Tag: insight

Grant Barrett: If you find yourself angry or irritated by something… it’s probably because you don’t have enough data

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If you find yourself angry or irritated by something about language, it’s probably because you don’t have enough data. 

– Grant Barrett, A Way With Words, episode 1594 Familiar Strangers, about 12 minutes in

Yes, the more we understand the background for variations and changes in language, the more we’ll tend to find appreciation for it rather than being annoyed.

For instance, I remember my uncle being upset about changes in the Norwegian language over his lifetime. If we know that language always changes from generation to generation, and that’s why we have different languages and don’t speak the same as our ancestors, we’ll tend to be more at peace with it. It’s just how it is. Language changes with how we collectively change and it’s how we adapt to new places and conditions. We may find that annoyance gives a place for fascination.

That’s how it is in life in general as well.

If I find myself angry or irritated by something, it’s probably because I don’t have enough data. 

I may not know enough about the other person and her or his background and history and current situation, and what they struggle with and how they deal with it. 

I may not know enough about my own patterns and dynamics, and how I deal with the parts of me struggling and in pain. I may not have thoroughly enough found love for what’s been unloved in me, or seen what’s been hidden. 

I may not know enough about the bigger picture. I may not recognize thoroughly enough how everything is happening within and as what I am. I may not know enough about the bigger picture of life and the play of life. 

When it comes to language, we find there is an innocent and often fascinating and perhaps even beautiful reason why language is as it is and changes as it does. 

And in life, the more I understand and examine it, I find the same. There is often an innocent, ultimately impersonal, and fascinating reason why things are as they are. I may even find it beautiful, and sometimes also heartbreaking. 

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Adyashanti: If we’re not trying to control so much, a lot of the meditative experience is actually naturally occurring

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If we’re not trying to control so much, a lot of the meditative experience is actually naturally occurring.

– Adyashanti, The Boundless Awakened Heart

What does Adya mean by meditative experience? I am not sure, but I assume it may be basic meditation – to notice and allow what’s here and rest in that noticing and allowing.

In general, the more we try to control our experience, the more we are distracted by that attempt at control, and the less available our attention is to notice what’s here.

And the less we try to control our experience, the more free and available our attention is to notice what’s already here.

So what may we notice if we relax trying to control our experience?

BASIC MEDITATION

As mentioned above, basic meditation is about noticing and allowing what’s here.

If we intentionally try to notice and allow, we may find it’s not really possible. Our attention is too distracted. We get caught up in efforts to control our experience.

After struggling with that for a while, we may find that the noticing and allowing is already happening. We may find that basic meditation is more essentially about noticing the noticing and allowing that’s already here.

The experience that’s here is already noticed by consciousness, effortlessly and naturally, and before any thought comes in commenting on it.

And it’s already allowed. It’s already here so it’s already allowed – by existence, space, mind.

Basic meditation is essentially about noticing that our experience is already noticed and allowed, rest in that noticing, and allow it to work on us. To shape and transform us.

And all of this is easier the less we engage in trying to control our experience. Trying to control binds our attention. Relaxing that effort frees our attention to notice what’s already here.

INQUIRY

What I mentioned above is already a basic form of inquiry, and it can lead to further insights.

We may consciously try to notice and allow, and find we cannot really do it, or can only do it very imperfectly.

We may then notice that the noticing and allowing is already happening, and we can invite that noticing to work on and transform us.

We are built conscious and open for the world. We cannot escape it.

This is already a form of inquiry. We notice certain basic things about what’s here and how the mind works.

As mentioned above, when we try to control our experience, our attention tends to be caught up in that effort. And the less we try to control, the more attention is available to notice what’s already here.

What are some of the things we may notice?

We may notice that trying to control our experience is ultimately futile. The content of our experience – thoughts, emotions, sensations, reactivity, and so on – lives its own life. It’s already here before we even consciously notice and can relate to it or make up a story about it.

