Good News for Dave

Q: Annette, I've been reading your writings for a long time. I've read all the books, done the satsangs, retreats, etc. and have come to recognize that it's an inside job.

So I've been trying to get down to the core of me. I'm writing to you because you don't seem to feed the conceptual and you recognize the necessity of finding one’s own way. I'm committed to freeing myself from this “suffering dave.” I started from ground zero, choosing to ignore as best I can all that I've heard about, read about, thought about, talked about, The Way It IS. Here goes... 

So the belief of dave being real is based on a feeling, sensations in the throat, chest... heavy tight contracted etc. and an image, picture, of this person that seems to emanate from the head. So that's a me that seems to be subject to an endless stream of these images, fragments of past experiences, memories and imagined futures, some having strong feelings, others, meaningless meandering stuff.

Basically a picture of dave, bodily sensations, and a stream of images, some more emotionally charged than others. This seems to be what is real, the over-all feeling tone is fearful, and there's this drive to escape, fix, change. I sit with this...at times I focus my attention on internal sensations and feelings, observe thoughts, etc., in what seems to be an unsuccessful attempt to be free, or relieved.

I feel like a beginner after forty years of searching... I don't really have a question, more a need for support .... Anyway, thanks for being there...

A: You are really right on to say that it’s an inside job. The pointers are only to allow one’s own inner wisdom to be accessed. This insight comes only from inside, not from a teacher or guru. Without that self-exploration, the books and satsangs are just a hobby or pastime, something to keep the mind busy.

I’m glad you know what you want. You want to stop suffering. It helps a lot to keep your “goal” in mind, because many teachings are aimed at other stuff, like “knowing reality” or whatever. Stick with this – you want the suffering to end.

Everything you describe sounds just like what it is to be human. You can’t change the experience of having a human mind that does all of that. Does it matter if the mind distorts reality? No, it doesn’t. Your experience of it is all that matters. You’ll never be able to have any other experience but yours. And it is what it is. And so we just have to know what’s going on, so we don’t have to suffer about it.

And what’s going on is a story about some time other than right now. That’s what’s always going on. Right here, right now, is anything wrong? That’s all you ever need to know. Is there any desire? Is there any aversion? Is there any problem, right now?

You’ll notice that there is nothing missing – nothing wrong – until there is a thought about a “me” that is divided from “all that is not me.” But notice that that division does not exist right here, right now.

Don’t worry about whether there is or is not a division. It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about who you are, or any learning, process, or practice at all. Just look at your experience. Right here, right now, there is no problem. There is nothing missing. Every moment, what is reinforced is that you are not separate, because if you were separate, there would be suffering right here right now! And there is not.

Do you sense that right here, right now, there is no problem?

Q: Thank you for your response. It has been very helpful and has given me some direction. Is there any problem right now? That question has been my companion for the past few days.

A: Thank you for sticking with what I asked. It helps.

Q: There is experience...there are thoughts about it... defining, interpreting, distorting....the story...what should/shouldn't be ....suffering dave. I realized that some things I took to be true, e.g. “I have tightness in my throat,” was part of the story. A lot of what I take to be true is part of the story.

A: This is very good. You get it.

> There is experience...there are thoughts about it...

I’m selecting this out of what you said because it’s important and I want to elaborate on it.

The first thing we notice right now is pure experience. We just know there is experiencing going on, and that’s all we know. We know it because the experiencing is being experienced. We know it directly. I would call this the primary experience.

Then there arises – from within the pure, primary experience – a secondary experience. The secondary experience is “I am experiencing; there is an experiencer here to be experiencing.” And then a whole world in thought opens up, from that one thought of “I,” and that’s where all the suffering is. The suffering is not in the pure, primary, present-time experience that is here all the time.

So you described it well. First, there is experience; then, there are thoughts about it. The thoughts about it arise in the pure, first experience. They can’t exist without the pure experiencing. Is there any pain or discomfort in the pure experiencing?

Q: I have a sense of “being with experience” before the story, so to speak, although it feels very tentative.

