it being repeatedly, abundantly clear that I don't do any of it. I've been using the "Mara, I see you" or just noting conceit or pride etc methods, and still.... I realized that the big stupid grin on my face earlier was partly just sukkha etc, but partly pride. I'm not beating my self up about it, but it's not skillful to ignore it either.
Oh, and i've been reifying space.
Oh, and i've been reifying space.
Going through what feels like Dissolution.Dissolution.Dissolution (or Reobservation.Reobservation.Reobservation). It feels like things have changed, but also haven't changed at all.
There may be an insight in this snarky period after all, the sensations of ease, peacefulness, space, equanimity, formless realms, afterglow, etc come and go like everything else. I was aware of the "golden chains", but this makes it clearer.
Edit: Removed silly cartoon, doesn't seem appropriate, I generally try not to swear here.
There may be an insight in this snarky period after all, the sensations of ease, peacefulness, space, equanimity, formless realms, afterglow, etc come and go like everything else. I was aware of the "golden chains", but this makes it clearer.
Edit: Removed silly cartoon, doesn't seem appropriate, I generally try not to swear here.
This retreat basically started on the 2nd with the eye injection and resulting colors which eventually became a kasina. It's been a little over 20 days now and it feels like it's done, though practise will continue. I seem to have achieved the goals I set early on in the retreat, and the car seems to do what a car should. That said, i'm going to give it a year and a day to see if the car keeps puttering along.
Thanks to everyone who helped out before and during this retreat. Much metta to all, i'm going to relax for a bit and integrate all this.
Thanks to everyone who helped out before and during this retreat. Much metta to all, i'm going to relax for a bit and integrate all this.
It was useful to do the log during the retreat, and hopefully it will be of some benefit now that it's done. Thanks again for your help, you struck a good balance between being supportive when needed, and just leaving me to do the practise when things went smoothly. Much appreciated.
I'm wondering if i'm using the jhana notation correctly in some cases. Sometimes Nothing is a harder state (usually when doing corpse pose), in which case I describe it as j7 since it's more of a deeper samatha version. Usually however it's more of a softer vipassana version in which I investigate more, where i've been calling it vj7. When looking through MCTB and some other sources the other day I noticed that they only recognize vj1 through vj4 (with the latter lining up with the equanimity nana) and don't mention formless vipassana jhanas. Is what i've been describing as vj7 actually vj4.j7? Not sure if it matters too much since both are versions of a similar state, but i'd like to use the terminology correctly. There are enough maps and notation systems out there without creating yet another one.
One of the reasons I ask this is that last night when the white/black eye was pulsing (transition to j7 or vj4.j7) it started turning into the "worlds" again where I could see people moving about within the kasina. As it pulsed the scenes would change and eventually the entire visual field was full of what looked like people interacting within an environment. It looked like the kasina was an eye shaped TV screen displaying black and white infared images where the people were bright and the environment was more dark. When it went full visual field it was similar, but constantly morphing and changing. I could see the people waving their arms and gesticulating at each other, walking, running etc but not enough detail to see who they were or what the environment they were in was. It went from being transition to Nothing, to more of a j4 style vivid environment, which suggested it's more likely to be vj4.j7 than j7. It was a little strange watching the pulsing eye turning into people and places. Usually it leads to the absence of visual forms, not proliferation of them. Probably overthinking this lol, but it's something I wondered about during the retreat as well.
One of the reasons I ask this is that last night when the white/black eye was pulsing (transition to j7 or vj4.j7) it started turning into the "worlds" again where I could see people moving about within the kasina. As it pulsed the scenes would change and eventually the entire visual field was full of what looked like people interacting within an environment. It looked like the kasina was an eye shaped TV screen displaying black and white infared images where the people were bright and the environment was more dark. When it went full visual field it was similar, but constantly morphing and changing. I could see the people waving their arms and gesticulating at each other, walking, running etc but not enough detail to see who they were or what the environment they were in was. It went from being transition to Nothing, to more of a j4 style vivid environment, which suggested it's more likely to be vj4.j7 than j7. It was a little strange watching the pulsing eye turning into people and places. Usually it leads to the absence of visual forms, not proliferation of them. Probably overthinking this lol, but it's something I wondered about during the retreat as well.
