I perceive two kinds of vibrations. The first one is always associated with a sensory object and it’s a subtle but regular variation between the object existing and not existing. I can compare the rate of these vibrations between objects and for slow vibrations I can even count individual waves such as my finger now vibrating at three times per one heart beat. For more rapid vibrations I sort of “hear” them but I cannot count the individual flashes of existence.
The second type of vibration that I perceive is of perception itself. My attention is constantly resetting itself and returning to the object of concentration. Sometimes it manifests as “bad key-framing”. For a split second at a time the experience is frozen in time but still moving in a simple way until another moment of perception replaces it. The simple predictor movement from one “key-frame” to the next doesn’t always line up and that’s how I notice that my attention is resetting itself few times per second.
This is fascinating and I wish more people would describe experiences like this in terms of familiar metaphors like key-framing instead of metaphors which only make sense to other accomplished meditators.
Maybe it’s just the writer in me, but I feel that any subjective experience can be communicated.
What is the difference between knowing consciously that identity is an illusion and intuitively feeling that identity is an illusion? I became a good reductionist long ago, but I still feel my own identity. I’m not sure if I would want to lose it.
I’m glad you liked the key-frame metaphor. I’m planning on writing a proper article about these experiences and developing a coherent language that makes sense to other physical algorithms trying to experience themselves as such. However I feel that I need to meditate a little longer to make sure I’m not making up too much nonsense.
The main difference between knowing that the self is an illusion and feeling it as such is control of the self-alief. Even without getting into a meditative state I can steer my experience from the habitual one that I use to socialize and become a flow of information between different conscious and semi-conscious modules. I cannot fully eliminate the experience of my habitual identity but I can see it jump between different modalities while still claiming to be the same agent that it was before jumping. It’s hard to believe in an unified self when you can see that the self-experience is just a way for the mind to control itself.
The disbelief becomes even stronger in meditation when the identity is simply not there even though the mind is clearly experiencing something and recording memories.
Losing your identity is not so bad. You can still keep it and be your habitual self whenever the wish to do so arises. This whole thing is pretty great but I still advice making sure that you really want to do this. There is hardly any way of going back.
Let me address some fears associated with losing oneself:
I could no longer feel happiness for myself!
There is great joy in becoming the experience of happiness itself. Bliss needs no target to feel good.
I could no longer feel pain! Life is meaningless without contrasts.
Just as there is joy there is pain. It simply has less chance of sticking anywhere because the sufferer can be toned down at will. To find meaning I recommend focusing on the pain of others and having compassion. They are made of the same bits as you are and there is no fundamental separation. (Compassion is not strictly required if it feels too touchy-feely but where’s the harm if done in moderation.)
I have done great things and all my achievements will be nulled if I disappear!
The autobiographical self won’t disappear but the memories won’t seem any different from any other autobiographical story. You won’t be special for yourself but you will be and feel special in the sense that you’ll be writing new chapters in the story. The achievements in your autobiography will be seen as events caused by inner and outer forces. Acknowledging the merit of others in your finest moments and feeling grateful is a wholesome experience. In my opinion feeling inclusive pride (aren’t we all great) is superior to feeling exclusive pride (I’m great, aren’t I) but do consider that feeling exclusive pride will feel like a bad joke. Luckily there just won’t be anyone left to get hurt by that joke. If you are motivated by exclusive pride you can take comfort in the fact that other people will think you’re great even after enlightenment. Freeing up the potential of the information processor under your skin will look like “you” doing all kinds of great stuff.
For vibration type 1, do different things have different frequencies? Do certain classes of things fall under similar frequency ranges? Do the frequency of particular objects change over time? Is that change predictable? (Ignore any questions that assume “yes” to the previous when the previous is “no”)
For type 2, is this just noticing how things are all the time (higher sensitivity), or is it a degradation in the quality of your perception or experience? As before, does the frequency change and if so, is it predictable?
