I continue to explore the sense fields and how they combine to create gestalts, and in particular how thoughts combine with the other sense fields. (The sense fields: sound, sight, smell, taste, sensations, thoughts.)

I see how sensations combine with thoughts to create a sense of particular moods, emotions, pain, and much more.

Today, in the dentist’s chair, I noticed how particular sensations combine with thoughts to create a sense of discomfort. Seeing sensations as sensations and thoughts as thoughts, the gestalt loses its substance and sense of reality. The same happens when I bring attention to the sensations serving as anchor for the sense of discomfort. The gestalt cannot arise with any sense of substance when attention is brought to its anchoring sensation because the mechanism is seen through.

In the past, I have explored how sleepiness - for instance when it arises during practice - also is just a sensation combined with a thought.

And tonight, in exploring a sense of cloudiness, fuzziness, murkiness, I find that too as being made up of sensations and a thought.

In addition to all this, I also find that when there is an identification with any of these, it is as if a bulls eye for a sense of a separate I is placed on the sensations. They then not only serve as an anchor for the gestalt of an emotion, pain, discomfort, sleepiness, murkiness and so on, but also for the sense of an I with an Other.

And that is when, for instance, identity gets absorbed into the sleepiness or murkiness gestalt, and I fall asleep during practice, or the practice gets lost in murkiness.

Seeing all this, as it happens, allows the center of gravity to shift out of these sensations and gestalts. Now, I not only see how the gestalts are made up of sensations and thoughts, but the sense of a separate I is released out of them. (Either placed on other sensations, or seen through as awakeness itself.)

Now, they are objects happening within and as awakeness.

Emotions or sensations tend to appear very different when resisted and when allowed.

For instance, I notice when arrogance or resentment comes up, and is fully allowed, they shift into an open heart, empathy, care, compassion.

And really, all experiences seem to shift into the same… a sweet nurturing fullness, an open heart, a receptive view. The particular quality of the initial resisted experience may carry through or not, and if it does, flavoring the way it is revealed when fully allowed.

Arrogance includes a discernment which may carry through. When resisted, it is combined with a sense of being right, and when allowed, combined with an open heart and a sense of us. And this discernment can be more in the foreground or background following the shift, depending on where the interest is and what the situation calls for.

Anger has a dynamic energy and clarity which may carry through. Sadness a quited stability. Physical pain a stable fiery clarity.

And resentment shift into an open heart and a sense of intimacy, a recognition of myself in the other, a sense of us.

Reactive emotions maintain their appearance through resistance to experience, and reveal themselves as something quite different when fully allowed.

Resistance to experience is one of those things that seem so solid and substantial, but turns out to be ephemeral and even fall away (at least as something identified with) when seen more for what it is.

When I explore resistance to experience, I find…

• Attention shifting to something else. Instead of being with the trigger (the circumstance) or what is triggered (emotions, tension), it continues on to stories about what is going on, or something entirely different. It may go to stories about something else, or I may create other sensory inputs that attention can go to, for instance by talking with someone, eat, or watch a movie. In other words, there is subtle and not-so-subtle distraction.
• A good deal of drama is created from identification with the stories and resistance. There is a clash between my stories of what is and what should be, and from here there is a split into a sense of I and Other, and a dramatic relationship between them.
• Behavior aimed at changing the situation. Such as the trigger, which is usually something in the world, a certain set of circumstances. The triggered, such as emotions and tension. Or even the triggering itself, the process of resistance, for instance through inquiry into the stories of what is and what should be, and a being with of whatever comes up in terms of images, sensations and emotions.

For instance, say there is physical pain.

I have stories of how (a) there is pain and (b) there shouldn’t be pain, and to the extent I take those stories as real and true, there is a clash between them. There is also a clash between what is and my image as someone who either is generally healthy, or at least should be healthy.

So now there is resistance to the pain.

My attention then goes away from the direct perception of the pain to stories about the pain, or to stories about something else, or to different sensations created by something I do (eat etc.)

This clash of stories creates a sense of drama around the whole situation, creating more emotions and physical tension.

And I may try to change the pain itself (by taking a pill), I may try to change the emotions triggered (by talking with a friend, go for a walk, watch a movie, eat good food), or I may try to change the triggering process itself (by examining my stories of what is and should be, or being with what is alive in immediate awareness in a heartfelt way).

