Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 03:08 AM         

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Well, not funny. More like weird. Why's everyone bugging?
As far as I'm concerned, its the greatest thing since sliced bread.

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Posts: 14203
From: Pleasanton, CA, USA
Registered: May 2005

posted January 11, 2009 03:19 AM         

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I know. It was one of those brilliant ideas I wish I'd have come up with.

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 03:20 AM         

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You can still win the million bucks!

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Posts: 14203
From: Pleasanton, CA, USA
Registered: May 2005

posted January 11, 2009 03:26 AM         

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quote:

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(Sorry I took so long in writing back. I was contemplating, and hanging my laundry up.)

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I was going to go on about how there might be simple people who live simply, and how I find myself complicated and therefore turn to simplicity to manage the chaos, but that may not be true. I think that what I treat as simple is merely me reacting more instinctively to what naturally seems right. It's kind of easy to be simple on a forum. There's a good amount of choice there. It's more difficult in real life.

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Posts: 110
From: Australia
Registered: Dec 2008

posted January 11, 2009 04:46 AM         

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Hi H-SC, AG, 26T,

Truly, i think, ourself is hard to get to know,

Thomas Moore talked of the marriage within us 'heiros gamos', the sacred marriage. He said it is the reconciliation of the many contraries that exist in our make-up; and, reconnected over time, leave us to feel creative and vibrant.

He gave a personal example. He said he has felt like he has been called to teach and have a public life but at the same time he is unusually awkward and shy. He gets easily embarassed even in small social settings.

He has tried to overcome it but it remains so he has tried to marry his public calling with his shyness. He lets the shyness influence his public work.

As you have said before, H-SC, opposites blended to bring about the couple as the third.

He says it is not always a perfect marriage but then what marriage is.

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Posts: 110
From: Australia
Registered: Dec 2008

posted January 11, 2009 05:08 AM         

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and I meant to add,

26T you were speaking of this union earlier,
and
AG you spoke of reconciliation in light of reality; essentially linking the inner with the ordinary.

H-SC, Moore says 'the marital dark night of the soul is a fermentation'. He said it took Jesus a mere minutes at the wedding at Cana when they were calling for more wine. But for us it usually takes years. He goes on to say 'it is sometimes a painful alchemy but the result is worth the wait, like a good wine that can't be rushed but needs to rest in the cool dark cellar before it matures.'

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 05:45 AM         

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AG,

Yes, I'm sure if I had very much to deal with "out there",
I would never find the time, energy, or composure for "this".

Chryseis,

I enjoyed your posts.

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Posts: 15481
From: *
Registered: Jun 2004

posted January 11, 2009 11:35 AM         

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quote:

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Do you ever think about writing a book of farcical religious/metaphysical teachings? I do. I mean, why not? Someone's bound to believe it if you stick to the tried and true formulas.

Personally, I don't think I could make such an endeavor believable. I'd probably rather write a novel with whatever fantastical thing I created. Still...there's definitely a market.

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Just take a look at the metaphysical section of most bookstores. That's a lot of what's been going on.

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From: *
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posted January 11, 2009 11:52 AM         

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Thanks Chryseis. Seems we're all trying to get to know the same Self and our human selves get in the way.

You brought to mind a dream I had years ago in which I was being dressed as a bride and had just "won" (i guess you could say) some huge prize or something, I was getting married, except it was like it was too myself? I had just achieved something great and people around me were clapping and very happy for me too. Some were even crying. I had recieved a new body which was see-through and I loved it (apparently i had lived without one my whole life and was only a head until then). Up until that point I never knew what it was like to feel whole. I fell to the ground crying and saying thank you over and over again and saying how no one understood how hard it's been. The experience was very powerful and very real. It woke me up and I could feel tears streaming down my face, but when I touched my cheeks they werent there, yet I could feel them running down and had to keep checking. I've yet to feel that kind of joy in waking life. I'll never forget that dream. In fact, I think about it often.

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Posts: 15481
From: *
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posted January 11, 2009 12:36 PM         

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quote:

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I am a thinker. That's how I worship.

And God is not indifferent, or inaccessible, to my form of worship.

You may not find God in these complicated places, but I do. I can.

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Youre a Gyana yogi!

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Posts: 170
From: UK
Registered: Jan 2007

posted January 11, 2009 01:08 PM         

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I think - in repsonse to the OP HSC - that we 'find' oursleves in the process of being. I don't mean to sound vague, but its those moments when we forget to think and just 'be' that we are as close to ourselves as we will ever get.

We are split - everyone has a sense of duality (some more than others) and this arises from the constant conflict which exists between our 'animal' inheritence and our 'human' destiny. You could look at it this way - the story of creation in the garden of eaden is essentially a metaphore for humanity. The snake is simply a representation of our old 'reptile' brain and we are in a state of 'temptation' to respond to that and that only. To become 'human' and achieve our true destiny of elightenment then we must strive to move beyond these very deep and very strong urges.

Shakespeare perhaps did not realise quite how close he was to expressing the whole state of humanity in the character of Hamlet - 'to be or not to be, that is the question.'

Indeed, ponder these things, but don't forget to 'be'. x

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 05:20 PM         

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Thats kind, T.

