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emc
2072 Posts |
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Tibetan_Ice
Canada
758 Posts |
 Posted - Nov 02 2009 : 12:36:01 PM
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Hi emc :)
Thank you for sharing this link.
When I first watched the video I thought it was an expansion of the principle of mindfulness and it reminded me of the idea that "if a person can be mindful of something for 24 hours in a row, they will become enlightened." This is a well known principle. Sustained attention on an object will eventually fuse the watcher and object producing samadhi/jhanas, or, as I like to think of it, eventually the dualistic aspect of 'observation' collapses revealing what is beyond. So, why not do little bits of resting in awareness throughout the day? Eventually it will grow and become reflex. It might/will even carry over into your dreams, helping you conquer the dream realm. I like that.
If I may be so bold as to estimate what AYP's perspective might be, I would say that it might be this: "the deep silence garnered through deep meditation will eventually spill over into your daily activities and become longer and longer until eventually deep silence becomes a solid foundation which is permanently intermingled with your essence 24 hours a day." I have found that to be the case, especially after a deep AYP stock meditation.
However, the principle of "Short moments of awareness repeated many times becomes automatic" is a great principle and intuitively, I believe it to be true. I hope it is true. Not only is it a good way to return to a practice of mindfulness throughout the day but the idea that one can gain a taste of the deeper states so that one knows what one is looking for is of great value.
The little fun and games that Eckhart Tolle suggests gave me great insight. Tolle has a game of asking yourself "I wonder what my next thought will be?" And then you pause, monitor your thoughts and wait. When I do this, my breathing suspends, my concentration goes way up and I become silent, if only for a moment. The first time I practiced this exercise for about 6 or 7 times in a row, I experience a strange phenomenon. I was just sitting there and my body dissolved, I became a cloud of little balls, just floating there and the feeling was quite pleasureable. Actually, it took me by surprise and kind of scared me a little. However, it was a great moment for me because it helped me to understand what the silent state may be like. At the moment when you have intense concentration on listening to your thoughts, that is 'silence'.
Likewise with Tolle's exercise of listening to the fading of the meditation bell. You listen to a ringing meditation bell and try to establish the point where the sound returns to silence or dissolves into silence or presence. As you listen, your attention increases naturally and you get another taste of silence (or awareness). After a while it is easy to understand and identify your awareness! To think that repeating this over and over again would expand that attention is a great idea. I applaud whomever thought of marketing just that! :)
There is a fascinating little book called "Way of Ultimate Calm" by Webu Sayadaw and Roger Bischoff. Here is the link: http://books.google.com/books?id=B8gwRyv7wbMC
The book is about buddhist breath meditation/mindfulness. Webu is teaching 24 hour breath mindfulness as a means of garnering energy, controlling the mind and reaching enlightenment, as Buddha taught. It is a very difficult practice for me because my mind keeps telling me it doesn't want to be controlled. I have more success with things that feel good.
Also, Osho had the great idea that if one remembers the feeling of "I am" many times during the day, eventually it will bleed over into your dreams. So, you will be dreaming and suddenly you will remember the feeling of "I am" while dreaming and you will be conscious in your dream.
Don Juan/Carlos Casteneda had a similar technique. He said to look at your hands many times during the day. Eventually, you would remember to look at your hands during a dream. It works! When I practised this technique many years ago, I became conscious in my dreams 3 times. It was wonderful. I flew around and even flew into and through the ground (and didn't die). The colors were bright and clear. It is quite an experience. Like living in a cartoon world.
So, armed with the afforementioned insights, I took a look at the Great Freedom website, many Youtube videos and read many of their teachings. My first disconcernment was that I could not really find simple clear instructions on the practice of producing a "short moment of awareness". I expected to see simple techniques or practices cleary documented (like in the previous Tolle examples that I mentioned above). I could not find any. The discourses talked around the practice, espoused the benefits and sold me on the overall concept, but I could not find the simple practice. Maybe I was looking in the wrong place or looking for the wrong kind of thing. Finally, when I came upon the list of teachers along with the course list I started to feel as though it was the typical business model of selling spiritual practices or services. If their practice is so easy and effective, why do they need teachers?
