Preetom

@MarkusSweden Thanks! Enjoying this written contemplation style more than any spiritual practice I've ever done. I usually do 2 sessions on paper and 1 time here on forum everyday

Am I aware? yes. What is the conventional waking state? Is it the same persistent reality or is the persistence something being assumed everytime after waking up? Well there has to be a narrative or symbolization to make a distinction in the first place. How do I know that today's waking state is exactly the same as yesterday's waking state? Because the thought says so? Thought says many other things as well. What seems to be consistent in two consecutive waking states is the narrative or mental dialogue that starts it. So am I waking up to a new Reality every single time from a deep sleep? What is it that registers the change between a deep sleep and waking up? It is certainly I and that doesn't seem to change. While I'm thinking and writing, there is a palpable sense that all these functions are being known or witnessed. What is this magical stuff that seems to happen when attention is turned on itself? Is there any independent object? From direct experience, no. But what else do I have other than direct experience? Have I ever encountered anything in my life outside my Consciousness? So how does the illusion of objective knowing take place? Is there really such a thing called objective knowing? At least I have yet to come across such knowledge. So the more direct question is, is there a world other than the knowing of it? No. I have to know or experience something to verify it's presence. Now is there any difference between an object and the knowing of the object. The knowing of a thing is all that is ever known. What else is out there? As I've never came across anything other than knowing, so does it mean that nothing exist outside knowing? So the world, it's events and even myself do these things have an objective Reality? It's hard to believe in their permanence when it is questioned like this. So does it mean I literally think them in permanence? that's a hell of an audacious claim.

Take a realized being. You and I are seeing him to inhabit a body. But in his direct experience, he finds absolutely no distinction between having a body or not. In fact, to him there is no notion of having a body. Would that man ever have a desire to leave the body? Would that man be able to distinguish between life and death?

@MarkusSweden In the movie Matrix, we see that Neo wakes up from one reality to a higher reality. When you wake up from dream, you break out from one reality to a seemingly higher level reality. But the thing with final Enlightenment is, there is nothing outside waiting. Haven't this come across your mind yet? Everything is happening in Consciousness and the sole substance of it all is nothing but pure consciousness. Once you see clearly, once you only know Consciousness aka become permanently Enlightened, where can you go from there? There is no outside dream or a bubble waiting to receive you. For the self realized being, there is literally no distinction between waking, dreaming and sleeping. All he knows is the Self and knowing the Self is all there is. Quoting from Ashtavakra Gita, ''The realized being wishes for neither living nor dying''

Am I aware? yes. What is it that I can legitimately say from my own experience without borrowing any previous knowledge? I am. I exist. What else can I say from my experience? I'm aware that I am. So I simultaneously exist and am aware that I exist. Anything other than this knowledge seems arbitrary and derivative from my upbringing. Do I need someone else to point out that I am? No. Do I need a book to tell me that I am? no. Do I need a thought to tell me that I am? No because I am aware of thoughts coming and going. Do I need to believe that I am? no that sounds silly. So this knowledge of I am, what does it depend upon? Is sight needed to verify that I am? No I can be blind and still know that I am. Is sound needed to verify that I am? no I am irrespective of sound and silence. So let's get this clear, the image of the body and the sounds of the thoughts are not fundamental to I am. I exist without the body and self image and without thoughts. What about feelings? How much can I subtract while keeping this I am intact? Can I erase all my memories and still know I am? yes. Can I subtract the sensations in the head and still know I am? Can I subtract all sensations of the body and still know I am? In the dream last night, the experience was completely different from now but still the sense that I exist was one and the same. Does it mean that this body, these sensations, these thoughts are totally arbitrary? Yes these sensations are changing and morphing constantly, in sleep they disappear all together but do I ever experience a break in my own existence? No. So how much can I subtract without tainting this knowledge I am? It seems that I can erase every pixel of my present waking experience and still be as much I am as I am right now, So if this I am is fundamental, why do I mix it with these sensations, thoughts and perceptions? This I am can only appear to be mixed with objective experience if I am knowing aware of this I am. As long as I know I am, it stands on itself by itself, knowing itself. So is it legitimate for me to identify my existence with a particular experience from now on?

