Ch. 8 - Don’t Get Lost Down the Rabbit Hole. Some Notes on the Nama Session
Don’t Get Lost Down the Rabbit Hole...
Some Notes on the Nāma Session
[These were notes given in response to questions about how far the yogi should go with the reviewing of states before the practice of Vipassanā can begin.]
Don’t Get Lost Down the Rabbit Hole...
I want to give some notes about this process of reviewing mental states. The question keeps arising, “How far do we need to go with this reviewing?” Many of you feel already that you can see the arising and passing of material and mental states and are growing tired of reviewing them. That is fair enough as long as you have done enough. One of the reasons we do this is to develop dispassion to states of mind. To grow tired of the elaborations of the mind. But equally it is important you are not growing bored on account of sloth and torpor. We have to navigate this point very carefully.
Let me explain it like this. How far down the “Rabbit Hole” do you really need to go? Well, that will depend upon how view-rooted you are. Some people will stop clinging to the mind as soon as they see the basic process by which it is conditioned (contact, feeling, perception, volition etc.) and recognise the affliction it is causing. Others will stop clinging as soon as they recognise that the basic state of mind is awareness itself, and that all ideas are just elaborations, and that all other mental processes are contrived.
In both these cases the yogi has to reach a sure knowledge of the truth of no-self. That is, we have to see clearly that it is the arising of perception of self that is the fundamental cause for suffering and separation. Others take much longer to be convinced that there is no resolution in the mind. In fact some are convinced that the only resolution is in the mind and so will not stop clinging to the mind until all grounds for it are removed.
Others, on account of pride, identify so strongly with their ideas that they cannot see a truth that is beyond them. Literally they cannot accept that there is any truth that they themselves have not seen. So we can see that there is a great variety in types of beings, and how far each of us will have to go down the rabbit hole seeking resolution there, before we understand that there IS no resolution, is personal. This question lies right at the heart of the debate about when it is appropriate to take the direct approach and when we must practice systematically, and for how long.
But the most important thing of all to at least be told, even if we don’t yet believe it, is that the answer doesn’t lie down the rabbit hole. We aren’t going this deeply into the rabbit hole of the mind because our freedom lies at the bottom of the rabbit hole. No. We are only going as far down as we have to go to realise that it is just a rabbit hole, it is a cul-de-sac that we have got lost in, and that our freedom lies in extracting ourselves from that very rabbit hole.
Freedom doesn’t lie in the mind, it lies beyond the mind. There is a real danger that we don’t understand this when we get so involved in this detailed scrutiny of mental states. Remember we are only breaking them down so that we can truly see for ourselves how unprofitable they are, so that we can become dispassionate towards them. We are not investigating them so that we can finally come to the all encompassing view that satisfies us. That is our pride seeking resolution. The talk I gave on the Mind as a Mandala makes this point clearly I hope. (See Chapter Twenty-Nine; “The Vajra Mind-Slayer”).
There are those yogis who are so determined to seek resolution in their mind that they will cling unrelentingly to their views. It is very hard to find freedom from this perspective, because there is no liberation, no freedom, and no cessation of suffering in the mind. Mind is the rabbit hole itself, it IS saṁsāra, and it is all too easy to forget this when we are working so hard to understand the mind.
Clinging to views is just an extreme form of pride. It needs to be let go. Remember we are only going as far down the rabbit hole as we need to go to convince ourselves that there is no resolution, and no freedom from suffering in the mind. So it is not the same for everyone. Please remember this. Some of you get rather pleased with yourself in your diligent investigation of mind and matter, but remember that while you are getting pleased with yourselves, others may already have started to let go and see the way out of suffering.
If we spend too long down the rabbit hole there is even a danger we become blind. Then it may well be that we get lost down there for a very long time until eventually we do literally fall out the bottom of the rabbit hole and realise Nibbāna that way. The Buddha wanted to be sure that there was a way out of suffering for everyone. And in truth one way is to go all the way to the bottom of the Rabbit hole until you fall out the bottom and realise that where you end up is back where you were before you got lost in it in the first place. The difference now being that you know you are awake.
But this can be a long and painful process. So maintain a perspective on what you are doing. This is very important work for as long as it needs to be done, but once it is done it will be let go. You do not have to keep putting your hand in the fire to remind yourself that it burns you. Hopefully, once is enough. Some of us will need to burn ourselves more often before we are truly convinced, but once we know that the nature of fire is to burn we will stay away from it. In the same way, once we have seen that the nature of the mind is to cling to views of self and become bound up in suffering, hopefully we will turn away from it. This is why we spend so much time in the fire of the mind, until we are cooked through by it. It’s part of the process that prompts us to let go.
I know that some of you haven’t seen this yet. Some of you of course will still be seeking resolution in the mind. No one can stop you doing that. The Buddha can only suggest to you that it is unprofitable, but each of you will have to convince yourselves. So please continue to investigate these states of mind and matter for as long as it takes to prompt you to let go. But please do not think that those of you that have to go almost to the bottom are making the most progress. It may be that you are the last to start to let go. So be careful of comparisons.
Having said that, here are some guidelines from the Suttas and commentaries on how we might approach this subject of how far down the rabbit hole we need to go.
