Dear Bob, all steps lead to the same place. It's a simple concept..."to be or not to be." You know it all and none of it at the same time so don't let that get in your way. I, for one, have missed your facetious wit and tales of the unenlightened-enlightened, unrealized-self-realized and am glad to hear you are engaged in the question of "being" still.
--- On Thu, 9/8/11, Bob Price <bobpri...@yahoo.com> wrote: From: Bob Price <bobpri...@yahoo.com> Subject: Re: [FairfieldLife] Excuses for avoiding liberation? [was Re: Blissy vs. Happy] To: "FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com" <FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com> Date: Thursday, September 8, 2011, 8:37 AM "No One Is Paying Any Attention To Me So I'll Suck Up To A Few People Hoping They'll Fall For It And Focus On ME" I'm writing this post from the nurse's station in the psychiatric wing of the Betty Ford Centre in Rancho Mirage. In the event the nurse returns, I apologize in advance if my post ends abruptly. As part of my recovery program, I'm not allowed any connection that might allow me to post on FFL or any Internet forum where I could announce my recent ascendance to a higher state of consciousness. My present circumstance began a couple of weeks ago last Saturday when I started using the mantra BIRDIENUMNUM after watching "The Party" the night before. After one meditation, I began to experience a complete sense of being present and awake----of being here and now---in a place I had always been and therefore could never find. Not unlike a fish that never stops to consider the latest fashion in swimming suits. At first, I felt a great deal of fear and trepidation as I started to entertain the possibly I might have finally become "enlightened" and wondered if the planet could sustain another realized soul with a heroic capacity for sticking to a narrative no matter what evidence was presented to the contrary. Fortunately, it was not long before I realized that I was not realized since that implied that I was different and since I had always been where I had arrived---I had always been there, and had not gone anywhere that wasn't where I already was. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bT75Uce6pqc Of course, the realization that I wasn't realized---since nothing changes including the fact that everything is always changing and there is nothing new under the sun, brought me to the realization that everything was a manifestation of my own thoughts and therefore any of my thoughts not only could---but likely would become manifest. Then the panic set in when I realized that with any thought I might bring back Pol Pot, Stalin or even someone claiming to be enlightened. At this point a strained mightily in an attempt to stop thinking, but try as i might I couldn't stop the thought from coming and the next thing I knew I was channeling Harvey Weinstein. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JVkonHpxKk&feature=related Regrettably, this cognition lead to the incident of my insulting Obbajeeba, one of my favorite collaborators on FFL---I hope he will accept this as my sincere apology. At first, I thought I could sustain the new occupant of my lower self although the following day the wife did comment on the calories I seemed to be consuming and how much I kept asking everyone if they knew who I was. By Monday things came to a head---which lead to my present incarceration. The trouble began when I started to act out certain FFL posts at the wife's office. The one I felt particularly compelled to execute was Turq's "People Of Color" post. I think it was the Producer "in me" that saw this as a rare opportunity for self-expression. I was so impressed with Turq's post that I bought a bunch of paint in spray cans--- I was particularly drawn to Krishna blue (my favorite color) and Orange (Frank Sinatra’s favorite color) and started to spray paint all the women in the office. I even convinced the "Young Attractive Woman with Large Breasts" to take off her blouse and other gear and let me spray paint both of her breasts. This is where the problem really started as the young woman complained about the "She Has David Bowie Eyes" look I attempted by painting one breast blue and the other green. It was then that I realized the paint I was using was indelible and the s**t hit the fan just as the wife returned to find her staff painted in bright colors running around the office naked. The last thing I remember was wondering if one pink woman was enough---just before someone clocked me with a paperweight---and the next thing I remember waking up where I am now. They say I'm not the first not realized, realized, person they've had here. They claim they had many, including a number of levitators, and the only effective remedy is cold turkey with a vigorous completion of the 12 steps for the not realized, realized. Although I can't see anything that I need to recover from---since I only woke to where I’ve always been, it seems my best option is to play along and do a little drafting and see if I make it to step two. There are two other beds with the names of FFL posters in my room. No, the names are not Ravi or If Not Now When. People who drive dangerously or whose claims of higher consciousness are tolerated to get them to wash the dishes are sent to another facility. I'm sure you've guessed this--- the beds are reserved for Turq and Robin. This might surprise you since both Turq and Robin have stated clearly they want nothing to do with any claims of realization (although in Robin's case---one assumes to cover all the bases---he maintains a placeholder on the past, not to mention the fact that he killed off Jesus to avoid any chance of being called square), but I'm told claims of not being realized can be a slippery slope into my present state of not being realized realization. Just to give him a heads up, Turq's bed is equipped with a NetFlix enabled television and he will be allowed to continue to post his film reviews. Since I've not been given any such privilege, I think of this as a kind of basket weaving. Robin, I think Mel is in the next room. I believe I saw him go by earlier in a straight jacket although I can't swear I wasn’t hallucinating. In case the wife has compromised my account and is monitoring my posts the following link is for her. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eja-popojUo PS: Everyone---who enjoys their flashbacks as much as I do--- knows that the REAL thing Douglas Engelbart, Alan Kay, their Holinesses Steve's Jobs and Wozniak, Larry Ellison, GUI, Xerox PARC labs, SRI, Apple and the "Valley", have in common is LSD. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_the_Dormouse_Said ________________________________ From: maskedzebra <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Thursday, September 8, 2011 5:16:28 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Excuses for avoiding liberation? [was Re: Blissy vs. Happy] Another instance of this on this forum is how MZ views what he does as "missionary work." He is preaching to the poor, deluded people who still believe in the enlightenment metaphor, and trying to convince them (for their own good, of course) to climb on board the Jesus Bang Bus. Again, the metaphor is "Be like me." RESPONSE: Barry, you couldn't be more wrong here. What you say here is the same as my insisting you are now located in America rather than Europe. No matter what you post, I will continue to believe you are here in North America. Are you dead or something? Try at least to get the *facts* right, even though you perversely are incapable of understanding my philosophy. By the very nature of what I believe in I *cannnot* provide any spiritual solution to the present predicament of human beings in this universe. Curtis represents the person closest to my own way of seeing things, and his philosophy in some purely theoretical sense is the opposite to my own. If you want to say I have converted Curtis to my point of view, then, I guess you are right. But Curtis doesn't believe this is the case. Are you going to refute him in this? Your problem, Barry, is that something has hit you so hard neurologically and psychologically, that you have lost the capacity seemingly to be hurt into the truth. Your experience of existing in the universe has taken on a monolithic form which deprives you of the existential kick that is there in every moment. You want proof of this? Just observe what your mind is doing right in this moment: it is refusing, a priori and involuntarily, to do anything but react to what I am saying. You can't take in even the content of what is being presented to you in this moment. That you are intelligent and discerning and interesting as a person is undeniable if I am to go by many of your posts. But take Judy's persistent attempt to set you straight: you walk away from that challenge, and carry on blithely as if no one has ever scored an important point—to the detriment of your own sense of well-being. This anaesthetizing of your own personal consciousness to that which would have you become vulnerable and open (even while maintaining a necessary disinterestedness) goes unrecognized by yourself, and in the instance of myself, you entirely miss—each and every time—what I am saying. For example, in this segment of your latest post which I have quoted here: I don't even believe that Christ exists anymore: How do you fit *that* into your interpretation of my motives? And I have absolutely nothing to offer up to anyone at FFL—or anywhere else—which could constitute some form of spiritual truth which could affect their consciousness—or their souls. I write on FFL *for my own benefit*—my motives are identical to those of Curtis. Wake up, Barry.