Awareness Established
I decided to sketch out the stages of a meditation that happened a few months ago. I sektched it roughly at the time and have tried to do a little better to post it here.
In this meditation I was using breath awareness as an anchor. (In the sketches I did not note this at all.) It is important to state here that using an object is done initially as a stabilizer. When awareness asserts itself, the focus on the object lessens considerably. When awareness is completely established, the use of an object is defunct.
Here are the 6 diagrams:
Comments/notes:
- The infusion of joy is essential. It creates a lightness of heart and mind that enables higher states to manifest.
- The meditative seal is obviously felt. In fact it is felt as a force rather than seen.
- Once the seal is developed, the awareness is undefiled.
- The established awareness can manifest be projected anywhere; it is not confined to the illustrated sphere.
- The sense of identity was not there
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I feel these are important diagrams for anyone who meditates or rather who attempts to meditate and finds that the effort is helter skelter, indistinct and uncertain.
It is important to know what other ascetics do in meditation, so that one may compare and find reference and also difference in the experiences. For instance, in the first diagram, the busy cluttered mind is diagramed and there is nothing but the minds harassment and activity. An observer is not shown. It seems that only what was observed was illustrated.
So, I went to Disney world. Someone asked about my experience there. I described what I saw. I had no idea while there that I was an observer and the camera I used could not represent me in the video. There was everything which I saw and was sensually subjected to there, except that in none of it, was I seen.
In the second diagram, the intention for insight is present. The shenanigans of the mind are under cordon like pigs in a fenced area. The mind is no longer being harassed. Instead, suddenly there was an intention for insight, which surrounded the distractions and kept them immobilized. I was aware of it and knew what happened but again I am not present there because the recorder was unable to locate me.
One way to state this is that there is the intention and the trapped confined distractions, along with the invisible presence which realized that the intention was present in an effective way.
In the third diagram, we see that the intention overpowered the mental and emotional distractions, to such an extent of thinning them out. This is encouraging.
In the fourth diagram the mind assumed joy/happiness which was a relief for it when compared to when it was filled with distractions and also when it was in a state where the distractions were cordoned and squeezed.
In the sixth diagram, there is awareness of a meditative seal which has the special feature of being impenetrable to sensual and mental objects. And the observer? In each of the diagrams the observer is absent, but still a description was noted.
Was there only observation but no observer?
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In the above diagrams, I would deduct that awareness always underlies the clutter illustrated in diagram 1. As the obscuration is cleared away by the meditation technique, one glimpses natural awareness ( diagram 5.) In my practice up to now, I would say that the act of observing is a natural feature of awareness and that acts of observing arise from awareness.
Up to now, when the mind stills, when thoughts and memories, imaginings and feelings clear out, there is an aware knowing, or sometimes a profound stillness. In these states, I have not detected an observer who remembles a godly being or any being with subtle or divine form, limbs or personality. If you have found such an observer, perhaps you can give some clues!
In the meditation above, firm resolve and application of the technique, enabled the total sealing off the psyche leading to an experience of unpenetrated awareness (awareness free of thoughts, emotions, sensual impressions, sense of self as an "I"). It was so obvious that I couldn't not diagram it for reflection. So out comes the "I" for reflection!
I've been trained to not have expectations or to work for a desired result, and so I just accept the experience, continue practicing, and wait for insight to progress.
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Up to now, when the mind stills, when thoughts and memories, imaginings and feelings clear out, there is an aware knowing, or sometimes a profound stillness. In these states, I have not detected an observer who remembles a godly being or any being with subtle or divine form, limbs or personality. If you have found such an observer, perhaps you can give some clues!
In the meditation above, firm resolve and application of the technique, enabled the total sealing off the psyche leading to an experience of unpenetrated awareness (awareness free of thoughts, emotions, sensual impressions, sense of self as an "I"). It was so obvious that I couldn't not diagram it for reflection. So out comes the "I" for reflection!
An observer is an observer regardless of his/her/it having or not having subtle or divine form, limbs or personality. Is there an observer or not. I am open to the idea of an experience where there is no observer but where there is observation without an observer or as you stated:
the act of observing is a natural feature of awareness and that acts of observing arise from awareness
which means that you are stating that your experience is that there is observation which arises from awareness but not from an observer.
Okay... that is clear!
In my experience there is an observer but it does not have limbs and senses in the experience because it is not permitted in the space to allow that. This is similar to when two men enter an aircraft and only one fellow is experienced at flying the aircraft. In that case the unskilled person has no limbs which can be used to pilot the craft and so even though he does have limbs, he, for all practical purposes is limbless while the skilled other person has limbs because the vehicle is outfitted to use his skill.
In these experiences, in my notes, there is a limbless observer who produces awareness which is in contact with spatial awareness but that observer is spherical in shape with energy emanating from it continuously but it has limited expression because of that specific level of awareness.
If the core awareness of a monkey is transferred into the form of an amoeba, that monkey will no longer have functional limbs because of the limits it encounters due to the amoeba form restrictions which does not accomodate limbs.
So yes, in that situation it will experience itself as being limbless. However we have to be sure that there is no other condition of express because we can be sure about its format.
The awareness as you experience it has no core or format, no gravitational field. Okay... that is accepted as your experience as contrasted to my experience where it is like a round earth with a central core and the center of that core being the source of gravity, where it is a spherical influence.
More information about your experience would be useful as it gives a fresh perspective and challenges other experiences in meditation.
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Michael quoted and wrote:
the act of observing is a natural feature of awareness and that acts of observing arise from awareness
which means that you are stating that your experience is that there is observation which arises from awareness but not from an observer
Yes. This is correct. Also your comments seem to correlate to the Gita, where there is an observer which/who is not well defined:
When the observer perceives no performer besides the influences of material nature and knows what is higher than those influences, he reaches My level of existence.(14.19)
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In response to Erinn, regarding determination and a determiner. Who are these? Well, here I am veering away from experiennce and into philosophy. Determination is a mental factor. It is an operation of mind. It can operate independently of a "determiner" because it is just one link in a whole sequence of events of causes and conditions. This is not as radical as it sounds. Even the Gita verse above declares the modes of material nature and an observer who is situated apart. Maybe awareness is the observer?
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Could I share more about this experience? For me personally, the highlight was the establishment of the meditative seal. It was very pronounced. Regarding the resulting awareness. in my notes I called this a "tapestry of awareness". It was steady. It was alive. It was apart of any influence. If I think too much more about it, I will be adding speculation. If there are further questions, I would certainly try to answer.
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May we all penetrate the freedom which is beyond the material modes!
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Marcia Beloved Thanks for sharing these diagrams. Looks like a solid meditation practice.
