|
Post by kate on Mar 20, 2011 21:22:57 GMT -5
[quote author=kate board=misc thread=1361 post=17141 time=130066728 Yes, what you are is the attention. Attention isn't thinking until it touches mind, so it moves spontaneously wherever it is drawn. Control doesn't enter the picture. It's drawn by the interest in thoughts, feelings and sensory perception. This is God falling into his own dream, and it's all very innocent and playful until somebody pokes an 'I' out. (hehe) There is no interest until perception happens, and the interest is formed from within the dreamscape. So attention, being what I am, becomes interested in things from within the dreamscape. Although it’s not exactly interest as we know it, it’s just innocent movement? For some reason the phrase “rest in/as awareness” really niggles me, but for lack of a better way of putting it, that is what happens when the interest (in thoughts) disappears? Would you say the interest is dissolved by seeing that the thoughts aren’t true? I think this is where I am at the moment. I’ve had a glimpse of the fact that no thought is any more true than any other thought, which I guess can only have come from seeing that thoughts in general are flimsy, misty things that don’t have roots in reality, but then I still get interested in them. It’s like it hasn’t absolutely been seen. This is the same way it is with pretty much every other realization. My mind interrupts, too. It feels like it pounces on realizations when they’re half baked, wanting to turn them into an achievement it can take the credit for.
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Mar 20, 2011 22:05:38 GMT -5
Yes, what you are is the attention. Attention isn't thinking until it touches mind, so it moves spontaneously wherever it is drawn. Control doesn't enter the picture. It's drawn by the interest in thoughts, feelings and sensory perception. This is God falling into his own dream, and it's all very innocent and playful until somebody pokes an 'I' out. (hehe) There is no interest until perception happens, and the interest is formed from within the dreamscape. So attention, being what I am, becomes interested in things from within the dreamscape. Although it’s not exactly interest as we know it, it’s just innocent movement? For some reason the phrase “rest in/as awareness” really niggles me, but for lack of a better way of putting it, that is what happens when the interest (in thoughts) disappears? Would you say the interest is dissolved by seeing that the thoughts aren’t true? I think this is where I am at the moment. I’ve had a glimpse of the fact that no thought is any more true than any other thought, which I guess can only have come from seeing that thoughts in general are flimsy, misty things that don’t have roots in reality, but then I still get interested in them. It’s like it hasn’t absolutely been seen. This is the same way it is with pretty much every other realization. My mind interrupts, too. It feels like it pounces on realizations when they’re half baked, wanting to turn them into an achievement it can take the credit for. I'd say that last part is a good insight that you should take credit for. Hehe. I've tried to say this before and failed utterly, but maybe this here is one reason why it's important. All insights are fundamentally empty, such that no knowledge is gained, only lost. Is it true that some concepts are ultimately True? Nope.....That's the insight......nope. Is it true that there's a separate, volitional person here? Nope........That's the depth and breadth of the insight. No knowledge has been gained, only lost. Ultimately, you're left knowing nothing, which is perfectly okay. You don't need to know anything. It's very difficult to take credit for knowing nothing, although mind can find a way. Hehe. As far as no thought being more true than another, that's not really true. The thought that this forum is filled with posts is more true than the thought that it is filled with pistachio ice cream. This idea may have been a conclusion derived from the better insight that no thought is grounded in reality. In fact, thoughts are not ultimately referenced to anything but other thoughts, in the same way that all words are defined only by other words, and all dualistic concepts are self defining pairs. The whole deal is imagined and conceptualized into apparent existence and experienced through the apparent senses, and is self contained and self sustaining. It couldn't possibly say anything about that which is prior to thought, even if there were something to say, which there isn't.
|
|
|
Post by kate on Mar 21, 2011 0:43:02 GMT -5
Enigma: "I'd say that last part is a good insight that you should take credit for. Hehe. I've tried to say this before and failed utterly, but maybe this here is one reason why it's important. All insights are fundamentally empty, such that no knowledge is gained, only lost. Is it true that some concepts are ultimately True? Nope.....That's the insight......nope. Is it true that there's a separate, volitional person here? Nope........That's the depth and breadth of the insight. No knowledge has been gained, only lost. Ultimately, you're left knowing nothing, which is perfectly okay. You don't need to know anything. It's very difficult to take credit for knowing nothing, although mind can find a way. Hehe."
