Sockrattes

What are your Top 5 movies you would recommend to others, because they have affected you deeply, and why? Mine are: 1. Arrival - Everything about it. It's just the most perfect film i've ever seen. The overall tone of it. It has exactly the same emotional depth and dyeing of the short-story which is based on. 2. Her - Very emotional. With a deep melancholic pace and tone. A comprehensible lovestory, with an ending that hits you hard. 3. Matrix - No explanation needed on this one.^^ 4. Waking life - It's more of a lecture from God about the nature of reality, other than a movie. 5. Lord of the Rings-Trilogy - Not necessarily "spiritual", even if gods and demons are part of it. But it is the greatest film based on the monomyth in maybe the last 30 years. It has flaws, yes, but very few people can deny this trilogy is something else. Also it touches many philosophical themes like determinism/free will, transcendence, suffering and release. I hope this topic is allowed here. I've used the search function but couldn't find anything related or similar.

Love is the absence of desires

@Nak Khid The AfD is a pseudo-giant. Those political views always existed in Germany. A few years ago those people were members of the right-wing-portions of CDU, FDP and SPD. They just left their original parties and merged into this obscure project called AfD. I don't think they will govern any time soon. I don't even think they want to. The AfD is changing their platform like every 5 years and they are trying to maintain media-coverage with dog-whistle-politics. In the end they are not trying to make politics for "the little man" as they say. All those politicians care about are their own pensions and not the greater good. I mean... in most other countries those people were dangerous. But Germanys government and the german people in general have a very sophisticated political immune-system, which is working very well.

1. Cum hoc, ergo propter hoc. Sociological inequality doesn't necessarily mean inequality on the dating market. If this was true, Tyler wouldn't impregnate Stacy on a daily basis. People want to have Sex and relationships with "their best options". 2. 1. Nothing. It's actually a good thing. Marriage is just a fancy term for a sales contract. People have to accept, that all people are individuals with desires and that they will act accordingly. The whole concept of a lifelong unconditional partnership was a lie to begin with. 2. 2. Socialism. 2. 3. Making them more attractive. Social dynamics lessons in schools maybe. Girls want cool guys. Guys want cool/hot girls. It's simple as that. When you realise, that you are attractive to at least some girls, life is easier. When you realise, that you have more than just one option, you naturally want all of them. Because desires are endless. 3. *grabs crystal ball* Marriage will die. People will fuck around and the economic and political system will adjust to that. Being a single-mum is not a problem, since the government will make sure, that every child has his basic necessities met. Men are not obliged to pay child-support anymore. After a few years in Babylon, when everyone already participated in weekly orgies, everyone is bored as fuck. Everyone will realise, that sex/desires is the root-cause of all suffering, and then they transcend and merge with God.

@Robi Steel That's a mature answer, i will give you that. The problem is, that i don't get, what exactly you were aiming at, when you opened this thread. Do you think everyone should have their own opinion and everyone should be entitled to not getting their beliefs attacked?

So you want to censor me? Just kidding Genuinely curios: Are you avoiding uncomfortable statements and questions strategically and on purpose, or do you think they have no value?

This nothingness, that doesn't exist, has somehow strong political opinions. Funny thing is, that i've already proven, that Germany didn't go insane, when roughly 1,5 mio. people from the middle east went there. Isn't it possible, that you are just projecting your own insecurities onto others? I know, it's not your fault. You are just a kid. But why do you think, other people are more mundane than you are?

At the height of the immigration-crisis in Germany, the biggest political party opposing that, was the AfD, and they were polling at like roughly 20% or something. According to your comment german-culture would be therefore "being very welcoming and being very open-minded" isn't it? The last part of your comment is very revealing. It sounds like you are longing for affiliation and identity and you are somehow disappointed, that Germany won't provide you with that. That begs the question: Even if there would be a nation that would fulfil all your desires, would you be happy? Probably not. That's actually the whole point of spirituality. As the Buddha said: "Now this, bhikkhus, is the noble truth of suffering: birth is suffering, aging is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering; union with what is displeasing is suffering; separation from what is pleasing is suffering; not to get what one wants is suffering; in brief, the five aggregates subject to clinging are suffering."

There is no "german-culture". There never was. For most of history "Germany" was patchwork of (at it's peak) dozens of countries which loved to fight each other. What is "german culture" supposed to be? Democracy and basic human rights? That's american (for the most part). Capitalism? That's british. Pretzels? It's austrian. The german language? Quote: "someone from the rhineland can not even ask for directions in bavaria".

I like how Swami Sarvapriyananda puts it: "It is not a thing. It is not nothing. It is no-thing."

No you didn't. But you are assuming, that those who are referring to consciousness are. At least i took you comments like that. I fully agree with what you have said in you last comment, except for "because it is everything". There are not things. I AM....! that's it. What i am is open to question, but i am... otherwise i couldn't say or feel that.

