5. After clearly discerning all the factors that arise with jhāna individually and collectively, contemplate them as elements of mentality (nāmas); they are just mentality. Notice that mentality has the characteristic of bending toward its object. You might mentally recite nāma, nāma, nāma or mental phenomena, mental phenomena to direct your attention to the simple fact that they are nothing more than mental constituents.
6. In this way, discern the mental factors associated with every jhāna subject that you have previously learned. For those of you who have accomplished all the subjects offered in the previous section, it may take several hours to review them all, and the exercise may appear redundant since the mental factors remain virtually the same for each jhāna object. Repeated practice increases agility, proficiency, speed, and clarity of attention and is an effective exercise for training the mind.
This exercise will expand your comprehension of jhāna—there is more to a jhāna state than the basic five jhāna factors that were emphasized in the formative stages of concentration practice.
THE COGNITIVE PROCESS
Although multitasking has a certain appeal in our fast-paced contemporary society, it is an illusion. We can only be aware of one thing at a time. Consciousness always arises with a specific object that it cognizes, and only one object can occur in any conscious moment. It appears as though we are seeing the orange color of the carrot in our bowl, tasting the flavor of salt in the vegetable broth, feeling the warmth of the soup, listening to music on the radio, and feeling the ache of tired feet, all at the same time. In reality, however, these sensory impressions are processed in rapid succession.
The subtle interplay of matter and mind can be observed and analyzed. A material element is known through the combined process of seventeen consciousnesses. A rūpa is traditionally thought to exist for a duration of sixteen mind-moments and perishes with the occurrence of the seventeenth mind-moment. If each consciousness is divided into three briefer moments—arising, standing, and perishing—the existence of a rūpa is then calculated at fifty-one mind-moments (17 × 3 = 51), with one brief moment of arising, forty-nine brief mind-moments of standing, and one small mind-moment of perishing. According to ancient Buddhist theory, mental and material phenomena arise together in mutual dependence and yet exist for different durations: “Herein, although materiality is slow to cease and heavy to change and consciousness is quick to cease and swift to change, [nevertheless] the material cannot occur without the immaterial, nor the immaterial without the material.” It is likened to a tall man and a dwarf who travel together; a single stride of the tall man is matched by multiple strides of the dwarf as their journeys occur together.206
By observing the fifty-two mental factors that combine to form various mental and emotional impressions, you have seen how clusters of components interact to produce experience. This represents a significant departure from the conventional mode of identifying with our personal narratives of continuous experience. The Abhidhamma further enhances this distillation of phenomena into their ultimate constituents by presenting an analytical model that reduces each cognitive process into seventeen discrete momentary events. In this training we will discover a seventeen-part cognitive series for sense-sphere cognitive processes, and a variable number of sequences for mind-door cognitive processes.
Discerning the precise mental formations that arise in each segment of the seventeen mind-moment sequence is a subtle endeavor that requires intense concentration, stillness, and patience. Strong concentration is emphasized in the first half of this book in order to train the mind to properly hold subtle objects for sustained examination. But now, rather than meditating upon objects that enhance the stability of concentration, you are meditating upon these ultimate constituents of mind and matter as they are actually occurring. Just as it is possible to focus on one car in a motor race and watch how it moves through the pack in the midst of potential distractions—other contestants racing past at incredible speeds, flashing colors, dust, smoke, roar of engines, cheers of spectators—you can observe the mental formations that arise and pass in the speedy whirl of cognition.
This meditation practice invites you to end habitual fascination with concepts and enter into an intimate and clear encounter with reality. As mindfulness, concentration, and understanding deepen, the minutely incremental nature of the cognitive process is exposed. Through this examination of the minutia of cognition, you will realize again and again that experience is merely an impersonal series of conditioned events.
OVERVIEW OF THE COGNITIVE SERIES
Mind-door processes take mental formations, materialities, and concepts as objects; these function through a variable series of consciousnesses. Sense-door processes, also called five-door processes, reflect objects that occur via the five sense bases of eye, ear, nose, tongue, and body; these function in accordance with a standard sequence of seventeen consciousnesses.
We shall dissect the cognitive processes to reveal a series of momentary occurrences of consciousnesses; these events may be called “mindmoments.” Each momentary unit includes consciousness unified with a set of associated mental factors. These factors represent various combinations of the fifty-two mental factors introduced earlier in this chapter. Each mental factor performs a specific function in its momentary cluster. For example, feeling produces the pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral flavor of the contact; applied thought directs attention to the object; rapture experiences delight in the object; perception recognizes the object; and so on. The mental factors arise together, perform their specialized function within their unit, and pass away together as soon as they have originated, thereby forming an uninterrupted continuum of momentary events. Once you have carefully examined the mental factors contained in each mind-moment, you may progress to examine the role that each moment of consciousness plays within the cognitive series.
