Kolomo
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Post by Kolomo on Feb 21, 2016 15:18:22 GMT
It is good to hear that you are at rest with your seeking. From what I could gather, you must have a devotional heart. I’ve heard it mentioned many times that this is the most authentic and direct path. Unfortunately, I seem to be on a path of reason that is full of misguided detours because it is so easy to trick yourself into thinking you have gained something. Hence, as Arlene has mentioned, it is good to have a guide but for some reason, either perhaps because of lack of trust or some other bull headed reason, I don’t have any motivation to seek one. I am curious to hear more about your discoveries. Some of what you said was a bit of enigma for me.
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tony
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Post by tony on Feb 23, 2016 2:57:37 GMT
Some comments on the above thread (by Kolomo and CD) and links to the discussion prompted by Arlene's question about Non-duality ('Dropping by' thread).
In my experience, Truth and Devotion are the same thing or at least are two aspects on the One Thing: devotion is to/for the Truth (That which makes us free). However, if I become devoted to an expression of the Truth (e.g. a teaching) or to someone who talks about it (e.g. its messenger) how do I know that I am looking at Truth Itself? After all, there have been many ways the Truth has been described and pointed to by many over the millennia. Which is the right expression of IT? The risk in picking one over the other, especially equating Truth with a person, is that we objectivise what cannot be spoken of as an object. It's the risk inherent in dualistic thought.
It is not possible to pin down Truth to any expression, because Truth is All There Is. It is beyond thought, words and letters. Our existence and that of the lilies in the field is proof enough. Therefore, what I/you/Jesus think or feel about it has no bearing on IT. The words themselves bear the Truth (Logos) when spoken without self ("...whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak." John 14).
The link to the Non-duality discussion comes through this expression by Kolomo: "There is nothing to realize for there is no one to realize anything and, as such, there is nothing that could be propagated." In my understanding, that describes the Absolute aspect of the truth, the Formless, the No-thing, the Transcendent, the Garden of Eden. The other aspect is the Relative: my existence in/as a body mind, the world of forms, of thoughts and feelings, of clarity and confusion, of happiness and sorrow, suffering and the blood, sweat and tears of worldly life and the phenomenon of realizing that which is beyond my thoughts to realize. Both are the Truth (not One, not Two). The greatest and most profound metaphor for the Truth being both aspects is the life and teachings of Jesus (son of man) Christ (of Divine origin). He embodied both. So did Shakyamuni (of the Shakya tribe) Buddha (Awakened) and Krishna (the lover prince) the Supreme (come through Me). They lived Non-duality.
Therefore, 'what's wrong with this present moment (Absolute), if you don't think about it (Relative)?' is as good a pointer as anything we find in the Scriptures.
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tony
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Post by tony on Feb 25, 2016 11:09:48 GMT
More on non-duality! A recent letter from Wayne Liquorman:
What's the point? Everyone wants to know what is the point.
The answer could not be simpler.
The point is to live.
The point is to breathe.
The point is to laugh.
The point is to cry.
The point is to ache.
The point is to love .
The point is to fight.
The point is to rejoice.
The point is to work.
The point is to play.
The point is to rest.
The point is to be.
In the quest for deeper meaning and for significance in life, life itself is often overlooked. In the attempt to unravel the mystery of life, life in its entirety, in its wholeness, in its fullness and completeness is lost. All that remains are dead scraps of knowledge. So live if you can! Be still a moment and look about you, if you can! Climb aboard this very breath and know you are fully alive!
With Love,
Wayne
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bee
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Post by bee on Feb 25, 2016 12:09:50 GMT
Tony, Wayne and others spell it out plainly but still people are searching for 'What Is' already.
Annihilation of the ego happens (mostly) unknowingly every night upon sleep, for to relinquish the concept of a separate self does require a trust that it will still be here upon awakening. (This trust though is usually hidden in the subconscious)
The irony is however, that most upon awakening, are still asleep.