Very nice Lars. Such a unique approach and I admit that I was really uncertain that you would get any traction with this approach, but it really does seem like SE and review. Congratulations. Still wait a year and a day of course before claiming anything, because I'm not the toughest judge of people progress.
For what it's worth, my main lingering question is "How much is Lars noticing things like urges, emotions, and thoughts? All he reports are sensations and visual effects."
Any thoughts on what you might focus on next? Refining jhana? Or other visualizations? Any other techniques or theories that you are interested in?
For what it's worth, my main lingering question is "How much is Lars noticing things like urges, emotions, and thoughts? All he reports are sensations and visual effects."
Any thoughts on what you might focus on next? Refining jhana? Or other visualizations? Any other techniques or theories that you are interested in?
Thanks for the suggestion, i'll just keep alternating between vipassana and samatha jhanas and see what happens as they go deeper. I did some more reading today on the vipassana jhanas and apparently I misunderstood something i'd read earlier. The current version of MCTB2 lists 7 vipassana jhanas with 8th being basically beyond investigation, so it's not considered a vipassana jhana. This seems to match my experience so i'm a little less confused lol. I should really just go buy a physical copy so I can refer to it more easily.
As for rewiring, i'm interested as well. Even prior A&P events brought noticeable changes. One thing i'm noticing now is that after learning a few things i'm realizing how much I don't know, similar to how I realized prior to the retreat that I didn't actually know diddly-squat about kasina practise. It's almost like there's something to that whole beginner mind thing.
As for rewiring, i'm interested as well. Even prior A&P events brought noticeable changes. One thing i'm noticing now is that after learning a few things i'm realizing how much I don't know, similar to how I realized prior to the retreat that I didn't actually know diddly-squat about kasina practise. It's almost like there's something to that whole beginner mind thing.
Consciousness can be also thought of as overlay that receives stimuli from other overlays. It acts as some sort of broadcast system inside your body.
Sounds similar to the way Culadasa describes it. I'll agree it can be difficult to let go of old overlays once they've become established, though not impossible. My current interest is building concentration and using that for insight practise. I'm definitely not against siddhis and that sort of thing, but it's not my priority at the moment, if they happen they happen.
You remind me of someone who used to post here (and of reading the Enuma Elish in my teens).
Practicing siddhis is the sllippery slope of insanity...
Thankfully upon enlightenment both sanity and insanity are transcendened so there is nothing left to loose ;)
Real siddhis are enabled by experiences of supermundane path. There are many of these and have various powers. I set one of such experiences, the one that was culmination of my bodhicitta awakening idea and by far my favourite one, as my soul signatiure and password.
I like these ancient belief systems because they do not assume any infinities or permanence of title of supreme God. Pretty much any descendant of any god can contend for this title. This is also the mind set people had in the times of Buddha so perhaps more fitting to understand Buddhism as a whole.
BTW. If I was active on DhO in the past I must have been more angry or something
Thankfully upon enlightenment both sanity and insanity are transcendened so there is nothing left to loose ;)
Real siddhis are enabled by experiences of supermundane path. There are many of these and have various powers. I set one of such experiences, the one that was culmination of my bodhicitta awakening idea and by far my favourite one, as my soul signatiure and password.
I like these ancient belief systems because they do not assume any infinities or permanence of title of supreme God. Pretty much any descendant of any god can contend for this title. This is also the mind set people had in the times of Buddha so perhaps more fitting to understand Buddhism as a whole.
BTW. If I was active on DhO in the past I must have been more angry or something
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
It is insights that lead to fruitions, isn't it?
This seems like a path versus fruition thing. Repeating them doesn't seem to be the same thing as the initial path/cessation that allows for repeating them. In the same ballpark, but not strictly the same, otherwise fruitions would also cause paths wouldn't they? Some people flicker their eyelids to induce fruitions, and while technically that's about impermanence and the three doors it's not quite the same as the initial insight into impermanence (or the other characteristics) that causes cessation. I'm no expert on this so if i'm incorrect don't hesitate to say so.
Maybe I should have phrased my question like this: "I'm wondering if you meant this as a method for inducing fruitions (merging/falling into the kasina) or as a way to induce cessation/path?"
Lars:
Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö:
It is insights that lead to fruitions, isn't it?
