Preetom

I understand you're dilemma. You're still trying to grab Consciousness by it's neck as if it's an object Don't worry I too tried to do this for over 2 years. Here is what worked for me. 1) Read the attached thread very carefully. Make sure you understand the instruction. Read it once every 2 weeks to polish your understanding. 2) Start doing that self-inquiry meditation for 30-60 minutes everyday. Once a month, set out 2-3 days retreat like setting at home where you do nothing else but self-inquiry 3) During all these meditation sessions, search for yourself. Keep on looking. Just remember that whatever you point to as you is not you. Because the perceived object cannot be the perceiver. 4) Tire yourself out by looking for yourself at every corner of your experience until...you experientially open yourself up to the possibility that what you truly are can't be located as an object. You need to get this insight over and over again in your direct experience. No guru's word will do the trick. 5) It may take months to years. When you really get it, you'll start losing the obsession towards objects. Naturally you'll skew towards resting in I AM. This is where advanced self-inquiry begins which is nothing but Self-resting/Choiceless awareness/Observation whatever you wanna call it. Good luck

@Samra An object is anything with objective qualities. For example, thoughts, emotions, feelings, sensations, world etc anything that you can know. Whereas consciousness or the real 'you' is that which knows all objects but itself cannot be known as an object. So the question is are you having the experience of 3 consciousness or are you experiencing 3 thoughts/memories/imagination in one consciousness, at this one now. This now.

If this doesn't shatter materialist paradigm, I wonder what will https://youtu.be/usvt5awnmpM

@Viking watch this video carefully. This one video explains almost everything discussed in this thread in less than 15 minutes. This is pure genius at work

Ask yourself are those 3 events happening to 3 'l's? Ask yourself are those 3 events happening in 3 different times or are they all happening now? If you are suspecting all of this as illusion, find out the root of that illusion. I'll give you a hint about illusions. When your real 'I' aka the pure Consciousness without any objective quality identifies with a particular object, that is the mother of all illusion. Very interesting mindfuck tho. Thanks for sharing it. Enjoy your contemplations

@Faceless How do you define 'experience'? Take the feeling in your chest. To your direct experience, what is it to you?

@Faceless Let us contemplate on these questions. This isn't an exam where we will be marked for our answers

Yes that's neti neti. It's part of self inquiry. This neti neti is done to relax your focus from objects. stop asking who am I if that doesn't work for you. There are bunch of other more practical, contemplative questions. But from reading your posts, I'm assuming that you have a limited understanding on Self-inquiry. Search Self-inquiry and listen to at least 3-4 teachers breaking this down. Seach for the commonalties in their interpretations. That's the bulk of the work. Anyway I'm listing some of the questions that work for me. 1) '' What is it, that knows this experience?'' 2) ''That which knows this experience, is it attached to this experience?'' 3) ''That which knows this experience, does it have a boundary?'' 4) ''That which knows this experience, does it have a color, shape, size, location etc?'' 5) ''That which knows this experience, does it change with the changing experience?'' 6) ''That which knows this experience, how does it knows it's presence?'' 7) ''This knowingness, is it ever present or it comes and goes?'' 8) ''That which knows this experience, is that an experience itself?'' The answer to these questions is never verbal or something like, ''I don't know/I don't care''. These questions are here to facilitate the observation. Always stay with your present experience. Never go to thoughts about what should or should not happen right now

You are that which is noticing that 'something' But you cannot be noticed like an object

If you clearly see that you're not that sensation, then that's self-inquiry happening right there. You're not supposed to get a verbal answer from your questions. That would be anther thought aka another object. The experiential understanding is the key here. You're supposed to ask a question and keep observing the whole phenomena with an open mind. Not trying to make stories of what should or should not happen. That's it! whatever needs to happen will happen in due course. This is why from mind's perspective, these highest spiritual practices like self-inquiry, unconditional surrender etc. are regarded as total waste of time. Just because it cannot formulate a story around them

