Alexander's Blog

[Michel]

I'm trying to develop dual awareness also, though not at your level. Maybe it's like learning to master a musical instrument. It's just takes practice and practice to pull it off.

[Jhanananda]

I am able to maintain my attention if I get rid of the external actions. So, perhaps I should self-simplify, and dedicate more time to actions that are simpler.

I had some trouble with self awareness early on, so I took a menial job in a factory where I was to make the same object over, and over again, which meant there was no requirement for mental activity.  I then remained in the present, and kept the mind still, and just knocked off sheet metal parts for air-conditioning units one after another. By the end of that summer I was pretty well established in mindful-self-awareness. Perhaps it will work for you.

I have tried to stay self-aware during the day using the following approaches:

1. Watch the inner silence. Problem - lost when an action is complex and requires thinking/cognition.

2. Listen to the sound charism. Problem - if the location is too noisy it can't be done.

3. Keep an awareness of myself. Problem - lost or becomes uncertain if I feel hazy, or if I'm completing unpleasant or complex tasks.

4. Watch the breath. Problem - lost when an action is complex and requires thinking/cognition.

Yes, life in an industrial world that does not value its contemplatives is complicated, which is why just giving up the world, and retreating into the wilderness helps some.  The extended solo-wilderness retreat has its own complications, so it may not work for most people.

I'm trying to develop dual awareness also, though not at your level. Maybe it's like learning to master a musical instrument. It's just takes practice and practice to pull it off.

Yes, I would agree, Michel, developing the skill of mindful-self-awareness 24/7 is at least as challenging as developing mastery over a musical instrument.  In fact I used to use this analogy because I am sure you know that musical mastery requires hours of practice every day.  So, developing the skill of mindful-self-awareness 24/7 requires hours spent every day in meditation practice, as well as taking it with you throughout the day.

[Alexander]

I'm trying to develop dual awareness also, though not at your level. Maybe it's like learning to master a musical instrument. It's just takes practice and practice to pull it off.

You are probably right, Michel.

I had some trouble with self awareness early on, so I took a menial job in a factory where I was to make the same object over, and over again, which meant there was no requirement for mental activity.  I then remained in the present, and kept the mind still, and just knocked off sheet metal parts for air-conditioning units one after another. By the end of that summer I was pretty well established in mindful-self-awareness.Perhaps it will work for you.

Yes, life in an industrial world that does not value its contemplatives is complicated, which is why just giving up the world, and retreating into the wilderness helps some.  The extended solo-wilderness retreat has its own complications, so it may not work for most people.

Yes, I would agree, Michel, developing the skill of mindful-self-awareness 24/7 is at least as challenging as developing mastery over a musical instrument.  In fact I used to use this analogy because I am sure you know that musical mastery requires hours of practice every day.  So, developing the skill of mindful-self-awareness 24/7 requires hours spent every day in meditation practice, as well as taking it with you throughout the day.

Thank you, Jhanananda, for sharing your experiences.

[Alexander]

I have been keeping a dream journal since April 6th. I have tried to keep dream journals in the past. Those failed because I would have a couple nights when I remembered my dreams, then a long sequence of nights when I remembered nothing. Usually after that I would stop.

This one seems to be my serious practice at it. I keep a record by sending myself an email with the date. Even with no dreams remembered I write "no memory" to keep it as a record.

I am trying to proceed in the dream world with the idea that it is a dimension of the spiritual world - just the lowest manifestation of it. I have also been keeping in mind the idea that I am interacting with other people in my dreams; and I've been thinking about when I've interacted (or not interacted) with people and when they might be asleep.

Many of my dreams, and the memories I have of them, are fragmentary - just images or impressions. But sometimes they will be more detailed. I remember only one impression from last night - attending a concert of a band - while yesterday I had nine different memories/impressions.

I try to write down if I remember things that were impossible. In the dream itself I never realize these. In one of yesterday's dreams I saw a woman swimming in a pool at night, then cross a road to her house when it was daytime. I was thinking about this in the dream - but I still did not become aware I was dreaming.

I seem to see different levels of my personality active depending on the dream. Some are like returns to childhood; being passive and going along with what's happening. Some are of my base or lower self; interested in women or sex. Some dreams seem to recycle impressions from the day. Others seem to be of my higher self. In these, what seem to be my most self-aware dreams, I feel in the dream that I am wearing some kind of disguise.

More on dreams:

I seem to have the best dream recall when waking up directly from the REM stage. If I sleep too little (<5 hours) I don't seem to get to the REM stage. If I sleep too long (>7-8 hours) I sleep through REM and into a non-REM stage which when waking up from causes me to forget my dreams.

