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Post by Reefs on Oct 14, 2023 9:49:08 GMT -5
It's been a good discussion so far. Carry on. ++++++ Just out curiosity, how much time do you guys spend each day following the news, reading, watching, discussing? And do you check the news at a specific time of the day or do you check the news randomly around the clock? Or are some of you guys on a news detox? Always a junkie, but this latest turn of events has narrowed the sources that aren't completely polluted to an even narrower set than in the last decade or so. Certain situations are quite revealing, despite the seemingly ever-intensifying problem of allowing the absence of deception to leak out from around the sides of what gets presented. The leaking out from the sides part is the only reason that I still follow the news. As you know, I am a big picture, meta-level guy. So it's times like these when people who cannot focus get lost in the noise, but when those who can take a step back at the same time can see the fingerprints of the magicians, and sometimes can even witness how they are tweaking the matrix in real-time. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 14, 2023 9:55:40 GMT -5
Here's a quote from Seth: This of course implicates the question of complicity in a network of pain and trauma. It also suggests a sort of balance that certainly manifests in the bigger picture of the natural world, but that doesn't seem to me to fit with the human psyche. Perhaps my take on this is unduly colored by the notion of supply and demand. Would we really expect there to be as many volunteer wombs as there are curious souls? I also hesitate to completely embrace such a self-sufficient explanation. This channeling has some compelling aspects to it, for sure, but not all of my reservations are grounded in common mind, like, at all.  There's a fair bit of higher level anthropomorphizing going on, I'd admit. But as a counterpoint, Seth's story is a much better story than the one SDP has to offer in terms of personal suffering potential. SDP is lost in the specifics, so it looks extra bleak because it is so narrow. Seth goes more into the big picture perspective, so it looks brighter because it is so much broader. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 14, 2023 9:57:10 GMT -5
It always seemed to me that folks are only ready when they feel that they've suffered enough. Until then, they can't hear what I have to say. Vewy weird! Suffering comes with a component of stubbornness....stubbornness and receptivity are not a good match! Folks have to be ready to drop stubbornness. That's a good point. When suffering becomes part of your identity, it's hard to break loose. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 14, 2023 10:18:34 GMT -5
AFAIAC, sometimes s**t just happens. I think in terms of ~your being attracts your life~, rather than LOA. There is a continuum running from order to chaos. I have no problem with LOA operating on most of that continuum, say the upper 95%. One's being puts one somewhere on that continuum. At the ~top~ you find flow and synchronicities and a sense that everything is operating perfectly as it should be. Most people live somewhere in the middle. What I've been writing about, since last Saturday, poking, exploring, is the bottom 5% where chaos reigns. This is the realm of hardened criminals, terrorists, serial killers and others of the sort, they have no rules. This is where s**t can just happen. A group of the nasty guys of the 5%-and-lower have imposed their will and chaos upon some innocents of the higher continuum. I've ~battled~ ZD (mostly) over this issue for years. I don't mind calling my view a paradigm, I haven't made it up. For me it explains certain aspects of what happens. All this, in a nutshell, is why I said at some point LOA breaks down. You'll never convince me that the babies and toddlers who were decapitated are part of a natural flow of the universe, they are not responsible in any way for getting their heads cup off. They got caught up in an unnatural flow of the ~5%~ chaos. Everybody does not live at the same level of being, there's a continuum. And now we have a *more ordered group* trying to restore and maintain order, fighting the no-rules-chaos of a 5%, and lower-down to a negative 1%. You could even say the 2,3,4,5% are caught up in the really-nasty-1%. IOW, we have a terrible mess. There is no good outcome coming. I think we've past the point of a better-outcome. One problem here is that you're butting up into the limits of common sense. Common mind demands characterization of events as either random or inevitable, but reality, is neither. LOA in the way reefs explains it strikes me as sort of altogether sideways to these dichotomies. But it's still after-the-fact, an overlay, a description of a pattern that manifests. To reconcile