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[Guy1298]

Newest modification of the daily meditation routine is 1 hour concentration on the breath, 30 minutes Advaita reading, 30 minutes self-inquiry, followed by 30 minutes loving-kindness meditation.

 

Not sure what it is with that routine, but the high it induces for the day is something I'm deeply grateful for. Perhaps I've found a compilation of practices worth holding on to. Each practice is aimed at something and seem to work together like a concert. Concentration is aimed at jhana, finding calm in which to observe the mind, body, and world, Advaita reading primes the mind to look at my experience doubtfully and enquiringly leading into self-inquiry which yields direct awareness of oneself at the expense of the apparent world, and loving-kindness meditation reminds and encourages me to see myself in all (possibly also encouraged by the self-inquiry), intent on their happiness.

 

Is it the aim of Buddhist meditation? No. Is it the aim of Advaita? Probably not. Regardless, I'll continue it and see what it's real aim is. 

Edited by Guy1298, 20 January 2023 - 07:43 PM.

[Guy1298]

The self-inquiry is really quite interesting. 

 

This time around, I was reminded of a description of self-inquiry that Mooji used. I have more recently decided to not listen to Mooji and other Youtube gurus and Neo-Advaita types in general. But, I was reminded of his telling someone to watch the road in the midst of a rainy drive. The person he describes can't take his eyes off the windshield wipers. So, in self-inquiry this time around, as I looked at experiencing, as awareness or existence, it didn't occur to me that the world ceased to be. I seemed to see a sense of "I am" that contained mind, body, and world. It felt very close to seeing the road in the midst of the windshield wipers. 

 

At that moment, it seemed that mind, here and now, with all the thoughts and memories conventionally known to be "I" had unreasonably and unrealistically limited the freedom, happiness, and nothingness that was that other "I". Nothingness because seeing it communicates the unreality of the other conventional "I" which as far as it sees now is all it reasonably can be except for itself... which is nowhere to be found.

Something like that at least.

Edited by Guy1298, 24 January 2023 - 07:22 AM.

[Guy1298]

There is reason to be skeptical of all experience. 

 

During that vipassana retreat, I remember one day there was an account of certain experiences that signal the experience of jhana. It was the appearance of a minor hallucination, possibly light, or something else. After having heard that, as I meditated a persistent light came into view just as I appeared to deepen my meditation. Haha. Just the mind creating what it needs to call itself "special". At other times, I felt that I had a more direct experience of the three characteristics in phenomena, concurrently I felt blissful and happy at that new knowledge.

 

In my opinion, it's the same with just about everything. If your mind is flexible enough it will meet your expectations within certain limitations. So, I have a mind filled with ideas about what the results of self-inquiry are, the way of talking about those results, etc. Upon doing self-inquiry I find something quite similar. 

 

But, it's important also to notice that it's true that Advaita recognizes that this is the case. Many Advaita texts say... all of this is mind-made, an illusion (greater than what I just suggested). Ramana says don't attend to self-limiting thoughts, the not-self, only attend to the Self. Advaita has a pattern of saying, think that you're Brahman and you're Brahman, think that you're a jiva and you're a jiva. Think that you live and die and you live and die. Perhaps there is something more magical in it. I've yet to see it. Perhaps that's because the world my mind has created is too quick to wring out the magic with reason and doubt. Or maybe it's because Advaita isn't magical. The apparent world, mind, and body, are merely concepts maintained in the mind. "I" is a baseless concept, apparently arising from and indicative of the Self, but one that is freely and intensely associated and attached to things that it isn't. It's a knot between Self and the apparent world. And it seems it's the knot tying a rope that's strangling me to death. That can be taken literally to an extent, identification with body means life and death.

