The Awesome Truth Series

[Reefs]

Omnipotence (S01 E13)

3. Field Theory

(06:00)

In our current scientific way of thinking in the West, this kind of growth, this kind of formation is always talked about in terms of what we call field theory. Fields of force. And I suppose one of the most striking exhibitions of what a field is can be seen in looking at the formation of magnetic lines of force in iron filings. As when we take filings that are not magnetized, just thrown chaotically over an area. And then with the magnets underneath, notice that all the filings form together into a pattern. The whole area moving together, every single part of it simultaneously into its shape. And that shows us the whole nature of a field of force.

Now, the fascinating thing is that some of these fundamental words which we've been studying throughout this program [Sunya, Dharma-Dhatu, Li] form the basic principle of nature, or the basic reality underlying the world, are words that have the meaning of a field.

[…]

In the field there is a structure. And the structure of the field is thought of as governing the formation of the universe. And a particular Chinese word which means the basic pattern or order of the world, is Li [里], which had as its original meaning the markings in jade, the fiber in muscle, or the grain in wood.

This word then designates the basic structure within the Tao [道], within the fundamental field of the world. And thus, its order, which can be, as it were, understood by looking at it. But is too complex, too much happening so fast, all together at once for us ever to be able to analyze it in the relatively clumsy language of words.



4. Spontaneous Arising

(11:00)

Now thus, you see, it seems to us that that order is enormously complex. The order of nature, the order of beauty, the order of ethics, all these kinds of orders baffle us when we try to think about them bit by bit.

But actually, this order is only a complicated order when we try to think about it. I mean, it's very simple, isn't it, to drink water if you put it in a cup or a glass and toss it down. But it would be extraordinarily complex if one tried to drink water with a fork. And in the same way, the world and the order of the world, the activity within the field, seems incredibly complicated to us when we try to translate it into thinking and into words.

But this then is the fundamental Chinese Taoist and Indian Buddhist view of how the formations of the world arise. Not by a step by step process which can be put down in a line like the instructions for making the flower. But by something which happens spontaneously all together at once.

And this particular form of activity is commonly represented in Eastern art by many armed and many headed figures of various divinities. Such as this particular Tibetan figure of Quan Yin / Kuan Yin [觀音] […] But the interesting thing about it is, that the figure has three faces and eight arms. And you might think that that presents an incredible problem of coordination. But isn't it really the same problem that we have in being alive in the simplest and most fundamental way? Our own bodies, without our thinking about it at all, are doing all kinds of things all together at once, and we don't have to stop to think about it.

You remember the little rhyme—thinking of creatures with many arms—the little rhyme that says:

A centipede was happy – quite!
Until a toad in fun
Said, "Pray, which leg goes after which?"
This worked its mind to such a pitch,
It lay distracted in a ditch,
Considering how to run.

And you may have noticed the same thing can happen to us when we think too hard about how we breathe. Or if you're doing something to which you're accustomed in quite a mechanical way, like knitting or tying your neck tie. When you begin to think about it too hard, you get balled up, and you start dropping stitches.

[sree]

Jun 14, 2022 21:59:01 GMT -5 Reefs said:

Omnipotence (S01 E13)

Omnipotence (S01 E13)

1. Constructed World vs. Grown World

(00:10)

Throughout this series, I have been trying to explain two fundamentally different ways of looking at our world—one characteristic, predominantly of the West, and the other of the East. And these might be called, respectively, the way of description as opposed to the way of seeing. The way of understanding things in words or in terms. Contrasted with the way of understanding through looking and seeing a field or a subject totally all at once. Or you might call these the linear view, strung out in a line, or the total view, seeing all at once. Or the serial view on the one hand, as contrasted with the simultaneous view on the other.

In classical Western science, we have depended largely on this serial, or analytic, view, which understands the world by translating it into ideas, into words, or into, say, even series of numbers. The basic feature of it being that things are understood in a step by step way, in sequence. And insofar as we constantly look at nature in that way, we tend to think of nature as something constructed. Something made or put together as we ourselves make and put things together through a series of steps. And perhaps this gives us the feeling that if we understood nature sufficiently, if we understood in full detail all the steps which go to the making of our universe, we could ourselves make it.

