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Post by quinn on Sept 22, 2014 15:24:29 GMT -5
I agree, though I don't talk about it that way. Some talk about dropping into the heart, or body wisdom, or gnosis, which may be the same as what yer saying? The way I like to talk about it is, you can provide a focal point for consciousness by using mind to contemplate such questions, and then simply let go of the mental activity, which naturally results in an expansion of that focal point of attention beyond the boundaries set by mind. Clarity may result, and it will be clarity regarding that prior focus of attention. The split between intellect and feeling only happens in the absence of gnosis. Feeling and emotion don't provide any more of a basis in form for realization than the intellect, but the body is direct, while the mind is abstracted. Feeling lends perspective a more direct notice of the presence and degree of suffering, and often, intellect, by the process of rationalization, can obscure that. Yes, I think the directness of the body is part of it. No abstraction. But I don't equate body with feeling/emotion in the way that you're talking about it. I think of body like...well, sort of like a dog. Less encumbered by the workings of mind. Emotions are the product of mind, playing out in the body. I agree that feelings are more direct than thought, but when I say 'dropping into the body' I'm not talking about working with feelings.
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Post by laughter on Sept 22, 2014 17:03:17 GMT -5
The split between intellect and feeling only happens in the absence of gnosis. Feeling and emotion don't provide any more of a basis in form for realization than the intellect, but the body is direct, while the mind is abstracted. Feeling lends perspective a more direct notice of the presence and degree of suffering, and often, intellect, by the process of rationalization, can obscure that. Yes, I think the directness of the body is part of it. No abstraction. But I don't equate body with feeling/emotion in the way that you're talking about it. I think of body like...well, sort of like a dog. Less encumbered by the workings of mind. Emotions are the product of mind, playing out in the body. I agree that feelings are more direct than thought, but when I say 'dropping into the body' I'm not talking about working with feelings. I know this distinction that you're making between sensing stillness with the body and feeling emotion. Even using the word stillness here .. it sort of fits, especially in some contexts, like sitting meditation, but it doesn't encompass every state that's relevant to the distinction. It's difficult to pin down exactly what we're talking about because there doesn't seem to me to be much of a vocabulary for it, at least in modern American English. edit: funny synch was that I wrote that before I read this. We've definitely been exposed to some of the same textual cultural artifacts. Those new-ager's are good for sumthin' at least.
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Post by enigma on Sept 22, 2014 19:03:12 GMT -5
I agree, though I don't talk about it that way. Some talk about dropping into the heart, or body wisdom, or gnosis, which may be the same as what yer saying? The way I like to talk about it is, you can provide a focal point for consciousness by using mind to contemplate such questions, and then simply let go of the mental activity, which naturally results in an expansion of that focal point of attention beyond the boundaries set by mind. Clarity may result, and it will be clarity regarding that prior focus of attention. Yeah, you could call it any of those things. Although the heart is only part of it. It's also gut, which I think can be even more of a challenge. The key is the expansiveness you mentioned. For me, I could become very still and quiet (mentally) in meditation and in moments throughout the day, but there was no sense of expansiveness. Although the quiet was a relief at first (heh heh), it was kind of dead and one-dimensional. When I let that stillness drop into the body, that's when it became an alive and open stillness. And does that stillness speak?
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Post by tzujanli on Sept 22, 2014 19:11:41 GMT -5
The split between intellect and feeling only happens in the absence of gnosis. Feeling and emotion don't provide any more of a basis in form for realization than the intellect, but the body is direct, while the mind is abstracted. Feeling lends perspective a more direct notice of the presence and degree of suffering, and often, intellect, by the process of rationalization, can obscure that. Yes, I think the directness of the body is part of it. No abstraction. But I don't equate body with feeling/emotion in the way that you're talking about it. I think of body like...well, sort of like a dog. Less encumbered by the workings of mind. Emotions are the product of mind, playing out in the body. I agree that feelings are more direct than thought, but when I say 'dropping into the body' I'm not talking about working with feelings. I understand the body/mind/spirit/essence to be a unified process/presence of wholeness experiencing itself through its independently functioning parts of itself, manyness.. the 'dropping into the body' reference feels odd, as if why 'drop' when you're already there.. the 'abstraction' happens when the experiencer thinks the mind's ideas about the directness are better than the actuality.. Emotions are direct communications between part/whole, local/non-local.. your description of emotions is more about the mind's reactions to them.. emotions are direct experiences, the confusion is created by the mind's choice to manipulate emotions..
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Post by quinn on Sept 22, 2014 19:29:59 GMT -5
Yeah, you could call it any of those things. Although the heart is only part of it. It's also gut, which I think can be even more of a challenge. The key is the expansiveness you mentioned. For me, I could become very still and quiet (mentally) in meditation and in moments throughout the day, but there was no sense of expansiveness. Although the quiet was a relief at first (heh heh), it was kind of dead and one-dimensional. When I let that stillness drop into the body, that's when it became an alive and open stillness. And does that stillness speak? You should write a book by that name!! Oh...wait. Yes, but no download of info or anything. Sumthin else... Jeez that sounds mysterious and I don't mean it to, I just can't describe it.
