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Wei Shan Yang wrote:haha, Gonzo, try the hear what I'm saying. I'm not saying its all thought, I'm saying there is more to see than thought is telling. So its thought is, to phrase it another way... "is that certain?" aka lets question these assumptions rather then assume they are true.
Is there such a thing as birth? We have seen birth occur around us, but that could be because it was the inception planted, like in dreams. Our own birth we do not recall, cannot remember. Maybe we could hypnotize ourselves and have a birth recall, but how firm would such a recall be? The birth event will never be as certain as say the day we graduated high school or the day we learned to ride a bike. These events we consciously recall, but birth is not a conscious recollection. Yet we believe it so certainly due to everyone believes it and its seen all around. The only missing piece is our own experience of it at the time it supposedly happened. What is birth like (experientially)? What is begining like? A true beginning? We don't knwo. So why believe it's a certainty it even happened?!
Again, you believe all is thought, not me. I want to get past that assertion. You are not being facetious as I see it, you are just not seeing the distinction. Thought is one of the 5 aggregates in Buddhism, from which arises a view of ignorance and it is ignorance that must be overcome to experience enlightenment. Its not all thought, cannot be, thought is one component and is interconnected. I have said this to you before and so remind you about it here.
Heard a quote yesterday "What is thought? No matter. What is matter?" Nevermind." But take one away from this interconnected relationship and both are unqualified. So neither one originated the other, they are interdependent.
Heard a quote yesterday "What is thought? No matter. What is matter?"
Nevermind." But take one away from this interconnected relationship and
both are unqualified. So neither one originated the other, they are
interdependent.
If I may, thought is a physiological occurrence. Stimulus--->action potential in a neuron that coincides with the area of the brain stimulated---->thought. The magic may be in the stimulus rather than the thought itself. What causes a thought? What causes a part of the brain to "fire"? Thoughts are as much matter as breath imo.
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SelfHealedMadman wrote:Wei Shan Yang wrote:
About that movie... when I saw it I was noticing how its implied to the audience that there is even a waking realm in the first place...its just something taken for granted. That a waking is intrinsically different than the dreaming layers. Then a tension in the movie builds around this need to find/get back to the "real" realm.
Saw Inception last night. Very interesting.
Yes Wei, your comments above are accurate. I also noticed this in the movie, The Matrix, as well. My first thought was, after he was 'awakened,' "how do you know you're not in yet another matrix?"
I've not much to add at this point. A bit rattled due to the fact that when the team went to get the new chemist, that basement scene with all the dreamers was very familiar. Several years ago I Dreamed that exact setup as in the movie. A bit unnerving. Hey SHM, just now saw your post, would have responded sooner...
Yes, I thought it was also very similar to the Matrix, but it had its own unique take and was actually more relevant to our experience of existence. This idea of dreams within dreams and we think there is an anchorpoint which is the waking realm, but the waking is just a slower vibration of dreaming for instance.
Something is happening in perception, and its the inception of the idea of the real vs the unreal. The real "us" is in waking, the unreal us is in dreaming. Just an inception ...this idea. Another one: the real us is separate from other things around us. Such as, the real us is the perceiver, the perceived is a result of that. So the perceiver is the essence, the reality "seen" is a byproduct of that essence. That's what is implied in the movie, that these people have essences and reside in their waking realm and that the dream layers are byproducts of their true state. The solidification of a true state is the inception doing its work in the most extreme sense. Because its been anchored, fear can then be inserted into the "dream" with the threat being the loss or hijacking of essence of whats perceived as real self, (waking).
The movie puts forth the idea at the end, at least this is how I interpreted it, of "is there even such a thing as a true state (essence) of reality that is more than dreaming? and if not, then all is dreaming." My friend who was with me was uncomfortable with the ending and I see this as the uneasiness of temporarily losing the anchorpoint of solidification and so she tried to reestablish it by asking questions such as "ok, what happened, did he get back to his real life?" So she was going to anchor it eventually with whatever conclusion she came up with becasue her intent ws not so much to understand, but ratehr to re-anchor herself to the idea of a solid reality.
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On a related note, I was watching a documentary of haunting and one of the testimonies was of a man who described a demonic presence in his house as a whirlwind influence in that it would suck attention into its vortex. The destabilizing of the integrity (and here I mean integrity in the functional sense, such as a building stands by the integrity of sound construction) being the result, as if one would be swept into the current of a whirlwind. He didn't elaborate on whirlwind as I have here, he merely mentioned it was much like coming into contact with a whirlwind. If such a current destabilizes, it can then establish a new anchorpoint.
To give an example, back to my friend after the movie. She was uncomfortable, not talking as we left the theater because she was still thinking about the movie, that feeling held her and she wanted to find conclusion (rest). Granted her discomfort was not extreme, keeping in perspective it was a movie, but the idea of being held by a thought that was like a current spinning and destabilizing and within all this was the implication to regain solid footing. So that alerts that her anchoring to begin with (before entering the theater) was not her own anchoring (integrity), but that of the inception of another, lets say. Obviously if it can be manipulated, then its not in her own and was put there by someone else.
