fopylo

Insight about thought

9 posts in this topic

Thought is friend.

Thought is a tool.

Thought is for creation.

After practicing some thought-awareness meditation I've come to realize better what is thought, the actuality of though - These exact images you see in your head when you read this, and the meaning and labels you give to things, this.

Thought is not an enemy.

Use thought.

Listen to thought.

Feel the thought.

It is guidance.

The goal isn't to "get rid of thoughts" - they appear all the time! And some of them you really like. Some even feel good! You want to think, don't lie...

I believe the 'goal' is to align thought, to experience natural thoughts, thoughts that feel good to experience. That doesn't mean chasing "good" thoughts, or trying to change/fix the content of the thought. You don't control the content really, so forget about that. Thoughts arise, and you feel them:

If it (the thought, the content) feels natural/aligned - then great! However, make sure you are true to yourself and be honest. You will learn the meaning of honesty deeper, simply by the innocent desire to feel good and prioritizing that over the "quality" of the content (The content may be absurd, weird sexual fantasies, unusual desires - If they honestly feel good, goof for you, keep the flow!)

If the thought doesn't feel good, it simply means that it isn't aligned, isn't natural for you, and that you are still thinking about it. Here you also need to be honest with yourself about how it feels (good/not good, keep it simple). Usually we tend to get 'stuck' on thoughts that we believe are true, are real, sucked into them. Be honest with yourself (whenever you want, no rush) that you actually want to feel good (more like, to feel, which is amazing). Recognize the discord and let it go whenever you feel like - basically, focus on anything (your legs, the sound, a more aligned thought, your whole body sensation - These are examples of things that the natural flow will pull you towards, so no need to force yourself to focus on these thing. It will happen naturally, simply, because they feel better, it is more relaxing, calming - natural).

This is something I found very important to know, however don't make it a dogma. You'll simply want to do that if you start listening to the quite innocent desire of wanting to feel better, aligned.

This also doesn't mean to focus on thought to try to practice it.

This means focus on feeling aligned, for your own sake.

This means simply feel - your body sensations as they arise, thoughts, emotions, what not! You feel all of that stuff. Focus on listening to the feeling, to feel what's natural.

Thoughts will still pass by. If you want to feel more aligned, thoughts will become more aligned, they will feel better - You'll see it! You'll feel it!

Also, thoughts about what you want, desires, basically thoughts that make you feel "Ye, ye, this, give me this! I want this!" will feel great, since they are aligned with you. Those are your preferences - wants that feel aligned, to you.

Awareness of thoughts meditation. (Thanks to Nahm) @Nahm

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If this seems insightful for you and you want to continue this then great!

But from my point of view it seems as if you are getting stuck with the content/feeling of thoughts and making the practice complicated. From my understanding the point of the practice was to create a space between yourself and thoughts. You are neither your thoughts nor feelings. It doesn't matter if you have bad feelings, just like thoughts they come and go, the witness you - remains unaffected. I think that is a much better goal (to realize you are the unchanging/unaffected factor) than wanting to have thoughts that make you feel good.

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@Judy2

28 minutes ago, Judy2 said:

@Seeker_of_truth Can you elaborate on how to create such a distance, that is, disidentify from thoughts and feelings?

Meditation. Deep meditation. The key word is 'awareness' not 'thought'. On one level, meditation will make you aware of thoughts, as you continue the practice, meditation will make you aware of awareness itself.

Focus your attention on Self discovery of awareness. Deepen awareness.

Return to AWARENESS, again and again and again and again, until you don't even have to return anymore. This is the meditation game. 

Thoughts? Let em be.

Edited by Spence94

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On 3/7/2022 at 8:05 PM, Judy2 said:

@Seeker_of_truth Can you elaborate on how to create such a distance, that is, disidentify from thoughts and feelings?

This is how I do it: I watch the thoughts/feelings. I realize that I am the witness/awareness to which these appear. Can a thought/feeling affect awareness? Does awareness care or know whether it is aware of a good feeling or a bad feeling? Thoughts interpret feelings as good or bad, not awareness / you. If I am identified too strongly with any feeling or thought, I may question "who is identified"? Mostly it just turns out to be another thought.  This way I keep reminding myself that I am the unaffected witness to which everything appears and by doing so I disidentify from thoughts and feelings.

