More interesting observations from "Seeing That Frees"

I'm continuing to enjoy the book by Rob Burbea, Seeing That Frees: Meditations on Emptiness and Dependent Arising. (First post about it is here.)

It's clear that Burbea knows a lot about meditation, Buddhist variety, and is skilled at communicating his knowledge both to his students in person and to the world at large through his book. 

There's so much of interest in the six chapters (out of 31) that I've read so far, I find it difficult to decide what to share in my blog posts about the book. So I'll focus on some of what got special highlighting as I make my way through Seeing That Frees with pen and highlighter in hand.

In a chapter about "The Cultivation of Insight," I liked what Burbea had to say about the limitation of unobservable entities.

Third, however, it is important to stress that, as we are defining it here, only what is actually perceivable to a practitioner qualifies as an insight for that practitioner.

I may, for example, feel anxious when I check my bank balance and see that there is no money at all in my account. But refusing to believe the bank statement and simply choosing to believe instead that I have a million dollars in the account would not in itself constitute an insight here, even if it did have the effect of reducing my suffering.

More generally, any introduction of a belief not based on perception, or similarly, any introduction of notions of unobservable entities would also, strictly speaking, be excluded from this particular definition of insight.

Fourth, and related to this last point: Rather than being based on faith in the experience of another, or upon blind beliefs -- even 'Buddhist' beliefs -- about how things are, insight, as we are defining it, is based primarily on personal experience of what decreases dukkha [suffering].

When there is insight, the seeing melts dukkha, and that release of dukkha we can feel and know for ourselves.

Samadhi is a term that I don't often think about in my own meditation practice. Burbea is helping me to understand that while it sounds exotic, being in a foreign language, it's actually fairly simple. Samadhi is concentration, basically. With concentration comes pleasure, usually.

For me samadhi is a lot like flow -- absorption in doing something either mentally or physically to the exclusion of other possible doings. Here Burbea relates concentration to defabricating the stories our brain tells itself about what's being experienced.

This fits with how I felt driving my Subaru Crosstrek into town today along the six miles of twisty, hilly, two-lane road that connects our neighborhood with Salem, Oregon. When I was simply concentrating on how the car was moving under my control, there were no stories about driving in my mind. There was just driving. And that felt good.

It typically takes a good deal of samadhi practice and insight to reverse a misconception of what is actually happening in a state of 'concentration'. For at first it understandably seems that such an altered state of unification and well-being is arrived at by ignoring phenomena other than the chosen object, so that these other phenomena, both inner and outer, are repressed from the consciousness at that time.

It might seem too that, replacing them in their absence, with much 'huffing and puffing' and strenuous effort, an altered pleasant state is constructed.

Is that really what is happening though? A state of samadhi is indeed still a constructed, fabricated state. But keen investigation, reflection, and a pondering of the relationship it has with letting go suggest that it may be more accurate to understand samadhi as a spectrum of states that involve progressively less fabrication than a more 'ordinary' state of consciousness involves.

It may not be obvious for quite a while but any state of samadhi is to some degree a state of letting go, of reduced craving. And the deeper the samadhi, the deeper and more comprehensive the letting go that it involves.

As we shall come to see through the insight practices, less craving results in less fabricating. Therefore any state of samadhi is a state of less fabricating, less building of the perception and sense of the self and of the world. If we understand how to contemplate it, samadhi itself offers profound insights into fabrication and dependent arising.

Spaciousness is a powerful means of lessening suffering, pain, unease, discomfort. Here Burbea explains how that happens.

Whenever there is any grasping or aversion toward something, indeed whenever any hindrances are present, the mind is, to some degree or other, in a contracted state. It has, so to speak, been sucked in to some perception, some object of consciousness, has shrunk and tightened around it. Generally we experience this contraction in the mind as an unpleasant state, as dukkha. 

We can notice this contraction, this constriction of the mental space, in relation to both internal and external phenomena. It will be evident, for instance, with regard to some unpleasant sensation in the body, like tiredness, or a difficult emotion, such as fear. And we may also detect it in social situations, if a certain relationship is charged.

The clinging mind contracts around some experience, and then, because the mind space is shrunken, the object of that grasping or aversion takes up proportionately more space in the mind. It thus seems somehow larger, and also more solid -- its size and seeming solidity both corresponding to the degree of contraction in the mind.

With the object appearing then bigger and more solid, and the experience of contraction being painful to some degree, the mind without insight in that moment will usually react unskillfully.