And I realize I'm bringing up the notion of self here, but for the sake of the unfolding of the story, this is something clearly seen and I think relevant here. That, why would an anchorpoint that is supposed to offer self-stability actually do the opposite? That is, actually serve as a means, very direct means, for another to be able to destabilize someone?
And to present this in another way...the fact that we have essences should comfort us, yet how many people walk around in comfort? Most don't. For example, many attend church because they fear their essence will not have an afterlife. Yet if they have an essence, why the fear? Is not the assuption then that such essence isn't truly theirs and they must fight for it? So essence has been tampered with in a way to make it what its not. And this gioes beyond religious people, everyone has a fear that can be manipulated and so any idea of essence does not help them in any way.
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"If I may, thought is a physiological occurrence. Stimulus--->action potential in a neuron that coincides with the area of the brain stimulated---->thought. The magic may be in the stimulus rather than the thought itself. What causes a thought? What causes a part of the brain to "fire"? Thoughts are as much matter as breath imo."
I take it you equate thoughts as being part of matter. How did matter begin, come into being?
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~
Hi Wei! I'll put your previous comments in "quotes".
“Yes, I thought it was also very similar to the Matrix, but it had its own unique take and was actually more relevant to our experience of existence. This idea of dreams within dreams and we think there is an anchor point which is the waking realm, but the waking is just a slower vibration of dreaming for instance”.
SHM: Agreed. I like that, “a slower vibration of Dreaming.”
“Something is happening in perception, and it’s the inception of the idea of the real vs. the unreal. The real "us" is in waking, the unreal us is in dreaming. Just an inception ...this idea. Another one: the real us is separate from other things around us. Such as, the real us is the perceiver, the perceived is a result of that. So the perceiver is the essence, the reality "seen" is a byproduct of that essence. That's what is implied in the movie, that these people have essences and reside in their waking realm and that the dream layers are byproducts of their true state. The solidification of a true state is the inception doing its work in the most extreme sense. Because its been anchored, fear can then be inserted into the "dream" with the threat being the loss or hijacking of essence of what’s perceived as real self, (waking)”.
SHM: You mention, “Because its been anchored...” Thus the question, what’s being anchored? Our perception?
“The real us” is interesting as well. In chat we spoke about ‘reality.’ What’s reality? I mentioned that reality is a position of the AP (assemblage point) anchored. Our attention held in this AP position. Another idea mentioned is that reality is this here and now, this waking state. We always return to it.
Yet, if we look at it from a different perspective, as don Juan mentioned the Double dreaming us, how does it change? What if reality is the Double, and our waking state is a journey into the unknown? Reality isn’t the correct word for what I’m describing, but fun to speculate
“The movie puts forth the idea at the end, at least this is how I interpreted it, of "is there even such a thing as a true state (essence) of reality that is more than dreaming? and if not, then all is dreaming.""
SHM: Understood. Here’s one for you: If reality is nothing more than a Dream, why be concerned about death if ‘our experience’ isn’t real? Where does that leave the idea of ‘Death as an Advisor?’
Here’s another idea: If experience isn’t real or fact, what is experience?
I know these are loaded statements assuming a great deal, and I’m all over the place here, but it’s fun to throw ideas out
“My friend who was with me was uncomfortable with the ending and I see this as the uneasiness of temporarily losing the anchor point of solidification and so she tried to reestablish it by asking questions such as "ok, what happened, did he get back to his real life?" So she was going to anchor it eventually with whatever conclusion she came up with because her intent was not so much to understand, but rather to re-anchor herself to the idea of a solid reality.”
SHM: This ‘anchoring’ is interesting. It reminds me again of the AP; Dreaming is used to move it, Stalking is used to anchor it. I think where the issue comes in, with everyone at some point, is that of taking one ‘anchored point’ as MORE REAL than another.
It once again reminds me of Castaneda’s work, when he was ingesting hallucinogens. His AP (reality?) was moved and remained unstable. Juan needed him to anchor, using his shields, which of course is daily life after the hallucinogens. Daily patterns become entrenched anchors, even though we should be able to move about freely.
“To give an example, back to my friend after the movie. She was uncomfortable, not talking as we left the theater because she was still thinking about the movie, that feeling held her and she wanted to find conclusion (rest). Granted her discomfort was not extreme, keeping in perspective it was a movie, but the idea of being held by a thought that was like a current spinning and destabilizing and within all this was the implication to regain solid footing. So that alerts that her anchoring to begin with (before entering the theater) was not her own anchoring (integrity), but that of the inception of another, lets say. Obviously if it can be manipulated, then its not in her own and was put there by someone else.”
SHM: This reminds me belief and disbelief, per the movie reference.
An anchored bound AP is the same as a muscle-bound body; ineffective in a situation that requires flexibility of action. For an AP to be free, it must not be too tied to logic, or anchored.
Logic is to the mind what muscle is to the body. It is the muscle of the mind that gives power to discriminate between what works and what doesn’t. But all of knowledge is sourced through logic, and is but a tip of the iceberg of the wisdom available to mankind, or freely moving AP’s to sorcerers.
Logic, like muscle, is very useful in daily life, but taken as an end in itself, and using it to support a personal agenda, severely limits available opportunity.
Disbelief actually works in the same way as belief. We arrive at both through logical deduction. Disbelieving is believing in the impossibility of a thing because there is no logical possibility of it being so (within the sphere of our particular experience or with the movie, Inception).
