“..to take each question to a deeper level…”

“By being ready to take each question to a deeper level, it dissolves or transforms each structure in turn, so that in the end there are no obstacles to the recognition of knowledge at work.” – Tarthang Tulku LOK, 273

Last night a strong desire came and I had the opportunity to practice Jack’s invitation to enter emotionality differently. I felt into the desire directly, knowing it from inside it. The desire expanded. This intimate way of inquiring/knowing the desire brought a reaction: it was a sense of dying. “Okay, so this is next…” I became curious: What’s this? I entered it, coming up the inside of it with space and playfulness. I felt into the dying. I, in a manner of speaking, became the dying.

I faintly discerned it had to do with a loss of ‘selfhood.’ Dropping into another layer of it all, I found the ‘self’ was rejecting the original inquiry – sullenly resisting opening to the original desire, and so I next entered into the resistance with the same curious spaciousness.

Soon I noticed that there was something to do with my mother which had arisen, and entering that I found (to my surprise) that there was resistance to having no structure, because that would mean the loss of some structured ‘good me’. I could see my self-structure was built around being ‘good’ (and so letting the original desire be conscious was threatening to my ego-structure.)  There was a belief there that I had to be good for my mother. So, next I let that be here, and again – entered it intimately as ‘space presenting to space,’ I trusted not-knowing as the ground of fidelity to ‘what-is.’

It dropped down another layer. I saw that the self- structure thought that I NEED the good-bad polarity, for my existence. I saw my whole life as a dharma practitioner there – taking on the dharma as a way to be good (for an internalised mother). This dissolved the structure. I stayed with no structure for a while, curious, and again entering the sense of emptiness from inside it. Next I experienced the mind desiring another step. I realised that it believed that another step must come. But that was a kind of a serial-jump. (That is, if I’ve had one layer after another, then I must have another, so I create the next step by expecting it.) So, I didn’t jump and I stayed put for what was presenting. Then I saw that I am not anything that appears or presents itself. This was evident from the mist-like insubstantial presentation of my bodily sensations. They were luminosity presenting as activity. But whatever they were, I wasn’t in them, nor was ‘I’ established  ‘by’ them. There was a total darkness which was also a peaceful knowing.

That’s enough for now.
Christopher.