Telepresent

Hmm, not entirely sure I agree. Absolutely yes open-mindedness (and extreme open-mindedness at that) is essential if you want to progress on this journey. But you also need to be very skeptical of everything you encounter, so that you don't allow emotional reactivity or mental comfort/familiarity to throw you down a dead-end. There's a lot of complete crap out there and if one was completely open-minded to everything, they'd never get anywhere as they constantly spun their wheels in an endless and contradictory mess of hogwash. So you need both. You need to be extremely open-minded to allow yourself to consider, explore, and play with things you have never encountered before and not dismiss out-of-hand; you also need extreme skepticism so that you keep questioning everything you encounter to ensure its validity. You cannot trust what someone else says, ever. You have to verify it for yourself.

@InfinitePotential I think the problem here is that our conception of a 'physical universe' is entirely dependent upon the universe. We believe there is a physical universe because that is how it appears, and so we determine that there must be, and as you point out even if it's established that hard physicality requires observation (and before that it's only potential), here we are trying to determine whether or not there can be a real physical universe ... somewhere. Problem is, our whole concept of 'physical' comes from the concepts of matter, and substance, and so on. And it's also dependent upon the idea that this matter creates consciousness. So once you've established that consciousness must be prior (by collapsing potential to physical matter), you have a problem. Because what do we mean by 'physical matter'? We mean that there is definitely something (whatever it may be) beyond consciousness, that directly informs and influences what we experience within consciousness. More regularly, we mean that there is an object made of whatever this physical stuff is, that is analogous to our direct experience, and we want to point to that and call it 'me'. Now, I'll agree with you that it is entirely possible that there is some'thing' beyond this entire spectrum of experience that could have some other substance that is not consciousness (and I'll outline a metaphor in a moment) - but when it comes down to everything you experience, can experience, will experience, or anything else at all that comprises this universe, you butt heads with the physical matter / consciousness prime problem. So, as a metaphor: Say there is a computer. This computer has a screen that is not made of pixels, but made of awareness. There is also a processor, cpu, etc. etc., and of course there is what appears on the screen (which is awareness). So let's say we create a program for this computer that is a free-learning, first-person experience. The processor makes all kinds of calculations in binary, and it sends the output to the screen as a first-person image of a 3D world. It also creates the thoughts that this character has, the emotions it experiences, and so on and so on. So this is what awareness is aware of. Of course, awareness doesn't have it's own independent thoughts, beliefs, experiences, or desires - it only manifests what the cpu sends to it as output. So while the output on the screen and the screen itself are one thing, there is kind-of a separation in the substance (the world being simulated, of thoughts and feelings and so on), and the truth (that this is only known because it is appearing on a screen 'made' of awareness. And maybe one day the character becomes curious as to its reality, and it does all the searching stuff and one day becomes enlightened. Well, what does this mean? Oddly, it is a contradiction, because the character cannot become enlightened, only the screen can; it can become self-aware. But no, that's also not right, because the screen cannot DO anything, it just manifests what the program sends to it. So perhaps it is better to say that the program stops creating beliefs that it is NOT the screen (which of course, the screen never actually believed, but only experienced believing)... ugh, this is where words fall apart and I hope I'm getting across what I'm trying to say. Anyway, throughout all of this, the entire physical universe which the character previously believed to exist is revealed to be a simulation upon a screen 'made' of awareness. Woohoo. The physical universe is not real. But it also goes further, because to express reality you have to account for the program (the binary programming and processing etc.), the manifestations on the screen, and the screen itself. ALL of these together make up 'reality' or the truth - not just the screen. But the awareness that is aware, is only the screen. So there's a separation and also not one. I hope that makes sense? And now we have to move up a step, because in this metaphor-model there IS a physical reality: the computer in which the program resides. And I would argue here that at this point we can never, ever, ever know anything. Why? Because in the metaphor, 'we' are the manifested character - the program taking place, being manifest on the screen, and the awareness that the screen is 'made' of. All of that is what - in my understanding - McKenna means when he refers to Consciousness or the Universe. So... is it possible that there is really a physical universe of some description and means in the same way that there is in my metaphor? Sure, yeah, but I'd argue that the use of the word 'physical' here is not really useful as it carries baggage from inside the program with it; our entire understanding of 'physical' comes from the world manifest inside the program, not the one that may exist beyond it housing the 'computer'. Need another word. I'm not Done. So I don't know what happens when you are. And yes people - including McKenna - speak very authoritatively about the notion that consciousness is ABSOLUTELY ALL. And you have to take that with a pinch of salt. Could all be bollocks, could all be wrong, absolutely. But the prime factor, I think, is that at the moment we're well under the point of worrying about that, as we're still believing the program itself is 'physically real'. Once that's dispelled, there'll be more exploration to do, I'm sure. But for now, I find that concerns about an absolute physical reality are more ways of me trying to persuade myself that the program is, in fact, physically true. (There's more to say here with regard to the infinite digression of a 'real' physical reality as well, but I've written enough for one go!)

