Similarly we are conditioned to look for fulfillment outside of us through centuries and generations. Fortunately at some point we come to a conclusion that we cannot find lasting fulfillment outside of us and start to notice an underlying sense of friction and dissatisfaction. When I reached that point, I wanted to find a way to deal with this underlying friction and sense of un-fulfillment.

After many years of exploring various traditions, courses, books and practices like Buddha’s teachings (Zen, Mahayana, Teravada, Shingon), Patanjali’s yoga sutra, bhagwad gita, vendanta, tao te ching, Ramana Maharishi’s teachings, Nisargadatta’s teachings, kriya yoga and Goenkaji’s vipassana. What resonated with me was the oldest teaching of Buddha as it gave a clear, practical and logical path. I was also able to experience the path during the 10 day vipassana course.

Before we go further, it’s important to know that most mindfulness teachings assume that one has come to a realization that fulfillment may not be found outside of oneself and one is now ready to look inwards. I liked how one of the ancient authors started his teaching - “Therefore, let’s begin the teaching”. Usually, there has to be something before therefore as the conclusion comes after it. It was explained in the translations that he was pointing towards a state of readiness before starting his teachings. I assume that is the case for you too.

First let’s start with some progress markers of regular practice. At some point we would start to see these amazing qualities in us that build on each other. We do have to remember though that we are not practicing to achieve these markers, we are practicing to eliminate friction and achieve lasting fulfillment in life.

Mindfulness - We would be able to stay present longer, we will become better listeners, observe the beauty around us and wouldn’t find the mundane boring

Investigation/Clarity - Our mind would have more clarity, we would be able to investigate our feelings and thoughts much more clearly

Energy/Stamina - The more we sit, the more stamina we will be able to build to sit longer. We will find ourselves more energetic for longer in everyday life

Joy - At times there will be an experience of natural deep joy during meditation and it will flow through our days even after the session

Tranquility - Slowly people around us will be telling us that we seem much more at peace and patient even in situations that might have aggravated us before

Concentration/Focus - We would find that we are able to maintain concentration longer, not only when we are meditating but also throughout the day

Equanimity - This is much harder to experience. During a retreat or after many days of long sessions, we can experience a completely steady mind. We are able to observe the feelings and thoughts as they arise and see how they lead to pleasant or painful reaction. We would be able to just smile at this process and not create further thoughts or action.

At the highest level the path is divided into 4 stages of awakening according to Buddha’s oldest teaching. The first stage is Stream entry. Once we cross this stage, the current of the stream takes us forward much more easily, getting there is the hard part. At this first stage the illusion of a separate self shatters. We realize that “I” is not in this body and it is neither separate from the universe nor a permanent thing as we believed it to be. The next three stages further refine our realization until the self-view completely falls away. We can discuss them after we have reached the first stage. After the first stage, friction in life will be drastically reduced and we will feel more aligned with the flow of life.

To get to stream entry, we need 3 realizations:

1. Suffering/Friction is a feeling when things don’t go as we wished or we have to put up with things we don’t like. With consistent meditation practice we can not only see suffering in our daily lives, we can also see the cause of this suffering

2. Impermanence - We realize that our feelings, sensations, thoughts are all impermanent including our body. We also see how change (impermanence) is woven in the fabric of the universe

3. No-‘I’ - We realize that ‘I’ has no control over our feelings, sensations and thoughts. Moreover, we can differentiate between observation and attention, eventually realizing that ‘I’ is fluid, impermanent just like our thoughts. We also find that attachment to ‘I’ is the cause of friction. At the stream entry stage we have a direct and irreversible knowing but self view will truly be eliminated by the fourth stage

There are primarily 2 types of meditations to reach these realizations:

1. Stillness meditation has 2 components, one is to still the body. Like when we stop moving glass of dirty water, the dirt settles down after some time. Similarly a still body helps still the mind. The second is to collect our scattered attention and make it more concentrated, like scattered light when concentrated becomes laser. Only then we will be able to use our single pointed attention to come to the intended realizations.

   
   Initially when the attention is too scattered, it could be quite hard to get hold of our attention. Stillness requires patience and takes time, it cannot be rushed.

   There are many techniques to create stillness and aggregate our scattered attention e.g. observing the breath, chanting, counting the breath. I found that it’s easier to concentrate the attention around movement of something like breath or sound instead of something static like a point on the forehead.

   A lot of us struggle to find the right technique for Stillness meditation because there is so much to choose from and we also lack experience at the beginning. I usually choose between 3 techniques depending on how I am feeling. If I am feeling too scattered I’ll focus on meditation music. If I am fairly calm, then I’ll just aggregate my attention under my nostrils and feel my breath. If I am not calm and not too scattered, I’ll count my breathing usually from 10 - 1 and repeat.
   

2. Insight meditation. Once we have practiced aggregating our attention we can then use this single pointed attention to investigate the nature of our experience. This practice will help us realize the 3 realizations mentioned earlier and come to stream entry.
   
   We sit still and move our attention through each area of our body, as small an area as possible. We don’t stop, we keep the attention moving from top to bottom and back to the top. Insight meditation has 3 components or aspects of investigation. In one sitting we investigate only one aspect.
   

   1. One is to observe the impermanence of feelings, sensations and thoughts. We observe how feelings, sensations and thoughts begin and end as we move our attention through each area of our body. We realize that not only all sensations and feelings are impermanent, our physical body is also always changing.
      

