winterknight

How do you know what color in the inner movie corresponds to the brain? Words, right? Don't they look at an fMRI and ask what the person is seeing? Suppose two people say they see "green." How do you know if their inner-movie experiences of the color green are the same?

Because maybe at one point in an earlier time and situation that was useful advice.

What I'm talking about is the experience of color in your inner movie. How can you know whether the colors aren't reversed in someone else's inner movie?

My pleasure. Glad to be of help.

Go get psychoanalytic/psychodynamic therapy. There are probably issues in your unconscious that you are not dealing with.

Right, but do you understand the idea that if, for example, someone experienced the color you see when you look at grass when they looked at a clear sky, and the color that you see when you look at a clear sky when they looked at the grass, but still called the sky "blue" and the grass "green," that science would never be able to detect this?

Of course. Literally any element of your experience for which you use shared language has the same piece. Does another person experience the same thing when you talk about love, couches, or numbers? You may use the same word but the experiences could be radically different. And you will never, even with all the scientific instruments, be able to know what someone else's experience is really like because you, as observer, stand in the way. Science can't figure that out, because it's impossible . Dead matter cannot generate sentience. No, the Self goes beyond being human, in fact goes beyond all concepts. You can experience that fact directly for yourself if you like.

If you really knew what it was trying to tell you, you wouldn't feel like you needed to 'overcome' it. That language suggests that fear is some kind of enemy. It is not. It's a voice within yourself that is trying to help you. If you listen to it, you should try to address its concerns. Is the fear realistic, for example? Or if it is not realistic, then what is it really about? Maybe it's about something different than what it seems. This is again why I recommend psychodynamic/psychoanalytic therapy. It can help you with this. If you really know what the fear is telling you, it shouldn't feel like you are "overcoming" it... it should feel like a gentle process... like you are deciding to act after having carefully and compassionately listened to what the fear is about and having tried to address those concerns as best you can. There are many voices, desires, and concerns within ourself. We need to try to listen to them all, let the whole richness of their points of view come into our consciousness.

I don't recommend concentration on points on the body. I recommend Ramana Maharshi's self-inquiry method. It's very specific. If you are in that state, if it is a state of calm, clear peace even while you are awake and doing things in the world -- which it sounds like it is -- you can simply stay in it and relax. No need to interrupt that with further deliberate inquiry. But if you fall out of it (which you may), then use inquiry to get back. And repeat. I wouldn't say it's waiting for an experience. It's inquiring into your nature until you see past an illusion. Follow Ramana Maharshi's method. Nice. This sounds like you are glimpsing the Truth. Now knowing this, can you just relax, letting whatever happens happen, since there is "no longer even an I," as you say? Might be worth a try. Yes, it's a problem. If this is the case, you might go for a psychoanalyst on Skype. Contact your city's institute and ask if they know anyone who would do that. So that way you can meet them first in person, and then continue with them on Skype. Don't know enough about Mooji or Papaji to have an opinion, to be honest. Self-inquiry should be done in the sitting position only at the very beginning; it really needs to be done in every waking moment, whatever else you are doing. Doesn't matter what mudra you use. Good, that's progress. Keep inquiring into the Self. And get some psychodynamic/psychoanalytic therapy for support in this process. Know nothing about spiral dynamics, sorry.

So I have two answers here. The first is: yes, you can. It may take a little practice at first, like learning to juggle, but yes. But second is that when I read this, I feel here is that there is within you there is some kind of conflict in you about the spiritual work. And so, like a parent, you're telling yourself, "Ok, I'll let you have your weird little self-inquiry hobby, as long as it doesn't interfere with your homework." I feel the grip of that inner parent super tight, unwilling to let go. These fears arise because you are identified as the doer. But in fact, believing this is like watching a movie and believing that if you slack off, the hero of the movie is not going to be able to fight the bad guys. You're not in the movie, actually. You're sitting comfortably on your sofa, and what the hero does has nothing to do with you. But that's ok. Move at the level you are comfortable with.