When you ask yourself that question, see how your sense of 'I' shifts. You don't perceive that sensation in your chest as 'I' but rather you see clearly that 'you' are aware of that sensation. And your presence has nothing to do with this sensation in chest. That's how you disidentify from deep feelings, thoughts, beliefs etc. literally all objects. And another important thing, self inquiry is NOT a philosophical or intellectual endeavor that can be written as a Thesis. It is a very personal and emotional endeavor. At times, you'll feel like your heart is gonna explode out of fear. That's when you know that it's working and the depth of this work. I just read that you'll be going on a meditation retreat. If you are determined to do self-inquiry in that meditation retreat, then I highly recommend you to really understand how this thing works. Or else, you'll be wasting all that time mindlessly. Read books, watch videos on Self inquiry. When self inquiry is properly done, it can shift one's experience in few minutes. You may not sustain it, that is depended on regular practice. But make sure you understand how to actually do this self inquiry. If not, then I'd recommend you to do concentration practices (like focusing on breath, sensation etc). Trying to do self-inquiry without understanding it, is a waste of time. It is not regarded as the highest form of meditation for no reason you know

That's right. You can't have any idea about it Jokes aside, let me explain: Your attention can have 2 movements 1) It can focus on Objects 2) or it can relax the focus on objects. If I tell you to focus on the sensation in your chest, you can easily do that. How long you can keep it there is depended on your concentration skill (which you can increase by practice or decrease). This is called giving attention to an object. Now once you get a hold of that sensation, ask yourself, ''What is it that knows this experience?'' That which knows must be irrefutably different than the object that is known. Because the eye can't see the eye. A sensation can't be aware of another sensation. it is YOU, the aware presence that is aware of all this object. \ When you ask that question, see for yourself how your attention relaxes on that sensation. A shift happens in the direction of your attention. Consciousness doesn't have any objective quality. So focusing on Consciousness doesn't feel the same way as focusing on an object. Be in that relaxed attentive state. That's all you have to. You're taking your stand as the knowingness itself, rather than imagining yourself as a limited object. That is ''Being aware of being aware'' in a nutshell. It is something you're doing 24/7, you're just not aware of it. That's why it is called a non-doing. Focusing on an object is called doing. This is the relaxation of that doing. Hope this clears up things a bit more.

@Viking Here are some points to play with your beliefs. See what works for you. 1) Read eye opening, unpredictable books on non duality. Books that don't feed you more new beliefs but encourages you to explore your direct experience and verify if your beliefs are confirming your experience. Presence by Rupert Spira can be good place to start. The more you see the fallacy between your experience and your assumptions, the more the beliefs corrode over time. You see the illusion here? We have never experienced a something called 'matter', yet that's probably our most unconscious belief. We believe in some external matter (external world) more than our existence itself. We think there always was, is and will be a world made of matter while I am nobody compared to that. We have such firm conviction on this thing called matter which we have never experienced, nor has it been discovered objectively. See the twist of belief here? God save us 2) Be aware of being aware/self inquiry. You don't have to know how it works. It just works! It's a dream law. If you focus more on consciousness rather than the objects in consciousness, then the objects will eventually erode and aware presence alone will remain. The dream contents (thoughts, beliefs) will loose it's hold and only the awakeness will remain. And all of this will happen 'behind your back'. You can't fight against a belief with brute force. It only reinforces it. The only food your beliefs live on is your precious attention. So instead of drooling over your beliefs, pay attention to your attention. Be aware of being aware. 3) When you're in the state of unknowing, learn to live with it. Watch your tendencies to desperately trying to make sense of things mentally. Ask yourself, 'why do I need to believe in a thing?'. 'Is my reality evaporating before my eyes if I stop believing this?', ''Will my heart beat stop if I stop believing it?'', ''If nothing really changes why do I carry around this stuff in my mind?'' ponder on these questions. See for yourself that there is no solid thing residing in you. The only way this phantom self can appear to be real is through unquestioned thoughts and beliefs. 4) Take it easy. The purging of emotions and beliefs and embodiment are some of the most advanced works. No finite, limited mind can mathematically track it or make sense of it. The bulk of this work will be happening behind your back over the years. The best thing you can do is to stop feeding the self recurring thoughts and beliefs with your attention

@Viking You don't have to believe something called a Consciousness model. That would be another believe system. The infinitely more important question is, why do you believe in a materialist paradigm? What are your assumptions and what proofs do you have to believe it? And about Consciousness being a byproduct of matter, do you really know what matter is? Quoting from Rupert Spira, '' Matter was a concept created by Greek philosophers 2,500 years ago but scientists yet haven't found something called matter'' If you can dismantle your current beliefs, assumptions and then self-inquire from a place of unknowing, then there is a possibility that you might discover something new. If you try to get rid of a belief just to fill it back up again with another set of new stories, then that's futile.

