A Naive Question About Enlightenment.

[Parki]

I kinda get that common sense doesn't really work here, but if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?
It would make sense if I would be everything I would be aware of everything.

[Shin]

No, because infinity includes limited perceptions

@Parki Yes it does, you just don't understand the answer and/or your own question.

@Parki Infinity has to include everything, since it's infinity.
So the fact that you only see yourself as a human being and not everything is totally normal.

Edited June 9, 2017 by Shin

[Parki]

@Shin ye but it has nothing to do with the question.
 

[Parki]

@Shin then which part do I fail to understand?

[Prabhaker]

58 minutes ago, Parki said:

if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?

You even don't know yourself. The real question is to know how you are not knowing yourself, how you are missing such an obvious reality, such a basic truth which is so near to you, how you go on not seeing. You must have created a device; otherwise it is difficult to escape from oneself. You must have created walls; you must, in some sense, be deceiving yourself.

So what is that trick of escaping from oneself, of not knowing oneself? If you don't understand that trick, whatsoever you do will not be of any help - because the trick remains, and you go on asking how to know oneself, how to know the truth, how to know the reality, and consequently you go on helping the barrier. You go on creating it also, so whatsoever you do will be of no use.

Really, nothing positive is needed to know oneself, only something negative. In a way, you have only to destroy the barrier that you yourself have constructed, and the moment that barrier is not there you will know. Knowing happens when the barrier is not; you cannot make any positive effort for it.

You have just to be aware of how you are missing it.

So a few things have to be understood as to how you are missing it. One: you live in your dreams, and then dreams become barriers. Reality is not a dream. It is there, you are surrounded by it everywhere. Inside and outside, it is there - you cannot miss it - but you are dreaming. Then you move in a different dimension which is not a reality. Then you go on moving in a dreamworld. Then dreams become like clouds around you, and they create the barrier. Unless mind ceases dreaming, the truth cannot be known. And when you see through dreams the reality is distorted, and your eyes are filled with dreams, and your ears are filled with dreams, and your hands are filled with dreams.

So whatsoever you touch is touched through the dreams, and whatsoever you see is seen through dreams, and whatsoever you hear is heard through the dreams, and you distort everything.

Whatsoever reaches you, reaches through dreams, and they change everything, they color everything. Because of the dreaming mind you are missing the reality outside and the reality inside.

You can go on finding ways and means how to come to reality, but you will be trying that too through your dreaming mind. So you can dream religious dreams - you can dream dreams about reality, about truth, about God, about Christ and Buddha - but that too will be dreaming. Dreaming must cease, and dreaming cannot be used to know reality.

Just be an observer, as if you are standing by the side of the road watching the traffic – no judgment, no evaluation, no condemnation, no appreciation – just pure observation.

As you become more and more accustomed to observation, a strange phenomenon starts happening. If you are ten percent aware, that much energy has moved from the mind process to the observer; now the mind has only ninety percent energy available. A moment comes… you have fifty percent of energy. And your energy goes on growing as mind goes on losing its energy.

The traffic becomes less and less and less, and you become more and more and more.

Your witnessing self goes on increasing in integrity, expanding; it becomes stronger and stronger.

And the mind goes on becoming weaker and weaker: ninety percent observer and ten percent mind, ninety-nine percent observer and only one percent mind.

One hundred percent observer and the mind disappears, the road is empty; the screen of the mind becomes completely empty, nothing moves. There is only the observer.

This is the state J. Krishnamurti’s statement is pointing at. When there is nothing to observe, when there is only the observer left, then the observer itself becomes the observed – because there is nothing else to observe, what else to do? The knower simply knows itself. The seer sees himself.

That is Krishnamurti’s way of saying it, that the observer becomes the observed. You can call it enlightenment, it is the same thing: the light simply lights itself, there is nothing else to fall upon. You have dissolved the mind. You are alone, fully alert and aware.

[No-Thing]

@Parki Hey Parky. It's good that you ask those questions. Most people try to stay so busy or blurry so that they avoid those questions.

You are trying to understand an existential question with your mind which is not the right tool to ask those questions. It's like asking a hammer, "what is the meaning of life?"; "I don't know, but you can use me to build a house!"

On the path it is helpful though to have a working model until you don't need it anymore. One I found useful was the one described in the book: http://www.butterfliesfree.com/ . It's free. Check it out!

[eputkonen]

7 hours ago, Parki said:

I kinda get that common sense doesn't really work here, but if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?
It would make sense if I would be everything I would be aware of everything.

With this logic, you would not be most of your own body.  You are not aware of what the adrenal or pituitary glands are doing right now.  You are not aware of what cells in the body are dying and being replaced by new cells.  You are not likely aware of your shins right now...well maybe now that I brought your attention to it.  You are not likely aware of the inside of your nose nor the inside of your ears.  You are not aware of your ear drums.   I can go on like this...but I won't.