However, availability to all possibility says that we must be free to act without belief, or disbelief - neither believing nor disbelieving, because these are essentially the same.
In Dreams, we can fly like a bird, breathe under water like a fish, and even pass through walls. These are examples of suspending disbelief. Loving our enemy, in spite of his obvious perfidy, persevering at a task when failure seems immanent, these are examples of suspending disbelief.
Walking on hot coals and not burning the feet, or staring at the sun and not harming your eyes are exercises in this regard. Ultimately, of course there is no need for us to test ourselves, self-consciously, because the Universe is already doing it at every moment.
However, we use self-conscious testing at times because it can awaken us to what is going on around us, when otherwise we might remain ignorant of the great opportunities available to us through suspension of disbelief.
We must learn to let go of disbelief.
This gives us the ability to act without motive – from a state of emptiness or freedom. This then is true action, unpremeditated.
Living in the relative world or an anchored AP is like going to the movies; suspending disbelief.
“And I realize I'm bringing up the notion of self here, but for the sake of the unfolding of the story, this is something clearly seen and I think relevant here. That, why would an anchorpoint that is supposed to offer self-stability actually do the opposite? That is, actually serve as a means, very direct means, for another to be able to destabilize someone”?
SHM: My first thought on this is personal history. Our socialized nature. It’s not our true nature. It becomes destabilized because we’re defending a false point; our personal history. It goes back to what you mentioned, being real. We ‘think’ that reality is this AP position we’re most familiar with. For the majority of us, this ‘here and now’ is reality. Yet, what of the sorcerer? Or, the mental patient? If one’s ever been to a mental ward, I can assure you that these folks do not see ‘real’ and ‘reality’ the way the majority of us do. Is their ‘world’ any less ‘real’?
Another answer may be that life is full of contradictions, or, just our limited perception and understanding of an ‘anchor point.’
“And to present this in another way...the fact that we have essences should comfort us, yet how many people walk around in comfort? Most don't. For example, many attend church because they fear their essence will not have an afterlife. Yet if they have an essence, why the fear? Is not the assuption then that such essence isn't truly theirs and they must fight for it? So essence has been tampered with in a way to make it what its not. And this gioes beyond religious people, everyone has a fear that can be manipulated and so any idea of essence does not help them in any way”.
SHM: I’ve read this a couple of times and am still a bit foggy on what you refer to as ‘essence.’ Could you define it for me? Is essence our soul? The totality of the self? The habitual AP position?
As to fear….huge topic.
I think fear in the manner you are using the word, is of not understanding the two words, “I-Am.” It’s the thinking mind that brings about the fear of not understanding who or what we are. Similar to the purpose of life. Why are we here? This of course brings me to duality, which is another topic for another time
Thanks Wei for your time and your thoughtful replies. Hopefully this post makes sense, as I realize I’m all over the place with it
SHM
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Hi SHM,
Thanks for your insights, gives much to respond to and to keep these ideas flowing! I really like these sorts of discussions that get to the heart of experience.
SHM: You mention, “Because its been anchored...” Thus the question, what’s being anchored? Our perception?
Yes! But here’s the rub, perception cannot truly be anchored, it’s like a flowing stream of water continually on the move; it’s an elusive thing where when you look for the previous moment its gone. Or an example, you meet a friend on the street corner one day, the next day you cross the same corner and your friend is not there, so it was a synchronous event that you originally ran into the friend (unplanned) but you can’t necessarily produce that perceptual event again. But there is a way to ”manufacture” a sense of stability and predictability (repetition), and that’s by returning repeatedly to an idea and so now we come again to the term inception.
In the movie what is inserted into the dream and consequently perception of the dreamer is the inception of an idea specifically, and that is determined by the outcome wishing to be produced by the inserter. Now since perception is not a fixed thing, then first the inception that perception IS a fixed thing would have to occur. This last sentence is most important, the idea that perception is a fixed thing. So what could do this? What inception could accomplish the equivalent of a perceived damming up of the flowing river of perception, not truly but the appearance of?
That inception would be to establish linear time, insinuating a beginning, middle and end to perception itself. Then perception becomes something measurable, something fixed.
How does this occur? It occurs when we are young and everyone around us insists upon linear time and that we acknowledge our birth, enduring life and eventual death. And we thought birthdays were for fun, truly they are part of a vast sinister plot, bwaahahha. I am joking a bit, lol. But certainly a birthday will help to anchor perception, will it not?
Instead of a following river that was so from beginningless time, what is perceived is an origination, and coupled with it a sense of luck that it occurred, and with that a fear of it's ending. So fear has now entering into the landscape (fear being the tool of manipulation). Fear of losing perception that began apparently at birth and is enduring now, but soon will end. And around this is the appearance that it’s all so normal and nearly everyone will confirm it’s so for each other. You mention logic later in your post, this is a good example, that logic is the glue that holds everything linear together. Nagarjuna’s text does a full out assault on logic, and shakes those foundations. The idea of a self that originated (is born) just does not hold up to logic, the very means that was believed to give it validity in the first place. That’s when you begin to smell a rat, when you see that even the logic it’s founded on is not logical.
