Body, Mind, Soul and Spirit

 The Dalai Lama in ‘The Opening of the Wisdom Eye’[i], describes meditation in terms of nine stages that closely correspond with the nine stages of the Enneagram. The author’s comments are added in italics.

1. Cittasthapana is the state in which the mind first becomes unaffected by outer objects and fixed in the meditation-object. The conscious focusing of the mind with Mindfulness. ONE
2. Cittapravahasamsthapa is the establishment of the stream of mind, meaning that the mind is fixed upon the object for some time by compelling the mind to consider again and again the object of concentration. This compelling of the mind again and again establishes a deeper, more compassionate relationship with the object of meditation. TWO
3. Cittapratiharana is the state when, the mind being disturbed, one “brings back’ the mind to the concentration object. Bringing the mind back is an act of Strength and commitment to the goal of meditation. THREE
4. Cittopasthapana in which the mind is expanded while exactly limited to the object. Expanding our capability to maintain concentration opens us to unconscious patterns of thinking and perceiving. THREE – FOUR
5. Cittadamana – “mind-taming” which is done by seeing the ill results of distracting thoughts and defilements, also perceiving the advantages of collectedness, so that one makes efforts to put away the former while establishing the mind in the latter. We aware of what gets in our way, in this case, the establishing of a collected meditative mind and honor what is most valuable. Forgiveness is the process of releasing ourselves from the self-defeating habits of the past and opening to the blessings of our true nature. We release the nonessential and embracing the wisdom of Spaciousness. FOUR – FIVE.
6. Cittasamana – “mind-calming” in which feelings antagonistic to the practice of collectedness are quelled. If boredom arises regarding collectedness since the mind is still hungry for sense objects, then it is thoroughly pacified at this stage. Antagonistic feelings to the practice of collectedness are quelled not through acts of suppression or denial, but rather through Acceptance. SIX
7. Cittavyupasamana or the subtle pacification of mind. Even the subtle stains are set aside here. Pleasant thoughts or ecstatic states may distract the mind. We remember to rest in the Joy of wholeness, rather than be seduced by anything less. SEVEN
8. Cittaikotikarana The mind here becomes like one undisturbed stream and continues to flow along one-pointedly. There is no separation. Our will is at one with divine Will (Dharma) We have surrendered to each emerging moment of the eternal now. EIGHT
9. Samadhana When this state is reached, there is no need for effort since the mind is naturally one-pointed. Inertia dictates what is at rest will remain at rest. In effortless leffortlessness we rest Peacefully in the unconscious competence of the essential wholeness of being. NINE

Invoking the Essential Qualities of Meditation

Simply inquire and receive what emerges:

1. How is awareness becoming more Mindful of what is emerging now?
2. How is this expanding Mindfulness helping the heart open to Compassion?
3. How is the deepening of Compassion enabling awareness of the Strength of Being.
4. How is Strength empowering Forgiveness to release the past and embrace the eternal now?
5. How is the heart of Forgiveness opening awareness to the Spaciousness of Being?
6. How is Spaciousness allowing awareness to unconditionally Accept everything as it is?
7. How is unconditional Acceptance opening awareness to Joy?
8. How is Joy enabling awareness to surrender more fully to the way things are (Divine Will)?
9. How does Divine Will surrender to Peace? 

ONE  – How is awareness becoming more Mindful of what is emerging now?

Clearly stating one’s intention orients the mind in the desired direction. The essence of mindfulness is to remember ones true nature and rest as that. To be mindful of breathing, mental activity, emotions, body sensations or other sensory phenomena, is to be aware of that which comes and goes.   In meditation it is our intention to rest as the unchanging awareness that allows the ever-changing objects of awareness to come and go.

The process of self-remembering can become a habit, but first we must recognize the need. Establishing a routine of meditating regularly will create fertile ground for self-remembering and mindfulness to flourish. The greater our intention the greater our experience will be. Therefore we meditate for the benefit of all sentient beings.

TWO – How can this expanding Mindfulness help my heart open to Compassion?

