Beyond Freedom

originally posted by: Itisnowagain

She speaks a lot like Tony Parsons. Do you know if they were associated?

What do you mean by "the illusion" ? Isn't an illusion something made to trick something else ? But if as you say there is no one, no separation, then what is there to trick ? Nothing.

It is a false assumption which just happens - there is nothing right or wrong about it. A tree is just being a tree - when leaves appear they just appear - the tree is not doing it - it is just happening. But the human believes he is doing thinking and moving but thoughts and actions just happen.
There is a very strong belief that you are in control of what is appearing but all that appears is just happening.
Everything is life and there is no separate you - that's good news - there is only life and this is it.

The freedom comes from there being no one. Feelings, sensations, rooms, hands, everything, is just appearing. This is one seamless being.

a reply to: HarryTZ
She has been to some of his meetings. Naho said a friend of hers was speaking this stuff to her and she was hooked and eventually flew from Japan to London to see Tony. And later it just so happened that she was in a town where Rupert Spira was speaking at some point and a friend told her she should go - so she did.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

That's cool, I really like Tony. I haven't heard much of Rupert but it seems that non-duality is like indie music -- after awhile it all starts to sound the same ^.^

Robert Adams is well worth a read.


omnicircle.blogspot.co.uk...

a reply to: DrunkYogi

You have to forget about yourself and expand your consciousness until you become the whole universe.

says Robert. But how can one expand something that is already all-encompassing? Or maybe I should stick to my point that there is no consciousness...

but why limit yourself to the universe, which is a simple thought? We're better off not to disorient ourselves like that

originally posted by: HarryTZ
a reply to: DrunkYogi

You have to forget about yourself and expand your consciousness until you become the whole universe.

says Robert. But how can one expand something that is already all-encompassing? Or maybe I should stick to my point that there is no consciousness...

but why limit yourself to the universe, which is a simple thought? We're better off not to disorient ourselves like that

Did you read it all?

a reply to: DrunkYogi

No, I was just feeling a little cheeky. I'll go read it all now, for real this time

a reply to: HarryTZ


No probs mate, It really is worth a read. To me he is the genuine article.

a reply to: DrunkYogi

I liked it. Very down to earth. I don't necessarily agree with his stance on "being the witness", just because that implies that there is something there witnessing something else. But I suppose thats the problem with words.

a reply to: HarryTZ

Everyone has problems trying to explain what is apparently unexplainable. I guess that's why silence is the way to go.

a reply to: DrunkYogi
Truly.

originally posted by: Itisnowagain

I just like the way she looks at me and talk and the way she smiles silently and I just look back at her.

My metaphysics resonates with your insight.

The word enlightenment has a lot of heaviness and stickiness and is in fact an extremely misleading phrase for serious seekers.

I agree - "What you are seeking is seeking you."

Therefore, seeking enlightenment is akin to trying to see the back of your head in every minute detail without having a reflection or mirror to do so. You already have a head....but some desperately need to see it reflected to believe it, instead of simply feeling it is there...or having another reflect back to us what they see on our behalf.

The word, enlightenment, has a lot of personal concepts or labels that many attach to it, such as "heaviness and stickiness." We ALL do it...philosophize.

For instance:

The word implies the attainment of a specific state, perhaps a more peaceful and wholesome state. But this cannot be true freedom because the concept of 'state' implies a specific mental perspective, limited by its own existence.

I feel you, and agree for the most part, but does the word actually only imply "a more peaceful and wholesome state?"

I agree that it does reflect "a specific mental perspective," but I wouldn't narrow enlightenment down to only being one certain or specific state.

Perhaps there are infinite ways to express our innate enlightened selves through infinite variables of thoughts, emotions and interactions in what some may consider everyday mundane experiences?

You know? Seeking what is already seeking you...?

On the other hand, the term 'liberation' implies freedom from all states, including the capacity for awareness of any state. I am talking of a total freedom from the known and a dissolution into unknowing.

Unconsciousness is what you are speaking about? And, if so, is it still a state of mind that people seek.... ? How can one seek to become the uncarved block....?

I agree that complete psychological freedom is what we attain when allowing ourselves to become unchained from all preconceived concepts, thoughts, and past mental conditioning. Welcome to the Void.

Yet, your above words (thought process) still reflects a mental state that is moulded through entertaining, philosophizing, and defining it as a "goal" to be sought for its rewards, or the state of mind it evokes. The belief in what can be attained is also a state or concept of mind that often times leaves one imprisoned in thoughts about enlightenment.

Liberation of mind is the destination.

Animus Libera is the vessel.

Animus Vox is the navigator.

Nisargadatta spoke of this absolute dissolution on many occasions. He said that even what we call consciousness is itself a conditioned mental state, and is in fact the beginning of seperation. Consciousness only exists in relationship with a seemingly separate world. If you are conscious, you are conscious of something, and that intrinsically implies a seperation of the 'known' and the 'knower'.

I agree. One can either know it or one can Be it, but one cannot experience both at the same time. It's called Duality and there exist NOTHING outside of awareness that is NOT dual in nature.

Q: How can one 'know it" but cannot "be it" in a world of duality? Sounds contradictory to not experience both if everything is dual in nature....yeah?

A: Experience, experiencer and experienced are all one....

*******

How come one is not aware when they are sleeping despite having the experience of sleep....?

Let it marinate.


