"Mystical Experiences and Vipassana" - can someone relate?

[Moksha]

42 minutes ago, StillnessSpeaks said:

@Moksha what is the correlation between being free of thoughts(letting go) or just being and allowing thoughts  to be there .. is aligning thoughts with feelings still an act of the ego?. Most of the time when I just feel the bliss of being present , creative or positive thoughts pop up after a while. Should I let them go too or play them out. 
I have the sense that , especially in the traditional spirituality, thought in general is seen as bad. 

Any judgment toward thoughts is itself a thought  Just be aware that every thought, no matter how sincere, has the treacherous potential to be conscripted into the service of the ego. Even the thought that "I am no-self" or "I am enlightened" or "I am free from thoughts" is the ego pretending to be what it can never be.

Don't fight with your thoughts. It only empowers them by binding your attention to them. Allow them to arise, without resisting or identifying with them. Let them come and go like clouds in the sky.

Eventually you will learn to consistently remain present, with thoughts in the periphery of awareness. Some thought and feeling clouds are heavier than others. The energy of past experiences is trapped within them. You develop the capacity to sense those that are ready, and lean your awareness gently into them. The light of your being softens their boundaries, and eventually they release their rain back into yourself.

This is only an analogy, but I am trying to describe the inner process of unifying the mind. It is the gift of meditation, which conducts the disparate voices of the self, and teaches them to sing in harmony. Each thought blends into the seamless Hallelujah chorus of enlightenment. ?

[StillnessSpeaks]

@Moksha  beautiful analogy.. thanks ??

[theleelajoker]

After a few weeks (that feel like a lifetime) have passed I want to share some experiences and conclusions I made since my first post:

• I went to 3 day vipassana reatreat, this time with different mindset and the simple intention to relax and let go no matter what
• This meant e.g. I went against the instructions (be "perfectly equanimous" - which just created pressure if you are not "perfect") , some parts of the daily schedule, mediation instructions  and other small things that did not "feel right" to me

Findings (= My opinion, not saying these are fact. Happy to discuss)

1. The vipassana technique is great, the teachings aren't. They are repressive, just as said before by @Breakingthewall
2. The mind is nothing that needs to be controlled or worked against  - it's just doing its job, even trying to help. As soon as I not only observed thoughts but welcomed them with a friendly curiosity, many things clicked. And at some point the mind was super calm without any effort. There was a crazy point where I was "empty" and there were no more thoughts to be thought. No pressure, no force, no effort - just everything that wanted to be thought by the mind was already expressed.
3. The mind tries to help but can only project the future from past experiences. Sometimes this helps (fire was hot yesterday - fire hurt - better not touch fire today) and there was a time where thoughts/emotions/ behavior by the mind made 100% sense. It was adequate in the context of a certain point of time. But since things change all the times, we need to learn when to follow the suggestions of the mind and when not to. But not by fighting  it - rather by treating the mind (i.e. one part of us  --> ourselves) gently like we would treat our own child ("look, I know why you think that. I understand why. I appreciate your suggestion. But you see, things have changed because...")
4. Following this, there is nothing about the mind that's need to be purified or even controlled - it just needs to be integrated
5. A key information was the "inner family system" (e.g. different parts of our psyche / personality) that people wrote about here. No matter what, integrate it - it's yourself after all.
6. This applies on psychological level, but also on the big picture: If we are all just parts of the "godhead" - I am bothered by another person's behavior, I am bothered by my "own" behavior. This person is simply the "external extension" of one of my own parts of my personality (see also the "mirror laws")
7. Same goes with any pain. Someone else wrote in this forum "the pain signal is the healing signal" (can't remember who did) and it is so true
8. Point no 7 applies to any emotional or physical pain. Just feeling it with curiosity, welcoming it makes it not only go away. It makes me free.  (physical meaning in this context pain e.g. from meditation sitting, not pain like "I just broke my leg in a car accident")
9. As I changed, and stopped trying to change others, they started to change. I almost could not believe my eyes and ears but clearly could see it in other peoples behavior.
10. Tat tvam asi -you are it. Always. In every daily interaction, thoughts, struggle, conflict. It is all there because "I" want it to happen. So why fight it? Having this thought in mind helps me tremendously to avoid suffering (oc, I still have pain etc - but right now I don't suffer over suffering as much as I did).

