Low Tide Review

 I decided to review this poem, as it is a nice concise little representation of the style of poems from this time, and it was a major developmental period for me.  The review follows the reprint here.  

Low tide no longer floats the look in my eyes,

They splash like stars gasping in little pools,

Extracting codes, 

Tears that fall all night long,

One for each empty hole,

For each breath,

For each sense,

X rays that float out of the frames,

Of blood shot paraphrased passport propositions,

Valves leak, doors creak,

But not enough for me,

Not enough for my shape, 

To believe in the trembling screen,

To believe in the doorway,

Light years below, where the red shifts infra weaves unkempt sleeves,

Rename the swirling dust born rust forms dimmer edges, 

Senses are all I have,

Senses searching for a home,

Senses with no end in sight,

Rescue the lines around my resistances,

The code spreads far and wide,

To three sides,

 The story is told,

To three tides,

 The gold is hidden,

To three little toys,

 The west was won,

The shoreline rising and falling, 

In the hollow veils, 

Drifting in mirrored solutions,

Questioning the doubt, 

With claws and teeth, and fear,

Forces in a soft machine,

Painted, tainted, circles of ringing bells,

Circles of tingling wells,

Stormy windows,

Clues that foretell,

Working the bends,

The burning lens, little glass capsule of little heats that never sleep,

Where the raven sings,

Shapes the search light to weep again,

The code drifting south,

A little orbit where we call each other friends,

In dry runs between the heart,

In electrified wires, 

Between palm trees in the phases of Neptune’s’ moons,

A giant leap,

Slower than the changing tide,

A great feat,

Slower than the piper at the gate,

To save the silk palace,

Quieter than the angel of dawn,

Unwinding the snowflakes crystalline rivers,

My cross linked blinking billboards shiver,

Windows peeling back the dolls’ house origami apparitions,

In lips of puppetry abolition,

Half grinning, forfeit,

The midnight garden takes flight,

Dream of my imaginary friend,

A wave in the Silk Road,

Ahmed weaves in the silk chamber,

I lost my eyes,

Shapeless at last,

No match for the deep ecology of the design of bricks and mortar in truth or dare my mixed messages on the tip of my tongue,

Catching and casting the first rays,

That overlap the shore,

In the safety of imperceptible storms,

Fit to miniature slips in my fingertips,

Balance the fortune, the fame, the hunger,

In the wounds of the corner of the returning of more than I could bet,

Of memories, moods, meanings, meanderings, mores,

Burning slower than justice,

    My poems mostly follow a fractal like format, like nature and so forth.   Also known as the law of scale invariability, the law of octaves, the hermetic view of “as above so below.” And a loose Fibonacci like sequence.

    This also features the pattern of variations on a theme.  Also like a fractal, and so on.  

    Like waves on a beach, the scales and forms are revised and revisited, transformations ensue, a story, of sorts, is sort of told.  

    My own personal touch is that of dream like boundary-less-ness.  The laws of most peoples’ daily reality do not apply here.   

    Welcome, and fare thee well sisters and brothers.

    

Low tide no longer floats the look in my eyes.  They splash like……. in little pools.

     When the tide is low tide, it reveals stuff that is usually covered up by “the deep.”  Leaving little pools of ….. codes.   Tears.      One for each empty hole, for each pool, each sense……… is one of those little pools.      

    This first stanza is the basic theme.  The hardest thing for people to understand is that there is nothing new after this.  Keeping this little theme in mind is hard for people.  Staying with the theme, much less understanding the theme requires a state of concentration that most people find difficult.  

(That is why I am writing my meditation book, to give people a simple method to understand concentration in a practical useful method, which is not given by most meditation teachers, if any.  Kind of like exercise, pilates, yoga, etc. strengthens certain kinds of muscle combinations, but does not help you stand up.   or walk, or bend down, or lift objects, or move your  body in any useful way. It is mostly useless.  And actually nonproductive, once you understand how the body, (and mind, and nature, really works.) which is why I developed my exercise program.  And write.  Anyway. Back to the poem, which represents the true nature of reality.  )

    So, the basic theme, 

    Low tide…….The introductory little stanza itself is a little repetitive cycle, like each stanza, like the entire poem.  This is the nature of a fractal.  This is the nature of existence.  

    The next stanza.  X rays.  X rays reveal things.  Like low tide does.  Like tears do.                                                                                                                                              The little repetitive cycle is repeating, revising, reformulating, layering and re layering into more (complex) forms that are really just reformulations.  

    Blood shot paraphrased……….revealed, again, by tears, that leave bloodshot eyes, here reimagined as “paraphrased passport propositions.”  Those are the eyes, the frames,  the pools.   Re-visitations, re imaginations, waves of the ocean, over and over, crashing on the beach, re arranging, reformulating.

    Valves leak,  eyes,  pools, again, revisited.  No new ideas.  Just re imagined.  Not enough for me.   They don’t fit in the frame, like the x rays, like the tears.  See?

