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Tan Jui Horng (who also lives in my country/city Singapore) wrote this on 9 August 2012 after his initial anatta breakthrough:
Just the Scenery
Hello everyone, seemed to have got a realization and since AEN asked me to share my experience, here's a long post starting from the first "sighting" of awareness. Any advice, admonishments, please do post a reply. Please definitely post if this realization is delusion in disguise. Thanks in advance!
I was originally just keeping bare attention on all sensations trying to see if there's a "self" anywhere. Somehow though, I experienced from time to time something underneath these sensations, a "something" (that I realised was what people referred to as awareness) that's seems to be receiving and acknowledging sensation.
This awareness eventually became felt as being switched on pretty much all the time. There's no getting away from it at all because it's always present. Essentially, if I had to say what I was, I was this awareness, and this awareness is constantly looking out into the world waiting to acknowledge all sensory input. Eventually there was another development where I realised everything experienced was in the here and now. Time and distance was only inferred through a series of experience via awareness rather than directly i.e. a string of "now"s and "here"s processed into time and distance. All past experiences can only be invoked from here and now.
Also at this point, the experience of awareness is something like this: "Aware of muscle tension", "Aware of the song of the birds", "Aware of the sound of the cars driving past". Essentially I was breaking things apart, where "awareness of this sensation" was not "awareness of that sensation".
The separation of an awareness "receiving" sensation was gradually removed starting from one day when my back started acting up while showering. I began to wonder "which part of being aware of the backache is not in being aware of water on skin?" And then, eventually it just became "There is just one awareness, and every sensation is in this awareness". Awareness encompasses the backache, as is the water on skin, the blinking, forming only one picture. The experience of "awareness receiving sensation" also became "awareness IS sensation", because there are no gaps at all separating the experiencer and the content of experience. Awareness has now become some kind of source where everything is the work of awareness.
Throughout the whole ordeal I had refused to believe in an actual source, an agent. There is no source in any form, so even if the experience tells me otherwise, there was no reason to believe it was true. So I begin looking at the question: "Is there an awareness outside of these sensations?" which led to this a few days back:
Without sensation, there is no awareness. Awareness is not a solid entity, rather it is like a quality of sensations, just like saying that water is wet. Which also explains why I have never experienced being aware of literally nothing. Even in the dead of the night I hear some kind of "low frequency noise" (hopely you all know what I mean here), even with my eyes closed I see blackness. Even while dreaming, awareness is there, if not it's impossible to recall dreams. Can't remember I've dreamt? That's ok, doesn't mean there was no dream and awareness wasn't present, it's not like liberated people will suddenly develop photographic memory and can remember every waking experience.
Sensations are always changing moment to moment, and thus awareness is changing moment by moment. Not a source, just a quality, forever changing. Everything happening is now seen as scenery, and life is just scenery after scenery playing now, becoming like a movie. A pretty great movie too!
Soh Wei Yu
Author
Admin
My question to Tan Jui Horng: I remember when you initially had this breakthrough, you noted that it was not so stable.
How long did it take for that to stabilize and what helped?
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
I thought it was strange that I suddenly had a bunch of notifications...
So
anyway, yes originally it was not quite stable, likely because like the
average person on the street I did not actually have anything
resembling regular practice, either on and off the cushion. I mostly did
the investigations during moments in the day when my mind was
relatively calm. Post initial anatta insight, when I was returning to a
more thoughtless state after constant thinking, that moment of
heightened clarity would sometimes cause this confusion. I suppose this
sudden redirection of energy was bringing up the last remnants of the
awareness delusion. The issue petered out gradually over the years.
Every time it came up I just did what I had been doing leading up to my
insight: honestly investigate what was going on in experience.
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
Certainly
there some future development such as experiencing total exertion,
experiencing the world as illusory, getting some insight into
conditionality, breaking down assumptions about objects into mere
sensations, etc. However, it was when my life became way more complex
and a magnitude less comfortable that shortcomings in my practice were
exposed, making me see what I was still clinging on to despite my
apparent progress. The surface level self-view is just the first of many
challenges. It's very humbling, and reminds me of how much further I
have to go.
Yin Ling
Admin
Nice, thank you!
Yes this journey is truly humbling. I’m just waiting to see how I’m gonna be trashed by life and hopefully could laugh at myself then
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
Thank
you also for your passionate sharings! I need to take my practice more
seriously like you do. Your viriya is very inspiring and I'm happily
infected
Yin Ling
Admin
Tan Jui Horng hahaha it is the newbie post Anatta nonsense who cannot contain what she found , no restrain give me a few more months I will return to my food pics.