@Joseph Maynor I wonder if part of the challenge here (and why it can feel like solipsism) is that it can come across seeming to mean "nobody else exists, but I do," as opposed to "nobody else exists and neither do I." Because if we stop thinking in terms of individual selves or souls (for want of a better word), and think in terms of what IS, then perhaps other people exist to the same extent I does - as a collection of thoughts, feelings, physical sensations, etc., in this knowing-space. Of course whenever I think about this the thought-train gets hijacked by the "but do they have their own knowing-space?" question which, I have come to suspect, is a giant red herring: we're never, ever going to know for certain, and whatever the case it doesn't exist here and now. What is true for me must be true for them. If I don't exist as a self, then neither do the selves I am projecting onto others

So I've been having an interesting conversation with myself about one of the core fears I'm facing moving forward. I won't go into specifics because a) that probably won't be of much use/interest to anyone else, and b) I'll ramble for ages. However, in the process of dealing with it I noticed a fantastic trick I've been playing on myself, which goes something like this: 1. I have a core belief. 2. I am afraid of dealing with it. 3. The reason I am afraid of dealing with it, is that I am afraid of the consequences of doing so. They would be bad. 4. The consequences are only bad BECAUSE of the core belief. If it wasn't there, there would be no 'bad' to the consequences. But I realise so many times I've become stuck on point 3. I have believed the 'inherent bad-ness' of the potential consequences (most of which I in fact do not know, and what I am imagining is coming from that fear perspective) and so believed that I cannot do it because it is factually bad, evil, wrong, unethical, etc. So I go round and round in circles, trying to trick myself or convince myself of xyz, to pretend I'm 'further along' than I really am, so that I can actually keep that core belief and avoid the consequences which I am so afraid of. Which I wouldn't be afraid of if I didn't have the core belief to begin with... Anyway, thought it was one to share in case anyone else is doing the same!

Well this is definitely a problem - the subjectivity issue. I struggle with this all the time, and almost daily have to have this discussion with myself and remind myself why I reached the conclusion that the materialistic paradigm is definitely questionable. These reasons are: 1) The absolute truth MUST account for the subjective, phenomenological experience I am having - the qualia which make up my entire life experience. It is worth noting that the current materialist/scientific perspective actually doesn't do this: it talks of how there is this and that and other in the brain, and that this is what is 'really' happening - but offers no answer as to where, how, and from what my conscious experience takes place. To the point that some are trying to argue that consciousness isn't real at all, because it's inconvenient to their model (I mean, what is it? Another plane, another dimension? If it's an illusion, an illusion in what? Taking place where? Nobody even ATTEMPTS to answer this) 2) Quantum physics. Now, I'm not a physicist and there's much, much, much here that I don't and can't understand. But I've also seen enough to recognise that there is a connection between conscious observation (and it has to be conscious observation - delayed quantum erasure has shown that) and the collapse from potential to actual. Again, nobody seems to be connecting this to our regular subjective experience, as if somehow it doesn't matter, and at the macro level Newtonian physics still applies and we can ignore that quantum stuff because it only effects the very very very small. Which is supposedly the very small which composes the stuff of Newtonian physics, but we'll ignore that because it's inconvenient to our modelling... So, yeah, that's enough for me to say there's more going on than meets the materialist eye, and it seems to be centred on subjective consciousness

@Nahm Hmm, very interesting - I have to sit with that for a bit!

