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Scott
USA
969 Posts |
 Posted - May 17 2007 : 6:05:34 PM
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| All that you've just said I relate to. |
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kadak
79 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2007 : 06:13:24 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Jim and His Karma
Come to think of it (right this sec), it did in fact resemble something I used to work on. I used to be convinced that there was great spiritual profundity in moments where you forget what you were going to say, or why you walked into a room. Those brain fart moments struck me as being real close to perfect silence, so I'd try to cultivate and refine that sort of hiccup. .....and this seemed like an extreme version of that. It was like rising on my toes to make an emphatic point, with my finger in the air, and just standing there with mouth agape....for a long, long time. There was such inertia and potential energy that even a bit of self-consciousness couldn't make me sink off my toes and draw back my finger. I didn't feel frozen or spacey, I felt free.
Hi Jim
This state is what tibetans call "Hedewa". When the brain is stopped. This is a state of emptiness, but not of clarity, nor bliss. The "real" natural state (our true nature) is sat-chit-ananda : emptiness, clarity, bliss.
When I read meditation experiences, they are often devoided of clarity, because most teachers, books etc... speak only of emptiness. Yogani speaks much of bliss, wich is good, because few teachers tell how important it is. But it is important do develop clarity along with the 2 other qualities. |
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Manipura
USA
870 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2007 : 07:56:51 AM
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| Hi Kadak. I don't experience the clarity as a thing that can be developed. It just is. It's like something I discover, or enter, like finding a cave and stepping into it, and thus entering emptiness, clarity, and bliss. The trick is to find the cave, and I'd be very interested in any teachings on that. At the same time, I have to keep reminding myself that searching for these states is a diversion from the path, and even emptiness, clarity, and bliss may turn out to be more scenery. |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2007 : 10:37:13 AM
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I didn't say there was no clarity or bliss.
And, really, I disagree that bliss is worth much of anything at all. Mostly, it distracts. It's definitely an unavoidable part of the process, but it's not helpful to the process except insofar as it offers positive reinforcement to keep going and acknowledgment that one is indeed opening. But it is quite distractive to clarity (to the point of being a narcotic), and is, in that sense, just another thing to transcend. The anandamaya kosha is just another kosha. |
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kadak
79 Posts |
Posted - May 19 2007 : 12:45:06 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Jim and His Karma
I didn't say there was no clarity or bliss.
The way you described it seemed to indicate there was not so much clarity. Sorry if I misunderstood.
quote:
Originally posted by Jim and His Karma
And, really, I disagree that bliss is worth much of anything at all. Mostly, it distracts.
The bliss helps the winds to enter and dissolve in the central channel. In the tantras, it is the key to reach the ultimate clear light. So, it is not supposed to be distracting. If it is, masters would probably say to stick to the sutra path, and not going into the tantras.
quote:
Originally posted by Meg
I don't experience the clarity as a thing that can be developed.
Yes it can, there are special practices to develop it, and they're considered to be the highest in the tibetan buddhism. If you wonder what it is about, you can just search for "dzogchen" and "thogal". |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - May 19 2007 : 02:03:20 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by kadak
The bliss helps the winds to enter and dissolve in the central channel. In the tantras, it is the key to reach the ultimate clear light. So, it is not supposed to be distracting. If it is, masters would probably say to stick to the sutra path, and not going into the tantras.
Kadak, thanks for giving the Tibetan Buddhism perspective on this (or at least your perspective from your lineage). |
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Kyman
530 Posts |
Posted - May 19 2007 : 1:05:40 PM
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"Yes it can, there are special practices to develop it, and they're considered to be the highest in the tibetan buddhism. If you wonder what it is about, you can just search for "dzogchen" and "thogal"."
The consciousness whereby I can see through a person, and understand a situation from many angles, is what I strive for. That state is the best measure I've for where to go in life and how to get there.. Also, there is undeniable joy and peace in this state. You have no enemies, and it seems every thought you have, every word you say, is relevant to the topic at hand. You become the ultimate servant, with whomever you are situated with at the time.