Now, it's here, you see, that we get a very fundamental contrast between East and West, and especially through Chinese and Japanese ideas of the formation of nature. Because for them, it seems extremely odd to think of nature as being constructed or made by a sort of step by step procedure. Their feeling is rather that the world and its forms are not so much constructed as grown. And one of the most important keys to an understanding of Far Eastern thought is to see the difference between a view of a constructed world and a grown world.


2. Creating from the Outside vs. Creating from the Inside out

(03:00)

To give a sort of crazy illustration of this, supposing I construct something. For example, an artificial flower.

And notice that as I put [the petal and leaves] on, I take them from outside and around me things that are bits, and I bring these bits together to make the flower, the construction, or whatever form it is that I'm intending to create. And so from going around to the center, from getting something that was previously pieces and bringing it all together, I get my flower.

But now, watch how an actual flower grows. How it starts, as it were, from the center. And it unfolds itself, not bit by bit, but all the parts of the flower exfoliating together, from the center outwards. In contrast to the making process, which goes from the outside inwards, from a situation where the parts are originally all apart, all in bits, and then assembled. Contrasting with a situation where you have some simple beginning, like a seed or a bud. And as it expands, it constellates, or forms, its own parts from within itself.

And this is the fundamental process of natural growth. It's in the same way that the human baby is formed within the womb. It's in the same way that if you watch crystals under a microscope forming in a solution, you will notice the whole area of the crystal, the whole structure of the crystal coming into being all together at once. And you will not see a kind of bit by bit assemblage, which we use when we make machines, or make houses, or make tools. Even when we carve a block of wood, although the block of wood is not originally a lot of distinct parts. Nevertheless, we work upon it from the outside towards the inside. Whereas all processes of growth go from the inside to the outside.

This term 'creating from the inside out' is actually one of those buzz words A-H use a lot. And in the deliberate creation context, it essentially means the same as Alan describes it. It's the difference between making things happen (forced, efforting) and letting, allowing things happen (naturally, effortlessly). People often misunderstand this LOA/deliberate creation business in a very fundamental way. The fundamental principle is "ask and it is given". So the point is not to put in effort via positive thinking, visualizations, affirmations or skillful action in order to will or force what we want into place - relationships, things and events. That's like making artificial flowers. The point is to be in a state of being that we prefer and then everything around us will naturally and automagically adjust to and reflect that state of being - relationships, things and events. And that's more like a flower growing, naturally and effortlessly. So this disconnected action orientation in the Western world shows a fundamental misconception of how nature or creation in general works. Sure, effort and action and nose to the grindstone gets things done, but compared to the natural and effortless unfolding we see in nature, the results are not really that impressive and also not that long-lasting and usually create additional problems that then have to get fixed with even more disconnected action. So I think this is a very important distinction Alan is illustrating here, the focus on being vs. doing. After all, we are human beings, not human doings, hehe.

Do you find Watts intellectually entertaining or that he had insights of value to you?

Watts was an intellectual, and (according to Wikipedia) described himself as a "philosophical entertainer". I would describe him as a spiritual entertainer based on the stuff you have posted.

East and West. Are these parts of a world that Watts had constructed to sell his perception of us? Perhaps, we should study the man instead of swallowing his words. He was a heavy smoker and alcoholic who had heart issues and died at the age of 58. He pretty much trashed his body while he was delving into the mystery of its creation. And yet, you fell in love with him. Women do that. They prefer cads.

I would like to examine Watts spiritual teaching objectively with you. Do I have a bias? Yes, I am afraid so; but I am willing to listen to your arguments.   

[sree]

Jun 7, 2022 9:10:21 GMT -5 shadowplay said:

Jun 6, 2022 23:27:35 GMT -5 Reefs said:

Bingo! Well said. The world of abstract thought, of objectified perception, is a lifeless world, a mere shadow (or representation) of the real (or actual) world of direct perception.

Thanks for posting this. I think Watts nails it here but I’d go a bit further. I think that abstraction is the key element in terms of delusion. Without abstraction and representation what is (whatever that is) is not-two. That’s the default natural state of existence. Abstraction carves it up and re-presents it. That’s the primary distortion. Without it there would never be a question of separation.

