Ask a nondual "person"

[SalixIncendium]

If you are really awake always, how can the dream really happen? If there is an Absolute reality always, how can Relative Reality appear? If there is only Rope always, how can Snake appear?
It's only one's ignorance to say that "there is a dream, and in that dream I thought of eating 2 cookies, in that dream I played and danced in a form of a character, etc.".

Truly, there is no dream at all and one is awake always.


I'm sorry. That's where I see the difference between Gaudapada and Vasistha. Vasistha never tried to give meaning upon Ignorance, but Gaudapada tried and that's why Shankara too had such conception. Gaudapada tried to create a conception upon Ignorance/Maya/etc., where it is not even necessary to do that and it misleads, and that's how he differ from Vasistha, and that's what the difference between their disciples - Shankara and Rama.

What Vasistha says "There is just Brahman, nothing else. Fix that in your mind, and remain peaceful". But, what Gaudapada tried is "Maya/dream/appearance is an aspect of Brahman, Snake is an Appearance of Rope, etc., and remove such snake from your mind and attain Rope." As Shankara have Vairagya and much trust in his guru's guru, become Enlightened of this way of perception, but it is no different from Buddhist disciple attaining Enlightenment by trusting words of Buddha. Also, nowadays, Nondual seekers gets confused/entangled by such concepts and never remain peaceful of such concepts about Relative Reality "How/why it came", and never try to understand what Sages/Vasistha/etc., try to point out that there is no Relative Reality at all and just shun your Ignorance and wake up.

What Vasistha suggests is easier said than done. All of these you mention are merely tools to help seekers to realize their true nature.

Guadapada verifies in verse 2.32 of the Mandukya Karika:

There is no dissolution, no birth, none in bondage, none aspiring for wisdom, no seeker of liberation and none liberated. This is the absolute truth.​

 

[Viswa]

What Vasistha suggests is easier said than done. All of these you mention are merely tools to help seekers to realize their true nature.

Guadapada verifies in verse 2.32 of the Mandukya Karika:

There is no dissolution, no birth, none in bondage, none aspiring for wisdom, no seeker of liberation and none liberated. This is the absolute truth.​

Yes, no birth, none aspiring for wisdom, as there is no dream as such, as there is no Relative Reality/Appearance as such, and only Absolute Truth.
If one feels there is a dream and there is an Appearance of Bondage,liberation,birth,death,universe,etc., then just ignorance.

Vasistha elaborated it more precisely, and that's how I understood it, as I now see the Misleadings of concepts like Appearance/etc.

But, never matters. Never matters Vasistha/Gaudapada, as what matters (and real Matter/Substance/Presence) is just the Absolute One and no appearance matters at all.

 

[SalixIncendium]

This is an essential question. Is subjective reality an appearance within objective reality, or separate from objective reality? When something manifests as something else, does the manifestation continue to exist within that thing, or does it have its own existence? I can’t say that I know at this moment.

By subjective reality, I conclude you mean transactional reality (vyavaharika), and likewise by objective reality you mean absolute reality (Parmartika).

When you go to sleep and dream, does the dream reality have its own existence, or does it borrow its existence from you? Can it be separate from you, or does it appear within you?

Vyavaharika has no intrinsic existence. It borrows its existence from Paramartika. It appears as separate, but is actually only and appearance within the absolute.

 

[Viswa]

It is very good to hear that you do not have any bad intentions. I wish all people (except those ignorant scientists and technologists, they are incorrigible and bad) were that too, but the apparent reality of the transactional world is that all people are not like you.
I have no problem with your being a theist. Theists also can be good people, but IMHO, not all are.

And, I accept about many Theists. I wish the hatred against a particular Theist's Character should not make one/people an Atheist, but create an urge to become a True Compassionate Theist. That's why Messengers are necessary time to time, to really show the people what it means to be a True Compassionate Theist, and create True/Strong Belief upon God within people's ignorant minds.

And I forget to mention One. Everyone is Me, not as Viswa and you know Who. And Everyone is Me, including Viswa Aup Salix - who not.

 

[Viswa]

What Vasistha suggests is easier said than done. All of these you mention are merely tools to help seekers to realize their true nature.

Guadapada verifies in verse 2.32 of the Mandukya Karika:

There is no dissolution, no birth, none in bondage, none aspiring for wisdom, no seeker of liberation and none liberated. This is the absolute truth.​

I recently thought of an Example about Computer.

Say, you see the screen of the Computer when it is Off... How it looks? Empty. But, Images are ever stored in the computer.
Likewise, Consciousness/Absolute Reality present containing all unlimited forms of Images.

