jesse
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Post by jesse on Dec 17, 2010 14:32:13 GMT -5
It seems like you guys are pointing us back towards the door.
Using the dream analogy, what I am after is lucidity; to be awake within the dream. Like I said before, I know there is no manner of lullaby that's going to put us back to sleep, and this isn't what I, and I dare say ender, at all desire anyway.
I've been lucid in dreams before where I have no control over the dream. Just the knowledge that what I am experiencing is in fact a dream. This is where I am at. All I'm asking for is a mere modicum of control. Just enough so I don't feel like I'm slipping into mental illness.
It seems like this is the kind of thing Rose is referring to when he talks of triangulation, or Jed with Human Adulthood. I just need a means to that end. Rose can be a little too technical for me, and Jed's often just too vague. Seems like there must be something out there that addresses specifically this issue.
A Course in Miracles? Byron Katie's stuff, maybe? Joesph Campbell? In the meantime, I think I'm going to re-read Spiritual Warfare and see if there isn't anything else I might glean from it.
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Post by klaus on Dec 17, 2010 14:58:43 GMT -5
Jesse, Ender,
What you are experiencing is fear of dying, mind you it is the fear that is being experienced; not the dying. In dying you surrender all that you think you are: the physical, mental, psychological, metaphysical, spiritual. Everything. This is the natural process of dying and there is no fear in dying.
You are no closer to TRUTH now than when you started. What you're dealing with is the machinations of the mind; nothing more or less. Enter into the process of dying by surrendering to it.
THAT will take care of the rest. You have no say what so ever.
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jesse
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Posts: 12
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Post by jesse on Dec 17, 2010 15:06:01 GMT -5
klaus,
I agree with your post completely.
The thing is- I have absolutely no interest in TRUTH. Just to feel some sense of groundedness in my life. To enjoy it while I'm here.
Hell, maybe all I really need is to go on antidepressants ;D
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Post by klaus on Dec 17, 2010 15:42:19 GMT -5
Jesse,
You want groundedness in life. You know there is no such thing that's why you're in the state you're in now.
Yes, you may come upon a "system of "control" and be happy with that as long as you live. But both "system and "control" is temporary and even this will end when you die.
You're just reaching now to save your own skin(mecinhnations of mind). The hardest to accept is no "system of controll"
But good luck to you.
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Post by therealfake on Dec 17, 2010 15:57:35 GMT -5
Well said Klaus,
Jesse,
If that is that all that you want, then there is only one thought to contemplate.
What makes you think that there is any difference between your greatest fear and your greatest want?
When you realize that they are both the same thing, only than will you be able to move forward. (trying not to sound preachy)
TRF
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Post by monkkey on Dec 17, 2010 20:25:25 GMT -5
Hi Monkkey, What you say is true, just as what Enigma said was true. But this is not the time to intellectualize the situation Jesse and Ender find themselves in. If that's all it took, most spiritual seekers, including myself would be there by now. There are hundreds of books, libraries and teachers that have given me the words for salvation, yet that information hasn't moved me a bit. Sometimes, I feel that the intellect can only take me 99% of the way and then I have to let it go. I think that what Jesse and Ender need, is that which takes them the rest of the way. They will have to find out for themselves, if there is something else there, something that they can conjure up that will carry them across the bridge. Or, if their time is up, for being on this beautiful planet. They both have a date that they must keep. My only suggestion at this point would be, to make sure things are right in their lives, to resolve any issues at hand and get rid of any baggage. When Jesse, relays the circumstances of "how" he reached the "invisible door" and how he opened it with his"invisible key", I will reveal a couple of experiences that happened to me, that may or not help him and ender take the final step. Of course, there are some great teachers in here that could do the same and relay their experiences on this matter, which would make my personal tales of power, redundant PS: If my post seems a little over dramatic, it's only meant to reflect the seriousness of the situation that they both find themselves in. TRF TRF- no, do not go off believing what anyone on this board says is true. i, for one, am just taking pop shots at the ever-crafty little bugger keeping jesse occupied while the pain and misery of that lie continue to get exposed and fall away. why? i used to think i was that crafty little bugger and know just how crafty it can be! what jesse is is just fine, and if you are thinking