For some crazy reason it took me ages to figure out what you were talking about here and why it was relevant to what I was asking, but I've got you now...I think.
So the insight is simple and limited to the seeing that something is not true, but the dissolving of the false belief must be absolute? In which case how can you have these bitsy insights? How does one insight become separate from the whole shebang? Surely it all comes down to the belief in a separate volitional person and so it seems like it should be a house of cards.
"As far as no thought being more true than another, that's not really true. The thought that this forum is filled with posts is more true than the thought that it is filled with pistachio ice cream. This idea may have been a conclusion derived from the better insight that no thought is grounded in reality."
Hm, maybe the no thought being any more true part of the “realization” was actually the mind pouncing part.
"In fact, thoughts are not ultimately referenced to anything but other thoughts, in the same way that all words are defined only by other words."
Yes, I can see this.
Everything you say sounds true to me but I guess I don't really see that no concepts are ultimately true or that I am not a separate volitional person. I feel like I could sit here endlessly reading posts telling me this stuff and I could see the truth in them and conceptually understand but my experience of the world - my perspective, my sense of who I am, my belief in thoughts would all remain the same. Sometimes it feels like distraction, that initially the intention was pure (another word that's probably not the best one) but now it's just something to get caught up in to distract me from suffering.
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Mar 21, 2011 1:32:42 GMT -5
For some crazy reason it took me ages to figure out what you were talking about here and why it was relevant to what I was asking, but I've got you now...I think. So the insight is simple and limited to the seeing that something is not true, but the dissolving of the false belief must be absolute? In which case how can you have these bitsy insights? How does one insight become separate from the whole shebang? Surely it all comes down to the belief in a separate volitional person and so it seems like it should be a house of cards. Well, yeah, it is a bit like a house of cards, but folks are resistant to pulling out the foundation first, and so you're free to remove some of the roof and walls first. I would say that's most often how the ego house comes down. You CAN look at one particular belief and see through it completely. This will definitely compromise the integrity of the whole structure. If you do actually see that all thoughts only reference other thoughts, not just as a concept but with absolute clarity, then it must be clear that no thought is ultimately True. Seems to me that this has to effect your belief system. How can it not? The implication for the mind that seeks understanding of Truth, or holds anything to be ultimately True, is pretty devastating. Nothing you can think can ultimately be True. That's the obvious implication, assuming we're interested in noticing it.
|
|
|
Post by kate on Mar 21, 2011 2:56:08 GMT -5
For some crazy reason it took me ages to figure out what you were talking about here and why it was relevant to what I was asking, but I've got you now...I think. So the insight is simple and limited to the seeing that something is not true, but the dissolving of the false belief must be absolute? In which case how can you have these bitsy insights? How does one insight become separate from the whole shebang? Surely it all comes down to the belief in a separate volitional person and so it seems like it should be a house of cards. Well, yeah, it is a bit like a house of cards, but folks are resistant to pulling out the foundation first, and so you're free to remove some of the roof and walls first. I would say that's most often how the ego house comes down. You CAN look at one particular belief and see through it completely. This will definitely compromise the integrity of the whole structure. Oh, well that's any easy answer to accept. Thanks. If you do actually see that all thoughts only reference other thoughts, not just as a concept but with absolute clarity, then it must be clear that no thought is ultimately True. Seems to me that this has to effect your belief system. How can it not? The implication for the mind that seeks understanding of Truth, or holds anything to be ultimately True, is pretty devastating. Nothing you can think can ultimately be True. That's the obvious implication, assuming we're interested in noticing it. I probably don't see it with absolute clarity. I mean, my immediate response is: of course thoughts only reference other thoughts! How could they reference anything else? They're stuck being thoughts, mingling with other thoughts in their thought world. Now, I don't know where that came from or whether it's even true. When you say no thoughts are ultimately true do you mean that they’re not true because they're thoughts, as opposed to them not being true because they're about the fact that I think this forum is full of pistachio ice cream?
