Beginning to embrace or turn towards openness is a notable turning point. This is the beginning many teenagers and adults are looking for.
The process moves towards recognizing openness simply and clearly, leading from suffering to change to anatta.
This process may eddy in momentariness, isolation, ecstasy, or self-absorption. Fixation at this point could be pleasurable, angry, or slothful.
Dissatisfaction here points inward to increasing subtlety, simplicity, appreciation, and clarity, and points outward to health, communion, and generosity. One is looking for a new balancing of activity and introspection that incorporates a refined sense of motivation.
This seems to be a second notable turning point, but having to do with establishment more than removal, affirmation more than negation. Play, study, build, step back. Within a lifetime, this seems to be an effort to incorporate meditation into the stage where building or establishment takes priority in one’s activity.
As far as awareness is concerned, the process seems to begin in not-knowing and proceed through qualitatively different shadings: obscured awareness, defining-knowing, understanding, appreciating, clarity, nonconceptuality, and abiding.
Although awareness may always be partially obscured, in comparison to the following stages, awareness at this point is muddled. This stage is similar to intoxication.
By defining-knowing, we start believing that we know what we’re doing or talking about. There is a childish confidence, and one may be competent enough for accomplishing one’s purpose, but that purpose evidences a relatively simplistic understanding. Instead of being muddled in one’s sense of purpose–as with obscured awareness–purpose is determined by a simple understanding of the self as an individual.
When defining-knowing is felt to be unsatisfying, either due to curiosity or felt limitations, one begins expanding one’s understanding of the context. From self as individual, one develops an understanding of self as a contextualized individual. If defining-knowing is unilinear, understanding is multilinear. By exploring and incorporating a wider angle of vision, one’s options develop at the same time that one’s understanding of self expands to include broader purposes and subtler methods.
Appreciation develops after one’s understanding of some particular context or field makes one competent in that field. In a general sense, enjoyment is always possible. In the specific sense that I am using it, appreciation as a stage means a sense of appreciation that includes understanding. This appreciation includes an intellectual appreciation. Just as understanding includes multiple lines of defining-knowing, appreciation includes understanding. It is possible, though, to move from understanding and competence to boredom. So in the same sense that understanding develops out of defining-knowing, in the same sense that one must decide defining-knowing alone is not sufficient AND have the ability to develop understanding, one must decide understanding without appreciation is insufficient AND have the ability to develop appreciation instead of getting stuck in boredom or simply shifting one’s attention somewhere else. If understanding involves competence or craftsmanship, appreciation involves artistry or mastery as well. Appreciation, then, is similar to expertise.
It seems that clarity rarely develops as a stage. Most people have experienced multiple moments of clarity but not established clarity as the base they move from. Meditation may be necessary to develop clarity in one’s experience and understanding. As artistry is incorporated in one’s actions, it becomes possible to master artistry. Another description is that one’s intention is influenced less by immature impulses, one’s intention is not set on actively directing one’s attention to the task at hand. As attention become accustomed to competent manipulation of certain circumstances, intention seems to come more from the situation, or one’s active direction of intention takes on a lighter touch. That lightness includes both appreciation of the activity or the moment and also an unquestioned sense of confidence and creativity. It is quite possible to lose a sense of “self” in the moment or flow. Clarity is psychologically similar to grace.
Nonconceptuality is characterized by panoramic awareness and equanimity. Familiarity with grace alters one’s relationship with conceptions. While the purpose or value of conceptions does not change or diminish, one’s reliance on conception–which may have been necessary at some point–fades away. Intention changes radically from appreciation to clarity to nonconceptuality. With nonconceptuality, one experiences grace in fields where one understands and also in those where one does not. While it is possible earlier in the process to experience compassion without understanding, while it is possible to be gentle earlier in the process, with nonconceptuality, it is possible to act gracefully and forcefully based on the slightest hints. Through clarity, one relies less and less on the mental processes involved with decision-making and good choices and more on the complexity of information and sensations that stream through our bodies and awareness. Nonconceptuality is a greater familiarity with grace and an unquestioned trust in each situation. With nonconceptuality, there is less of an experience of no-self as the conceptual difference between subjectivity and objectivity, between individual and many no longer functions or is no longer employed. Intention and activity are experienced as fitting with each situation naturally without any manipulation being necessary.
Abiding can be seen in two ways. In the first, it appears that one has reached the base, the ground. Regardless of what one does or where one is, one remains centered, seemingly in touch with the extent of reality. In the second, instead of a focus on describing a base to others, instead of speaking about stability, the description is more of finding that basis of reality in each moment, in each individual one encounters. The experience of not needing to manipulate or change things that one feels for oneself in nonconceptuality is recognized as abiding with every individual everywhere. This is called abiding because there is no longer any possibility of wavering over where reality is or how to describe what is, since reality is recognized as abiding.
Beginning to turn towards openness occurs when one moves from defining-knowing into appreciation. For some, this will include a greater degree of understanding, but for others, little understanding is needed. If one identifies more with intellect in defining-knowing, one may demand greater understanding and find understanding to be more satisfying. If one identifies more with compassion through defining-knowing, understanding may feel unnecessary, and one will look to pass quickly through. Either way, it is not necessary to attempt to understand anything more than the individual self. It is not necessary to understand the self if one’s interests lie elsewhere. One’s interest going into understanding and appreciation will affect the texture of the course and the length of time and effort required for each following step.
Without developing consistent appreciation, though, it is most likely that the process will become derailed at understanding. One may continue to experience moments of peak awareness into the higher stages without actually arriving. As reality is abiding, a focus on understanding or appreciation is not necessary in order to experience higher levels, but competence with each can be beneficial in diminishing the difficulty of the path further on. The uniquely momentary nature of ecstatic energies encourages for consistency found in appreciation to be used as a reliable standard at this stage of individual development. The desire to expand one’s appreciation leads naturally into clarity, and the grace experienced in clarity encourages the openness and dignity of nonconceptuality. Expanding appreciation is the antidote for being stuck in momentariness, isolation, ecstasy, or self-absorption.
Copyright 2007 Todd Mertz