LastThursday

@Frenk yeah, probably not one to tell around the campfire.

Apparent separation from the Godhead is a feature not a bug. All that being alive means, is to be separated. Alive to dead is not just a one way street though. "You" could merge with the Godhead and die and yet still come back to life later. Will it be the same "you" again? No. But you're not the same "you" even of five minutes ago: that "you" already died.

If by future you mean the present moment in ten minutes time, then yes it probably will along with all those non-physical events. If by exist you mean with 100% certainty, then probably not - maybe we'll all be swallowed by a passing black hole?

The future doesn't exist. It's just linguistic trickery. All there is, is an ever-changing present moment.

Some of the most rewarding things I've done in life have involved communal activities. For example I remember a work trip where we made willow fencing for a play garden for disabled kids. The sheer act of doing something physical for the communal good is magical. Some of my most rewarding holidays have been where I went with a bunch of friends and just hung out together. I think many of us are missing this communcal aspect of living in the modern world. There seems to be an inverse correlation between the richness of a country and how communally they live. Don't misunderstand me I'm not advocating a political system here. I just thinking that there is a missing piece of the humanity jigsaw in modern Western societies. As well as a strong emphasis on individualism there appears to be an island mentality within family units. That's not to say that there aren't bridges between the islands in the form of friends: but that doesn't constitute communal living. Of course if you don't have much money for rent in Western society you can go and flatshare. You may or may not get to choose you share with however. I'd say that in general it isn't conducive to living communally. What is missing is the sharing of resources, ideas, meal times, child care and generally "pitching in together" that communality entails. Perhaps it isn't for everyone and certainly we are so inculcated in the myth of individual consumerism that deviating from that is impossible for most. It's a cultural attitude and mindset more than enything. It isn't a complete panacea of course. Any society of people at whatever scale will have its inherent problems both organisational, relational and in terms of self policing. Long term communality requires rules and regulations and probably a strong element of routine, so that everyone knows where they stand. As an extension to the communal tribe that you belong to, you would also have to fit into the bigger tribe of society at large. So largely there would be an overlap of values: there is no point living communally if that community shuts itself off from everything else. Even the Amish are not completely disentangled from American society at large. You see how difficult it is not to veer into a political system. How difficult is it to live differently in Western society? It appears that communal living entails living in communes which by definition are somewhat separated from mainstream society. Often there is a strong element of religion and or idealogy involved. I believe that just provides a shared basis for living from the outset. But I also think it's possible to do it the other way around. Start living communally and over time work out what the best rules and policing strategies are. After all most of us are employed to work communally, often we have to "work out" the culture of the workplace, there are no explicit rules given to us from the outset: i.e. it can be done. So why is employment not a good surrogate for living communally? It certainly has some of the aspects of working together for the common good (of the business) and of sharing values. But there are other aspects which don't work so well. Most businesses have a strong hierarchy where the people higher up the echelons are distant and don't interact much with the lowly workers. The emphasis is also wrong: making money, instead of sharing. And if you don't belong to a union of some sort, there is generally no safety net if you get ejected from the workplace or you need your child looked after. In other words working in business is at best token communal living. If I were to set up some sort of commune then the following is a must: Regular shared spiritual practise (non-religious) and high consciousness activites in general Shared physical activities - building, constructing, gathering food, Shared preparing and eating of food, Ready and open discussion of ideas of any persuasion, The use of technology as an enabler for communal living, Some system that stops certain individuals dominating the group: no kings or big-man mentality, A strong attitude of self sufficiency for all members, An attitude of doing things for both the common and individual good, altruism and reciprocity. I'm sure there are 101 other points I could add.

NLP has the Swish pattern, where you can use visualisation: https://www.nlp-techniques.org/what-is-nlp/swish/

@BipolarGrowth exactly. If nobody (including you) has ever occupied another perceptual bubble, then how do you know they exist?

This is solipsism in a nutshell. Which is it: is it just me or is it we? Can it really be both at the same time?

