Vigdisdotter said:
How do you figure that? I sound like you're only away of one kind of meditation technique.
And while that might be your subjective understanding of "stillness" it is not mine. To me, stillness is a state of neutrality and calmness where one can perceive things without being wrapped up in, or emotionally attached to them. It heightens awareness, it does not negate it.
Oh stillness is like a like a state of neutrality and calmness where one perceives things without being wrapped up in them. Certainly. And this can be like a heightened awareness too. Yes. But these things are not stillness itself, they are things we perceive. In complete stillness there is no perception because there is nothing to perceive.
In my response before I was reacting to the sense that perception (assumed, changes in) is more important than stillness. While exercises like meditation, silent prayer, reposeful contemplation, etc. certainly do lead to changes in perception it is stillness itself which is most important, not the side effects. Rather than the means to the end of changes-in-perception, these changes are surface manifestations only. No matter how fascinating and fulfilling they appear to be they become dry when cut from their source in stillness. I'll try and explain what this means.
A good night's sleep can do wonders. Problems that seemed insurmountable the day before can be seen with a simpler clarity. Logical & creative insights that did not occur and could not have occurred in the rush of the moment appear like new shoots breaking out of the ground though hidden by darkness. We can't explain it to ourselves, but much is dealt with in the absence of our consciously directed thought. This is like stillness, a hole for I-know-not-what to enter. We don't control this stillness for our own ends we give in to it and let it take over.
During a relationship with another where things have reached an impasse it may be futile to carry on trying to make things work. Time away from the conflict can shed light on the whole thing. By calming down and taking a break we can come to accept where we were wrong, understand ourselves and the other better than we did before, and forget our hot-headed grievances. To withdraw is to move forward, and again, it is not through actively trying to change things that this is possible but by letting it all go. This is like stillness. Its a great harmoniser yet its methods are mysterious. All we are aware of while it is at work is the stillness.
Up until the end of my teenage years I spent my life trying to experience as much as I possibly could. I wanted to storm the gates of heaven by force and I got the impression 'paradigm shifts' were part of this. I thought that if I could expand my mind enough, try all sorts of things, make some enormous effort and discipline myself, that the way would be revealed to me. For sure I went through many altered states of perception yet the more I experienced the greater the distance seemed from myself to my goal. Nevertheless my hunger drove me on. I don't think its an exaggeration to say I had an almost pathological determination to look upon the imperceivable face of God. In the end I became so enamored with what I viewed as my successes in life I actually began to believe I was unstoppable. Thats a very dangerous delusion! The unstoppable in search of the impossible is a vicious circle. The myths at both extremes of the cycle are illusory; that there is somewhere tangible to get to and that this will be reached eventually if pursued. That these myths were a product of my imagination took the collapse of my health, something I saw as a monumental and irreversible failure, to realise. Even then only in part since I did not understand the extent to which all grasping is futile.
So I came to stillness from that. I stopped everything (had to) and followed a meditative lifestyle (had to), taking only minimal breaks. Not only did I become the happiest I'd ever remembered being during this period and had sweeping 'spiritual' experiences much deeper than any before, but when I was well enough to return to work/study I found many of the neurotic problems I'd struggled with for as long as I could remember had disappeared! Plenty more to deal with and some new ones too but the fact so much had been resolved stunned me. I was undeniably better off yet I had not been aware of any attempt to sort myself out. All I'd been doing was practising meditation, not even that really since it wasn't something I had been trying to do it had been something I had to do. I didn't understand the significance of this. Becoming less happy after returning to work/study I began to panic and tried to force myself to meditate (grasping at happiness). That of course made things worse and I lost my equanimity quite quickly. Laughably I then become even more embroiled in the quest to get it back, missing the point completely. At least I had this: I knew I had to understand what had happened to me while recovering from illness and I looked to psychology, philosophy and Taoism/Buddhism to help, which they did. I also had the direct experience of that time in great stillness to help me discern the real deal from the BS of ego-flattering religious sentimentality.
My major hang up was over discipline. The more I tried to be disciplined the more wayward, hedonistic and dissatisfied with my progress I became. It wasn't like before since I no longer believed I was getting anywhere yet, as I mentioned before, I hadn't understood the significance of this and thought I must be doing something wrong. I was of course, but it was because I 'perceived' The Way as something that was leaving my perception rather than permeating it throughout. My whole life fell to pieces, again. Although I knew I was in stalemate I didn't know what to do so carried on regardless. More than five years later I was still no better off. A thousand paradigm shifts and exciting adventures had amounted to nothing. So, I gave up, again. I resigned myself to being a failure, again. Lo and behold I could meditate, again! It came as easily as sitting down to do nothing. Oh the irony!
The difference now is rather than wait until I'm so exhausted I have no choice other than to let go and be surprised to find the great stillness of the Tao picking me up and putting me back on my feet I'm starting to appreciate I can make the conscious decision to give up before it comes to that. I understand the necessity of discipline but I'm also beginning to understand the necessity of surrendering spiritual & material aspiration to stillness, nothingness, for such discipline to have any use. This is what Chuang Tzu called the usefulness of uselessness. Discipline, effort, virtue, power, changes in perception, meditation, etc. they are all quite useless, and only when this is understood do they flow in harmony with the Tao found in stillness. And to find in stillness is not to find at all! It is to rest from the search. What we are seeking is always right here. The true self is not-self, and not-self is not found, created or maintained. All that can be found, created or maintained is the suspension of grasping so as to let the I-know-not-what through, and this means realising that doing anything else is as worthless as nothing. Thus a Taoist does nothing to achieve nothing yet leaves nothing undone.
The source is not some religious perspective or personal perspective. Its not some heightened awareness either. None of this is it. Its what we don't see, and we don't see it most completely in stillness. Its better to forget perception and just return in stillness. This is why I spoke up before.
