Posted in facebook group "Dharma Connection"
by Jackson Peterson
Awareness
We shouldn't make "awareness" into a dirty word when speaking about realization in Buddhism. "Awareness" can have very many subtle nuances outside of Advaita. At the Dharmakaya level of realization and experience, there is no localized center point of consciousness. The entire essence is unestablished in every way.
However, at the level of Sambhogakaya, the picture is quite different. At this level we appear in a dimension as a "deity". We have a body of Light. We sense that we are positioned in the center of a mandala of perceptual experience. That body of Light is within the physical body. It is our subtle energy system of chakras, channels, kundalini and chi or pranas. Our "consciousness" is a pure sphere of awareness, bindu or thigle, situated in the skull. Its connected to the heart chakra through the central channel. Our experience of Dharmakaya is experienced when our sphere of consciousness or awareness moves into the heart chakra.
When we die or have a temporary out of body experience our "awareness" sphere moves out through the eyes or out the top at the fontanele. Our perspective is always as being the sphere of awareness looking outward and around. We perceive directly without the body's sensory perceptions. We are this "awareness". Recognizing that we are this pure awareness along with its intrinsic wisdom, is rigpa. Rigpa is pure knowingness (gnosis) and awareness.
Our physical body has its own mode of consciousness within the functioning of the brain. It also has its own means of getting its goals accomplished. We get thoughts about sexual activity from the limbic system. For males with lots of testosterone there may be many more sexual thoughts. When other areas of the brain are stimulated or damaged we get different thoughts and thoughts patterns as well. We can actually alter the brain chemicals and hormones in the brain that will cause the person to feel depressed and to have negative thoughts. We change the chemicals and hormones to correct levels and the negative thoughts magically disappear. Our sphere of awareness is apart from this input, yet perceives it, like reflections in a mirror. This is known as the "mirror-like wisdom".
In Dzogchen we are reversing the process. As functioning at the Nirmanakaya level, by simply doing "calming meditation", we are just observing our thoughts as they come and go. These are mostly brain thoughts. We then become aware of the sense of being a separate aware observer of these thoughts. That is consciousness moving into the awareness as the Sambhogakaya. At this point we are realizing that we are not the brain, body or its thoughts. We are gaining insights that we are this pure empty observing awareness that is not the body or brain dependent. That is the beginning of vipassana or insight meditation. That will blossom into what is called "rigpa", pure Knowingness. (gnosis)
To go further in wisdom we come to understand the empty quality of our knowing awareness directly. By doing so we recognize the nature of the "unestablished" Dharmakaya. Awareness is never absent at any level of experience and is not a separate viewer of experience. Experience is itself aware and self-knowing. A Buddha functions through all three aspects: Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya and Nirmanakaya (material body). The Sambhogakaya is localized presence as well as the Nirmanakaya. The Dharmakaya is non-local.
I hope this helps some to untie the knots in trying to figure out this "anatta" thing in accord with our apparent nature of awareness.
I replied:
Indeed, the realization of Awareness is important... reminds me of a reply by Thusness to someone two years ago
"What you described is fine and it can be considered vipassana
meditation too but you must be clear what is the main objective of
practicing that way. Ironically, the real purpose only becomes obvious
after the arising insight of anatta. What I gathered so far from your
descriptions are not so much about anatta or empty nature of phenomena
but are rather drawn towards Awareness practice. So it will be good to
start from understanding what Awareness truly is. All the method of
practices that u mentioned will lead to a quality of experience that is
non-conceptual. You can have non-conceptual experience of sound,
taste...etc...but more importantly in my opinion, u should start from
having a direct, non-conceptual experience of Awareness (first glimpse
of our luminous essence). Once you have a ‘taste’ of what Awareness is, u
can then think of ‘expanding’ this bare awareness and gradually
understand what does ‘heightening and expanding’ mean from the
perspective of Awareness.
Next, although you hear and see ‘non-dual, anatta and dependent
origination’ all over the place in An Eternal Now’s forum (the recent
Toni Packer’s books you bought are about non-dual and anatta), there is
nothing wrong being ‘dualistic’ for a start. Even after direct
non-conceptual experience of Awareness, our view will still continue to
be dualistic; so do not have the idea that being dualistic is bad
although it prevents thorough experience of liberation.
The comment given by Dharma Dan is very insightful but of late, I
realized that it is important to have a first glimpse of our luminous
essence directly before proceeding into such understanding. Some times
understanding something too early will deny oneself from actual
realization as it becomes conceptual. Once the conceptual understanding
is formed, even qualified masters will find it difficult to lead the
practitioner to the actual ‘realization’ as a practitioner mistakes
conceptual understanding for realization."