Learning and applying the points above as best as I can I feel as "good" (meaning balanced, calm, equanimous)  as I have never before.

Happy to hear opinions on this!

[Moksha]

@theleelajoker Beautiful insights. I'm glad the retreat was helpful for you, despite the Vipassana teachings. It's not unique to Vipassana, all teachings have the potential for being repressive if you cling to them instead of seeing beyond them to the wisdom they point toward.

For a long time, I thought my mind was the enemy. Of course, this is the mind thinking something about itself  The mind should at least get credit for its capacity to recognize its limitations. It can do so, if the essence of who you are awakens enough to guide it in this way.

After a long period of suffering, when I was finally brought to the nadir of myself, I made a deal with my mind. I promised to remain in the surrendered state if my mind would stop torturing me. I realized that my mind was not my enemy. All this time, it had only been trying to keep me safe. I had supercharged it with my attention to such a degree that it dominated my life and made me miserable.

We settled into a harmonious state. It's like the earth in its formative stages being pummeled by asteroids, but eventually reaching a stable system with the moon serenely orbiting it. My mind is the moon, and although I don't ultimately identify with it, I realize its value in sustaining the system of myself. There is spaciousness between us, but just enough attraction for sustainability.

It's a beautiful way to live. I don't regret the suffering, or even that I didn't realize this sooner. It took 13.7 billion years for the cosmos to create this little system, and I honor it. ?

 

[theleelajoker]

@Moksha Thx for your words.

Once certain things are realized I often think "how could I not see it before? How was it actually possible to miss this for such a long time?"

I like the fish in the water asking "what water?" analogy  fits so well!

 Will be good for me to keep in mind that realizing the water around me is not a one-time thing. Looking back how often I already had this feeling it seems to go on very often for a very long time or maybe even infinite.

[Moksha]

@theleelajoker It is endemic to the human condition. The vast majority of people will be born and die without even seeing that they are not their thoughts, let alone directly realizing what they actually are. We feast insatiably on suffering.

[theleelajoker]

 

19 minutes ago, Moksha said:

@theleelajoker It is endemic to the human condition. The vast majority of people will be born and die without even seeing that they are not their thoughts, let alone directly realizing what they actually are. We feast insatiably on suffering.

Why do you think this is so?

Sure, there is the idea cosmic hide and seek, the analogy the red button "god" created labeled "surprise me ", the idea of "experience for the sake of experience", like dancing for the sake of dancing (Alan Watts elaborates wonderfully on these ideas). It does make sense to me but even if I can't put a finger on it...it does not seem complete to me, either.

And even if it all about experience - why is the structure of reality, the way of experience exactly the way it is? If it is just about experience, you could experience literally anything. Why this feasting on suffering? Why this strange "path" to wake up? Why is there Feeling, Thinking, Being and Awareness,  etc.?

The matrix movie makes me wonder sometimes - is there a secret dimension that is hard or impossible for us to access that is powered by suffering?

[Moksha]

@theleelajoker I feel it has to do with the nature of existence. The cosmos is stretched upon a dream framework of dualities. Every process must have its polar opposite to exist.

Chaos/order, Destruction/creation, Suffering/enlightenment. It is the inhalation and the exhalation of being. The Big-Bang and the Big-Crunch at every level. Beyond it all is the absolute, changeless, dimensionless, and timeless.

[theleelajoker]

Yes I believe I get where you are pointing at. Thinking this to the extreme: The whole thing about "awaken the world" and the bodhisattva idea of bringing enlightenment to all sentient beings is actually an illusion then? You can't have "no suffering" without suffering.

Like a dog chasing its own tail  - endlessly going in circles

[Moksha]

7 hours ago, theleelajoker said:

The whole thing about "awaken the world" and the bodhisattva idea of bringing enlightenment to all sentient beings is actually an illusion then? You can't have "no suffering" without suffering.

Exactly  They are opposite ends of the same stick. How can something sleep or awaken that isn't ultimately real?

