Experience is never direct

[Leo Gura]

11 minutes ago, Dodo said:

but in so called direct experience all of those happen in the same space.

This "space" isn't space. It's nowhere and nothing.

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This space must exist then, so it also perceives itself like all other things that exist, but can't perceive itself as an object... Couldn't this space be the perceiver/subject?

YES! But it's not a space. It is nowhere. Nowhere is the perciever/subject. But notice, this now creates a new duality: nowhere (space) vs the stuff in it. So this is not yet full nonduality. For full nonduality you must realize that all the form is itself identical to the "space" in which it occurs. If you are distinguishing space from its contents, that is still duality.

In the final awakening you must realizing that absolute indifference between form and formlessness.

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This space is definitely not the Ego self, since the ego self is also an object within that space which perceives itself like the Red and the Chair. 

If you distinguish the "space" from the ego, that is a duality.

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To me it seems you are saying here that there is no true self... Or I am not fully understanding.

No-self = True Self

When everything collapses into ONE, there are no more parts. Your mind is trying to grasp at parts but Unity cannot have any. That's why this is so confusing for you. You are trying to grasp Infinity using the mind but that cannot ever work because the mind itself is entangled with the question. There cannot even be 1) a mind, and 2) a thing which the mind grasps. Since that is still duality.

Things ARE mind!

The chair is not happening in the mind. The chair IS mind. The end.

[Dodo]

25 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

This "space" isn't a space. It's nowhere and nothing.

YES! But it's not a space. It is nowhere. Nowhere is the perciever/subject. But notice, this now creates a new duality: nowhere (space) vs the stuff in it. So this is not yet full nonduality. For full nonduality you must realize that all the form is itself identical to the space. If you are distinguishing space from its contents, that is still duality.

If you distinguish the space from the ego, that is a duality.

No-self = True Self

Oh yeah I get this. In experience the I that unifies all forms of experience is not experienced as a space, I am just using the word for lack of a better one. Definitely I don't mean a physical space when i say this word.

But yes there is one reality. It's definitely not dual. Waking dream, just as dream at night, only appears to be there, while it's only dreamlike /hallucinatory/nonexistory which makes it of the same substance as that nothingness that we start with! Just as a dream It only appears to be real while the dream state is happening.

Amazing ?? nothing came out of nothing after all 

Maybe my flavour of nonduality is a bit different, and probably more escapist if I have to be honest. I say this because from what I heard you say the world is real and there is no self type of nonduality,  but I say the self is real and there is no world... Which is probably the same thing in the end somehow ... ? lol

Edited September 1, 2020 by Dodo

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, Dodo said:

Maybe my flavour of nonduality is a bit different, and probably more escapist if I have to be honest. I say this because from what I heard you say the world is real and there is no self type of nonduality,  but I say the self is real and there is no world... Which is probably the same thing in the end somehow ... ? lol

I think this is just a difference of perspective. I don't see any substantive disagreement here.

[Johnny5]

12 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

To make it really simple, there is no perceiver. There is only the RED perceiving itself.

Everything is self-perceiving. The chair perceives itself. Ego takes credit for it.

Careful not to reify qualia as self-existing. They don't.

If everything were self-perceiving, then the absence of everything could never be perceived. If you suddenly became blind or deaf, you wouldn't even know it. And there would be no reports of nothingness or "the void".

The union of perceiver-perception-perceived is the dream as such, not truth and not absolute. It is Atman (I Am), not Brahman (Void). Atman is self, Brahman is no-self.

There is no "everything" in any way shape or form. Brahman exists, Atman is a mirage, a "thought" of Brahman.

A mirage can't be self-perceiving, there's nothing really there.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Johnny5

[Leo Gura]

@Johnny5 There can't be an absence of Everything since the absence itself is part of Everything.

Stay humble, grasshopper. Your mind keeps creating dualities.

The mirage is Absolute. Form = formlessness. Atman = Brahman.

[Fran11]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

Atman = Brahman.

They are and they also aren't, both must be realised. Atman is the way Brahman has to experience itslef as form.

Of course you know not even the term "non-duality" can do justice to reality.

This is one of these subtleties that being so strict with collapsing dualities (even before you drew them in the first place) doesn't help people to get.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Fran11

[Johnny5]

37 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

the absence itself is part of Everything.

There is no "everything"..., Your mind is trying to reconcile appearance with "the absolute". The mirage with the desert. The image with the mirror.

It's nothing more than a flickering of light, nothing ever actually happened here.

That's not a duality, only the mirror/desert/absolute actually exists.

 

@Fran11 +1

[Gesundheit]

50 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

Your mind is trying to reconcile appearance with "the absolute".

Appearance = the absolute.

[Dodo]

2 hours ago, Johnny5 said:

 Brahman exists, Atman is a mirage, a "thought" of Brahman.

A mirage can't be self-perceiving, there's nothing really there.

Atman is pure awareness without form. Tell me how can there be a mirage without form?! That's equivalent to no mirage.

The mirage is Brahman if anything.  All Form is a mirage appearing in Atman. You can verify the reality of Atman, as it is the self which unifies the 3 states: waking, dream and deep sleep. Those 3 states happen to you, is that correct?  Just because that you is empty/noform does not mean it doesnt exist. For if it didn't exist, the states would not be known to you. 

The only reality of a dream is the you that knows it. The rest is illusory happening. In Waking is harder to see this, just as it is hard to see it while a dream at night is happening.

