Waves

Its funny to analyze some of the thoughts we have during the day isnt it

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On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

JahBohl

The beer or your latest epiphany?

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"If you know what life is worth, then you would look for yours right here on Earth" ~Peter Tosh

I'm in favor of it as long as it's multiple choice. ~Kurt Rambis, on drug testing

verklingen

The process of liberation is designed to relieve us of our material discomforts. A Buddhist will tell you to relieve your discomfort by meditating on void, or nothing. If you are enveloped in nothing, no action or reaction can phase you. But a self-realized soul will tell you to continue your actions, but gradualy become unattached to them.

Under the material condition and due to the modes of nature, we are always helplessly doing. We are breathing, digesting, metabolizing, et cetera, and this is impossible to stop. Likewise, for the maintanence of our bodies we are forced to eat, sleep, mate, and defend. We cannot stop these activities, even if we tried. So the proper course is to continue one's duties but have no attachment to the labor or to the fruits of the labor. In this way, a man can come to be truly renounced and as a function of this he is made fit for liberation.

To be liberated from these unending cycles of birth and death! Living is a discomfort, and we are always trying to avoid the discomforts of life (birth, disease, old age, and death) because we are in reality eternal spirit-souls. We have forgotten our eternal being due to the modes of material nature, and are therefor under illusion. We identify with our bodies, so it causes us discomfort to see that our body is aging, diseased, and dying. But the fact is that we are not our bodies. We are, each and every one of us living beings, eternal spirit-souls who are part and parcel of God. Our bodies are material and subject to change, but our spirit is eternal and unchangeable. Unless one realized this, he is doomed to continue the discomforts of material existence.

Yes, our soul resides in our body. It is the spark which gives us life. The soul is described as sub-atomic, being the size of one ten-thousandth of the tip of a hair strand. It is not meditation in and of itself which strengthens the bond of our identification with the material body we inhabit, but the aim of the meditator may. In any case, meditation is not an ideal form of realization for our age.

So what is? Why am i conscious?

Of course not! One may meditate if he likes, but he should also know that by attaching any spiritual meaning to it he is deluding himself.

I do not agree with this. We cannot speculate on the nature of Krishna's abode by reflecting our material world onto the spiritual. The material world is a gross reflection of the spiritual, and its inhabitants chose to manifest under the material condition due to a desire for mastery. We cannot become master in the spiritual world because God's mastery is absolute. But under the material condition, we are given the illusion of mastery, and this is the origin of ignorance, misery, and hate. These things are not present in the spiritual planets.

BUT, if those realizations pertain to material existence, any meaning derived using any faculty has no true meaning.

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“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

verklingen

"Spiritual" and "material" are not subjective. They cannot mean something to one person and a different thing to another person. To believe differently is to be under illusion. The applications of meditation/lucid dreaming/psychedelic taking are indeed many, but all such applications share a common thread: they are material.

Many many thousands of years ago, life was simple enough to use the process of meditation and renunciation to achieve self-realization. It is and was a very difficult process, but it was achievable nonetheless because the conditions of life at that time served to make such practices more available. Back then many yogis failed due to the myriad distractions of daily life. What does that say about our day and age where it is impossible to open one's eyes and not be bombarded with random information? This is what makes meditation futile as a method to attain true knowledge and bliss.

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“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Ego Tripping

Picture your Conciousness as a Window and Thoughts as daily Dirt. As Society increases (and our respective role in it), the Window becomes dirty, stained. Think of Meditation as Windex....but the dirtier the Window, the harder it is to clean. This is why Meditation can be near useless on most people nowadays. They require stronger cleaners, which luckily have been invented...tripping, dreaming (lucid and not), astral projection and Near Death Experiences. Everyone has their preferences of which to use and which works best for 'their Window.'

It's merely important to remember that while you can use a Cleaner and have PERFECT Clarity, Change and Entropy still apply to the Physical manifestation of our Conciousness and the Window will consistently become blurry and unclear, more and more, moment by moment, until we Clean it off again.

Hm, I don't think I've ever made a better analogy.

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verklingen

^
Your analogy is well-constructed, but I find that it cannot be used as a metaphor for our true existence.

We are reflections, or extensions, of God. Thus recognizing a mirror for our soul is better suited for this particular allegory. Due to our interactions with the material energy, this mirror is ever being clouded by dust and other obstructions which cover up our true identity as eternal spirit-souls who are part and parcel of God. So in order to see the Truth, we must somehow get the dust to lift up from the mirror.

But how to do this? Meditation (Windex) may work somewhat, but as we take up the meditative process with material goals (attaining enlightenment, reaching higher states of consciousness, et cetera) the surface of our mirror will remain obscured by smudges which blur and distort the image (as we will always leave streaks and residual oils on the mirror while using windex).

