The End of the Game: Deconstructing the Portals to the Absolute

[Ludwig]

Quote

 

In what could be his final YouTube (or swan song), Stephen-Narayan Wolinsky in the “The End of the Game: Deconstructing the Portals to the Absolute” dismantles not only the portal of light, sound, and vibration, but also emptiness, void, stillness-silence witnessing, non-duality, vibration, energy or shakti, being(ness), the I Am, consciousness and awareness. The End of the Game demonstrates that portals are pleasant, however they are merely temporary states or stations or layers or covering. The Absolute (prior to the word Absolute) does not have and knows nothing about the portals or states of light, sound, emptiness, energy, vibration, consciousness or awareness, being(ness), the I Am and stillness.

In the last part of the YouTube Sephen-Narayan points to rarely mentioned temporary states that ultimately evaporate.  In the “End of the Game” the state of the Witness, Aware-er Know-er etc. are shown to be temporary states that come and go. Moreover, as long as the silent witness, aware-er, know-er etc, are present the game continues and the Absolute, (Prior to the word Absolute), will remain a distant conceptual goal. As Nisargadatta Maharaj would say, the Absolute is “Prior to Consciousness.” Finally as you read or listen to the book or You Tube please keep tucked away somewhere, “All that is heard, (or that is about to be read seen or heard is non-existent.” Shankara Your Mirage brother, Stephen-Narayan

 

 

[Preetom]

16 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

So eternal death is the Truth? Or what?

"As Nisargadatta Maharaj would say, the Absolute is “Prior to Consciousness.”"

He just used the word Awareness instead of Consciousness. So he is still talking about the same Ultimate Consciousness which we and all sages and spiritual teachers are talking about.

More specifically, he used the term 'consciousness' for expressing subject-object consciousness. That means the human consciousness that knows an 'other', that seems to start and end, that seems to fluctuate.

And by awareness, he meant the absolute on which this non-existent dream of consciousness appears. The absolute does not know any 'other'.

Just like Ramana Maharshi rigorously differentiated between the I-thought(the object knowing ego consciousness) and the Self ( the Absolute that knows no otherness aka no-thing).

Edited January 20, 2019 by Preetom

[cetus]

@Ludwig Thanks for posting this.

[Preetom]

11 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

So Ramana Maharshi was wrong and deluded with this?:

“Pure Consciousness, which is the Heart, includes all, and nothing is outside or apart from it. That is the ultimate Truth.”

— Ramana Maharshi

No Ramana wasn't wrong. These are just arbitrary technical contradictions. You can nitpick the terms consciousness and awareness separately or use them as the same thing. Go with the one that makes most sense to you.

11 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

And the materialists are right with death: there is no Consciousness/Existence (absolutely nothing) in Truth? (After death?)

That's exactly what you are saying. No Consciousness would mean eternal death.

The materialists say that there is nothing after death because all they 'know' is matter/phenomena. So after death, of course there can't be any matter, thus they declare that as nothing.

Notice the wording you used. Eternal vs non-eternal, death vs life all these are categories of non-existent appearance.

That's why nothing sensible can be said about 'The Absolute'. Even the term 'Absolute' is redundant and collapses on itself.

Realize who you are and get done with this contradiction once and for all 

If you are seeking for a belief system to subscribe to and pretend that this existential crisis is solved, you'll always be disappointed.

Edited January 20, 2019 by Preetom

[Preetom]

1 minute ago, Mikael89 said:

Yea but Ludwig said: "The Absolute (prior to the word Absolute) does not have and knows nothing about the portals or states of light, sound, emptiness, energy, vibration, consciousness or awareness, being(ness), the I Am and stillness."

So neither Consciousness or Awareness. 

Yeah the absolute truth is that the portals or states of light, sound, emptiness, energy, vibration, consciousness or awareness, being(ness), the I Am and stillness are all non-existent appearances only because there is a perceiver/ego/self/subject, however gross or subtle it might be.

8 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

You are talking like realizing who you are is a easily doable thing.

Of course I want to realize who I am.

This is why the viable strategy is ruthless self-inquiry all the way. It is basically staying with the presence of the subject while being totally uninterested in all objects, states, understanding, insights, peace, bliss and all that heart crap...until that illusory 'I am'ness/egoness/subjectness is found to be non-existent then, now, forever.

Leaving you as you are, the absolute.

[Preetom]

1 minute ago, Mikael89 said:

Eh. Well, what does portals or states mean then?

Consciousness or Awareness is non-existent? And it's a appearance?

There's no subject?

Sigh. All that is contradictory to what Ramana Maharshi and other sages have said.

Hey man, please don't panic. Nisargadatta's primary attitude was to almost always go against the questioner/student's current beliefs. That's why we can see this absolute negation style of everything in his teachings, just so people cannot nest in a particular state and start believing that they 'got' it.

There is an absolute truth, the sole substance aka the reality beyond all these words. That Reality alone 'appears' as the trinity of

1) subject/ego/consciousness/awareness/perceiver

2) objects/phenomena

3) mechanism of perception/god

These 3 elements ''arise and subside'' simultaneously and cannot stand without the others.

If one can completely see through any one of these 3 elements, the entire 'appearance' collapses. In self inquiry, only the subject is of primary focus and thus dissolved. 

In the end, the terms consciousness/awareness are just as much nonsensical as kgbnadsvaihdv or axcnCNCVMa. So use these terms as maps as long as it is helpful, but don't get attached to them or try to conceptually prove their validity against all other concepts. 

