The Jhanic Arc: Riding the Rainbow of the Mind
Known to him they arose, known to him they remained, known to him they subsided. – The Buddha
Joel Groover: You were talking about your experience in meditation interviews with Sayadaw U Pandita at his monastery in Rangoon. Isn’t that what the traditional interview is all about, that feedback loop to help the student?
Kenneth Folk: Actually, no. The traditional interview is not a real-time feedback loop. In fact, on the very rare occasions when a teacher will ask for real-time reporting during the interviews, the teacher is hailed as a genius. “Oh, look. The teacher actually got this person to understand the technique by having the student report in real-time.”
We should be doing that every time. Talking about meditation is useless. You have to be doing it together and modeling it. You know, the way we transmit these techniques is so inefficient that it literally takes years to learn the basic meditation technique.
I was recently talking with another meditation teacher who said this very thing, unprompted. She said, “It’s taking people years just to get the basic technique. There has got to be a better way to impart this. It’s not that complicated.”
But the way we explain these things, together with all of the hoo-hah about spirituality, it all gets mixed up in a person’s mind.
Now, if you take all of the various traditions, instructions, ways to look at this–all of the ways to think about it and all of the legends and baloney about it–how does a student know what to do?
How do they know who to believe? Should they believe anybody? And it is remarkable if anybody actually does get the right information and applies the techniques for a few minutes and figures out what works and what doesn’t.
JG: Yeah, and there is also a problem in that half of what people are talking about is embedded existence and their own “stuff,” right? And I don’t know how you sort through that because some people are just at a level where that is what they want to work on and that is what their focus is.
When I was younger my life was way out of balance and in all of my meditation interviews, I’m pretty sure I never talked about meditation.
KF: [laughs]
JG: You know, it was “Here is what is going on with this aspect of my life and that aspect.” There are certain Buddhist ways of handling situations that you can talk about that are helpful and have to do with paying attention more and so forth, but in terms of radically dis-embedding from your stuff…
KF: Yes. It is very important to make the distinction between psychology and spiritual growth as we are talking about it here. I once asked Bill Hamilton, my teacher, “Why don’t people make more progress? You see people meditating year after year and going to the retreats and becoming Buddhists. Why are they not making progress through the Paths of Enlightenment?”
He said, “They are doing psychology.” Now, nobody is saying that psychology is not useful. Bill Hamilton had a degree in psychology. In fact, psychology is extremely useful and essential for having a sane life. So it has to be done. But it is not the same as making progress through these levels of insight that you and I are talking about now. They are related. And actually, they are related all along the way because the truth is, you do become a better person. As you see your own mind, you get more insight into the minds of other people and that empathy is the basis for compassion.
So there is a synergy between meditative insight and becoming emotionally mature. That synergy continues throughout your practice and basically begins to accelerate in the higher levels of meditative practice, which is why the great sages insist that compassion and wisdom are inseparable.
But we have to make this distinction. So if somebody is sitting there embedded in their thoughts, however valuable those thoughts, they simply are not doing the practice that leads to enlightenment.
JG: Right. Yeah. And you know it is interesting–well, getting back to the idea of why people are not making progress–the folks in the integral movement would say people are not making progress because they are not doing enough bodywork, shadow work, mind work and then “Spirit” would be where they would categorize meditation. My take is that it is generally true that if you are overeating and not getting any exercise that there is an energetic toll to be paid there. But it is very easy to be embedded throughout all of those realms of work that you might be doing. Maybe there is not quite enough emphasis on the dis-embedding process, on the part of practitioners, when it comes to the spiritual work that they do?
KF: I think that’s an important point. Most of what we do in terms of self-improvement doesn’t require dis-embedding from our experience. You can do all of your psychology and all sorts of self-help, self-improvement, all kinds of bodywork, and manage to be embedded the whole time. So what you and I are talking about has everything to do with dis-embedding and nothing to do with content. We should give a passing nod to content because if your mind is coming up with one thing after another to torture you and you are completely at wit’s end—well, you are not even going to be able to do this practice.
But once you can do this practice, content becomes irrelevant because all we’re doing… for example, with thought we’re categorizing thoughts. When I say “anticipation thought” I may be anticipating some upcoming event that I’m excited and happy about or I may be anticipating with dread some horrible upcoming event. The content doesn’t matter; if I can look at it from the outside: “Oh, there is that thought over there. Here I am over here, looking at that thought over there.” I can see that it is a thought about anticipation.