But, the Images can Appear to be Experienced only when the Computer is switched On. Likewise, the Images of World/etc. forms can be experienced only when it Appears in Mind.

But, Brahman never desires such Appearance but only out of Ignorance One experiences such Appearance of Images.

So, whatever happen after Ignorance is not real happening at all. It may look like Appear, but it looks so only out of Ignorance.
What one has to see, is to surpass/remove such Ignorance and not stick to it by believing Appearances of Images.

The Computer turns On only out of Ignorance, and so Images are happen to be Experienced as Appearing in Screen. Truly, Images never Appear and Remain subtle Absolutely. The Magic of how Images Appear on the screen by turning On, is called Maya. But, it's just a concept to not hold upon, but understood only to surpass that Power and Ignorance, and remain Still as if the Computer is not Turned On.

What matters is not the Images in Computer, but to be Still and Remain as Computer itself.

Edit - Out of Ignorance, one sees the Appearance of Images in Computer screen, and thinks that "This is world, this is person, this is food, etc.", but Truly there is Just Computer and Misunderstood by Ignorant-Appearance. Images never Matter, and Computer is Matter to be not forgetting and remain Peaceful.

 

[Zwing]

By subjective reality, I conclude you mean transactional reality (vyavaharika), and likewise by objective reality you mean absolute reality (Parmartika).

Yes, those are the terms that I have come to use, and there are no substantial differences.

 

[Zwing]

When you go to sleep and dream, does the dream reality have its own existence, or does it borrow its existence from you? Can it be separate from you, or does it appear within you?

Vyavaharika has no intrinsic existence. It borrows its existence from Paramartika. It appears as separate, but is actually only and appearance within the absolute.

There is, however, a significant difference between your dream analogy and Vyavaharika, and that is that your dream can only be experienced by yourself, and so is not able to be corroborated. Events within Vyavaharika are able generally to be experienced by any and all individual persons who can sensibly perceive them, alike and at once. The only way that Vyavaharika could be directly analogous to the dream metaphor, is if we apply to Vyavaharika the “Matrix (as in the film) Thought Experiment”, supposing that all minds in the World are being fed the same input data simultaneously. Alternatively, the dream analogy could hold if you consider as a premise that people do not have individual minds, but rather have only one mind in common, which consideration seems to be contradicted by the obvious fact that people in this world have highly individualistic experiential and thought lives. Without such considerations, neither of which appear plausible, the dream analogy seems to fail.

I am not sure if both Vyavaharika/transactional reality with subjective reality, and Paramartika/absolute reality with objective reality are truly analogous. I must say that, though I am by no means settled on the supposition, I think that subjective reality is dependent upon objective reality. Since, however, I am unsure of the afore stated analogies, I cannot yet say with any certainty what the relationship between Vyavaharika and Paramartika truly is. These are new concepts to myself, ones which I am currently trying to comprehend.

 

[SalixIncendium]

There is, however, a significant difference between your dream analogy and Vyavaharika, and that is that your dream can only be experienced by yourself, and so is not able to be corroborated. Events within Vyavaharika are able generally to be experienced by any and all individual persons who can sensibly perceive them, alike and at once. The only way that Vyavaharika could be directly analogous to the dream metaphor, is if we apply to Vyavaharika the “Matrix (as in the film) Thought Experiment”, supposing that all minds in the World are being fed the same input data simultaneously. Alternatively, the dream analogy could hold if you consider as a premise that people do not have individual minds, but rather have only one mind in common, which consideration seems to be contradicted by the obvious fact that people in this world have highly individualistic experiential and thought lives. Without such considerations, neither of which appear plausible, the dream analogy seems to fail.

Relative to the reality one is currently perceiving, there is no difference between the dream analogy and vyavaharika.

Yes, events one is perceiving from the waking self's perspective can be corroborated by any and all individual persons who share the same perspective. Are events your dream-self experiences in a dream not able to be experienced and corroborated by any and all individual persons in the dream that are sharing that same perspective?

Guadapada makes this very observation in chapter 2 of the Mandukya Karika. If you are interested in comprehending such pondering from an advaitic perspective, you might be interested in reading both the Mandukya Upanishad and the accompanying Karika.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Inspired by @VoidCat's Ask a nonbinary person thread. Ask me anything nondual (or about nonduality of you so wish). Keep in mind I'm only speaking from my own experience and no one else's and I don't speak on behalf of any religion or philosophy. Flood the thread with any argument you wish. I'm game. If you want to attack me or my view, I won't put you on ignore, but I will ignore you. However, I won't ignore you if you tell me I (mind and body) don't exist. I might even agree with you.

