Hi Xain

Well, it has been an interesting journey. There were several times when I thought there was no point in continuing. Only your excellent guiding kept me on track and brought me to the simplicity of seeing through the illusion.

Xain, I can not thank you enough. I very much appreciate your ...

Hi Xain

Some further questions:
What if taking responsibility happens? Would that mean that you are 'back in the dream'?
What is 'taking responsibility'? Is it necessarily an aspect of believing in a separate self?


The questions are red herrings. There is NO SELF that can take responsibility ...

Hi Xain

You seem to be saying that you see, (that you've realised no separate self) but could flip back into self later.
Is this true? How do you know this?
Could you say more about this area and what you understand to be the case.

This would be something said much earlier in our conversation ...

Thank you for your recent replies - they have clarified things for me and left me satisfied that my "seeing" is authentic.


What really made a difference was sitting in meditation and suddenly realising that the whole realm of mind, including thought and the "I" sense had no real solidity or ...

Hi Xain

Before answering the rest of your post, I just want to ask about this:

ell . . . 'You know you are done when you realise there is no 'you to be done' (I mean inherent self).

At times that "knowing" is very very clear. At other times it is almost forgotten. I have to remind myself and ...

Hi Xain

Sorry, took a few days to sit with what I was arriving at. Sorry to hear you are stopping your guidance.

What you wrote in your last post seems very much in alignment with where I am at with this.

I was hit first of all with the absolute simplicity of there being no Self and therefore it ...

Xain

Don't even bother to reply to the last post. Was just standing in the shower and I suddenly saw something which probably changes everything.

Have to go to work and won't have time to integrate this until later today or tomorrow.

Thanks

Andy

Hi Xain

Back to basics for a moment. Is there a real separate self having an experience of life and directing life?

NO. When one it looked for it can not be found. There is only ever the experience of what is happening in that moment.

If I raise my hand, is someone directing that? NO, there is no ...

Hi Xain

thank you for staying with me on this.

Again, I intuitively sense you are right. I have spent many hours in recent days looking at this. There is an incredulity that perhaps everything really is just happening without any control, yet at the same time, whenever I get an inkling of this ...

Hi Xain

At this stage the belief in the I no longer seems to be there. It seems quite natural just to notice so called "reality" taking place without an I to experience it.

But consider how many times in a day that the arm moves or raises without a thought being experienced beforehand.

Yes, I ...

Hi Xain

I have spent a number of days very confused about this.

Yesterday I woke up and the confusion was gone. It was as if I had been "chasing my tail" for a while.

Sit down. Think a thought suggesting 'Arm raise into the air'. This would be the cause.
Now raise that arm into the air. This ...

Hi Xain

I discussed our conversation with an ex-buddhist friend of mine, who suggested that Buddhists have a very strong belief in cause and effect as part of their teaching which might be the issue we are having here.

Buddhists of course talk about karma: a subtle law of cause and effect. But ...

Hi Xain

My only concern with you here is that the 'cause' is something separate which may be a subtle hiding place for an 'I' belief (hence I am going in to more depth with you than I normally do).
Or that cause and effect that you are referring to has a link to the body - that the body has a ...

Hi Xain

I can only say that intuitively I sense you are right, but I am not seeing it yet.

Can I just check: Are you really saying there is NO cause and effect?

Thanks Andy

Hi Xain

Thanks for pointing me back to direct experience.

So, I sat this morning and again it was obvious that there is no inherently existent I.

There was just thought, and thought creating a sense of I which I could see had no real existence. I don't see why it is a problem to say that thought ...