The mystery is that absolute reality is within and beyond the dream. It has the capacity to show and hide itself from itself.

[theleelajoker]

This reminds me of the Law of Opposites from Conversations with God. So "suffering" has to exist for us to take "enlightened" action, like the room has to be dark before light can come into it.

There is this quote that I thought to understand a long time but did not fully experience to really understand. "Strictly speaking, there is no enlightened person but only enlightened action".

The way I understand this: Let's say we do take an "enlightened action" in this very moment. Afterwards, the next situation will occur with again a choice and this duality of "right action" in the next moment (which is then oc now ). And as everything changes constantly this continues until the end of our life here (or infinity, IDK) - choices over choices, experience over experience. --> So there is not "state of enlightenment" to reach and all we ever can do is to focus on the now, to act now in the current moment to the best of our ability.

BTW:  Your replies help me a lot to clarify things in my head, thanks for keeping replying. It's very much appreciated.

 

[Moksha]

Yes, the quote is pointing to the absolute. Nothing personal or transient is real. The absolute creates and is within the cosmos, imagining that it is defined by the appearance of forms, movement, and change. Beyond the cosmos, there is no appearance, only absolute reality which is formless, motionless, and changeless.

The mystery is how absolute reality intersects with relative reality. It is beyond comprehension, but the nexus can be directly realized. You are in a flow state, where the absolute no longer identifies with the form, but continues to experience existence through the form. All along, what was thought to be you turns out only to be a thought, and the real you is realized. It can be called a state of enlightenment within this moment, but the state itself, where you are still apparently localized within the cosmos in this form, is not absolutely real. The absolute has no state.

I don't know if that helps, or just confuses you  The point is to remain in the flow state, and live lucidly in this moment. Not only are you free from suffering, but the light of your absolute nature shines through you and increases the quality of everything in experience.

[theleelajoker]

It does help as far as it can help on my current stage of development. I did not experience a direct realization of who I am, no deep state of meditation, DMT or similar. As as far as this goes there is merely an intellectual "ok makes kind of sense and I can imagine"...or better, talking about the limitations of the mind, I understand that I really can not imagine

What I do have is recently more and more often the feeling of - I don't know how to say that in any other way - living in two layers of reality. I notice that with less resistance and judgement, I see another perspective of reality. Still in this dimension, still everyday human stuff. But it becomes easier and easier to me to see the meta level of things. Why is this or that happening to me or my friends? What is the background- teaching, learning, growing, facing fears or simply playing etc - of this particular event or situation? I see synchronicites and get more of an idea of how current events are related with other events in my past.

Don't know how to describe it better. A metaphor would be that I got new glasses for my eyes - things are still the same, but I believe to see them much more clearly.

 

Edited March 31, 2023 by theleelajoker

[Moksha]

9 hours ago, theleelajoker said:

A metaphor would be that I got new glasses for my eyes - things are still the same, but I believe to see them much more clearly.

Seeing the layers of reality is a step toward realizing your essence. Most people, especially those before Einstein, see only a proper cause-effect universe that is predictable and comprehensible. Relativity revealed the limitations of Newton's secure universe. It proved, even within the dream, that the cosmos is not absolute. Time, space, and matter depend entirely upon the perception of the observer. Which is scary, considering how poor our perception is  It is stunning, and a tribute to the power of the evolutionary process, that the cosmos has the capacity to realize its own impermanence. At the edges of relative reality, extremely large (astrophysics) or extremely small (quantum physics) qualia, the dream begins to fray.

We are born with spiritual glaucoma, which only worsens over time. People become blinded by their condition, which further deteriorates with every conceptual layer they add to it. Seeing clearly is the reverse process. Gradually, your conceptions are removed until there is only the direct vision of the absolute through your eyes. 

[theleelajoker]

Quote

At the edges of relative reality, extremely large (astrophysics) or extremely small (quantum physics) qualia, the dream begins to fray.

When seeing it like that, it seems that many mysteries of life/science simply disappear. It is so interesting that this happens at boith the extreme macro and extreme micro level. Thanks for pointing that out. I really like how you put it with "edges of reality". Reminds me of a video game - try to walk to the edge and there is no game beyond that anymore.

