Hey nen,

you create you're reality, there is no good and bad, it's all a dream...

Hixidom

There is nothing coherant about a person who is claiming it's all ego, or that it is all illusion or w/e other sort of pointless slogan they want to come up with. It's just a sort of incoherant babbling, becasue it is just another kind of dualism. It is just the other side of that same coin.

Coherance is what binds everything. Coherance is what makes the world turn. Being coherant means realizing me AND you, and everyone and everything else..not just realizing everything as your own egotistical projection.

We really are all one..but I tend to think that most people who talk about this stuff dont even really know what that means. Maybe that makes me arrogant, so be it.

Dual vs non-dual is a concept I wish to throw away into the garbage can of ideas that are of little relevance. Im gunna go out on a limb here and state that coherance is far more an enlightened concept for one to realize. Coherance is like the wave form that cancels out dualism and non-dualism at the same time as if it is a 3rd dimensional level of organization manifesting at a level of complexity beyond the 2 dimensional dicotemy of dualism/non-dualism.

2 mistakes that I have made at different times while on psychedelics:

1. Assuming that everyone else on psychedelics experiences the same thing that I do.
2. Assuming that nobody else on psychedelics experiences the same thing that I do.

The "truth" is some combination of these two assumptions, such as: Everyone experiences the same thing while on psychedelics, and yet everyone interprets what they experience differently.

I think it is erroneous to presume that your experience of oneness is unique to you; that we have not experienced what you have experienced. How we, as different people, attempt to communicate this sense of oneness to each other usually results in some sort of argument, but our differing philosophies are all correct in the context of our respective subjective interpretations.

What I'm trying to say is that we have all experienced something life-changing that brought us here to this forum, and in that sense we have all experienced some version of the same thing, in my opinion. As ego-based beings, we have not yet figured out a way to constructively embrace and revel in this oneness. We are still trying to figure out how to share it as a concept.

duality & coherance = 2 sides of the same coin

the word coherance implies that there is such a thing as incoherence, hence reaffirming oppositional (but not nessacrily contradictive concepts ...(duality)

for something to cancel out something, there must be a 'something' in the first place and a 'nothing' for it to cancel it out in to.

chaos-order-chaos-order-chaos-order.

it's all semantics anyway...interpretation and misinterparatrions....Easy to want to throw away a concept based on the mis-interpretations others have given it.

Saying that, i do agree that most people throw around the word without really knowing it's core escence.

i wouldnt really say it was restricted to 2d either.it's multi-dimensional when you know how to look at it. and besides you cant have any subsequent dimensions without 2d right?

yeah it gave us martin ball

I feel that anything we can express as individuals is bound to be locked within duality. The simple fact is that everything we can write or speak about, literally or verbally, is existent in a realm of polarity. IMO, the mind can never fully know the Divine, nor God know the isolation of individuality. Even thinking about these issues and aspects of existential being keep us in an endless whirl of conceptualization. Taking this to the next level, spiritual unity or indivisibility are mirrored reflections of disunity and concrete division.

I do agree, "coherence" as a unifying principle is the equal & opposite twin of complete incoherence. But I really do like the sound of it. If coherence is another way of saying Gnosis, symmetry or spiritual enlightenment, it's really the same house of mirrors we wander within. But it becomes a light which guides us through this labyrinth of mind stuff inside of our head. We do though, remain sailing within the same ideological boat, in and of itself. A ship built of our own thoughts, composed of opposing and/or harmonizing echoes and reflections. Tis forevermore the mysterious voyage of the psychonaut.

Likewise, when we label all of the diversity in this universal process a whole, as with the "Unified Field of Energy" (which Dr. Einstein struggled to prove through rational science), we still continue to be wrestling within the duality of it all. When all along... there is the distinct possibility that no duality exists apart from our perception of it being so, whether it is... or is not.

It's surely a matter of our subjective perspective, interacting with those of all other life forms cohabiting this reality and arguably, many other realities which we do not even remotely perceive of (yet we still do interact). We humanoid organisms use a great many words to say what cannot ever be said (I sure as hell do!). Humanity is caught within an intellectual checkmate, spiraling beyond our individual grasp, every single time we attempt to raise voice or pen towards that indefinable state (whereby we perceive of that which underlies the dichotomy of something/no-thing).

