Why there is attachment to thought

[Javfly33]

It seems that there is attachment to thought when Consciousness is not activated, or awake, at a certain point or intensity.

When there is enough activation, Consciousness becomes conscious of itself, of the fact that It is Real, and It Is Existing.

When this happens, attachment to thought as a way to identify oneself with 'something' (a thought), is no longer there. Because, in that state, Consciousness clearly knows, what it is = Itself. 

So no more "grabbing the next thought so I can exist. " Since Consciousness at that point is existing by itself, then the compulsion to grabbing onto thoughts ends. At that point there can never be a personal thought. Thoughts at that level are seen as heart pumps. Just another phenomena of the body.

When Consciousness is asleep, or not activated enough, is looking for something that defines it. Thought enters. Identification with thought enters. The ego is created and maintained, as long as Consciousness is asleep, not conscious of itself, it will constantly look in thoughts is existence. 

The only solution seems to be, to activate/awake ourselves. 

Edited August 22, 2023 by Javfly33

[Breakingthewall]

Attachment to thought is something fundamental in the human being, it could be said that it is its essence. For thoughts to generate evolutionary movement, they must have an irresistible attachment base. There are thoughts that make thousands of men run in the direction of a trench full of machine guns, for example.

The problem is that although this attachment to thought generates movement and strength, it is a source of suffering. it creates a living and real conceptual entity, only not tangible but real, and very unstable. unlike an animal, whose form has been tested for hundreds of thousands of years in contrast with it's environment, the form of the conceptual entity is always new, unstable, unadapted to a changing environment. this living conceptual entity (as alive as the body) suffers, and wants to stop suffering, to do so it seeks new ways. the ones we seek, the next evolutionary step in the very fast evolution of the mind

Edited August 22, 2023 by Breakingthewall

[Osaid]

What's happening when you identify with thought is:

>> pure sense perception (thought)

>> the real you decides to act as if the thought is true (heart racing, avoidant behaviour, self-deprecation (more thoughts), etc)

Unknowingly, you are extrapolating thought into something that is not thought (physical symptoms mentioned before), which experientially makes it SEEM like thought is connected to experience, but it absolutely isn't. 

The "connection" with thought is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You get spooked by a real event (physical symptoms), you create a belief about the experience that spooked you, and then this belief recreates REAL physical symptoms which cause you to misinterpret the thought as real. If you recognize this unnecessary connection, the "realness", which is simply just physical symptoms, will stop.

There is also this underlying sense that you can predict or interpret experience, which is not the case. Prediction/interpretation is not experience, it's just a thought, which will never touch experience, so same deal as before. Experience is never something you can guess or hypothesize or misinterpret or interpret at all. Experience is just a fact, always. It's always there in front of you. It doesn't need any interpretation to exist. You don't need to interpret the color red, any interpretation is just wrong and won't represent red. Same goes for existence. Same goes for you. When you try to interpret and think about existence, or yourself, you are immediately throwing yourself into something that is explicitly NOT any of those things, and so you are immediately deluded when you try to replace existence with any of these things.

There is a part of you that might logically understand this, but you don't "embody" it. There is a certain existential element to existence which supports this logic, and if you recognize that, it will permanently recontextualize your experience, and then you don't have to use logic to perceive it anymore, and then that is embodying. Not imagining fear just becomes as simple as perceiving the color red, no thinking needed. All animals aside from humans do this naturally. It's not something complex. It's not something you have to take 1000 psychedelics to do. It's a simple psychological shift/recontextualization that you can trigger and it just happens immediately, and then you don't have to worry about it again.

Edited August 23, 2023 by Osaid

[gettoefl]

wow this knocked my socks off, 24k gold here folks

[Breakingthewall]

7 hours ago, Osaid said:

Unknowingly, you are extrapolating thought into something that is not thought (physical symptoms mentioned before), which experientially makes it SEEM like thought is connected to experience, but it absolutely isn't. 

 the thought is real as any other physical manifestation, and it's a great part of the experience. The thought is real and the mind is alive. What is the qualitative difference between a thought and an image projected by the retina in the brain? both are experience, both are a representation of reality. both have the function of survival and evolution. the mind will always think, the thing is to do it at the right frequency, understanding which are the activators of thought, its bases, and eliminating all the useless noise, the dysfunctional rubbish. the mind is a very complex piece of software, it needs deep understanding and proper maintenance

[Osaid]

18 hours ago, Breakingthewall said:

the thought is real as any other physical manifestation, and it's a great part of the experience

I know. My position is not that thoughts are unreal. Of course they are real. It is SOMETHING that's happening. Theres just absolutely no reason to worry about them. It's like I'm trying to point out to you that the snake on the television screen is not real, and you're like, "But, you know, technically it's real", and then your heart starts racing in reaction to the screen.

