UnbornTao

It was more about others reading the interchange. It's an analogy. You can point to a tree but not a forest. Similarly to how you can point to a body but not to "marriage" or "fight." Anyway, this was beside the point. Washing the dishes could also be called a spiritual practice. It wouldn't be socially validated as much as fun activities would. Without attaching a spiritual narrative around it, the action, event or activity would be what it is. The action can be disdained, enjoyed or used as a way to contemplate, without placing more conceptual baggage on top or concocting a story about what the act means. But people don't seem to consider that a serious possibility. How come there's no spiritual doctrine based around the transcendence of washing the dishes? I'd say because, among other things, this would be silly to do and easy to recognize as wishful thinking. Besides, it's a mundane activity. It's better to use a "spirituality" pretext in order to justify activities that we already want to engage in so that we can give them a special meaning. "Feelings of devotion towards the sacred" is not a phrase I'd ever use. You can meditate, focus, question, go through all kinds of experiences and states, face a wall, study, write, dialogue, facilitate, take psychedelics, and do anything you want. It'd be useful to first clarify what we're doing and why, check on our expectations, and call it by its name. What are pretension and sincerity? What is an ideal?

My pleasure. Nothing like destroying your fantasies.

This is a bit like saying: Why learn to ride a bike if I'm going to fall? Falling is just a minor aspect of riding a bike, especially once you learn to ride it. Just so with life. Acknowledge positive aspects of life such as growth, creativity, intimacy, learning.

There was a guy in New York who set himself on fire fairly recently. He was not a Vietnamese Theravada monk, and this goes to show the role that fantasy plays in spiritual circles. Was that Nirvikalpa? Granted, he might have had insight into the nature of pain, although this would still be relative. It'd be recognizing the distinction/experience "pain" as a conceptual activity that is itself generated by you. Thinking of it as the result of a process is problematic, which you keep bringing up. You hold it as some sort of fantastical state. I meant stopping your brain waves, reading minds, levitating, etc. Whatever trip, state or experience you go through can't produce enlightenment and isn't necessary. This would concede that what's true of you now is missing something and that it has to be "managed" by first achieving "this or that." This goes to show that standing on one's consciousness on the matter is harder than continuously referencing adopted hearsay. Ananda, you're looking elsewhere.

@Water by the River No matter what state or experience you're in, however powerful or healing, that isn't enlightenment. This is like siddhis. Nice tricks but ultimately distractions. It is not a perception either. What you're referring to is a function of mind. It belongs to the domain of mind control.

It's entertaining mental masturbation. Of course people like him. You'd be better off with someone doing real work like Adyashanti.

Alan Watts was another charlatan. A bit out of the blue, but paying attention to what he's doing makes it clear.

It's not a perspective, but you know that, and I'm not. This is basically the reality of interaction: you can work on a tree as it is a grounded reality, physical and "occurring", while "the forest" is entirely a convenient fiction. Because they're singing and dancing. I also suspect there's a fair amount of fantasy going on there. Hence the culty vibes. This is why I dislike using terms such as spiritual. It can mean anything. If you hold it as getting in touch with your body, letting yourself go in social contexts, etc, then sing away. But at that point why call it spiritual and think it special? You could achieve the same result by going for a run or by playing video games. This is like doing hatha yoga and thinking you're getting nearer to your higher self or some such, when all you're doing is stretching your body. Just call it what it is.

Two approaches to facilitating others: Moving them into a new experience: This approach often meets resistance because it involves "taking away" their current experience in favor of introducing a new one. Pushing them into their current experience: This requires guiding them through the process of personal discovery, helping them generate an experience that more closely aligns with the one you're pointing to.

If it's meaningless, and then again, we don't know that, you can create meaning. If it's meaningless, why the negative disposition? Isn't a negative attitude towards that still operating from meaning? Of course, negative is still meaningful. Perhaps you're misunderstanding what this is about, and you are in fact free to create any meaning that you want for your life consciously. Make it empowering and healthy, and set out goals for yourself to move towards. It could be mastering a skill, becoming enlightened, becoming a professional athlete, or whatever. The point is that the purpose pushes you to new experiences and learning opportunities, and that it "embiggens" you (shows up on The Simpsons). Also: What is meaning? Something to contemplate.

I'm asking what they're doing and why. Increasing consciousness isn't limited to the absolute. Social itself doesn't exist, so working on the individual is the thing to do. In any case, pretending that rituals such as this one will somehow lead to a "spiritual" result is misleading, which is what I'm pointing out. But then again, you can use "spiritual" as an umbrella term for any kind of state or experience, specially if it is unusual. Not everything is facing a wall. Nothing against having fun, as long as it's called that. They're singing and dancing.

You win. Cheetos pizza.

I guess the next conversation could turn into: what is language?

I'd say that that would be something else, not consciousness.

It's easy to hide behind the genetics part and underestimate what you can accomplish with commitment.

What even is the purpose of that? You can go to a Taylor Swift concert and it would be as "spiritual" as this. You're right to be skeptical of rituals that are aimed at "social" purposes rather than anything real. Of course it comes off as cult behavior.

You just need to learn how to cook them. Vegetables stir fry (carrots, red pepper, onion), a bit of salt, some spices (parsley, cayenne pepper, thyme), tomato sauce, three boiled eggs, two tablespoons of this sauce (red peppers, garlic, cumin, salt, vinegar, and olive oil), and of course, a can of cooked lentils.

Ramana was free of life and death and Wilber wanted him to work at McDonalds. After being diagnosed with cancer, his students wanted him to go into treatment. Ramana's disposition, if I recall correctly, was something along the lines of: "Why? Just let me die already." This speaks not of repression or apathy but transcendence and freedom. On his deathbed, his students were beside him, crying and mourning the loss of his teacher. He said, I'm paraphrasing: "Why are you crying? Where do you think I'm going?" That is something that we find incomprehensible from here. It points to a radically different perspective than ours.

How one uses language reflects the distinctions that one employs and where one is coming from. Neither have we met Ramana, etc. About "this and that", it wouldn't be a problem if we weren't talking about the absolute. Take care not to cause diabetes with your "water."

Later this year.

The author of Nondual Perspectives on Quantum Physics is releasing a new book soon. https://tomajjavidtash.com/2018/10/29/nondual-perspectives-on-quantum-physics/