Preetom

So the tendency of getting more 'experiences' seems to outweigh the desire for self-realization..

Spread bad reputation about powder consciousness and your unenlightened ass will be banned in no time! (Subtle forum guideline)

You are welcome. Hope you find it helpful!

You find the cosmic dance of the powder god funny? Heretics!

1) The constant sense of lack and the subsequent search for happiness/release 2) Fear of disappearance/death These 2 are actually two sides of the same movement.

If you are honestly content and satisfied in life, please forget all this jargon. If not, then only enlightenment can solve that root issue. Enlightenment is very real in the sense that it is deeply linked with our very thrust for living life and getting unmixed, unlimited happiness which is really all we want whether we know/acknowledge it or not. Enlightenment is the cessation of that primal wound we humans are afflicted with. No amount of jargon war would legitimately satisfy that need. I highly recommend this book, a must read for anyone pursuing enlightenment. Hope it clarifies your doubts and shows you what's next http://www.happinessofbeing.com/The_Path_of_Sri_Ramana_Part_One.pdf Thanks a lot @who chit for discovering this gem

You need to get this with every fiber of your being, not with just the intellect. That itself would be enlightenment. Only getting it with intellect makes one more confused, bum out and nihilistic about life. Have some trust and keep inquiring into the one that is confused

So this whole enlightenment business runs on pure desire after all. No wonder Shankara considered the intense desire for liberation as one of the 4 prerequisites of the seeker. I heard Michael James saying that getting enlightened through self-inquiry is supposed to be the easiest task of all, because we are already the Self. The only thing preventing us is that we don't really want it. Our attachment to 'things' outweighs the desire for liberation by 10000000000000000000000000X. Such a bitter pill to swallow..

the more I look, the more the term enlightenment makes less and less sense

C: I fear that I might lose interest in dank memes

@Mikael89 You should know that Ramana's own state was called ajata, which does not acknowledge any existence of ego, subject, consciousness, universe, god, objects etc in the first place. But because we feel ourselves as egoes, the sage has conceded a practice called 'self-inquiry' out of compassion for the devotees. He instructs us to inquire and actually see if there is an ego in the first place, instead of assuming an ego and going on an arduous path of reading scriptures, mantra, tantra, yantra, karma, bhakti yoga etc to get rid of that assumed ego. Thus it is regarded as the direct path, which short-circuits all other spiritual practices, opinions and yogas. Hope that made sense

Geographical limitations lol

@Jack River where are 'you'?

a-n-t-h-r-o-p-o-m-o-r-p-h-i-c superimposing human bias on everything that is non-human

yes. A concept appearing in waking state, not when it's lights out lol

Well the irony is, there is no illusion. Only the illusion of illusion. The whole game of spirituality is to directly get this point once and for all. Let's not assume from the very beginning that there is illusion or there is form. Who claims these assumptions about illusion, form, perception and existence? Does a form say ''I am form''? Does the body say ''I am body''? Does the world say ''I am world''? Who then makes these claims from the get go?

There can be a subject only as long as there is an object. Both are two sides of the same coin called appearance. And 'YOU' are not an appearance. 'YOU' transcend both subject and object. And what that is, cannot be symbolically represented. It is only appearing to be contradictory because of linguistic limitations.

There can be no legitimate concept and images about deep sleep. Whatever concept there is about deep sleep, is outside deep sleep.

Hey man, please don't panic. Nisargadatta's primary attitude was to almost always go against the questioner/student's current beliefs. That's why we can see this absolute negation style of everything in his teachings, just so people cannot nest in a particular state and start believing that they 'got' it. There is an absolute truth, the sole substance aka the reality beyond all these words. That Reality alone 'appears' as the trinity of 1) subject/ego/consciousness/awareness/perceiver 2) objects/phenomena 3) mechanism of perception/god These 3 elements ''arise and subside'' simultaneously and cannot stand without the others. If one can completely see through any one of these 3 elements, the entire 'appearance' collapses. In self inquiry, only the subject is of primary focus and thus dissolved. In the end, the terms consciousness/awareness are just as much nonsensical as kgbnadsvaihdv or axcnCNCVMa. So use these terms as maps as long as it is helpful, but don't get attached to them or try to conceptually prove their validity against all other concepts.

I agree. The very calling out the birds sounds fishy in the first place lol I just wrote my previous post for arguments sake. Ultimately, anything that is objectively known is speculation. Speculation is the mode in which the mechanism of objective knowing takes place.

all humans , birds, trees etc are equal in deep sleep. A birds deep sleep and your deep sleep has no qualitative difference. that is our shared being

Yeah the absolute truth is that the portals or states of light, sound, emptiness, energy, vibration, consciousness or awareness, being(ness), the I Am and stillness are all non-existent appearances only because there is a perceiver/ego/self/subject, however gross or subtle it might be. This is why the viable strategy is ruthless self-inquiry all the way. It is basically staying with the presence of the subject while being totally uninterested in all objects, states, understanding, insights, peace, bliss and all that heart crap...until that illusory 'I am'ness/egoness/subjectness is found to be non-existent then, now, forever. Leaving you as you are, the absolute.

Why hasn't the psyche guru Leo Gura locked this thread already for spreading hearsay against powder consciousness aka God-dust?

No Ramana wasn't wrong. These are just arbitrary technical contradictions. You can nitpick the terms consciousness and awareness separately or use them as the same thing. Go with the one that makes most sense to you. The materialists say that there is nothing after death because all they 'know' is matter/phenomena. So after death, of course there can't be any matter, thus they declare that as nothing. Notice the wording you used. Eternal vs non-eternal, death vs life all these are categories of non-existent appearance. That's why nothing sensible can be said about 'The Absolute'. Even the term 'Absolute' is redundant and collapses on itself. Realize who you are and get done with this contradiction once and for all If you are seeking for a belief system to subscribe to and pretend that this existential crisis is solved, you'll always be disappointed.