And yes ... the breath. The breath we take mostly goes unnoticed but it's the prime physical source of our bodily life. The breath is often missed, so too that this physical self is fully immersed in the air it breathes. The air is abundant and free yet we pay it no heed. We collectively put far more of our attention on our thoughts or watching TV, yet while so doing we are breathing, however more often than not, our breath is unconscious.
Like our breath our non-dual state of presence or beingness always is, but we are usually unaware it is so.
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Kolomo
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Post by Kolomo on Feb 25, 2016 16:27:26 GMT
Yes, We are already It ..... but for various reasons we push away. Still, with respect to CD, is not the love for Jesus a vital path to say Yes?
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tony
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Post by tony on Feb 25, 2016 22:53:01 GMT
Hello bee, had not heard from you for quite a while! After a slow start, most of us seem to be back into these discussions.
In regard to the 'annihilation of the ego...' while we are awake (not dreaming or in deep sleep), who is there to annihilate it? The ego is part of what we are, same as all our thoughts, feelings, etc. So, it's not a matter of denying or eliminating it, but of 'dying to' it, transcending a level of consciousness where the ego is thought to be real, a fixed independent entity and identity.
In my experience, the process/journey to realize that I am not a fixed entity, just a body-mind mechanism, starts with a questioning of that assumption at some point in life. The questioning starts when it does, as a result of all the factors and experiences (e.g. suffering) that bring one to question life's meaning and purpose (e.g. who am I?). The question may not arise at all for many human beings. When it does it makes one a 'seeker'. Seeking itself then has to be transcended, because eventually it is seen that the Seeker is the Sought. That means there are 'Not Two', i.e. Non-duality. I am not separate from my breath.
There is only Truth, God, Beauty, Goodness, Emptiness which are the breath, the joy, the sorrow, the love and hate, the experiences of our lives as they are being lived, as they change instant by instant. The process of 'Awakening' is impersonal and will take as much time as it has to take, same as waking up from sleep and dreaming takes its own time. The first step in a 1,000 mile journey is as good as the step in the middle and the last step at the end of the journey. So, simply walk!
The message in the letter from Wayne can be heard only if one is ready to hear it. For some it may not make much sense, it would not resonate. In the same way, the message from the great Teachers, God's Avatars, is there to be heard only when one has ears to hear it. It is so simple that it is easily missed: just breathe!
Kolomo, Clouddust
we humans tend to 'love' all sorts of people, but usually it's those we find an affinity to, those who resonate with us. We do not tend to 'love' those who are different, that we cannot understand, that give a message we cannot relate to. The injunction/pointer by Jesus to "love thy neighbour as thyself", means that anyone or anything that we come in touch with is equal to us, a part of us, not separate. When we do that we are moving from a sense of separateness to a sense of inclusion, therefore Love and Compassion arise as universal, not personal, qualities.
So I would say love Jesus as you would also love your next door neighbour, your pet, a blade of grass and all that is manifest. One needs to experience the glory that is in the lilies as being God's own glory. In the esoteric Christian context, Jesus becomes the CHRIST, the Son of God, an aspect of God, while remaining the son of man. So it's the Christ that one is devoted to, which is the same as the Truth. In esoteric Buddhism and Hinduism, the same is the case for Shakyamuni the BUDDHA, the Awakened One, and Krishna, the Supreme One. Christ-nature, Buddha-nature and Krishna-nature are descriptions of our true nature.
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bee
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Post by bee on Feb 26, 2016 12:53:32 GMT
Earlier this week I laid down around 4pm.
When I awoke I had no memory whatsoever of anything, of even being asleep, there were no sounds and no dreams, etc. After negotiating the stairs in a kind of a semi trance-like state and making it into the kitchen for my morning cuppa I noticed something was not quite right, the whole feel was somehow different. It was the familiarity of an early morning that was missing as if I had woken up into a kind of twilight zone.
Of course as it turned out my belief system assumed it was the morning but in fact it was the day turning into night. But I didn't question that it was not morning, that is until I saw that the dogs didn't eat their chicken frames last night, because when I picked up the bag it was still cold. This was the moment the light went on.
