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alwayson2
USA
546 Posts |
Posted - Nov 21 2009 : 9:21:10 PM
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quote: Originally posted by Etherfish
I have never heard of anyone contacting God by philosophising or thinking about God.
My point is to go inwards to find God, which 99.9% of people don't do.
Realize God is a faulty time bound thoughtform in your mind as is everyone else in your life.
To answer the original question of the thread, I would say the first part of the Abramelin operation is your best bet. |
Edited by - alwayson2 on Nov 21 2009 9:38:03 PM |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Nov 21 2009 : 11:02:13 PM
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I've had contact with God using the methods taught here. Have those methods worked for you or anyone you know? |
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alwayson2
USA
546 Posts |
Posted - Nov 22 2009 : 12:10:24 AM
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The Abramelin Operation?
No I have not done it. |
Edited by - alwayson2 on Nov 22 2009 01:15:26 AM |
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Suryakant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Nov 22 2009 : 5:43:47 PM
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quote: Originally posted by Etherfish
Stories of contact with God or being God are just a form of mental masturbation. You can spend time reading them for fun, but until you experience it meditation is the only worthwhile practice. And then once you experience it, the stories are pretty worthless too!
Yours truly finds that reading stories of spiritual devotion enhances all aspects of sadhana. After profound meditation experiences, stories of spiritual devotion are far from worthless. On the contrary, such stories fill the heart with bhakti and motivation for sadhana. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - Nov 22 2009 : 11:31:23 PM
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OK I take it back!
Sorry I meant talking about it and thinking about it doesn't make it happen, but you're right; bhakti is powerful. |
Edited by - Etherfish on Nov 22 2009 11:52:08 PM |
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chinna
United Kingdom
241 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 04:17:01 AM
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quote: Originally posted by alwayson2
Yet another way to think about it is to realize that God is LITERALLY a thoughtform in the mind just like other people are.
So it you realize the nature of the mind, nondualism style, you realize God.
The real nameless inconceivable God, of whom we can't even use the word G_d, is not a thought form, s/he is the source and end of all thinkers, thoughts and objects of thought, and is not in any way the same as or different from them.
When you realise God, there is no longer any realising of God or not realising of God, no God, no realiser, no realisation, no non-realisation, and there never was. Was, is and will be are not different, 'eternal life'.
chinna |
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mikkiji
USA
219 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 09:09:10 AM
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quote: Originally posted by Etherfish
I have never heard of anyone contacting God by philosophising or thinking about God.
Actually, thinking, studying and "philosophizing" about god add up to one of the branches of Yoga--Jnana Yoga, which is the Path of Knowledge or Intellect. It is NOT a path for most of us, and is a discipline aimed at achieving liberation through intellectual understanding, thereby arriving at true and complete truth. The danger of Jnana Yoga is that it CAN become a trap, a "mental masturbation" as you put it--yes, that is always the danger, that the study becomes a distraction from the goal of the studying... Michael |
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delta33
Canada
100 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 10:22:47 AM
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Q.] "Have you had direct contact with God?"
A.] not sure what god is..
i've never seen god as a discrete entity never heard a booming voice never seen jesus or buddha or shiva or some other ishta saw a being of white when i was young (so terrified) saw a green woman in a waking dream saw reality peeled back in a flood of dusty stars as i stood behind myself (pranayam) sometimes when i'm feeling sad a comforting presence is there to hold me and after about 11 minutes of SRI OM SRI OM IAM IAM NAMAH every cell of my body is spaced with delicious tingly bright |
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mystic_robert
USA
7 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 3:35:37 PM
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So you think God is a "she"?quote: Originally posted by mikkiji
My first direct experience of god was at the age of 13, in a near-death experience (NDE). Yes, they ARE real, and yes, the content of the experience is totally infused with directly contacting the Divine. I had no idea what was going on as I was in that coma for 3 days, but I was alert, joyous, peaceful, and felt that everything was right and correct and perfect in the white light that inhabited the spaceless space I was in for that timeless time. When I awoke, I carried the feelings of joy and peace with me for the rest of my life--It just took me many years until I totally figured out what it all meant and how to make it totally a permanent part of my Self. 40 years of meditation, darshan with my guru (the late Maharishi Mahesh Yogi) and other practices, techniques and experiences have deepened and clarified my contact with the Divine until, now, she is with me, in me, IS me 24/7... Michael
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chinna
United Kingdom
241 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 5:28:37 PM
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quote: Originally posted by mikkiji
quote: Originally posted by Etherfish
I have never heard of anyone contacting God by philosophising or thinking about God.
