PepperBlossoms

Thank you. Wow. How does identifying as the silence work? Is the voice still you or what is the voice? Do you want to keep the distance or make it larger or closer or merge with it? It may have felt like a path towards increased beauty and appreciation. (I don't know if we can ever know our truth or what is fully right or know anything fully). Have you considered doing things so that you don't have to repress or be a double person anymore? Is that really hard? Is the voice in your head perceived as a stranger talking to another stranger? Have you ever had it where you identified it as you talking to yourself? As we learn more and more, we may tend to be able to see more of the situation with how the various parts work together and may be able to think about it differently and the influence may be greatly different and of a different perspective and impact. With the re-conditioning of voices, do you have to lie to yourself about the other person and trick yourself or is it actually an honest thing? Just curious. Is there a way to get to the root of the issue or is that too hard? I can see that going around the root can be helpful for coping but is there a goal to eventually get to the root even if baby steps? (I can see that I tried to get to the root of the issue/relationship with my parent and it did not work well and kinda just gave up at this point for the time being.) Good job on thinking in two languages. Wow With the music being stuck on repeat - is it because there are just not enough things going on to keep you busy and shifting focus? Man that must be tough with the same song. Could you try increasing the amount of inputs or decreasing the amount of inputs? (If you wanted to get rid of the music.. if not, nevermind.) I had a realization that nothing can be fully known or unknown. But yet we still sometimes say that we forgot or that something is known or unknown anyway. It would be interesting to look into why we decide that one part of life is unknown - or that we have not experienced knowing or experiencing it - but even the experience or having experienced something cannot be certain either. Wow existential crisis's that last for weeks that are super deep. I can't tell if that is horrifying or amazing - maybe some of both? You are very strong. Do you find that when your identity has crumbled so much that there is no more identity left to crumble or does it not ever go that far and there is always some identity left afterwards? Or a new identity that replaced the old one so there is always a new one to crumble? Beautifully said. Thanks for the response.

@LastThursday Interesting point - I guess it would be where we "decide" to draw the line. I think I am angry. I feel angry. They are similar - they both seem to be a physical thing going on in the body - it is crazy how emotions or words in the head or images in the head even exist in the first place. But then calls the question, it is crazy that sounds images smells tastes touches even exist either.. weird stuff. Yeah I can see that - the different "thinking" modes for different activities. Calls into question how or why the heck all the thinking is going on in the first place or if that is basically the same thing as repulsion and attraction like a magnet.

@Yamak9889 I was watching a youtube video and the speaker was saying how one can be very much so developed spiritually but very much low developed in another area such as maturity - you'd get someone of high spiritual insights who still acts like a child - the low developed area will tend to impact the other areas - in that case - it can be beneficial to not only build up the strong areas, but to try to build up the weak areas too. The video was shared by @nistake from another post.

@Yamak9889 True. Then comes the question of - what is the key to unlock the door of the closed-minded person? What sentence do I need to tell them to pry open the door? What image do they need? What story should I tell? What documentary should I have them watch? I have tried with some people and have yet to make any dents.

Now everytime someone says that they forgot or can't remember something, I am going to be thinking - they never fully "knew/did not know" in the first place - it is like for both known and unknown - neither exist. It may be a "foul" word that the english language created - even the word "experience" is a weird one because one cannot guarantee that they experienced what they think they experienced either - or "is" - one cannot guarantee that "is" is to know, to be, is, to experience .. language tends to quit working (on the realm of infinite) as language tends to cut the whole into something else

The unknown unknowns. They are out there, we just don't know it, until we do, then it becomes a known unknown. What are all the different ways to decrease them as much as possible? Example - create rules/standards to allow for predictability (to get rid of unknown); create distinctions; increase observation, knowledge, and understanding

@Mu_ I think that sometimes I tend to forget massive things about reality (even though I never technically knew them so maybe forgetting is the wrong word) but in the things that I had said earlier - there was this sense of stating that things could be known via x,y,z and me thinking about that now is like - what was I thinking? ha - I think I can see what you are saying - yes nothing can ever be fully known (or so it seems) so everything will be an unknown, no matter what the circumstance is. Hmm - with the duality of known vs unknown - that brings up the idea that - there is no known or unknown - there just is both and neither - or just is. Known and unknown could be like descriptions added on to something like how we add on the word pillow to cloth and cotton (or whatever pillows are made of) - but we could have given it any description/distinction and that is the one we gave it - we could not give it a distinction and just say it is what it is - so rather than known or unknown - it just is.

