The Anchoring of Time and the Fear of Unraveling
El Anclaje del Tiempo y el Miedo a Desmoronarse
Two questions are explored: the first about why certain experiences, such as the visual field and emotional pain, seem more resistant to being seen as momentary; the second about the fear that arises when the seeker begins to see through the framework of seeking itself.
The Anchoring of Time and the Fear of Unraveling
Two questions are explored: the first about why certain experiences, such as the visual field and emotional pain, seem more resistant to being seen as momentary; the second about the fear that arises when the seeker begins to see through the framework of seeking itself.
The bubble-like nature of experience is really helpful to me, the difference between timeless presence and the bubble-like changes that happen in our experience. It's really easy for me to see in sensations, sounds, and thoughts. But there are two aspects of my experience where I get a bit confused. One is the visual field. Sometimes I'll look out, and especially if nothing is changing, no one is moving, I'm just looking at the environment, it can seem more constant or consistent. The other is emotional experience. Sometimes, especially with emotional pain, the bubble seems to last longer. It's harder to see that as momentary change. I notice I get more confused and I stop being able to distinguish what is changing versus the timeless presence.
I'm using a metaphor to undo the part of perception that is built on assumption. When I say "assumptions," it goes much deeper than a cognitive process. There are mechanisms through which perception occurs, and then there is interpretation, what I call the mind map. Parts of the brain modify what is brought in through perception, involving areas that have more contact with the frontal lobe and the cortex, where cognitive processing happens.
I'm saying all this to make the point that it does require changes in the way the brain is functioning. That's why in some areas there's going to be more resistance, which is what you're describing when you say it doesn't seem as easy. Consider it like learning a new motor skill: it's going to require time for it to become natural. Because we've been running this kind of interpretation for decades, pretty much all the time, there needs to be a process through which we undo it. It begins at a cognitive level, by questioning the reality of some of our interpretations. For example, questioning the nature of time being absolute. By "absolute" I mean the assumption that time is built into the foundation of the physical world.
The anchoring of time in perception
Now, getting to your question: what you bring up has to do with the rate of change. The only difference is whether movement is fast or slow. If everything moved at the same rate, there would be no notion of contrast at all. The experience of something moving slowly feels more tied to fundamental reality because that is where perception is anchoring. For example, as you were saying, if nothing in the visual field is moving, that stillness becomes the anchor. Everything else that moves gets measured in relationship to it.
So you mean measuring change for other things?
Exactly. There's a background, which is emptiness. That's the timeless. But if you assume the background to be the visual field, and you look at something that's not moving, you've stepped out of the timeless into something that's an appearance, something that's formed. Now everything moving in relationship to that is how time gets imagined.
What you're describing as the solid, sticky aspect is precisely where perception is anchoring in order to measure time. If everything moved at the same rate, there would be no relativity between fast and slow. The whole perceptual interpretation of time works against that background.
But if you look, that background only appears stable because it moves slowly. Intellectually you know that even something that appears still was not there a while ago and won't be there in a while. Though that language starts to bring in again the absoluteness of time.
Everything is movement at different rates
The first shift is to see that everything is just movement at different rates, which does not require time to be absolute. Time, in a sense, emerges from what's appearing as a map, a way to measure rates of change. It's very useful, but what happens is that it becomes upside down. We've done it so much that we embed ourselves into it. We end up living inside of time, but it's living inside of a conceptual map. It's not that there is a present moment with a past and a future. There is only presence. It's not even a "present moment."
That's pretty clear to me. The timeless present is clear. The past and future are just thoughts to me; they don't seem real. But there is an anchoring of the perceptual, like you said, in both the visual field, because it moves slower, and the emotional quality, especially if it's painful. I notice it seemingly lasting longer; it just continues to be there.
Emotions and the projection of time
The emotional level is trickier. I would first contemplate what in the visual field is not moving and try to bring into it the perspective and the understanding that it actually is moving, just at a very slow rate, so that you can see the relative nature of that.