William Lim
Yin Ling,
you should definitely write a journal. Your writing is direct,
authentic yet expressive - as can be seen in the fact that it isn't
overtly flowery and you dun used too many spiritual jargon. Keep on
writing from the heart
Yin Ling
Admin
William Lim haha thanks!
Actually.. it is bc English language skills is limited , dhamma jargons limited , it becomes like that but yea just scribble, not authoritative ya!
William Lim
Wow...
sounds like quite a journey! Looks like someone (*wink Anatta Bot)
should compile a handbook to help guide people on this most worthy path
Yin Ling
Admin
I really love hearing stories about how ppl use their realisations, any of it, to manoeuvre life situations.
It
gives so much motivation and aim to practise, and also give other ppl a
little guide as to how to use situations on the path!
Hoping for more life stories like this on ATR
William Lim
Tan Jui Horng
I use the wrong word... the Anatta Bot definitely excels in
Compilation. What we need is to code a Summary and Editing module for
the Bot
Matt Joe Garrett
Lovely descriptions, love it
William Lim
"Even if experience tells me otherwise, there was no reason to believe it was true"
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
I
have to elaborate on this. It was because I had sufficient faith that
what the Buddha taught was correct. Also because people like Wei Yu and
even other non-Buddhists also emphasizing on anatta being what the
Buddha taught. Hence, I was never content with stopping at awareness.
William Lim
My experience tells me I'm dual, but there is no reason to believe it is true
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
Don't
push that experience away, investigate honestly whenever you can. The
Buddha is right, but my experience doesn't seem to match it. What is
actually going on?
Tan Jui Horng
Admin
Gonna
steal and adapt some guy's maxim: The first rule of awakening to the
Buddha's teaching is that the Buddha was right. The second rule: Don't
forget the first rule.
Angelo wrote in his group “Awakening, Realization and Liberation”. https://www.facebook.com/groups/546474355949572/?ref=share
Good pointer for self enquiry and the initial I Am realization
“Inquiry for First Awakening
The inquiry that leads to first awakening is a funny thing. We want to know “how” precisely to do that inquiry, which is completely understandable. The thing is that it’s not wholly conveyable by describing a certain technique. Really it’s a matter of finding that sweet spot where surrender and intention meet. I will describe an approach here, but it’s important to keep in mind that in the end, you don’t have the power (as what you take yourself to be) to wake yourself up. Only Life has that power. So as we give ourselves to a certain inquiry or practice it’s imperative that we remain open. We have to keep the portals open to mystery, and possibility. We have to recognize that the constant concluding that “no this isn’t it, no this isn’t it either...” is simply the activity of the mind. Those are thoughts. If we believe a single thought then we will believe the next one and on and on. If however we recognize that, “oh that doubt is simply a thought arising now,” then we have the opportunity to recognize that that thought will subside on its own... and yet “I” as the knower of that thought am still here! We can now become fascinated with what is here once that thought (or any thought) subsides. What is in this gap between thoughts? What is this pure sense of I, pure sense of knowing, pure sense of Being? What is this light that can shine on and illuminate a thought (as it does thousands of times per day), and yet still shines when no thought is present. It is self illuminating. What is the nature of the one that notices thoughts, is awake and aware before, during, and after a thought, and is not altered in any way by any thought? Please understand that when you ask these questions you are not looking for a thought answer, the answer is the experience itself.
When we start to allow our attention to relax into this wider perspective we start to unbind ourselves from thought. We begin to recognize the nature of unbound consciousness by feel, by instinct. This is the way in.
At first we may conclude that this gap, this thoughtless consciousness is uninteresting, unimportant. It feels quite neutral, and the busy mind can’t do anything with neutral so we might be inclined to purposely engage thoughts again. If we recognize that “not interesting, not important, not valuable” are all thoughts and simply return to this fluid consciousness, it will start to expand. But there is no need to think about expansion or watch for it. It will do this naturally if we stay with it. If you are willing to recognize every thought and image in the mind as such, and keep your attention alert but relaxed into the “stuff” of thought that is continuous with the sense of I, it will all take care of itself. Just be willing to suspend judgement. Be willing to forego conclusions. Be willing to let go of all monitoring of your progress, because these are all thoughts. Be open to the pure experience. Just return again and again to this place of consciousness with no object or pure sense of I Am. If you are willing to do this it will teach itself to you in a way that neither I nor anyone I’ve ever seen can explain, but it is more real than real.
Happy Travels.
Art by: Platon Yurich”
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Данила Игнатовски
Thank u Angelo Grr
But I got one nuance here.
What you mean by "relax into it"?
