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Jun 30, 2014 9:56:22 GMT -5
Post by laughter on Jun 30, 2014 9:56:22 GMT -5
Bashar just doesn't ring true to me. According to wikipedia, Daryl was/is a special effects guy in Hollywood who (surprise!) also worked on Star Trek. Bashar looks like a big show to me. Me too. But Anka's definition of 'channeling' is no different than just creatively expressing without personal inhibition -- IOW, everyone does it or has done it, probably (coloring with crayons, playing music, dancing...). So Bashar is the character that he expresses with (along with his side career of special effects). I doubt he's maliciously making it up, just as I doubt folks claiming to have been abducted by aliens are knowingly fabricating a story. The message I've heard so far is not much more than you find anywhere else in the self-help/new age aisle. The main message being 'follow your bliss.' If he's not making it up then he believes what he's claiming. Either possibility is going to color what he has to say for me.
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Jun 30, 2014 9:57:03 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 9:57:03 GMT -5
Agreed. Back to something else, though. Your differentiation between working out the question and seeing through the illusion... In this case the question is, Is volition actually true?. So, as Max said, you "look openly". Looking openly is what I call working on the question, and it involves the mind. I don't see how you can look at a concept without using mind. "Seeing through the illusion" (any illusion, actually) would be the end of that looking. Why would that not be called working out the question? The distinction is often necessary to make it crystal clear that what's being talked about is not thought thinking about thought. No progression of working through it. No logical analysis. In this case it's more like a burning question that sits openly with no resolution. The moment it's seen to be irrelevant, it's done. There's nothing left to say. The whole thing evaporates. The interest in the question evaporates. Innocent confusion, period. Precisely. It's done once and for all.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:03:51 GMT -5
Post by laughter on Jun 30, 2014 10:03:51 GMT -5
If volition or determinism, either, is decided on then, yes, the relationship happens through the veil of that belief. That's the point, really. Until it's looked into, that veil/distortion is there. Not exactly. Keep in mind that it's all memory based and that this feeling of having free will comes natural. So, as with all other attempts of trying to live a concept, when push comes to shove, they will all forget their conclusions in the heat of the moment and will act all the same way. (** muttley snicker **)
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Jun 30, 2014 10:04:05 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 10:04:05 GMT -5
I don't know that looking openly in a process involving mind means realizing the truth of non-volition. If it does, then we're talking about the same thing. To me, the focus of attention is done with mind, but not the actual seeing. If you don't see the distinction, then we're not talking about the same thing. As Reefs said, it's possible to mentally understand non-volition, and just as easily mind may conclude the opposite since they're both just conceptual stories. One timeless moment of clear seeing, without thought, ends both the stories. Ok. I see the distinction you're making, but I don't know if I'd describe it the same way. Here, I'll give you a little rundown of how I see it: Mind wonders whether volition is something that actually happens. Mind turns attention to volition. Mind says, no, not this - no, not that (repeat, repeat....) (... until eventually) *HEAD-SLAP* Ferchrissake, it's not there! Mind says, "I think I'll have some ice cream. Maybe rum raisin." Yeah, that's close. However, it's not the discovery of something new and profound (as your exclamation may suggest), it's more like deja vu. So it's actually more like "What a joke!" and then you will ROFL for a week or two under your bodhi tree.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:07:00 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 10:07:00 GMT -5
I don't really know what you mean. Yeah, probably because it's an area I'm not clear about. What I'm trying to say is I'm not convinced that mind isn't involved all the way through. I experience the difference between philosophizing or logic-ing my way to a conclusion and realizing that something I took as real is, in actuality, a thought about something. The difference between the experience of these two things is huge. But I'm not convinced that they are not both mind processes. (I don't know if that makes any more sense!) In order to understand it you would have to understand what self-evident actually means.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:10:34 GMT -5
Post by laughter on Jun 30, 2014 10:10:34 GMT -5
Did you choose to have that question or did that question just appear out of nowhere? To assume that folks would deliberately choose to torture themselves with existential questions is absurd. My experience has been that the questions appear out of nowhere, and I have no control over the mind to halt the process. It is possible, through meditative practices, to gain the ability to pause the foreground process indefinitely -- the question of whether the process is halted altogether (background and foreground, ie: "no thought")is just a bunch of TMT over the definitions of "mind" and "thought". This is outside of my experience, but from reading what others have written, if the ability is gained before the illusion of a separate self is seen through then a subtle and deep trap can spring in which the person believes that they have acquired mastery over their mind.
