What Just Happened?

[Scholar]

Okay, I want to write this down before this state I am in disappears.

So, I just meditated, and I don't know how to put it into words, but I see the content now. I can see the content for what it is, I think? And I am aware that the content is nothing but content, and I am aware that something is witnessing the content. I have no clue what it is, but I am aware of it being there. I feel like I am a movie, and this person is sitting there and watching the movie. And, I can sense the calmness of that person, even though I am still the movie. I feel anxious right now, but at the same time it's like I am completely calm.

I don't know what just happened, but whatever it was, it was so fucking obvious I am can't believe it. I don't feel any different, but at the same time everything is different. I wasn't even meditating for 20 minutes and this happened. I have no idea, but this is way too underwhelming to be enlightenment. I don't feel any different at all, I don't even feel really happy about it. But it's like I'm aware that I'm dreaming? That the content is just content...

And before, I thought I was aware of content being content while meditating, but right now, as I am writing this, I feel like I am in a more meditative state than I ever was, even though I am nervous. This is so strange and subtle, but it changes everything, and it's kind of scary at the same time, but I am not scared of the "scariness"? I was just talking to my dog and it didn't even feel like I was talking...

 

But this can't be it? I still feel the ego being there, I don't feel "unconditional love". It's more like I am aware of the "simulation"? I am pretty sure this will go away after a while, I don't even know if I want it to stay this way. But at the same time, it's so fucking obvious, that I don't even know if I can unsee it. 

 

This is just so fucking weird. I hope I didn't break my mind or something. I'm thinking that maybe I'm seeing the tail of the bull, or maybe the trails? But, I haven't even been meditating for a year, and not more than 20 minutes a day. It's impossible that this is it, I'll just wait until this goes away.

 

Someone probably had similar expiriences, right? 

Edited March 4, 2017 by Scholar

[Nahm]

Sounds like maybe you are noticing the big causation. 

Keep going.

Edited March 4, 2017 by Nahm

[cetus]

@Scholar Sounds like you had a bout of ego death.

"I must not be awake, for everything looks as it has never before.

Or else I'm awake for the first time and all that was before was just a dream"   Walt Whitman

[Azrael]

@Scholar, well you just became aware of the witness. @cetus56 introduced me to that term when I was in your situation. Don't think that enlightenment will be one big breakthrough and then it is done. It reveals itself to you slowly. It shows you more and more aspects of reality and then you kind of fall into it until you cannot really think back how it was just 2 years ago when you were rooted in the normal egoic reality.

So, just stay with it. It'll go and come back, you'll try to cling to it and then it comes back when you wouldn't have thought about it. Just follow along. You're on a good track here.

Cheers to you, Az

[Scholar]

I don't know, I don't think I did enough meditation work to be aware of the witness or anything. Maybe I am just deluding myself?

 

It's so hard to explain. I can "feel" this something now, but it's not really a feeling. I am just aware of it, the best way to explain it is like dreaming? I don't feel like I am really writing this.

I don't even know how to explain it, I don't even know if there is a point in explaining it.

[cetus]

2 minutes ago, Scholar said:

I don't know, I don't think I did enough meditation work to be aware of the witness or anything. Maybe I am just deluding myself?

 

It's so hard to explain. I can "feel" this something now, but it's not really a feeling. I am just aware of it, the best way to explain it is like dreaming? I don't feel like I am really writing this.

I don't even know how to explain it, I don't even know if there is a point in explaining it.

Your breaking through. Welcome this opportunity and make friends with it. It's what Leo refers to as "getting traction". You may feel a bit schizophrenic right now? If so that would be a good sign, believe it or not.

[Scholar]

Yes it's a very strange situation, I do kind of feel like I am going crazy. It's like I don't see reality as "reality" anymore.

[cetus]

8 minutes ago, Scholar said:

Yes it's a very strange situation, I do kind of feel like I am going crazy. It's like I don't see reality as "reality" anymore.

How many times have you heard the words "all reality is phenomena".  Now you know exactly what that means through direct experience.

[Scholar]

I feel am so calm, it's almost funny to me.

Edited March 4, 2017 by Scholar

[Nahm]

@Scholar time feel a little slower? Like you have more time between an observation and your mental reaction?

[Scholar]

@Nahm I don't know, but I feel much more patient.

[Nahm]

@Scholar From my experience, you're in for some real treats soon. If you start noticing how most people are in a reaction state and don't know it, try not to say anything to them about it. Might save you a couple headaches in the near future. 

