Episode 7: A review of "Neti-Neti Meditation" by Andre Halaw (Part 1)

In this podcast, Jill summarizes key points from chapters one through three of Andre Halaw's book "Neti-Neti Meditation".

For a video version of this podcast (including subtitles), go to https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJeyAmTqsGQLmfMWaogH7mQ.

For a written transcript, go to https://www.spiritualbnr.org/blog/part-1-a-review-of-neti-neti-meditation.

Link to "Neti-Neti Meditation" by Andre Halaw on Amazon.com: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B00GP62LU0

Link to "True Meditation" by Adyanshanti (another insightful meditation resource I found on Audible.com): https://www.audible.com/pd/True-Meditation-Audiobook/B002V0153I?asin=B002V0153I

Find SBNR episodes and more on the Spiritual But Not Religious Website and connect with me on Mastodon and YouTube!

Transcript

00:22
In Episode 6, I talked about my takeaways
from Andre Halaw’s book, “God is Nothingness”.

Today I’ll discuss another book by Halaw
called “Neti-Neti Meditation”. This episode
will be split into two parts as this book
delves deeply into the process of negation,
how it applies to meditation, and how meditation
conveys to everyday life.

00:46
One of the most basic concepts Halaw puts
forth is that what you think is…just a thought.
Thoughts are not reality, yet they can lead
to emotions like fear, hate, and anger that
cause physical changes in our forms—tensed
muscles, grinding teeth, increased heart rate.

01:07
This physical response reinforces the thought
you just had—if this person, place, or thing
makes me feel this way, my thoughts about
it must be true. The reinforced thoughts then
self-validate the feelings. This circular
validation happens within moments of an interaction,
and it happens to all of us when we are ruled
by our emotions.

01:31
The Neti-Neti process allows us to see beyond
the thoughts that we have about people and
things. It frees us from the habit of seeing
the world in rigid, unchanging terms based
on thoughts and emotions derived from limited
data. It also acknowledges that there is no
such thing as experiencing raw reality. Our
senses provide input to the nervous system
which then processes it based on our past
education and experiences. By the time our
nervous systems process the data and we have
a thought or emotion, Reality has changed.

02:09
Through Neti-Neti meditation, we question
the nature of Reality. Who am I? What am I?
Am I my body? Am I my mind? Am I my thoughts
or emotions? When I am angry, where is that
emotion? Am I anger? Where does anger come
from, and where does it go? As we examine
the anger, it loses its identity and it loses
its power over us. We can understand this
emotion as simply a part of human experience
and then let it go.

02:44
All emotions can then be transcended, experienced
as part of the nondual fabric of Reality.

Emotions do not define us, but they are integral
to our human experience in this world. Our
goal along our spiritual journey is to recognize
our humanity while not falling victim to the
whims of the ego and its array of emotions.

03:09
Neti-Neti reveals to us that everything is
just a manifestation of the Absolute. We identify
a rock as a rock because that is what we have
been taught to call a hard conglomeration
of minerals in that form. In reality, it is
just the Absolute manifesting as a form that
we call a “rock”.

03:32
As Halaw puts it, “Neti-Neti exposes everything
we can conceive of to be just ideas, thus
negating their reality as things.” When
we examine any “base object”—defined
by Halaw as anything we can “perceive, sense,
experience, or investigate”—we will eventually
find it lacking any sense or logic. This leaves
us with, as Halaw puts it, “a nondual experience
beyond words.” Buddhists call this Thusness
or Suchness, a direct manifestation of Reality
beyond words and concepts.

04:12
Halaw writes that when we recognize that our
“I”-ness is just our idea of self projected
onto the manifest world, we see the reality
beyond the delusion, the beautiful Thusness
that is in us and is us. This allows us to
see that we are all just expressions of the
Absolute, Neti-Neti, “not this, not that.”

04:38
Halaw talks about the Hindu and Buddhist cycle
of Samsara. Samsara is defined by emotional
turmoil, the ups and downs of our human feelings
that can go from extreme highs to extreme
lows within minutes or hours. Halaw stresses
that just exchanging bad thoughts for good
thoughts in order to bring on good emotions
is not enough. Attachment to any thought will
only lead to suffering. Instead, we must come
to realize that we are “not this, not that,”
beyond thought and feeling, beyond awareness.
We are the Absolute from which everything
springs.

05:21
In Chapter Three of “Neti-Neti Meditation,”
Halaw takes us through an exercise to help
us learn how to use Neti-Neti to navigate
our everyday lives.

05:31
First, he tells us to identify a base object
that needs investigating. This can be anything--a
thought, emotion, etc. He uses the emotion
of frustration as an example.

