silene

Sat 11-apr-20 Day 21. Tomato seedlings growing fairly quickly onto the true leaves now. It looks like I've sown them too thickly and I'll need to prick out soon before the roots get too entangled. When I have a glimpse of mystical awareness, there's a temptation to make comparisons with 'regular' life, and generate dualities. Doing vs being, grasping vs letting go, emptiness vs fullness, spirituality vs materialism, that type of thing. Integration can mean finding a wholeness so that life doesn't start to feel split or compartmentalised by these dualities. I guess there's a cycle of integration and disintegration, coming together and falling apart - re Leo's video on Division vs Unity. My inquiry is to see if the 'nowness' of the eternal present moment is one with the apparent flux of contents, or are the changing contents distinct and passing through, in time, as it were. Rather like the analogy of the eternal TV screen with its changing images. Is the present moment a point travelling through time, or is it the whole of time? Being & becoming is a duality. Perhaps we can call it a meta-duality because 'being' is itself a nonduality formed from the collapse of the subject-&-object duality; being is another name (according to me) for the total unified eternal present here-&-now itself; becoming is the flux of changing processes/phenomena which are the fragmentary contents of being. What can I call it when this meta-duality collapses? Be(com)ing, be/com/ing perhaps. I'm basically looking for a vocabulary free of God-language, so I'm using this ontological (being) language instead. More importantly, how do I see, notice be(com)ing? I seem to flip between the duality of being & becoming; nondual and dual consciousness, and, as well as increasing my time in nondual mind (eg when meditating) I feel the next breakthrough could be entering a state beyond both (or combining) duality & nonduality, is there even such a thing, or am I merely creating intellectual philosophical abstractions? Meditation practice has been slipping over the past few days due to it being the Easter holiday period: I seem to find it easier to keep my spiritual practice going when I have the structured routines of working life. But I have been practicing in other ways, such as mindful gardening in the unseasonably warm & dry weather at the moment.

@Arzack sure, I'm not denying the relative cycles of birth and death, happiness and suffering, I have suffered in the past too. Although existence after physical death is unknown to me. But even if there is afterlife, doesn't it still feel like the present moment? Except when in dreamless sleep? My inquiry is to see if the 'nowness' of the eternal present moment (the front line) is one with the apparent flux of contents, or are the changing contents distinct and passing through, in time, as it were. Rather like the analogy of the eternal TV screen with its changing images.

How about the present moment, the here & now itself, that seems to last forever doesn't it, although the contents of the present are always changing.

Nahm's reply says it better than me, and more besides, but I'm thinking that when we have a glimpse of mystical awareness, there's a temptation to make comparisons with 'regular' life, and generate dualities. Doing vs being, grasping vs letting go, emptiness vs fullness, spirituality vs materialism, that type of thing. Integration in this sense can mean finding a wholeness so that life doesn't start to feel split or compartmentalised by these dualities. I guess there's a cycle of integration and disintegration, coming together and falling apart - Leo has a video on Division vs Unity, have you seen that?

Tues 7-apr-20. Three rather random unconnected streams this time. 1. Our understanding (the map) isn't exactly the territory (the environment or even ourselves). A really accurate map of the world, if you zoom in, will have a little picture of the map itself. And then zoom into that picture ... and there's an infinite regression caused by self-reference. I guess approximation is the price we pay to avoid paradox, as the quantum physicists found out. 2. When we go out for our daily walk allowance we see rainbows in the windows of local homes, drawn by children as a symbol of hope and solidarity to the community; now with teddy bears in the windows too. There was a rainbow I saw today with the message 'This too shall pass', it reminded me of a poem I read in a Unitarian publication a while ago. It's a message I try to remember whenever things look bleak; I could do with a ring like in the poem. But the one thing which doesn't pass is the present moment itself, which is eternal. Even though the millions of phenomena, processes, are passing through the here-&-now, the nowness itself is always present. At least, when I'm awake and conscious. I've just contradicted myself; here-&-now awareness comes and goes as I wake up and go to sleep. Is the present moment passing through all the phenomena, or the phenomena passing through the present moment? Or is this just another unnecessary duality? 3. My limited time commitment to my practice is my biggest limiting factor, I could get a lot more mileage out of another 30 mins or so sitting per day. I can't seem to follow meditation techniques very well, I start off ok for a few weeks then adapt it to my own version. Eg with the Spectrum Of Awareness, I haven't even finished reading the book yet, but I am starting off, not with the recommended traditional concentration like mindfulness of breathing (which I prefer to do on its own), but just letting the monkey mind be for some time - like do nothing - until it resolves its restless chattering and settles down naturally. Then I seem in a better place to let go into (beingness) and broad deep awareness can appear; perhaps it's always present just in a subconscious layer I don't access very often. My quietly rebellious, non-conforming, even heretical, pattern is what has led me to broad-minded communities like Actualized and Unitarians, even though these are very different in other aspects.

