Life's curious path has led me here (on the way to where?)

[Cabs]

You know, it's becoming more clear to me that the way this is currently playing out is that I am throwing you concepts in response to questions and you are just systematically burning them up.

I can see that the concepts I am conjuring are almost always something that I've stumbled across during my seeking journey - and although they seem relevant to the question, and I genuinely start to see how they could be construed as the answer, your response always seems to just squish it with the concept-crushing hammer.

I am frequently experiencing mixed feelings of dismay and relief. Dismay stemming from some feeling that I should be able to understand all this, and disappointment that I'm stupid or ignorant for not getting it, and relief stemming from being deep-down glad that the concepts I am putting forward are not correct, because some part of me doesn't fully resonate with it.

I am acknowledging the importance of this process however, because it is essentially burning through unhelpful beliefs I've held, or have been trying to hold.

Concepts won't penetrate the fog. Word games are my only tool in the toolkit at the moment, but they are useless here.

Without conceptualizing or thinking, what is present with a thought to notice it? Is there something, or is there only the thought? We have no idea what a thought is. All models are useless. Without reference to ANYTHING other than the thought, is there anything but the thought? Is there location, orientation, dimension, top/bottom, large/small, good/bad, near/far? With sound, is there anything but the sound? Where is the witness? Where is the 'seat', the universe or everything or anything?

In my mind, this question presumes there is a thought to be referenced to, albeit that it can't be referenced to anything else. I agree that without any other reference the thought has no location, orientation, etc. But I get stuck when considering how to even acknowledge thoughts existence itself without any reference? As with any other - sound, sight, taste, physical sensation, etc. I'm stuck on how any of these things can be referenced to at all. How are they even distinguishable as varied from one another? How is a thought different from a sound or a sight, etc? Are there still characteristics discerning them from one another? How are those distinguishing characteristics even processed?

[davjak]

I am frequently experiencing mixed feelings of dismay and relief.

There is an inherent discomfort in living from a false foundation, and relief comes as the knots start to untangle themselves.

Dismay stemming from some feeling that I should be able to understand all this,

That there is a you who should be able to understand anything is the false foundation. You = presence. From one point of view, everything is conspiring to confirm this. Even the 'holiest', rarefied spiritual teachings want to convince that 'you' are 'what doesn't come and go' or the 'ground of being'. That's the fog.

I'm stupid or ignorant for not getting it

More thoughts and sensations taken as a false sense of presence, shaping an identity that is never found, touched, known, contacted. Even the sense to be confused is 'I am confused', more identifying. The sense that there is something other than what is here/now and that this something is what's needed is also an energetic signature of 'me'. It's all saying I am here, and something's off. It could be better, so I need, and I want. I have to become.

Presence is to be before and after. I am here awaiting the arrival of what happens, and I am what consumes, holds and stores what seems to happen, digesting it so that I become improved ad infinitum. Presence is to be after, to reflect back upon what has come in. None of this is real. It's the dream of separation, I am. This exchange point or center point is not there.

and relief stemming from being deep-down glad that the concepts I am putting forward are not correct

Yes

In my mind, this question presumes there is a thought to be referenced to, albeit that it can't be referenced to anything else.

Referencing is what does not happen. Nothing refers to anything else. There is nothing that refers. When there is the seen, heard, touched, tasted, smelled and cognized, what is it like without the concept of relation to it? Nothing is in relation to anything else. There is only what seems to be apparent. Nothing is in relation to it. It was just more fabricated sense of what is happening.

I agree that without any other reference the thought has no location, orientation, etc. But I get stuck when considering how to even acknowledge thoughts

Nothing can acknowledge anything else. You don't need to and cannot acknowledge anything. What is left when there is no you acknowledging anything? There is exactly what seems to be without a false sense of relation to it. The thing that would be in relation to it is not there. It was a dream.

How is a thought different from a sound or a sight, etc? Are there still characteristics discerning them from one another? How are those distinguishing characteristics even processed?

How does anything happen? Are you there making ANYTHING happen?
'Shifting attention' is pretty subtle stuff. Is a presence there making it happen?

[Cabs]

That there is a you who should be able to understand anything is the false foundation. You = presence. From one point of view, everything is conspiring to confirm this. Even the 'holiest', rarefied spiritual teachings want to convince that 'you' are 'what doesn't come and go' or the 'ground of being'. That's the fog.

This is clear - even just the nature of the biological organism at this point in evolution seems to produce this effect of conspiring against me.

More thoughts and sensations taken as a false sense of presence, shaping an identity that is never found, touched, known, contacted. Even the sense to be confused is 'I am confused', more identifying.

While I understand this, I need help seeing it. When I take a comment such as this and attempt to notice it, it feels that I am looking through a conceptual lens. When I re-read what I just wrote, I can see the problem being "me" interpreting at the comment, followed by "me" attempting to notice it. But I'm unsure how to utilise that information to break free. It seems that utilising the information immediately converts it into a concept, therefore contradicting it's purpose.

Presence is to be before and after. I am here awaiting the arrival of what happens, and I am what consumes, holds and stores what seems to happen, digesting it so that I become improved ad infinitum. Presence is to be after, to reflect back upon what has come in. None of this is real. It's the dream of separation, I am. This exchange point or center point is not there.

I am reading this to suggest there is no remnant, nor cause. There simply is. Remnants are memories/stories that can only be held by a separate I, and causes are only assumptions/stories that must be created by a separate I. These are therefore illusions as created by thoughts. Without a separate I, there could be no retention or projection, because thought would not be experienced as having a pre or post state? Can thought exist in isolation to anything previous to it, or flowing on from it?