A: It probably only feels tentative because it is not experienced through the verbal part of your brain. Just like I said above, the primary experience, or as you put it, “being with experience,” is before words. The wordless stuff has a tendency to feel unreal and ethereal, when it’s really not; it’s just unverbalized. Verbalizing concretizes things for us, but experience cannot be concretized. It can't be frozen or held. But there is actually nothing more “real” and un-tentative than pure present-time experiencing! Is there?

Q: There is no problem there.

A: Good.

Q: I haven't really understood the “division” stuff.

A: Fine. Forget it. Many concepts are tossed around. Only the ones that help you matter. Nevermind the rest. They are only tools, not truths. Nothing is “truth.”

Q: I know there's a “me” thought but that is rather vague in my experience. Like a familiar heaviness hanging around my neck.

A: The heaviness is the story, and you’ll notice again and again that the primary experiencing has no heaviness at all. It is not until the secondary "I" experience is noticed within the primary that there can be any heaviness noticed, because there has to be some “one” there who is or feels heavy, and some one who compares “heavy” to some other state it thinks of as lighter or preferable. In primary experience – pure experiencing without an experiencer – there can be no such judgments made about experience; it’s all the same in its purity. All experience is equally pure.

Q: Anyway, I intend to continue with this exploration until there is no doubt about this suffering business.

A: Good! You will succeed with that attitude. 

Q: Your help is always welcome and greatly appreciated.

A: Thank you. I’m glad to help.

Later:

Q: Your response was very helpful and, as always, to the point.  Particularly your discussion of primary experience. It's ever-present, a bedrock. However in my experience it often appears as background, and the internal verbal and visual images appear as foreground.

A: It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about it. Who cares what’s in the foreground? Does it effect anything?

Q: It seems that I find myself “returning” to primary even though obviously it's always there. So there's a “settling in” to the primary and at the same time a sense of being in two places or a straddling between.

A: Fine. No problem.

Q: Also the notion of the secondary experience, the one who experiences, is clearly “after” the primary, however it is very unclear how/when that shift occurs.

A: You’re getting way too brainy and wordy about this. Words and thoughts won’t help. Just look right now. Is there experience, or not? Is there a shift needed to know that you are experiencing? Your freedom is now, period. There is no other time. So notice right now that there is no “I” and nothing to worry about! You are free! Leave all the rest of “time” alone, and you are free.

Q: I hope this doesn't sound too conceptual, it's not that I want to figure it out.

A: Yeah, just drop all the stuff about how and why and when. It all applies to the future happiness of the “I,” and it is found upon examination that neither the “I” nor the future exists. These questions are about nothing that exists, so it’s pointless trying to get answers to them. The answers will be meaningless.

Q: I do want to become aware of what's happening since my  assumptions are so conditioned and seemingly automatic. The reference to the verbal part was very helpful – that too seems to be foreground, and recognizing it as “story” frees me considerably, allowing me to “return” to direct experience.

A: Good. Remember that what you are talking about only happens now. Do you notice experience right now? Was there any need for you to “return” to it? Aren’t you always experiencing? You can’t get away from it!

Q: And lastly I still seem to be confused about internal sensations. When a chair is perceived, the story about the chair is clearly not the chair; but when an internal sensation is perceived, it's not so clear that the experiencer is not the sensation. I realize this sounds kind of confusing but there's some sticking point here. 

A: Well, yeah, it’s confusing to me. What does it matter? Don’t make a problem where there isn’t one. Just notice that something here is aware of its presence. Is there another piece of information you need, before you can experience this pure experience and be free right now? Throw away this sticking point and all other sticking points that come along – they are red herrings. They keep you running around in the mind, while you’re missing all that’s going on in pure experience right now!

Just drop the questions and notice your own experience. This is where it all happens. This is where inner peace happens – right now, right here, and at no other time. Inner peace – freedom from suffering, boundless joy – it’s only now. It’s not permanent. Ever, not ever. There is no permanent peace, there is no permanent anything. Right now is your peace, in pure experience, noticing only what is here and not what you imagine. 

Later:

Q: Annette, Got it! Thanks for reining in my over-active mind.

A: Good news, Dave. Glad I could help.