So perhaps silence itself may be the only appropriate statement we could utter about the Godhead, the non-dual state or the eternal Tao? It has been suggested innumerable times by wiser folks. And the irony is that we have deeply touched by our embrace with Sacred Medicines, and we will never be the same!

From my vantage point, as I am unable to define the undefinable... I gather symbolic words-concept-thought forms, which remain bound by my own relativity of perception. Are we not all subjective lenses by which we transfer our epiphanies from a mystical place which dissolves our isolated perception of being self, and so too, absorbs the witness back into that which has always been infinite being?

Thus, wholly silencing the mind of the inner observer piloting our awareness. Even when I aim my very soul focus towards a plane of being which effectively silences my thoughts and dissolves my separation from all else... there is not a tangible thing which can be brought back into the dimensionality of self and other, to realistically discuss with any success. Yet we feel this irrepressible urge to say something tremendously profound about it, when we do once more return to "normal" consciousness.

So we all seem to agree about many aspects of this cosmic puzzle. We do not seem to be able to put it into proper quantification or create a reasonable, cohesive theory about whatever we intend to express about THAT/THIS level we have become immersed within and transformed so powerfully by. I am reminded of something Dr. Richard Alpert (Baba Ram Das) said in the early 1970s and I do admittedly, paraphrase his wisdom as best as I can recall.

"That essence which exists within all things cannot be known in the usual sense of knowing. it can only be experienced directly. We cannot realistically describe it's eternal nature or pin it down to an earth-shattering hypothesis. But we can BE IT and we can awaken to discover this living presence, this very moment, right here & now. And so, we can either change the channel and choose look another direction... or enjoy the magnificence of simply being it, wholly and blissfully."

As per the OP's opening post, which I honestly feel is a profound insight, our friend's dramatic dilemma about experiencing fear, universal loneliness and the mortal fate of struggling with the immense incomprehensibility of it all... deserves much compassion and understanding. By finding such a spiritual truth behind the material appearances, who isn't shattered, perplexed and totally overwhelmed? We might ask just WHY... and question the purpose for any existence at all, let alone that vacuum of non-existence. It's all too much!!! But I sincerely believe this to be our personal bias about the mystery of the Divine, this curiosity of ours.

Some things remain unknown and will continue to elude our labels. They remain unknowable, so they must also be unspoken of (if that makes any sense, given my verbosity now). This paradox, coupled with our transient human sentience, leaves us all STILL having to live life as an ordinary human being, albeit a traveler to alternate planes of conscious-awareness. It definitely does create an angst within the singular soul about being temporarily locked within the material dreamscape of the time-space-continuum. Why did the ineffable and insubstantial essence of being divide itself... if all along the way... only the singularity of Spirit is the one true reality? Furthermore, if it is immeasurably unfathomable, why ask why?

These are highly valid points of consideration. I do wholeheartedly encourage him/her to take some time to integrate this self-shattering lesson and so, gradually and gently become acquainted with it's vast and total incomprehensibility. We all end up finding that we must surrender all of our limited human understanding, to even attempt to grok the expanse of the indefinable Void, itself a vast mirror of all that is existent or nonexistent. But it is a truly wonderful journey if we abandon our need to grasp the ungraspable!!!

Rising Spirit wrote: ..yes, once 'we' are anything other than the whole there is a duality..duality emerges from the very notion of self..
..i enjoyed your perspective....yeah, just flow..

proof of concept

...to do what can't be done.

saints and rishis

defining the divine

for the rest of us

"duality & coherance = 2 sides of the same coin"

Well..not really. I know what you mean and I thought about that while posting becasue there is a dicotemy between incoherance and coherance..but it's not exactly the same as dualism/non dualism. There is some similarity..but people often talk about dualism as an ego state and non dual as a state transcending ego.

