Sacred space

[tsuki]

4 hours ago, Zigzag Idiot said:

That makes sense. Relating to the playing card symbolism of Alchemy, deliberateness in speech and movement is a sign of being in the center of gravity of the Kings of Spades and Diamonds.

I'm sorry, but I haven't caught the significance of this.

4 hours ago, Zigzag Idiot said:

When I'm in Witness Consciousness and well rested my posture is a lot straighter, shoulders layed back, breathing belly breaths. Not just me,,, anybody,, or most people experience this slight change in posture. I thought of this when you told the story of the guys who were triggered somehow when you walked by. Also you being in a balanced and relaxed state set you apart from other people on the street, possibly. Oh, I forgot you said you looked at them also. I pictured their painbodies recoiling from seeing a smile and then lashing out. Angry suffering people have to keep finding new things to feed on and projecting something onto someone else happens mechanically, it seems.

I was verbally assaulted in a similar way while doing a slow meditative walk on the grounds of a big hospital a few years ago.

"Back then", when I was assaulted it felt unfathomable. I was smiling, happy, and yet scared. The notion of pain and pleasure stopped to be significant, it was just an 'intense experience'.
It was like my whole body was created by love so intense that it was painful. The discharge of mental breakdown that happened for that guy was now stored in me and needed a release. I wanted to discharge that love in terms of what was available to me at "the time", which was my body. I was prepared to meet them and physically kill them.

When I started surrendering that desire and wanted to return home, there was nobody out there waiting to confront me. I knew that what that 'person' did was exclaim his own insecurity, contraction, when he saw a blank slate. I took that in and dissolved it back to nothingness by traversing the path 'for him'.

4 hours ago, Zigzag Idiot said:

You we're trying to remember Abraham Maslow's name I think. From green to yellow in the shift from first tier to second tier it seems that the capacity to Witness becomes a lot more pronounced here,,,

I really can't believe just how perfect the conditions for buddhahood have to be. I don't know if that's surrender what's causing perfection, or perfection allowing for surrender to occur. It really seems like the pyramid becomes inverted at the apex in the initial awakening and folds back on itself in the Absolute.

Edited June 13, 2019 by tsuki

[tsuki]

 

[tsuki]

Quote

(At this point, it may be proper for me to state that we make a distinction between Religion and Theology—between Philosophy and Metaphysics. Religion, to us, means that institutional realization of the existence of THE ALL, and one’s relationship to it; while Theology means the attempts of men to ascribe personality, qualities, and characteristics to it; their theories regarding its affairs, will, desires, plans, and designs, and their assumption of the office of ‘’ middle-men’’ between THE ALL and the people. Philosophy, to us, means the inquiry after knowledge of things knowable and thinkable; while Metaphysics means the attempt to carry the inquiry over and beyond the boundaries and into regions unknowable and unthinkable, and with the same tendency as that of Theology. And consequently, both Religion and Philosophy mean to us things having roots in Reality, while Theology and Metaphysics seem like broken reeds, rooted in the quicksands of ignorance, and affording naught but the most insecure support for the mind or soul of Man. we do not insist upon our students accepting these definitions—we mention them merely to show our position. At any rate, you shall hear very little about Theology and Metaphysics in these lessons.)

Three Initiates. The Kybalion: A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece (p. 24). Perennial Press. Kindle Edition. 

As I was saying - the only fruitful application of Metaphysics (and Theology, apparently) is deconstructive.
Elucidating your petty imaginations about the Absolute for the sole purpose of seeing right through them.