 

Why wouldn't it be magical? I guess, what is better for me to ask is does it need to be magical? If I knew of the magic, I might try to use it. But, who would I use it for? Same old guy, myself, who hasn't had his fill. More happiness, sex, relationship, connection, intelligence, entertainment, knowledge, fame, fortune... etc. Ultimately, I prefer the life I live now because the satisfaction and happiness I know is free and independent. And so, I prefer the world I know now. It is the reason I return to meditation and self-inquiry (and maybe psychedelics too). So, for me, I prefer Advaita be simple. The simplicity is the unreality of the apparent world as known in the fact that it is wholly maintained by concept. Would it vanish if I enquired more vigorously? I don't know. I suspect not. There is relief in knowing that I am not what I think I am. That knowledge only seems to come when I turn away from the concepts that maintain this world.

Edited by Guy1298, 26 January 2023 - 03:05 AM.

[Guy1298]

Self-inquiry is hard, in my opinion. 

 

I find it interesting that I can self-inquire, coming to the conclusion that I'm not the body, mind, world, etc. I notice immediate existence, consciousness. But, I don't really get it. Haha. 

 

Last night, I laid down to sleep and revisited thoughts long passed. I recall challenging the idea that I'm actually the person who exists throughout time. Well... I'll try to explain. At all times, when I think of myself, I have a concept in mind that is a person. A person has a body, a mind, a history, and a future. The person is the doer and he is also the one that enjoys and suffers. But, clearly, I never find or experience that person here and now. At all times, I merely think and find a concept that is a person. I identify with the concept (Because wouldn't it be quite odd not to?). Now, maybe there is such a person and not only this concept that I see in my thoughts. But... am I him? 

 

In my opinion, I'm not. This is obvious but unintuitive, because there's been glue between immediate existence and this concept for as long as I can remember. Indeed, if it were possible, I might be considered crazy to remove the glue entirely. It's obvious because for many reasons, it appears to me that I am not the body, nor the mind. And I am only in the present. It seems to me that if this person were not, I could continue here and now to take on this identification regardless. I can play that part. But, has playing him made me him? I think that suggesting that it has requires that I discover that I am the body and mind. But, to me, it's clear I'm not. Playing him hasn't made me him, nor will it ever, because regardless I am what I am, and that's not in time, not body, not mind. 

 

I might say that I don't even play him. Yet, I appear to, because in proximity to the mind I take on its form. The mind as the person is the doer, so I appear to do.

[Guy1298]

There's a pattern I have with most Advaita media. At some point, I start to have an issue with some of the reasoning of the teachers. For instance, with Ramana, there's a tendency to reason that you exist in deep sleep because one says "I slept." That' reasoning is spoken by Ramana himself and echoed by his students and the teachers that sprang from him. But... my saying "I slept" is clearly no evidence of existence in deep sleep. If we submit this to the same rigor one might expect a self-inquirer to question the concept "I", I don't think there is any evidence of existence in deep sleep except the direct experience of existence in deep sleep.

 

So, that's the reasoning that pops up often enough to make me lose faith in Ramana. The same goes with all the Advaita teachers. There is faulty reasoning everywhere, sometimes it even appears to be a truly joyful interpretation of reality, but when I see someone reason like that, I can't continue to listen with trust in the speaker. In the same way, I also lose interest in them when I see that there are cult-like followings, etc.

 

So... there are things I like about Advaita, some of its literature, and some of its teachers, but really none of it has taken perfect hold, though it might have appeared to at certain times.

 

For me, it's more important to forget those teachers, the cult-like followings, and their apparently faulty reasoning. Questioning the reality of the world and the identity of oneself and investigating it honestly is all that matters. After a large dose trip a number of years ago, out of it I recall thinking and knowing that the world was created by myself, that I was not separate from absolute reality, I knew to some extent that I was consciousness only, and believed that I had seen or experienced eternity. Those ideas seem no different than what Advaita is suggesting. What led me to think that way? The mushroom trip and the experience itself.

 

I guess this is me coming to say that I can't be a devotee of any particular offshoot or expression of Advaita. There is merely the knowledge that oneself is not his thoughts, his body, his past, his future... In it, there is freedom, that is also no freedom at all.

Edited by Guy1298, 28 February 2023 - 10:32 PM.