When the brain is shut off, you appear that way. This must be the spaced out feeling that Scott mentioned a while back. You are there and can observe those around you, but it doesn't promote interaction. I imagine it is very useful for processing energy, or suckling from the source.
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 19 2007 : 8:40:45 PM
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Can someone explain how there can be emptiness without clarity?
I mean I have had states where I guess I was "empty" because I had no thoughts or desires. But I was perfectly aware of everything around me; I just felt no connection with it. No reason for it. I guess this was clarity because i was perfectly aware. If there was no clarity wouldn't we be sort of asleep and un-aware? I think I'm not understanding "clarity". |
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billeejak
20 Posts |
Posted - May 20 2007 : 08:57:22 AM
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Posted this in the Milestones section but it seems to have some relevance here...if not feel free to delete...
"A Presence – timeless, gentle, yet infinitely powerful – pervaded, and its overwhelming Love replaced mentalization.
Time stopped and the awareness of Oneness with eternity replaced all though or sense of a personal self. The “I-ness” of the Presence revealed itself as Allness……
It was now a silent, unified Oneness, magnificent in its brilliance that shone forth the Divinity of all existence…
The condition was a permanent replacement of the personal self - a slient, universal, timeless Presence by which the totality of Allness replaces any prior states of consciousness or the presumption of a personal self or “I”…
As a prior Hinayana Buddhist, I had believed that the ultimate reality of the Buddha nature was “Nothingness”, or “Void”. That was an effort because of voidness itself is a belief system that, however, had recurred as an experiential reality during meditations in this lifetime…
With the constant pursuit of the pathway of negation (attachment or aversion to form), the condition of voidness would return – enormously impressive, infinite, beyond space, time, or description; omnipresent, all-pervasive, and beyond all thought or volition. Yet despite its seeming nonlinear totality, there was an awareness of the absence of a critical quality that had been experienced as a youth in the snow bank – the exquisite softness, the at-homeness, the familiarity, the recognition of the essence of the totality of Reality as all-inclusive Love. This quality of Love is beyond joy or ecstasy and is intrinsic to the state of Peace.
Strikingly , the Void is very similar to the Ultimate State, except that it is devoid of the Love that is the very essence of Divinity. Without Love, the Void, is like infinite, timeless, empty space. Devoid of the quality that identifies it as Divinity, the Void is a limitation. This appeared to be the final, great polarity/duality of the seeming opposites, the resolution of which permitted the Realization of the Self as the Allness and Oneness out of which Creation emerges."
-David R. Hawkins "Discovery of the Presence of God"
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Manipura
USA
870 Posts |
Posted - May 20 2007 : 10:00:16 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Can someone explain how there can be emptiness without clarity?
I mean I have had states where I guess I was "empty" because I had no thoughts or desires. But I was perfectly aware of everything around me; I just felt no connection with it. No reason for it.
I've experienced emptiness without clarity and it was disorienting. There was this infinite void from which I was disconnected and alienated. This was before I started meditating. But now, when I experience the same, exact emptiness, I'm connected to it - in fact, I'm one with it. So I think that 'clarity' comes with connection. It's not a mental activity; it's more of a nervous system experience.
quote:
I guess this was clarity because i was perfectly aware.
Aware of what? The emptiness? I don't think that's enough. There needs to be an awareness of the connection, and ultimately, an awareness that there is in fact no separation. This is how I would define clarity. |
Edited by - Manipura on May 20 2007 10:02:59 AM |
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Kyman
530 Posts |
Posted - May 20 2007 : 10:52:36 AM
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Usually, you must empty a cup in order to fill it. I think this is why Alex Grey draw the Christ Consciousness as proceeding from the Buddhas Consciousness. In this painting, he seems to be saying one leads to the other.
"I am the glass half empty that is still full, there is only one other glass like me, the glass half full that is still empty." |
Edited by - Kyman on May 20 2007 10:54:55 AM |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 20 2007 : 2:39:30 PM
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Yes I have experienced two different "void" states, one empty, and another where I felt God is with me. I don't see where the word clarity would come into it.
