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Post by ravenscroft on Sept 10, 2010 16:14:29 GMT -5
zd and enigma rock
the problem is that real truth is never good news to people
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Post by zendancer on Sept 10, 2010 20:49:08 GMT -5
Marie was doing some sort of 'being present' practice the other day, which in her case means sitting around with the thought of not thinking, which she found quite boring and tedious. Hehe. I don't really 'get' the point of practices anymore, but i know there is one. Anyhoo, I was talking about how it's a little like being on this ego mountain and wanting to get to this enlightened mountain, and it seems like you have to go through the valley to get there. I called it the valley of the shadow of death, but i don't really know that's what the quote means. I just meant that one has to empty oneself of what isn't really there before he can get to the enlightenment mountain, and this isn't so fun, especially if Ego mountain is on fire. Hehe. The funny thing is, there is no ego mountain, and no valley of the shadow of death. The whole game is watched from the top of enlightened mountain. The game is interesting and the idea of it ending is not....so much....really, but none of that has anything to do with what you are and where you are looking from. The peaks and valleys (exciting and boring) are both being watched by You. So true, and yet, this is how we/It manifests. What is the point of practice? Well, from my perspective, it has almost nothing to do with spirituality, until it does. haha. It is more of a psychological exercise prior to any deep experiences of unity. Most adults spend 99.99% of their time focused on reflective thoughts. Unconsciously they practice thinking about themselves all day long. They become very attached to their ideas about the world, and, as a consequence, they suffer a lot. They suffer because reality often does not conform to their expectations or desires. They experience highs and lows as their life situations change. Some people live in good dreams. They have lots of money, good health, and the impression that they are in control of their lives. Other people live in bad dreams. They are poor, or ill, or working at jobs they hate, or involved in abusive relationships, or doing things out of duty, and they feel that they have no control over their lives or any freedom. People in either set of dreams are jerked around by their ideas about how life should treat them and what a "good life" looks like. Most non-duality practices are designed to help people escape the mind and ideas ABOUT reality. Repeating mantras, sitting in silent contemplation, counting or following breaths, tai chi, shikan taza, shifting awareness from thoughts to what can be seen or heard, etc. are all activities that interrupt reflexive self-referential thoughts and shift attention to "what is." Many people get attached to the practices (one of many pitfalls on this path), but many don't. As the habit of thought is replaced by the habit of direct perception, the mind loses its power and people begin to have different kinds of experiences as well as a wide range of insights into what's going on. They once again begin responding to life like they did when they were children. Unlike children, their total focus upon themselves shifts to the world around them and they begin to understand (at least intellectually) that selfhood is an imaginary construct. Little children are innocent of the adult's imaginary world, but they do not know who they are. When adults become focused upon the real world, and the habit of reflexive thought is diminished, it becomes possible to see the "big picture." It becomes possible to see that all "things," including selfhood, are abstractions abstracted from the wholeness of "what is." It becomes possible to see the difference between ideas and reality and cease confusing the two. The deeper one sees the connectedness of reality, the more one is filled with awe, humility, and gratitude. Cause and effect are seen to be abstractions. Time and space are seen to be imaginary projections of the mind. Ultimately, selfhood is seen to be only an idea. One then stands in emptiness and unity with the All. One does not become one-with "what is" because that has always been the case, but oneness is now seen in all things. At this stage practices are no longer seen as practices; they are now simply the empty functioning of "what is." Perhaps shikan taza continues or perhaps not. It no longer matters. The mind is allowed to function however it must, and thinking ceases to be a problem. The Buddha is reported to have said that practices are like a raft for getting from one shore to another, but once one reaches the farther shore, the raft can be left behind. This is not a great allegory because it makes it appear that there is someone who moves from one shore to another, and that is certainly not the case. Oh well, TIFWIW. These are some ramblings after many miles of hiking in the Rocky Mtn Nat Park and two glasses of wine. The coolest experience of the day was coming around a bend in the trail and happening upon a gigantic bull elk (with a fourteen point rack) and his harem of three females. From thirty feet away the scene was impressive to say the least. Fortunately, the bull was unimpressed with our presence and totally ignored us.
