Putting it all on the Table

In order to understand that Self is only an idea, it is necessary to understand the difference between experiencer and experience. One metaphor I like to use is the image of a table on which all experiences are placed, with the experiencer standing over, surveying them.

First, you take all your sensory experiences and place them on the table. Sights, sounds, tastes, etc. This is only a tiny fraction of what you experience daily so it doesn't take up much of the table. I know this is an odd thing to say, but you have to remember that most of what we experience is ideas. For example, if you see a car in your driveway, you get a brief flash of color as a sensory experience, then you get the experience of identification with ideas (such as "car", "mine", "driveway" etc.), and the formulation of new ideas (i.e. "needs washing"). Most of what we "see" are ideas and thoughts.

So, the next thing to do is put all the ideas, thoughts, impressions, emotional reactions, etc. on the table. Now you are looking at the contents of your mind, and your senses, and your life begins to take shape in the myriad objects populating your table.

But now, who's looking at the stuff there?

"It's me!" you think. But wait, "me" is an idea, so that has to go on the table as well. "Me" is an idea that we attach to experiences we identify with, to differentiate them from things we don't, but as chapter 3 discusses, those things are not only all experiences (as opposed to experiencer), but they are free to change in any way imaginable without altering the presence of experience as a constant, and therefore, altering the experiencer of experiences in any way.

So, we revisit the question about who's looking at the stuff on the table, and no matter what we come up with, it's still an experience (usually an idea) and therefore must go on the table. Then what's left?

When you make the effort to experience the experiencer, you become the camera that tries to photograph itself. You experience a paradox. The experiencer which makes reality possible (See Ch. 3) cannot be experienced, because there's no experience there. There is only what the Buddhists call "emptiness", and it is the truth at the core of our existence.

Jim

Intelligence Experiment

I think that intelligence, largely, is a matter of being able to find patterns in one's environment, and that the greater intelligence is that which is capable of finding more and more subtle patterns. If this is true, then it should be possible to exercise one's pattern detecting ability in a number of ways, and increase one's intelligence.

Well, one way that seems promising to me is the assumption of different points of view. That is, training your mind by attempting to see things from other points of view as completely as you can; the more points of view the better. Being able to put yourself completely into different vantage points (not just intellectually, but emotionally as well), opens up new ways of looking at things, and, as a consequence, gives more ways of finding patterns in the chaos of our moment to moment environment.

I am already trying to expand my ability to assume different points of view, and I feel it's helped me to see many things more clearly than I otherwise would have. However, I would like to invite others willing to try the same thing (or who have been making the effort to assume a wider range of views for other reasons) and see how the effort has effected them.

Have you found that opening yourself to different points of view has sharpened your mind? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Jim

The Ideal Meditative State

As I discuss in Chapters 5 and 6, to listen is the most fundamental spiritual act. This is different than merely hearing. It is an active process, where you willfully direct your attention toward discovering what is. This idea can be extrapolated to include ideas like looking (as opposed to seeing), touching (as opposed to feeling), and so on. It is an active process of discovery.

That being said, the ideal meditative state should reflect this goal of listening. Most books on the subject that I have read recommend focusing on some kind of object. This can be the breath, a candle flame, an ambient noise, or any number of other objects. In fact, my own book discusses using such objects for meditative attention. However, you can go further.

Objects of any kind will generally direct the mind, karmically, toward the generation of distracting ideas. If you focus on a flame, for example, the idea of "flame" will invariably overlap what your raw attention is taking in from the present experience, splitting your attention between the intimate (idea) and extimate (the flame) experiences. So, to keep the attention intact, and intensify the meditative state, I suggest focusing the attention not on a thing, but on the answer to a question: What is?

Instead of identifying a thing in your environment, and focusing on THAT, the idea is to focus on whatever you are experiencing right now. There is less need for control (such as trying to keep the mind totally fixed on one thought or object) making it easier to just allow what is to be what is. It's an absolutely passive state, listening to one's own experiences in real time and just allowing them to be. In fact, there is no allowing, even, as that is a response to the stream of experience. You just simply take in your experiences, without reaction, as they are, as they pass through your awareness.

I have had great success in my meditation from taking this approach. To know what truly is, you have to take the time to look. We don't do that, naturally, as we are all programmed to understand our environment in terms of ideas, and how they relate to each other. Meditating in the way I described will help to distance you from that habit, opening you up to new ways of looking at reality.

Jim