If we simply think about this it won’t work - but if we just let go of our abstractions and mental representations, here it is - THIS - without a second.

I don't think Watt's nailed anything that we haven't nailed ourselves. And that is why we find him compelling. Watts told us what we want to hear because we need his validation.

Reefs made a distinction between a world of abstract thought, which he (Reef) rephrased as objectified perception, and the real world of direct perception. Is there a difference between the two? This is mind trickery. I am not saying that Reefs, or even Watts, was deliberately conning us. Watts was conning himself, and his self-deception has infected us like a virus of the mind. The infected sick mind sees two worlds: the abstract world and the real word. And this condition of "seeing double" comes from Watts reasoning, his unskilled usage of thought.

Take that stick figure example that Watts said is an abstraction and not a real man. Really? If I were to draw that stick figure on a piece of paper, cut it out and stuff it into Reefs' mouth, would he chew it up and swallow it to prove that it is an abstraction? He ought to if it is not real and just an objectified perception.

Where is laughter when I need him? 

[stardustpilgrim]

Jun 19, 2022 9:26:19 GMT -5 sree said:

Jun 7, 2022 9:10:21 GMT -5 shadowplay said:

Thanks for posting this. I think Watts nails it here but I’d go a bit further. I think that abstraction is the key element in terms of delusion. Without abstraction and representation what is (whatever that is) is not-two. That’s the default natural state of existence. Abstraction carves it up and re-presents it. That’s the primary distortion. Without it there would never be a question of separation.

If we simply think about this it won’t work - but if we just let go of our abstractions and mental representations, here it is - THIS - without a second.

I don't think Watt's nailed anything that we haven't nailed ourselves. And that is why we find him compelling. Watts told us what we want to hear because we need his validation.

Reefs made a distinction between a world of abstract thought, which he (Reef) rephrased as objectified perception, and the real world of direct perception. Is there a difference between the two? This is mind trickery. I am not saying that Reefs, or even Watts, was deliberately conning us. Watts was conning himself, and his self-deception has infected us like a virus of the mind. The infected sick mind sees two worlds: the abstract world and the real word. And this condition of "seeing double" comes from Watts reasoning, his unskilled usage of thought.

Take that stick figure example that Watts said is an abstraction and not a real man. Really? If I were to draw that stick figure on a piece of paper, cut it out and stuff it into Reefs' mouth, would he chew it up and swallow it to prove that it is an abstraction? He ought to if it is not real and just an objectified perception.

Where is laughter when I need him? 

When you go to a restaurant, do you eat the menu?

[sree]

Jun 19, 2022 9:35:47 GMT -5 stardustpilgrim said:

Jun 19, 2022 9:26:19 GMT -5 sree said:

I don't think Watt's nailed anything that we haven't nailed ourselves. And that is why we find him compelling. Watts told us what we want to hear because we need his validation.

Reefs made a distinction between a world of abstract thought, which he (Reef) rephrased as objectified perception, and the real world of direct perception. Is there a difference between the two? This is mind trickery. I am not saying that Reefs, or even Watts, was deliberately conning us. Watts was conning himself, and his self-deception has infected us like a virus of the mind. The infected sick mind sees two worlds: the abstract world and the real word. And this condition of "seeing double" comes from Watts reasoning, his unskilled usage of thought.

Take that stick figure example that Watts said is an abstraction and not a real man. Really? If I were to draw that stick figure on a piece of paper, cut it out and stuff it into Reefs' mouth, would he chew it up and swallow it to prove that it is an abstraction? He ought to if it is not real and just an objectified perception.

Where is laughter when I need him? 

When you go to a restaurant, do you eat the menu? (stardustpilgrim said this)

No, I don't eat the menu because it is as much a part of the real world as the food. Please listen to this. For God's sake, give your heart to find out.  (I don't mean to shout. Just mimicking Krishnamurti whom you would listen to just as Reefs has ears only for Watts.)

Perception is reality. We all know this. Right? Therefore, there is only one real world, the perceived world in which we live. This is the world we can see, touch, hear, taste, smell and reflect on. It's the reflection part that we screw ourselves up on and drift into lala land, the place where spiritual teachers dwell.

