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Post by someNOTHING! on Feb 27, 2018 22:59:38 GMT -5
I wouldn't reduce realization to identifying with such mechanical cause-and-effect bound devices, no. Have you considered or thought about pure creativity in your studies? Take a look at it in the spirit of a fountain of youth kind of idea, with ALL eternally spewing forth and appearing as unique perspective to No-Thing. It's ok if, at first, mind doth protest and vague messages beginning with "But...." start appearing. That's indicative of mind's limitation. Yet, and this is important, it is still possible to do and it is ALL happening without even the slightest effort, like, all the time. Tell me if this does not make the body wiggle and, eventually, the mind giggle. There is a most excellent book by Joseph Chilton Pearce (which everyone could benefit from, but especially parents of small children, or better yet, prospective parents), Magical Child. Of course what Pearce writes about fits within my paradigm, that's why it's brilliant (and Pearce backs up most of his ideas with current science). But he says that we are the most intelligent we will ever be, at birth. So creativity is ~built-in~ from the start. Pearce says we are all essentially born geniuses. This is FAIAP proved out because we learn more in the first two years of life than we will ever learn in any two year period the rest of our lives. Picture being born as a clean white sheet of paper, there are unlimited possibilities. We are born with the greatest number of neurons we will ever have. Pearce says all children are born with a predisposition to learn how the physical world operates, he calls this unbending intent. All that is necessary for this to be fulfilled is for content for exploration to be supplied by parents or primary caregivers (stuff for exploration, "toys", basically anything within safe bounds, "concrete" stuff, abstraction comes later, built upon the concrete). But what happens is everything the baby/small child learns is like a line being drawn on the paper, what is learned is stored in the neural structure, as connections between neurons. Things go well for about the first two years of life, learning is exponential. But then what is already learned begins to form a base for further learning, instead of the clean white sheet of paper, the pristine mind. So what the child has learned begins to narrow and limit the child's exploration. This continues, for most children, until about the age of six give or take. At about this point all learning occurs through what the child has already learned, thus all learning becomes constricted. What we know as the prodigy is a child who happens to find itself in a prefect environment, and whose inborn talents get nourished. At birth, we are all a potential Mozart. The more a parent imposes their own psychology upon the child, usually in the form of punishment, the more constricted the child's learning becomes. The job of a parent is not to 'teach' but to provide a safe environment and content for exploration. (My sister has 4 kids who now have children, and small children. I see much of what I would call abuse every time I am around them, and have to bite my tongue. Some physical abuse (spanking) but mostly psychological abuse, that is, imposing their will upon the child (teaching stuff, how to "behave"). But society wouldn't call it abuse, just "normal" parenting). So yes, I have considered creativity. (Pearce goes on to explain that at first he thought once the child grows up, this possibility of being a prodigy/genius is forever lost, but he later changed his mind and considers it possible for "Nature's Plan" (pretty-much his words) to be recovered). Interesting that I've posted photos recently of "magical children". I will look into this book. Thanks. Yeah, I do think there's much to be said for genetic predispositions that we don't quite yet know about. That said, it is impossible to refute the power of cultural/social conditioning and how such factors can either open or close doors in the flow of experience. The fact that the conditioning is at play in every waking hour gives credence to the search for what causes or gives rise to suffering. You are touching on a very complex set of other issues that are treated in sociology classes with respect to the development of a social self. Perhaps that whole other discussion can be saved for another thread. But to cut to the point of self and its relation to suffering, we'd prolly wanna look at the "symbolic interaction" aspect: self concept, the looking glass self, significant others, etc. This area of focus is ripe with finely layered substrata of mental constructs and imagined beliefs which, in turn, give rise to the narrative of personalized story. To the tune of truthiness, it's fair to say that, within the sphere of the psycho-physical in which interaction and/or intra-action take place, there are form, senses, and perception at play. Additionally, at least as far as creatures with some semblance of brains and/or cognition, there is some modicum of mental activity that gets translated into memory, instinct, bodily changes, etc. In the human species, there's has even evolved the possibility to become aware of our selves objectively and in relation to apparent others. Woweezowee! It is that notable mental activity that we are mostly concerned with in this ongoing discussion. It is there that something in the psycho-physical has been perhaps miss-wired, not yet noticed, and not fully realized in its exceptional pervasiveness. The projected mental construct is centered on an imagined self, maintained through a seemingly infinite number of inter-related conceptualized things including a value/belief/worldview system that makes up our conditioned lives. The attention lost to that projected worldview (filtered through the conditioning) ignores the wholeness from which it ALL arises. As such, the experience of an otherwise simple "As It Is 'Reality'", is based on, filtered through and then pivots on that illusionary world that is centered on a self. All physicality and psychological expression is sensed, perceived, interpreted, acknowledged, rationalized, felt, limited, minimized, and then imagined as the life around what it thinks it is. That narrative of self, when believed and not seen through - is delusional, and is the story of the separate self that suffers. Suffering can be seen for what it is. Putting the realization out of reach is indicative of the mind's amazing capacity for distraction. Pulling our attention into that story begins the fall. The illusion, taking on a life of its own, does not want to die and can only live by the power given to it. Bringing the dynamic into greater awareness brings about discernment of truth. There's a qualitative shift that happens upon seeing through the divisive illusion of self. In clarity, the psycho-physical sense of being can and does live on as an expression that is conscious of its wholeness.
