practice/singing the praises of...

[Guest guest]

Before I get to the main aspect of this posting, let me just say that IMO,

this path leads the practitioner first to a stabilisation of thought via the

agency of attention and will around a pre-determined object of attention.

It really does not matter what this object is, or whether it may be a moving

kind of attention, like sweeping through the body. The aim here is to

develop the ability to pay attention to things in a clear way, unencumbered

by the interference of thought.

More long exposition coming -

Yes, there are two different approaches to the development of insight.

The vehicle of calm, Samatha, involves the prior development of calm

meditation to the level of access concentration or absorption

concentration as a basis for development of insight. There are any

number of mental exercises for this - kasinas, and so forth such as

contemplation on fire, or space (and I rather think this comes from

the yogas of Hinduism), and one attains access to the fine material

or immaterial jhanas. Then the meditator turns to the development of

insight by defining the physical and mental phenomena occuring in the

jhanas and seeking their conditions, after which he contemplates

these factors in terms of their three characteristics - and so on,

this gets involved and is perhaps more than you want to know about -

essentially, one develops degrees of calm with Samatha but all

Buddhist teachers including the Tibetans say that Samatha absorptions

are impermanent and do not lead to liberation although one achieves

some purification of mind. The Tibetans have funny stories about the

yogi who went to a cave and stayed in absorptions for a thousand years

and then when he came out of it carried on with his chores just where

he left off.

Vipassana does not employ the vehicle of calm as a foundation for

developing insight, although westeners are usually taught some

following the breath because we are so active and busy mentally, very

speedy and restless. The meditator, after purifying his morality,

enters directly into mindful contemplation of the changing material

and mental processes in his own experience (body and mind only).

(This yogi is called a "dry insight worker" because they develop

insight without the "moisture" of the jhanas.) As one practices,

contemplation gains strength and precision, the mind becomes

naturally concentrated upon the ever-changing stream of experience.

Purification of view (freedom from wrong view of a permanent self) is

the discernment of mind and matter with respect to their

characteristics, functions, manifestations, and approximate causes.

Insight arises into the nature of personality which is discerned as a

compound of mental and material factors which occur interdependently,

without any self within or behind them.

After initial practice where one is freed from obstacles to progress,

the meditator passes through a succession of insights - some list

nine - others fourteen and they are definately experienced as a

tangeable path and unfolding of insight - and constitute purification

by knowledge and vision. You go through the path as process taking

different insights as objects of meditation and insight "ripens."

The meditation teacher who has passed through most of these stages

helps you along when you report what you are noting as primary object

in your meditation. You may begin with watching the rising and

falling of the abdomen as primary object of meditation but then your

object of meditation becomes what next predominates in your mind

stream - usually pain at first but eventually, and I have no personal

experience of this, nirvana itself becomes object of meditation and

one becomes a "stream enterer" fully understanding the truth of

suffering, its origin, realizing the truth of its cessation and,

developing the path to its cessation the meditator then enters upon

the supramundane cognitive process of absorption. This is quite

"high" - better to deal with more basic things. But, quite early on

in ones attempts with vipassana meditation, one has the sense of a

concrete path, a feeling of equanimity towards ones physical and

mental suffering (and concern for others) and whiffs of freedom.

Sweeping the body can be a primary object of meditation but it

depends on the student's needs. Anyone given to a lot of use of

imagination and conceptual thinking might be told to do this for

awhile but its very individual when you work with a teacher.

One can easily feel quite miserable in beginning meditation practice -

we confront our habitual state without any of our usual distractions.

We experience cravings, aversion, inner conflict, negative tapes

endlessly running, endless aches and pains, but this is the meat of

practice. We learn not to push the negative stuff away or pull

pleasant things like bliss and neat thoughts, to us. If we just

observe whatever negativity arises without touching it, without

identifying with it then it plays itself out from its own finite

energy and eventually dissapates and goes away forever. Through

just observing with equanimity everything that rises in consciousness

- hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, feeling body and thinking mind

without interfering or making any value judgments we work through

blockages down to the bedrock of our intrinsic nature which is

happiness beyond happiness. There is no way over all the stuff

except working with what we are with insight, but we are not cripples

in any way - just suffering beings. Actually, one quite quickly

breaks through the misunderstanding of the "I" habit quite early on.

