Creation is Now

[Willamena]

Which post are you referencing?

 

[Quiddity]

Which post are you referencing?

Particulary no. 30...but over all just trying to grasp the world without "parts" or "seperation".

 

[Willamena]

Particulary no. 30...but over all just trying to grasp the world without "parts" or "seperation".

Ah. Unity is something I struggled to grasp. It wasn't an idea that came easily to me - although it came in a single instant, so was the easiest thing of all.

Perspective is important. "The void" doesn't produce selves; rather, we are each "self" in relation to a "void" (for lack of a better word, one that we necessarily, logically must lack). What I described in #30 is a perspective, a way of looking at things that says that the forms my consciousness gives to identify all the "things" in the world around me are transitory ideas (some call it "illusion of reality" or "illusion of self").

The idea of thinking is what occurs for us, "knowledge" of the world around us (Plato it was, I think, who introduced the idea of an idea) that produces a "now" or an operating present in the mind. "Real" thinking, then, must occur in what is to us a void, an actual present. That's the actual (ultimate, supreme, or "groovy" to use a Sunstoneism) reality. It's "void, to us" because it's beyond the operating present that we give identity-forms to.

So now that we've split reality asunder by acknowledging this perspective as "true" (if we do), then we bring it back together. Unity is found in the idea that the void that is beyond all forms, this "nothingness," is at one and the same time the source of the forms that we give to things. As Brad Warner said (in post #30), "Thinking occurs."

Unity spawns the image (from imagination) of form arising out of the void. It's poetic, and lovely, and gives rise to further images such as Kahlil Gibran's foam on the wave crests rising out of the ocean, a useful metaphor for understanding and passing along the idea of transitory life-forms. Images are our forms. Every sensation we experience "now" in the operating present is composed of images formed in the mind.

"Form does not differ from emptiness;
emptiness does not differ from form.
That which is form is emptiness;
that which is emptiness, form."

(If it sounds very much like, "A wonderful thing is a Tigger..." that's just what its rhyming emulates.)

"The same is true of feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness.

All dharmas are marked with emptiness;
they do not appear or disappear,
are not tainted or pure,
do not increase or decrease.

Therefore in emptiness, no form,
no feelings, perceptions, impulses, consciousness;
no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, no mind;
no color, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch,
no object of mind;
no realm of eyes and so forth until no realm of mind-consciousness;
no ignorance and also no extinction of it, and so forth until no old age
and death and also no extinction of them;
no suffering, no origination, no stopping, no path;
no cognition, also no attainment.

With nothing to attain (the) mind is no hinderance.
Without any hindrence no fears exist;
far apart from every inverted view he dwells in nirvana."
~excerpt from the Great Heart of Wisdom Sutra

Edit: The way I read it, "dharma" is what is, "worlds" composed by various ways of looking at things - they are what is; the "realm of the eyes" is perception; "suffering" is emotion and fears spawned by lack; "origination" is creating forms; "stopping" is will; the "path" is desinty; "cognition" thinking, and "attainment" being.

Edit: Also check out this post:
http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/showpost.php?p=902951&postcount=36

 

[methylatedghosts]

Ok, I'll try my best to explain it a little more. And don't worry, I sometimes even need a few days to work out what *I'm* thinking....

Sorry for the late reply. I'm not sure I understand the imagery, and I thought I'd give it a few days to see if I could make sense, for me, of it. By "more vertical than horizontal" I got that you mean a way of thinking about time as perpendicular to the usual "timeline" way of thinking about it.

Let me come to this down a bit further and just address this part first:

For "movement through space" I get an image of the planet circling the sun, the sun ciricling the galaxy, etc., and us in movement on the planet, all engaged in the grand dance of existence. So "past and future" through peception is experienced as "here and there," which is the "horizontal."

Ok, here goes. Before the universe existed, there was no time. There was nothing to move anywhere to experience time. When the universe exploded into existence, particles were created, and these particles moved, and thus time was created. Because at first a particle was "here" and then it was "there", and the period it took to get from "here" to "there" was measureable. What I mean by movement through space is basically matter moving from "here" to "there". No particular direction at no particular speed, just general movement through space. (space being not outerspace, but 3D space, up/down/horizontal)

The bit I had trouble with was trying to "pancake" the grand dance into something "vertical." It seems, ostensibly, to just turn the "timeline" image on its side, so that I see no difference between "vertical" and "horizonal." But I've also found that some original thinking can actually be simpler than some common ways of viewing things (of course, my way is the simplest , but that's true for each person). Still, I'm struggling with the image of the "time tower" as something different from the "grand dance" I pictured.