We may notice the overlay of mental images and words that our mind puts on the world. The constant commentary. And how this commentary brings us into certain states. That it’s really just innocent questions about the world. That it’s not ultimately true. It’s different in nature from what it comments on. And even within the realm of stories, it’s not any final or complete story.

We may notice the changing nature of our experience. All content of our experience is always changing. Nothing stays the same. If all of this is always changing, including any experience of being this human self or an I or me, is that what I more fundamentally am?

We may find we more fundamentally are capacity for the world as it appears to us, including this changing experience of this human self and the world. We may find we more fundamentally are what all of this happens within and as. And that any attempt to give it a label or to pin it down is ultimately futile and misleading.

We may explore what happens when we keep noticing our more essential nature. Does it allow our human self to reorganize and transform within that noticing? We may find that this is an ongoing process with no finishing line.

All of this is a natural and essential form of inquiry, and it’s something built into us. We are naturally curious about these things, and we naturally notice if we allow that noticing to take place.

SUMMARY

By not trying to control so much, attention is more available to notice what’s already here. And what’s already here is the essence of basic meditation. It’s more a question of noticing that it’s already here and resting in and as that noticing.

Within this is a natural and simple inquiry. We may notice some of the dynamics of the mind. We may notice the noticing and allowing that’s already here. We may notice it’s built into the mind and what we are. We may notice the changing nature of all content of experience, including anything within the content of experience we may take ourselves to be. We may notice what we more fundamentally are, in our own first-person experience. We may explore what happens when we rest in that noticing and allow it to work on us. And so on.

We may find that all of this is an ongoing process with no apparent finish line.

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Finding safety in understanding

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Finding safety in understanding is a big one for me.

That’s partly why I write here. It makes me feel I understand something, and it makes me feel safe and OK.

It’s true that some understanding can be helpful, in a practical sense. And yet, it can also be used to avoid feeling something, and look at apparently painful thoughts.

Right now, what would I have to feel if I didn’t write here? If I didn’t go to my understanding? Feel that.

What am I afraid would happen if I didn’t understand X?

I would be lost. Scared. Confused. Aimless. I wouldn’t know how to live my life. I wouldn’t know how to feel better. I would be miserable. Alone. In a dark hole.

Can you find X? Understanding? The one who understands? If you sift through images, words, sensations, can you find X?

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The awakening feeling

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When there is an opening or awakening, it often comes with a feeling.

That feeling may then become associated with the opening or awakening, or certain realizations and insights that came from that opening or awakening. Even if the feeling is really created by our mind’s reaction to the awakening.

So we may seek that feeling again, try to recreate it, because we think it somehow is connected with the opening or awakening, or the realizations or insights that happened within that opening or awakening. And that doesn’t really work.

Eventually, we may see that feeling as a sensation with certain stories attached to it. And we may see that what we are can recognize itself independent of particular feelings or experiences. After all, what we are is that which already is allowing any feeling or experience. It’s not dependent on any of these to recognize itself.

I went through this. There was a certain feeling associated with the initial opening and awakening, and the realizations and insights that came with it. I chased this feeling for a while. It didn’t work. Life went against it. (It’s too kind to allow it to work.) And there is an invitation for a deepening recognition of what I am independent of feelings or experiences.

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Notes about meditation

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It looks like I’ll teach (show, guide) meditation for a group of teenagers, so I thought I would go over the basics again here, as a reminder for myself.

There are three basic forms of meditation: Stable attention, rest, and inquiry.

Stable attention / samatha. Attention can be trained. Untrained, it may easily be scattered and unruly. Trained, it can become stable and pliable, and a stable attention is helpful for almost any activity in our lives – from relationships to sports to learning and working. One way to train it is to bring attention to the breath, for instance the sensations at the nostrils as the breath naturally goes in and out. Attention may wander, and when that’s noticed, bring attention back to the breath. The noticing happens as grace.

Rest / shikantaza. Allow everything to be as it is. Notice it’s already allowed to be as it is. Notice what’s here – the sensations, sights, sounds, smell, taste, words and images. It all comes and goes. It lives it’s own life. Rest and notice what’s here. Even notice any resistance or trying. It’s all happening within and as the field of what’s here. There is nowhere to go and nothing to do. Just notice what’s already here.

