The Smell of Bacon and the Taste of It
El olor del bacon y su sabor
A student describes moments of deep clarity, stillness, and intuitive knowing, but finds that these experiences are eventually obscured by fear. The teacher explores why partial knowing, even when it feels self-evident, is not yet the full, unshakeable recognition that cannot be veiled.
The Smell of Bacon and the Taste of It
A student describes moments of deep clarity, stillness, and intuitive knowing, but finds that these experiences are eventually obscured by fear. The teacher explores why partial knowing, even when it feels self-evident, is not yet the full, unshakeable recognition that cannot be veiled.
I feel like this is a good follow-up to what was just shared. I was having a similar experience. Every time I'm in some inquiry, whether in meditation or just out in my day, I'm in this very deep presence, stillness. It's very clear. And I had this beautiful deepening where I was really asking what you suggested: do I exist without thought and sensation? I noticed there was a subtle image of light. It has a feeling; it feels pleasurable, blissful. There's a thick blanket of peace and aliveness, and then my mind produces an image of light. I also see it with my eyes open, like dots of light, almost like static. It feels like that's consciousness, but it's confusing: why is there an image and a sensation? I can't separate that from the experience. And then there's a deep knowing when I ask, "Without that, am I still here?" There's a whisper of knowing: "Yes, I'm here." That felt really clear. But then, on a more mental level, I have these curiosity questions about what this is, on the level of image and sensation, for what I'm seeing consciousness to look like.
The mind cannot answer that question. Only truth can, only experience.
Subtle form as a reflection of being
The image of light, the pleasurable sensations, the feelings, the static, the whispering answer to "Am I here?" All of that is what I was telling you specifically last time we spoke: rupa is form. It is a reference to being, to existence. If there is light, there is consciousness. If there is a whisper, there is an answer. If there is a pleasurable sensation, "I am here." It's all an answering through a reflection.
Yes, that's what it felt like. It feels like the mind's interpretation of reality. But this knowing feels like it's beyond that. Are you saying that's still a sense of form?
That's the intuition. That knowing is intuition, which comes from truth, from a knowing that is real and true. But it's still at the level of intuition, because it is somewhat vague. It needs to be clarified. It needs to be extremely obvious.
It feels in the moment like it is obvious, like it's very self-explanatory. And the freedom and the emptiness is so apparent. It feels like that's enough in that moment.
The test of fear
It will be enough until you look at the evidence of how much fear still affects you. You can know what you know intuitively. You can have moments where it's very clear and obvious, and to you it is obvious. But then, in the face of fear, that obviousness dissipates. It needs to be so obvious that it is more real, more true, and more obvious than the fear.
That's what I'd say. It usually lasts two or three days where nothing can attach. Fear arises and it's quickly seen through. It's so clear that suffering is simply not possible; it's like an open fist. But then eventually the fear wins at some point. I can come back to that space of openness, but there's still this habit.
That habit will break. Partly through facing the fear over and over again, but that alone will likely not be enough. The habit will break when the answer to that question is answered more directly than through an intuition or through a knowing that is partial. The fear comes back where there is doubt. The fear is basically helping you see where there is doubt. And by doubt I mean: where truth becomes obscured.
So it's not just about continuing to see it, with the repetition eventually becoming enough?
That doesn't hurt. That's good. But it needs to be seen more deeply, more directly. This is where there is a bit of a loss in assuming you have seen it, just because there is an obviousness through intuition, or because at times it's very clear. Recognize that it is partly intuitive and partly obvious only at times. I'm saying it can be known more fully, more directly, to a degree that it can never be obscured.
That makes sense. I guess to know that more deeply is just an unfolding, right? I don't know how I can...
Out of time, not in time
No, it isn't. An unfolding happens in time. This is out of time. This is fully stepping out of time. It's in timelessness. And "how" is the question, which is the question I gave you last time, which can be asked in many ways. It is: do you know that you are, without experience?
You've answered yes. "I know it intuitively, but also I know it through subtle experience: through ecstasy, through witnessing, metaphorically a whispering answer, through the light of consciousness." These are all subtle forms. The answer is coming as a yes, and it's close, but there is still a reflection. There is still, basically: I think, therefore I am. I sense, therefore I am. I see, therefore I am. I taste, therefore I am. I know ecstasy, therefore I am. I know form, therefore I am. It is all a reflection.
