Absolute falsehood?

[FredFred]

While I haven't encountered it yet, I'm starting to understand that absolute truth could be a "thing".

What about absolute falsehood? Does it exist? What does it look like?

[zeroISinfinity]

It looks like exactly like Reality you live in including everybody and yourself. 

[FredFred]

10 hours ago, zeroISinfinity said:

It looks like exactly like Reality you live in including everybody and yourself. 

But I can say right now that the sky is blue, which is true. Wouldn't absolute falsehood prevent me from doing that?

[AlwaysBeNice]

Something can be separate = absolute falsehood

[Forestluv]

@FredFred That creates a dualism. Absolute truth vs. Absolute falsehood.

Absolute includes everything. There is no escape. 

[Leo Gura]

Falsehood does not exist. There is only truth.

What you call falsehood is an idea which exists in your mind. You're confused about what it is. You're confusing ideas for reality, which makes falsehood seem like it exists when actually it does not.

I dare you to take your finger and point to one false thing in the world. Notice, it cannot be done. Anything you point to, is true. If it isn't true, it isn't a thing so you cannot point to it.

If you point to a picture of a unicorn thinking that's false, you're wrong. It's true. It's just a drawing of a unicorn. That's what it IS. That's its truth. The mistake is imagining further that this unicorn is supposed to exist as something other than the drawing that it is. See? You get lost in your imagination. That's the whole problem here. Falsehood seems to exist only when your imagination is active. You must imagine falsehood. But even imagination is true. You just need to be aware that it is imagination and not the physical world. People conflate those two very easily because it helps us survive.

Falsehood is like a magic trick. It's a clever illusion. An impossibility that appears to be possible when you're not looking at it closely enough.

[Inliytened1]

@Leo Gura ahh but what is the physical world in this equation.  You speak of actuality vs concept and imagination.  Actuality is Being.  Its God.  It's what YOU are.  It's the Godhead.  So to call it the "physical world" is just a metaphor in a sense.

[Leo Gura]

@Inliytened1 "The physical world" is a conceptual abstraction. But the raw sensations of stuff we commonly call chairs, tables, trees, dogs, cars, etc. is what I call Being/Truth.

When the physical world is stripped of all concept and interpretation what remains is Absolute Being. At that point the world stops being "physical" and it becomes divine and eternal.

Yes, we are saying the same thing.

[How to be wise]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

@Inliytened1 "The physical world" is a conceptual abstraction. But the raw sensations of stuff we commonly call chairs, tables, trees, dogs, cars, etc. is what I call being.

Ramana Maharishi: “Physical pain is a thought.” 

How do you explain this if you say that raw sensations are different from concepts.

[Leo Gura]

@How to be wise What we commonly call "pain" is not elemental. It is a compound thing which includes several components: 1) a raw sensation, 2) an automatic bodily recoil reaction, 3) a conceptual activity of interpretation, assignment of meaning, and judgment, and 4) an emotional reaction.

So what Ramana is referring to is #3 & #4, which are of course conceptual activity which can be stopped. The raw sensation is still there. But once you eliminate #3 & #4, this thing we call pain starts to feel and look very different from pain. The sting of pain is not in the raw sensation but in our conceptual interpretation and emotional reaction to it.

So there's no contradiction between what Ramana says and what I am saying. He's just stating it a bit simplistically and starkly so that you realize the important lesson: your mind plays a huge part in how you experience pain.

Have you ever had an experience of pain so intense you start to enjoy it? If you get really curious about pain as it is happening, the sting of it lessens. In that moment you are experiencing it purely as #1, a raw sensation.

Also notice that most pain is not physical but emotional in nature. When someone breaks your heart, or when you feel sad or lonely, none of that is physical pain. It's conceptually driven. And even if you break your leg, at least half your pain will come from the story you tell yourself about it, "OH MY GOD! Why did this happen to me? When will I be able to walk again? What if my boss fires me? How much is this gonna cost me to fix? How could I have been so foolish? Why can't it just stop?" etc.

[ahmad ibdah]

nothing exists but GOD ,all other is illusion. the ego deludes you into not seeing it ,so it comes up with all other things other than the absolute God,the truth. 

[kieranperez]

@Leo Gura one of the things I’ve found in my tests with contemplating pain as it’s occuring is yes the steps you pointed out. What I feel is missed though from what Ramana says and like Ralston has said in his books and in the video above by not making the distinction or thinking that thought is that... the way you dropping it is focusing like a motherfucker JUST on the raw sensation and hold it on that. You feel the sensation more. You feel and concentrate on that sensation so much that pain the emotional parts of pain and what not don’t even arise. Like in concentration when you concentrate so deeply on a candle all there is is the kindle. Distinctions of the bird chirping in the background is dropped, self-activity has subsided significantly, etc. 

Shinzen Young I think has done a great service in really clearing up this matter when he talks about concentration, clarity, and equanimity. 

Edited April 10, 2019 by kieranperez