When we are caught in psychological problems, such as self-concern, the time factor plays a crucial part in it. ‘Tomorrow’ is obviously imagined. Then, we imagine ourselves (as mind-body appearance) in this fictitious tomorrow. This personal movie about tomorrow (and also yesterday), in most cases, fascinates us. Admittedly, we are the only audience in this personal movie theatre. When we get tired of the drama in it, with us alternating as the hero and the loser, we may yearn to get back to ‘real’ life, devoid of this type of fictitious drama.
The way back is to realise that it is an internal movie only. When this is seen, then the attention will turn again – via the senses – to what’s happening right now and a natural, wordless appreciation for being alive (right now) will take over again. This seems to be easy to understand but most people cling to their dreamlike identification with the hero and occasional loser. The absence of imagined importance that comes with letting go of the hero/loser deters most people from having a less stressful and more fulfilling life experience.
Identification
The ‘Born-Apparent’ Nisargadatta
Hello Friends,
Here is another small sequence of comments, should it be of some interest.
Comments in response to a YouTube audio with quotes from Nisargadatta:
Dietrich
The ‘born apparent’ cannot be led to its True Unborn Self. However, the recognition of the True Unborn Self reveals that the born is only apparent and therefore is not. Something that is not will never see what is.
daisilui
Dietrich, The ‘born apparent’, let’s call it the body-mind is the starting point that believes it can do something to arrive at the Self. Whether led by grace or by own persistence [or both], it must start from somewhere to get nowhere and to disappear at arrival in the realisation that it never actually moved. The mind is the only tool that leads one to the realisation that it doesn’t exist.
Dietrich
The term ‘mind’ is a broad term. The ‘born apparent’ is a specific application of mental activity that miraculously convinces awareness to believe that it is a separate entity. That believed-in, fake, separate entity is unable to see that it does not exist, that it is imagination only. The questioning of this belief is a mental act, guided by intuition. Thoughts can point in the right direction but the waking up from the illusion is a non-mental realisation. The same applies to creation as a whole. It does not exist; it only appears to exist. It only seems real to the believed-in ‘born apparent’. Both are unreal. They continue as Lila (light-hearted play) once Maya has been exposed as being an appearance only without any independent substance.
Dreaming to be the dreamt
In response to a video by Paul Hedderman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R8S4MoHvfY
A question of morality
In response to a YouTube video by Rupert Spira:
What we have available to verify any statement is consciousness. If we, as consciousness, identify with the belief to be a separate self, then trouble is generated as outlined in the video. If we, as consciousness, do not identify with such a hoax belief, then consciousness is aware of its formless nature, even while engaging in the dreamworlds of form and time. That’s why I can’t verify the statement that ‘infinite consciousness knows (=is aware of) only itself’ – meaning without perceptions. It continues perceiving via the senses and it perceives the flow of thoughts without sacrificing universality. In this case, the hoax of being a separate entity is absent. The dreaming is exposed to be a dreaming only, and its fleeting happenings are perceived with ‘benevolent indifference’ (Francis Lucile). Some call it universal love. Universal love is active in the middle of dreaming. The questioner’s aversion against violence is understandable but it undermines the questioner’s capacity for universal love in the name of morality. Consciousness, identified as the action figure, say the child offender, is driven by a conditioning that would have caused anyone with the same conditioning to be violent as well. Benevolent indifference is much more potent than a judgemental attitude that implies that ‘we are better than others’.
Do Something!
Doing is going on. Spiritual paths usually encourage personal development. That’s doing something to get somewhere. That’s what society understands since every conventional step in a lifestream focuses almost exclusively on a better tomorrow. So what’s wrong with that?
This ‘better-tomorrow’ drive can include the idea that tomorrow is the time to wake up to the boundless energy that’s closer than any thought about it.
It may feel like a disappointment to the ethically conditioned mind that the focus on personal development can keep us identified within the boundaries of time.
The point is that doing happens anyway in all areas of living. Personal development may happen anyway, practising a musical instrument may happen, improving a health condition may happen, financial issues may be tackled etc.
It would be a mistake to think that doing stops. Thinking, doing, expressing, creating, improving, are natural movements in time and will continue to be enjoyed.
