Xeno,
Thank you for your post, I found it both resonant and refreshing. Comments below. ________________________________ In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" > <anartaxius@> wrote: <snip> ...They are not empathetic, they are not sympathetic, they do not care about a person's individuality, because that individuality is a false perception they are trying to root out. They do not care about a person's beliefs, or what is good or bad, because that is all part of the illusion. But they do have a purpose, to trick us into seeing through our own illusions one way or another. Any aspect of life can function like this if you let it. Even Barry can be a surrogate for a master if one lets the experience in as a lesson, can function like a master even if he is not a 'master' in any sense like the ones adored on this forum. This is because every moment, every situation is a part of the whole of life, and it is that whole that beckons us to see it in its entirety.... ***In the case of a Buddha, Christ or Krishna isn't empathy---I agree with everything else you mention---with the suffering of humanity and creation what motivates them to manifest? Even with Maharishi, Krishnamurti and OSHO I sensed a capacity for empathy although I agree they were without sentimentality. Although I agree with a previous comment I thought you made---(sorry if I'm paraphrasing) that what is communicated on FFL is a voice and can hardly be used to measure the whole communicator---one of the issues I have with the declarations of enlightenment, on this forum, is that the practitioners, or at least their voices, seem so emotionally unenlightened, while having so much of the verbiage down. For my money, the voices on this forum that sound closest to the original western use of the word enlightenment (as in the renaissance) are yours and Curtis's. The rest, including mine, are something entirely different. But then some of us have other interests---holes to dig, nests to raid and finding a place to lay our heads. ________________________________ From: Xenophaneros Anartaxius <anartax...@yahoo.com> To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2011 7:44:44 PM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Excuses for avoiding liberation? [was Re: Blissy vs. Happy] [Comments in text] --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <jstein@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" <anartaxius@> > wrote: > > > > Ravi, I was just questioning how deeply we can know someone's > > internal state by external cues. I do not know what Barry's > > internal state is. I for one cannot figure him out, but I am > > not convinced that projecting my hypotheses as an explanation > > of his behaviour is really to any point. > > > > Judy has a very keen intellect, but I do think she also > > projects her own emotional states onto others. I *think* that, > > but it is an hypothesis, because I do not *know* that. I also > > *think* she does not think that she projects her internal > > states onto the world. But that thought might not have any > > substance to it. There is always ambiguity because what people > > feel and think is not necessarily what they say, nor does their > > behaviour always indicate what is really going on in there. > > I find it fascinating that you focus on my purported > emotional projections onto Barry, while completely > ignoring Barry's own tendency to project. I was posting via a post you had written, and to give what I wanted to say some kind of point of view, that seemed to me to be the point of view to take. Barry obviously does mention others in his posts and makes comments about them. Don't feel like you have been picked out for persecution. If 10 vehicles are going 75 in a 50 miles per hour zone and one gets ticketed out of the group for speeding and the other get off free, it might just be the fall of the dice. I did try to make sure I said when I suggested you were projecting, that in fact that was also what I was doing when I suggested it. I try to make a habit of not projecting, of being neutral, but do not always succeed, but in the past when I have brought up the subject, you have always retorted that that was a diversion from the argument at hand. So, do you feel you project your inner feelings and musings and ideas onto others as you discuss them, or do you feel you do not do this? I think this concept is one of the important linchpins of the enlightenment game. As Maharishi said, unity is real, diversity is conceptual. Zen masters exhort their disciples to give up opinions. Adyashanti mentioned in an interview that as a child he came to the conclusion that adults were insane because they believed what they thought. This idea can also be appreciated in say, the Bible, 'God said let there be light, and there was light.' That is, there is a connexion between word and form. You can see this in the Gospel attributed to John, 'In the beginning was the word and the word was with (or toward) the god (theos), and this same was the god.' There is a connexion between thought and what we perceive exists. I do not want to get into some kind of theological argument here because I am decidedly not theological. In thinking about our experience, about the world, about others, we are essentially creating a world of our own making and layering it atop reality, which is always there anyway. We are carving up the unity of existence, of being, into our conceptual matrix by which we understand the world. Processes like meditation, like TM, or the TM-Sidhi techniques are an aid into seeing past this process back to the beginning before it all starts, and at some point the vice-like grip the mind and its concepts have on obscuring experience will break and there is what is called awakening, and the process stops, at least long enough to see how it works. It is astonishing how thought, how ideas, how opinions can distort experience, and create its own analogue for direct experience. Direct experience is silent, non-judgmental; you could not have any argument with what Barry says or does in this. One can only have an argument when one is in opposition to reality in part or whole. Of course you cannot forever be without thought, but once the process of identifying with thought is sufficiently broken, it becomes much more difficult to get involved with the realities (aka illusions) created by what one thinks. In my own life I am still not completely clear how this perception is playing out, but