@seeking_brilliance a brilliant topic idea! I'm being lazy, but this a micro-story reposted from my journal: "I woke up. I think. I couldn't quite work out what I had woken up from. What had been razor sharp and solid just then, had diffused into the husk of a sensation. The serenity had been broken and I began to feel agitated that I had been let go of without my consent. What was it? Where had I been? It was nowhere now. Out of the husk grew something that I could remember. Yes, yesterday I had celebrated my birthday. I thought about this. There had been the usual cohort of friends. Jez the joker in the pack, quick to make light of a heavy situation, his disposition rock solid; he was never outwardly melancholy. Cassy was forever warmhearted and would always get me quirky gifts - why is it I never returned the gestures? I couldn't remember just now. Franco idolised himself as some sort of Adonis, but I always found him to be harmless, and he threw a great party, it helped that he was in catering. The rest I couldn't bring to the fore, but boyfriends and wives and friends of my friends, there must have been twenty or so. Come to think of it, had there been family there? No. Karen was on holiday in France with girlfriends. Mum had died only last year, what a god awful time that had been. Dad? I couldn't recall yet. My temples began to throb. Ah yes. The Mojitos Franco had mixed one after the other. I was sure I could still smell the mint on my breath. I breathed in sharply. Of course Cassy had told him to stop and offered to show me to bed when I had started to say absurd things. Jez thought I was hilarious. Bed! I reached out and felt if there was a body next to mine. No. I felt a wave of relief and nausea come over me at the same time. I took another deep breath. Suddenly, an alarm buzzed. I opened my eyes for the first time. 10:20 am. "Shut the fuck up!" I shouted and the alarm stopped. It felt good to shout, but it also somehow felt like the first thing I had ever said, my voice was rough and raspy and unexpectedly deep. It was at that point that my bodily functions kicked in, and I knew that I had to get up. I showered and dressed and ventured cautiously downstairs. The place had been immaculately cleared of the debris of the night before. In middle of the round oak table in the kitchen sat a small white box with an overly large red bow on it. It had to be. I opened it. Inside was a snow Globe, with the motto "Cassy" in red letters underneath. Once the snow slowly drifted down, I began to make out the words "Welcome to Heaven". I half smiled. I sat down and shook the snow globe again.

I think I've always been looking for serenity in my life. There's a small boy inside me that is easily overwhelmed by the real world and wants tranquility and peace. That feeling of overwhelm still dogs me as an adult. The adult me is incredulous: how can some of the simplest things overwhelm you, man up will you? Instead of manning up, the fixer in me has a different idea. It's recently become aware that emotions are held as tensions and sensations in the physical body. I mean I've read as much in the past, but not really paid it much attention. But in my continuing exploration and fascination with self hypnosis, I've come across a particularly effective video that pretty much paralyses my body and thoughts. When I'm in that paralysed state for over an hour, and also without the normal internal running commentary, certain things have started to become very clear. The feelings of overwhelm are 100% represented in the body. In that hypnotised state I can watch the overwhelm flick on of its own accord, and track exactly where in the body it expresses itself. For me, it's mostly tension around the chest area and I have been doing some visualisation to move or remove that tension (as if it were a physical object) away from the body. I think even realising (embodying lol) the fact that all my negative emotions are just tension and vibrations in different parts of my body is curative. It means my awareness is heightened as to when anxiety, fear and overwhelm grip me, and I can bring on the trance and dissipate the negative energy. As a consequence I can stop the body->thoughts->body feedback loop which keeps me overwhelmed for long periods. Magic indeed! My aim in the middle term is to "man up" and eliminate the anxiety and overwhelm that's plagued me my entire life; and have some of that serenity instead.

We are all narcissistic to a degree. We want the love to flow into us from outside, so we puff ourselves up to grab attention and delude ourselves that this is the love we want. Really, the flow needs to go the other way and you should be the source of love. We should give it freely and unconditionally and practise until we become masters at it. And in the process you'll learn to love yourself in the way you want and teach others to do the same. God I've become such a hippie.

I'd say learning is downloading knowledge in slow motion. Can you increase the speed of learning so that it becomes instant? But there are instances of instant learning out there: Is the only way to do this to have a head injury? I wonder.

I'd say there's two types of exist. One is the direct type: you're looking at your hand right now. The other is a kind of mental story or sensation: my mother is living in London. One is direct, one is an inference or a mental construction. The problem with the direct type of existence, is that it's not static. Stuff is constantly coming in and out of direct awareness. So you look in one direction and see the chair, you look in another direction and see the table. So the chair goes from one type of existence to the other. There are even things that come into your awareness that you didn't know previously existed: typically we call it news. The question you're asking is do you believe in the inference type of existence? The problem with inference, is that it's always in the realm of possibility and probabilty. It's never 100% certain. When you're waiting at a bus stop, you can't know with 100% certainty if the bus will turn up. You are inferring from evidence that the bus exists and is coming your way. Quantum scientists grapple with the exact same problem. My opinion is that even direct experience is not certain. When you look at your hand, what is it you're experiencing? Is it a hand? Or five fingers and a palm? Semantics, maybe, but that's precisely my point. To say that you have a hand is a mental construction: i.e. inference.