     

,

[Reefs]

Jun 17, 2022 8:34:49 GMT -5 sree said:

I would like to examine Watts spiritual teaching objectively with you.

Sure, no problem. But you need to cut out the ad hominem and focus on the message instead of the messenger.

[Reefs]

Jun 19, 2022 9:26:19 GMT -5 sree said:

Take that stick figure example that Watts said is an abstraction and not a real man. Really? If I were to draw that stick figure on a piece of paper, cut it out and stuff it into Reefs' mouth, would he chew it up and swallow it to prove that it is an abstraction? He ought to if it is not real and just an objectified perception.

Real in my book means 'existing in its own right'. 

[Reefs]

Jun 19, 2022 12:08:23 GMT -5 sree said:

Perception is reality. We all know this. Right? Therefore, there is only one real world, the perceived world in which we live. This is the world we can see, touch, hear, taste, smell and reflect on. It's the reflection part that we screw ourselves up on and drift into lala land, the place where spiritual teachers dwell.

If that's your definition of reality, then your reality is constantly changing, i.e. transitory. And that's called maya, aka illusion. Relative realness, not absolute realness. 

[Reefs]

Omnipotence (S01 E13)

5. The Universe As A Self-Governing, Living Organism

(14:30)

And so one might ask, how is it possible for Quan Yin, this figure that we have seen, to use so many arms, to use so many faces, so many eyes? It's the same question: How can the centipede use so many legs? How can we make our bodies function, all the different parts of it going together at once without having our having to think about it at all.

And the answer that the Eastern world would give is that it happens because it is a field of forces. It is, in other words, the process that's going on, not governed by a boss, but a process that is self-governing.

[…]

And so speaking of the fundamental principle behind the world, old Lao-Tzu […] said, speaking of Tao:

The great Tao flows everywhere,
Both to the left and to the right.
By it, all things come in to being.
It loves and nourishes them,
But does not lord it over them.
Merits accomplished,
It lays no claim to.

In other words, this is an idea of the ultimate reality which does not govern the universe by ruling it, by telling it what to do, but by, as it were, letting it be free to organize itself harmoniously. In the same way as you saw the iron filings organizing themselves within the magnetic field. In the same way as you saw the natural rose growing as distinct from the artificial daisy being made by being put together.

These forms of Asian philosophy want us, as individuals, to feel that we participate in this great democracy of nature. No longer as isolated individuals trying to push it around, or command it like monarchs or bosses. For their conception of the omnipotence of nature is not like the omnipotence of a king, but of a self-governing state. Not a mere collection of units, but a body, a self-organizing pattern. And they want us to feel that the true self of each one of us is that entire pattern.


6. The Universe As My Body

(17:15)

Now, in the ordinary way, we feel that although I am doing certain things, nevertheless most of what is going on in the world is happening quite independently of me. The motions of the clouds and winds, the circling of the stars, the fluctuation of the tides, the flowing rivers. All these seem to happen quite independently of the individual me.

And yet, the flowing of rivers, which seem to go along by themselves, are surely neither more nor less independent of the individual me than the beating of my own heart. Which, although it seems to go on independently—I mean, I don't will the beating of my heart. Nevertheless, what is more fundamentally me, the very center of my physiological life?

And if I don't will the beating of my heart, might it not also be possible to feel that although I do not will the motions of the winds, the tides, and the stars, that these are nevertheless just as much my activity as the coursing of the blood in my veins. Moving without my having to think about it, like the centipede's legs. Might we not be able to feel that the whole eternal universe is our body? Like this system here in which every point is defined by its ties with every other point.

[sree]

Jun 22, 2022 8:56:22 GMT -5 Reefs said:

Jun 17, 2022 8:34:49 GMT -5 sree said:

I would like to examine Watts spiritual teaching objectively with you.

Sure, no problem. But you need to cut out the ad hominem and focus on the message instead of the messenger.

Ad hominem. This means attacking the person and not his argument. I never attack the person because the person is an illusion and doesn't exist. If I associate "Reefs" with a statement that I take apart, it is not an attack on Reefs. Attachment to the statement being invalidated is the problem. If I were to observe conventional decorum, I would be contributing to the reinforcement of the illusion of the self.