Compassion is whole-hearted attention and willingness to identify with whomever or whatever we are attending to. It is the suspension of the perception of separation. An expanding and deepening Mindfulness begins to highlight how alienated we have become from our bodies, emotions, and other internal experiences, as well as the world around us. For example, tensions in the body are experienced as happening to us, causing us discomfort.   Rather than something we are actively doing to ourselves. The holding in the muscles is being held by some intention that is unconscious; by a part of us we are alienated from. In the deepest sense of the meaning of the word, compassion is the experience of you being no different than me. Your experience becomes my experience. If you suffer, I suffer, and because of this I want to do whatever I can to relieve our suffering. Compassion is the opening to the love that connects everything. When we are more compassionately identified with tensions (or whatever discomforts), we are able to sense what the part of us that is holding on needs to let go. When we stop making distinctions about what is me and what isn’t, and embrace the wholeness of our experience, we begin to approach the depth and breadth of compassion that extends to everyone and all aspects of ourselves.

THREE – How is the deepening of Compassion enabling awareness of the Strength of Being.

When we identify with a separate unloved or unloving self we feel weak, isolated and vulnerable. Compassion holds everything in love. Within the vastness of undivided compassion we feel unified in the unshakeable Strength of Being. Having compassion for our human experience leads us to the recognition that we have a body, mind and emotions, rather than being our body, mind or emotions. There is vast strength in that which neither comes nor goes. It is timeless and unaffected by even old age, sickness and death. We realize our bodies and minds are tools for helping others.

FOUR – How is Strength empowering Forgiveness to release the past and embrace the eternal now?

Pema Chodron has said that you really haven’t meditated until you have wept on your cushion. Coming home to being highlights how we have lived so much of our lives disconnected from the source. We hold grievances about those events that we perceive robbed us of our well-being. We either blame others or ourselves for the pain of separation from love and happiness. However it was only ever our perception of ourselves as other than love and happiness that caused us to suffer. The strength of being allows us to see our mistaken perception and grieve that mistake and the years of suffering we have endured.

Forgiveness helps us become more aware of our dream-like stream of consciousness. Generally in our waking hours, because usually we keep our conscious minds focused on our usual day-to-day preoccupations, we don’t notice this subtle processing.   It continually goes through its peaks and troughs of activity, just as it does through the night, in the form of dreaming. We may notice it, at times of reflection or when in captures us in a daydream. This stream of consciousness is what the psychoanalyst asks his patient to tap into when utilizing the technique of free association.

These streams of consciousness are like the film in a movie projector.   The light of consciousness when projected through these mental constructs creates our perceptions of reality. The painful memories we unconsciously hold on to are internal representations of the myths and the unconscious proof to ourselves that the myths are true. Because these experiences are usually unpleasant or has been labeled as socially unacceptable, we generally try to “stay on top of it”, rather than experience rather than immerse ourselves in our deeper experience. In meditation it is important to neither stay on top of it (which would be to remain at THREE), nor to act it out (which is to get lost in the myths of suffering), but rather to forgive. Forgiveness is the willingness to turn our awareness inward towards the light of the projector. Enlightenment is resting in the light of our true nature. A Forgiving mind experiences all of creation as within the light of Being and recognizes any other perception is an illusionary projection. Every story of pain and struggle becomes an opportunity to cultivate our essential wholeness. Just as an irritating grain of sand stuck in the soft vulnerable flesh of the oyster, is only a problem until the oyster transforms it into a pearl.

FIVE – How is the heart of Forgiveness opening awareness to the Spaciousness of being?

 If you want to control a wild stallion it is much easier to do so within a large pasture, rather than a small corral. In the small space we must work hard to contain the stallion who will try to break free. The same is true with our minds. We allow our minds the space to be free to wander, but within the boundaries of our mindfulness.

Opening to Spaciousness we come to experience ourselves more as the Space within which various perceptions (or stories) arise. Rather than being identified as the character within the play or even as the play itself, we begin to experience ourselves more as the theatre within which the play is being acted out. When we embrace our spaciousness even more fully we come to notice that we are more like the community, the world or the universe within which there may be many different theatres, each with different dramatic productions that come and go. We recognize there are classic plays that are reproduced over and over, as well as archetypal plots that are continually reconstituted. The names and locations may change but the story remains the same. As we open into Space we transcend the roles we have been identified with, we also come to realize that these stories are something that play out within our Space. The roles of victim and the perpetrator, the hero and the coward, the abandoned and the abandoner are all within the stories that we carry within us. As we open wide and deep enough we come to realize that in this life, or maybe over many lifetimes we have acted out the many different archetypal roles.

