Non Duality (Are the Senses a Thought?)
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- čas přidán 5. 09. 2024
- A viewer asked if the senses are just another thought. In this video we address the difference between the sense fields and thought and more importantly how to differentiate the two. As it turns out having gone through initial awakening makes it far easier to investigate the far more subtle "sticky" thoughts that cause the senses to "bounce" attention immediately back into the mind.
Thank you again for giving water to the thirsty on their way
Welcome
I have to pause for a minute to write this comment. I must say I have never heard THIS in a more “simple, logic and structured” way ! THIS is so close and intuitiv that I! simply can NOT unterstand IT!!! Immense GRATITUDE for YOU and THIS 🤍🤍🤍 PS: I bought your book just to support you and give it to someone after reading it! Again thank you! NAMASTE 🕊🕊🕊
PPS: i KNOW THIS (you) does not need support because IT supports ITS SELF! ONE LOVE 🙃
Beautiful ! Thx for your comment :)
I must give credit where it's due: In terms of dissemination of non-dual principles, Angelo is "The Great Communicator".
His clarity of thought is remarkable but so is his the ability to make it make sense.
Thank you. So Very Clear! This goes well with the video exploring the sense gates, which takes this idea to practice, going there now, again.
Need the first shift already. Need to break through. Impatient and frustrated.
I understand what you mean. Also frustration is fuel!
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake The struggle is real. Today I had an unsettling moment when I got up fast and felt vertigo. The world seemed a bit different and I wondered if this was the shift you speak of. Then I got really scared and thought maybe I am dying. I pulled myself back. I felt dizzy and scared. My palms were sweating and my heart was racing. It felt like a panic attack. I used to get them all the time years ago. Over the years I have managed to make friends with my anxiety. Since I thought it was my old buddy anxiety I just sat with it and let it do its thing. Now I am wondering what happened, was it anxiety or a scary pre-shift moment.
@@carynroll4725 awesome! It won’t trigger that reaction at some point, not at all.
@@carynroll4725 just keep doing what you’re doing :))))
The overlays can be really subtle though. That is, times i haven't had any contextual overlay there aren't "things" it kind of just (paints an expressionist, colour filled shapeless painting and makes random noises). Unless, you know, in some way *that* is an overlay too.
Now i have speedy gonzales in my head. "Overlay! Overlay!"
But yeah, do we know the senses aren't in some way illusory too? Lots of science, and experience, seems to point that even our most raw sense data is inaccurate and like 3.5D foam on the surface of... a something (a everything).
Once non-dual is clarified (always the case experientially) then yes, even the senses and apparent physicality empty out in a way that is impossible to describe bc it doesn't turn into nothingness, space or awareness. Speedy G... lololol
When here is only hearing,i don't know what you say😆
But thoughtless"space" is so peaceful
💭😊
it works....for short time.
When here is only seeing,it looks like true natur❤
👁👂🏻👈🏻
great stuff man
:)
I'm only 100 pages into the book and have watched a lot of your videos. A question that comes up for me is when you speak of shifts. I haven't heard you comment on the type who does not experience obvious shifts of identification, but instead has a gradual, almost unnoticeable transition. I think of Suzuki Roshi vs. Eckhardt Tolle. Tolle whet from deep mind identification to profound awakening, like going from 0 to 60 in a second. Suzuki Roshi was the Abbott at the SF Zen Center and had not had an awakening experience. When he later did, he said it was anticlimactic, presumably because he was so close, that when he had what would be described as an awakening experience, it didn't entail so much of a movement. Maybe it was more like an "of course". It would be great to hear you comment on this if you haven't already. Thanks Angelo!
I have never experienced the identity shift, so the spaciousness doesn't extend to the visual field, which has boundaries and distance.
You’ve never had awakening? A fundamental experiential shift who’s after effects lasted weeks to months? If not it may be valuable to work on n who Am I or the one pointed approach first. Until that spaciousness is all pervasive and it’s very clear that thoughts are ghosts and don’t refer to or bind any “one” as a self.