Actually, thinking, studying and "philosophizing" about god add up to one of the branches of Yoga--Jnana Yoga, which is the Path of Knowledge or Intellect. It is NOT a path for most of us, and is a discipline aimed at achieving liberation through intellectual understanding, thereby arriving at true and complete truth. The danger of Jnana Yoga is that it CAN become a trap, a "mental masturbation" as you put it--yes, that is always the danger, that the study becomes a distraction from the goal of the studying... Michael
Jnana yoga is only of any use for those who are consumed by the need to KNOW the answer to the question which is their existence. Jnana is no more subject to inauthenticity than any other path. Those who are merely curious or only give a part of themselves to jnana yoga, or who merely want to display erudition or spiritual attainment, will no more find the pearl of great price than the bhakta who is merely pretending to love in order to receive something, who is holding his or heart back from the beloved just in case a better or more powerful teacher/god comes along in their rootless fruitless seeking. Jnana is just as all-consuming as true, all-consuming, bhakti, or it will also be fruitless. The key to any path is that it is all-consuming. It's less significant what you do on the path, provided it consumes all of you. In other words, it's not magic, it's real. The Japanese zen sect who dedicated themselves to a life of ceaseless cleaning of other people's lavatories understood this perfectly.
For the jnani the desperate need to KNOW consumes all thought that arises in response to it, because thought can never answer its Question, and eventually this desperate need consumes the question and the questioner too.
So Jnana is not a path of knowing, and certainly not a path of intellect. It is a path of unknowing, of the destruction of all abstract knowing, of all intellect. The jnani in any tradition has abandoned books and doesn't think about anything philosophical or spiritual. S/he responds spontaneously, directly, when an authentic question is asked. It has become automatic. It is very far from the university, which Nisargadatta dismissed as 'just entertainment'.
chinna |
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Suryakant
USA
259 Posts |
Posted - Nov 23 2009 : 6:11:03 PM
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quote: Originally posted by chinna
Jnana yoga is only of any use for those who are consumed by the need to KNOW the answer to the question which is their existence. Jnana is no more subject to inauthenticity than any other path. Those who are merely curious or only give a part of themselves to jnana yoga, or who merely want to display erudition or spiritual attainment, will no more find the pearl of great price than the bhakta who is merely pretending to love in order to receive something, who is holding his or heart back from the beloved just in case a better or more powerful teacher/god comes along in their rootless fruitless seeking. Jnana is just as all-consuming as true, all-consuming, bhakti, or it will also be fruitless. The key to any path is that it is all-consuming. It's less significant what you do on the path, provided it consumes all of you. In other words, it's not magic, it's real. The Japanese zen sect who dedicated themselves to a life of ceaseless cleaning of other people's lavatories understood this perfectly.
For the jnani the desperate need to KNOW consumes all thought that arises in response to it, because thought can never answer its Question, and eventually this desperate need consumes the question and the questioner too.
So Jnana is not a path of knowing, and certainly not a path of intellect. It is a path of unknowing, of the destruction of all abstract knowing, of all intellect. The jnani in any tradition has abandoned books and doesn't think about anything philosophical or spiritual. S/he responds spontaneously, directly, when an authentic question is asked. It has become automatic. It is very far from the university, which Nisargadatta dismissed as 'just entertainment'.
chinna
yes
all-consuming devotion to divine intimacy and blissful surrender to The Beloved
jnana = bhakti and bhakti = jnana |
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chinna
United Kingdom
241 Posts |
Posted - Nov 24 2009 : 06:18:05 AM
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quote: Originally posted by Suryakant yes
all-consuming devotion to divine intimacy and blissful surrender to The Beloved
jnana = bhakti and bhakti = jnana
Indeed, amen.
The differences of paths are only apparent.
AYP's all-consumingness is that it provides a practice for every part of the body, mind and heart. You start off meditating, and before you know where you are you're also breathing spinally, pumping your chin, drinking your own pee, extending your tongue up your nose fron the inside, making love in a special way, and generally undertaking all manner of complex psychophysical challenges with reverence and solemnity, and your previous preoccupations and inner and outer rituals have been supplanted by 'the path'. You can't help but recover your natural state of peace and joy, beyond the old 'self, in these circumstances.
It's not about the practices, hence the confusing range of mutually exclusive practices and points of view offered to us on the spiritual quest. As Lance Armstrong said, in a not wholly dissimilar context, "It's not about the bike". It's not magic, nor technology, it's real.
We can be all-consumed by dedicating ourselves completely, at every level of our being, to a single shaft of light which leads to non-duality, or we can be all-consumed by dedicating ourselves to a kaleidoscope of lights which together make up a single white light leading to non-duality. The key is that we let yourselves be all consumed by the light.
For most people, the more complex and diverse the practices, the more effortless the all-consumption. Few have the burning desire for one shaft of light which can consume them. AYP and similar are the steady, sure, path for the majority.
