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Post by laughter on Jun 28, 2015 12:22:08 GMT -5
This is a half truth, and the intellect is powerless to assemble the whole on it's own. Where did I say intellect is the creation, I am saying intellect is also one of the creation, searching would find the answer in such a ways searching would continue. I didn't take you to identify with intellect. What I meant by half truth was your idea that you are not the one riding the roller coaster and not the one directing your life, it's a half-truth. What I mean by the powerlessness of the intellect is that the truth I'm referring to isn't one that can be expressed by an idea, but when you find it, you'll know and understand the fallacy expressed by the half-truth in a way that can't be directly expressed by words.
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Post by laughter on Jun 28, 2015 12:31:51 GMT -5
It's possible to find your own practice, whatever that may be, one that will work for you. The elements are silence, inquiry and daily motion. For me personally, mine involved sport, the outdoors, and even art, primarily as an admirer. The bottom line is that, as you've agreed, the intellect alone isn't sufficient to provide the answers to whatever existential questions you might have remaining. yes Intellect never gives the answer, because thinking about something is also a creation, at the same time any kind of practise you consider would ultimately fail. Believing any practise would eradicate anything would create the experience where you would need to apply your practise. And yet life goes on. There is the appearance of the way that life continues as being modulated by our choices and related to this is where our interests lie. You're interested in certain existential questions, so let me give you a metaphor. If you're tasked to write or modify an app, you read the code you have to change or interface with, read the specs, lay out a design, and then the fun part starts. Once you start coding, the details of each line and function and class emerge from these structures that are in place, and in that happening, your sense of yourself as separate goes away for awhile. You lose track of time and when you stand up you might feel a bit light headed and disoriented. This losing yourself is the element of silence. It's from that silence that the answers to your existential questions will emerge, similar to the way that the finished source file emerges from the process of coding. This is what I mean by practice. Life happens, and we could say that life, itself, is practice.
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Post by zendancer on Jun 28, 2015 13:11:07 GMT -5
The roller coaster is a product of self-referential thought. Who is riding the roller coaster? Penetrate the illusion of self-referentiality, and the roller coaster ceases to exist along with the imaginary rider. How could you say this is self-referential thought? I am not the one who is riding this roller coaster, roller coaster happens automatically, I am pretty sure I am not the one who is directing my life. Who you THINK you are isn't doing anything. Who you really are is the only do-er. FWIW, I remember the roller coaster, but these days there is no roller coaster. The roller coaster was imaginary, just like the imaginary rider. Find the one who is reading these words. It is not "Gopal."
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Post by Deleted on Jun 28, 2015 23:14:55 GMT -5
How could you say this is self-referential thought? I am not the one who is riding this roller coaster, roller coaster happens automatically, I am pretty sure I am not the one who is directing my life. Who you THINK you are isn't doing anything. Who you really are is the only do-er. FWIW, I remember the roller coaster, but these days there is no roller coaster. The roller coaster was imaginary, just like the imaginary rider. Find the one who is reading these words. It is not "Gopal." I don't know which one is true, when Enigma asks you whether you have roller coaster in your life, you say 'yes', when I ask you you say 'no', which one is true? You don't have any roller coaster(happy/unhappy,freedom/pressure,interest/boring)?
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Post by Deleted on Jun 28, 2015 23:17:23 GMT -5
Where did I say intellect is the creation, I am saying intellect is also one of the creation, searching would find the answer in such a ways searching would continue. I didn't take you to identify with intellect. What I meant by half truth was your idea that you are not the one riding the roller coaster and not the one directing your life, it's a half-truth. What I mean by the powerlessness of the intellect is that the truth I'm referring to isn't one that can be expressed by an idea, but when you find it, you'll know and understand the fallacy expressed by the half-truth in a way that can't be directly expressed by words. What other technique is available to you which doesn't strengthen mind?
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Post by zendancer on Jun 29, 2015 2:36:08 GMT -5
Who you THINK you are isn't doing anything. Who you really are is the only do-er. FWIW, I remember the roller coaster, but these days there is no roller coaster. The roller coaster was imaginary, just like the imaginary rider. Find the one who is reading these words. It is not "Gopal." I don't know which one is true, when Enigma asks you whether you have roller coaster in your life, you say 'yes', when I ask you you say 'no', which one is true? You don't have any roller coaster(happy/unhappy,freedom/pressure,interest/boring)? We can talk about life in different ways and different contexts, but if you want to settle your affairs, find the one who is reading these words. It isn't who you think.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2015 2:37:48 GMT -5
I don't know which one is true, when Enigma asks you whether you have roller coaster in your life, you say 'yes', when I ask you you say 'no', which one is true? You don't have any roller coaster(happy/unhappy,freedom/pressure,interest/boring)? We can talk about life in different ways and different contexts, but if you want to settle your affairs, find the one who is reading these words. It isn't who you think. I can understand where you are pointing at, you are saying the single doer which is reading the words,right? This person named Gopal is not reading, but the single self which is reading, Is that you are expecting me to understand?