Inquiry / vipassana. Insights into what the mind is, and how it works. These happen, to some extent, through the two previous ones. And they also happen through guided inquiry or exploration. such as sense field explorations, the Living Inquiries, The Work, the Big Mind process, and also holding satsang with what’s here.

Mutual support. Each of these support the others. A stable attention makes it easier to rest and do inquiry. Familiarity with rest makes it easier to explore a stable attention and inquiry from rest. And inquiry gives insights – and a release of identification with words and images – that supports a stable attention and rest.

Support of life. All these forms of meditation are in support of life. And there are, of course, many things that supports both life and meditation. Physical exercise is one, including forms of yoga (tai chi, chi gong, Breema), endurance and strength. Precepts is another, guidelines for how to live our lives. These give a preview of how it is to live from more clarity, they shows us what’s left (fears and beliefs that prevents us from living from clarity and love), and they support an easier and more stable relationship with others and ourselves. Different forms of therapies can also be very helpful in allowing our human self to align with clarity and love.

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Supported by a state vs not

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I notice I am curious about this, partly because it’s not very clear to me yet.

Sometimes, shifts in perception is supported by a state. There may be a state that makes it easier to notice (what a thought may say is) all as one, all absent of any “self”, all as Spirit, all as love, meeting all as love etc.

So there is a shift in state, which invites a shift in perception, which in turn invites a shift in insight, and a shift in noticing.

When the state shifts again, perhaps into something (apparently) very ordinary again, the invitation is to keep noticing and questioning. Is it true it – the noticing, all as Spirit/love etc. – went away? Is it true this is not one, Spirit, love?

This noticing throughout changing states and experiences is in itself (sort of) a state, a state of noticing.

And it is also a shift from something that may appear extraordinary, an extraordinary state, to something very ordinary, noticing what’s already here in (and as) any state, any content of experience.

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Experiences, insights and shifts

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Experiences come and go. Joy, sadness, grief, anger, bliss, temporary release of identification, strong identification and contraction, openings, periods of clarity, ease, surfacing shadow material. It all comes and goes.

From this may come insights, and these are a bit more lasting although also transient. I may notice I am what all this happens within and as. I may notice the circle eight pattern of going “up” (clarity, bliss) and “down” (shadow material, wounds). I may notice the effects of identifications and beliefs.

And from this may come a shift – in perspective, noticing, identity, or identification. For instance, there may be a shift into more consistently exploring and noticing that I am what experiences happens within and as. There may be a shift into more consistently meeting what’s here in satsang.

An experience or series of experiences leads to an insight or noticing, and this in turn may lead to a shift in perspective, noticing, identity, or identification.

I see how this is also the case with “spiritual” experiences or openings.

There may be an experience of oneness, all as one. It comes into the foreground of experience, clear, undeniable. As this experience goes away, as any experience does, there may be an insight that all is one even if it’s not experienced directly. Further, there is an invitation to notice this oneness within any experience. Is it true oneness is not here?

There may be an experience of all as awareness, or all as love. Again, it’s strong, in the foreground, undeniable. As it goes away, what’s left may be an insight that all is awareness or all is love, whether it’s noticed or not. And there is an invitation to notice this too within any experience. Is it true this is not awareness? Is it true love is not here? Is it true this is not love?

There may be an experience of selflessness, of no self, and this too may be strong, clear and undeniable. And this experience too shifts and something else is here, leaving an insight of selflessness even if there appears to be a self here. And again, there is also an invitation to see what’s really here independent of any particulars of experience. Is it true there is a self here? Is it true that this, that appears as a self, really is a self?

In this way, the different facets of reality can be an experience (a visitor that comes and goes), which translates to an insight, and with an invitation for it to be noticed within any experience. The first is given, the second may or may not follow from the first, and the third may require some intention, shifts and new habitual grooves.

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