Bubbles Of Experience

[Echoes]

Hey, 

since a few months when I had a LSD trip I get glimpses in meditation  that we are like tiny bubbles of experience, floating around in a vast infinite ocean of consciousness/nothingness. 

Anyone esle had this? Has it any truth? Or is it just a meaningless image that pops up from time to time

Edited February 3, 2017 by Echoes

[Vercingetorix]

Leo tackles this question in his last Rant against realism, basically he is saying that "there is no stuff behind the scenes", reality by definition is what is in your direct experience, so their no point to say reality in inside a bubble and and is surrounded by XYZ, it's just another mechanism to try to explain something you can't explain. I think his point is ultimately: there in no point trying to understand such things, calm your mind and and be present in the moment and enjoy the experience, instead of trying to understand it.

[Primeval]

@Echoes I think you are on to something!

[Toby]

Actually I had a sense of that quite often (I never did any psychedelics, weed or any of that stuff). But I guess or feel that life or the world is "just" like a small bubble or in my image I would often refer to it as like a table-tennis ball within an ocean. The ocean is awareness. The ball is everything that appears (world, bodies, the universe). But actually again, there is no real separation. And also it is also good not to cling to images because they might represent a lot of truth but maybe they just represent one aspect of it.

[Echoes]

7 hours ago, Vercingetorix said:

Leo tackles this question in his last Rant against realism, basically he is saying that "there is no stuff behind the scenes", reality by definition is what is in your direct experience, so their no point to say reality in inside a bubble and and is surrounded by XYZ, it's just another mechanism to try to explain something you can't explain. I think his point is ultimately: there in no point trying to understand such things, calm your mind and and be present in the moment and enjoy the experience, instead of trying to understand it.

I think you're right. It's hard sometimes though for me to figure out what may just be an distorted mental experience and what has actually truth in it.

7 hours ago, Toby said:

Actually I had a sense of that quite often (I never did any psychedelics, weed or any of that stuff). But I guess or feel that life or the world is "just" like a small bubble or in my image I would often refer to it as like a table-tennis ball within an ocean. The ocean is awareness. The ball is everything that appears (world, bodies, the universe). But actually again, there is no real separation. And also it is also good not to cling to images because they might represent a lot of truth but maybe they just represent one aspect of it.

Yea, the seperation thing also came to my mind. But I would say that the ocean is the "thing" in which we are all connected (Brahman) and the bubble, or the "I am" experience (Atman) is the individual part of it. Of course, the bubble is also the ocean, so there is no real seperation.

You are correct, clinging to mental images is a problem and can actually hinder the progress. I had to learn this in the past. If it's not NOW in my experience it doesn't matter I guess.

[Toby]

I'm not so sure how to interpret this. I more lean towards "thinking" that the ocean is the "I am", but I'm not so sure about that.

[Leo Gura]

Nothing is hidden.

When you meditate/self-inquiry, aim to drop all metaphors and models. They are all symbols but your aim here is non-symbolic awareness.

You cannot get to the Absolute through symbols. It's hard because the mind is addicted to symbols.

Nothingness is not separate from the present experience you're having.

[Echoes]

1 hour ago, Toby said:

I'm not so sure how to interpret this. I more lean towards "thinking" that the ocean is the "I am", but I'm not so sure about that.

Ultimately there is only the ocean. And the ocean "dreams up" these "individual" bubbles. Atleast this was my interpretation so far.

42 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Nothing is hidden.

When you meditate/self-inquiry, aim to drop all metaphors and models. They are all symbols but your aim here is non-symbolic awareness.

You cannot get to the Absolute through symbols. It's hard because the mind is addicted to symbols.

Nothingness is not separate from the present experience you're having.

I try to do that. But sometimes those experiences or images pop up (I don't really know what to call them, guess this is the limit of language) So they are all meaningless?

I had the shift of perception a week ago, where I realized that I have literally no face (or that the face is only a thought/another sensation) and that im thus everything but also no-thing, just empty awareness or the "things" itself, because there was no difference anymore between the perceived and the perceiver. Do you mean this with Nothingness? It seemed to match the description. When I have an insight like this, my mind always tends to assume "this is it! you got it, there is nothing more to discover" of course, I don't believe my mind anymore. It's still very confusing for me, because there is one fraction that says "enlightenment is the simplest thing in the world, and you are already enlightened, it's directly in your face" this matches with the "experience" or shift of perception that I had. But then there is the other fraction that says it takes decades or lifetimes and only a few sages get it. There was also not the direct realization of infinity or that I'm god 

Edited February 4, 2017 by Echoes

[jse]

11 hours ago, Echoes said:

...that we are like tiny bubbles of experience, floating around in a vast infinite ocean of consciousness/nothingness.

Metaphors such as these are very important for grasping the incomprehensible.

[Leo Gura]

@Echoes See my video about "flattening the illusion".

The mind will come up with models. Your job is to resolve what those models actually are when flattened.

Contemplate the question: What is a model? or What is a thought?

[Principium Nexus]

When the two bubbles meet a new reality is created in the form of life, that's why love could be seen as infinite, it streches across an entire reality