Yes, it's perfectly possible to engage in career ambition and activity with the self-inquiry path. What's much harder may be to deal with the depression and anxiety you may generate if you are telling yourself you are engaging in it with a kind of playfulness, when you actually are still pushing yourself and forcing yourself to do things that you don't really want to do. But you have to decide that yourself... and as you say, you can try it out and see how it goes. But self-inquiry is in itself compatible with anything you do, any career path or ambition, so long as between the two, self-inquiry is the priority -- at all times, that's where your main focus should be.

It is hard. Some people will never be convinced, but some people want to be convinced but just haven't been yet. This second group has at least some possibility. The basic argument that kind of works is this. The idea that the brain generates consciousness is materialism: everything comes from matter. Matter is that which can be observed by everyone equally. In theory, all humans, with the right instruments, should have access to it. That's the whole beauty and point of science -- it is publicly observable. But in fact, you can never know what someone else's experience is really like. You can never know, for example, whether their color blue is really like your color blue. Even if a computer monitor printed out the color of what they saw when they looked at a clear sky, you could actually know it. Why is that? Because it would be you looking at the monitor. Maybe they would see something different. So if other people's experience is something that you can never actually directly access, then it is not publicly accessible. If it is not publicly accessible, then it is not scientific. If it is not scientific, then the brain cannot account for it. So each person's experience cannot be accounted for in the brain. Therefore the brain does not generate consciousness. Whew. Oversimplified, but that's the argument in a nutshell. Look up the hard problem of consciousness, spectrum inversion, and the zombie problem if you want more serious philosophy on these points. But they get quite complex.

It's not really about what's preferable but about who's talking with what level of understanding, in what context, and for what purpose. Ultimate truth is beyond symbols and contexts, so all the words about it are distortions of one kind or another. If I understand you correctly, yes. But you do say "Now for me the inside is gone..." Who is that "me" that is in that statement "for me"? Well said. A very relatable situation. You are probably going to have to acknowledge that you don't want what you "should" want. You think you "should" want career success. You think you "should" want financial security. These shoulds are killing you. The shoulds are just thoughts, patterns that you have obtained from family and society, when it is your emotions that control the ballgame. Time to align yourself with what you actually want -- what your emotions are telling you -- and see if you can come up with a solution that satisfies them. As you say, "if there is not enough motivation to work... one simply doesn't work." Yes. This is the fact. There is no getting around it. No use trying to use "willpower" to overcome it. Of course, perhaps part of you is afraid about money and career, and part of that may also be genuine emotion... if so, those desires have to be taken into account too. But you have overemphasized them at the expense of all other emotions, and that's why you are facing a problem. Probably you actually care much less about these things than you tell yourself. Maybe you would be content with a much lower amount of money and career success. The "loser's excuse" bit is the problem -- it is a judgmental self-condemnation that is blocking out what you actually feel. But perhaps it is a deeply-embedded habit. No easy way to get rid of that sense. Condemning yourself for having that feeling would itself be playing into its hands. So how do you reconcile all these? There is no cookie cutter solution. The main key is simply acknowledging and discovering what it is you actually want, without judgment or condemnation. That is the starting place. You cannot choose what you want, but you can open your eyes to it. That itself is a discovery process. Try to think about alternatives that match up to what you actually want... when you imagine them, how do you feel? If you try them out, how do you feel? That's how you discover more clearly what will work with your internal psychology. You say that not putting in your work in your field is "clearly not sustainable," but is that really true? Perhaps you need to find a less-demanding job, perhaps one out of science. Maybe that's really what you want to do but are afraid of admitting to yourself: that you don't care about science anymore. Basically, you have to get in touch with your emotions. That's also why I so highly recommend psychoanalytic/psychodynamic therapy for seekers. Oh, and use this entire situation as a springboard to the spiritual. Do Ramana Maharshi's self-inquiry continuously as you face and deal with these problems. One day, you will be ready to surrender, and allow these problems to solve themselves. Until then, consider these recommendations.