it has been a fascinating adventure to have the reality by which I lived my life in a single moment completely stripped away. And then, a few years later to have that reality come crashing down when the effects of past events began to work themselves out of my system, only to have the 'awakening' perception gradually return. I have had at least one argument with Barry, and one with you over the past half year. Both were very trying, but the net effect for me was about the same. The process of the arguments was what was trying, the content really was irrelevant, but a lot of energy is required to maintain a point of view. In enlightenment one is attempting to get away from a point of view, to become boundless. For example, TM takes one out of a point of view. With sufficient time at this, that boundless point of view may take hold for everything one does, though one still sees through the eyes, hears through the ears, and there are thoughts, but the sense that there is an entity that has the thoughts, a 'me', fades away more and more. I read somewhere that Krishnamurti said that his 'secret' was that he did not mind what is happening. This is what happens, as the identification with the world created by our thoughts breaks down by way of meditation etc., the disconnects between that world of thought and what is going on become less and less because they are not so important, and yet there is no feeling of disassociation with life, if anything, everything becomes more intimate and enjoyable. It is not necessary to fix life to match the internal world of thought, the reverse happens: take it as it comes; or let thy will be done, whatever one conceives or not 'thy' to be. As far as I can see, Barry conserves his energy for what he likes to do. If he does not engage in an argument, perhaps he knows this, perhaps not, but he is saving himself a lot of work by not engaging. It is really amazing how much energy is required to maintain the world of our thought intact against an outer world that does not quite ever seem to fit in with them. The period where the storm Irene knocked me out of most communication, and the usual habits of day to day living made me reflect on this more than usual. How much am I willing to expend to deal with attempting to adjust the world to conform with my thought compared to just enjoying and living life. After all I do not have much time left. The younger folks have a bit more time to play around. Now I will make a projection of my thought and map it onto the world. True or false it is just a statement and its only useful reality is if it gets someone to see something they have not seen before. I think you spend a much greater amount of energy maintaining your world view than Barry does, and whatever else he may be or does, in regard to the forum, he has the advantage of conserving his energy because he doesn't care. He seems to be able to take and leave a point of view. You seem to care, and that means you have to maintain a point of view. A true master has only one care, to get his/her student to enlightenment. They are not empathetic, they are not sympathetic, they do not care about a person's individuality, because that individuality is a false perception they are trying to root out. They do not care about a person's beliefs, or what is good or bad, because that is all part of the illusion. But they do have a purpose, to trick us into seeing through our own illusions one way or another. Any aspect of life can function like this if you let it. Even Barry can be a surrogate for a master if one lets the experience in as a lesson, can function like a master even if he is not a 'master' in any sense like the ones adored on this forum. This is because every moment, every situation is a part of the whole of life, and it is that whole that beckons us to see it in its entirety. > > These are just a few selections from his posts in the > past seven days: > > ----- > > My "sin" is that I won't give them [Jim, MZ, > Ravi, and Judy] any attention and allow them > to suck me into an argument so that they can > spew their venom at me. And the more I ignore > them, and the more that their attempts *to* > suck me into arguments fail, the more > obsessive and the more pissed off they seem > to get. > > Was I right on by calling this syndrome > "attention vampirism," or what? They're all > acting like vampires who haven't been able > to feed for some time, and are starting to > starve. > > 289050 > > 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." > > 288761 > > Alternate titles for this post [by Masked Zebra] include: > > "Jealousy: A Whine In 1,430 Words" > > "Why Is This Guy Famous And I'm Not?" > > "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" > > 288633 > > Translated from the Latin, "I argue therefore I am." This > is a play on "Cogito ergo sum" -- "I think therefore I am," > and is held as a credo by those whose only possible mode > of social interaction seems to be trying to provoke people > into arguing with them. > > 288474 > > ----- > > Xeno, you've been here long enough to have seen any > number of this type of post from Barry. There have > even been a couple directed at you. Yet you haven't > commented at all on his propensity to project. > > Any idea why that might be? Why are you focused > exclusively on your perception of my projections > onto Barry? I was of course projecting my idea that this is what you do, and I ignored what Barry does this time. But Barry probably would not engage over this. You tend to engage much more. We could ask him about it. We could ask the question of Barry: 'Do you feel you project your own ideas about the world and people onto us?' He could say 'yes', he could say 'no', he could ignore. He could do other things. He does occasionally talk about his experiences when he is not stirring the pot, and I always find this interesting, at least when it is not about bars, beer, babes, etc.; he is not entirely opaque about his experiences so I interpret, though it does not seem to be frequent. It is not required that one bare one's soul for the edification or clarification of others. As far as enlightenment is concerned, it is not even necessary to have a soul, it is only necessary to be. You have being; Barry has being. You both have the required qualifications for the journey, and both of you as far as I can imagine, have been travelling on this peculiar path for some time. We never fall off the path, because it really does not exist.