I am saying that you are enacting physical symptoms in reaction to thought, which make the thought "feel realer" than it actually is, and this causes you to misinterpret those thoughts and create a belief/perception (whether conscious or unconscious) that says "this thought exists as something that isn't thought" or "this thought is me" or "this thought is a threat to me." You are delegating experience to thought, which is the only way to actually be scared of thoughts in the first place.

And, experience is NEVER thought, experience is always the whole thing, and it is infinite. You cannot subtract or abstract a part of experience and say "this is experience", because no, it's just a PART of experience. You cannot escape or delegate experience with any word, thought, or communication no matter how descriptive it may be.

Edited August 24, 2023 by Osaid

[Breakingthewall]

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

Theres just absolutely no reason to worry about them. 

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

 

It depends of the thought. Thinking clearly is essential to having a good life. thinking wrongly can take you to hell. Thinking is or main power. 

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

saying that you are enacting physical symptoms in reaction to thought, which make the thought "feel realer"

If you think that there is a guy who wants to kill you will have a physical reaction, because the root of the thinking activity is survival. You will be thinking non-stop until you find a solution. this is the human essence. The problem is if you think incongruent things, if you have repressed emotions and have a distorted subconscious that generates anxiety and looping thoughts. that is that you are thinking wrongly and you have to find the cause  

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

And, experience is NEVER thought, experience is always the whole thing, and it is infinite

Thoughs are phenomena that appears is the experience, like everything else. We should understand what they are and use them properly. we are not the content of thought but we are the activity of thinking, like the activity of breathing. we must know when to detach from thoughts, when to immerse ourselves in the activity of thinking, and above all, how to think effectively to develop our potential

Edited August 23, 2023 by Breakingthewall

[integral]

7 hours ago, Osaid said:

I know. My position is not that thoughts are unreal. Of course they are real. It is SOMETHING that's happening. Theres just absolutely no reason to worry about them. It's like I'm trying to point out to you that the snake on the television screen is not real, and you're like, "But, you know, technically it's real.", and then your heart starts racing in reaction to the screen.

I am saying that you are enacting physical symptoms in reaction to thought, which make the thought "feel realer" than it actually is, and this causes you to misinterpret those thoughts and create a belief/perception (whether conscious or unconscious) that says "this thought exists as something that isn't thought" or "this thought is me" or "this thought is a threat to me." You are delegating experience to thought, which is the only way to actually be scared of thoughts in the first place.

And, experience is NEVER thought, experience is always the whole thing, and it is infinite. You cannot subtract or abstract a part of experience and say "this is experience", because no, it's just a PART of experience. You cannot escape or delegate experience with any word, thought, or communication no matter how descriptive it may be.

Ah ok it makes sense now, I like the other comment on Ken Wilber not sure you read it? It covers the slow transitioning to embody these realizations after the first awakening. 

On 8/22/2023 at 1:49 PM, Water by the River said:

Well, it is, like often, not either/or. How to integrate all these diferent perspectives? Even Full Enlightenment develops. The Awakenings before that also. Or as Ken Wilber said: From experience, to plateau, to permanent. Yet, Enlightenment is a decisive shift, or realizing/being/understanding for the first time fully the nature of ones True Being and of Reality.

Daniel Brown, Pointing out the Great Way: PATH WALKING: ENHANCING THE REALIZATION [after Full Enlightenment]

Just as certain conditions serve as obstacles to maintaining enlightenment, other conditions, properly understood, serve to enhance it. Theterm path walking (lam 'khyer) pertains to the type of lifestyle, behavior, and specific practices engaged in after enlightenment that serve to enhance and consolidate the realization as an enduring condition of mind.The term lam hhyer means "to walk along a path." A traveler who crosses over a mountain needs a plan for discovering the new territory. Likewise, the practitioner whose mind crosses over from seeming individual consciousness to the enlightened mind is more likely to stabilize and consolidate the realization with a plan for everyday behavior and activity. The path-walking instructions provide that plan."