Up until this point I didn't question that it was not the morning, I only felt it was a somewhat unique morning.
So it took me a while to rearrange my thoughts as after a deep sleep, when I often quite literally feel I have woken from the dead, if it's becomming light it has always been the morning.
Now this little episode is pointing to one thing-
The ego that we think and trust we are is nothing other than a learned behaviour and this then turns into the myriads of cross-pollinated patterns which we as this Presence associates with, but to the degree that It gets lost within these many patterns, and actually mistakes them for Its identity is also the degree of assuming and of cementing the ego.
The ego is still there as is our ability to record events which is an astonishing feat, but those that lose their memory seem to also drop away the ego much to the grief of their loved ones.
Yes, annhilalation of the ego as most know it is usually able only during the deep sleep state which is equivalent to death, or death itself.
But it it possible to annhilalate the ego while awake, but for how long or how fleetingly is another matter altogether.
A quote from Karlfried Graf Von Dürkheim's "The Way of Transformation":
"Only to the extent that man exposes himself over and over again to annihilation, can that which is indestructible arise within him. In this lies the dignity of daring... Only if we venture repeatedly through zones of annihilation can our contact with Divine Being, which is beyond annihilation, become firm and stable. The more a man learns wholeheartedly to confront the world which threatens him with isolation, the more are the depths of the Ground of Being revealed and the possibilities of new life and Becoming opened."
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tony
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Post by tony on Feb 27, 2016 9:43:11 GMT
bee, in my experience one exposes himself to the possibility of not being just an ego identity (e.g. by the self-inquiry "who am I?"). Nothing really gets annihilated because the ego identity is itself a belief, not a substantial thing. If we think of ego as a shadow, then it exists but it's not real. One needs to see through the notion of ego, of separate self. Seeing that, when it happens, is good enough.
Also there is a need to be careful about a 'contact with Divine Being'. If that is understood as some 'thing' existing separate from you, then how would we ever know IT? We are already IT. The Ground of Being includes everything. In other words, everything is already perfect, including all the imperfections and delusions.
Faith is a condition of mind/spirit by which one knows that "all is well and all will be well" despite the imperfections, the good and bad, happiness and sorrow, etc. It's not faith in a God, it's Faith in God, Truth, What Is irrespective of what we think and feel. That Faith is also known as Surrender (to God's Will).
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bee
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Post by bee on Feb 27, 2016 12:18:16 GMT
The ego is certainly a belief and a hugely persistent one at that. What I was endeavouring to describe about the evening ... (that was the next morning) .. was my absolute belief that it was morning. But it was different, sureal, a feeling of a strange land even though I was at home.
At some point it hit me that this ego is the total of all the beliefs and their numerous patterns, and at some point I do remember sensing without them the ego is no more.
The belief was so strong that it was in fact the morning, even though it was a really strange experience of one, and that belief stayed until I noticed and then picked up the bag of chicken to give to the dogs as I thought I must have forgotten to give it to them last night.
Bang, bang, jolted back into present awareness from the standpoint of belief it was the morning. You see I took the chicken out of the freezer, and do so around 4'ish or so most afternoons to defrost for the dogs, so even though my belief system firmly agreed it was morning when I picked up this bag of chicken, and to my total surprise it was still cold because it's been so hot here in Qld, I knew something was up.
I saw through the illusion of belief and remembered sensing this all happened because of an annihilation of ego. The deep sleep followed by waking into what I thought was an early morning.
There are many people who recall those losing ego some with devastating effects for the rest of their lives. Some blogs where people are describing their use or misuse of different halucigens tell stories of friends or family who have become brain dead tend to let us know it is possible to annihilate the egoic mind and so lose all previous beliefs and behavioural patterns or character. I remember reading years ago about a sage who was so pure in vibration that the keepers kept him in a cage for his own safety as he was just a pure living life form. I think it was one of the Eck Masters who knew of this person.