In the void state, there was no feeling of anything missing; just nothing. So maybe this clarity iswhere you realize in the void that God is there, and those two states are the same? |
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Kyman
530 Posts |
Posted - May 20 2007 : 5:56:08 PM
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We all have the experience of feeling like no one in particular, or there is a strong impersonal presence felt. Then there is a strong sense of individuality, as the impersonal presence is pure enough to fully occupy and an individual form.
If you observe your own or another's experience, you can tell when they are in the I'm no one in particular consciousness versus the I am very much myself consciousness, both of which are true. |
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kadak
79 Posts |
Posted - May 22 2007 : 06:22:28 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Can someone explain how there can be emptiness without clarity?
I mean I have had states where I guess I was "empty" because I had no thoughts or desires. But I was perfectly aware of everything around me; I just felt no connection with it. No reason for it. I guess this was clarity because i was perfectly aware. If there was no clarity wouldn't we be sort of asleep and un-aware? I think I'm not understanding "clarity".
Hi,
in tibetan buddhism, the nature of mind is rigpa, and this nature kind of degenerates in 3 "states of shine", "no-thinking state", "bliss state", and "clarity state". Clarity-bliss-emptiness are the 3 aspects of rigpa, but these aspects can be "objectified" (they become an object, with a subjet), and then they are separate from each other. Emptiness objectified is "non-thinking" state.
The lack of clarity is not only being asleep. One can feel alert and lack clarity. In fact, there are signs of clarity, for example when you watch the sky. In the dzogchen path, there a 4 levels. At the second level, you're supposed to see things like in some Van Gogh paintings, and you may see through walls. Signs of clarity can be found easily in psychedelic experiences reports, but it is usually clarity without emptiness, experience is grasped. |
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Manipura
USA
870 Posts |
Posted - May 22 2007 : 07:34:41 AM
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| Kadak - your posts have been interesting, and I've been reading a bit further online about the Dzogchen tradition. thanks for the great imput. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 22 2007 : 6:51:28 PM
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Thanks Kadak.
So, what would you say clarity is? |
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kadak
79 Posts |
Posted - May 22 2007 : 10:27:57 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Thanks Kadak.
So, what would you say clarity is?
Saying what it is (one of the 3 aspects of the nature of mind) is not very interesting. What is interesting is to know the signs and how to develop it. There are 2 books on the matter.
http://www.amazon.com/Wonders-Natur...85804&sr=8-1
http://www.amazon.com/Heart-Drops-D...85836&sr=1-1
The perspective is completely different from the tantras. In the tantras, you try to reach the purest aspect of clear light, and you melt it with dream state and waking state in order to produce the illusory body. In the dzogchen, you just stay in the natural state (a meditation which main instruction is "leave it as it is"), and while you do this in the dark or under the sky, clarity develops and you get signs, until you get rainbow-body. But it is very difficult, usually you don't get any sign and clarity doesn't develop because the meditation is basically flawed and you don't even know it. The flaw is that whe think that we have enough basic clarity in our waking state, but we don't. We're asleep, even if we don't feel asleep.
That's why the dzogchen is the ninth and highest vehicule in tibetan bouddhism. It is very difficult, and you ordinarily need to be a good tantric practicioner before practicing it. Which I'm not, of course. I just tried enough dzogchen practices to discover I was not worthy of it, for the moment. So I stick to the tantras where you develop bliss, the bliss allows you to develop some clarity, and then you can practice dzogchen (which is somehow the equivalent of indian advaita).
The physiologic reason is that clarity resides in some specific channels, the kati channels, which are inside the central channel, so you have first to open the central channel (which is the purpose of bliss) before being able to open the kati channels. This channels go from the heart to the eyes, and they contain five-colored beams, dispatching five-colored visions in front of you (the signs of clarity, also named thogal visions). The more you have clarity, the more these visions develop. It seems that some upanishads display the same kind of information, but it would be necessary to read them in the text to be sure. |
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Sparkle
Ireland
1457 Posts |
Posted - May 23 2007 : 04:06:04 AM
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Just wondering about clarity from a practical standpoint in everyday living.