You're welcome. Happy inquiry

@LiakosN it's because you cannot verify your own self image empirically to yourself. Because that self image itself is false, hollow and untrue. So you project this self image and it gets reflected back to you by other people and circumstances and thus get verified to you. This is something we're constantly doing. Projecting our self image, worth, opinions, thoughts and emotions outward so that they can be reflected back to us. But if you inquire into the same images honestly by yourself, you find them to be utterly false and arbitrary.

Seek and ye shall find

Yes I agree. Even in finding life purpose it can be helpful. It's called negative imprint. Things that you feel you're impaired in compared to other's around you. Many gurus, teachers, professionals have used this strategy to turn their greatest weakness into their defining strength. For example, I'm sure you've heard of many pick up gurus confessing that they were so horrible when it came to girls but they vigilantly overcame that and now it's their profession to teach others how to bang half dozen girls every night. There are communication/public speaking teachers who had crippling social anxiety and low self esteem. Most revered spiritual gurus have a past so dark that it compelled them to take the arduous journey to come out of their wounded and emotionally banged up life. Now they help other people to reach the same Enlightenment. When it comes to financial advice, you probably wouldn't listen to a guy who was born millionaire but a guy who has a rags to riches story under his belt. Most health gurus were either anemic or overweight. So you get the idea. The wounded healer, the blind seer etc. are some of ancient examples when it comes to this. The students resonate with these teachers more because they seem to understand student's problem from first hand experience. An weakness can become so debilitating that it can force a person to take a long journey which makes it their greatest strength. Or not. Maybe it can break them apart too

@dvdas @RabbitHole I think there is no point in denigrating @kieranperez's work. It's kind of inevitable if you think about it. The people who are into personal development knee deep for several years; spending over 5-6 hours or even more a day on this stuff; reading books, watching gurus talk, exercising, following diet, sleep routine, developing communication and emotional skills, meditating etc. at some point this becomes their whole life. A regular jock( or people in general) who never picked a single book out of curiosity, who always go in mainstream system of conventional day jobs, family and entertainment for the rest of their lives; they won't be here in this website in the first place. On the other hand, after reading hundreds of books and following teachers for a decade it's almost impossible to revert back to ''normal way'' of life and thinking..whatever normal means. This website attracts mostly unique people, not sheeps who can't think past their daily bread. People who have thought outside the box, asked questions to which there is no answer around. So it's not a surprise that most of them will eventually get into this teaching thing themselves. Think of Leo. Considering the amount of PD stuff he has devoured over the years, it's almost impossible for him to live outside of it now. This has become his whole life. You can see that most prolific artists and musicians inadvertently skew towards teaching their crafts one way or another, either as their main profession or as a side job because this has become a huge part of their lives. Similarly almost all PD junkies will one day open their mouth after maturing and gaining some of the insights for themselves. Even if everyone don't become full time gurus, they can write a book or start a blog or help people here and there in their lives or through videos and private sessions. The students that stick with gurus long enough, themselves become a guru one day. ta da!

@kieranperez Check this out. Enlightened gurus like Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj also reported to be have self-awareness in deep sleep. I think it's a result to taking the witnessing position all the way and dis-identifying Consciousness from the objects of Consciousness fully.

@anaj This is a work of brilliance! Thanks so much for sharing it.

@Marinador Enlightenment is not any kind of experience.

Maybe. But the consciousness with which that 4d kid knows itself and the consciousness with which we know us is one and the same

fucking yes. The point is there is no point. The only way this drama can continue as long as you're not aware of this pointlessness constantly.

The books are necessary for starting and developing. To come out of this complacency and taking everything for granted. But when the pupil is matured, outside sources are no longer necessary. At some of the final levels, it's not about hoarding more stuff but to dig deep into a single thing. Ultimately all knowledge has to burn. The maze itself burns into ashes with it. So it all depends on where you're at. Reminds me of the advice from Ramana Maharshi when asked about the necessity of books. He said that all real, wise books tell us to quiet the mind. If you're convinced and actually working on it then no further books are necessary. If not, then go read 500 books until you see there is no alternative to this work. so the question is, are you gonna learn the easy way or the hard way..

Some real talk. A teacher/author who teaches at disciple's level by coming down to his level. The author must teach from his/her own experience and how they overcame the exact problems. Discussing few topics in and out instead of a info dump on every cosmology the author has gathered throughout his life. Finally, encouraging them to join in the process and promote self-responsibility.