This seems like a path versus fruition thing. Repeating them doesn't seem to be the same thing as the initial path/cessation that allows for repeating them. In the same ballpark, but not strictly the same, otherwise fruitions would also cause paths wouldn't they? Some people flicker their eyelids to induce fruitions, and while technically that's about impermanence and the three doors it's not quite the same as the initial insight into impermanence (or the other characteristics) that causes cessation. I'm no expert on this so if i'm incorrect don't hesitate to say so.
Maybe I should have phrased my question like this: "I'm wondering if you meant this as a method for inducing fruitions (merging/falling into the kasina) or as a way to induce cessation/path?"
So usually I'm all for intellectual analysis, to the disappointment of some ...
. But in this case I'd say just wait to you get super high concentration and try it out. Talking about it in advance is probably not all that useful.
curious:
So usually I'm all for intellectual analysis, to the disappointment of some ...
. But in this case I'd say just wait to you get super high concentration and try it out. Talking about it in advance is probably not all that useful.I had a feeling your response would be something along those lines, and I don't disagree. I'm posting way more than usual which is classic desire for deliverance and reobs, and mind feels stirred up, which is generally not fruitful <insert laugh track here>. I'll likely be doing another retreat within the next few weeks so i'll wait until then and give it a try. Thanks!
No offense, but i'd prefer to just get back to the practise versus discussing the finer points of fruitions or cessations or mimics. Like Malcolm said, better to just do it versus talking about it. The answers will reveal themselves naturally anyhow. I hope this doesn't sound snarky, I don't intend it to come off that way.
It just occurred to me that recent practise answered a question that I asked during the retreat which was essentially "what's the difference between getting into jhana through attending to the kasina versus attending to the jhanic factors?". When repeating "peaceful, peaceful" after getting into 7th via the kasina, it basically switches gears from vipassana jhana to samatha jhana. Doing so causes it to become much more of a hard jhana versus soft (and harder jhana had been difficult to ease into previously). It's cool that you can use more vipassana style techniques to reach a certain jhana and then "convert" it to samatha by shifting attention (and vice versa). I think I knew this at some level but it's clearer now.
While reading some texts tonight I started to feel like I was in jhana so I closed my eyes. Usually at the beginning of a sit there's a quick flash of the A&P phase of the kasina, followed by dissolution etc up to EQ. This time when I closed my eyes it was already somewhere in the DN phase doing the swirling purple kasina. I seem to recall someone else mentioning something similar in another thread. It's interesting that just reading dhamma texts can give it a nudge in that direction (and to verify this using the kasina phases). Usually it jumps ahead when I sit for a while attending to the kasina, get distracted for a bit in 4th territory, recognize that and drop the distraction, and the kasina re-appears already at the 6th to 7th transition. Once in a while this also happens outside of meditation, but not as common.
It just occurred to me that recent practise answered a question that I asked during the retreat which was essentially "what's the difference between getting into jhana through attending to the kasina versus attending to the jhanic factors?". When repeating "peaceful, peaceful" after getting into 7th via the kasina, it basically switches gears from vipassana jhana to samatha jhana. Doing so causes it to become much more of a hard jhana versus soft (and harder jhana had been difficult to ease into previously). It's cool that you can use more vipassana style techniques to reach a certain jhana and then "convert" it to samatha by shifting attention (and vice versa). I think I knew this at some level but it's clearer now.
While reading some texts tonight I started to feel like I was in jhana so I closed my eyes. Usually at the beginning of a sit there's a quick flash of the A&P phase of the kasina, followed by dissolution etc up to EQ. This time when I closed my eyes it was already somewhere in the DN phase doing the swirling purple kasina. I seem to recall someone else mentioning something similar in another thread. It's interesting that just reading dhamma texts can give it a nudge in that direction (and to verify this using the kasina phases). Usually it jumps ahead when I sit for a while attending to the kasina, get distracted for a bit in 4th territory, recognize that and drop the distraction, and the kasina re-appears already at the 6th to 7th transition. Once in a while this also happens outside of meditation, but not as common.
No offense taken. That sounds like a very wise decision. Best of luck with your practice! And it doesn't sound snarky at all.
That sounds like a very wise decision. Best of luck with your practice! And it doesn't sound snarky at all.