So what will work? Some may try a more powerful, direct approach and consume phychedelics. This is of no avail because rather than only noticing the obstructions on our mirror we are now being bombarded with material energy from all sides: even from sides we were not even aware of! We are made cognizant of distractions and obstructions to which we formerly paid no heed. The bewildering strength of these psychedelics is overwhelming and can leave us more ignorant as to what image our mirror ought to be reflecting than we originally were. Using such methods to clean our mirror is akin to wiping the dust away with thick oils and sand, leaving scratches and attracting yet more dust.

So in the end, any material means we utilize to cleanse our mirror (spirit-soul) of dust (material obstruction; identification with the material as absolute truth) will only be able to at best leave us with an equally dirty mirror, and at worst further reinforce our false association with the material energy as the absolute.

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“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Waves

If liberation is designed to relieve of us our material discomforts, i would think that not only is meditation needed to achieve this goal but it is the only way to achieve it.

There is a very small difference between an "astral projection/deep meditation" experience and the actual physical death experience. And just like we all have to adjust to percieving objective reality, you WILL have to adjust to percieving subjective reality. It is beneficial to know whats going on before you actually have to go because otherwise you will have a very bad time for quite possibly a very long time, seeing as time doesnt even exist outside of our physical system we live in.
I dont believe that you have to disattach yourself from reality to experience reality. Rather than disattach I choose to revel in them. I also dont think life is all about liberation.

We choose to be here. You either believe that or you dont. You choose to create every waking second of your life. To throw away that choice to a bunch of gods or cycles or whatever forcing you to be here is silly in my mind. No one is forcing you to be here but YOU.
And is that knowledge alone not enough to end the cycle?

In waking life, when i go to end a cycle, i usually have to sit down and figure out whats causing the cycle to perpetuate. It usually comes down to my ego's wants and needs, and with the knowledge of whats happening i adjust my behavior accordingly. I ought to think that its the same way for stopping cycles in the afterlife, or wherever it is that we are supposedly forced into these human bodies.
Living is only a discomfort if you make it one. Its entirely possible for a person to come to grips with things like old age and death dont you think?
I very much like this paragraph, i believe with most of it. And like you say, the cycle of life doesnt end until you realize its cyclic nature and do something about it. But i disagree with the idea about our spirit being unchangeable. We are all here to change ourselves. And by ourselves i dont mean our physical bodies, i mean our minds. The way we think about things and react to things. Life is a lesson, an experience. We dont end life and wake up in some room as a different person. You are the same you after death as you are now. The only difference being what you learned here on earth.
I think its silly to believe our soul resides in our physical body. Like if you started digging into your stomache you could take it out or something.
A bunch of blood and organs and goo and stuff you would puke at if you saw it

You are conscious because you choose to limit your perception to a very small focus of energy. At our base, we are all just focuses of energy and we dont take up any space or matter or weight. We just are. By becoming human you change your circumstances to that of the body you seem to reside in. You create a subjective link, basically.
hint: theres no such thing as "spiritual"
So your saying the reason i get pissed off at my boss is because i am under the illusion of being a physical being who just got told to mop the floor?

I contend that there *is* a physical being who now has to mop the floor and because of that, my perception is going to be bored for some time while this human who i think i am does his job
True meaning is all around you friend

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

Waves

I hate that word illusion. Everything in life is an illusion, from your thoughts to your gods to your keyboard to the food you eat. All just manifestations of energy, just like the words you type are manifestations of computer code consisting of millions of 0's and 1's.

Now taking that into account, the only thing guiding this illusion, creating it, is yourself. That negates the concept of reincarnation right there because NO ONE is forcing you to come back. The fact that you are here again means that you didnt complete your mission the first time. So what are you going to do to try and find out what that mission is so you can accomplish it? The key is realization like you said. Its a sad fact that most people dont even believe in reincarnation, let alone make the effort to accomplish the goals they themselves set up before hand. Dont get me wrong, its perfectly possible and fairly common for people to achieve their goals without even knowing it, so to speak,(in fact i think you yourself would be a good example of that) but if people knew just how easy the whole process is the world would be a much better place.
It tells me that these yogis were using primitive technology and that in this day and age we should be advanced to the point where we look at yogis like we look at cavemen!

Science is going to come in soon and make it all happen, so im not worried. But until then you can go on and get past the yogis and their primitive tools (religion) and explore non physical reality in a more objective way, less riddled with negative beliefs and more fueled by curiosity and courage.