I got a few option of this so-called presence/imness/being
1.
Just stay like black screen/witness/center/feel the fact or being just
here literally, feel more like something behind the eyes. Also this is
the place where the attention goes automatically after self-inquiry/koan
or another same contemplation. Just here and now. More like
Nisargadatta method.
2.
If I relax more (especially area around face/eyelids), I cant even say
that I Am here, feels like attention is nowhere, can't self-inquiry
because its feels like tension, any moves of consciousness feels a
little like suffering, thoughts come and feel like its have no fuel to
unfold, just gone after arrising. So I drop even intention to move
attention, super do-nothing. I just keep attention without control.
Phenomena is arises and passes in DO by itself totally. Presence feels a
little like absence because I have sooo relax/let go of any tension of
attention. More like Shinzen Yang teach.
3.
I can actively scan for ME, where are me right now in experience, what
is me now or looks like me. Usually its goes to head/behind eyes and
then start to move after question: go to cheeks, nose, mouth. Illusion
of "I" is moving but Im actively penetrate this sense, that try to hide
in phenomenons. More like Ramana i guess.
So, what's the "right" method?
Or its the same?
Or its just one method with different layers?
Also
Im curious do u think that I Am presence, self-inquiry and zen koans
(who am i precisely) its the same techniq and leads to same insight?
Maybe Soh and others can answer this too, TY.
Angelo Grr
Admin
Данила Игнатовски
hi, just a few pointers, may be helpful. The overarching thing I want
to say after reading this I suspect still sone analysis going on while
doing the self inquiry. Even subtle thought still holds space, avoids
the pure being sense /I Am so it’s important to recognize subtle
thoughts as such and return to the pure knowingness in that case. It’s
more an activity at first than a stillness (hold that lightly ).
Case
number one, WHEN practicing, if you detect something like wondering
about this stuff, “is it like this or that,” recognize Oh! That’s a
subtle thought like analysis or doubt. That should return you to
knowingness, knowing without an object. Just rejoin alert there. Doesn’t
feel like a blank screen or a dark screen or space at all, if you
perceive that even subtly remind yourself “Oh that’s a mental image of a
screen or darkness… THOUGHT!” Like that . It’s sort of dynamic esp at
first in this way, alertness remains it’s not dull or empty, the effort
subsides once you’re in the groove .
2.
When sensation is noticed, recognize the noticing of that as a thought
(bc it is). Then you’ll be right back in the gap. When it comes to self
inquiry specifically it’s better to close the sense gates in this way
initially.
Angelo Grr
Admin
Данила Игнатовски
number three this sounds more like body scanning which is initially a
combination of attention in the sensations / body regions plus overlay
of mental images of body regions. This sort of dodges the actual point
of self inquiry. Because both are objects of perception in the way we
are referring. So in either case follow it back to the literal “I”
FEELING that seems to be going out to the sensations and/or is aware of
the overlay images of body regions (especially the second).
Hopefully that’s helpful.
Overall
I think people tend to overanalyze at first “is it this or that”
internally which is just an oppprtinuty to recognize “oh indecision,
that’s a single thought, then return to the gap.”
Also
be prepared that once you can truly be without thought yet fully in the
gap, it often brings a fear response initially, bc you are letting go
of identity and the body interprets that as threat. Just let it pass and
continue on, it will subside.
Hope that’s helpful
Soh Wei Yu
Author
Admin
On zen koans, John Tan wrote in 2009,
“Yes Emanrohe,
That
is precisely the question asked by Dogen that “if our Buddha Nature is
already perfect, why practice?” This question continues to bother him
even after the initial glimpse and that led him to China in search for
the answer that eventually awaken his wisdom into the non-dual nature of
Awareness.
Therefore
we must understand in Zen tradition, different koans were meant for
different purposes. The experience derived from the koan “before birth
who are you?” only allows an initial glimpse of our nature. It is not
the same as the Hakuin’s koan of “what is the sound of one hand
clapping?” The five categories of koan in Zen ranges from hosshin that
give practitioner the first glimpse of ultimate reality to five-ranks
that aims to awaken practitioner the spontaneous unity of relative and
absolute (non-duality). Only through thorough realization of the
non-dual nature (spontaneous unity of relative and absolute) of
Awareness can we then understand why there is no split between subject
and object as well as seeing the oneness of realization and development.
Therefore the practice of natural state is for those that have already
awaken to their non-dual nature, not just an initial glimpse of
Awareness. The difference must be clearly understood. It is not for
anyone and it is advisable that we refrain from talking too much about
the natural state. The 'natural' way is in fact the most challenging
path, there is no short cut.