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Post by quinn on Sept 22, 2014 19:44:38 GMT -5
Yes, I think the directness of the body is part of it. No abstraction. But I don't equate body with feeling/emotion in the way that you're talking about it. I think of body like...well, sort of like a dog. Less encumbered by the workings of mind. Emotions are the product of mind, playing out in the body. I agree that feelings are more direct than thought, but when I say 'dropping into the body' I'm not talking about working with feelings. I understand the body/mind/spirit/essence to be a unified process/presence of wholeness experiencing itself through its independently functioning parts of itself, manyness.. the 'dropping into the body' reference feels odd, as if why 'drop' when you're already there.. the 'abstraction' happens when the experiencer thinks the mind's ideas about the directness are better than the actuality.. Emotions are direct communications between part/whole, local/non-local.. your description of emotions is more about the mind's reactions to them.. emotions are direct experiences, the confusion is created by the mind's choice to manipulate emotions.. Well, you're probably right that my description of emotions was short-sighted. I'm certainly no expert. In my experience, most emotions are related to my thoughts and beliefs - i.e., if I think something's sad, I get sad. But I have experienced seemly random emotions too, so there's that. And I agree, mind/body/spirit/essence are not independent of each other. My point to laughter was just that when I referred to body, I wasn't talking about emotions, just to a felt sense of the body. I don't know who's manipulating emotions.
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Post by enigma on Sept 22, 2014 20:50:06 GMT -5
And does that stillness speak? You should write a book by that name!! Oh...wait. Yes, but no download of info or anything. Sumthin else... Jeez that sounds mysterious and I don't mean it to, I just can't describe it. I would say that mysterious sumthin else takes the form of an absence, which sounds even more mysteriouser. This would explain why you can't describe it, because there's no 'it' to describe. Lets say, for example, you're pondering yourself as a separate being, and suddenly the mind goes quiet and you get a much larger view of the landscape, and the idea of separation is seen to be an imaginary boundary erected by mind somewhere in infinity. That belief goes bye-bye, but you didn't actually see a true idea that you can talk about and say 'I saw sumthin'. This is the nature of all 'seeing', because all we're dealing with is false boundaries. There aren't any true boundaries to see. As Niz or whoever said, "Just see the false as false. That is enough." But of course the implications of 'no boundaries' is actually quite dramatic.
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Post by enigma on Sept 22, 2014 20:57:17 GMT -5
I understand the body/mind/spirit/essence to be a unified process/presence of wholeness experiencing itself through its independently functioning parts of itself, manyness.. the 'dropping into the body' reference feels odd, as if why 'drop' when you're already there.. the 'abstraction' happens when the experiencer thinks the mind's ideas about the directness are better than the actuality.. Emotions are direct communications between part/whole, local/non-local.. your description of emotions is more about the mind's reactions to them.. emotions are direct experiences, the confusion is created by the mind's choice to manipulate emotions.. Well, you're probably right that my description of emotions was short-sighted. I'm certainly no expert. In my experience, most emotions are related to my thoughts and beliefs - i.e., if I think something's sad, I get sad. But I have experienced seemly random emotions too, so there's that. And I agree, mind/body/spirit/essence are not independent of each other. My point to laughter was just that when I referred to body, I wasn't talking about emotions, just to a felt sense of the body. I don't know who's manipulating emotions. Yeah, same here, except I've noticed that emotion can either follow or precede conscious thought. There is what we could call preconscious thought, and together with that is preconscious feeling. IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface. Feeling is still associated with thought on some level and doesn't actually show up for no reason at all.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2014 2:58:59 GMT -5
Well, you're probably right that my description of emotions was short-sighted. I'm certainly no expert. In my experience, most emotions are related to my thoughts and beliefs - i.e., if I think something's sad, I get sad. But I have experienced seemly random emotions too, so there's that. And I agree, mind/body/spirit/essence are not independent of each other. My point to laughter was just that when I referred to body, I wasn't talking about emotions, just to a felt sense of the body. I don't know who's manipulating emotions. Yeah, same here, except I've noticed that emotion can either follow or precede conscious thought. There is what we could call preconscious thought, and together with that is preconscious feeling. IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface. Feeling is still associated with thought on some level and doesn't actually show up for no reason at all. "IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface"
What do you mean this? What is it going on? More than one thought created even before it arrives at surface? If not , what do you mean 'lots of stuff'?
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Post by tzujanli on Sept 23, 2014 5:17:24 GMT -5
Yeah, same here, except I've noticed that emotion can either follow or precede conscious thought. There is what we could call preconscious thought, and together with that is preconscious feeling. IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface. Feeling is still associated with thought on some level and doesn't actually show up for no reason at all. "IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface"
What do you mean this? What is it going on? More than one thought created even before it arrives at surface? If not , what do you mean 'lots of stuff'? It's mind-play about mind-play.. it's a fairly well-known experience that a still mind's awareness has the most likely opportunity for clarity, for seeing what is actually happening, but.. the experiencer chooses intricate complexities to explain what they 'think' they experience.. rather than the experiencer expounding on their ideas about what they 'think' they are experiencing, it would seem prudent to cultivate stillness..