Edited June 18, 2019 by tsuki

[tsuki]

Quote

The Hermetic Masters long since discovered that while the Principle of Rhythm was invariable, and ever in evidence in mental phenomena, still there were two planes of its manifestation so far as mental phenomena are concerned. They discovered that there were two general planes of Consciousness, the Lower and the Higher, the understanding of which fact enabled them to rise to the higher plane and thus escape the swing of the Rhythmic pendulum which manifested on the lower plane. In other words, the swing of the pendulum occurred on the Unconscious Plane, and the Consciousness was not affected. This they call the Law of Neutralization. Its operations consist in the raising of the Ego above the vibrations of the Unconscious Plane of mental activity, so that the negative-swing of the pendulum is not manifested in consciousness, and therefore they are not affected. It is akin to rising above a thing and letting it pass beneath you. The Hermetic Master, or advanced student, polarizes himself at the desired pole, and by a process akin to “refusing” to participate in the backward swing or, if you prefer, a “denial” of its influence over him, he stands firm in his polarized position, and allows the mental pendulum to swing back along the unconscious plane. All individuals who have attained any degree of self- mastery, accomplish this, more or less unknowingly, and by refusing to allow their moods and negative mental states to affect them, they apply the Law of Neutralization. The Master, however, carries this to a much higher degree of proficiency, and by the use of his Will he attains a degree of Poise and Mental Firmness almost impossible of belief on the part of those who allow themselves to be swung backward and forward by the mental pendulum of moods and feelings.

The importance of this will be appreciated by any thinking person who realizes what creatures of moods, feelings and emotion the majority of people are, and how little mastery of themselves they manifest. If you will stop and consider a moment, you will realize how much these swings of Rhythm have affected you in your life—how a period of Enthusiasm has been invariably followed by an opposite feeling and mood of Depression. Likewise, your moods and periods of Courage have been succeeded by equal moods of Fear. And so it has ever been with the majority of persons—tides of feeling have ever risen and fallen with them, but they have never suspected the cause or reason of the mental phenomena. An understanding of the workings of this Principle will give one the key to the Mastery of these rhythmic swings of feeling, and will enable him to know himself better and to avoid being carried away by these inflows and outflows. The Will is superior to the conscious manifestation of this Principle, although the Principle itself can never be destroyed. We may escape its effects, but the Principle operates, nevertheless.

Three Initiates. The Kybalion: A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece. Perennial Press. Kindle Edition. 

 

[mandyjw]

So should you attempt to "ground" yourself in happy or bliss states the same way we do with depressed or reactive states? 

[mandyjw]

That back and forth is what for the past few days I've so desperately wanted to conquer. Yesterday though, that desire also seemed like a resistance to life. 

[Zigzag Idiot]

Growing up, it seemed inevitable that if someone was to be made an example of, it would be me no how buried I was in the middle of the crowd.

If I had gotten the 2 points, I know it would have stung. So I can empathize with you there. For some reason I can't fault Outlandish, though. I can see how tough it would be to be a moderator at times. Especially if if there is a concerted effort now to reduce the unnecessary argumentiveness and confusion created by those who seem to operate almost solely from imagination.

I feel Irreverent banter can add to the lightheartedness of the forum and cushions against false seriousness. I guess there is always a fine line and a gray area and inevitably mistakes are sometimes made.

 

[Zigzag Idiot]

23 hours ago, tsuki said:

As I was saying - the only fruitful application of Metaphysics (and Theology, apparently) is deconstructive.
Elucidating your petty imaginations about the Absolute for the sole purpose of seeing right through them.

Meditations on the Tarot Page 379;

There is what is called in Christian Hermeticism the “freeing of the guardian angel”. The guardian Angel is freed – often in order to be able to acquit new missions—when the soul has acquired the disposition of its part of “likeness” in order to experience the Divine more intimately and more immediately, which corresponds to another hierarchical degree. Then it is an Archangel who replaces the freed guardian Angel. Human beings whose guardian is an Archangel have not only new experiences of the Divine in their inner life, but also, through this very fact, receive a new and objective vocation.