How much suffering, whether mental or physical, would you say you experience on an average day? Would it be significantly more if not for your spiritual perspective?

 

[Zwing]

Are events your dream-self experiences in a dream not able to be experienced and corroborated by any and all individual persons in the dream that are sharing that same perspective?

Yes, but the figures in my dream are merely conceptual, utterly lacking any causative substance which they might be viewed as a manifestation of. Indeed, they are not manifestations of anything, nor do they have any existence in either Vyavaharika or Paramartika, but rather are the mere result of neural activity in my brain. The only thing which has any existence or reality within Vyavaharika in this case is said neural activity; the dream-figures are even less than illusion, they are utterly unreal. My brain, the neurons which compose it, and the activity of said neurons have reality within Vyavaharika, and are illusory; the dream-figures “produced” by that neural activity, however, are utterly unreal, providing no basis for illusion based upon duality. A thing, what Plato called “a form”, must first have some measure of reality which can relate to the ultimate reality of Brahman, before it can be viewed as an illusion within Vyavaharika of a reality in Paramartika. Do you not agree?

 

[SalixIncendium]

How much suffering, whether mental or physical, would you say you experience on an average day? Would it be significantly more if not for your spiritual perspective?

What I'm about to say is in the context of what I said back on post #60 of this thread.

I don't suffer. This does not mean I don't feel mental or physical pain. I have a human body and mind just like you do. But pain is an appearance in my consciousness, and I accept it for just that. I don't react to it, because I know that it is temporary, and aside from treating it, any other reaction brings an attachment to that pain, thereby creating suffering.

And yes, previous to realizing this knowledge, I have suffered.

 

[SalixIncendium]

Yes, but the figures in my dream are merely conceptual, utterly lacking any causative substance which they might be viewed as a manifestation of. Indeed, they are not manifestations of anything, nor do they have any existence in either Vyavaharika or Paramartika, but rather are the mere result of neural activity in my brain. The only thing which has any existence or reality within Vyavaharika in this case is said neural activity; the dream-figures are even less than illusion, they are utterly unreal.

The same can be said of the figures in vyavaharika from the perspective of Parmartika.

All is not. There is only Brahman. All this is verily that.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

By subjective reality, I conclude you mean transactional reality (vyavaharika), and likewise by objective reality you mean absolute reality (Parmartika).

When you go to sleep and dream, does the dream reality have its own existence, or does it borrow its existence from you? Can it be separate from you, or does it appear within you?

Vyavaharika has no intrinsic existence. It borrows its existence from Paramartika. It appears as separate, but is actually only and appearance within the absolute.

That is in my tradition of philosophy neither true or false. It is one understanding that works, but there are other ones.

 

[Zwing]

The same can be said of the figures in vyavaharika from the perspective of Parmartika.

All is not. There is only Brahman. All this is verily that.

I am enjoying this dialogue. More later…gotta get ready to earn my living!

 

[Aupmanyav]

I wish the hatred against a particular Theist's Character should not make one/people an Atheist, ..
And I forget to mention One. Everyone is Me, not as Viswa and you know Who. And Everyone is Me, including Viswa Aup Salix - who not.

It does not happen that way. I became an atheist by analysis of things and after serious study of Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam.
We are in Vyavaharika. You are different from me.

 

[Viswa]

It does not happen that way. I became an atheist by analysis of things and after serious study of Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam.
We are in Vyavaharika. You are different from me.

Just because of sense of Diversity, doesn't mean there is Difference.

It's like Rainbow. Can you say there is presence of Difference in Light because of Diverse representation of Colours?

 

[Zwing]

I wish the hatred against a particular Theist's Character should not make one/people an Atheist, but create an urge to become a True Compassionate Theist.

I doubt that many, if any, turn to atheism because of hatred of another person. I myself became an atheist upon returning to “first principles” in evaluation of my belief system, and this effort was pursuant to a personal crisis in my life caused by my wife of eight years leaving me for another (wealthier) man. My first reaction after this abandonment was to hate God (YHWH, the Christian “Father” God), as I had placed my reliance upon him utterly, reaffirmed daily, for the health and blessing of my marriage. After hating and cursing God for some time, a feeling of frustrated, foolish impotence drove me to reevaluate why I believed what I did. This reevaluation, supported by studying the writings of both theists and atheists, and the application to the question of God of the methods of formal logic, resulted in my utter abandonment of the life of faith. My position now I characterize as one of atheism, but not antitheism (cum Richard Dawkins et. al.), meaning that I do not say that “gods do not exist”, I merely say that “I have insufficient evidence that gods exist to cause me to believe that they do”. I think that the notion that somebody would become atheistic because of, and based upon, something so trite as personal hatred is misguided, and anyone who did thusly is not worthy of anybody’s attention.