Animals are Enlightened in the sense that they don't possess a separate identity and in most cases are in tune with nature and it's cycles. But they are not Enlightened in the sense that they don't possess intellect which is used to reach the pinnacle of Knowledge and ultimately transcending knowledge resulting it in the end of knowledge aka Enlightenment. Animals don't have any morality or emotional control. But these things are unrelated to Enlightenment so they shouldn't come into discussion. PS: I have no memory or experience of being an animal (a convention animal ). So it's safe to say that these are my speculations.

@cirkussmile @Sashaj This is Ramana's narrative of his own experience, '' About six weeks before I left Madura for good, a great change in my life took place. It was quite sudden. I was sitting in a room on the first floor of my uncle’s house. I seldom had any sickness, and on that day there was nothing wrong with my health, but a sudden, violent fear of death overtook me. There was nothing in my state of health to account for it; and I did not try to account for it or to find out whether there was any reason for the fear. I just felt, “I am going to die,” and began thinking what to do about it. It did not occur to me to consult a doctor or my elders or friends. I felt that I had to solve the problem myself, then and there. The shock of the fear of death drove my mind inwards and I said to myself mentally, without actually framing the words: “Now death has come; what does it mean? What is it that is dying? This body dies.” And I at once dramatized the occurrence of death. I lay with my limbs stretched out stiff, as though rigor mortis had set in, and imitated a corpse so as to give greater reality to the inquiry. I held my breath and kept my lips tightly closed so that no sound could escape, so that neither the word “I,” nor any other word, could be uttered. “Well then,” I said to myself, “this body is dead. It will be carried stiff to the burning ground and there burnt and reduced to ashes. But with the death of this body am I dead? Is the body ‘I’? It is silent and inert, but I feel the full force of my personality and even the voice of the ‘I’ within me, apart from it. So I am Spirit transcending the body. The body dies but the Spirit that transcends it cannot be touched by death. This means I am the deathless Spirit.” All this was not dull thought; it flashed through me vividly as living truth which I perceived directly, almost without thought-process. “I” was something very real, the only real thing about my present state, and all the conscious activity connected with my body was centered on that “I.” From that moment onward, the “I,” or Self, focused attention on itself by a powerful fascination. Fear of death had vanished once and for all. Absorption in the Self continued unbroken from that time on. Other thoughts might come and go, like the various notes of music, but the “I” continued like the fundamental sruti note that underlies and blends with all the other notes. Whether the body was engaged in talking, reading, or anything else, I was still centered on “I.” Previous to that crisis, I had no clear perception of my Self and was not consciously attracted to it. I felt no perceptible or direct interest in it, much less any inclination to dwell permanently in it. If a man considers he is born, he cannot avoid the fear of death. Let him find out if he has been born or if the Self has any birth. He will discover that the Self always exists, that the body which is born resolves itself into thought and that the emergence of thought is the root of all mischief. Find where from thoughts emerge. Then you will abide in the ever-present inmost Self and be free from the idea of birth or the fear of death.''

https://actualized.org/start

good ol' days also feeling nostalgic about those Shahrzad stories from Arabian nights hah

Anything that goes against survival and Status quo is viewed as a threat by Society. Enlightenment is 180 degrees apart from survival so the answer is kinda obvious lol

@MarkusSweden Beautiful post! This is what I would like to add. From mind's perspective, Consciousness doesn't seem to exist. It's because the mind can only know and masturbate (!) with objects and Consciousness is not an object. It's like mind narrating while watching a movie on TV, ''What the fuck is a screen? I can't see it!! maybe just some illusionary thing at play, but nothing is really going on. Hey LOOK! I can see the movie and it seems alive and continuous. That's all there is''...all the while looking at nothing but the screen. On the other hand, intuition as I understand it, is a far more refined version of 'mind'. That's why it can intuit things beyond gross objects. All these mental phenomena can be thought of as the parts of the 'big mind'. And you're right. With mind, you can model Consciousness as empty space at best. But that too is a subtle object. That's the limit of the mind, not the limit of Truth.

@Widdle Puppy It's because we ARE hollow. We don't have any solid foundation located in us. A person is either conscious of this or distracted from this existential fact. Don't rule yourself out as an exception or defect.

I AM full of shit I AM full I AM I .