LastThursday

That's awful, I hope that you recover as soon as possible and that the Covid is not getting the better of you. I'm not so sure myself. I agree, experience is mostly distinctions without a running mental commentary. But is it even possible to see a stool without the language concept of a stool? Language definitely informs distinctions and distinctions inform language. It's messier than you make it out to be. Language has it's tentacles deep in our conscious experience. This is why I have a deep issue with "direct experience" because it's anything but. I wonder if a doctor even has the same conscious experience of a human body as someone who isn't? The language available to them allows them to have finer distinctions in consciousness than most people.

Rock and roll baby...

I already re-incarnated. None of me is left from when I was kid. Just some vague memories and sensations and other people's accounts. Will the idea of "me" live on? Yes in other people's heads until I finally get forgotten. After all, I'm just an idea anyway. The reality is that I'm indistinguishable from the rest of existence. Will my influence live on? Almost certainly. I have permanently changed the Earth in my way, and my possesions and things I've touched may get passed down. My close family share my genes and they will live on and "re-incarnate" by giving birth. And if you're materialist then my constituent atoms and particles are immortal and will get re-cycled during and after my death. I think the premise of re-incarnation is flawed, because it has a too narrow definition of "you".

So form is more fundamental than distinctions? It kind of makes me uneasy, is there then something more fundamental than form then? Turtles all the way down? I suppose with this line of reasoning, there is then a form for "sight" which manifests itself as the experience of seeing and the physicality of my eyes - the two being facets of the one form? Interesting. Which of the above two are right? I presume that "prior to labeling" really means "prior to making distinctions"? But surely there must be some distinction in order that I can separate out "my eyes" from "my sight"? (let me use the word "my" without questioning "my" existence please). You're right, the label of "subjective idealist" is just a concept - and "subjective experience" is actually not well defined, except in opposition to "objective experience". However, that doesn't discount that I'm actually having some form of "experience", that is one thing I'm absolutely certain about - even if I don't fundamentally know what it is. But I concede that "change" is conceptual and in fact could be/is illusory. The unchanging thing however is the experience itself. And the experience itself is made up of distinctions, one of which is my eyes and the other my sight and they are mysteriously linked. I suppose I get there are levels to this. Then, "experience" is non-duality? Or is that going too far? Or is "experience" the world of forms? I grok that "perception" requires an observer, and observerless is the way to go (on here). And so "subjective experience" is tainted with implying an observer and a shared experience (everyone has it), i.e. it's still a consensus construct and not to be trusted. For the record. After much thinking about it. I was confused about seeing. Seeing and eyes are not inseparable, they are both manifestations of the same thing. It's like pointing to the tyres and the engine and being surprised that they're linked in some way. Further, is it actually possible to "see" with other parts of the body, such as the fingers or ears? Is a bat actually seeing with its ears?

@Nahm weird, but received. @Leo Gura meta meta always go(o)d thanks. @tsuki Ok ok. Let me sit in a darkened room and contemplate further before responding. Excellent response BTW. @aurum agreed, but I cannot see without them either - saying that I haven't actually tried. Although dreams... Compliments most welcome, thanks.

Sitting by the old cherry tree The stream sings gently Pink blossoms silently falling A breeze soft and swirlling

That's right. How else does something come from nothing? There is nothing to be observed and nothing to observe it. Why does that make me laugh? Is it because it's completely absurd?

@An young being I hope I'm not being thick in the head. How is it possible to know how accurate your direct experience is? Ok, humour me, give me an example of a direct experience that's 50% accurate.

Yes, Right now I am the observer of colors, sensations, thoughts etc... Does the observer observe itself? Is that possible? Just how many observers are there?

@Twega all experience is limited, direct and indirect. There's always more experiences to be had. Direct experience is only accurate if you're clearly able to tell the difference from indirect experience. For an uninitiated mortal that's very hard. For example just ask someone if they think what they did yesterday was direct experience.

Materialism is fine. It's possible to live a perfectly good life with it. Look around you, everything was made by a materialist, including you.

What if you're not? Is there really an observer? Is it possible to have the attributes of (your definition of) God directly?

Jawad himself is just a memory that arises in consciousness. Every time you speak your name, it is a memory. You have no option but to share the memory of yourself all the time with others. People will even take pictures of that memory called Jawad. Ah, you say! But what about my private memories, will they live on? If every memory is different every time, then every memory is a kind of death, it will never be repeated exactly again. There are no memories to access (because they are not stored). So as Jawad, as a memory, you are dying all the time. But you are also being reborn with each fresh memory. The definition of "me" is changing all the time. When the physical body dies, the definition of "Jawad" will change again.

