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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 21:11:11 GMT -5
You characterized it as an it that will insist until you heed it. Sounds like a person. lol maybe that is your experience of people. Maybe an alarm clock would have been a better example. In fact it's my experience of you!
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 21:15:33 GMT -5
I think you are over simplifying the baby's experience again. Watch this one...notice the intention, the figuring out, the frustration, the pleasure. (this one is easy to watch because there's no baby suffering with colic) What's your point here? It shows the complexity of the baby, and that it isn't so different from adults. Intention, attachment to outcome, frustration at failure, pleasure at success. It all illustrates that the abstract 'me' concept isn't as significant to cognitive thought, feeling and suffering as you seem to be suggesting. It's not significant to cognitive thought and feeling, but it's critical to suffering.
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 21:17:04 GMT -5
I dunno. Seems more like need. What is mild greed called? A little greed?
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 21:19:50 GMT -5
You think thirst requires identification with body and mind? A young baby or an animal is not identified (the meaning used on ST's) with their body, they are their body. (If that seems like a contradiction, I could unfold it. Just throw in at the appropriate place, psychologically). Right, and yet they drink when thirsty, eat when hungry.
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 21:45:24 GMT -5
Interesting article. This is what the author calls level 0 self awareness: "Pet owners know that placing a mirror in a canary cage is substitute for companionship and triggers in the bird melodious courtship songs. It is also the level expressed by dogs, cats, or monkeys facing mirrors and posturing endless aggressive displays to their own specular image as if they were confronting a creature other than themselves." Yeah, I thought it might be useful as a point of reference for this ongoing discussion. The references to gradual building in complexity, abstraction, and self-reference seemed pretty well spelled out. I also liked the terminology in the stages themselves which kind of link with much of the vocab used here: confusion, differentiation, situation/context, identification, permanence/ (impermanence, hehe), and self-consciousness. With a little more introspection and contemplation, it seems quite possible to clarify in more detail in one's life how the layers of unconscious conditioning, perceptions, actions, self-consciousness, etc, built up in the mirror of mind. As for a wee bit more reading, here are a couple of articles that help to see the interesting comparison-contrast in the quality of memory between animals and humans that might provide context for the discussion. Just passing them along. Animal MemoryHuman Memory2 minute retention for dogs sounds about right, based on my own 'study'. I do home maintenance, and meet a lot of dogs. They typically bark at first, then lick me like an old friend. When I go out to the van to get a tool or a part, the experiment begins. If I'm back in a minute or so, I'm greeted like the old friend I am, but if it's more like a few minutes, I get barked at and have to get reacquainted all over again.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2018 22:13:20 GMT -5
Brutal is an understatement. I had a friend who owned a mink farm. The stories he told me. Wait! Are humans part of nature? Is it all about context or perspective. From my friend's view the mink farm feeds his family. From the hawk's perspective, the pigeon is food. From the pigeon's perspective the hawk is a monster, also from my wife's. I guess you're right, we, humans, can see all the different perspectives. What does that say about suffering? From an SR perspective we never lived so there is no suffering--see Nisargadatta quote in previous post? I sat with that a minute contemplating. Yeah I can definitely find the truth or validity of that 'perspective' within me. On the other hand, my experience is that trying to find that perspective in a moment in which there is already a feeling/emotion is just a way of trying to find a quick way out of the feeling/emotion. I'm trying to 'cheat' what's going on in that moment. So in a sense, if it's already there, the only way is to feel it fully. If I'm sad, then feel that fully. If I'm feeling the brutality and pain of nature, then feel it. Equally if there is joy or love, then feel that. I sense that maybe even for the likes of Niz, that the SR 'perspective' is generally true for him, but perhaps is still a bit of an ideal. I mean, he wasn't best known for holding his temper lol. Here's a link to a chap I listen to on youtube on occasion: he argues that either approach to suffering is valid: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rU1esD17C8 Don't know if the link works. Have never done it before. Let me know if you can get to the vid.
