SOUL

@Salvijus I said no such thing, I'm not sure anymore that we're talking about the same thing. Be well Peace

@Salvijus My well being isn't limited by opinion, I'm not talking about opinion, it's the experience of well being not the story about story. Which is what opinion is about, something like 'freedom' or understanding someone's teaching or the social dynamics of it. All of those things can become a distraction from well being and are replaced by the finite feelings of self justification through 'truth'. Genuine liberation transcends the conditional including the narratives we tell ourselves are true. So the enjoyment someone may get from the different expressions of descriptions and understandings of mystical and spiritual experience can be fruit of the unconditional well being that transcends the story and is not dependent upon having the 'true' story.

I don't pay any attention to getting anyone to think anything so people will just think, believe and do any which way they see fit. My own intention is for well being in my own experience and I don't need to legitimize it to anyone, not even to my 'self', to be well. I don't get involved with the social cliques aspect of the ideological differences, opinion doesn't influence my well being.

Watching that Spira video really demonstrates to me how there is a strong bias towards trusting one's own perception as true and dismissing another perception as false. It is extremely difficult to not fall into this 'trap' of confirmation bias especially when it is reaffirmed by 'traditional conceptualization', for lack of a better phrase to describe it.

Well, your sloppy framing is continuing to slide...first it was "not smart enough to see the truth of it" and then it becomes "not smart enough to recognize the wisdom"...both seem a bit self righteous about ones own perception. Again, to stay on the point I'm making it's just something that is in the imagination of the perceiver, there is no universal truth to it, it's a perception of personal truth.

@Salvijus The description of the 'reward-punishment' and I only use those words as a reference not as a 'truth' are different in different religions but the psychological mechanism is the same. Not 'smart enough to see the truth'? That's the same demeaning attitude dogmatic zealots of many religions use... I suspect those are just your words and not Buddhist ways of referring to it but it doesn't change the point. It's only in the imagination that one trusts it is true, that one believes it to be the truth. No hand waving away 'belief' either, that's exactly what it is, one trusts the perception one has in awareness, in the imagination that it is 'true'.

I would but since I transcend time I don't have the time to explain it.

@Salvijus The explanation of Buddhism you use to suggest that only if you believe as Buddhists do and do as they do can you know they are right and others don't have the authority to question them being right is pretty much how Christianity and many other religions suggest theirs is. This is in the imagination and that one believes is the truth which doesn't mean it is a universal truth for all.

People confuse the fact that all of our experience is known through the perception of imagination in the mind with thinking that makes everything imaginary. It's an inability to distinguish the difference between the field of perception that is generated in the mind's imagination which allows us to perceive what is actually in the physical manifest reality from the things that only exist in the imagination, so are imaginary. Not only are things like mystical and spiritual experience often transferred from something imaginary to trusted ideas so are believed to be true there are also things some have as self perceptions and aspects of memories they believe to be true but are only imaginary. This doesn't mean all mystical and spiritual experience are imaginary so are not to be believed but similarly we shouldn't believe all mystical and spiritual experience to be true. Mystical and spiritual experience is useful if it brings us well being not that it's 'truth'. Again to clarify, just because it is a fact of the natural world that all our perceptions of experience happens in the mind's imagination doesn't mean that everything is only imaginary. Although, I haven't read that book so am not trying to explain it to you. I'm just discussing the erroneous conflation of imagination and imaginary as being the exact same thing and some of the consequences of this.

No joke, just be is the simplest explanation because it's not even an explanation, it's the absence of an explanation.

What if the 'you' and the 'god' do not exist at all...and even as they don't exist it is only in your imagination that you believe they exist. whoop there it is....

Here's a simple explanation even though there are deeper ones that can be made: awakening is like taking off blinders and insight is what is seen once the blinders are off.

Being fit, making alot of money and having a hot sex life but still miserable so in conflict with random people on the internet is evidence those things you are doing haven't brought you well being.

@bloomer You are just imagining me taking something horrific and going so abstract... or am I imagining you imagining me? Maybe someone else is imagining us imagining each other... Use your imagination and it's obvious what this is...

No, you are just completely missing it.... I'm going to leave you hanging and maybe one day you will realize what I'm saying. It's just too funny to spoil it... haha

@Nivsch Logic...circular and all are imaginary...science and religion are imaginary Eventually you will catch on to what I'm saying implicitly, don't make me say it explicitly.

@Nivsch A reference point is just imaginary

According to the belief system of this forum you are god and created all of this, you are alone and it's all in your imagination. You imagined the incident, you imagined the terror, imagined the attacker, imagined the victims running, screaming and the violence, imagining the conflict between cultures. Why would imagine all of that? You are even imagining me asking you why are you imagining all of this? I know it sounds foolish and detached from the reality but it's only imaginary that it may sound that way because it's only you who exist and everything is just your imagination, real reality is imagined. Don't believe it? Just read the forum and all the imagined members will tell you in post after post, thread after thread... that is until the imagined Leo has a new imagined deepest awakening on drugs and then they will start to preach that new imagined belief. I will now sit back and await the imagined backlash for them imagining me saying this.

@CaptainBobbyOlsen Thinking one is has the 'absolute truth' isn't the same as thinking one has reached 'the end'. Sure, some may think if they have found the 'truth' they are 'done' but the belief about having the 'truth' is a continual 'trap' of the ongoing process of awakening, not the end of it.

@CaptainBobbyOlsen The one that is the constant and persistent 'trap' if we are going to use this word to describe the phenomena of attachment which entraps within the experience of awakening is believing our perception is the 'truth'. As we are freed from the attachment of self perception so transcend to more unified perception of oneness quite often there is a revelatory experience of 'this is the true' reality. People will call it absolute truth, they will capitalize it as 'Truth' and they will dismiss everything else as false, an illusion and not real in favor of their mystical experience of awakening. They will shout from the metaphorical rooftops about how they have awakened to the universal truth that applies to everyone, not just their own experience, it's everyone;s truth... it is THE TRUTH! This is a 'trap' as you would call it. Every new and deeper awakening no matter who the awakener is seems to always be the most truest truth to ever be seen whether it's someone newly on the path or years into it like the venerable host of this forum believes they are seeing the absolute truth and their experience is pure in perception. It's DIRECT EXPERIENCE! How can it be wrong or an illusion? So be aware of this 'trap' if this is what we are to call it.

It has nothing to do with making compelling arguments, it's about well being which is about the cessation of self suffering. Once there is well being there is nothing left to argue about.

@DrugsBunny People who are magical minded, whether it be the new age mystic or the religious adherent, takes what is a kernel of fact and exaggerates it to the extreme degree then declares their exaggerated belief is the truth because the kernel is. Don't let their exaggerated belief disturb your peace.

@Carl-Richard The commas don't need to be in there because 'describe to define' is communicating the point well enough but a comma can be in there if desired but not required. Although, ironically, the comma separates just like the ego separates haha.

A statement about an observation.

@Julian gabriel There is an evolutionary habituation in the human psychology to seek out accurate information and understanding for our physical survival but the ego will use this as a means to preserve self identity as well so..... it's quite a challenge to transcend this so that it won't habitually do it in the mind.