The question of "realness" is quite a gnarly one. I'm just guesing that by objective you mean persistent and autonomous. But, I'm willing to bet there are people in your dreams and that they act independently of you: i.e. they are persistent and autonomous. You could argue that people in your dreams are random and don't hang around for long, but it's the same in waking life. That's just one example. The more you examine dreams the more commonalities you see with being awake. In the end I think it's difficult to call one real and the other one subjective. Either both are real or both are subjective. Where's the boundary between dream and awake? If that boundary is "waking up" then it's not inconceivable that you could wake up out of reality. Maybe there's no end to the waking up?

Is judgement itself "high" or "low" consciousness? Should we stop doing it? Maybe call it what it is: "good" and "bad" actions. Actions which cause suffering or actions which cause happiness or neutral actions. Phew!

Which is what? The problem here is, is that there's nothing more than dream (awake or sleeping). So what you're asking here is to explain the dream in terms of... the dream. It's not all lost though. The circularity is the answer. It's a self perpetuating system. The dream creates the dream. There's no beginning or end to it. Or if you prefer it's like zooming into a fractal; it's a self similar system. The other way to explain it is to say the dream is irreducible. In other words it can't be explained in simpler terms, it is what it is. To explain anything at all, you are effectively reducing it down to words or symbols and applying some sort of algorithm (process, calculation). Some things in reality can be reduced down, for example the theory of gravity. Other things are impossible. In general it's impossible to explain if an algorithm will produce an answer or not (look up Turing). Some things in maths are impossible to prove. And so on. Prove, explain, calculate, algorithm are all synonyms in this context. Yet another way to see it is as a groundless relative system. Imagine a system with two parts to it. There is no user manual, so the parts are not well defined, they are free to take any form they want. For example they could look like the Yin Yang symbol with one black part and one white part. But because they're not defined they can change from one moment to the next. But there are some things you can say about this system: 1. There's no gap between the parts. The consequence being that one part is the complement of the other. 2. The two parts make up the entire system. The consequence is that there's nothing beyond or outside of the two parts. 3. The system is free to take up any configuration it likes. The consequence is that it's unbounded (a.k.a. potentially infinite). The other being that it could be potentially in constant flux. 4. The two parts exist, but are not describable in terms of themselves. So now look around you. Does "the dream" fit the four descriptions above?

SIDE NOTE: All those 3 pounds of porridge must be doing something right? Otherwise why not replace it with air? Still, there are normal people living with only half a brain. There are actually 1000000000000000 connections in the brain, and one neuron for each star in the galaxy. Geek out.

@Someone here you ask good questions. Not really an answer, more of an observation: dreams and waking reality are identical manifestations. So whatever generates dreams is also generating your waking state right now. Ultimately, it's a philosophical question. I'd say the main difference is not in nature, but just in cohesiveness. Dreams are less rigid or cohesive; everyday waking reality is very strict and unbending. If you examine dreams, they are very staccato and full of non-sequiturs. Then again if you really examine waking reality, it's very similar.

