Author: Dan_K
Forum: Practical Dharma

Hello everyone,
First I must attempt to express my starry-eyed gratitude to Mr. Ingram for his book, as well as the moderators and everyone else here. Muchos gracias.

I began paying attention to sensations of intimacy, as suggested somewhere in “Mastering…” I take note of any sense of immediacy or immersion. My intention is to become alert to the presence or absence of direct identification in the most specific, precise manner. What I have noticed, initially, is that the sensation of intimacy most often involves an overlap of the sensations of the front of my face (and sometimes a mental image of it), the mental dialogue, and a proximity which supercedes most other information. There is also a sentimental aspect to the arrangement. This all feels very solid until I begin to contrast the mental/physical aspects. It is especially interesting to note the contrast when thoughts lack the sense of intimacy, and instead appear distant and robotic. Because the object is so immediate and ‘personal’ and therefore overlooked, I most often only become privy to the process as it begins to pass away, or as an after-image. Luckily, sometimes it persists long enough to get a more clear picture and even see it flicker. I hope to isolate the pure sense of intimacy apart from the objects it commonly arises with and penetrate it. Any thoughts/advice?

Dan

I'd suggest remaining open to the possibility that this 'pure sense' may not exist apart from the sensations that at present appear to 'accompany' it... If you do locate it, then please tell us more! If not, I wouldn't be too surprised, because how could it manifest except as a sensation, and if it's a sensation how can it be 'apart' from whatever it arises with?

Author: Dan_K

Duncan, thank you for your comment, btw love your site. I appreciate what you are saying, and I suppose that phrasing my goal as ‘untangling’or ‘dissecting’ the sense of intimacy might be better, as I am not expecting a standalone experience of ‘me,’ simply a dichotomy of perspective.

Notes: There is a wide spectrum of intensity concerning the directness and size of intimate presence. Sometimes feels like I’m staring at my ‘self.’ Intimacy often arises with a strong jerkiness that is felt in the throat (“choking-up”), and fluttering of eyes. Closed-eye visual field may shake. Intimacy can disappear for a couple solid minutes. Minute sensations of heat and light arise with it.

The sense of presence is the difference between whether I am immersed in experience or not.

Hi Dan!

Thanks for the website compliment!

Have you had any fruitions so far? What I think you're talking about is grasped and resolved at the point of fruition, although (unfortunately) in an indescribable way. And the understanding of it doesn't fully remain afterwards (not until you're an arahat, I suppose...) But basically, all this 'immediate' vs. 'distant', 'over here' vs. 'over there' stuff suddenly is completely seen through...

My own experience of working with what I think you're talking about is that it can manifest in any sensation whatsoever. As far as I can tell (so far) this is because it arises from 'my' relationship to the sensations, rather than from those sensations itself...

Hope this helps and makes sense... There are other people here who will have something clearer to add, I'm sure! But it sounds like you're onto something really exciting and promising!

Duncan.

Author: Dan_K

I have not yet had fruition, which is my only real goal right now. I have been fortunately able to do noting practice for 4-6 hours per day for the past week, (and ~1 per day in the preceding months) and I have a 5 day retreat coming up in a few days. I experienced a lot of Dark Night symptoms since the beginning of this year, which I think are beginning to level off. I am attempting to investigate the more subtle sensations that imply observer-ship, such as inquiry, intention, attention, and the like. Immersion is a tricky business…I have felt rather ‘trapped’ in my mind for a while, and I have found that the sense of intimacy arises most significantly with my thoughts. I suppose in Buddhist lingo this would be called attachment. The investment in, essentially, the “sound of my own voice,” especially as the coordinator of meditation and inquiry, I suspect to be what is holding back the fruition that I so desperately seek. Noting practice has allowed me to see a more inclusive picture of my false-self, which has become a much more of spiritually driven false-self. I think I inadvertantly reinforced the ‘split’ by simply denying the sense of intimacy.

Dan

Hi Dan,

It sounds like you've been doing some solid practice. One thing I would offer is to be careful that when you say you've "experienced a lot of Dark Night symptoms" you are keeping in mind that the 3 characteristics--which precedes the dark night--has very similar characteristics. This is important when using the maps, as it's definitely possible to think you've passed through the dark night and then had a fruition, when in fact you may have gone through the 3 characteristics and crossed the A&P (pseudo-nirvana). This would be especially useful to keep in mind as you go into retreat. Questions I would ask are, what kind of symptoms were you experiencing? What kind of insights were associated with them? What was noting practice like, etc? (You don't have to answer them here, I just wanted to throw them out there.)

