Enhancing Perception

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DISCLAIMER

 

First read the practice section; reading my commentary is entirely optional. Comments are hardly ever necessary, and our current Western civilization suffers from a terrible inflation of words. Less is more, and I don't wish anyone to waste their time on airy platitudes that offer highly inefficient instructions of what one should do in order to advance spiritually.

 

My only request to anyone who tries my instructions is that you post here whether or not it delivered to you what it claimed. Anything else will be intellectual exercise that I definitely want to avoid, especially in this sketchy stage of writing.

 

 

PRACTICE

 

Some of you may have taken a notice of me promoting innocent wondering. In this practice I want to take you there, so that you can see why the sages seem to have put a lot of emphasis on the virtues of effortlessness (i.e. "naturalness") and youth. Following the practice might also provide you with a neat alternative or supplement to any mindfulness practice you might have, since it should amp up the ease of absorption considerably.

 

Small children observe the world in a peculiar manner. Whenever they meet something new or exciting, their eyes enlarge with interest and their mouths open in awe. Can you put yourself into the same state by empathic resonance, and can you uphold the state without much effort? How does it affect your mindstream and sense of being? More importantly, why should adulthood mean the cessation of this wonderful process?

 

You should especially be mindful of how the eyes convey the sensation of amazement and how the muscles of the soft and hard palate are lifted. It should induce an overall sensation of facial muscles being pulled towards the back of the head. Perhaps you can also find a sweet lightness in your chest, as if you are falling in love. By engaging into these movements you will easily regain a hold of the state, even if you should become distracted or pursue some other task in the meanwhile. I've found cultivating amazament of the amazament to be a good way to let the sensation spread all over the body, which should prove to be a fairly effortless entrance to the first jhana.

 

Consistent practice and will bring prompt results: the more you do it, the more engaging it becomes. From personal experience I can tell that ego and intrusive thought patterns fall off very quick, even when I simply start wondering again if I had become distracted. You see, all mental perturbations are transmuted in the fresh and non-judgemental inspection, and this averbal process eventually leads to the pervasive joy of the present moment. I've been making a good recovery since February, but things have gotten very interesting about two weeks ago when I started just wondering. Unfortunately, I can't remember the context how the practice came forth, but I guess it was an inevitable conclusion from all the research I've done.

 

Sometimes your emotions may drift into unbalanced or negative states, yet it's especially beneficial during these moments that you gently turn your attention to the process of just wondering it and let the tensions subdue: it provides the necessary healing of the unprocessed energies. Remember that awareness is energy, and the only purpose of these stuck energies is to merge back into your undivided attention. It might be wise to intentionally seek to trigger all sorts of uncomfortable sensations in a tranquil location, and first learn how to deal with a bit of such tension by bringing it into the wondering awareness, so that you can easily overcome the draining moments in the future. However, the overall emphasis should be on cultivating the wondering and amazement.

 

To recap: Genuinely put yourself in a mental frame as if you had no comprehension at all how to intellectualize anything; be as curious as if you saw even the most common things the first time, or you have no idea what to recall at all, or you're amazed what things are called when you recall them, etc.. The cognition is always very limiting, and it would be beneficial to human beings if they were not concerned of how to constantly represent things in a limited manner.

 

Caution. The purpose of this practice is to prime you for more enjoyable and satisfactory perception through innocent wondering and amazement. If you should mistake the process for cultivating confused and ignorant states of mind, then the consequences would almost certainly be dire.

 

 

COMMENTARY

 

So what's so special about getting into the process of innocent wondering and turning yourself into a living question mark? That is up to decide whether you want to lose the rigid self-identity and enter a wondrous silence of alertness and vividity. Your cognition will remain intact with all the precious experience you have, but you will be able to deal with matters with a lightness of spirit. Besides, it's neuro-physiologically completely arguable that this state is indeed how the healthy human beings operate.

 

Most of you are probably familiar with the Reuniting.info and its discussion of neuro-physiology affecting human behavior. However, sexuality and mating behavior is only a specialized function of a more generalizable conduct. Firstly, we have the parasympathic nervous system that relates to lasting and relaxed being (anabolic body functions; rest and digestion) and sympathic nervous system that responds in urgent and intense manner (catabolic body functions; "fight or flight"). From this I'm going to suggest two complementary ends on a scale of nervous stimulation: the sensitive (i.e. perceptive) and the irritable (i.e. reactive). Secondly, these nervous circuits generate an interest. If you understand anything of mathematical attractors, banking, chemical buffer reactions, or the concept of vicious circle, you already know the deal. If you are at either base level, then you will have to invest quite a bit effort until you have managed to switch sides. If you are an irritable person, then it's very hard to not engage in irritable behavior and further stimulate the irritation. On the other hand, the sensitive person will have the capacity not to be overwhelmed even by the severely irritable traumas for his base level function dissolves efficiently such impacts. Thirdly, there's little understanding of the efficient ways to cultivate the neuro-physiological sensitivity. Religions exist to rectify this, but unfortunately not all of their methods and traditions are efficient and easy enough to guarantee a lasting peace on Earth.

 

All life simply strives for a good vibe. If the subtle pleasure of perception becomes overwhelmed by the mass of irritable responses that offer a temporary fix, we find that there might even be a problem with the language that associates the true with good (i.e. pleasure), but neglects separating the sensitive and irritable ends of pleasure clearly enough.

 

From survival's point of view, it's quite clear that living in the head promotes unrealistic and dissociative behavior in the long term, thus thinking can only have a limited benefit. Moreover, the testimonies from life-threathening experiences indicate that dangerous situations make us recall our past experiences as in to learn from them, so there seems to be a very definite connection with excess mental dialogue and stress.

 

The Greek daimon, especially as elaborated by Plato, is certainly remiscent of the ancient traditions that say that the dead and their influence affects the world of the living. Although daimon is described as more of a type of personal spirit of fate, Plato disagreed with the tradition which claimed the daimon was given to each of us, and he instead said that it is chosen by us. Without going too deeply into the shallow discussion of free will, it seems strange to speak of any kind of freedom of choice or withdrawal when it's always the good we're after. Nevertheless if we become ignorant or inhibited of some valuable type of pleasure, it would undoubtedly lead to great disease and discomfort. Through understanding the neuro-physiological foundation, we thusly profess that the law of karma guides living beings and that the impact of karma is at the gross level a cultural and epigenetic heritage that reaches back in time for many generations.

 

It seems to me that in the center of all the distress is a simple set of prejudices that mortify the innocent heart and make entire populations insensitive to the simple pleasure of perception, which leads to wars and confrontations of authority. Since the irritable pleasure is the competitive pleasure, this type of relative position is always beyond all justification: Life offers no explanations, but we just are here and make ourselves feel good and homely. Yet our atomized civilization spends vast amounts of time and effort in rationalizing and justifying even the minutest fads and concoctions, even though hardly any of it has anything to do with valid ontological concerns that can be rationalized in the first place. Nietzsche spent volumes in explaining why truth seeking is delusional mask for the Will to Power, but unfortunately for him it's always easier to deconstruct and criticize than offer a sane alternative that does not end up being another justification for an insatiable power high.

 

I think there's more to all this discussion, but I'll leave it to a level I'm experienced with: Whether or not karma has further spiritual dimensions, I can't tell for sure. There's also much more to the neuro-physiology aspect, both evidence and instructions, and how it shapes human civilization and culture, but that material is not quite ready to be published yet.

 

Blessings