X, This'll be too long to read. I'm just putting it here cuz I want to write about it for the 2,001st time, but I think you should read it and see that I'm at least trying to be honest...laughable as that is for a goal.
You could be right. How would I ever know though? Only through you and I agreeing to keep certain words' definitions clearly agreed upon and policed could we hope to arrive at an agreement, and we both know that's not going to happen. I can't even do that when I talk to myself. And Godel's laughing too. And even then, if that purity, that clarity was achieved between us, then what? I have been wrong in deeply axiomatic ways ALL MY LIFE. And at almost 70 years of age, I've run out of time to meet all the challenges of my obviously broken personality. I'm no longer in the self-help business. I'm in the slap-my-forehead-oh-my-god-there-I-am-pretending-I'm-running-this-fucking-ape's-mind business. And every day is intense therapy -- with the mind trying to make sense of reality what with its yinyang spectrum of "war mongers puking murderous rage and cooing infants teaching perfect innocence." Most of the neo-advaitans are giving "programming instructions for hacking the brain." It's like they've been forced by their paying audiences to pretend that refining the thought process of an ape is true spirituality. BAH! If you're looking somewhere for truth, you've already blinded yourself by believing that that THAT which is to be sought is a visible object to the eye or to the mind or some other instrumentality or processing trick. As if. Brahma sought the bottom of His lotus stalk. 3000 years seeking it. Gave up. A metaphor for the limitation of omniscience -- both the kind espoused by the intellect and by the heart's intuitivity. No heart. No intellect. No kind of ken can can it and so THAT can't be put it up like preserves for future generations to spread on their spiritual toast. "Knowledge in the books stays in the books." Like that like that. Ask Guru Dev how much Maharishi grokked. It must have been torture from him to come out of the jungle into the world's sound orgy with all the nutzoid simians posing as sentients. I read Ramana and Nisargadatta, and I thought I was hep to that shit for years before I began to see that being hep was just more of me being ape seeking non-apehood. I don't get to know. Brahma didn't; where do I get off demanding I'm so important that I get to know? I mean really. It'd spoil the whole damned creation if I knew. My ignorance is part of a perfect plan that I dare not question. I'm not meant to be "an Edg." I'm not something that can be meant to be. "I'm not" doesn't mean I'm a something that could not be. And not-ness has actuality I never knew of until, well, I knew, but I wrote about it as if I knew for years before I knew. It was as if I was building my nervous system, growing the ability to know by laying down building blocks in actual molecules and psycho-physiological structures by dint of my hours of time processing the concepts of the Advaita. A child cannot tell the difference between a square and a circle until about the age of four. But it grows the nervous system that finally can have this truth revealed -- generally as an emergent phenomenon that makes the observation suddenly obvious. I think I grew my nervous system just exactly so. I built it and silence came to be seen by me as real instead of "nothing there." But of course, its realness is of another order altogether than the realness of the objects of consciousness. Again and again I approached the words and they always left me thirsty like drinking syrup instead of water. I loved the words, but they didn't get me to the bottom of the lotus stalk and never taught me about the limitation of concept and emotion. Yet did I drink. And after years of, say, two three hours a day at least of reading or writing about Advaita, silence just got real. Square/circle/obvious. "Nothing" had value to me and there were no words that could budge me into a doubt about that assertion. And it's all there in a single moment that every person on Earth can duplicate and fully experience. Simply stop. Stop and let that silly damned monkey pick its butt and chatter all it wants. Here's what I did and still do: I stop breathing. Even a bird has direct control and can stop breathing -- a penguin for instance can hold its breath, but what I'm pointing at is to momentarily stop the breath in its tracks and have the intent: "I'm not breathing. Go ahead if you want to, but I'm not going to start it up again." Prana is the king of all processes. Stop breathing and you get everyone's sincerest attention. All the senses, the intellect, every faculty springs into emergency mode. Watch the ape try to talk itself into breathing again. It's hilarious. All these sub-routines are blazing to red line, and you're just watching it all. It's so clear that one isn't part of that cacophony until one begins to breath again and clarity is gone. And that's just a few seconds for most folks before the breath starts up again by will or involuntarily -- yet what vastness is there if one but studies that moment again and again. "Studies" means paying attention to who's who and what's what in that moment. The doer is observable in that moment, and IT AIN'T YOU. Repeat until no longer necessary. Don't know if the above works even for me, but it's what I say when I try to explain myself. You? What say you about silence? Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" <anartaxius@...> wrote: > > Now suppose I got those books you read and reread, but only read the first > two pages of each one (but those two pages perhaps more than once)? Silence > being 'part of the definition of everything' sounds about right '-- that is > dirt, love, God, money, sin, Hitler -- any thing is merely nuanced silence'. > Smallness of ego sounds right too. > > I do not see that what is in that PDF file is essentially different than what > you said. It seems to me you have not quite grasped what you are > experiencing, that is, your explanation is not up to the task, which of > course you have acknowledged, but it seems to me you are right on the edge of > a cliff, but have not yet fallen off into infinity. For myself, I have read > very little on Advaita, but is that really the only way to experience it? > > This whole thing is reading between the words, but the words that trigger > this for you might not work for someone else. For example does the following > story have anything between the lines?: > --- > A woman is running from a tiger that's chasing her. She runs through the > woods until she gets to the edge of a cliff. The tiger is still behind her, > so she climbs down a vine. The tiger reaches the top of the cliff and paces > back and forth, licking its chops. Midway down the cliff, hanging onto the > vine, she sees another tiger below her, pacing back and forth, licking its > chops. As she's hanging there, two mice come out and start gnawing on the > vine. She tries to shoo them away, but they won't go. > > Just then she sees, growing out of the face of the cliff in front of her, a > wild strawberry. She picks it and eats it. It's delicious. > --- > > Ernest Hemingway said 'All good books are alike in that they are truer than > if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will > feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the > good and the bad , the ecstasy, the remorse and sorrow, the people and the > places and how the weather was.' > > Not everyone resonates with the same book however. > > Richard Fenyman said: 'Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in > fiction, to imagine things which are not really there, but just to comprehend > those things which are there.' > > 'A book is a mirror: when a monkey looks in, no apostle can look out.'* There > is the converse of that, which is your experience. > > *Christoph Lichtenberg > > If you are reading something unfamiliar, or even something that appears to > contradict what you feel is true, it may be that the lack of familiarity is > the obstacle, because all points of view are nuanced silence. > > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Duveyoung <no_reply@> wrote: > > > > I read about two pages of the below pdf file. > > > > This guy is clever, but he doesn't get Advaita. Nope. > > > > In fact, I'll just say it: it's not merely the author of the pdf I'm > > finding fault with; I've yet to read any post at FFL that had me believing > > even one other person at FFL -- other than ME -- knows what the fuck > > Advaita is about. > > > > Yeah, I said it: I know and you guys don't. > > > > I did the fucking work. I intellectually studied it as if I were a PhD > > candidate in "silence." I didn't get it for three years. And then I did. > > > > And when I did, I saw exactly what the neo-advaitans were missing: they > > didn't know the actuality of silence. > > > > Not that I'm enlightened or that my ego has specialness, but I'm saying > > that the world's so-called experts on Advaita are so obviously superficial > > and don't even know that they are the blind leading the blind. Egos > > talking to egos. > > > > And some of them are far smarter than me -- okay, almost all of them are > > far smarter than me. It's not about understanding anything; it's about the > > ego getting it that understanding is not the spiritual technique it is > > purported to be and that YUP, karma is unfathomable....nothing can be > > understood completely. > > > > Experts sin all day long by being good at explaining something and > > pretending that that's a proof of ownership of that subject matter. > > > > Fuck no it ain't. > > > > I'm a very good writer, and I've tried at least 2,000 times to put Advaita > > into words. Result: even I can't get there from reading my own words > > about getting there. There is no formula. > > > > But between the words: it's there. > > > > My technique I offer to all of you: read the same books that I read about > > Advaita, read them again, read them again, keep reading until silence > > becomes part of the definition of EVERY THING -- that is dirt, love, God, > > money, sin, Hitler -- any thing is merely nuanced silence (see chapter > > eight in the SBAL.) > > > > At that point the ego gets a lot more humble about it's place in life. > > IT'S RIGHTFUL PLACE.....seen best in those paintings of a vast wilderness, > > and in the corner of the artwork is a single tiny wandering monk. > > > > That's not enlightenment, but at least get there -- intellectual clarity > > about the smallness of ego -- before you start thinking you can talk to > > people about Advaita. > > > > Edg > > > > > > > > > > > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "emptybill" <emptybill@> wrote: > > > > > > Read and see how - > > > > > > http://www.shiningworld.com/top/images/stories/pub-pdfs/Articles/%284%29\ > > > %20Neo-Advaita.pdf > > > > > >
