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Post by spongey on Jan 27, 2013 5:21:16 GMT -8
Ok makes sense. Serious question, can one just stop believing in this craziness? Is it as simple as that? (Goodness you must be fed up of these questions!) As long as you are coming from that sincerity, I'll follow you wherever you need to go, Spongy. You can't choose to stop believing. You believe because there seems to be evidence to support it. You'll stop believing when new evidence comes along or you see the falsity of the evidence you have. This is just how mind works and you can't change that. What doesn't work is rearranging the evidence that you already have, which is thinking. You already know what you think you know, and you're almost guaranteed to find more apparent evidence to support what you already think you know because that's what you'll be looking for. I know you know thinking doesn't work, I just wanted to offer a reason why. Most of our illusions are accepted without really questioning them at all, so some of them are collapsed quite easily by simply noticing what's actually happening in our experience. Mind is obviously involved in this, but we're trying to do is look at the big picture and not get caught up in what mind thinks it knows about it. For example, volition is not difficult to see through if we drop the assumption that we know what our next thought will be. If you take a look, you'll see you don't know. Hencely, no control over thoughts, options, choices, desires, etc. We can take a look at how dualistic experience works and drop the assumption that happiness is an absolute quantity that we should be able to increase. When we notice that all dualistic polarities are subjectively defined, and therefore mutually defining, we can see that our experience of happiness is entirely dependent upon our experience of unhappiness, like two sides of a coin that can never be separated under any conditions. If we drop the assumption that we know we are a mind/body, we can potentially notice that the mind and the body is appearing to me, and so I must be something else. In fact, we notice that whatever appears, appears to me, and so I cannot be anything that appears, which also means I never appear and am not 'something'. These are the sorts of illusions that can be seen through with a little sincere effort to know the truth of the matter regardless of what we believe or want to believe. (I haven't made any assumptions about what you have or haven't seen) It does require some insightful realization, but it's not some kind of transcendent woo woo no-mind self realization stuff. Seeing through illusions is much more accessible. Don't ever worry about Truth realization. Empty yourself completely of falsity, and the Truth will come looking for you. Thanks for sticking with me on this. Guess it's a case of 'keep looking'. I often think I've gained real clarity but the illusions all persist.
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Post by beingist on Jan 27, 2013 7:34:30 GMT -8
As long as you are coming from that sincerity, I'll follow you wherever you need to go, Spongy. You can't choose to stop believing. You believe because there seems to be evidence to support it. You'll stop believing when new evidence comes along or you see the falsity of the evidence you have. This is just how mind works and you can't change that. What doesn't work is rearranging the evidence that you already have, which is thinking. You already know what you think you know, and you're almost guaranteed to find more apparent evidence to support what you already think you know because that's what you'll be looking for. I know you know thinking doesn't work, I just wanted to offer a reason why. Most of our illusions are accepted without really questioning them at all, so some of them are collapsed quite easily by simply noticing what's actually happening in our experience. Mind is obviously involved in this, but we're trying to do is look at the big picture and not get caught up in what mind thinks it knows about it. For example, volition is not difficult to see through if we drop the assumption that we know what our next thought will be. If you take a look, you'll see you don't know. Hencely, no control over thoughts, options, choices, desires, etc. We can take a look at how dualistic experience works and drop the assumption that happiness is an absolute quantity that we should be able to increase. When we notice that all dualistic polarities are subjectively defined, and therefore mutually defining, we can see that our experience of happiness is entirely dependent upon our experience of unhappiness, like two sides of a coin that can never be separated under any conditions. If we drop the assumption that we know we are a mind/body, we can potentially notice that the mind and the body is appearing to me, and so I must be something else. In fact, we notice that whatever appears, appears to me, and so I cannot be anything that appears, which also means I never appear and am not 'something'. These are the sorts of illusions that can be seen through with a little sincere effort to know the truth of the matter regardless of what we believe or want to believe. (I haven't made any assumptions about what you have or haven't seen) It does require some insightful realization, but it's not some kind of transcendent woo woo no-mind self realization stuff. Seeing through illusions is much more accessible. Don't ever worry about Truth realization. Empty yourself completely of falsity, and the Truth will come looking for you. Thanks for sticking with me on this. Guess it's a case of 'keep looking'. I often think I've gained real clarity but the illusions all persist. Let them. That's how you 'notice' them. 'Noticing' them as illusions is how they stop being so persistent.