You were talking about tests of self-delusion. Such a test already invokes a duality, a duality which has to be pierced with another duality. If there are no enlightened ones, then there are also no unenlightened ones and no tests for self-delusion. You pick the context...

1. It's a paradox. It's a message to seekers, who will find later on that it is a contradiction. 2. Ignorance is not here but not there. To think that is itself ignorance. And to understand that statement, you have to follow the path. 3. Yes. Whatever you are doing, wherever you are, you can engage in Ramana Maharshi's self-inquiry. It may take a little bit of practice at first, but you will quickly get the hang of it. You will do no worse than you otherwise would have done. 4. They are using the words "I am" in different ways. In this particular case, RM's "I am" is the true I am, which knows itself nondually. Nisargadatta is talking about the dualistic "I am," which feels that it is, which knows itself as an object. "The Absolute does not know it is" as an object. It knows itself nondually. So they are simply using slightly different terminology. For the enlightened one, even thought is non-thought. Conversely, even the absence of thought is thought. The one who understands this understands their true nature.

We have to understand carefully what is meant by the idea that they are not "real." What that means is that they are not what they seem to be. What they seem to be is "concepts and thoughts." But this is the result of a mistaken belief about what we are. That is, we define objects from a kind of perspective that assumes that we are independent selves viewing objects. Only by occupying this mistaken position is it possible to see these kinds of objects, to draw these kinds of boundaries. If we remove, through self-inquiry, that mistaken belief about what we are -- then we will no longer be able to see the objects this way. The objects will no longer seem to be what we thought they were. It's as if we were looking through a weird set of distorting glasses. Take the glasses off, and -- boom -- things look totally different. Through the glasses we might see what we thought was a man. Take the glasses off and it turns out it was a tree. Where'd the man go? Wasn't the man real? Well, no, the man simply never was. Or we we think of a cool idea in our dreams -- we think it's going to change the world. When we wake up, it's total gibberish. Doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Wasn't it real, what we thought? No -- what we thought simply was nonsense. Only we didn't realize it at the time in the dream. So similarly, it turns out that the very idea of "concepts and thoughts" is itself part of the result of that mistaken belief about ourselves. So what are these things actually? Well, all we can say upon recognizing our true identity is that a) they are not what we thought they were b) they are so much not what we thought they were that we cannot even call them "objects" or "concepts" or "thoughts" c) they are so much not what we thought they were that we cannot even call them "things" -- we cannot even call them "them" d) they are so much not what we thought they were that we cannot even say that they "are" e) whatever they are, they must be nothing other than the Self Technically, I am not the one who thinks, so never. But if you prefer me to admit for the sake of discussion that I am the one who thinks, then -- sometimes, but less than before.

Keeping in mind that this is just a metaphor, one way it's been put is that ignorance is actually a very special kind of thought: a veiling thought, a thought which covers up. It's the thought of forgetfulness. When consciousness reflects that thought, you get the idea of an "ignorant" mind. When that veiling thought disappears, you get the thought of an "awakened" mind. But both are simply images in the projector of consciousness.

A good psychoanalyst. Psychoanalysis and psychodynamic therapies are a family of therapies that started with Freud -- but have progressed a lot since his day. They are very sophisticated and subtle. Psychoanalysis is the most powerful type -- but it usually requires at least 3x/week sessions. Psychodynamic therapy can be 1x or 2x/week. Same principles are used. Psychoanalysts these days usually do both types. Psychoanalysts are on average the best trained therapists. So to find a good therapist, google "psychoanalytic institute <my city>" and see if there are any institutes in your city. Call them and ask for a referral. They often have low-fee options available if that is an issue. In the first couple of sessions, you should feel that you are getting something from it. If you don't, or if you don't feel the therapist is a good fit, try someone different. Sometimes it can take a couple of tries to get a good match. If you have any trouble or are getting confused, PM me and I will help you.

