Forum: Maps of Meditation

The maps are a good help to go the way but you need a lot of faith to follow it. For me I need an

modern understanding to get the needable faith because I am very sceptical and I want know what

will happen with me too.

I am a "Buddhist" because I could find there a description of some of my experiences (A&P-Event).

Especially in the Theravada-Abhidhamma I could find some good explanations. Unfortunately the

Abhidamma is full of antiquated things.

Therefore I tried to make an easy new model what the parts of the maps are and what will happen

with you if you are enlightenment and what not. Maybe it can help someone.

First an comparison for the A&P-Event.
Not only men have an A&P-Event. Your Computer has an "A&P-Event" too.
If you look on the Screen you see some Windows. These Windows result from software. if you rip

these Programs you come to the operating system, then the basic input/output system (BIOS) and then

the "A&P-Event" happens. In the computer it is an Stream of 1 and 0 (10000100, 10000100 etc.). If

you see this. There are no static windows. It seem that there is an chaotic stream of data (but it

is not chaotic, the stream is interdependent). The "ultimate reality" (I don' t liken this calling)

of a computer is this stream. The "concepts" are made of software. This software interprets the

stream (build the necessary abtstraction layers) and we will get the nice windows.

Are the windows real? The windows are an interpretation of the interdependent stream.

If you want to get the A&P-Event by yourself, you have to rip the abstraction layers (concepts). Then you come to the experience of the stream of your base data.

There are many ways to get it. I prefer the Mahasi way. Normally your mind has an reading cycle (sense door process) and then some interpretation-cycles (following mind door processes). With the quick labeling you try to prevent the interpretation-cycles. You fix your mind on the origin of the experience.

The A&P-Event exist of nothing more than of not interpreted base data. May be a right hit on your head can make this experience happen.

If you want know how your interpretation software works (in Buddhism the main dhamma for this is called sañña) look at the clouds. You can see that sañña tries to identify something. Sañña compares unknown pattern with known pattern. May be you will see an animal or a face. This is the figuration pressure in your mind and you have to learn to control it to get the A&P-Event.

Why do so? (First, I think to get enlightenment is only an option. If you are happy etc. You don't need to do it)

Your basic concepts or (software) was build as you was born. A new born Baby get the A&P-Event already. The baby need to sort the basic data stream and builds basic concepts. The I-Concept too. Later, on this basic concepts he build of the basic data stream the hole experienced world. But the Baby has no knowledge. That is why the child unfortunately will make software that will lead to suffering too.

If you go with an adult mind back to this state, you will interpret your experience in an other way. This will automatically correct some errors in your early built software. all suffering depend on this "software-errors" will vanish but nothing more.

(Sorry for my bad English)
Paticca

Hi Paticca,

To me, the maps and models are a motivation for practice first: to see if what they describe is really there.

They are also a great consolation: I'm not the only one having these kinds of experiences, I'm not alone, I need not be bewildered, there is the possibility of guidance.

For me, faith has got very little to do with it - if the maps are bogus, I'm no worse off than before, if they hold true, so much the better.

What they are not, to me at least, is a cookie-cutter for reality to fit into. If my opinions about reality are off the mark, well, I can't make reality responsible for not accomodating my opinions.

BTW, a computer's lowest level of 1's and 0's is what it is only because our convention. Underneath the 1's and 0's there are physical phenomena which, within certain bounds, exhibit certain logic traits: but it is our, the observer's choice to understand it so (a voltage in a memory cell and a magnetic moment on a disk have little in common, yet both mean "1" or "0" TO US). Thus, the 1's and 0's are not fundamentally different from the pictures on the screen, which are meaningful only because we give them meaning. So the A&P "of a computer" really is still the A&P of the person thinking about computers, observing them.

Cheers,
Florian

Hi Florian,

> They are also a great consolation: I'm not the only one having these kinds of experiences,
> I'm not alone,...

Yes it is. I found the map 15 years after the experience of the A&P-Event. I thought I was going mad.


> For me, faith has got very little to do with it -
> if the maps are bogus, I'm no worse off than
> before, if they hold true, so much the better.

To me it is not the same because I lost my "innocence". To me it is a dangerous territory and if I go there again I need a good understanding which builds a stable base which I can trust.


> What they are not, to me at least, is a cookie-cutter for reality to fit into.

The maps are models and all models have their weakness. sometimes one need more than one model to explain something (e. g. different models of atoms etc.)


> BTW, a computer's lowest level of 1's and 0's is what ...

It is only a comparison to help to get a better understanding. To me it is useful because with it I don't enter a total unknown territory. I can understand why it happens and this gives me more confidence.

ciao
Paticca