Thanks for the response! Agreed - I think the skill will tend to get better developed as we learn more about different ways of responding and when to respond based on our own trial and error and seeing what others are doing and will start to see what is the best method (also depending on what we are trying to go for). That is an interesting point on stating - if they are open-minded. I guess that then brings up the discussion - how do I know if this person is open-minded or even if they are, are they open-minded in this topic/realm of life? I guess hints of open-mindedness could as an example be the ability to have a back and forth conversation and discussing your views and the other views together and the ability to dig deeper into the other person's views and ask them more questions about it rather than keeping the focus on one's own's views - the ability to give focus to an idea that is different from one's own. It can be fine to not say anything if they won't listen - we just have to accept that that could lead to lots of destruction/suboptimal results if that is a path that they are on - which we just have to accept and be okay with. I tend to veer on the path of say something even if they are not open-minded because it is at least opening the door for them to consider the info rather than saying nothing which keeps the door closed.

I was noticing the kind and gentle nature of people and wondering if that was the best way to go but then I realized that kind and gentle can be nice and pretty but can be extremely inefficient - it can be far more efficient to say the words that need to be said in a way they can be understood and utilized rather than to say nothing at all and not help the person become more aware of what oneself is aware of. Some egos need to hear things so as to help the person better grow their ego and get away from maintaining a low ego state (but some will be capable of hearing the info and others will not - but if no one ever tries to address the low ego - it may never get developed if the person is unable to do it on their own.. tricky. @BlackMaze Thanks for the response. Good responses! Regarding getting triggered at work - At least you are able to recognize that there is something toxic about the situation - even if there is an emotional response. It is a step above not recognizing it at all. I was thinking that there tend to be 3 stages - not seeing the toxicity for what it is so no response, seeing it and emotionally responding, and seeing it and having more info to not have an emotional response but a logical one - which sometimes the logical one will be to say what needs to be said as it can be unacceptable to just let the toxicity continue with no one doing anything - so good for you for putting a stand to that! I'm sorry your work has stuff like that - but we're also all at different levels of development and working through different things in our lives. With the cheating friend thing - I'd probably talk to the person doing the cheating and try to get them to reconsider what they are doing as the first mode of action. Yeah some people won't understand or take action on our suggestions - we can either keep sending them the message in different ways until they do or they convince us that they have more info than us and we are the ones that are off or b let them continue on and either they make the connection eventually or they don't - it is hard to get someone to pay special attention to something - I guess we could say - hey man listen up this is important or something like that and try to force them to listen depending on what it is.

@Peter-Andre Thanks for sharing the Flynn effect article! Very interesting! That's an interesting point that abstract thinking skills has gotten better and better - I can see that having access to more information with the internet and widespread use of the internet has allowed for more information to see repetition and patterns with. Would be interesting to look deeper into what all the abstract reasoning consists of. Regarding the talking out loud around others - I don't do it that much but just sometimes "unconsciously" find myself narrating a task of some sort for a few seconds. That's interesting how you can have a word with no voice - I find that all of the words are from the spoken voice in my head (unless I am not paying attention enough and am doing that??)- otherwise there are no words but the images which I see. Thanks for sharing the Noam Chomsky video. Interesting that language has been made more for thinking than communicating. @Jay Ray Nice notice! The more we notice, the more things we can put together - and basically the level 2 thought are some putting the pieces together but it is still missing a bunch of things. That is interesting that you noted that Level 2 is egoic. I can see that we can have a selfish or angry reaction to something at first and have to keep on digging more and more to find the harmony, and beauty in it - level 3.

