See – Hear – Feel

I’ve been asked to do a little write up about basic insight meditation technique, and while I’m in no ways a super experienced and esteemed dharma teacher, I am quite familiar with this technique as I do it every day (sometimes multiple times a day!)

For further and more in depth reading into this style of meditation practice please check out Daniel Ingrams “Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha”, Culadasa’s “The Mind Illiuminated”, or you can just go more OG and read

Mahasi Sayadaw’s “Manual of Insight”.  For teachers I would recommend the esteemed Shinzen Young, who has various online resources you can check out.

If you’re going to stick with me however, I can certainly get you started.

What we’re doing

In order to see through reality, we need to break it down into individual parts.  Our brains do a great job of blending experience together so you can’t see where one sensing experience ends and the next begins.  It’s hard to separate you (”SELF”) from what you’re seeing and experiencing.  When we break all that down through meditation you can start to see how your reality is constructed, how your emotional states interact and influence your sensory experiences, and how your sensory experiences (amazing, horrible, and neutral) can all be broken down into smaller units of individual moment to moment sense awareness.

Why?

Why would you want to do that?  Well, for one thing when you are able to break things down to that level and see the truth of the way your experiences are constructed, it’s much easier to deal with intense emotion and difficulty as it arises in life.  The ability to see things as they are and experience emotions as they are without trying to change them or getting too caught up in them is a great way to reduce daily suffering in your life.  This ability to feel and experience deeply but not to fight our experience or attach to our experience is called Equanimity.  There’s also enlightenment, which isn’t too bad either.

*note – this is different than APATHY – which is disconnected. In this practice we cultivate an intense connection to our experience rather than a disconnection*

Components of reality – the Sense doors

We typically are tracking 3 senses in this technique – See, Hear, and Feel.

See

– Can be anything you see with your physical eyes when they are open, as well as anything you see with your eyes closed (images, dancing lights, visually replaying memories etc)

Hear

– Can be anything you hear with your physical ears, as well as anything you hear with that narrator that lives inside your head that feeds you thoughts and opinions on everything.

Feel

– Is just about any other sense experience.  We lump “taste” and “smell” into this one too.  The important thing is that this just isn’t physical feeling like the breeze blowing on your face – it’s also emotional feeling.  So if you suddenly feel anger arise – that’s also a “Feel” state.

Noting vs Labelling

In this technique you’ll simply see which of the 3 sense doors above are activated – which pull your attention away – and first note and then label them. SO EASY right?!  In order to do this you need to know the difference between noting and labelling.

Noting

is when you NOTICE an experience in awareness – for example, you NOTICE that you feel a breeze.  Perhaps you haven’t fully translated that experience into mental words yet and brought it into narration – but you’ve NOTICED what is happening.

Labelling

is putting that noticing to words with a single word label such as See, Hear, or Feel.

The distinction is important, since as you get more advanced the labeling might become cumbersome – at which point you will drop activating your language centers with labeling, and instead simply note all experience.

Technique 

Step One – Access Concentration
The first 5 minutes of every meditation always consists of what I like to see as “letting the dust settle”.  The first few minutes I tune in I just become very aware of all the white noise I have going on in my head.  So to get started just take a few deep breaths and notice what’s there today.

Next we’ll do a simple breath counting technique for 5 minutes to develop access concentration – in this state of conciousness your mind is settled from the day to day enough that you can really focus on your object of meditation – in this case the breath.

So simply count your breaths up and down from 5, counting on the out breath and in breath.

Breathe in (ONE)
Breathe out (TWO)
Breathe in (THREE)
Breathe out (FOUR)
Breathe in (FIVE)

Then back down to one again.  Do this for about 5 minutes (10 is better!)
If your mind wanders off – that’s totally fine, that’s what minds do even with lots of experience.  Just start back up with the counting.

The counting is there to remind you of what you’re doing, if you lose the count it’s typically because your mind has wandered off just for a moment – sometimes in a stealthy under the radar way that you’re not aware of.  Just stick with the counting as closely as possible, and pick up where you left off if you lose it.  No big deal

Step Two – Noting and Labeling for senses
After 10 minutes (you can use an app like the Insight Timer that allows you to program in interval bells) – you can start with the noting and labelling.

Imagine yourself like a cat, waiting in front of three mouse holes, one for each of the senses.  Notice where your attention is drawn to one, and then at the end of the out breath label it “see” “hear” or “feel” based on the breakdown above.

