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More words ? ! I don’t know ...
Just this .. non-dualists are searching for that which has no opposite .. The nature of existence is that which has no opposite being all the opposites at the same time ..
The apprehension of this can stun you into silence or bring forth spontaneous laughter at the cosmic joke which was never told but is telling itself and revealing itself all the time.
That which has no opposite is also being past present and future continuously .. past and future are just as real as present but generally time bound beings such as ourselves have no access to other than the present ..
(cf: Allah saying, “Do not curse time because I am time.”) ..
(cf: Allah saying, “Do not curse time because I am time.”) ..
That which has no opposite is being all the opposites in past present and future in all places .. it is all time and all space infinitely and eternally .. .. now ..
In order to know that which has no opposite “I” must disappear .. in the full realisation of my nothingness I become that which has no opposite .. & am nothing and everything .. at the same time I am aware that I still exist actually .. so my true nature is nothing or that which has no opposite but also I am manifested in the world of opposites with a point of view in space and an existence in time ..
For the theist God is that which has no opposite .. What is the opposite of God ? (not the devil as the foolish Christians say .. at least the Muslims know that God created good and evil) .. so apart from that foolish answer .. that which has no opposites and is all opposites at the same time is that which hides itself as apparent nothing and manifests as being everything .. it can also be thought of as nothing hiding itself by being everything ..
I say apparent nothing .. because we can’t find it or apprehend it in any way with our minds or senses .. yet it becomes everything everywhere all at the same time infinitely and eternally .. and we don’t know how ..
So the ‘How’ we do not know ..
What about the ‘Why’ ?
If that act of apparent nothing or that which has no opposite becoming everything .. or all the opposites .. is seen as manifestation without a how .. it may just be accepted .. (maybe as not an act at all in any known sense of the word .. i.e. no cause or effect) ..
If that act is seen in any way as an act or action which takes the sense of cause and effect then it must be known as Creation ..
God is then that which has no opposite becoming or manifesting as or creating all the opposites .. which we then know as Creation or the known universe ..
(.. and here I think we tend to forget that the sufis tell us of many unknown universes existing beyond the reach of our normal intellect and senses, maybe the closest to us is that of the djinn .. but many more exist, perhaps we may say, in 'parallel universes' .. an expression which even now is becoming necessary in scientific circles to account for our own universe and what we can apprehend and comprehend of it ..)
For me that which has no opposite becomes all the opposites in every millisecond of existence .. some sufis say that the known universe is created anew all the time, passing in and out of existence so fast that it appears to be solid ..
I could go on but for now .. I was trying to find a common ground for theistic non-dualists and non-theistic non-dualists and if we stop with ..
Non duality equals (or means) that which has no opposite.
Then we notice that our conscious apprehension of existence is made up of opposites and that this is the root of our suffering .. i.e. dualistic consciousness.
Something exists .. we know that through our intellect and senses ..
When we look carefully at our intellect and senses as ways to prove anything we find that they are unreliable .. and inextricably bound in the world of opposites ..
How do we transcend or get out of the world of opposites or duality ?
One useful way is at least to recognise that that which has no opposite is being all the opposites at once .. in the apprehension of this reality we learn to accept and allow the existence of that which has no opposite and all the opposites at the same time ..
It is a way to short circuit the flow of the opposites while totally accepting them all equally right now ..
It overloads the system .. blows it and .. yet still miraculously exists !
For a theist God (that which has no opposite) being (manifesting or creating) Creation (all the opposites) ..
For a non-theist nothing being everything .. or everything mutually arising .. in the now ..
emptiness is form, form is emptiness ..
One has to admit .. as either theist or non-theist .. we do not know the ‘How’ of it ..
For the Theist .. God or that which has no opposite is the causeless cause of all that is manifested .. and He did that because He wanted to be known .. (which is for the theist the ‘Why’ of it ) actually it is all He knowing Himself through manifestation ..
The point of the human being as the crown of creation is that he has the highest and best possibility through his own deep conscious self-awareness to realise that he is none other than God ..
Through his dualistic awareness he is aware of himself as God manifest in body and mind ..
In the no-self understanding he is aware of himself as the unmanifest God .. the non-dual consciousness which has no opposite and is God Himself known in and through man ..
That is why it is said that God created man in His own image .. because man can know himself as both manifested and unmanifested .. both dual and non-dual .. in the world .. (as composed of opposites) but not of it (as being without opposite) ..
God is man and man is God ..
Worship of God is man as God in His dual nature recognising and humbling himself before God in His non-dual nature.
Real worship is where the dual and non-dual meet and recognise each other .. God knows himself through man .. man knows himself through God ..
Man is none other than God .. God is other than man .. because man in his dual nature is created and must submit to physical death and man in his dual nature cannot create .. and man in his dual nature cannot cease to be entirely except through complete annihilation in God .. the highly realised sufi sometimes literally disappears from the sight of others .. and also literally appears in many places at once .. both are signs of his real annihilation in God.
In our pure non-dual nature we are God so that to know ourselves is to know God ..