Different things usually do have different frequencies but that depends on the meditative stage I’m in. Stage 2 usually involves different sensations bursting to the foreground of attention vibrating at their own pace and maybe even accelerating in frequency as they appear and decelerating when fading out. Stage 3 is a cacophony of subtle sensations all vibrating at different frequencies and slowly shifting about. Because everything is constantly fading out and stays in the background it’s hard to pick up any individual vibrations at all. Trying to “hear” it all at once takes effort but is doable. Now that I no longer experience mind numbing agony in stage 3 it’s actually quite an impressive ocean of dark tones. In stage 4 however all vibrations line up and everything that arises vibrates at the same stable frequency as everything else. Even the experience of space beats away at this global rhythm. All of the previously described vibrations are in the 2 to 6 Hz range but there are higher vibrations associated with more precise sensing like feeling the individual hairs on my eyebrow. The experience of the lower frequency vibrations vibrates too but at a higher pace. Another high frequency object is the emptiness between individual moments of conventional space at stage 4. Don’t ask me where this space beyond space vibrates into. I have no idea and luckily subjective experiences are not required to add up to a coherent system.
For type 2, this is how things are all the time. The mind is good at hiding the the details and discontinuities in its function and it takes a good look to see how things don’t always line up. While the actual discontinuities are hard to notice the periodic jostling around of attention might be easier to pick up. Attention is constantly pushing away and trying to find novel things. I can sort of feel every push when fixing my focus on a particular object. The frequency changes when I engage in an activity that requires more attention but it’s hard to pay attention to attention when I’m supposed to be paying attention to the activity. This difficulty of paying attention to attention may even mean that the discontinuity of experience and the subtle pushes of attention are separate phenomena. I just haven’t been able to experience them individually.
Stage 3 was awful for me. Mainly because I gave too much weight to the unpleasant experiences. When you’re blaming yourself for all the pain pouring out of your subconsciousness you’re just repeating the cycle and training the mind to feel bad for feeling bad. As I also stopped meditating this cycle of self-blame solidified into an automatic habit. Neither did it not help that it feels good to wallow in self-pity when you think you deserve it. Needless to say I was depressed, short on energy and life felt meaningless and void of joy. It was hard facing this undercurrent of agony face-on and painful to let go of the solid tracks of negative feedback. It’s a challenge not trying to blame yourself for failing not blaming yourself...
But now the Dark Night has given way to a dawn of serene contentment. Even when not meditating I feel this undercurrent of peace and when I’m relaxed I simply feel myself fading in and out of space to a cosmic rhythm. (Not to imply that such a cosmic rhythm actually exists out there or anything like that but subjectively I feel like I’m being caressed by the Universe with every breath I take.)
I perceive two kinds of vibrations. The first one is always associated with a sensory object and it’s a subtle but regular variation between the object existing and not existing. I can compare the rate of these vibrations between objects and for slow vibrations I can even count individual waves such as my finger now vibrating at three times per one heart beat. For more rapid vibrations I sort of “hear” them but I cannot count the individual flashes of existence.
The second type of vibration that I perceive is of perception itself. My attention is constantly resetting itself and returning to the object of concentration. Sometimes it manifests as “bad key-framing”. For a split second at a time the experience is frozen in time but still moving in a simple way until another moment of perception replaces it. The simple predictor movement from one “key-frame” to the next doesn’t always line up and that’s how I notice that my attention is resetting itself few times per second.
This is fascinating and I wish more people would describe experiences like this in terms of familiar metaphors like key-framing instead of metaphors which only make sense to other accomplished meditators.
Maybe it’s just the writer in me, but I feel that any subjective experience can be communicated.
What is the difference between knowing consciously that identity is an illusion and intuitively feeling that identity is an illusion? I became a good reductionist long ago, but I still feel my own identity. I’m not sure if I would want to lose it.
I’m glad you liked the key-frame metaphor. I’m planning on writing a proper article about these experiences and developing a coherent language that makes sense to other physical algorithms trying to experience themselves as such. However I feel that I need to meditate a little longer to make sure I’m not making up too much nonsense.
The main difference between knowing that the self is an illusion and feeling it as such is control of the self-alief. Even without getting into a meditative state I can steer my experience from the habitual one that I use to socialize and become a flow of information between different conscious and semi-conscious modules. I cannot fully eliminate the experience of my habitual identity but I can see it jump between different modalities while still claiming to be the same agent that it was before jumping. It’s hard to believe in an unified self when you can see that the self-experience is just a way for the mind to control itself.
The disbelief becomes even stronger in meditation when the identity is simply not there even though the mind is clearly experiencing something and recording memories.
Losing your identity is not so bad. You can still keep it and be your habitual self whenever the wish to do so arises. This whole thing is pretty great but I still advice making sure that you really want to do this. There is hardly any way of going back.
Let me address some fears associated with losing oneself:
I could no longer feel happiness for myself!
There is great joy in becoming the experience of happiness itself. Bliss needs no target to feel good.