[Shin]

50 minutes ago, Scholar said:

Yes it's a very strange situation, I do kind of feel like I am going crazy. It's like I don't see reality as "reality" anymore.

What makes you think that you ever saw reality until now ?

 

Edited March 4, 2017 by Shin

[Scholar]

I have just done some research and I do think I saw the tail of the ox.

https://ancientforestzen.wordpress.com/2012/12/09/seeing-the-ox/

But how do I proceed now? Do I just do the same meditation for longer periods of time? I'm not even quite sure how I did it, it's like I was in a dark room filled with thousands of switches, and accidently I found the right one to turn the light on. Shouldn't I "note down" where the switch is so I find it again once the room goes dark again?

Maybe I am too fascinated looking at the room, now that I see it for the first time, but all the excitment will distract me from finding the switch later again.

 

I always tried to make the content disappear, but I think it's the content, the true recognition of what the content is, what leads one to the source? When I just become aware of sight, I also become aware of "where" sight is happening.

I guess you can do this with everything? Maybe it is a way to disillusionize the mind. Instead of thinking everything is illusion, simply look at everything the way it really is. I want to try this with the feeling of "someone else".

Edited March 4, 2017 by Scholar

[Vercingetorix]

@Scholar my opinion is just continue to be with the experience, try to see it for what it is without concepts and thoughts, any trying to reach it and hold on to it will only bring you suffering, enjoy while it last and enjoy when it ends

[bobbyward]

@Scholar about a year ago I had a permanent change in experience, were i seen that there is no controller of thoughts and the body, its a subtle change in experience. the first 2 thoughts that came to my mind were 'I cant believe how simple this is, and this is the way it has always been i just never seen it'. I was only meditating a few months when this happened, I was on a high for about 3 days when this happened.

if this is what happened to you it wont go away its permanent, but its far from being enlightenment 

 

[Scholar]

I don't even feel like this is a special expirience. It's just so obvious. I think whenever I meditated previously, I was always trying to do something. Even when I was pretending not to want something, I simply was. It's like I was trying to focus in on awareness, not realizing that I have always been focused on awareness. I was so caught up with trying to find out what that "awareness" might be, that I couldn't simply expirience it, as I was all the time. 

It's so strange how the feeling of past and future is so fragile. Right now, it seems like there has been no past, everything that happened always happened in the now, and all that I thought the past to be was merely a feeling and memories, that all still happened (happen) in the now. Even describing now as now is kind of silly, because there is nothing else than now, so there is no word needed to describe it. It literally is everything that exists. Even using present tense is strange, as if there was something else than presence.

I don't know how to describe this feeling, but it feels like the nothingness before death was just part of the moment right now, as everything else I have ever "expirienced". If I had to put it into words, it's like awareness is the moment, and the moment never, ever changed. And somehow, the content just became a resonance of that fact. So, even if the content changes, even if I go unconscious tomorrow, it will not matter at all, because I am part of content. The moment will not change no matter how much the content will change, even if tomorrow the content is death.

I don't even feel like my own suffering is bad right now. It's strange, because I do care about my suffering when I am wanting to do something. But the condition I am in is giving me such a great certainity that suffering is completely irrelevant, that I don't even care about caring about suffering in the "future".

Everything is the moment, every single thought I have, every single concept. I don't see a difference between being with the concepts and thought, and being purely with whatever else is there. Both are content, no matter how "chaotic" the content is, the moment is always completely still and calm.

Having monkey mind is just as much of being "in the moment" as every other state is. Even the most unconscious state is "being in the moment", because there literally is nothing else than that.

 

Not wanting monkey mind is the content trying to be a certain content. Wanting to be "enlightent" is a state of content. Whether the content aligns with the moment or not does not matter at all. The content will never have influence on the moment. Wether the ego exists within content or not does not matter either. Isn't it the ego itself that wants the ego to disappear? Because, what else is there to want anything? 

The moment itself doesn't want anything, it's just there. And if the moment is the only permanent thing there is, why even bother? The moment always has everything it wants, because it doesn't want anything. It is beyond wanting. Wanting to understand and become the moment is the contents desperate attempt to change itself, isn't it?

Edited March 4, 2017 by Scholar

[Natasha]

@Scholar Eckhart Tolle talks about this state in his videos and in books. You're on the good track. Start on self-inquiry to transcend body-mind.

[Scholar]

I feel like I am becoming a Zen-Devil...

[Nahm]

@bobbyward Thanks for taking the time to share that!!!!! I had that experience, I would describe it exactly as you did! My 3 day high dissipated but the change in perception did not. Stay classy!

Edited March 4, 2017 by Nahm