How did you understand non-self?

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zavk
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by zavk »

rowyourboat wrote:Hi Ben

Thanks for the reply. I should be clear in my questions: did your understanding of dukkha lead to (proximate cause!) your understanding of anatta, or was it something else?

with metta

Interesting question. In a manner of speaking, I would say yes too. It is by confronting dukkha directly at the level of nama and rupa that I learn to understand what dukkha really is. And the more I understand what dukkha really is the more I begin to understand anicca and anatta.

Yet, to say that my understanding of dukkha was the 'proximate cause' for my understanding of anatta doesn't quite describe my experience, if by 'proximate cause' we mean 'that which is immediately responsible for causing an observed result'. This is one of those things that's hard to articulate because it is a kind of felt understanding. Maybe I can explain my experience with the notion of dependent origination.

Proximate cause implies linear causality. To this extent, it doesn't sit well with dependent origination. Dependent origination does refer to a law of cause and effect but it is not a linear one.

So if I reflect on my experience from the perspective of dependent origination, I cannot strictly say that my understanding of dukkha 'led to' my understanding of anatta. Well, in a conventional sense, it does. To begin on the path, I have to accept that there is suffering and be willing to investigate it before I can really appreciate anicca and anatta. But in investigating the nature of dukkha I am also at the same time observing anicca and anatta.

This is especially so during intense meditation. When observing nama and rupa, I may experience all sorts of pleasant and unpleasant thoughts and sensations. But observing these thoughts and sensations--even if they are extremely unpleasant--doesn't mean that I've understood what dukhha 'really is'. I will not understand what dukkha 'really is' until I see clearly that thoughts and sensations are impermanent and accept with equanimity that they do not belong to 'me'.

So to this extent, I wouldn't say that the understanding of dukkha 'led to' the understanding of anatta (or anicca). I would prefer to say that the understanding of dukkha, anicca, and anatta mutually condition one another or are mutually constitutive. If there is causality here it is not a linear one.

:anjali:
Last edited by zavk on Wed Feb 24, 2010 4:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
With metta,
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Ben
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by Ben »

Hi Zavk
I'm so glad that you posted the above. I have had much the same thoughts.
metta

Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

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effort
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by effort »

i'm not experienced like some known practitioners here but as much as i feel relax with annata still i cant connect with annica.
Freawaru
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by Freawaru »

rowyourboat wrote: did your understanding of dukkha lead to (proximate cause!) your understanding of anatta, or was it something else?

with metta
Hi RYB,

for me it is kinda other way round. When I watched the character as a whole and on high speed with that knowing "this is not me, I am not it" there was no pain. Pain is that what I observed, namely the personality could be in physical, emotional, mental or spiritual pain. But there is another kind of pain, yet, and I experience it again and again when I merge with the character, when I loose the observing perspective. It is also there when the character is in jhana, I suspect it must be related to the merging (absorption) process itself, whatever the object. But I loose the awareness of this kind of pain real fast, it only takes a second or less and I have fully grown used to it by the time I can access the memories of the character as "my memories".
rowyourboat
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by rowyourboat »

Hi Zavk, Ben, Retro

Today I was listening to a sermon in Sinhalese by a skilled monk- he spoke of how the eye brings us nothing but dukkha and yet we consider some of it to be dukkha and the other bits sukkha (pleasant/satisfactory). He went on to portray the whole body and all mental states as nothing but a mass of suffering. I had a glimpse of anatta- because something so vile and fit to be discarded as this could ever be considered as me. There was this incompatibility- like oil and water. At our depths we wouldn't identify with something so foul, as myself -'egodystonic'. This leads me to the understanding that the depth of unsatisfactoriness/uselessness of it all, which the Buddha was talking about was quite deep, in order to get a glimpse of anatta in the manner mentioned in the suttas (which is often anicca-->dukkha-->anatta). In that sense the world 'revulsion' (nibbida) fits in very well.

I have heard a few people say that they did not know at what point they understood anatta. Similarly others are quite clear of the point that they understood it- because it was a bit of a surprise/shock- or a serendipitous finding. I guess this is why the Buddha never said 'folks this is the method and technique you must do to understand anatta' but laid out the whole satipatthana to explore.

