2022-12-14-Gil-Insight Pentad (3 of 5) Fading of Reactivity

7:47AM Dec 15, 2022

Speakers:

Gil Fronsdal

Keywords:

fading

disenchantment

caught

projections

insight

nonreactive

fuel

talk

awareness

disenchanted

gladness

fed

desires

gaze

logs

begins

happiness

states

feel

good

So this is the third talk on the insight, pen Ted, which is the five qualities of practice five aspects of how we change and grow. That has a flow to it. There's a kind of evolution, there's a kind of a natural growth from one to the other. Of course, it doesn't always work in this linear way. But they another way of understanding this is that there's a five qualities that work together, they support each other and guide each other and feed into each other. And sometimes, maybe it goes in reverse order, but to the classic ways, this order, which I'm presenting them to you. So it begins with him, having insight described as seeing things as they are. And then from that comes disenchantment, breaking the spell of our desires and our projections onto things that are not so helpful. And then, today, we'll talk about something called fading away, sometimes translated as dispassion now I'll talk about the two choices. And then there's liberation. And then there's this interesting we'll talk on Friday, the knowledge of liberation. And, but today, the topic is be rāga fading away. And, and this is, as we see things as they are, as we really love it and get back up a little bit further. This insight, PENTA builds on the gladness pentathlon. And one of the great treasures, maybe the phenomenal forms of wealth that we can have is, inner well being some sense of inner contentment, happiness, gladness, joy, some kind of feeling of well being within, it's not easy to come to unnecessarily. But I think it's fair to say that most people will live a life without availing themselves of what is available, that if we slow down or take the time to really allow the inner life to settle and open, chances are, there's more well being there than most people allow for. But it's a treasure we want to stay close to, and build and know how to support and protect. Because what this does, when we sit down to meditate with this inner sense of well being, then we have a reference point for what takes us away from that, and what keeps us close to it. And so, when we then are settled enough then to begin seeing things as they are we can see that the ways that we are caught in them and chanted and then preoccupied with them, is takes us away from that well-being diminishes it and, and so of course it doesn't feel good to do it. And that seeing that distinction that this one feels like it's I feel more contracted I feel more tight. I feel more caught up in my my despair, depression, upset resentments, whatever, that doesn't really feel good. It takes it's a diminishment of some modicum of well being that's just being here can feel like that it's begins to be easier to question, the value of the projections, the interpretations, the ideas to desires, that keeps us hooked and fixated and caught up in something. And so there starts to be a process of disenchantment. These things are changing, constantly moving constantly and permanent. Arising and passing these things are you know, they're suffering that I'm caught in. There's, it's causing, causing more pain to be caught up in things. And there's something about being these things that I'm caught in, that are not useful to define myself by, to measure myself by. And so, a process of disenchantment, as I talked about yesterday. As we get disenchanted in the projections we have, then the strength of the projection the strength of the desires, the one Seeing and not wanting that's behind those projections that enchantment is begins to diminish, and it begins to fade away. And this fading away is supported by nonreactive awareness, as we become non reactively aware of what's happening here, and now, that's a, for many people, it's a very different way of being and business as usual. Business as usual as you go about our life is to have a reaction, and to be living in the reaction in the living in response to the reaction, participating it in a little bit, or a lot or a lot in way that feeds it and keeps it going and keeps the fire going. But by keep putting logs into the fire keeps burning. And so our anger will not persist as long as it does, unless we are putting more fuel in it, maybe repeating the story and to ourselves over and over again. And, and so the nonreactive awareness is doing something very different. It's ceasing, putting logs on the fire, it's leaving things alone, and we can watch the fire whatever it might be. But it watched fire, which we don't put logs back onto it. You know, in a little love little fireplace fire or something I can't fire will fade away by it's just die out. And you can if you have enough time, when evening watching a campfire, not being fed, you can watch the whole process kind of until it fades away and, and the flames disappear the hot coals cooled down. And so they're gonna do the same thing within that as we become, we see things as they are, as we become disenchanted with them. disenchanted with our promise and then how they're gonna they're gonna bring us happiness, which is a future happiness that unreliable compared to the inner happiness we know for develop through meditation, then the interest in those fades away the the desires and the aversions that go into those projections begin to fade away. And, and that fading away stronger in the nonreactive awareness that doesn't put fuel in the fire. And it's fascinating to watch that process of fading away. And some things will fade away quite quickly under the gaze of nonreactive awareness. Some thinking, you know, people sometimes struggle with thoughts and let go, the thoughts come back to the breath, let go of your thoughts come back, keep getting caught up until they are told just let yourself think. But bring careful gaze, look carefully on the fact that you're thinking really see it. And some people are so surprised by this new exercise, because they're thinking stops some something under the gaze of attention, thinking doesn't have the fuel that it needs, which is often done, kind of out of sight. But to read it to have the main fuel be seeing, which is no fuel at all, for some of these fires, things fade away. Sometimes it's fading away is very slow. Maybe days, weeks, months, maybe years for some things that are quite powerful habits within and some things can fade remarkably fast, at the speed by which things fade, has a lot to do with how much concentration we have, together with the nonreactive awareness. It's almost as if the more more concentrated we are to some degree, the more open space we have, for things to kind of unwind and and dissipate under that gaze of nonreactive awareness. And so part of this process of insight insight practice is to allow recognize and allow for the disenchantment, they no longer in chant with the things we used to kind of want and think was all about what we had to fix or get. And to allow for this fading away. This fading away is very important, whether it's fading away or the tensions in our bodies, and some of the tensions we can relax but some of that take a long time. It's just a it's a remarkable what a deep body work can happen by regular meditation and sitting in a good posture and things begin to relax and relax in a deeper and deeper way. And

and then things reactive emotions fade away. reactive thinking fades away. And I use the word reactive because some am motional states moods that we have are not reactive. And, and, and those are necessarily fade away the same way, they sometimes actually get bigger and stronger, because there's more room for them to flow into. They don't come from reactivity. They don't, they're not states that are being fed by the fuels by the, by the logs and the fire. It's more like, rather than, than the light of the fires, lights up the darkness. There's some emotional states like loving kindness. And that is more like the dawn, where the sun rises, and it feels everything. And, and it'll be there for the day, it's not going to fade away quickly. So. So, this enchantment, what are so what are you disenchanted with? What projections what investment of belief and value do you have you put in things consciously or unconsciously a lot of this is, you know, happens subconsciously that we think somehow it's so important. What it what do you invest yourself in that doesn't really serve you, that takes you away from this place of well being, trust the inner well being. And then allow for the fading away. And so the homework, if you'd like for this next day, is to spend some time, some high quality minutes during the day through the day, maybe having tea, maybe looking out the window, maybe going for a very nice stroll, maybe meditating a second time or third time today. And, and see if you can, in the giving room and space a little bit too, you know, some minutes of a Sabbath submitted so sacred pauses. And see if you do that, what fades away. If you give time that allows for fading away, what fades away from you. If you're relaxed and taking a break from the usual being caught up notice and engagement. Take breaks through the day and observe what's happening in you to see if you can see what fades away. And how is that good. What's the goodness? What's the value? What's the benefit you get you get from this fading away? So thank you for going along here in this insight journey. And we'll continue tomorrow. Thank you