Referencing is what does not happen. Nothing refers to anything else. There is nothing that refers. When there is the seen, heard, touched, tasted, smelled and cognized, what is it like without the concept of relation to it? Nothing is in relation to anything else. There is only what seems to be apparent. Nothing is in relation to it. It was just more fabricated sense of what is happening.

I can't break free of conceptualizing when attempting to consider what sensations are like without the concept of relating to it. How do I look at that without the proposition of a concept itself? It feels somewhat like I'm imprisoned in concepts, and concepts are the signposts, but those signposts just serve to keep me trapped in concepts.

I regularly get the sense that I somehow need to bypass my thinking mind to make a shift. But the conversation/guidance itself is directed at my mind through language. Receiving the guidance, interpreting it, attempting to utilise it, and responding to it all engages my thinking mind and essentially pumps more fog into the already foggy landscape.

How does one disengage the automated-defences of the logical, interpretative mind in this process? Is there merit in utilising the senses other than thought? Is a key factor in this problem that thought is taking up too much of the sensory pie-chart in experience?

Nothing can acknowledge anything else. You don't need to and cannot acknowledge anything. What is left when there is no you acknowledging anything? There is exactly what seems to be without a false sense of relation to it. The thing that would be in relation to it is not there. It was a dream.

What makes a sound a sound? Or a sight a sight? Or is that irrelevant? Is answering that question just immediately converting what 'is' into some-thing? Is it possible to not differentiate - even on a biological level - between what has been labeled as 'heat', or 'darkness', or 'movement', etc? Before language, before labelling and intellectual processing, did a plant not respond to light and dark, or heat and cold, etc? Qualia that engages sensory receptors is present with or without consciousness, and the response - even when consciousness is not present - is always relevant to the stimulus, isn't it? Like smelling salts will not burn an unconscious person, but it will directly and exclusively engage with their olfactory sense... So how does one not differentiate between sensory data when it does not have anything to do with thought?

How does anything happen? Are you there making ANYTHING happen?
'Shifting attention' is pretty subtle stuff. Is a presence there making it happen?

I see that this is addressing the above ponderance, but my conceptual filter is trying to tell me this is asking me to ignore something.

When looking from another angle (as in, not looking at it as a direct answer to the questions, but questioning the relevance of these questions at all), I see the irrelevance of knowing anything if it's outside of any control. If things are simply just happening, what point is there in calling it sound, sight, whatever. We would only give things labels as utility - in an attempt to hold them, or utilise them to construct future projection. I see the purpose of this in surviving as an organism, within the dream, or the 'person-state', whatever. But equally can see that a state where any illusion of control is completely relinquished, a state where being a thing (especially person-thing) is not experienced, needed, or sought after, details such as these would be completely irrelevant.

These two worlds seem so unrelated. It almost seems impossible that one could experience both simultaneously.

I recall a comment by Jed McKenna talking about being a character amongst characters when operating in the dream. I can't help conceptualising what we are discussing in this way. Functioning in the realm where any of this matters must be like 'pretending' in some way if you truly can experience the non-self (non-anything) state. But then how does one function at all in that realm?

Oh man, so much thought-ing.

[davjak]

These questions are starting to go down the road of someone asking for explanations of how things work, how do I do this? It's trying to figure out and put things together in a rational way to get relief from perplexity and the sense that I am here, and something is missing. But explanations will only fit into frameworks, and there is NO framework, no real or actual structure.

If a me asks and is given, what is this reaffirming? Any satisfying explanations received will only reinforce the pattern and perpetuate seeking for more explanations. NO answers will satisfy. They will just feed more hunger.

What is missing now? What needs to happen? What is this gnawing, grasping energy coming from? What more is there if there is only the apparently seen, felt, heard, tasted, smelled and mental forms without any stories about them?

Why is everything gone as it appears? Why is solidity never actual solidity? Where is anything going or coming from? Why can't it be caught hold of? There is nowhere to look, because nothing is there but the appearance in its disappearance.

Looking for answers is to already be in a conceptual projection. It looks out, into an imaginary distance. There is no distance to look into, nowhere to look at all.

If there is no fixed reality out there, what is fixed here? What to make of this clue that when looked into, everything falls apart. Nothing stands in itself.

There is no existing reality waiting to be experienced, figured out or to become knowable and utilizable. There is nothing that is fixed in ANY particular way, nothing waiting to be discovered. There is no firm ground anywhere, and there are no answers.

What is not in absolute flux? This feels solid and substantial, but how do I know what anything is? How do I KNOW? Where is ANYTHING that I know with absolute certainty?

NOTHING reliable can be found, NOTHING. There is just this, what seems to be, and there is no more. It can't be looked for, and it can't be found.

[Cabs]

I agree that this has taken the trajectory you identified - me seeking explanations, trying to figure it out, knowing something is missing...

I did not intend for that to happen, it just happens as a result of the forthcoming response to what was before it. The response is exactly that, it's not premeditated - in fact I would say that every reply has been nothing like what I'd anticipated - so there's certainly no opportunity to do anything other than witness a reaction that results in a response.

There is a distinct feeling of knowing less than I did when I started - in fact I feel quite lost. I don't even fully understand the questions anymore. My mind feels cloudy and disoriented. I feel lost.

I'm finding it confusing to read your assertions about everything throughout your responses - there is nowhere to look, nothing is there, nothing stands in itself, no reality waiting to be experienced, knowable or utilizable, no answers, etc... this is not (yet) my experience, as you can tell, and to hear it only latches onto my grasping-mind that is seeking/wanting some kind of understanding. I have already had all the previous things I've latched onto shot down here, so I don't want to take on your understanding/experience in the same way - if it's not my direct experience then it's nothing more than a concept I am looking to understand, recognise, believe.

