Q4-20010706-Larry_Rosenberg-IMSRC-q_a_practice_cant_be_separated_from_living_part_iii-8723 Leandra T

Talk: Talk: 20010706-Larry_Rosenberg-IMSRC-q_a_practice_cant_be_separated_from_living_part_iii-8723 Leandra Tejedor.json Start_time: 00:45:10 Display_question: Can you speak at the distinction between the observer and the meditator? Keyword_search: mindfulness, observer, vipassana, non-judgmental, present moment, clear mirror, thinking, non-conceptual, psychological, non-attachment, intimacy, fear, ego, walking meditation, breath, doerless doing, ballet, thought Question_content: Questioner: (inaudible) Larry: Yes, no, that's a very important question. I mean, they all are, but one that I feel I can try to answer. I think it's important. Ones that I can't answer too well, I don't think (laughter) yeah. We read a book, or a teacher tells us about mindfulness, to observe your experience, your breath, bodily sensations, the stuff that we practice within vipassana. We all read it. We say, oh, mindfulness, it's non-judgmental. It can only happen in the present moment. It's not thinking, it's non conceptual. It's like a clear, clear mirror. Fine. And then we all set about doing it. To begin with, I think inescapably in doing it, our psyche intervenes a lot. That is, if someone asks, what are you doing? I'm practicing mindfulness, what is…I am getting to your question. It seemed to be gradations of what can happen as practice matures. Break_line: So, at first inescapably, the quality of our seeing, is compromised by our psychological tendencies, our likes and dislikes, and avoidances, and so forth. I don't see how we can be otherwise. But with encouragement, we begin to see that that is also the subject of mindfulness itself. And it starts clarifying itself, so that the mirror starts becoming a lot clearer. It's not as much influenced by yesterday. Yesterday being all of our accumulated experiences, wounds, and successes, and failures, and conditionings, and upbringing, and all that, and more, and more. Because in real mindfulness, there's just clear seeing. Okay, but there's still an observer, and that's maybe getting to what you mean. And it's very, very helpful to… even this is very, very helpful. Some people think that the instructions are talking about detachment. Personally, I don't think so. And there are some who do. I don't. Break_line: I think it's about nonattachment. It's a kind of participant observation, that is it's a lot you're receiving. You're opening up to, rather than pulling back from. It's not looking at fear from a mountaintop, with binoculars. It's actually allowing fear in. It's the intimacy you're talking about. But to begin with, there is a bit of separation because the observer is, essentially, it's the ego that's now decked out, as a meditator, as an observer. It's a very subtle form of ego. But it's the same character that's been with us for a long time. And that subtle separation keeps it from being the real clear seeing, which is timeless. Has nothing to do with the past. It's fresh. Even if you've had a certain… let's say you've had fear a thousand times in the past, of a certain kind, without training, you look at the present instance of fear. There's a bit of coloration from the fact that you've had fear so many times. That kind of fear. And maybe even the word fear is there, which judges it a bit. Break_line: The day can come, where the sense of the observer withers away, quite naturally. And that's when you hear in talks, and in books, there's seeing without a seer. Or when you're doing walking meditation, maybe you've had sometimes, it's so beautiful, like ballet, like dance. Where there's just the walking. And it's what's called doerless doing. There's no one doing the walking or with the breath. Sometimes it feels. That was your example. It feels if you're being breathed. And one of my teachers asked me, well, “who's breathing?” And I said, “I am”, and he said, “that's just a thought.” “Find this I am,” and so once I look for it, it was unfindable. And those are happy times. The reason they're happy times, is because we're not there. End_time: 00:50:12