Ok, here I go. I'll try make it followable :sarcastic (If that's a word)



EDIT:

OMG!!!! I just wrote this HUGE reply and something went wrong and I lost it all!!!!!

Dang it, I need to go too.... wait right there, and I'll try get a reply as soon as I can.

So... watch this space

 

[methylatedghosts]

So… take two....

Try to follow, it gets a bit rough in some places. I’m going to go for moving through time at a personal level first, and then try to explain how I get that to the time tower.

Imagine an enormous pyramid. At the very tip is the present. At the bottom is your future, and your life’s end. When you are born, you arrive at the very top of this brand new pyramid. Then you must make your first choice. The present you are standing on is the brick at the top. Now directly beneath this brick is another layer of bricks, and each of those bricks in that layer touch the one at the top. This layout represents the decision you must make. Each of those bricks in the second layer represents an option you must choose between. Now you must move from the present to the second layer, but the present can only be represented by one brick. So you must make a choice as to which brick you keep, and you discard the rest, much like you would discard all other options once you’ve made a choice. So now you have a large pyramid with two bricks, one on top of the other, at the very tip. Your “present” is now the second brick down, and the one above it is your old present, and is now your past.

Jump ahead a few years. You’re now 30 years old. By now you will have made a huge amount of decisions, (both big and small, barely significant). Your present is still, and will always be, the single brick on top of the pyramid. After all the decisions in your life your past has grown, and now on top of your time-pyramid is a very tall tower of single bricks, standing one on top of the other. Each of those bricks is a choice. Each move from the future to the present selects one brick and discards the rest. Now keep in mind, also, that each option might lead to more decisions, and to discard an option may be to discard many options that become unavailable due to the options before them disappearing. So discarding some choices may shave off an entire side of your pyramid.

Ok, jump ahead further. Now all that remains is a tower of bricks, one on top of the other. The pyramid has disappeared, as you discarded more and more during your life (Don’t worry, no bricks were harmed in the making of this imagery). Oh, by the way, as there is no pyramid left, this life has ended. But above you is your entire life history. Each brick represents a blip in time where you made a decision.

I hope you have been able to follow me thus far.

Now I try to bring it out on a much wider scale.

You will have touched many people during this life. So if it’s possible, try to imagine putting next to your lifetime-tower next to the one of every single person you interacted with. Now add the people who THEY have interacted with. And now those of whom THEY interacted with etc etc etc. At the moment of your death, there are billions of lifetime towers extending up alongside yours, and if you were to zoom out, you would see a perfectly straight tower of bricks of the lifetimes of billions of other people. Now, at the moment of your death you would also see the “future” consist of billions of pyramids underneath the present. Billions of pyramids; billions upon billions upon billions of choices. Ok, so it’s an unimagineable number, but the point is, that were we to take the eyes of someone who knew the entire history and future of humankind until the end, and knew it all perfectly, they would see an enormous tower of bricks. Thus you have the time-tower, with a huge number of people all existing at different points in the tower.

What I was trying to get across with the pancake idea was some sort of visual divisions to represent time periods. But as you can see by going into more detail like this it gets a little more complicated than pancakes.

What I was trying to get across also, was that if you were to imagine time to be vertical, it becomes easier to see how decisions can effect the future. Remove a brick and a whole side comes tumbling down. The horizontal plane was to represent the ability to choose between different paths. (I had more written here but I can’t remember it since I somehow lost it)

With this you can begin to appreciate visually how the future becomes the past so fast that it barely has “time” for the present, but you can also see how it is that the present seems so endless from our perspective.

Ok, now I’ve completely forgotten what else I had written here. But I’m bound to remember when more questions are asked

Don’t worry if you still don’t get it, I can understand if it still seems very complicated. This sense of time just clicked for me one day. If you get it, great! If you don’t, well, I guess I’ll just have to try harder huh? Although, for me, trying to explain my thoughts to someone is sometimes like trying to explain to a snake how to walk. But after I lost it the first time, I think this time I’ve managed to explain it a bit better.