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 22:35:47 GMT -5
Dissatisfaction is not suffering. Do you suffer when you write a post that you're not really satisfied with, or when you get hungry? Would you expect that to end with SR? That's Andy's conclusion as well; that any kind of pain or dissatisfaction is suffering. I'm not saying dissatisfaction is suffering. Rather, I'm asserting that the usual, non-dualist definition of suffering--indeed, your definition of suffering-- isn't my understanding of suffering (for that matter, neither is it the commonly understood definition of suffering). To understand your definition, I have to use another term, which, for lack of a better one, is dissatisfaction with what is. Not dissatisfaction in general. That said, and to get back to your earlier assertion, I don't understand how you can come to the conclusion that dissatisfaction with what is ("suffering" to you) will continue after SR. The definition Google gave me for suffering was "pain, distress, injury, loss, or anything unpleasant". I find that definition a little too broad for our purposes here, don't you? I mean, anything unpleasant could be a loud noise or a fly buzzing me. If that's suffering, there's clearly no amount of Self Realizing that's going to do the trick, and really we don't care about those things, right? You care about getting rid of pain that really impacts your life, right? Isn't that what everybody imagines SR will do for them? Nobody expects that it's never going to rain again after SR, right? Are we pretty much in sync about that? Are we, like, on the same page and all?
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 22:41:58 GMT -5
If the masochist is enjoying the sensation, he's not suffering, right? Right, well, this is why I cannot hold your definition of suffering. A masochist finds joy in suffering (or, at least, the commonly understood definition of suffering). Otherwise, there could be no such thing as masochism. Googles definition of suffering is "the tendency to derive pleasure, especially sexual gratification, from one's own pain or humiliation." It doesn't imply that the masochist is suffering. I don't see him deriving joy from suffering, just from his own pain and humiliation. He obviously doesn't experience pain and humiliation as suffering, right?
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Post by enigma on Feb 18, 2018 23:47:34 GMT -5
As humans, we understand that nature can be brutal, (we can also understand that nature is benevolent). So we can step back and say....'I shouldn't interfere, I know the hawk is hungry and trying to feed babies, and is just being a hawk', but even if we do step back (which may be the wise thing to do in some situation), it's likely to hurt a bit to witness the brutality of nature. Animal photographers have to step back obviously, but I suspect that the job (and the camera) acts as a kind of filter which blocks the emotional connection to the situation. In a Louis de Bernieres book I read many years ago (a fictional book), one of the characters was collecting snails to eat, and as he looked at the snails squirming around in his bucket, he contemplated that it seems a poor way for a universe to be ordered, such that the strong prey on the weak. I sort of know what he means. Brutal is an understatement. I had a friend who owned a mink farm. The stories he told me. Wait! Are humans part of nature? Is it all about context or perspective. From my friend's view the mink farm feeds his family. From the hawk's perspective, the pigeon is food. From the pigeon's perspective the hawk is a monster, also from my wife's. I guess you're right, we, humans, can see all the different perspectives. What does that say about suffering? From an SR perspective we never lived so there is no suffering--see Nisargadatta quote in previous post? Niz wouldn't say there is no suffering, only that the sufferer is an illusion.
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Post by enigma on Feb 19, 2018 0:20:45 GMT -5
I sat with that a minute contemplating. Yeah I can definitely find the truth or validity of that 'perspective' within me. On the other hand, my experience is that trying to find that perspective in a moment in which there is already a feeling/emotion is just a way of trying to find a quick way out of the feeling/emotion. I'm trying to 'cheat' what's going on in that moment. So in a sense, if it's already there, the only way is to feel it fully. If I'm sad, then feel that fully. If I'm feeling the brutality and pain of nature, then feel it. Equally if there is joy or love, then feel that. I sense that maybe even for the likes of Niz, that the SR 'perspective' is generally true for him, but perhaps is still a bit of an ideal. I mean, he wasn't best known for holding his temper lol. Here's a link to a chap I listen to on youtube on occasion: he argues that either approach to suffering is valid: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rU1esD17C8 Don't know if the link works. Have never done it before. Let me know if you can get to the vid. What he didn't mention is that, without the resisting thoughts the fear dissolves, because the fear is made of resistance. Fear IS resistance.