That's the whole error you are making. Neither Yogacara-Buddhism nor Advaita Vedanta is saying, that the personal experiencer or even the experienced object is in any way real. What they are saying is that the only reality is the subject. In Yogacara it is called Buddha-Consciousness and in Advaita Vedanta it is called Brahman. PS: I don't know anything about infinite love and so on.

Maybe it's just your pre-assumption of the term consciousness, which is giving you a hard time. Consciousness, in this framework, is not some property of the individual person, but the "thing" to which every kind of experience appears.

@traveler @Inliytened1 You two are talking about two different philosohies. This "fight" is actually going on for a thousand years now. travelers comments are referring to the second turning of the wheel, while Inliytened1 is talking about the third turning. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Turnings_of_the_Wheel_of_Dharma

So is God creating something which he already is?

I'm sure you will like this one (attached picture)^^ To support my statement, i would like to quote someone famous: John 10:30 I and the Father are one. John 14:11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me— or at least believe on account of the works themselves.

So according to you (Shankaras) non-duality is wrong and (Ramanujas) qualified-non-dualism is the way to go, yes? But do you really think, that God is struggling with his own existence? Wouldn't it be horrifying? I mean, if it's a play, as you said earlier, we could say, that some form of liberation is possible. But if God himself is struggling we are screwed, aren't we?

So is ignorance created deliberately by God, or is it part of his essence?

In the absolut sense, this might be right. That doesn't change the fact, that there is a "relative truth" to our existence. Let me ask it this way: Why don't we know, that we are that infinite oneness? We feel, that we are separate in some sense and we are ignorant about our oneness until we have a breakthrough. The question is, why? Classical nondualism would say, that our ignorance is beginning-less and when we attain knowledge we realise, that we have been always free. But why is infinite knowledge "partially ignorant"?

Or he is talking about God deliberately making reflections of him/his consciousness. I like the idea that Shankaracharya, Ramanujacharya and Madhvacharya were equally right.

Meister Eckhart disagrees "Here, in time, we are celebrating the eternal birth which God the Father bore and bears unceasingly in eternity, because this same birth is now born in time, in human nature. St. Augustine says, 'What does it avail me that this birth is always happening, if it does not happen in me? That it should happen in me is what matters.' We shall therefore speak of this birth, of how it may take place in us and be consummated in the virtuous soul, whenever God the Father speaks His eternal Word in the perfect soul."

Probably. When you look closely you will see that Jesus WAS a non-dualist. Basically everything he says is identical with what Buddha and traditional Advaitans say about "truth and peace" and how to attain it. Of course many christians, buddhist and advaitans would disagree with that statement. Buddhist probably won't talk about God. Most of them won't even talk about "what is", rather than "what is not" or sunyata. Christians will talk about a monolithic omnipotent, but not necessarily omnipresent entity which they call God. And they will certainly never admit, that they are somehow related to God, other than being his servant. Advaitans will talk about fullness, and how existence, consciousness and bliss are the same thing, and everything else that can be thought and imagined is falsity. IMO these are just different approaches to the same goal which can't be described with words.

The trinity is most likely an error, the early fathers of the church have made. Jesus said, "the father and i are one". And there is the holy spirit which is somehow related to God. So the catholic church made those three a singular entity. But Jesus actually said something else: 30 I and the Father are one.” 31 At this, the Jews again picked up stones to stone Him. 32 But Jesus responded, “I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these do you stone Me?" 33 “We are not stoning You for any good work,” said the Jews, “but for blasphemy, because You, who are a man, declare Yourself to be God." 34 Jesus replied, “Is it not written in your Law: ‘I have said you are gods’? 35 If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken 36 then what about the One whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world? How then can you accuse Me of blasphemy for stating that I am the Son of God?" Jesus is talking about Psalm 82 here: 6 I have said, ‘You are gods; you are all sons of the Most High.’ 7 But like mortals you will die, and like rulers you will fall.”

Jesus said that the Kingdom of God cannot be observed in any way, but that it can only be found within. So is the use of quantum physics to prove the existence of God not a disservice? As Swami Sarvapriyananda puts it very nicely: "Incompleteness, relativity, uncertainty... these are exactly the terms the ancient Indians used to describe Maya".

Hi everyone, is awakening even an experience? Many people have various degrees of mystical experiences. No doubt about it. Even i have them on a regular basis, without even trying to have them. While those experiences are always profound and mind shattering, i will always fall back to a condition, in which suffering is existent. No matter how deep those insights are, it is always certain, that i'm going to be this ordinary guy Sockrattes again, who has to deal with scrap pile, i call "life". So i'm left with the question: If suffering is still going on, am i even awake? Buddha and the rest teached, that we are suffering, because we desire. And we desire, because we are ignorant. Ignorant about our true nature. Are mystical experiences no matter how deep the are, even capable to end our suffering once and for all? We are running around chasing the rabbit with this approach, don't we? We are trying to get freedom by searching for the one object, that will fulfil all our desires. But is that even the right approach? Is an 'object', that can be attained or experienced fulfil us eternally? I don't think so. That's why i think it is fundamental, that we have to stop chasing for objects, and start recognising the subject. cheers