I've read this, and I think it's understandable, but that may just be because I know what I've written.

EDIT: If you REALLY feel like it, I can go further in depth to explain free will, and how a possible God wouldn't know what you choose until you do. But be careful, because that also requires me going into why we are here.

 

[Willamena]

I hope you have been able to follow me thus far.

Sure. It's the path of a single person's life.

Now I try to bring it out on a much wider scale.

You will have touched many people during this life. So if it’s possible, try to imagine putting next to your lifetime-tower next to the one of every single person you interacted with. Now add the people who THEY have interacted with. And now those of whom THEY interacted with etc etc etc. At the moment of your death, there are billions of lifetime towers extending up alongside yours, and if you were to zoom out, you would see a perfectly straight tower of bricks of the lifetimes of billions of other people. Now, at the moment of your death you would also see the “future” consist of billions of pyramids underneath the present. Billions of pyramids; billions upon billions upon billions of choices. Ok, so it’s an unimagineable number, but the point is, that were we to take the eyes of someone who knew the entire history and future of humankind until the end, and knew it all perfectly, they would see an enormous tower of bricks. Thus you have the time-tower, with a huge number of people all existing at different points in the tower.

What I was trying to get across with the pancake idea was some sort of visual divisions to represent time periods. But as you can see by going into more detail like this it gets a little more complicated than pancakes.

That tends to happen with analogies. I get it now.

What I was trying to get across also, was that if you were to imagine time to be vertical, it becomes easier to see how decisions can effect the future. Remove a brick and a whole side comes tumbling down. The horizontal plane was to represent the ability to choose between different paths. (I had more written here but I can’t remember it since I somehow lost it)

With this you can begin to appreciate visually how the future becomes the past so fast that it barely has “time” for the present, but you can also see how it is that the present seems so endless from our perspective.

Ok, now I’ve completely forgotten what else I had written here. But I’m bound to remember when more questions are asked

I look forward to reading more, if you can.

Yes, I can see how this model represents linear time from a life-time perspective.

I've read this, and I think it's understandable, but that may just be because I know what I've written.

EDIT: If you REALLY feel like it, I can go further in depth to explain free will, and how a possible God wouldn't know what you choose until you do. But be careful, because that also requires me going into why we are here.

I'd like that even more. Reality is something I've been examining this year.

 

[methylatedghosts]

Ironically, according to some you already are enlightened (we all are), you just have to realise it.

Or, if you like, you just have to remember it... (seeing as we are looking at the future and past occuring now)

 

[methylatedghosts]

I'd like that even more. Reality is something I've been examining this year.

Ok, let me get a bit of a starting point begun in my head. I'll get back to it in a couple of days. Be prepared for a fair amount of reading and re-explanation LOL

EDIT: I'll have to go back to what my views are on

1) Why we are here
2) Creation
3) Who/what we are
4) How free will fits into it
5) What our outcome will be.

I may only just skim quickly on #3 and #5.

 

[methylatedghosts]

DISCLAIMER: NONE of the following is supportable by evidence. It is ENTIRELY opinion and personal belief (And maybe a little – I hope – logic… but at the very least very careful thought influenced by a fair amount of reading)

Ok, lots of writing here. Lots of reading for you. Feel free to mull over it for a while before replying.

Let me first look at what God is. Not who, but what. Ask anyone what God is, and I think you’ll get replies of varying degrees, but generally, I think they have something in common. These replies will be something like “Energy” (not as in heat, kinetic, etc, but as in the sense if love was an energy force) “Love” “Everything” “That which is and that which is not” “The great consciousness”. What all these have in common is that minus the universe, minus the existence of matter, all of these could theoretically exist. I think that were we to go back to before time began, before the universe popped into existence, we would find that God could still exist. (Even though many sources say there was nothing before the universe). So lets go with this. Lets imagine God to be a bunch of love energy that is conscious, and this existed before the universe. Now God, being the only thing able to think at this point, is the smartest thing that exists. And so, being this smart, he must have thought “Ok, so, I know I’m God. Pretty neat. I know also, that I am not not-God” (This is important – the concept of not-God). “So I know this, but how can I experience this? I mean, I can’t get any perspective on it; I can’t take a step back to look back at me, because, well, there is nowhere to step back to. And what can I compare being God to? I’m going to have to find a way that lets me experience being not-God so that I can compare that to being God.”