I do wonder about the conceptual thinking. It is always said "drop all concepts".  I get the idea. But...how does this e.g. practically work for you if I may ask? How you manage to get there - meditating a lot? "just doing it"? 

And how dou you go through your life and everyday human stuff? For instance relationships (friends, family, partner). So you know "you" dont really exist, the others dont really exist, but here we are. And there is a reason why we are, otherwise we would not be at all. Even if we just exist for the sake of being". For me it is not clear how this works and I am curious to hear your oppinion on that.

Edited April 3, 2023 by theleelajoker

[Moksha]

5 hours ago, theleelajoker said:

I do wonder about the conceptual thinking. It is always said "drop all concepts".  I get the idea. But...how does this e.g. practically work for you if I may ask? How you manage to get there - meditating a lot? "just doing it"? 

And how dou you go through your life and everyday human stuff? For instance relationships (friends, family, partner). So you know "you" dont really exist, the others dont really exist, but here we are. And there is a reason why we are, otherwise we would not be at all. Even if we just exist for the sake of being". For me it is not clear how this works and I am curious to hear your oppinion on that.

As you've probably noticed in the monster thread, there are different perspectives on the value of conceptual thinking  I feel it has enormous relative value, as long as you don't identify with it.

After talking with a lot of people, I've realized the spiritual journey is entirely unique. The absolute is nothing if not creative in realizing itself.

For me, life has been a strange unraveling hybrid of relative- and absolute-identification. I have a Ph.D. in psychology so clearly the human mind is interesting to my character. Still, as far back as I can remember there is a keen spiritual sensitivity. I don't identify with beliefs any more, but for a long time much of me did. It took a lot of suffering, caused by that misidentification, before I finally woke up to the shenanigans of my mind.

Now, it is all about deepening the direct realization of being and navigating life from 20,000 leagues under the sea. It is eerily silent and seamless, but looking upward you still see the phenomenal diversity of creation on the surface of reality. From this perspective, every form is more precious because of its obvious transience. You feel the absolute aliveness of each moment, and the flow of experience moves through you like a symphony.

I used to spend so much of my life struggling inside of my head. Now, when triggers happen that used to send me into a tailspin, I blink and they are usually gone. I still get annoyed at times, but at least the suffering is under the bridge. Life has become unconditional, and there is so much more space for creativity and productivity. I notice little things, like the taste of cold water or the amazing acrobatics of a pigeon in the sky, and there is sincere appreciation in each moment. There are fewer apparent boundaries within myself and others now.

I was still asleep when I first heard this song, but it spoke to me and still does. The lyrics are probably boring to some people, but I love where they point.

As the Rush Comes

Traveling somewhere, could be anywhere
There's a coldness in the air, but I don't care
We drift deeper, life goes on
We drift deeper into the sound

Traveling somewhere, could be anywhere
There's a coldness in the air, but I don't care
We drift deeper into the sound, life goes on
We drift deeper into the sound, feeling strong

So bring it on
So bring it on

Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Oh, embrace me, surround me as the rush comes

So bring it on
So bring it on

We drift deeper into the sound, life goes on
We drift deeper into the sound, feeling strong

So bring it on
So bring it on

Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Oh, embrace me, surround me as the rush comes

Embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Oh, embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
Oh, embrace me, surround me as the rush comes
As the rush comes
As the rush comes
As the rush comes
As the rush comes

[theleelajoker]

Thanks for sharing Moksha.

I can realte to the missodentification and the uniqueness of the journey, at least I believe I can do so to a certain degree.