When you mention energetic jerkings, minute heat and light, etc, that sounds much more, to me, like the 3 characteristics and A&P. Other 3 characteristic patterns are tight parts in the body (like back, jaw, neck, or forehead--on one side or both in one of these areas), heat and other energetic movements (though as mentioned elsewhere on the DhO these movements can happen later, but are much more a hallmark of the earlier 3 characteristics), irritation (much like the dark night) and a sense of one's perception of the 3 characteristics speeding up.

Best of luck on your upcoming retreat. Practice well and please share anything you learn here.

Author: Dan_K

Hi Vince, and everyone else

I got back from retreat (Adyashanti) with a few insights that I have found useful, thought not permanent (however I am inspired to maintain a practice that fascilitates them.)

Related to my original question about sensations of intimacy, or what I might now call familiarity and ownership, I found that those sensations were temporarily suspended at the height of the retreat and in the afterglow. We we doing choiceless awareness on the retreat, and I paid special attention to the sense of grasping, and allowing sinking into stillness. On the last night, I found formed reality to be dreamlike and distant, having sunk to a new level of silence (for me). The silence came to ‘meatier’ more palpable levels as my attention sank towards ‘what’s looking.’ There were memorable hums and rings, a sense of proximity, and minimal sensations that imply ‘self.’ I wonder if you would call this a formless realm, even though I was not concentrating explicitly. After the retreat I learned an interesting lesson about intimacy when I went out into public and noticed that my usual, often unconscious, judgement of/projection onto others had been suspended, allowing them to appear more spontaneous and natural. I was accepting of all sorts of sensations, even my own faults were okay. The next day in meditation I experienced an incredibly beautiful rapture with much crying, ‘ananda’ etc. I understand, slightly more, what Duncan says about intimacy arising only with sensations.

A number of people that I have read about or met have had fruitions through sinking awareness, surrendering into silence, looking at what’s looking, etc. and I feel like I got close, atleast closer. Does anyone have any advice about success with this sort of practice? (con't)

Author: Dan_K

I realized that I should not personally attempt to fit my progress onto the map of insight due to my own confusion. The points Vince made above about the Three Characteristics could certainly be the case for me. In particular, the names of the Dark Night nanas seemed appropriate for what I was going through. However, I also noticed that my attention was continually drawn toward to background, like in restaurants I would hear coversations across the room over someone at my own table, which seems like something I read in “Mastering…” about the Dark Night, and I also perceive vibrations consistantly. So, who knows?

I am planning on doing the November retreat at Tathagata Center (I know, completely different than Adyashanti). Anyone else?

Vince, this is a question I have for you: what is the practical impact of the difference between the late first vipassana jhana and the third vipassana jhana? Especially in light of many people crossing into Dark Night territory unwittingly and then needing to work through it all again? I mean if you are having a bad time in the third nana, and then having a bad time in the seventh, I imagine it's going to be the difference between having alot of neck pain and being in a bad mood, or having a bad mood on account of that awful body-parts-falling-off feeling.

From my own experience and what I've been advised to some extent to get out of the second vipassana jhana a meditator needs to let his single-pointedness drop (i think the second vipassan jhana material has a way of being a subtle trap, since in a way it's possible to keep doing the same thing and get stuck) and expand into a broader awareness, analogous to what would happen with shamatha practice--or am I just making stuff up on this?

Hi Nathan,

Thanks for the questions. I'll give a crack at answering them, though I'm not sure how satisfactory my answers will be (weird vipassana pun intended). ;)

I think the practical difference has a lot to do with effort, though it both cases continuing to practice and learning via one's mistakes seems to be the best route. In my experience one can really power through the 3rd nana despite the fact that it is fairly unpleasant, whereas in the dark night trying to "power through", though possible, can actually make attention to tight. The dukkha nanas are all about progressively opening, or broadening one's attention, to include the sense of the background and observer. For me that usually involves a slightly lighter touch.

The other practical difference, when trying to make assessments of progress, is to not think you've gotten 1st path, when in fact you've crossed the A&P, and then not knowing you are in the dark night, trying to solidify that as an enlightened condition... That happens enough w/o the maps, but the maps and the careful distinctions between these various phases are really meant to help us avoid these sticky obstacles.

I'm not really sure about the suggestions you've received regarding the 2nd vipassana jhana (or what I assume you're meaning as the A&P). I've always found that just by practicing consistently (especially after getting stream-entry) that I just cross the A&P and the dark night opens up, at which point awareness broadens of it's own accord. I suspect there are traps during the A&P, but I don't think I've ever gotten triped up enough during this phase to have to figure out my way out of it. For me the dark night & equanimity were much trickier.

