The “words, thoughts and judgements” that arise reflexively, inevitably, are not chosen in the moment, but in the past when one chose victory or defeat, right or wrong, success or failure; back when one made lasting commitments for fear of being untethered.
Now that I feel free to question everything and explore anything, my past commitments remind me that freedom is keeping the past in its place.
I managed somehow to finish reading your whole post and now I beginning to see the light… 
I shouldn’t have replied to it too soon, I’m really too tired tonight and my mind refuses to focus on the train fo words. I’ll come back to it tomorrow.
Yes, that makes sense. Thank you for your contribution. I’m too tired now to give justice to the topic.
See you later.
I won’t elaborate too much now as you have already said that you are a bit too tired to respond anymore tonight, and I don’t want to add anymore clutter to your reading! (sometimes I write too profusely).
So I thought I would just briefly reply to one thing you said here (which you have mentioned a couple of times in your replies, and which Erik also picked up on):
I think my approach to this (not that I am putting myself forward as a counsellor or an expert on these matters, but just to share my attitude) would be to simply treat the physical tension of the feeling of resistance as the thing to be observed - independent of any other interest. So just to become interested, for itself, in the sensations of tension in the body, and find out if one can observe and feel them (sense them) without labelling them as “resistance” (i.e. as something negative to be overcome).
It’s like being an artist and looking at something just for itself, with no higher purpose than just looking. But in this case, it is being an artist of uncomfortable sensations - to be interested to just feel the sensations of tension in the body for themselves, as though one was Van Gogh looking at his sunflowers or at his famous wicker chair.
As Erik says,
Although, the only thing I would say slightly differently (to the way Erik explains it) is that I would have no expectation at all that the tension or resistance will or must dissolve. It may never dissolve, or it may. The point is just to be interested in the present sensations of discomfort for themselves, without labelling them as “discomfort” - and let the future (whether dissolution or continuance of resistance) take care of itself. If one cannot remain aware for long, then that’s ok too in my book. I would just leave it and return to the sensations again when I next notice them, or have energy to give to the observation.
Does this make sense to you? This would be my approach.
Yes. Choices always arise from the past (even though they feel active in the present, i.e. as though we were actively choosing and labelling); while awareness is just whatever we are aware of this second, and only this second (there is no such thing as past or future awareness).
I suppose the brain could do that if it had reason to, or if the reason was so obvious that the brain could do nothing to prevent its transformation. But speaking for myself, it is impossible “to look at what one is currently feeling or sensing inwardly, without labelling, without judgement, without like and dislike”, because it just happens, and I have nothing to say about it until I see no use for it.
Maybe at some point this reflex weakens and fades because it isn’t observation - it’s just another reminder of who I am, what I stand for, what I fear, what I want, I,I,I.
If this is so, then why not experiment instead by looking at something external to you, something outside yourself that holds no threat to you, that doesn’t particularly stir you up with reactions of desire, fear or revulsion?
I don’t know what interests you have or what kind of personalty you have, but everyone has interests and hobbies of some kind. Maybe there is an art gallery near you where you can go to look at paintings, or a church that has nice chiselled columns inside or stained-glass. Maybe you have a small garden where you can sit near a tree or some flowers that the summer hasn’t yet withered; or a bird feeder that you can comfortably see from your window; or maybe there is a nice park bench you sometimes sit on when you go for walks, where you can watch the pigeons, the ducks, or the park wildlife; or maybe there is a cafe with a table or window overlooking the street where you can watch the traffic and people go by. I don’t know what it might be for you. Maybe you have a house plant that you can look at from the comfort of your home, or a view of the sky and clouds from your bedroom window.
The point is, everyone has something neutral and pleasant that they can observe, look at. Now, what is to stop someone like you from taking 5 or 10 minutes in their day to just see if you can look at an external object without labelling it or bringing in the whole movement of past memory. It’s an experiment, right? So there’s no right or wrong answer. Maybe you try it a few times and you can’t remain interested in the bird or tree or cloud or flower for more than a couple of seconds. Or maybe you find that your thinking kicks in immediately each time, and that you cannot look at the bird without mentally verbalising something about it. But there must be an interest in playing with this observation; it’s not something many of us have spent much time doing, because our lives are so driven by needs, desires, wishes, expectations, responsibilities, demands - the future.
But it can be done. Anyone can look for a few seconds at something external without labelling it. And unless one can do it there, in relation to simple external things, it will inevitably be difficult to be aware of complex emotional or cognitive states. Wouldn’t you agree?
Yes, that’s what we do.
But there must be an interest in playing with this observation; it’s not something many of us have spent much time doing, because our lives are so driven by needs, desires, wishes, expectations, responsibilities, demands - the future.
Yes. When I’m “playing with this observation”, I’m testing my tolerance for what does not serve me, support me, sustain me. It isn’t about me - it’s about what isn’t me.
James, I see it like this too. If there is a wish in there, that the feeling should dissolve then there is the wanting and this complet awareness cannot and will not take place because the wish is the dominant thing. And the wish is thinking. But if one delves into that feeling with that complet interest as you say the feeling will dissolve because it cannot sustain in that awareness. I am not speaking here about a dissolving for ever. That would be foolish. One cannot say that. And as you further said, we have to understand the labelling because that is the expression of thinking and the wish to dissolve the feeling.