@Max_V Follow the advice stated in almost all Matt kahn videos. You can't help anyone by lowering your consciousness/freedom in the name of empathy. The only way is to keep yourself elevated no matter what.

@Widdle Puppy ''Humans are the only species that can set certain values and then pursue the completely opposite ones'' -Nathaniel Branden this all boils down to the topic of consciousness. High consciousness is never a given. You have to earn it. Every single moment, you're either upgrading your consciousness or degrading it.

I can't imagine Ramana eating meat lol. He had tremendous amount of compassion for every person and animal that lived in the ashram. When someone bought any food or souvenir as courtesy, Ramana would only eat after that was distributed among everyone present right there. As recommendation for food it is written ''Sattvic food in moderate quantity is the best''. I think your own body awareness can come here to resolve this issue. As one grows spiritually/mindfully, one becomes sensitive to food and the energy of the body. So developing consistent body awareness is a win win. It auto-corrects your diet and movement levels thus providing great benefit for the body on one hand and on the other hand it increases mindfulness/focus. Our entire body adjusts to how we act generally. I've actually tried this out. When I shift to a plant based healthier diet after eating meat daily for 2 weeks, my tummy feels bad. Because it was used to assimilate meat regularly now suddenly it is reacting against veggies. The opposite is equally true. So it may take few weeks/months to shift to a new diet properly. This reminds me of a Teal Swan video where she ranted against the classic spiritual notion that the body is the enemy for a seeker. She said that it's actually the opposite. Our bodies love us the most. Even if I start snorting cocaine regularly, the body will adjust so that the damage can be minimized as much as possible. Our bodies love us so much that it supports every single of our actions, no matter how ignorant and self-destructive it is.

@MarkusSweden I haven't directly came across the diet concept in Osho's work yet. But then again, I haven't studied much of Osho's work so I am not sure how deep he went on this topic. But at one of his lectures on youtube( more than 1 hour long satsang type setting), I heard him say that he generally lived on minimum amount of food. Every morning he would only drink a glass of juice as breakfast before having cold and hot showers one after another. His brisk aliveness and sharpness of mind came from his state of Being, not from food. Many wise people have reported that a man's tendency takes after what he eats. If you eat like a pig, you're tendency and intellect will reflect that. This is so true if we observe our diet day to day and how we generally behave. The only restraint Ramana Maharshi prescribed as the most beneficial was diet, precisely for this reason. He generally would not prescribe any other ritual or belief system or mental practices other than self-inquiry. In the end, I think when it come to food, moderation is the key. The amount and balance of the food is way more important than the content of it. And of course there are totally shitty foods that you can't justify in any way other than it tastes kinda good. They should be out of question from the beginning.

I think I've just heard the most badass thing ever!

How can you get into someone else's personal subjective experience? That seems like something that science or any other method could never crack. We can only assume and at the end of the day they are...well just our assumptions

@John Lula He actually promotes the notion of practice a lot. He also says that waking up has got nothing to do with effort. But it's the Follow Up or Clearing up or Embodiment whatever you call it, that's the real deal. In this post he clearly states that when it's about clarity, practice is a must. We are always keeping the glass window clean or we're blowing on it and making it muddy https://awakeningclaritynow.com/events/

If you're assuming that a tree falls without anyone seeing in the first place, then following that same assumption, the tree makes sound as well without anyone hearing. I was reading some commentary on Mandukya Upanishad this morning. It explained this phenomnea/qualia problem beautifully

Have you watched his youtube videos? They are really potent form of non dual guided meditation. And by being enlightened, he doesn't mean becoming buddha in 1 hour. It's waking up from the false identity even if that's for a few seconds. This is very possible with anyone if they are openminded and willing to explore honestly for like an hour leaving their beliefs and stories aside for the time being. Fred Davis is not some magician. Anyone with some solid understanding (just intellectual) on non duality can wake up from their egoic identity and have a taste of witnessing consciousness while reading a non duality book/self inquiry/guided meditation.

@Solace Thanks for the link. Those meditation techniques are explained beautifully

''I've honestly gained absolutely nothing from Enlightenment'' -Buddha ''Be a light unto yourself'' -Buddha