It's the other way around, the human body(s) is manifested into consciousness by consciousness itself. If you tell your life story to your children, then your memories will continue without your physical body even when you're still alive. You could argue that they're not your memories any more, but, each memory is different every time, so that is not a good argument. Memories don't belong to anything, they are manifestations of consciousness. Consciousness is completely free to play as it wants.

Does a memory ever repeat? If you have a memory of something that happened when you were a child, is it the same memory every time you have it? Or does it change each time? If a memory is never repeated, then there is nothing to store. The memory just appears from nowhere into consciousness. A different way to look at memory is to see it as an event that is spread out over time. Say you eat an icecream. When does the event finish? Is it when the icecream has disappeared? No. The event carries on because you have a recurring memory of eating icecream. It is spread out over time. A bit like an echo in a cave.

I've never been a follower myself. An admirer, yes, but that's different. I think it comes from a very strong sense of equality I've always had. No one person should be raised above others. As such I would object to being followed myself. I would agree that it's a strength because you have to take responsibility for your own mind and actions. Sales people have a hard time with me, because I have to be convinced on merit and not razzmatazz. The only weakness I can see is that sometimes self delusion can take over, especially when you ignore the advice of others who actually know better than you.

I think I've finally reached a point where I'm mostly comfortable with not knowing, ambiguity, the unknown and paradox. Instead of fear or agitation, I feel peace and acceptance. I'm finally able to switch off the logical analytical mind and just be. This statement is false. And yet despite the paradox and the breakdown of logic it implies, there it is. This is similar to the state of being. There is a deep paradox to existence itself in that existence cannot be proven within existence, and yet here it is. Being itself doesn't succumb to paradox and ambiguity because they are simply embedded within being. Instead of chasing my tail and being outraged by it, I can just let it be what it is. All paradox arises out of a constriction of reality. It's like the illusion of the twisted triangle: The paradox in this case is in the restricted viewpoint. As soon as more context is filled in, the paradox resolves itself. Being, ultimately resolves all paradoxes, because it embodies all view points. Being is freedom.

@Marinador I understand you now. Are you enlightened?

@Marinador have you disproved it? To say something is real or not, is a matter of definition. In other words something is real if you define it to be real or you agree with other people it is real. "Real" is just a word. "Truth" is also just a word, and so is "Nothing". In language everything is relative to everything else (@Meta-Man would love that). But I'm sure you know that already. So there's nothing to prove. I say the present moment of appearances is real, so therefore it is for me. You are completely free to say otherwise, if your definition of "real" is different from mine. I say the past is not real, so it isn't for me.

Figure of speech. It's very hard to describe timeless things in English. Time is a fairy tale, it doesn't exist, other than as a construct inside the present moment. Something has to be real right? Otherwise why use the word "real" at all? Although, you could choose to give up on the word "real" if you want, that's perfectly fine. My "real" is the present moment, which is just an English phrase trying to describe an event outside of the construct of time itself.

Service interruption. @K Ghoul you're so cool, but don't let that go to your head or your ego. Deal! We'll swap keyboards. See you on the astral plane, I'll stand on tip toes. Resume service.

It's worse than that. Nothing was real before this moment. This moment is real, the rest is make believe.

I would go to music school and study the piano - for the sheer pleasure of it. I didn't need to go to university to be a software developer. But it did teach me how to study and focus and how to socialise with many different types of people and how to look after myself - it gave me confidence - all of which are very useful.