My theory is maybe that's why psychedelics might be helpful, as they get you out of the waking state perhaps to a superwaking state and you can see waking as if it's the dream state. Not sure about this as no experience with psychedelics,  but it makes sense if its the case.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Dodo

[Johnny5]

2 hours ago, Gesundheit said:

Appearance = the absolute.

No, it really isn't...

What do you even base that on?

 

1 hour ago, Dodo said:

Atman is pure awareness without form. Tell me how can there be a mirage without form?! That's equivalent to no mirage.

Brahman is awareness without form, Atman is form and alll form is a mirage. When you see everything as yourself, that's Atman, and that's still a step removed from truth.

 

1 hour ago, Dodo said:

You can verify the reality of Atman, as it is the self which unifies the 3 states: waking, dream and deep sleep.

Yes Atman is the self and unifies those three states.

Brahman is no-self, and for Brahman there are no states.

 

1 hour ago, Dodo said:

Those 3 states happen to you, is that correct? 

No! That's the whole point  

 

Atman = THIS

Brahman = Not even...

Edited September 1, 2020 by Johnny5

[Gesundheit]

7 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

What do you even base that on?

There's no distinction between absolute and relative. Everything is absolute. Whatever is, is absolute. Otherwise it couldn't be.

[Gesundheit]

14 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

Brahman is awareness without form, Atman is form and alll form is a mirage. When you see everything as yourself, that's Atman.

Talk about subtle dualities.

[Johnny5]

Just now, Gesundheit said:

There's no distinction between absolute and relative. Everything is absolute. Whatever is, is absolute. Otherwise it couldn't be.

Whatever is, is absolute. Relativity isn't. They are not identical, one exists the other does not.

There is no distinction because relativity doesn't exist, so no distinction comes up in the first place. The whole point I'm trying to make is that you can't reconcile truth with appearance. And there's no need because appearance is nothing more than appearance. There is nothing actual about it. There isn't even anything making an appearance, there's just the appearance of something where there's actually nothing.

But hey I've only been arguing this point with Leo for close to 5 years. Nobody is obliged to go all the way, I don't even know that I will. But I'm not the one with the website and the business. Maybe someone on here wants to hear this, I don't know. Either way I said it. FWIW.

 

6 minutes ago, Gesundheit said:

Talk about subtle dualities.

You live and breathe dualities, might as well use them productively.

The only reason to talk about appearance is because you're stuck with it. Doesn't mean there's really anything to say about it,, except that if you want to wake up then you might want to stop mistaking it for reality.  ?‍♂️ 

[Johnny5]

12 minutes ago, Meta-Man said:

@Johnny5

Yep. Yet the no-thing, holographic appearance is absolute at the precise moment it appears.

Right, because as we all know, the absolute comes and goes and changes in time.....  ? 

Edited September 1, 2020 by Johnny5

[Gesundheit]

13 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

Whatever is, is absolute. Relativity isn't. They are not identical, one exists the other does not.

When we say relativity doesn't exist, we initially admit that it exists by necessity and then deny that with language. It seems like you want to maintain an idea of what the absolute is like or should be, and then you compare it to another idea of what relativity is like or should be. So there are two ideas, one of the absolute, and one of relativity. But the absolute is not the idea. It's the raw being, whether of ideas or not. The fact that there's only the absolute doesn't exclude the thing we call relativity, but rather makes it absolute.

19 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

The whole point I'm trying to make is that you can't reconcile truth with appearance. And there's no need because appearance is nothing more than appearance. There is nothing actual about it.

Appearance is appearance, and since it's there, then it's actual. Otherwise it couldn't be there. To say that appearance is not actual is to create a false distinction.

[Nahm]

[Johnny5]

9 minutes ago, Gesundheit said:

When we say relativity doesn't exist, we initially admit that it exists by necessity and then deny that with language.

No, we initially make it up with language and then argue about its existential status.

What's the existential status of something that we just made up ourselves... can you guess?

Here's the deal: The existential status of relativity is that it's a complete fabrication. There is no such thing, it's simply not possible.

Strange loops are not possible...

Wait what? Yeah that's right! Strange loops are not possible, what a novel concept!  ? Holy shit I just fell out of my chair. Are you saying strange loops are impossible? Fuck yeah that's what I'm saying.

What, you didn't know?

Can God be so all-powerful that it creates itself? No of course not! Shit, does this really need explaining? It doesn't matter how powerful anyone or anything is, it can't do anything whatsoever if it doesn't already exist.

How does a clever little bullshit "paradox" like absolute = relative even make it through the filters??? Is that what passes for "open mindedness" these days?  

 

[purerogue]

48 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

 

That is why I stay out of that grey area, there are very few people who can in any way grasp what I am trying to say  and in honesty there are no words to do it justice as it completely collapses logic. 

Edited September 1, 2020 by purerogue

[Fran11]

16 minutes ago, Meta-Man said:

Of course it doesn’t. But the relative is the absolute. Look at your hand right now. Yes - it’s an empty appearance of nothingness. Yet the shape and color of your hand is right there. ABSOLUTELY there. Prior to your mind’s non-dual conceptual neglection of the fact.

Debating wether apparences are "absolute" or "relative" is word game IMO. They are what they are.

We could say they are relative because they are changeful in our direct experience.

Or that they are absolute because they are by extension a part of the absolute and exist beyond time within it.

It's not of much use getting lost on these labels.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Fran11

[mandyjw]

7 minutes ago, Johnny5 said:

 

Wait what? Yeah that's right! Strange loops are not possible, what a novel concept!  ? Holy shit I just fell out of my chair. 

Did you get back in it again?