The bombardment of consecutive questions amongst, or followed by, what I am interpreting as 'answers' is creating a sense of overwhelm that I do not know how to use as guidance. It almost seems like I'm being told off. I know you are not doing that - but it is how my conditioning is meeting these responses. My ignorance and shortcomings are clear. As I said, I barely understand the questions now. I am clearly being blocked by something, and this current system needs some refinement to navigate it's way through whatever those blocks are.

I hope you may have some suggestions on how we can simplify this and help it be more effective?

[davjak]

trying to figure it out, knowing something is missing...

What are you trying to figure out?
What is felt to be missing?

I did not intend for that to happen, it just happens as a result of the forthcoming response to what was before it. The response is exactly that, it's not premeditated - in fact I would say that every reply has been nothing like what I'd anticipated - so there's certainly no opportunity to do anything other than witness a reaction that results in a response.

Yes, prompt and response, right? There is only what seems to happen.
Is there ever anything else but what seems to happen?
Is anyone doing any of it?

If every reply is nothing like what you anticipated, what does this tell you about anticipation? Does your statement not illustrate the complete illusion of the movie in the head?

There is a distinct feeling of knowing less than I did when I started - in fact I feel quite lost. I don't even fully understand the questions anymore. My mind feels cloudy and disoriented. I feel lost.

Sounds good.
What footing do you need? Where do you want to land?

I'm finding it confusing to read your assertions about everything throughout your responses - there is nowhere to look, nothing is there, nothing stands in itself, no reality waiting to be experienced, knowable or utilizable, no answers, etc... this is not (yet) my experience, as you can tell, and to hear it only latches onto my grasping-mind that is seeking/wanting some kind of understanding. I have already had all the previous things I've latched onto shot down here, so I don't want to take on your understanding/experience in the same way - if it's not my direct experience then it's nothing more than a concept I am looking to understand, recognise, believe.

What do you know for sure? What is the stable footing that serves as your starting point or surety from which you can assert anything, even that you are? How do you know?

The bombardment of consecutive questions amongst, or followed by, what I am interpreting as 'answers' is creating a sense of overwhelm that I do not know how to use as guidance. It almost seems like I'm being told off. I know you are not doing that - but it is how my conditioning is meeting these responses. My ignorance and shortcomings are clear. As I said, I barely understand the questions now. I am clearly being blocked by something, and this current system needs some refinement to navigate it's way through whatever those blocks are.

Sounds good to me. This isn't meant to stabilize or make you feel good. Not at all. It's meant to take it all away. Because everything you have ever gotten, has come with the unrecognized dread that it will be taken away, that it will ultimately not satisfy because it was not what it was thought to be, and nothing was ever really yours. If you wanted more of that, you wouldn't have come here. Something else brought you here.

Presence is to be before and after. I am here awaiting the arrival of what happens, and I am what consumes, holds and stores what seems to happen, digesting it so that I become improved ad infinitum. Presence is to be after, to reflect back upon what has come in. None of this is real. It's the dream of separation, I am. This exchange point or center point is not there.
I am reading this to suggest there is no remnant, nor cause. There simply is.

Even less than that. Find something that is. The more you look the less you will find.
Tell me something that is. Name something.

[Cabs]

What are you trying to figure out?

Trying to figure out any question you have posed - to know how to consider it in the way you intend.

What is felt to be missing?

Something in my interpretation of the question that allows contemplation beneath the superficial - the ability to penetrate deeper into the contemplation - beyond my logic.

Yes, prompt and response, right? There is only what seems to happen.
Is there ever anything else but what seems to happen?

There is reaction - Like impact changing the trajectory of experience. Experience itself feels like it flows, but also somehow feels influenced by external factors.

Is anyone doing any of it?

No. It seems like reaction (by me, or my senses) to external factors, but if I did not make any assumptions that experience was flowing along a particular tangent, then it would not feel as though the course had been impacted. My presumptions, expectations, predictions are inverting my perspective. I imagine and predict a course that things will flow along, and interpret it as unexpected when it doesn't - whereas life flows as it does. My predictions are the reaction I sense.

Does your statement not illustrate the complete illusion of the movie in the head?

Yes. Even the above response illustrates this. Here I am still of the viewpoint that I am doing something. I am suggesting that I make assumptions, I imagine a path. I create an expectation that can be thwarted. I have the ability to feel or notice reaction of some kind.

ME: There is a distinct feeling of knowing less than I did when I started - in fact I feel quite lost. I don't even fully understand the questions anymore. My mind feels cloudy and disoriented. I feel lost.

YOU: Sounds good. What footing do you need? Where do you want to land?

I don't know the answer to this question. I would like to see beneath the surface of everything. Everything feels somehow detached from my experience of it. I don't feel integrated with everything around me, like a droplet of water sitting millimeters away from a giant lake, just needing to be touched by it to get absorbed back into the whole. I don't need a footing, I need reabsorption.

What do you know for sure?

Again, I feel somehow blocked from being able to contemplate this question. My process is to look at something, anything, and explain how I know that. For example; "I know that my son exists". How? I can see him, hear him, touch him, observe his impact around me, etc. What is it that makes him real though? He is none of those things in isolation, but those isolated factors that I sense are combined into a concept that I perceive as HIM. Could he exist without me perceiving those factors? No, well, not to me at least. Could he exist outside of my perception? I have no idea, because anything I would classify as 'outside' (such as my wife, his friends, etc) still exists only via the combinations of factors I perceive of them. I can't know for sure if anything in my perception exists independently of me. And I can never know because 'knowing' itself would require a me to 'know'.

