Does Direct Experience Really Triumph Over Anything Else?

[Valley2Mountain]

Let's say someone acts in a way that at that particular moment his direct experience of the situation is positive. Counting only on his direct experience, he countinues doing the same thing over and over again as it bring positive feelings for him. However, the person didn't realize that the negative consequences of that action will come only later in his life.

 

Can't you say that in this case, Direct Experience deceived the person while prior knowledge would have saved him from doing that action in the first place?

 

Examples:

•  Doing drugs

• Hedonism over strategizing for a better future.

 

 

Edited May 4, 2022 by Valley2Mountain

[Loop]

Direct Experience is not charged in any way, (Positive, Negative), those are thoughts. Truly he would not be operating from Direct Experience, noticing what is so, he is actually lost in thought about a thing separate from him that will bring some positive result and not realizing that. Satisfaction is nowhere but Now.  

Direct Experience untangles the deception, but until that happens you believe what you believe is Direct Experience, and on Life goes, never believe you have it, You are It, Be, falling every deeper in Love with each breath. 

[Aware Wolf]

I would draw a line here between "direct experience" Direct experience or immediate experience generally denotes experience gained through immediate sense perception. Many philosophical systems hold that knowledge or skills gained through direct experience cannot be fully put into words.

 

And Sensual experience: the condition of being pleasing or fulfilling to the senses.

 

You hit a key point in Buddhism. To reject sensuality and hedonism,  to view as a wrong path. Yes, sensual pleasures do provide pleasure, as the saying 'Sweet like honey on a razor.'  And neither do austerity and purity practices provide salvation. 

 

Buddhism favors the Middle Way. This may involve, certainly, reflection on past or planning for the future. Those who fetishize present moment, "The Now", often miss this. Wisdom is a thing and we don't need to disconnect contemplation and reflection. The Buddha and other sages did not. 

Edited May 4, 2022 by Aware Wolf

[Valley2Mountain]

@Aware Wolf Didn't understand the distinction you drew. What is the difference between  an

2 hours ago, Aware Wolf said:

immediate experience generally denotes experience gained through immediate sense perception

and the second term you said - "Sensual experience" (which I think doesn't have to be necessarily positive) ?

 

 

@Loop

2 hours ago, Loop said:

Truly he would not be operating from Direct Experience,

For the sake of grasping what is Direct Experience, 'cause I probably don't really understand what that is,  can you describe please what goes inside the head of a person who is truly operating from Direct Experience? Let's say in the example of doing drugs? Or Navigating through life (deciding what one wants to do in life)?

[Aware Wolf]

@Valley2Mountain

 

Take a drug experience. Cocaine triggers  the reward system in the brain and decreases the stress trigger. What is the direct experience? Snorting the coke. What does that feel like? Powdery? Dry? A bit arid? A metallic taste on the tongue? 

 

The brain changes are too subtle to be directly experienced. What we experience is the pleasure and absence of stress. Usually, although there's some who will interpret the brain changes unfavorable. There's people who when they first smoke pot, don't like the strange way it makes them feel. There's people who drink alcohol and don't like the feeling of losing control. There's college kids who take mushrooms and have a nice pleasurable trip, while a family who accidentally gathers some psychedlic mushrooms on a mushroom hunt, may go to the emergency room. 

 

What is the sensual experience of doing cocaine? It's much more than just the direct experience. It's the euphoric sensation involved with cocaine use. 

 

We eat chocolate. What is the direct experience? The taste, sweetness, texture, smell, etc. Then there's feeling, pleasurable, aversive or neutral. Then there's thoughts about it, "I love this imported German chocolate!"

 

#1

We are being whipped by a birch stick. There's sensations here. Direct experience. 

We don't like it. We call it pain. We seek to flee the scene or strike the person back.

 

#2 

We are being whipped by a birch stick. There's sensations here.

We paid for this therapy session featuring massage with birch sticks. There's sensations, pain, but we interpret it as a good kind of pain. We relax and enjoy it.

We tip the masseuse at the end. 

 

I think it's kinda funny when a husband or a kid asks their wife/mom about some food, "Do I like this?" -- they're experiencing some sensations and aren't sure whether to label it favorable or not. 