So again from peak to plateau to permanent.

"Tashi Namgyel lists a variety of everyday situations that best serve to enhance the realization. These include when there is attachment to ordinary experience, when the practitioner is caught up in passion and hatred, when the practitioner is meditating and is finding it very difficult to settle the mind, and when the mind is so much at rest and happy in everyday life that he or she is less likely to recognize the real nature of idle thoughts (TN, pp. 619-20). The best time to practice is when there are passions (hhu phrig), and especially when these passions are intense (drag po; TN, p. 619). In short, any difficulties (dka ngal) encountered in everyday life become good vehicles for consolidating the realization, and the more intense the better.

Awakening already brings a lot of bliss, but not yet all tools necessary to move towards freedom from suffering/psychological resistance.

Basis-/Full-/Great Enlightenment (different names for different traditions, basically understanding/realizing what one really is and what Reality is) brings for the first time the possibility for sustaining bliss by dissolving progressively the hangover/remains of the separate self during/over(!) the following years/life-time. Awakening does not bring that potential yet fully, because there is still somebody who "awakens". And of course most remaining "hang-overs" of the separate-self will let themself know by what they do best: Causing suffering. But now, after Enlightenment, there is a tool available to work with what has not already been dissolved: Looking into their essence, AND into the being doing the looking. 

Even Ken Wilber said in the Interview-Audio series Kosmic Karma on the question of Tami Simons: Anybody 24/7 permanently in realization, including deep sleep, with zero lapse? Answer by Ken Wilber: A clear no.

But that is not a bad thing. Enlightenment gives the chance the reorient the remaining character/body-mind fully (or as much as possible) during the rest of ones lifetime. And when the remaining character is not aligned or has a lapse and goes into separation again: clearly noticed by suffering. Suffering and fear reduce dramatically, and a door/method is opened up to progress towards dissolving what remains of bliss/fear/suffering, or the remaining character which is not yet fully aligned.

Ken Wilber gave a description on the possible (longterm) enlightened outcomes, depening on the character. 

Ken Wilber, The Eye of Spirit, Chapter: The Eye of Spirit:

Ken Wilber also wrote in "One Taste" that one can remain an enlightened jerk. Or that realized Dzogchen adepts are sometimes depicted as looking incredibly bored (seen IT, done with it). Nisargadatta smoked a lot until it finally killed him. Adi Da ran quite some cult. The list of less-than-integral Enlightenment-expressions is long....

But also the enlightened archetypes of the link above are possible. So it depends a lot on the personality that was there before Enlightenment. There seems to be a huge variability.

And the soul ripens also after Enlightenment, over many lifetimes (Christopher Bache, LSD and the Mind of the Universe: Diamonds from Heaven, Dustin DiPerna: Earth is Eden, and Jürgen Ziewe). Enlightenment is not the end of the soul, just the end of the "separate-soul". There seems to be a long path also afterwards, and not just the crude Nirvana-extinction-gameover of early Buddhism. Buddhism developed a lot towards that view in the following centuries/millenia (see Rainbow Body for example).

Selling Water by the River

I feel like your saying once you realize it, thats it. If so how? 

[Osaid]

5 hours ago, integral said:

Ah ok it makes sense now, I like the other comment on Ken Wilber not sure you read it? It covers the slow transitioning to embody these realizations after the first awakening. 

I did read it. What it says is basically correct but I think it's being misunderstood. There are "awakenings" or certain insights that come before enlightenment, but all of these are not enlightenment.

For example, at the end of the first section he quotes Ken Wilbur (and I would agree with this): "Or as Ken Wilber said: From experience, to plateau, to permanent. Yet, Enlightenment is a decisive shift, or realizing/being/understanding for the first time fully the nature of ones True Being and of Reality."  