what jesse thinks he is is going to go down quietly without a fight, well ok then, that is what you are thinking. carry on. he already is thinking about and gathering little distractions and pre-occupations that can be used to prolong this process of suffering and doubt. i am giving him a sword to counter the distractions of attachments and resistances. here is some more 'intellectualizing': IT is right here, right now....BE the SEEING----YOU are IT just LOOKING (without the mind's intellectualization). in fact, one can even look at the words on this screen without being 'able' to read them, because one is prior to the mind that can read them. alas, that simplicity will never be enough for our dear 'jesse the lie', the crafty little bugger. his story is going on in the world of darkness, the world of the lie, the prison, the separateness, the intellectualization, the duality, the suffering, and all the rest of the ignorance. i know that in the dream, all of that is actually falling away at all times, but something is keeping it tethered to his sense of self. here is a sincere question to help keep you occupied: what is it that is really ripping our dear jesse apart in this nightmare? the pop shots are meant to expose the shennanigans of the crafty little bugger 'jesse the lie', steer the attention toward IT. 'monkkey the lie' has nothing to do with this; it is actually being done at the limited level of awareness of monkkey's mind, so it sounds like a barrage of something or other. monkkey is not a teacher, but is aware of the terrain, and knows that 'jesse the lie' and the other characters are just looking to settle into IT. once done, the actor can do whatever it wants as a character in the dream, and the thoughts, beliefs, and whatnot that once imprisoned you wll be seen more as ornamentation and the spices of life. is that not the direction of this thread? IT is pure awareness (without attachment to, resistance of, judgment of) the experience that 'jesse the lie' is fearing. anything else is a continuation of the lie/self' surviving off the attachments to pleasure, resistance to pain, and the judging between those two VERY limited 'human' prison bars. the real IS THAT (pure awareness), that I AMNESS HERE. there is no other to get back to (space), or 'to become more aware of' (time). HERE. LOOKING. NOW. IT IS. SIMPLY EXISTING. (look at these words without reading...that is your experiential direction...the mind will move it inthe "other" direction, but the movement is still within IT.........AWARENESS..........SEE?) later, when you feel a need 'hold on to' something so you can loosen your grip, consider David Carse's "Perfect Brilliant Stillness". It is no nonsense, simple, and gentle pointer that should help the attention gravitate to a better direction than what the ego is trying to do now. p.s.-the monkkey dream goes on out of the country for a while, so will be away.
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Post by enigma on Dec 17, 2010 22:25:49 GMT -5
"haiku" means "playful verse." I will try to participate in conversation in such format (for fun) ............ our coin has one side no man can fix the dream duality does not exists ........... Shaking without a speare Longing without a fellow Tossing a one-sided coin
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Post by enigma on Dec 17, 2010 22:35:57 GMT -5
"Hi Monkkey,
What you say is true, just as what Enigma said was true.
But this is not the time to intellectualize the situation Jesse and Ender find themselves in.
If that's all it took, most spiritual seekers, including myself would be there by now."
I went back to my post to see if I could find the intellectualizing, and couldn't. What we seem to have here is a failure to communicate.
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Post by therealfake on Dec 18, 2010 13:56:17 GMT -5
Hi Enigma,
Ah yes, the old "failure to communicate", the scourge of modern society.
The cause of so much suffering and angst, on so many discussion boards.
I always giggle when I look at the mockery behind the principle, " to communicate".
Nevertheless, it's not the first or the last time I'll be blamed for my lack of acceptance and sensitivity.
My response was for Monkkey and I was simply paying homage to a couple of posts that expressed some truths about reality.
In retrospect, it probably would have been better not to reference other posters, no matter how innocently.
TRF
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Post by enigma on Dec 18, 2010 14:32:22 GMT -5
Hi Enigma, Ah yes, the old "failure to communicate", the scourge of modern society. The cause of so much suffering and angst, on so many discussion boards. I always giggle when I look at the mockery behind the principle, " to communicate". Nevertheless, it's not the first or the last time I'll be blamed for my lack of acceptance and sensitivity. My response was for Monkkey and I was simply paying homage to a couple of posts that expressed some truths about reality. In retrospect, it probably would have been better not to reference other posters, no matter how innocently. TRF No problemo. Just trying to follow the bouncing ball here. I don't know what anybody needs to hear or how they need to hear it. Fortunately, that's not my job.