What is the stable footing that serves as your starting point or surety from which you can assert anything, even that you are? How do you know?

I know there is 'something'. I know something must be something because it is not nothing. I experience nothing when in deep sleep, or when I was under anaesthetic. Nothing is nothing. This is not that.

Find something that is. The more you look the less you will find. Tell me something that is. Name something.

Whatever unknown thing is interacting with my biology resulting in the perception of light, sound, smell, touch... science would call it waves, frequency, vibration... I don't know what it truly is - I cannot know what the raw data truly is - but whatever 'it' truly is, it results in something perceivable that we have termed 'sensation'.

[davjak]

What are you trying to figure out?
Trying to figure out any question you have posed - to know how to consider it in the way you intend.

If all trying stops, things might feel better and easier.

Something in my interpretation of the question that allows contemplation beneath the superficial - the ability to penetrate deeper into the contemplation - beyond my logic.

There are no mistakes, and whatever comes is perfect.

Whatever will happen will just happen without any effort. The effort is the illusion. That there is someone doing it is the illusion.

Did you ever have the sense that there is something you need to do, and yet the body just sits there slacking off, watching YouTube or whatever, like it's oblivious to the thought-stream? Have you ever noticed the movie playing in the head doesn't actually do anything? The inner world hardly syncs to anything at all, much less control it?

Have you noticed how over and over and over again, what's happening in thought never amounts to anything whatsoever? That it is something is the illusion. Thought just keeps dissolving and dissolving and dissolving as it appears, and we never notice it amounted to nothing, absolutely nothing. It's only a waking dream.

There is reaction - Like impact changing the trajectory of experience. Experience itself feels like it flows, but also somehow feels influenced by external factors.

But isn't the impact that changes the trajectory of an experience just itself experience? How do you get around this to imagine a divider? What could impact experience when experience is all there seems to be? Is there anything outside your experience?

If you sat on a chair with eyes closed, can you find a boundary between butt and chair? Isn't it really just this nebulous thing called a sensation and probably some hazy image thoughts appearing? Isn't it just a projection to say more? Without thought, where are the edges? Can you find an edge or limit to experience?

My presumptions, expectations, predictions are inverting my perspective.

I would replace inverting with inventing your experience. It's all made up. Do you imagine you look out two open windows as eyes, at things like trees and walls and people? Or is it all an interpretive reconstruction? This too is a story, but don't perceptions travel to and happen in the brain as electrical impulses? Aren't the senses really just detectors, indicators and transmitters? What exactly is your perspective or experience then? Isn't it all a construction?

Find something that is. The more you look the less you will find. Tell me something that is. Name something.
Whatever unknown thing is interacting with my biology resulting in the perception of light, sound, smell, touch... science would call it waves, frequency, vibration... I don't know what it truly is - I cannot know what the raw data truly is - but whatever 'it' truly is, it results in something perceivable that we have termed 'sensation'.

I asked you to tell me something that 'is'. You are offering an 'unknown thing'? Are you saying you believe in an unknown thing?
Can you see this is pure speculation, again, of 'something outside my experience', something on the other side of an imagined divider?
There is never any evidence of anything that is outside experience. If there was evidence, that would be the experience.

Take gravity or quantum entanglement. There is ONLY the evidence of it, never a thing in itself. Why is this? Because there is no-thing there.

Things appear to fall down. That's it. That's the evidence and the experience. There is no separation and there are no dividers, only imaginary ones. What any of this is is completely unknown. The point is to undermine a false sense of solidity and a false sense of knowing, to be disabused of all basis for illusion.

[Cabs]

If all trying stops, things might feel better and easier. There are no mistakes, and whatever comes is perfect.

It seems that when I stop trying (or try to stop trying) that the delusion overwhelms.

Did you ever have the sense that there is something you need to do, and yet the body just sits there slacking off, watching YouTube or whatever, like it's oblivious to the thought-stream? Have you ever noticed the movie playing in the head doesn't actually do anything? The inner world hardly syncs to anything at all, much less control it?

Have you noticed how over and over and over again, what's happening in thought never amounts to anything whatsoever? That it is something is the illusion. Thought just keeps dissolving and dissolving and dissolving as it appears, and we never notice it amounted to nothing, absolutely nothing. It's only a waking dream.

I can certainly see that most thought is simply noise, or chatter that never amounts to anything - imagined conversations playing out, various scenarios and ideas coming and going, memories, hopes fears, etc. Very much dream-like.

That said, I feel that certain thoughts have had the influence to initiate action... Albeit with the use of further thought. For example, if I'm slacking off and the thought comes "I'd better get started on dinner before it gets too late", or "I'd better mow the grass while its not too wet", this will motivate some kind of action. This appears to be thought amounting to action. Similarly, action that was not taken can often be blamed on lack of thought - ie, forgetting to lodge a form on time, or forgetting to call someone for their birthday.

But isn't the impact that changes the trajectory of an experience just itself experience? How do you get around this to imagine a divider? What could impact experience when experience is all there seems to be? Is there anything outside your experience?

Yes I agree. It's not really even impact. It is just the experience happening. The impact is an illusion caused by my mind expecting something else. Thought/imagination is projecting the idea of something outside my experience, but that idea is still within the experience.

If you sat on a chair with eyes closed, can you find a boundary between butt and chair? Isn't it really just this nebulous thing called a sensation and probably some hazy image thoughts appearing? Isn't it just a projection to say more? Without thought, where are the edges? Can you find an edge or limit to experience?

I have done this type of experiment before in some meditations, and agree that the experience blurs all boundaries. I like it. I'm not sure if I've experienced something similar during non-meditation.

