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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
 Posted - May 15 2008 : 12:02:14 PM
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"Enlightenment is not about having a sustained experience of any kind, or being in a state of uninterrupted mindfulness twenty-four hours a day. It isn't an achievement. It isn't personal. And yet, this is precisely how the mind imagines it. The mind is forever at the Spiritual Olympic Games, looking for the Gold Medal Realization. And for every winner in such a competition, there has to be a loser: hungry seekers gathered at the feet of mythologized finders.
The finish line exists only in the thought-generated mirage. Bare being is always free and complete. Even when the mirage appears, there is really no-thing there! The only "problem" is that there is some idea that "you" (a mirage!) need to be liberated from mirages. It's like trying to save a movie character from the movie! Joan does not wake up from the illusion of Joan; that would be absurd! There is no one real to be saved! The dream characters do not get enlightened because they have no separate, permanent, real existence, except in the mind. The one who thinks she is having the mirage is part of the mirage!
The dream character is not the dreamer; she's the dream. It's a lingering confusion of identity. It's like those people who come to Nisargadatta and say, "I see there is nothing at all. Now what do I do?"
How quickly the mind reasserts itself!
"Am I really here yet? Is this it? Is there more? What do I do now? Am I done?"
Absurd questions. Funny. Makes me laugh every time when the bubble breaks."
http://www.lotusandrose.com/dewdrops/zone.htm
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 15 2008 : 7:34:11 PM
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Thanks Balance,
and a little further down the same page:
"All of it is the play of Consciousness. Enlightenment is not a one-time event that transforms "you" into a spiritual superstar. It's this, right here, right now: the sensations of acid indigestion, the screech of brakes, the faint aroma of someone cooking lamb chops down the hall, the direct experiencing of anger or hurt. Nothing at all! Not exactly what the seeker had in mind!"
Excerpt from Awake in the Heartland, pp 110-112
By Joan Tollifson
Published by Trafford
© 2003 Joan Tollifson
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Divineis
Canada
420 Posts |
Posted - May 15 2008 : 11:13:14 PM
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| I second all of it. |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - May 16 2008 : 01:40:05 AM
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| Yes, absolutely beautiful!!!! Thank you, Alan! You have a great gift of finding words for us to enjoy! |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 16 2008 : 02:02:54 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by emc
Yes, absolutely beautiful!!!! Thank you, Alan! You have a great gift of finding words for us to enjoy!
Aw, that's nice emc. I like gifts. We are all gifts  |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 16 2008 : 11:57:13 AM
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The secret of life and liberation is hidden right in front of our eyes in plain view. It is right here showing up as the breakfast dishes, the laundry, sunlight on leaves, the barking of a dog, the sound of traffic or rain, the humming of the computer, the taste of tea, the shapes of these words, and the awareness being and beholding it all. And only when we describe all of this in words does it seem as if "awareness" is one thing and "the taste of tea" is something else. The non-conceptual actuality of this breathing-hearing-seeing-being is undivided, without center or periphery. No inside, no outside. No subject, no object. Simply this, just as it is.
- Joan Tollifson
http://www.joantollifson.com/rcommndd.htm |
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Suryakant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - May 16 2008 : 12:55:11 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Balance
The non-conceptual actuality of this breathing-hearing-seeing-being is undivided, without center or periphery. No inside, no outside. No subject, no object. Simply this, just as it is.
- Joan Tollifson
Ram
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 16 2008 : 7:14:48 PM
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Has anyone who has clairvoyant visions (remote viewing) noticed how "special" those visions seem, like a rare jewel, and different from normal vision?
So then I think what if I was somewhere else seeing what my eyes are seeing now?
I think it may be that to be clairvoyant one must turn off the ego and thought noise that messes up our normal everyday perception.
Anyone else think so? |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - May 17 2008 : 02:47:36 AM
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| Hm, Etherfish. Nice question, and I agree they are like rare jewels. Just what on earth made you write it in this topic? |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 17 2008 : 11:20:14 PM
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because of this concept:
"The non-conceptual actuality of this breathing-hearing-seeing-being is undivided, without center or periphery. No inside, no outside. No subject, no object. Simply this, just as it is.
- Joan Tollifson"
I think the visions may seem as rare jewels because they are seen in this non-conceptual manner.
And so also it mey be that everyday moments may appear with that value if seen in this way.
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 17 2008 : 11:33:20 PM
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This is always a rare jewel, whether or not we see it as such.
Don't forget this part though: "Simply this, just as it is."
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2008 : 09:21:05 AM
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Yes balance, i'm not saying anything appears different than it is. But the visions seem as rare jewels because all of reality is a rare jewel, but we take it for granted. If we are in the moment and put ALL our attention on one thing, we can see the wonder and beauty in it, just as a baby does before they are taught a world view.
A baby doesn't have any stories related to objects yet. It doesn't know what something is for, where it came from, why it is there, whether it is dangerous. It just experiences the sensual input. |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2008 : 12:20:07 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Yes balance, i'm not saying anything appears different than it is. But the visions seem as rare jewels because all of reality is a rare jewel, but we take it for granted. If we are in the moment and put ALL our attention on one thing, we can see the wonder and beauty in it, just as a baby does before they are taught a world view.
A baby doesn't have any stories related to objects yet. It doesn't know what something is for, where it came from, why it is there, whether it is dangerous. It just experiences the sensual input.
Hi Etherfish.
I agree with you. I wasn't really directing my comment to anyone in particular, just to everyone including myself. A reminder that this is it. Like you say how it is for a baby it is all right here before us without any hindrances except in the identification with thought.
What is right here before us is countless things going out forever. They are all expressions of the One. As those things are all the One, so are we together with everything. The baby "knows" this as a natural seeing, feeling, of himself in everything. But himself is not yet under the illusion of an individual, seperate self. The baby is the One shining through everything including the unique baby. The One is ever new, unique and original.
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Edited by - Balance on May 18 2008 7:39:01 PM |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2008 : 3:35:09 PM
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Etherfish, I have just recently bought the Yoga sutras of Patanjali. (I got so curious since they are so basic.) Among the first I found this:
Chapter 1:41
As the patterning of consciousness subsides, a transparent way of seeing, called coalescence, saturates consciousness; like a jewel, it reflects equally whatever lies before it - whether subject, object, or act of perceiving. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2008 : 9:29:46 PM
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| Wow! |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 18 2008 : 9:40:53 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Wow!
I'll see your Wow! and raise you two!
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - May 25 2008 : 09:55:34 AM
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| That was a long one, but worth listening to! What gave me an AHA was when she says that the expanded experience won't be there all the time! The contractions will be there continuously also! It's more that we are what's making both expansion and contraction possible - the arena. Thanks for the link! |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - May 26 2008 : 01:47:55 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by emc
That was a long one, but worth listening to! What gave me an AHA was when she says that the expanded experience won't be there all the time! The contractions will be there continuously also! It's more that we are what's making both expansion and contraction possible - the arena. Thanks for the link!
There's another interview with her on the column to the right, as well as other interesting interviews. I liked Alice Gardner.
Yeah, it's that scenery stuff. Expanding, contracting, those are just happening within the experience of being. |
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Joan Tollifson