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Post by laughter on Feb 28, 2018 7:09:11 GMT -5
Yes, I agree with that. And it's a layered truth. It's easy to see how pain leads to thoughts about not just the pain but all sorts of other subjects. At it's deepest, the idea implicates the foundation of the notion of physicality to begin with. This is why a quiet, spacious state of mind is one where the tolerance for pain is relatively higher. It seems to me that this is where the interest in the extremes comes from. An interest in focusing on what the subjective description is when the physical sensations are obviously dominant in the scenario. It's similar -- from a different angle -- to your interest in prying apart the physical and the emotional components to pain and suffering. Peeps feel like they have endured, and want to be acknowledged for that. May be more of a male thang, not sure. Well sure, that happens, no doubt. And I'd say it happens for women too but that it tends to expresses in different ways in either men or women. But I don't think that's happening for everyone who's interested in these scenarios. Some peeps just want to relate the pointers based on the distinction between pain and suffering to their past experiences.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Feb 28, 2018 11:48:30 GMT -5
Your post explains everything. (If you can't do other than what you do, there is no choice involved). What I said was in no way nasty, just a fact. Choices are made even when you don't believe choice is involved. What you do is already what you want to do (given the apparent limitations in play). Why would you want to do other than what you want to do, and why would you do it even if you could? The whole notion that there should be something operating independently of it's experience is misconceived. It would make no sense to do so. This is life responding to life. Don't pretend there's nothing here that can respond. When you say 'others understand better than you do', you're voicing an opinion based on your own understanding, and not a fact. As such, stating that opinion just looks like a way to champion your opinion by putting others down rather than trying to support your opinion in some meaningful way. If one is conditioned in a certain manner which *makes the choice for us*, then there is no choice, period. [For me, (psychological) conditioning, is the false sense of self]. What Andrew understands is the truth that nonvolition is trying to point to. I'm merely saying your understanding of that truth, your definition of what nonvolition is, is further away (from the truth) than that of Andrew.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Feb 28, 2018 11:58:00 GMT -5
There is a most excellent book by Joseph Chilton Pearce (which everyone could benefit from, but especially parents of small children, or better yet, prospective parents), Magical Child. Of course what Pearce writes about fits within my paradigm, that's why it's brilliant (and Pearce backs up most of his ideas with current science). But he says that we are the most intelligent we will ever be, at birth. So creativity is ~built-in~ from the start. Pearce says we are all essentially born geniuses. This is FAIAP proved out because we learn more in the first two years of life than we will ever learn in any two year period the rest of our lives. Picture being born as a clean white sheet of paper, there are unlimited possibilities. We are born with the greatest number of neurons we will ever have. Pearce says all children are born with a predisposition to learn how the physical world operates, he calls this unbending intent. All that is necessary for this to be fulfilled is for content for exploration to be supplied by parents or primary caregivers (stuff for exploration, "toys", basically anything within safe bounds, "concrete" stuff, abstraction comes later, built upon the concrete). But what happens is everything the baby/small child learns is like a line being drawn on the paper, what is learned is stored in the neural structure, as connections between neurons. Things go well for about the first two years of life, learning is exponential. But then what is already learned begins to form a base for further learning, instead of the clean white sheet of paper, the pristine mind. So what the child has learned begins to narrow and limit the child's exploration. This continues, for most children, until about the age of six give or take. At about this point all learning occurs through what the child has already learned, thus all learning becomes constricted. What we know as the prodigy is a child who happens to find itself in a prefect environment, and whose inborn talents get nourished. At birth, we are all a potential Mozart. The more a parent imposes their own psychology upon the child, usually in the form of punishment, the more constricted the child's learning becomes. The job of a parent is not to 'teach' but to provide a safe environment and content for exploration. (My sister has 4 kids who now have children, and small children. I see much of what I would call abuse every time I am around them, and have to bite my tongue. Some physical abuse (spanking) but mostly psychological abuse, that is, imposing their will upon the child (teaching stuff, how to "behave"). But society wouldn't call it abuse, just "normal" parenting). So yes, I have considered creativity. (Pearce goes on to explain that at first