Spirituality might work if it wasn't so stupid.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

Nothing is what you are before any appearance appears. But that nothing is the potential to be all that is seen and heard.

an appearance is not a thing ... so how can an appearance appear ... it has to be the appearance of something therefore is not nothing ... nothing does not exist unless it is something appearing ... so nothing is nothing not everything

a reply to: Itisnowagain

An empty clear space that is filled with what is here, to be seen and heard.
The emptiness is full of 'what is'.

An empty space is an empty space ... if that space is filled with things it can no longer be said to be empty

a reply to: artistpoet

Knowledge has its place, it is practical to know how to write, calculate, geography, biology, and so on.
This practical knowledge is not an isolating wall that limits us.

originally posted by: artistpoet


an appearance is not a thing ... so how can an appearance appear ... it has to be the appearance of something therefore is not nothing ... nothing does not exist unless it is something appearing ... so nothing is nothing not everything

There is just one image appearing - and everything appears in that ONE image.
Is this ONE image that is appearing presently a 'thing'.
There is no thing.

what a poor understanding you have

a reply to: earthling42

Knowledge has its place, it is practical to know how to write, calculate, geography, biology, and so on.
This practical knowledge is not an isolating wall that limits us.

Not sure how your reply relates to what I was speaking of
but I agree with your statement in spirit

a reply to: Itisnowagain

There is just one image appearing - and everything appears in that ONE image.
Is this ONE image that is appearing presently a 'thing'.
There is no thing.

How would you know that unless you could view the whole of everything ... which is impossible
The Universe is full of "Images" of things ...
Something is causing their appearance ... it is not nothing it is something ...

a reply to: artistpoet
What can be seen right now (presently)?
The ONE image that appears as sight may be divided/split into many things but they appear in/as the ONE image.

originally posted by: artistpoet

An empty space is an empty space ... if that space is filled with things it can no longer be said to be empty

Notice what is actually experienced.
In deep sleep you are blank - like a tv screen when the tv is switched off. When the light comes on (on waking) the blank screen is filled with a light image - just like when the tv is switched on. The screen is now full of what might appear to be separate things but really there is just the screen full of moving light - one screen, one image.

In the beginning there was nothing and God said let there be light. God saw the light was good.
That which appears to have life outside the light - as in past or future or somewhere else (the individual living in time) - does not really exist - it is just a thought appearing as the light.
Thoughts and ideas appear to exist ABOUT a separate me but the separate me does not actually exist as an independent entity.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

What can be seen right now (presently)?
You may split the ONE image that appears as sight into many things but they appear in the ONE image.

I can relate to that idea ... with our eyes we see so little of all there is ,,, that limited image or part of the whole we consider as a fact ... Yet the larger/whole unseen image of the whole of everything must be a fact also ...

a reply to: LesMisanthrope

Now what? What do you as an enlightened being endowed with full infinite wisdom have to offer the world? It almost sounds like you should be set to task in changing the world for the better. Maybe you should design something so great it might change the direction of humanity. But that’s not your method. What is the industry of spirituality?

It less complex than what everyone makes it out to be. Being "enlightened" just means being given the knowledge or wisdom in the moment to now what the next thing to do is.

Like a lamp lights your path at night… so you can 'see'.

This awareness lets you see the right choice to make. You can still decide to walk off a cliff, the decision is yours.

This awareness is given to you, not generated by you. It is separate and only shows the way. One can't cure diseases or invent new things, just walk throughout life's journey, guided along the way.

a reply to: artistpoet

originally posted by: dominicus
Hey Les,
As usual, since I've always been the white to your black, left to your right, up to your down, I'll take a bite from the "obviously" placed bait:

First, in regards to the practicality of spirituality, I see little benefit. So you’ve reached enlightenment. Now what? What do you as an enlightened being endowed with full infinite wisdom have to offer the world?

You realize, like an infinite tapestry, everything is connected via a butterfly effect of karma. Give a young boy a bit of advise during a troubled time, and he will remember you for the rest of his life, perhaps even, those words remain in him as sparks of hope, life, change. Open the door for an old lady bent out of shape that life dealt her the wrong cards, and it changes her consciousness, which effects all other things. You teach, provide links at the bottom of your posts, help others, and offer guidance so another may experience the aspects of enlightenment that you have.

idolatry, where a man reads aloud and waves a book that was perhaps once relevant thousands of years before, all at the cost of our own dignity and whatever change we have in our pockets

There are hustlers, power trip narcissists, scam artists in every branch of humanity, especially things that have to do with religion/spirituality....meaning its not genuine. But genuine, and not, is inherent in all things.