    Not in the trembling screen, or the doorway,   …….. like the pools, like my eyes.  

(It is so ridiculously repetitive it escapes most people’s ability to just stay with it.

There are no new ideas.  There is really only one idea present in the universe.  One story.  Told over and over, in culture after culture, movie after movie, song after song, portrait after portrait, painting after painting.  Being rediscovered, moment after moment, in another re imagined way.  Anyway, back to the poem)

Light years below…etc…. are the pools again,  re imagined into red shifts etc.

Senses are all I have…..  lines around my resistance…..the frames, the pools again.

The code spreads far and wide…….three sides,  this gets explained in more detail in my upcoming book.  Why three?  The trinity.  Life is made of protein, consumes protein, and makes protein.  Just like the stars.  Recycling themselves. Like the father, son and Holy Ghost.  Re arranged in different forms.  As most of you know, there are no new stories.  The same story has been told and re told over and over, in every culture, in every century, since time immemorial.  

    Three little toys the west was won.  My favorite line.  Says it all again.  The west, the new land, the new story.   Conquered.  Like obstacles, evil. By your “efforts”   A real satirical parody on popular culture.   It will be explained more in my book, if you need it.  

    The shoreline rising and falling…..the shoreline, just like the tide, rises and falls. 

Veils…..the pools, 

     Claws, teeth, fear……. are the re imagined trinity.

    Forces in a soft machine……are the tears, pools,   re imagined in; circles of ringing bells, wells, stormy windows, clues, etc.

    Working the bends……pools, tears, again,,,

    Where the raven sings,………..re imagined  pools, tears,   sorry, it is so ridiculously repetitive, just like a fractal, and existence, but the variations keep us interested, keep us thinking, there is something unique happening here.  Like….  Us.  The greatest illusion of all.

    A giant leap……..the piper at the gate,  is the re imagined…raven, and the tears again.

    To save the silk palace…..the frame, the pools

    Unwinding snowflakes,……………….i hate to say it,,,, the tears…..

    Dolls house,   the frame, the tears, you know, the interesting thing IS that there are all sorts of intrinsic, hidden, implied meanings behind all these little variations.  That is what really makes it bearable.  Or interesting if you will.  Thanks.   Within the meanings of the variations of say,  the tears,  re imagined as the raven for example,  the tears represent those things we may not understand.  

We may not understand, or fear, like our feelings.  They are bigger than us.    They don’t fit in the frame.  They are like X rays into some other dimension of our being.   Such is the raven,  the devil,  the dolls’ house, hell.  They represent all those things were overwhelming to us.  That have now become all the conditioned things we are afraid of.   Anything we don’t understand.  Anything different than what we have been conditioned to accept.  Like other people, from other families, from other cultures, form other religions, from other races, from other sexes, from whatever “other” you have not really accepted that is really the “other” part of yourself that you have not met yet.            

    

    The dream of my imaginary friend……the part of myself I have not met yet.  That “dreams” my hopes, and nightmares.   Heaven and hell.

    I lost my eyes.  Shapeless at last.     The savior.    Full of mixed messages, because it contains the entire unknown.   Imperceptible forms.  Slips etc….

Balances the fame, fortune, hunger……the trinity again………  burning slower than justice,,,,,it just defies our understanding.                  

Meditation 1

 

Basic Skills.

    One of the key elements to gaining access to the present moment is developing concentration.   I recommend beginning with practicing with small doses of present moment centered concentration.  Concentration is an example of a way of relating “to your experience”, and/or a characteristic of mind involved in relating “to your experience.”   That is through concentration, we find we have access to other ways of relating to our experience, and knowing our experience, and find that we have access to different experience.  These ideas will be explored all through this book.  Presenting all these views and methods is challenging because they do not exist in a linear fashion.  As such, I present the information in a circular fashion, revisiting the ideas over and over, each time revealing some different aspects of them, and how to use them in the process of self-realization.  I prefer that term of other terms for the fruits of meditation. I prefer the terms, self-analysis, self-awareness, self-consciousness, self-recognition., self-knowledge, self-revelation, self-actualization, self-discovery, self-exploration, self-fulfillment, to describe this process and how it works.  Notice the interrelated nature of the experience and the result in this way of thinking.  I call it a form of “process relating.”  This idea will be revisited in many ways throughout this book.   I present it this way so that you can begin to learn the process immediately, become familiar with it, and then evolve it.  Some phrases get used over and over so that each time, as you deepen your experience with the methods, they might reveal more nuanced qualities to you, and may find other interests in them to consider, and pursue.

    I have found from my own experience and the experience of teaching lots of other people meditation skills, that one way to begin is to narrow the range or scope of what you are attending to.  This is a common practice and consists of instructions like paying attention to your breath and/or your other body sensations.  This is known as mindfulness of the body.  Narrowing or attenuating your scope of your field of attention has many benefits.  First it reduces your reactivity.   When you attend to certain aspects, or attend to less, you react to less.  Narrowing your field of attention is like narrowing the range of Ph. of two compounds.  The relationship of compounds can be described as the range of Ph., or potential hydrogen.  ( this refers to the number of potential hydrogen binding sites available for reactivity.)  When you narrow the Ph. of two compounds, they are less reactive.   When you reduce the sphere of your attention you reduce your exposure to potential things to react to or with.  

