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Anthem
1608 Posts |
 Posted - Dec 09 2009 : 12:26:05 AM
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Have been observing the evolution of inquiry lately.
At first inquiry was a very thorough step by step process of identifying the thoughts, which often were not self-evident, writing them down, contemplating the thought and corresponding attached beliefs, recognizing their lack of truth and that they were only one limited aspect or perspective of reality and eventually letting go and finding balance again.
After a couple of years and lots of repetitions, it was easy to do the process mentally only occasionally resorting to pen and paper when necessary. Identity shifted away from being the thoughts into the witnessing of the thoughts. The first time it was in a profound flash of insight, but there were many extended moments of re-identifying with thoughts and stories, more often identified with the content of mind than not.
Eventually it was seen that no thoughts were true though this wasn't completely trusted at first and it became much easier to not attach to thoughts and concepts and remain in the now as pure "Isness" or "beingness", the observer of it all.
More trust was gained as repeated automatic inquiry made thoughts more like objects that could be chosen and experienced. Fewer emotionally polarized and "unbalanced" thoughts that were capable of causing identity to shift away from witnessing or back into the story again. with grace, may I never forget.
The body was seen more as an object inside awareness rather than the other way around, though this waffles back and forth in perception.
Does the witness dissolve or are all objects seen to reside in the witness and the witness is all? It looks this way at times.
There is still a barrier between witnessing and objects. There have been profound moments where that inner familiar sense of me was perceived in the ceiling or in an object but it quickly vanished. How to inquire to see past this illusion of separation that I can remember experiencing with vivid clarity but isn't a perpetual state of observation at all times?
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - Dec 09 2009 : 01:39:10 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Anthem11
Have been observing the evolution of inquiry lately.
At first inquiry was a very thorough step by step process of identifying the thoughts, which often were not self-evident, writing them down, contemplating the thought and corresponding attached beliefs, recognizing their lack of truth and that they were only one limited aspect or perspective of reality and eventually letting go and finding balance again.
After a couple of years and lots of repetitions, it was easy to do the process mentally only occasionally resorting to pen and paper when necessary. Identity shifted away from being the thoughts into the witnessing of the thoughts. The first time it was in a profound flash of insight, but there were many extended moments of re-identifying with thoughts and stories, more often identified with the content of mind than not.
Eventually it was seen that no thoughts were true though this wasn't completely trusted at first and it became much easier to not attach to thoughts and concepts and remain in the now as pure "Isness" or "beingness", the observer of it all.
More trust was gained as repeated automatic inquiry made thoughts more like objects that could be chosen and experienced. Fewer emotionally polarized and "unbalanced" thoughts that were capable of causing identity to shift away from witnessing or back into the story again. with grace, may I never forget.
The body was seen more as an object inside awareness rather than the other way around, though this waffles back and forth in perception.
Does the witness dissolve or are all objects seen to reside in the witness and the witness is all? It looks this way at times.
There is still a barrier between witnessing and objects. There have been profound moments where that inner familiar sense of me was perceived in the ceiling or in an object but it quickly vanished. How to inquire to see past this illusion of separation that I can remember experiencing with vivid clarity but isn't a perpetual state of observation at all times?
Hi Anthem. Good questions that seem to be basic observations of the inquiry process that I too ponder. I observe jnana yoga to be one of the yogic paths of clearing the window to prepare ourselves for knowing the grace of our true nature of self-realization, and believe the revelations from practicing jnana to be the same basic process that occurs in all the yogic paths.
When I started on a process of self-inquiry it was quickly seen that I was working through an awkward, clunky and painful practice of breaking the perception of thoughts as being objects of self-existent truths. When that stage was passed through it corresponded with a finer releasing of deeper held beliefs from which I percieved my world. Progressively the practice has become one of seeing beneath thought and finding my self-identity there as a growing "perception" or knowing of an indefinable and objectless fathomlessness, without any definition possible, but encompassing all perceptions and thoughts. Thoughts and perceptions have become aspects of this underlying "quality" with less meaning and self-substance in themselves than was known before. They appear to have become more like indefinable shimmers of the fathomlessness itself with a completely different appearance than before when they were seen more as separate objects. Self inquiry to me now is nothing at all what I "thought" it was in the beginning of practicing.
Like you, I am also pondering the barrier, the objects and the witnessing. I am looking at the possibility that they are somehow of the same point of consciousness.
I always now accept that I can release myself in the undeniable truth. The process of yoga has enabled that easier way of being. It is the Guru within that I am knowing a greater faith in, which then helps me release yet more false identification. When the seemingly separate "I" has less validity it appears more to have no power to cause anything to be and I gain greater discrimination between what appears as separation and what is the truth. |
Edited by - Balance on Dec 09 2009 06:10:08 AM |
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tadeas
Czech Republic
314 Posts |
Posted - Dec 09 2009 : 11:42:48 AM
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quote:
There is still a barrier between witnessing and objects. There have been profound moments where that inner familiar sense of me was perceived in the ceiling or in an object but it quickly vanished. How to inquire to see past this illusion of separation that I can remember experiencing with vivid clarity but isn't a perpetual state of observation at all times?
Whatever you're releasing, thoughts, images, all objects in awareness, it's always the same process of samyama. So you're doing this again and again, on more and more subtle levels. Then at some point it can be seen that this releasing can itself be released. So it is released and then one's abiding. That's It, being itself. Shining through. At least that's how it works over here :)
It's like doing samyama on samyama itself. Doing samyama on the subtlest level.
Some nudges that I use - the samyama sutra "I-thought" is very efficient for this, in my experience.
Or you can try and look as if the whole world (you) in space-time was like one eye looking through it's every cell and atom.
