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Thoughts are liberated just by recognizing them
Thanks! Yes, sort of, but not quite what I had in mind. (Mahamudra is similar to Dzogchen, as I’m sure you know, and this practice is a familiar one.) I was thinking of attention to five-sense perception rather than to thoughts. And also a more active sort of attention than this. There are practices in Dzogchen (and I expect Mahamudra) in which five-sense perception is liberated similarly; but they are more, hmm, passive than what I am imagining, less passionately involved, less fascinated.
Practice
I’m excited you have started drawing out your ideas on the complete stance itself as opposed to just the pitfalls it avoids—this page was a joy to read.
It does seem that further development and articulation of how practice is critical here. Without it, where does that leave people with a naturally low openness to experience? Or who have any other personal or contextual stumbling block that makes experiencing wonder less likely?
Looking forward to reading the pages on play and creativity, as they seem the most active and therefore perhaps the most available for practice. If not, what do you think the most accessible entry points are to the complete stance?
Meditation method
The meditation method you describe sounds a lot like what Insight Meditation can be. Check out Joseph Goldstein. When I did an Insight Meditation retreat, I was at first frustrated by the lack of a clear, concrete technique, but later realized that it’s intentionally left fluid, and there are lots of ways to practice, one of which is akin to what you describe here. Or maybe I just misinterpreted and was doing it wrong shrug
Gregory's Girl
This is really good. I’m really enjoying myself.
Good. I’m glad we bumped into each other.
SHE WHISTLES Do you want to dance?
It’s really good. You just lie flat down… and dance.
I’ll start it off. You join in when you feel confident enough.
OK?
SHE GIGGLES Just dance.
I’ll tell you something,…
..and not a lot of people know this,…
..we are clinging to the surface of this planet…
..while it spins through space at 1,000 miles an hour,…
..held only by the mystery force called gravity.
Wow!
A lot of people panic when you tell them that and they fall off.
You’re not falling off. That means you’ve got the hang of it.
That means that you have got… Natural ability.
Yeah.
A thousand miles an hour, eh?
Why are boys obsessed with numbers?
I’m not.
You are!
Don’t stop dancing or you’ll fall off.
Hello fellow homo sapiens
This is a very nice book you’re writing. I’ve stumbled across your blog while I was searching more info about Robert Kegan’s model, and your post convinced me to read his books, which I did it and were ones of the best books I’ve read in the past years. Now I’ve also started reading your other posts, and I really enjoy reading this blog/book.
This post especially struck a chord within me, maybe because of the title. I’ve once named my world view “wonderment”, because it seemed like the best description of it, and now I see you’re describing something similar.
I have a blog where I write about things like that, but my blog is completely different from yours: it’s more personal and much more chaotic, not reader-oriented and generally not thought to be read, rather to be written.
I was trying to find a post about this, https://cyclinginthewind.com/post/38 this being the oldest ones, I would change a lot of thing in there now, but I guess it gives an idea of how I started on this path. https://cyclinginthewind.com/post/53 and this one talks more about my methods to get into the wonderment state. I’m not advertising my blog, as I said it’s not thought as a project to read by others, but I still somehow want to share, because it’s quite unusual that anyone would understand this topic at all.
I kind of dislike the idea of leaving a public comment, but I couldn’t find another way to contact you and tell you that I really like your blogs :)
Spider webs and galaxy filaments
Hi David,
I like the way the example of the spider web takes us into a particular mind adopting the complete stance, or an aspect of it, at a particular time and place. That kind of example is, for me, the nucleus around which the vapor of an idea condenses into understanding. (It’s why I’m always skimming ahead through Buddhist books in search of the part that says, “For instance, Timmy never gave impermanence much thought until the day his pet hamster was abducted by space aliens,” etc.) I’ve enjoyed the many juicy examples of incomplete stances adopted by hippies and fundamentalists and the rest. I’d also be interested to read more stories of the complete stance in action, if you felt so inclined. Clearly these are harder to come by in history, if any exist at all. But, as you write elsewhere, “We want practical resolutions to particular problems of meaningness. How best to sort out a work or family conflict, for example?” If you ever felt inspired to relate how the complete stance untangled the knot of such a conflict, I for one would love to read it.
Yours,
Sam
Agendaless Attention
In respect of a meditation method, “that specifically trains you in the agendaless attention that wanders about according to its evolving fascinations,” there is this:
“Whatever thoughts or afflictions arise, don’t reject them…
Recognize them at the very instant they arise…
Thoughts are liberated just by simply recognizing them.” [MM117]
“Rest the mind directly
on the recognition of the identity of whatever arises…
If you become used to resting on their identity,
thoughts will cause no harm;
rather, thoughts themselves will then become the main practice.” [RSM84]
“No matter how many identified thoughts you have,
there is no problem at all.
You don’t need to deliberately achieve a certain stillness.” [RSM87]
“In the very natural condition of your mind,
the state of things as they are,
there is not even the slightest taint, obscuration, or anything considered impure
that needs to be eliminated or expelled.” [RSM282]
Sources:
MM - Peter Alan Roberts, “The Mind of Mahamudra”
RSM - Gerardo Abboud, “The Royal Seal of Mahamudra”