Clearing

[FyodorFinder]

What if seeking pops up from time to time?

I'm just enjoying it while it's here. I'm sure there will be plenty of time when it's not present, so why rush towards that.

One question: I understand there's no seer here, but have never had the "headless way" experience. It still feels like I'm seeing from something the behind the eyes, centre of head apparent seat of self.

Any pointers?

There's nothing to get, I suspect. It's already it.

[FyodorFinder]

One question: I understand there's no seer here, but have never had the "headless way" experience. It still feels like I'm seeing from something the behind the eyes, centre of head apparent seat of self.

I decided to look into this, because, well, just because. No apparent cause, really, ha. Just what's happening here.

"I am seeing" is the claim.

But "I" is nothing more than a thought. It can't be found other than in thought. And thought doesn't constitute a place seeing happens from, it's just an opinion about experience inseparable from experience.

The sentence then becomes "am seeing." Am seems to refer to existing, or being, and that's less problematic. What is being, I don't know, but it does seem at least like SOMETHING is happening. Seeing seems to refer to the experience of a visual field occurring, but I note I can't isolate JUST seeing from the totality of experience. It also seems to imply "something" is seeing. But I cannot find a seer, or a place where "seeing happens from." This makes sense, as "consciously" seeing would be tiresome, nay, impossible. Not only would we then have to see, we'd have to consciously breathe, poop, whatever.

So, there is no seer. Furthermore, seeing is inseparable from everything - most notably, what's actually seen.

Seeing and seen are inseparable. It's even a tautology to refer to them as separate things. "Seeing happens" is more accurate.

FURTHERMORE, if we can say seeing/seen are inseparable, and note seeing is inseparable from the rest of experience, THEN I CAN'T EVEN REALLY SAY "SEEING HAPPENS." I can't deny it, I'm just saying IT DOESN'T HAPPEN SEPARATE FROM LITERALLY EVERYTHING ELSE HAPPENING.

So, just using experience, all "I" (inseparable from experience) can really say is "AM."

And this AM includes ANYTHING/EVERYTHING HAPPENING.

Does this make sense? It's really just walking around, not understanding, living magic?

[FyodorFinder]

Duality / relativity then are just means for the absolute to communicate with itself without being bogged down in the actual impossibility of communicating this.

[JonathanR]

Hi

So, just using experience, all "I" (inseparable from experience) can really say is "AM."

And this AM includes ANYTHING/EVERYTHING HAPPENING.

Does this make sense? It's really just walking around, not understanding, living magic?

Yes. It makes sense.

Jon

[JonathanR]

Let me know if there is anything else you wish to look at.

We have not mentioned things like Choice. Decisions or Free Will. How do things happen? You may wish to look at these?


I'm around tomorrow (Friday) but then without internet access over this weekend. I will be able to post again on Monday.


Jon

[FyodorFinder]

We have not mentioned things like choice, decisions, or free will. How do things happen? You may wish to look at these?

Hmm. Well, let me try to keep this simple.

Who is writing this?

There is no experience of "pre-thought" here. As in, there is no thinking about thinking before thinking happens. Nothing plans thinking. It's just happening. There is the experience of seemingly being able to control thought - "I'll think about lobsters now." But it just happened that lobsters was thought of. Choice only seems to happen in retrospect - there was no pre-thought about lobsters. So, the thing that claims choice "I thought of lobsters" is just a thought about thought. Furthermore, the thought about lobsters that's now "gone" is in the "past" according to current thought. But current thought takes place in the same place as past thought. Without recourse to opinion (thought), there is no experience of there being either a time/place thought takes place in, or a chooser of thought. The idea of choice, then, is just that - an idea. Choice is an illusion. But this is comforting. Because otherwise thought becomes a minnow trying to control the titanic.

So, there is no experience of someone writing this. There is the experience of an inseparable something unraveling somehow. The magic thing. I don't think this is the same as determinism - because that implies something unfolding in a pre-determined, locked in way. This seems more obfuscated than that. There's the sense that everything's happening, nothing is guaranteed, the situation is volatile. But in a good way.