“The real us” is interesting as well. In chat we spoke about ‘reality.’ What’s reality? I mentioned that reality is a position of the AP (assemblage point) anchored. Our attention held in this AP position. Another idea mentioned is that reality is this here and now, this waking state. We always return to it.
Yet, if we look at it from a different perspective, as don Juan mentioned the Double dreaming us, how does it change? What if reality is the Double, and our waking state is a journey into the unknown? Reality isn’t the correct word for what I’m describing, but fun to speculate
Yes, I would say all that’s perceived is a reality. The only mistake is to perceive and then see it as not reality, or that one perception or realm is more real than another. Again, this is what’s being done. The waking is often seen as the reality, where we are born live and die, and dreaming is but an extension of that, so not really "real", only in the sense of imagery and subconscious expression, so it’s down-graded to like a sub-reality that is merely an extension of the waking person. But like you said, if the dreaming double dreams the waking, then suddenly it’s like the dream is reality and the waking is not as real, but rather a substrate of the dreamer. But, why not both as realities? Why is it even felt there is a need to decide?
“The movie puts forth the idea at the end, at least this is how I interpreted it, of "is there even such a thing as a true state (essence) of reality that is more than dreaming? and if not, then all is dreaming.""
SHM: Understood. Here’s one for you: If reality is nothing more than a Dream, why be concerned about death if ‘our experience’ isn’t real? Where does that leave the idea of ‘Death as an Advisor?’
Its not that we should not be concerned about death, its that we should unravel the twisted version of reality that holds us in fear and thus a control that is not our own doing. The fear will drive us, but we reach a point where fear no longer drives us when we no longer fear dying. Suffering can still motivate us then. Unlike fear, which is an unwanted outcome of events, suffering is what’s happening here and now. So the wish to end all suffering becomes more prominent than the previous fear. Both were useful allies so both are functional and aid in evolution. And death as an adviser works when a sense of self is intact as an active idea, once that is vanquished completely though, suffering becomes the next hurdle. Maybe it does not happen quite like one after the other, but more often simultaneously. But I do believe that suffering is the last obstacle rather than death. So after we lose death as an advisor, we still have suffering as an advisor and we keep pressing for evolution away from it.
Here’s another idea: If experience isn’t real or fact, what is experience?
For me, it’s that experience IS real and impermanent. So “fact” would not be something very reliable in impermanence. Such as gravity is a fact to many people, but one day it’s not a fact anymore when one can defy it. So never should reality or experience be seen as fixed. Its real but we can’t grasp it. Only experience it. And the rules continually change as perception changes. That’s why a shaman can shapeshift for example. Or yogis can walk through walls. Because they have dispelled the idea of permanent laws in reality. The idea, inception, is what holds a view of permanence. A new inception, impermanence, opens possibilities previous unavailable. Experience is dreamlike but its real at the same time.
“My friend who was with me was uncomfortable with the ending and I see this as the uneasiness of temporarily losing the anchor point of solidification and so she tried to reestablish it by asking questions such as "ok, what happened, did he get back to his real life?" So she was going to anchor it eventually with whatever conclusion she came up with because her intent was not so much to understand, but rather to re-anchor herself to the idea of a solid reality.”
SHM: This ‘anchoring’ is interesting. It reminds me again of the AP; Dreaming is used to move it, Stalking is used to anchor it. I think where the issue comes in, with everyone at some point, is that of taking one ‘anchored point’ as MORE REAL than another.
Yes, absolutely. I could not agree more. The whole ability to manipulate and be manipulated springs from this idea, which is an origination idea. Because, the only way to view one thing as more real than another is to give one precedence. First Cause.
So to anchor in the understanding that its all real and spontaneously arising, changes the dynamics in the playing field.
“Dreaming is used to move it, Stalking is used to anchor it.”
Great insight!
Now here’s a question for you: Do you see any way we can we get beyond these two precepts? And, if so, how?
It once again reminds me of Castaneda’s work, when he was ingesting hallucinogens. His AP (reality?) was moved and remained unstable. Juan needed him to anchor, using his shields, which of course is daily life after the hallucinogens. Daily patterns become entrenched anchors, even though we should be able to move about freely.
The consensual agreement of the collective social understandings works like a force of inertia and often and effectively reestablishes connection to anchors, so it’s like a two steps forward, one step back scenario. But for a person on the path of liberating all this, understanding the hidden core Lex alludes to is essential! And it blasts away the force of inertia of this collective in a way that it is greatly weakened if not done away with all together. Again Nagarjuna is really good for this. So establishing a new anchor point that is adaptive and counteracts inertia of a social collective. It’s a superior anchor point in that it has the vantage of seeing the social anchoring and avoiding such as a result of knowing what the remedy is. Its not the end of the road, but rather just the beginning of a new venture.
These are my views and experiences anyway.
Ok, part 2 coming soon : )
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“It’s a superior anchor point in that it has the vantage of seeing the social anchoring and avoiding such, as a result of knowing what the remedy is.”
And to correlate this with the movie…Di Caprio got the first half…”seeing the social anchoring” and knowing how to maneuver it, but he didn’t know the remedy to it so he was a victim to the inception as well. And the idea here in this thread, the hidden core, centers around seeing the second part (the remedy) and thus overcoming the drawback of having only partial information.