    Another aspect is that as you attend to less, you may slow your reaction speed. This known as titration.  The reaction of two compounds is also dependent on the speed at which you combine them, as well as their ph.  You can combine two very reactive substances, (with a wide ph range) if you combine them slowly.  Reducing your range of attention and speed of attending are also examples of ways to attend to your experience.  As you start to narrow your field of attention and slow your speed of reactivity, you will begin to feel more in the present moment, more at ease, and this may lead to more peaceful, tranquil, and serene experiences.  In this way you may notice things about your experience that you did not notice before. This is one example of how changing the way you relate to things, can change your experience of things.  The whole process feeds back in a loop so that as you change your experience of things, you will be changing the way you attend to things as well.  I term this phenomena of inter relationships in perception, ways of attending to the experience, and the experience as a “process” way of relating.

    We can liken reducing our attention field to the process by which we may prevent our exposure to a pathogen, like a virus.  Just as we would limit the proximity, or distance, of our exposure to a pathogen, we can limit the exposure of our range of experience to just our immediate surroundings of the present moment.  By limiting our exposure to a pathogen, like a virus, we minimize the potential compromise of our natural protective barriers.  By reducing our exposure we give our natural barriers opportunities to stay strong or time and space to rebuild.  They then provide us with additional support to our health and well-being.  The protective barriers in the case of meditation practice, is what we may call our sense of inner wellness, safety, stability.   I believe that cultivating this experience of wellness is the most important aspect of meditation practice and this book is dedicated to exploring that process in many ways.

    Traditionally people are taught morality before meditation.  They learn generosity, compassion, so they begin to become less self-oriented, less conditioned in the ways they experience wellness, or pleasantness, before they begin their meditation practice. These qualities are known as “blameless joys.”   This is how people are traditionally taught to cultivate a sense of wellness as a basis for their meditation practice.  I think this shows the central importance of the quality of wellness, and a basic healthy positive sense of self, as a life experience, as a basis for meditation practice.

        Another aspect of the present moment is that it may be likened to the medium of our experience.  An analogy is that oxygen is the medium in which a fire burns.  Oxygen is not the source of the fire, or the fuel of the fire.  It is the medium.  There are many such example of this in biology, chemistry and other domains.  For example, the number of molecules of ATP can be produced from glucose, known in chemistry as glycolysis, is dependent on the available oxygen in the cell.  I suggest that the degree of present moment attention you have is going to have an effect on the way you experience things, or the relationship of subject and object.   We will explore many aspects of this phenomena throughout this book in a systematic and detailed way that will give you access to many kinds of developmental processes associated with mindfulness.

        Beginning to come more into the present moment can begin some other processes.  One is that you may notice that some aspects of awareness are more in the background and others in the foreground.  Sometimes you may find it useful to arrange your experience in this way.  In the above application you can allow your sense of wellness to be in the foreground, and allow other aspects of your present moment experience to be in the background.   Or you can let the other aspects of your present moment, such as your body sensations, or the sounds around you or vision be in the foreground and let your sense of wellness be in the background.  I do not think it matter which one is in the foreground and I actually think it’s useful to let these arrangements change if that feels appropriate to you.   If some aspects of your present moment experience become too strong, or perhaps become a bit overwhelming in some way, just try to acknowledge and observe them and perhaps focus on a smaller proximity or sphere of the present moment to increase your sense of wellness and safety.  If you are not really able to maintain your focus that is ok and you may want to put on some relaxing music or try to engage in something pleasant or distract yourself in some way that will be relaxing or releasing for you.  There are many healthy ways to distract yourself if you begin to get uncomfortable with a present moment type of meditation exercise.   You may need to do something like take a shower, drink some water, splash cold water on your face, wash your hands in cold water, go outside, call someone on the phone, do some exercise, watch a movie, read a book or magazine, sing loudly, and/or gargle with water for several minutes, (these last two have been shown to increase vagal nerve tone, which can increase the para-sympathetic aspect of your autonomic nervous system, which may help you “rest and digest” the opposite of “flight and flight”, which may help with many physiological functions, including things like sleep, and having a bowel movement.  

  

  Experiences that overwhelm us tend to challenge our natural sense of wellness.   Ongoing stress and the experience that so many people have of not having enough time for themselves, or always feeling there is too much to do, or life is too demanding, may also be experiences that challenge our natural barriers of wellness. 