05:45
Instead of trying to figure out why you are
frustrated or what led to the frustration,
you must see the emotion for what it is. Deny
the emotion its power by taking a deep breath
and allowing yourself to witness it objectively.
Remember that frustration is the result of
thoughts, which lead to emotions, which are
not Reality. In reality, there isn’t even
an “I” to be frustrated.

06:14
Now that you have defused the base object’s
emotional power, experience it fully. What
is its texture? Where in your body do you
feel a reaction to it? What other emotions
does it elicit? Where do those feelings manifest
in your body?

06:33
Carefully witness each of these emotions and
feelings as they appear, but do not try to
make them disappear. Your role is not to change
the base object into something more pleasant.
You should neither push it away nor pursue
it, just examine it.

06:51
If the base object (in this case frustration)
disappears, you may ask, “What was it, and
where has it gone?” The answer is always,
“It arose from and has subsided into Emptiness.”
It was never more than an idea.

07:11
One reason we find ourselves attached to or
repelled by certain thoughts or emotions is
that we tend to apply labels to them such
as “good” or “bad”. Neti-Neti allows
us to transcend these labels along with the
objects, dissolving their hold over us. We
do this by identifying the emotion along with
any physical response. It also helps to identify
any other charged thoughts or labels related
to the emotion--for example, shame, anger,
or frustration at being frustrated. Once we
identify them, we can observe them and let
them go.

07:51
According to Halaw, “The longer we observe
an emotion or thought without actively engaging
it or acting upon it, the more detached we
grow, as it becomes apparent that whatever
we are observing is not us, and thus we are
free from it.”

08:07
When we stop labeling any base object as good
or bad and we strip away the labels and the
charged thoughts about it, it stops being
an object. As its form and substance disappear,
we can recognize that it just “is.” Just
like you and me and everything else in the
universe, this object is not a “thing”,
it is merely a part of Thusness, the nonduality
that encompasses us all.

08:37
The big questions in Neti-Neti meditation
are usually, “What is this? Is this me?
Is there any ‘I’ in there?” Halaw notes
that traditional forms of Neti-Neti skip past
the identifying and de-labeling of base objects
and jump straight to teaching that you are
“not this, not that.”

08:58
But Halaw says that it’s not enough to simply
reject all things as not us. We must also
realize our part in Nothingness, that our
bodies do not exist in a way that defines
us. Halaw refers to The Buddha’s Diamond
Sutra, which teaches that to be free of the
objects of the world, we must empty them of
their self-hood. To do this, we must, for
example, negate the body’s “body-ness”,
the eye’s “eye-ness”, etc. When all
of a body’s properties are negated, we are
left with only an idea and no “thing”
to attach to. With no “thing” to attach
to, we are no longer separated from everything
else in the universe. This leaves us ready
to tackle the question, “Is this me?”

09:51
The answer to this question is always “No,”
but there is more to it than that. A simple
“No” implies there is a different answer.
If you go looking for the “I” of your
Self, you will find that, like all other “things”,
it is merely an idea.

10:11
Once you come to this realization, you have
unlocked the door to nonduality. This may
be enough for many who want to improve their
everyday experiences with equanimity and grace.

10:25
But Halaw offers one final step for those
who want to go further in the Neti-Neti process.
He invites us to negate all that remains.
For those who have experienced the Absolute
through formal meditation practice (something
he describes in Chapter 4), he explains how
to bring awareness of the Absolute into our
everyday lives.

10:50
Halaw says that anything you experience—all
sights, sounds, thoughts, and even nondual
experience—is not the ultimate truth and
must be cast aside. Doing this, you will pass
from “the void of Thusness” to “the
Void-with-a-capital-V of Nothingness”.

11:13
All experiences involve change, but the Absolute
is unchanging. Anything you experience is
not It-with-a-capital-I; it is all Neti-Neti.

11:28
In the end, once everything has been negated
and the universe has been emptied of its contents,
only the Absolute, “your true face,” remains.
Since there is nothing left to say “not
this, not that” about, we have negated the
process of negation itself. We have transcended
Neti-Neti, and all separateness about the
world falls away.

11:55
In the next episode, I’ll discuss chapter
four and beyond of Halaw’s “Neti-Neti
Meditation”. In the meantime, identify some
of the emotions you go through each day. Examine
them and try to understand the thoughts that
bring on these emotions. Consider how you
might be able to avoid emotional turmoil associated
with certain thoughts and actions by approaching
things more objectively. This will help prepare
you for bringing Neti-Neti into your daily
interactions.

12:28
I’ve found that when I do these things,
I’m much calmer and content. When I forget
these lessons and allow frustration or fear
or another emotion to possess me, I become
very uncomfortable. And when I find myself
too busy with everyday life to take 20 minutes
for meditation, I’m much more susceptible
to emotional turmoil. Feeling guilty about
that won’t help though, so I just get back
to it when I can. The more I practice the
meditation, the easier it is to live the Neti-Neti
way and love life for what it is.