Even the idea of an edge to experience is difficult to wrap my head around. I can seemingly define limits to how far I can see, or how bright or dark it must be before sight fails, or how low or high a frequency my ear can discern, or how faint a smell can be before it is not perceived, etc. But thought seems limitless. It's also hard to define because experience is always in flux - it's never still enough to measure limitation.

I would replace inverting with inventing your experience. It's all made up. Do you imagine you look out two open windows as eyes, at things like trees and walls and people? Or is it all an interpretive reconstruction? This too is a story, but don't perceptions travel to and happen in the brain as electrical impulses? Aren't the senses really just detectors, indicators and transmitters? What exactly is your perspective or experience then? Isn't it all a construction?

Yes totally. I fully comprehend this notion, but cannot see around it. It's like a magic-eye puzzle... I know that there is a 3D illusion within the 2D image, but my eyes just cannot see anything but what's presented. Until there's a shift of perspective, and all of a sudden an object appears. This is how this notion seems to me - I know that my senses are just detecting data and constructing what appears with the help of thought, but I just can't break out of that automated convergence.

As I was sitting eating breakfast this morning, looking out at my garden, I was trying to conceive what it would be like to not have words to describe anything I was noticing. I have no idea what other people are like but I experience so much of life in my mind - there is constant narration of everything - not just thoughts, but narration of observation - "tree, green, flower, red, warm, clear, far away, round" etc. It's like I can't actually experience anything without a commentator putting it ALL into words. So this morning I tried to conceive what it would be like to not have words. Like humans pre-language, or animals. The experience would have to be extremely different. I could get a sense of how things would be less defined, less categorised and separate. There would be less assumption and implied meaning. It's hard to imagine there would not be the perception of 'edges', for example birds navigating through trees would use the perception of edges to avoid crashing. And it seems that distance would be perceived even without name. But of course I don't know this. I'm not even sure why I've rambled on this path, it seemed relevant. Oh yes, my experience and perspective do seem constructed, particularly via language and subsequently language-based thought. But I can't see around that, and when I experiment, it's more thought.

I asked you to tell me something that 'is'. You are offering an 'unknown thing'? Are you saying you believe in an unknown thing?
Can you see this is pure speculation, again, of 'something outside my experience', something on the other side of an imagined divider?

You possess great clarity in observation. It wasn't my aim to imply believing in an unknown thing, but I can see taht is what came out. I want to say I believe in something, but have no words for it. That something is experience, I guess. Experience 'is' - I have no words to define it other than that. The opposite of no-experience.

There is never any evidence of anything that is outside experience. If there was evidence, that would be the experience. Take gravity or quantum entanglement. There is ONLY the evidence of it, never a thing in itself. Why is this? Because there is no-thing there. Things appear to fall down. That's it. That's the evidence and the experience. There is no separation and there are no dividers, only imaginary ones. What any of this is is completely unknown. The point is to undermine a false sense of solidity and a false sense of knowing, to be disabused of all basis for illusion.

I like this. I recognise I am forever adding (or attempting to add) explanation and understanding into the evidence > experience equation. This unnecessary step is what creates the story.

[davjak]

Yes I agree. It's not really even impact. It is just the experience happening. The impact is an illusion caused by my mind expecting something else. Thought/imagination is projecting the idea of something outside my experience, but that idea is still within the experience.

Good, nothing outside. How about inside my experience? Does the question even make sense?

I can certainly see that most thought is simply noise, or chatter that never amounts to anything - imagined conversations playing out, various scenarios and ideas coming and going, memories, hopes fears, etc. Very much dream-like.

So, where is I? What am I made of, the stuff listed above? The thing that notices the stuff? Where is the belief, and what does it say? What is being taken as I?

Yes totally. I fully comprehend this notion, but cannot see around it. It's like a magic-eye puzzle...

If the viewer/viewing position is assumed to be solid and real, how will the assumed substantiality of what is viewed collapse? The solidity of the seen is a reflection of the solidity presumed to be looking at it. Who/what is looking?

To a solid, fixed viewer, everything else looks just as solid and familiar. There isn't actually anything that's familiar. Fire is not the same fire moment to moment. Light is not the same light moment to moment. Son and wife are not the same son and wife moment to moment.

I believe in something, but have no words for it. That something is experience, I guess. Experience 'is' - I have no words to define it other than that. The opposite of no-experience.

It just brings us to the same question. Who is it that knows something is? What is I made of? Is the evidence thought, sound, sensation, deeds or actions, feelings and emotions? These are apparent conditions. Is there anything else? Are the conditions even fixed, static things?

Is there some-thing that fire is? Or does fire appear when the conditions are present, heat, oxygen, fuel? And when the conditions are no longer present, where has fire gone? Did it ever exist apart from the conditions? Is the sense of I independent of conditions, and if all the conditions are taken away, will there be the sense I am? This is essenceless nature. There is nothing that has its own freestanding existence. Everything that seems to be is apparently 'dependently co-arising'.

If we build a house, is there a precise moment when it becomes a house? If we take apart a house, is there a precise moment when it stopped being a house? Or was it all nothing but apparent conditions and particular designations, just continual flux? Does this illustrate how belief can make solid what doesn't actually exist?

Where is the I?

[Cabs]

Good, nothing outside. How about inside my experience? Does the question even make sense?

No, i suppose not. Everything happening inside the experience IS the experience - including the thought/hope/presumption that something could be (or "is") happening outside of it.

So, where is I? What am I made of, the stuff listed above? The thing that notices the stuff? Where is the belief, and what does it say? What is being taken as I?