My point is...not being aware does not mean separation or not being it. 

Most of our awareness only comes from the senses on and around the head...which is why so many people think they are in there somewhere (in the center of all the senses).  Hearing, sight, smell, and even taste are all in the region of the head.  Then we have the skin covering the rest of our bodies that provide sensations.  But the skin sensations take a back seat to the major senses on the head - most people focus more on visual and auditory.

Do you feel your liver?  Are you aware of your brain?  Right now...are you aware of all the organs of the body?

So by your own logic, because you are not aware of everything in your body...you are not your body.  This is a false conclusion because you don't have to be aware of it for it to still be a part of you.  Conscious awareness is not required.  In fact it would get in the way...how does a centipede control its hundred legs...it doesn't think about it.  If you were consciously aware of everything inside your body and had to consciously control it...you wouldn't manage to get out of bed.

Most functions of the body happen unconsciously...but let us say superconsciously instead...giving it a plus instead of a minus.  Superconsciously, you are beating your own heart, you are digesting foods that you eat, etc. 

Now breathing is interesting in that you can consciously be aware of your breath...you can consciously control your breath, but most of the time you are not consciously controlling your breath and you may not even be aware of your breath.  And yet it happens.  You don't have to be aware of breathing in order to breath.  And so do you breath or don't you?

Alan Watts once said, "If you find out that it's you who circulates your blood, you will at the same moment find out that you are shining the sun."

Edited June 9, 2017 by eputkonen

[Nahm]

@Parki There's no rush on getting back man.    It would be like looking at a photo and as soon as you see it you start saying "why can I only see this photo" and then you remove your focus from the photo and lay it back on the general world. We're all going back but fuck sakes Parki, you're the one who focused through Parki. Soak it up man. No rush.  Would you rather see all 8 billion photos from a distance at once, or experience each of them individually? Me too. 

 

[Emerald]

16 hours ago, Parki said:

I kinda get that common sense doesn't really work here, but if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?
It would make sense if I would be everything I would be aware of everything.

The thing to ask yourself is "What assumptions am I making about the existence of other perceivers?" 

Your question takes for granted that you are one perceiver in a group of many perceivers that all experience the same reality from different viewpoints. So, right now, my cat is next to me. So, I may think "If I'm everything, then why am I not experiencing what my cat experiences." This assumes that my cat is actually a separate entity from myself. This may be true but it may be false too. It's a belief. 

You have to get in touch with the fact that you've never experienced anything outside of your present moment experiences. And that you really don't know for sure that there are other perceivers or perceptions separate from your experience. But you also don't know for sure that the opposite is true.

When you realize how little you know about the reality that gave rise to your question in the first place, you can then let go of the hope to ever answer that question. And if you let go of enough illusions, your buoy can eventually rise to the surface of the water.

 

[electroBeam]

16 hours ago, Parki said:

I kinda get that common sense doesn't really work here, but if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?
It would make sense if I would be everything I would be aware of everything.

If a screen can play everything, why can you only see one image at a time?

You aren't everything. You have the potential to be everything

[Real Eyes]

16 hours ago, Prabhaker said:

You even don't know yourself. The real question is to know how you are not knowing yourself, how you are missing such an obvious reality, such a basic truth which is so near to you, how you go on not seeing. You must have created a device; otherwise it is difficult to escape from oneself. You must have created walls; you must, in some sense, be deceiving yourself.

So what is that trick of escaping from oneself, of not knowing oneself? If you don't understand that trick, whatsoever you do will not be of any help - because the trick remains, and you go on asking how to know oneself, how to know the truth, how to know the reality, and consequently you go on helping the barrier. You go on creating it also, so whatsoever you do will be of no use.

Really, nothing positive is needed to know oneself, only something negative. In a way, you have only to destroy the barrier that you yourself have constructed, and the moment that barrier is not there you will know. Knowing happens when the barrier is not; you cannot make any positive effort for it.

You have just to be aware of how you are missing it.

So a few things have to be understood as to how you are missing it. One: you live in your dreams, and then dreams become barriers. Reality is not a dream. It is there, you are surrounded by it everywhere. Inside and outside, it is there - you cannot miss it - but you are dreaming. Then you move in a different dimension which is not a reality. Then you go on moving in a dreamworld. Then dreams become like clouds around you, and they create the barrier. Unless mind ceases dreaming, the truth cannot be known. And when you see through dreams the reality is distorted, and your eyes are filled with dreams, and your ears are filled with dreams, and your hands are filled with dreams.

So whatsoever you touch is touched through the dreams, and whatsoever you see is seen through dreams, and whatsoever you hear is heard through the dreams, and you distort everything.