That's what I was seeing in the meditation when I'm exploring. When I notice that it's still subtle form, then I have that clear experience. It's like a knowing and a not-knowing at the same time.
That's where I'm recommending that, instead of holding on to a sense of "Well, I do know it, it seems pretty clear, it seems pretty obvious," you take the other side and say: "I have a sense of knowing. It's intuitive. It's clear at times, but it's not that clear to me. It's still reflective. It's still based on experience. The answer of 'I am' is conditioned on experience."
You don't fully, truly, experientially know whether or not you are, prior to experience. You cannot answer that intellectually. And the question will take you there if you ask it fully. If you want to know fully, it's not an unfolding. It's an answer out of time, without a process.
So you're saying that even though I have these moments where it feels clear and experiential, I should just assume that's not it?
It's not fully it. It's partial. It's a lot, it's great, but it's not total.
What would it take to...actually, I forget what I was going to ask, but it seems like you can't answer that.
No, I can't. But it's basically just to really, deeply want to know, and ask, and look, and be very curious.
I feel like I'm doing that and having this clarity. I don't know what else to do, how to go deeper.
The position of "I'm good"
Keep looking and keep asking. What I've been trying to say is that you seem to be taking a position of "Well, I have a pretty strong answer, so that's it. I'm good."
It's not that I'm saying I'm good. It's just so evident. It's total love. I can't say anything about it. It's so clear, so self-evident. And then I'm moving about my day from that place and it's like, "This is all I've ever wanted." There's nothing saying to myself, "Oh, I need to see more."
Until that changes.
Until it changes, right.
I'm talking about when it changes. It changes because there is still an illusion. That's what I'm calling the partial knowing, the intuitive knowing. It's almost like you're in a room and you smell bacon. You sense there's very likely somebody cooking in the kitchen, somebody making breakfast. But you haven't seen the bacon. You haven't eaten it. You don't know if it's actually bacon, or something that smells like it, or if it was just a bacon-scented candle.
Are you sure I'm not even tasting it? I'm not even getting nibbles?
That's where the problem is. You're getting ahead of yourself. You're wanting to accomplish, to get ahead of yourself, to be there already. The inverse attitude is actually more practical. Instead of standing in the position of "I taste it pretty well most of the time, so I'm good," take the position of: "I'm smelling this really strongly. Maybe I'm nibbling it. But I want to eat the whole thing, to be sure I know what it is."
Yes, that's definitely what I want.
You're smelling it, you're maybe nibbling it, and that's great. What I'm saying with quite a strong sense of conviction is that there's more. You can taste it more fully, more directly. Because if you spoke to me about the bacon, if you talked to me about the taste of it when you ate it, I would know. And I'm not hearing that.
Well, I just ignore that part because it's not what I need help with. That part is great and self-explanatory. I don't need to share it. I want to talk about when I'm losing it.
I don't think you know what I'm talking about. Because what comes and goes for you is due to the smell, metaphorically. You might have never tasted it, not to the degree I'm talking about. And if you did, you might need to taste it again, or more than once. But it just hasn't been known and tasted fully to the degree you need, for you to be completely convinced.
Right.
If you had, we would be having a different conversation. What I'm hearing is the conversation of somebody who has, metaphorically, smelled it or nibbled it. Because it has a really powerful effect to be that close.
Ignoring versus forgetting
I find it so odd. But it's clear: if I'm still asking you about it, I clearly haven't gone as deeply as I want to. So the question is, in the moment that I don't feel clear, do I just keep doing more of that questioning?
There's another possibility: that you have fully tasted it but you're not letting yourself see it. And that might just take time.
That's the feeling I get when I'm in it. It's why sometimes I'm just laughing and then crying, because it's so obvious that I've been seeing this for so long. Every time I come back to it, it's like, "Oh my God, of course." It's just so obvious. And then I don't know why I keep losing it. What you just said is exactly the feeling I get when this continues to be experienced. It always feels so final, because it's like, "I can't forget this again. This is ridiculous. It's so obvious."