This is such a key question, and I can see that I have been (and still am) caught in an illusion of a separate self - not so much as a solid entity, but as an observer/witness/narrator/noticer/awareness. I find it difficult to see around this conundrum because even the act of trying to engages in the illusion. the closest I can come, it seems, is where I began - recognising that I am not thoughts or sensations, in isolation, but an illusion created by them - thought particularly in the form of memory, fear, expectation, assumption, etc. But one form of thought remains entangled, that which believes it is noticing and comprehending it. It's acting as a type of 'knowledge' i guess. Hard to get around because to know, is to ultimately not know, and that appears as a choice that cannot be chosen.

To a solid, fixed viewer, everything else looks just as solid and familiar. There isn't actually anything that's familiar. Fire is not the same fire moment to moment. Light is not the same light moment to moment. Son and wife are not the same son and wife moment to moment.

I agree with this and can see the fundamental importance of truly realising this. There is an automated summarisation of data - sensory and thought-based - that makes everything appear solid and fixed - repeating and predictable. But it can't be.

If the viewer/viewing position is assumed to be solid and real, how will the assumed substantiality of what is viewed collapse? The solidity of the seen is a reflection of the solidity presumed to be looking at it. Who/what is looking?

This makes sense. How I experience everything will reflect how I experience the experiencer. If I have some kind of notion that I am separate, then everything must also have that capacity. Whereas if i do not experience my own existence that way, then it would not be possible to experience anything else that way either.

What IS looking? Knowledge (assumed knowledge that is, assumed to be discovered/taught/gathered/ingrained over a lifetime) is what keeps presenting itself as the looker... but WHAT is truly looking is NOT known. I truly do not know this. I only know what I think. I have no sense of what is looking at all. It's completely blank when I try to find it. When I try to look behind the knowledge - there's nothing there. A total void.

It just brings us to the same question. Who is it that knows something is? What is I made of? Is the evidence thought, sound, sensation, deeds or actions, feelings and emotions? These are apparent conditions. Is there anything else? Are the conditions even fixed, static things?

The question of 'who' feels less relevant know. What, on the other hand, still feels unresolved.

The 'evidence' (i like this word) trapping me is what I'm terming knowledge - which is really a convergence of memory of things encountered before, thought, feelings, physical experience, sensory information, things impressed upon me by culture, family, interests, etc. all bundled up into a ball of "I". Even new experience is viewed through the "I" knowledge, and either absorbed into it for further assimilation, or rejected, haha, and even the rejection is absorbed into it as more 'knowledge'.

But what is knowledge other than evidence? Old evidence at that. Old evidence that is now only memory or thought in this instance.

Is there some-thing that fire is? Or does fire appear when the conditions are present, heat, oxygen, fuel? And when the conditions are no longer present, where has fire gone? Did it ever exist apart from the conditions? Is the sense of I independent of conditions, and if all the conditions are taken away, will there be the sense I am? This is essenceless nature. There is nothing that has its own freestanding existence. Everything that seems to be is apparently 'dependently co-arising'.

Yes I comprehend this and fully agree. For me the entanglement occurs beyond the recognition of the separate conditions of the object, but the added conditions that contribute to it being part of my experience - namely, sensory conditions and mental conditions. For example, when looking at a tree, I contemplate the factors of the tree - water, soil, sunlight, seed, etc. - but I neglect to factor in the sight, touch, memory of being 'told' that was called 'tree', my 'knowledge' of the species, etc. These factors are as inseparable as the intrinsic factors of the tree, but they are overlooked/not acknowledged in tandem. Regardless, as you say...

Or was it all nothing but apparent conditions and particular designations, just continual flux? Does this illustrate how belief can make solid what doesn't actually exist?

Yes.

Where is the I?

The I is like the fire - a convergence of conditions. But I don't yet 'feel' this. It still 'feels' like the object created by the combined factors. I too readily (unconsciously) summarise experience, and this factor I'm terming as knowledge for lack of a better phrase, seems to be the architect.

[davjak]

No, i suppose not. Everything happening inside the experience IS the experience - including the thought/hope/presumption that something could be (or "is") happening outside of it.

Yes, all concepts with no basis. Nothing is there.

I find it difficult to see around this conundrum because even the act of trying to engages in the illusion.

Yes, trying is automatically a divided experience. It is predicated on being and acting in relation to something else, a thought, a sound, behaviors, being in relation to experience rather than the apparent isness of what seems to be.

If there is no divider between inside/outside experience, then what divides noticer from what is noticed or awareness and what it's aware of? Where is the line between witness and what's witnessed? If there is no divider found, even the feeling of being divided is undivided THIS.

WHAT is truly looking is NOT known. I truly do not know this. I only know what I think. I have no sense of what is looking at all. It's completely blank when I try to find it. When I try to look behind the knowledge - there's nothing there. A total void.

How does it feel, this 'nothing there'? If there are no dividing lines, nothing there is the same as nothing 'here', right? How does nothing here feel? Is there any need to cloud or muddy things with a concept about this?

I only know what I think.

Did you not already say there is no thinker of thoughts, and they are uncontrolled? Either way, is there someone there in relation to thoughts? In the apparent flow of thought, sound, sensation... whatever, can it be that it's only that with nothing separate as a knower of it? Without any idea attaching, how is it?

Yes I comprehend this and fully agree. For me the entanglement occurs beyond the recognition of the separate conditions of the object, but the added conditions that contribute to it being part of my experience - namely, sensory conditions and mental conditions. For example, when looking at a tree, I contemplate the factors of the tree - water, soil, sunlight, seed, etc. - but I neglect to factor in the sight, touch, memory of being 'told' that was called 'tree', my 'knowledge' of the species, etc. These factors are as inseparable as the intrinsic factors of the tree, but they are overlooked/not acknowledged in tandem.