Oh, I absolutely agree with you. I simply meant that it's very easy (and I know because I've done it!) to use the idea of relative experience vs. the absolute to justify all sorts of stuff in a 'not-dealing-with-it' kind of way - which will come back and bite you. I don't intend to disregard experiences that come from 'not caring' actions, but I also know that the way we consider them, frame them, think and talk about them, need to be understood as not absolute - and then we need to work out how we deal with that honestly. I suppose there's a risk in talking about it that it will always come across as nihilistic, which isn't my intention, but at a certain point I find words like 'good', 'bad', 'right', 'wrong', 'sin', etc., to be very obstructive to progress. Which I'm not sure is what you were originally responding to, but it's what I read into it! I'm afraid I'm not sure what you're saying with the last sentence - why call yourself an idiot? Are you trying to head off what you see as my potential rejection, or are you just acknowledging that that's your expectation?

@Dodo Ok, cool - I can see why some may look at what I wrote at the top and shout 'Spiritual Bypassing!', but it seems like it's a question of execution. So I could just say to myself "well it's all relative and nothing is absolute so I can behave how I want and not care about anything else GO ME!" and pretend to myself like I've got somewhere, all the while avoiding my own shit. Sure. But at some point if I want to progress I am going to have to honestly sit down and address the same question. To actually get it. And weirdly, for this, the answer may technically be the same, but my understanding of and relationship to it will be totally different. Because I will have dealt with it honestly, not as an excuse or a mask sitting on top of fear

Depending on what you're doing, why, and what the intended outcome is Sorry, I'm sure you know that already, I'm just playing devil's advocate. So, depending on what you want to do, we can dig a little further. You know these things are beliefs, but you also believe they are helpful. Why? Suffering. That's your next context, perhaps. Your next spectrum. Basically what you're saying here is you believe suffering is wrong, and non-suffering is right. Interestingly, I'm slamming my head against a similar but different door: I'm stopping myself from moving forwards and using "I don't want to make things difficult/weird/scary for other people" as an excuse. I don't want to cause them suffering. But I also know I'm fooling myself over what suffering is, over the truth of it, and I'm playing to the spectrum of suffering bad / not-suffering good. Which is false. People might call that spiritual bypassing (a term I'm not familiar with so I'm guessing as to its meaning), but I would counter that such people are looking at 'spirituality' as an extant thing, and not a context-spectrum itself

Sin can only exist in context. It's a very broad word and for everyone it means something different. So for some it is based on a religious doctrine. For others it might just mean 'bad' - perhaps bad for society, or bad for your ability to place yourself 'well' in society, or bad for your health, or bad for [fill in the blank]. Of course, 'bad' is also context-dependent: bad compared to what? Bad is one end of a spectrum of possible action/outcome, and we label one end better and the other worse depending on the context we are living by. So something may be sinful (bad) because it means we're going against what someone says god says. Or something may be sinful (bad) because it means we're not contributing to a peaceful society. Or whatever. But note that both of these require a judgement as to what is right and wrong, good or bad: that obeying what someone says god says is right. That society being peaceful is right, and that you should contribute to it. Often many of the things we enjoy don't contribute to the things we societally and/or personally have determined are good or right. Therefore the things we enjoy must be considered bad, wrong, sinful. But it's only actually a perspective. Same goes for the larger questions you're asking. Rather than worry about the 'sin' itself, use it as a chance to examine your perspective, your assumptions, your beliefs about why such and such is a sin. What is the context that sin rests upon? For bonus points, look into the assumption that something can be 'spiritually correct'. Where has that come from?