 

There's a famous sutta, the Bahiya sutta, and I like this sutta, because it's bare bones Buddha instructions on how to become realized:

 

Herein, Bahiya, you should train yourself thus: 'In the seen will be merely what is seen; in the heard will be merely what is heard; in the sensed will be merely what is sensed; in the cognized will be merely what is cognized.' In this way you should train yourself, Bahiya.

 

Why is this at all important?

 

It's important to know the reality of how things are and the framework and conceptual mapping that goes on. 

 

Practice: Ajahn Amaro's "Is that so?" Question your mapping and your judgements. 

 

 

 

Edited May 4, 2022 by Aware Wolf

[Loop]

6 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

 

For the sake of grasping what is Direct Experience, 'cause I probably don't really understand what that is,  can you describe please what goes inside the head of a person who is truly operating from Direct Experience? Let's say in the example of doing drugs? Or Navigating through life (deciding what one wants to do in life)?

Whats inside a head? 
Let me know when you find something in there.

 

It is as effortless as noticing what is going on. Verses thinking you know something, believing something. 
 

The noticing of the taking of a drug, & what was experienced afterwards, then noticing of that experience now being a thought, a fabrication, a story of what happened. Now. 
 

You are Life. Emotions are Life guiding you Home. Your passion for It, that is what to look for, deep in the Heart. 

[Winter]

Is Direct experience better than Indirect experience? Is the screwdriver better than the hammer?

 

To what goal? Nothing is "better" in the absolute. If you assume "Survival" is the goal then both are useful. Indirect experience may contains lies, indeed, but you are free to valide someone's indirect experience with your direct experience. Only ever trusting direct experience would mean you wouldn't ever believe anyone ever and only trusting indirect experience would mean you wouldn't ever know who is right as you are unable to see which idea matches your experience. Obviously both are needed to survive in society.

That being said it isn't natural to "only trust direct experience". Your feelings don't have this "problem" of ignoring indirect experience. If people warn you of consequences of your actions your feelings will guide you to investigate whether that concern people are raising is founded or not. Someone may ignore those warnings and pretend it feels good to do so but really I doubt they are being at true peace doing so.

 

Pleasure inducing drugs are indeed tricky because they can contribute to someone pretending they are happy when they aren't really. What's a better way to ignore the consequences of my actions than to incapacitate my brain's ability to make me feel their weight. But even the most addicted junkie knows that his high is temporary and that when his drug will wear off he will be back feeling the suffering associated to his actions and his life. Is this junkie making the mistake of trusting direct experience? No, he is making the mistake of trusting indirect experience. As he sits down and feels all sorts of feelings in his stomach, he judges those as "bad" and convinces himself that he would feel better if he got high again. None of this is true nor direct experience, it's basically hearsay, or indirect experience.

 

Notice that this idea that "Direct experience > Indirect experience" is a claim someone else made you are trying to challenge. That claim IS indirect experience. How can you know whether that claim holds water? Will you ever be satisfied with more indirect experience (people telling you their opinion)? Even if the message "Direct experience > Indirect experience" is silly when taken literally, it more or less means "have your own opinion, verify things for yourself". If you don't want to agree with the message then that's fine, have your own opinion.

Edited May 5, 2022 by Winter

[Mandy]

Do you have a problem right now? Ask this question whenever you find yourself suffering because think you have a problem. It's not about triumphing over anything, or ignoring problems, it's just realizing what actually is... peace that passeth understanding. It's never not now. 

[Phil]

In direct experience there isn’t anyone which does or doesn’t understand (what direct experience is, or anything else). There is no such thing as understanding as there is no understander or one which has, gives or receives understanding.

21 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

Let's say someone

The pointing of “direct experience” as a pointing to nonduality is already skipped over. There is no such thing as “direct experience”, or “nonduality”, no one which has a direct experience, no one which is nondual. No one is ever saved as there never was a strategizer.

[Valley2Mountain]

So If I understood you correctly, direct experience is what actually happening, not the interpretations of it that happen afterwards in the form of feelings and thoughts. Right?

[Phil]

@Valley2Mountain

Is there an afterwards in direct experience? Is there any true knowing something / anything just happened? 

Is “direct experience” a conceptualization too? 

Is “feelings and thoughts”… direct experience, conceptual, a thought that there are feelings and thoughts?

Is ‘a thought’ directly experienced, direct experience, or is ‘direct experience’ a thought?