The one thing I wonder:  The more I progress on my path, the more lonley i feel (especially lately). It seems that fewer and fewer people see what I (beleieve to) see, respectively fewer people can get at least an approximate idea of what is going on with them and the world around. To relate to your example, I could symbolically express it like this:

It's like I watch the pigeon in the sky, and the people next to me look at me in a strange way, saying "what's wrong with you? It's just a bird". Or they even get insecure, being mad at themselves for not seeing the pigeon the same way. As if they can't stand the peace of others as it contradicts their own state if mind of  "unhappyness"

I know it makes no sense to tell them about the bird because same way as I did, we all have our journey and everbody learns on his own (or not). I know it's on me to accept the way things are and probaly there are others looking at me and wondering "how can he not see it?"  It is just this very uncomfortable feeling that the more I learn, the less understood I feel. Fewer people I can talk to on the same "level" and more situations where I just stay silent knowing that noone around will be able to understand what I am saying.  Am I creating a problem myself? Am I projecting my own thoughts and fears? Or is there maybe a price of personal development that needs to be paid in a strange form of loneliness?

Thinking about it, probably this is one of the reasons why I joined this forum - a desire to be understood and to relate to others in some way. Any other ideas you have re this situations other than "accept and/or find the people you do relate to"?

[Moksha]

3 hours ago, theleelajoker said:

It is just this very uncomfortable feeling that the more I learn, the less understood I feel. Fewer people I can talk to on the same "level" and more situations where I just stay silent knowing that noone around will be able to understand what I am saying.

The deeper you realize the absolute, the harder it will be for others to understand. Even awakening is rare, let alone enlightening. It dissolves boundaries, and you see the same essence in everything, regardless of apparently different states of identification.

I don't talk about it much with my loved ones. Instead, I silently love them.

You are flying higher, and seeing clearer, so what do you do now? You can enjoy the solo flight, or periodically choose to rejoin the flock and help them fly for themselves.

I haven't thought about "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" for decades, but it has been in my mind lately. I relate to Jonathan at a deeper level than when I first pondered the analogy. Some people see it on the surface as a child's story, but it is luminous in its depths.

A lot of quotes, but hopefully they will resonate in some way that is helpful:

“Most gulls don’t bother to learn more than the simplest facts of flights–how to get from shore to food and back again. For most gulls, it is not flying that matters, but eating. For this gull, though, it was not eating that mattered, but flight. More than anything else, Jonathan Livingston Seagull loved to fly.”

“You will begin to touch heaven, Jonathan, in the moment that you touch the perfect speed. And it isn’t flying a thousand miles an hour, or a million, or flying at the speed of light. Because any number is a limit, and perfection doesn’t have limits. Perfect speed, my son, is being there.”

“For a long time Jonathan forgot about the world that he had come from, that place where the Flock lived with its eyes tightly shut to the joy of flight, using its wings as means to the end of finding and fighting for food. But now and then, just for a moment, he remembered.”

“His one sorrow was not solitude, it was that the other gulls refused to believe the glory of flight that awaited them; they refused to open their eyes and see.”

“’Why is it,’ Jonathan puzzled, ‘that the hardest thing in the world is to convince a bird that he is free, and that he can prove it for himself if he’d just spend a little time practicing? Why should that be so hard?’”

“For in spite of his lonely past, Jonathan Seagull was born to be an instructor, and his own way of demonstrating love was to give something of the truth that he had seen to a gull who asked only a chance to see truth for himself.”

“He spoke of very simple things–It is right for a gull to fly, that freedom is the very nature of his being, that whatever stands against that freedom must be set aside, be it ritual or superstition out limitation in any form.”

“Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation.”

“Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you’ll see the way to fly.”

“The trick was to know that his true nature lived, as perfect as an unwritten number, everywhere at once across space and time.”

“‘The only true law is that which leads to freedom,’ Jonathan said. ‘There is no other.’”

[theleelajoker]

On 22.4.2023 at 5:49 PM, Moksha said:

I don't talk about it much with my loved ones. Instead, I silently love them.

Seems like a valid strategy. I guess my loneliness-feeling will pass like everything else. Anicca. At the same time, I realize I have enough on my plate letting go of things and focus on the love part.

At first, they quotes did not resonate that much. It took me a few days and some recent experiences. Now I can see much better why you like them. Beautiful. All of them. This one stuck the most.

Quote

“Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you’ll see the way to fly.”

 

[Moksha]

@theleelajoker Yes, I suppose the reason they came to mind was because you mentioned feeling lonely in your realization, much like Jonathan did. His answer to the loneliness was to lose himself in flight, and also to love.