Our major problem isnt really with anything that arises in

consciousness - it with our resistence to it. ie. anguish, despair,

disappointment, broken heartedness and general hopelessness - which I

rather think we like to use the word "depression" to describe. One

sits with this without resistence if it is present in any moment -

and then as the awareness of this mind state fades, one returns

attention to rising and falling of abdomen, and then sound may arise,

and attention relaxes with hearing until this fades and attention

returns to abdomen rising and falling, and then sadness may arise, or

memories, or pain in the body - attention follows until this

dissolves and mindfulness returns to rising and falling. Sometimes

during this process - pain is intense and you eventually note that

resistence/fear is present and then resistence becomes the primary

object of meditation. Fear is a really interesting object of

mindfulness as one can see it right down to a primary fear of death.

It is a bit like moving log jams and accumulated debrie out of a river

so that it may then flow freely again....this takes "right effort" and

right concentration and so on...the mind continuum is naturally

purified and transformed through the process of observing with

equanimity and there can come a point in intensive practice when all

that is left is light and one has the sense of being "enlightened by

ten thousand things."

This moment to moment activity of mind continuum is what gives us the

sense of a self but really it is only activity that rises and passes

as part of the flow of nature (like the stop frames of a film that

give the illusion of a "movie." The activity called personality is

made up of certain ideas and body sensations that moment to moment

give us the sense of "I am". Then, when there is no interference

with the activity flow of self, this mind continuum, it expands and

contracts with the flow of events, rather like the breath or the

tide. You are really more of a doing than a thing - it becomes

"no-self" and activity seems to move out of emptiness or a bright

transparent clarity.

Long before one even approaches nirvana, although one may accomplish

that in this very life, one quite cheers up. People have been doing

this for 2500 years and even early as Buddhist practice evolved out

of the earlier teachings of India, adding their insights to the

general structure of the path from all the Buddhist cultures - I

think this is a remarkable heritage, a gift of the "wish-fulfilling

gem". One of the preliminaries in practice is to contemplate our own

death, we know not when it might be, and the difficulty of aquiring

the human body to work out our freedom. Some may have fortunate

karma and be "all-at-oncers", wherein they understand almost

immediately the truth - the rest of us have to walk one foot ahead of

the other making haste slowly and share the going - oddly there is "no

path" but there is a path TO no path.

Joyce

It is then proposed that such one-pointedness will lead to a complete stable

position of the interaction between attention (as the observer) and the

object (as the observed). They have called this state Samatha.

The main purpose of reaching this stability of consciousness is to have a

clear mind which can have Insights (Vipassana) into many aspects of our

being as well as the nature of experience, reality etc.

The ultimate purpose of Vipassana is to come the clear understanding that

thoughts, and especially the I - thought is a transitory phenomenon,

appearing and disappearing with all other perceptions.

This is what I understand of this practice as it is mostly taught around the

world.

Please add to this if you will.

In a way, the above is the ' cold ' practice and does not include the extremely

important aspect to which you so correctly pointed - the content of

consciousness. My understanding is that this practice has an elaborate way

of dealing with the psychological factors present in the practitioner, what

you called the content of consciousness. The purpose with this is to

prepare the practitioner on a very wide base to deal with the viscitudes of

life outside of meditation.

This brings me to what I really wanted to agree with you. Meditation can

certainly take place in a vacuum, and will undoubtedly show results. But it

is my experience that for many, despite the blisses, insights, clarities of

perception, moments of oneness and so on, if the psychology is not attended

to as a PARALELL process, and very ofetn as part of meditation practice,

transformation will be slow and for ever hampered by the deeply rooted

psychological stuff we carry with us from very early. This psychology

cannot be by-passed in the spiritualising process. All has to be attended

to, and by all I mean everything which is hampering the revelation of the

non-dual condition. We can move right to the heart of the meditation

process, but if we are still emotional and psychological cripples, our

efforts are very likely to be of little use. I- consciousness lies deeply

embedded in the entire phsyche, and has to be seen and transcended at all

levels of our being lest we mistake our search for psychological security

for the spiritual path.

Love Moller

//

All paths go somewhere. No path goes nowhere. Paths, places, sights,

perceptions, and indeed all experiences arise from and exist in and

subside back into the Space of Awareness. Like waves rising are not

different than the ocean, all things arising from Awareness are of

the nature of Awareness. Awareness does not come and go but is always

Present. It is Home. Home is where the Heart Is. Jnanis know the Heart

to be the Finality of Eternal Being. A true devotee relishes in the

Truth of Self-Knowledge, spontaneously arising from within into It

Self. Welcome all to a.

To from this list, go to the ONElist web site, at

www., and select the User Center link

from the menu bar

on the left. This menu will also let you change

your subscription

between digest and normal mode.