|
|
|
Post by angela on Mar 21, 2011 9:34:31 GMT -5
enigma and kate - your discussion here has been so useful to me! thank you... especially the parts about attention, enigma your phrasing helped me to see through some small lingering false belief that has been nagging at me for the last few days. i've noticed lately a stillness in me that is based around what apparently is "attention" saying a gentle no thank you to whatever the mind tries to offer up. it seems to choose not to follow it, preferring, it seems, to look FROM instead of looking AT in some way. i have been speculating about the actual mechanism of thought and mind, and how exactly it is that we seem to get lost there. lately, the thoughts more often than not just float across the screen and no matter how intense or captivating they are, there is this sense that attention is more content right here, looking FROM instead of rushing out to look AT whatever is offered. i don't know if that makes sense, but it's been really interesting to notice as it happens. it's been about two years now since i first noticed that nothing i think is true, or can ever be true, but the actual movement of attention into the thoughts continued, although over time it diminished. and recently it's very simply saying "no, none for me thank you" to whatever antics the mind has going on. there begins to be this lovely shimmering quality to the world where things seem to lose their distinctions from one another, as the reality of this attention seems to draw a quality of mind that is less afraid of the "i don't know" - no longer sort of threatened by it, only infrequently twirling around and freaking out to find somewhere to rest.... i have sensed for a while that there wasn't really such a thing as choice anymore, but here it really does feel like a choice, although very different than any kind of choice i've ever experienced before, because it's really got nothing to do with me..... it's as if this attention is more often than not sort of choosing itself over anything else that pops up on the screen. the choice doesn't feel like a me making a decision, but from the experience side i seem to just witness this empty space choosing itself, saying "yeah, not really interested there anymore" to the mind's offerings. and the mind, drunk out in the gutter, using kate's terms, can sort of go on and on, singing and rambling, and it's just not really interesting anymore. last week, before this open space started to roll, i posted a long post about feeling really empty and meaningless in life - i felt like my "spiritual" life was just toast, it was as done as done could be. there was nothing left to do. but then i saw that meaninglessness is just another place to rest, another story, and then with that - this sort of silence just started sort of eating whatever debris was laying around. it's fascinating. in the giving up, in the utter exhaustion, in the inability to "do" another d*mn thing to try to gain a position or a standpoint.... there is just this. anyway. this thread has been a great blessing to me, at just the right time, so i thank you both from my heart.
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Mar 21, 2011 10:37:05 GMT -5
Well, yeah, it is a bit like a house of cards, but folks are resistant to pulling out the foundation first, and so you're free to remove some of the roof and walls first. I would say that's most often how the ego house comes down. You CAN look at one particular belief and see through it completely. This will definitely compromise the integrity of the whole structure. Oh, well that's any easy answer to accept. Thanks. If you do actually see that all thoughts only reference other thoughts, not just as a concept but with absolute clarity, then it must be clear that no thought is ultimately True. Seems to me that this has to effect your belief system. How can it not? The implication for the mind that seeks understanding of Truth, or holds anything to be ultimately True, is pretty devastating. Nothing you can think can ultimately be True. That's the obvious implication, assuming we're interested in noticing it. I probably don't see it with absolute clarity. I mean, my immediate response is: of course thoughts only reference other thoughts! How could they reference anything else? They're stuck being thoughts, mingling with other thoughts in their thought world. Now, I don't know where that came from or whether it's even true. When you say no thoughts are ultimately true do you mean that they’re not true because they're thoughts, as opposed to them not being true because they're about the fact that I think this forum is full of pistachio ice cream? It sounds like you're seeing it with some degree of clarity, then as you talked about, mind steps in and says things like 'where did it come from and is it even true?' Maybe a premature pulling of attention away from the 'looking' into the thinking. Mind will always be able to question what is seen, so it has to be absolutely clear so that mind's doubt become irrelevant. What you 'see' beyond mind is the sudden collapse of what is in mind. It's not a thought stream or a concept until mind conceptualizes it, which is fine AFTER it is seen with absolute clarity. Be very gentle and patient with the 'looking'. It's very subtle. Mind will give you a focus of consciousness, then hit the pause button on mind and look at the bigger picture without knowing what you're looking for. When I say they're not ultimately True I mean they're over here (pointing to the right) in a feeding frenzy with themselves, while that which is prior to all thought (pointing to the left) is watching the feeding frenzy in complete stillness with no thought. What is over there (pointing to the feeding frenzy) can't possibly say anything about what's over there (pointing to that which is aware of the feeding frenzy, and about which there is literally nothing to know because it stands before knowledge, as the source of knowledge, prior to knowledge)