Edited by Seeker_of_truth

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Does that feeling thing work? Wasn't Nahm banned for a reason? Don't you lose sight of reality? 

It's a gamble for sure. 

I'm for practicing stillness of mind. I catch myself thinking, I'll ask if it's necessary. Awareness of breath is helpful sometimes. 

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thought is the creation of the imaginary world that we humans share, and that we confuse with reality. it is the map, which makes us separate from the territory. the way is to completely detach yourself from thought, to arrive to silence. hard! without thought you are alone, absolutely. As humans we are terrified of loneliness, so we think.

can you separate? can you shut up ,enter into absolute solitude, where only you exist? that is liberation

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@BipolarGrowth

12 hours ago, BipolarGrowth said:

Properly applied thought can turn a mystical experience into awakening.

What do you mean?

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9 hours ago, fopylo said:

@BipolarGrowth

What do you mean?

When I meditate, I usually go through a series of 5-7 different spiritual aspects of my direct experience which I’ve gathered as part of my baseline consciousness after doing this stuff for 8 years rather intensely. 
 

Usually, I’ll start with my “zero gravity” aspect of my direct experience. I describe what this “zero gravity” means in this video. You can watch it if you’re interested to know more: 

How to Permanently Realize “Zero Gravity” on the Level of Perception (Spiritual Insight Guide)

Then I’ll go to the Boundless Space aspect of the fifth jhana (Buddhist term you can look up if interested). 
 

As I’m turning thought and attention to these different aspects, I will amplify their intensity. 
 

Anyway, the next thing I do is I will then turn attention to the Boundless Consciousness aspect of the sixth jhana. Side note: when I say “the ‘xyz’ aspect of the ‘xyz’ jhana,” I am saying this as at this point in the meditation I am not in a completely formless state of consciousness which is required for it to be a full 5th, 6th, 7th, or 8th jhana. 
 

Usually by this time things are rather close to formless, with sensations of form being detuned to <10% of my baseline state of consciousness which is already likely detuned to some extent compared to how most people experience things. 
 

At this point, I’ll usually try to move into the 7th jhana or at least a rudimentary form of it or quasi-7th jhana state.
 

I don’t have a good way yet to reach 8th jhana with any consistency, so I don’t waste time trying for that currently.

Next, I’ll release my attention from focusing on any of these particular aspects of my awareness to then feeling all sensations as they are. This is a state where essentially all sensations and thoughts are just a seemingly infinite soup of flickering micro-phenomena with the visual field having at least 100 unique sensations within a second but often seemingly far more than that which is obviously a bit hard to count. 
 

At this point, all of the distinct sense doors are very noticeably merged into one sense door which is something certain Buddhists like to talk about. 
 

Lastly, once the soup of sensations is really boiling, I’ll turn my attention to the impermanence of these various instantaneously flickering sensations. I prefer to do this with music by the way. 
 

I may also throw in the insight that this field of experience is all that this field of experience can know/experience. 
 

When all of this is said and done, I’m in a state that is in ways more potent, satisfying, and awe-inspiring than let’s say my 10 tab of LSD or 5.87 dried grams of psilocybin God Consciousness experiences 2-3 years ago. 
 

All of this is done by using thought in unison with skills developed in meditation and psychedelic trips. 
 

I often prefer to vape three medium to long hits of delta-10/delta-8 THC when I do this practice as it loosens things up quite a bit and makes the level of consciousness reached typically higher than doing the practice completely sober. 
 

This is only one version of using thought to increase the profundity of states that I do. It’s the format I’ve been using for the past couple weeks. 
 

It’s not uncommon to run into effects people experience while on serotonergic psychedelics while I’m doing practices such as these.  One example of this that I experienced a few nights ago would be my entire visual field morphing into essentially a single color in my environment with very little distinction to be noticed in the visual field. 


Everybody wanna be a mystic, but nobody wanna dissolve themselves to the point of a psych ward visit. 
https://youtu.be/5i5jGU9wn2M?si=-rXSAiT1MMZrdBtY

 

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