That’s just a feedback loop. The fact that I know it’s about anticipation proves that I’m objectifying it. I can sense that there is dread involved with it and I note it. Good, I have objectified that level of mind state. I can see that it is unpleasant, and I note it. Good, I have objectified that. I can see that there is tension in my neck, and I note it. Good, I have objectified that.
From the point of being free, it’s not remotely important what the thought or sensation is, only that I see it clearly and note it.
JG: I guess it’s worth saying that we are really good at and predisposed toward embedding. And so, of course, in the integral literature, this point is made that you need to dis-embed. But it is just very easy to lapse into that mode of being embedded and turning it into, I think Trungpa Rinpoche called it “the project mentality.”
KF: The project mentality could be a project involving embeddedness. In other words, I could be thinking about ways to improve myself and that would be a self-improvement project. On the other hand, a project mentality could also be, “I’m going to get more enlightened.” Trungpa Rinpoche was all about exposing spiritual materialism in every form. So for him, I think he would have been very concerned that when you’re doing what I call 1st Gear, this is really all about self-improvement. We are going to dis-embed more and more and we are going to presumably become better and better and more transparent so that eventually, what? Eventually we become what? Are we back to the Superman myth?
JG: It seems to me more like you are painting the “I” into a corner with this, and so the ultimate joke might be on the “I.”
KF: That is a very useful way to see it. So we are willing to put up with the self-improvement project and the spiritual materialism. We will call it what it is: yes, spiritual materialism is what’s happening here and it’s OK because we’re painting the “I” into a corner and eventually it has no place to hide. Even better, in this moment of doing the practice–[notes in real-time] pressure… warmth… unpleasant… pleasant… curiosity… fear… anticipation thoughts… remembering thoughts… –in that moment there was no place for the “I” to hide.
JG: Yes, and you could also say–let’s say that something is going on and the practice is deepening and you notice, OK, “hoping”–you notice that you’re hoping for something… you can actually dis-embed from the impulse toward spiritual materialism itself, in the moment.
KF: That’s right. Everything becomes grist for the mill. That very impulse of hoping becomes the target: “OK, hoping. Oh wow, hoping has been objectified now.”
JG: You had mentioned that you had some stuff to say about access concentration. Early in Daniel Ingram’s book Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha, he says, “Look, what you want to do is get access concentration so that you can start seeing sensate phenomena at this sort of higher-level.” And then other teachers—you know, I’ve been interested in the subject of jhana and these more traditional concentration practices—other teachers also emphasize access concentration. The way I am conceiving it is as a hard absorption state, I guess you might say, one that then gives you access to the jhanas. But as you were running me through this process the other day, I had the thought, “Is access concentration just having enough background concentration to be able to dis-embed from objects as you move through the strata of mind?”
KF: Well, practically speaking, what we we’re doing, what you and I did when we just reported to each other in real time–that is doing the work. Now, whether we are getting into access concentration or not depends on how you define it. But the important thing is the process of dis-embedding in real time. Do we really care about the concept of access concentration?
My problem with access concentration is not that it isn’t a real and useful phenomenon, both as a tool and as a concept, but that it can become just another thing to get: “Oh no, I’m afraid I don’t have access concentration.”
I actually have a friend who told me “I have failed to get access concentration. I’ve been really demoralized and defeated by this. I just don’t see that I’m ever going to do it.” Well, that is not particularly helpful.
On the other hand, if you abandon for a moment the whole concept of access concentration and lead somebody through this process of dis-embedding from body sensations, feeling tones, etc., then if access concentration is relevant, then it is happening and you might not know whether you’re in it or not. You don’t care.
Now, there is a phenomenon that you will sometimes notice while you’re meditating where suddenly it is as though you were inside a car and the car windows were rolled up. Sounds become muted. You are able to stay with your meditation object better. One of my students came up with that car window analogy and I think it’s great. Well, that is access concentration. The problem is making too big of a deal out of it. It becomes just another thing that I have got to have so I can put another notch on my belt.
JG: I’d like to think that I have a more healthy relationship to it in that I want to progress. I want to know. I have curiosity about these phenomena. I guess that can be unhelpful. But you know, others are talking about all of this stuff like in your online community and people, they want to find out. “Well, what is it that they’re talking about here? What should I be doing?” I think even beyond just trying to get something, there is that aspect of it.
