|
Post by zendancer on Apr 7, 2013 7:12:51 GMT -5
I'll leave what I see as the most direct level unsaid for others who come along. A second level that I see that is a bit less obvious is that M-G took what myself and what I would speculate several other readers took as words sourced from life and containing, as much as words can, the essence of that life, and dealt with them as something inert. Is the third level an ironic iconic? (... I think I can leave this at least on the edge of the table as well ...) Just to be clear, it had nothing to do with the boards own phroggy. The frog = ZD's message. What you posted was half way between the 2nd and 3rd points I was trying to convey. The 3rd is a more general moral to our Aesop's Fable. The 2nd still relates to the condition of the message/post (it's now dead, Jim). Ha ha. Some of us understood what the frog represented. It's the reason I didn't respond to any of the questions. It would have been pointless.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Apr 7, 2013 7:16:07 GMT -5
It would have been pointless. is that the long awaited answer to the cig man riddle?
|
|
|
Post by topology on Apr 7, 2013 7:58:28 GMT -5
It would have been pointless. is that the long awaited answer to the cig man riddle? Not engaging is one possibility. The other is to engage him in a way he doesn't expect or have any association to. (if you can find such a way). Invite him to dance the waltz with you. Mow his yard when he is away at work. Buy him a pack of cigarettes. Write him secret admirer letters.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Apr 7, 2013 8:04:38 GMT -5
As what I call "natural focus" or child like focus becomes the primary way with which a form interacts, there is a "falling away" of previous egoic structures. Structures that were kept in place through incessant mental reinforcement; the me, my wants, my plans, my ideas about things, etc..., lose momentum and eventually no longer appear in the field of awareness. So there is clarity involved, but not the mental arrangement of words into clear sentences and sign posts, clarity. That kind of clarity comes along through thinking about how to use limitating words to explain an unlimited topic. Then writing/saying some to see if they work. They trying some more. Then some more. 18,000 posts later....... When I talk about clarity, I'm never referring to conceptual clarity or the kind of clarity that comes through thinking and involves effective wording. I'm talking about realization, which is needed for stuff to 'fall away'. I don't know what 'non-trying clarity' is, nor do I know what 'youthful clarity' is. What it sounds like is that the term 'clarity' has been kidnapped and forced into a box at gunpoint. To be blunt, i don't believe you because I see the mind labeling machine operating in auto mode, which is inevitable,and that's why some clarity about those labels is necessary. Can one see the truth from within delusion, resulting in the delusion falling away? This seems to suppose there is something to see beyond the falsity of beliefs. What is this thing you recognize "which all our words try to point to"? I dunno. Seems irrelevant to the conversation, really. E: I may have misunderstood your response to OHC, and OHC can answer for himself, but I think what OHC meant by "youthful clarity" is the clarity of a child who sees and interacts with the world directly--ATA. There is no naming, filtering, interpreting, reflection, or self-referentiality. What you see is what you get. If an adult stays in the same mode, conceptual structures cease to be reinforced and eventually collapse, fall away, etc. I personally know OHC, and what he wrote accurately describes his own experience. From my POV mind labeling is neither necessary nor inevitable, so what we're really talking about concerning labels is clarity of consensus rather than simply clarity. The greater the consensus concerning labeling the clearer the resulting communication. All of us have to choose words that best describe our experiences and realizations, but there is often little consensus in this realm. Somewhere you wrote, "There is no mystery," but from my POV, "Everything is a mystery." Each of us is pointing to the same thing, but we often use different words to express ourselves and our understanding. You asked OHC, "What is this thing you recognize 'which all our words try to point to'?" His answer was "______________", by which he was saying that whatever words we use to describe __________ are inadequate. From OHC's POV there is definitely something to see beyond the falsity of beliefs, and that something is __________. That seemed pretty clear to me, so I'd be interested in what wasn't clear to you about that. During the last year or so I've been communicating with a lot of young people who get the ATA thing very fast, probably because they're not carrying around a lot of intellectual baggage. I got a note from a sixteen year old the other day who got clear very fast using ATA. Scary fast. This is why I'm madly writing a new book. I'll bet you can guess the title. Ha ha.
|
|
|
Post by zendancer on Apr 7, 2013 8:07:03 GMT -5
[ quote source="/post/113661/thread" timestamp="1365336771" author=" zendancer"] It would have been pointless. is that the long awaited answer to the cig man riddle? [/quote] Ha ha. That's not the answer, but I think you got the point of the koan.