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Post by angela on Dec 19, 2010 11:46:01 GMT -5
jesse,
my heart feels your fear, just reading your notes. and there are as many ways of addressing your issue as there are login accounts on this board. some are hard, some are soft, but none of them is going to help you honey.
here's the thing. you saw something true. and you will never, ever be able to un-see it. no matter how far you run away, or where you go, you will never be able to avoid it. thats the thing about the truth. it has a ring to it like nothing else, because it's true. that's the nature of it. nothing false can withstand the truth. you can just bury your head in the sand, go do drugs or join a cult or become a businessman and CEO.... but nothing, nothing you do will ever remove the truth fire from your system.
that being said, if you can find some way, any way, hard or soft, wild or sedate.... to simply accept that you saw something true, much of the fear will be released from your system. your fear and terror and mental illness feelings are coming because you're trying to use this tiny, false little thing called a self to fight against the gigantic wholeness of existence called the truth. you cannot win.
yes, you said the word surrender. that is exactly what you have to do. you have to stop fighting. this does not mean you have to decide to go whole hog ahab style and dismantle what is left of your ego with gusto. the truth will do that for you (there really is no YOU doing any of this anyway.... ) in bits and pieces.
you, my friend, have to relax. and admit the truth. the fight, the struggle, the pain, it's all the same thing. if you stop trying to deny what you know to be true, you will stop hurting. and you will stop feeling so crazy. and you will look around at the dreamlike world and say, well now.... new amusement park. let me go check out the rides.
besides all that, be good to your body. drink a lot of water, take walks outside, eat your vegetables, laugh as much as you can. these things go a long way to providing stability.
enjoy yourself. don't forget, death is around the corner and you don't want to spend your last breath fighting. relax. appreciate what you have. that anything is appearing to happen at all is a blast, and a miracle. it's pretty fun if you let it be.
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Post by harrison on Dec 19, 2010 13:03:21 GMT -5
"haiku" means "playful verse." I will try to participate in conversation in such format (for fun) ............ our coin has one side no man can fix the dream duality does not exists ........... Shaking without a speare Longing without a fellow Tossing a one-sided coin YES!!
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Post by nobody on Dec 20, 2010 16:20:32 GMT -5
The dilemma here, is that now that I’ve had a peak over the edge, as it were, I am suddenly terrified of everything. It’s as if seeking was some form of escapism for me: you know- “everything’s just a projection anyway, so don’t sweat anything”. Now that I’m sure the Truth is much too heavy a thing for me to realize, or become, or whatever way you want to put it, I find myself clinging to things: chiefly relationships and existence. Not a very desirable outcome in the least. I think we may have seen the same thing. My experience about three weeks ago. You don't really know what "non-existence" really means until it's knocking at your door. It's especially a shock when the so-called awakened ones (and the rest of the spiritual world) are going on about love, bliss, and peace. This has nothing to do with any of those. It's more like pure terror. Like you I had to ask myself, "Is this really what I want?" Although, I'm not really sure that we have a choice. I think it's a good idea to learn to breath properly, take care of your body, and learn to surrender to fear. I don't know how long you've been going this, but for me it hasn't been very long. I feel that the experience I had was like the universes' way of saying, "Here's a taste, are you sure this is what you want?" The real deal may actually be a ways off, but who knows. I want to be free within the dream, not terrified to death of a nightmare. I know there’s no going back to the sleep state, and that’s not what I’m after. I just have to figure out how to function within this paradigm. I had high hopes for McKenna’s third book in that regard, but it never really expounded on “Human Adulthood” in any implimentable way (for me). Jed's books have been my primary source. Regarding Human Adulthood, what do you think it takes? What do you think Jed is suggesting you do?
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jesse
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Posts: 12
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Post by jesse on Dec 22, 2010 8:42:35 GMT -5
I sent Eddie Traversa an email summing up the content of my posts in this thread. Here's his reply (reprinted with his permission):
What you’re asking is impossible in the sense that you never ever had control to begin with. Going with an old Zen saying of before enlightenment, chopping wood carrying water, after enlightenment chopping wood carry water could just as easily be written as before enlightenment no control, after enlightenment no control. My point being that you’re asking for a modicum of control where there is none to be handed out, never was and never will be.