Retro- love the Phena sutta. Talk about emptiness!

with metta

Matheesha
Last edited by rowyourboat on Wed Feb 24, 2010 2:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by rowyourboat »

Hi effort

Interesting! Did you just hear the teaching and think 'yeah, this makes sense!' or was there any difficulty accepting it at all?

with metta

RYB
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by Ben »

Hi RYB
In that sense the world 'revulsion' (nibbida) fits in very well.
SADHU!
It was one of the characteristics of my own experience.
metta

Ben
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

Compassionate Hands Foundation (Buddhist aid in Myanmar) • Buddhist Global ReliefUNHCR

e: [email protected]..
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effort
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by effort »

hello rowyourboat, freawaru
Freawaru wrote: Hi RYB,

for me it is kinda other way round. When I watched the character as a whole and on high speed with that knowing "this is not me, I am not it" there was no pain. Pain is that what I observed, namely the personality could be in physical, emotional, mental or spiritual pain. But there is another kind of pain, yet, and I experience it again and again when I merge with the character, when I loose the observing perspective....
what freawaru said for me is just like looking for suffering and think like there must be suffering, i dont accept it , in the other hand i dont refuse the 'suffering idea' just because i cant connect with it, if it is there i follow the path it has to come, the problem is , like others i dont have a solid anchor to stick with during hard times of dilemmas and doubts.

same thing for annata , i read it first and i know it, but even this knowing has degree , for example 'my money!' is still mine!! you know there is no me but when something greedy or hateful comes up in the same time me, self idea shows it self. also i have to remember this annata feeling or knowing also is impermanence , if i drink or wont cultivate mindfulness it will vanish , impermanence feeling.
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by Freawaru »

Hello effort,
effort wrote:hello rowyourboat, freawaru
Freawaru wrote: Hi RYB,

for me it is kinda other way round. When I watched the character as a whole and on high speed with that knowing "this is not me, I am not it" there was no pain. Pain is that what I observed, namely the personality could be in physical, emotional, mental or spiritual pain. But there is another kind of pain, yet, and I experience it again and again when I merge with the character, when I loose the observing perspective....
what freawaru said for me is just like looking for suffering and think like there must be suffering, i dont accept it , in the other hand i dont refuse the 'suffering idea' just because i cant connect with it, if it is there i follow the path it has to come, the problem is , like others i dont have a solid anchor to stick with during hard times of dilemmas and doubts.

same thing for annata , i read it first and i know it, but even this knowing has degree , for example 'my money!' is still mine!! you know there is no me but when something greedy or hateful comes up in the same time me, self idea shows it self. also i have to remember this annata feeling or knowing also is impermanence , if i drink or wont cultivate mindfulness it will vanish , impermanence feeling.
There are many different kinds of pain, some won't go away even when one is an aryan. Even an aryan knows the physical body to be his, he does not confuse his body with the body of other people. Same with money and all that. The kind of dhukkha I tried to describe here is different.

Consider reading a book or watching a movie and being completely absorbed in it for a while. The main character's thoughts are your thoughts, his/her feelings your feelings, his/her pain your pain. Do you feel your body tensing when watching a horror movie or reading Stephen King? Do you feel the fear of the fictional character even though you are sitting comfortably and safely on the sofa? I do.

But it gets old. When watching "Pitch Black" for the hundred time it is not as shocking as the first time. What has changed? I remember, I recall, I know what will happen, I expect. I can detach and observe the music or the art. Or I can observe my own reactions to image, sound and story. There is detachment even when in absorption. But the movie has not changed.

When being in absorption with a fictional character we are helpless, without defence we are at the mercy of the script. We have no control because all control is with the character that is construed by the script. It is okay when we like the script but noone can guarantee that it won't end up as horror. But when we are aware of the absorption, aware that there is a difference between the personality and the "me", a distance that can be used to observe the mechanisms there is already a liberation of sorts. One pain less. Namely the pain of being the victim of the script. And the good thing is the experience is even more complete, being with the character and observing it, too. One does not loose anything but one gains something. Both for the good stories as well as for the horror stories. Don't look for suffering - look for liberation. Don't look for self-idea, look for the character that is written in the script :popcorn:
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effort
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Re: How did you understand non-self?

Post by effort »

Freawaru:

look for the character that is written in the script :popcorn:
nice,it is good to remember. thank you
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