It will unconsciously try to escape the situation by increasing the grasping or aversion, in a way that only keeps it stuck or even makes things worse. For unfortunately this further grasping keeps the mind space contracted, or contracts it even more. This makes the issue, the perception, still larger and more solid, setting up a vicious circle in which the mind is trapped.

About all this, for now, we simply want to point out that it can be very helpful, when the awareness is unwisely sucked in in this way, to pay attention deliberately to a sense of space. Noticing space opens up the perception, and can begin to dissolve the vicious circle. Even attention to external physical space can help us open and ease the constriction of the mind, and can create a sense of space around an internal experience such as bodily discomfort or a difficult emotion.

As we have stated before, space is not emptiness, and emptiness is not a space of any kind. Rather, our investigation here is simply into how the mind gives solidity to experience and fabricates dukkha through the very ways we relate to, see, and conceive of things.

We are gradually learning to untangle the tangle of suffering. And again, like all deliberate shifts in the way of looking, the more we do it, the more accessible it becomes. The more we practise inclining the mind to notice space, the easier it becomes to actually open up some space in the perception and experience some relief.

Comments

[Ron E.]

Burbea puts it concisely: “It may not be obvious for quite a while but any state of samadhi is to some degree a state of letting go, of reduced craving.” And also: “. . . the mind is, to some degree or other, in a contracted state. It has, so to speak, been sucked in to some perception, some object of consciousness . . .”

Translating that into my speak, it takes a certain insight to realise that what is doing the seeking is the agglomeration of information and experience that comprise the contents of mind and self; the contents that we know as consciousness. These structures, these contents, having been put together from the myriad experiences and information accumulated since birth are generally the vehicles from which we approach the question of ‘who am I’. They are also – as Burbea indicates – the seat of dukkha or suffering (with a little pleasure thrown in!)

It all points to the mind’s contents, the habitual way we generally see and approach life, as being the seat of dukkha. Makes sense: when it comes to what we are ultimately searching for, we are looking through the very misty vale of our accumulated thoughts, opinions, prejudices, our particular knowledge, culture and so on.

It is this conglomeration of data that is doing the searching, or more put more succinctly, it is the illusory self construct trying to find itself – or, one illusion looking for another. The more (or moment) this is realised then there is no seeker, the accumulated mass (of self) steps aside and life is seen and lived as it is.

[SantMat64]

Anything that offers success in our unjust society without trying to change it is not revolutionary – it just helps people cope. In fact, it could also be making things worse. Instead of encouraging positive, constructive action, mindfulness says the causes of suffering are disproportionately inside us, not in the political and economic environment that shapes how we live. And yet mindfulness zealots believe that paying closer attention to the present moment without passing judgment has the revolutionary power to transform the whole world. It’s magical thinking on steroids.

That's the macro view. On a more personal level, there's the obvious phoniness of conversing with someone who is dealing with you on a platform of mindfulness. Ever experienced that? My experiences over the years with some Buddhist poobahs confirms the essential falsity of a lizard-like mindful detachment from other people. You can feel how they view you as not a human being but as a contaminated object they hold at a sterile distance. You can feel their inwardness, their narcissistic fear of talking with you in a truly natural way. It's phony and not a little insulting.

That's not genuine Buddhism. Genuine Buddhism deems that we must incorporate compassion and other human qualities into our perception of the world. It's not just about self concerned feeling of the present.

[Spence Tepper]

Burbea writes:
"Is that really what is happening though? A state of samadhi is indeed still a constructed, fabricated state. "

Then it isn't Samadhi. That is just living in another concept, not reality. I think that this avoids reality.

Burbea writes:
"We are gradually learning to untangle the tangle of suffering. And again, like all deliberate shifts in the way of looking, the more we do it, the more accessible it becomes. The more we practise inclining the mind to notice space, the easier it becomes to actually open up some space in the perception and experience some relief."

Learning to accept reality as it is, using a visual concept of space, or peace, or balance can all accomplish as much. But it doesn't last. It is at best a temporary distraction, another tower of notions we build. It is at best insulation, but not Samadhi.

To understand suffering you must go through it, accept it. Become that. Don't fear it, don't try to think your way out of experience.

Focusing on space may not actually generate the internal experience of vast space that arises in deep meditation when the awareness is no longer connected to the logical, conceptual flow of thinking.

Samadhi is not a thinking process at all. It is the emergence from thinking.