Maybe a Gyana (Jnana) aspirant?

Maybe I was a yogi once and misused my power or something...

Anyway,

Have you read Shankara?

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
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posted January 11, 2009 05:22 PM         

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quote:

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Indeed, ponder these things, but don't forget to 'be'

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Also, don't forget that, to ponder is also to be.

Especially if you are a born ponderer.

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posted January 11, 2009 05:50 PM         

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I meant yogi in the definition of one who is following a spiritual path or who has gained a high level of insight.

I have not read Shankrara.

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
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posted January 11, 2009 06:08 PM         

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There is no consistency, in individuals, nations, ages, - you name it. In every man, we may discover instincts and ideas as diverse as those exhibited by the most dissimilar cultures on the planet. Read a book and you will not find the man; only a proximal point of convergence, where all that is not the man comes to blows; this conflict is the man. The measure of identity appearing to the casual observor is but a momentary "blip" in the eye of the observor; the fin that, for an instant, breaks the surface; but never the fish. Were she to look with deeper insight, this "identity" would crumble, - or, rather, concresce into manifold characteristics without definition; each giving way to another, and unable to maintain an independent integrity. Everything that achieves (appears to achieve) any degree of particularity divests itself (appears to divest itself) from the totality of Being, in order to exhibit a momentary singularity; a sanctuary, of sorts. And everything must end in a compost of contradicting impulses, drives, and currents, since, being a particularity (appearing to be a particularity), it is, in itself, something of a ruse. Yet, that which we so-called "spiritually minded" folk are fond of calling "ultimate truth" is no more (or less) real. All things, including that which we call The One Thing, have reality only to the extent that they are subjectively witnessed and experienced; to think that this reality may be objectively considered would be a mistake. The act of reflection is not divested from the thing reflected upon, but, rather, is the continued reverberation of it. So, while we may appear to reflect, it is we who are reflected. That which arises before the mind is like a hammer striking a bell or a stone; the mind is the bell, or stone, reverberating according to the nature of the strike; the reverberations in the mind are our impressions of the thing. Even to reflect upon them is to experience them, for the impressions made on the senses are no more "real", or legitimate, than the impressions awakened in the mind, which is only a more sublte extension of bodily sense. But a mind which has been anchored in the depths of things will not mistake the reverberation, or the thing, for something definite and concrete. Any judgements formed will be nuanced, tentative, and conditional in the extreme. Likewise, sense impressions will acquire an indefiniteness, or a kind of fleeting quality, even as they are received. The mind operates as a witness, without forming absolute judgments, and, even when formulating conceptions, does not take itself too seriously. There is a lightness; even the most reverent emotions and meaningful insights are accompanied by a flexible and irreverent wit. And the action of thinking becomes, as it were, a kind of dancing, with the object being, not to distinguish true from false, but, to dance well. She, the illumined, orchestrates her thoughts as a dance is choreographed, and the question in matters of choreography is never, "Is it true or false?", but, "Is it well or poorly done?"; "Does it evoke, at once, both soul and spirit?"; "Is it beautiful?"; "Is it sublime?" This, then, becomes, in a sense, the new criterion of truth. "Is it sublime?" Moreover, "Does it flow?"; "Can it dance?"

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 06:16 PM         

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quote:

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I meant yogi in the definition of one who is following a spiritual path or who has gained a high level of insight.

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High in relation to whom?

Yes, perhaps, in some ponds, I am a "yogi".

Love To You.

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From: *
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posted January 11, 2009 06:24 PM         

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To the majority of average people out there. In relation to a "Joe Schmoe".

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
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posted January 11, 2009 06:27 PM         

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Gee, thanks.

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
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posted January 11, 2009 06:27 PM         

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I think you just wanted to say "Gyana".

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posted January 11, 2009 06:28 PM         

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It is a fun word to say!

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 06:30 PM         

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 07:45 PM         

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That's an amazing dream, T.

The most significant dream I had doesnt compare to that, but its interesting:

I was in a bookstore, looking for the right book for me...

And a man who seemed like a teacher (later in the dream,
while we were talking, people came up to pay their respects to him),
saw me looking at a copy of "Passion of the Christ" (a book, in the dream).

He said, "It is a wonderful book, but, if you choose this one, you wont be able to read any other."

Then we went and had this long talk, which I pretty much forgot upon waking, and dont remember at all now.

I dream very rarely, and I've only had a few lucid dreams in my life.

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Posts: 9582
From: 11/6/78 11:38am Boston, MA
Registered: Aug 2004

posted January 11, 2009 08:11 PM         

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Anyone but a writer can find joy in writing, no problem.

Anyone but a carpenter can hammer a nail without thinking.

We identify with our roles at the expense of our roles.

More to the point, we identify with ourselves at the expense of ourselves.

What consciousness captures, it stigmatizes.

There is no way to just be.

No way but the way.

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From: *
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posted January 11, 2009 08:16 PM         

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Posts: 706
From: ohio
Registered: Nov 2008

posted January 11, 2009 08:45 PM         

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Yup, I'm simple. I thought I was deep, then started reading your threads...LOL!!

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