I just brushed against no-self. It scared the crap out of me. I was switching between reading passages from Jed McKenna's Dreamstate and doing autolysis when it happened. I seem to have a strong desire to communicate it to someone else (ha!) I think as a comfort, but I'm going to let that play out as something useful will probably come from it. I'm just going to copy-paste what I wrote below, so excuse the choppy form of writing - it's just how I do it. *** so what if I just stopped? just stopped the believing the mental-emotional connectedness the mental-emotional attachment to all the OBJECTS I'm making because, yes baby, I am making them I am making them all all the rules all the objects all the laws and the people the appearances may be changing around but the emotional beliefs are making them objects and here is the seeming paradox again that the dream cannot be true and yet here it is and the paradox lies on a false assumption that observation and observer are separate that there is an invisible observer watching some kind of THING playing out separate SEPARATE one THING to another THING which of course is the mistake the illusion of two SHIT SHIT SHIT ok yes this is frightening fuck me fuck ok stay with it stay here what is the fear? the same thig it's shaping appearance the fear fears what? danger risk an ending no self non being the black hole fuck me that was it I brushed it as with all of these the problem premise comes in the assumption of two observer and observed which is the creation of object of OBJECT an object, here, me writing thinking FEARING EXPERIENCING and a body there and a world there please now you KNOW what this means the dream the dream the dreamstate run little man run back to your comforting cuccoon another person another book another life another another another refuge in there being more in other in support in it being there to comfort you larger than you why do I fear no self? I don't know because everything I am everything I am attached to feel I need must be love want hate desire cry strive dies it's the breaking of everything I know know everything I know tree of knowledge what do I know? NOTHING I can invoke arguments from whatever but it's all out of the same dream that I am trying to deny using the dream to deny the dream? got to drop the crutches in the end yes all I know is I am and that the experiences I am having MUST BE consciousness and nothing else that there CANNOT be a separation between consciousness and conscious OF there IS not of there IS NO CONSCIOUS OF there is ONLY consciousness and therefore EVERYTHING experienced 'in' consciousness is no more than a dream including the fear and including especially including the fucking I that is convinced it's observing because that's the point, isn't it? all this time you've been looking for I as the observer as the witness it's not fucking there it's NOT FUCKING THERE only consciousness no division of witness and witnessed and I can't get this shit into words and there's no point trying

There's a problem here that anything translated into thought or word is automatically false, because thoughts and words are symbols/translations of a thing, and not the thing itself. An insight may come as a wordless 'aha!' moment, which is great; however there's a danger that if you dwell too much on it in thought or writing (and, yes, debate and discussion here) you lose touch with anything of value the insight provided as you get sucked more and more into the thoughts/words about it

I quite like what Jed McKenna says here, when talking about what we can know for sure. First the student says "So I know I'm sitting here..." to which he replies "No, you only know 'I am'. The rest is taken on faith." She replies "OK, so I'm not sitting here..." "No, you don't know that either. All of this doesn't mean that everything isn't, just that it's unverifiable." Trying to make any definitive statement based purely on our limited personal perspective is a big problem. Now, there is a lot that we tend to believe about ourselves that can be debunked with some deeply honest questioning, and there are some inconsistencies in our communal understanding of what we are and the way the world works which can help to highlight some of these questions. But you have to do it for yourself, I'm afraid. It's one of those cases where you can't be given the answer, you have to do the maths