he thought once the child grows up, this possibility of being a prodigy/genius is forever lost, but he later changed his mind and considers it possible for "Nature's Plan" (pretty-much his words) to be recovered). Interesting that I've posted photos recently of "magical children". I will look into this book. Thanks. Yeah, I do think there's much to be said for genetic predispositions that we don't quite yet know about. That said, it is impossible to refute the power of cultural/social conditioning and how such factors can either open or close doors in the flow of experience. The fact that the conditioning is at play in every waking hour gives credence to the search for what causes or gives rise to suffering. You are touching on a very complex set of other issues that are treated in sociology classes with respect to the development of a social self. Perhaps that whole other discussion can be saved for another thread. But to cut to the point of self and its relation to suffering, we'd prolly wanna look at the "symbolic interaction" aspect: self concept, the looking glass self, significant others, etc. This area of focus is ripe with finely layered substrata of mental constructs and imagined beliefs which, in turn, give rise to the narrative of personalized story. To the tune of truthiness, it's fair to say that, within the sphere of the psycho-physical in which interaction and/or intra-action take place, there are form, senses, and perception at play. Additionally, at least as far as creatures with some semblance of brains and/or cognition, there is some modicum of mental activity that gets translated into memory, instinct, bodily changes, etc. In the human species, there's has even evolved the possibility to become aware of our selves objectively and in relation to apparent others. Woweezowee! It is that notable mental activity that we are mostly concerned with in this ongoing discussion. It is there that something in the psycho-physical has been perhaps miss-wired, not yet noticed, and not fully realized in its exceptional pervasiveness. The projected mental construct is centered on an imagined self, maintained through a seemingly infinite number of inter-related conceptualized things including a value/belief/worldview system that makes up our conditioned lives. The attention lost to that projected worldview (filtered through the conditioning) ignores the wholeness from which it ALL arises. As such, the experience of an otherwise simple "As It Is 'Reality'", is based on, filtered through and then pivots on that illusionary world that is centered on a self. All physicality and psychological expression is sensed, perceived, interpreted, acknowledged, rationalized, felt, limited, minimized, and then imagined as the life around what it thinks it is. That narrative of self, when believed and not seen through - is delusional, and is the story of the separate self that suffers.Suffering can be seen for what it is. Putting the realization out of reach is indicative of the mind's amazing capacity for distraction. Pulling our attention into that story begins the fall. The illusion, taking on a life of its own, does not want to die and can only live by the power given to it. Bringing the dynamic into greater awareness brings about discernment of truth. There's a qualitative shift that happens upon seeing through the divisive illusion of self. In clarity, the psycho-physical sense of being can and does live on as an expression that is conscious of its wholeness. Yes and yes. Astute. And yes again, and likewise astute. (And may come back to this later). I'd say MC is a quite profound and amazing book. (JCP later came to study the effects of TV watching on kids, came to the conclusion that for kids under 11 TV watching should be severely limited, as it does *too much of the work* for the developing brain. If I recall, that goes back to the '80's. [See his Evolution's End: Claiming the Potential of Our Intelligence]. He was probably horrified at today's smart phones and video games, and the time kids spend on-them).
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Post by enigma on Feb 28, 2018 14:32:27 GMT -5
Peeps feel like they have endured, and want to be acknowledged for that. May be more of a male thang, not sure. Well sure, that happens, no doubt. And I'd say it happens for women too but that it tends to expresses in different ways in either men or women. But I don't think that's happening for everyone who's interested in these scenarios. Some peeps just want to relate the pointers based on the distinction between pain and suffering to their past experiences. They're relating the ideas to their past experiences of their own stories that create the suffering to begin with, and all they can come up with are more stories to hold it in place. I say stop trying to correlate a new potential insight about the problematic nature of the stories to the stories that are causing the problem. (I have endured more pain than you, and it was unavoidable and isn't my fault, and you should feel compassion for me as I do for all the small creatures of the forest, and my goldfish.) Trash the stories and come fresh, come empty. I would like folks to feel alone and foolish in their suffering, and I know this is a lot to ask. I would like them to see that nature is not cruel and lacking in compassion or trying to teach them something, and that they are the only ones who have found a way to suffer in heaven.