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Apr 7, 2013 12:22:06 GMT -5
This is why I'm madly writing a new book. I'll bet you can guess the title. Ha ha. "ooooooooooooooh yeah"
|
|
|
Post by tzujanli on Apr 7, 2013 17:03:10 GMT -5
Greetings.. I don't define clarity to mean the same as realization. I said I'm talking about realization, as realization leads to clarity. There are many words used in a spiritual context that don't carry quite the same meaning as the dictionary defines them. I know this is a source of frustration for you and some other literalists, but that's the consequence of trying to talk about such spiritual matters that are sufficiently uncommon in everyday conversation that most dictionaries don't see fit to include a reference that we can use directly. As such, it's often necessary to clarify what each of us means by certain terms, which is what I did. The way I use 'clarity' is not radically different from the dictionary definition, but "non-trying clarity" and "youthful clarity" is a major departure. Why is it you aren't having this conversation with OHC instead of wagging your finger at me for pointing out that departure? (Rhetorical question) Look again at what you posted: You state what you're never referring to when you talk about clarity, then you state what you are talking about, "realization".. there is contradiction within ambiguity, which you are skilled at using as plausible deniability.. and to be blunt, i don't believe you did that unintentionally.. Be well..
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Apr 7, 2013 18:25:02 GMT -5
When I talk about clarity, I'm never referring to conceptual clarity or the kind of clarity that comes through thinking and involves effective wording. I'm talking about realization, which is needed for stuff to 'fall away'. I don't know what 'non-trying clarity' is, nor do I know what 'youthful clarity' is. What it sounds like is that the term 'clarity' has been kidnapped and forced into a box at gunpoint. To be blunt, i don't believe you because I see the mind labeling machine operating in auto mode, which is inevitable,and that's why some clarity about those labels is necessary. Can one see the truth from within delusion, resulting in the delusion falling away? This seems to suppose there is something to see beyond the falsity of beliefs. What is this thing you recognize "which all our words try to point to"? I dunno. Seems irrelevant to the conversation, really. E: I may have misunderstood your response to OHC, and OHC can answer for himself, but I think what OHC meant by "youthful clarity" is the clarity of a child who sees and interacts with the world directly--ATA. There is no naming, filtering, interpreting, reflection, or self-referentiality. What you see is what you get. If an adult stays in the same mode, conceptual structures cease to be reinforced and eventually collapse, fall away, etc. I personally know OHC, and what he wrote accurately describes his own experience. From my POV mind labeling is neither necessary nor inevitable, so what we're really talking about concerning labels is clarity of consensus rather than simply clarity. The greater the consensus concerning labeling the clearer the resulting communication. All of us have to choose words that best describe our experiences and realizations, but there is often little consensus in this realm. Somewhere you wrote, "There is no mystery," but from my POV, "Everything is a mystery." Each of us is pointing to the same thing, but we often use different words to express ourselves and our understanding. You asked OHC, "What is this thing you recognize 'which all our words try to point to'?" His answer was "______________", by which he was saying that whatever words we use to describe __________ are inadequate. From OHC's POV there is definitely something to see beyond the falsity of beliefs, and that something is __________. That seemed pretty clear to me, so I'd be interested in what wasn't clear to you about that. During the last year or so I've been communicating with a lot of young people who get the ATA thing very fast, probably because they're not carrying around a lot of intellectual baggage. I got a note from a sixteen year old the other day who got clear very fast using ATA. Scary fast. This is why I'm madly writing a new book. I'll bet you can guess the title. Ha ha. The idea is that conceptual structures that are not engaged with will 'collapse'on their own, which implies that beliefs have no power beyond that which is given them through repetition of thought alone. If this were true, then one could reverse the process and simply repeat the concept/thought that one is perpetually happy,(or whatever) and this repetition alone would be sufficient to bring about that perpetual happiness. Seems like that active process would be more effective than the avoiding process prescribed, since mind IS that active process and is more than willing to engage. Of course, this is what is done with positive thinking and affirmations and the like, and most find that it works a little for a while, and then it doesn't. Likewise, avoiding thoughts, as such, has a similar effect. It works as long as the thoughts are not engaged, and various