What is it that sees (hears, feels, thinks)?

[James]

@anon78228991

So when I put the question, ‘What is this energy?’ who is putting the question?

You are putting this question.

[Utes]

Thank you, Nobody - interesting article.
I’ve been reading about research on jackdaws, which live in communities. They often start quarelling about the theft of nesting materials, one bird willl begin to cark to state it’s complaint and all other birds of the colonie will join in. After a while it’s suddenly over, everyone has forgotten the reason for the agitation and carries on.

[Utes]

@DanMcD

When something occurs, ‘anger’ say, we don’t just have it and move on, over and done like the tiger. We can question why and how it came about, approve or disapprove of our reaction to it. Vow to keep it from happening again, join an anger management class, etc, etc. We have evolved from the pure instantaneous actions of the animal with this ability to assess, judge what we do

In addition (if tigers were humans), we also create e.g.: the tigress who has really shown it to the tiger or the tiger who loves her so much and is always rejected

[PhilipB]

@James

@anon78228991

So when I put the question, ‘What is this energy?’ who is putting the question?

You are putting this question.

Perhaps that is itself, the significance for why “I” have arrived.

I arrive (late) so as to put the question of myself to myself.

[anon78228991]

@James

You are putting this question.

No. What is this nameless energy in consciousness when it is not acted upon in any way? There is no other energy. There is no observer or questioner waiting for an answer. Do you see what this means?

[rickScott]

@Utes

After a while it’s suddenly over, everyone has forgotten the reason for the agitation and carries on

I’m trying to imagine liberals and conservatives forgetting their conflict and moving peacefully on … nah, can’t do it, we should take lessons from corvids. (Only we’d probably end up getting in an interspecies fight with them.)

[anon78228991]

@nobody

Not expecting so much, more: I’m hoping for something to happen. A flood of beauty, or a still pond of peacefulness, the Answer, the Question, understanding, emptiness. Something! Anything but drab ho-hum ‘reality.’ If I wanted that, I wouldn’t bother meditating … I’d just LIVE.

Alright, you are hoping for something to happen. Why? What could possibly happen that is more important than this moment of waiting?

[PhilipB]

@anon78228991

@James

You are putting this question.

No. What is this nameless energy in consciousness when it is not acted upon in any way?

Then it acts of its own accord, such that it is. And as such, it now calls “I” to be to likewise act of its own accord. After all, “I” did not exist before it, but it is before me.

I cannot refuse its call to be, which is the gift of myself. For I did not yet exist.

[rickScott]

@anon78228991

What could possibly happen that is more important than this moment of waiting?

It’s not about importance, rather: enjoyment. Waiting is rarely enjoyable for me. Likewise when the initial grace period of peaceful ‘pure’ looking is over, to continue looking is rarely enjoyable. Unless something intercedes, I move towards enjoyment (pleasure, comfort) and away from suffering (pain, boredom).

[DanMcD]

@anon78228991

That dread is the real you; everything else that you call ‘you’ is just that dread covered over. Can that dread come into full flower?

It may be. For me. this dread is I think the ever present fear that my ‘house of cards’ will be crumbled and the person I present myself to be will be seen as the sham that it is. I get a taste of this when I am humiliated by something, someone, some memory. I feel diminished , small, frightened etc. Thought may want to “stay with” this feeling with the goal of letting it ‘flower’ but is that just a ruse to try to de-sensitize one self to the feeling of humiliation?

[anon78228991]

@PhilipB

Then it acts of its own accord, such that it is. And as such, it now calls “I” to be to likewise act of its own accord. After all, “I” did not exist before it, but it is before me. I cannot refuse its call to be, which is the gift of myself. For I did not yet exist.

Are you sharing the question with us?

[PhilipB]

@anon78228991

@PhilipB

Then it acts of its own accord, such that it is. And as such, it now calls “I” to be to likewise act of its own accord. After all, “I” did not exist before it, but it is before me. I cannot refuse its call to be, which is the gift of myself. For I did not yet exist.

Are you sharing the question with us?

Of course. There’s a lot to unpack there.

[anon78228991]

@nobody

It’s not about importance, rather: enjoyment. Waiting is rarely enjoyable for me. Likewise when the initial grace period of peaceful ‘pure’ looking is over, to continue looking is rarely enjoyable. Unless something intercedes, I move towards enjoyment (pleasure, comfort) and away from suffering (pain, boredom).

Without the movement towards pleasure, is there any pain at all? So there is no grace period. There is no such thing as peaceful, pure looking. There is only looking. The moment you assign results to looking by labelling what you see it has already moved over into the realm of pleasure. If you look there is neither peace nor noise, neither pleasure nor pain. When you say, ‘This is peaceful,’ you have stopped looking; and almost immediately the opposites begin to appear.

[Viswa]

@anon78228991

Without the movement towards pleasure, is there any pain at all?

Hi Paul. How are you? - after a long time - happy to speak with a friend.

So, this “movement towards pleasure” - is this an idea or actuality? - why this always happens in our life? - why we keep on running for pleasure from ‘thoughts and senses’ - even though we see “it brings sufferings”? Does this ‘seeing’ is not deep/serious?