Then, at the emotional level, most things remain because of the projection of time. If there weren't an attachment to time, emotions would move a lot faster and dissolve faster. There has to be a narrative in time for an emotion to be propagated or maintained. It's a chicken-and-egg situation.
So thoughts continue to create emotions through the story?
Yes. You will only have the experience of emotions lasting for a long time if you are, in a sense, believing a narrative in time. If the narrative and the belief in it drop, the emotion moves. It just moves and shifts. It needs to be maintained through an effort, through a mental process.
Is it that I keep believing the story? Because if the thoughts come but I don't believe them, the alternative would be for them to pass as phenomena, rather than getting attached to the story, which then creates more emotion.
Just look at what aspect of it you're buying into. Attachment means you're believing something; you're wanting for something to be more real than it is. To put more words to it: attachment is wanting a mental construct to be more real than it is. I want it to represent more of reality than just thought.
So when the emotion is sticking, when you say it's remaining, look at the narrative that is associated with it. Look at what in the narrative you are invested in, what you are wanting to be real.
I can see that. I think there are layers to this, because as I look at the narrative, some layers are a lot easier to detach from than others.
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I'm having a bit of a hard time because I can sense that if I stop seeking, then I stop. And that's really scary. My heart is beating fast. I thought I wanted to stop seeking, and I do, but then I realized: oh no, I don't want this. I feel caught between a rock and a hard place. I want to stop seeking, and then I realize I don't.
Seeing the attachment to seeking
So attached. That's actually a big breakthrough right there. When you see that, a lot has dropped.
It's just very scary. On the one hand, everything is the same. But it's almost like there's a pulling back: I don't want to see that.
But now you're seeing reality at a deeper level. You're not pretending. You're not telling yourself a story. You've opened up to seeing a lot more of what is there. That might seem like a setback, because you were so convicted, so gung-ho for awakening, and then suddenly it's: oh, I'm not.
But actually, that is a step in awakening. It is the dropping of what I call the inner hypocrisy, the lack of inner integrity, where we tell ourselves stories. We all begin there. We all do not want to see. Then we want to see, but only some things and not others. Then we start to see more and more, until it becomes harder not to see than to see.
You need that kind of delusional conviction early on just to stick around. You get to the point of no return, and then you're able to see: a big part of me is really not okay with this and not wanting this. All of the attachment and resistance becomes seen and becomes conscious. That's a big breakthrough.
The unraveling of the framework
It feels like an unraveling. During the meditation, and in my experience in general, there's a wanting to put the frameworks back together, like a house of cards. If that framework isn't there, then I don't exist. That might be too many words to describe it, but I don't know how else to say it.
What you thought you were is not. What you thought you were was thoughts. And that's pretty shattering.
It feels very intimate but also very exposed. I think that's all there is to say about it, really. It's kind of happening on its own.
Losing the ability to rebuild
The putting it all back together, the house of cards: what we normally imagine is that we just stop doing it because we decide to. What actually happens is that we lose the ability to do it.
It feels like something is fighting. During that meditation, something is fighting: keep the framework together, keep it together. But then something else sees that and can't unsee it.
Exactly. Because you can't unsee it, you're pulling all of the energy out of it. You're pulling the rug out from under the whole thing. Just by seeing it, it's like you've seen all the evidence that Santa Claus is not real. You've seen the gifts in the closet. You've seen the disguise. And you're saying, "No, he's real, he's real." But you keep seeing more and more evidence, and the whole belief system starts to collapse, until you simply cannot buy it anymore. It does happen on its own. What is key is the love of truth, the love of seeing, the love for reality.
Trusting the longing
I've really been thinking about that word, the longing. You once talked about trusting the longing. There's something that wants to put the framework back together, but there's also that longing.
The longing just needs to be nudged to evolve, so that it is longing for the right thing. The longing must be for something that is here now, always.
Not an idea of what could be.
Right.
That's a helpful pointer around the longing, because part of building the framework is longing for something past, like calling this a "glimpse" and then saying I'm seeking again. Putting a process around it, a framework around it.
Yes, there's a practicality of getting somewhere that keeps reasserting itself.