Let's use VR as a way of approaching this. In a virtual reality, the only things that 'exist' are 1) the underlying code, and 2) the output of image/sound/etc that compose the virtual world. When you see something, it exists as output. When you turn away from it, it only exists as potential, in the code (in other words, it's not there when you turn away - there isn't a world beyond what is created through the visual and sound outputs). Now, let's say you spend a week living in a VR environment. One day, the weather is nice and sunny. You go to sleep (which involves the screen going black for 8 hours), and when you wake up, the ground is wet with puddles everywhere. "Ah!" you think, "it rained last night." Only... it didn't, did it? Because the only OUTPUT was the black screen. There was no 'there' for 'it' to rain on. There was no 'it' to do the raining. There was only the output of a wet floor, and you mentally filled in the gaps. Also, note that it didn't rain in the code, either. There may have been a line in the code that says 'on morning X, the floor will be wet', but there was no physical rain, or codified rain, taking place anywhere. Only the output of 'wet'. Because it didn't need to rain anywhere - it only needed to be wet the next morning. And this is the problem with trying to use sensory phenomena to try to prove an objective reality. Just because it has a consistency of behaviour, doesn't and cannot prove the solid objectivity of a physical system. We're deeply deeply used to interpreting our sense data this way, and we tend to use consistency and our understanding of cause-and-effect to 'prove' the solidity of the world, but when you really look at it, you can't. You just can't.

Another day, another consideration. The phrase 'no-mind' is widely used, but perhaps the idea of 'mind' is something of a trickster itself. Certainly, it can seem as though the mind is 'a thing': an object, an entity, something which owns/makes/thinks thoughts. But if we look at what mind is made of, it's made of those same thoughts (and maybe feelings, depending on how you look at it). So, if it's made of thoughts, it can't be the cause of thoughts. Yet we speak of mind as thought it is an extant object. A thing. Of course it's not: it's just a collective noun. In the same way we can break down the body into organs, to cells, to atoms, to particles, to strings... we can break down mind into thought-sentences, to thought-words, to thought-sounds... (not to mention interpretations, images, feelings...) At what point in this is 'mind'? Of course, it's not. Not to say that collective nouns aren't useful (mind is a nice shorthand), but it can easily be misunderstood to be an objective thing. Whoops.

Something's just occured to me that I'd like to explore here for a moment. It's a very fresh thought so I'd really value people's reflections! I've debated with myself the whole "I am / I am not the body" question to death, and played all kinds of thought-experiments and mental exercises, to the point that I'm very comfortable saying that I know the experienced body is not me. And yet, I still can't get away from a deeper, more embedded belief that it is. Or so I thought. It's just struck me: I don't talk/think in terms of being the body. I talk/think in terms of owning the body. Like some vehicle that I am piloting. So it doesn't matter if (for example) I'm not controlling my heart beating, in the same way that when I drive a car I am not manually running electricity from the battery to the electrical components; I'm driving the damn thing even if some of the mechanisms don't require my direct input. HOWEVER, I am the one that makes the car go faster, or slower, or left or right. And (most of the time) it does what I want it to. And that's the embedded view I have of the body. Not that I am it, but that I own and pilot it. And I can already see how loose that garment might prove to be, but it's wedged in there pretty tight at the moment. Whaddaya think?

@Ramu Thanks! That looks like a great resource

Wow - thanks everyone! A lot to consider further here That's the bloody trick, isn't it? This reply is a conscious effort to respond to everyone without using that word, but it's a constant filtering out: "I" wants to come and must be moved aside every time. Every sentence. Even while understanding and agreeing with what you say on one level, on another more entrenched level the word "I" persists in its insistance that is has substance. More work, more work... @username Yeah. The wannabe explanations are bloody persistent, though! It's the seeing through them that's a slow slog, although it seems that in attempting/fighting to explain or define them, and truly recognising the futility of that, they fall away. To be replaced with another set of beliefs, and the work begins anew... @Nahm Thank you. You're right about identification with thoughts/mind - and it's a frustration! But the encouragement is very much appreciated @Space Very true. Once again, a definitive statement proves false... @Shin Ha!