I take this forum and forum members seriously and with respect. If a poster were to inform forum members of a spiritual realization, it is incumbent on me (and others) to verify its authenticity. Spirituality is not a form of escape to me. It is serious business pertaining to your welfare and mine.

Take your views on physical health matters. I know a thing or two myself about exercise/nutrition and have been working out to maintain health and fitness forever. Have I questioned you on this topic? No. I would have if you had said something I found silly and harmful healthwise 

[sree]

Jun 22, 2022 9:10:15 GMT -5 Reefs said:

Jun 19, 2022 12:08:23 GMT -5 sree said:

Perception is reality. We all know this. Right? Therefore, there is only one real world, the perceived world in which we live. This is the world we can see, touch, hear, taste, smell and reflect on. It's the reflection part that we screw ourselves up on and drift into lala land, the place where spiritual teachers dwell.

If that's your definition of reality, then your reality is constantly changing, i.e. transitory. And that's called maya, aka illusion. Relative realness, not absolute realness. 

Objectified perception vs direct perception. I live in a world of objectified perception. The denigration of this world as one of "relative realness" serves to promote an other world of absolute realness. Why? Why do we do this?

You pointed out that there are people who have everything going for them in this world and yet feel something missing. I doubt that. How do we know that people can have everything going for them? Is that even possible?

Our world, the one in which we live, is real enough but it is a mess and we can fix it. I am not talking about political or social activism which worsens the mess. The pursuit of absolute realness is the avoidance of maya, the mess that needs fixing.

It's funny that you know enough to attend to the health of your worldly body instead of ignoring its welfare to seek an ideal absolute body. 

[Reefs]

Jun 22, 2022 10:21:15 GMT -5 sree said:

Jun 22, 2022 8:56:22 GMT -5 Reefs said:

Sure, no problem. But you need to cut out the ad hominem and focus on the message instead of the messenger.

Ad hominem. This means attacking the person and not his argument. I never attack the person because the person is an illusion and doesn't exist. If I associate "Reefs" with a statement that I take apart, it is not an attack on Reefs. Attachment to the statement being invalidated is the problem. If I were to observe conventional decorum, I would be contributing to the reinforcement of the illusion of the self.

I take this forum and forum members seriously and with respect. If a poster were to inform forum members of a spiritual realization, it is incumbent on me (and others) to verify its authenticity. Spirituality is not a form of escape to me. It is serious business pertaining to your welfare and mine.

Take your views on physical health matters. I know a thing or two myself about exercise/nutrition and have been working out to maintain health and fitness forever. Have I questioned you on this topic? No. I would have if you had said something I found silly and harmful healthwise 

You did make it about Alan's character, didn't you? And he had a colorful personality and made some stupid decisions that got him into a lot of trouble and dependencies, no doubt. In essence, he was born into almost poor conditions, but his parents were very adamant to give him a good education. Basically the entire family savings went into Alan's education. And he did well at school and got a scholarship into a very good school that gave him a solid classical education. He developed an interest into Buddhism before it was even popular in the West and especially Zen before anyone outside of academia had even heard of it. He also started to meditate when he was still in school and a young teen. Being very much fascinated with Zen, he was very skeptical of academia right from the start and didn't want to have a career there, even though he would have had a stellar career there, given his talent, interest and background. He married rather young and also into wealth and he lived the good live of the upper classes for many years. He was able to move to America and escape the chaos of the war in Europe. But his main focus in life has always been the divine in all its facets, not mundane life and so he very much neglected that part of his life. So he got divorced and lost not only his affluent life style but also his reputation and from that point he was a full time bohemian, minus the money. His circle of friends was huge and so was his influence on them. Alan was basically the foundation of the later hippy and new age movement of the 60s. He was hip before hip was cool. With his depth of knowledge and understanding of eastern culture and religion, he laid a very solid foundation and become a sort of go to guru for the flower children. So if people want to portrait Alan as merely an intellectual then they are not really familiar with his perspective and life. Now, one sticky point in Alan's life has always been Christianity. His upbringing was very strict and ultra-conservative, basically the opposite of what A-H teach, instead of being taught that what feels good is good and what feels bad is bad, Alan - like so many of us - had been taught that if it feels good it must be really bad and if it feels bad it must be good. And it took Alan almost half of his life to see thru the idiocy of that approach to life and to finally correct that perspective intellectually, philosophically and then to actually live it. One of his book is called A Joyous cosmology, after all. So despite all of the rather extreme ups and downs in his life, he managed to remain his naturally cheerful self, almost carefree and always in love with life. 

