abrakamowse

We are eating ourselves

I really have no idea what I am doing, but I am doing it anyway. I am trying to focus on awareness, observing everything as the witness. And meditating everyday half hour or more. And when I meditate I do mindful meditation with self inquiry. I also do meditation observing an object, like a candle, a glass of water, etc...

Nice @Shanmugam that's good stuff. Now I don't believe in anything upfront but I try to see all the options and keep them "open" until some experience confirms it. And even when that happen I am always open to change my ideas, or a new thing that I discover makes me change my opinion, but I try not to cling to my opinions. I really posted that more to try to show another "side" of the coin but I really don't know if any of the theories is true, because we need to defy the conventional thinking (that is that the brain makes the thinking) and the unconventional (like the one I posted about the heart) we have to double check like the way you did. And we only have our experience, any idea that we get from "other" people is not on our experience and it becomes a belief. Remember the old saying... "If you meet the Buddha, kill him.”– Linji We can not rely even on the scriptures and at the end of the path we have to even let go the idea of enlightenment.

I read an article that people who got heart transplants get the skills or abilities of the person who was the donor of the heart. It was published on an Chinese newspaper that I got in the subway in NYC. We don't know nothing at all. https://www.thesun.co.uk/archives/health/388617/transplants-changed-our-personalities/

How do you know that there's a body?

Is there a brain?

Nice, that makes sense. Thanks @cetus56

I am studying the buddhist doctrine, something that I feel so true and really helped me to understand what was happening to me was how a "person" is created. That is the 5 aggregates of buddhism. I found this on wikipedia: What caught my attention was that Buddha grouped consciousness into the 5 aggregates, and I had the idea that we are consciousness. So, it can't be an aggregate right? What am I missing? Thanks!!!!

Thanks @Leo Gura that's why I was wondering what did Buddha mean with that. Not sure if that "consciousness" is the pure awareness that Nisagardatta talks about, our true self, the absolute... or something different. I think he's talking about our consciousness as a separated being, the lower self consciousness. Not the higher self.

You have to drop everything. No desires at all, not even desire for enlightenment. The ego wants this and wants that... the ego wants "things" but who you really are doesn't need anything and it's not a thing. And it's already "whole". The desire of doing something is actually not letting you achieve whatever you want to achieve. You can't do nothing from the ego perspective, we are limited when we are identified with thoughts, emotions, body, objects... It's a paradox. You have to stop desiring to achieve what you really want. Jesus said "For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it." The life Jesus is talking is our life as a little self, our ego, desires, etc... if you lose that you will find your true self.

That's difficult to give a response. Because as you said that "nothing" is a concept and "not a thing" cannot be grasped by the mind, it becomes an object. Same thing happens with the idea of seeking our real identity. You have to seek it without seeking it... hhehe... that's why Zen call it to cross the "gateless gate" por "pathless path". I think that's were intuition comes into account. And intuition is the way our true self "talks" through silence. This is from my experience, I am still working on understanding all this really. :-)

What they say is that we create suffering, by giving value to the things of the world. Like a car. If I buy a car, I am happy. If I can't buy a car I am unhappy. The car doesn't have happiness, there's no happiness or unhappiness in the car. We superimpose happiness because we think that having the car will give us happiness. The only happiness is in the Brahman, that's why when we buy or get things, objects, car, houses, a good job, a family, a beautiful woman/handsome man etc... in fact we are seeking that eternal joy that is you, the true and only self. If you think about it (thought can't never grasp the absolute, but I will try) if there's something, it must come from nothing. There's should be nothing there to something appear. That's why something without any concept, as nothing or something, something that is outside of space, time, etc... can "create" or make the world appear. I don't think we are in a body. Because our identity can't be in the body. You know who you are, not because of what you think you are, you know it because of what you are not. What is left is you. You are not your body, or senses, or thoughts, etc....

Yes! You are it

Exactly... the non dual teachers says the reality, let's call it the ultimate truth... is that nothing is happening. Note: The "illusion" allows the world to be "created"

That's what Buddhist call "discrimination". And they call the infinite self buddhi and the lower self jiva. The Buddhi is a part of the ego that is closer to the light, to the absolute and the jiva is more attached to material things and it is the dark side of the ego, it is farther from the light source that is you.

There's an appearance of permanence that is not real, hence it's an illusion. Illusion means that things are not what they seem. Their true nature is not what we think it is. What is the nature of a tree? The leaves? The trunk? Everything is the tree but it has no nature, there's no tree nature. It's really empty and our mind call it a "tree".

That's what I needed to hear and I wasn't understanding. I had a lot of beliefs about thoughts, like if I see that I am not my thoughts "what am I going to do"? "How I will know how to function"... Lol... :-P Those are just thoughts and not real.

@Shin Thanks! That's what I am doing all the time, trying to be mindful all the time and thoughts are appearing less and less than before. And I am trying again to go back to my meditation schedule. I stopped for some months and yesterday I began to meditate again on top of being mindful all the time. I appreciate your input! :-)

Do you think that being mindful all the time can be enough to see it?

@Max_V One thing that it helped me a lot is to be mindful all the time. Mostly mindful about "the thoughts"... notice that I didn't write "your thoughts". The thoughts are what create the distortion on reality. If you can see that you don't have control over your thoughts, you will see that they have no power on you. Ergo, your belief about your brain having your "consciousness" or creating it it's going to fall apart. You need patience, it takes time... we have been indoctrinated all our life to that belief. It needs to be removed but not with other belief. It has to be consciousness who awakens. Your real self.

God is a God of laws!!!! And that includes law of physics, mathematics, quantum mechanics and more...

@Natasha with that video I had an experience of feeling all my body completely. I even noticed the blood running into the veins and the breathing, the air entering in the lungs. It was amazing, but I couldn't "reproduce" that experience again.

Try on a Mac next time