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Post by zendancer on Jun 29, 2015 8:31:48 GMT -5
We can talk about life in different ways and different contexts, but if you want to settle your affairs, find the one who is reading these words. It isn't who you think. I can understand where you are pointing at, you are saying the single doer which is reading the words,right? This person named Gopal is not reading, but the single self which is reading, Is that you are expecting me to understand? It can't be understood, but it can be realized.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2015 12:01:25 GMT -5
I can understand where you are pointing at, you are saying the single doer which is reading the words,right? This person named Gopal is not reading, but the single self which is reading, Is that you are expecting me to understand? It can't be understood, but it can be realized. Yes, nothing can be said about SR except that it IS, and there is no person who can realize what IS. There is no I-ness, in what IS.
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Post by laughter on Jun 29, 2015 12:23:18 GMT -5
I didn't take you to identify with intellect. What I meant by half truth was your idea that you are not the one riding the roller coaster and not the one directing your life, it's a half-truth. What I mean by the powerlessness of the intellect is that the truth I'm referring to isn't one that can be expressed by an idea, but when you find it, you'll know and understand the fallacy expressed by the half-truth in a way that can't be directly expressed by words. What other technique is available to you which doesn't strengthen mind? A strong mind is one that is discerning, informed, not confused but not closed, fixed and brittle either. Do you mean a technique which doesn't reinforce a sense of personal identification?
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Post by jay17 on Jun 29, 2015 16:09:13 GMT -5
So, guys..which is what? I'm sure it's been heavily debated in here but I haven't been keeping up and I'm interested and also mildly confused. I guess I felt that suddenly I wasn't sure about what I'm doing. Self improvement has definetely been my thing but I like to think that that's shifted. Not entirely, mind you, because there's the idea that a healthy self is better than a not so healthy self so in some ways there doesn't have to be a conflict (said the self). Depends what you're confused about, for there are many reasons to be. Eg; are you confused because you do not understand something, or have you experienced things you did not expect to occur from your efforts, or you do not understand why you think, feel or behave in a way you consciously do not wish to, or you do not understand your purpose in life. Conflict within oneself is the opposite of internal peace\calmness\stillness. To be in an adversarial state with oneself denotes elements within\of oneself are out of balance\harmony with the others. Thus part of self improvement\development\growth means to resolve the inner turmoil\illness\dis-ease...and bring it back or create for the first time, a harmonious\unified\holistic Oneness of all aspects of one's being. So there's the process of becoming more conscious and in that process also becoming more aware of a more authentic self. This, to the self, would be self improvement. At the same time there is deconstructing of ideas of self going on. "A more authentic self" is made of the same stuff that an unhealthy self is. You do not have to answer these in this thread, they are offered as exploration points. Are not the judgements of what is 'authentic' and 'unhealthy' aspects of oneself, self determined? Are you not the one who examines via your self awareness and examination, ie Contemplation, and then concludes the quality of each thing you have encountered? Do you not judge the ideas of yourself(self perception) which you want or need to deconstruct because you have determined or theorized they are non beneficial to your being and your life journey, and you retain the ideas of yourself that you determine or theorize are of benefit? For is this not an aspect of self improvement - you are the author\creator of your being and subsequent life, thus you determine that which is worth keeping and improving,and that which requires removal via transformation or dissolution? And it seems to me one can walk in this jungle forever, never knowing what's doing the looking. I think i understand your dilemma. If you were in an actual jungle, i imagine you can easily understand who is the observer("looking") in this jungle. You may initially not know all there is to know of oneself , though i theorize your level of self knowledge will only increase as you contemplate self within each step on your jungle journey. If you are seeking to obtain full 100% understanding of yourself, the observer, then it seems reasonable to conclude all one has to do is keep examining and you judge for yourself if your self knowledge is increasing. But if you have no experience of knowing what a 100% self looks like, then even if you reached that level, how can you compare to verify you have actually obtained it. Of course, there are numerous philosophies that state what a 100% self looks like, so you could simply just accept those ideas as absolute truth and set upon your journey to reach the goals set out by them. Or you could simply continue the potentially endless(until your human existence ends) journey of continuous self improvement, with an attitude of appreciation, joy and enthusiasm, not only for the journey, but for the ever increasing benefits you obtain, and not worry about the possibly unobtainable perfect score. I guess my question is weather you believe there is any correlation between becoming more conscious and SR. Is a fully conscious human SR? Well, yeah, there is a correlation in that it is claimed that an increase in self awareness\becoming more conscious\awakened as opposed to asleep\unconscious, is required to obtain Self Realization. However it seems logical to me there's two potential conclusions. 