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Post by quinn on Sept 23, 2014 7:06:29 GMT -5
Well, you're probably right that my description of emotions was short-sighted. I'm certainly no expert. In my experience, most emotions are related to my thoughts and beliefs - i.e., if I think something's sad, I get sad. But I have experienced seemly random emotions too, so there's that. And I agree, mind/body/spirit/essence are not independent of each other. My point to laughter was just that when I referred to body, I wasn't talking about emotions, just to a felt sense of the body. I don't know who's manipulating emotions. Yeah, same here, except I've noticed that emotion can either follow or precede conscious thought. There is what we could call preconscious thought, and together with that is preconscious feeling. IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface. Feeling is still associated with thought on some level and doesn't actually show up for no reason at all. Yeah, I think that's true for the most part. I also think there are some unexplained emotional energies that maybe relate to somebody's thoughts somewhere, but not necessarily the thoughts of the person experiencing them. Supernatural stuff, past-life stuff, group consciousness stuff, that sort of thing. So the relationship between thought and emotion can get blurry. Question for you, E...do you consider The Peace that Passes All Understanding to be an emotion? Or a feeling? Same for unconditional Love.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2014 7:12:33 GMT -5
"IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface"
What do you mean this? What is it going on? More than one thought created even before it arrives at surface? If not , what do you mean 'lots of stuff'? It's mind-play about mind-play.. it's a fairly well-known experience that a still mind's awareness has the most likely opportunity for clarity, for seeing what is actually happening, but.. the experiencer chooses intricate complexities to explain what they 'think' they experience.. rather than the experiencer expounding on their ideas about what they 'think' they are experiencing, it would seem prudent to cultivate stillness.. you misunderstood what I asked, I know this stuff which you explained already and I refuted that this seeing is not possible in some other thread,because through 'seeing' you are generating another thought pattern which would be recreated. Now My question to him here is, Whether more than one thought is ready before it arrives in the surface of our consciousness ?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2014 7:22:45 GMT -5
It's mind-play about mind-play.. it's a fairly well-known experience that a still mind's awareness has the most likely opportunity for clarity, for seeing what is actually happening, but.. the experiencer chooses intricate complexities to explain what they 'think' they experience.. rather than the experiencer expounding on their ideas about what they 'think' they are experiencing, it would seem prudent to cultivate stillness.. you misunderstood what I asked, I know this stuff which you explained already and I refuted that this seeing is not possible in some other thread,because through 'seeing' you are generating another thought pattern which would be recreated. Now My question to him here is, Whether more than one thought is ready before it arrives in the surface of our consciousness ? What's your experience? Mine: when I am mindful, or attending the actual, putting focus and attention physical sense-perceptions, there's a way that it's like the surface of a swamp. There's a focus on physical sensations, and always a lot going on there (breathing, sounds, tactile sensations...). And then there's awareness of the mental environment and often a perception that there is something just below the surface. And periodically of course becoming aware of having been 'lost in thought.' But my experience is that even with attention/focus on senseperceptions there is a shimmering mental surface, where thoughts could arise and 'take over' or not, depending. Not sure if they are formed below the surface, it seems like they are formed in consciousness. But maybe that's just the process of trying to articulate them.
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Post by justlikeyou on Sept 23, 2014 7:38:47 GMT -5
OK, since you bring it up. Here is a Niz quote: "The person merges into the witness, the witness into awareness, awareness into pure being, yet identity is not lost. He seems to be saying that something of the individuated personality is not lost in all that merging. He seems to be suggesting that the personal expression somehow survives the Merge. I can only speculate as to what that could suggest. A continuing journey of sorts as the eyes and ears of Source in ways that can not be imagined? And elsewhere, he says existence doesn't even know it exists. Yes, I know what you are saying. I think he would say the Absolute does not know it exists. He tends to use the word "existence" and "consciousness" interchangeably, and refers to them as a temporary states of affair. Anyway, I found the original quote using the word person a bit odd, but then it occurred to me that he is likely referring to the true self behind the personality as that which does not lose identity as it merges. Which raises its own questions, but I'll leave it alone for now.
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Post by enigma on Sept 23, 2014 11:10:04 GMT -5
Yeah, same here, except I've noticed that emotion can either follow or precede conscious thought. There is what we could call preconscious thought, and together with that is preconscious feeling. IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface. Feeling is still associated with thought on some level and doesn't actually show up for no reason at all. "IOW, there's lots of stuff going on below the water line that has to build up some intensity before it reaches the surface"
What do you mean this? What is it going on? More than one thought created even before it arrives at surface? If not , what do you mean 'lots of stuff'? Conscious thought is just the surface of the pond; the movements of mind that have built up enough interest that you consciously attend to them. This is what's happening when thoughts and feelings seem to show up out of nowhere.
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