    Challenges to our barriers can put us into an experience with the unknown.  We may at times have a sense of some of the unconscious fears that lay outside of that comfort zone we may know of as ourselves.   It may occur as a sense of being threatened in some way, or a fear of some kind, or a loss of some kind.  It may be perceived as a loss of some kind of stability we may have come to depend on.  A relationship of some kind may seem to be threatened.   It can arise on a physical, emotional or mental aspect or all of the above.  Many kinds of unconscious content may arise as our barriers become compromised.

    A safe experience of the present moment with adequate barriers can provide us with the potential for regaining a deeper sense of integration with ourselves, our world, and a deeper sense of sustainability.    Because it has a particular kind of relationality to it, I have termed it above as a “process” way of relating.  The present moment can also be a bit challenging as well.  It can feel a little less stable at first, because it has a different kind of stability than the one we are used to.   We will go into this more later.  For the time being, let us focus on some simple steps to beginning our journey into the present moment.   We will examine more characteristics of the journey as we go along.  

    Some people experience this process as a development of more inclusivity of a certain range of attention rather than a kind of selectivity or reduction of their field or focus of attention.  I do not think it matters how you characterize it.  I think our words and descriptions may not always exactly represent our internal experience, and we will be exploring this idea in some applications as well. 

   Just as we begin to have certain kinds of experience by attenuating our field in certain ways, and slowing our reaction time, we are going to be interested in developing certain qualities of being in the present moment, or ways of attending to the present moment first.  We will go into other kinds of experiences and processes later, but for the initial development here, we are going to focus on developing particular ways of relating to our experience.  Just as in physical rehabilitation, there needs to be a systematic approach to the re training , development of, and stretching certain muscles groups first, in a particular order, to re balance the functionality of the muscular skeletal system, and then integrating them into the rest of the bodies functionality.    

    One of the areas we are going to focus on first as a characteristic of relating to our experience is developing the capacity of observation and acknowledgment.  Observing and acknowledging our sense of safety, security and supporting our sense of wellness in the simplicity of the present moment and allowing that wellness to cultivate within us is the most important fundamental process of meditation, and I believe all other meditation practices are developed out of this, and for deepening and exploring this experience in its many manifestations.  Becoming rooted in simple observation, leads naturally to acknowledgment and can then, when applied to being in a safe present moment centered environment, can naturally lead to a wonderful state of acceptance of our present moment and ourselves.  When I speak of allowing and acceptance in the present moment I am referring to our internal experience in the present moment of a safe environment.  I am not speaking to accepting and allowing the behaviors of others in any way.  I am also referring to internal experiences that we deem safe for us and within our present ability to remain feeling safe. We will be revisiting this and many related areas of these kinds throughout this book.  After developing a strong basis of a variety of self-awareness and self-regulatory skills, we will begin looking into how to explore more difficult experiences if and when that may become appropriate for us within the models of this book.  If at any time you feel this book is not leading you into a safer realm of experience and way of experiencing, I highly recommend you seek the expert therapeutic assistance of a qualified therapist who is familiar with trauma processing with whom you feel safe, seen, acknowledged and accepted for where and who you are.  

(There are some professional trauma resource suggestions listed at the back of this book.)

   

    It may seem that reducing our sphere of attention might be counter to, or anathema to, something like liberating awareness, or a sense of expanding consciousness.  I think that reducing or attenuating our attention sphere to the present moment is bringing our attention to a place, or field of awareness where it can be liberated.  By liberated, I mean in the basic preliminary stages we are discussing here, a place, and an experience where we can come to a basic sense of well -being.  A basic sense of acceptance of ourselves, where we feel at ease with ourselves and within ourselves.  I believe that from this place we can begin to access experiences that most people would consider “spiritual.”  Such as generosity, morality, diligence, patience, tolerance, acceptance, truthfulness, goodwill, friendliness, loving-kindness, equanimity, serenity, compassion, concern, caring, kindness, understanding, empathy, wholeness, connection, to name a few.  I do believe that in order to have these experiences it is necessary to have a fundamental feeling of being ok.  Of being well within ourselves.  I also believe that this wellness is an experience as well as a way of experiencing.  In my experience bringing ourselves more fully into the present moment is one of the very important and fundamental processes to developing this kind of way of being.  I consider this kind of present moment experience to be another context of experiencing.  To borrow from a famous Thai forest tradition teacher Buddahdassa, I belive this contextualization process may be called a perceptual formation.  We will be exploring this concept in great detail later in the book after exploring some more preliminary concepts and practices.  This may also be relatied to what Don Juan spoke of to Carlos Casteneda as the assemblage point.  I believe the beginning of the journey is marked by a development of a heightened sense of ourselves in the present moment.  An arising of a more acute sense of ourselves and our present moment experience.  An arising of a more astute, keen, and basic act of perceiving with and within ourselves.   A beginning of a clearer awareness of, and impression of ourselves, that leads to more comprehension, acceptance, and appreciation of ourselves and our world.  I suggest that this is what is called the action tendency of this process.  It is the resultant changes in us and our behaviors that occur from this shift in perspective. We will be exploring this idea more as well. This shift in our field of awareness, its’ contexts and relationships can be characterized and experienced in many ways.  While I will be offering many suggestions of how to experience these capacities, I will also be inviting and encouraging you to bring to this practice any of your personal development or spiritual development resources.  However you experience this movement towards the present moment and all that it may or may not entail is completely up to you.  If you wish to include other religious ideas and experiences as part of your practice I fully encourage you to do so.  For example if you wish to include God, or the Holy Spirit, or Jesus or any other religious experiences into my characterizations of the present moment and other features I will be sometimes calling a first person way of relating, you are very welcome to do so.  I hope you enjoy this journey.  