So you see, your earlier portrait of Alan as just another intellectual couldn't be further from the truth. And actaully, your comments about the Chinese language and those professors of Chinese culture at universities don't seem to be based on any real knowledge either. I am actually wondering if you have ever seen a university from the inside, let alone a faculty or department of Chinese studies. I highly doubt it, given the caricatures you have drawn about academia. You see, without these people in academia who studied classical languages and spent years working on translations of ancient books, we wouldn't be here talking about these subjects with such ease. These people were pioneers in their own fields. And so was Alan. He was trailblazer. He went where no one before him in the West had gone before. And his work speaks for itself. Even 50 years after his death, his talks and books are more popular and relevant than ever. 

[Reefs]

Jun 22, 2022 11:53:07 GMT -5 sree said:

Jun 22, 2022 9:10:15 GMT -5 Reefs said:

If that's your definition of reality, then your reality is constantly changing, i.e. transitory. And that's called maya, aka illusion. Relative realness, not absolute realness. 

Objectified perception vs direct perception. I live in a world of objectified perception. The denigration of this world as one of "relative realness" serves to promote an other world of absolute realness. Why? Why do we do this?

You pointed out that there are people who have everything going for them in this world and yet feel something missing. I doubt that. How do we know that people can have everything going for them? Is that even possible?

Our world, the one in which we live, is real enough but it is a mess and we can fix it. I am not talking about political or social activism which worsens the mess. The pursuit of absolute realness is the avoidance of maya, the mess that needs fixing.

It's funny that you know enough to attend to the health of your worldly body instead of ignoring its welfare to seek an ideal absolute body. 

That's, strictly speaking, impossible, unless you are an AI bot. As long as you are human, you live in the world of direct perception, maybe with an extra layer of abstraction that can become rather thick over time. But your body, the cells in your body, they live in the world of direct perception. That's your natural state, your default stat of functioning.  Now, you may not be aware of the world of direct perception most of your waking time because you are hyper-focused on that extra layer of abstraction, mesmerized by it, but the fact remains, as long as you are a living, breathing human being, you are firmly grounded in the world of direct perception. You'll notice that when you wake up in the morning. Even those who seem totally lost in abstractions have their brief moments when the matrix in their heads goes silent. They just don't pay attention to it. So this is merely a matter of perspective, an error in perspective if you will. And the realizations that we talk about here are merely about corrections in perspective, pointing out that error and then going on with your life. So what many have realized is that it's not the world that needs fixing, it's our perspective that needs fixing. The world can take care of itself and actually does take care of itself as does nature and the entire universe. As Alan put it, the universe is a self-governing living organism. It doesn't need your intervention.

[Reefs]

Omnipotence (S01 E13)

7. Surrender

(20:30)

Now then, the fundamental and final question that remains is, how are we to come to feel that way? How are we not just to think, but actually to realize, to make real to ourselves, to feel that the motions of the heavenly bodies, the rivers, the seas, the winds, are all my body. How are we to feel the general impression of life in which man is no longer the isolated, lonely, separate ego trying desperately to defend himself by attempting to become the world's monarchy? But feeling rather, instead, a profound kinship, and fellowship, and fundamentally love for the whole world just as if it were his own body, which in this view, it is.

The thing which all these great Eastern philosophies insist upon, whether they be Indian or whether they be Chinese, is at first sight rather depressing to us. Because the fundamental insight is that our ego and our will can do nothing to acquire this feeling of fundamental unity and solidarity. It can't do anything at all. And the feeling cannot be had until, as we say, we have given up our own will. Set aside our own ego.

This after all too corresponds with the great basic Christian insight where, as for example, Dante says of the will of God, in his will is our peace. Or as another Christian writer says, our wills are ours to make them thine. In all the great religious traditions of the world, there is the recurrent theme of self-surrender of giving up one's self.