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Post by tenka on Feb 19, 2018 2:37:59 GMT -5
Compare the foundation of perceiving life through the mind-body experience and what you are beyond that . No-one is touching upon this point and it is the point pertaining to suffering . Can anyone else here relate to the differences between what you are that is not within experience of the mind-body and experiencing the mind-body? The foundation of a screaming babe in arms is not the same as beyond the screaming babe . The babe in arms is limited by it's experience . All experience is limited to that which can be experienced . What is also limiting is the limitation known or unknown in the moment pertaining the experience in reflection of one's self awareness . A babe in arms doesn't have to know that there is limitation placed upon themselves in relation to working out mathematical equations . The actual perception of this world via the mind-body construct is a form of suffering compared to not . Suffering only applies to one who is aware of themselves compared to not .
Peeps have to have the comparison otherwise they can say that they are in this moment not suffering when they are, they are by that very suggestion that they are not . Let's just talk about bunnies for a moment. Bunnies are not biologically self aware. I.E. when you put a mirror in front of them, they do not recognize their own reflection. So suffering doesn't apply to them? First thing on the net that I copied and pasted about bunnies behaviour . Grunts are often angry reactions to a human behavior or towards another rabbit and may be followed by scratching or biting. ... Some rabbits show their disapproval by grunting to protect what is theirs (cage, food, etc.) from a human hand or another rabbit and often, that is the extent of their anger.Now call me Mr Picky butt certain behaviours mirrors one'e sense of self in reflection of others . Suffering is this sense of self compared to not . When you are of this world you are suffering, simply by being of this world . Have you the comparison in toe?
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Post by tenka on Feb 19, 2018 2:44:59 GMT -5
How else is one going to relate to what is happening in reflection of the belief they have pertaining to what they think they are? The body will signal the brain to relate to in reflection of pertaining to that it is thirsty. No mind/body identification necessary. The brain signal, the body urges all require a self identification in order to act upon them . Your not connecting the dots between body-mind-self .. How do you know what water is? How do you know how to turn the tap on? How do you differentiate the hot tap from the cold tap? How does the bunny know what water is compared to dry earth?
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Post by laughter on Feb 19, 2018 6:30:46 GMT -5
Tolle is always a source of insight, and I like his interpretation of the prodigal son .. but wow .. .. telling Andrew Cohen that the purpose of the world is so that peeps can suffer enough to wake up ?? .. Suffering is an undeniable part of many folks path stories. But. It's really, always, quite optional.
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Post by andrew on Feb 19, 2018 9:02:16 GMT -5
Compare the foundation of perceiving life through the mind-body experience and what you are beyond that . No-one is touching upon this point and it is the point pertaining to suffering . Can anyone else here relate to the differences between what you are that is not within experience of the mind-body and experiencing the mind-body? The foundation of a screaming babe in arms is not the same as beyond the screaming babe . The babe in arms is limited by it's experience . All experience is limited to that which can be experienced . What is also limiting is the limitation known or unknown in the moment pertaining the experience in reflection of one's self awareness . A babe in arms doesn't have to know that there is limitation placed upon themselves in relation to working out mathematical equations . The actual perception of this world via the mind-body construct is a form of suffering compared to not . Suffering only applies to one who is aware of themselves compared to not .
Peeps have to have the comparison otherwise they can say that they are in this moment not suffering when they are, they are by that very suggestion that they are not . Let's just talk about bunnies for a moment. Bunnies are not biologically self aware. I.E. when you put a mirror in front of them, they do not recognize their own reflection. So suffering doesn't apply to them? They don't have a highly developed self-awareness, but there is still a basis for self-awareness...a basic ego. A toy robot bunny can't evolve into a bunny that can know itself in a mirror, but a real bunny potentially could.
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Post by andrew on Feb 19, 2018 9:03:48 GMT -5
How else is one going to relate to what is happening in reflection of the belief they have pertaining to what they think they are? The body will signal the brain to relate to in reflection of pertaining to that it is thirsty. No mind/body identification necessary. The sense of thirst is felt though, and feeling is not mechanical.
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