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake believe my thoughts, so that clarity is not there. After watching your interviews, initial awakening seems like very dramatic business. Yes, I will go back to the fundamental inquiries in the awakening approaches-section and the book.
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake
the video ”What to Do When You Experience Unbound Consciousness” seems to give exceptionally clear instruction on what to do
This is great, thank you so much for clarifying and making this video!! I see what you mean now by "self-referential thought" in relation to sound. But if I may bother you with a follow-up (sorry!!): isn't sound itself silent? Isn't it just a wave? Isn't the universe silent without (psychoacoustic) mind to convert that wave into an electrical signal for the brain?
The experience of sound is manufactured or conjured by the mind, and in this way isn't it "in" mind, or perhaps "made of mind" itself as a translation of the wave? (and in this way, couldn't it be said it's a "thought" insofar as it's made of mind?) I see that this translation itself can happen without self-reflexive, egoic thought (it's just a process happening like any other in the world, or in the void), but to experience sound "directly" would be to experience it without the mediation of the brain's translation, wouldn't it?
I understand that this translation can arise without a self-concept, and in this way a wave indeed listens to itself (the subject/object false dichotomy you mention), but I don't see how this can happen without a translation, and therefore I don't see how it can be direct. I know you are friends with ZDoggMD who interviewed Donald Hoffman on this issue, namely that evolution did not design us to see (or hear) the truth/reality, only fitness payoffs (I would love to know your position on Hoffman's "consciousness-only" work!); but I guess what can be direct is the precise experience of our lack of access to what it really is, we can access our lack of access right now, haha and that's all there is -- the void laughing at us as it slips through our fingers...
"isn't sound itself silent? Isn't it just a wave? Isn't the universe silent without (psychoacoustic) mind to convert that wave into an electrical" this is a great question! Now... do you know what I'm going to ask you? That's right, I'm going to ask you is this a thought/ belief OR is this your immediate experience?? When I point or lay out an inquiry method in reference to non-dual perception, I'm always talking about direct experience only. To clarify let's imagine you and I are standing in a room and I point to a wall painted entirely red. I say to you "Just look at that over there and don't think about it or label it." If you do so is there something in the ACTUAL EXPERIENCE ITSELF that says something like "This is color which is light (electromagnetic waves) bouncing off my retina and carrying information to my brain to interpret that as red,?" Do you see how that is a thought and not intrinsic to the "redness?" for instance before you learned those concepts you could have still looked at "that" and it would certainly have looked exactly the same right? If you get this and see how quickly a sense experience is turned (seemingly) into a thought, you might understand what I mean when I say that there is a very fundamental layer of processing (subject/object) that underlies thought, but happens very quickly and leads one from direct experience to concept in a nearly unconscious way. This work is about making that unconscious movement conscious :) Excellent question. Perhaps I'll make a video about this. Can I hire you as a consultant to come up with video content? :))))
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake Thanks again, I'm literally laughing out loud as I read your response, that feels like a good sign :)) and sure, I'm more than happy to waive any consulting fees, haha. I'm reading your book really really slowly, and taking time to stop and feel anytime something comes up. might take me a year or so to read it this way, but I'm just trying to absorb it more than read it. I'm so very thankful to have found you and your work.
@@integralsonic awesome, I like that approach, depth instead of breadth with reading and info , it will serve you well.
I don’t know if I experience sound without thought, or how that is supposed to be. Sound is everythere in the experiencing field and can feel very close, regardless of the distance of the objekt.