On
the other hand, the gradual path of practice is a systematic way of
taking us step by step until we eventually experienced the full non-dual
and non-local nature of pristine awareness. One way is by first firmly
establishing the right view of anatta (non-dual) and dependent
origination and practice vipassana or bare attention to authenticate our
experience with the right view. The gradual paths are equally precious,
that is the point I want to convey.
Lastly
there is a difference between understanding Buddha Nature and God. Not
to let our initial glimpse of pristine awareness overwhelmed us.
Edited by Thusness 05 May `09, 10:35PM
“
AWAKENINGTOREALITY.COM
Thusness's Conversations Between 2004 to 2012
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(On the last point: also see Daniel's Post on Anatta/Emptiness)
Soh Wei Yu
Author
Admin
More quotes on koan by JT from the past as I was explaining to someone:
John Tan:
“More by john tan:
Alejandro,
I would separate non-arisen and emptiness from the luminosity. Imo,
it's a separate pointing. The one hand clapping here directly points to
the luminosity.
What is the way that leads the practitioner to “the direct taste”? In zen, koan is the technique and the way.
The one hand clapping koan is the instrument that leads one to directly and intuitively authenticate presence = sound.
Let’s
use another koan for example, “Before birth who am I?”, this is similar
to just asking “Who am I”. The “Before birth” here is to skilfully
lead the thinking mind to penetrate to the limit of its own depth and
suddenly completely cease and rest, leaving only I-I. Only this I as
pure existence itself. Before birth, this I. After birth, this I.
This life or 10 thousand lives before, this I. 10 thousand lives after,
still this I. The direct encounter of the I-I.
Similarly
the koan of the sound of one hand clapping, is to lead the practitioner
after initial break-through into I-I not to get stuck in dead water and
attached to the Absolute. To direct practitioner to see the ten
thousand faces of presence face to face. In this case, it is that
“Sound” of one hand clapping.
Whether
one hand claps or before both hands clap, what is that sound? It
attempts to lead the practitioner into just that “Sound”. All along
there is only one hand clapping, two hands (duality) are not needed. It
is similar to contemplating "in hearing always only sound, no hearer".
As
for the empty and non-arisen nature of that Sound, zen koans have not
(imo) been able to effectively point to the non-arisen and emptiness of
one’s radiance clarity.”
Soh Wei Yu
Author
Admin
JT:
“Liu
Zhi Guan Zen koans relate more to the direct pointing of one's radiance
clarity whereas mmk is abt letting the mind sees it's own fabrications
and allowing it to free itself from all elaborations (non Gelug) or free
itself from all fabrications (Gelug). The most crucial insight of
both Gelug and non Gelug (imo) is to let the mind realizes the
primordial purity (emptiness) nature of both mind/phenomena.
Although
Mipham treated gelug's freedom from self nature as categorized
ultimate, I can only tell u I disagree. Both are able to achieve their
objectives (imo). In fact if u were to ask for my sincere opinion, I
prefer freedom from self nature (Gelug) as if understood properly and
with experiential insight, it will lead to both +A and -A of emptiness.
If
we were to treat the conventional (conceptuality) as the cause of
ignorance, it prevents some very valuable insights that will take
probably a lot of time to detail out. I will not go too detailed into
that.
In
short seeing through intrinsic existence will similarly allow
practitioners to see through conceptual constructs
(non-conceptualities), see through duality (non-dual) and substantiality
(essencelessness). Phenomena lack of self-nature also lacks sameness
or difference, therefore their primordially purity will likewise be
realized and selflessness also results in natural spontaneity; yet
because practitioners put freedom from self-nature at a higher order,
they will not be bounded by conceptualities and can embrace the
conventional fully.”
Soh Wei Yu
Author
Admin
Having said that john tan did deviced a “koan” as a pointer to emptiness:
“Now is not a container to him but rather a ground for him to land.
Say that there is
Share with him the post abt daniel's post on anatta and emptiness.
Then
say there is a related koan that I ask u to a direct taste of the
emptiness of the "here and now" but requires one to hv direct experience
of non-dual presencing:
Appreciate the vivid, lurid scenery in non-dual and ask,
Where is this scenery?”
“André,
to me "no awareness" in anatta is like telling us not to stop moving
air to experience wind so that we can experience the blowing directly,
effortlessly and naturally.
Dependent
origination is to explain the conventional relationship between wind
and moving air to establish it's validity conventionally and frees the
inherent and dualistic rigidity.
Emptiness is very special, it is a koan.
The convention "wind" is empty and non-arisen,
What is that "wind"?
Why express that it originates in dependence and is empty and non-arisen?”