Granted, I do not wish to denigrate the practice of joining many short moments of mindfulness during the day until they expand to encompass a person's life. I think it is of great value and is certainly a unique perspective (at least for me). I guess I'm guilty of judging the content of the teaching by the presentation of the website and assessment of their business plan.. :(
Thank you very much for sharing this link. It has given me a chance to reflect upon the positive impact of progressing little by little in a continuous way. Kind of like the benefit of compound interest on a savings account...
:)
TI
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Kirtanman
USA
1651 Posts |
Posted - Nov 02 2009 : 7:54:16 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by emc
Candice O'Denver and the organisation Great Freedom, www.greatfreedom.org has one simple teaching:
Short moments of awareness repeated many times becomes automatic.
Hi emc & All,
WOW -- Good (Great??  ) stuff; their premise is certainly accurate -- and their material is nicely "tradition independent".
Basically, whatever goes on in mind (or, more accurately "via mind") is stored in memory.
If it's the conceptual reactions of limited thinking .... conceptual reactions of limited thinking become reinforced ... and are what are automatic.
If it's short moments of awareness .... awareness, rather than the conceptual reactions of limited thinking ... becomes the default.
That's the shift from unenlightenment to enlightenment in a nutshell; when awareness is automatic, and when any focus on form is known to be focus on form, rather than "me", or "a failure to be enlightened" .... that's enlightenment.
This (Great Freedom), seems like a "tradition independent" form of non-duality .... and certainly points people to where reality can be found (original awareness).
The only question I have is:
I'm curious as to how effective going "straight to awareness" actually is .... whether or not beginning practitioners can go "straight to awareness" without (literally) thinking themselves out of it (in the exact same way that beginning yogic meditators often feel a sense of challenge with how many thoughts are present).
The "small moments" approach seems like it would be very helpful, in that regard (as opposed to trying to sustain awareness, from the start).
If beginning practitioners *can* experience small moments of awareness ... then Great Freedom seems poised to do some awesome good, in the world.
Wholeheartedly,
Kirtanman
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sunrays
USA
1 Posts |
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rabar
USA
64 Posts |
Posted - Oct 28 2012 : 4:08:54 PM
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It's been some years since Tibetan_Ice posted this regarding Candice O'Denver's "Short Moments" teaching:
quote:
I could not really find simple clear instructions on the practice of producing a "short moment of awareness". I expected to see simple techniques or practices cleary documented (like in the previous Tolle examples that I mentioned above). I could not find any.
Perhaps it's been answered elsewhere, but here is Candice's description of how to 'taste' a short moment of awareness (that more recently she refers to as 'clarity' or 'open intelligence'):
quote:
"What is a short moment of awareness? To know the answer to that question, stop thinking just for a moment.
"Anyone can do that just for a moment: to stop thinking, without even the thought 'I'm not thinking.' This
is where you can point out to someone their own clarity. If you then ask them what it was like, some
people might say, 'nothing' or'the void' or who knows what they'd say -- 'scary.' But at that moment, what
remains when you stop thinking? A sense of alertness and clarity, that's what remains -- alertness and clarity,
the power to know.
"That's what awareness is, clarity and alertness that is open like a cloudless sky. If we just look at the sky, it's
pure and it's vast and our own clarity is just like that, shining from within everything. The sky metaphor, combined
with pointing out what is present -- alertness and clarity -- are very, very powerful together."
from
http://www.greatfreedom.org/faq_newcomers.html
I've suggested the following add-on:
If someone has trouble not-thinking for a moment, I recommend the 'voluntary blink' that
I learned by watching the Dalai Lama interviewed on TV. You cannot think when you blink, and I
got positive feedback on this both from Tibetan buddhist teachers and also from a UK researcher.
More info here: http://www.raysender.com/blink.html
In further Great Freedom/Open Intelligence teachings,we are introduced to the understanding that this 'awareness level' is always there, even when caught up in your thinking ('data streams'). Thinking and 'clarity' are
actually one and the same in the same sense that clouds appear and dissolve by themselves under a blue sky. None of this is unique to the Great Freedom teaching (Eckhart Tolle, for example is similar), but Candice for me put the final missing piece of peace in the jigsaw puzzle. By the way, Tolle, in one of the DVD's of his retreats, talks about blinking with the eyes to get rid of a (persisting) thoughts.
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