How does what is being said above about clarity relate to the understanding that comes about through insight. In other words, becoming more aware.
We can have vague cloudy areas in our physic which don't add up, or we can be emotionally responsive to a situation and not know the root of the emotion. Meditation can bring clarity to these areas through insight and understanding.
This is my take on clarity, would be interested if it could be linked in some way to what is being said.
Louis |
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Katrine
Norway
1813 Posts |
Posted - May 23 2007 : 07:30:52 AM
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Hi Louis the Sparkle
quote:
How does what is being said above about clarity relate to the understanding that comes about through insight
I don't know if this will connect things for you....but let me tell you:
Two nights ago, before going to sleep, I had a vision:
I was in a car-like vessel.....sort of like an old fashioned cabriolet (imagine the very first Ford vehicle....a cabriolet version) Beside me was a soft, strong, mother-like being. I did not see her, I only sensed her. She was dark and light at the same time, and her presence was all around me. "The raod" we travelled was no more than a slim walking track.....like the kind you find in the mountains. All of a sudden a great abyss appeared on our right. In the bottom of it were lots of people toiling hard with shovels....digging out tons of sand. Digging a deep pit that only got deeper. What a heavy way to find water....I was very frightened when I saw that we approached a hole in the ground....the whole path came to a halt....a few meters ahead it continued. I begged the presence beside me to slow down, but she laughed in a comforting way and I was stiff with fear when we fell into the hole. Mysteriously, before I knew it, we were on the other side. I was amazed....and very safe. When I turned back, I saw that there was a wooden plank laid out as a tiny bridge across the hole. I don't know why I hadn't spotted it earlier....
Later that night, I woke up.....inside me, was the presence from the vision....the soft laughter was there, and also a liquid-like flow of tenderness, lovingness.....a green river flowing all over inside my chest. I don't know whether it was flowing upwards or downwards....only that it did have a direction. It did have an intention. I just don't know what. I fell asleep again. Later i woke up again.....and I was filled with clarity. Events and experiences from my life showed up in this clarity.....and I immediately understood what they ment. All i had seen as "flat" events and "separate" happenings were interconnected.....and many funny, obvious explanations happened. I was full of joy. It was exactly like having an insight - except that it lasted for a longer time. As such, it was more like being in insight (non-mental understanding)....instead of "having" it.
This is what Clarity is to me. It is the same as the Shine. It is presence.....showing a special "side" of itself. |
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Manipura
USA
870 Posts |
Posted - May 23 2007 : 08:54:49 AM
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Kadak - So what you're saying is that first we experience bliss, which opens the proper channel between heart & eyes, and then clarity is 'released' through that channel, at which time we may have signs, and those signs are visions of rainbows? Is that an oversimplification? I'd be interested to hear or read more about the visions...does one of the books you recommended go into this more deeply?
Louis - do you think there may be a difference between the kind of mental clarity that you write about and the clarity that Kadak is referring to? What K. describes seems to be experienced bodily and accompanied by some degree of bliss, while the activity of 'becoming more aware' is predominantly a mental function. I wonder what you think of this...if there's a distinction or not. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 23 2007 : 7:45:25 PM
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Thanks Kadak.
I think I have experienced the kind of clarity you are talking about Katrine.
I felt like all my experiences are like little twigs on a tree; that they all lead back to the same thing. It made my very complex life seem utterly simple. |
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kadak
79 Posts |
Posted - May 24 2007 : 12:40:43 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by meg
Kadak - So what you're saying is that first we experience bliss, which opens the proper channel between heart & eyes, and then clarity is 'released' through that channel, at which time we may have signs, and those signs are visions of rainbows? Is that an oversimplification? I'd be interested to hear or read more about the visions...does one of the books you recommended go into this more deeply?