So what can God do with this problem? Well, everyone says God is supposed to be smarter than us, so God must be very, very smart indeed. So God figures It (energy has no sex) has to create a vantage point from outside of Itself. But we have a problem. There is no *stuff* to do anything with. I mean, the only thing God has to work with is, well, God Itself. So God takes a piece of Itself and tells that piece, to separate from It’s bigger self – It tells this piece to put some SPACE between them so it can go THERE to look over HERE.

So, by taking Itself and putting space in between Itself, God creates relativity. Relative to these two portions, God is “here” and the piece is “there”. This has quite a profound effect, because space is nothing. But God grabbed some space and put space in between Itself and It’s piece (I’m going to change “piece” for “child” – easier that way I think). How is it even possible to grab nothing and put nothing somewhere? To have nothing, it’s opposite must exist – thus, something was created. This something was seen as an immense explosion. This explosion released huge, unimaginable amounts of energy, which burst forth out of non-existence. This is what many people refer to as the big bang. God becomes the universe and puts space in between It’s child and Itself.

But how does this let God experience being not-God, because, God is still everything. The only ingredient that was there to make the universe was God, so the universe must be made OF God. Ok, so this separation, this creation of relativity, created the universe. But don’t imagine that all of God was used up in this creation. There is still a lot of God left. So, what God can do is take many many pieces of Itself, create many children. These “children” are all made of the same stuff, are all conscious, and are all God. Much like taking a big cake, and cutting slices – each slice is separate, and each slice is its own thing, but nonetheless, each slice is still cake. Jump ahead a while and there are people walking around on earth (Not ruling out other planets. Not ruling out that humans were specifically created), so he takes each of his “children” and puts one into each human. In this process, each God-child undergoes a memory blank. Because, remember, what God is doing, is trying to experience being God, by experiencing not God. (One cannot know up if one doesn’t know down, hot if one doesn’t know cold, heavy if one doesn’t know light). But a God-child, being made of God, and having the consciousness of God would know the exact same thing as God, namely, that it IS God. So this memory blank is removing the “memory” that this God-child is God.

Now that we have God-children in flesh on earth, they can begin doing their own thing and the God-Child can experience being not-God. Now I’m going to try and put the issue of the workings of free will into it.

You’ll remember how I had each person’s life-time a pyramid at birth. A God-Child (from now a soul, but use whatever word you like) although forgotten it is God, can still do things that God can. The task of the soul is to experience physical life – being not-God – and then “report” the experience back to God. To do this, the soul needs to be able to take an outside look – to take a look at it’s current life from a higher perspective. So the soul – being God – can “jump outside time” and see the life-time of that souls current life. At any stage, the soul can see what decisions and possible choices there are ahead, and see the decisions made before. But what the soul cannot see is beyond its current life. To do so would be to look beyond this life into what happens before/after death. Many people say that if God were to know everything that you would end up doing, there would be no possibility of choosing anything else. You would never have chosen to do anything other than what you are going to choose, thus it is not true free will. But to separate from Itself, the God-child – the soul – is limited in such a way that it cannot see what you will definitely pick over all the other options. What it can see is, in the same way we can see an entire pyramid, that you will choose (to take something trivial) toast for breakfast. It can also see a reality where you will choose cereal. Or another reality where you will choose fruit. Or nothing. Each of the “bricks” in the next layer are possible realities. You will choose ALL of these things - until you choose one. And the soul cannot see beyond that. The soul – being God – in this way cannot see which bricks you will keep, and which ones you will discard. Thus you have true free will.

Some people will also say “But if I have the ability to freely do as I wish, why would God punish me if I wished to do a certain thing? It can’t really be free will if the greatest influence on earthly decisions is a non-earthly entity that let said we could do as we wished anyway!” My answer goes kind of like this. I said earlier how God must be pretty smart. God, being so smart, would be able to create a plan and execute so perfectly and in such a way that it could not possibly fail. This plan was to experience being not-God. So if someone tells you that you are being evil, and that evil is “not very godly” well then, you are kind of doing the thing God intended aren’t you? You are doing what you wish, in God’s playground, (And which parent would put their child in an unsafe playground huh?) experiencing being not-god. So God doesn’t need to punish you. There is no need to punish someone for doing what you want them to do. That’s like punishing a child because he played on the swings instead of the sandbox.