So, what there is to get from this quote is that enlightenment is: 

-a decisive singular shift

-understanding for the FIRST time (the awakenings before were not it, just breadcrumbs leading towards it, therefore this is the first time, not the second, third, or fourth time)

-it is permanent

Awakenings are more like "hints" or specific insights about enlightenment. For example, this is what every psychonaut is basically doing. They'll have a genuine awakening through psychedelics, which is valid, because by definition they are insights and temporary, they don't have to be permanent, they are just states/experiences, they are nuggets of truth that you have to bring back or slightly embody. They'll bring back some insight like "oh, the universe is love" or "the universe is infinite" or "God is completely alone", but you'll always sense this lack of completeness in their resolution, you'll see this desire to chase after more "truth" in them, and a lot of times you can easily see some human delusions are left over, therefore, they are unenlightened. That's because the medium of memory and knowledge is wrong, you cannot understand what is absolutely true through memory or knowledge. There is an existential reality which supports those insights that is directly embedded in experience, and you can view it without memory or knowledge.

Enlightenment is like a resolution to all those awakenings and improvements from before. It's a recontextualization that embodies ALL of those instantly and permanently. It's like finally seeing the entire elephant for the first time rather than just touching parts of it (using the analogy of the blind men and the elephant).

At a certain point, something will sort of "click", or you'll untie the final "knot", so to speak, and then there won't be anymore "increases in truth", the realization will just be final. You'll just kind of realize: "Ohh ok, so every single experience works this way." And this is what enlightened people can directly see 24/7, it's not some idea or philosophy, they are just conscious of it forever, because it exists in all experience. And, there is no identity involved, it's just pointing to existence/truth. 

I have to say, since my enlightenment, I have realized the absolute biggest trap in this "work" is just getting lost in stories and ideas about enlightenment/reality and never actually achieving traditional enlightenment. You can't skip over it. It's not just some trivial human desire to reduce suffering, it is the only way to perceive reality accurately. When you get there you will understand. If you don't understand, that is ok because you're not enlightened. but you need to have the open-mindedness to actually consider it, or else you're just stuck there forever. I find that the term enlightenment is very bad for teaching enlightenment (in certain circles at least), because when you try to describe it, you get a bunch of unenlightened people trying to tell YOU what it is. So, it's just a mess. And I completely understand why private workshops are conducted now, and why every tradition has their own terms and descriptions and methods. I also understand why enlightened people sometimes don't call themselves enlightened. It just puts ideas in people's minds that aren't supposed to be there.

I am not saying that it is an end to exploring metaphysics or psychedelics. I'm not saying it's an end to exploring life. I'm saying that it's actually the beginning of life. And this is where you can actually start doing what you want from a place of clarity and love, not a place of attachment and fear and delusion. If Leo became enlightened and THEN pursued psychedelics, this would transform his work into something even more amazing than it already is (assuming he still has the desire and interest afterwards).

Not to introduce some appeal to authority or something, but just using another person I would consider enlightened as an example, there was a newsletter from Ralston, and Leo asked a question about his experiences, and his response just perfectly encapsulated my sentiment here, and now I understand why Ralston is so careful about psychedelics and the like, because it can really pull you away from enlightenment (truth). The entire thing is in the link, but this is the quote I am specifically talking about:

https://mcusercontent.com/8a146e2bfe98efdd8c326d97a/files/08332a98-370d-44da-86ff-2c04a3ff1858/CHNL_Summer_2020.pdf?mc_cid=f12b90ff1c&mc_eid=3667cfd58d

"Direct conscious is not relative and so there is no this or that. In your descriptions of awakening there are a lot of this’s and that's, here and nowhere. You may well have had some insights but I think you are also making conclusions about it and extrapolating out where things might go. Please consider this as a possibility. I have had many conundrums come up along with intense contemplation. Something "calling" me to join, the pull to leave or stay, feeling like dissolving, or the whole world falling apart, shattering, and so on. These felt urgent and important at the time, like I had to decide something or now knew something about reality. But to tell you the truth, although they may have been impressive and dramatic, I doubt I could have "left" or done much at all really, it really wasn't my decision because I (as are you) was still the central player in all of it! They were all states, experiences, desires, longings, ideas, etc. They were subjective in the end. Cool, but subjective."

Furthermore, here Ralston briefly talks about "testing" his enlightenment with acid:
 

 

Edited August 24, 2023 by Osaid

[Inliytened1]

On 8/22/2023 at 5:40 PM, Javfly33 said:

It seems that there is attachment to thought when Consciousness is not activated, or awake, at a certain point or intensity.

When there is enough activation, Consciousness becomes conscious of itself, of the fact that It is Real, and It Is Existing.