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Post by zendancer on Sept 10, 2010 23:21:22 GMT -5
Alot of people ask questions and want to have a logical explanation or answer to the questions. For example, "why would math be imaginary, it clearly works?". ZD and enigma cant give a logical explanation fitting with the questioners current belief system, so the answer cant possibly be satisfying. Eventually it ends up being in ZDs case "just look at what is" and in enigmas case "take it or leave it". So why cant they give a satisfying logical explanation? I do believe it is possible to do so, but it would involve a huge amount of logical explanations just to break down big parts of the western belief system, before a logical explanation could get to the point. For example 1+1=2 cant be explained as illusion because we already assume counting. So then we would first have to break down counting, and to break down counting, we have to break down "things", which is enormously hard, it is about equal to enlightenment. It is driven so deep into our mind that it cannot be "explained away". Even if you attacked the problem of "things" logically from 1000 angles, so that you could intellectually see the truth, your mind would take a good while to absorb it before it would begin to intuition without the idea of "things". So maybe in the end ZD or enigma cant help any further then "look inside for 1-10 years and maybe you'll see". It is just very difficult and tedious to take the mental route and try to explain all these things, so it will come to some kind of dead end. And this is of course assuming that enigma and ZD are "right". Which I can't verify for myself yet. We could also probably argue that the discussions isn't interesting "for waking up", since 1+1=2 is a very practical idea and doesn't need to get questioned. We are conditioned to wear clothes, but we don't have to stop doing that.. The spiritual teacher trying to "wake up" a student might think that questioning "I am" or something like that is better, becoming less motivated to discuss these intellectual philosophies. Well I don't know, I do really appreciate these discussions so I would too like more satisfying explanations and less dead ends Souley: Your post is totally on target. To logically explain how math functions, to explain why Enigma says that it is created rather than discovered, and to explain what it means to say that it is imaginary, one would need to significantly deconstruct western intellectual thought, and/or spell out the process in detail of how imagination simulates reality. Several years ago I started working on a book that would do precisely what you suggested. I used photographs and graphic images to show how the human mind looks at reality and separates it into things. I explained the gestalt nature of how figure and ground are related, how thingness is simulated by images, words, numbers, and algebraic functions, and much more. Even when the process is broken down graphically, however, it is still difficult for people to step outside their usual mental contructs to see and understand what's going on. I know this because I showed the unfinished manuscript to several friends and watched their reactions to it. Unless someone has a serious interest in understanding this sort of thing, it will be very difficult to grasp it. When I first read books by Alan Watts, about thirty-five years ago, I sensed the truth behind his words intuitively, but I couldn't quite "feel" what they meant in an everyday sense. I remember reading his explanation about why the idea of cause and effect is an illusion, but I couldn't quite "get it" in a visceral way. Only after an initial cosmic consciousness experience did all of his elementary explanations explode into obviousness. For this reason I am always amazed when people "get it" who have not had powerful unity-consciousness experiences. Clearly, some people do not get as attached to the western philosophical constructs of thought as strongly as others. In the West we get a powerful dose of philosophical separateness whereas in the East people get a more Taoistic outlook of yin/yang connectedness. Why didn't I finish the book? Because the further I went down this path, the more boring this sort of intellectual endeavor became. I can understand the frustration of people who are searching for an intellectual understanding of non-duality, but the intellect can only take people to the jumping off point. At some point we have to see where the path leads and leave the mind behind. Only then is it possible for direct understanding to occur and for that understanding to become fully internalized. Many Zen Masters refuse to waste any time with beginners and their only instruction to novices (often given through advanced students) is to sit down and shut up. They have learned that talking about the absolute to people who have never experienced any internal silence is an almost useless endeavor. Over the years I have quit talking to church and university groups for the same reason. Unless people have a sincere interest in discovering the truth, there is no point in talking about this subject. There are a few rare exceptions where a teacher may say something creative and thereby tweak someone's interest who previously had no interest, but they are so rare that they can be ignored as a practical matter. What drew me to this forum was the large number of people who are seriously interested in non-duality. I visited some other boards, but never found the same level of interest. Here, there is a great deal of open-mindedness, curiosity, intuitiveness, and willingness to experiment with consciousness. What more could anyone ask for? This is the highest level of play that I have ever found! Better yet, I am constantly learning new things here, and I am often invited to explore aspects of reality and ideas that were only superifically examined in the past. Thanks to Question and Enigma, for example, I have had fun this week thinking about how various mathematical systems relate to reality. Thanks to Charlie Gee I have enjoyed reading great poetry and discovering that there can be "Naturals" at this game (even if their naturalness occurred in the most extraordinary way). Thanks to Klaus, I get regularly challenged, which is another kind of fun. Enigma's writing style is brilliant and I am always in awe of his understanding and creativity. I could go on and on and explain why each person who posts on this board is fascinating and special, but it's late and this computer is abysmally slow. The bottom line? I love everyone here, but I hope no one takes this statement too personally. After all, there's only one of us! LOL
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Post by charliegee on Sept 11, 2010 0:17:34 GMT -5
awww thanks ZD ... I/you/us/it/them________ appreciates that ...