Ok, so this is looking a little… well… grim? Kind of pointless? Well, not completely. Remember the ultimate end of this plan would be that God can experience being God, by being not-God. Right now, you are being not-God. The point of which, is to experience being God. But what needs to happen is to consciously put those two together in the same space. God by Itself cannot experience not-God, that’s impossible. In physical life, the soul is experiencing not-God, but can only do this because the soul has forgotten that it IS God. So, to put the being God, and the being not-God together in one place, can only happen in physical life. It can only happen by the soul remembering it IS God on earth. To be AND not to be, THAT is the answer. (Yeah, kinda cheesy, I know). Our “goal”, our “task” is to re-member (get it? Currently separate… remembering we are God…. Re-member of God….). But I’m sure you, and many others will agree that at this point, so far not a lot of people seem to have remember that they are God! They all seem to die way before they have the chance to. Don’t worry, God, being so brainy, does give us more than one chance. God gives us more than two chances. In fact, take as many goes as you wish – as many lives as it takes. You don’t give your child one chance to learn to ride a bike. You give him as many goes as he needs – as many scraped knees as it takes! Each life you experience more, and each life you have the chance to get to enlightenment. Some people may seem a whole bunch more Godly than others, but that’s ok, we all were at the same point at some stage. We all had to learn how to ride a bike. Some souls are just a little more experienced than others. What we all have in common is that there is no possibility that we can reach the destination – there is only one – re-membering God. There are unimaginable numbers of ways to get there, unlimited paths, but the destination is the same. No – all roads DON’T lead to Rome – they lead to God. As a side note here, when you pray/meditate etc, you are praying to your soul. The wisdom of eternity is contained within the soul because it is God, but having forgotten it, your meditating or praying “awakens” that wisdom to bring it free to the earthly plane.

 

[methylatedghosts]

"The text that you have entered is too long (11799 characters). Please shorten it to 10000 characters long."

LOL here's the rest

You may have heard of people “remembering” previous lives. And I believe that some people do. But why do some people do this and some not? Are some more special? Chosen? I feel that everyone can. It is partly a matter of listening rather than asking, and partly a matter of where you are on your journey. We are all on the same journey, but we are all at different stages. The further along the path you are the closer you are to God and the more “enlightened” you are. Your soul’s journey echoes around the universe and this vibration can be “tuned into” like a radio. I think that we are all taught to suppress instinct and gut feelings in favor of careful thought and logic, but children seem to be very “tuned in”. You may know of kids – maybe even your own – that seem to refer to having lived before. As a kid, my mum was crossing the road with me and she said “now look both ways to see if it’s safe to cross otherwise you’ll end up underneath a car” and my reply was “Oh, I’ve already been under a car – but I had a different mum then”. Anyway, the point is that we seem to have been taught to suppress these experiences and do away with thinking about previous lives. No one is more or less special, and no-one is chosen over others. We can all delve into these mysteries and attempt to see for ourselves, and we can even “visit” previous lives under hypnosis. Well, that’s my feeling anyway.

I hope this is clear and concise and understandable. I keep reminding myself of this whole thing by reading my signature every day. I took it from the bible – can’t remember where. “Ye are Gods”

 

[Willamena]

...has to create a vantage point from outside of Itself. ...takes a piece of Itself and tells that piece, to separate from It’s bigger self – It tells this piece to put some SPACE between them so it can go THERE to look over HERE. ...To have nothing, it’s opposite must exist – thus, something was created. ...so this separation, this creation of relativity, created the universe. ...These “children” are all made of the same stuff, are all conscious, and are all God. ...a God-child, being made of God, and having the consciousness of God would know the exact same thing as God, namely, that it IS God. ...Now that we have God-children in flesh on earth, they can begin doing their own thing and the God-Child can experience being not-God. Now I’m going to try and put the issue of the workings of free will into it.

The conclusions you come to are remarkably similar to many mystic's views, except that the mystic begins his speculation with one thing he can be sure does exist (rather than God, unknown to us), that being his sense of self.