Present moment as neurological platform.  One aspect of learning to focus on a variety of neurological platforms in particular ways.  We are now going to explore a varity of ways to potentiate this experience in different ways in terms of concentration, perception, feelintgs and thoughts.

    

    Let’s look at three common Buddhist meditation practice concepts and see how they may be used in relation to the present moment exercise.

CONCENTRATION INTRO

    There is also a concept about collecting the mind or concentration that is also necessary as a way to access a place, or field, where the mind can be liberated.  We are going to explore many practices that are in service of developing and deepening this experience. 

     Achieving simple observation is dependent on developing good concentration.  Simply put, concentration is a quality of mind that is non-distracted.  It has the ability to stay focused on a particular object of attention for a particular time. Buddhist literature consistently uses the term “object of mind” to refer to something held within our attention.  Let us consider concentration and Jhanna in more detail after we look at two other main practices in the Theravada tradition as it has been brought to this county, vipassana, and metta.

VIPASSANA1

    Vipassana means insight.  It is a meditative practice that strives to see experience in a few insightful ways, although it is not necessarily practiced as a formal “sitting” practice that most people associate with meditation.   One of the three insights of Vipassana is that experience is impermanent.  This is obviously not exclusive to Buddhism but in Buddhism it is seen as a way to liberation, that is, a way of viewing our experience and ourselves that leads to less suffering, or perhaps the “end of suffering” as it is called in Buddhism.

    In one sense I can think of Vipassana as a noun.  As an insight.  This insight can help us relate to our experience in a different way than we might if we don’t consider, in this example, impermanence.  For me, the impermanence can also lead to inter-relatedness.  For example, the impermanence of my breath can lead me to contemplate oxygen, that I am inhaling oxygen, and releasing carbon dioxide.  And may remind me that the trees breathe in this carbon dioxide and release oxygen.  This is one of the cycles of interrelatedness that I am in.  For me, as a human,  changes in oxygen results in changes in carbon dioxide.  It is part of the cycle that I am in where changes in carbon dioxide results in changes in  oxygen occurring in trees.  The only way oxygen changes in my existence is by, with and through changes in carbon dioxide, and that includes the processes of trees.  While this insight has an experiential component, it does not entail or require any formal sitting type meditation practice.  It does not entail any special kinds of mind states like concentration as we have defined it above.  That is, it does not entail any kinds of accentuation on certain aspects of our experience, and the reduction of others.  These insights are fantastic and can yield extraordinary changes in the way we view, relate to, and experience. I think most of what is being done in meditation and spiritual development, personal development, and religion in general is insight practice.  Vipassana is often practiced in this country as a sitting practice. 

    Vipassana also has specific ways of viewing, and gaining insight into thoughts and feelings.  I will present these after a quick review of the Jhanna theory. 

CONCENTRATION1

    Concentration, in Buddhism, often refers to the practice of Jhanna. The other quality of mind predominantly discussed in Buddhism is Jhanna.  Like Vipassana there are several aspects of Jhanna practice, for our purpose right now, we are just going to be interested in the beginning aspect of the process of concentration.  I think the word Jhanna can also be used as a noun and as a verb.  Jhanna as a noun means concentration.  The state of being concentrated. Concentration has been compared to a magnifying glass.  By focusing on something, concentrating, (verb) the power of the mind to observe, and acknowledge, can be developed, along with the other ways of relating presented in detail throughout in this book.   Jhanna as a noun is also referred to as a state of “absorption.” 

    Jhanna as a verb in Buddhism refers to a particular way of using concentration.   

Jhanna also specifically refers to a concentration practice that begins with pleasantness as the “object of mind” and continues through a series of “objects of mind” that are often considered more and more subtle, into what are called the “formless meditations.”   These are objects of mind or meditative states that are considered very subtle and perhaps beyond worldly experience within a Buddhist view.   Concentration in general refers to the activity where one places their attention on an aspect of experience and then accentuates that aspect while reducing the other aspects. Jhanna is a specific way of experientially prioritizing our experience.  Another way to view Jhanna practice is as placing some aspects of our attention in the foreground and letting others be in the background.  These are perhaps some modern terms and views of the method of jhanna, but commonly taught today. The degree of selectivity, that is the degree to which one aspect is experienced, and the others are reduced, determines the depth of the Jhanna experience.  If you are doing a present moment exercise like the one above, and do not want to go any deeper into the experience, or want to regulate the experience in some way, you can just reduce your degree of selectivity.  That is, you can just not focus as diligently on the selectivity process, and lessen the attenuation on one particular aspect of your present moment experience.  You can notice body sensations, such as breathing, movement, gravity, hearing, seeing, more as a conglomerate.  This will reduce the depth and intensity of the experience for you.    