Yet we are created and in our dual nature what is there to do but to bow in awe at that in the presence of which we are nothing and in the being of which we have our existence.
PART TWO ..
Proposition for deepening no self as a learned and repeatable experience.
Anyway posted the above on all the FB groups I’m in (except for Orgiva massive.) .. umm . two things ..
1) The difference between “catching” & living that early morning realisation, which made me laugh and get out of bed, and tying it down with all the intellectual bridging of non-theistic and theistic non-duality .. and
2) Pleased to see the Horizon program showing the struggle of the phycisists to get to grips with how something came out of nothing in the Big Bang theory .. laughable really what they come up with .. and amusing how they balk at ‘infinity’ in an equation and see it as a failure because really .. it puts them out of a job ..
Which to deal with first ?
Perhaps after some breakfast ?
1) .. What was the realisation ? ..
That non-duality can be defined as that which has no opposite ..
And that God can be defined as that which has no opposite ..
And that dualistic or material reality is that which has no opposite appearing as all opposites ..
Then as I thought about that .. the dawning realisation that that which has no opposite .. had to have been actually present at all times past and future as well as present .. now .. as well as being in all places far and near at all times past and present .. here and now ..
But I kind of felt it .. permeating my being as though I melted into it .. it was a thought formulating rather than formlated .. and spread through me like a ripple of pleasure culminating in laughter ..
I kind of felt myself melt in the unity of opposites in that which has no opposite .. and of course .. for a minuscule moment .. thought stopped ..
Meditation on the infinite and the eternal can do that .. but to some (especially children when for instance they look up at the stars for the first time and think about what is beyond that and what is beyond that and ... sometimes they run to their mothers in a kind of giddy horror at what their little minds have taken on) ..
When you get right up to the no-self it can produce a similar feeling .. but ..(and here’s the point) ..
Realisation of unity should and does produce Trust .. when seen in the right way it is not a frustrating lack of power or lack of will or ability to do or a frightening void or vista of infinity with no firm hold stretching away with no ground beneath one .. it is the total confidence that everything is happening exactly as it should in exactly the right way at exactly the right time and cannot possibly be any other way .. that one is completely held and supported from the six directions and completely at one with all that is in an effortless flow of perfection ..
As this ripple effect of seeing all I was seeing and experiencing as that without opposite appearing as the opposites .. I slipped out of my customary self point of view and was able to watch as my hand busied itself around the kitchen to make a cup of tea .. reaching out for the kettle .. filling it .. taking the cup .. putting in the tea bag .. it was all just happening .. but it wasn’t ‘me’ doing it in any way that I am accustomed to .. things just happened in a natural effortless harmonious flow while some part of me watched .. fascinated & enjoying the show
This was short lived but connected to all the thoughts and grappling with the concepts which eventually trip the system or overload it like a koan ..
Me being God being me .. if you like ..
.. dualistic material me composed of opposites and thoughts but something in me watching that without opposite manifesting in my actions as me making a cup of tea ..
.. beautiful ..
non-dual consciousness for a short while aware of itself manifesting in duality in motion in action in manifestation .. the experiencer an the experienced seamlessly one ..
To be there in that consciousness while recognising and observing the world in operation .. but permanently .. that is sort of how non-dual consciousness is .. or what enlightenment is taken to be .. abiding non-dual awareness ..
Also there was an awareness of a choice which may exist (and even may have to exist) ..
In order to trigger non-dual awareness .. it may be necessary (or at least convenient) .. to suspend all idea of God .. in order to find God it is (or may be) necessary to suspend belief in Him ..no believer and believed in .. just Him ..
I believe this is a personal problem in a way .. though connected to the whole manner of revealing no-self as noticed in many younger exponents and practicers .. that of rejecting all beliefs in order to reveal the Truth .. on the basis that all beliefs are necessarily in duality .. pointers to reality but not It itself .. (I wonder what happened to the great sufis in this case, they must have disappeared as the lover drowned in The Beloved ) ..
Any belief which contributes to your sense of separate “I” must go ..
.. finally had ‘breakfast’
been for a walk .. which was actually lovely .. in the moment and ‘with God’ .. in a unitary way .. seeing Him me and the countryside/nature .. as one and feeling so thankful for it ..
more like seeing myself and the countryside/nature as Him manifesting actually .. as me and it .. three but one, subject and object subsumed in the verb as present continuous tense ..
So-o-o .. can I get back to that investigation of the difference between an experience caused by some genuine thoughts .. and the extrapolating of it in such a way as to “murder to dissect” ..
Can I re-activate it in that way ? ..
How does it relate to the dissolution of self .. or “self noughting” as it has been called .. ?
Will I have to wait until tomorrow for the energy to return ? .. Is there a possibility for this to be turned into a practice ?
Non-dual = that which has no opposite ..
Subject has object ..
No subject = no object
Therefore .. experience of no-duality or non-duality consciously experienced ..
Seeing of the illusion of self ( or that which is commonly taken to be the subject) .. is really seeing of the false self as an object and deconstructing it ..
One should then be left with the real self .. as real subject .. (which I take to be the substance and cause of all i.e. God .. Who is also the substance and cause of all the objects manifesting ) and in this way the subject is known as union of God self and other ..