In meditation we can deepen our experience of our true nature by observing the images, sounds and sensations that emerge from our unconscious, by noting these representational system modalities and their submodality distinctions rather than engaging with the content of the story or drama. If the experience is primarily images we can note this by simply thinking “seeing”, if it is words or sounds of some sort we can note “hearing” if, it is primarily sensations in the body, we can note “feeling”. To further deconstruct the story we can begin making finer distinctions about the thinking, hearing and feeling functions. We can note submodality distinctions such as where the picture located in the field of vision, is it close or far away, more to the left, the right or middle, or do you experience yourself as being in the movie? Are the images like movies, photographs or slides? Is it a single image, or a series of images? Is it in color or monochrome? Sharply focussed or blurred? Similar distinctions can be made for the sounds or internal dialogues. We can note location, direction, volume, tone, pitch, rhythm, tempo, etc. With sensation we can make such distinctions as location, size, intensity, pressure, shape, temperature, movement (turning, twisting, expanding, contracting, in what direction), hard, soft, rough, smooth, empty, full.

This way of attending to our internal experience interrupts the habitual process of getting involved in the content of the stories. It’s like when watching a movie if you are thinking about camera angles, lighting, editing, acting techniques or other components that go into the making of the film you won’t be involved with the story. Movies that take us on an emotional roller coaster are the ones that we most forget we are watching a movie and feel like we are really having the experience, or at least watching a real-life experience. Deconstructing the objects of mind into their submodalities puts us more in the role of a filmmaker of our perceptions rather than trapped in our nightmares and fantasies. Just as a parent will help her child regain her sense of well being by awakening her to the fact that her nightmare was just a dream; we can allow our consciousness to expand to the Spacious wholeness of Being when we disengage from the constructed illusions of our minds.

SIX – How is Spaciousness allowing awareness to unconditionally Accept everything as it is?

To feel Acceptance of the impermanent nature of experience is in a sense being willing to die and be reborn in each moment. We have a tendency to hold on to what feels safe, comfortable or good, or to resist what feels frightening, painful or bad. Acceptance is surrendering to the wholeness of experience, to the Yin and the Yang continually flowing into one another. To open to pain and pleasure, life and death, growth and decay, gain and loss, happiness and sadness, past and future, success and failure, expansion and contraction. Acceptance brings us in to the eternal now. We are the wholeness within which the polarities of life appear to occur.

At SIX we notice how much basic trust we have in the essential wholeness of the universe. The more we lack in a basic trust of he universe, the more we feel the need to stay in control of maintaining our sense of safety within the isolation of our ego mind. We will tend to resist dissolving into the wholeness of creation, for fear of being hurt, abandoned, unloved, uncared for, or whatever attitude we hold about the nature of the universe (or God). People tend to project their experience of how their parents cared for them on God (universal wholeness). Generally the more we experienced our parents being there for us in a loving way in our early years the more we will tend to experience the universe to be a friendly place which we can trust to care for us. The more we felt let down, or our basic trust was somehow abused the harder it is to trust. When we deeply accept ourselves and we surrender to the moment, the identification as a daughter or a son in a sense dies, in fact the sense of ourselves as only a body dies, as we open to our essential wholeness in creation.

Deep Acceptance happens when we are able to hold two seemingly contradictory experiences simultaneously. I simultaneously experience myself as the child and the parent simultaneously, the needy and the needed, the abused and the abuser, life and death, etc. When we are able to maintain awareness of polarities simultaneously then the separation between the two disappears. We become more identified with the infinite experience in which all beginnings and endings, (and all other polarities) are contained.

As a technique of meditation to help open to Acceptance:

• You can be aware of the left side of your body and you can be aware of your right side, and you can experience both at the same time.
• You can be aware of your undersides and can be aware of the topsides of your body and you can be aware of both at the same time.
• You can be aware of the front of your body and you can be aware of the back of your body and you can be aware of both at the same time.