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“And to present this in another way...the fact that we have essences should comfort us, yet how many people walk around in comfort? Most don't. For example, many attend church because they fear their essence will not have an afterlife. Yet if they have an essence, why the fear? Is not the assuption then that such essence isn't truly theirs and they must fight for it? So essence has been tampered with in a way to make it what its not. And this gioes beyond religious people, everyone has a fear that can be manipulated and so any idea of essence does not help them in any way”.
SHM: I’ve read this a couple of times and am still a bit foggy on what you refer to as ‘essence.’ Could you define it for me? Is essence our soul? The totality of the self? The habitual AP position?
Ok SHM, you are really good at intuiting my posts so I want to give you the answer that best gets to what I mean.
Essence as I'm referring to it is anything which evokes fear of death. But its not something feared at first, essence is at first loved, adored by all who conceive of it, until certain thoughts, inceptions, occur and seem to pose a threat to the essence so beloved. This essence takes different forms depending on the awareness of the one experiencing it. The fact that it takes so many forms gives it a quality of being something truly unique, but again fear stalks it constantly. The uniqueness is the pleasure derived from it even if short-lived. Pain (fear) is endured only because of its (essence's) promising fulfillment (which never arrives) of security.
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~
“The idea of a self that originated (is born) just does not hold up to logic, the very means that was believed to give it validity in the first place. That’s when you begin to smell a rat, when you see that even the logic it’s founded on is not logical.”
Ah yes. This was the spark for me. I love logic as a tool and use it to…devour itself. I also enjoy sitting or meditation. Action/Surrender.
“But, why not both as realities? Why is it even felt there is a need to decide”?
Key point here, indeed. Dualism. Good/bad, right/wrong, action/result. We live in a dualistic world and it’s helpful to understand this…it’s just that it’s not the entire picture.
"Its not that we should not be concerned about death, its that we should unravel the twisted version of reality that holds us in fear and thus a control that is not our own doing. The fear will drive us, but we reach a point where fear no longer drives us when we no longer fear dying. Suffering can still motivate us then. Unlike fear, which is an unwanted outcome of events, suffering is what’s happening here and now. So the wish to end all suffering becomes more prominent than the previous fear. Both were useful allies so both are functional and aid in evolution. And death as an adviser works when a sense of self is intact as an active idea, once that is vanquished completely though, suffering becomes the next hurdle. Maybe it does not happen quite like one after the other, but more often simultaneously. But I do believe that suffering is the last obstacle rather than death. So after we lose death as an advisor, we still have suffering as an advisor and we keep pressing for evolution away from it.”
Agreed.
Death occurs always in a here/now environment. Death is never related to our ideas of the future, present and past. Nor is it to our idea of here and there. Death, as an energetic phenomenon, compresses all of our five measuring units into one. The energetic shock brought about by this is of such magnitude that our life force is dissolved, unable to keep our energetic fields together anymore.
As to suffering, it is indeed an obstacle!
SHM: Dreaming is used to move it; Stalking is used to anchor it.
WEI: Great insight!
Now here’s a question for you: Do you see any way we can we get beyond these two precepts? And, if so, how?
SHM: Well, I don’t know. I’m wondering if there’s a need to get beyond these. How about this idea. Perform ‘inception’ on ourselves in Dreaming, plant a new idea within ourselves? Not good or bad, just an expanding of our awareness, pushing further…
“But for a person on the path of liberating all this, understanding the hidden core Lex alludes to is essential”!
Speaking of Lex, where’s he at?
“Essence as I'm referring to it is anything which evokes fear of death. But its not something feared at first, essence is at first loved, adored by all who conceive of it, until certain thoughts, inceptions, occur and seem to pose a threat to the essence so beloved. This essence takes different forms depending on the awareness of the one experiencing it. The fact that it takes so many forms gives it a quality of being something truly unique, but again fear stalks it constantly. The uniqueness is the pleasure derived from it even if short-lived. Pain (fear) is endured only because of its (essence's) promising fulfillment (which never arrives) of security”.
Fear of death is certainly present. I’ll also say that fear of no-self comes into play once the fear of death is understood. Once again, another obstacle
As to pain…would you say fear is the action that leads to pain, the result?
Aaron Niemzovitch, a chess master, once said that the threat is stronger than the execution. This is a basic principle, which has been corroborated by centuries of practice. Extrapolating this to the everyday world, it could be said that fear of pain is stronger than pain itself.
There is no spiritual pain. There is only physical pain. The social order's last line of defense is sustained on weapons that cause physical pain and death. The only interest of "spiritual" or mental pain, in terms of this conspiracy, is that it eventually develops into physical pain.
There are two kinds of pain. The natural one, felt by the body through the nervous system as a cold abstract feeling, and the one composed by the sum of this natural pain and fear. This type of pain we call "disease", and we also have a very thorough taxonomy for its diverse manifestations.
Pain does not kill. Pain is a sensation, as cold and abstract as the sensation of hunger, thirst, sexual arousement, sneezing, itching and practically an infinite number of physical and sensorial possibilities.
Pain plus fear, however, do kill. This combination is lethal. It's like the case of two gasses that are completely harmless when isolated, but highly explosive if mixed.
