Have I Captured The Three Levels Of Self

[Joseph Maynor]

Regular Life

1.  Egoic self.  The small Self.

Self-Transcendence

2.  The Higher self.  Still egoic but tries to act selflessly using awareness.

Enlightenment

3. Brahman.  Self-aware reality without distinction.

Edited July 26, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[Dodo]

I don't think these definitions are giving a full picture. To be honest to give them definition I must first have experience of them. Brb.

[Joseph Maynor]

@Dodo But do the definitions paint a useful picture?  How does your experience relate to that picture?  Can you draw an interesting line of creative energy that would at a minimum entertain me?

Edited July 27, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[Loreena]

@Joseph Maynor  for me it's not like 3 levels but 2 modes 

One survival mode or lower self mode and the other is spiritual mode or higher self mode. 

Both are necessary so both combine. None is dispensable. 

[Joseph Maynor]

@Loreena I feel like the lower mode can be completely transcended.  I know some among us are skeptical of this.  Brahman is the prespectiveless perspective.  That is possible for you.  Anything less would be a distinction and thus an illusion.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[SOUL]

Capture.... interesting word choice... subliminal message in it? Heh

[Joseph Maynor]

@SOUL Yes.  I am a manipulator!  You caught me

[Prabhaker]

23 minutes ago, Loreena said:

One survival mode or lower self mode and the other is spiritual mode or higher self mode. 

I think spiritual mode is only survival mode, if you are miserable it indicates that you are not spiritual, you are deceiving yourself.

[Joseph Maynor]

@Prabhaker I agree.  Brahman is the only destination.

[Loreena]

16 minutes ago, Prabhaker said:

I think spiritual mode is only survival mode, if you are miserable it indicates that you are not spiritual, you are deceiving yourself.

I don't think spirituality has got anything to do with being miserable. Those are conditions. A person can still be spiritual. To say someone is not spiritual is a huge statement. A person can be happy yet not spiritual. Suffering still exists whether one is spiritual or not. The only difference is that by practicing spirituality one gets some reprieve from suffering

[Prabhaker]

2 minutes ago, Loreena said:

I don't think spirituality has got anything to do with being miserable.

If you are not blissful , you are not spiritual. If you intellectually know about spirituality , if you like to read and learn about spirituality, it doesn't makes you spiritual.

Just like, if you read and learn about swimming, philosophize, contemplate about swimming, it will not make you a swimmer.

[Loreena]

4 minutes ago, Prabhaker said:

If you are not blissful , you are not spiritual. If you intellectually know about spirituality , if you like to read and learn about spirituality, it doesn't makes you spiritual.

Just like, if you read and learn about swimming, philosophize, contemplate about swimming, it will not make you a swimmer.

In my opinion, the concept that one gets ultimate freedom from suffering by practicing spirituality is just another illusion of the many illusions. Just like chasing money doesn't make you happy. A person can be intrinsically spiritual, he doesn't need to do special exercises. It's a quality of the soul or the spirit and not of the body, so just no correlation with swimming.

[Prabhaker]

10 minutes ago, Loreena said:

A person can be intrinsically spiritual, he doesn't need to do special exercises.

If you are intrinsically spiritual then you don't need to do special exercises, but if you are miserable than you need transformation. You can start with the body, if you find it difficult to start with the mind. Everybody can't start transformation by doing nothing, philosophizing, contemplation.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Prabhaker
spelling mistake

[Loreena]

6 hours ago, Prabhaker said:

If you are intrinsically spiritual then you don't need to do special exercises, but if you are miserable than you need transformation. You can start with the body, if you find it difficult to start with the mind. Everybody can't start transformation by doing nothing, philosophizing, contemplation.

You're right that philosophizing doesn't achieve anything. 

Edited July 27, 2017 by Loreena

[Prabhaker]

Just now, Loreena said:

But imo, it's wrong to call someone not spiritual just because they are not happy. 

Blissfulness is ecstasy  without excitement , it is not not happiness. If you are not blissful, then you need spiritual transformation.

[Dodo]

5 hours ago, Prabhaker said:

I think spiritual mode is only survival mode, if you are miserable it indicates that you are not spiritual, you are deceiving yourself.

5 hours ago, Loreena said:

I don't think spirituality has got anything to do with being miserable. Those are conditions. A person can still be spiritual. To say someone is not spiritual is a huge statement. A person can be happy yet not spiritual. Suffering still exists whether one is spiritual or not. The only difference is that by practicing spirituality one gets some reprieve from suffering

To be spiritual... What does it truly mean? It all depends what your definition of spiritual is. In my view absolutely everybody is spiritual.

The more one progresses with the path of spirituality (I can only talk about the path of non-duality here - from what I have observed in myself and read about it) the more the pain no longer has root within. It still appears, the person can still be unhappy and miserable, angry and sad, the whole spectrum - otherwise where is the freedom? The difference is that the more spiritually evolved is able to live those moments out and then leave them behind - not copy paste the suffering further into the future.

 

Edited July 27, 2017 by Dodo

[Prabhaker]

7 minutes ago, Dodo said:

It still appears, the person can still be unhappy and miserable, angry and sad, the whole spectrum - otherwise where is the freedom?

Everybody is free to be miserable, you can create a hell, you have freedom. But it doesn't makes you a more conscious person. Unless you are not blissful it only indicates that your meditation is not ripened.

[Dodo]

14 minutes ago, Prabhaker said:

Everybody is free to be miserable, you can create a hell, you have freedom. But it doesn't makes you a more conscious person. Unless you are not blissful it only indicates that your meditation is not ripened.

Ok, while that could be true, at the same time claiming those who are not ripe fruits are not spiritual is an extreme claim. Fruit will ripen in it's own course. It is still a complete fruit even when it's green. The soul of the green fruit and the soul of the ripened fruit are exactly the same. The true self is unchanging. There is only one, not many.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Dodo

[Joseph Maynor]

I've come to the conclusion that even the higher self is an illusion.  It is based on the perspective that we should maximize human life.  That might be good, but it is not the absolute perspective.  The absolute perspective has no interest in body-mind perspectives.

But even if you were a monk living in a cave, you would still need to provide for the body-mind, so you might as well do that adequately and not deficiently.  And so I can see why life purpose is a good thing to pursue.  As long as you don't get too imbalanced doing it.  

Videos that allude to higher self.  All great.  Watch them all.  

 

Edited July 28, 2017 by Joseph Maynor

[Dodo]

14 minutes ago, Wormon Blatburm said:

No, lol. Pretty sure it's the other way around.  Why do you think making everythung relative and calling it spiritual is useful? Spiritual means disembodied beings/people , astral projection, the afterlife etc. Not saying those things exist but if spiritual means anything it's that

Useful for what? I dont understand what do you mean, does the truth have to be useful for something? 

What do you mean by me making everything relative?  Im just saying how I see it from my point of view. What else could I do?

For me spirituality is Being.

From that point of view Everything is Being, therefore Everything is spiritual. You are free to have and pursue other definitions of spirituality however, for which not everything is spiritual. It all depends on your definition.

I am arguing my point, you are arguing your point, but we obviously mean different things when we think of the word Spirituality. That's why we disagree. Doesn't make one of us more right than the other, unless there is an absolute definition of Spirituality.