To elaborate, the mystic's view turns what you've said around and looks at it from the point of view of us as conscious being, and comes to similar conclusions. Consciousness creates a "vantage point" outside itself (subjective perspective) that we call the objective perspective ...through identity it creates "space" between things to view them relative to each other ...not-me "things" exist relative to "me," and each other, and a "me" relative to them ...all "things" together form the universe, and from there the separation between "me" and "things" is bridged by another perspective that sees them as One, and the same. One can be interpreted as God. The concretization of the illusory separation between "me" and not-me "things" leads to the experience the can be interpreted as "being not-God."

Much similarity, as I see it, but from another perspective.

...But to separate from Itself, the God-child – the soul – is limited in such a way that it cannot see what you will definitely pick over all the other options. What it can see is, in the same way we can see an entire pyramid, that you will choose (to take something trivial) toast for breakfast. It can also see a reality where you will choose cereal. Or another reality where you will choose fruit. Or nothing. Each of the “bricks” in the next layer are possible realities. You will choose ALL of these things - until you choose one. And the soul cannot see beyond that. The soul – being God – in this way cannot see which bricks you will keep, and which ones you will discard. Thus you have true free will.

It (soul) is unconscious. :yes:

...(The) plan was to experience being not-God. So if someone tells you that you are being evil, and that evil is “not very godly” well then, you are kind of doing the thing God intended aren’t you? You are doing what you wish, in God’s playground, (And which parent would put their child in an unsafe playground huh?) experiencing being not-god. So God doesn’t need to punish you. There is no need to punish someone for doing what you want them to do.

A reasonable conclusion based on the premise.

Some schools of Buddhism postulate that our lives and the things we do in our lives (dharma) are a way for the universe to experience being and doing these things.

Ok, so this is looking a little… well… grim? Kind of pointless? Well, not completely. Remember the ultimate end of this plan would be that God can experience being God, by being not-God. Right now, you are being not-God. The point of which, is to experience being God. But what needs to happen is to consciously put those two together in the same space. God by Itself cannot experience not-God, that’s impossible. In physical life, the soul is experiencing not-God, but can only do this because the soul has forgotten that it IS God. So, to put the being God, and the being not-God together in one place, can only happen in physical life. It can only happen by the soul remembering it IS God on earth. To be AND not to be, THAT is the answer. (Yeah, kinda cheesy, I know).

I love it. It's lovely.

Our “goal”, our “task” is to re-member (get it? Currently separate… remembering we are God…. Re-member of God….).

Right, I get that. Atonement (at-One-ment, being One).

But I’m sure you, and many others will agree that at this point, so far not a lot of people seem to have remember that they are God! They all seem to die way before they have the chance to. Don’t worry, God, being so brainy, does give us more than one chance. God gives us more than two chances. In fact, take as many goes as you wish – as many lives as it takes. You don’t give your child one chance to learn to ride a bike. You give him as many goes as he needs – as many scraped knees as it takes! Each life you experience more, and each life you have the chance to get to enlightenment. Some people may seem a whole bunch more Godly than others, but that’s ok, we all were at the same point at some stage. We all had to learn how to ride a bike. Some souls are just a little more experienced than others. What we all have in common is that there is no possibility that we can reach the destination – there is only one – re-membering God. There are unimaginable numbers of ways to get there, unlimited paths, but the destination is the same. No – all roads DON’T lead to Rome – they lead to God.

Very similar to Buddhist beliefs.

 

[methylatedghosts]

The conclusions you come to are remarkably similar to many mystic's views, except that the mystic begins his speculation with one thing he can be sure does exist (rather than God, unknown to us), that being his sense of self.

To elaborate, the mystic's view turns what you've said around and looks at it from the point of view of us as conscious being, and comes to similar conclusions. Consciousness creates a "vantage point" outside itself (subjective perspective) that we call the objective perspective ...through identity it creates "space" between things to view them relative to each other ...not-me "things" exist relative to "me," and each other, and a "me" relative to them ...all "things" together form the universe, and from there the separation between "me" and "things" is bridged by another perspective that sees them as One, and the same. One can be interpreted as God. The concretization of the illusory separation between "me" and not-me "things" leads to the experience the can be interpreted as "being not-God."

Much similarity, as I see it, but from another perspective.

Yes indeed.

Some schools of Buddhism postulate that our lives and the things we do in our lives (dharma) are a way for the universe to experience being and doing these things.

My perception of "The truth" (tm) is a mix of a whole lot of areas - particularly eastern beliefs.

Right, I get that. Atonement (at-One-ment, being One).