Reading isn't enough for being more enlightened (small e). How is it possible to read several hundred pages of a book and retain all that information? And even more importantly how can you put that new information into action? How can you, when faced with a novel situation, think back to that particular piece of wisdom you read about and use it? The answer is you can't - not easily. So is consuming a large number of books worth it at all? What actually happens when you read a book? When reading, the words on the page generate sensations in your imagination. If the words are good they will generate novel arrangements of sights and sounds in your mind's eye. To that end you may have spontaneous realisations, or insights, and some of these can be long lasting. But most will be forgotten. More importantly than the words themselves is the overall gist or direction of what is being said. Most times if the writer is good they will guide you through their thinking, and if it clicks this can stick around long enough in the memory to be useful. Other times you have to think for yourself and go meta and try and understand what is being pointed to. Arguably thinking for yourself when reading will be more useful long term. One of the things that happens when you read many different sources of material, is that broad themes start to emerge. So you go beyond the style and content of a work, and realise that there is commonality with other stuff you've read. This is the most useful feature of reading. For example it may take 300 pages to explain how a nuclear reactor works, but the gist is that it boils water, to make electricity. That tidbit of information is really what you will remember. One useful thing to do is take notes (not for me personally!). The essence of note taking is precisely that condensing down of information into tidbits you can remember and use in future. There are myriad ways to take notes. But I wouldn't say it was useful to just summarise a book as you go, but actually put down the insights you believe will be useful to you in future. The main thing with notes is to re-read them. If realistically you're not going to revise your notes, then there is an argument for not bothering to take notes at all. If this is the case then you will need a good memory! What should you do with insights? You shouldn't just collect them to show them off. You need to actually embody them and use them day to day. If you have an insight that to attract someone you must first love yourself, in itself is no good, if you don't in fact try and love yourself. There is a gulf between just knowing something and actually embodying it, that takes work and often rote learning: if X then Y, if X then Y, until it becomes automatic. That process of embodying knowledge is actually the end goal of reading. It should be 80-20 or even 90-10. 10% reading, 90% trying to embody. It takes effort. Personally, I don't read many books, and I've never been a good note taker. But I do consume and think about vast and varied quantities of knowledge, constantly, and some of it sticks. And I can see myself changing over time as I embody these new insights and I'm better off for it.

I'd say it's less about acceptance or liking and more about judgement. You are judging yourself against some internal standard that you've built up over time. Maybe as you say it started in your teenage years. But reaching back to being 15 and trying to work it all out is fruitless. I'd say work on being less judgemental about yourself in general. Easier said than done I know. It's more of an attitude than anything else. Can you lead life without judging?

Here's an exercise to try: Imagine making love to yourself. Bear with me, this is not some narcissist's wet dream, I'm not that way inclined. It all starts with loving yourself. There's a lot of talk in self help about loving yourself. This is probably something to do with some sort of symmetry which goes like this: how can you genuinely love others if you can't bring yourself to love yourself first? It's walking the walk so to speak. So sure, you can chant affirmations every morning and perhaps this acts as some sort of proxy for a loving mother. But it's weak sauce in my opinion. What about something with more kick in it? For those visualisers and touchy feely types why not lie down, close your eyes, put on some mood music, and then let your imaginary alter come into the room and join you with intent. The alter's intent is to literally make carnal love to you. If you're not into imaginary gay sex with yourself, then you're not ready to really love yourself. One notch down, would be to imagine yourself as the opposite sex and let your mirror alter play ordinary you. Approach. Kiss. Work out who goes first. Let the alter unbutton your blouse, let yourself fumble with their belt. Keep kissing. Press bodies, let breast and muscle collide. Be vigorous if necessary: you should feel something, if you're turned on just give into the pleasure of it, if you're turned off keep going anyway. Get naked, let your mind's eye find a comfortable position and start the heavy petting. One way to improve the experience is to match your imaginary mirror self with your every move. If you touch their behind, they will touch yours and so on. Again, feel into it. Feel the hands, the breath, the contours, the unpleasant bits, the pleasant bits, all of it. Explore your alter as much as possible. And let them explore you, and go to places you would rather not. It is only your imagination after all. Make love. Make love. Make love. Afterwards, make note of anything that came up. What surprised you? What repelled you? What did you like most? Would you go on a second date? Love thyself properly.

And two strengths combine to create a bigger strength. Naturally, every relationship is completely unique. Some of them may be a joke, others challenging, but some are beautiful. Relationships are largely improvisation anyway, they shift from day to day and change slowly over time. There's so much to learn. My mantra now is that if a relationship stops working, be polite and civil and move on. Many relationships become a joke because they're past their sell-by date.

Yeah it's funny. The mantra of "direct experience" is repeated over and over again here as if we're not having direct experience at all. As for words, it's like this: after you read War and Peace what are you left with? Was it just words or actually the direct experience of imagination? Words and their stories serve to prime the imagination, that is their utility. Words themselves are just hot air and ink. It's all absurd insofar that all acts are fundamentally meaningless. But that's ok. Relying on meaning as a crutch is also absurd.

Oh absolutely. But that was my original point with @BipolarGrowth. You can't just denigrate the stories, they're part of consciousness too. And my reply to you was metaphorical too.

@Aturban I have. The juxtaposition of Alan Watts and food is irresistible. But Alan Watts is wrong in saying that the human form is the outliers from the splotch of ink. We are the ink itself, the source.