The opposite is being said. Objects don't have conditions. There are no 'intrinsic factors of the tree', no 'recognition of the separate conditions of the object' because there is no object or 'tree' at all, just the dance of apparent conditions. Tree and object are just designations, concepts. In the same way there is no I, no son, no wife, just the apparent play of conditions designated as such but never fixed in any given place, time or state. There is no fixed, enduring thing anywhere.

The I is like the fire - a convergence of conditions. But I don't yet 'feel' this. It still 'feels' like the object created by the combined factors. I too readily (unconsciously) summarise experience, and this factor I'm terming as knowledge for lack of a better phrase, seems to be the architect.

No worries, ocean liners don't turn on a dime. Let me ask, thoughts and feelings and the stories they tell, does this have any reality or substance? Is any of it TRUE? How about accurate or substantial?

[Cabs]

Yes, trying is automatically a divided experience. It is predicated on being and acting in relation to something else, a thought, a sound, behaviors, being in relation to experience rather than the apparent isness of what seems to be.

Agree. "..being and acting in relation to something else" sums up things well.

If there is no divider between inside/outside experience, then what divides noticer from what is noticed or awareness and what it's aware of? Where is the line between witness and what's witnessed? If there is no divider found, even the feeling of being divided is undivided THIS.

Agree. This is what I was getting at the other day using terminology like object/observer, recogniser/recognised. But I don't think it was being integrated with inside / outside of experience. Or, the comprehension itself was still being observed as outside. Not completely clear. I can experience being undivided as awareness and what it is aware of, but seemingly only when intentionally focused on it.

How does it feel, this 'nothing there'? If there are no dividing lines, nothing there is the same as nothing 'here', right? How does nothing here feel? Is there any need to cloud or muddy things with a concept about this?

It seems vast, but close. I feel a sensation like vertigo when approaching it - kind of a butterfly, fear-like nervousness in my chest and back. There is an emptiness that kind of has no feeling. But, it is very slippery. Unable to be held for long enough to really experience a 'feeling'. Difficult to retain - kind of like trying to maintain a visual on a person amongst a moving crowd in front of you - thoughts and sensations incessantly swamp attention.

I have not yet been able to hold it long enough to feel it as 'here'... it still seems like it needs to be found, or at least that the fog needs to dissipate so it can be experienced fully.

Did you not already say there is no thinker of thoughts, and they are uncontrolled?

Ha ha, yes. This exemplifies the labyrinth i feel stuck in - following a path only to wind up back where I began...

Either way, is there someone there in relation to thoughts? In the apparent flow of thought, sound, sensation... whatever, can it be that it's only that with nothing separate as a knower of it? Without any idea attaching, how is it?

It can be that, but never retained in my experience. Everything feels so slippery and easily covered back over with old unconscious habit. It doesn't yet feel like that without focus. When going about my day, I frequently slip out of any perspectives such as these. I don't spend all my day 'trying', partly to observe what occurs when I let go and just 'be' throughout my day - but so far, without holding attention and intention, these perspectives just fade away.

Aside from the experience just mentioned, to address the question specifically ... hmmm ... I feel tired this morning, so it's actually seeming like hard work to ponder these questions - kind of like there's a certain amount of energy required to inquire properly. It's interesting to notice the way the body and mind want to yield to habitual interfacing with everything. The irony is that it would feel so much less energy intensive to be able to just be - to experience everything as a flow without any separate self having to do anything with any of it. Sorry, I'm not doing well at answering this.

I know it can be just flow without a separate knower. I have glimpsed this fleetingly from a distance. Aaargh, my brain is being very odd this morning.

No doubt we will return to this question as you continue guiding me through what feels like very thick fog today.

The opposite is being said. Objects don't have conditions. There are no 'intrinsic factors of the tree', no 'recognition of the separate conditions of the object' because there is no object or 'tree' at all, just the dance of apparent conditions. Tree and object are just designations, concepts. In the same way there is no I, no son, no wife, just the apparent play of conditions designated as such but never fixed in any given place, time or state. There is no fixed, enduring thing anywhere.

I'm a bit confused about this - my language has not helped. When you said "Is there some-thing that fire is? Or does fire appear when the conditions are present, heat, oxygen, fuel? And when the conditions are no longer present, where has fire gone? Did it ever exist apart from the conditions?" I interpreted it to mean that a seeming object (fire) is an illusion appearing as such when conditions (heat, oxygen, fuel) are present together... Is my error that I have termed the conditions as "intrinsic factors", implying some kind of permanence?

Perhaps the seeming slowness of movement of certain conditions underlies a misconception of permanence - ie. the state of flux of the conditions appearing as a tree appear to flow a lot slower than the conditions of a cloud. Maybe I'm too reliant on the obvious to grasp this notion fully.

No worries, ocean liners don't turn on a dime. Let me ask, thoughts and feelings and the stories they tell, does this have any reality or substance? Is any of it TRUE? How about accurate or substantial?

What even is "true"? Any perceived reality or substance that thoughts and feelings allude to is seemingly just more thought and feeling. I don't think i could ever really see anything as undeniably true anymore. So it goes without saying that accuracy and substantiality aren't really possible.

Confusion, yes. Haha.

I can see we are going around in circles on many things, and you do a good job at helping me see my frequent contradictions - I appreciate your patience and willingness to persist with what is quite likely conditions appearing as frustration :) Thanks.

[davjak]

Agree. "..being and acting in relation to something else" sums up things well.

Is there anyone or anything that has a say in how this is showing up? Is the anything separate from what happens?

I can experience being undivided as awareness and what it is aware of, but seemingly only when intentionally focused on it.