In my own opinion, the word “spiritual” is derogatory, a sign of a weaker more tender sort

That's just a relative definition. Whereas mine is someone who is sensitive enough to feel their own soul, gut, intuition, awareness/consciousness, connection to the source. Can't both be right, bu then again, plenty masquerade in spirituality masks as a way of escapism and trends, sure.....but that's not genuine.

The non-sequitur that spiritual practice should lead to understanding is what bothers me most.

There are channels and portals with you, and they exist in your heart, gut, third eye, spine, etc. WIthout spiritual practice, you can forget about merging with the source of consciousness, or absolute beingness, or the light of awareness, or the source of thought.....in that case, you merely entirely wrapped up in the illusions of what the ego/mind has to offer in a very limited and relative level. Whereas in enlightenment, you can access transcendence and the bigger picture of universes, timelessness, present moment, becoming immovable by what the world throws at you, loving towards all, etc.

And of course, you will adamantly announce the benefits of meditation are palpable, but as far as I can see, they are no different than the benefits of getting a good nights sleep.

in a friendly way and no offense, that's a statement from ignorance. In your heart/subconscious, are the memories of who and where you were, before you were born here on earth, and that gives you a more defined knowing of what's really going on then main stream media, science, earth knowledge.

I’m sure you’ll find that the child who does the opposite—who doesn’t close her eyes, and who doesn’t meditate and conform when told to, who expresses rather than suppresses her learning faculties—will become the more exceptional adult.

There are various dynamics to this and I can give examples of the opposite. I have quite a few cousins and childhood friends who would never meditate, eyes always open, super extroverted, financially successful, travel, always busy doing, making kids, chasing more, etc....many of them have come to recently to express that they want the spirituality that I have, the peace/silence/contentment that exudes from me, and want to know spirituality/meditation because they feel the need in their hearts (something the natives are keen to when they say the West has lost their way because their heads are disconnected from their hearts, lol)

Take the whole metaphor of “going inward for knowledge” or “finding truth within” to its logical extremes.

That metaphor is based on accessing the Soul that is within you, the bliss and light and ocean of consciousness you can open up to in the heart and the portal in the gut. If you sit for a few hours, as a skeptic, and can't face the silence, the boredom, can't face yourself in that manner, then you will never ever find that gold that is within, and will be basically subject to assume and project that there is nothing there, which results in posts such as these.

Once the clock runs out on your meat suit, you'll see on the other side that all this "spiritual" stuff is legit.

a reply to: bb23108

You have been patient and accommodating with your ideas, bb. I respect that.

See this is where we differ. You presume that only a body-mind knows that an object exists and what it looks like; whereas I am arguing that everything is a modification of consciousness or reality itself, and as such, reality is aware of what is arising and is not separate from what is arising. Reality has real knowledge of what everything is, whereas any point-of-view mechanism cannot possibly know what anything actually IS.

I don't think I am presuming anything. I have seen no knowledge outside of human discourse. I have witnessed humans engage in knowing all the time. I would have to wonder where you have seen or observed reality engaging in the same sort of thing, and that it isn't you doing the presuming?

Why is it not obvious that we do not actually know an object directly?

Simply because we directly interact with objects. Knowing is many-sided, but the most important prerequisite to any knowledge is the relationship between knower and thing known. This is not an indirect relationship.

When we see something, what we are experiencing is an image of the object, not the actual object. It is reflected light, neurons firing, etc., not the object itself. Everything we experience is a mode of awareness, not the objects themselves. All perception is memory, we are only thinking that we directly see the object.

I wholeheartedly disagree with this. Reflected light is reflected off the actual object into the actual eye. Turn the lights off we can still feel, smell and hear it. Those are our neurons firing. Those are our electrical impulses. That is our skin touching the actual object. This is direct as direct can get. We aren't touching images, seeing, nor smelling images.

To fully understand reality one would need to be reality altogether! Well that is a very great matter that may be glimpsed even with these types of considerations, but to actually realize the unconditional reality in which all arises is a whole other matter.

Reality, as we know and name it, is not one thing. Reality is many things. Perhaps this is where we disagree most. I do not have sufficient enough reason to believe reality has a boundary or container in which everything is contained.

a reply to: dominicus

Good Dominicus, thank you for your insight.

WIthout spiritual practice, you can forget about merging with the source of consciousness, or absolute beingness, or the light of awareness, or the source of thought.....in that case, you merely entirely wrapped up in the illusions of what the ego/mind has to offer in a very limited and relative level. Whereas in enlightenment, you can access transcendence and the bigger picture of universes, timelessness, present moment, becoming immovable by what the world throws at you, loving towards all, etc.