...
"Vipassana is about being bare in attention, noting and mindful of the 3
characteristic of phenomena whereas “Experiencing whatever arises
fearlessly and unreservedly” is not vipassana, it is simply the way I
see how practice
should be after the arising insight of anatta and realizing the empty nature of phenomena.
You can take this “Experiencing whatever arises fearlessly and
unreservedly” as your path of practice and at the same time contemplate
whether a mind that sees things dualistically and inherently is able to
experience phenomena ‘fearlessly, completely and reservedly’. Practice
with this question in mind will also help you penetrate into
non-conceptuality and non-duality."
"Anatta" and "emptiness" is also not to be seen as a "higher stage" than
"realization of Awareness"... it clarifies the nature of "Awareness"
but should not be seen in terms of hierarchy.
As Thusness also said in the correspondence,
"Not to take the 7 phases of insights and experiences as ‘stages’. It is
merely a narration of the journey I have gone through. Phase 6 insight
is not necessarily a higher state of insight than phase 1 insight. I
think all these 7 phases of insights and experiences are of equal
importance, they complement each other. Some might have experiential
insight of Emptiness first with intensity of luminous essence coming
later."
For example there was a lama who experienced the 7 phases in reverse order from the way he presented it:
2008
"(Mind has often been likened to a mirror, but the analogy goes only so
far, because mirrors exist and mind doesn't, well let's say that one can
touch mirrors. What existence means, particularly at these levels,
would be a fruitful topic, but one that i will not cover. Also , mind
doesn't really reflect phenomena, it is the phenomena themselves. This
is covered further down in these 4 prajnas, but for clarity i thought i
should mention that.
(4:15 PM) AEN:
"Thusness' or "suchness" is what one feels with the experience of
emptiness. It is a solid sense of being (yes, emptiness has a solid or
one could say rich feeling). The luminescence of mind can be compared
the the surface of a mirror. If the mirror is dirty it doesn't have a
bright surface, and if mind is filled with obscuration its awareness is
dimmed. With the experience of emptiness, phenomena become more vivid.
It is said in the post that this confirms one's entrance into Zen. In
the vajrayana, this vividness of mind is called "osel" in Tibetan, and
it is a sign that one has entered the vajrayana. In my experience, this
is quite far along the path. To get to this point, one would have to
experience egolessness of self, egolessness of other, nondualty,
emptiness, and only then luminosity.)
(4:16 PM) Thusness: very good.
(4:16 PM) AEN: from another thread: "Exist is a tricky word in Buddhism.
Mind does not exist in the sense of being a thing, but it does exist as
well, otherwise how would we be able to see, hear etc.
Having said that, for an individual, there is nothing "outside of
awareness." Everything that happens to us happens in our awareness(it's
not ours, but so what). Furthermore, we are literally everything that
happens in our awareness. There is no self; we are simply the world. if
we see a chair in our kitchen, that is what we are at that moment since
there is no separation between phenomena and mind. Phenomena are mind
and mind is phenomena. smile.gif
Tsultrim
(4:22 PM) Thusness: this tsultrim is insight is stage 6.
(4:23 PM) AEN: oic..
(4:23 PM) Thusness: truly good.
(4:23 PM) AEN: icic..
(4:23 PM) Thusness: not many can truly feel the differences.
(4:23 PM) AEN: oic..
(4:24 PM) Thusness: it is only until a certain phase of experience then that clarity comes.
(4:24 PM) Thusness: and often in tremendous in the stability of
thoughtlessness... thought almost seldom arise and one becomes the full
vividness of arising phenomena.
....
(5:26 PM) Thusness: There will come a time when emptiness becomes so
clear and the separation is no more then without the need to recall or
remind. The last veil that separates is like permanently gone. Then
there is no practice because all moments of arising phenomena is just
one practice.
(5:29 PM) AEN:
In a post above, i distinguished between the two. I know you asked
Matylda, but until she replies, if she does, possibly i could be of
help.
Prajna is the tool that sees emptiness. It is actually an expansion of
awareness, using awareness in the context of mindfulness/awareness.
Awareness gets to a point where it discovers the nature of mind which
includes emptiness. At that point, awareness transforms into prajna.
There are lesser stages of prajna as well, but i would have to review
them.
Prajna has been likened to the mother of all the Buddhas, because
through its activity the mind that becomes the Buddha mind is born.
Actually, it has always been there, and is unborn, but let's not
quibble.