Its gonna happen in your lifetime, kids will be doing with toys what yogis were trying to accomplish their whole lives. But thats what science is all about, getting rid of the clunky constructs and providing shiny new objective ones

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

verklingen

These comments prove that your intelligence is very well-developed. I won't argue with any of your points, because the differences we squabble about are, in the end, inconsequencial. For all intents and purposes and despite the seeming incongruity of our beliefs, our worldview is essentially the same. There are only a couple points I would like to bring up in relation to your comments:

Technically, you are wrong. But in practice you are quite correct. Our souls cannot change, but the condition under which our soul exists can change. We can experience eternal bliss and knowledge under the spiritual condition, or we can experience temporary bliss and knowledge under the material condition. Both exist and both have their various qualities. As you say elsewhere, we have chosen this material condition: otherwise we would not be here.

I understand your position with the spiritual, I only hope to make my position equally clear.

Good question! There are two answers:

The reason your boss is telling you to mop the floor is because he is under the illusion that he has authority. Being individual souls who are part and parcel of God, we are all equal and none of us are superior to any other. But under the material condition, we are given the false illusion of power and authority. This is the principle cause of distress in the material world.

The reason you get pissed off at this order is because you are yourself also under illusion. You understand that his authority is greater than yours, and you covet this authority. This makes you unsatisfied with your present position and causes you distress. This is due chiefly to the material condition which causes all beings to be at odds with eachother over mastery. This illusion of control is becoming more and more dangerous and hurtful. It doesn't take long to see that greed, selfishness, and lust are the causes of all our worldly problems.

But like I said, I don't want to argue with you because we are mutually set in our respective beliefs. Your intelligent displays have made me realize you are on your path and that it is the correct one for you to take.

Hare Krishna!

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“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Ego Tripping

Hmm...this phrase isn't very Enlightened of you.

Technically, there's no such thing as wrong, when you can't define Right.

You're in my world, buddy. If I am truly an extension of God, there are no 'rules' that I need to abide by, I create them.

I'll be liberated right after this cycle, if I choose to...you also neglect that idea that I chose to come back and was not enslaved to do so.

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ziplock

And what doesn't share this common thread? Please don't say chanting hare krishna.

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Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.

-Illfaded-

i want some of what yer smokin...

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under the old government man exploited man,
but since the revolution it's the other way around.

real eyes realize real lies.

new greed, i'm the bad seed.. smokin' weed till my mutha fuckin eyez bleed..

Ego Tripping

The Physical is so beautiful, I don't understand wy we're trying to Transcend it rather than mold it.

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JcPizwink

I think everyone in this thread needs to remember that they know nothing. They think plenty, but know nothing.

The only thing I know is that compassion is the way to go. And I only know that because it's the only reason I'm here in the first place (mommy and daddy made love).

Any time anyone says "you're wrong" in reference to religion or God means they're too busy being self-righteous to see that they are just as cold, naked, afraid, and hopeful as the rest of us.



Don't mean to harp on one person. I think this is applicable for everyone including myself, it was just that one phrase that made me post.

ziplock

Same man. It seems pretty common in various religions to look at physical life as some sort of punishment, that we're unworthy and must redeem ourselves. Seperating the material, the physical, with the spiritual, such as in this case. I've never really been able to commit to that sort of outlook, and when I examine it it never seems to hold. Verk for instance is very eager to categorize various activities as material and on these grounds say they're inadequate for liberation. Last time he spoke of an activity that does bring about liberation, it was chanting Hare Krishna, which is material, and thus should be inadequate.

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Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.

JcPizwink

You just blew my mind. Again

Waves

I dont like the whole "no one can know anything" approach.

Yeah i know that i know nothing, but i know something, and i am in a constant quest to know more things.

It would be great if everyone were right in their beliefs, but unfortunetly in this highly subjective system, there are objective frameworks for the things we can and cannot do.

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

Waves

Precisely

People who view life as some sort of cycle we are forced to participate in are looking at it from the complete wrong perspective, i think. life is awesome if you choose to focus on the awesome parts. life sucks if you choose to focus on the shitty parts.

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

Waves

In the olden days im sure there was an agenda behind the various beliefs as far as controlling the population goes, just like there are today.

Theres always a catch-22 with these kinds of things, and its unneccessary. i find it much easier to simply create my own beliefs and step outside the mold than to model my beliefs around some irrelevent 2000 year old superstition, like "liberation" or that kind of thing.

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

reverie

I find the progression of this, out of all threads, to be very..... disappointing.

So much animosity and imposition derived from a topic so beautiful and full of constructive potential.

Anyways Verklingen would you mind clerifying a few points, so I can understand?
What results would you acheive which is separate of our material condition? When you speak of results what do you mean? What is the goal that is seemingly unattainable in this physical existence?

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dissolve popular detachment