When this happens, attachment to thought as a way to identify oneself with 'something' (a thought), is no longer there. Because, in that state, Consciousness clearly knows, what it is = Itself. 

So no more "grabbing the next thought so I can exist. " Since Consciousness at that point is existing by itself, then the compulsion to grabbing onto thoughts ends. At that point there can never be a personal thought. Thoughts at that level are seen as heart pumps. Just another phenomena of the body.

When Consciousness is asleep, or not activated enough, is looking for something that defines it. Thought enters. Identification with thought enters. The ego is created and maintained, as long as Consciousness is asleep, not conscious of itself, it will constantly look in thoughts is existence. 

The only solution seems to be, to activate/awake ourselves. 

Life is form and form is attachment.

[integral]

@Osaid Thank you for taking the time to explain your point of view to this length. +1 

Are you saying that what I am is the never changing part in direct experience? The never changing part in every experience?

That seems to be ralstons teaching here. 

Edited August 24, 2023 by integral

[Osaid]

23 minutes ago, integral said:

Are you saying that what I am is the never changing part in direct experience? 

That seems to be ralstons teaching here. 

My initial inclination is to answer "yes", but I find that this immediately creates a separation in your mind that says "I am not the part of my experience that is changing", which is not true.

It's kind of paradoxical. Enlightenment is something that doesn't change (because it's absolutely true) and it applies to all experiences, but experience itself does change all the time. 

But, there is a meta-logic, or "truth", to all experience that is always there, and that is "you." So this "enlightenment" thing is always present, even when the contents and ideas of experience change. It's just always true, and thus it is truth. It is what all experience runs on, so to speak.

To further Ralstons point, in the video he says "It's the nature of stuff, it's not stuff", which is basically correct, but it is also intimately interwoven with all "stuff", so it's not that there is some part of reality hiding in the background which is more true and separate from "stuff."

Edited August 24, 2023 by Osaid

[integral]

38 minutes ago, Osaid said:

To further Ralstons point, in the video he says "It's the nature of stuff, it's not stuff", which is basically correct, but it is also intimately interwoven with all "stuff", so it's not that there is some part of reality hiding in the background which is more true and separate from "stuff."

I think that perfectly explains the point. 

38 minutes ago, Osaid said:

It's kind of paradoxical. Enlightenment is something that doesn't change (because it's absolutely true) and it applies to all experiences, but experience itself does change all the time. 

Maybe a pointer that works here is the screen doesnt change but the content does and I am both the screen and everything on it.

Edited August 24, 2023 by integral

[Osaid]

1 hour ago, integral said:

Maybe a pointer that works here is the screen doesnt change but the content does and I am both the screen and everything on it. Both the relative and the absolute? 

Paradoxically, in order to find what you are, you have to let go of the desire to find what you are and just let experience happen by itself. Because the thing that is desiring to be "found" or "identified" is an error, it is a thought form, and you cannot make contact with yourself using it. That "happening by itself" is what you are. You cannot explicate experience further. Experience doesn't have to identify with anything to be itself. You don't have to identify with anything to be you. You are experienced, therefore you are experience.

When you're trying to identify yourself, it's like a TV that is trying to display itself on its own screen. The medium of the screen is wrong. No matter how accurately it displays itself, it will never actually approximate itself and it will always fall short, because it's just an image appearing on itself. The TV does not realize this, so it spends the rest of its life trying to understand itself and perfect its understanding of itself, but the input of "understanding" or "displaying accurate images" is unnecessary, because the TV just exists exactly as what it is by itself, so all it has to do to find itself is literally nothing. It can't not be itself, even if it gets the wrong image on its screen. The TV creates a problem for itself that does not exist. There is no "self-image", because it's just an image, so it has nothing to do with "self." It can't ever be correct. 

A rock has no self-image problems. A rock doesn't have to identify with anything. That rock is part of you, and its existence is as factual as YOU. You are the entire thing, including the rock, and the trees, and the chair, and the sky. How does the sky have self-love or self-image problems? Your existence is as seamless as the sky or any other object, because they are all part of you, and they are you. Unknowingly, you are separating "you", which is the entirety of experience, and you are focusing on this image of yourself, just like the TV, and you can contort this image any way you want, you can imagine that it lacks love, you can imagine that it is stupid, etc. But none of these ideas can actually affect your love, or your intelligence, because it is always just an IMAGE of those things, not love or intelligence itself, hence, "self-image."

