graded24

Sorry if I am dragging this on but.. I am a little confused by your emphasis on this part (the psychological/therapy/unification) of the path. One one hand you make it sound as if this is largely unnecessary (since identification with the doer is ignorance to begin with) addition to the self inquiry but has to be done to indulge the normal life.. and then on the other, you say it is like 90% of the work? If it is 90% of the work, then isnt this the main work in self-inquiry?

Have you read The Mind Illuminated? Just want to be fair to it. It is basically a modern book taking the buddhist mindfulness approach to enlightenment. It is rigorous and goes into very details of meditation. But one of the underlying theme is that we have many subminds that talk to each other by broadcasting their contents into consciousness moment to moment. And awakening largely consists of unifying the mind over years of meditation. Of course it has been a topi of thousands of years of debate whether the buddhist awakening is the same as avdaitan awakening. But i digress..

Ok got it. Often in self inquiry, the very reality of the world is denied to such an extent that i wasnt sure where unifying the subminds--which sounds less metaphysical and more like psychological work--would fit in that picture. But I remember even you saying that this is where 90% of the work lies? Dont get me wrong, i am all about doing the self-inquiry all day long. It's just that i also need a coherent approach to practicalities of life, which often involve such conflicts as 'i want to do but for some reason i am not doing..' . Even Ramana always encouraged his listeners to continue with the household's life and not abandon their worldly duties. And sometimes it is hard to differentiate whether parts of me are just using nonduality as an excuse to further their very egoic agendas.

How can the direct experience remain? Do you mean a memory of it remains?

Ok this one is much clearer, Thanks! Now I understand what you are saying. I am going to relate to what you said with something I have learned previously, something I wasn't sure how it fits with self inquiry. Correct me if i am wrong. In reading J. Krishnamurti, I came across the idea of what he referred to as fragmentation.. how we suffer because we are fragmented.. and how to a clear mind there is no choosing.. because it is already clear whats to be done. Conflicts only arise when ones psyche is fragmented: one part wants to this, other wants to do that. In actions where all fragments agree, like removing ones hand from a hot stove, there is no question of choice and 'thinking what should be done'. Similar ideas of unifying subminds through attention to the breath are expressed in the famous book The Mind Illuminated. So are you pointing to something similar.. that these conflicts are pointing to an existing fragmentation of my psyche and i should focus at unifying the fragments. Once that is done, actions will naturally follow.

I understand what you are saying. You were the Truth in that moment. But you can also see that however great that experience was, it is at best a memory now. Memory is a function of the mind. The Truth that is Here and Now has no relation to that. I have gone through mini versions of this dynamics with cannabis and thats why psychedelics do not look as attractive to me at the moment.

Now lets say i be honest with myself and i see that i honestly want to lose weight. What then? I would try and lose weight right? Are you saying that if i am not losing weight it is because secretly i dont want to.. and i would discover that if i were being honest with myself? That might be true. But it still leaves the possibility of NOW wanting to change and lose weight, right? I guess, more fundamentally, i am asking where action fits into all this. I can discover my honest feelings. Should i act on them or just analyze and leave it at that?

Yes, right now i have more trust in traditional approaches laid out by the sages and have an open mind about using psychedelic to 'accelerate' , should the opportunity present itself. (I do meditate on cannabis once in a while but thats about it) I feel there is a reason why the great traditions/sages do not include Psychedelics extensively as part of the path. They dont forbid it but caution against relying on it. It's not that they didn't know about it. Psychedelics are great to give one a glimpse of the Truth. But to actually move there permanently, one has to adopt one of the traditional approaches.

How did this ego death come about? I am self inquiring so of course my ego death hasn't taken place. That's the very purpose.

@winterknight There is another unrelated question. A self inquiry is a constant discovery and rediscovery of what I Am not. But sometimes it is tempting to try and Be what I Am. Kinda, Be that empty space of knowingness in which all phenomena is appearing. Though often that feels like a trick of the mind: it creates an object that it thinks Self is and then tries to identify with it. My question is, as a matter of practice, should i always engage in negation (what I am not) or should i also engage in affirmation (what I am)?

I mean 'should, me,my' are just words. The question is basically thoughts interacting with other thoughts. You can rewrite them without using I,me,my and shoulds.

There is no doer but there is doing. That doing will be affected by what eyes read here.