The path of human adulthood, what people call being but misinterpret that as enlightenment, is one of a path of a continual alignment with the Absolute. In terms of enlightenment it’s the same, except it further until there is no further and there is no one to be, and no “being”.
In your situation, you can think of the path to human adulthood as one of progressively letting go of control. As a human being there is always the perception that one is in control. Even when we surrender, it is still someone giving up, an act of will, that by definition is an attempt at controlling the situation. Again using the same Zen saying, from a human perspective it could be written as Before enlightenment, perceives control, After Enlightenment no control. The faultiness for lack of better wording is the perception of control. Even though an act of surrender is ultimately control as well, at least it then gives the sense of no control after the surrender has occurred. You follow? After the act of surrender there is a perception of no control and that is more in alignment with the absolute than an act that gives the perception of more control.
Relating this to human adulthood, it is one where we deliberately and progressively let go of notions, beliefs, etc and of course control. We do not do this to get enlightened, nor do we do it to get rich or get happy or whatever. Though that’s usually where we start and that’s fine. But ultimately we come to a point where we do it to discover new territory, new ways of operating within the world or we want the plain and simple truth irrespective of what that may be.
How you will operate in new territory will be slightly different to the next person and different again to another person. That is part of the path of adulthood where you have to discover the new territory and then fully explore it in order to see what does and does not work for you. You have to play with it, experiment with it persistently. There isn’t a way around this and there is no shortcut. One literally has to become adult enough to step in new waters even if means floundering or sinking for a while.
On the subject of mental illness, by what standard are you defining mental illness? Are you judging yourself on what everyone else believes to be normal and sane? If so remember that our world is one where 1 in 5 female children are sexually abused and 1 in 8 male children follow the same fate and that figure may be underreporting the fact of the situation. We live in society where half of all marriages end in divorce. In the remaining 50 percent, 5% are happily married, 1% are extremely happily married and the rest fall on the continuum of putting up with the marriage or living unhappily in a marriage.
We could look at the current wars, how we let millions starve to death whilst there is an abundance of food being thrown away simply because it would not be commercially viable to ship the food to those in need. What price a life? We ruin the environment in the name of greed and progress. I could go on and on, but I am sure you are getting a good sense of the picture. Here is the question.
Do you honestly believe that a sane world would engage in these acts?
Again how are you measuring mental illness? On preconceived ideas and where did these ideas come from? That’s what I would look at to begin with.
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Post by Peter on Dec 22, 2010 11:09:49 GMT -5
Hi Jesse, let me welcome you to the board somewhat belatedly.
I read the reply you got from Eddie Traversa with interest, and then went back to read all your previous posts, so I had a bit of catching up to do. Sorry to hear about your girlfriend, that can't have been pleasant.
Eddie refers to mental illness at some length which makes me think you might have gone into more detail with him than in your posts on this board? I've an interest in mental breakdown / psychosis in the context of spiritual growth, so can discuss that further if relevant. I suspect it isn't.
I'm not sure that you really mean "borderline dissociative-disorder" because as I understand it that's more to do with alternative personalities and you'd be more likely to have gaps in your memory which I don't think you're experiencing?
What I would say about being emotionally detached is that (in my experience) it's a defense mechanism which comes into play when an adult wasn't encouraged to express themselves emotionally when they were a child. I've spent some time working with this issue (which comes and goes, as does my actively working on it, and not often in sync) as as always I find I can't do anything without a degree of presence / mindfulness / self awareness whatever you want to call it in place first.
Once you realise that you're being emotionally detached, then you can start to work with it. Pull up a hand, look at it and ask yourself if you're "Mad, Bad, Glad, Sad or Scared"
Mad = Angry Bad = Guilty Glad = Happy Sad = Sad and Scared doesn't rhyme, but it's the 5th option.
Once you've worked out roughly where your emotional state is at, you can start to explore it a bit further and allow yourself to connect with that state.
Anyhoo, that's just what came to mind when I was reading your posts.
Take care, Peter
EDIT: Still getting those 42 synchronicities. Jesse made that post at 14:42 (my timezone) and this is my 402nd post.
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