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Post by enigma on Jan 27, 2013 10:34:45 GMT -8
Thanks for sticking with me on this. Guess it's a case of 'keep looking'. I often think I've gained real clarity but the illusions all persist. Let them. That's how you 'notice' them. 'Noticing' them as illusions is how they stop being so persistent. Right, the focus is not on getting somewhere or accomplishing something or even Truth realization, since it can't be known what that is. The focus is simply on noticing what in blazes is really going on. The reason illusions aren't seen through is not because it's difficult, but because we don't want to. We want something else more. We want to be happy or enlightened or safe or right or something else. If we don't want to know what's really going on, attention is always going to be somewhere else.
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Post by silence on Jan 27, 2013 12:15:51 GMT -8
Mainly, I want the Truth. I can definitely relate to this. Definitely. What does it mean to you to say you want the Truth? (serious question). Ah, the perfectly pertinent question. I used to think that it meant that I just wanted to know everything. Then I thought it meant that I just wanted to know everything that was true. Then, I thought it meant that I just wanted to know Truth (with a capital T). Then, I realized that Truth is all there is, and so I AM the truth, and it blew all thinking about it totally out of the water. Yea, and I appreciate your honesty. I think it's a generally problematic word for most people.
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Post by beingist on Jan 27, 2013 12:25:20 GMT -8
I can definitely relate to this. Definitely. Ah, the perfectly pertinent question. I used to think that it meant that I just wanted to know everything. Then I thought it meant that I just wanted to know everything that was true. Then, I thought it meant that I just wanted to know Truth (with a capital T). Then, I realized that Truth is all there is, and so I AM the truth, and it blew all thinking about it totally out of the water. Yea, and I appreciate your honesty. I think it's a generally problematic word for most people. It is, indeed.
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Post by silence on Jan 27, 2013 22:02:20 GMT -8
The reason illusions aren't seen through is not because it's difficult, but because we don't want to. Makes the situation a lot more simple eh?
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Post by enigma on Jan 27, 2013 23:21:05 GMT -8
The reason illusions aren't seen through is not because it's difficult, but because we don't want to. Makes the situation a lot more simple eh? It can sure slow down the frantic search quite a bit.
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Post by james on Jan 27, 2013 23:24:13 GMT -8
Makes the situation a lot more simple eh? It can sure slow down the frantic search quite a bit. Whatwhat? I don't want to? But this must be an unconscious non-wanting then, right? So how does it make it simpler?
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Post by spongey on Jan 28, 2013 4:43:21 GMT -8
It can sure slow down the frantic search quite a bit. Whatwhat? I don't want to? But this must be an unconscious non-wanting then, right? So how does it make it simpler? Yes you two, don't start now!!
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Post by enigma on Jan 28, 2013 9:02:55 GMT -8
It can sure slow down the frantic search quite a bit. Whatwhat? I don't want to? But this must be an unconscious non-wanting then, right? So how does it make it simpler? Yes, unconscious. It's possible to realize you don't want to, but then how could the search continue? The person does not want to find the truth that there is no person, and 'God' doesn't want to find anything at all. This is how the obvious goes unnoticed.
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Post by humphrey on Feb 4, 2013 13:58:44 GMT -8
The reason illusions aren't seen through is not because it's difficult, but because we don't want to. Makes the situation a lot more simple eh? But there ain't no 'we' in the first place, eh? How can a movement of mind, or some repeating type of thought 'want' or 'not want' anything? I'm not only not seeing through illusions, I'm not even seeing illusions. Doesn't the illusoriness of illusions depend on something non-illusory? There needs to be some contrast to see through an illusion. If all we do is see through one illusion to see another illusion, then can we really say we're seeing through illusions?
