VeganAwake

"the greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance, it's the illusion of knowledge" The mind likes to put things in a box and check it off as being known, so it can move on to the next box to check off. This quote points to: when you believe you already know something, the mind tends to subconsciously skip over it without inquiring deeply enough... this is why it's often said to become child like, as if looking at something for the first time. This is why the middle path is so often referred to with Enlightenment work. It's not about landing on one side or the other... staying emotionally neutral during deep introspection. Open and grounded simultaneously sorting through the wheat and the chaff like Leo says...? ❤

Leo, I nominate Marinador as a new mod...?

A very similar experience occurred here after months of spontaneous meditation periods(every 2 hrs or so) I woke one morning with a still mind and noticed everyone running the rat race and completely tangled in what I refer to as the socially conditioned mind matrix. They seemed as slave robots completely identified with there conditioned minds and completely unaware of it....it was shocking and yet ordinary because I completely understood what was going on. Simultaneously it was recognized that this ME character I believed myself to be was also a consequence of social conditioning....it became loose like a house of cards and collapsed. Just pure luminous emptiness is what was left and also recognized as having always been the case. This is Samadhi Enlightenment Liberation Nirvana ❤

"Enlightenment is a destructive process. It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It's seeing through the facade of pretence. It's the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true". -- Adyashanti

When it's recognized there just isn't a right or wrong path to begin with the idea of spiritual bypassing becomes irrelevant or non applicable. There aren't correct and incorrect ways of doing it.... and it's way too free and radical for the mind to grasp.

Like Leo says awareness alone is curative. The ego isn't something to demonize because it isn't real. It's an identification with habitual and conditioned patterns of thought which overlay an illusory self centered experience on top of reality.(what's in it for 'me' mentality) These three videos are fantastic in helping understand:

I did psychedelics like 20 years ago... There were periods of time when the minds constant analyzing judgment or thinking(monkey chatter) just wasn't happening.... there was just Being. The experience here left a subtle recognition of what was possible. The minds constant dialogue became more fluid and manipulatable sort of speak. It also became less valued than before. ❤

"The solution is not to fight for peace or conquer nature, but to simply recognize the truth; that the very existence of the ego structure creates duality, a split between self and other, mine and yours, man and nature, inner and outer. The ego is violence; it requires a barrier, a boundary from the other in order to be. Without ego there is no war against anything. There is no hubris, there is no overreaching nature to create profit. These external crises in our world reflect a serious inner crises; we don’t know who we are. We are completely identified with our egoic identities, consumed by fears and are cut off from our true nature. Races, religions, countries, political affiliations, any group that we belong to, all reinforce our egoic identities. Almost every group that exists on the planet today wants to claim its perspective as true and correct, as we do on an individual level. By claiming the truth as its own, the group perpetuates its own existence in the same way that an ego or self structure defines itself against other". -- Samadhi (Maya illusion of the self)

Totally...it seems to hide by being everything ?

The belief that there's something to find which is better than what's already here.

Maybe 'your' not conscious of it because....'your' not conscious of it. Wow what a simple recognition right? ❤

After awakening, love here feels not only as an acceptance but also as a big picture understanding of the human condition and behavior. Things are just seen for what they are because that's what's happening and what's happening is what's true. ❤

Absolutely, and truth seems to be an ever-changing infinite potential rather than something solid(truth is constant change)...so truth is THIS or What IS. Quick story: My friend told me over the phone that he was excited to experience the natural self without ego, I told him the natural self is the ego... How can what's happening be argued with as unnatural right?... So in that sense identification as an individual and or awakening are equally natural(as in one isn't better than the other). There is nothing unnatural, there's just THIS or the Dao. Every path is the path ❤

And that's what's being experienced there bud. It felt perfectly spot on here.