Pain and fear create a vicious cycle of the most energy-draining patterns. They build a mutual feedback that compromises all of the physical body's resources until they are no longer sufficient to stop death. This loss of energy is manifested as an uprising depression which is common to all people affected with disease.
Fear of upcoming pain increases pain, since it compromises new energetic resources of the body in order to attack this fear. Fear of death as an unknown, alien factor increases the speed of the vicious cycle of illness.
I’m getting off-track, so I’ll end here
SHM
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Fringe & Inception
Wow I just saw the season opener of Fringe and it is dealing with the inception theme. In Fringe there are two parallel universes where the same people inhabit both universes, parallel versions of each other. The universes though mostly similar have evolved slightly differently. One of the main characters from “our” version of reality had years ago travelled to the “other” universe years previously. Complications arose (too complicated to expound here if your not familiar with the show) complications that had a destabilizing effect on the other universe. The other universe saw this “trespassing” as an ultimately hostile threat as they did not know how to travel between universes. The other universe is portrayed as slightly dark and very paranoid at least in its power structures and their knowledge of this other/our universe.
Years later a team from “our” universe travels to the other universe. The national security adviser of the other universe has a plan to deal with the situation. He captures one of the team and then lets the team from our universe escape back to our version of reality however one of the team is one of his agents from “their” reality a female FBI agent. The team from our universe does not know they have an embedded agent amongst them working for the other side.
The captured agent is subjected to all kinds of special drug treatments and very subtle therapy aimed at convincing her she is actually the person from that “other” side. The season opener focuses on the insidious inception aimed at stabilizing certain memories, of the agent sent to “our” side, within the captured agent (now over there). The show ends with therapy apparently successful and the captured agent now believing she just suffered a temporary psychotic break that she has now recovered from. Some of the people she is interacting with are in the know and some family members are not and they too believe it is actually her. The end result is the NSA head guy now has two embedded agents in both realities. Considering what we have been discussing watching how the inception takes hold is particularly eerie.
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Thanks Lex, I'll record this. It's not on yet, here.
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“The idea of a self that originated (is born) just does not hold up to logic, the very means that was believed to give it validity in the first place. That’s when you begin to smell a rat, when you see that even the logic it’s founded on is not logical.”
Ah yes. This was the spark for me. I love logic as a tool and use it to…devour itself. I also enjoy sitting or meditation. Action/Surrender.
Use logic to devour itself, that’s great! One of my favorite examples of this, which is just a mental exercise of revealing logic rather than something of spiritual implication, is to examine finite and infinity. Poe wrote about this in Eureka. Poe was quite a metaphysical pioneer for his time and culture. He wrote that we cannot comprehend either finity or infinity. We only imagine we can. Such as we imagine space continuing infinitely and then conclude we have grasped infinity, but we only followed the visual of expanding space for a few moments in the mind’s eye and ended the visualization with the idea it continued forever, of which we could never witness first-hand because we would have to hold our view of it for infinity, lol.
Then he talks about finity. That we find it impossible to imagine an end to space, because we visualize the perimeters but see a darkness beyond the borders, which defines the borders of finite space, but truly that darkness is seeing “something” rather than “nothing”. If space ends we should see beyond it “no-space” but we cannot do this! He then points out that we reject finity, for this reason, as a possibility because we find it a greater impossibility than infinity. But adds at the end of his discourse, how can one impossible thing be any more or less impossible than another? If two things are impossible, that impossibleness is equally impossible! So he’s just saying we grasp neither infinity or finity, but logic tells us we have grasped infinity so we choose it as a means to explain the universe, thinking we have truly experienced it, then become apathetic about this logic so as to accept it without examination. But spatially speaking, both infinity and finity are equally unexperiencable, so both impossible. Logic merely chooses to endorse one over the other. Logic can be very flimsy and is in many many cases. So using logic to devour itself is something I do too because it’s so effective, probably what logic is best for…outdoing itself.
“But, why not both as realities? Why is it even felt there is a need to decide”?
Key point here, indeed. Dualism. Good/bad, right/wrong, action/result. We live in a dualistic world and it’s helpful to understand this…it’s just that it’s not the entire picture.
I want to delve very briefly into human history here. It’s good if only in the metaphorical sense, the myths of story-telling that convey otherwise intangible understanding…
In prehistoric times there were clans and the need to separate from neighboring clans, so each developed a unique view of reality and then children born into the clans were taught that ideology so that it became a normal view of reality that would reject other views of reality as “unreal”. So it was an intentional wish to make one reality real and other realities (of other clans) un-real, as a means of protecting and nurturing individual clans by identification and solidification of them. For example, one clan may have designated a certain tree sacred, an nearby clan may have dismissed that clans claim and said instead the mountain nearby was sacred. So the children of the first clan worship the tree and not the mountain and the other clan the opposite. If you asked these children, and even ask them as adults, “why do you worship this particular object?” they would reply simply “because it IS sacred. And the other object of the other clan is not.”
In modern times there not many strict clans because they have long ago expanded populations and have become cultures moreso. So cultures did the same thing as clans but due to large numbers began to diversify, and it became harder to contain “one view” of reality. This threat lead to many wars, the fear of one culture being changed by another, a fear akin to death itself, losing what is sacred (the identity of clan or culture).