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Post by enigma on Feb 4, 2013 18:59:52 GMT -8
Makes the situation a lot more simple eh? But there ain't no 'we' in the first place, eh? How can a movement of mind, or some repeating type of thought 'want' or 'not want' anything? You don't see 'want' happening? To recognize illusions is the same as to see through them. If you saw what you knew to be an illusion, then you have apparently seen through it. No, to see through illusions just requires the recognition that there is no actual foundation. There may be the belief that you are the body, but you know if you lost all your arms and legs, you would still be here as whole as ever. You know that not one cell of your body was here 7 years ago, so how is it you survived? You notice that the body changes, but you somehow don't. The same 'you' is here that was here when you were 5 years old. So did a non-illusory you show up so that you could see the illusoriness of body identification? Contrast is needed in order to identify something as true or real, and these may become increasingly problematic terms for you because there isn't something true or real. Nothing that actually IS can be made into a true or real idea.
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Post by humphrey on Feb 5, 2013 11:05:05 GMT -8
But there ain't no 'we' in the first place, eh? How can a movement of mind, or some repeating type of thought 'want' or 'not want' anything? You don't see 'want' happening? Yes of course want happens. But there is no one wanting, right? When you say 'we don't want it' (to see through illusions) it sounds like you're saying that there is someone there that wants or does not want stuff. But from what I understand, the wanting is just a temporary appearance and movement of mind/feeling like everything else, including the appearance in the form of thoughts that there is someone wanting. It's possible that there is a wanting-to-see-through-illusions. This want just arises and passes like everything else. Maybe what you are saying is that seeing through illusions can not actually be wanted? It's not that seeing through illusions is not desired, it's just that the want or desire depends on an illusion. Is there a non-illusory you that is engaged in this conversation? those terms have been sticky wickets for me for a long time.
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Post by enigma on Feb 5, 2013 16:55:28 GMT -8
You don't see 'want' happening? Yes of course want happens. But there is no one wanting, right? When you say 'we don't want it' (to see through illusions) it sounds like you're saying that there is someone there that wants or does not want stuff. But from what I understand, the wanting is just a temporary appearance and movement of mind/feeling like everything else, including the appearance in the form of thoughts that there is someone wanting. Yeah. Yeah, it's not actually wanted. I mean to say it's not actually desired long enough to fulfill the desire. From whence would the desire come from to see that the one desiring is just an idea? It's not about the idea that there isn't somebody there to desire it. The desire is happening, and that's enough for desire to happen. The problem is that the desire to be free has to come from the belief that you are a prisoner, and yet freedom is only possible when it's realized there is no prisoner to desire freedom. So can the prisoner actually be freed? Can freedom happen for the one in prison? The answer to those questions is no, and somewhere along the line before truth is noticed the imaginary prisoner is going to have to come face to face with that reality, and he must then back down. At the last moment he will retreat, over and over, and never notice that he has retreated. Chances are you have been at the very edge of Self realization dozens of times, but you never knew. Can I, the prisoner, find freedom if freedom means realizing there is no prisoner? Then where is my desire to be free? where is the energy to carry me across that threshold into freedom? It never actually happens. Nobody ever actually gets free. Watch the peeps on the other forum dodge and weave because they simply don't want to see something. Watch how effortless it is for them to not see, and not see that they don't see. The same thing happens in their search for truth. That's why it's called the spiritual circus. The good news is that the truth is not hiding. This is why the only function of effort in the spiritual search is to exhaust the effort. To stop thinking effort will work.
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Post by humphrey on Feb 6, 2013 7:00:20 GMT -8
Heh, I actually understand that. Wow. I see a lot of dodging and weaving at ST, including by someone named maxdprophet. Sometimes I wish there was fear about a precipice, teetering on the unknown. On the top side, all is imagined, including the one teetering, the precipice and the danger. On the other side, just nothing and THIS, of course. Dive into it, and the diver disappears. But mostly such drama just doesn't appear; only wistfully in imagination. I go about my day, grooving on what is or not. Doing stuff as it happens. I come here to these forums to do what?? It'd be nice to state something confidently without bluster. In some ways, I'm seeking confidence, yet I know confidence can only be genuine and is expressed freely from a place where there is no belief in separation. I'm not talking the Donald Trump sort of confidence. Perhaps what appears as confidence is just because what is uttered comes from a place where there is no self-doubt because there is no self to doubt. There is no need to second guess because there is no ownership over what is uttered.
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