A stone is immovable to what the world throws at it. A puppy is loving towards all. I'm really not sure why one would want to access this sort of transcendence. Beingness isn’t even a word.

Sure, it might be nice to be able to act like a child again, or to have the equanimity of a plant or comatose patient, but I see these as illusions, perhaps necessary for a being wanting to escape himself but can't. Perhaps a full-frontal lobotomy, narcotics, sleep, is genuine spirituality, because at least it is done out in the open.

in a friendly way and no offense, that's a statement from ignorance. In your heart/subconscious, are the memories of who and where you were, before you were born here on earth, and that gives you a more defined knowing of what's really going on then main stream media, science, earth knowledge.

That is an extraordinary claim, and thus, extraordinarily easy to dismiss. No offence taken.

There are various dynamics to this and I can give examples of the opposite. I have quite a few cousins and childhood friends who would never meditate, eyes always open, super extroverted, financially successful, travel, always busy doing, making kids, chasing more, etc....many of them have come to recently to express that they want the spirituality that I have, the peace/silence/contentment that exudes from me, and want to know spirituality/meditation because they feel the need in their hearts (something the natives are keen to when they say the West has lost their way because their heads are disconnected from their hearts, lol)

They sound like interesting people with stories. It saddens me that they will trade it to become a voluntary beggar.

If you sit for a few hours, as a skeptic, and can't face the silence, the boredom, can't face yourself in that manner, then you will never ever find that gold that is within, and will be basically subject to assume and project that there is nothing there, which results in posts such as these.

Once the clock runs out on your meat suit, you'll see on the other side that all this "spiritual" stuff is legit.

I do not wish to become nor find gold within. Such a thought to me seems to lessen oneself, to make oneself infinitely smaller, to deflate oneself, to reduce oneself to a preconceived point, and it nauseates me. I have to wonder why you immaterialists can assert enlightened true reality, but cannot figure out how to open the locks on your meat prisons. You’re always there for whatever reason, a bird proud of his cage.

originally posted by: LesMisanthrope
I don't think I am presuming anything. I have seen no knowledge outside of human discourse. I have witnessed humans engage in knowing all the time. I would have to wonder where you have seen or observed reality engaging in the same sort of thing, and that it isn't you doing the presuming?

When I said you are presuming, it was in the context of your presumption of being the body-mind - and along with that is the sense of separate "I", the subject over against objects, the knower and the known, etc. This separation is the false basis for materialism.

There is reality beyond this separate presumption, beyond the body-mind, beyond all of our conventional knowing. It is self-evident once "experienced" - it is unconditional and only the heart in deepest feeling "knows" it. It is what the heart yearns for in every thing we seek after - until we see it is already the case, and it is our search itself that hides unconditional reality or real love from us.

There is no talking another into this - the heart simply must discover its truth. Then the search that prevents this most direct understanding stops because we are doing that search, that contraction upon separate self, that suppression of heart-radiance, that lack of feeling - this hurts! When we see we are hurting ourself, we stop.

originally posted by: LesMisanthrope
Simply because we directly interact with objects. Knowing is many-sided, but the most important prerequisite to any knowledge is the relationship between knower and thing known. This is not an indirect relationship.

We only experience everything conditional through the body-mind. It is not direct experiencing as explained before and also below your next quote.

originally posted by: LesMisanthrope
I wholeheartedly disagree with this. Reflected light is reflected off the actual object into the actual eye. Turn the lights off we can still feel, smell and hear it. Those are our neurons firing. Those are our electrical impulses. That is our skin touching the actual object. This is direct as direct can get. We aren't touching images, seeing, nor smelling images.

The simple proof that every object we experience is a memory is this:
By the time the light hits your eyes and the neurons fire and you sense the object, the object has already changed.

Look at a star - that star may already be dead in reality, but the light it emitted is still coming to you. So by the time you see the image of the star, the star may well not exist any longer, and will certainly have changed by the time you register its light. It is just a memory.

originally posted by: LesMisanthrope
Reality, as we know and name it, is not one thing. Reality is many things. Perhaps this is where we disagree most. I do not have sufficient enough reason to believe reality has a boundary or container in which everything is contained.

Reality is not a "thing" nor does it have boundaries. It is unconditional, beyond time and space, and is the "substance" of which all conditional appearances are a modification of.

Of course conditional body-minds are not going to experience the unconditional - it is only self-evident to the being beyond its separative gestures that contract the feeling heart. Transcend the point-of-view-making body-mind through real surrender to the heart's feeling of reality, and it will become self-evident, LesMis.

