Sources to support this, please?.. TnkU!.
The core essence of things are the things themselves, which when observed vanish.
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Thank for keeping me honest, turns out I should have qualified my statement. Theravada Buddhism asserts that awareness and awareness-of-awareness run serially. Other flavors (Mahayana, Vajrayana, Tibetan, Dzogchen) all assert they run parallel.
My original text for this idea is from an article by Wenge Huang, here’s the crux of it:
According to the empirical materials of Theravada Buddhism, if we regard each
aggregate as an “awareness” which is the state of being conscious of something, then
contemplating the five aggregates would reveal the existence of “awareness of
awareness”, and discern that it arises a moment after each aggregate and they do not
appear simultaneously.Thus, one may realize that the notion that there is a constant self experiencing/observing
all aggregates just results from “awareness of awareness” appearing between any two
aggregates, something that under ordinary conditions happens very quickly. (That’s like
a torch spinning so fast that it looks like a ring of fire.)This would lead to the insight of “non-self” which means no subject of awareness (or
consciousness) at all. The sense of self just emerges out of the process of alternating of
“awareness” and “awareness of awareness”. Our interpretation of “non-self” is very
similar to David Hume’s “Bundle theory”.
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What are the consequences of this understanding of ‘core essence of things?’ How might it affect the life of the person who holds this view? (You, perhaps?)
These are the consequences and how it affects the life of a person who does not hold this view, but has come to this understanding 
:
Why haven’t I a problem about not earning a livelihood? Because - very simple. You’re all waiting? (Laughter) You’re a strange people all right! (Laughter) I’ve no problem because I don’t mind what happens. You understand? I don’t mind if I fail or succeed, I don’t mind if I have money or not money - personally I have no money, thank god. I don’t want money, but I need food and clothes and shelter, and if somebody gives me, it’s all right, if somebody doesn’t, I live where I am. You understand my question? I have no problem because I don’t demand anything from anybody or from life. I wonder if you understand this.
Krishnamurti, Ojai 2nd Public Talk 3rd April 1977
The answer to this question is irrelevant.
Meaning: Things exist ‘on their own’ whether or not they are observed?
What vanishes? To whom does it vanish, can you give an example?
No problem.
Well, there is that famous phrase someone said about “the observer is the observed”. But it seems that this is not so for most of us, since how can we observe something without the observer and the thing observed?
And there is also that other famous phrase that someone else said about “there is nothing that exists in and of itself”. Which seems not to be so for most of us either, since wherever we look everything appears to us as existing in and of itself.
But when what those two phrases imply is carefully observed, both the division between the observer and the observed, and the appearance of the existence of everything in and of itself, vanishes.
So, if instead of dividing what I said into two parts, you had observed it as a whole, you would have seen that what I was trying to say is that the core essence of things (including the observer) is emptiness… which is not the same as saying that there is no core essence of things.
It is then that one can genuinely say…
I’ve no problem because I don’t mind what happens
Krishnamurti, Ojai 2nd Public Talk 3rd April 1977
Emptiness meaning what? There are at least three nontrivially different versions: Buddhist emptiness, Krishnamurtian emptiness, existentialism emptiness.
You left out Fraggle emptiness.
We each have to discover ‘our‘own’.
“Nontrivial”?
Do we have our own emptiness or our own way of looking at the same emptiness? Is the search for the ultimate essence of things trivial, nontrivial, both, neither? Are we seduced by words?
Empty of any image regarding reality
All words, which together with the words of others that you do not mention, speak essentially of the same thing; bearing in mind that the word is not the thing… otherwise, one runs the risk of thinking that everything is empty except the emptiness itself.
Does emptiness depend on “our own way of looking at the same emptiness”?
Wanting to be free from all suffering is trivial, non-trivial, both, neither?
We are not seduced by the words themselves, but by the imagination that these words arouse in us.
Yes, each of us has to meet his own emptiness, which is no different from other emptinesses. Or as the saying goes: “known one, known all”.
Plugging that into what you said above: “the essence of things is to be empty of any image regarding reality.” Is that a fair representation of your view? A concrete example would be great: What is the essence of the message you are now reading?
Arouse is right! Words (imagination) can get you very very high, and very very low. Pandora!
The notion resonates with me that sentient beings are like organs of sensation/experience that enable the universe to sense/experience itself. Going along with this, our mission as sentients would be simply to sense/experience.
This would make us the universe’s touchy/feelers.
Are we doing a better job than the amoebas and the cockroaches?
How come we are not the universe’s hands and brain? Does it have any? Is that someone else’s job?
If we take the universe to be the great project of constant recycling of energy; surely our purpose here is to help make compost? (nb. to which we should apparently avoid adding citrus and cooked food)
Klassik Mad MakDougDoug Musing-musings!
All we Universe boys and girls (and hybrids) have a perspective to bring to the Big Picture.
Maybe we are. Are we? Is the universe pressing these keys through my body? Am I channeling das Universum? Am I possessed by IT?
You need you some Sophie in your life: https://sophiestrand.substack.com/
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I found the following exchange with Bard delightful. AIs can surprise you sometimes!
Bard:
Ego can sometimes stifle creativity, as we may be afraid to express ourselves for fear of being judged. Without ego, we would be more free to express ourselves creatively.
Me:
But, without ego, if we expressed ourselves, what would we be expressing? (With that I thought I had Bard backed into a corner, but it was up to the challenge.)
Bard:
That’s a good question. Without ego, we would be expressing our true selves, our authentic selves. We would be expressing our thoughts, feelings, and experiences without fear of judgment or criticism. We would be able to share our creativity without worrying about how it would be received.
In a way, we would be expressing the divine spark within us. We would be expressing our connection to the universe and to all of creation. We would be expressing our love, our compassion, and our joy.
It is difficult to say exactly what we would be expressing, as it would be something that has never been expressed before. It would be a new and unique expression of the human spirit.
Here are some examples of what we might express without ego:
Our deepest thoughts and feelings, without fear of judgment.
Our creativity, without worrying about how it will be received.
Our love, compassion, and joy, without holding back.
Our connection to the universe and to all of creation.
Our true selves, our authentic selves.
It is impossible to say for sure what we would express without ego, but it would be something that is both beautiful and profound. It would be an expression of the divine spark within us, and it would bring us closer to one another and to the universe.
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