Moksha

You seem to accept this teaching as valid, while eschewing the other teachings of the masters. If all things are one, wouldn't their other teachings also be true? Emptiness is translated as spaciousness. And while it is no-thing, it enables all-things. Here's one of my favorite passages on the utility of spaciousness:

@Someone here Is God ego? Evil? Illusion? Do Jesus or Buddha possess any of these qualities? Isn't enlightenment the process of disidentifying from illusion? What do you think this means?

Lol, so there are just two stars multiplied by infinity

Tell that to the spiritual masters It is not a denial of suffering, but rather a transcendence. Do you know anyone that has been diagnosed with a terminal illness? Sometimes, rather than depressing people, a death sentence sets them free. They see the world with new eyes. Every breath becomes a gift. True joy, humility, and appreciation for the life they have left. They aren't fooling themselves by denying that death is at their doorstep; to the contrary, the imminence of their demise is the key that unlocks their prison.

Interesting study on the illusion of free will:

Yes, if you believe Jesus, Buddha, Laozi, Krishna, or anyone else that describes the realization of enlightenment. But ultimately you won't know the answer until you experience it for yourself. Suffering is the path to infinite peace and happiness. Have you suffered enough yet? The mind asks a lot of questions, but it has no real answers. When you still the mind, even for a moment, what happens then? I remember sleeping under the stars as a kid, and just looking up at the night sky without any thoughts going through my head. I felt awed, humbled, connected...but none of those words were in my head. It just was. That's what awakening feels like. It's not something you can logic your way into. It literally is the state of no-mind, being alive awareness. When Jesus talked about everlasting life, he wasn't referring to living in the clouds with a bearded white god for eternity. He said the Kingdom of Heaven is within us. Another way of saying it is, "the Dimension of Spaciousness is within us". It is "no-thing", but it is lively and infinitely abundant.

Beautiful, thank you.

Yes. All I can tell you is that enlightenment, as I experience it and as it has been described by others, is more than a conceptual recognition of emptiness. There is a sense to spaciousness that is infinitely deeper than the human mind can comprehend. It is the Source that ultimately connects all of us, and that connection is love. I don't find it coincidental that Buddha and Jesus use words like peace, abundance, and joy to describe enlightenment. Rather than dismissing them as illusions, perhaps their experience can be a pointer for your own.

Awesome. This is my experience as well. I see all of these posts about nihilism and solipsism and the ultimate emptiness of everything, and it makes me wonder if some have truly freed themselves from the conditioned mind. It feels like a thought trap more than an awakening. My own experience is what you describe: awareness, wisdom, peace, connectedness, and joy...nonconceptual and undeniable. If you're using the mind to understand infinity, you're running on a hamster wheel trapped inside a conceptual cage.

@Someone here I hear you, and I understand. What I'm asking is, how did you arrive at this conclusion in the first place? At some point in your life, you encountered the idea and you began exploring it. Where do you think the idea that Awareness is all there is came from? Do you believe that the Awareness that is behind my human form typing these words exists? If so, do you believe the Awareness that was behind Buddha's words exists? If so, how do you reconcile that my experience of Awareness and the Buddha's experience of Awareness don't match your own experience of Awareness?

Which is why Buddha described enlightenment as "no mind". You seem to accept this part of Buddha's teaching, while ignoring the part about enlightenment being inseparable from joy. Either Buddha was a real person or he wasn't. Either his teachings reflect ultimate reality or they don't. If everything is an illusion, the teachings you're using to draw that conclusion are themselves an illusion. So why accept them in the first place?

If you are the only one that exists who are you talking to? Am I a thought form you have created as well? People paint themselves into a conceptual corner with this stuff. It makes no sense to apply the teachings of Buddha to your life in order to draw conclusions about your existence, only to deny that Buddha and his teachings are anything but your own creation.

Do you believe others have reached enlightenment? If so, do you believe they were nihilistic and solipsistic?

Sounds very conceptual. Do you really believe Buddha and everyone else on the planet is a figment of your imagination? If so why are you even following the teachings of Buddha? You quote platitudes like "that which is empty but is ever-present" but where did those words come from and why do you believe them?