Fleurghugh (that's an attempt at approximating my mental reaction at how to start addressing this question!) First off I agree entirely with @Space: we can't answer this in any way that will be meaningful, satisfying, or probably even useful to you. Secondly, don't worry about going back and forth: I have to answer this question for myself several times every week, and each time the answer is slightly different and (hopefully) more nuanced, but every time I doubt I can't allow myself to say "well I know other people say it and I think I worked it out in the past, so I'll accept the idea and move on". Nope, I need to work through it again. And again. And again. Each time the doubt arises. But each time I become more certain in my answer. Those said, in an attempt to address this question: maybe there is a physical object residing in a head, called a brain. Maybe it is receiving stimulation from eyes, ears, etc., and maybe it is firing off electro-chemical signals in response to those stimuli. My question to you is, if that is the case, where is your conscious experience taking place? In order for there to be a physical brain with all its electro-chemical firings, there must be an objective physical reality. Great. So is your conscious experience (your PERSONAL experience of colour, and sound, and feeling, and thinking) existing in that objective physical reality? Is it? And if not, where the hell IS it existing? Another dimension, another reality, a pure hallucination (within or against the backdrop of... what)? And how does that 'whatever' relate to the objective physical reality in which a brain sits and fires off electro-chemical signals?

I work in a university setting, and I sometimes think that academics don't realise that not all postgrad students want to become professional academics as well. However, that often looks like the only path available, because if you're doing a PhD, the only people teaching you, mentoring you, etc., are people who did PhDs and then went on to become academics. I often think the same thing happens here. People seem to assume that the end of the path has to be teaching or somesuch. But guess what? The people teaching are the people who did the work and then chose to teach it. They're a limited role-model stock, not the be-all and end-all

I worry when people write sentences like this that they're trying to convince themselves of something: someone else has told them that they're 'nothing', or 'not their sensations' and now they're trying to persuade themselves to believe it. Which leads to the sort of struggle you're describing. I'd suggest rather than doing that - rather than trying to align your thinking to what anyone else is saying - you want to find what you're believing and then interrogate its truth. So what you're describing here sounds like a conflict of intellectual thought with deep belief (that you ARE the sensations and they ARE constant). Find your evidence. Find the PROOF of that belief. Don't try to prove it wrong or work out a clever argument that you're not the sensations (such as 'they're not constant') - find the PROOF of what you believe, which is that you are them. Of course, if you fail and fail and fail to find proof, that may shake your foundation a little. For some fun, here's a game: pay attention to where your sight ends. In the periphery of your vision, try to pinpoint the exact spot where something becomes nothing. Then try to pay attention to the quality of that nothing: it's not dark, it's not light, it's not anything. And then ask yourself where your sense of you resides. Is it 'inside' your head? Is it behind or inside that nothing? Then pay attention to that in comparison to the changing images of sight. Is there a difference? What is it? And what does it mean for you?

Some people recommend writing. I find this a highly useful way of working because it keeps your attention focused on what you are doing, and you are forced to try to communicate it in clear terms

Because it's not about just asking the same question over and over again. It's about interrogating the answers that come. When an answer comes, "I am this, I am that, I am here...", whatever it is, you need to examine that answer. Find the truth in it - or the lack of truth in it. It's no use going 'no I'm not that because someone else said I'm nothingness'; you have to strip away the layers of 'you' that 'you' think 'you' are. And most of these are invisible to you. To be honest, it seems to me that an awful lot of people misunderstand self-inquiry. It's an ongoing, difficult, oftentimes frustrating process, and in the end you're not actually looking for an answer. No answer is going to come. You're looking to remove the assumptions/beliefs (both created by you and inherited from society/parents/school/peers/etc.) which sit in your mind and pose as answers. And most of them you aren't even aware of at the moment. So, yeah, I suppose it is but that's going to take years of ongoing, daily inquiry. Still, it comes away piece by piece; sort of a series of little disillusionments. I'm not 'there' yet, but my perspective and understanding of everything have significantly changed through a simple application of critical thinking to the situation I find myself in. Which is really cool. Just remember to not let your mind cheat you by stating answers from other people (such as "I am nothing"). If it helps, you can reframe the question slightly: "What is I?" "What is true?" etc.

I find I need to do both. I need the concentrated sessions in order to really hammer the work at 'get somewhere'. I also fuel it and help to assimilate new understandings by keeping my mind tuned to a self-inquiring frequency as much as possible in my day-to-day