As you say James, the labelling is a habit we learned and we cannot stop it by will. But we can understand it and be aware of it and then it looses its dominance and it slows down or even might not come in.
Yes, I see your point. Your post is complementary to that of of James and both contributed to change my attitude. Actually it’s something I knew but which I negletted to do. No more words by now. Now it’s time to experiment with that. I’ll let you know…
Thanks again.
Yes, that is just the central issue. Actually I have done it several times and I knew I was on the right track. But after some “blessed meditations” unsolicited and unprogrammed, in which I felt a kind of silence and well-being, I lost that attitude and the tension and the incapacity of facing it came back. Knowing that I could not bring back the blessing I forgot about it.
My chatting mind would like to argue about the problem of “nothing to attain” but I feel it’s utterly futile now. In your reply there is all I need to consider and the only sane move now is to experiment with it.
Thank you again. I’ll let you know if I’ll be able to do it.
Yes - I am (or ‘we are’) of course not saying that there is nothing more than what we have talked about here (on this thread) to be unfolded; that would be incredibly presumptuous on my (on our) part.
For instance, K talks about the seeing and watching that can take place in a brain that is free/empty of thought/time. He says (and I have no reason to doubt him) that in this seeing and watching (in a brain that has no thought, no time) there comes about a state of attention which, in its depths, is “mind outside the brain” (a “mind” that is also the fullness of love). This is something way beyond the ordinary experiments in awareness I have been talking about. So it would be wrong, foolish, to rule this ‘impossible’ possibility out. K says it is possible, so one remains open to that possibility. Maybe our simple seeing and listening will unfold such a state of attention; and maybe it won’t. So I think we can remain open to such depths of the mind without ignoring what we presently are.
Just to be clear: what we have been talking about here (on this thread) has only been concerned with the seeing, listening and learning about what presently is the case for us (our what is). So if we are full of thought, full of reactions (such as insecurity, dullness, boredom, irritation, etc - as is often the case for me!), then that is the thing to be perceived, be given attention to (awareness of). But it doesn’t rule out the depths of what is possible. It is merely a wish to remain ‘real’, that’s all.
So I think you are totally right to refuse to be limited to some small reactions of resistance or frustration (or whatever it might be). But so long as the sensations of resistance and frustration are what is present, then it is only natural to give them the attention they deserve. The whole ocean is in a single drop; the whole universe is in a single reaction truly felt (perceived).
Anyway, I have appreciated your contributions Voyager. You have a refreshing breadth of sensitivity and intelligence that I feel helps to clarify these matters. I too feel there is little left to say about these things. I just want to experiment with it too - and perhaps some of those “blessings” of which you speak might come my way too!
Dear James, it is possible. But saying that has no meaning as everone has to find that out for him- or herself. And as you said that what might be is not important. Important is to face what is and start there, with the interest, as you put it, to really find out, to feel the body, the organism with all its reactions and twists and what happens in the brain. As you said, I too feel there is more about awareness. One aspect I always find very important is what I call movement. Life in general is movement. A continous movement which we can experience in our body. Our organism is never the same, from the first second we start to exist in the womb until death it is moving, changing all the time. Around every seven years even all our cells will be completely changed, renewed. Also our feelings and senses are always moving. They are never the same. The feeling of hunger for example rises slowly up to a climax and slowly or quickly disappears when we get food. Although it is hunger it is never the same. And too the hunger tomorrow is not the hunger of today, though both are hunger. We can only percieve that movement if we are in a state of moving too. This cannot be thinking because thinking is just moving within the past. This awareness we are talking about, which is not judging and giving in to what is happening in the moment, is this moving. Moving with what is which is always changing. I find that really fascinating because it involves a lot of energy, an energy which is different from the one we create out of thinking. So the question would be, are we moving? Moving with what is? If we percieve fear and resistance arises do we move with what is and face for example then resistance?
Dear Voyager, thanks for your comments. All the best experimenting.In the end that is the only thing what we then can do. Hope to meet you again.
I don’t completely understand what you are asking, but I share your fascination (at least, when I am aware of it) with the simple energetic movement of life. Thought is energy, feelings are energy, emotions and sensations are energy, the body as matter is condensed energy; and the whole movement of nature externally is a movement of essentially the same energy that moves/animates our bodies and brains (including all the qualia of our experience).
So you are asking - aren’t you? - can we move with this energy? Can we be sensitive to, notice, the energy and movement of everything going on within us and everything going on all around us, as a whole? (this is the way I have interpreted your question).
So if fear and resistance, for example, arise in the energy of what is presently being manifested, can we meet those qualities (of fear or resistance) simply as energetic movements which are part of the whole energy?
Dear James, yes that is the question. We are nature. Our bodies, organism are nature and can we move with that energy within and around us. Exactly. Can we be moving from moment to moment? And if there is fear and out of it springs resistance can we move with it, observe it. In this example then resistance which pushes fear aside. Can we move with the “what is”?
Again yes!
Since this reply of yours I have understood what it means “to stay with what is”, I mean I can do it easily, and also: “You cannot deal with a non-fact, you can only deal with facts”. (Which is related to the previous one). The sensation is a fact, the idea of resistence is a non-fact. It’s all so obvious! But one is so rooted in ideas that fails to see that point. The tension is gone. So far so good…
That is why it is so strange to say: “I came into this world”;
it seems more accurate to say: “I came out of the world”.
Dear Wim, it depends what we mean by I, would it not?