You can be aware of comfort and discomfort, and you can be aware of both at the same time. You can be aware of internal experiences and you can be aware of external experiences and you can be aware of both at the same time.

If you find that your awareness has become lost in the limitations of one dimension of experience, you can seek out it’s opposite and then open your field of awareness up to hold both.

If your awareness is captured by pain, you can notice the pain, and you can notice where in your body you feel comfortable, then you can hold the awareness of both at the same time. If certain visual imagery catches your attention, you can be aware of the images, and you can then notice the empty spaces between and around the images. Like the classic idea of the mind being like the sky and thought are like the clouds. You can be aware of the clouds, and you can then bring your awareness to the sky, and you can be aware of the clouds and the sky at the same time.

When you become aware of tension in the body, you can become aware of a contracting quality within your muscle and when you pay close enough attention you can become aware of an expanding quality, and then you can notice both at the same time.

Acceptance is letting the universe (ourselves included) to be as it is. When we do this we begin to experience the joyful wholeness of our true nature.

SEVEN – How is unconditional Acceptance opening awareness to Joy?

Beyond pleasure and pain is bliss. Tears of Joy flow forth from esential Acceptance. When happiness and sadness are married with Acceptance we have tears of Joy. When we change the things we can, and we accept the things we can’t, we experience serenity. Unconditional Joy shows its face when we stop grasping at pleasure and resisting pain. Joy is our birthright and it lights up our experience when we stop trying to find it. It is our pursuit of happiness and our avoidance of pain that keeps us from opening to the ‘Joy of Being’ alive at this moment.

In the meditation of the Sixteenth Karmapa visualizing his smiling face radiating unconditional acceptance brings a smile to my face. When we are empty of expectations and agendas our hearts begin to take vicarious Joy in the joy of others. Those others can include birds, dogs, trees, the sun, stars, dolphins and people. Joy is universal and through Acceptance we breakdown the boundaries that isolate us from universal Joy. A sense of ‘joie de vie,’ thrives where there is Acceptance.

Some meditative practices suggest you sit with a slight smile on your face. Smiling activates joy. Joy is the basis of friendliness. Joyfulness is an experience of being friendly with life, with ourselves and the world we live in. To be Joyful is to not only accept, but to greet life, to greet sorrow, to greet love, to greet the miraculous, and to greet the mundane of each moment with Joy. Joy sends shivers up your spine and connects you with the light of your Being. As we remember to extend a joyful welcome to whomever or whatever arises in our consciousness, we naturally experience the Joy of Being.

A deep commitment to anything means following our bliss. To follow our bliss is to surrender to the Will of God. Enjoying our exploration of the meditative process is what propels us down the often-arduous path of coming to know our true nature.

EIGHT – How is Joy enabling awareness to surrender more fully to the way things are (Divine Will)?

Buddhism doesn’t ask you to take anything on faith. It is not necessary to take on any particular beliefs. The path of meditation may be made easier by following the teachings that have been accumulated over centuries, but at the heart of the teachings it says that if you really pay attention to experience, what the teachings describe are what you will observe. There is know need to believe in anything. Open to experience everything fully we realize our place in Divine Will. It just a matter of how fully we can be aware of and accept the nature of reality and the reality of our true nature, or remain committed to the limitation of our constructed perceptions. The more conscious and accepting we are of the true nature of ourselves, the more free we are of the illusions that create a sense of separation and the more our experience feels like the Will of the Universe.

An act of Will involves a conscious choice to something that doesn’t come automatically or easily. At SEVEN it is easy to become infatuated with various interesting mental phenomena, images, bodily sensations, or engaging experiences in the intermediary realms of consciousness. It is easy to be carried off by these experiences which can be very appealing to our ego mind. This is when our commitment to Being (experience) rather than having (experience) is crucial. By exerting our Will in this way we align ourselves with the Will of God. The sense of your individual will and the Universal Will merge and the dualistic sense of the experiencer and the experienced dissolves into essential wholeness. It is in wholeness that we experience Wholly Peace.