The keyword is ‘natural.’ By that, I mean that these doings will happen naturally. Our almost compulsory, mental focus on the belief that something depends on a better tomorrow is the trap.
In reality, everything depends on the timeless energy that is present in every move. If our beliefs focus with priority on ‘moving to a better tomorrow’ then stress will replace naturalness, and with that stress comes the worry about tomorrow. At the same time, worry distracts from the only reliable fulfilment there is, namely the ever-fresh boundless presence of our true nature that is closer than our next thought about it.
Good musicians express that timeless presence, they don’t worry about the next note. Even when practising a scale to improve the skill level, the exercises can be done playfully, without worry about the outcome. The outcome will present itself anyway. In fact, efficiency increases when there is no worry since worry consumes a lot of energy.
On a global scale, suffering is caused by the effects of worry and self-concern.
The last point is that this self-concern will come up again and again as long as there is a disregarding of our true nature, a conceptless presence that can’t be measured, and that is closer… than the next thought about it.
Nonduality and I Am Not That Person
We are free. We are not the person that wants freedom. What we are is the freedom from identification with a person that wants freedom!
The seeing itself is the freedom. It is entirely neutral and unbound to any idea of identification.
If everything is nondual, how come, that the identification with a person is not us? One would theorise that everything is us and that we should not say that ‘the person is not us.’
Here is the answer: The identification with a person is, indeed, us. We are dreaming this identification as part of a bigger dream. Once this particularly annoying identification within the large-scale dreaming has been exposed as a dreamed image, the identification doesn’t continue.
In both cases, nonduality is a fact. In the event of continued identification, we believe to be a separate entity. In the event of seeing the mistaken identification, we see that freedom from identification with anything is what we are.
The point is that the seeing of ‘what we are not,’ namely a separate entity, is not in conflict with nonduality. It is the realising of nonduality.
What keeps going is the dreaming without identification with anything.
We see that everything appears and disappears within this freedom.
Virtual Reality
In response to comments on a video by Tony Parsons:
The misunderstanding in these discussions arises because the terms are not very well defined. For example ‘God’ is a word that can mean a lot of different things. I am not against the idea that there is a hierarchy in the world of appearances. The ‘top’ leader in such a hierarchy could be called ‘a Personal God.’
However, anything ‘personal’ is part of the ‘virtual’ world that is derived from memory. All these discussions are memory-based, including the citing of so-called holy scriptures. To see these virtual constructs as such is a somewhat courageous step as it dismantles any support from memory. You are truly naked, even naked of your self-concept.
Realising this is freedom from the hypnotic influences of the virtual world. It is not rejecting the virtual world. It’s only seen to be ‘virtual’, ‘made-up,’ another word for ‘created.’ It is not ‘believed’ to be virtual – it is SEEN to be so. The seeing is real. Saint Francis of Assisi: What’s looking is what we are looking for. We can’t ‘believe’ in seeing. Seeing is happening anyway.
No Lack
..in response to a comment about J Krishnamurti and Schopenhauer:
Interestingly, the sense of ‘no lack’ does not cause inertia or phlematism. It’s more a truly ‘self’-less situation in which the already present ‘no-lackness’ expresses itself joyfully. Children play in a sand castle without a felt need to entertain any meaning.
JK would agree with St Francis of Assisi who said: “What we are looking for is what is looking.’
We can verify this by sensing that the ‘looking itself’ has no lack. It is the mental identification with a ‘me’ that
1. believes that it causes the seeing (how ridiculous to think this) and
2. interprets/defines/relates to the apparent objects (what is ‘seen’)
Those two mental activities result in a sense of lack and cause the striving toward no lack. Hence the yearning for meaning – in the hope that meaning will fill the sense of lack. It won’t. To realise the ever-fresh, timeless ‘looking’ (fundamental awareness) is what Krishnamurti is pointing to – and many others. Schopenhauer’s interpretations can lure the mind into dwelling on theory. Once done with it, the actual realisation of what JK is pointing to is more rewarding.
Meaning
When you feel lack, your meaning is to feel no lack. When there is no sense of lack, there is no need to add meaning to life. That is only seen when the imagined ‘I’ is not imagined any longer. The absense of this imagination reveals fullness.