experiences can be reported, and yet the belief structures remain just as they do with attempting to overlay positive thoughts. These belief structures return with a remarkable tenacity because one forms his individual world before there is even the conscious thought about that world. The conscious thoughts are just the surface of the pond, and what happens at the surface is affected by whatever is happening below the surface as well. So, the issue here is really not about whether or not belief structures collapse, which they clearly do in many cases, but rather how does this actually happen? Does it happen strictly because attention is removed from those thoughts and so they are no longer continually reinforced, or is there something else that happens and which is required in order for those structures to collapse? This is really the question i was getting to with OHC because I detected that the notion of clarity was never being applied to mind, which says that illusions never have to be seen through so as to remove confusion from mind, but simply not thought about long enough for them to go away. Andrew would likely agree that mind can just remain in confusion and ambiguous paradox forever, but I don't. In this vein, I think you would agree that these illusions in fact are seen through, which is to say mind IS informed of the falsity of these notions and is forced to abandon them, and this is what I mean by clarity. If this is so, the informing of mind is what actually collapses those structures and not the process of no longer enforcing them. Once an illusion is seen through, it may appear that it simply collapsed and was replaced with a non-conceptual realization, but I suggest that the realization is actually informing mind, and this is what constitutes the collapse.
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Apr 7, 2013 19:14:41 GMT -5
Greetings.. I don't define clarity to mean the same as realization. I said I'm talking about realization, as realization leads to clarity. There are many words used in a spiritual context that don't carry quite the same meaning as the dictionary defines them. I know this is a source of frustration for you and some other literalists, but that's the consequence of trying to talk about such spiritual matters that are sufficiently uncommon in everyday conversation that most dictionaries don't see fit to include a reference that we can use directly. As such, it's often necessary to clarify what each of us means by certain terms, which is what I did. The way I use 'clarity' is not radically different from the dictionary definition, but "non-trying clarity" and "youthful clarity" is a major departure. Why is it you aren't having this conversation with OHC instead of wagging your finger at me for pointing out that departure? (Rhetorical question) Look again at what you posted: You state what you're never referring to when you talk about clarity, then you state what you are talking about, "realization".. there is contradiction within ambiguity, which you are skilled at using as plausible deniability.. and to be blunt, i don't believe you did that unintentionally.. Be well.. I think you've been taking lessons from Mr Goat.
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Apr 7, 2013 19:30:02 GMT -5
E,
The perspective, or the attitude of the witness doesn't involve the avoidance of thought.
I equate the attitude of the witness with ATA -- I'll dispense with the disclaimers, this is based on experience in following the prescriptions.
|
|
|
Post by silence on Apr 7, 2013 19:52:33 GMT -5
E: I may have misunderstood your response to OHC, and OHC can answer for himself, but I think what OHC meant by "youthful clarity" is the clarity of a child who sees and interacts with the world directly--ATA. There is no naming, filtering, interpreting, reflection, or self-referentiality. What you see is what you get. If an adult stays in the same mode, conceptual structures cease to be reinforced and eventually collapse, fall away, etc. I personally know OHC, and what he wrote accurately describes his own experience. From my POV mind labeling is neither necessary nor inevitable, so what we're really talking about concerning labels is clarity of consensus rather than simply clarity. The greater the consensus concerning labeling the clearer the resulting communication. All of us have to choose words that best describe our experiences and realizations, but there is often little consensus in this realm. Somewhere you wrote, "There is no mystery," but from my POV, "Everything is a mystery." Each of us is pointing to the same thing, but we often use different words to express ourselves and our understanding. You asked OHC, "What is this thing you recognize 'which all our words try to point to'?" His answer was "______________", by which he was saying that whatever words we use to describe __________ are inadequate. From OHC's POV there is definitely something to see beyond the falsity of beliefs, and that something is __________. That seemed pretty clear to me, so I'd be interested in what wasn't clear to you about that. During the last year or so I've been communicating with a lot of young people who get the ATA thing very fast, probably because