[Spence Tepper]

If Burbea thinks he can think his way past suffering, he is in denial of suffering.
That might be OK if its his own, but disastrous if he withdraws from the suffering around him.

How strange that suffering can become our teacher and our friend.

So long as Burbea considers suffering something to mentally avoid and withdraw from, it will haunt him.

[Brian Hines]

Spence, since you haven't read Burbea's book, you really shouldn't be making false comments about it. In no way does Burbea advocate thinking your way out of any problem. Thinking and analysis can help understand emptiness and suffering, but truly grasping emptiness and what causes suffering has to be experiential -- which is what Buddhism is all about and what his book is all about.

You also are 100% wrong that Burbea minimizes suffering or doesn't care about alleviating suffering. That's what his entire book is about: suffering and finding ways to minimize it. Of course death, disease, ill health, poverty, and all the other causes of suffering will always be with us. But you're completely off base in saying that Burbea views suffering as something to mentally avoid and withdraw from. What he's after is reducing the impact suffering has on us, the whole "second arrow" thing. First arrow is the suffering. Second arrow is our reaction to the suffering, which can cause more suffering.

What you've done in the comments above is what you often do on this blog. Ignore what someone is actually saying and substitute your own ill-informed view of what you think they are saying. Next time, read a book before you critique it. Or at least critique the quotes I share in a blog post, not your imagination about what you fantasize the author is saying. As an author myself, there's nothing more irritating than to have someone criticize something I've written when it's clear they haven't even read it.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian
While you are absolutely right about reading the whole book rather than making comments on a particular quote, before drawing conclusions about an author or a book, my first comments were only about Burbea's statements that you offered up, not the entire book.

My second comment was a generalization of what this might mean for the author. That was wrong because I assumed what I read reflected his whole thesis, and that is presumptuous.

Burbea writes that Samadhi is a fabrication of the mind. That statement has no precedent in spiritual writings referencing Samadhi.

If that statement is not accurate, please correct me.

Your comment doesn't actually do that, however. You would need to acknowldge what I actually wrote first.

You have a habit of not acknowldging facts when they are part of a statement you disagree with.

I'm an author of comments, and as you write, it's a bit disappointing when someone ignores the factual parts of what I wrote, to defend their own argument against me, and then generalize this, cherry picking my mistakes, inflating those into a general statement.

You do not need to agree with my conclusion to acknowldge the facts used to draw it. You could use the sane facts and others to draw a different conclusion. But you do need to acknowledge those facts otherwise you aren't trading the whole 'book' I wrote.

For example, I acknowledged above that Burbea's approach to focusing on space can help alleviate suffering, just as focusing on anything else may help us see from a broader perspective. But I suggest this is only temporary.

Is Burbea not suggesting focusing on some concept of empty space? Did I get that wrong? Or did I get that right? Again, correct me on this point if he is not advocating that technique. Or acknowledge that facts I've properly cited.

If he Is advocating for that, my view is that this is just a way to build insulation and not insight into suffering.

Insulation can be very helpful, temporarily.

But it doesn't consciously allow for the integration of that suffering into the whole that is human life. It doesn't deepen the understanding of suffering as our teacher until we look directly at our again, understand it now deeply.

If Burbea has other methods that do, then perhaps those deserve a look.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian
Now talking a deeper look at what you wrote..
"That's what his entire book is about: suffering and finding ways to minimize it."

Is his objective to minimize suffering? Or to understand it? Or both?

Maybe suffering isn't something to be manipulated, minimized, expanded, etc. Maybe it is itself.

You wrote
"You also are 100% wrong that Burbea minimizes suffering or doesn't care about alleviating suffering."

Is it possible, from what you have read of Burbea, that his way of handling suffering, alleviating suffering, is, indeed, to minimize it?

You wrote
"But you're completely off base in saying that Burbea views suffering as something to mentally avoid and withdraw from."

Yes, that was the impression I got from what he wrote:

"The clinging mind contracts around some experience, and then, because the mind space is shrunken, the object of that grasping or aversion takes up proportionately more space in the mind."

And then
"The more we practise inclining the mind to notice space, the easier it becomes to actually open up some space in the perception and experience some relief."

And

"we simply want to point out that it can be very helpful, when the awareness is unwisely sucked in in this way, to pay attention deliberately to a sense of space."

So, is he advocating focusing on space when confronted with suffering? And not directly with suffering?

Perhaps that's best when you are going through suffering, but you wrote something else, Brian...

