When the Mind Map Peels Away
Cuando el mapa mental se despega
A student describes how visual perception becomes flat and muted during meditation, and the teacher explains that this signals a natural deconstruction of the mind's interpretive overlay, revealing raw perception beneath.
When the Mind Map Peels Away
A student describes how visual perception becomes flat and muted during meditation, and the teacher explains that this signals a natural deconstruction of the mind's interpretive overlay, revealing raw perception beneath.
I've been noticing that when I'm meditating now, my visual experience becomes very two-dimensional. Things are contrasty, the colors are muted, there's very little depth perception, and it's very peaceful. Objects appear somewhat unreal, and things are just shifting and moving. I see that as my mind interpreting.
The other way around, actually. But go ahead.
So for me, I feel like this is my mind interpreting everything. You're saying it's the other way around? You were telling another student that this is actually life appearing or being created in the moment?
Distinguishing raw perception from interpretation
I'm speaking specifically about your experience of visual perception seeming less real, objects not seeming as real, and losing depth perception.
Let's distinguish what we refer to as "mind," because the word can point to different things. Mind can be said to be everything that is experienced: sights, sensations, thoughts, perceptions, sound. That's a relevant way to speak, because everything experienced in phenomena is a creation of mind.
But let's set that aside. Let's say there is raw perception and sensation, everything that comes through the nervous system: sensations from the body, sight, sound, taste, the senses. Let's consider the senses and sense perception as raw input and not call it "mind."
Then there is the interpretation of that raw perception and sensation. When I refer to the mind mapping, I'm referring to an overlay that is an interpretation of perception. When I look this way and I see a door, a mirror, a computer, that's the mind mapping. There is first perception of sight, and then there's interpretation of what objects are there. But not only the objects: the three-dimensionality of it is also an interpretation, a mind mapping. The perception through sight is not three-dimensional. An interpretation is needed for that.
When that interpretation starts to become peeled off from perception, it becomes optional. The interpretation can be focused on more or less, and then we're able to have a more direct experience of perception.
How the overlay builds and reverses
When we're very young, we have very direct experience of all perception. Then the interpretation builds up and takes over to a degree where we focus more on the mind map and the interpretation than on raw perception and sensation. Part of the process of meditation is to revert that.
What you're describing is exactly this: you sit to meditate, and sight perception starts to lose its depth, starts to become more two-dimensional. That's because the overlay of the mind map, of three-dimensionality and objects, is actually a part of the brain's mechanism that is starting to slow down. It's a significant part of the brain. Our brain is highly focused on visual processing; it's a large portion of the cortex.
For me, this is a really good sign: that you can sit to meditate and this is starting to happen naturally. What I said earlier about it being the opposite is this: there is less interpretation happening, but you are noticing the interpretation. So it seems like more interpretation is happening. The opposite is true. There is more recognizing and realizing the interpretation itself, whereas before you thought that was reality.
The same thing happens when meditators begin to practice and they start saying, "My mind is going crazy. I'm thinking like never before." No. You're realizing more and more how much you were thinking nonstop. The thought process is becoming conscious; you're becoming more aware of the level of mental activity. And so it stands out: "I'm thinking much more than before." Actually, you're noticing how much you've always been thinking.
So when you said, "I'm experiencing a kind of loss of depth perception, objects seem to become less real, and I'm seeing all my mind's interpretation," what's happening is you're becoming conscious of the mind interpretation that was there before. It's there less now, but you're seeing it more.
So what I'm experiencing is more like what you would call raw data?
Two aspects of experience seen as separate
Yes. And you're now experiencing two aspects of phenomenal experience that used to be seen as one. You're seeing them as separate, in the sense that sound and sight are two types of experience, two types of phenomena. But interpretation of visual information and visual information itself used to be collapsed into one. It's normally very hard, without a certain level of awakening, for those to be seen as two separate parts of experience.
Ultimately, all of this experience is one experience, but I'm making a distinction. Visual perception and the objects that are seen are two separate things. One is raw information from sight. The other is projected from thought onto the image.
When there is the experience of sensation in the hand, and the only way to relate to that sensation is through the image and the thought "hand," those are two things that have been collapsed into one. It is then possible to have the experience of hand without the image, to have direct experience of raw sensation, of body sensations, without the mental overlay. The mental overlay can appear in trickles here and there if necessary, but it's not there as a compulsion. It's not there as a need.