It's not a forgetting. Forgetting is a useful word at times, but I would not call it forgetting for you right now. I would call it denying, or ignoring.
Actually, a friend said that to me. I've been sharing for years about these kinds of experiences and then saying how I just ignore them, because that's what I interpret the teaching to be: whatever comes and goes is not relevant. It's not now, it's not your experience now, so it doesn't matter. So I just ignore that I've seen so deeply, and I tell myself I need it to be now.
I agree about not attaching to experiences. But what I'm talking about is not an experience. It's in fact the opposite. And what is the opposite of experience is true, always.
It feels like it's true always, in the moment. It just gets veiled again, and then I put it in a category of experience even though I know it's not. It's always the reality I come back to when it's unveiled again.
I would still recommend what I was recommending in the beginning: keep looking and asking. Because the answer seems to be subtle form, subtle thought. It seems to be, at least part of the time, based on a reflection. And I think once that is clarified, the coming and going is going to stop.
Do you recommend doing that throughout the day, or more in meditation, or all of it?
Mostly in meditation, because it's the kind of question that, if you go deeply into it, you cannot function. It's good to let it wander in the background of your curiosity, contemplating it throughout the day. But to go deeply, you would need to be fully absorbed.
What if meditation isn't clear enough either?
I think throughout the day I'm wanting to bridge whatever gap is there: when I'm meditating it's very clear, and then the more I interact with the outside world, it seems to trigger whatever the fears are.
What if, even when you're meditating, it's still not clear enough? Just go with that. What if, when you're meditating, it's still to some degree intuitive, still somewhat subtle? It's nibbles, and it could be known more fully. And if you have known it fully, maybe it's just the integration of that: to fully know it at the level of body-mind. In that sense, you could say you need to digest it.
Those feel like two very different things.
They are two different things, but the approach is the same. You need to know it fully, and you don't know it fully enough. So keep looking. Whichever of those two it is, it will have the same result. It's either going to be known to you more fully, or integrated more fully into body-mind experience.
Knowing without experience
One thing that came up when I was asking that: to be with no experience, on the level of thought or sensation, would be like deep sleep. And then the question arises: is there a knowing in deep sleep? Do you have a knowing in deep sleep?
That's a good question. That is the question. The answer is yes, not all the time, but yes, for me. But that is the question. It could also be known not in deep sleep. But it is what is known in deep sleep.
My experience whenever I ask teachers about deep sleep, they say no, nobody has that. Nobody knows deep sleep. There's no experience.
I don't agree. It also has a lot to do with what is remembered. I have had several times a really bizarre sense of knowing, yes, not in dreamless deep sleep. But that's actually less important. I have found that to happen only after a bigger shift. What was valuable was the inquiry prior to that, which, to me, catapulted that shift. It's not about any knowing in deep sleep. It's knowing in wakeful consciousness, in an awake state.
It would be impossible to have an experience, but it's beyond experience.
It is the absence of experience. The knowing of the absence of experience.
But in the wakeful state, you're always having an experience.
Yes, until there's a glimpse. We can get pretty lost in just the language there. But what I mean is: not while you're asleep, while you're awake. While you are sitting, or in a state of meditation or contemplation.
That's why these questions were coming up, because it was like, "Okay, this would be..." and then there's an experience of a void. But even that is an experience.
Nothing and everything at the same time
Yes. What I'm talking about, when you know it and you put words to it, can be confused, because it is very radical. It's like not being there and being there at the same time. There's nothing and there's everything. And that is always true. There's absolutely nothing: absolute voidness, emptiness, total nothingness. There is no God, there is no universe, no person, no nothing. And paradoxically, the knowing of that: something still is there. No sounds outside, no forms, no mind, no body, no world. And it's also known to be more fundamentally real than anything, that emptiness, that voidness.
That's what it feels like. I don't know why, but it seems like when I put my attention in the lower belly, I get direct access to this void. And then it's clear that it's everywhere and it's not located there, but for some reason, that seems to be an entry point.
Yes. But that is a door. It is the source, but at the source there is no existence, no need for existence, no need for a universe, no notion of a universe.
That's how it feels. And even though the mind projects it, it looks like blackness.
Blackness is not it. The mind will project blackness onto it for sure, but that is a way to cope.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.