I could say that there is a little self; I could say that there isn't. I could say that there appears to be but in reality there isn't. In the end, words just can't express truth that well. I think that's the key point. That all the concepts are themselves within the realm of illusion. All the concepts -- and thus all names -- and thus all objects. Are you extremely sad for all the people who die in a movie? Psychoanalytic/psychodynamic therapy (google "psychoanalytic institute <your city>" and ask for a referral), expressive writing/art/music, self-inquiry. Fear should not be regarded as something to be "overcome" but as bringing you a message. Your task is to listen to it and to understand what it is really saying. Therapy's very helpful for this. Haha, yes, exactly. Hrm... possibly. Would have to give it more thought. As far as division in the world, division is the nature of illusion. As soon as you say "I" and "you" -- boom, division has been created. Luckily, that division is just an illusion. But "within" the illusion division will persist. Maybe there are. How would you know? Glitches in dreams are known when you wake up. So wake up and then see. Your mind is being analyzed. While it may be true in the end that there is no I, as a seeker, just telling yourself there is no "I" is not enough. In order to get to the point where you can have peace of mind, the clarity, the concentration, so that you can practice and find that out yourself, you have to calm the mind. Psychoanalysis can be a powerful method of mental calming. If none of us really exist, then where are the mothers and where is the giving birth? These are all just words until you experience it yourself. The seeker must take the standpoint that it appears as if we all exist, and it appears as if mothers are giving birth, and that they are looking to penetrate that illusion. I don't think in terms of kundalini and chakras, so I wouldn't know, sorry.

Relationships are easier. I'm more able to be open and give more, since I have more myself, and I expect and require less of other people. On the other hand, because I need people less, there is in a way less reason to seek them out. As far as the human condition, I have no idea what's going to happen. Ultimately whether there is division or not in this world is in a way irrelevant; that's all merely a superficial appearance... the eternal peace and unity is what really matters.

Yes. There were many things about which I was in denial, and I had to uncover those things one by one. What I was telling myself that I wanted in my career, in my love life, in my creative life, and in my spiritual life: all were wrong.

Yes. Sooner or later. May not be this lifetime, however.

Who is bothered by this "barrier of ignorance"? Who is the "I" in the "I don't know what all of this awareness really is"? You need to look into that "I" relentlessly.

The question makes assumptions which are not true. There are no humans. There are no people. But you will never be able to understand this unless you see it directly for yourself. Hehe. It's almost like the question "When did you stop beating your wife?" There's no good answer . The truth is that the entire way of looking at things in terms of the person I would have referred to myself as in the past is wrong. It's so wrong it cannot even be spoken about in a coherent way. I can neither say yes nor no to your question, really. It's something you will only fully understand if you walk the path. Mainly by aligning my actions with what I really wanted -- and it takes work to discover what you want. Often we are not clear about that. Psychodynamic/psychoanalytic therapy and expressive writing were important in helping me do that. More here. Don't know enough about nootropics to say, sorry. When there is no distinction there is nothing to see through... it is simply being knowing itself.

You seem to be bringing up the point again that you brought up before -- that by trying to work within duality, we seem to be perpetuating it. Is that what you're getting at? Yes, if you consider yourself a seeker, then you must put in effort -- either to inquire into the self, or to utterly surrender and accept whatever happens without question (the latter is a harder path). Even surrender will seem to take effort. Looking back, there is no seeker and no dispelling of that identity. It's impossible to understand unless you see it for yourself. It has not. That's a misconception that arises from the fact that you falsely identify yourself with your body and mind. Because you falsely identify with the "I" of the human body-mind. Humans don't exist. Only the Self exists. Walk the path and you will understand that all this time you have always been free and have never not known the truth.