OOH Good one! I'll write that one down!

 

[lilithu]

"Everything exists in this moment (now). This moment is the basis of all creation. The universe wasn't created the Biblical six thousand years ago or even the scientific fifteen billion. The universe is created right now and right now it disappears. Before you even have time to recognize its existence, it's gone forever. Yet the present moment penetrates all of time and space. In Dogen's words, 'What is happening here and now is obstructed by happening itself; it has sprung free from the brains of happening.'
In other words, we can't know the present in the usual sense because the present is obscured by the present itself and by the act of perceiving it and conceiving of it. Form meets emptiness here and now and all of creation blossoms into being."
~Brad Warner on Dogen's teachings

Do you agree with Brad Warner's consciousness-centred interpretation of reality? Why or why not?

Impermanence and interdependency. Yes, I agree with Warner. Or more accurately, I agree with Dogen.

Or more more accurately, I agree with the Buddha.

 

[Melissa G]

I don't agree wholly. In one sense, it's correct, each moment is all there this in that moment. But time is ever moving forwards. Hence the moment I started writing this line has already gone. Our brains are configured to have both a memory of the past, and an anticipation of the future. It is how we make sense of where we are and the world around us. So, I would say, we are grounded in the past time, and at the same time ( moment) looking into future time, each instant is too instant to hold onto.

Melissa G

 

[YmirGF]

It will come as no surprise but I don't especially agree completely with Warner or Buddhist thought for that matter. Though it will cause a ripple of a smile on some of your faces, for various reasons, I reject the No-self premise categorically. What makes my point interesting is that I believed in the the concept of No-self/Not self for many years and feel I have simply gone deeper. The point I am trying to make is to draw attention to a part of self that is completely alien to our normal perspective. It is not human in as we understand the term and yet its inherent creativity gives rise to what humanity has become in all its tarnished glory.

I am still not sure whether I am percieving an aspect of Oneness which is true for all beings (includes all beings) or if it is an individual perspective of a symbol that is simply seen as such. On the one hand I see us as all aspects of the same being, like drones of the same mothership, as it were. On the other hand I wonder if we are all separate "mother ships" and it is just as case of those "ships" looking the same to each observer, giving the illusion that we are all seeing the same ship where in fact we are simply perceiving our own personal "larger identity". It is reasonable to conclude that we are One with our own larger idenity, but I am now curious if we are in fact all part of the same being.

In regards to the idea that the void preciptates form or that from nothingness comes everything. I am not so sure that nothingness actually gives rise to form but rather it seems more logical that form is a reaction TO nothingness. To my thinking, and here I am just speculating, but it seems more reasonable to see "the void" as buffeting against "reality" and the "friction" perhaps could be said to produce form (or non-void). The difference is that "the void" is not the doer, but merely a benign catalyst.

As far as time goes, time as a tick, tick, tick... past, present and future is an illusion created by the physical senses so that those senses do not become engulphed in sensory overload. In my estimation there is only NOW as it is the singular perspective that is true to all of our perspectives. WE see our world only from the perspective of the present or the Here Now, but through the lens of our accrued experience (or past). Although it is true that our thoughts are continuously "in the past", our consciousness is always in the present interpretting reality as it impinges against reality which gives rise to thoughts about what we are perceiving. It is like a perpetual motion machine that is in a constant state of "catch up".

The last thing before I pass out from exhaustion (it's been a long day, lol) is that consciousness and the perennial "I am" clause is not merely an egotistical affectation although ego is patterned after the "larger idenity". I am reluctant to call this "larger identity" a "superego" as it is considerably more than the narrow definitions of that term.

Ah well, I'll have to read this in the morning to see if it makes any sense, lol. G'night. :sleep:

 

[Diogenes]

I'll have to admit that there are many aspects of Zen that are appealing to me. If you eliminate the self the ego disappears, and with it the necessity to do harm. If you eliminate the necessity of time then history disappears and with it all of the grudges and misconceptions built up around centuries of 'wrong thinking'. But hard core Zen seems a bit like suicide without the mechanical apparatus as well. If our thoughts are a tyranny, couldn't it be just as beneficial to change them instead of eliminating them entirely? To believe in No-thing as a totality seems to rob our experience of a certain depth of beauty that only comprehension can bring to the Universe. If there were no self in essence, no consciousness, and hence no Universe or world reflected back upon it, then the spiral of meaninglessness could produce a despair which is more devistating than the consciousness cure itself. Although I do admire much of what Zen has to offer, I believe it's final result is intellectual suicide.

