the power of suggestion

Interesting article on placebo/nocebo effect in a wide variety of cases:

blogs.plos.org/neurotribes/2012/07/16/ar...rugs-making-us-sick/

I'm not sure this is news, at least it seems pretty common sense. Telling someone a drug may cause nausea or headaches makes it more likely they will get nausea and headaches... people with cancer who believe they are doomed to die in a certain year (because of astrology) are more likely to die that year, and so on.

What I intended to add, and why that article was interesting to me, was that to me this supports the importance of intention and belief in things like meditation practice. Believing it's possible to learn to meditate, that it's possible to awaken, using tricks to convince yourself (believe in) the efficacy of certain methods... (tricks meaning hacks or whatever, not something negative). When you see someone else try something, or you are motivated by confidence in certain teachings, or you trust that a certain practice will help you, that seems to me to be playing with much the same aspect of our psychology and physiology.

What came to mind after reading your second post was that many of the temporary benefits of experiential attainments like stream-entry are probably due to placebo as often as genuine change - if not MORE often. I can't tell you how many times I've read forums posts that go something like this: "I just had a HUGE fruition, and now there's no more self! No more suffering! It is finished!" In most cases it doesn't last, and people either admit they were wrong or adjust their model to include some higher attainment with even less suffering and less selfing.

We're told by some teachers that when we have such-and-such an experience, it means such-and-such has changed. Even when this may not be actually true, we experience it as true because the stage was set for it. Thus the importance of continually refining one's View.

These things are motivating, though, even if they are temporary or illusory, and I think that's okay. The danger is in getting attached to your own fantasies of how things should and shouldn't be. But a period of massive relief and bliss after a shift does act as a sort of reward, too, before one settles back into looking at reality with a clearer eye.

But for sure with a poor View or bad guidance this ends up being a mess, a diversion, or a trap.

More than that (this article was one a several things that sent me off on a ponder, clearly), the whole POINT (or at least a good part of it) of awakening is that it's not about you. It's not about getting what you want, fulfilling your fantasies, conquering your enemies, achieving high status, becoming extra special, and all that. That's a big ole pile of clinging and aversion.

To think you can somehow wake up while still hanging on with both fists to all your clinging and aversion is bizarre. But not uncommon.

Good points. I read something in one of Ngak'chang Rinpoche's books yesterday that spoke to what we're talking about. More or less, he said that perceptions - including meditation-induced experiences - aren't so bad, so long as we don't react to them with, "... therefore, I am." For example, "I had such-and-such an experience. Therefore, I am enlightened/ done/ special" etc. Referential concepts quickly concretize, becoming self-conjured prisions, setting the stage for frustration down the road. The fact that people (including me) tend to frame reality into being about "me" is hilarious, if you take it lightly.

The good news is that such misunderstandings are par for the course, and are not the end of the world. If they were the end of the world, no one would ever wake up.

It really is quite a delight to share your discovery of Ngak'chang Rinpoche's writing, Jackson. Another horrifying and liberating thing he has said about attainments/liberation is that the one kind of student he can't teach is someone who professes that he/she wants enlightenment 'more than anything else'-- my understanding is that such a project illustrates too little insight and honesty about oneself to make one amenable to teaching; our profound ambivalence must have its due, if we're honest. We DO want the spectacular change of 'enlightenment'-- as long as it doesn't involve the discomfort, fear, confusion, looking uncool, etc. that change entails.

He's said that what we really want is to get right to the very brink-- then turn around and admire our magnificent achievement. It takes a lot of guts to grin and own the truth of that one!

That's funny, Kate, because I can dig up the email I sent to my teacher, at some early stage of my meditation practice, which ended with the line "I must awaken, I must, it's the only thing that matters." Which is, yes, pretty damn funny eventually.

I also remember quite clearly some point not too much later where I completely forgot what it was I ever wanted (ie what my fantasy of awakening had been or why I thought it was important).

The thing about the "We DO want the spectacular change of 'enlightenment'-- as long as it doesn't involve the discomfort, fear, confusion, looking uncool, etc. that change entails." is so very true.

I see it, like just yesterday, in a couple of acquaintances I talked to who were in the throes of self-pitying anxiety and depression. They both expressed that idea in their own ways. "I want this to change and that to change and the other to change. But *I* don't want to change. At all. Not one single bit." I wanted to say (because this is not the first time I've been invited to hear the download of self-pity) "how's that working for you so far?" but I said it far more obliquely. But I also came home and realized I may very well have run out of interest in participating in those semi-regular "invite my friend for coffee so I can dump a load of self-pity" sessions. What's the point?

Kate, I appreciate your having brought the Aro literature to my attention, which first happened quite a while ago. I admit it took me a while to get comfortable with the lineage, mostly because - by my own conventions - the Aro lamas come off as a little... peculiar? Maybe just weird. Reflecting on this, I'm not sure why this would be an obstacle, since my wife and I often joke about how the "W" in Wilshire stand for weird. (If you met my dad, you'd really understand!)