KF: I see what you mean. Sure. And I certainly talk a lot about jhanas and moving up and down through 20 strata of mind and noticing where you are in real time on the jhanic arc as you go up and down through these states. There are all these recognizable phenomena and the mind apparently is set up in layers, because every time I go up and down through this jhanic arc these phenomena arise in invariable order. It’s all very interesting. It’s fascinating and worth learning. And so as long as we keep a healthy perspective on it, that we are exploring our own mind and that if you can access these various strata of mind and explore them at various levels of depth and resolution, this is very worthwhile doing–I teach this and it can be done.
In some sense it should be thought of in a slightly different way from satipatthana [the four foundations of mindfulness], because satipatthana is something that I can do with almost anyone on the first phone call and we can continue to take it deeper. Learning jhana–and that is what we are talking about with all of these states–is something more like learning to play a musical instrument. This is something we develop over a period of years and the skills involved are very high-level skills that don’t come easily.
JG: And what do we want? We want the high-level skills now.
KF: Right.
JG: It is much healthier to focus instead on–this is why I see so much enthusiasm, I think, from you when you will write something to someone like, “Great! You are identifying sensations in the shoulder. That is great! You’re getting really clear about these particular sensations over here.” That should be our focus, I guess. It’s the path to all that other stuff, right?
KF: Yes. I’m very excited that somebody can identify the sensations in their shoulder because then I know that they are penetrating the object and they are dis-embedding from it, and I know where that leads. That leads to freedom.
At the same time, as part of this package we always want to develop and refine the ability to access deeper levels of mind because those, too, have to be objectified. We are only free to the extent that things are not sticking. Things do not stick when they can be readily objectified. When we can slide up and down this whole rainbow of the mind from red all the way up through orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet—mind you, the rainbow is just a metaphor—but when you can slide up and down that whole spectrum and not get stuck, you are free.
The more you develop the deeper strata of mind in addition to the more shallow strata of mind, the freer you are.
JG: And I guess that’s the point. It is a continuation of that process. It is a spectrum and you are actually doing the same thing but just at this more subtle level.
KF: That’s right. And so practically speaking it makes a lot of sense to start where we are. If a person does not have a lot of concentration, I’m not going to say, “Let’s wait five years until you have developed concentration and then start to be free.” I say, “Let’s be free from the strata of mind where you spend 90% of your day.”
JG: In my practice I had sort of been focusing on, “Let’s get access concentration and then we will understand vipassana at this deeper and higher level.” Meanwhile, I had not been doing any vipassana at all. It makes more sense to me to have a balanced approach with some pure concentration practices, and to just continue with the dis-embedding process that you have introduced me to.
KF: And also keeping in mind that these things reinforce each other. So the fact is, your concentration does build. It does get stronger every time you do the noting practice.
JG: Yes, and the pure concentration practices, I have noticed, do make mindfulness stronger off the cushion, just walking around.
KF: Yes. There is synergy.
Author Info
hi…
Kenneth writes "I know that they are penetrating the object and they are dis-embedding from it"
Can you explain what the intent, attitude & experiential differences if any, are between disembedding from a state/object and penetrating the state/object? Or is this two different ways of talking about the same thing?
Hi Sparqi,
Think of penetrating the object as a subset of seeing the object clearly. To see the object clearly is to dis-embed from it. In other words, when I am looking at something, saying “look at that thing over there,” even if the “thing” in question is a sensation within my body or a thought within my mind, it is intuitively obvious that the “thing,” which is now seen as an object, is not “I”. Surely “I” must be the one who is looking, rather than what is being looked at. What I’ve just described is what I mean by objectifying phenomena and therefore dis-embedding from them. Dis-embedding just means that I am no longer confusing experience with self. “I” am not my experience, and this is known deeply, pre-consciously, every time I note “pressure, coolness, pleasant, unpleasant, joy, fear, remembering thought,” etc.
So, objectification (seeing an object clearly) is the game in a nutshell. Within that larger understanding is the question of seeing experience at a high enough resolution to notice that things are not solid; they are made up of smaller phenomena that come together to create the illusion of solidity. Here we can use the simile of the rope. When you first see a rope lying across the rope, you can objectify and dis-embed from it even at the gross level. It appears to be a rope. Fine. You can note, “seeing, seeing,” and immediately become aware that you are not the rope; you are apparently the one looking at the rope. So you are dis-embedded and that is excellent progress.