Wow...That's such a beautiful way of explaining....thank you ❤ I didn't have a religious background or structure really. Everything feels like an unguided and boundless life energy without parameter or purpose. All the beautiful words that attempt to describe it, are also it. And the realization of it seems to hide itself by being everything. ❤

I know you're not and yes it's good inquiry ❤ All that's being expressed here is that there isn't any real separation.... sure within the appearance of everything there seems to be different sects, groups, cultures ,religious belief systems, states, countries, territories, continents.... this apparent separation is imaginary.... the borders that seem to separate are imaginary. ❤ Exactly the same as the experience as a separate sense of self within the body... different thoughts and beliefs identified with does not constitute a real separation.

❤ Who is the 'My'... If it's 'my' ego, 'my' thinking and suffering....who or what makes up this sense of 'My'? Who is the 'ME' and what does it consist of?

How can there be separation between something that's real and something that doesn't exist. Would you run up to a man having a fight with his imaginary friend and tell them to separate?

If everything always seemed perfect it would get boring rather quickly. There's nothing right or wrong with mourning. The idea that one feeling is better than the other or that something needs to change creates an inner struggle or resistance. We seem to want the good without the bad the happiness without the sadness the light without the darkness... this sets up a constant craving and aversion cycle that will never end. ❤

Nihility “Isn’t ‘nothingness’, as the basis of ajata teachings, an outgrowth of nihilism?” Nihilism is, generally, a word used by philosophers. In the nothingness of which ajata speaks, there are no words, ideas, definitions or labels which apply. In nothingness, there is not any thing—even “nihilism” has no reality there. Nihil is Latin for “nothing”. Theologians consider whether the universe was created ex nihilo, which means “out of nothing”. But, as stated above, there is not anything which comes out of nothing. From the standpoint of nothingness—and the teachings of ajata— not anything has ever been created (starting with the universe). Ajata is unsettling to religionists; it undercuts every doctrine that could be promulgated. Further, it indicates that there is no meaning or purpose since there has not been anything created which could have such values. When it is possible to give up the attachment to “something”—anything—then nothingness (nihility) can be understood. But when the attempt is to try to envision nothingness in relationship to something else (“Then what’s here?”), there is still an attachment to the idea that there is some thing other than nothing which “exists”. The teaching of nihility, like it or not, is that reality does not exist. In fact, “nothing” itself can be said neither to exist or not exist. Not anything can be said of nothing. But that doesn’t mean that the premise can’t be understood, empty as it is. In fact, emptiness is a synonym for nothingness, as long as you can envision emptiness outside of something that is empty. So, one could say of nihility that “all is emptiness,” in a like manner—denying the reality of the “all”. Where most people go astray in attempting to understand nothingness is this: nothing is nothing. There is not anything which nothing can be compared to, because you have nothing that you can bring to the comparison. Nothing is devoid of characteristics or questions. In Buddhism, the synonym is called the void. But the mind immediately evokes a “void”, which is to say “not a non-void”. This is why the word “nothing” must be comprehended: we are not talking about a void that stands away somewhere from something that is not a void. Nagarjuna says, “If there are things that are not empty, ‘voidness' may exist. If everything is empty, how can even emptiness exist?” His point: “There is nothing that is not empty”. This means “void” and “non-void” are both empty! Shantideva says clearly, “There is nothing…how can absence—lacking all support—remain before the mind, as something present?” Nothing does not mean something. It means nothing at all, not anything. Nothing to behold. Is nothingness empty “like space”? Nothing is empty of space. We could say that it was nothing before empty space. Nothing does not have, or occupy, space. All thought—particularly about nothingness—is empty". Ramana: “I teach ajata.” “Ajata means ‘non-creation,’” David Godman has written. It is a philosophical or experiential standpoint that declares or knows that neither the physical world nor the person in it have ever been created. “Questions about the liberation or bondage of persons are therefore inadmissible and hypothetical since the persons themselves do not really exist. They are all a complete fiction brought about by the power of defective imagination.” Godman adds: “When one…knows the truth of ajata by direct experience…such a one is sahaja nishta [experiencing sahaja].” Godman: “This particular standpoint…known as ajata or non-becoming…was the only teaching that Ramana taught from his own experience.” As Muruganar, one of Ramana’s most faithful disciples has said, “We have heard him say that his true teaching, firmly based on his experience, is ajata.” Regarding such teachings, Godman has written, “Almost all his ideas were radical refutations of the concepts of physical reality that most people cherish.” Ramana has said: That alone is real…which is eternal and unchanging. Was (the world) ever seen without the aid of the mind? In deep sleep, there is neither mind nor world. When awake, there is the mind and there is the world. What does this invariable concomitance mean? You are familiar with the principles of inductive logic, which are considered the very basis of scientific investigation. Why do you not decide this question of the reality of the world in the light of those accepted principles of logic? He adds: There is no alternative for you but to accept the world as unreal if you are seeking the truth and the truth alone. Ramana notes: A dream as a dream does not permit you to doubt its reality. It is the same in the waking state, for you are unable to doubt the reality of the world which you see while you are awake. How can the mind, which has itself created the world, accept it as unreal? That is the significance of the comparison made between the world of the waking state and the dream world. Both are creations of the mind and, so long as the mind is engrossed in either, it finds itself unable to deny their reality. It cannot deny the reality of the dream world while it is dreaming and it cannot deny the reality of the waking world while it is awake. Adding: If, on the contrary, you completely withdraw your mind from the world…you will find the world of which you are now aware is just as unreal as the world in which you lived in your dream… While you are dreaming, the dream was a perfectly integrated whole. That is to say, if you felt thirsty in a dream, the illusory drinking of illusory water quenched your illusory thirst. But all this was real and not illusory to you so long as you did not know that the dream itself was illusory. Similarly with the waking world… Only if there is creation do we have to explain how it came about… Whatever you see happening in the waking state happens only to the knower, and since the knower is unreal, nothing in fact ever happens". -- Ajata Project Robert Wolfe

