2009.11.28 19:00 - A Boat Called "No-Boat"

The Guardian for this meeting was Pema Pera. The comments are by Pema Pera.

Pema Pera: Hi Eliza!
Eliza Madrigal: HI Pema :)
Eliza Madrigal: We're stepping into the session gap. Have you missed having Saturday evenings? :)
Pema Pera: to be honest, I've lost count of all the session switches I've made the last two months . . . .
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Pema Pera: a bit like jet lag
Pema Pera: wondering which continent I'm in upon waking up
Eliza Madrigal: yes I suppose, especially if changing times of day often
Pema Pera: but I'm happy to take this session now for the next seven weeks or so
Eliza Madrigal: Okay. :)
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Eos :)
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Eliza, Pema
Pema Pera: Hi there Eos and Calvino!
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Calvino :)
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Calvino!
Calvino Rabeni: Hello all!
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Pema Pera: Calvino, I really enjoyed reading your description of how you have been working with the 9 sec practice, a few days ago, when you were talking with Fael, at 1 am SLT: http://playasbeing.wik.is/Chat_Logs/2009/11/2009.11.26_01%3a00_-_Transformation
Calvino Rabeni: Thanks. Let me review :)

Pema Pera: Calvino Rabeni: When I do PAB (as I try to understand it) I touch a no-mind experience briefly, but then immediately let something else arise, possibly within a setting of imagination or intention.
Pema Pera: that description really resonated with my own experience
Calvino Rabeni: I thonk I was comparing it to other techniques in terms of how I experience it differently
Calvino Rabeni: A willingness to follow the changes. BUt also a bit more invention perhaps?
Pema Pera: openness for invention to happen, perhaps :)
Calvino Rabeni: I think there's some invention in the setup too. It is like a round trip or cycle
Pema Pera: invention in what way?
Calvino Rabeni: In that when you go into the state of awareness, you may have first decided where to "come from" - a focus or something. For instance, it seems sometimes that there is a suggestion of what to look for while going in - that creates a kind of filter or bias
Calvino Rabeni: THen you deconstruct that, or drop it or whatever
Calvino Rabeni: It i s often automatic - but sometimes a matter of choice
Calvino Rabeni: Automatic meaning habitual, those things that seem to take up energy "of themselves" in the mind.
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: But attention can shift that also
Calvino Rabeni: Contemplation plays with a focus, unlike open mind meditation styles
Eos Amaterasu: There's contemplation as "fixating" on something (though that's somewhat degenerate contemplation)
Eliza Madrigal: hm, like getting into a boat but then letting it go?
Eos Amaterasu: and there's contemplation as opening you up (often via the horns of a dilemma :-)
Pema Pera: ouch
Calvino Rabeni: funny ELiza, kind of like that
Pema Pera seeing a matador image, sorry
Eliza Madrigal: :)))
Eos Amaterasu: re the boat, it gets you to the other shore
Calvino Rabeni: I mean, you didn't have to get into the boat.
Eos Amaterasu: but you don't need it then
Calvino Rabeni: That is a boat metaphor for a crossing
Eos Amaterasu: but Calvino, "walking on water wasn't built in a day :-)"
Calvino Rabeni: but you could get into a boat in a more general way
Eliza Madrigal: Maybe you need the boat for a while... And then maybe you just enjoy it..
Eos Amaterasu: if there is a pretend ocean to cross, you need a pretend boat
Calvino Rabeni: Not sure what to do with that Eos, Eliza. There seems to be a "need" in your metaphor
Eliza Madrigal stops herself from playing with the boat for too long :)

Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Eos Amaterasu: the inventiveness of mind - is that what you are referring to playing with, Calvino?
Eliza Madrigal: Well, the need was a starting point, Calvino, but I'm really interested to hear you elaborate. :)
Calvino Rabeni: Imagination
Calvino Rabeni: In some traditions gets a bad rap, but unfairly I think
Eos Amaterasu: (Calvino's a Kantian :-) ?
Calvino Rabeni: What does one of those look like :)
Eos Amaterasu: digs the world through imagination
Calvino Rabeni: Well it is one of our abilities why not use them all?
Eos Amaterasu: It's always a little funny to say, let's try "APA" in the openness
Eos Amaterasu: but that's a way to use imagination?
Calvino Rabeni: Anyway, one of the last sessions brought up self-disclosure
Pema Pera: (APA can be used as a kind of tool to find openness, perhaps)
Calvino Rabeni: So I finally gave my profile some content - it has been blank for years
Calvino Rabeni: I don't think it looks like a kantian's profile
Calvino Rabeni: Nor perhaps a buddhists
Eos Amaterasu: "everything is real" as in "everything counts"?
Eos Amaterasu: Nice profile!
Eliza Madrigal: Nice, Calvino
Pema Pera: Wow, great summary, Calvino!!
Calvino Rabeni: I plagarized some of it - then there wasn't room to put an attribution, but I added to it .
Calvino Rabeni: Because it felt on the right track
Pema Pera: Let me echo it for the log:
    Life, for children: What your Mother already taught you:
        Be kind, and you know all the rest.
    Life, for adults - all the above, plus:
        Wear your beliefs lightly; leave metaphysics to sectarians;
        confront reality directly; renounce romantic dreams of realization;
        learn from suffering; play with your limits; look at your confusion;
        dare to be alone; give yourself over to the pleasures of pure subjectivity;
        understand that everything is real; know the exhilaration of silence.
Eos Amaterasu claps
Eliza Madrigal: each line could be a theme session :)
Pema Pera: !!!
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Pema Pera penciling in Calvino for the next dozen theme sessions . . . .
Eos Amaterasu: Pick one for the next 90 secs
Eliza Madrigal: We could start at the end...
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Calvino Rabeni: THanks, Most of the writing credit goes to Daniel Odier.
Calvino Rabeni: Pick any one :)

Eos Amaterasu: exhilaration of silence
Calvino Rabeni: sure
--BELL--
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Calvino Rabeni: Actually theme sessions sound good - sometimes I like to focus
Calvino Rabeni: Comments on silence?
Eos Amaterasu: silence is a huge space; all sounds happen within it; it is enough, doesn't need anything else; therefore it allows every detail
Pema Pera: down to earth experience: I thought of a song from my high school days "Silence is Golden" -- but of course the song was not so silent :-)
Calvino Rabeni: I believe I got a very similar thing, Eos
Eliza Madrigal: It was rather noisy during the pause for me... from the next room... but I considered silence and sound at once... so similar also..
Calvino Rabeni: SOmetimes they seem the same
Eliza Madrigal wonders if youtube would have Pema's song...
Calvino Rabeni: Silence has a lot of cultural baggage, gladly omitted from the experience
Eos Amaterasu: The Tremeloes
Eos Amaterasu: Silence on retreat is a powerful experience (silence for a day, as was the case in August)
Calvino Rabeni: Your experience of silence Eos, was not the standard one in which silence is a lack of sound, but more like one where silence includes ANY sound. Is that somewhat accurate?
Eos Amaterasu: Well yes, because sounds were (are) happening. It's worth connecting to literal silence (a very very quiet place), but even in a sound-ful place there is the silence of ... listening?
Pema Pera: /me, hesitant to interrupt the deep conversation, found the song, thanks to Eos' hint: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP3YCZvuB6A)
Calvino Rabeni: I can relate to that
Eos Amaterasu: listening to the song
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, good. That's the one I was listening to...
Calvino Rabeni: Pema may have lost the /me gesture
Pema Pera: the comma may have done it?
Calvino Rabeni: not sure
Eos Amaterasu: music can create a kind of suspense-ful moment, both complete and in time
Pema Pera: but yes, real silence is everywhere, like real emptiness in all form
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
Pema Pera: music is something very mysterious . . . .
Calvino Rabeni: As is speech, which has a musical centerr
Eos Amaterasu: so going to a really quiet place and being silent is a somewhat artificial way at arriving at the silence that pervades
Calvino Rabeni: I agree Eos
Eliza Madrigal: its a boat :)
Pema Pera: :-)
Eos Amaterasu: yes :-)
Calvino Rabeni: But it can be done at the bus stop

Calvino Rabeni: The "boat" for example, is the framing of the attention going towards the timeout.
Eos Amaterasu: yes....
Calvino Rabeni: THe boat in this case was "exhiliarating silence"
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Eos Amaterasu: the Diggers in San Francisco had a wooden frame in their free-food space, through which you were invited to walk: a frame of reference
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Calvino Rabeni: WHich may have a different effect than the boat "peaceful silence"
Calvino Rabeni: fuuny pun
Eos Amaterasu: the act of walking, and accompanying grin, created the real frame :-)
--BELL--
Eos Amaterasu is walking into the 90 secs :-)
Calvino Rabeni: Conceptual art
Eos Amaterasu: gateless gate
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Eos Amaterasu: gateless gaté
Eos Amaterasu: the 90 secs is always happening (every 90 second interval), but we tell ourselves to walk through it
Pema Pera: :)
Eliza Madrigal nods and smiles... we take a note
Eliza Madrigal thought to compare to canvas... but what once the canvas is painted...
Calvino Rabeni: Maybe there is a "boatless" version of the 90-sec experience
Eliza Madrigal: Ohhh of course, Calvino :)
Eos Amaterasu: maybe, in fact certainly, but as soon as we say something a-boat it we boat it
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Pema Pera: :-)
Eliza Madrigal: =P~
Pema Pera trying to picture a bottomless boat
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, but if we try to unboat it we could get a boat called "No-Boat"