Just that you seem to have been meditating for only a few months (if I've understood it correctly), and you have had some deep experiences of emptiness which are frightening and blissful in turns. Integrating it as in having a context for the mystical awareness, to feel ok with being nothingness and having an identity for normal life purposes "I remember calling my girlfriend in a panic and asking her to please start an argument with me so that I could take a definitive stance and in so continue to live the lie that I was living." you've had a taste of bliss and emptiness and you are now working on integrating this with your regular relationships in life, which can carry on with a deeper love rather than fear and panic. You're doing nothing wrong. Although there's nothing to hold onto because there's no separate self to do the holding, and everything is in flux, yet life is infinitely creative and provides new patterns to flow with, even as the old ones dissolve away. Sorry if I sound a bit vague and woolly, are you looking for something more practical or a reassurance that all's well and you're on the right path?

You've come a long way in a short time friend, I can see your need to integrate your deep insights into everyday life beyond the meditation cushion. "The act itself of letting things go is doing? " I don't have a good answer yet, I've been kicking around similar questions on the forum and in my journal. How to reconcile individual will/ego with the river of life. Keep going, I have faith the answers are to be seen with deeper insights. Have patience, life is good, God will reveal her Truths when the time is right. Look after yourself and your loved ones, take care.

There are things when I am someone, there is nothing when I am no-one. My mind fluctuates, I create both something and nothing. In an absolute sense there is neither something nor nothing.

@trenton hi, a religious approach which works for me, and leads me towards a form of relative syncretism is that the basic Religious Truth is mystical awareness which cannot be expressed directly in language (ineffable). Therefore all scriptures, teachings, sermons, creeds and the like are just pointers to look beyond words, ideas, thoughts. Prophets and religious founders usually have some type of vision or special experience which could be mystical, but these get written down in the relative culture of the time, so the unawakened followers mistake relativity for the absolute. How to convince stage blue people? I'm not sure I would try to push them too far, they are developing at their own pace, but just drop a few little seeds here and there, to point towards the mystery behind the beliefs; find some good quotes from their own scriptures, which have multiple meanings, whatever works for them. Like 'I am that I am', 'God is Love', 'forgive my trespasses as I forgive those who trespass against me', 'I and the Father are one'. Sorry all these are Biblical quotes, but every stage blue tradition has its own. Don't make out that you are more advanced than anyone else, be humble and community minded else they may not respect you.

You're quite right to mention bias, the media is just as much biased as politics. The RT TV network is pro-Russia/Putin (try looking them up in Wikipedia) and other stations have different biases, so we need to compensate when consuming the news. The Cold War is still alive and kicking I'm afraid to say.

Ego is a shorthand word for our survival instinct, relative to what we identify with. Edit: @Peter124: "to love and accept my ego not change or manipulate my ego" Well yes, of course do that if you feel it's right: and do it mindfully with awareness to really investigate the truth. For example, what does the phrase 'my ego' mean to you? Who is me who has your ego, or is that just a figure of speech with no meaning, is me the same thing as my ego or something else?

Link to the Diana Winston session in Sangha Live for reference. https://sangha.live/dharma-library/the-spectrum-of-awareness-practices-2/

I'm impressed by how you do a daily to-do list and then review it to see your progress, and this builds into plans for weekly, monthly and longer term. Maybe it'll help encourage you if a few of us check in and follow your progress. I am trying to learn a little bit of Python (as a hobby) so it's good to connect with others doing it professionally. What sort of meditation are you doing, are you into Zen ( going by your journal title) - or feel free to tell me to back off if I'm getting too nosy

This fear sounds relative to who you are now, but if there is a future life you will have a different POV, so unspiritual & ignorant may not feel bad at all. Plus the person you are now may appear pleasant or unpleasant to who you were in your previous life to this one. You just don't know, unless you have some awareness of past/future selves? How would your childhood self view your current self? You've changed a lot even since then. This suggests to me the need to release and let go of the past, not clinging to views and opinions past their useful time. Similarly, to let go of the future and trust that Life will work things out for the best if we live well now.

