axiom

40 years of contemplation. As a five-year-old child, I would cry myself to sleep at the prospect of death. ”Who made God?” I would ask my parents, who strangely seemed unable to provide an answer. 20 years of meditation. Years of psychedelics, including full-blown metaphysical breakthrough experiences. Years more contemplation, depression, seeking, glimpsing, getting lost again. The final layer peeled away. Once finally seen it is hilarious. Immediately a previously unrecognised tension in the body / mind simply drops away. It becomes startlingly clear what was being carried in its absence. Just wow. Clarity. Perfection. @RMQualtrough You’ve got it (so to speak). Enlightenment. Trippy isn’t it? Such a wonderful and fun community that Leo built here. Not sure whether I’ll stay around… there is obviously no point now except for enjoyment. Much gratitude in any case.

Enlightenment is an all or nothing thing really. The sense of needing to change one’s experience or have a better experience tends to disappear entirely.

@KGrimes Because then the self comes back online and turns it into an experience, a strategy, a new thing to achieve, to hope for, to apply in some way to living.

I like Bernardo. Very cerebral, has some fun ideas. He is actually running an online zoom course in November over 5-6 weeks. I believe Rupert Spira is also participating at some point.

It doesn't have to take years and years. The self can seem to dissolve one morning while drinking a cup of tea. The problem is that the ego - in most apparent people - is so desperate for an answer that it will cling to anything at all. In this example, it will cling to the idea that drinking tea could maybe get it somewhere. The ego is a bit like a very hard-to-kill parasitic infection. When you think all trace of it is gone, you realise it's still there, hiding in some cell or other.

This appearance, This passing away, Happiness arising, Sadness passing away, The smell of salt, Taste and touch. The sky arising, The sun setting, Clouds cast shadows on the sea. Waves breathing, reaching, Coalescing with rain, Then Thunder, lightning, wind. Ideas arising, Passing away, Thoughts arising, Passing Away. The movement of infinity. This appearance, That appearance, Never leaving a trace.

@EternalForest True, but in a way, any spiritual seeker is just as bad. The metaphysical ego (the self) can only feel separate by definition, so it will never stop looking for ways to feel whole. It is all seen to be an excuse in the end.

Would make a fun kids' picture book. "Now little Timmy, settle down and I shall begin...

Yes. Infinite. But when there is the illusion of someone being there, it will always seem finite. It could be said that to the degree the self seems to be there, infinity will seem to present itself only in degrees of finitude. Infinity appears to be much bigger (truly infinite), and free to simply be what it is when noone is there attempting to circumscribe it.

@Breakingthewall That what is has infinite depth is not being denied. But what is can never be known. You think you are a self that can know. That is duality, and duality is the great illusion.

The duality of appearance and awareness is the very separation which fuels the seeking energy. No such duality exists. Here's a pointer: Does there appear to be awareness?

It cannot be understood.

@Someone here Bodies seem to exist. Physical organisms seem to exist. This is not about denying the existence of bodies. This is about the individual having no existence at all. There is no person "in there" (so to speak) who can do anything. There is no awareness. There is no free will. Often, when this message is heard, this phrase "awareness is an illusion" can feel totally incoherent or even crazy. So to be clearer, it turns out (after awakening) that that which was formerly considered to be awareness (i.e. before awakening) is not awareness, and never was. "So what is it?" you might ask. This. All that is. The appearance. Infinity. I would not use the word "consciousness". I like the word "appearance". Consciousness is a very misleading term as it gives rise to the idea of selves, "everyone" being "one consciousness" and so forth.

@TheAvatarState You didn't get nothing?

This is all a story. There is no time, there is no past. "Time" needs a self to measure it. The self seems to be a kind of seeking energy which erroneously takes ownership of appearances (including thoughts). It doesn't do anything else. One question : a metaphor for what? A metaphor for there being noone home (so to speak) I'm not really sure what is meant by ego death. The death of an identity, of an individual, is always illusory because there are no individuals. I would distinguish only on the grounds that they seem to appear different, and that they seem to involve a different cocktail of emotions. Physical death (as in death of the body) seems to happen. But all appearances are just appearances. Nothing is actually happening (as per your story above about Buddhism, infancy, philosophers, physical changes etc). None of that actually happened. If you are referring to death of the individual, then this never happens. The individual is already not there. There is nowhere to go. It's just this. Already.

Both. A self suffers the illusion that it can die. But the self is illusory, and thus a self can never die. There is noone here already. This could be described as "death", but it's just a metaphor.

One thing psychedelics seem to do is dilate time. As the sense of self collapses via reduction of activity in the DMN, a single note from a piece of music can seem to last for a very long time, e.g. 10 minutes. There seem to be several anecdotal reports of this. All a story, but interesting anyway. A fun pointer. Enlightenment reveals time as totally illusory - there is no one left to measure it.

Death is an illusion because there is noone there to die. In a way, death is already the case.

The sense that you are a separate person with a life and free will, and that you’re going somewhere or achieving something.

Reasoning is the experience of separation.

There is an apparent body. But it is not yours or "ours". There is no observer in the body. What seems to be an observation is an appearance, but noone is watching.

Impossible. None. This too is a story.

The notion of solipsism (of others’ minds and your mind being the same mind) is a misleading pointer. “There are no minds at all” is a better pointer. No minds. Just thoughts apparently arising. No space, no time. Thoughts, rock, sky. All of these are substantively exactly equal. Thoughts about the sky are not an abstraction, they are simply an appearance. And there is no one watching.

There may be a fear and dread as the awakening is happening. There is a profound recognition that this (the appearance) is everything. It is revealed that "you" were always being animated by infinity. It becomes obvious that you were never there. This is the cosmic joke. All tension seems to fall away, and the need to gain anything whatsoever is completely gone. It is infinite love. No judgement, and noone to judge. It becomes obvious that this is complete and perfect. Beyond words. There was never separation. All seeking is over.

It can’t be languaged, as Terence McKenna might have said. It’s hopeless, hilarious and utterly absurd. The ultimate booby prize.