[Jhanananda]

More on dreams:

I seem to have the best dream recall when waking up directly from the REM stage. If I sleep too little (<5 hours) I don't seem to get to the REM stage. If I sleep too long (>7-8 hours) I sleep through REM and into a non-REM stage which when waking up from causes me to forget my dreams.

I suppose this is one of the reasons why mystics generally get up early in the morning to meditate.

[Alexander]

I was reading some passages from Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, in which my favorite character is Eponine.

When she spends weeks looking for Marius, only to give him a letter telling him where another woman is:

"Ah! There he is!"

He raised his eyes and recognized the unfortunate child who had come to his room one morning, the elder of the Thenardier girls, Eponine; he now knew her name. Singular fact, she had become more wretched and more beautiful, two steps which seemed impossible. She had accomplished a double progress toward the light, and toward distress. She was barefooted and in rags, as on the day when she had so resolutely entered his room, only her rags were two months older; the holes were larger, the tatters dirtier. It was the same rough voice, the same forehead tanned and wrinkled by exposure; the same free, wild, and wandering gaze. She had, in addition to her former expression, that mixture of fear and sorrow which the experience of a prison adds to misery.

And with all this, she was beautiful. What a star thou art, O youth!

Meantime, she had stopped before Marius, with an expression of pleasure upon her livid face, and something which resembled a smile.

She stood for a few seconds, as if she could not speak.

"I have found you, then?" said she at last. "Father Mabeuf was right; it was on the boulevard. How I have looked for you! If you only knew! Do you know? I have been in the jug. A fortnight! They have let me out! Seeing that there was nothing against me, and then I was not of the age of discernment. It lacked two months. Oh! How I have looked for you! It is six weeks now. You don't live down there any longer?"

"No," said Marius.

"Where do you live now?"

Marius did not answer.

"Ah!" she continued. "You have a hole in your shirt. I must mend it for you."

She resumed with an expression which gradually grew darker:

"You don't seem to be glad to see me?"

Marius said nothing; she herself was silent for a moment, then exclaimed:

"But if I would, I could easily make you glad!"

"How?" inquired Marius. "What does that mean?"...

When she sacrifices herself for Marius during the uprising:

As Marius, the inspection made, was retiring, he heard his name faintly pronounced in the obscurity:

"Monsieur Marius!"

He shuddered, for he recognized the voice which had called him two hours before, through the grating in the rue Plumet.

Only this voice now seemed to be but a breath.

He looked about him and saw nobody.

"At your feet," said the voice.

He stooped and saw a form in the shadow, which was dragging itself toward him. It was crawling along the pavement. It was this that had spoken to him.

The lamp enabled him to distinguish a blouse, a pair of torn pantaloons of coarse velvet, bare feet, and something which resembled a pool of blood. Marius caught a glimpse of a pale face which rose toward him and said to him:

"You do not know me?"

"No."

"Eponine."

Marius bent down quickly. It was indeed that unhappy child. She was dressed as a man.

"How came you here? What are you doing there?"

"I am dying," said she...

The character Eponine makes me think of the mystic and the mystic quest: how the mystic must follow a lovelorn, self-sacrificing quest to make progress on the spiritual path.

[Alexander]

An excellent poem of Rumi's, read today:

IN PRISON

Don't despair in prison.
The king who freed Joseph
is on his way to let you out.

Joseph himself is coming too,
who tore Zuleikha's veil and let her see.

You cry Lord all night.
Now that lord is here.

You have grown so used to the old pain.
Now there's a cure.

A key enters your stiff lock.
You have stayed away from the companions
you most wanted to be with. No longer.

This is a feast day, but keep quiet
in the resonance that brings with wondering
silence that is growing larger than all speaking.

[Jhanananda]

Thank-you, Alexander, for the two quotes.  Yes, this world is a prison for the mystic.  So, we retreat away from it to nurture the true love that dwells within.  I live among the miserables in this small town, but keep my own company, and only return here to this forum for the company of its few mystics.

[Alexander]

Thanks, Jhanananda, you respond to every post. I am indebted to you for the encouragement and feedback you give. The spiritual life is hard and lonely, and I wear a disguise every day in life, so I appreciate the guidance I get from you.

[Alexander]

4. I texted Lauren last night. No response. Every time I text her I ask, “Is this right?” I have not heard from my Inner Guide. Sometimes, if I feel an inner wall, I will take no action. Often, I delay, if I had planned to message her. Every time I message her she is silent.

I do not know what to say about this. It has been an extremely long time. I have sent her more messages still. In the past I've dealt with a long list of disappointments - so when it came to Lauren my subliminal self said to me, "No, it is not so." That voice repeated itself in me again and again; and it resonated in me so many times I embraced an unshakeable, willful certainty that it was right, that I was proceeding correctly. I am still listening to it now: but there is nothing to support what I'm doing. Except intuition. Otherwise there is... silence.