[tsuki]

1 hour ago, tsuki said:

The Hermetic Master, or advanced student, polarizes himself at the desired pole, and by a process akin to “refusing” to participate in the backward swing or, if you prefer, a “denial” of its influence over him, he stands firm in his polarized position, and allows the mental pendulum to swing back along the unconscious plane. All individuals who have attained any degree of self- mastery, accomplish this, more or less unknowingly, and by refusing to allow their moods and negative mental states to affect them, they apply the Law of Neutralization.

@mandyjw If you wish to be happy, act happy, regardless of the mental state you're currently in. This is what 'polarization' is.
Refusing to participate in backward swing simply means that you do not try to act your misery out when you feel miserable.
The pendulum swings, but you do not swing with it.

When you go against your conditioned ways, it creates a bodily shock, discomfort, pain. It screams: DO SOMETHING. 
If you choose to do nothing, you can learn to tolerate it until you stop noticing it.

This "resistance to resistance itself" slowly stops the pendulum makes the pendulum disappear.
It may take many swings until it finally rests. When it stops, it is put back to motion by 'external' events.
Mastery is when you are able to react to circumstances without losing presence.
When you are able to ease the circumstantial charge right on the spot by seeing it as arising for your benefit, as a reminder, a centering lesson.

Edited June 19, 2019 by tsuki

[tsuki]

22 minutes ago, Zigzag Idiot said:

Meditations on the Tarot

Sigh, I'm gonna have to buy that book... 

[mandyjw]

Ah... I like your edit. This has been a riddle from Nahm that I've been trying to answer for days, why no back and forth? That's what I so desperately want. My awakening both distracted me from that desire and made it more obvious than ever. It's funny that antique clocks have been coming up more and more lately in my mind, the pendulum metaphor really helps me understand this. 

[tsuki]

1 hour ago, mandyjw said:

It's funny that antique clocks have been coming up more and more lately in my mind, the pendulum metaphor really helps me understand this. 

Interesting. Take note of the fact that there is time involved in this vision.
It is exactly right, time is a misconception stemming from ignorance to rhythmic/cyclic nature of reality.
A misapplication of linear thinking, blindness to midnight.

Edited June 19, 2019 by tsuki

[tsuki]

So, for the past few weeks nothing happened. I kept the momentum of my everyday life at peace.

The dust after my recent happening is settling down and I'm resting in the state of no-mind. It's still difficult in the morning after the night's sleep, but noticing the struggle to be struggle-free seems to end it. My nights are usually peaceful and dreamless. I am aware of that I am sleeping and the constant thought creation and annihilation seems to carry on into the night. The thoughts that occur in this space are often profound insights about love, truth and beauty, but I'm unable/not interested in retaining them in the morning. There are a lot of synchronicities happening there, but they are expressed in terms of things that happen during the night, like my wife squirming in bed. 

I noticed that I've been asking myself "what now?" often, and the only satisfying answer that comes up is simply: 'now'. What now? Now.
If I were to say what the world needs the most right now is to simply need less. The only worthwhile contribution that I can make is to teach, by example, how to be free of desires and offer guidance to people in need. However, teaching is not a desire of my own, so I will not venture out on a quest. Making myself publicly available is the only thing I'm going to do. I found a meditation group in my city and I'm planning on going there few times a week. It's equally an opportunity to help others that seek help, as it is an opening for them to show me my place. Both are fine with me.

Now that I'm a steady state of surrender, I no longer need to be 'on my own', without a teacher. I started reading a lot. In the past few weeks I finished the Kybalion and started reading God is Nothingness, but lost interest halfway through the latter. The book is great, especially for those mistaking Nothingness with nihilism (@mandyjw) but did not offer much value to me. I bought myself Kindle Oasis to fuel my passion for reading and ended up short on money this month. Thankfully, Amazon lets download previews of books, so I can keep my space from the black hole of youtube cat meme videos. Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi are giving me a lot of insight into the process of self-realization and the nature of various practices that I've done. Maharshi is very intelligent and somewhat cheeky, so reading it is entertaining. I'm Just getting started with Meditations on Tarot, but I can already tell that this book is very profound. I may start to study Christianity more deeply because it's very popular where I live and I need a common ground to work from, if I want to help people.