[bardh]

2 hours ago, Phil said:

@Valley2Mountain

Is there an afterwards in direct experience? Is there any true knowing something / anything just happened? 

Is “direct experience” a conceptualization too? 

Is “feelings and thoughts”… direct experience, conceptual, a thought that there are feelings and thoughts?

Is ‘a thought’ directly experienced, direct experience, or is ‘direct experience’ a thought?

Direct experience is two words and directly experiencing is magic? Aight?

[Valley2Mountain]

16 hours ago, Phil said:

@Valley2Mountain

Is there an afterwards in direct experience? Is there any true knowing something / anything just happened? 

Is “direct experience” a conceptualization too? 

Is “feelings and thoughts”… direct experience, conceptual, a thought that there are feelings and thoughts?

Is ‘a thought’ directly experienced, direct experience, or is ‘direct experience’ a thought?

riddle-@Phil e,   what do you mean by asking "is there any true knowing something just happened"? Why wouldn't you be able to know if something just happened? From your point of view, everything that happens in this world is a thought and there are no facts?

 

They seem like leading questions, but ultimately what principle do you try to point to?

Edited May 8, 2022 by Valley2Mountain

[Phil]

5 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

riddle-@Phil e,   what do you mean by asking "is there any true knowing something just happened"?

 

Nothing. Really. 

5 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

Why wouldn't you be able to know if something just happened?

In direct experience, is there a you / a knower, a thing and a past actually found? 

5 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

From your point of view, everything that happens in this world is a thought and there are no facts?

In direct experience, is there a point of view, and or a your point of view?

5 hours ago, Valley2Mountain said:

 

They seem like leading questions, but ultimately what principle do you try to point to?

The truth of suffering. What is the anything else which isn’t direct experience? 

[Valley2Mountain]

On 5/4/2022 at 10:33 PM, Aware Wolf said:

We eat chocolate. What is the direct experience? The taste, sweetness, texture, smell, etc. Then there's feeling, pleasurable, aversive or neutral. Then there's thoughts about it, "I love this imported German chocolate!"

6 hours ago, Phil said:

n direct experience, is there a you / a knower, a thing and a past actually found? 

@Phil Isn't in this case:

The knower = We

The thing = Chocolate

Why wouldn't you be able to know that you just ate a chocolate?

[Phil]

@Valley2Mountain

If interested, investigate beyond the thoughts, into the actuality of a knower, we, chocolate, & past. 

[Valley2Mountain]

@Phil How do you actually do it?

[Phil]

@Valley2Mountain

Start with daily morning meditation. 

 

[Valley2Mountain]

Thank you 🙂

[Robed Mystic]

On 5/4/2022 at 10:54 AM, Valley2Mountain said:

Let's say someone acts in a way that at that particular moment his direct experience of the situation is positive. Counting only on his direct experience, he countinues doing the same thing over and over again as it bring positive feelings for him. However, the person didn't realize that the negative consequences of that action will come only later in his life.

 

Can't you say that in this case, Direct Experience deceived the person while prior knowledge would have saved him from doing that action in the first place?

 

Examples:

•  Doing drugs

• Hedonism over strategizing for a better future.

 

 

Most of the time knowledge is gained from direct experience in the first place.  But anyway, that's not what is meant when we say direct experience is King.   That's a strawman of what is being said.  Lets look at direct experience in a spiritual context - getting in touch with what is actual - what you are experiencing directly right now - vs what is conceptual- such as a dragon you are imagining in your mind.  The danger, when it comes to spirituality - is that you take spiritual teachings, which are conceptual, as a belief that they are true.  But you have not directly experienced them as True.   The words  "Direct Experience" are actually misleading in a sense because directly speaking, there is not a you that experiences.  There is just pure experience, you might say.  So, when you realize spiritual Truth directly you will actually become it, and that is direct as it can get.  In this context it triumphs all else - because all else is conceptual and not actual.  

That said, it can also apply to everything in life.  Unless you actually directly experience something for yourself, you probably will not gain knowledge and wisdom.  Someone can tell you something until you are blue in the face - but until you experience it for yourself you won't learn it and won't gain the wisdom that comes with experience.  So in this sense it triumphs concept as well.

Edited May 9, 2022 by Robed Mystic