Zigzag Idiot

If I were to warm up to rap, it would probably be through Eminem or rappers that are funny or maybe funny-raunchy. As it stands now I feel almost as disconnnected as when I would sit at my grandparents as a kid and watch the Lawrence Welch show with them. Or The Porter Wagoner Show. It was pretty bad also. Childhood with only 2 tv channels,,,

This was a very entertaining book. I didn't realize it was made into a movie. is cognitive dissonance metaphorically a first cousin to psychic entropy? Hmmm ,,, Probably more like a sibling. ?‍♂️

Thanks for sharing. I put it in my I books. I've waffled over this one for years after having read most of David Hawkins books. Lately, I've related having a purified emotional center to natural paranormal abilities. In allowing ourselves to be dominated by the thinking brain the natural intuitive abilities of the emotional center atrophy. ?‍♂️A grain of salt,,,,

Psst,,,,, Earth is actually a Hell realm. Maurice Nicoll's metaphor about it is that this planet is a pain factory. For me, I experienced this information at one time, as a relief. Martin Butler's latest podcast is pretty much related to this idea.

Being from a small town in the Bible Belt. I understand the repercussions of sharing too much personal information. Which I have done somewhat. Paraphrasing Ocke de Boer - A Conscious or an Awakening person needs to learn and interpret when one should go run and hide. Otherwise the surrounding 'sleeping' humans will peck one to death. Anyway, Who knows what next week might bring. Peace and good luck with whatever you decide.

@Keyhole, I hope you don't leave. I enjoy your perspective.

Please excuse me for double posting the Abba songs. For some, Willie Nelson's Stardust Album competes with The Best of Bread for being relaxing music.

? Correctimundo! @modmyth ?? I like the way you phrased that. It's a sobering concept especially when it's realized that the Teaching applies this to everyone. I view humans psychological multiplicity as the basis for our authentic multidimensional individuality in Holon form. That was a bit of a mouthful ,,, Ive always enjoyed the song Waterloo and it does tend to get stuck on a loop in my internal jukebox sometimes. Perhaps because it's kind of a catchy tune? I ve always enjoyed ELO's MR Blue Sky. I'm glad there was eventually a movie context connected with it , that transformed your experience of the song. I need a similar fix for most of Eminem's and Kid Rock's songs. ? Abba and ELO both were at the pinnacle of their Success when I was a kid. I've always enjoyed Jeff Lynn's symphonic style.

Having just responded to a thread about what constitutes Love, My memory was triggered concerning a great version of the Bible that I read about 4 years ago. It's written in everyday language and It has wonderful illustrations also. Actually it's a paraphrasing of the Bible but if you want to know what the Bible really says. I highly recommend it.

I@TheAlchemist I think you nailed it pretty good. ACIM teaches that Love is so all encompassing that it has no opposite. I picked out a couple of Quotes from the Ridhwan Glossary on Love. There are about 20 more if anyone wants to follow the link. I also included one quote on evil. There's 3 or 4 more of those to be found by following the lower link. To Really See that Love is Beingness is Not Easy What is the implication of this insight? If love is our beingness, our essence, and the very substance of our soul, then what is going on when we have love only in a relationship? It means you are yourself only in certain relationships. If you say that love can exist only with specific others, you’re saying, “I can be myself, my beingness only with specific others and only under certain conditions.” The conditions of the personality will restrict love, will restrict you, and you’re saying then that you can only be yourself under those conditions. If you say, “I only love this person,” what does it mean? What are you saying about yourself? To really see that love is beingness, is-ness, is not easy. You cannot understand it intellectually. The way to understand it is to experience it, to taste it, to be it. You will be able to understand its qualities only when you experience it. Love is not an idea or a concept. If you’ve never seen a coconut, never tasted a coconut, someone could explain to you the taste of a coconut forever, but you would never really know what coconut tastes like. If you taste essence, you know it. If you don’t taste it, you don’t know it. Everything is like that. When people say essence or Being or love is something mysterious, it means they have never tasted it. It isn’t any more mysterious than anything else. Your Personality or Ego Does Not Know How to Love The first thing you need to know is that your personality or ego does not know how to love. It cannot love. When you say, "I love you," it is always a lie, because the person who says, "I" cannot love, and doesn't know what love is. The personality does not know how to love. The personality is the product of the lack of love, so how can it know love? The personality is what you usually think is you, what you call "I," "myself." When you say "I," it is a lie. "I" doesn't love. "I" doesn't know how to love. "I" is there because you don't know how to love. "I" is there from the beginning because of the loss of love. The very existence of an "I" is the absence of love, the blockage and distortion of love. The "I" knows how to need; the "I" does not know how to love. It is not possible. What we call "I," our separate identity, is our self-image. Even if the self-image knows what love is, it does not have the love and cannot be a source of love. In fact, when there is love, love tends to melt away the "I." The "I" relaxes and gets out of the way. From - https://www.diamondapproach.org/glossary/refinery_phrases/love All Spiritual Work Would be Pointless if There Were Such a Thing as Ultimate Evil As we have seen, each Holy Idea is a characteristic of reality at all locations, at all times, and at all levels. Holy Truth explicates this understanding. Here, we are saying that not only is reality just one presence that is boundless and real, but that it is also positive, blissful, and wonderful. So not only is God one, but God is also wonderful and made of love. The truth, then, is loving and lovable, which is why we say in the Diamond Approach that you must love truth for its own sake. If your orientation is that you love truth so that it will change you and make you a happier person, your orientation is out of sync with how things objectively are; if you see reality as it is, you can’t help but love it. It follows, then, that objectively there is no evil. We see evil only when we perceive reality through a filter. A person who behaves in what we consider evil ways is a person acting through a distortion. In spiritual work, concepts of a devil, of dark forces, of some evil that exists on its own outside of the goodness of reality are considered manifestations of ignorance, both in terms of believing in such concepts and in terms of the manifestations attributed to such forces. All spiritual work would be pointless if there were such a thing as ultimate evil. From - https://www.diamondapproach.org/glossary/refinery_phrases/evil