(5:29 PM) AEN:
So, prajna sees emptiness. When first seen, however, one feels emptiness
as separate from what has discovered it. There is still a slight trace
of dualism. We experience this dualism as a seeking for emptinesss ie
there is a seeker and something sought. At the realization of jnana,
this duality melts, so to speak, and emptiness exists or doesn't exist
without a sense of something observing it. Also, one attains wisdom when
emptiness arises, not wisdom about anything, simply being in the state
of wisdom. With prajna, one observes that wisdom; with jnana, one
becomes it.
Tsultrim
(5:35 PM) Thusness: jnana here does not refer to the type of
concentration (i.e. jnana = knowledge, not jhana/samadhi) like it said.
It is an effortless non-dual luminous experience due to the maturing of
prajna.
(5:35 PM) Thusness: I have often said clear until absorbed. Vividness of forms.
(5:36 PM) AEN: oic..
(5:37 PM) Thusness: It is the outcome of the clarity of insight due to
the dissolve of that tendency to divide. It is natural, not a form of
attention or concentration. This should not be misunderstood.
(5:37 PM) AEN: icic..
(5:38 PM) Thusness: He mentioned about luminosity is the last fruition
stage and one must go through emptiness to realise this stage.
(5:39 PM) Thusness: This is not exactly right.
(5:39 PM) Thusness: Advaita Vedanta practitioner will experience the opposite.
(5:39 PM) AEN: but for mahamudra it is like that rite? (no-self/emptiness first, followed by realizing the luminous essence)
(5:39 PM) AEN: theravada also?
(5:39 PM) AEN: like dharma dan
(5:40 PM) Thusness: yes
(5:40 PM) Thusness: it is because of right view
(5:40 PM) AEN: oic..
(5:40 PM) Thusness: without the right view, u will experience luminosity aspect of awareness without knowing its empty nature.
(5:40 PM) Thusness: that is more dangerous.
(5:41 PM) Thusness: therefore establishment of right view is most important. Seeds are planted."
........
(12:54 AM) AEN: btw does freawaru know non-dual? u mean he's like the ken wilber kind of nondual but not anatta?
(12:55 AM) Thusness: he is having glimpses of non-dual like Ken Wilber.
(12:55 AM) Thusness: It is without the experience of 'I' but still rest in the Subject.
(12:56 AM) Thusness: U will see stage 4 onwards is all about resting in transience and nothing on Subject.
(12:57 AM) Thusness: all those practitioners even after non-dual
experience if insight of anatta has not arisen will have the tendency of
towards the stage 3.
(12:58 AM) Thusness: all those practitioners even after non-dual
experience and still sink back to the Subject, will have the tendency of
skewing towards the stage 3.
(12:59 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:59 AM) Thusness: However stages are just appearances, in tsultrim serri post, it becomes reverse.
(1:00 AM) AEN: oic..
(1:00 AM) Thusness: Therefore the stages are mere appearances like what i have said in the beginning of the blog.
(1:00 AM) AEN: icic..
(1:00 AM) Thusness: u should not take it as ultimate but mere guidance for u.
Same term in different nomenclature, do not be confused by it ie awareness, supreme, thusness, nirvana, buddha nature, enlightenment and others.
Originally posted by Nyorai:Same term in different nomenclature, do not be confused by it ie awareness, supreme, thusness, nirvana, buddha nature, enlightenment and others.
No. Enlightenment, awareness, nirvana, Buddha nature and so forth are very different concepts and refer to very different aspects of reality. Look at just the general meaning of these words and how can you say that they are the same?
Awareness: All minds are included within the five sense awarenesses and mental awareness. There are five types of sense awareness: eye awareness, ear awareness, nose awareness, tongue awareness, and body awareness. There are two types of mental awareness: conceptual mental awareness and non-conceptual mental awareness.
Enlightenment: Usually the full enlightenment of Buddhahood – an omniscient wisdom whose nature is the permanent cessation of mistaken appearance and whose function is to bestow mental peace on all living beings. Generally, there are three levels of enlightenment: small enlightenment, or the enlightenment of a Hearer; middling enlightenment, or the enlightenment of a Solitary Realizer; and great enlightenment, or the enlightenment of a Buddha, also known as ‘Buddhahood’. An enlightenment is a liberation and a true cessation.
Nirvana: Sanskrit word for ‘liberation’. Complete freedom from samsara and its cause, the delusions.
Buddha-nature is the inseparability of luminous clarity and emptiness.
Grasping on emptiness leads to nihilism, grasping on luminous clarity leads to eternalism. Liberation is found in recognizing its inseparability.