the suffering of innocents requires a particular perspective that is transcendent of the sort of levels you're interested in. This reconciliation does not involve acceptance. It does not involve denying the intensity of the pain and suffering involved, and it does not blame the victim. It is beyond blame, even while accounting for accountability. There is no way to earn this perspective, although if you constrict your mind around refusal of what you imagine it to be, you create your own veil obscuring the possibility of it. To my eye, the least distorted conceptual hint of this perspective is ourboros' interdependent origination, but on the other hand, as Low said .. "arose the mind ...". You're not supposed to resolve this situation with mind or emotion. Never mind that it's not possible. Yes, see my previous post to SDP. If you look at LOA or creation serially, you will get it wrong. You have to look at it in the mutual, interdependent arising context. So in a sense, LOA does transcend the usual confines of duality, but at the same time it is also just another overlay on THIS, even though it may trump all other mental overlays. That's why I sometimes say it is somewhere in the twilight zone between duality and non-duality. That shouldn't be mistaken as a bridge though. It may be an important piece to the puzzle of creation, but in no way does a full understanding of LOA give you an even fuller understanding of non-duality. There is no such relation. However, if you want to be a master of the two worlds, as Campbell phrased it, you have to know about both LOA and non-duality. |
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Post by laughter on Oct 14, 2023 10:52:52 GMT -5
Always a junkie, but this latest turn of events has narrowed the sources that aren't completely polluted to an even narrower set than in the last decade or so. Certain situations are quite revealing, despite the seemingly ever-intensifying problem of allowing the absence of deception to leak out from around the sides of what gets presented. The leaking out from the sides part is the only reason that I still follow the news. As you know, I am a big picture, meta-level guy. So it's times like these when people who cannot focus get lost in the noise, but when those who can take a step back at the same time can see the fingerprints of the magicians, and sometimes can even witness how they are tweaking the matrix in real-time. That's perhaps a bigger ask that I'd expect but then I have to question that thought on my part as what inavalen might call out as a limiting belief. People who followed the news were less surprised by the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 than those who didn't. In a wider context, people who've followed the news for decades are presented with an opportunity to free themselves from the manipulation by fear, if, by no other means than jadedness. |
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Post by tenka on Oct 14, 2023 14:32:54 GMT -5
I have to say: your reply rubs me wrong. So, my response will be to ignore it. I can see why that could rub you wrong. SDP has direct experience of a 'dark night of the soul', and I surmise that intrinsic to any 'dark night', there is a sense of choicelessness to it.
I am reminded of a guy called Jeff Foster...who is known in non-dual circles. Recently had Lyme disease and documented it. It left him begging to God for mercy. He's on the mend now. One thing I can say with sureness, is that in these moments of begging, all belief goes out of the window. Every scrap of spiritual ideology. And I think there's value in that for most folks that experience it, as awful as it is in the moment. To be clear, I absolutely do not wish that for you or anyone! I have learned that people have their own unique spiritual paths with their own lessons...some suffer, some don't. I have come to appreciate that diversity. And for those that do suffer, I wish for them to speedily move through it. We have touched upon this before regarding a complete turnaround regarding Jeff. He seems a nice guy doesn't he, butt it really does require attention when peeps start to talk about no-one is here, or what is here is not real etc .. He kant of had a realisation that there is no one here, to then beg for mercy to God lol . You kant have a reversal of realisation. You either realise without any doubt that there is what you are here as an individual or not. You kant change your mind afterwards to that extent otherwise the realisation wasn't a realisation at all. A realisation, is a realisation . |
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Post by inavalan on Oct 14, 2023 15:14:16 GMT -5
I can see why that could rub you wrong. SDP has direct experience of a 'dark night of the soul', and I surmise that intrinsic to any 'dark night', there is a sense of choicelessness to it.