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Post by stardustpilgrim on Feb 28, 2018 15:04:31 GMT -5
Well sure, that happens, no doubt. And I'd say it happens for women too but that it tends to expresses in different ways in either men or women. But I don't think that's happening for everyone who's interested in these scenarios. Some peeps just want to relate the pointers based on the distinction between pain and suffering to their past experiences. They're relating the ideas to their past experiences of their own stories that create the suffering to begin with, and all they can come up with are more stories to hold it in place. I say stop trying to correlate a new potential insight about the problematic nature of the stories to the stories that are causing the problem. (I have endured more pain than you, and it was unavoidable and isn't my fault, and you should feel compassion for me as I do for all the small creatures of the forest, and my goldfish.) Trash the stories and come fresh, come empty. I would like folks to feel alone and foolish in their suffering, and I know this is a lot to ask. I would like them to see that nature is not cruel and lacking in compassion or trying to teach them something, and that they are the only ones who have found a way to suffer in heaven. But pain can be such that it swallows up everything, even one's psychology. IOW, there is/can be ONLY pain.
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Post by enigma on Feb 28, 2018 15:20:41 GMT -5
Choices are made even when you don't believe choice is involved. What you do is already what you want to do (given the apparent limitations in play). Why would you want to do other than what you want to do, and why would you do it even if you could? The whole notion that there should be something operating independently of it's experience is misconceived. It would make no sense to do so. This is life responding to life. Don't pretend there's nothing here that can respond. When you say 'others understand better than you do', you're voicing an opinion based on your own understanding, and not a fact. As such, stating that opinion just looks like a way to champion your opinion by putting others down rather than trying to support your opinion in some meaningful way. If one is conditioned in a certain manner which *makes the choice for us*, then there is no choice, period. [For me, (psychological) conditioning, is the false sense of self]. What Andrew understands is the truth that nonvolition is trying to point to. I'm merely saying your understanding of that truth, your definition of what nonvolition is, is further away (from the truth) than that of Andrew. You could say that you have no choice about the choice you make, or that a separate volitional person choosing is illusion, but it's not so that choice is not involved (you) or that a choice can't be made (Andy). Choices happen, and they are made on the basis of experience.(conditioning) In this scenario that you're imagining in which there is choice, what is that choice based on other than experience? Can you see that, rather than being left without a choice, the whole question of choosing in the absence of an experience used to derive that choice from, is misconceived? You and Andy are using a false notion of 'no choice' to change your choices in your life, and you clearly don't understand what's going on. What nonvolition is trying to point to is that there is no independent self here, false or otherwise, not that choices can't be made.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:26:23 GMT -5
What does it even mean to say 'the energy has to play itself out'? YOU are playing it out because you want to be on the forum and you don't. Since you don't want to make one choice and let the other one go, there is a 'mild suffering involved' and a need to blame your childish wants on 'an energy that needs to play out'. There isn't a you playing it out. There are two (or more) autopilot impulses playing out (pre-programmed/conditioned impulses), neither one a you. Neither one is ~real~. So to say the energy is playing out, is correct. yep.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:27:28 GMT -5
I think it might be the reverse. The concepts/thought can make it seem as if it is just one thing at a time, but the actuality is that experience is multi layered and complex. Kind of like if we glance at a river we can see it is moving in one general direction, but if we look closer we can see currents are intersecting and many things are happening. Lots of peeps find it challenging to know what they're feeling when. yeah, but that doesn't mean they're not feeling, it just means that they're struggling to describe it.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:28:23 GMT -5
what do you mean 'culled from'? (you sound like you are suffering a bit here hehe) I'm still looking for the relationship to spiritual thinking that you're talking about. I'm needing to use quite a bit of resistance in the extraction, but resistance is not suffering. The spiritual thinking is hijacking the definition of suffering such that it is no longer possible for babies and animals to suffer. Surely that is clear now.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:32:03 GMT -5
I can seemingly 'make a choice', but ' committing to a choice' is pretty much beyond my capacity...because I don't believe in a chooser. At best, the chooser appears, it is superficial, and the energy (or motivation/desire) to maintain and perpetuate this 'chooser' isn't there. I'm not frightened of suffering, so that's just not much of an issue. I might responsibly work WITH desires to create stuff, but I don't see desires as 'my creations'. At most, if I was to create a piece of art because the desire was there, I would say the art was 'my creation', but not the desire itself. By the way, where did I say that I had 'a goal' to play out all my desires? Can you specifically quote me on that please? Or were you just generally saying that if someone had that goal it would be a recipe for suffering? It would be a very odd goal to have. Your 'intent' is to allow desires to play out. "Goal" must have triggered some resistance. Desires form in your mind according to conditioning. They aren't bigger than you. I don't recall using 'committing', but If I did it was probly a poor choice of words. I don't mean making a decision and sticking to it. I mean choosing one and letting the other go. Of course you're frightened of suffering. But that's not my intent. Desires play themselves out whether I like it or not, I have no particular interest in 'allowing' desires to play out, they do anyway, and all the time. Making choices apparently happens, but I am never 'letting the other go'. Is that what you do? I would say the specific form that desires take is formed in mind according to conditioning, but 'desire' itself isn't formed in mind. This is actually an interesting issue. What is 'desire'?