I'm just wondering how this experience during meditation translates over to other areas of just being.
It translates to everything, because everything you experience all the time is raw sensation and perception plus mental interpretation.
So now there's this sort of separation happening.
You're peeling off what is "small mind" from raw perception and sensation. You're discerning that they are of different qualities.
So I shouldn't see this as something that only happens visually when I'm meditating?
Actually, for most people it's the opposite: the visual dimension is the hardest. It's easier to recognize this distinction in sensation and in sound. Sight carries a great deal of attachment. But what you're experiencing there is going to transfer very easily as you explore the same thing around sensation.
The image at the root
There's a passage in the Gospel of Thomas where Christ says something like, "When you make a hand where there is the image of a hand, you will enter the kingdom." He says this in a few more ways: when you make a foot where there is the image of a foot, when you make a face where there is the image of a face, when you make the sound of a bird where there is the image of a bird. What it means is: when you relate directly to the raw experience of hand, where before there was only the image of a hand, then you will enter the kingdom.
What it's pointing to is that when we stop functioning in the world of mind, where mind interpretation comes first and everything else is second, something fundamental shifts. At the root of the image of everything (the image of hand, the image of body, the image of the world) is an idea: a self, here, localized at the center of that world, separate from objects. That idea, that core image of "I," of a person, of separateness, is made of thoughts. The thoughts don't appear to be thoughts, but they are. That "I" is made of thoughts, and it becomes a belief: "This idea, this 'I,' separate from that person, that thing, is what I am, all that I am."
That belief is where suffering begins. A whole series of consequences follows, affecting the functioning of body and mind. It's like a domino effect of suffering, a vicious cycle of beliefs and actions that reinforce the sense of separation and the experience of suffering. At the root of it all is just the belief, the image, which before it is seen through is not known to be an image. It is simply taken to be "I."
What you're describing is a little bit of this deconstruction. At the root of it is going to be the belief, the image of a separate self. And you will then have the possibility to see that what you truly are cannot be limited by nor contained by that image. That image is an appearance, a creation that comes after what you truly are. What you are is prior to it.
The mutedness is temporary
It's funny, because when I experience that, I realize how much my mind is interpreting things. And then the thought comes up, "Oh, I don't like how the colors are all muted." And then suddenly all the colors become very vivid.
Yes. The mutedness is temporary. Part of the energy that was going into interpretation starts to shut down as you stop energizing it, and things seem to become more dull for a while. But there's going to be a coming back, in full force, into all sensation and perception, with very bright, beautiful, alive vividness. And you've already described that taste of how it can come back instantly.
Eventually, what is seen through is the identification with the personal, separate self at the root. That identification is what's really dulling everything.
Can you say that again?
As you do this continuous work, what is seen is that this belief and this image are at the root. When it is seen that that's not what you are, there will be a release of energy and attention that has been focused on "me, me, me." It will be released and allowed to relax. All sensation and perception will come forth as it is. It's just a change in the mechanism of perception and attention. It will be allowed to be as it is, which is raw, direct, vivid, alive, and in a sense divine. That is the kingdom of heaven: completely immersed in this mysterious, infinite aliveness, which is loving, which is peaceful. All sensation, all perception, all thoughts as well, because this will then move into the thought process, where thoughts themselves are going to be seen as this kaleidoscope. All of experience, all of creation, including normal everyday struggles and pains, just imbued with aliveness. And then comes the recognition: it always has been this way. Nothing fundamentally changed. It was just the veil, the interpretation, that made it seem not so.
I guess we'll see what happens.
Yes, and you're tasting it. It's pretty clear. When I describe what I just described, it's partly an encouragement, but I understand the risk of it coming across as somewhere to get to in the future. It's really just something that's here and available now. It just naturally tends to have this unfolding over time.
I really appreciate your guidance. I tend to resonate with a lot of the things that you tell me. But I know that much of it I'm not yet experiencing, so I don't fully understand everything you're saying. I know it's encouragement, like you said.
It's a lot closer than you think. That's exactly how it is.
Thank you so much.
You're welcome.