When I was reading Ramaji's 1000 I stumbled across the fragment about Lama Tsultrim Allione and immediately resonated with her. Her books have been translated to Polish and I was hoping to find Feeding your demons, but it has been sold out. I bought Women of wisdom instead and gave it to my wife to inspire her. The results are mixed because she's interested, but it's tearing through her trauma a lot. I also bought her Loving what is by Byron Katie and she seems to be much more into this one. I find it a little flattering that she finds mine and Katie's teachings regarding the heartmind similar.

In the future, I will probably study the practices of Kriya Yoga from the book list. Unfortunately, the most important book is not sold as an e-book, so I will have to order a physical copy.

[tsuki]

Quote

The tenet of the essential unity of all that exists precedes every act of knowledge, and every act of knowledge presupposes the tenet of the unity of the world. The ideal—or ultimate aim—of all philosophy and all science is TRUTH. But “truth” has no other meaning than that of the reduction of the plurality of phenomena to an essential unity—of facts to laws, of laws to principles, of principles to essence or being. All search for truth—mystical, gnostic, philosophical and scientific—postulates its existence, i.e. the fundamental unity of the multiplicity of phenomena in the world. Without this unity nothing would be knowable. How could one proceed from the known to the unknown—and this is indeed the method of progress in knowledge—if the unknown had nothing to do with the known? If the unknown had no relationship with the known and was absolutely and essentially a stranger to it? When we say that the world is knowable, i.e. that knowledge as such exists, we state through this fact itself the tenet of the essential unity of the world or its knowability. We declare that the world is not a mosaic, where a plurality of worlds which are essentially strangers to one another are fitted together, but that it is an organism—all of whose parts are governed by the same principle, revealing it and allowing reduction to it. The relationship of everything and of all beings is the conditio sine qua non of their knowability.

Anonymous  (2005-08-24T23:58:59). Meditations on the Tarot . Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

 

[tsuki]

 

[Bill W]

1 hour ago, tsuki said:

 

1 hour ago, tsuki said:

 

 

 

One my favorite books is this

Edited July 1, 2019 by Bill W
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[tsuki]

10 hours ago, Bill W said:

One my favorite books is this

Thank you for the recommendation. I'm still reading through Meditations on the Tarot.
Are there any other highly conscious Christians that you follow?

I was born and raised Atheist, but I'm very drawn to Christianity for the past few weeks.
I never even considered this tradition seriously despite the fact that it's a dominant religion where I live.

[Bill W]

7 hours ago, tsuki said:

Thank you for the recommendation. I'm still reading through Meditations on the Tarot.
Are there any other highly conscious Christians that you follow?

I was born and raised Atheist, but I'm very drawn to Christianity for the past few weeks.
I never even considered this tradition seriously despite the fact that it's a dominant religion where I live.

I actually wouldn't mind if you defined highly conscious as I'm not sure what that is (genuinely question).

I've been pretty much agnostic all my life, neither "here" or "there" in terms of religious beliefs. Over the past 9 months I've become very interested in Christianity, so I'm at the beginning of my journey, and probably looking for the same literature you are asking me about.

I will say that I am enjoying the author Gina Lake. I think some of her stuff is referred to as "channeling". I don't care either way for channeling. The text is useful or not, regardless of where it came from so to speak. A year ago I'd have dismissed these books out of hand just by the cover, thinking them as nonsense. How times have changed for me. 

These are the two books of hers I've really got a lot from

 

[Zigzag Idiot]

Im absolutely going to have to read this one . Thomas Keating was a mentor to Cyhthia Bourgeault. Two of her books I really like: Thanks @Bill W

[Bill W]

@Zigzag Idiot Nice one and thanks for the other recommendations.