Each refined moment of consciousness is designated by a term that describes its function within the cognitive series such as adverting, sense-door sensitivity, receiving, investigating, determining, and so on. There are seventeen parts in the sense-door processes and a variable number of stages in the mind-door and jhāna processes. See Tables 13.3 and 13.4.
TABLE 13.3
Seventeen Consciousnesses in Sense-Sphere Cognitive Process
* Registration consciousnesses do not arise in all sense-door processes. They only occur with vivid sense-sphere objects.
TABLE 13.4
Variable Consciousnesses in Mind-Door Cognitive Process
1 The number of impulsions vary. There are usually seven impulsions, but jhāna can have more and particularly weak objects can have fewer.
2 Registration consciousnesses do not arise in all mind-door processes. They cannot arise when the object is a concept; they occur only with vivid sense-sphere objects. Thus, they are not a part of jhāna cognitive processes, and they do not accompany states, such as loving-kindness, that depend on the concept of “beings.”
The first three steps (life-continuum consciousness, vibrational life-continuum consciousness, and arresting life-continuum consciousness) identify the phases in which the activation of the life-continuum consciousness causes the dormant phase to cease, and enables consciousness to emerge from that resting phase (bhavaṅga) between processes. These first few moments in the chain are ultrasubtle and usually occur below the threshold of awareness. Because it is very difficult to discern these formations, we shall initially focus on the more vivid elements of consciousness. After you learn the meditative procedure and become facile with the discernment, you will be able to discern these ultrasubtle consciousness moments as well.
After these initial three moments pass, the mind is capable of orienting toward sensory phenomena (five-door adverting consciousness). Sense-door consciousness occurs and sparks a rapid chain of infinitesimal mind-moments oriented toward that particular sensory input. The sensory object is received, examined, and a determination is made regarding how the mind will relate to
it. The determination may bring a wholesome or unwholesome response. A series of consciousnesses called impulsion consciousnesses (javana) immediately follow from the determination and produce the more notable and vivid component of experience. With the impulsion consciousnesses, the person is fully experiencing the object through a repeated sequence of momentary consciousness units that are characterized by exactly the same set of mental factors. Because they are identical in character, they may at first appear to the meditator as one long moment; however, as the discernment becomes increasingly refined, you will be able to discern, and even count, the arising and passing of each of the seven distinct impulsion mind-moments. Finally, the last two registration consciousnesses permit the process to quiet down and settle before sliding back into the transitional life-continuum phase of cognition.
A mind-door cognitive process operates through a similar, but abbreviated, sequence. The steps that are needed to orient to a sense door, and engage with sensory information through receiving, investigating, and determining, are not required. Mind-door objects arise directly as mental phenomena and are instantly received by the mind without the need to interpret data from the five sense doors.
The refined resolution of this examination invites repeated observation of the functioning of subtle and causally connected events until each momentary arising is distinctly and certainly seen through the direct knowledge of the meditator. This is a pragmatic endeavor, not an intellectual pursuit. Therefore, it requires strong concentration and a steady mind.
Jhāna consciousness is especially potent and can produce an extended series of impulsion consciousnesses; therefore it is the easiest process for the meditator to discern. If you have already discerned the mental factors that arise within jhāna (meditation instruction 13.2), the basic constituents will be familiar. Now we shall analyze those mental factors according to the cognitive series and discern them in the order in which they perform the function of cognition.
MEDITATION INSTRUCTION 13.3
Discerning the Jhāna Cognitive Process
1. To begin, reestablish the first jhāna with the breath or a kasiṇa of your choice. Direct your attention to the mind door at the heart base and discern the jhāna factors and mental formations as you practiced in meditation instruction 13.2. You may shift between absorption in jhāna and the discerning process until it is clear.
2. After emerging from jhāna and perceiving the appearance of a reflection of the nimitta in the mind door, focus on the jhāna mind-door processes that just occurred. You will find that twelve mental formations arise in the initial mind-moment, followed by a stream of momentary events that contain thirty-four mental factors (consciousnesses plus thirty-three associated mental factors).
3. This discernment procedure is similar to the previous discernment; however, now you will be attentive to the functions of consciousness in a sequential process, noting at a glance the individual mental factors that permit each consciousness to perform its special role in the jhāna cognitive process. The sequence of mind-moments in the jhāna cognitive process are named according to their functions: mind-door adverting consciousness, preparatory consciousness, access consciousness, conformity consciousness, change of lineage consciousness, and jhāna impulsion consciousness (see Table 13.5).