 

[Willamena]

In regards to the idea that the void preciptates form or that from nothingness comes everything. I am not so sure that nothingness actually gives rise to form but rather it seems more logical that form is a reaction TO nothingness.

This is where I agree with the Heart sutra, that says "Form does not differ from emptiness," the idea being that one is the other. Neither generates the other, except poetically, imaginatively; rather they are two ways of looking at the same thing.

 

[Willamena]

I'll have to admit that there are many aspects of Zen that are appealing to me. If you eliminate the self the ego disappears, and with it the necessity to do harm. If you eliminate the necessity of time then history disappears and with it all of the grudges and misconceptions built up around centuries of 'wrong thinking'. But hard core Zen seems a bit like suicide without the mechanical apparatus as well. If our thoughts are a tyranny, couldn't it be just as beneficial to change them instead of eliminating them entirely? To believe in No-thing as a totality seems to rob our experience of a certain depth of beauty that only comprehension can bring to the Universe. If there were no self in essence, no consciousness, and hence no Universe or world reflected back upon it, then the spiral of meaninglessness could produce a despair which is more devistating than the consciousness cure itself. Although I do admire much of what Zen has to offer, I believe it's final result is intellectual suicide.

As I understand it, it's not possible to eliminate thought permanently, unless you die. The goal is to be aware of both thought and thoughtless being --that is enlightened being.

 

[YmirGF]

As I understand it, it's not possible to eliminate thought permanently, unless you die. The goal is to be aware of both thought and thoughtless being --that is enlightened being.

I am curious why you make the assumption that the thought process would end upon death, unless of course you are implying the complete death of "self" and the fusing into some imagined Oneness.

I do agree with the second statement almost completely. I would however change it to read this way, "The goal is to be simultaneously aware of both thought and thoughtless being --that is enlightened being". It is merely a matter of focus and that is one thing that meditation fosters rather well. Now add a few dozen other types of focus and you are beginning to hit the mark of what is enjoyed in multidimensional awareness.

Ordinary awareness can be likened to juggling. The simple fact is that many people do not have the focus to juggle the single ball of their mind/awareness with much skill or focus. Those who learn to meditate will initially touch a calm and seemingly different type of consciousness. In effect they are learning to keep two balls in the air simultaneously, but they tend to funble quite a bit. Like a muscle, focus needs excercise to get strong and is very much governed by the "use it or lose it" law. After one has meditated for a rather long time, their focus is sharpened so that they can keep both balls in the air, effortlessly. They are ready to add yet another and another and so on. It is all about focus and keeping ones inner eyes on the balls as it were.


This morning while wandering about the dew covered gardens at sunrise I was mulling over "the void" and likening it to the Hubble Deep Space Imaging a few years back. The scientists trained the Hubble onto an area that appeared to be utterly void to our perspective and after the image was resolved over a period of, I think, two week exposure, they discovered that the formerly "void" area was literally teeming with billions of galaxies that were too faint for us to pick up via our usual means. I can't help but wonder if the supposed "void" is not a similar type situation. Perhaps it is only our limited perspective that makes it seem to be "void" in the first place.

 

[Willamena]

I am curious why you make the assumption that the thought process would end upon death, unless of course you are implying the complete death of "self" and the fusing into some imagined Oneness.

I define death as the end of, or stilling of, the thought processes.

In my imaging, it is not necessary to "fuse" at death since we are already part of "Oneness".

This morning while wandering about the dew covered gardens at sunrise I was mulling over "the void" and likening it to the Hubble Deep Space Imaging a few years back. The scientists trained the Hubble onto an area that appeared to be utterly void to our perspective and after the image was resolved over a period of, I think, two week exposure, they discovered that the formerly "void" area was literally teeming with billions of galaxies that were too faint for us to pick up via our usual means. I can't help but wonder if the supposed "void" is not a similar type situation. Perhaps it is only our limited perspective that makes it seem to be "void" in the first place.

To me, the "supposed void" is a philosophical and linguistic construct to explain a particular idea, and so it is quite certainly a "void" in that that word describes/images it quite well.