That is what I dont agree with. Of course we can say that what non-dualism really is is just a state of coherance between all of the parts present..then yes that makes way more sense to me. I have absolutly no desire to seek out a state of "enlightenment" where all ego is absent. I just dont see that being realistic. The way the ego is integrated is what is important from my perspective. In a coherant system there is still ego. Nature(as in organic ecosystems etc) is a living dynamic coherant system..at least it can be. Humans are part of nature and we often act in incoherant ways but anyway..a rainforest ecosystem can have a remarkably fractal, coherant formation to it..it is in formation..therefore it has informaton..it has intelligence..it self regulates as a whole, seeking out the greatest level of coherance possible.

This is what all systems strive towards. Mystical systems should not be any different.

"i wouldnt really say it was restricted to 2d either.it's multi-dimensional when you know how to look at it. and besides you cant have any subsequent dimensions without 2d right"

Of course I agree with this, but this is not what I meant. I do think that dualism and non dualism is a very 2nd or 3rd dimensional representation of what we are talking about here. Yes of course it is analagous to every other level as well..as this seems to be a holographic universe..I just would not call it dualism from a more integrated perspective.

I still think that coherance is a better descriptive term to use here, and that for our purposes here we can say that a state of coherance should by definition be a sort of binding together of both sides of this dicotemy. I would say that "incoherant" would be a good explaination for the whole "dual/non-dual" thing. So in that sense there is still a dicotemy present in what I am saying..which would only back up the idea that this is a holographic universe so of course some analogy of dicotemy is going to manifest at every level..it's just that the parameters of that dicotemy are going to be more and more intricate.

The dual/non-dual paradigm is a mindfuck. it's a paradox. Paradox seems to be a sort of higher dimensional shadow cast upon our reality. At least this is how I envision it. We cant explain it becasue we cant see enough of the thing to understand it. All we see is the shadow and it makes no sense..it condescends itself. It's presense is noted in all times and places and humanity has forever seeked out it's own identity in it's wake. I would assume this same shadow manifests throughout all levels of reality as various analogies of our "paradox" from the "top" down(of course this analogy itself is limited). Differing levels of complexity but in an infinite system there will always be higher levels of coherance and complexity and therefore shadows of those levels will be cast back into levels of less complexity.

You have to understand that this is just the languagable translation. Translations are limited in their accuracy.

Jamie, I think the difference and key to understanding the difference in the dual/non-dual states as it relates to the ego stems from a certain issue of semantics and the word "ego". When a lot of people refer to the scorn of their ego and wanting to annhilate their ego and all that, I think what they're really referring to is the Freudian superego, and not the ego itself. In the non-dual state, there can still be the "I", there can still be the "observer", there can still be the "ego", but that part of the self that is incessantly intrusive, imposing and enforcing societal norms, constantly filtering thought through language, etc...is temporarily abolished, and the key word is temporarily.

Also I think part of the "paradox" is that as humans we tend to see things as one way or the other, and this is the eternal trap in which to fall. Things can exist in multiple states at the same time which is contradictory to our analytical (dare I say dual) state of consciousness.

For any of us having difficulty dealing with non-dualism - as has been discussed today above - I ran across this little text, "The 7 Nails" last night. For the purposes of this thread it might be called "7 Mind Exercises for Reconnecting with One's Natural, Non-dual State":

Nail the original immutable ground with the seven great nails of the path of the nondual.
The difficult path between samsara and nirvana and the primordial great bliss will arise.

1. Nail together samsara and nirvana
With the unobstructed clarity of pure gnosis.

2. Nail together the observer and the observed
With self-existing clear light.

3. Nail together mind and matter
With the spontaneous stainless essence.

4. Nail together nihilism and eternalism
With liberation from all views.

5. Nail together dharma and dharmata
With absolute awareness.

6. Nail together elation and depression
With the absence of sense impressions.

7. Nail together appearances and emptiness
With the primordial perfection of the limitless space of dharma.

- Sri SImha's last testament to his student Vimalamitra, around 8th century.

smoking changa and listening to alan watts
heard this and it reminded me of this thread




♥ much love, nexus ♥