@winterknight I know I have asked a similar question before and you answered but tbh I am still not sure how to deal with thoughts of 'things i should do'. So let me ask with a specific example this time. I woke up today and my wife told me i have gained a lot of weight. I check my weight and indeed there is a 2kg weight gain. So now there is a clear sense of urgency that i should start exercising and lose this weight before it gets out of hand. There is also a slight self judgement about being lazy past couple of months. Of course I am meta-aware of these as they arise. Now, my question is, being on the self-inquiry path, what should be my response now? I can clearly see the egoic structure at play here .. about protecting my body image, remaining attractive etc. Though of course there is also a general health perspective. The problem is, if I steer this all into the self-inquiry direction (who is that wants to lose weight?), that would be muddying the waters and i would lose this clear intention to lose weight.. and most probably would get back to my lazy ways. The exact same thing applies when a concern about work arises. It often arises in the form of fear of my future, so I have been steering it all into self inquiry direction and lo and behold, I pretty much havent worked at all in last month or so. So at some point spirituality starts looking like an excuse for the part of the ego that doesnt want to work. This way i am gonna be a fat lazy unemployed bastard in no time ;P I know you keep saying in reality i dont have to do any of these.. but lets say, my thoughts have to do these work and they are asking what the response should be.

What do you mean by that? Do you mean they would happen on their own and the real I wont be doer of them? Or that there wont be a need for it to happen at all?

@winterknight One other question i have is, sometimes you have to think in terms the personality called 'insert-your-name'. For example while making career decisions and strategy you have to weigh in on what your skills are, how others perceive you etc. Can these thoughts be effectively entertained without doing damages to one's spiritual progress?

@winterknight I have been doing self-inquiry more consistently and more correctly I suppose. So I have a question. Sometimes the two questions, "where is I coming from?" and "Who am I" lead to different answers. While the former asks for a more elementary objects (like body sensation or simple thoughts in the current experience with which identification seem to take place, the latter can have answers like "i am the seeker" or "i am the worker" . These are higher cognition, more conceptual "I"s.. that seem to be present at times. Like while interacting with my wife if I ask what is the I, the answer seem to be a character called symbolized as 'the husband'. You know what I mean? What should I do with these? It is always possible to ignore these and refocus on more concrete things in the present like a body sensation.. but these conceptual entities also feel like "me" ..

Could you please elaborate on #3 in https://www.siftingtothetruth.com/blog/2017/10/17/four-mistakes-people-make-when-engaged-in-self-inquiry ? Do you mean distractions in the short term like 'oh i need to work, i am lagging behind' Or 'i should be exercising, i am getting fat' etc. With all these thoughts one can respond with 'who is it thats getting fat' , or actually get up and exercise and continue the self inquiry as well. Or did you mean distractions of in the long term like changing jobs, wanting to get married etc?

thanks, got it! Just wanted to say that your list here https://www.siftingtothetruth.com/blog/2017/10/17/four-mistakes-people-make-when-engaged-in-self-inquiry helped me a lot. I think i was making the 4th mistake. I have a clearer picture of the process now.

@winterknight Also, the sense of I Am with open eyes is often 'I am the one looking out of these eyes' . It is a little difficult to say 'but i cant be it because i am experiencing this' because I actually cannot see behind my eyes. You know what i mean?

Well, but the way most people, including me, understand 'peace' and 'satisfaction', there will be a lot of times when "I" would feel at peace or satisfied.. that is, there would be a feeling of peace and satisfaction (like after achieving a goal) but there will also be an I there who is enjoying it. What should I do in this situation?

@winterknight How would I know when what you call the "spacious mind" has arrived and the "I" has disappeared? That is, how would i know when to 'stop' the self-inquiry?Would there be a significant shift in consciousness? It feels like there can be many states of mind that would feel like the 'spacious mind' ..

So, the distinction to be made is between Pleasure and Happiness? What is the key distinction ? That pleasure has it's opposite (pain) but Happiness does not?

@winterknight The Teachers often point out by giving real life examples of how Happiness is when in a moment of desirelessness, Self, which is happiness itself, experiences itself. It is marked by the absence of the ego self.. or at least it is not center stage. Though it makes sense for some cases, what doesn't fit in this understanding of Happiness is, some of the happiest moments of my life, as i am sure must be true for many others, were when i had finally achieved something great, and hence felt unique and special. Sure a desire was met, and as such it was a moment of lack of desire.. but this moment is also marked by a strong presence of Ego, a sense of superiority and uniqueness. You know, like scoring more than everyone in an exam. Indeed, these moments become the defining moments for many as we want to get back to that high again and again.. and our mind thinks "well if being a little unique and special made me so happy, if i work hard enough, one day i will be unique and special enough that i will get the ultimate happiness".. so it becomes a life long pursuit. Do you have an insight into this? How come those moments, laced with the strongest presence of ego, were also the happiest?

The same kind of people who engage in these debates also make a distinction (as a way to counter the advaitan narrative) between two kinds of awareness.. First, awareness that has the I in it.. as in, it is aware that it is. Second kind, where it is aware but has no I in it. They call the second one the deeper kind. I think Nisaragadatta also spoke along similar lines.

Are you familiar with Hameed Ali's (A H Almaas) work? He talks about how there are realizations beyond Nonduality. He, and others seem to too, make a difference between awareness and emptiness