I could no longer feel pain! Life is meaningless without contrasts.
Just as there is joy there is pain. It simply has less chance of sticking anywhere because the sufferer can be toned down at will. To find meaning I recommend focusing on the pain of others and having compassion. They are made of the same bits as you are and there is no fundamental separation. (Compassion is not strictly required if it feels too touchy-feely but where’s the harm if done in moderation.)
I have done great things and all my achievements will be nulled if I disappear!
The autobiographical self won’t disappear but the memories won’t seem any different from any other autobiographical story. You won’t be special for yourself but you will be and feel special in the sense that you’ll be writing new chapters in the story. The achievements in your autobiography will be seen as events caused by inner and outer forces. Acknowledging the merit of others in your finest moments and feeling grateful is a wholesome experience. In my opinion feeling inclusive pride (aren’t we all great) is superior to feeling exclusive pride (I’m great, aren’t I) but do consider that feeling exclusive pride will feel like a bad joke. Luckily there just won’t be anyone left to get hurt by that joke. If you are motivated by exclusive pride you can take comfort in the fact that other people will think you’re great even after enlightenment. Freeing up the potential of the information processor under your skin will look like “you” doing all kinds of great stuff.
Thanks. I look forward to the article and wish you luck.
For vibration type 1, do different things have different frequencies? Do certain classes of things fall under similar frequency ranges? Do the frequency of particular objects change over time? Is that change predictable? (Ignore any questions that assume “yes” to the previous when the previous is “no”)
For type 2, is this just noticing how things are all the time (higher sensitivity), or is it a degradation in the quality of your perception or experience? As before, does the frequency change and if so, is it predictable?
edit, also, how bad was stage 3 for you?
Different things usually do have different frequencies but that depends on the meditative stage I’m in. Stage 2 usually involves different sensations bursting to the foreground of attention vibrating at their own pace and maybe even accelerating in frequency as they appear and decelerating when fading out. Stage 3 is a cacophony of subtle sensations all vibrating at different frequencies and slowly shifting about. Because everything is constantly fading out and stays in the background it’s hard to pick up any individual vibrations at all. Trying to “hear” it all at once takes effort but is doable. Now that I no longer experience mind numbing agony in stage 3 it’s actually quite an impressive ocean of dark tones. In stage 4 however all vibrations line up and everything that arises vibrates at the same stable frequency as everything else. Even the experience of space beats away at this global rhythm. All of the previously described vibrations are in the 2 to 6 Hz range but there are higher vibrations associated with more precise sensing like feeling the individual hairs on my eyebrow. The experience of the lower frequency vibrations vibrates too but at a higher pace. Another high frequency object is the emptiness between individual moments of conventional space at stage 4. Don’t ask me where this space beyond space vibrates into. I have no idea and luckily subjective experiences are not required to add up to a coherent system.
For type 2, this is how things are all the time. The mind is good at hiding the the details and discontinuities in its function and it takes a good look to see how things don’t always line up. While the actual discontinuities are hard to notice the periodic jostling around of attention might be easier to pick up. Attention is constantly pushing away and trying to find novel things. I can sort of feel every push when fixing my focus on a particular object. The frequency changes when I engage in an activity that requires more attention but it’s hard to pay attention to attention when I’m supposed to be paying attention to the activity. This difficulty of paying attention to attention may even mean that the discontinuity of experience and the subtle pushes of attention are separate phenomena. I just haven’t been able to experience them individually.
Stage 3 was awful for me. Mainly because I gave too much weight to the unpleasant experiences. When you’re blaming yourself for all the pain pouring out of your subconsciousness you’re just repeating the cycle and training the mind to feel bad for feeling bad. As I also stopped meditating this cycle of self-blame solidified into an automatic habit. Neither did it not help that it feels good to wallow in self-pity when you think you deserve it. Needless to say I was depressed, short on energy and life felt meaningless and void of joy. It was hard facing this undercurrent of agony face-on and painful to let go of the solid tracks of negative feedback. It’s a challenge not trying to blame yourself for failing not blaming yourself...
But now the Dark Night has given way to a dawn of serene contentment. Even when not meditating I feel this undercurrent of peace and when I’m relaxed I simply feel myself fading in and out of space to a cosmic rhythm. (Not to imply that such a cosmic rhythm actually exists out there or anything like that but subjectively I feel like I’m being caressed by the Universe with every breath I take.)