Some Notes on Nāma Session
The Mental continuum should be first recognised by whichever of contact, feeling, perception, or consciousness appears more clearly to the yogi. Thereafter the other three must be brought gradually to mind as discrete over time.
For one who has not practised jhāna, then the reviewing of mental states should be done upon the mind-moment that reviews the body. That is: while reviewing the body as four elements and their derived material bases, that mind which knows the body is seen as constituted of the four mental aggregates of FEELING, PERCEPTION, VOLITIONAL FORMATIONS and CONSCIOUSNESS. This is the five aggregates method that I teach.
One who has jhāna as the basis can start by reviewing jhāna dhammas (the mental factors of jhāna consciousness as made up of the same four mental aggregates.) This is the easiest way to start because these mind moments appear repeatedly and so reviewing them in bhavaṅga is much easier than a single ordinary mind-moment.
It is clearly stated in the Visuddhimagga that mental dhammas will only come to mind clearly in the discernment of the meditator who has previously discerned materiality clearly. There are many instances where it is said that if we try to discern mentality when materiality is not yet clear to us, the meditation will fall back or fall merely into meditating upon views and concepts rather than reaching the definitive experience of the direct perception of dhammas as they are. Only this direct perception will lead the meditator to the discernment of Path Knowledge. All kinds of meditation upon views or concepts will fail to reach this point. This is so frequently commented upon that we would be foolish to avoid this point.
There is a similar advice given (the simile of the mountain cow) regarding the effort to attain higher jhānas before the lower ones have been properly mastered. One who attempts to attain second jhāna before first jhāna is mastered will not only fail to reach second jhāna but may also find he loses this first jhāna. It is clear from this that with regards to both samatha and insight practice each step of the way stands upon the stability reached with the previous step.
With regards to the discernment of each and every mental factor in each and every kind of mind-moment, it should be remembered that this was the practice of the Venerable Sariputta, whose capacity for insight was second only to the Buddha. We need to understand that whilst it is necessary to exhaustively investigate rūpa as the basis for the knowing of matter, with regard to mentality, nāma, we need only investigate nāma to the point of eliminating all doubt and reaching sure knowledge that mental states are conditionally arisen and of the nature of anicca, dukkha, anatta. Having reached the sure knowledge that there is no refuge in the body we need to reach sure knowledge that there is no refuge in the mind. This then becomes the basis for the practice of vipassanā. With regards to this please see the first part of this chapter “Don’t Get Lost Down the Rabbit Hole...”
Further to this there are six doubts to be overcome. They are as follows:
Doubt about Virtue and morality;
Doubt about the correct way to train in meditation;
Doubt about previous existence;
Doubt about future existence;
Doubt about Causality (Dependent Origination);
Doubt about the Triple Gem.
With the above in mind, the system that I teach is to review mental states in terms of the arising of the unwholesome roots and develop clear comprehension over time of what is wholesome and what is unwholesome mind, to the point of becoming clear that pride (attachment to ideas of self) is the fundamental ignorance at the beginning of the causal chain of suffering. This then becomes the motivating factor in seeking the definitive experience of no-self that prompts the quantum cutting off of clinging. This is done through gradually developing the clear understanding of the unprofitable nature of those views, ideas and habitual mental tendencies, that were previously clung to as being profitable and conducive to happiness.
This process should not be elucidated merely as a textual teaching because until the appearance within the meditator’s own mind of the sure knowledge of what is the unprofitable, the mind will continue to incline towards those views that uphold its attachment to and views of self. Should the intellectual understanding then become the cause for the rejecting of the path of Dhamma on account of doubt, then the teaching would have performed the very opposite of the function for which it is designed. This is particularly important with regards to the yogi who has little faith but strong intellect, where the tendency to stand upon views is strong.
It is important to understand that the mind cannot review the arising of mental states contained in a discrete mind-moment from within that mind-moment itself. That is to say, while we are reviewing the four elements in the body or practising jhāna, we cannot review the mental process involved while it is happening. We can only review it in bhavaṅga upon its passing. This is because the mind cannot perform two functions with taking two objects in one mind-moment. The moment of knowing an object is one mind-moment, the moment of reviewing the knowing of that object and its concomitant mental factors is another.
Similarly, we cannot review the arising, the static and the passing stages of any moment of material or mental phenomena simultaneously. We must review them one by one. So too is it with the discernment of the various mental states (cetasikā) within any mind-moment. We must look first for the appearance of one mental state, (for example feeling of contact) then thereafter, knowing that feeling is present, look for the next (for example perception). In this way we build up our understanding of what each mind-moment contains by way of universal, occasional, and wholesome/unwholesome mental factors, step by step. So it is done by inference namely: Contact having arisen, feeling appears; feeling having arisen, perception appears; perception having arisen, volition appears etc. But we also have to know that all the mental factors that constitute a mind-moment appear simultaneously. It is while maturing our discernment of mental factors and the mental process that Dependent Origination first starts to become clear to us.
In the same way that mind starts to become clear to us through our discernment of material states, Dependent Origination starts to become clear to us through our discernment of both mental and material states. It is a process that reveals itself to us directly through wise attention and direct perception, and not something that can be put together only through reasoning.