True Jnana is for the very few already consumed by the need to KNOW. The true jnana yogi needs little from the teacher, occasional confirmation or challenge. Sitting calmly and curiously in a satsang to try to learn something, or reading a book in this mood, is not Jnana Yoga. One must be almost mad with the need to know, rolling about the floor in desperation to find the liberation one seeks. Just like the true bhakta is mad with the need for love-unity. The Jnani finds Self, the Bhakta finds God, and both realise that these are not-two.
For the bhakta and the jnani, everything is staked on a single enterprise which most of the time seems hopeless. Madness is the mood. It is the sudden eruption of sanity, of balance, which tells us that the path is over, and in fact never was.
chinna |
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alwayson2
USA
546 Posts |
Posted - Nov 26 2009 : 12:33:12 AM
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would rigpa qualify as God or not? |
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chinna
United Kingdom
241 Posts |
Posted - Nov 26 2009 : 3:30:03 PM
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quote: Originally posted by alwayson2
would rigpa qualify as God or not?
Rigpa, Self and God all refer to THAT.
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SeySorciere
Seychelles
1571 Posts |
Posted - Dec 03 2009 : 09:41:14 AM
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Etherfish - I completely agree with everything you have said. I was practically an atheist (but one with an open mind and high aspirations and plenty of bhakti) when I started deep meditation two years ago. I have had very direct contact with God; I have asked him questions and he has "answered" them in a conversation. I place the word "answered" in quotation marks because His answers are more in the form a revelation (illuminating all at once). It is a little different than just experiencing pure bliss consciousness although pure bliss consciousness is present when He/She is or is it that He is pure bliss consciousness? He is both a voice and a Knowing; but the voice does inflect emotions such as amusement. I am new to this forum and I'm sure many will now be thinking - ok... another cuckoo, not all screws in place...
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brother neil
USA
752 Posts |
Posted - Dec 03 2009 : 5:12:40 PM
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when have you not had direct contact with God? |
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alwayson2
USA
546 Posts |
Posted - Dec 03 2009 : 6:35:03 PM
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EXACTLY |
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yvangkwheng
China
2 Posts |
Posted - Dec 03 2009 : 10:30:50 PM
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yeah, cant agree. thats just delusion. how come u see god? its just a saying of superstitious |
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SeySorciere
Seychelles
1571 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 01:59:06 AM
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quote: Originally posted by yvangkwheng
yeah, cant agree. thats just delusion. how come u see god? its just a saying of superstitious
I did not say that I saw God, but that I had a conversation with Him - on two different occasions. I was filled with an overflow of Love - more Love than you can handle - it spills over, and a radiance within. Now, I would have put that down as a "normal" side-effect of Deep Meditation, except He "talked" to me. I had been asking a lot of the Why Why Why questions? Suddenly He was there and answering. We had a conversation. I asked questions and He "answered" but like I said more like an illumination /revelation of a Truth I could not understand before. It was a conversation about Love and Fear. Oh! and it was in the middle of an afternoon in a hotel room in Madrid about two months ago and I was not doing meditation. I was dancing to no music because the Love was too much for my feet. On the other occasion I woke up in the night and He was there and the conversation was about a sick little boy I know. |
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chinna
United Kingdom
241 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 05:39:10 AM
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Is He not talking to you in the words of everyone else, in the events that unfold.....even in this forum? What could be outside Him?
chinna |
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manigma
India
1065 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 06:32:20 AM
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quote: Originally posted by mystic_robert
If so, how did you get it? I seek it, because I'm worried about what I will experience when I die.
Yes, whenever I looked into my son's eyes (when he was between 2 to 12 months old) I could see God behind them... so innocent.
But now he is grown and I don't see it. Now I see only my son.
You have to be born before yuo die. Are you even born yet |
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Balance
USA
967 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 08:12:25 AM
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In my view God is everything. So I guess God is in direct contact with 'me'. But that isn't always easy for 'me' to see. |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 09:12:41 AM
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You don't see or get in contact with God. It's the other way around. The one looking out through your eyes IS God.
This is an attempt to show the shift of perspectives:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YV8TaQCm2pg |
Edited by - emc on Dec 04 2009 10:05:20 AM |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 3:52:45 PM
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Trouble is, you are attempting to describe what other people's experiences are before they even know it themselves. This is not an objective view of God. Saying that God is looking through everyone's eyes doesn't tell us why you needed to tell everyone here right now. It also doesn't prove that you do not exist. |
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cosmic
USA
821 Posts |
Posted - Dec 04 2009 : 10:54:56 PM
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quote: Originally posted by emc
This is an attempt to show the shift of perspectives:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YV8TaQCm2pg
Thanks emc, I enjoyed this. I just hope he wasn't the one driving |
Edited by - cosmic on Dec 04 2009 11:51:27 PM |
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