No-Self and Impermanence as Insights

I think you’re mostly on the right track. The path is very simple but not easy. The simple part is getting a lay of the land. Yep, impermanence means stuff starts and ends. Yep, no-self means that there’s no essence to anything. But these statements have MASSIVE consequences on your mental life, if understood subtly and deeply. Simply understanding the statements logically is a fool’s game. Simply wanting to observe these things in action is the first step in a very long and personal journey (“the path”).

I will outline a few of my thoughts on these insights and what they mean and how they might help your practice in reducing dukkha. Warning: not theoretical, not religious or dogmatic, not from a textbook or scripture. Purely from my own experience.

About anatta.

Atta = soul. An = not. It means “not soul”. There is no soul or essence to your being. However, it’s not about erasing your selfhood or destroying your ego, despite what some may say. It’s not about proving that there’s no Self. That’s just another view to store in your library of views.

It’s about seeing the individual mind moments of contact, feeling, craving, clinging, becoming, etc… that lead to your dissatisfaction-stress. It’s about realising that the mind’s natural tendency to possess, try to possess, identify with, or otherwise claim sensations as “Me, Mine, or I” is unfounded and leads to dissatisfaction-stress.

The non-essence of your being is about realising potential and constellation. Potential is all the things the mind can be. Constellation is all the things the mind makes itself. It’s about this ebb and flow of fabrication and de-fabrication. The mind makes itself a fortress and guards it with special sacred ideas, and then that fortress is swept away and the guards die. This hurts. When the mind is attuned to its own pattern of fabricating itself a reality, and de-fabrication of that reality, it no longer feels the dissatisfaction-stress of having to let that reality fall to the wayside. E.g., “I am the business dude”. You get home but it’s no longer business time. It’s family time. Are you going to demand your partner hits the KPI of one dinner per night? Or say that their key deliverables are lacking? BUT on the other hand, shifting from business-you to family-you is kind of grating, because you’ve been going at it for 8-10 hours. A deep realisation and mastery of no-self is being able to shift those realities smoothly without any of the friction or stress. In your meditation your mind may jump from one fabricated reality to another, such as thinking about boobies and then realising that actually was meant to be concentrating on the breath — fabrication, de-fabrication, and fabrication. Eventually, the mind will jump to a new thing.

Regarding the observer, which seemingly cannot be separated from the sensations. What does that say about the observer if it is inseparable from the sensations it seemingly observes? This is a mental overlay our mind makes on sensations; to possess them. The inseparability is itself a big clue on what this observer really is. Also, play around with the sensation of the observer, it was designed for a purpose. It makes our lives feel continuous, contiguous, and unified. They are anything but. Just more feelings and ideas wrapped within each other.

About impermanence.

As you say, everything is coming and going. So, if everything is coming and going, what’s the use of trying to hold onto one thing over another? It’s another way of looking at no-self. Okay, business time is over; no point of holding onto that. Family time starts now — time to shift. If you’re clinging to business-you while it’s family time, you can’t enjoy family time.

Impermanence is about riding the waves of life, within yourself and the environment.

It’s about making the most of every moment and making them count as if the next second you will die (and, you actually do, in a way!). It’s about appreciating the time you have right here, right now, and not letting it pass.

It’s also about attention. There are billions of sensations happening all the time, competing for a scarce resource of your attention. What are you paying attention to? Is it wise and conducive to freedom and attaining your deep values? Or is it fleeting, a fairweather friend, something that has little to give and much to take?

You can watch all the frames and flickering you like. But there also has to be the understanding that this means there’s nothing to hold onto in that mess, other than what is wise. What is wise to hold on to? If impermanence is the only unchanging thing… Then what? This isn’t a logical game. It’s something to be understood pre-verbally/pre-rationally.

Seeing either.

No-self and impermanence are INSIGHTS not observations. They are to be known, fully. No-self and impermanence are not things to be only observed, but understood, consciously and unconsciously. They’re to be acted upon. They become instinctual, almost. In actual fact, I’d say that observing no-self or impermanence or dukkha is really just the first step in a very long process of ingraining them into your life, and living according to their wisdom.

And that takes repetition, it takes courage, and it takes grit.

Ultimately, no-self and impermanence prepare you for the greatest journey that’ll happen to you, the greatest letting go — your death. If one has let go of life and death as aspects that condemn us, they are truly deathless. That’s where no-self and impermanence can take you. If you were that cancer patient with the attainments, you’d say, “I’m on another great journey and I’ll savour it.” If there is no essence to the death, you are free to fabricate an understanding of it as you please. If each moment arises and passes, then your attention on joy leads to more joy.

Don’t fool yourself into a phenomenological view of the attainment. They are incredibly subtle, and deep, and infuse themselves into our entire mental lives.

The path is very simple, not easy.

Enjoy the journey, it looks like you’re in a good place and ready to make some big strides in furthering the ending of dukkha.

Best wishes and regards