No need to go inward because reality is as present here as anywhere. Simply feel altogether your inherent nature in the midst of all arising, all relationships, everything you experience. Embrace this altogether to discover if your heart will awaken to the reality that it already is.

Why wouldn't we do this? We obviously have appeared in a vast field of relatedness, and so why not participate with real feeling, real surrender to whatever reality is?

Notice when you contract into just a separative mental approach to things, it blocks feeling participation as the whole body-mind. Notice this, and see if that is truly intelligent. Feel with the heart and see if that is intelligent. Find out directly what reality actually is.

a reply to: LesMisanthrope

I'm really not sure why one would want to access this sort of transcendence.

Because transcendence is the highest view, and it allows love to be like a puppies love, available to all. Most can only love those they know, but not strangers. I have been without transcendence until 25, and then with it for the last 11 years, and its apples and oranges. To be without transcendence is to live under the guise of a ridiculous limited mind and body.

Beingness isn’t even a word.

Being. Human Being(s). THe Universe Being. Existence Being. Are there any boundaries to Being? Does a tree discern where its being ends and the forests being begins? No. The imagined and illusion constructed division of beingness, is just that, an illusion. The Beingness of existence can be tapped into and merged with, and it is itself conscious and intelligent

Sure, it might be nice to be able to act like a child again, or to have the equanimity of a plant or comatose patient, but I see these as illusions, perhaps necessary for a being wanting to escape himself but can't. Perhaps a full-frontal lobotomy, narcotics, sleep, is genuine spirituality, because at least it is done out in the open.

You color all these things in the way that you do above, because you lack access to them. As someone who has access to them, it is nothing like you propose above. It is the next step in human evolution and it is the default of pre-existence, and how you will be when you're meat suit dies and leave behind limited belief systems

That is an extraordinary claim, and thus, extraordinarily easy to dismiss. No offence taken.

Of course its your take because it comes from someone who has not accessed these things. The Majority of monks across global cultures who work on themselves in a variety of settings, pretty much all come across the memories of pre-existence. Heck, there are even a number of threads of ATS'ers who remember before being born. Here are just 2:

I remember Life Before I was Born ATS Thread 1

Anyone Else Remember Anything From Before They Were Born? ATS Thread 2

There are many more besides those and we can take it one of 2 ways. We are all just imagining and making it up. Or you just simply don't remember and don't have access to these memories and as a result are forced to construct a philosophy based on materialist and mainstream science belief systems, including their limits and biases. Of course, until I was 25, I believed much like you, except that I was always agnostic about things and open to possibilities. When the pre-existence memories arose from my heart, it pretty much changed everything.

They sound like interesting people with stories. It saddens me that they will trade it to become a voluntary beggar.

You took my examples out of context. They are not quitting their jobs and giving everything away. Heck, even I work and save and have goals/plans. My point was that philosophizing/theorizing like you do, plus the rat race, plus material belongings and children/family...all the things the world has to offer, has still left people empty and lacking a deep inner connection with themselves and the universe. My cousin used to talk like you do, and no is telling me, "damn, you were right all along about this stuff. Sorry for fighting against you."

I do not wish to become nor find gold within. Such a thought to me seems to lessen oneself, to make oneself infinitely smaller, to deflate oneself, to reduce oneself to a preconceived point, and it nauseates me.

Again, out of context. I'm saying you have this brilliant infinite diamond within you, that you have not accessed yet. Instead, you build up excuses, assumptions, speculations about what it is, or that it doesn't exist at all, as circular reasoning by the ego/logic/reason/mind in order to not see for yourself...because it threatens the belief systems you have built up for yourself.

I have to wonder why you immaterialists can assert enlightened true reality, but cannot figure out how to open the locks on your meat prisons. You’re always there for whatever reason, a bird proud of his cage.

Not sure what that's supposed to mean, however I am not just an immaterialist, but also a materialist, because both exist. And I have figured out, to a certain degree, how to unlock the birdcage and my consciousness leaves it t wander freely at certain times. I know I am not the body or the ego...but that consciousness which is aware of it.

a reply to: Itisnowagain

I watched the Tony Parsons vid you posted ... thanks ... I know you meant well ... but for me there is a fundamental difference with how I think about things but some interesting points and ways of looking/thinking about things ...

However I do not believe that all things arise out of nothing ... Nor do I believe nothing created everything ... though it may appear so ...

But interesting vid non the less

originally posted by: artistpoet


However I do not believe that all things arise out of nothing ... Nor do I believe nothing created everything ... though it may appear so ...

It is not that things arise out of nothing - there is nothing - it is just happening to look like something - this appearance that is appearing is the form nothing is currently appearing as.
Glad to hear that you found the talk interesting.