But you can go deeper, and this is where penetrating the object comes in. As you move closer to the rope, you see that it is not a rope at all; it is a line of ants moving back and forth across the road. You have now penetrated the object and are seeing it at a higher level of resolution! And you can still objectify and dis-embed from it. “Seeing, seeing.” “I” am not the rope, nor am I the ants. Surely I am the one who is looking at the newly de-constructed object.
But you can go deeper. So far, we have taken the observer for granted. “I” must be the observer. Let’s look into that. It turns out that we can turn the light of attention around to take the apparent observer as object. The jig is up! Even the so-called witness is just another object. It cannot, by definition, be “I”. We have penetrated even the illusion of self.
But there is more. Who knows the knower? There is awareness, in this moment, into which both subject (“I”) and object (the stuff “I” am looking at) are being born and dying in each moment. When we stand aside and allow this awareness to recognize itself, it turns out that awareness is not other than the entire manifest universe.
I’ve just outlined the 3-Speed Transmission: seeing 1) objects, 2) subject, and 3) awareness clearly and allowing them to be as they are.
Thanks for the excellent question.
Kenneth
Thanks so much for taking the time to provide such a crystal clear exposition.
My mind is at rest!
Errata: typo: In paragraph two of my response to Sparqi's question, I wrote, "When you first see a rope lying across the rope…" The second "rope" in that sentence should be "road." The corrected sentence reads, "When you first see a rope lying across the road…"
KF
Hi Kenneth,
Is it possible to access all 20 strata of mind by just doing noting practice?
Thanks for another interview that gets to the heart of the matter!
Tina
Hi Tina,
In order to access all 20 strata of mind, it’s necessary to develop a very high degree of concentration in addition to moving through the Four Paths of Enlightenment. That means that you have to balance samatha (concentration practice) and vipassana (insight practice, e.g., mental noting). Along with the noting practice, it’s important to do some kind of practice that is specifically designed to take you to the more subtle places in the mind. Some examples are following the breath (with or without counting); gazing at a kasina object; reciting a phrase or phrases (e.g., a mantra or metta phrases). It is also possible to go deep in concentration by dwelling as the Witness, i.e., keeping the sense of observer in the foreground and letting the mental states develop in the background.
When applying 1st gear to 3rd nana, with hope of penetrating enough to get to A&P and beyond, is dedicating to increasing noting practice sufficient; or is it better at this early stage to split practice time into, say, kasina followed by noting? Thank you, Kenneth, for this inspiring and practical series!
Hi Mark,
I recommend practicing pure samatha in addition to noting practice, even for beginners. Concentration is one of the seven factors of enlightenment and is never wasted. Ability to access the more subtle layers of mind is essential to progress in developmental meditation in addition to being its own reward. By "its own reward," I mean that the ability to spend a few minutes each day in a calm, undistracted state can contribute immeasurably to a sane and happy life.
"By "its own reward," I mean that the ability to spend a few minutes each day in a calm, undistracted state can contribute immeasurably to a sane and happy life."____I'll drink to that! The lightness of being that comes with dis-embedding goes hand in hand with the lightness of being that comes with a 45-min sit each morning, some breathing exercises throughout the day, a healthy diet, a walk by the river, and peaceful home life.____As long as one remembers that the happiness from true realisation of the former is unconditional, while the happiness from the latter, without penetrating insight, is always subject to the next natural disaster, broken ankle, car alarm, or job layoff.____Which is to say, samadhi isn't a bad way to spend one's free time
…but maybe its helpful to keep being open to a deeper contentment which comes from insight. ____Or something like that.
I had never realized before that following the breath would be classified as a samatha practice. Thank you Kenneth, for this incredibly freeing (and now, incredibly obvious) clarification.
And also, for making the distinction that vipassana disembeds, while samatha takes you deeper.