   I would like to briefly mention effort here.  Effort has been used in Buddhism in a number of ways and I will be presenting more later.  One way of looking at effort in this concertation practice is the degree of effort required to maintain the selectivity of attention, or objects of mind.  The Sona sutta mentions five kinds of effort.  My most preferred aspect of effort is in the Vitakkasanthanna sutta which compares using effort to that of tuning an instrument.  One uses the required effort to maintain the experience. To me it is just most simply put as a resonance with our experience.  I like this idea and would prefer not to overthink it.  In terms of concentration I like to think of it in terms of the ease of selectivity.  I prefer to maintain a degree of comfort and wellbeing in my meditation.  Personally, I don’t like to force my experience too much in any way, and in the sonna sutta the forcing of experience is mentioned as the least preferred method of effort.   For a greater detail of context please google search the sutta.   If I cannot access a certain kind of experience in my meditation practice, within a certain range of comfort or wellness, I just change the practice I am doing.  That being said, I do strive diligently in my meditations as is often suggested in Buddhist literature, I just don’t push myself into areas where I may be uncomfortable beyond what I consider reasonable at that time, for where I am in that moment. 

        I will present some other views of effort in a later chapter in a more detailed discussion.  In the present moment exercise, a degree of selectivity was presented and I will be presenting more detailed methods on how to keep developing this degree of selectivity practice in physical, feelings thoughts, and other states called “formless” meditations.  I will leave it up to you to find what depth of selectivity, and what areas of focus, or aspects of body, feeling and mind, are most useful to you at a given time.

   CONCLUSIONS j/v

    I think most of what is being done in terms of meditation practice in and outside of Buddhism is a combination of vipassana and jhanna.  I also suggest that much of what constitutes our general waking experience is a combination of some kinds of vipassana like and concentration like experience.  We are always using some degree of concentration to organize and prioritize our experience.  And we are always using some thoughts and ideas to guide, give us perspective on our experience, to make decisions, and judgments.  Whether they are mostly conditioned reactions or somewhat consciously participated in activities. 

        Vipassana as a method and methodology is a common state and activity where we use some form of information to look at things differently or experience things or ourselves in a different way.  We may use a variety of sources such as information from our parents, friends, a news report, studies in psychology, sociology, religion, music, art, stories of all kinds, and information from the internet to inform and mediate the way in which we look at and experience our world.   This is comprises the basic forms of communication, discussion, debate, dialogue and interaction with a number of information media and protocols as ways we exist.   

    Concentration as a method and methodology is a common state and activity where we use prioritizing and selectivity to inform and mediate the ways in which we look at and experience the world.  In terms of meditation, many things have been used as subjects of concentration including smells, sounds, tastes, sights, sensations and mental phenomena.  I myself have used all these things as subjects for concentration.  It is mostly dependent on having focus, settled-ness, collectedness, and consolidation of mind, other qualities of mind may become involved depending on the object of concentration, and a few other areas I will present in the practices section after exploring other contexts of experience.  In my view it is not dependent on the object on which we place our attention, but perhaps at times, we may find some things more conducive to our concentration than others.

     In the terms we have outlined here; when you are enjoying a piece of music, and the enjoyment and pleasantness becomes very strong, you are practicing Jhanna.   When you are enjoying a piece of music, and the music helps you relate better to yourself, or the world, understand yourself differently, or understand the world differently, you are practicing vipassana.  When you are enjoying a piece of music or a movie, and the message of the movie helps you relate better to yourself, or the world, understand yourself differently, or understand the world differently, you are practicing vipassana.  When you are looking at a piece of art, and the enjoyment of the piece of art and pleasantness becomes very strong, you are practicing Jhanna.   When you are enjoying a piece of art and the art helps you relate better to yourself, or the world, understand yourself differently, or understand the world differently, you are practicing vipassana.  When you put on a piece of music to help you study, or focus, or sleep, you are practicing vipassana.  When you go to Starbucks to help you work or study you are practicing vipassana.  When you go for a run to help you relax you are practicing Vipassana.  When you go for a run to enjoy the state of mind you are practicing Jhanna.  When you pray to god to help you surrender something you are practicing vipassana.  When you contemplate the nature of surrender you are practicing jhanna.  When you pray to god to help you understand something, or achieve something you are practicing vipassana.   When you contemplate the attributes of god and begin to have experiences of divine attributes you are practicing Jhanna.   When we just surrender to the way things are and we are focused on the experience of those things are we are practicing Jhanna.  When we surrender to the way things are and have acceptance or equanimity for the way things are in terms of good or bad, liking or disliking, wanting or avoiding, we are practicing vipassana.  When we surrender to the way things are and are focused on the experience of acceptance we are practicing Jhanna.  