Whatsoever reaches you, reaches through dreams, and they change everything, they color everything. Because of the dreaming mind you are missing the reality outside and the reality inside.

You can go on finding ways and means how to come to reality, but you will be trying that too through your dreaming mind. So you can dream religious dreams - you can dream dreams about reality, about truth, about God, about Christ and Buddha - but that too will be dreaming. Dreaming must cease, and dreaming cannot be used to know reality.

Just be an observer, as if you are standing by the side of the road watching the traffic – no judgment, no evaluation, no condemnation, no appreciation – just pure observation.

As you become more and more accustomed to observation, a strange phenomenon starts happening. If you are ten percent aware, that much energy has moved from the mind process to the observer; now the mind has only ninety percent energy available. A moment comes… you have fifty percent of energy. And your energy goes on growing as mind goes on losing its energy.

The traffic becomes less and less and less, and you become more and more and more.

Your witnessing self goes on increasing in integrity, expanding; it becomes stronger and stronger.

And the mind goes on becoming weaker and weaker: ninety percent observer and ten percent mind, ninety-nine percent observer and only one percent mind.

One hundred percent observer and the mind disappears, the road is empty; the screen of the mind becomes completely empty, nothing moves. There is only the observer.

This is the state J. Krishnamurti’s statement is pointing at. When there is nothing to observe, when there is only the observer left, then the observer itself becomes the observed – because there is nothing else to observe, what else to do? The knower simply knows itself. The seer sees himself.

That is Krishnamurti’s way of saying it, that the observer becomes the observed. You can call it enlightenment, it is the same thing: the light simply lights itself, there is nothing else to fall upon. You have dissolved the mind. You are alone, fully alert and aware.

@Prabhaker  Wow what a post!   

A question if I may...with reference to just observing thoughts disinterestedly...is this a tad different than the "awareness watching awareness" practice?  

I understand that they may become the same in the end, but early on, would you say there is a distinction between the practice of "observing one's thoughts disinterestedly"  VS the practice of "awareness watching awareness"?  

[Pure Imagination]

18 hours ago, Parki said:

I kinda get that common sense doesn't really work here, but if I am everything, why am I aware only of me?
It would make sense if I would be everything I would be aware of everything.

You ARE aware of everything! All of existence is there right in front of you! You are it! ALL of it! Anything else is just a thought or a concept that takes place in awareness. Awareness is already everything!

[Real Eyes]

32 minutes ago, Fidelio said:

 If there seems to be an interest, and if I have the time, I might explain how one can get into the correct state of mind so that, when meditating, this increased awareness becomes (more) possible.

@Fidelio  I'm definitely interested in hearing more about this.

[Prabhaker]

14 minutes ago, Real Eyes said:

I understand that they may become the same in the end, but early on, would you say there is a distinction between the practice of "observing one's thoughts disinterestedly"  VS the practice of "awareness watching awareness"?

Everybody can't begin with the practice of "awareness watching awareness". It will difficult for most of us.

When you have become aware of your body and its actions, then move deeper – to your mind and its activity, thoughts, imagination, projections. When you have become deeply aware of the mind, you suddenly find yourself in your being, at the very center. There you are aware only of awareness. And this is the ultimate purity.

[Prabhaker]

2 minutes ago, Fidelio said:

I don't know why Prab writes these things.

I am jobless, so I post these things to keep me busy.

[Real Eyes]

19 minutes ago, Pure Imagination said:

You ARE aware of everything! All of existence is there right in front of you! You are it! ALL of it! Anything else is just a thought or a concept that takes place in awareness. Awareness is already everything!

@Pure Imagination

Is this how you see the world?  For example right now at your computer, are you aware of everything?  

[Prabhaker]

7 minutes ago, Fidelio said:

Come work for me.

I don't need work, I only play.

[Prabhaker]

Just now, Fidelio said:

My kind of work is the best kind of play.

I don't do any kind of work.

[Pure Imagination]

21 hours ago, Real Eyes said:

@Pure Imagination

Is this how you see the world?  For example right now at your computer, are you aware of everything?  

I am aware of what is real right in front of me. That is simply all there is. Anything else is a concept. For example, my cat isn't in my direct awareness right now, so she doesn't exist. Any thought of her at this moment is a concept, not reality.

[Real Eyes]

Just now, Pure Imagination said:

I am aware of what is real right in front of me. That is simply all there is. Anything else is a concept. For example, my cat isn't in my direct awareness right now, so she doesn't exist. Any thought of her at this moment is a concept, not reality.

But is this a theoretical understanding, or actual direct perception of that as fact?  Because anybody can read this somewhere and parrot it, but it's different to actually experience it.