NINE – How does Divine Will surrender to Peace?

To be at Peace is to experience the universal perfection. There is nothing to do, nowhere to go, nothing to experience. To simply be with what is. ‘A Course in Miracles’ says there is only one ‘Son of God’ and we are all him. We, meaning not just people but everything I normally perceive to be a separate entity, whether it be a tree, a house, a door, cardboard box, video tape, bird, mountain, nuclear warhead or whatever. I am at one with all creation and with the creator. When we open profoundly to this level we experience what is referred to as ‘no-meditation’. There is no need to control the mind, only to rest in mindfulness. In fact any purposeful effort is a return to the perception of separateness in which we perceive there is someone who is doing something to something else. There is no need to control the focus our attention.   The mind at peace is no longer focused; rather it is merged with infinite wholeness.

Sogyal Rinpoche speaks of cultivating “the view”.   In meditation we sit with the eyes half open and half closed. Allowing the eyes to be relaxed and softly focused, looking through things rather than at them, seeing the entire visual field, rather than having the eyes holding on to any one thing.

The pitfalls of meditation

Mindfulness – Trying too hard to be mindful, rather than resting in mindfulness can lead to holding too rigidly onto an object of concentration and/or trying to block out anything we consider to be undesirable. In the process we end up resisting the heart of compassion taking us deeper into communion with essential wholeness. Let mindfulness be effortless.

Compassion – Trying too hard to be compassionate, rather than resting in compassion can lead to ruminating about how to help others or ourselves with improving something outward. By denying our innate strength can lead to an indulgence in our emotions and getting lost in self-pity. Let compassion be effortless.

Strength – Trying too hard to be strong can lead to a rigid numbness and a false sense of realization. To do this it requires denying our unwanted, unhealed or unforgiven parts. These aspects then remain in our shadows of our subconscious mind and projected on others. A sort of enlightened ego develops that leads us to see us to feeling superior to others. Let strength be effortless.

Forgiveness – Trying too hard to be forgiving can lead us searching for forgiveness rather than resting as forgiveness. We can end up trying to convince ourselves why we should be more forgiving. Instead of giving up all hope of a better past we may seek justifications for our actions or rationalize others’ behaviour by still blame ourselves. Meditation can then become a sort of penance that one is performing to earn forgiveness. Let forgiveness be effortless.

Space – Trying too hard to get space from thoughts and feelings can lead to a detachment or dissociation from our experience and makes everything seem like nothing. We can get stuck in witnessing reality rather than surrendering to the nothingness that accepts everything as it is. Let spaciousness be effortless.

Acceptance – Trying too hard to be accepting can lead us into confusion as we equate acceptance with agreement. The illusions of mind seem equally valid as reality and we lose our ability to be discerning. We end up being loyal to illusion rather than opening to the joy that comes with the new eyes of a beginners mind. Let acceptance be effortless.

Joy – Trying too hard to be joyful can leave us seeking spiritual highs that come and go rather than experiencing the unconditioned bliss of reality at its most basic level. This can lead to a sort of spiritual bypass of what is perceived as negative or unpleasant. From this dualistic perspective we miss out on experiencing unity and oneness. Let joy be effortless.

Will – Being too determined to reach enlightenment happens when we forget that it is surrender to divine will that awakens us to the truth. Rather than imposing ideas we have of what enlightenment is on ourselves. It by surrendering that we open to the peace of essential wholeness. Let will be effortless.

Peace – Trying too hard to be peaceful can lead us into a dull complacency in which we ignore anything which might take us out of our comfort zone. Instead of being mindful we keep ourselves mindlessly ignorant. Instead of awakening to the universal peace of unity we stay asleep in the limited perspectives of our conditioned mind. Let peace be effortless.

Most Simply

We can use these nine steps by simply naming the essential quality that is our intention to invoke. We can then repeat the name of the essential quality of where we were if our minds have wandered off.

Secondly while being mindful the breath, simply take note and acknowledging whatever state we find ourselves in each emerging moment.   This enables us to trust we are on track by recognizing the signposts along the path to bringing the mind home to resting in our essential wholeness.