Eliza Madrigal smiles
Calvino Rabeni: So how to not do that, I wonder?
Eos Amaterasu: mabye that's what celebration is: saying something about it while knowing it's not really there (show-boating :-)
Pema Pera: I think it is similar to silence in sounds . . . the no-sound in sounds
Calvino Rabeni: That expresses a part of what happens for me
Eos Amaterasu perks ears
Calvino Rabeni: I have a felt sense of it as an experience - the experience where sound and no-sound become the same. It feels different then thought, although it might be a subtle one. When I attend to that it comes into being as an experience. Then other things drop away.
Calvino Rabeni: I am a bit leery of describing it due to the way ideas calcify an experience.
Pema Pera: :)
Pema Pera: you're doing a great job, Calvino!
Pema Pera: (in not calcifying, I mean :-)
Calvino Rabeni: But I like it when others describe such things :)
Calvino Rabeni: thx P.
Pema Pera nods mightely
Eliza Madrigal: yes, really nice... seems a developed sensitivity ... 'attending to'
Calvino Rabeni: that meas something to me, yes
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: I would like to talk to a mahamudra practitioner and a quigong pratitioner about this same theme
Calvino Rabeni: I think there's a similar core to it in these different traditions
Eos Amaterasu: That harks back to the form/ no-form session earlier today
Calvino Rabeni: but I am interested perhaps more in whether it can be taken out of those traditions
Pema Pera was just thinking about that, yes -> Eos
Eos Amaterasu: humor works similarly
Pema Pera: that's a central question, Calvino
Calvino Rabeni: there seems to be plenty of evidence that this is something obvious people kep discovering
Eos Amaterasu: I think so, yes
Pema Pera: for PaB to "work" in any way at all, the fruits from other traditions should be available in some way
Calvino Rabeni: and at a greater rate now that "'experiential" is allowed into the culture.
Pema Pera: yes
Pema Pera: one thing we are good at in this culture is "switching" . . . perhaps that might actually help a bit here
Eliza Madrigal: flexibility?
Calvino Rabeni: Yes

Calvino Rabeni: but it has to be anchored somehow
Pema Pera: yes
Eos Amaterasu: switching from one thing to another?
Pema Pera: traditionally, anchoring is done in two ways, in a belief system. first, and then through integration into daily life
Calvino Rabeni: right, but those present problems nowadays
Pema Pera: the question is: can PaB anchor directly into daily life, without belief system???
Calvino Rabeni: I hope so, Pema
Pema Pera: from one belief system to another, Eos, like mahamudra and chi gong
Calvino Rabeni: Or continuum movement, active dreaming, etc.
Pema Pera: the Mahasiddha tradition has great examples of individuals taking one very simple kind of practice and really going into it: they could "anchor" it seemed without elaborate belief system
Pema Pera: can we become PaB Mahasiddhas?
Eliza Madrigal: or holding various belief systems at the same time... learning to see from various angles, can cause a drop of all belief system and yet a kind of respect of the essential core
Calvino Rabeni: And in some cases, almost any practice would do. As if the details of form didn't matter that much.
Pema Pera: yes, Eliza, and yes, Calvino :)
Pema Pera finds himself saying yes many times this hour :-)
Calvino Rabeni: I met a Zen -of- -cafe latte man.
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Calvino Rabeni: It was a gateway
Eos Amaterasu: "doing it" requires no belief system, but talking about it inevitably creates that (eventually) (unless you're a really good comedian) (even then...)
Pema Pera: hehehe
Calvino Rabeni: He and his disciples had made literally millions of cafe-lattes - as a mindful activity
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Eos Amaterasu: modern day barista-siddha
Eliza Madrigal: :))
Eliza Madrigal: oh my... getting sleepy :)
Eliza Madrigal: Thanks guys! :)
Pema Pera: it's getting bed time for me too
Eos Amaterasu: Thanks Eliza!
Pema Pera: what a fun session again!
Calvino Rabeni: Good evening / night ELiza and Pema
Eos Amaterasu: Hope you had a great thanksgiving!
Eliza Madrigal: Bye for now :) See you all tomorrow, and yes an excellent session
Pema Pera: perhaps I'll dream about a no-boat
Eos Amaterasu: Yes, definitely!
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Calvino Rabeni: :) pleasand dreams
Eos Amaterasu: Ciao!
Pema Pera: bfn