After I posted last night I decided to do a short sit before bed. After a few minutes restlessness set in, but I kept going and it turned into a 1.5 hour sit. The intensity of the kasina was crazy toward the end, I don't even remember what I saw but it was similar to the vivid phase of the kasina retreat. (Update: I now remember there was more of that "people in an environment" thing, and this time instead of being solid white they were detailed and I could see their clothes and faces). I went to bed to sleep but ended up doing corpse pose for another 1.5 hours. The kasina (which as usual looks like my eye) at one point turned on an angle and seemed to be looking down and to the left. A golden smoky beam of light shone out of the eye and created very detailed visual forms that were 3D and translucent, like a 3D projector or hologram system. Then it just went crazy again and the full visual field filled with complex 3D imagery. At one point it was intense enough that I opened my eyes and it just continued overlaid on the ceiling of my apartment (it looked like a mass of tentacles writhing around). The funny part was I didn't really intend to open my eyes and it took a few seconds for me to realize that my eyes were open and yet I was still seeing the visuals. There was also a pulsing of white light in the visual field after the forms faded. I almost got up to post in this log but decided to try and sleep. It was difficult to fall asleep, I kept falling into waking dreams, coming out of them, falling back in, but not really falling asleep. Eventually I did sleep for about 5 hours. In a way I wish i'd gotten up to log in more detail, but the content doesn't really matter.
After the retreat I didn't do much extended sitting, just enough to maintain concentration and the kasina. I'm a little surprised how quickly it escalated after just one evening of longer sits. I have a feeling i'm back in early EQ again, which is amusing because i'd intended to do a retreat in a few weeks, I may be doing it sooner. It's almost like i'm not in control of this.
After the retreat I didn't do much extended sitting, just enough to maintain concentration and the kasina. I'm a little surprised how quickly it escalated after just one evening of longer sits. I have a feeling i'm back in early EQ again, which is amusing because i'd intended to do a retreat in a few weeks, I may be doing it sooner. It's almost like i'm not in control of this.
Thanks, I try not to force anything too much but i'll try the swapping thing again when it seems appropriate.
Just to make shargrol happy, when I was considering whether that actually was past life stuff I felt confusion, nervousness, striving, questioning, fear, excitement and a few others in addition to physical tension (particularily in the neck) and mildly shaky hands.
Just to make shargrol happy, when I was considering whether that actually was past life stuff I felt confusion, nervousness, striving, questioning, fear, excitement and a few others in addition to physical tension (particularily in the neck) and mildly shaky hands.
Lars:
Thanks, I try not to force anything too much but i'll try the swapping thing again when it seems appropriate.
Just to make shargrol happy, when I was considering whether that actually was past life stuff I felt confusion, nervousness, striving, questioning, fear, excitement and a few others in addition to physical tension (particularily in the neck) and mildly shaky hands.
Just to make shargrol happy, when I was considering whether that actually was past life stuff I felt confusion, nervousness, striving, questioning, fear, excitement and a few others in addition to physical tension (particularily in the neck) and mildly shaky hands.
Definitely worth keeping Shargrol happy! He really knows his stuff.
Don't forget to note "past lives thoughts"
shargrol:
Don't forget to note "past lives thoughts"
Lol, my noting vocabulary has been expanding a bit lately, adding a new one to the pile.
Sat again last night for an hour or so, i'll admit the positive feedback gave me a little rush of pride, which not surprisingly then turned to dukkha when I wanted to sit, but some part of me wanted to bask in the pride instead. During the sit the kasina stuff was surprisingly muted, as if it was already moving into the subtle phase. Not going to make any assumptions based on one sit though.
During the sit there was one thing that was very vivid, after sitting in nothing for a while a bright gold "ingot" appeared at the top of the visual field. It looked like it was glowing and as I watched it began to rise slowly above my head until it went out of view (though I could see the glow). It was as if my view tilted a little so I could watch it going up, it seemed to go a few feet above my head. Then it came back down until visible again and turned silver, seemed to turn into some sort of symbol and then faded. When I had a kundalini opening a couple years ago I saw what looked like the crown burning with golden fire, this reminded me of that even though i'm not experiencing any significant energetic stuff at the moment.
I'm going to continue practise at current levels for a bit as I have some mundane stuff getting in the way of a retreat right now, but I should be able to start another home retreat around March 5th. I'll also possibly be getting another eye injection on that day so it might boost the kasina again, I find it funny that to some degree i'm looking forward to an injection.