When someone calls you stupid, it doesn't ACTUALLY change your intelligence. But, despite that, it still affects how you perceive yourself. Now you start thinking that you ARE stupid. This is the where the crux of all this discrepancy is. You cannot point to anything that is actually "stupid" in your experience right now, because it's not you or experience, it's just an image that you created. Existentially, you are just wrong to ascribe that quality to yourself. It doesn't exist.

 

Edited August 24, 2023 by Osaid

[gettoefl]

thanks for this great discussion

for me, enlightenment is recalibrating the lens of perception from the puny myopic to the prodigious macroscopic

[integral]

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

When you're trying to identify yourself, it's like a TV that is trying to display itself on its own screen. The medium of the screen is wrong. No matter how accurately it displays itself, it will never actually approximate itself and it will always fall short, because it's just an image appearing on itself. The TV does not realize this, so it spends the rest of its life trying to understand itself and perfect its understanding of itself, but the input of "understanding" or "displaying accurate images" is unnecessary, because the TV just exists exactly as what it is by itself, so all it has to do to find itself is literally nothing. It can't not be itself, even if it gets the wrong image on its screen. The TV creates a problem for itself that does not exist. There is no "self-image", because it's just an image, so it has nothing to do with "self." It can't ever be correct. 

But practically speaking changing the channel to a person who thinks they are enlightened is what everyone does after awakening. 

Right now you think your enlightened and thats on screen but your also experiencing enlightenment and thats not on screen.

Edited August 24, 2023 by integral

[integral]

8 hours ago, Osaid said:

Paradoxically, in order to find what you are, you have to let go of the desire to find what you are and just let experience happen by itself. Because the thing that is desiring to be "found" or "identified" is an error, it is a thought form, and you cannot make contact with yourself using it. That "happening by itself" is what you are. You cannot explicate experience further. Experience doesn't have to identify with anything to be itself. You don't have to identify with anything to be you. You are experienced, therefore you are experience.

Im pretty sure Leo gets this. Why is he chasing deeper understanding?

And also tell you your not awake if he had a chance to lmao

Edited August 24, 2023 by integral

[Osaid]

2 hours ago, integral said:

Right now you think your enlightened and thats on screen but your also experiencing enlightenment and thats not on screen.

You can't actually think you're enlightened, it's just an experience. So there's no "thinking" that is involved in enlightenment, it's just an experiential shift. I still have my old personality or whatever, but all the neuroticism has been removed. Just like a cat wouldn't become an "enlightened person." Cats are naturally enlightened, and they are not human, and they don't have any ideas about it.

I am well aware that "enlightened" is a label that appears to describe people who achieved this. But, it really isn't about the person. It's about what the person achieved. And that word isn't even used in some circles. There's no certain way I'm supposed to act after enlightenment, really, the way I act either naturally changes as a result (the neuroses disappear), or I'm just completely the same. I'm definitely more loving and all that, but that's a strict consequence of the experience shift, it's not something I'm forcing or intellectualizing out of some newfound enlightened ego. 

You can think of it that all of this is just me looking at my experience and thinking, how can I communicate this to this guy? 

1 hour ago, integral said:

Im pretty sure Leo gets this. Why is he chasing deeper understanding?

And also tell you your not awake if he had a chance to lmao

It's just intellectual, not embodied, probably. He remembers understanding it from some trip, but now it's just converted to memory, hence, no embodiment. There is an existential aspect embedded in experience that supports the intellectual conclusion and allows you to actually just live in it without depending on any intellectualization or philosophy or memory, and then this would be "embodying." 

If I had to guess, he might be misinterpreting enlightenment as an end to exploring psychedelics or something of the sort, which is not the case. I also saw him make this analogy that people chasing enlightenment are "just trying to reduce suffering" and that "truth has nothing to do with suffering", which is again, not the case, because enlightenment is truth, the reduction in suffering is just a side effect.

If I had to guess further, he is misinterpreting newer and more intelligent states as "more to understand", but like existentially, they literally become untrue once they are not being experienced. So, more "stuff", as Ralston puts it. It doesn't change what you are. It just recontextualizes "stuff", which is relative. The truth of what you are never changes though, and then that is not relative, and it is experienced in every experience.