 

[Preetom]

19 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

There's no subject?

There can be a subject only as long as there is an object. Both are two sides of the same coin called appearance. And 'YOU' are not an appearance. 'YOU' transcend both subject and object. And what that is, cannot be symbolically represented.

20 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

Sigh. All that is contradictory to what Ramana Maharshi and other sages have said.

It is only appearing to be contradictory because of linguistic limitations.

[who chit]

4 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

Eh. Well, what does portals or states mean then?

Consciousness or Awareness is non-existent? And it's a appearance?

There's no subject?

Sigh. All that is contradictory to what Ramana Maharshi and other sages have said.

That's why what is spoken is not the real. Language can't ultimately define/describe what it is. The teacher,in compassion to help,knows what is said is not the thing itself, in their best way try to point to as close to what it is or is not.. Ultimately they are all pointing to the same reality. 

[who chit]

 Late post. 
What Preetom said .

[Preetom]

@Mikael89

You should know that Ramana's own state was called ajata, which does not acknowledge any existence of ego, subject, consciousness, universe, god, objects etc in the first place.

But because we feel ourselves as egoes, the sage has conceded a practice called 'self-inquiry' out of compassion for the devotees.

He instructs us to inquire and actually see if there is an ego in the first place, instead of assuming an ego and going on an arduous path of reading scriptures, mantra, tantra, yantra, karma, bhakti yoga etc to get rid of that assumed ego.

Thus it is regarded as the direct path, which short-circuits all other spiritual practices, opinions and yogas. Hope that made sense 

Edited January 20, 2019 by Preetom

[Leo Gura]

What people fail to get is that consciousness isn't a thing, it is nothing.

If you think of consciousness as a thing, as a substance, as experiential phenomena, as form, or as a state, then it will seem that there is something prior to consciousness. But really there is not. If you hold that there is 1) consciousness, and 2) something prior to it, that's two things! Which is duality.

Regardless of which labels you wish to use, in the end your ultimate understanding of reality better contain only 1 thing! Otherwise it's still a subtle duality.

The most important thing is to realize ONENESS, and why it cannot be anything but ONE.

Whatever you choose to call that ONE is then a matter of style.

"Consciousness" and "awareness" are very tricky words. Be careful what you assume about these words. Consciousness and awareness are not what you assume they are. You will only appreciate that at the moment of enlightenment.

Psychedelics help suss out what consciousness really is and how it behaves.

[Preetom]

11 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

I have watched the video now, but before (as recommended in the video) I watched this 

So in total it was over 6 hours. It felt like putting your mind in a grinder.

He say that consciousness and awareness are appearances, a illusion. That there is no consciousness or awareness. He destroyed everything. He even said there is no Absolute.

He also said that there is no duality and no non-duality, etc.

So it was like 6 hours of just talking about death. Seriously.

In death there would be no duality or non-duality. No existence or no non existence. (Because there is no non-existence in non-existence. In non-existence there is no knower of non-existence thus there can't be non-existence.)

So it feels like he was just talking about the same death which materialists believe in.

You are misunderstanding!

Yes he destroyed everything. But it is translated as existentially bleak, nihilistic and negative from the perspective of the mind which is all about constructing/spinning all sorts of groundless imaginations and firmly believing them as objective, ultimate truths.

This is exactly what it sounds like when you attempt to speak about that which can't be spoken about in any case. 

You cannot say a thing positively about the absolute. Even the term absolute and anything said about it becomes misleading and redundant at one point, as it must be.

You can only skillfully use the negation methods to talk about it for teaching purposes. And the mind bums out just because of that as it all gets bleak when everything is indiscriminately destroyed. It doesn't realize that nothing real is ever destroyed.

Would you call the end of a dream as some valid, substantial loss or destruction? That dream never had any substance, consequence and reality in the first place! 

[Preetom]

45 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

@Preetom Okay but the apparent dream is still here

Nope. It's gotta be here only as long as you persistently believe it's here. Does the dream say ''Hey! I'm the dream''?

45 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

It didn't teach me anything, just made me more confused.

The best thing it can do for you is to vividly show you that you can never ever grab this on an intellectual and belief level. It should show you the utter dryness and futility of knowledge and mental masturbation. It should create a nagging desperation inside you to actually forget everything you thought you knew, dedicate whole-heartedly to a legit spiritual technique and not stop until the search collapses on itself, leaving you 'done'. 

If these 2 videos did just that for you, I'd say they have fulfilled their purpose.

45 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

To your comment he would just say there is no dream. There is no end. Etc.

The dream analogy was mentioned to put up with the argument. Of course there is no actual dream and actual end lol. Or else Enlightenment would be a real thing, which it is not. The term/strategy called 'enlightenment' is a thorn to remove another thorn you are afflicted with right now which is ''I am bound''.

45 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

He even said "This teaching doesn't exist."

Of course! Any genuine teaching must eat it's own tail. Like dissolution of the stick in the burning pyre as Ramana would say.

16 minutes ago, Mikael89 said:

Oh and he also said that there is no hope. And he showed a quote which said: "You are like grass growing."

Become more and more dispassionate, uninterested in the contents of experience and instead be more interested to the one that has all these conflicted experiences. 

Hope you find solace in that. All the best.

Edited January 21, 2019 by Preetom

[Moreira]

So astral travels where a person saw a friend living in another country with a red shirt and days later the friend confirmed he was wearing a red shirt? And NDE where the dead described exactly what happened in the room?

The guy in the video ignores quantum consciousness, only considers materialism.