Natural Samadhi

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Rumpelteazer
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Natural Samadhi

Postby Rumpelteazer » Mon Jun 06, 2011 4:54 pm

We took a new look at this somewhat neglected area of H.H.'s teaching. One member of the group had commented that our previous week's meeting focussed on the 'highlands' and that it would be helpful if sometimes we could also cover some practical ideas in the 'lowlands'. In response to this, the paper includes a practical programme which provides a path towards the practice that H.H. suggests of extending moments of natural Samadhi, starting from the 'lowlands', progressing to the 'middle-lands' and pointing in the direction of the 'highlands'.
Natural Samadhi.doc
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As previously, here are just the questions raised and not the answers given:
  • I thought Samadhi was a very high state - not something that is part of ordinary life?
  • What does it mean when it says "if one can become aware of these broken samadhis, no other samadhi need attract one?"
  • This is rubbish - how can one see gaps between desires? Surely the only important thing is to stop and be still between activities?
  • Is Samadhi really possible during activity?
  • Further up the mountain, is it more like 'desires between the gaps'?

Dots
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Re: Natural Samadhi

Postby Dots » Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:36 pm

Surely anything done with complete attention gives rise to natural samadhi. A small example - If I am not attentive or even in an impatient mood and I'm cooking - the results are certainly less than perfect. But if I am concentrating and valuing every gesture or activity with one-pointed attention, the cooking goes well, the food is fine and the inner peace is there. Isn't this what is meant by natural samadhi in the 'lowlands'?

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Rumpelteazer
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Re: Natural Samadhi

Postby Rumpelteazer » Sat Aug 20, 2011 5:24 pm

Lovely to see you back on the forum, Dots.

I think you are right that one-pointed attention encourages Natural Samadhi, because doing something like cooking in the way you describe will generate sattva and I am sure that is a pre-requisite. In my own experience the gap more usually occurs when the attention is broadened and relaxed into passive (allocentric) attention, which is normally after the activity has stopped (unless it is something that doesn't require full one-pointed attention). It's then good to try to bring this into the next activity, but unfortunately this is often interrupted by another desire. Others may see it differently and will perhaps contribute their own experiences to this topic?

Although we are told they happen very frequently during the day, I think it might be quite hard to become aware of moments of Natural Samadhi in 'the lowlands' as represented by Stage 1 of the programme in Annex 1 of the paper, as they are so infinitesimally short. (The levels of the mountain referred to above are not official definitions - they were just invented by a member of Cheltenham group - and are open to very different interpretations.) In my experience awareness and extension of them started happening automatically after quite a lot of practice along the lines of Stage 2, when one gets close to the 'middlelands' which is where Stage 3 starts. And when spotted, one can sometimes extend them further. When extended to several minutes, these moments of Natural Samadhi seem to be characterised by calmness, happiness and love of everything and everyone around.

The three basic practices of self-observation, attention and stillness seem to be the key.


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