Where do intentions come from? If they come straight out of nowhere, completely unforeseen, can intentions really be intentions?

I have not yet been able to hold it long enough to feel it as 'here'... it still seems like it needs to be found, or at least that the fog needs to dissipate so it can be experienced fully.

Is there the capability to do or not do, to 'hold long enough'? Is this all imagination, just going into concepts

When going about my day, I frequently slip out of any perspectives such as these. I don't spend all my day 'trying', partly to observe what occurs when I let go and just 'be' throughout my day - but so far, without holding attention and intention, these perspectives just fade away.

With no fixed center, can anything really fall away, slip or go in and out? Is this just thinking and trying to conceptualize? Is there anyone who can or need let go and be?

I know it can be just flow without a separate knower. I have glimpsed this fleetingly from a distance. Aaargh, my brain is being very odd this morning.

A separate knower is the flow too, if that's what seems to be, even if it doesn't feel that way. There isn't anything but the flow.

I'm a bit confused about this - my language has not helped. When you said "Is there some-thing that fire is?

The point is simply that nothing has intrinsic or self-nature of its own. There is no thing or object that is fire because it is entirely dependent on the conditions that give rise to its appearance. There isn't anything that isn't like this. The relevance is to see that it applies to anything that could be taken as self. Thoughts, sensations, actions, speech, body, emotions, consciousness... all are entirely dependent on conditions for their appearance.

What even is "true"? Any perceived reality or substance that thoughts and feelings allude to is seemingly just more thought and feeling.

What about the thoughts and feelings that say these thoughts and feelings are what I am? Do those look true or feel true?

I don't think i could ever really see anything as undeniably true anymore. So it goes without saying that accuracy and substantiality aren't really possible.

So, what good is it to believe anything?

I appreciate your patience and willingness to persist with what is quite likely conditions appearing as frustration :) Thanks.

You are most welcome.

[Cabs]

ME: "..being and acting in relation to something else" sums up things well.
YOU: Is there anyone or anything that has a say in how this is showing up? Is the anything separate from what happens?

No there isn't. When looking, what is happening IS the experience, including the sensation of experiencing it / being the experiencer. There is no controlling how or when these things show up, nor how long they appear to remain, nor when they cease.

Where do intentions come from? If they come straight out of nowhere, completely unforeseen, can intentions really be intentions?

Intentions are much like choice in their appearance. Appearing to be capable of direction and utilisation. Appearing to be the cause of action. I am now starting to understand that both intention and choice are stories emerging after the event as explanations for the event itself. They appear to happen after decision, but there is enough evidence in neuroscience now to show that the illusion of choice - and intention - are after-thoughts aiming to explain the event. It's interesting watching the flow of experience from this perspective.

Is there the capability to do or not do, to 'hold long enough'? Is this all imagination, just going into concepts

No, there is not the capability to hold, do, not do... anything that appears as intention or choice. What is happening is just as it is. The desire for it to be held, the desire for it to be remembered continuously, is a desire for something that is not part of the current flow of experience. The desire itself IS part of that flow of experience, but the object of that desire is not. If the flow of experience so happens to increasingly include a lengthening of the time spent in these perspectives, that would be wonderful.

With no fixed center, can anything really fall away, slip or go in and out? Is this just thinking and trying to conceptualize? Is there anyone who can or need let go and be?

It's craving, wanting, desiring. Which is thought. There are other sensations involved - feelings of frustration, impatience, etc. - all stemming from the belief that something needs to change, that change from what IS is even possible. These thoughts and thought-based feelings create a sense of a separate self that is re-emerging every time the guard is down, but these things are the experience, not blocking it.

A separate knower is the flow too, if that's what seems to be, even if it doesn't feel that way. There isn't anything but the flow.

Yes, that is what is emerging more frequently as I respond to these questions. But how does this differ from what came before this guidance, or seeking? That is the question that keeps popping up today. Shifting perspective to a state where intrinsically seeing this normal flow of experience clearly as it is appears seems to be an added condition - a condition required for the flow of experience to be as it is while being experienced without delusion. Delusion is a condition in itself. Perhaps it's more a case of delusion reducing, rather than clarity increasing.

The point is simply that nothing has intrinsic or self-nature of its own. There is no thing or object that is fire because it is entirely dependent on the conditions that give rise to its appearance. There isn't anything that isn't like this. The relevance is to see that it applies to anything that could be taken as self. Thoughts, sensations, actions, speech, body, emotions, consciousness... all are entirely dependent on conditions for their appearance.

So delusion is dependent on the conditions that give rise to it's appearance - which is a very clever self-protection mechanism that inhibits the ability to even see it - like a cloaking device using the external conditions to shield itself from view. It has even less of a sense of tangibility than the conditions that give rise to it - thought, belief, conditioning, emotions, feelings, sensation - these all appear as tangible, describable elements that can appear isolated, while 'delusion' which is caused by these conditions seems indescribable and isolatable because it's invisible.

What about the thoughts and feelings that say these thoughts and feelings are what I am? Do those look true or feel true?

Less so as these discussions continue. While I cannot choose to maintain clear perspective when the flow of experience does not provide it, the flow of experience does include these discussions which are acting as regularly occurring reset points - that may result in more frequent recurrence of these perspective at other times.

To answer the question; thoughts and feelings are experiences happening in any given moment. They are not really true or untrue - they are real insofar as they are experienced, but they are equally unreal as they are not necessarily what they've been labelled to be, or interpreted as.

So, what good is it to believe anything?

Good question. Belief is built on an assumption of what is true or untrue, right or wrong, etc. When neither of those opposites exist, a side can't be chosen, a belief has no footing.