they're not carrying around a lot of intellectual baggage. I got a note from a sixteen year old the other day who got clear very fast using ATA. Scary fast. This is why I'm madly writing a new book. I'll bet you can guess the title. Ha ha. The idea is that conceptual structures that are not engaged with will 'collapse'on their own, which implies that beliefs have no power beyond that which is given them through repetition of thought alone. If this were true, then one could reverse the process and simply repeat the concept/thought that one is perpetually happy,(or whatever) and this repetition alone would be sufficient to bring about that perpetual happiness. Seems like that active process would be more effective than the avoiding process prescribed, since mind IS that active process and is more than willing to engage. Of course, this is what is done with positive thinking and affirmations and the like, and most find that it works a little for a while, and then it doesn't. Likewise, avoiding thoughts, as such, has a similar effect. It works as long as the thoughts are not engaged, and various experiences can be reported, and yet the belief structures remain just as they do with attempting to overlay positive thoughts. These belief structures return with a remarkable tenacity because one forms his individual world before there is even the conscious thought about that world. The conscious thoughts are just the surface of the pond, and what happens at the surface is affected by whatever is happening below the surface as well. So, the issue here is really not about whether or not belief structures collapse, which they clearly do in many cases, but rather how does this actually happen? Does it happen strictly because attention is removed from those thoughts and so they are no longer continually reinforced, or is there something else that happens and which is required in order for those structures to collapse? This is really the question i was getting to with OHC because I detected that the notion of clarity was never being applied to mind, which says that illusions never have to be seen through so as to remove confusion from mind, but simply not thought about long enough for them to go away. Andrew would likely agree that mind can just remain in confusion and ambiguous paradox forever, but I don't. In this vein, I think you would agree that these illusions in fact are seen through, which is to say mind IS informed of the falsity of these notions and is forced to abandon them, and this is what I mean by clarity. If this is so, the informing of mind is what actually collapses those structures and not the process of no longer enforcing them. Once an illusion is seen through, it may appear that it simply collapsed and was replaced with a non-conceptual realization, but I suggest that the realization is actually informing mind, and this is what constitutes the collapse. Yea, the willingness to see through thought structures rather than avoid them and hope for the best is largely a function of maturity if you ask me. I'd say most will find this necessary rather than merely having things unfold as such that they simply pay attention to sights, sounds, smells and so on until everything just fixes itself. Additionally, it is entirely possible to have profound realizations and still have equally powerful beliefs still playing themselves out again and again until one's willing to look at THAT in such a way that is not thought thinking about thought. What I see mostly are folks becoming empowered with a way of finding tremendous relief from the typical neurotic state of their mind in its baseline state. This is useful because for one, it opens up a sense of tremendous possibility and may even create a foundation of silence for those who couldn't otherwise "get out of their heads" so to speak. On the other hand, I also see people becoming enamored with this sense of relief, the experiences that coincide with it and an interpretation of specialness in the same way that the drug addict's world begins to revolve around getting back to "that place". The point of emphasis that I see going missing is that once that foundation of silence is available, one then looks from there rather than repeatedly keeps trying to perfect that foundation again and again. In other words, it's useful until it's not. The other fundamental piece of the puzzle that seems to me to often be missing is the recognition and curiosity to explore why mind is in a state of neurotic overthinking to begin with. Rather, it seems to be assumed that this is just the way minds are and so everything is built and acted upon from that assumption. Of course this assumption is arising from fear of examining some of the most primal movements of mind because it is already known on some level that to do so would destabilize oneself in ways that could not even be predicted.
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Apr 7, 2013 20:07:00 GMT -5
E, The perspective, or the attitude of the witness doesn't involve the avoidance of thought. I equate the attitude of the witness with ATA -- I'll dispense with the disclaimers, this is based on experience in following the prescriptions. Isn't that precisely what non-abidance in mind is?