@Brittany Thanks for the book suggestion! I think I'm gonna have to get it. It looks pretty good so far of the preview I saw. I like it how the writer is able to find captivating things in moments and things. @Mu_ Thanks for the explanation. Interesting note on how everything is connected because it cannot exist as separate outside the container (I hope I got that summed up right). It reminds me of the chinese finger trap for some reason. The "space" between the two objects is also an "object" too- everything is solid - it is just with different things in different places - different origamis. Makes the idea of "space" or what seems to be "empty" (but still a thing) an interesting, curious phenomenon - and hard to grasp because if the earth is rotating around its axis around an orbit around the sun which could also be moving around something else and else and else... and then all the THINGS within the system moving too, and how the "space" just lets us go through it... or waving one hand through space.. weird stuff. Space is the road that things can travel through but space is also the things travelling at the same time, through itself. @nistake @Consept Thanks for sharing the video. The speaker had some beautiful things to say. I really liked the part about silence as well as energy - I've noticed that the sound of cars, loud AC units, loud talking, etc. can be bothersome and there is a beauty to silence - and that silence is not a lack of sound but merely the baseline - sound is the addition. The speaker's gentleness is very admirable as well. I liked it how he got excited when the other speaker brought up identity but did not force a discussion to stay on it or how it was discussed that it can take many years to really integrate a new observation. It was also an intriguing point in how if one is low developed in one area, it may tend to influence the other areas.

How do you integrate/experience non-duality into your life? How you found any belief/experience systems better than non-duality? How has non-duality helped you with coping mechanisms? Example - being okay with eating a vegetable noting that you are choosing your survival over the vegetables but also that you and the vegetable are part of the same arrangement and are just rearranging the vegetable's portion of the arrangement to take on a different form; being okay with the death of your peers and yourself - noting that our arrangement will transform to an arrangement that can no longer remember it's past portion of self's memories (based on science of the existing arrangement); noting that arrangements are arranged in a way that will respond to other portions of the arrangement based on arrangement

@Tim Stretton Good luck. Could have a rocky road but eventually get two different value systems of what the relationship should look like to merge and work out over time (good enough at least). My boyfriend did not get me anything for Valentine's Day and I had put a lot of effort in to make him something one year and I was super, super sad/mad. He then took out a calendar and had us go through every month to say what days we had to do stuff for each other and what exactly we would be doing (such as how many presents and how big those presents were) so we knew what to expect and then had us sign the calendar as a "contract". Pretty funny but it was an interesting idea. I have kinda changed and quit caring so much about presents in comparison to how I used to since then. I think we all kinda have our own list of needs that we want our partner to do and we kinda have to let them know what they are and they the same with us.

@Twega Sending virtual hug! Well said @Snader . I find it hard to picture or plan for the years ahead - life is so unpredictable - one could go for what seems like a decent path and just keep on re-evaluating it. Leo did hit on some pretty interesting ways of thinking about it that I had never considered when I was that age that would have probably been, and still would be, really helpful.

@Khr @Megan Alecia Thank you very much

How do you see the beauty in: Failure, Success, Low Ego Development, High Ego Development, Confusion, Pain, Arrangement, Repetition, Lack of Care, Intense Care, Great situations, Horrible Situations, Rejection, Loss, Spontaneity, Precision, Reliability, Unreliable, Optimization, Love, Hate, Evil, Forgetfulness, Death, Birth, Forever, Sameness, Annoyance, Arrogance, Complexity, Hopelessness, Softness, Structure, Symmetry/Asymmetry, Color, Combination, Transformation, Equality, Rules, Domination/Suppression What is your relationship to beauty? What is beauty to you? What distinguishes beauty from lack of beauty or is it the same thing?

Well said. If one has not experienced one belief system/perspective/understanding to the that max it can go, they will tend to not be aware of all the things that there are to it and will thus could also be representing something less accurately than someone with more experience/knowledge. I like to think of a person's acceptance of a belief system based on the experiences that they have had/observations made/conclusions drawn that impact how they interact with the world and what they see with it. I am assuming that the typical baby is born and grows to see the world in a dualistic way and it would take something beyond the original programming, typical experiences of a human to see/experience/be the non-dual way. As there are people who have experienced oneness, it would be interesting to see how they are able to go back and forth from one to the other or if there is no back and forth and they tend to stay in the non-dual and what exactly changed. Thanks.

Well said! - the known is that it cannot be a full known. Nice! Integrating it to the prior - the engineer/doctor/psychologist/etc. has to understand that they will tend to not have full access to the entire scope of the situation and will be just working within the limitations of the options/tests/equations/calculations/perspectives/data to take on but will not be able to account for the entirety of the situation and could be missing many things. Thanks.