*******

In an absolute sense, consciousness doesn't actually exist. There is no knowing of anything. 'Reality', if you will, neither exists nor fails to exist. Both existence and non-existence are essentially illusory in this sense. True freedom, therefore, is not a state, but is actually the 'reality' before the capacity for states to appear at all. And because all states are based on absolute illusion, freedom is already the case, absolutely. Liberation, then, in a relative sense, is the end of illusion, which never existed.

Something to contemplate:

In searching our minds for some way to comprehend physical-ness, it should become apparent that the only thing that is some thing about our conscious circumstance is experience. There is nothing else going on in our conscious minds that we would label as something that we would not also label as experience.

www.science-of-consciousness.com...

a reply to: Involutionist

That was very beautiful.

A few points:

What I mean by the fundamental unknowingness of reality doesn't imply unconsciousness in the way you put it. It is what we mean when we say emptiness, or the void. In a total absence of experience, there can be no consciousness or unconsciousness. It is just... this. This is the void. There's actually nothing here. And no knowing of that fact either. And yet somehow words come and attempt to explain that. It's outside of the frame of human logic, because logic would say that there is a fundamental paradox here. but it's not even that.

Also you touched on seeking. I 100% agree with you, how can you seek what is already the case? There's really no better way to put it. Actually seeking is just a meaningless desire to escape reality, which you can't do. In a way, seeking takes you away from yourself and yet in another sense you never moved an inch.

I also enjoyed your 'head' analogy. One may see a head, their own or another's, and say to themselves, "I want to be that". Actually what they want is to extend and intensify that experience of a head that they are having. But when one 'becomes' that, they realize that they always were that but because there is no knower there who can actually experience anything there was no way that they could have known it. A Buddha doesn't know he is a Buddha, but others do. That knowledge is what's essentially blocking reality.

We are all figments of our own imagination.

Someday we will imagine ourselves (die) into another imagined existence.

The less there is the more the potential to be.

Fizzzzzt.

Circuit failure.

a reply to: HarryTZ

Thank you, my friend.

What I mean by the fundamental unknowingness of reality doesn't imply unconsciousness in the way you put it. It is what we mean when we say emptiness, or the void. In a total absence of experience, there can be no consciousness or unconsciousness. It is just... this. This is the void. There's actually nothing here. And no knowing of that fact either. And yet somehow words come and attempt to explain that. It's outside of the frame of human logic, because logic would say that there is a fundamental paradox here. but it's not even that.

I feel you. I understood where you were going with that insight (it resonates with me deeply) and that is why I included that link in my last post that mirrored your thought process and expounded on it. Btw, I admire Nisargadatta's insight (and many others on the Vedic path) very much.

Q: How does one become aware they are indeed experiencing the Void?

It's outside of the frame of human logic, because logic would say that there is a fundamental paradox here.

Such is life.

Also you touched on seeking. I 100% agree with you, how can you seek what is already the case? There's really no better way to put it. Actually seeking is just a meaningless desire to escape reality, which you can't do.

Seeking can also be a meaningful way to explore and discover hidden facets of reality.

In a way, seeking takes you away from yourself and yet in another sense you never moved an inch.

I agree. It's akin to placing a finger into a glass of water in order to explore what that experience is all about.

Q: Is your finger over there in that glass of water or is it still here as a part of you? Is it there or here? Both, perhaps?

Perhaps the answer depends on how one defines the experience itself?

What they are seeking might influence their perspective. Some may contemplate from a physical perspective (how water effects the skin, nails, look, smell, etc) and some may contemplate from a mental and emotional perspective (how it makes them feel/ they ponder what that all means). It depends on what we choose to identify with (thought processes) when we seek.

Something to contemplate: en.wikipedia.org...

A strange loop arises when, by moving only upwards or downwards through a hierarchical system, one finds oneself back to where one started.

You stated beautifully:

A Buddha doesn't know he is a Buddha, but others do. That knowledge is what's essentially blocking reality.

Yes, the reality is ALL are already enlightened Buddhas to the highest degree possible and we are simply experiencing ourselves as if it we are not through the fragmented filter of human consciousness...and that is what I believe is causing reality to flow at the moment--ignorance of self allows for the illusion to persist. All is YOU. There are "no others..."

To possess awareness, even of the most mundane and trivial of things in life, is to be enlightened. The Void is the opposite of enlightenment, IMO. It is returning to "Just Being" and how can that be enlightenment?

Yet, I offer this contradictory quote (that also resonates with me because we are all already enlightened) concerning the Void ("No -Mind").

"The more we try and understand enlightement the more it will elude us. And that's because enlightenment does not come from the mind. It comes from "no-mind". It comes from just being. You already are enlightened. You just have to realize it to allow it into your experience." - Anita Moorjani

Q: How did she become aware of such a notion without her own mind to discern such information?

Hindsight or Insight?

While in blissful slumber, you only become enlightened to the fact you were sleeping, but only after you awaken...

Again: How come one is not aware when they are sleeping despite having the experience of sleep....?

To be unaware of having an experience seems the opposite of enlightenment....

I miss the time when I could experience everything around myself without being aware of my part in the nothingness that is everything.

You see ?, we start out enlightened and become polluted and conditioned to think of things in certain ways.

Someday, somehow, if there ever comes a time when I can shelter a child and allow that child to become whatever it is that child will become without any outside influence.......

What?.

a reply to: MyHappyDogShiner

It might not even be possible to shelter a child from influence. It's the nature of the brain to gather and process information, after all...
But really who knows?

a reply to: HarryTZ

That is where "What?" came from....