1. Yes, Self Realization means a person has obtained the full potential of their human beingness. 2. No, a person only believes they have obtained. That a person has simply reprogrammed their mindtank with the precepts set forth in Self Realization, accepting them as absolute truth, thereby perceiving they have obtained. Which brings me back to that dilemma, "fully conscious". How does one determine they are fully conscious. For it seems to me the only way to actually know 100%, is to have already experienced real actual 'full consciousness'. If not, then it's all speculation, theory, hope, wish fulfillment, a human thought construct of a desired goal. And why would anyone want to construct this idea in the first place? Seems reasonable to me that they were not happy with their current life or state of being. And in Buddha's case, he saw that all human life was saturated in suffering, and thus he set out to find a solution. That perhaps suffering simply did not make sense to him in the context of living and he sought to understand this phenomena. He then(according to what i have read) discovered that most, if not all suffering is self inflicted\created, and during his spiritual\metaphysical explorations, he also discovered various ways to remove that suffering. But somewhere along the line, and it is retold that he even knew this would occur, that people would misunderstand what he was saying, they would modify it, thus make a bit of a mess out of what he originally discovered\constructed. I interpret Buddha's teachings as he found out how to remove suffering from one's being. That he never spoke of obtaining an ultimate anything, nor did he clam that the self and the physical realm is all an illusion. All of those were created by others over hundreds of years as they added and changed what he spoke of. Finally, back to the two potential conclusions. I don't bother trying to find out which one it is, nor trying to convince others they are right or wrong. I do not bother trying to achieve some ultimate state of being. I am well aware i still have improvements to make, but after 20 years of self development\healing\transformation, i am now having a most wondrously profound life experience, full of near constant peace, joy and love of myself and others. I have reached a level where there is no longer any serious life destroying suffering, so even though i still self explore, i now spend most of my time enjoying my self, others and life, and supporting other fellow travelers still struggling within themselves when they ask for help.
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Post by jay17 on Jul 1, 2015 15:42:47 GMT -5
"Self improvement vs SR"
To me, the thread title asks or theorizes that the two philosophies are against each other, or they are just two different paths. Depends on the usage of 'vs'.
I think each contains both similarities and differences and thus i reason each individual should judge for themself.
But here's some things i have noticed about SR\Advaita and the people that proclaim it's precepts, and that they have achieved it.
'Realizing' is the experience of obtaining new information about oneself or thing. People realize all the time. It's the act of "comprehending completely or correctly." (the completeness or correctness can be either actual or personally judged as such) It becomes real to oneself, one is real-izing. Before it was theory, now it is taken as fact.
So it seems to me that both self improvement and the journey to SR requires acts of realization.
But what always strikes me as odd is when a verb is translated into a noun. 'realizing' into Self Realized...'awakening' into 'Awakened'. When an action one can perform is translated into a state of being.
For it seems to me that the current knowledge one has of oneself is obtained thru realization. One observes and reasons and formulates a conclusion that one accepts as valid. So it seems odd to me to declare oneself Self Realized, as everyone self realizes.
A SR person has accepted, as truth, someone else's ideology of what a human being is, and the physical realm we exist in. SR, to me, simply means a person has aligned themself to an established ideology. They have realized for themself that what the ideology\philosophy states, is true.
Somewhere along the line this ideology was given the name Self Realized. I think it's a tricksy\spellbinding way to suggest that all endeavors of self examination will lead to the realization set forth by this philosophy. As some of you may have noticed that the SR\Advaita devotees do constantly declare it is the absolute truth about existence and self, without using the term 'truth'. They avoid such terms because they also declare SR\Advaita is not a construct of the mind, it's not a belief...it's what reality actually is, and thoughts are not required to see what IS.
For reasons unknown to me, SR\Advaita declares that separateness does not exist, that individual forms existent in the physical realm are all illusion, that there is only one thing that exists. Thus the individual self is not real, it's an illusion. Only Oneness exists, no separation. For some reason, those that created SR\Advaita and align themselves to it, deny or avoid that which is clearly seen in our physical realm.
"As above, so below."
If the physical realm is a depiction of what exists in the non corporeal energy realm, then separateness exists within the energy sea of oneness. A human being is one entity, it can be worded that a human being is a Oneness form. Yet this human being is comprised of billions of individual cells. That's but one example of separateness and oneness co-existing. Then each cell can be considered to be a Oneness form, once considered by scientists to be simple organisms with very few parts. Now they have discovered there many be as many parts to a cell as there are cells in a human being.
And all of these separate physical elements that are unified to create a larger single form, all of physical matter is nothing more than non physical energy, combining harmoniously, unifying in such a way as to manifest physical forms.