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Mar 21, 2011 11:36:28 GMT -5
enigma and kate - your discussion here has been so useful to me! thank you... especially the parts about attention, enigma your phrasing helped me to see through some small lingering false belief that has been nagging at me for the last few days. i've noticed lately a stillness in me that is based around what apparently is "attention" saying a gentle no thank you to whatever the mind tries to offer up. it seems to choose not to follow it, preferring, it seems, to look FROM instead of looking AT in some way. i have been speculating about the actual mechanism of thought and mind, and how exactly it is that we seem to get lost there. lately, the thoughts more often than not just float across the screen and no matter how intense or captivating they are, there is this sense that attention is more content right here, looking FROM instead of rushing out to look AT whatever is offered. i don't know if that makes sense, but it's been really interesting to notice as it happens. It makes perfect sense. I love this conversation cause yous guys are tiptoeing through the conceptual tulips and blowing them up with your attention. This attention can attend to what is happening in mind and see it for what it is, or it can get pulled into mind where it goes blind as a bat. I think that's what you mean when you say "look AT in some way". You (as attention/awareness) are not mind. You are aware of mind, and so there is the option of looking from outside of mind or through mind. Wonderful! It's extremely helpful to understand how this works, and we're talking about the functioning of mind rather than Truth, so we're allowed to understand. Hehe. All that is moving is this attention that You are, and it moves spontaneously because it is innocent; prior to thought, so it seemingly gets pulled this way and that, mostly into thought, and once in the thought stream, you use thought to wonder why you got pulled into thought, and then you wonder how you're going to get out. (hehe) This is why thoughts are not controllable so much, and why the choices that happen are just happening. As such, working with the conscious layers of mind is not useful. Attention emerges from the unconscious levels of mind. Follow the mind down through the unconscious levels and you ultimately arrive at Consciousness, so YOU arise through those levels. (It's a way of talking about it) As such, attention gets pulled into mind before there is conscious awareness of it. What pulls is what we call conditioning, and so if you are to avoid this pull into the conscious thought stream, the conditioning has to be altered such that there is no longer the belief or interest in what is there. Then, this spontaneous attention spontaneously attends to itself. This is what you're describing when you say, " attention is more often than not sort of choosing itself over anything else that pops up on the screen". Maybe it looks like a choice but it's really losing interest in the content of mind because the illusory nature of that content has been seen. Without the interest in that content, what is observed through the body is seen for what it is, and this is where 'my path' and 'Zens path' join in non-abidance in mind and the perception of what actually IS.
|
|
|
Post by therealfake on Mar 21, 2011 15:19:43 GMT -5
Any thought in this world that you believe is good or valuable and worth striving for, like awakening, can hurt you and will do so.
Not because the thought has the power to hurt, but because you have made it real, rather than to see it directly, that it is an illusion.
To make the illusory thought of awakening into a perceived reality you are making all the other illusory thoughts of the world equally real.
In that belief comes wrongfulness, specialness, hurt and harm in sacrifice and death. Because you cannot make one illusion real and escape the rest.
Can you choose to keep the illusion that you prefer and find safety that only the truth alone can give? Who can believe illusions are the same and still maintain that even one is best?
Don't make your noble illusion as your only friend. Because that one illusion obscures the truth.
What illusion can replace the truth?
See thought for what it is, a thought, an illusion, don't befriend any thought no matter how beautiful.
The space you create by observing thought as thought, will be filled with the truth and you will be lifted from the shadowy world of thought.