" What he's after is reducing the impact suffering has on us, the whole "second arrow" thing. First arrow is the suffering. Second arrow is our reaction to the suffering, which can cause more suffering."

Are they really two different things?

Why would you care how you think about trauma afterwards if it never impacted you as trauma?

Should we think about suffering by replacing that with focus on space?

Or consider what happened, focus directly on it in retrospect , but from a larger place? And couldn't we also learn to go through it that way to begin with? So there is no impact and thus no second arrow needed?

These are two entirely different things.

That larger place isn't a concept we think about. It's a place we can view things from directly and objectively, without reaction. You may consider it a biochemical place.

This was my point that you can't think your way there. It isn't a concept, a fabrication. Dealing with suffering isn't a matter of replacing suffering by thinking about space. That would be a first arrow strategy. And it avoids suffering, attempts to claim they have minimized it by focusing on something else. One might call that denial. But it, the experience, the trauma, the suffering is all still there, buried deeper.

The second arrow would not be turning away from suffering but looking at it directly from a different level of consciousness that has been described in spiritual literature as a larger, more spacious experience, at least in the early stages

You wrote
"What he's after is reducing the impact suffering has on us, the whole "second arrow" thing. First arrow is the suffering. Second arrow is our reaction to the suffering, which can cause more suffering."

So are you talking about the suffering we undergo emotionally afterwards?

Or" The impact" which is the first arrow? Or the second arrow?

As I wrote above, couldn't we also learn to live through life from that higher view to begin with? So there is no second arrow needed?

Some call that living in the eye center.

[Ron E.]

The problem with samadhi is that it has accrued a number of meanings. Many prefer to go with the ‘spiritual’ meanings of Samadhi describing a state in which individual and universal consciousness unite along with the release from the cycle of death and rebirth, whereas for others it is merely the process of concentration – the object of concentration, and the mind that is trying to concentrate or meditate all have become one.

Indeed, Samadhi can be understood as a fabrication (construction) of the mind in that Samadhi is the mind in its most concentrated state. The mind is always present; it may calm down somewhat allowing a response (nirvana) rather than to react, but to assume that the mind can quiet itself – or conversely, to believe that there is some mysterious element that does the quieting is unnecessary. Unless we prefer to understand the mind as being separate from the brain, the mind is more reasonably to be understood as simply the ‘end product’ of the on-going processes that produce the brain/body’s response to a current situation.

Also, suffering or Dukkha is better addressed as ‘unsatisfactory’, or even as simply ‘being out of kilter’. It’s not a question of going through Physical or mental suffering (in the contemporary sense of suffering) but of understanding the imbalances that the thought process habitually engages in driving an on-going series of reactivity.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Ron E.

You wrote
"Unless we prefer to understand the mind as being separate from the brain, the mind is more reasonably to be understood as simply the ‘end product’ of the on-going processes that produce the brain/body’s response to a current situation."

Great comment. Let me offer two thoughts about this..

The mind, physiologically, is several things moving at one time. The lymbic system tends to be involved in emotion... The four Fs of life... Feeding, fighting, fleeing and reproduction.

Higher brain centers handle perception, cognition, ideation etc.

These don't all function the same way. Under different conditions they affect one another differently.

So you can speak of beyond mind or higher or lower mind but you can use current cultural terms or even physiological terms for different configurations of operation that are dependent upon stimuli, perception and all those filters and adjustments we've been discussing lately.

Therefore it is normal to function at different levels of awareness under different conditions. It isn't a single immutable pathway.

Samadhi could just be experiencing awareness without the normal train of thoughts, from a different channel or configuration of channels. And that would naturally result in a different experience.

This is an important consideration. Samadhi may not be an incremental change to the deep meditator. It could be switching to a different channel of experience altogether. Just as being awake is entirely different from the experience of sleep. And even the experience of sleep has different modes each with their own experience: deep sleep, rem sleep, etc. These are not incrementally different. They are entirely different.

To claim Samadhi is one extension of wakefulness, a degree of thinking, or to claim wakefulness is only a single experience with different incremental levels, does not have support in neuroscience. Neuroscience has proven long ago that many different mechanisms are involved and generate different states.

We tend to think, experientially, that we are the same beings moment but moment. But from the objective perspective of science, we are morphing from different points of view all the time. We just don't remember. Just like forgetting dreams when we are awake. And in most dreams we forget waking reality and assume the dream is all we are.

Deep meditation, by helping us transport to a different reality, helps yes understand our normal condition better. But all those realities are within.