Bazooka Jesus

Gotta admit... sometimes your relentless one-liners do crack me up. More so than Leo's, that's for sure.

Yes you are! Well, let's say you and perhaps five other people on this forum. I mean, let's be honest... few of us would ever have ended up becoming forum members if it hadn't been for the fact that we had the very strong urge to escape "mundane reality" in one way or another, or at the very least significantly upgrade it. But if you are doing the "work" properly, you will eventually reach a point where you fall madly in love with ordinary, mundane, boring ass old reality just like it is, like it has always been. Sure, some of us are going to take a couple of rather wild and bumpy detours along the way, but the destination will be the same one: The place where you started.

It looks like THIS. The question is, do you recognize it?

What happens when you let go of your notion of "you" for a second? What remains? Here's a fun experiment: Replace the words "you" and "I" with "THIS" in the statement above. And "they" with "you", while you're at it. There can never be anything but THIS in THIS experience. THIS will never experience another consciousness bubble, that is separated from THIS. THIS could argue "but there still can be you, THIS just can't experience you". But THIS experience is all there ever will be for eternity.. you DON'T exist. Mmmmmmmm, I like that. It's still just a story about reality, but a good one.

@Breakingthewall My state-ment still stands.

Hence "transcendence". Transcendence ≠ Getting out of / rid of.

This just popped up in my Youtube feed: WOW. Even though I usually like my Wagner the same way as I like my occasional single malt scotch whiskey - pure and straight without any fancy additional fluff - I have to say that this is a pretty cool visualization of old Richard's epic armageddon fantasy. Well done, Zürich!

That is a mystical experience, not "enlightenment". Enlightenment is not a state. It is the transcendence of all states. Exactly.

Talk about how your experience cannot be talked about? Good one.

It's like asking if there is an Easter Bunny outside of Santa Claus. Both are conceptual constructs. Ta-da!

Man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun. - Alan Watts -

@gettoefl Separation Imagined Now... damn, that's good. With your permission, I am going to steal this and pretend like I came up with it myself.

They are based on the same principle. When X happens, Y will follow. And I am saying that it does. It is just a question of how and when. The consequences of your actions may not be immediately apparent, but they will manifest in one form or another. Just as sure as the stone hits the ground when you drop it. Which doesn't make it any less stupid.

That's why they are called pointers. No story about reality is reality itself. Notions of "God", "creation" etc. are like crutches that can help you with learning to walk, but you will eventually have to let go of them if you are ever to stand on your own two feet. The "morality" of life lies in the infallible principle of cause and effect. When you drop a stone, it will fall to the ground. So it's not just about skill. It is also about wisdom aka. seeing the big picture. Immoral behaviour = short-sighted stupidity that will eventually somehow come back to bite you in the ass.

PPS: @Water by the River Going back over this thread, I am starting to miss the delicious banter that Your Moistness, Moshka (may he jest in peace) and myself had going on here. Schnief! But it is all good. I can be my own Mariachi band.

Never trust a person who listens to the Eagles. I am dead serious.

@Kuba Powiertowski Yup. Another paradoxical fun fact about this piece of music is that the composer of what some people call the most magnificient example of sound art ever created was as deaf as a goddamn doornail when he wrote it. The story goes that at the end of the first performance they had to turn him around in order to let him know that the audience was clapping. God truly works in mysterious ways.

That's funny... for me, it was always the other way around. Until I realized that life and death are two sides of the exact same coin. You are dying and being reborn every single moment. You've just gotten so used to it that you don't notice it. You can end up in hell or heaven right now... which, according to your own signature, is the only now there is. What does any of that have to do with some supposed point in the future which you call "death"?

PS: Yeah, it's a good one... especially considering that the guy who wrote it was one of the grumpiest mothereffers who ever walked this planet.

@Water by the River The story of how the story that you are telling yourself is not a story is my absolute favorite story. True story!

Golden words. 🕉

Read your own OP. You have already given yourself the answer.

If you truly understand this, you have already learned the lesson. The purpose of pain is to be painful. The purpose of challenges is to be challenging. If they weren't, they wouldn't exist. Do you expect pain and challenges to dissappear once you have grasped their divine value and purpose? That's like expecting your girlfriend to dissappear once you have learned to unconditionally appreciate and love her. Doesn't really make much sense, now does it?

All of the above, and none of it. Why cling to a label?