Accepting the unacceptable
Death, The absurb, Solitude
ego finds you again
like a jealous lover
while you sit basking in its glorious absence.
then you kiss and makeup
************
Death is for many of us the gate of hell; but we are inside on the way out, not outside on the way in. ~George Bernard Shaw
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Kolomo
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Post by Kolomo on Feb 27, 2016 16:31:48 GMT
As I listen to a portion of the video, I had the impression that perhaps we are discussing a central issue or dilemma in spirituality. On one hand, there is the drive to practice in order attain a ‘higher level of consciousness’, but on the other side, this can easily be considered an act of the conscious ego to embellish itself. Many point out that the ordinary ego mind is itself the infinite expression, that form is emptiness, samsara is nirvana, we already are what we seek. But, perhaps, one way is not exclusive of the other and it all comes down to what seems to be double talk – we are practicing not to practice; just to be.
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bee
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Post by bee on Feb 27, 2016 23:00:43 GMT
Am referencing someone like Karlfried as even though these units including the ego we relate to as ourself are a construct, it is unimaginable to see how we could carry out this life as we know it without our own unique character and an egoic perspective.
Being aware of our underlying non-dual reality is all about easing up and being able to view this egoic body-mind unit with a sense of detachment. Let it do what it does with interest but not caught in it.. I am present in this life but I am not of it.
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Kolomo
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Post by Kolomo on Feb 28, 2016 14:08:53 GMT
Just a couple of quotes to add on to bee's post --
"Many forms of spirituality try to get rid of thoughts, feelings, and memories—to make the mind blank, as if that were a desirable or spiritual state. But to have the mind blank is not necessarily wise. Instead, it is more helpful to see through thoughts and to recognize that a thought is just a thought, a belief, a memory. Then we can stop binding consciousness or spirit to our thoughts and mental states." Adyashanti
"It is the nature of the mind to wander. You are not the mind." Ramana Maharshi
BTW - I liked your video, will listen to the whole thing later -thanks
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tony
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Post by tony on Feb 29, 2016 11:57:29 GMT
It follows (from the quotes above) that Meditation/Now/This is the only way to act and to be. Meditation is not an activity, a technique, an exercise aimed to obtain something, it is not the act of sitting, standing, concentration, reciting mantras, or any form it takes. It is living and experiencing this Present Moment, as-it-is, before labels are attached to the experience, prior to sensation and perception. Meditation bypasses 'thinking' about the experience, i.e. it is beyond all of mind's activities, (thinking, feeling, conceptualizing, etc.), but includes them as-they-happen. We are That.
The answer by the Zen Master to 'What is enlightenment?': pour me a cup of tea. It's the life of the ox-herder at ease chopping wood and carrying water or walking around the market place. It's the very doing of all those things Wayne Liquorman talked about: life as it happens.
So, in Meditation, what I am does not exclude the mind (its activities) or the body (its sensations) or anything else that arises: there is no subject-object separation. Because of that, thoughts are just thoughts, seeing is just seeing, thinking is just thinking: events happen but no problems arise.
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tony
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Post by tony on Mar 10, 2016 23:21:01 GMT
In the context of the 'different teachers' thread, I have been meaning to comment on the wisdom and insights of K G Durckheim, which I listened to a few days ago. Beautiful account of the mystical state. However, of interest to me was the offer of yet another 'method' (the path of initiation) to realize the Truth he speaks of. For one who is still 'searching' for an answer to the fundamental questions, it is tempting to adopt it. The hope is that it might get 'me' there.
The insight also comes that 'this', 'here and now' is already being 'there'. The bird doesn't have to fly to the end of the sky to experience what the sky is.
The pointers from Adyashanti and Ramana (quoted by Kolomo) are powerful enough reminders to bring Me back to 'this'.
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Kolomo
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Post by Kolomo on Mar 11, 2016 3:27:39 GMT
Just a quick check in -Great quote about the bird, and always looking forward to reading a new material. thanks k
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