Even this thought is meant only to transcend thought and then to be discarded.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Mar 21, 2011 15:53:01 GMT -5
Any thought in this world that you believe is good or valuable and worth striving for, like awakening, can hurt you and will do so. Not because the thought has the power to hurt, but because you have made it real, rather than to see it directly, that it is an illusion. To make the illusory thought of awakening into a perceived reality you are making all the other illusory thoughts of the world equally real. In that belief comes wrongfulness, specialness, hurt and harm in sacrifice and death. Because you cannot make one illusion real and escape the rest. Can you choose to keep the illusion that you prefer and find safety that only the truth alone can give? Who can believe illusions are the same and still maintain that even one is best? Don't make your noble illusion as your only friend. Because that one illusion obscures the truth. What illusion can replace the truth? See thought for what it is, a thought, an illusion, don't befriend any thought no matter how beautiful. The space you create by observing thought as thought, will be filled with the truth and you will be lifted from the shadowy world of thought. Even this thought is meant only to transcend thought and then to be discarded. Yes, our words on this website are only pointing to the truth, and are not the truth, but some words and thoughts are "better" than others. Ha ha! For example, Gangaji once told someone, "There is only one worthwhile desire--the desire to wake up." That desire, too, is an illusion, but at least it points in the right direction. IOW, forget the new Porsche and go for waking up. If you wake up, you get the Porsche, the factory, the Nurburgring, and the entire universe it all appears in. LOL
|
|
|
Post by therealfake on Mar 21, 2011 16:16:45 GMT -5
If you see thought as thought and as an illusion you don't need a direction for anything, including awakening. What direction would it be in anyway?
Like I said you can follow that one desire that you think is in the right direction, to your own detriment.
The truth is easily obscured even by the best thought, no matter how directionally correct it seems.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Mar 21, 2011 17:17:49 GMT -5
TRF: I probably misread your previous post, but it seemed overly serious, so I was pointing at the same thing in a more lighthearted manner. Ramesh used to say that if you have a choice between enlightenment and a million bucks, take the million bucks cause enlightenment won't give you anything. LOL. Same flavor. FWIW the direction of awakening is due west on Interstate 40 from my office. If waking up doesn't occur, at least there are some great hiking trails in the Rockies.
|
|
|
Post by Portto on Mar 21, 2011 18:03:38 GMT -5
The truth is easily obscured even by the best thought, no matter how directionally correct it seems. That thought is floating in truth, so how can it obscure truth?
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Mar 21, 2011 18:22:14 GMT -5
Any thought in this world that you believe is good or valuable and worth striving for, like awakening, can hurt you and will do so. Not because the thought has the power to hurt, but because you have made it real, rather than to see it directly, that it is an illusion. To make the illusory thought of awakening into a perceived reality you are making all the other illusory thoughts of the world equally real. In that belief comes wrongfulness, specialness, hurt and harm in sacrifice and death. Because you cannot make one illusion real and escape the rest. Can you choose to keep the illusion that you prefer and find safety that only the truth alone can give? Who can believe illusions are the same and still maintain that even one is best? Don't make your noble illusion as your only friend. Because that one illusion obscures the truth. What illusion can replace the truth? See thought for what it is, a thought, an illusion, don't befriend any thought no matter how beautiful. The space you create by observing thought as thought, will be filled with the truth and you will be lifted from the shadowy world of thought. Even this thought is meant only to transcend thought and then to be discarded. Yes, our words on this website are only pointing to the truth, and are not the truth, but some words and thoughts are "better" than others. Ha ha! Yes, some pigs really are more equal than others. (Animal Farm) That's the best deal on a Porsche I've ever seen!
|
|
|
Post by kate on Mar 21, 2011 19:36:27 GMT -5
last week, before this open space started to roll, i posted a long post about feeling really empty and meaningless in life - i felt like my "spiritual" life was just toast, it was as done as done could be. there was nothing left to do. but then i saw that meaninglessness is just another place to rest, another story, and then with that - this sort of silence just started sort of eating whatever debris was laying around. it's fascinating. in the giving up, in the utter exhaustion, in the inability to "do" another d*mn thing to try to gain a position or a standpoint.... there is just this. anyway. this thread has been a great blessing to me, at just the right time, so i thank you both from my heart. That's great! I can relate very much to the empty and meaningless stuff. I'm feeling a bit that way now and it does seem to be in response to a diminishing interest in mind stuff, particularly around the "spiritual". Even as I have been writing these posts there is an underlying sense of emptiness and meaninglessness towards it all. So I'm glad it has been helpful to you regardless! I don't have any tradition behind me, and I've never been to satsangs or even meditation groups or anything so I don't have much connection with other people when it comes to all of this. Sometimes I think it's as much about that for me as anything else.
|
|