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Post by someNOTHING! on Dec 12, 2009 1:09:55 GMT -5
Yes Karen, it is a cool thread.
Today, I walked up in the forest on the mountain near my home and contemplated a few of the pointers I have come across in the past in regards to the ideas here. There are some beautiful, simple, and even in-your-face ones out there, but for some reason (perhaps it was the mood of the forest and shadows) I felt like digging out "The Book of Mirdad", by Mikhail Naimy.
(From Ch. 12: On Creative Silence, Speech Is At Best An Honest Lie)
Mirdad: The silence I would usher you into is that interminable expanse wherein non-being passes into being, and being into non-being. It is that awesome void where every sound is born and hushed and every form is shaped and crushed; where every self is writ and unwrit; where nothing is but IT.
Except you cross that void and that expanse in silent contemplation, you shall not know how real is your being, how unreal is your non-being. Nor shall you know how fast your reality is bound up with all Reality.
It is that Silence I would have you roam, that you may shed your old tight skin and move about unfettered, unrestrained.
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Post by zendancer on Dec 12, 2009 13:06:55 GMT -5
Last night my wife and I went to a big party at the home of some friends. My wife, being an introvert, cowered in a corner of the kitchen overwhelmed by the wall-to-wall bodies and the din of conversation. I, being an extrovert, roamed around trying to find someone interested in talking about something interesting. The first conversation bored me to tears as a friend told me in mind-numbing detail how his company had won a big sales account. The next conversation was equally boring, and reminded me of my favorite story about President Obama.
After Obama got elected to the Senate, he went to one of his first meetings. As a junior Senator, his job was to be seen and not heard, so he sat on a rear row in silence. The chairman of the subcommittee--I forget his name, but he is very long-winded--began talking about the issues before the committee. He went on and on, interminably. After ninety minutes of non-stop talk, Obama wrote something on a notepad he was holding, and handed it to the aide sitting behind him. The aide was very excited to get his first note from Obama, thinking that it might be a request for research into some topic. The note said, "Shoot me now!"
This is how I feel when I get trapped in a boring conversation. AAR I kept moving on until I came to a friend who always wants to talk about physics and reality. He periodically gives me books like "The God Particle" or "The Matter Myth," and I always poke him by telling him that he can't get to the truth by thinking. He started off by saying, "You really disturbed me with something you said when we went sailing together a few weeks ago." Amused, I asked what I had said. "You said that it wouldn't matter if the human race blew itself up or if the entire universe blew up and disappeared." I replied, "Who would it matter to? You'd still be here." This led to an extremely interesting conversation about non-duality, and I learned, for the first time, that my friend had once had a mystical experience, something that he had never told me.
This morning, after my wife and I awakened, she said, "I can't believe that Lance had a mystical experience that he never mentioned before. What did you discuss after he told you that?" I started telling her about the conversation and how I explained that there were no such things as subatomic particles or trees. My wife interrupted me at that point and said, "I hate it when you start saying there are no trees. I don;t care what you call them; you will still bump into them even if they don't have a name." I said, "The issue is not just names for things; it is the idea that there are separate self-existing things." Then, I went through my spiel about lines of latitude and longitude being imaginary, and eventually got to my hand/arm/wrist example. I held my hand in front of her face and said, "THIS is the truth (shaking my hand), but it is not a hand." She replied, "Okay, so if we imagine THIS (and she shook her hand in front of my face angrily) is a hand. So what?" I replied, "Well, THIS (shaking my hand) is connected to THIS (shaking my arm) and THIS (shaking my whole body) and THIS (grabbing and shaking her). I am talking to myself right now because you are me." I then grabbed her again and said, "And I love me so much. You are the most interesting me that I know." "Well," she replied sarcastically, "Do you want to get up and go have a cup of me, two buttered slices of me, and two fried patties of me?" I told her that sounded good. She responded, "That's just great! All day long it's going to be me, me me, me. Our conversation is really going to fun today. So, what does me want for me today?" I said, "I was going to say, 'Let's go have a cup of me, but I guess I ought to say, let's go have a me of me." My wife replied, "You can do what you want, but I'm going to go have a cup of coffee, two slices of toast, and sausage, thank you very much."
The morning got funnier and funnier as we continued poking into the semantics of me-ness and the implications of getting attached to ideas of selfhood. Once again, my wife threatened to come on this website and offer her own unique perspective on things. She said, "Those people need to occasionally hear from somebody normal."
SomeNothing: Great quote in your last post. Cheers.
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Post by Portto on Dec 12, 2009 14:48:52 GMT -5
Sounds like a perfect day, ZD!
Regarding the way thoughts start in the morning for me: the first thought is always triggered by direct/undivided perception.
Regarding human evolution: yes, humans are the driving force for "improving/extending" duality in this world.
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Post by klaus on Dec 12, 2009 17:56:45 GMT -5
Hello everyone,
Lightmystic and Zendancer, I understand what you are saying about direct and indirect perception. One is without distinction, the other with distinction.
Direct perception is without "I"as the focal point, whereas "I" is the focal point of indirect perception and modifer ( experience, thought, imagination etc.) of direct perception, and of how Consciousness is perceived as "I" and the "world" even though "I" and the "world" are modifications themselves of Consciousness which IS.
So whatever is perceived as direct perception or indirect perception is only a mode of Consciousness Itself.
Take this to it's logical conclusion there is only Consciousness Itself;
the generator of "I" and the "world." And the illusion is identifying "I" as the focal point, instead of Consciousness Itself.
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Post by someNOTHING! on Dec 12, 2009 22:56:17 GMT -5
Haha! A friend of mine and I have played with the "everything me" as Oneness kind of thing! Getting silly is one of my favorite "methods"!! The wondrous play that allows you to "reorganize" all the names of things into one basket, and before you know it, you're so into it, even that's forgotten! Good times!
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Post by zendancer on Dec 13, 2009 10:17:14 GMT -5
Klaus: Precisely!
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Post by lightmystic on Dec 14, 2009 13:14:20 GMT -5
Hey klaus, Exactly! Edit: I realized, upon scrolling down, that ZD gave essentially the exact same response.  Hilarious.... Hello everyone, Lightmystic and Zendancer, I understand what you are saying about direct and indirect perception. One is without distinction, the other with distinction. Direct perception is without "I"as the focal point, whereas "I" is the focal point of indirect perception and modifer ( experience, thought, imagination etc.) of direct perception, and of how Consciousness is perceived as "I" and the "world" even though "I" and the "world" are modifications themselves of Consciousness which IS. So whatever is perceived as direct perception or indirect perception is only a mode of Consciousness Itself. Take this to it's logical conclusion there is only Consciousness Itself; the generator of "I" and the "world." And the illusion is identifying "I" as the focal point, instead of Consciousness Itself. |
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Hilarious....