When we are focused on the experience, jhanna, when the exereince tells us something we are viassana

     By way of the above examples, I think we could broaden out the objects of mind we could use as subjects for concentration practice and include some of the topics from Vipassana.  By definition of Jhanna being the specifically defined experiences of pleasantness, and the associated classically presented states, and the specific order in which to perform those contemplations, other subjects, or “objects of mind” would not be Jhanna.  We could use the methodology of Jhanna, of selectivity and prioritization, and apply it to other “objects of mind” or aspects of our experience.  This is no doubt not new territory, I just wanted to define our terms, and the methodologies of the practice, and also get clear on exactly what we are doing from a Buddhist perspective.  This is practicing Vipassana topics, and other topics, as objects of mind with the methodology of selectivity.  

So then, we have a lot of potential insight type contemplations and other aspects of our experience that we could incorporate into concentration practice.  What this hinges on is 1) developing sufficient concentration to selectively maintain the object in mind. 2)  An object of mind that is clearly recognized as an experiential quality.   This means isolating out the insight portions of the object into clear experiential aspects.   That will be the topic of the next chapter where I will present a number of insight topics.  We will also consider the relationship of insight topics and mindfulness in the next subsequent chapter.

Let’s consider sensation as a verb and a noun.  The sensation, and the sensed experience aspect of the sensation.  Let’s say pleasant.  We can view pleasant as a noun, a pleasant thing.   Or as a verb, pleasantness.  In terms of vipassana we could view pleasantness in terms of impermanence, its’ changing nature, and how that might inform our experience.  

    In terms of Jhanna, we can focus selectively on the nature of that pleasantness.  This is the first traditional subject of Jhanna practice.  Let’s take another sensation, say pressure, related to gravity.  In terms of vipassana we could view the changing nature of this sensation   if we focus selectively on the sensation of pressure, or heaviness which can then become a concentration practice.   Let’s consider another related but lesser known and practiced topic in Theravada Buddhism, the contemplation of the five elements, Earth, Water, Fire and Air.  I think these topics can and are practiced as Vipassana and/or Jhanna, and I will go through some examples briefly. 

     In this example of the earth contemplation, let’s just add a couple other aspects to the fundamental present moment experience.  A term often related to this experience is a sense of being grounded.  Buddhism contains the idea of the five elements in various ways and traditions and the earth element may be useful to consider here.  I suggest two aspects to consider first.  I would especially like to introduce the idea of generosity here.  The generosity represented, manifested and demonstrated by the earth. Lets’ consider this generosity to be for ourselves and our wellbeing.  One thing we can do with this generosity is allow it to cultivate in us a sense of trust.   Trust and faith have been used in several ways in Buddhism as they have in all Religion’s.   

    These are some of the elements we can begin to contemplate with a present moment experience where we will be leaving some of our usual ways of being, relating, and identifying ourselves behind.  We are letting go of some of the defenses and other personality constructs, and just noticing some other essential aspects of our existence, without our usual habitual defenses, roles, and identities.  These components are a step or two removed from what I will be referring to as a first person order of experience.  This little example can incorporate some aspects of concentration and insight and may be adopted in either of these directions in a variety of applications we will explore more of through later sections of the book.

    We can focus on also consider some other ways of contemplating our experience in the present moment.  Stability, safety, wellness.  What does this wellness look like to you and how do you relate to it?  While I will be suggesting many approaches, I will still be inviting you to investigate your own experience in your own way, and to find the areas and methods of contemplation that feel appropriate and useful to where you are in your life right now, what needs you have, and what work to bring you the kinds of experiences you feel would be most supportive.

     Some people have suggested combining vipassana and jhanna practices together.  As we can see from examples from several areas since the introduction, there is a great interrelatedness of (all) phenomenon.   So it is with Jhanna and Vipassana.  They both affect the way we understand, relate to, interact with and experience ourselves and our world.

    One way some people have suggested putting these two practices together is to allow experience to reveal its changing impermanent nature while we are in a state of concentration.  For example, we want to focus on the sensations of our breath, which are changing, and we want to remain focused on those changing sensation.  This can be a little challenging at first.   I suggest you focus on a particular region of your breathing, and noticing that the sensations in that region are changing.  Try to stay focused on that place, while at the same time, you notice the changing aspects of the experience.   This means that you would be focused on an object and have to include the changing nature of that object which would broaden out the selectivity of the object and this would decrease the level of Jhanna.  However I do like the idea of it very much, and that will be the addressed in more detail in upcoming chapters.

    This might also be applied to noticing the changing conditions of our experience of a sense of safety, security and wellness, making those features an object of our attention.  We will get into the more advanced aspects of combining these two practices in later chapters. 

    As we develop more joyful ways of relating to our experience, and each other, we may be bringing together the qualities developed through Jhanna practice, into relating with worldly experience and into vipassana like contexts of insight and contemplation. 