I find it easiest to do a rythmic noting, though some will note consistently – for me just labeling at the end of the out breath works great.

It’s that simple!

Optional Variation – Noting for Feeling States Only
This technique can also be augmented – so that instead of noting “see”, “hear” or “feel, you are just noting for feeling states.

So for example, you can sit for 15 minutes and ONLY note your emotional experience so “Angry” “Sad” “Peace” etc.  If you have a hard time identifying emotions, you can look in the body to see where they might exist as contractive or expansive energy (that feeling of being “punched in the gut” or like your “heart is going to explode” etc) and what they might be.  Sometimes an emotion arises and it’s not clear what it is, or there is no word for it – these feelings we label “something” or “don’t know”

This is a very effective tool for getting in touch with your emotional body if you’re the type to never really know what you’re feeling at any given time.  If that’s the case you should be noting feeling states like it’s going out of style!  In this technique you can also continue to note for Feeling Tone and Attachment (as outlined below) which can prove to be very enlightening.

Step Two Point Five – Dependent Arising
After a while, you might begin to notice the connection between senses and experiences, this is called Dependent Arising.

A simple example of this would go as follows:  there is a bird outside that chirps.  Your attention is drawn to the noise and you label “hear” and in your mind you see an image of the bird and you label “see” then perhaps you remember your childhood pet bird and feel a fondness arise and label “feel”.  The fondness carries you off into a memory of being a child and falling down on your bike, and you label “see” for the seeing experience, and “feel” for the sadness that arises, and “hear” for any self talk associated with the memory.  The sadness carries you off into another thought (hear for the narrator) that illicits a visual memory (see) and an emotional experience (feel), and then a car drives by outside and you label “hear” etc etc etc.  These chains of experience are always functioning in our awareness, even when we’re not paying attention to them.

This example, while simple, contains a deep truth about the nature of our experience.  It is helpful to notice the connections if they arise, but the instruction is to not get carried away by memories or thoughts.  However, you undoubtedly will – and when you do simply return like a cat to the mousehole and begin again to simply note what arises.

Step Three – Optional second labelling for feeling tones (Vedana)
You might need to sit with the See/hear/feel technique above for several days in order to get the hang of it.  Once you feel comfortable with it, you can add a second label for Feeling Tone (in pali it’s called Vedana pro: VEDNA)

Feeling tones can be as complicated as you want them to be, but like the senses we try and simplify things by simply using the labels Pleasant, Unpleasant, and Neutral

So in addition to the basic “see”, “hear”, “feel” label you’ll add a second label for whatever feeling tone above is associated with that sense experience.

Example
(Bird Chirps) Hear, Pleasant
(see bird mentally) See, Neutral
(feeling of fondness) Feel, Pleasant
(car screeching) Hear, Unpleasant

Etc Etc, you get the idea.

Step Four – Optional labeling for attachment and aversion
After you get the hang of two step labelling, you can add a third label for how much you are attached or averse to the experience you’re having.  The labels I like to use are “Wanting” “Not Wanting” and “Peace”

Example
(sadness about lost dog) Feel, Unpleasant, Not Wanting
(sadness about lost dog) Feel, Unpleasant, Not Wanting
(happy visual of playing with dog) See, Pleasant, Wanting
(Feeling of Happiness) Feel, pleasant, wanting
(Hear car drive by) Hear, Neutral, Peace
(Annoyance for car disturbing meditation) Feel, Unpleasant, Wanting <– self righteous anger is always an interesting one to witness!
(See car drive by on mental screen) See, Neutral, Peace

BONUS POINTS – sometimes when feelings are super intense like intense anger or sadness, it’s helpful to just spend your entire meditation period noting and labelling the fluctuations in that emotional state.  You might just find over time that you are able to shift emotion experience from intense feelings of “not wanting” to “peace” with diligent watching.  It’s also useful to see what thoughts arise from those emotions – as these are often connected.  Don’t get carried off by the thoughts, but just simply notice what the thoughts are.

Possible Example
(intense sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Not Wanting
(intense sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Not wanting

(intense sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Not wanting

 

(intense sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Wanting

(sadness) Feel, Neutral, Not wanting
(sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Peace
(sadness) Feel, Unpleasant, Peace

In Conclusion – Meditation Prescription