It is currently unknown what this underlying sea of energy is that all of physicality manifests from, though many spiritual philosophies state it is only one...and i have no reason to argue about that, as i do not have any evidence either way.
So, for argument's sake, there is only one underlying energy realm that all of existence stems form. Great, fantastic. But why believe\reason the physical realm is not real simply because there are separate forms.
If this singular sea of energy is a conscious creative entity, called God by the older spiritual institutions(religions), and this entity, for verified reasons unknown, had decided to create life in the physical dimension, why do some people choose to believe the physical is not real, and the reason being always comes back to ,"Oh there is only oneness, separateness is not real.", even though the evidence is overwhelming.
Seems to me, in the same vein as many spiritual people have issues with mind and thinking, SR\Advaitaists have issues with separateness, even though the source created it. I mean, why would source create an illusion of separateness that would cause humans to remain in a lie for centuries.
Seems to me that SRists\Advaitaists have thrown out the baby with the bath water.
If self improvement means examination and realizing more beneficial ways to exists within reality, then perhaps that is what a person does when they adopt the philosophy of SR\Advaita, though i have yet to hear of any benefits one obtains by doing so.
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jazz
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Post by jazz on Jul 1, 2015 19:59:15 GMT -5
I do not actually believe there to be a conflict between SI and SR but I suspect that there needs to be a willingness to "see through" any actual improvement of a little self in there. It needs to be seen that in actual fact you are not what you're trying to improve. Step back a little and become aware of the show. It is said that when one becomes aware of the show and identifies less and less until all identification is dropped, one is Self realized (capital S, very important ). What remains is said to be You. In the end, though, maybe it's just language games we're playing. Language, thoughts and concepts are powerful and trippy, ya know. Where are the arguments, the confusion and the identification without them? One question popped up in my mind today: "are they all pointing to the same thing? (It's not a thing, yes yes). How can we know without knowing the subjective experience of others? (There are no others, yes yes). I don't know..in the end it's just silly. Self realization as some sort of grand prize, lol. Cirkus. I wonder what would happen if we all just left each other alone, as in let each other be. But that's for another world.
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Post by jay17 on Jul 4, 2015 2:52:36 GMT -5
I do not actually believe there to be a conflict between SI and SR but I suspect that there needs to be a willingness to "see through" any actual improvement of a little self in there. Seems to me that if there is no conflict between the two concepts\paths\philosophies\understandings, then there would be no need to "see through" any self development. There would simply be peaceful acceptance of any improvements. It needs to be seen that in actual fact you are not what you're trying to improve. Why do you need to perceive yourself that way? And it seems to me the very act of needing this denotes you are engaged in self development, but you also cancel out the effect of this need by stating you are not that which needs it. It is said that when one becomes aware of the show and identifies less and less until all identification is dropped, one is Self realized (capital S, very important ). And it is also valid reasoning to categorize such intellectual behavior under Disassociative disorders. In the end, though, maybe it's just language games we're playing. Language, thoughts and concepts are powerful and trippy, ya know. I think it is a mind trip that some have chosen to enjoy playing. Self Realization: - the act of achieving the full development of your abilities and talents - the fulfillment of one's potential. - is an expression used in psychology, spirituality, and Eastern religions. It is defined as the "fulfillment by oneself of the possibilities of one's character or personality. Even though the devotees keep declaring the self is all illusion, they also keep talking about obtaining an ultimate state of self...they just conveniently do not use the term 'self', and use other terminologies to avoid the obvious contradiction in their philosophy. Word games - playing with words. Using words to avoid contradiction and error in their reasoning or that which they subscribe to. Or they are specific and say it's the 'individual separate self' that is an illusion, while avoiding mentioning that this Oneness that they have become\"realized", is simply the new definition of their self. Where are the arguments, the confusion and the identification without them? Seems to me the arguments, confusion and identification with the words, thoughts and concepts, reside in individuals. But many Advaitaists claim there are no separate individual selves with their own unique thoughts, so based on that claim i then reason that it's this Oneness being that has internal conflict, arguing with itself, being confused about existence and itself, and identifying with it's own words, thoughts and concepts.
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Post by tzujanli on Jul 4, 2015 16:05:23 GMT -5
How could you say this is self-referential thought? I am not the one who is riding this roller coaster, roller coaster happens automatically, I am pretty sure I am not the one who is directing my life. Who you THINK you are isn't doing anything. Who you really are is the only do-er. FWIW, I remember the roller coaster, but these days there is no roller coaster. The roller coaster was imaginary, just like the imaginary rider. Find the one who is reading these words. It is not "Gopal." Then why do you reply to 'Gopal', why do you craft a reply that addresses the questions asked by 'Gopal'?.. the reader of these words is both one and many, Gopal AND that which 'is' Gopal.. ZD replied to Gopal and that is self-evident even to a still mind's awareness..
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