Or I sometimes release just the finishing sutras of cosmic samyama: cosmos, unbounded awareness.
Or, I breathe and am aware of the whole of existence breathing at the same time, as one breath :)
Whether or not this can "work" is a question ;) It's a rather long term project dependent on how much the stillness has penetrated into experiencing. |
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Shanti
USA
4854 Posts |
Posted - Dec 09 2009 : 11:58:18 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Anthem11
Does the witness dissolve or are all objects seen to reside in the witness and the witness is all? It looks this way at times.
There is still a barrier between witnessing and objects. There have been profound moments where that inner familiar sense of me was perceived in the ceiling or in an object but it quickly vanished. How to inquire to see past this illusion of separation that I can remember experiencing with vivid clarity but isn't a perpetual state of observation at all times?
The witness dissolves. All of it dissolves. Being a witness still has a small degree of self reference, something watching what is happening... when the witness dissolves.. there is just doing, there is action... but no one is watching. It all happens here. That is what I was trying to say here: The Movie Screen.
It happens organically. It cannot be perceived with the mind. All we can do is meditate and open and allow. There is a point when the barrier between the witness and object is suddenly gone. Not sure if it is possible to inquire past it... Samyama kind of inquiry helps. It is not an illusion as the mind sees it.
The thing that I did do was, have an intention for this barrier to drop, but not have any idea what it feels like, no image of what it might feel like... no referring back to any past experience... just having an intention and letting go in stillness. |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - Dec 09 2009 : 10:57:49 PM
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What a garbled mass of confusion my last post was! 
One of these days I'll let go of trying to carefully explain what I can't put words to. I tend to post at AYP forums more rarely than past years in part because I am still processing attachment to form and concept. So there is no need to say much anymore because the saying is most often the illusory "I" thought that grasps at an infinite passing of phantom thoughts as there appears to be an attempt to remain in an illusion of separate identity. Silence is golden. Just goes to show I have barely put my toe in the water. But that toe alone to me is immeasurable immersement already. I fall in Guru's Grace.
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Edited by - Balance on Dec 09 2009 11:11:34 PM |
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Katrine
Norway
1813 Posts |
Posted - Dec 10 2009 : 03:54:55 AM
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Hi Andrew
Thanks so much for sharing
Yes.....everything dissolves.....
Beautiful Tadeas:
quote:
Whatever you're releasing, thoughts, images, all objects in awareness, it's always the same process of samyama. So you're doing this again and again, on more and more subtle levels. Then at some point it can be seen that this releasing can itself be released. So it is released and then one's abiding. That's It, being itself. Shining through. At least that's how it works over here :)
Here too
Funny....was just sharing something similar with a friend at yesterdays meditation....
All that can be said about it here....is that devotion.....the continuous sweetness inside.....everything spontaneously dissolves in it.
The feeling here......is of being so normal......so very ordinary...so simple. Simply spontaneously here....
Although the quiet love is everywhere......again and again I find myself sitting in the empty church......wordless.....just sitting there.....completely content......like a three year old in the tender hands of love....
The signature light of Christ.....it is always communing now....
Always this feeling of the bliss of bowing to it...like a wonderous open expression.......so even though there are no words......preciousness is expressed anyway
And so much gratefulness is radiated....
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Sparkle
Ireland
1457 Posts |
Posted - Dec 10 2009 : 3:50:32 PM
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Hi Andrew and all
quote:
Does the witness dissolve or are all objects seen to reside in the witness and the witness is all? It looks this way at times.
This has been a question for me also:-)
It seems that no matter how I experience things, when I really look at it, I am - "looking at it" and how is this done? other than by some sort of witnessing.
One thing observed here is that I can go into a state of what I call "streaming", of just being present and allowing life to simply flow through, it seems like there are no thoughts and any hiint at thinking takes me out of it and then I can choose to go back into the streaming at will, when there is inner silence.
But this again seems like it is being witnessed, otherwise how would I know about it?
The conclusion, born out of many observations is that the attention, when in this state is shifting constantly back and forth between the form and the formless or between pure awareness and concrete objects in form. There is no attachment or labeling of the forms, in this case, the attention simply flickers back and forth.
An analogy of this would be a flourescent light, it flickers on and off about 50 times per second, but seems like a continuous stream of light.
In this way the shifting attention creates a witness state which paints a picture which could be likened to a dot matrix picture, made of a pile of small dots which look like a complete picture.
On the other side of this, the pure awareness is also made into a picture in our experiencing and perhaps this is why it can be remembered.
I was having trouble recently with this barrier you spoke of and spoke to a friend during an Insight Dialogue.
I was reminded that the "barrier" is actually the "connection" and this is dissolved in an open heart. If everything can be received and accepted through the open heart, no matter how painful, then this is the so called barrier dissolving as we go.
Nevertheless, for me there is still witnessing of this, however when there is no labeling and thinking involved, the non-thinking mind is absorbed in heart and perhaps becomes the so called heart-mind.(although some would use a different language set and exclude use of the word mind totally, but this is how I understand it).
Not sure if that makes sense, but there you go. |
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Ananda
3115 Posts |
Posted - Dec 10 2009 : 4:30:31 PM
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Hi Andrew and all,
i know that you've already read this lesson before but i felt like sharing it since it seems to relate...
hope it helps:
Lesson 333 – Dissolving the Witness in Unity
http://www.aypsite.org/333.html
namaste(f) |
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Anthem
1608 Posts |
Posted - Dec 13 2009 : 10:59:41 PM
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| Thanks everyone for your messages and thoughts on this thread. |
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tadeas
Czech Republic
314 Posts |
Posted - Dec 14 2009 : 7:18:07 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Katrine
...
Here too
Good to know :)
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The evolution if inquiry and the witness
