snowyowl

I saw a Jim Newman video recently (can't remember which one) where he does his customary hand wave to indicate the here & now, and says "this is death already" as there is no-one here to experience the states of life & death, it's just pure appearance. I find Jim's work challenging but this quote is surprisingly comforting to me. The distinction between life and death is an illusion (in theory, but I'm not there yet!).

All conditioned phenomena Are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow, Like dew or a flash of lightning; Thus we shall perceive them.” - Diamond Sutra.

"The Great Way [the Tao] is not difficult It only excludes picking and choosing Once you stop loving and hating It will enlighten itself." - Xinxin Ming

The ego's illusory grip on life sometimes slips and the void beneath is revealed. Yes, it's super scary, many of us have woken up at night with existential fears. Death is scary, spirituality is the best way I've found through it which isn't denial or escapism. But hey, if it gets too much you can seek help without feeling guilty, keep talking, even see your doctor for some medication if you need it. Take care and look after yourself my friend.

@meow_meow but don't you see, this is a great insight you've already gained for all your hard work so far. Spirituality has shifted from seeking something outside the present moment, to chasing your own tail. The seeker is seeking the seeker, it's the strange loop, the awareness of awareness. So yes! It sounds like you're ready to drop the questions and goals, and be the Dao rather than seek it

Fantastic idea bro change needs to come from the grass roots. Nationalism can be a positive thing, if it brings people together and stop fighting each other (without demonising foreigners!) . Somehow we all need to learn to celebrate our rich diversity and co-operate together for everyone's benefit.

We are still in NATO, Interpol, and I'm sure the intelligence agencies will keep in touch. I agree with the rest of your post though.

Cherry picking is pretty common. Didn't Jesus himself chuck out many of the Old Testament rules while keeping the prophesies which suited him? Or at least the authors of the New Testament did.

I did wonder what's the connection with Indra. Turns out one of his powers is God of rain, which makes sense looking at your fab illustrations. Indra us an interesting God, the historical roots appear to be equivalent to Jupiter and Thor with their magical thunderbolts and hammers.

@Inliytened1 how much of the gospels is historically true, vs later additions - Christians mainly worship the Bible's image of Jesus instead. Same with other religions. The early Christians were expecting the second coming, which never came, so they created the Church instead.

@Mesopotamian well, I can honestly say I've never hated anyone or blamed myself for the tradegies of Iraq, however I've often felt compassion and sympathy for the chronic suffering of Iraq and many other communities and societies. A lot of countries had their borders and governments imposed by conflict and conquest, but some like Iraq don't settle down into stable communities. I can see the major trauma going on there: but what do you think should happen now, and who should do it?

@Consept fair enough, it's not a simple matter of one side = good, the other side = bad. Just different visions. It's pretty clear that we all need some radical and creative thinking, 'outside the box' because we're entering an uncertain new phase. Plus, there's other disruptive forces around, technological, geo-political, demographic, environmental, medical too, meaning that no-one can just carry on in the old way. Who knows, perhaps the EU will be slower and more bureaucratic adapting to the future than small independent states? But we're still Europeans, we will have relationships for the economy, security etc.

But how do you know if this is due to EU policies, or domestic govt? How to separate the complex variables? Don't forget there was another massive shift in politics in the late 70s when the nationalising Labour party approach gave way to privatisation, monetarism and deregulated free market policy of Margaret Thatcher (who was pretty Eurosceptic). We've had higher average incomes, but inequality is still a major problem, and the North-South divide is as bad as ever. There's plenty of old mining communities up north here which had their industries destroyed while there's still plenty of coal left underground. (Rant over, the 80s was my formative time politically!).

Desire means we're not fully satisfied and complete in the here and now, we are creating stories about finding future happiness somewhere else. That's what the Buddha meant by life is suffering, ie life estranged from the present moment (reality) by ego desire. It's the difference between Samsara and Nirvana.

Everything is a balance of union and difference. A single sovereign country is in effect a union of cities and regions, the UK has been a closer union for 300 years than the EU, but there's always ongoing debates about independence vs togetherness. The USA, Russia, China, Spain, everywhere you look there's tension between federal and local government. Each country is also unique culturally, so England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland all have their preferences and agendas which partly overlap with France, Germany, etc. But our UK relationship with the EU has always been fractious, with exemptions and rebates that created a compromise which never quite satisfied anyone completely. Now at least we can have multiple agreements to create a better bespoke relationship rather than feeling bulldozed into a future we never asked for (United States of Europe). Another issue is the invisibility of EU politics vs domestic politics. We vote for our Euro MPs, in a very democratic proportional way, only to never hear from them till the following elections (compared with Westminster Government), Perhaps this is more a fault of the media than the politicians, but it does create an impression of decisions being made behind closed doors.

Good communication skills, some charisma and know the right words to say, you can set yourself up as a guru. Who can tell the difference? Not so easy for newbies, I guess that's why we get organised religions with their lineages, authorisation and so forth. Plus all the bureaucracy, power games etc. We're programmed to follow the leader from childhood.

Immigration gives a clue to the shadow side of stage orange: that it becomes unsustainable quite quickly in historical terms. Advanced capitalist economies have low birth rates, skill shortages, shortage of cheap labour, raw materials, customers (for its growth agenda), and destroy nature. Immigration effectively dilutes orange (temporarily) by bringing in more stage blue. But it's only a short-term fix, sooner or later a more radical shift (to green) will be needed. But unfortunately we still have inequality on the global stage.

@Preety_India I totally agree, Christmas or other gifts, are just tokens for the love, friendship and quality time you spend together. That's what we need to express when we thank each other for presents, rather than how useful or valuable they are.

This belief is worth contemplating. You seem to believe she has this power over you, when she pushes your buttons, to control your emotions. Can you see there's some work to do here, a transformation from allowing other people to pull your strings like this, to reaching freedom, letting go of their negative energies, retaining that strong peaceful centre?

@Javfly33 This is Samadhi, a state of nondual unity. IMO you aren't connecting with anything, but rather dropping the imaginary divisions and noticing the universal reality beneath the facade of difference.

Tricky this, because the status quo includes all our reactions and inner stuff: complacency, apathy, indignation, compassion, hatred, lust, you name it. Change of a particular type is never required, but sometimes flows naturally when Love is present (through non-resistance?).

The Universe is flying apart on the mega scale, the Big Bang is still in progress and we're part of it. On smaller scales, it's a mixture of forces of attraction and repulsion, eg gravity, electromagnetic forces, strong and weak nuclear forces etc. The "rules" of Physics are purely descriptive, not controlling. As far as I can tell, the deeper into the structure of reality the physicists go, the more energy is required in their particle accelerators etc, so we've only got as far as our technology and budgets allow. How can we ever prove if we've got to the very bottom without ever more powerful experiments?

Consciousness is simply just This. It's the easiest thing to see, yet difficult to explain. 'Me' is when This has the thought of an observer looking from inside to outside.

I guess addictions aren't rational, so telling you the small chances of this actually happening doesn't penetrate to the emotional core which you're trying to avoid and suppress. Leo has a video on addictions, could be helpful if you haven't seen it. To summarise, you need to open up to, embrace and fully experience your feelings and work through them. Easy enough for me to say, hard to practice I know. How have you tried to quit so far, by yourself or with a support group? They may be helpful if you've not tried yet.

But this is our creation. When we used to believe in binary gender identities, lo and behold there were just two. Now, if we believe it, there are more: male, female, trans, intersex, cis, queer, I don't know them all myself. It's the magic of consciousness