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Post by robert on Sept 11, 2010 8:17:58 GMT -5
whom ever- i have found that most ego's find the path to 'beyond ego's constraints' to be very unsatisfying. i doubt that most of the children in this bunch really understood awakening to be anything other than the BIG ENLIGHTENMENT THEME park where all wishes and dreams come true. we are humans who've been fed a steady diet of ego gratification for our entire lives. sure we've had our ups and downs and enlightenment was supposed to cure all of that so naturally there's going to be let down if we, in our naive 'states', cling to the words without having had a significant and somewhat lasting unity consciousness experience and for everyone's mental health let's don't get into a mine is better than yours experience measuring contest, i only mention is because it gives context to the contextless. and as i said to the 'kids' a while back this stuff isn't easy so if you are looking for easy you are in the wrong place. truth is hard it's beyond anything an ego formed in our preteens can handle so you will all need to leave your preconceived ideas along with that BUL**IT every idea is okay notion at the door. why do you think zen has a stick involved, this is a 'blood' sport with aspects of ourselves as the playing chips so if you are not ready to leave your pound of flesh at the door you have no business here. if you want to gripe at someone gripe at all of those writers who sold you a bill of goods. most of whom had no business writing about things of which they had no direct experience. bitch to them. robert
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Post by zendancer on Sept 11, 2010 9:01:51 GMT -5
Charlie: Last night I was talking to Carol about people on this website and we were discussing your experiences. She reminded me that in a Gangaji video dating back at least ten years ago, there was a very similar story. When we return home, we'll make an effort to find the video because you would probably find it interesting. In the video Gangaji talks with a woman whose husband had recently died. The woman tells Gangaji that her husband had been the love of her life and they had spent many years together. Gangaji notices how happy the woman seems to be and comments upon it. The woman begins to laugh and says something like this: "I can't explain it, but when my husband died, I became free." At this point both she and Gangaji break into uproaring laughter and Gangaji says to the audience, "Isn't this amazing? Her husband, who was her best friend and soulmate died, and yet here she is laughing." At this point everyone begins to laugh with Gangaji and the woman. The woman then says something like, "Yes, he had been my whole life and when he disappeared, I was left with nothing and realized that I am nothing, and then I realized that what I am is free, infinitely free." Anyway, it was one of several remarkable accounts included in some of the early Gangaji videos. The dialogue may have been a bit different than this, but this was the general gist of it. Carol and I remember the laughter and the amazing clarity of the woman. We'll try to find it and make a copy for you because it was way more interesting than my feeble attempt to communicate it here.
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Post by enigma on Sept 11, 2010 12:32:02 GMT -5
Alot of people ask questions and want to have a logical explanation or answer to the questions. For example, "why would math be imaginary, it clearly works?". ZD and enigma cant give a logical explanation fitting with the questioners current belief system, so the answer cant possibly be satisfying. Eventually it ends up being in ZDs case "just look at what is" and in enigmas case "take it or leave it". So why cant they give a satisfying logical explanation? I do believe it is possible to do so, but it would involve a huge amount of logical explanations just to break down big parts of the western belief system, before a logical explanation could get to the point. For example 1+1=2 cant be explained as illusion because we already assume counting. So then we would first have to break down counting, and to break down counting, we have to break down "things", which is enormously hard, it is about equal to enlightenment. It is driven so deep into our mind that it cannot be "explained away". Even if you attacked the problem of "things" logically from 1000 angles, so that you could intellectually see the truth, your mind would take a good while to absorb it before it would begin to intuition without the idea of "things". So maybe in the end ZD or enigma cant help any further then "look inside for 1-10 years and maybe you'll see". It is just very difficult and tedious to take the mental route and try to explain all these things, so it will come to some kind of dead end. And this is of course assuming that enigma and ZD are "right". Which I can't verify for myself yet. We could also probably argue that the discussions isn't interesting "for waking up", since 1+1=2 is a very practical idea and doesn't need to get questioned. We are conditioned to wear clothes, but we don't have to stop doing that.. The spiritual teacher trying to "wake up" a student might think that questioning "I am" or something like that is better, becoming less motivated to discuss these intellectual philosophies. Well I don't know, I do really appreciate these discussions so I would too like more satisfying explanations and less dead ends A very logical and satisfying answer. Hehe. Serially, it's pretty good. One might form an image of the collapse of the belief systems coming about by nibbling away at the edges of the foundation, with the 'me belief' being at the center. I think this is what you're describing. As you suggest, this is an enormous amount of work, and it's being done from within that core belief, and the purpose of the foundation is to support and protect that core belief and so even the motivation to nibble is misdirected. It's the 'me' who wants to know the Truth, and all the while it's the 'me' that is the core lie. Hencely, the only real 'approach' is to question the core belief, and that questioning is happening from within that core belief. If that core belief collapses, the entire foundation collapses because it's all formed around that core. What you are seemingly has an interest in the questions because the questions sustain the questioner, and the questioner is of interest, but no real interest in answers, which will dissolve the questioner. An obvious conundrum that explains why realization is such a rare deal. There is simply no interest in it. The question might occur, 'So how does this interest come about?' It never does, and it's not necessary. That question is also coming from an interest in an imaginary questioner. Realization is the result of the interest in the questioner falling away. So how does such an interest fall away? Hehe. By itself, obviously.