Now is a very interesting time, very very interesting, lol. The global economy almost prevents wars like of previous times occurring, all the most populated cultures have become interdependent on trade and livelihood. So despite their differences, instead of warring they are forced to negotiate. As they negotiate they are compelled to incorporate these alternate realities in order to get along. So, on a mass scale notions of reality are expanding so that many are currently learning to embrace alternate realities as being equally real. It’s the old world beliefs that held the view of one reality against all others as false, and this view is dying out, by necessity and expansion.
As a result, the dualistic view now seems less evident. Such as, there is good, bad, semi-good, semi-bad, neutral, empathetic, on and on. Neutral would be not caring about good or bad, and empathetic is to see both good and bad in the light of understanding. There is also observational (scientific), which cares to observe, is not neutral or apathetic, nor caring and empathetic, but rather curious to learn but not attached. So these are like thought nations, each different but not completely distinct, they all reflect each other and can be transitioned into the next (and hybrided). In an evolutionary sense (mythical sense) we are learning to incorporate all perceived realities into the expanse of reality being experience itself rather than a specific truth that would disclaim other truths. And this has the effect of freeing perception (losing anchoring).
"Its not that we should not be concerned about death, its that we should unravel the twisted version of reality that holds us in fear and thus a control that is not our own doing. The fear will drive us, but we reach a point where fear no longer drives us when we no longer fear dying. Suffering can still motivate us then. Unlike fear, which is an unwanted outcome of events, suffering is what’s happening here and now. So the wish to end all suffering becomes more prominent than the previous fear. Both were useful allies so both are functional and aid in evolution. And death as an adviser works when a sense of self is intact as an active idea, once that is vanquished completely though, suffering becomes the next hurdle. Maybe it does not happen quite like one after the other, but more often simultaneously. But I do believe that suffering is the last obstacle rather than death. So after we lose death as an advisor, we still have suffering as an advisor and we keep pressing for evolution away from it.”
Agreed.
Death occurs always in a here/now environment. Death is never related to our ideas of the future, present and past. Nor is it to our idea of here and there. Death, as an energetic phenomenon, compresses all of our five measuring units into one. The energetic shock brought about by this is of such magnitude that our life force is dissolved, unable to keep our energetic fields together anymore.
As to suffering, it is indeed an obstacle!
Does death really occur though? Because if there was never a beginning, there is not enduring and cannot end. What ever began so as to die? When did we begin, can we pinpoint that?
I know visually we view death, but experientially, do we? A phrase I’ve heard before “we die in every moment”. Well if we died in one moment, we would not be around to know it in the next!
SHM: Dreaming is used to move it; Stalking is used to anchor it.
WEI: Great insight!
Now here’s a question for you: Do you see any way we can we get beyond these two precepts? And, if so, how?
SHM: Well, I don’t know. I’m wondering if there’s a need to get beyond these. How about this idea. Perform ‘inception’ on ourselves in Dreaming, plant a new idea within ourselves? Not good or bad, just an expanding of our awareness, pushing further…
I say there is a need to get beyond the precepts, and the inception you describe does relate to this. Expanding rather than choosing. Choosing is the ancestral way of our predecessors (choosing one sacred path over another which is seen as not sacred by comparison), as a survival mechanism (clans). Expanding is the effect of that cause that could not maintain the original desire for separation (just as populations expanded and diversified) because within that desire was the seed seeking unity (at first in the clan, but eventually unity of all). So the reason to get beyond the two precepts is to get beyond the limitations of choosing concepts of unity (faulty logic) that are not all inclusive, and thus not actually unity. Furthermore, the reason that there is the option of experiencing unity directly then. Thought is one of the 5 aggregates of which arises ignorance, so to transcend beyond thought-dominance that has defined perimeters of faulty logic. Inception is a thought, with it comes an effect. But to be immune to inception (cause and effect) completely, ironically we use the inception to do this. Logic to devour itself.
“But for a person on the path of liberating all this, understanding the hidden core Lex alludes to is essential”!
Speaking of Lex, where’s he at?
Yes, I know, I love reading his posts too. Com’mon Lex, give us some more of your insights here : ) When you have time of course… I saw he did post a new thread though. *update, I see Lex that you have posted here since I was writing this in Word, so look forward to reading your post.
“Essence as I'm referring to it is anything which evokes fear of death. But its not something feared at first, essence is at first loved, adored by all who conceive of it, until certain thoughts, inceptions, occur and seem to pose a threat to the essence so beloved. This essence takes different forms depending on the awareness of the one experiencing it. The fact that it takes so many forms gives it a quality of being something truly unique, but again fear stalks it constantly. The uniqueness is the pleasure derived from it even if short-lived. Pain (fear) is endured only because of its (essence's) promising fulfillment (which never arrives) of security”.
Fear of death is certainly present. I’ll also say that fear of no-self comes into play once the fear of death is understood. Once again, another obstacle
When you say here “fear of no-self”, this seems to correlate to what I described to you as fear of losing essence. So if we understand there is no essence (no self) yet we exist anyway, the fear cannot be present. Its only when essence is perceived as something created that fear becomes an active dynamic (stalks).