    While some traditional concepts of Jhanna may inherently dismiss the possibility of such an integration due to the inherently “formless” nature of the some of the Jhannas’.   I invite you to find out for yourself if such a union may be possible. This is not a commonly held notion or investigation in Buddhism as far as I am aware of.

    To pick up our discussion of making vipassana like topics and other topics into a concentration practice, can other qualities, such as accepting, be an experiential objects of mind?  Can we experience accepting as a sensory like quality?  I think it is up to you to find out, discover and perhaps develop into if you are interested in pursuing such a topic.   I would have to say that from a historical Asian perspective of language and philosophy these subjects were always one thing.  Qi.  There was no distinction between the expression of qi and its qualities and the way it was experienced or perceived.  This is especially evident in the I-Jing philosophy where something like opening was a quality of expression and experience that could definitely be felt and perceived.  Heaven qi, earth qi, fire qi, water qi, wood qi, wind qi, thunder qi, lake qi.  (Not respectively)  Opening, closing, raising, lowering, gathering, dispersing, entering exiting.  I do not think it is a great leap to consider that acceptance would be an aspect of mind that could be focused on as an experiential quality that could be felt and perceived as such.  I think it is just that we are used to experiencing things in a more Vipassana like way, where acceptance is pertaining to part of the way we are relating and experiencing and we do not usually put it into the category of an object of mind that can be perceived and practiced as a concentration exercise, with a dimension of an object of mind in that way, as something we would selectively attend to.    

    Impermanence as an object for Jhanna?  How about no-self?  I will come back to these topics later. 

    (If you see your meditation practice as a process of greater inclusivity, that is an insight or Vipassana practice if it does not entail greater selectivity and prioritization in the subject as well.  I will present some more details on this with the suggested Jhanna practices.)

    This view would espouse that the teachings on the four foundations of mindfulness, as presented in the famous satipatthana sutta, and their practices, that is mindfulness of the body, feelings, thoughts, are Vipassana if they do not specifically teach them in terms of a process of selectivity, prioritization (background/foreground) and experiential components.   

    I know several teachers who say that there are many Buddhist practitioners practicing Jhanna without identifying it as such.  That is, they are doing concertation practices of selectivity of various kinds, which fall into the traditional categories, language and descriptions and “objects of mind” described as Jhanna.  That is pleasantness and its subsequent traditional objects of mind.  This is people practicing Jhanna without identifying it in the classical terms.  Some other people are doing concentration practices on other kinds of objects of mind that do not fall into the traditional jhanna categories. 

(  I will be presenting and defining the other aspects of classical vipassana terms in much later section.  These three are interrelated in nature such that the un-satisfactoriness may come from its rising and declining nature, subject to beginning and ending and impermanence.  This also has a no self-aspect, no inherent nature which may also influence its un-satisfactoriness and its impermanence.  I will also be presenting other contexts of thoughts and feelings and perception in later chapters, after becoming more familiar with these contexts.)      

    Lastly, I would like to suggest that we are always engaged in vipassana-like and concentration like activities and they are inseparable.  I liken them to the association of thoughts and feelings, we are always engaged in some arrangement of them both, just often more emphasizing on or the other.  So it is with contemplation and concentration.

  

METTA

    The other most commonly practiced aspect of Buddhism in Vipassana and Theravada Buddhism is called Metta.  Metta is translated as loving-kindness.  It refers to the contemplation of the state of friendliness

    I think this practice could be done as a concentration exercise, or as an insight practice depending on the way it is done.  As an insight practice, it is performed by the contemplation of several phrases such as; “may I be well, may I be happy, may I enj oy my life, may I have physical wellbeing,

The phrases are then done with wishing others wellbeing.  The phrases are presented in a variety of ways.  It is often done as a chant.  It is also often done by considering different orders of people, such as close friends, acquaintances, and those with whom we have disfavor in any way.  These approaches are done in a systematic way and I will not be presenting the practice here.  My point is to show another form of Buddhist practice, which in my view can be done as an insight as presented above, and the deeper one dwells on, and concentrates on the state of loving-kindness, it then can become a kind of concentration practice.  One thing I am pointing out is the possibility of including a number of different subjects as “objects of mind.”   This is nothing new as I mentioned and throughout the history of meditation like practices there is practically no end to the things people have taken as subjects for deep meditation.

I personally practice all three of these methods on a very regular basis.  I enjoy the loving-kindness chants and contemplations very much and would not want to be without them.  I strongly encourage you to try several kinds of practices and find the approaches and applications that work best for you.  I will be presenting a number of related practices that are a bit outside of Buddhist practice, but well within the historical contexts of eastern philosophy and self-cultivation, liberation, and realization.   I hope you will try a little bit of all these methods and see how and which ones you may best enjoy and be benefited by.  If you could see and experience the benefits of the present moment exercise, you may be interested in other types of concentration exercises and/or exploring the practice of concentration more deeply.