Thanks Vince, that helps clear up things for me. I hold a princible of wariness with regards to deciding about my own progress closer than I hold any map. Than. Bhikkhu talks about being humble in "Jhana without Numbers", that it's best to treat the labels you use like sticky notes you can remove and place elsewhere, rather than milestones

I think the "trap" I'm referring to--this is just a theory, and tangential--has to do with the psychophysical kundalini crap . I feel like I have to make a conscious effort to avoid getting into it, otherwise, despite my intent it tends to become an ends in itself, i.e., I end up unwittingly doing kundalini exercises rather than investigation. This is likely idiosyncratic, and there's a subtelty in there I don't have enough experience to sort out

Back on topic:
@Dan K--I can relate to having attention drawn into the background during conversations, etc., but in my own case, I don't think i'd attribute it to 3rd/4th vipassana jhana so much as conditional (i.e., shamatha) equanimity, the dropping of single-pointedness for mindfulness. It's still weird, though. Likewise I've also had crying with feelings of "ananda" (the exact word I thought of last it happened), though I tend to think that is just some emotional shit working out via the concentration

Hi Nathan,
You wrote about "crying with feelings of 'ananda' [bliss]". Is this emotional crying or simple weeping? The weeping can be a purification sympton, if you are not distraught. If you are distraught, emotionally invovled, then please describe how (if?) this is also somehow blissful. In my experience (pre-Zen) the only time that tears, emotionality and bliss occur at the same time is during bhakti [devotion] practices.

Gozen

it was simple weeping. the last time it occured i had a very strong mind-state of happiness. i've also experience weeping during metta but then there is a strong element of jhana and positive emotionality so I understand the reference to bhakti

i don't want to hijack the thread though, i'd be interested to hear more from Dan K re: the feeling of awareness outside the centerpoint

Author: Dan_K

=)

The sense is of sinking, or falling away from sensory input. The mouth becomes dry, cottonmouthy, even though saliva is present. Sound becomes panoramic, hypersensitive, clear, with a fullness that is difficult to describe, ‘round’ seems like a good word. There is pressure, sometimes uncomfortable, in the ears. There arises a cool breeze felt on the face that is not environmentally related. Lately I have felt energetic throbbing in the dimple of my chin when I ‘do’ this, as well as less frequent pulses around the temples.The body is extremely warm and relaxed and almost falls asleep. It becomes rigid, but not tight. The back is pretty straight, but sometimes the head slumps a little. There is liberal sweating, and general fuzziness.
The silence is like an absence that consumes sensations. As it deepens it becomes chunkier, and a sense of density and spaciousness appears ‘between’ sensory objects. Like a gap, yet with immediacy and thickness. It all comes about mostly through a lack of interest towards the senses, and an emphasis on ‘what’s looking.’At some point, sensations lose their differentiation, and attention is drawn inward, usually suddenly. While it has qualities of relaxation and pleasantness, there is a ‘tug of war,’ a push and pull, between outer and inner, which becomes annoying. At some points there is an intense desire to stop sitting. The attitude is of effortlessness, not trying to get anywhere, being open to what arises, etc.

Hi Dan_K,
You wrote in your past posting about:

"The sense is of sinking, or falling away from sensory input. … It all comes about mostly through a lack of interest towards the senses, and an emphasis on ‘what’s looking. … The attitude is of effortlessness, not trying to get anywhere, being open to what arises, etc."

And in your original posting that started this thread you wrote:

"It is especially interesting to note the contrast when thoughts lack the sense of intimacy, and instead appear distant and robotic. .. I hope to isolate the pure sense of intimacy apart from the objects it commonly arises with and penetrate it."

What you seem to be describing here is a growing identification with (in your words) "what's looking" (or in my preferred terminology 'who's looking' – but the word choice here is somewhat arbitrary). This contrasts with your former, natural tendency to identify with the objects of attention rather than the source of attention itself (whatever or whoever that is in reality). The effortlessness and openness of what you are engaged in is characteristic of the method of inquiry, as distinguished from the development of the concentration states. Your thoughts seem distant and robotic because, in fact, most thinking is automatic; the brain generates thoughts without our conscious intention (in most cases).

If you continue along the lines that you have already described – which I would encourage you to do – then your next challenge will be to unpack the dualistic meaning behind your stated intention "to isolate the pure sense of intimacy apart from the objects it commonly arises with and penetrate it."

What do I mean by this?
[HINT: How can something be both intimate and isolated at the same time? If that something can truly be isolated, then what could be doing the penetration of it?]

Gozen