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Post by charliegee on Sept 11, 2010 12:51:03 GMT -5
oh Bob and Carol, I have one question: where is Ted and Alice? seriously, god bless you guys for bringing that Ganiji video up and the woman who lost her husband and the similar experience to mine and relating it to me. (how's that for a run-on sentence?) anyway, I burst into tears upon reading it and immediately understood the laughter they engage in. what I don't understand, and have no need or inclination to, is the freedom that I've been blessed with, it is truly such a gift in the midst of such a loss. as for this thread, I read it but don't get too engaged. it's not that It's not interesting just that it isn't vital to me anymore. some of the questions remain for me but the urgency is gone. whether I find out whatever the hell it is I want to find out becomes so arbitrary, so immaterial. I'm just sitting here being blessed and this little note you and Carol sent is just the latest in a long, unending string of gifts that I've been given.
god bless, charlie gee
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Post by enigma on Sept 11, 2010 12:58:14 GMT -5
Zen: "Why didn't I finish the book? Because the further I went down this path, the more boring this sort of intellectual endeavor became. I can understand the frustration of people who are searching for an intellectual understanding of non-duality, but the intellect can only take people to the jumping off point. At some point we have to see where the path leads and leave the mind behind. Only then is it possible for direct understanding to occur and for that understanding to become fully internalized."
Same here. Encouraged by friends, I've stared to write a book 3 times, and stopped at chapter 3 every time. Hehe. The only thing that is of any slight interest is a poetry book, which has been done for over a year but I never got around to publishing it. It occurs to me that 'inspiration' may be a useful approach if it manages to touch the mind and heart together. This is the poem that's on the cover:
Mind without heart is sterile. Heart without mind is sentimental. The pearl diver takes all to the depths, His courage and his wits, His wonder and his wisdom. One eye for beauty, And the other for clarity.
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Post by charliegee on Sept 12, 2010 23:25:43 GMT -5
yeah E ~ pure logic usually bypasses the heart, pure heart is sloppiness ...
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Post by souley on Sept 14, 2010 13:41:56 GMT -5
...One might form an image of the collapse of the belief systems coming about by nibbling away at the edges of the foundation, with the 'me belief' being at the center. I think this is what you're describing. As you suggest, this is an enormous amount of work, and it's being done from within that core belief, and the purpose of the foundation is to support and protect that core belief and so even the motivation to nibble is misdirected. It's the 'me' who wants to know the Truth, and all the while it's the 'me' that is the core lie. ... Yeah I don't really think enlightenment would happen through such an approach, it is something else (maybe the interest itself falls away, as you say:). I was more toying with the idea that things like this actually could be explained through logic to some satisfying level. But one thing doesn't exclude the other. Thanks, very clear:)
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Post by karen on Sept 14, 2010 16:29:23 GMT -5
It seems that logic and reason point to something beyond and prior to logic and reason. Like how physics points to something beyond and prior to physics and the big bang.
And speaking of the sense of self - think about when that formed. It formed back when I formed all sorts of ideas about how life works using a small child's reasoning to form such ideas. And I use to believe all sorts of wrong stuff when I was a kid.
Now to try to dislodge those wrong ideas, that's a bit harder though. Just keep looking at them as much as possible I suppose.
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Post by peanut on Sept 14, 2010 19:45:50 GMT -5
Karen. I don't think your ideas or anyones for that matter are right or wrong. They are just ideas ie thoughts to be looked at and seen through and then letting go will happen automatically. So I guess what I am trying to say is all thoughts /ideas need to be looked at.
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Post by karen on Sept 14, 2010 23:57:54 GMT -5
Ah yes. I didn't mean wrong in the right/wrong sense, but rather in the untrue sense.
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Post by peanut on Sept 15, 2010 16:25:55 GMT -5
gottcha Karen :-)
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