Those are some great ideas. Thanks. Could start by looking at each one and see what scenarios one could deliberately practice them on. Yeah I was thinking the same thing - the definition can vary from person to person but nevertheless having some sort of definition helps. Maturity can be thought of as having stages of development just like the ego and spiral dynamics - in that regard - if being able to notice what the different stages are and especially if one is acting at the lowest stages, it would be helpful for knowing and getting past as one extra dimension to be developed in. Having developed maturity could provide many benefits, perspectives, and understandings that an immature person may not have access to and be unaware of. Thanks for the reply.

We've tend to created rules - rules for how to interact with others, rules for who does what when, rules for how to respond. If X happens, I respond with Y. If Z happens, I respond with K. Theoretical example: If person yells at me, I will respond with avoidance. If person is kind to me, I will respond with kindness. What rules have you noticed that you have set? Do you have rules for how others should treat you or you treat them? Do you have expectations? Why did you set those? Do you have rules for how you interact with person A and a different rule for how you interact with person B? What have you noticed about your rules and when you noticed it, how did that observation change your likelihood of continuing to have a hard stance on following that rule no matter what or being more lenient with it or even changing it or dropping it completely? Other than just people, what other rules to life have you set unconsciously and then noticed that you set them? Have you ever questioned your own rules (as well as the rules that other people create for themselves (and may expect them but yet you have no idea what they are so you may not be able to meet them yourself))?

Thinking even more - even though we cannot guarantee something - that is how stuff works - it won't be guaranteed but it will be close enough. Engineering, science, and psychology know that they will not have all of the answers but that they just try their best. We can come up with equations that will do pretty good and make some amazing things - computers, rockets, airplanes, cell phones, houses, subdivisions, etc. Sure we can say that we will never know the absolute truth, but then that just shuts the door and prevents us from getting to explore anymore or even bother trying at all. Math is weird but it works pretty well for getting things done. It can pretty well work for designing and analyzing things, measuring things, constructing things, predicting things, etc. As an engineer, if one wants to go to space, they have the potential to make it happen eventually - they have to come up with some pretty good equations and measuring systems, calculating systems, get a list of the knowns, and a list of the unknowns to solve for, etc. Doctors look for the unknowns of a sick patient, a civil engineer looks for the unknowns of the existing paving and drainage issues, a psychologist looks for the unknowns of the patients history, etc. All we can do is try our best and build upon the knowledge that we currently have. So, even if the knowns are not absolutes, they can be good enough for the purpose needed.

@Consept Okay thanks. I guess the thing is is that when we drop self and all ideas and take on being complete oneness, we basically become the metaphor of a napkin - where we can't do anything as there are no boundaries or distinctions to play around with. To experience a life in the dual world then, enables the napkin to do so many more things and so we have to continue the illusion of the dual world to contribute to these crazy experiences and creations that otherwise a napkin wouldn't get. We then get @hyruga energy travelling through vacuums and electromagnetic waves and particles and electron colliders and magnetism and electricity and internet and me and you. I am still questioning though the absolute validity of oneness - if a magnet can have an attractive and repulsive force.. there is the duality right there.. that can be experienced without psycadellics.

Some examples: -Talking about ourselves, scope of concern limited to ourselves -Not listening to what others say, interrupting, not considering others, ignoring feedback, ignoring instructions -Not doing what we say we will do -Wanting things our way, getting upset when it is not our way -Thinking we are right and others are wrong, thinking we are better than others, blaming others, thinking that others are not our friend -Not taking care of needs -Being reckless, lack of planning, no concern for outcome -Thinking we don't need any help

@Mu_ Yeah agreed - you got it. (I think I was trying to find something that was just not there and had to go down the path to find that it was not there). I realized from the last post when I said that it was a known than 25+25=40... it really wasn't a known because I didn't even have that right, but then the idea of right cannot ever be fully verified either. So yeah - since nothing can really ever be a known, something will basically tend to always be an unknown and anything that is deemed a "known" is basically us forgetting that there are so many inner-connected parts that we could have left out or not been aware of. Skepticism wins out again. Even if we said that we are only saying that there are unknowns because we have experienced them in the past, we cannot rule out that they won't exist in the future. The law of requisite variety can be helpful for solving real world problems but not for guaranteeing absolute truths. Thank you for the assistance.

@hyruga This one is perfect for what I was asking! I remember this one from a ways back. Thanks for sharing!