So many different ways to say this but the whole point here is to make it relevant to the method of pointing to no-self as actually producing non-dual awareness .. so I am still trying to make sure that that mechanism is a true one for causing this and not, for instance, just a useful tool in the toolbox as it would appear to be regarded in Buddhism ..
And also maybe to align it to Self Enquiry to see if it is actually the same method approached in a different way ..
Maybe one could say .. Who am I ? is the positive side of the coin .. in attempting to find the Real Self .. but has had rare efficacy or positive results in the discovery of the Real Self because it haas to be recognised .. ‘found’ or lived in some way without knowing what it is or what it is like ..
Whereas direct pointing to no-self (especially when combined with dissolution of all ‘beliefs’ which can be seen to be pointers to reality obfuscating the real by becoming replacements for it) .. rather takes away what is not (the false self) by deconstructing the elements and mechanisms of it, as for instance, thought applied to or labelling experience and seeing feelings, emotions and also their interpretation by thinking mind .. plus memory of these ‘false’ experiences .. to reveal what is.
Sel Enquiry tries to find Reality, Truth, (non-dual consciousness or Self) by asking Who am I ?
The other tries to reveal Reality the Truth, (non-dual consciousness or the Self) by removal of the false.
The second one .. (what might be termed the negative method) is probably better suited to today’s people and conditions .. With dedication and passion one can get quickly to see that what has been taken to be the self is in fact an illusory construct composed of thoughts arising .. over which it is found that there is no control .. which label experience and interpret directly received sense data .. assigning meaning entirely composed of thought and thought plus feelings and emotions.
Some time is required for testing the veracity of these things through immediate personal experience .. Thought can be watched .. sensations can be observed .. sense data can be noted .. Negative experiences can be broken down into constituent parts to see how they arise and how even pain is interpreted and dramatised .. Psychological and emotional suffering, though more subtle, are found to be due to the same process .. Gradually the whole ego structure is being dismantled .. When it is seen that this has been happening over many years (some say from the age of three but maybe earlier) .. it can be observed that mechanisms are repeated due to false memory of false events .. real happenings have been assigned meaning unalloyed experience has been interpreted and then remembered .. It can also be seen that the people one is surrounded by are (obviously) living in their false selves and there is an assumption of your false reality on their part, sometimes for a vested interest or an emotional or psychological ‘pay off’, which supports the illusion of your and their assumed self .. so generally there is support and interest in perpetuating the lie. This means that the work to dismantle the false self can be somewhat lonely and requires courage .. Generally speaking the fire of suffering caused by living in the false self (and therefore dualistic consciousness) is what drives people to find an answer .. In present times when even the easily available alternatives of material reward and sensual indulgence are letting people down it is even more imperative that our fellow human beings can find a way out of the prison of false self and dualistic consciousness.
Direct pointing to no-self can be a great help ..
Questions .. after seeing the falsity of the ego self through direct pointing to its elements and temporary unstable nature how can an alternative consciousness become a stable and permanent feature ?
Suggestions
1) Repeated deconstruction and reminders ?as in ..
2)Awareness that a very pleasant, present-reality consciousness appears when the false self is temporarily removed and reference back to that state .. in the knowledge that it is the always available taste of reality .. When the ego self is unmasked and destabilized and temporarily collapsed a taste of present moment reality is obtained untainted by interpretation or assigned meaning .. Knowing that taste and revisiting it brings familiarity and ease of access so that in all moments, and especially unpleasant moments, it can be referenced, remembered and accessed .. especially when it is also recognised and remembered that the unpleasant experience is due to the assumption of false-self & dualistic consciousness which is imaginary and not real.
It is not so much “You don’t exist” (which is a logical absurdity) but .. “The ‘you’ you are accustomed to being is not real !”
The you you think you are is not real !
With the falling away of the shell of ego-self real experience starts to reveal itself as happening by itself .. there is an inevitable, deft, sure, seamless unfolding of events in precisely the right moment in precisely the right way .. nothing can actually be wrong .. the perfection of all is seen .. a web of interacting causes and events so well oiled and so perfect that it is seen to be one thing acting in total unison and harmony with itself without an atom out of place .. which has given rise to the sometimes heard expression “the perfection of imperfection” because as soon as one slips out of this perfect trust and recognition of unity into an assigned meaning of like or dislike .. it is recognised as a completely unavoidable and necessary part of the whole without which other parts would not function as they should.
Thus even ‘unpleasant’ experiences are recognised as engendered by false vision ..
This is most easily recognised in a very depressed person who sees everything in a negative light while those around him or her in the same conditions of time and place & experiencing apparently the same events do not see things that way at all.
Reality may be personal .. and varies according to ego accretions .. but behind all this is a universal impersonal Reality common to all .. which is the very ground of being .. non-dual abiding ever-present reality accessible in & as one’s own consciousness.
We can all make effort to return to access it and return to it as often and as much as possible until it becomes a habit which becomes continuous and eventually permanent.
That’s the proposition for “deepening”.
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