As to pain…would you say fear is the action that leads to pain, the result?
Fear certainly leads to suffering. Pain in physical body, result of fear?, quite possible. We have all probably heard of spiritual adepts who vanquished pain. What comes to mind are the Buddhist monks who burned themselves in protest of the Vietnam war. The first of them was a Mahayana Buddhist named Quang Duc.
He poured gas on and lit himself on fire and sat in lotus position while engulfed in flames. Really amazing. Imagine the pain it would (should) have caused. Any who suffers from pain, and consequently, fear of pain, would indeed imagine this pain upon witnessing his act. But for the monk, that imagining was not necessarily what he experienced. I was reading at Wiki that afterwards, after they re-cremated his remains, they saw his heart was intact (not burned). This symbolized to many Buddhists the power of his compassion and they then revered him as a bodhisattva, but I digress : )
Aaron Niemzovitch, a chess master, once said that the threat is stronger than the execution. This is a basic principle, which has been corroborated by centuries of practice. Extrapolating this to the everyday world, it could be said that fear of pain is stronger than pain itself.
Interesting. Being that he is a chess master, he would have taken logic to its limits, analyzed every angle, which I’m saying is good. It’s what Nagarjuna was good at doing as well. Logic is only an impediment when it’s claims are accepted, yet at the same time, go unexamined.
There is no spiritual pain. There is only physical pain. The social order's last line of defense is sustained on weapons that cause physical pain and death. The only interest of "spiritual" or mental pain, in terms of this conspiracy, is that it eventually develops into physical pain.
Interesting as well! Control sought via pain. Control sought because of suffering seeking release. The oppressors suffer and in their pain perpetuate more pain upon others in hopes that control will bring them relief. So clearly they are victims of the inception too. And the inception employed would be one that would twist the awareness of spiritual truth away from being painless (free of suffering), so that instead its perceived as pain and turned away from (feared). This can be done using mental imagery (images of people burning in hell realms for example).
In Dependent Origination we see that all phenomena arises interdependently, form, thought, sensation, perception , consciousness are not separate things that could stand alone but rather occur dependent upon the other, so no one takes precedence. Why is this important to understand? Because things have been misconstrued. For example, the spiritual is given precedence over the physical (soul supposedly resides in spiritual). Inserted into this idea is a spiritual ruler (God) who created essences of souls of beings and then from there is built in notions of reward or punishment. Because the “God” has precedence via inception of the idea, awareness of the interdependent truth (no precedence) will be forgotten or remain unknown.
And it’s this awareness of interdependence that would release the suffering view of a perceived oppressor who “created” us. I know many would argue God (or creator in general) is not an oppressor, and I’d say the image and idolatry surrounding God is, because notice how its believed one has to obtain admission into spiritual “realms” be it heaven or whatever name via God’s permission, always there is this stipulation of “qualifying”. We have dependently arisen and are already qualified because we never were created by a being who would qualify or deny such. We are unborn. My mentioning God here does not dismiss non-believers predicament because always there is a view of essence and creation established whether one is religious or atheist. For CC it was the eagle, for example.
You say there is no spiritual pain, which helps to explain how a monk can light himself on fire and sit motionless whist he burns, a testament to his awareness. But, the question arises, that when we say spiritual, what are we really referring to? What does that term really mean experientially speaking? For the monk who burned without exhibiting pain, was his form spiritual then?
Ok, SHM, I am enjoying this insight exchange immensely. I just want you to know, given how long these posts are, and that we all have lives outside the forum, if it takes you a while to respond or if not, either way I understand and its no problem for me to wait etc. Also, on weekends I am less likely to have time to respond, so may not hear from me till the weekday.
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Fringe...I don’t know if I will find this where I’m at, but interested to read any insights about how the inception unfolds. One thing is clear, that inception is a seed seeking propagation. So stalking is the understanding of how control is arrived at (how to do it how its done). But at the same time, control is not released by performing counter measures. Most movies end this way, that if there was a controller, the “good guys” found a way to gain control over the controller (blow him up usually ,lol), which is just more control, same ole same ole. Like animal farm where the animals overthrow humans and then become like them etc etc. So dual reality, parallel realms, polarizing good and bad…all themes here. Be nice if the series moves towards gray areas, something different. Then both universes could help one another come out of the inception (help each other wake up). How to get to this point where both sides will equally trust each other, allowing the focus to change?
Actually that was not a question really. I meant, how would the script writers do this, it'd be interesting to see.
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Note to everyone, that picture of the burning monk, not meant to cause unpleasantness to anyone. I thought he looks serene and peaceful, quite a beautiful sight really, I see it as a positive to all the horrible sites of suffering on the news etc.
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"Ok, SHM, I am enjoying this insight exchange immensely. I just want you to know, given how long these posts are, and that we all have lives outside the forum, if it takes you a while to respond or if not, either way I understand and its no problem for me to wait etc. Also, on weekends I am less likely to have time to respond, so may not hear from me till the weekday".
Understood.
I was put to task last night, a challenge was thrown down for me, if you will. Stalking exercises and Not-Doings. These will take time and energy, thus, minimal time posting here, there or anywhere
You've written good material above and I'll reply once I've a grasp of my tasks and get them moving.
SHM
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