Hey Tommy, it's similar to the thinking that happens during meditation - thoughts arise. It's easier to track thoughts during meditation than listening to sound because your mind can also wander automatically. For eg have you ever driven somewhere and listened to a song and all of a sudden you're at your destination but can't remember having driven there. Mind wandered. When you apply concentrated focus to sound the opposite seems to happen-sound is clear and it's like your field of awareness opens up expansively so there is a crystal clarity in the perceiving of sound but there's no sense of a self to hear. Try listen to something you enjoy - I like Pink Floyd's "Echoes" - it pulls me in and sucks me under, in a good way... Timeless jam...
@@nat998 tried listening to ”Echoes” on youtube and the sounds were streaming through me, but it’s noticed, so it’s still mixed with thoughts. But thanks for the tip.
Great! Being aware of thoughts being there, is a good step in practicing being present to what is - including thoughts arising. Thoughts don't ever stop arising, it's the nature of the body mind function (thinking) but just as they arise, they go too. Thoughts are temporary. There are brief moments of respite where we notice a falling away of a thought. Try to practice awareness of such a falling away and then as soon as another thought arises become aware of that and kind of play with it. You can't fight fire with fire - the goal is not to eliminate thoughts but to acknowledge the process with an awareness that you are that which is containing the thoughts and not the thoughts which are you. With practice this becomes easier, it's subtle and mind does relax its grip a bit 😀
I haven't listened to it yet - I can't contain my excitement!
😂
👻
I haven't had my first shift yet! But I did have that question regarding senses. I'm wondering if emotions like fear are thoughts as well? Sometimes when I'm enquiring, I'm in a thoughtless space but an emotion will come. Should I just see that as a thought, and continue to the thoughtless space?
You're awesome man, thank you again!
@@cookiemonster9276 at this stage yes for sure. Anything noticed is a thought :0000
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake ok great. Thanks my man.
Hi!
This is great, I actually practice exactly this, it is so enjoyable and makes everything melt..
It is seen clearly the difference between concept and what's real.
But.. when stopping this inquiry/practice, reflections come back.. and I come back :)
How to not come back?!
There has been many seeings of not self, but not a falling away.
Don't try not to come back, just lean into the senses ... one sound... then one form, then one sensation and on like this :)
very helpful and clarifying, thanks, j
King Janaka once dreamt that he was a beggar. On waking up he asked his guru, Vashishta: “Am I a king dreaming of being a beggar or a beggar dreaming of being a king?”
The guru answered, “You are neither, you are both. You are, and yet you are not what you think yourself to be. You are because you behave accordingly; you are not because it does not last. Can you be a king or a beggar forever? All must change. You are what does not change. What are you?”
Janaka said, “Yes, I am neither king nor beggar; I am the dispassionate witness.”
The guru said, “This is your last illusion: that you are a jnani-that you are different from, and superior to, the common man.”
(Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj)
Then aren't the body, sensations and the mind (thoughts) just appearences?
Great quote and indeed they are! However I find that if one takes a step wise approach and clarifies the specific experiential insights, then they have far less chance of overlooking "blind spots" in realization which can result in a fully or nearly fully belief based spiritual experience. Like "I believe there is no self, no world, no nothing so there's nothing to do and no one who can do it." This can be a big mistake if one truly wants to wake up to their true nature. So I always recommend starting with authenticity (what is one's immediate experience right now). If it is exquisitely clear that there is no subject/object division then great we can start to look into the nature of the vivid non-dual sense phenomena themselves, but if that isn't clear yet then concluding that all experiences are non-arising or illusory may sound good, and even provide a degree of experiential freedom, but one can fool themselves in this way.
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake great answer 🙏
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake like it or not I am not Krishna, I am not Ramana, I am not Nisargadatta or Robert Adams. I may be the same in essence but there is no such clarity or knowledge like their's here. So there may be a stairway to heaven but all there is right now here is this step, this-ness, and I need to work with it. Besides trust there is nothing to hold on to. As someone not realized, realization for me is an ideal, and the ways to it are ideas - be they spontanious realization or incremental practice. There is really nothing left but the stories of the realized ones and practice.
I walk in the dark and I know that I do not know.