   2. The second component is to notice how our mind likes and wants more of the pleasurable sensations and how it wants to get rid of painful sensations. By not reacting to our minds automatic reflex, we realize how our mind creates friction by being in opposition of impermanence
      

   3. The third component is to look for an “I” behind feelings, thoughts and sensations. We find all thoughts, feelings, sensations arise on their own and there is no “I” behind them. We also notice what actually is moving the attention is thought. We realize that the act of observation is mistaken for an unchanging, permanent observer. Ultimately realizing the real friction is caused by believing in permanence of “I”

Putting it all together, teaching can be mapped to the 4 traditional truths:

1. The truth of existence suffering, friction or unfulfillment in life

2. The truth of origin of suffering, it’s not realizing impermanence and no-I

3. The truth of cessation of suffering, it’s possible to cure friction and achieve lasting peace without changing the external world

4. The truth of the path, it’s the 4 stages of awakening, 2 types of meditations

We might think how can I do all this in 15-30 min a day :) A short daily practice with 1-2 hours of group meditation weekly or monthly can deepen our realizations and help us be more consistent on a daily basis.

Wherever we are starting from, practice itself will show us the way. Answers are out there, and they are looking for us. It’s the question that drives us. When we find the right question, the answer will be there!

I couldn’t find the observer though, according the Buddha there is no observer, there is only observation, so I didn’t try hard. I felt that this exercise was a good way to know the observation that takes place. I assume observation (we can also call it awareness or consciousness) is taking place even when we are not attentive as it always seems to be there as soon as attention is given to itself

So, following and observing the movement of attention was a great technique for me during sitting meditation or while being mindful. It helped differentiate minds ability to perceive things and the observation of that process

The next question that arose was Who/What moves the attention. It cannot be the Observation so it must the thought. In meditation we can fairly early see that thoughts just come and go on their own. Thoughts can grab the attention and thoughts can free the attention. Seems the attention does not have control over the thoughts, thoughts have control over attention.

This sort of explains Buddha’s formulation on dependent origination i.e. things are happening due to other things but there isn’t a doer or the first cause.

This can only be understood after experiencing what is written not by reading. If you came across this article and a thought arises to try out the technique, then there will be understanding. In this article when referring to “I”, it’s the “I” perceived by the mind which is just another thought.

In Buddha’s teaching he explained when our mind perceives something it automatically decides if its good or bad based on our past experiences. If the perception goes in the good bucket, good feelings are created, if it goes in the bad bucket, not so good feelings are created. This activity of the mind can be experienced in meditation. I was able to see this happen in my mind during the 10-day Vipassana course, probably after day 6 or 7. There is another thing I felt there which was called equanimity, will get into it in a few min 🙂

Happiness seems to be correlated to dopamine. When the mind decides that a sense perception is good, dopamine released. I came across the book Dopamine Nation in which Dr. Anna mentions a sort of seesaw in our brain. On one side is dopamine and on the other side are the gremlins (her term for nueroadaptation). Whenever dopamine is released, the seesaw is swings towards pleasurable feelings. But very soon the gremlins hop on to the other side of the seesaw to bring back the balance and those pleasurable feelings disappear. This in a way explains why our pleasurable moments are short lived. We also develop an attachment to pleasure and aversion to pain, so we want to keep doing things that will tilt the seesaw towards pleasure and constantly chase the next thing to give us a dopamine boost, the more the dopamine, the more are the gremlins trying to tip the scale on the other side. Gremlins are also slow in getting off the seesaw, and that explains why we feel more pain than pleasure in this pursuit

My experience with equanimity suggests that we cannot describe it as a feeling, perhaps more like a state of mind. During introspection sessions when I was at Vipassana, Buddha’s teaching on attachment and aversion became a bit more experiencial. When a perception was deemed good by the mind, the pleasure arose and the mind went beyond and wanted more of it. For example when I tasted something that was deemed good, I wanted to eat more of it. I could sense a little attachment to the good feeling that came with eating the good food. Similarly when I tasted something that wasn’t to my liking, I could sense a little aversion to the feeling and then towards that food.

In simple terms, a sense perception is deemed good or bad, then a good or bad feeling arises, then attachment or aversion is created. This process is constantly happening in our mind with almost every sensory input i.e. every time see, hear, taste and touch anything. During the 10 days at Vipassana we learned to develop single pointed concentration. Looking at the workings of our mind with this single pointed concentration we could see this process fairly clearly. I could see that the dopamine and gremlins were constantly playing on the seesaw. Equanimity arises when we stop this game or reduce it considerably. When the seesaw is at equilibrium, we feel a deep peacefulness. It’s not indifference, but a profound non-attachment to both pleasure and pain.

According the Buddha the best way to develop equanimity is to stop our mind right after the good or bad feeling before attachment or aversion develops. If we pause after the feeling, the mind’s seesaw will return to balance fairly quickly, as described by Dr. Anna. The act of being mindful to this process will reduce our chances of developing attachment or aversion.

In the state of equanimity our actions are not guided by our attachment or aversion. In other words our motivation is no longer driven by carrot (dopamine) or stick (fear of pain), when in a state of equanimity. We feel much more freedom in choosing our actions and motivation.

It wasn’t easy to get to experiencing the state of equanimity but once I did the pursuit of happiness seemed less important. It is also hard for me to maintain an equanimous state of mind though, nevertheless it’s known now so it’s easier to break free from attachment and aversion cycle when it becomes too much.

In conclusion, happiness is short lived and the current culture of pursuit of the next thing in order to stay happy is not necessarily the only way to be. We can choose to experience a more lasting equanimity, becoming free from the need to chase dopamine rewards and allowing us to consciously select our pursuits and motivations.