The funny, or tragicomic, part about all this is that resistance accomplishes very little.

It is a safety valve of sorts, allowing some of the steam created by the clash of stories to be diffused, so in that sense it is very helpful, in the short term. And it can bring us to certain actions in the world, although these tends to come from a certain compulsiveness (from beliefs) so often have unintended and unpleasant side-effects.

Beyond that, nothing much is happening.

Resistance is very much a spinning of the wheels, leading to not much apart from a sense of drama and a rehearsal of the habit of resisting experience.

But we can also see resistance as an invitation to explore the whole process of resistance in more detail. We can explore our stories of what is and what should be (are they true?). And we can explore what happens when we allow attention to be with what arises, as it is, as if it would never change, and in a heartfelt way.

By exploring the stories, we may find what is already more true for us than those stories, which releases the grip on them. And by being with whatever arises, what we previously resisted may reveal itself as something entirely different than what we thought it was (for instance pain may be just sensation, and beyond that, dynamic and fluid and even have a sense of sweet fullness in it).

(more…)

I have been exploring resistance more lately, in many different ways and situations.

Some weeks back, I spent a few days in Seattle and woke up the second morning with a terrible stomach ache (from a meal the night before). It was very intense, and there was little - of the obvious things - that I could do to alleviate it.

I noticed that if I brought attention away from the pain, it increased and became almost unbearable. If I brought attention to it - being with it, meeting it - it softened and changed quality.

So with resistance, in the form of bringing attention to something else and telling stories about how it shouldn’t be there, it intensified. Allowing the resistance to fall away, the sensations softened and changed - into just a sense of fullness which I couldn’t place the label “pain” on even if I wanted.

Just another example of how life is my main (in reality only) guru, giving me what I need. And how the greatest secrets are right under our nose. Resistance to experience = sense of separation, fragmentation, I - Other, stress, discontent and suffering. Allowing resistance to fall away = sense of fullness, spaciousness and a quiet joy.

There are many other aspects to this as well.

Resistance and beliefs

Resistance seems to go along with beliefs. There is a belief that the current situation should be different, and there is resistance to experiences in the form of (a) attention brought elsewhere and (b) another story about the experience and its meaning (often “bad”).

So I can unravel the beliefs, for instance through The work. Or I can allow the resistance to the experience to fall away, meeting it with simplicity, asking myself can I be with what I am experiencing right now?

As Bhagavan says, anything fully experienced is bliss. That is certainly accurate in my experience, although the bliss so far - in my limited experience - is more of a quiet joyfulness which goes along with the fullness of the experience.

Maybe most simply, a belief and corresponding resistance to experience creates a sense of I and Other, and this inherently brings up discontent, alienation, stress, unease, suffering. Allowing beliefs to unravel and resistance to fall away, there is an absence of I and Other and a corresponding sense of fullness, being at home, quiet joy.

I find physical pain to be one of the most pure things to work with. It is a clean laboratory for exploring how the mind works.

Sensation without story

Byron Katie says that pain is always a story about the past.

Thoughts are always about the past or future, even as they appear to be about the present. They can never catch the Present. Whatever happens is gone before it can be reflected in a thought.

From being a sensation with a story, there is now - in seeing this - just a sensation. This sensation may be the same as before, but without the drama that comes with a story about it.

Sensation changing

In addition to this, I also notice that whenever I am with the experience of the pain - without the drama, the sensation itself tends to change. It takes on a different appearance. It moves from being - yes, painful, to something else.

Two levels

So there seems to be two distinct things happening.

First, the sensation is freed from the story about it, allowing the drama and struggle to fall away leaving the sensation as it is. Far more simple and harmless than the story about it.

Then, there is also the changing appearance of the sensation itself, when it is no longer resisted. It changes into something that - even if I wanted to - cannot really be labeled pain anymore.

Process

Both of these may sometimes happen instantaneously as soon as there is recognition of pain. Especially if we are already familiar with these dynamics, if we are more initimate with this terrain.

If this is a new territory for us, it may take a little longer, and the ride may be more bumpy.

And if the pain is strong, or the belief in the story about the pain is strong, the ride may also be bumpy - even for those somewhat familiar with these dynamics. There is an invitation here to see the dynamics of it even more clearly, to be even more intimate with the terrain. To question and go beyond what we think we know.