@@eladleshem3790 your orientation is right on target… truly. If you’re oriented to what you think you know, you are drinking your own poison. However if you are oriented to the unknown, looking for something that is knowable beyond all doubt, you are indeed in good territory :)
is it like a deja vu that lasts or something? When i have deja vu's it's like everything makes sense but i don't know why or how. Thx
!!!
Like.... thank you.
How can thoughts be any different from the senses if everything is the same? Aren't they made of the same stuff, but put on the illusion that there is a reflective thing such as thought?
Question Sir. During non-dual exploration of the sense field(s), how to transcend the shock from sudden intense changes in stimulus like a loud bang or sudden sneeze in the next room. When I'm surrendered to direct experience, anything sudden seems to rip through me like a bullet.
Pretty uncomfortable. What am I doing wrong?
Nothing wrong, when you notice the body response to an unexpected stimulus then notice the belief that “my reaction to that was too strong/problematic” etc then just move attention back into the sense fields you’re working with :). 1, 2, 3
@@SimplyAlwaysAwake Thanks Angelo. 🙏
Much gratitude for your videos! Appreciate if you can let me know if I am ready for this practice. It’s been a while that I know there is no one inside me. I didn’t get to this thru a mind blowing experience but just looked inside and couldn’t find it. It happened naturally that I noticed that there is no hearer, there is only hearing (Also more of an intellectual understanding I think but it is very obvious). This happened with seeing as well (no seer only seeing). I also feel the expansion in the head level (not heart as Adyashanti puts it). A teacher suggested I listen to the sound which is further. I have done that a little without getting anywhere. Maybe should do it more or maybe I should focus on ‘who am I’ first? A bit confused how to proceed. Any feedback is appreciated. 🙏
I don't think who am I will be helpful really. I think you are better off working on any remaining reactivty with equanimity work and or clarifying non-dual.
Check this out and focus on the second stanza for a time, see if you recognize the experiential difference:
www.awakeningtoreality.com/2009/03/on-anatta-emptiness-and-spontaneous.html
Thank you so much Angelo for the direction. I will do that. 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
I have also wondered about this exact thing. At the very basic level, I recognise sound as sound, colors as colors, touch as touch, even if I don't go and further categorise them If this 'recognition' also is not there, is there any sensation at all?
what a great question ;) 💥
Where is this thought/identity barrier that you speak of? I can't find it! It's not in thoughts and it's not something outside thoughts... who is deluded, if there is no one? 🤕💣
There is no barrier. There is what is (reality) and there is thought. Both exist simultaneously and are intertwined. The awakening is the recognition that neither are you, and paradoxically both are you. Just continue to look for yourself by asking Who am I? or What am I? If you are like me, you will spend years asking this question to which you already know the answer, yet have no experience that can give you clarity. And then one day it will happen and you will understand exactly what is being pointed to here. When that first shift happens you will laugh at how obvious it was, sitting right in front of you the whole time. It is very paradoxical, and that is what I have found. Good luck to you!
Good question. It is imperative to know the difference between seeing logically or even in direct experience that in experience you cannot find a barrier or a self etc, and continuing to look wherever the SENSE of a me, a doer, a looker, a practicer appears even when you have realized you aren't going to find some "thing." Continue looking until you exhaust all belief that you can find it or solve this "problem" through intellect, thoughts etc... then just keep looking/Being in and as that thoughtless space. Go beyond all tethers of your life and self as you know them in this way until things get very quiet, singular, contentless. Just remain alert for arising thoughts and as they arise disregard them as thoughts/reflections/ghosts and then reorient to what is HERE regardless of the presence or absence of a thought :)
🙏💐
Will Smith + social media = the slap that never ends! 🤣😂
What a sufering for Something which are Nothing ,,,how much time for learning how to suffer much more grandios,,,,I am piss.,,,I supose I have left some energy to dive into the first shift,,,,,!