 

Edited August 24, 2023 by Osaid

[Water by the River]

14 hours ago, Osaid said:

There are "awakenings" or certain insights that come before enlightenment, but all of these are not enlightenment.

For example, at the end of the first section he quotes Ken Wilbur (and I would agree with this): "Or as Ken Wilber said: From experience, to plateau, to permanent. Yet, Enlightenment is a decisive shift, or realizing/being/understanding for the first time fully the nature of ones True Being and of Reality."  

So, what there is to get from this quote is that enlightenment is: 

-a decisive singular shift

-understanding for the FIRST time (the awakenings before were not it, just breadcrumbs leading towards it, therefore this is the first time, not the second, third, or fourth time)

-it is permanent

Awakenings are more like "hints" or specific insights about enlightenment. For example, this is what every psychonaut is basically doing. They'll have a genuine awakening through psychedelics, which is valid, because by definition they are insights and temporary, they don't have to be permanent, they are just states/experiences, they are nuggets of truth that you have to bring back or slightly embody. They'll bring back some insight like "oh, the universe is love" or "the universe is infinite" or "God is completely alone", but you'll always sense this lack of completeness in their resolution, you'll see this desire to chase after more "truth" in them, and a lot of times you can easily see some human delusions are left over, therefore, they are unenlightened. That's because the medium of memory and knowledge is wrong, you cannot understand what is absolutely true through memory or knowledge. There is an existential reality which supports those insights that is directly embedded in experience, and you can view it without memory or knowledge.

Enlightenment is like a resolution to all those awakenings and improvements from before. It's a recontextualization that embodies ALL of those instantly and permanently. It's like finally seeing the entire elephant for the first time rather than just touching parts of it (using the analogy of the blind men and the elephant).

Yes. That is what I can confirm, and that sequence one can also find in every spiritual tradition. The bold parts of your text are excellent. Welcome home to a home you never left.

What was your practice/path?

The normal sequence is:

1. Practice (or just Karma/"luck". But I would estimate from what I have seen that for 90% it was practice). Efficient way: Meditation + psychedelics + integration work + many other things. 

2. Many Awakenings (some traditions already call these Enlightenments)/ into stabilizing awakened nondual and empty/impersonal Awareness states: Into all these aspects (some aspects of Absolute Reality show up, like emptiness or nondual unity, love, timelessness, Infinity, and so on...  But the separate-self is STILL yet not fully seen through). The separate-self gets more and more transcended, ones identity more and more empty and more like Pure Awareness, and then it gets nondual/unity with the whole visual field/manifestation.

These Awakenings (field getting nondual and ones identity more and more just empty awareness) are normally caused by the practice that makes accident-prone.

And then comes the accident  that is called Enlightenment  (that can't be willed, since that would be a spearate-self wanting that which is already the case, and by doing that covering it), and for which practice makes accident-prone.

Enlightenment tends to happen for most only in very specific Awakened States (nondual/unity AND impersonal/empty). For that, I have written elsewhere (Mahamudra stage 3 (Awakened states of nondual and empty) "One Taste-Yoga" to Mahamudra stage 4 (stabilizing these states without doing anything) "Yoga of Nonmeditation). Bliss: These awakened states are already very blissful without needing external experience for that.

3. (Full/Basis/Great) Enlightenment into the True Nature of Oneself: Infinite Reality = Infinite limitless Impersonal and totally Empty Consciousness CONTAINING Infinite Manifestation, in an infinite Unity/Totality. The essence of every appearance/manifestation is the same Suchness as Infinite Consciousness/Awareness. A deep identity level shift, away from a separate-self to being aware that "one" is and always was the Totality/Infinite Reality/Infinite Impersonal Consciousness.

Phase 2 is gradual(!), Phase 3 (Shift of Full Enlightenment) is a sudden and complete understanding into the eternal and immortal nature/essence of all of Reality (limitless) and ones True Self (Awareness/Nothingness containing all manifestation). It can not be mistaken, is sure, doesn't need any external validation (understanding it by being it, and IT is infinite/all there is and can be). It is totally beyond "any further" and beyond any need for any confirmation. It is self-evident. This insight/understanding/realization is "more assured/ultimately assured" (beyond any chance for being shaken again) because anything else can only possibly just be more phenomenal arising (including any sensory-arising like visual arisings, but also including any other (I-)thoughts/concepts/I-feelings/n+1).