Hi Ian,
Yes, this is an important point. In fact, the Mahasi Sayadaw mental noting technique as taught by Sayadaw U Pandita deliberately combines samatha and vipassana. By following the breath at the rise and fall of the abdomen and noting "rising, falling," the yogi can access deep states of concentration. And by carefully noticing and/or noting the sensations associated with the rise and fall of the abdomen, e.g., softness, hardness, warmth, coolness, pressure, tension, release, the yogi clearly objectifies and dis-embeds from those phenomena. It's really quite an elegant technique, balancing, as it does, concentration and insight.
Following the breath without noting, on the other hand, is a pure samatha (concentration) technique and leads to deeply concentrated states including the jhanas. One way to move through the Progress of Insight is to first attain subtle states via the samatha technique, and then apply vipassana to those states. I call that "vipassanizing" the jhana. Whether you use this back and forth technique of alternating samatha and vipassana, or whether you develop both concentration and insight together as in the Mahasi technique, the result is the same: the balancing of samatha and vipassana leads to progress through the Four Paths of Enlightenment.
And by carefully noticing and/or noting the sensations associated with the rise and fall of the abdomen, e.g., softness, hardness, warmth, coolness, pressure, tension, release, the yogi clearly objectifies and dis-embeds from those phenomena.
So, if I understand this correctly, these phenomena (softness, hardness, warmth, coolness, pressure, tension, release, etc) appear whenever the mind is turned to noting/noticing. They are purely products of the mind process, and we are using the breath, or sensations, or whatever, to activate the part of the mind that gets stuck (in order to unstick it)?
I've been following the breath (without noting) for a while now, and have had little luck attaining jhannic states. However, perhaps that was due to my thinking of it as Vipassana practice, and looking for sensations to dis-identify with? I guess it would be hard to stabilize a jhana when I'm looking to tear it down before I even get into it….
Hi Ian,
Yes, this is an important point. In fact, the Mahasi Sayadaw mental noting technique as taught by Sayadaw U Pandita deliberately combines samatha and vipassana. By following the breath at the rise and fall of the abdomen and noting "rising, falling," the yogi can access deep states of concentration. And by carefully noticing and/or noting the sensations associated with the rise and fall of the abdomen, e.g., softness, hardness, warmth, coolness, pressure, tension, release, the yogi clearly objectifies and dis-embeds from those phenomena. It's really quite an elegant technique, balancing, as it does, concentration and insight.
Following the breath without noting, on the other hand, is a pure samatha (concentration) technique and leads to deeply concentrated states including the jhanas. One way to move through the Progress of Insight is to first attain subtle states via the samatha technique, and then apply vipassana to those states. I call that "vipassanizing" the jhana. Whether you use this back and forth technique of alternating samatha and vipassana, or whether you develop both concentration and insight together as in the Mahasi technique, the result is the same: the balancing of samatha and vipassana leads to progress through the Four Paths of Enlightenment.
Hi Ian,
Yes, this is an important point. In fact, the Mahasi Sayadaw mental noting technique as taught by Sayadaw U Pandita deliberately combines samatha and vipassana. By following the breath at the rise and fall of the abdomen and noting "rising, falling," the yogi can access deep states of concentration. And by carefully noticing and/or noting the sensations associated with the rise and fall of the abdomen, e.g., softness, hardness, warmth, coolness, pressure, tension, release, the yogi clearly objectifies and dis-embeds from those phenomena. It's really quite an elegant technique, balancing, as it does, concentration and insight.
Following the breath without noting, on the other hand, is a pure samatha (concentration) technique and leads to deeply concentrated states including the jhanas. One way to move through the Progress of Insight is to first attain subtle states via the samatha technique, and then apply vipassana to those states. I call that "vipassanizing" the jhana. Whether you use this back and forth technique of alternating samatha and vipassana, or whether you develop both concentration and insight together as in the Mahasi technique, the result is the same: the balancing of samatha and vipassana leads to progress through the Four Paths of Enlightenment.
Hi Kenneth,
I am practising Ashtanga Vinyasa style hatha yoga and AYP energetic pranayama and meditation. I am very interested in Vipassana meditation. Is it advisable to do it after powerful asana practise and are these two practises compatible? AYP meditation and samyama tend to result in pleasurable, even blissful states of mind with feeling of peace and inner silence after the practise. How energetic practises relate to 3 Gears method? Are these states of mind in your 20 Major Stata of Mind map?
Antero.
Hi Antero,
To answer all three of your questions in order:
1) Vipassana is compatible with anything that happens; vipassana is just the art of seeing your experience clearly, in real time. Nothing lies outside of that.