4. Notice the characteristic that is common to all mental phenomena—they bend toward their object. Recognize this characteristic of mentality in each of the momentary occurrences of consciousness.
5. Proceed to discern and analyze the cognitive processes associated with the second, third, and fourth jhānas. You will find that the second jhāna has the same initial twelve formations (consciousness plus eleven associated mental factors), followed by a brief spike of thirty-four factors (consciousness plus thirty-three associated mental factors) as the mind orients toward the object, and then settles into a stream of thirty-two mental formations (consciousness plus thirty-one associated mental factors) that compose the subsequent impulsion consciousnesses. The third, fourth, and immaterial jhānas will contain the initial twelve formations, followed by thirty-one formations in the impulsion consciousness. The fourth and immaterial jhānas invariably exclude pīti at every stage of the cognitive process.
6. Proceed to review each and every jhāna that you have attained. The pattern will be similar, with the addition of compassion or appreciative joy pertinent to those immeasurable attainments.
TABLE 13.5
Mental Formations Present in Jhāna
1 Initial and sustained applications of mind have been removed.
2 Rapture has been further removed.
3 Rapture does not arise with fourth or immaterial jhānas therefore there are only thirty-three factors that precede the impulsion consciousness.
4 Equanimity replaces happiness as the feeling tone.
5 Factors remain similar to fourth jhāna.
TABLE 13.6
First Jhāna Cognitive Process with Associated Mental Formations
Note: For jhānas based on appreciative joy and compassion, you will find the additional factor of joy and compassion.
MIND-DOOR COGNITIVE PROCESSES
Mind-door processes occur every time you are aware of a thought, concept, idea, emotion, material formation, or mental factor; they are not exclusive to jhāna states. When you think about a past event, imagine a variation of that event occurring in the future, rehearse how you might respond to it, and plan what you will say, you are engaging mental processes. If you are inclined to a revenge fantasy or an anxious state, you will be engaged in unwholesome mind-door processes. Not recognizing that these are merely momentary mental processes, you might give credence to the mental constructions and fabricate an illusion of continuity, imagine who you are and how you will be over time: “I am an angry person,” or “I am an anxious person.” In reality it is only a sequence of conditioned momentary factors.
The mind-door cognitive process (excluding jhāna and supramundane processes) contains three primary phases, each with corresponding mental factors. The three primary phases in a mind-door process are the following:
1. A mind-door adverting consciousness composed of consciousness plus eleven associated mental factors making a total of twelve mental formations.
2. Seven impulsion consciousnesses with variable mental formations:
(a) If there is unwise attention and the mental state is unwholesome, there can be sixteen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, or twenty-two mental formations.
(b) If there is wise attention and the mental state is wholesome, there can be thirty-two, thirty-three, thirty-four, or thirty-five mental formations.
3. Two registration consciousnesses that will contain either thirty-four, thirty-three, thirty-two, twelve, or eleven mental formations. Registration consciousnesses do not occur in all mind-door processes. They require a vivid sense-sphere object. Since registration consciousnesses cannot arise when the object is a concept, they are not a part of jhāna cognitive processes, and they do not accompany states, such as loving-kindness, that depend on the concept of “beings.”
Our examination will focus on these three active elements, postponing the formations of the ultrasubtle life-continuum consciousnesses (bhavaṅga) for a later stage in the meditative discernment. Meditators can employ this careful analysis of the momentary nature of cognition to break down the delusion that things are solid, enduring, and stable. When we look carefully, we only find fleeting contingent processes that function for a brief moment and vanish. In reality, there is nothing substantial to bind us; clear seeing dispels the only effective fetter—the fetter of ignorance.
TABLE 13.7
Formations that Comprise the Impulsion Consciousness of Unwholesome Mental States
*These factors are variable—they may or may not be present where indicated. Their presence or absence accounts for the variable number of factors for some of the unwholesome mind states. Sloth and torpor always appear together.
MEDITATION INSTRUCTION 13.4
Discerning the Mind-Door Cognitive Process
1. Establish strong concentration.
2. The discernment of the mind-door cognitive process will focus primarily on three aspects: the mind-door adverting, impulsion, and registration consciousnesses (Table 13.4). Discern the materiality supporting the mind door (sixty-three rūpas of the heart base) and then the eye-sensitive element (the translucent element that you discerned in chapter 12).
3. When the eye-sensitive element appears in consciousness, recognize it with wise attention. Know that this is the eye-sensitive element, this is materiality, or this is impermanent. Wise attention supports the occurrence of a wholesome cognition.
4. Discern the different clusters of mental formation that are included in the three primary phases of the mind-door cognitive process that is knowing the eye-sensitive element. Do this precisely and carefully.
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