At the precise moment when I'm making statements (eg 'I am/am not God), or asking questions (eg 'who is the thinker/observer') then I'm in duality by the fact of engaging my thinking mind. It's the gaps inbetween thoughts that, if I'm empty enough to purely observe, the truth of it is revealed. That's why I don't spend much time on self inquiry, it causes me to think too much

@fridjonk agreed, I've directly experienced both ego and non-ego, so I'm searching for a way to bridge them both. Calling one an illusion doesn't quite cut it, because they're both illusions from the POV of the other.

@fridjonk yeah, it just confuses me to read things like: "No one is seeking and asking the questions that's why it's called illusion of the self (Maya) Yes the separate self will always have a sense of purpose." Which one is it, am I a separate self or no-one? I'm sure the Vegan sees the view clearly from the rooftop but I only get glimpses and spend most of my time down here with the selves, misunderstanding. My human body is apparent, sure, but so is everything else just apparent, from the POV of awareness. Edit. I try and reconcile the paradox with a theory of levels: on the surface I'm an individual self but deeper down we can see it's just one Being (like waves on the ocean). The dualism is still there, also the non-dualism. Hmmm.

I get this in theory, but if duality isn't real and the individual is illusory etc, then who is asking the questions and doing the searching? There's an individual will hard wired into me somewhere, even if it's part of the whole of Being, it's still got it's own sense of purpose. Look at your language as you promote nondualism: "you're wasting your energy" as if I have some energy of my own to waste. This is so hard to even talk about, we create a duality of dualism vs nondualism don't we? Yet talk we must ...

I wouldn't call it a stare, more like a full attention and presence which most unawakened folks haven't achieved. Their compassionate and loving listening puts us on the spot, invoking us to open up our innermost feelings and suffering which is usually hidden from the world out of fear. We don't feel comfortable opening up to most people because we (probably rightly) fear they have selfish motives. But an awakened person has no agenda of their own, just unconditional love, which is scary and irresistible at the same time!

Yes, I'd say spirituality shines a light on any selfishness and hypocrisy in our personal & professional lives, and often (but not for everyone) nudging us in the direction of being integrated and breaking down the compartmentalisation in life - to live holistically in other words. To embody our values across all aspects of our lives. But not easy if ethical work is hard to find, or if family/work/study commitments limit the time & space for spiritual work.

If so many governments are (quite rightly) introducing schemes to protect people's jobs and companies from going down, they must be borrowing a heck of a lot of money for it (when we were just about getting govt deficits onto an even keel after the credit crunch). Who are we borrowing it from, the banks or cash rich countries? There's an upside for the creditors, perhaps one reason why governments have cut interest rates too!

I'm in favour of UBI overall but I expect it to have pros and cons. By universal do you mean global or national? if it's just national then it may create more migration issues as people try to move to countries with higher UBI, so some type of global income to level the playing field? On the issue of AI, I'm in favour of introducing income tax for AI robots if they are doing jobs which could be done by humans, which could help fund the UBI scheme, and protect jobs. Although I might be accused of stifling innovation

@Zigzag Idiot I've not seen her call it Presence yet, but I'll keep an eye out. I would equate them myself though. I still have desire for states of mind like that, it feels like a bit of a trap, wanting to end selfish grasping, even for spiritual stuff!

Brilliant that you give blood - do they make you drink water beforehand? That's supposed to help. I'm a donor myself too, and will go again when my time comes up.

weds 1apr20 I've started reading Diana Winston's book 'The little book of being'. It's about her meditation style called Spectrum of Awareness, which describes 3 levels of awareness: focussed, flexible and natural awareness, all of which we can practice with formal meditation. Focussed awareness is really another name for mindfulness concentration style practice; using effort to practice being aware of an object, moving it back when we stray. Flexible awareness is a middle stage, being like choiceless awareness of objects in the mind, but still having objects and a subject which is aware. Natural awareness is her name for the non-dual awareness of awareness, broad awareness without objects of awareness. She also calls it Buddha nature, luminous mind, ground of being, the nature of everything. It's an approach I've more or less come to myself before reading her book; but it is giving me some ideas to tweak my practice. She stresses there is no hierarchy between the 3 levels, and taking a more intuitive approach to meditation practice. Recently I've followed techniques pretty rigidly for focussed and natural awareness (1 week focussed + 3 weeks natural per month) but this is beginning to feel a bit mechanical. So when I've read through the book I will try and let go of controlling the technique as such, and allow my mind to feel its way to whichever state of awareness is appropriate in the moment. I already have a little bit of anxiety and excitement about this, as I have been rather technique orientated about my meditation practice for a long time, and letting go of controlling my mind feels like a good step to try. In any case, the contradictions involved in the mind controlling itself do seem a little neurotic when I put it like that.