That's my favorite Koan! It would be nice to attain the stability in the 2nd or 3rd tier as Ryokan . Good video too. I'll save it and watch again in the future as an alarm clock. Makes me realize I still have quite a few triggers and more work to do in spotting and observing them. My work on myself seems to go 2 steps forward and one step back. Sometimes, 3 steps back,,,,,? Thanks @Marc Schinkel I appreciate you.

Im multidimensional. A ship of fools. It's not easy being a ship of fools. It takes time and several committee mettings for a ship of fools to reach a consensus,,,,,

If the eye of Sauron had a shy bladder. That's what my experience feels like sometimes when I'm tripping. I read some earlier this evening in the 5 meo dmt megathread and other spots in the forum. Some really good stuff encountered. I'm such a numbskull, I thought, for not engaging more while I read of others experience and knowledge. Then someone in a cynical mindset barbecued another's ass and served it back to them. Oh! I remember now why I like to stay in my own little corner of the world for the most part. im a recovering cynic. It was a part of my prop for most of my life. Have always loved George Carlin. For the most part, having a cynical sense of humor is seen as cool. In a moment of clarity, I saw through that game. It's not worth it. Being cynical poisons the heart. A retreat from the world is necessary at times for my inner work. I've always had a tendency to be too 'thin skinned' and having a cynical sub persona gave me something to hide behind. It's been a long drawn out process in learning to let go of that stuff.

More grist for the mill- THE COURSE’S NONDUALISM: LOVE IS A LAW WITHOUT AN OPPOSITE A Course in Miracles is often described as “nondualistic.” Many compare it to the nondualistic Hindu philosophy known as Advaita Vedanta—it has even been called a “Christian Vedanta.” It seems to be a nearly universally held view that the Course and the great nondualistic sages of the world are saying the exact same thing in different words. I agree that the Course is nondualistic and shares many commonalities with other nondualistic paths. However, I also think there is at least one crucial difference between it and most other forms of nondualism out there—a difference that is the focus of this article. In a nutshell, the more conventional view of nondualism says that opposites (like good and evil, life and death, or spirit and body) are all manifestations of the One. The Course’s nondualism, on the other hand, says that only the positive side of certain fundamental opposites is a manifestation of the One (God); the negative side is not a manifestation of God at all, but is instead solely a mistaken product of our own minds. This snippet from - https://circleofa.org/library/the-courses-nondualism-love-is-a-law-without-an-opposite/

Been enjoying this thread some today. Good medicine.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibumi_(novel) Roughly 30 years ago this novel helped me to limp out of a very deep depression.

As you read these words. Stop. Feel your heart What does it say? Are you present?

2 1/2 minutes

@Oliver Saavedra I've typed myself as an enneatype 6 on the Enneagram. The chief feature is fear/doubt There's tons of information to be found with a google search of this subject if you're curious. I just did one and found a site that's new to me. https://www.enneagramworldwide.com/types/six-the-loyal-skeptic/

From my favorite Almaas book - Facets of Unity The Substance of One's Consciousness Looks Like Daylight What determines whether a soul has basic trust? Basic trust is the effect on the soul of a particular aspect or quality of Being that we call Living Daylight. We call it this because if one's perception is subtle enough to visually see and kinesthetically feel the substance of one's consciousness, it actually looks like daylight, and is felt as an alive consciousness. It is experienced as something boundless, in the sense that it is not bounded by one's body but rather is experienced as something that everything is made of. It is a universal sense of presence in that it pervades everything and is everywhere. The first level of experiencing it is to perceive that it is everywhere; the second level is to see that everything comes out of it; and the deepest level is to know that everything is made of it. At this deepest level, everything in the universe is seen to be originating in, bathed in, and constituted by Living Daylight. Facets of Unity, pg. 33 Vanity is the Specific Blockage Against the Channel of Living Daylight The more you get in touch with the helplessness, the more you might also get in touch with a specific physical blockage against it, which is the same thing as holding on to the delusion of vanity, of separate doership. This blockage is a specific holding at the anterior fontanel (at the front of the head) which blocks the channel of Living Daylight. When we see through this delusion and surrender our striving and our belief in it, this channel opens up. Then we can experience the beginning of real holding, the beginning of blessing as a descent of light that is love. This loving light expresses the action of Being as it melts the rigidities and fixations of the soul. When this occurs, we see that vanity is the specific blockage against the channel of Living Daylight, because in believing in yourself as a separate doer, you are taking God’s place. In other words, vanity and striving are reflections of the position that one does not need real holding. You feel that you can do it on your own and so you don’t need nourishment—whether human or divine. It also means that you believe that you do not need grace, and therefore block it. Grace is the descent of Living Daylight, specifically in regard to dissolving boundaries, so it allows us to be held by the universe and to trust in it. When you connect with this level of reality, the degree of holding in the environment ceases to be an issue. The environment that allows us to dissolve is Being itself, and when we connect with that dimension of reality, we feel held no matter what situation we are in. Facets of Unity, pg. 283

@mandyjw It's good you have a frame of reference that flexible! I may consider that approach. ?