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:33:09 GMT -5
Not overtly so, no, but if you make a heavy enough tea cup, you will notice the resistance more obviously. Or if you don't really want the tea, you might notice it a bit. But hey, what if you don't? Then we aren't paying attention to the resistance (which is good, it would be a major chore to have to pay attention to all resistance).
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:36:41 GMT -5
There isn't a you playing it out. There are two (or more) autopilot impulses playing out (pre-programmed/conditioned impulses), neither one a you. Neither one is ~real~. So to say the energy is playing out, is correct. To say the energy has to play itself out is incorrect. If you were to see and understand what I'm saying, the 'energy' of conflicting desires would cease instantly and effortlessly. And don't give me the 'there is no you who can make a choice' story. When it's in your interest you'll argue against it. The tension between desires doesn't stop. The tension doesn't have to be a big deal though, it's not often a big deal for animals. The cat wants to go out. The cat wants to stay in. The cat wants to go out. The cat wants to stay in. I've seen cats do this for half an hour lol but it's okay for the cat because they aren't making a problem out of what humans call 'indecision'. Indecision only tends to be a problem when we are telling a story about being undecided and believing that it has to be resolved. Normally folks are able to 'decide' and 'commit', because the energy of (or desire for) the separate chooser is quite strong, but I largely lost that capacity at a particular point, and then where there was indecision, it was just a case of going with the movements, and it took as long as it took for one movement to become sufficiently strong.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:38:07 GMT -5
Reading, I was just about to say Andrew understands nonvolition better than you do. I'll still say it *, Andrew understands nonviolition better than you do. Why do you choose to do that? It's ugly and serves no purpose. Nonvolition doesn't mean you can't choose. If you don't believe me, pay attention the next time you make a choice, which should be in a second or two. I didn't say there's no apparent choice made. I did say I don't make a choice and let another one go. Choices are apparently made, but they're not technically 'choices' if what we are doing is following movements.
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Post by andrew on Feb 28, 2018 15:48:06 GMT -5
If one is conditioned in a certain manner which *makes the choice for us*, then there is no choice, period. [For me, (psychological) conditioning, is the false sense of self]. What Andrew understands is the truth that nonvolition is trying to point to. I'm merely saying your understanding of that truth, your definition of what nonvolition is, is further away (from the truth) than that of Andrew. You could say that you have no choice about the choice you make, or that a separate volitional person choosing is illusion, but it's not so that choice is not involved (you) or that a choice can't be made (Andy). Choices happen, and they are made on the basis of experience.(conditioning) In this scenario that you're imagining in which there is choice, what is that choice based on other than experience? Can you see that, rather than being left without a choice, the whole question of choosing in the absence of an experience used to derive that choice from, is misconceived? You and Andy are using a false notion of 'no choice' to change your choices in your life, and you clearly don't understand what's going on. What nonvolition is trying to point to is that there is no independent self here, false or otherwise, not that choices can't be made. There's some misrepresenting happening here. I have said that choices are apparently made, but there's no 'letting one go'. When did you last see an animal 'let a desire or other choice go'? To 'let go of a desire or choice' is a rational, independent/separate self thing to do....and actually I would say that what happens is that the energy of the other desire is suppressed temporarily.
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