The only truth that matters is your own. That said, if your truth contradicts the collective wisdom of thousands of years from people that have achieved enlightenment like the Buddha and Jesus, it may be worth considering whether your truth is subject to growth.

Enlightenment isn't emotionless. Both Eastern and Western wisdom teach that enlightenment equates with peace and joy: “When you move amidst the world of sense, free from attachment and aversion alike, there comes the peace in which all sorrows end, and you live in the wisdom of the Self.” (Bhagavad Gita 2:64) "Let us live most happily, possessing nothing; let us feed on joy, like radiant gods." (Dhammapada 15.4) "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law." (Galatians 5:22-23) When asked to sum up his life “in twenty-five words or less”, Ghandi replied, “I can do it in three!” and quoted the Isha Upanishad: “Renounce and enjoy.”

People can experience Source, because they are Source. But as long as we're living in the horizontal dimension of form, we're still bound to it. The human brain is an amazing instrument, but it's still just flesh. We can receive creativity and intelligence from the infinite Source within us, but not in the infinite way you describe. If such a thing is possible, it would have to be outside the constraints of form. ImHO

Sadly, conservative politics has devolved into nothing more than fantasy ego trips like this commercial exemplifies. Not a single mention of a policy to improve Texas in the entire ad. As a Texan, I'm hopeful that one day sanity will return to our state. The tide is shifting, but I don't think we're there yet.

Gotcha. I'm hard pressed to think of a case where arguing spirituality positively changed someone. Real change only comes from within.

1) It's human to think divisively rather than coherently. 2) Most spiritual wisdom makes such distinctions (Bhagavad Gita, Bible, etc.). Not because the distinctions actually exist, but because humans think in this way and speaking their language can point them to the higher truth of Unity.

A great quote from the introduction in "A Course in Miracles": “Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God."

Tracking spiritual progress through a level system reminds me of Scientology's "Bridge to Total Freedom". Not to discredit anyone's sincerity or progress, but it raises a red flag for me personally.

The little you does exist, but only in a transient relative sense. In 100 years, the little you will be long gone. The part of you that is Source will always be. And what is Source? Consciousness that is conscious of itself.

I see it as a practice for being conscious enough to look past the unconsciousness of others. If I understand that everyone is part of the same Source, and that egos are illusions, it's easier to get along with people that see the world differently than my own conditioned mind does. Something I came across earlier today seems relevant: “Having conquered their senses, they have climbed to the summit of human consciousness. To such people a clod of dirt, a stone, and gold are the same. They are equally disposed to family, enemies, and friends, to those who support them and those who are hostile, to the good and the evil alike. Because they are impartial, they rise to great heights.” (Bhagavad Ghita, 6:8)

There are many forms of meditation, including one form (Karma yoga) that is essentially social. Yoga literally means “integration of the spirit”. It is the practice of becoming whole at the deepest spiritual level. Some of the traditional paths: Jnana yoga (the yoga of knowledge, use will and discrimination to disidentify from the body, mind, and senses until knowing we are nothing but the Self) Bhakti yoga (the yoga of devotion, achieve the same goal by identifying completely with the Lord in love; mostly taken by the mystics of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) Karma yoga (the yoga of selfless action, dissolve identification with body and mind by identifying with the whole of life, forgetting the finite self in the service of others) Raja yoga (the yoga of meditation, discipline the mind and senses until the mind-process is suspended in a healing stillness and we merge in the Self) Hatha yoga (“the yoga of force”, the physical postures and exercises of yoga; the Gita regards undue emphasis on this practice as outside the scope of spiritual development I recently came across this passage from the Bhagavad Gita, which references both Raja yoga (renunciation of action) and Karma yoga (selfless performance of action). Krishna recommends Karma yoga as the easier path to alignment, comparing it to climbing the mountain of self-knowledge; Raja yoga is discussed as the practice best suited after you have reached the summit. Ultimately you can arrive at the same destination through either path. Hopefully this is helpful: “Both renunciation of action and the selfless performance of action lead to the supreme goal. But the path of action is better than renunciation. Those who have attained perfect renunciation are free from any sense of duality; they are unaffected by likes and dislikes, Arjuna, and are free from the bondage of self-will. The immature think that knowledge and action are different, but the wise see them as the same. The person who is established in one path will attain the rewards of both.” (5:2-4)