Not sure if this is the guy but he has almost a similar if not exact story to what you were describing... he was very well known in spiritual circles.

Well of course everything is already non-dual, there are just imaginary lines and beliefs that seem to separate within the appearance. Those apparent separations are not real. And of course non-duality is just a word pointing to everything exactly the way it is without any real separation. So in that sense everything is already whole complete and perfect whether it's recognized or not. There's not a separate 'you' being a nondualist, there is only everything. ❤

I would imagine all of the above honestly... there's no real telling. I have heard everything from, major life transformation to nothing really noticeable externally changing at all. It is very radical and fun to talk about so it does seem that there are quite a few that find a way to earn an income by sharing their communication whether by writing books, holding retreats and online discussion groups with those who are open-minded and interested in the message.... but it's obviously easier to find these people because of their popularity. Simultaneously I would imagine it must happen all over the world and I'm sure some don't really discuss it that much at all.... I heard a story about an awakened guy discussing it with some people at a bar and his longtime friend grabbed him by the neck because he was so frustrated with what he was talking about.... So one probably should be aware of the company he or she is talking to...lol. When Awakening occurred here for example I still had three years left in the military before getting a retirement pension for the rest of my life. It just made sense financially for our family for me to finish up and get that retirement. Just simply can't tell it's fair game afterwards ❤

I know you do ❤ I love you too brother it's unconditional and unshakable

Notice how so-called infinite consciousness doesn't actually extend any further than the natural bodies senses and imagination. For example, your not actually aware of what your neighbors had for dinner and what movie they watched before bed. A bird could fly over head and shit, and you wouldn't be conscious of it, until it landed on your head. You also aren't aware of what's happening at the 711 fuel station in Stuttgart Germany right now. Sounds like this amazing consciousness bit isn't really all it was chalked up to be. The body can see, hear, feel, smell, taste, think/imagine(intellect) Is consciousness actually something other than this?