Day One Hundred and One

It takes a while to still, and the usual things call me away from being still; obligation, sound, thought patterns of not having, past and future concerns. But I become still by degrees, gently leading myself back to concentration, and feeling then a peace right with all of the things that call me away.

I feel the stone in an unpleasant way but actually it is just a restlessness. That subsides and then I actually feel the stone in an unpleasant way; it is 'too hard'. Then I also feel it in a neutral way and in a pleasant way. It seems to me that 'unpleasant' is just defined by wanting something to end. 'Pleasant' is simply the feeling of wanting something to keep going. Neutral seems to be just 'not knowing' a thing or being distracted while 'sort of knowing' a thing. In other words, it's not something that isn't there because that isn't anything (unless is in a subtle realm of some sense not looked at but felt). So if it is there (or at least 'there' in the meeting of sense organ and object), it is either pleasant or unpleasant unless not quite touched, investigated.

Of course, each of these definitions are the most tangible way I call myself me. Which came first, the feeling or the sense of me? I notice a huge stream of historic files that are various definitions of me, such as 'oh yes, beautiful blue butterfly wings...... I like them because I used to collect them and they made me feel dreamy when I first saw them etc.'

This inner dialogue is the made-up me, the clinging and craving that follows sense contact.