Now at first sight, this seems something spineless. This seems something weak and namby pamby, as if—you know, the Marxists always say, religion is the opium of the people. And they validate their point of view by saying, look, religion always tells people to give up their will. That's so that the tyrant can push them around, the nasty capitalists can make them do what they want.

But they forget that in the giving up of our own will, we do not surrender power, we gain power. Because in the giving up of our own will, we are, as it were, making ourselves an empty channel through which a greater power than our own can pass through. Lao-Tzu said:

The usefulness of a window is not so much in the frame
As in the empty space through which something can be seen.

And so in the same way, you might say that the power of a human being is not so much in his particular individual identity as in a certain kind of emptiness through which something can flow. And so all the great religions of the world, and most especially those of the Asian world, have as their deepest insight the principle that man comes into his own and finds his true power in standing out of his own way. In getting out of his own light. And this involves, as I said, the surrender of our own will.


8. Sincerity

(24:10)

But you see, always the problem is how does the will surrender the will? There is a Chinese saying that when the wrong man uses the right means, the right means work in the wrong way. In other words, if I'm the wrong man, that is a willful, selfish, domineering person, anything I do to give up my will, will be motivated by my fundamental selfishness. I shall be, in other words, like a clever woman who wants to get her man. But she knows that this particular man always runs away if you go after him. So she acts as if she doesn't want him. She gives him up apparently. But her real motive is, of course, to get him. And therefore, she is just, as it were, playing a trick. It's a kind of clever feminine wile, or deceit.

And so in the same way, if we say, now, I'm going to surrender my ego. I'm going to be unselfish. I'm going to give up my will so that I can become one with God. Also that I can feel this splendid fellowship with the whole universe, and feel that my identity is no longer lonely little me, but all. I shall have as the fundamental motive doing it, after all, for my own advantage. After all, because this is a new way of finding spiritual and psychological security.

And so because it is basically insincere, it won't work. And therefore, what is at first sight depressing about Eastern insights into this matter is not only that our will, when it is aggressive and assertive, stands in the way of this understanding.

It also goes on to say that we cannot even surrender our will on purpose. And that when it becomes perfectly clear to us that there is nothing at all that we can do about it, either positively by trying to achieve something, or negatively by giving ourselves up, this is the fundamental deflation of our ego and its whole domineering quality. This is the limit. At this, it doesn't give itself up. It sees that it has no alternative but to give up. And from the emptiness, the silence, the feeling of impotence that follows this, the whole vision of a united world busts like a flower from its bud.

This is really profound. How do you give up your will? It cannot be an act of will. It can only be an act of grace. How do you walk off the battlefield? It just happens. You have a realization and then you just walk. You are done. 

[maxdprophet]

Jun 14, 2022 21:59:01 GMT -5 Reefs said:

This term 'creating from the inside out' is actually one of those buzz words A-H use a lot. And in the deliberate creation context, it essentially means the same as Alan describes it. It's the difference between making things happen (forced, efforting) and letting, allowing things happen (naturally, effortlessly). People often misunderstand this LOA/deliberate creation business in a very fundamental way. The fundamental principle is "ask and it is given". So the point is not to put in effort via positive thinking, visualizations, affirmations or skillful action in order to will or force what we want into place - relationships, things and events. That's like making artificial flowers. The point is to be in a state of being that we prefer and then everything around us will naturally and automagically adjust to and reflect that state of being - relationships, things and events. And that's more like a flower growing, naturally and effortlessly. So this disconnected action orientation in the Western world shows a fundamental misconception of how nature or creation in general works. Sure, effort and action and nose to the grindstone gets things done, but compared to the natural and effortless unfolding we see in nature, the results are not really that impressive and also not that long-lasting and usually create additional problems that then have to get fixed with even more disconnected action. So I think this is a very important distinction Alan is illustrating here, the focus on being vs. doing. After all, we are human beings, not human doings, hehe.

If one is in a state of being we prefer and everything is automagically adjusting to reflect this, what motivates even the asking of 'ask and it is given'?  Wouldn't whatever it is just appear effortlessly anyway, without even a question?  Is the state of being where this principle holds sway a state that is great-in-every-way-(except-for-<insert list>)?