How To Run About a decade ago now I used to run regularly. Eventually I managed to get up to half marathon distance, which is around thirteen miles. It taught me a lot about how the body works mechanically. Nowadays I mostly walk and play sports instead. However, there is an art to running long distance which other activities don't have. One of the most important considerations is rhythm (or pace). The legs act as a pair of pendulums and so will have a natural resonant frequency. Longer legs have a lower natural frequency, and conversely for shorter legs. This natural frequency requires the least effort to run. Running faster than this requires notable extra effort; running slower than this can feel awkward as if you're working against yourself. The natural running frequency, is not just determined by leg length, but by the body as a whole and especially by muscle mass and how quickly the muscles can contract. This fact is important for sprinters who tend to have muscle fibres which contract more quickly than most. For long distance running it's important to find this natural frequency and maintain it throughout the run. To run faster, you need to improve muscle mass. The pace at which you run will determine how much air you need to take in. Oxygen is burnt is the muscles at a specific rate, and so enough needs to be taken in to cover this. In turn the rate at which you breathe and the lung capacity determines this. However, for efficient running the breathing needs to be in sync with the frequency with which you move your legs. This is because the whole body is acting as a connected system, and each part needs to be in resonance with all the others to run well. You will find it awkward if you breathe out of step with your leg movement. You can increase intake by breathing through the mouth and by taking deeper breaths - but this will require you to have stronger diaphragm muscles. I never used to run with music for two reasons. Most running music has a lot of percussive elements, and this can affect your running frequency so that you're not at your ideal rate. Secondly, it distracts from paying close attention to what your body is doing. A lot of the art of efficient running is fine tuning different aspects as you run and at different phases of your run. I would never stretch before a run (I never had an injury). But I would always start off with a very light jog for about half a mile or so - especially on colder days. I would vary my pace in small bursts over that half mile to get the body and mind prepared for what's to come. At the end of the half mile I would nearly walk (but not stop at all) before doing the run proper. With colder muscles you will naturally run more slowly, so you should maintain a slower pace for the first mile or so. I found that I would naturally increase my pace over this distance, but that could well be due to training. Once up to speed it's essential to maintain that speed throughout most of the run. How far you can maintain it is purely down to fitness. If you find you can't maintain your natural pace more than a certain distance, then you should stop and aim to improve the distance the next time. A good rule of thumb if you run once a week is to increase distance by 10% each time, but probably a bit less if you are less fit. If you are just starting running, then you should run exactly the same route each time and extend it, so you have a very clear physical way of seeing your improvement. For distance running I would say extending distance is more important than running faster. You will naturally start running faster as you get fitter, so no need push faster than your natural pace, if you do so fatigue sets in more quickly. Of course it's absolutely natural that your pace tapers off gradually towards the end of the distance as fatigue sets in. But you will reach a point were the running feels stilted if it's too slow and you should stop then. Where you place your arms can have an effect on your balance as you run, and there will be more efficient positions than others - you should experiment as each person's body shape is different. Ideally you should aim to reduce any lateral sway or rotation when running, as this means energy is being taken away from your legs and momentum. You do this with both your arms and how you angle your feet as they hit the ground. Early on in my running, when I was improving my fitness I would find my knees would ache and sometimes my hip bones. The main cause was that the muscles around the knees were too weak and therefore not holding the joint together, which in turn was causing more rotation in the joint than necessary. The other was the angle of my feet. Ideally they should point forward at nearly 12 o'clock at all times. Any other angle will cause the knee joint to rotate and can cause pain and injury. The ideal for running is to use your Achilles tendon as a spring which stores energy with each step. Unfortunately, most running shoes impede this mechanism by making your run more flat footed than it should be. This also means that the shockwaves as you hit the ground are transferred to your knee and hip joints rather then being absorbed by the tendons. Obviously, running in barefoot is not really possible out in the street, so getting the right shoes is critical - unfortunately it's mostly trial and error - but they can make a big difference. Should you drink lots of water? No. Take small amounts if your mouth gets dry. If it's a hot day, drink so that the liquid is not sloshing around in your stomach. Running holding a large water bottle can affect your running gait and should be avoided. Lastly is the psychological factor. Towards the end of a long run fatigue will set in and you'll need to overcome this to keep the pace up. Efficient running technique will help to a large extent. There's a tendency to throw technique out when fatigue sets in and the running can become sloppy. Instead of battling through you should just stop and try again a different day. One thing I used to do was stare upwards towards the sky, this has the strange effect of putting you in a light trance and this can distract from the fatigue. Another was to imagine lying on a warm beach or taking a hot bath. Choose a visualisation which works for you. And very lastly, if you're just starting, then stopping half way through on a long distance can be beneficial - especially if you're quite fatigued or out of breath. However, you should keep it short enough just to catch your breath and avoid sitting if possible. Start off slowly again and gather momentum over a few minutes. Should you warm down? Ideally you should do a light jog or walk for a few hundred yards at the end - enough to get your breath back. After that you should get indoors and keep warm if it's cold outside.

My god. I think this combines all my fetishes into one: Notes for future self: talk about Fetish don't be shy.