I am reminded of a guy called Jeff Foster...who is known in non-dual circles. Recently had Lyme disease and documented it. It left him begging to God for mercy. He's on the mend now. One thing I can say with sureness, is that in these moments of begging, all belief goes out of the window. Every scrap of spiritual ideology. And I think there's value in that for most folks that experience it, as awful as it is in the moment. To be clear, I absolutely do not wish that for you or anyone! I have learned that people have their own unique spiritual paths with their own lessons...some suffer, some don't. I have come to appreciate that diversity. And for those that do suffer, I wish for them to speedily move through it. We have touched upon this before regarding a complete turnaround regarding Jeff. He seems a nice guy doesn't he, butt it really does require attention when peeps start to talk about no-one is here, or what is here is not real etc .. He kant of had a realisation that there is no one here, to then beg for mercy to God lol . You kant have a reversal of realisation. You either realise without any doubt that there is what you are here as an individual or not. You kant change your mind afterwards to that extent otherwise the realisation wasn't a realisation at all. A realisation, is a realisation . is one of the excuses I find (almost always) unacceptable. Talking about "realizations"... I don't know if you ever experienced a "false awakening"; that is when you're dreaming, then you wake up, have some activity, then suddenly you wake up again to realize that your previous awakening was actually another dream. Also, you might've watched one of those hypnosis shows in which a person is suggested to not see his shoe in his hand, or forget their own name, or a number, or to speak, ... Just looking around you can easily see people being absolutely sure about all kind of ridiculous things regarding themselves and / or others. Look at a kid who believes in Santa. From another perspective, we all are kids of different ages and abilities. There is no way to "ultimately realize" anything, beyond that you exist, and that what you perceive changes. " Realizing without any doubt" anything should be a warning for you that you have to step back, put aside all your beliefs and expectations, and start again. Knowing isn't cumulative, but it is a process or differentiation, seeing more and more clearly, new and more details, ad infinitum. As I understand these, in the sense you seem to mean it: there are no realizations. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 6:27:10 GMT -5
It's been a good discussion so far. Carry on. ++++++ Just out curiosity, how much time do you guys spend each day following the news, reading, watching, discussing? And do you check the news at a specific time of the day or do you check the news randomly around the clock? Or are some of you guys on a news detox? I have my eye out for *progressively worse*. I have a few programs I watch normally, just entertainment. I watched most of the Carolina Hurricanes first game of the season last night. If I am otherwise occupied, I usually have TV on but sound off, so I can notice if there's a story I'd be interested in, mostly heartbreaking accounts of incidents from last Saturday. Presently, this mess is still relatively small. If Hezbollah enters the fight, then we'll have a real mess. I never knew much about Harper's Ferry, just before the Civil War. Saw most of the 'Ethan Hawk' as John Brown mini series a while back. I think we might have a similar situation, presently. John Brown could not draw others into his fight, as he had planned. That came a short while later. Hopefully this stays in Gaza. Did Hamas miscalculate? I don't know that we know wtf Hamas is/was up to. I stopped watching TV in the mid 90's. The TV's in our apartments are only for decoration, hehe. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 6:40:05 GMT -5
It's been a good discussion so far. Carry on. ++++++ Just out curiosity, how much time do you guys spend each day following the news, reading, watching, discussing? And do you check the news at a specific time of the day or do you check the news randomly around the clock? Or are some of you guys on a news detox? It varies. A couple of weeks ago, it was almost zero. Last few days, a few hours on twitter daily (it's about the only place I go for news, though I follow a vast array of people). Though mostly, I'm not 'looking' for news per se, it's more that the movement is there to engage on a subject in a particular way, sometimes with a particular group of people. The news absorption happens as I'm doing that. I explored twitter for a while and it was kinda fun. But you get lost there easily and it gives you the false impression that your voice may actually matter more than it actually does in reality, because usually you are isolated in your own personal little twitter bubble. What I liked about twitter was the meme culture, which is often surprisingly creative and high quality. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 6:43:40 GMT -5
One problem here is that you're butting up into the limits of common sense. Common mind demands characterization of events as either random or inevitable, but reality, is neither. LOA in the way reefs explains it strikes me as sort of altogether sideways to these dichotomies. But it's still after-the-fact, an overlay, a description of a pattern that manifests. To reconcile the suffering of innocents requires a particular perspective that is transcendent of the sort of levels you're interested in. This reconciliation does not involve acceptance. It does not involve denying the intensity of the pain and suffering involved, and it does not blame the victim. It is beyond blame, even while accounting for accountability. There is no way to earn this perspective, although if you constrict your mind around refusal of what you imagine it to be, you create your own veil obscuring the possibility of it. To my eye, the least distorted conceptual hint of this perspective is ourboros' interdependent origination, but on the other hand, as Low said .. "arose the mind ...". You're not supposed to resolve this situation with mind or emotion. Never mind that it's not possible. I've never found anything the Gurdjieff teaching doesn't explain. (Above, trying to avoid the words he used, what he called the law of accident. This is why 'your being attracts your life' trumps LOA). "Your being attracts your life" is LOA. Watch some more A-H videos and pay attention to those parts where Abe talk about "state of being" and "point of attraction". |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 6:48:22 GMT -5
The leaking out from the sides part is the only reason that I still follow the news. As you know, I am a big picture, meta-level guy. So it's times like these when people who cannot focus get lost in the noise, but when those who can take a step back at the same time can see the fingerprints of the magicians, and sometimes can even witness how they are tweaking the matrix in real-time. That's perhaps a bigger ask that I'd expect but then I have to question that thought on my part as what inavalen might call out as a limiting belief. People who followed the news were less surprised by the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 than those who didn't. In a wider context, people who've followed the news for decades are presented with an opportunity to free themselves from the manipulation by fear, if, by no other means than jadedness. Well, I don't have high expectations regarding regular people. But from folks who regularly talk about quieting the mind, meditation and awareness, as is the case here, I'd expect a bit more. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 6:59:30 GMT -5
I can see why that could rub you wrong. SDP has direct experience of a 'dark night of the soul', and I surmise that intrinsic to any 'dark night', there is a sense of choicelessness to it.