2) The 3 Speed Transmission teaches you to observe whatever arises in the mind without manipulation and to also surrender to what is always already the case. So, it is inherently non-manipulative. This is different from active energy practices that seek to redirect or consciously cultivate kundalini or chi.
3) The 20 Major Strata of Mind model is synthesized from Buddhist maps of Insight Knowledges and Realms of Absorption (jhanas). As such, it contains 13 states that are known for their pleasant, joyful, blissful, ecstatic, transcendent, or equanimous natures. So, yes the states you refer to are included in the model.
Why is dis-embedding from phenomena your preferred technique? Why dis-embedding vs. radical identification?
Hi Nathan,
Some years ago I was sitting around a television watching The Wizard of Oz with my family and some family friends including their little 5-year-old, Tommy. When we got to the part where the flying monkeys attack Dorothy, somebody elbowed me and pointed to little Tommy, who was sitting, mouth wide open in abject terror, eyes riveted to the TV screen. The elbowing continued around the room until all of the adults in the room where watching little Tommy, who was completely oblivious to the fact that he was now the center of attention. Little Tommy was embedded. As far as he was concerned, it was he who was being attacked by flying monkeys. Finally, one of the adults, moved to compassion by Tommy’s suffering, put a hand on his shoulder and said, “It’s all right, Tommy. You’re here with us. It’s just a movie.”
It’s possible that different people use the term “radical identification” in different ways (I hadn’t heard the term before I saw it in your post), but I would say that little Tommy was “radically identified.” And he was suffering. It was an act of compassion to reach out and help him dis-embed from his nightmare. We can learn to do that for ourselves; we can be our own wake-up call. It’s a beautiful thing to wake up and look around, only to find that you are safe and sound in your own living room, surrounded by loved ones. You can still watch the movie, but without the suffering. This is enlightenment, and this is why dis-embeddedness is preferable to radical identification.
One man's opinion…
Kenneth
hi Kenneth, Joel,
thanks for another excellent post/dialogue.Â
regarding real-time feedback loop, i find Kenneth’s description to be very similar to my teacher’s (Shinzen Young) style of teaching. the vocabulary may differ a bit but i find them very similar, if not exactly identical. (see Shinzen’s description of his interactive guided meditation ~ Â http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDmJ-3nLYNk )
i really like Kenneth’s description of dis-embedding. my question to Kenneth: how do you relate dis-embedding with equanimity?Â
also, i think that there are two ways we can approach dis-embedding: by zooming in, or by zooming out. for example, i can zoom in to a particular sensation (e.g. breathing) to break down its sensory components thus enabling me to dis-embed from it. alternatively, i can zoom out and observe (or visualize) my body as if i’m looking at it from another person’s perspective, which also enables me to disembed from my identification with the physical body and eventually with the witness. so what’s your take on the zoom in vs. zoom out approach? Â
thanks again. keep it flowing.
Hi C,
Shinzen Young has been very influential for me ever since 1990 when I used to edit/master Shinzen’s recorded dharma talks for Bill Hamilton’s Insight Recordings. I may well have gotten the inspiration for the interactive meditation from Shinzen (I don’t remember exactly). In fact, the idea of shifting gears, which I later expanded into the 3-Speed Transmission, also comes from Shinzen; he once mentioned in a recorded talk that he thinks of mindfulness of the body as 1st Gear, and he downshifts into it when he needs traction. So, I owe a great debt of gratitude to Shinzen; I consider him to be a true pioneer and one of those rare dharma teachers who really understands something about pedagogy (teaching and learning theory.)
Having said that, (based on the link you just sent) Shinzen and I have different points of emphasis while doing the interactive meditation with a student. He seems to focus on his algorithmic approach, which helps him target the instruction and guide the student skillfully. My main focus is to help the student master a technique, one of many in their yogi toolbox, that they can use throughout their lives to dis-embed from their experience.
Your point about zooming in and zooming out is excellent. In fact, it’s essential. You want to be able to see your experience clearly at every level of resolution and from multiple points of view. Sliding up and down through the strata of mind from gross to subtle and back; noting while deeply concentrated and while not concentrated at all; zooming in with a tight focus and zooming out for a diffuse focus: all of these are part of becoming fluent with and ultimately free within your own mind.
Thanks for the questions!
Kenneth