The bliss opens the central channel, and when it is wide open, the kati channels inside of it begin to open. And then clarity visions begin to emerge. You can see rainbows, but generally these visions are tigles (discs of light) and geometrical shapes, mandalas etc. They're spontaneously emerging from your natural state. The book "Secret visions of the Vth dalai-lama" features these kind of visions.
The process is very simple, that's why it is very difficult. Opening the central channel is not so easy, and developing clarity is very difficult because we have many veils to it. Dzogchen is like advaita. This is the most simple and thus, the most difficult path. Even for tulkus, it is difficult.
The 2 books that I quoted go more deeply into the matter. "The wonders of naturel mind" is easier, "The heart drops of Dharmakaya" is more difficult. It is a text from Shardza Tashi Gyaltsen, a XIX century master who achieved rainbow body, commented by lopön Tenzin Namdak, chief of the bön lineage. It describes dzogchen practices, and within, the 4 stages of thögal practice, which aim is rainbow body.
I'm sorry if my explanations are not so extensive, but english is not easy to me. |
Edited by - kadak on May 24 2007 01:24:42 AM |
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Sparkle
Ireland
1457 Posts |
Posted - May 24 2007 : 06:58:30 AM
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Hi Katrine and Meg, thanks for the replies.
I don't have a lot of time to reply for now, but just to say that my experiences of insight do not come from mental activity. The insights come form energy experience, dreams, opening to the silence and allowing creative wisdom to come through.
After the embodiment of the experience then insight comes and a further bit of clarity or awareness.
I suppose I am not really pushed about dwelling or chasing more levels of light and such. Recently, for instance I had some pressure in my head and when I put my attention on it a golden energy went up over my head and formed the conical shape you see on Buddhist statues. Accompanying this was the most prfound bliss. To be honest the bliss was very nice but it is not something I would particularly go after again, as Jim has said, it seems more of a distraction.
My main thrust now is service, I don't have a lot of time outside of normal work but I do what I can. This is the practical aspect I was talking about, if it's not something that can be used directly or related to directly in the environment of my home relationships and other relationships then it has very limited appeal to me.
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Katrine
Norway
1813 Posts |
Posted - May 24 2007 : 07:25:19 AM
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Hi Louis
quote:
Accompanying this was the most prfound bliss. To be honest the bliss was very nice but it is not something I would particularly go after again, as Jim has said, it seems more of a distraction.
Any attachment to an experience is a distraction. It becomes an obstruction then. I do enjoy fully the bliss when it happens, though....I am grateful.....and then the next moment is here. I agree that bliss is not the goal. To be fully always, is.
quote:
My main thrust now is service, I don't have a lot of time outside of normal work but I do what I can. This is the practical aspect I was talking about, if it's not something that can be used directly or related to directly in the environment of my home relationships and other relationships then it has very limited appeal to me.
It is possible to be in service whatever you are doing. Even normal work can be done in the atmosphere of service and acceptance. If the Presence is remembered as often as possible, then your action will always be serviceminded.
It is great....to be of service to others. It is a loving intention. Then the Presence can work through you. The greater the clarity, the broader the service. Small, innocent gestures of service to another, can result in tremendous happiness and harmony for many. Sometimes we see it, sometimes we don't.
The result is not ours.
To open up to the light is thus the biggest service we "do".
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Manipura
USA
870 Posts |
Posted - May 24 2007 : 10:02:29 AM
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Thanks for the info, Kadak. I find all of this very interesting, and will check out 'The Wonders of the Natural Mind'. Btw, did you know that the 'Secret Visions...' book as available on Amazon for $2,500? :)
quote:
Originally posted by Sparkle
my experiences of insight do not come from mental activity. The insights come form energy experience, dreams, opening to the silence and allowing creative wisdom to come through.
After the embodiment of the experience then insight comes and a further bit of clarity or awareness.
This is my experience too. And it's not so much that some insight arrives in my conscious that wasn't there before; it's more like another veil is removed to reveal that which has always been there. |
Edited by - Manipura on May 24 2007 10:18:34 AM |
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Interesting Experience of Infinite Becoming