I am reminded of a guy called Jeff Foster...who is known in non-dual circles. Recently had Lyme disease and documented it. It left him begging to God for mercy. He's on the mend now. One thing I can say with sureness, is that in these moments of begging, all belief goes out of the window. Every scrap of spiritual ideology. And I think there's value in that for most folks that experience it, as awful as it is in the moment. To be clear, I absolutely do not wish that for you or anyone! I have learned that people have their own unique spiritual paths with their own lessons...some suffer, some don't. I have come to appreciate that diversity. And for those that do suffer, I wish for them to speedily move through it. We have touched upon this before regarding a complete turnaround regarding Jeff. He seems a nice guy doesn't he, butt it really does require attention when peeps start to talk about no-one is here, or what is here is not real etc .. He kant of had a realisation that there is no one here, to then beg for mercy to God lol . You kant have a reversal of realisation. You either realise without any doubt that there is what you are here as an individual or not. You kant change your mind afterwards to that extent otherwise the realisation wasn't a realisation at all. A realisation, is a realisation . Exactly. It's all BS. But that was clear from his books already. The episode Andrew mentioned just confirmed it beyond a doubt. Now, we could accuse Jeff of deceiving and misleading other people. However, I usually see it a bit differently. Because fake gurus and their transgressions and shortcomings are usually good teaching examples. And his disillusioned followers may now be ready for the real deal. You've seen this with Niz. A lot of disillusioned, guru-hopping seekers who made the rounds in the spiritual circus for years or even decades, finally had to face the music after such episodes, realizing that they were going nowhere and just killing time and avoiding the inevitable. Once they've realized that, there was sincerity, and now they were ready for Niz' message. That's the gift of these fake gurus. So from the big picture perspective, it's all good. |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 7:28:06 GMT -5
We have touched upon this before regarding a complete turnaround regarding Jeff. He seems a nice guy doesn't he, butt it really does require attention when peeps start to talk about no-one is here, or what is here is not real etc .. He kant of had a realisation that there is no one here, to then beg for mercy to God lol . You kant have a reversal of realisation. You either realise without any doubt that there is what you are here as an individual or not. You kant change your mind afterwards to that extent otherwise the realisation wasn't a realisation at all. A realisation, is a realisation . is one of the excuses I find (almost always) unacceptable. Talking about "realizations"... I don't know if you ever experienced a "false awakening"; that is when you're dreaming, then you wake up, have some activity, then suddenly you wake up again to realize that your previous awakening was actually another dream. Also, you might've watched one of those hypnosis shows in which a person is suggested to not see his shoe in his hand, or forget their own name, or a number, or to speak, ... Just looking around you can easily see people being absolutely sure about all kind of ridiculous things regarding themselves and / or others. Look at a kid who believes in Santa. From another perspective, we all are kids of different ages and abilities. There is no way to "ultimately realize" anything, beyond that you exist, and that what you perceive changes. " Realizing without any doubt" anything should be a warning for you that you have to step back, put aside all your beliefs and expectations, and start again. Knowing isn't cumulative, but it is a process or differentiation, seeing more and more clearly, new and more details, ad infinitum. As I understand these, in the sense you seem to mean it: there are no realizations. That's a gross misconception of what non-duality is pointing to. The dream state/waking state analogy doesn't work here. Let's go back to the basics. We have the true Self, the phenomenal self and the fictitious self. The normal waking state as well as the dream state never go beyond the realm of the phenomenal self. We could even argue that the dream state is limited to the realm of the fictitious self. Which means both physical reality as well as non-physical reality belong to the realm of the phenomenal self. Non-duality, however, is prior to that. Which means to what non-duality is trying to point to, by definition, to the phenomenal self does not and cannot exist. So this is basically the level you are arguing from. The level we are arguing from is prior to that (i.e. that which to you does not exist because you cannot even imagine it to exist). Now, from your perspective, Seth or your inner guide would be higher evolved than the rest of the world, because compared to those guys everyone is far down the ladder of spiritual