UnbornTao

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Everything posted by UnbornTao

  1. In the context of this thread, if you followed Hinduism and believed in hundreds of gods, you'd be fucked. And overwhelmed. "Which one do I pick now?"
  2. @Carl-Richard The gist of it, in my view: you assume, deep down in your experience, that it is not possible for you to become absolutely conscious, therefore your focus and concern is mostly restricted to exchanging one belief system for another. Hence why I shared the video. It's got to do with the way you tend to approach these topics, and what that "says" about where your mind goes. It's essentially trying to think your way to what's true. For example, the fact that you posted this on the Consciousness subforum and not on the Intellectual one, may be hinting at this relationship. Zen stick for you. You are hearing that as an invalidation of thinking or some such. Answers are irrelevant. It's an odd thing to say, but have you ever done some long or intensive contemplation? This 'impossibility' sentiment is common but not necessarily easily located. That's what I'm pointing to. Yeah, direct consciousness applies to absolute matters. Since we're mostly dealing with existential subjects here, we can't really "get there from here," so to speak. We could think until our heads exploded - and that would be a good beginning of this investigation. Use every tool available for the job, but be aware what each is for. And be clear as to what you're doing and why. You can't think your way to what's existentially or absolutely true, because a thought is just a thought - it's never the thing it refers to. Don't let the apparent simplicity of this fact prevent you from recognizing the principle underlying it. That said, there's real merit to activities like thinking, planning, feeling, intuiting, testing frameworks, applying attention, drawing on memory, observing without bias, experimenting, and so on - when it comes to relative matters.
  3. @Sugarcoat But why is the physical one your concern? Rarely is that the prominent form of suffering for most of us. There's not much that can be done about physical pain, except handling it in various ways that can hopefully decrease it or make it tolerable. Another pursuit is grasping what pain is at its root - but again, that's advanced shit. What you are suffering is fear, so your subject could be fear, first and foremost. Stop imagining a future and pain can't be feared. Whenever something physically painful occurs, you may well suffer that, but at least the double suffering of fearing pain is no longer present. Suffering has many forms. We generally can notice how such seemingly innocuous experiences such as craving something or being jealous can be based on suffering. So, lots to uncover in this domain. I invite you to consider, you don't. You think you do, but you have yet to make the connections in your experience. It happens because you do it. You are responsible for it. This may be difficult to see but it is an essential recognition. We're talking about mental-emotional suffering, not physical pain. Wonderful. That helps. Also, focus on your breathing, and breath from the center (slightly below one's navel). Who's doing your mind? Again, small experiments are useful here. For example, when experiencing discomfort while sitting down, can you find something that isn't strictly physical, such as annoyance or impatience? Stay with that a little and question it as it occurs. We can learn a lot from that, hopefully make new distinctions.
  4. CBD

    @Sugarcoat Alright, thanks. You can always ask GPT about it. Good luck.
  5. CBD

    It gives me a calm focus. To be clear, are you talking about a skin product? If so, I have no experience with that. Yeah, do some research first and consult a professional if needed.
  6. You didn't explicitly say it. I inferred it based on what and how you tend to post on these topics. Of course, the intuition could be wrong, but I'll take my chances. The 'impossibility' assumption regarding personal knowledge of the absolute doesn't present itself as a belief. It operates in the background of one's questioning, as if. It's a rather common sentiment, consisting of holding the matter of absolute consciousness as "not really possible for me." Based on that, the only possibility we have left is to deal with various kinds of conceptual frameworks and beliefs.
  7. "Leave me alone you weirdo, I don't even know you. Geez."
  8. Great. My intention with that was to ground the discussion a bit.
  9. That's a reasonable take in principle. Psychic abilities are possible but I'm not sure that connecting with a long-dead person you barely know anything about falls into that category - unless, perhaps, you're taking creative liberties with that, or are being metaphorical. Also, calling it "sainthood" already invites too much fantastical thinking. I haven't investigated this topic deeply, but what comes to mind are a powerful intuition and seemingly magical feeling-states - like sensing someone's intentions before they act. Still, these would have to be grounded in something real, such as abnormally high sensitivity or awareness, rather than mere wishful thinking. Obviously, it's not about guessing the winning lottery numbers. It's already difficult to discern what's a purely subjective experience and what's grounded in reality. Throw in the drugs, and you've got a recipe for disaster.
  10. You are like the therapist on the video. The belief presents itself as true - it is experienced as real, or as the way reality is. The key is consciously recognizing it as belief. Look into what a belief is.
  11. Of course - that's the point. See above: there's a difference between the legend and the man. He was a human. Could you imagine him swearing, getting dressed, or taking a shit? Apparently, he had some anger management issues, too. For sure. I'm not saying he wasn't a profoundly enlightened guy. Then again, what do we know for sure? How much of it is historical hearsay? The gripe is with the way people relate to this whole business. It's worth checking what you actually know about historical figures. People, by and large, are followers - they want to be told how to behave and what to believe.
  12. Ahh, thanks. Hey, I had to come up with a full sentence on short notice.
  13. It's the Buddha - he's got the biggest ego. Regarding the segment on the mind, it's better left as something to contemplate. (Also, fancy way of saying 'I don't really know').
  14. The fantasy and faith-based thinking does. For starters, did any of us meet Jesus? What do we know about him?
  15. Why project annoyance when presented with a question? I mean it. Don't we all generally take our perceptions at face value? Anyway, I guess I sidetracked the thread. My contender is the sentence: @This @Koala @Isa @Loaded Shaman
  16. @Water by the River Who, in his or her own mind, is not selling water by the river? Who's @Peeing by the River?
  17. Emotions are an unconscious drive for people in general, although I'm not clear on what is feeling and what is emotion.
  18. I know it wasn't the point; I was just sharing that little fun fact. Probably exclude Trump from the list - but leave Santa. @Carl-Richard's gaydar, of course. (for context, there's another thread where some of us joked about this.) On a serious note, the direct consciousness itself is the 'who.'
  19. It's funny, the existence of Lao Tzu as a real historical person is uncertain, and there's no scholarly consensus on the matter.
  20. Yeah. It's useful to start with basic facts: Jesus was a man who lived and died thousands of years ago. We readily conflate the image or legend with the individual.