In regard to the above:

Seriously, leave me alone. I am not interested. Never was, and I never will be. In all sincerity, I do not want to talk to you and I do not want to hear from you. Do not contact me again.

So much for intuition...

[Jhanananda]

Thanks, Jhanananda, you respond to every post. I am indebted to you for the encouragement and feedback you give. The spiritual life is hard and lonely, and I wear a disguise every day in life, so I appreciate the guidance I get from you.

4. I texted Lauren last night. No response. Every time I text her I ask, “Is this right?” I have not heard from my Inner Guide. Sometimes, if I feel an inner wall, I will take no action. Often, I delay, if I had planned to message her. Every time I message her she is silent.

I do not know what to say about this. It has been an extremely long time. I have sent her more messages still. In the past I've dealt with a long list of disappointments - so when it came to Lauren my subliminal self said to me, "No, it is not so." That voice repeated itself in me again and again; and it resonated in me so many times I embraced an unshakeable, willful certainty that it was right, that I was proceeding correctly. I am still listening to it now: but there is nothing to support what I'm doing. Except intuition. Otherwise there is... silence.

In regard to the above:

Seriously, leave me alone. I am not interested. Never was, and I never will be. In all sincerity, I do not want to talk to you and I do not want to hear from you. Do not contact me again.

So much for intuition...

Yes, the interior life is a lonely life. 

Your obsession with Lauren reminds me of a similar obsession I had with a Susan decades ago.  In retrospect what I observed happening with me, is as my meditation practice deepened I would experience intense love, which is often called "the opening of the heart chakra."  I would then leave that meditation session with divine love blooming in my heart and look for an object for that love.  It went from pretty woman to pretty woman, and often centered upon one unfortunate woman, whom I obsessed over for decades.

In this obsession I often mistook wishful thinking for insight, which just made the obsession worse.

My recommendation to those who seek enlightenment in this life time, is to realize that no human can satisfy the intensity of divine love, so give up seeking an external object for that love, and place it where it belongs, which is love for the infinite.

[Alexander]

Thanks, Jhanananda. I think I lost weight this week from the stress. I was convinced I was proceeding correctly. But, I believed too much in redemption, and in the possibility I could change Lauren's opinion of me.

This experience affirms an unhappy irony to me - the fact that most of the people I meet will never know me, at all.

And I think you're right to say it is an expression of the love that comes from the spiritual quest. That love wants to find an object - but it's too pure and unquestioning, and doesn't doubt itself as it should.

[Jhanananda]

Thanks, Jhanananda. I think I lost weight this week from the stress. I was convinced I was proceeding correctly. But, I believed too much in redemption, and in the possibility I could change Lauren's opinion of me.

i went through the same nonsense, and the more I tired the more the woman I was obsessing over  became resistant.  So, I just had to let it all go.

This experience affirms an unhappy irony to me - the fact that most of the people I meet will never know me, at all.

Considering that most people do not take up a self-aware contemplative life at all, and of those few who do, almost never get anything out of it, because they tend to look in all of the wrong places, then it is reasonable that most people will never understand any of us here.  So, it is best to take up a solo contemplative life, and give up all attachments to the material plane.

And I think you're right to say it is an expression of the love that comes from the spiritual quest. That love wants to find an object - but it's too pure and unquestioning, and doesn't doubt itself as it should.

Yes, critical thinking is needed in all aspects of the disciplined contemplative life.

I recently had many obstacles thrown in my path by a well-meaning person who supported my work, but took too much stock in his intuition without considering that I too have intuition, and that mine might be better honed, and certainly more relevant to me.  I kept urging him to meditate deeper, and exercise critical thinking, but he was too deeply invested in following his intuition to consider that his intuition might just be heavily influenced by his wishful thinking.

[stugandolf]

I agree with Jeffrey's analysis on keeping away from old contacts with women - I recently tried to reconnect with a woman I have known for at least 15 years - it was a great mistake - she as well as other women I know do not have a clue about the contemplative life - I guess I had try to see if somehow something changed - the woman and I agreed we do not get along - she mostly wanted to use me.  So I reconfirmed keeping away from her as well most others who are not contemplatives.  Earlier this year I announced my use of B 12 and D3, well I ended up over energized, and I have continued to adjust the amounts.  The material world as well as most people, except contemplatives, are to be avoided.  I only use the internet at WIFI spots and then only once in a while.  Enough rambling... Stu

[Sam Lim]

There is a phrase called "chop wood and carry water".
It means that when you do a task, focus on the task itself.
Thus accomplishing awareness or having meditation like open eye meditation.
Just a thought.