evolvement. From the non-duality perspective, however, Seth and your inner guide are as deluded as the rest of the world, because no matter how far they got on that spiritual ladder of evolution, it's still always the realm of the phenomenal self in the end. And so there is no real difference. So from the perspective of true Self, you're either there or you are not, there is no closer or farther away, higher or lower level. Which is why when people only talk about levels and layers of reality, they can only be talking about some relative truth, not the absolute truth. Doubt belongs to the relative realm of comparative knowledge and experience. In the absolute realm there is comparison or doubt possible. So in a sense, you are right from your perspective, this non-duality is highly suspect and reeks of self-deception. It's the only logical conclusion given the limits of your perception. From the non-duality perspective, however, your stance of categorically denying the existence of what you have no reference for, comes across as small mindedness and spiritual arrogance. So either you open up your mind a bit and accept that there might be something you and even your guides haven't realized yet or we will continue to call each other hopelessly deluded. From our perspective you are like the little frog in his dilapidated well who tries to convince the sea turtle that is visiting him that there is no such thing like an ocean. Ridiculous, isn't it? |
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Post by Reefs on Oct 15, 2023 8:04:08 GMT -5
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Post by laughter on Oct 15, 2023 9:51:19 GMT -5
This of course implicates the question of complicity in a network of pain and trauma. It also suggests a sort of balance that certainly manifests in the bigger picture of the natural world, but that doesn't seem to me to fit with the human psyche. Perhaps my take on this is unduly colored by the notion of supply and demand. Would we really expect there to be as many volunteer wombs as there are curious souls? I also hesitate to completely embrace such a self-sufficient explanation. This channeling has some compelling aspects to it, for sure, but not all of my reservations are grounded in common mind, like, at all. There's a fair bit of higher level anthropomorphizing going on, I'd admit. But as a counterpoint, Seth's story is a much better story than the one SDP has to offer in terms of personal suffering potential. SDP is lost in the specifics, so it looks extra bleak because it is so narrow. Seth goes more into the big picture perspective, so it looks brighter because it is so much broader. I find this is very much related to what I wrote to zd here. What I'll say about Seth's narrative is that it definitely better fits what one can discern by dispassionately observing the arising of thoughts and emotions from the source. Seth states some really great descriptive prescription along those lines. Now, what we were talking about here, is the suffering of innocents, and this is as pointed a consideration of the existential question as someone on the personal side of the gateless gate will encounter. Most people just don't spend too much time considering it. Guys like the 'pilgrim, are the exception. The ancient Hebrews devoted the Book of Job to this issue. Side note: there is a mapping between the Seth material and what the Christians characterize as angels and demons, but, of course, without the ideas of reincarnation and "oversoul" (at least for the common man or woman). This is interesting, in and of itself, as the differences between these two narratives reflect a cultural attempt to reconcile the one/many dichotomy: Consciousness is singular (so, "One God"/"Holy Spirit"), but unique perspective is multiple (but related, grouped and interconnected, rather than isolated, so, "oversoul", and any given "demon" "is legion"). Said many times before, science is a similar cultural project, a sort of collective "neti-neti". Now, coming back to the suffering of innocents, the brown bears are not wrong (like, for instance, here) that these are all stories. Each is only one possible narrative among many .. such as Seth's ideas or the Book of Job or the angels and the demons. But, of course, that understanding is incomplete, as we all well know. My read of Ourboros' "interdependent origination" is about as close to what we can offer common mind (or even, uncommon but seeker mind). I find that he tends to reify the person when he debates on the topic. I'd say (already said in more detail here) that while it's "easy", on "this side of the gateless gate", to witness the suffering of innocents "without suffering", there is a converse. The suffering is " real", because it is felt, because it is perceived, because it is experienced, because of the answer to the question "what suffers?". As you well know, there is no explaining this for people on the other side of the gate. All they hear is confusion and, often, callousness, even if you're really good at pointing, like zd! |
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