Why pleasure throws a rope around our neck and drags us towards the materials (like car,house,etc…) or experiences (like lust,movies,party,picnic,etc…) or people (friends,parents,children,etc…)?. Why we couldn’t be ‘alone’ ?

Is it because - we couldn’t find the beauty in being ‘alone’?

[anon78228991]

@PhilipB

Of course. There’s a lot to unpack there.

I am aware of a movement of energy in my consciousness which usually I am quick to label as anger, hurt or greed. What happens when I don’t label it or do anything else about it?

[anon78228991]

@DanMcD

It may be. For me. this dread is I think the ever present fear that my ‘house of cards’ will be crumbled and the person I present myself to be will be seen as the sham that it is.

To whom are you presenting this façade?

[anon78228991]

@Viswa

So, this “movement towards pleasure” - is this an idea or actuality? … Why we couldn’t be ‘alone’ ? Is it because - we couldn’t find the beauty in being ‘alone’?

There is no beauty in being alone; there is just being alone. It is neither painful nor beautiful. But we are never really alone; we are always in the company of the past. So what is the past? As it now comes into consciousness as a memory, why is that memory there? And is it possible to be totally alone with just one memory so that its whole significance is seen and understood?

[PhilipB]

@anon78228991

@PhilipB

Of course. There’s a lot to unpack there.

I am aware of a movement of energy in my consciousness which usually I am quick to label as anger, hurt or greed. What happens when I don’t label it or do anything else about it?

Well, it’s too late to go back and now erase the label “anger” along with what is manifesting as anger. So, before we jump to what might happen without the label, we might first need to understand how it is that we are poising ourselves in orientation towards this “happening” that is already called anger. Perhaps the label is not simply just “excused” out of existence, but remains as the locus of orientation, not unlike the way we might orient ourselves towards a door in order to to walk through it. What we formally take to be a barrier (label), may also act as the crossroads, beyond which the more-to-it (what is held within) can emerge.

Paradoxically, what sustains anger is our refusal to become angry. If division is conflict and (as James was pointing out earlier) no deliberate act is possible, then shouldn’t we close the gap of division, embrace, walk into and through this feeling of anger in an act not unlike a consummation?

Perhaps we must humble ourselves before anger in order to become its supplicants. There we might ask in earnest, “what are you? Why do you not leave me?”

[anon78228991]

@PhilipB

Well, it’s too late to go back and now erase the label “anger” along with what is manifesting as anger. They both emerge together and are in fact, coextensive.

But when I call it anger I am already going back, aren’t I? It is like I am taking a step back from whatever is happening, labelling it from what I already know and then moving from there. Before I call it anger, hurt or greed, there is a movement of energy, a certain flame which I am aware of inside consciousness. Can I allow this flame to burn without the desire to dampen it?

[Viswa]

@anon78228991

why is that memory there? And is it possible to be totally alone with just one memory so that its whole significance is seen and understood?

So, we couldn’t be alone - as we are entangled with past/memory. But I see, there is gap between the pasts/thoughts - small intervals of ‘aloneness’. This small intervals immediately forgotten due to sensual or thought perceptions.

We can’t throw away/erase our ‘past/memory’ - because our ‘mind/brain’ is designed to store the past. But the past couldn’t be in it’s right place. Whenever there is this gap/emptiness - this ‘past’ comes into action in form of ‘thoughts’ through/not through ‘sensual perception’.

So, something always acts upon the emptiness - because there is fear of ‘something is missing’. But when we hear songs or dance or taste a sweet or feel/see a beautiful garden/nature or in sex or etc… - you may have seen - there is some kind of beauty which differs from pleasure. Pleasure is - if we achieve some expectation and the pain is if we don’t achieve the expectation/lost what we been attached. But the above said beauty is way beyond it. There is no expectation in it. It flows without any desire. But these are physical experience - which in time will die. In time, the body,senses,earth,universe will die - so we can’t experience this beauty all time. It is temporary.

In my view, this ‘fear’ arises in nothingness if the same ‘beauty’ is not felt in this nothingness.

What you say Paul?

But the funny thing is, the ‘materials/objects/atom’ is itself created from our ‘thoughts’. Whatever we see is only a reflection of our ‘Imaginations/thoughts’. We are living in a simulation. So, whatever we experience as above said beauty is not ‘truth’. it cannot be because - this atom from which universe expands - is time bound. So, whatever is time bound is only limited and not ‘truth’. These are just manifestations of ‘thoughts’.

So, ‘the other’ is beyond this beauty. It is ‘not this, not this’. The ‘now’ is immortal and fixed. It is not a moving thing. Whatever moves always takes rest.

Okay - coming back to ‘aloneness’ - we fear this emptiness - but there is something which eradicates this fear too. And it is called ‘devotion’. It may be a form of thought. But it is also one of the boat to cross the sea. After it is crossed, there is no need of this boat - and so merged with ‘the other’.

So - you are alone but sing,dance and do every thing related to the ‘truth’ - and so compassion will blow it’s wind to take the boat to ‘the other’ shore.

Have a Beautiful Life.