To "turn around and admire our magnificent achievement" seems to be a common desire. I know it quite well. It's not only that we want to personally admire our own achievement, but we also want others to admire how enlightened we are - especially on the internet!

Ona, I also frequently bump into the "if only things were different, I'd be happy" from others... well, and I suppose I probably do it sometimes, too. I sometimes point out that "well, this is how it is right now, and maybe things won't change right away. How about not waiting for things to change before doing those things you want to do?" This question isn't usually taken very seriously. Rather, it's blown off with an "I don't know" followed by more talk about how bad things are, and how much happier life would be if things were different. Changing the way one participates with the world is often the more sensible approach, but for some reason people find it unacceptable. Such individuals tend to see themselves as "realisitc" which is sort of ironic, don't you think?

I like the quote attributed to the Dalai Lama - better to put on slippers than try to carpet the world.

That's a good one. I found a site that attributed a similar saying to Ramana Maharshi:

"Wanting to reform the world without discovering one's true self is like trying to cover the world with leather to avoid the pain of walking on stones and thorns. It is much simpler to wear shoes."

Of course, the reference wasn't provided. Maybe this saying has been passed around spiritual scenes for longer than we realize.

That quote about shoes vs. the path must have been around a long time, and each iteration seems to ascribe it to some venerable prior master; I have a vague recollection of a much earlier attribution-- Gampopa or somebody...

Lest anyone get put off by my quote about fanatical students, from NCR, I should add that he also mentions that the surest way to NOT have something is to pursue it with great intensity. So the statement is as much a pointing-out as a dismissal, as it might seem.

And me-- well, it's only taken a decade for the penny to drop!

Sometimes teachings are so perfectly apt at a certain place, for a certain student. Like the one about chasing after enlightenment.

Vince tweeted one yesterday, quoting someone who said "You will awaken when you want to awaken." I thought about each of the people I talk to about their practice, and how each of them would respond to that phrase. Pretty much all of them would find it extremely frustrating.

There is a certain kind of student at a certain stage who benefits from being deliberately provoked, teased or given frustrating things to mull over. One like that, stuck in a late stage of practice, might find sitting with that phrase really beneficial. You can look at wanting and what it means to want something, and how you must be wanting in the wrong way and so on.

But if I said that to a typical beginner or even middle-stages sort of person, they would probably just think "but I do, I do, so what the hell does that mean?" and feel discouraged.

I thought about Vince's quotation a little bit and although I think you are right in that it could cause frustration, I also think that it can make one honestly look inward to see if there is something within him/her that may have been overlooked that could block the way to awakening. It's as if it's a catalyst for introspection, I guess just like any other teaching.

Ona - I didn't see Vince's tweet, but then again, I haven't been viewing twitter feeds lately. I agree that this pointer could be either frustrating or inspiring, depending on where one is at with their practice. When I read it, what came to mind was, "You will awaken when you're ready to have confidence in what is already here." I'm not at all saying that this is what Vince intended to say, but rather giving an example of just how much variation there is in how pointers affect the minds of individual practitioners.

Jake2 - I like that you referred to Vine's pointer as a "catalyst for introspection." Regardless of what comes to mind, it's bound to turn one's attention to reflect on their motivations for practice. I think most of us could spend a bit more time looking into these things!

Kate Gowen wrote: Lest anyone get put off by my quote about fanatical students, from NCR, I should add that he also mentions that the surest way to NOT have something is to pursue it with great intensity. So the statement is as much a pointing-out as a dismissal, as it might seem.

And me-- well, it's only taken a decade for the penny to drop!

Duly noted, Kate. From what little I know about NCR's teaching, I think your saying "the statement is as much a pointing-out as a dismissal" is right on the money. The problem with pursuing enlightenment above and beyond anything else in life is that it drives an illusory wedge between awakening and life-as-it-is. From a nondual point of view, such a desire is rooted in pure malarchy. Therefore, pointing practictioners away from splitting themselves is a way of simultaneously pointing them toward the nondual view... or so it would seem to me

Jackson Wilshire wrote: ...The problem with pursuing enlightenment above and beyond anything else in life is that it drives an illusory wedge between awakening and life-as-it-is. From a nondual point of view, such a desire is rooted in pure malarchy. Therefore, pointing practictioners away from splitting themselves is a way of simultaneously pointing them toward the nondual view... or so it would seem to me

Again this comes around to today's personal obsession, which is the appropriateness of teachings for different individuals. A student who is just starting out and full of doubt and needing motivation might do well to be pushed into a malarky-full overzealous desire, because it will help them gain some momentum and "faith" in the process. A student who is further along and beginning to get unproductively obsessive about awakening being some "thing" they can get or achieve, or is not bringing their practice to the world in a healthy way would be well served with a pointer like the one Kate mentioned.

I think this is on my mind because it is so clear we each take something different from a teaching, talk, pointer or book, depending on what we are caught up in at the moment. Which is cool, really. Interesting.