Why? To quote Ralston: IT IS YOU. Infinite Consciousness containg any possible appearances. Limitless. Infinite. Any limit would appear in IT. Empty. Any arising (tree, thought, I-feeling, anything) appears IN IT. Impersonal (onself can be nothing specific or personal, since one contains it all). And its Pure Awareness (without any location, without any second) itself. Potentially unaware if nothing arises. But always right here, never can not not be here, independent of whatever happens/appears IN IT.

It is waking up. Its essence is understanding that the separate-self as independent "anything" DOESN'T exist (just appears as illusion IN THAT), and never existed (was always an illusion), and can/will never exist (even if in another life illusions-arisings will occure again in ones True Being/Reality.

The Awakenings (2) are insights/understandings into aspects/properties of the nature of Reality/True Self/Infinite Consciousness. That then evolves, towards nondual/unity awakened states. And THEN the final big shift of full Enligthenment can happen, in which the nature of Infinite Reality/Ones True Identity as Impersonal Infinite Consciousness/Infinite Reality is revealed. 

4. Stabiling this Enlightenment, and letting it reorient the character top-down and back again towards love/openness/staying in nondual impersonal Suchness ("BEING the Totality"). Even then still, the separate-self character can still hijack the show (peak, plateau, permanent), but the separate-self-character and its associated suffering has lost its mirage-like seductive power. Its essence (Suchness/Infinite consciousness) is immediately seen when feeling into it. And that holds true for all building blocks of the separate self. So lapsing after Enlightenment is just a hang-over from a long time of illusion , and once noticed any emerging separate-self-arisings can be killed/transcended by just looking into it. Bliss: A lot and growing, since the awakened states now get even more stabilized and are always accessible. When True Nature is known, and if the separate-self-character "hijacks" again the show: Just look into these arisings and realize again their essence as manifestation IN the Infinite Reality/Consciousness that one really is, and return to what one really is.

While after (only) Awakening(s) (stage 2), certain elements of the separate-self-character are not seen fully through, or are NOT understood. One of the last stages is a very nebulous empty separate-"something" that is already in nondual unity with everything manifesting. But there is still an "Understander" or "a not yet fully understander" or some "seeker" -arisings there.... Roger Thisdell stage 4 vs. stage 5.

Stage 4:

 

stage 5:

 

Maybe that is helpful for some. Please don't beat me.  

 

Selling Water by the River 

 

Edited August 24, 2023 by Water by the River

[Water by the River]

16 minutes ago, Osaid said:

I also saw him make this analogy that people chasing enlightenment are "just trying to reduce suffering" and that "truth has nothing to do with suffering", which is again, not the case, because enlightenment is truth, the reduction in suffering is just a side effect.

If I had to guess further, he is misinterpreting newer and more intelligent states as "more to understand", but like existentially, they literally become untrue once they are not being experienced. So, more "stuff", as Ralston puts it. It doesn't change what you are. It just recontextualizes "stuff", which is relative. The truth of what you are never changes though, and then that is not relative, and it is experienced in every experience.

Guess Ralston would agree...

"because enlightenment is truth, the reduction in suffering is just a side effect."

And very much yes to that. If one thinks about it: Something has to rout beings home, and that mechanism is called suffering. NOT staying separate and in duality & happy ever after. And why should suffering continue when being back home? That suffering has to rout beings back home into non-separation is a Kosmic necessity/law of the highest degree, valid in each and all possible realms and dimensions.

Spirit "casting itself out" in manifestation, and drawing itself back in again with the tool of suffering. Making (the illusion) of each separate-self-contraction/suffering (separation/duality) return home to the Unity (non-separation) of its True-being. Couldn't be different. Leaving beings "out" eternally in separation would be cruel...

And: After having returned home to Enlightenment and non-separation, the individual perspective/soul doesn't stop to evolve and continues to other lives and other/higher possible forms of existences (maybe Leos Aliens?) Of course as a relative appearing phenomena, not as "Absolute Truth" or self-existing/separate-existing anything. Nirvana as extinction was a very early Buddhist dogma, and was replaced quite soon later (Mahayana, Vajrayana, Rainbow-body and so on...). It just does so in a non-separates non-identified way, knowing and understanding its True Nature and its unity with all of existence.

Selling Water by the River