That’s a perfectly reasonable reaction.
But now you have processed your reaction, put it out of the way.
That’s a perfectly reasonable reaction.
But now you have processed your reaction, put it out of the way.
Will you talk to your neighbour about this Dan? In Europe, the Osprey is a protected species and nest sites would probably be protected by law against destruction. Of course, the birds are probably not aware of this.
Probably not Sean. Osprey are protected here also but there’s a caveat for boat owners: you’re not responsible for the fate of the nest if it blows off when you are using your boat.
Desire is a very powerful energy and difficult to detect and worth exploring. I am not sure but this question seems to be arising from desire. I have an image of meeting others with complications and I don’t like it. And then I react and ask “Can we meet one another without a flicker of complication?” Is this not a desire based on an image or reaction of what I don’t want? Where is the question coming from? Or do you mean like an experiment?
Stating that the processing between the brain/senses can “come to a stop” is interesting. Let’s explore that. We know the process (between the brain/senses) is automatic. For instance, if I close my eyes, I can still hear, feel, taste, and etc. I cannot stop that process but be immersed in it. Even when we dream we can’t stop the processing in that environment. If we stop processing, our “physiological needs” could never be met as they arise. Perhaps we can explore it differently?
In a serious discussion, you don’t think it has anything to do with what someone says? We can all just go about with our own way of thinking, adding thoughts, conversationally, as we please?
Can I meet the world as it is, not complicated by all my interpretations of it? This is really the question. Can I meet a tree as a tree, not as my image of a tree? Then we go a step further by asking if we can meet each other without complication. If there is any image of what this lack of complication means, there must be desire behind it. If we are imagining some special state of non-complication or simplicity, the whole thing is already distorted by our motive to achieve this state. But why should any human relationship be complicated? We have accepted that this is so for many thousands of years, which may just be our vanity.
Can psychological processing never even begin? Otherwise, it cannot come to a stop because time has been triggered; and then the idea or the notion of stopping is just another distant image which keeps the process rolling along.
Physiologically, it is necessary to process what I have just said; it needs to make linguistic sense; and this takes a certain amount of chronological time. There will also be a lot of psychological reactions to the question, as to any question, either this question of processing never beginning or the question of meeting each other without complication or some other question we might throw in. Can we allow those reactions to occur without processing them? The reactions are perfectly natural, reasonable, acceptable; they are part of relationship, which is a mixture of clarity and confusion in communication. These reactions have a very short lifespan. Can we watch them in their totality without adding a single extra ingredient?
But you have just told me that you are not interested in what someone says because it sounds too complicated.
In serious discussion it is understood it is a communication, speaking in a common context, and it is an observation, for the mind, and there is no individual speaking. Yet what happens is the words are taken in the image of an individual, and the communication is set aside as being the others self expression. This is compared to ones own ideas, automatically, and repeats the image of an individual. Failing in the communication what is one to do? We see this failure as represented by our differences, such as, people with differences, education, religion, politics, etc. What is this effort to communicate? Is it that there is no natural, human, connection, and this is frighteningly real? We have made it all a ritual. I see this fear, actually, fundamentally, in my self, and then I see it is what the human being has become.
But there are many individual reactions. When you say, ‘What???’ this is an individual reaction.
Please read what I wrote. The individual sees it as an individual reaction. This is what I was just now talking about. And again, … Don’t you see it?
You wrote, ‘What???’ That’s a reaction, isn’t it?
Let’s explore how desire arises a little more. A brain who is in contact with the “world as it is”, does not have such a desire or motive to see the “world as it is” thus would not pose such a question as “Can I meet the world as it is”? A brain who has not been conditioned with K’s teaching or hasn’t been influenced by the idea of “seeing a tree not as my image of a tree” would not pose such a question or have such a desire to. But a conditioned brain poses such a question and many more questions (see all your questions below). The brain asking the questions has identified with all kinds of ideas and the energy of desire has arisen in them.
Desire is unavoidable it seems. Because I have a strong desire to survive. Desire may be a very important energy. If you like, we can explore this energy and its role in us.
Yes it is ‘ritualized ‘. Behind it is the fear of the ‘individual’ wanting to present himself well, to always make a good impression. For communication all the arising of the ‘content’ has to be observed in awareness. There can be communing but we both have be ‘grounded’ in awareness. Either we are the ‘individual’ or we are awareness…and there is no ‘my’ awareness or ‘your’ awareness, just the state of being aware.
There is a desire to go in a certain direction. This desire is limited by the past, by my experiences and my hopes for the future; and there is a time lag between where I am and where I want to be. Also, there may a host of contradictory desires in the background. The desire for happiness, enlightenment, love, security - these are all in this limited field.
But there is also the desire to find out exactly where we are now before we begin to move away in any direction. All those questions come from this energy, which has no direction, no time lag and no other interest. It is not broken up. Desire is only a problem when it is broken up, contradictory. Then it will have conflict built into it. The desire to survive is the paramount physiological desire or urge of all living things; therefore survival is a very fundamental and universal issue. But where there is any psychological desire to survive as a separate identity there is already conflict involved because survival has now become a personal issue. In other words, thought has separated itself from the rest of the universe, using the human body as its vehicle.
This comes back to our earlier point: that the entire universe is consciousness. This may just be a random remark from a separate identity wishing to expand its power-base. Or it may be a statement describing the actuality of existence. Now which is it? And is there now the desire to find out the truth of the matter? Because if the entire universe is consciousness, - and I am choosing the word carefully; I am not saying the universe is conscious - this must have a terrific impact on that tiny mess I call my own consciousness, which no longer has any major part to play in my life. So these questions have to be asked, explored and answered simply, directly and cleanly.
“Desire” might not be the best word here. The tree roots move toward what is favorable for it. Desire might be a strictly human trait? The bird doesn’t ‘desire’ to survive, it acts to avoid the predator,etc. Desire implies a future time something other than the Now.
It is the difference between survival and continuity. Survival is an immediate action; continuity is a series of reactions.
Please be serious about all this. The way of thinking is all a reaction. To keep it as something individual, about some thing, is not getting anywhere.
Then tell us what you mean by this word ‘serious’ because we are not mind-readers. Is a serious mind meant to be incapable of reaction? Is this what you are saying?
The serious thinker understands they are using words to talk together. They understand the meaning does not stand in the words, verbally, but is in the mindfulness of the reader. It is not adding more words, more knowledge, each speculating on the knowledge, it is careful attentiveness. The responsibility is in the communication, in the communing together, not limited to the verbal use, not limited to self-expression, although obviously there will be casual differences and irregularities.
So I don’t get what someone is saying, and I challenge the writer for their comments. I challenge the writers words and I am actually looking at what I think the words tell me about the writer. This is going around in circles. The understanding is lost in our own misunderstanding of our selves, and what people have become, intellectually. It is keeping to a verbal understanding and wanting someone else to provide a better verbal understanding, to provide some new logic, or just wanting to be entertained with clever words.
So I see all this, this customary practice, and I realise I am stuck within an individualistic point of view. Then I seriously address this insight with careful, attentive, mindfulness; not distracted by the thoughts which separate I, me, him, and her. Then there is a shared communion talking together, learning about this mind freely, for the first time, afresh, not just grabbing words and making up stories.
Can a thinker ever be serious? Let’s approach it this way.