|
|
|
Post by enigma on Apr 7, 2013 21:00:36 GMT -5
The idea is that conceptual structures that are not engaged with will 'collapse'on their own, which implies that beliefs have no power beyond that which is given them through repetition of thought alone. If this were true, then one could reverse the process and simply repeat the concept/thought that one is perpetually happy,(or whatever) and this repetition alone would be sufficient to bring about that perpetual happiness. Seems like that active process would be more effective than the avoiding process prescribed, since mind IS that active process and is more than willing to engage. Of course, this is what is done with positive thinking and affirmations and the like, and most find that it works a little for a while, and then it doesn't. Likewise, avoiding thoughts, as such, has a similar effect. It works as long as the thoughts are not engaged, and various experiences can be reported, and yet the belief structures remain just as they do with attempting to overlay positive thoughts. These belief structures return with a remarkable tenacity because one forms his individual world before there is even the conscious thought about that world. The conscious thoughts are just the surface of the pond, and what happens at the surface is affected by whatever is happening below the surface as well. So, the issue here is really not about whether or not belief structures collapse, which they clearly do in many cases, but rather how does this actually happen? Does it happen strictly because attention is removed from those thoughts and so they are no longer continually reinforced, or is there something else that happens and which is required in order for those structures to collapse? This is really the question i was getting to with OHC because I detected that the notion of clarity was never being applied to mind, which says that illusions never have to be seen through so as to remove confusion from mind, but simply not thought about long enough for them to go away. Andrew would likely agree that mind can just remain in confusion and ambiguous paradox forever, but I don't. In this vein, I think you would agree that these illusions in fact are seen through, which is to say mind IS informed of the falsity of these notions and is forced to abandon them, and this is what I mean by clarity. If this is so, the informing of mind is what actually collapses those structures and not the process of no longer enforcing them. Once an illusion is seen through, it may appear that it simply collapsed and was replaced with a non-conceptual realization, but I suggest that the realization is actually informing mind, and this is what constitutes the collapse. Yea, the willingness to see through thought structures rather than avoid them and hope for the best is largely a function of maturity if you ask me. I'd say most will find this necessary rather than merely having things unfold as such that they simply pay attention to sights, sounds, smells and so on until everything just fixes itself. Additionally, it is entirely possible to have profound realizations and still have equally powerful beliefs still playing themselves out again and again until one's willing to look at THAT in such a way that is not thought thinking about thought. Yes, that's the step of mind being informed by the realization, which may take some time because belief structures can be pretty convoluted and mind does not consciously process the realization. It's not uncommon to have one of them thar profound realizations, and ultimately go back to accepting what mind believes about it all. This is possible because the realization is non-conceptual, and is not mind's realization. This potential failure to inform mind is why I talk about the sovereignty of that realization. As crazy as it is, mind can still deny the self evident nature of that realization and go back to concepts as usual, in the same way that it can deny existence in the face of the obvious fact of one's existence. Yup, the egoic structure will continue to try to capitalize on all experiences and realizations until that structure has also been seen through. Good point. It's fashionable to objectify mind/ego from within mind/ego so that no responsibility need be taken for why monkey mind spins relentlessly. There are motivations behind this activity.
|
|
|
Post by tzujanli on Apr 7, 2013 21:04:17 GMT -5
Greetings.. E, The perspective, or the attitude of the witness doesn't involve the avoidance of thought. I equate the attitude of the witness with ATA -- I'll dispense with the disclaimers, this is based on experience in following the prescriptions. Isn't that precisely what non-abidance in mind is? You 'are' mind, 'mind' is you.. there is no separation from mind, and so there is only the understanding of mind's relationship with isness.. the Spiritual Theater of 'no mind' is very different from the advantage of 'empty mind'/still mind.. 'non-abidance' is a story that needs explaining, and so it suffers from its own ambiguity.. who/what is it that abides? who/what is it, that 'knows' of this concept of 'abidance'? Still mind empty mind.. active mind full mind.. find balance.. Be well..
|
|
|
Post by laughter on Apr 7, 2013 21:17:03 GMT -5
E, The perspective, or the attitude of the witness doesn't involve the avoidance of thought. I equate the attitude of the witness with ATA -- I'll dispense with the disclaimers, this is based on experience in following the prescriptions. Isn't that precisely what non-abidance in mind is? No. One way to surely plunge back into the dominance of mind is to run from it, deny it, try to ignore it, pretend it's not there. The only thing I could do from here is to describe experience, which I've done before a few different times, and while the words won't convey it they're all that I got if I want to try to convey it.
|
|