 

[Zwing]

Hey, @SalixIncendium, good evening!

A thing, what Plato called “a form”, must first have some measure of reality which can relate to the ultimate reality of Brahman, before it can be viewed as an illusion within Vyavaharika of a reality in Paramartika. Do you not agree?

Pertaining to this, I would like to expound a bit. My conception of the illusion of duality which Advaita indicates is of a particular nature. The indication seems to be that something real in Vyavaharika is perceived by living beings in this world as different than the true nature which underlies the perceived form. The entities perceived in the world appear differentiated, but they are still real as they are manifestations of an objective reality. For instance, if I am dyslexic, I will perceive the typed letter E as looking like Ǝ. This is an illusiory perception on my part; the Ǝ here is an illusion. Yet, it is still real. I can only perceive the illusiory Ǝ because the E exists, which means that both of these are different forms of the same reality.

Now, the illusion of differentiation which gives rise to the anppearence of duality operates similarly. A tree looks different to us from a bolt of lightning. Both are manifestations in Vyavaharika of Brahman. This means that there are two emanations (for lack of a better word) of Brahman which are perceived differently by us here in Vyavaharika. Both of the emanations are real. They are both real in Paramartika which is when they are perceived truly (objectively), and they are both real in Vyavaharika, when they are perceived falsely (subjectively). These two emanations of Brahman which present the subjective illusion of a tree and a lightning bolt in Vyavaharika, have both reality and existence in both Vyavaharika and in Paramartika. An emanation of Brahman is something real within Vyavaharika, though illusory as to its nature by being apparently differentiatble, just as it is real and utterly undifferentiated within Paramartika.

The difference between either of these two emanations of Brahman and the dream figures from my dream which you posited earlier, are that the dream figures are not emanations of Brahman, and so have no reality either in Vyavaharika or in Paramartika. They are merely the transitory result of the firing of neurons in my brain, and have no existence independent from my brain, upon which they are utterly dependent. This is why they are not analogous to emanations of Brahman within Vyavaharika, in my view.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Just because of sense of Diversity, doesn't mean there is Difference.

Yeah, IMHO, any kind of theism has the same problem, no evidence. That is why I became an atheist.

 

[Viswa]

I doubt that many, if any, turn to atheism because of hatred of another person. I myself became an atheist upon returning to “first principles” in evaluation of my belief system, and this effort was pursuant to a personal crisis in my life caused by my wife of eight years leaving me for another (wealthier) man. My first reaction after this abandonment was to hate God (YHWH, the Christian “Father” God), as I had placed my reliance upon him utterly, reaffirmed daily, for the health and blessing of my marriage. After hating and cursing God for some time, a feeling of frustrated, foolish impotence drove me to reevaluate why I believed what I did. This reevaluation, supported by studying the writings of both theists and atheists, and the application to the question of God of the methods of formal logic, resulted in my utter abandonment of the life of faith. My position now I characterize as one of atheism, but not antitheism (cum Richard Dawkins et. al.), meaning that I do not say that “gods do not exist”, I merely say that “I have insufficient evidence that gods exist to cause me to believe that they do”. I think that the notion that somebody would become atheistic because of, and based upon, something so trite as personal hatred is misguided, and anyone who did thusly is not worthy of anybody’s attention.

Sorry about your past.

I just pointed out only one circumstance of becoming Atheist, but you pointed out beautifully another.

So, from your life, there happens to become an Atheist by misunderstanding Scriptures too. Right?

If scriptures say that, God made Dog so that it can only Bark, and if you believe that "God can make Dog Roar", and if the Dog don't Roar and only keep on Barking, will you say there is no evidence to Believe God because your belief didn't come True?

Edit - One will Believe there is God only if God fulfil one's wish/belief but not by understanding Scriptures (To fulfil one's wish, is not that simple as "Magician, I want Apple" "Ta-da, here it is..." but have to consider many things - that's what Scriptures say) ?

Edit 2 - Just now I read about YHWH divorcing Israel as she is unfaithful to him. God must have made Goddess should be faithful to Husband at all means, but He didn't made woman that way. So, why have to believe that Wife must be faithful to Husband if God didn't created Woman totally such way?