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page 72
Jun 30, 2014 10:11:59 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2014 10:11:59 GMT -5
Since when is non-volition more than an absence of volition? Non-volition refers to the fiction of a separate person existing as a God-puppet. Ah okay, thanks! Let me be an instrument of Thy peace. I kind of like that one.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:12:31 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 10:12:31 GMT -5
Yeah, probably because it's an area I'm not clear about. What I'm trying to say is I'm not convinced that mind isn't involved all the way through. I experience the difference between philosophizing or logic-ing my way to a conclusion and realizing that something I took as real is, in actuality, a thought about something. The difference between the experience of these two things is huge. But I'm not convinced that they are not both mind processes. (I don't know if that makes any more sense!) Mind can be informed , how it processes its disappearance depends on that which disappeared.... Basically it's irrelevant how the 'being informed' process unfolds. But folks tend to have a certain script in mind how it should unfold and then try to sort out from that assumption who's the real deal and who is not.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:15:40 GMT -5
Post by laughter on Jun 30, 2014 10:15:40 GMT -5
Non-volition refers to the fiction of a separate person existing as a God-puppet. Ah okay, thanks! Let me be an instrument of Thy peace. I kind of like that one. .. yeah it seems popular. My guess is that the draw is the relief from letting go of worry.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:22:23 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 10:22:23 GMT -5
Right. It keeps the separate personal music going. Since when is non-volition more than an absence of volition? Actually, it's less.
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Jun 30, 2014 10:43:49 GMT -5
Post by enigma on Jun 30, 2014 10:43:49 GMT -5
Right. It keeps the separate personal music going. Since when is non-volition more than an absence of volition? When it leads to the notion of a person who has no volition.
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Jun 30, 2014 11:05:40 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 11:05:40 GMT -5
AAR, the good news is that people who want to find answers to existential questions can do so via contemplation, but the answers will not be like anything that one might have imagined beforehand. Each of us is intimately connected to the cosmos (indeed, we ARE the cosmos), and when the intellect is quiescent, our "downlink" to Reality (the "Supreme Ordering Intelligence?") is more likely to illumine us concerning the nature of what's going on. Most of us live in a cartoon-like world projected by the intellect while all around us the vastness of the ineffable silently awaits its discovery. Yes, the contemplation of existential questions can lead to silence. Actually, if done sincerely, questions like "Who am I?" or "Do I actually have a choice?" must lead to silence or a blank. That doesn't equal awakening, of course, but it's already quite something.
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Jun 30, 2014 11:09:59 GMT -5
Post by enigma on Jun 30, 2014 11:09:59 GMT -5
Did you choose to have that question or did that question just appear out of nowhere? To assume that folks would deliberately choose to torture themselves with existential questions is absurd. The way I understood the question that Top proposed is a way of determining whether an existential question is one that holds any weight to the one asking it. If it is just an idle curiosity where the answers one way or the other won't be that much of a big deal, then maybe it's not worth it anyhoo. In my case, I know that volition/free will is a subject that keeps coming up here, and I have been idly curious about it, so I looked to see if there were any interesting cartoons that addressed the subject. I posted a few. And a discussion has ensued. But it's not causing me any suffering. More like entertainment because I don't really care which way it goes, as per Top's question. I'm guessing Top saw that I didn't have a whole lot of eggs in that basket. Have you considered how 'no volition' may change your view of yourself and others? It's only a non-serious question if it's not taken seriously.
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Jun 30, 2014 11:15:19 GMT -5
Post by enigma on Jun 30, 2014 11:15:19 GMT -5
Well, I don't think there's no difference. Like I said earlier, there is an impact on the blame game. Among others. How would you know the impact until the question is looked at and resolved (or disappears, if you prefer)? Right. Blame is blame. If you believe in free will, you may have some kind of sense of personal freedom but also the burden of responsibility and finding a purpose. If you don't believe in free will, you may lose the burden of responsibility and finding a purpose but you also lose your sense of personal freedom. That's why I say, as soon as you have seen thru the separate volitional person issue (and therefore also thru the volition issue) the term 'freedom' gets a whole new meaning. Yeah, there's an uncomfy 'gap' between realizing no-volition and realizing no-personhood, and it's this gap that some try so hard to avoid in these volition discussions.
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Jun 30, 2014 11:20:15 GMT -5
Post by Reefs on Jun 30, 2014 11:20:15 GMT -5
Bashar just doesn't ring true to me. According to wikipedia, Daryl was/is a special effects guy in Hollywood who (surprise!) also worked on Star Trek. Bashar looks like a big show to me. Me too. But Anka's definition of 'channeling' is no different than just creatively expressing without personal inhibition -- IOW, everyone does it or has done it, probably (coloring with crayons, playing music, dancing...). So Bashar is the character that he expresses with (along with his side career of special effects). I doubt he's maliciously making it up, just as I doubt folks claiming to have been abducted by aliens are knowingly fabricating a story. The message I've heard so far is not much more than you find anywhere else in the self-help/new age aisle. The main message being 'follow your bliss.' That's exactly my issue with the Bashar guy. I'm no expert on the alien agenda, but I had my fair share of reading channeled stuff from the Playadians in the past, so that interest is sorta satisfied now. The LOA angle, I prefer to hear it straight from the horse's mouth and my impression is that he got it from A-H, so I'd rather listen to the original in that case.
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