[FyodorFinder]

There is a lot of fear here, specifically in social situations. There is also a lot of desire to be "free" around people, to be able to act without censoring, just feel natural among people. This seems worth exploring.

So, what is fear?

Fear feels like wanting to get away from what's happening. Some physical sensation that is seemingly so intense it creates thoughts powerful enough to change current behaviour. It might be something as simple as not making eye contact with someone, because that's uncomfortable, or not dancing because "that's weird."

So, fear seems to be a mechanism to control behaviour, based on a belief system of what's appropriate. It's like an early warning system.

The actual sensation of fear is a quickening in the chest and stomach region - it's not altogether unpleasant when actually felt. But there are times, even being with the sensation, that it feels so strong, like watching an episode of a television show that makes you cringe, you just have to get away from the situation to relieve the intensity of the feeling.

Ok, so, fear is a feeling.

What is a feeling? Well, it feels like feeling is isolating an aspect of the whole, a part or patina, and evaluating it as good or bad. Good or bad are also concepts inseparable from the whole. Feeling is just experience; naming feeling involves evaluation, separation, and the concept of good or bad.

So, feeling is none other than this inseparable whole magical experience. Surprise, surprise. Just like spiritual seeking, it's actually enjoyable once the opinion it shouldn't be happening drops.

So, fear is this. Fear isn't actually a problem; problems only happen when there is an opinion (thought) that something or other shouldn't be happening, or that something should be happening in a different way. Some disagreement with what is.

So, if fear itself isn't other than THIS, it's not a problem. It becomes a problem when it's believed it shouldn't be felt. When the whole reduces itself to believing it's only PART.

The solution then seems, again, to let fear happen - as there is no control over arisings anyway - and to feel it. AMness seems to be about welcoming everything.

[FyodorFinder]

I want to add this, because something happened yesterday that forced me to think about morality and responsibility.

So, I am not in control of arisings here. Because there is no apparent cause, I am thus not responsible for whatever thoughts arise. So, a thought about doing a certain something arises. It can now be entertained, or not. But just because it occurred without an apparent me causing it, it does not follow that, "Oh, I now have no responsibility to act a certain way anymore, because all this is just happening!" That would seem to be a trap of identifying as a separate thing, namely, "the thing that doesn't have moral obligations anymore." It must be that moral deliberations, confusion, and the apparent struggle to make a choice is ALSO arising without cause. So, this doesn't mean we just go around fucking anyone and punching people in the face if there is a thought to do so, just because the thought happened and "it's not me." It's like, Well, yes, there's no responsibility for thought anymore; however, that does not mean we do whatever. Struggle is still a part. Feeling attracted to other people outside your relationship still happens. That doesn't mean, "Oh, this don't matter, I'll do whatever!" It seems more so like, Well, you don't have obligation to thought, therefore, you can either entertain it or not.

But just because it arises without a "you," does not mean it is more true or pure or has to be acted upon. If anything, it allows us to not oblige.

[JonathanR]

hi,

You have written a lot. And a lot of it makes sense.

Are there any remaining doubts, niggles or standing issues to do with seeing that there is no separate self?

Does anything need to be different? if so, what?


Jon

[FyodorFinder]

hi,

You have written a lot. And a lot of it makes sense.

Are there any remaining doubts, niggles or standing issues to do with seeing that there is no separate self?

Does anything need to be different? if so, what?


Jon

You know what, Jon? It's all pretty good. There is a lot of curiosity, but I think I got it from here.

I don't feel confused anymore. It's just so simple and profound.

You have this idea of what it will be like, then it happens and you're like, "Oh, well, it's just this, hey? And it always was, huh? Now I just enjoy experience, no matter what happens? Well, okay..."

Thanks so much.

[JonathanR]

Hi F,

Thanks for your post.

I don't feel confused anymore. It's just so simple and profound.

I would like to as you a series of six questions, if you're interested? It's not a test but these questions can sometimes reveal more. Please let me know if you'd me to send them to you?

All best,

Jon

[FyodorFinder]

Hi F,

Thanks for your post.

I don't feel confused anymore. It's just so simple and profound.

I would like to as you a series of six questions, if you're interested? It's not a test but these questions can sometimes reveal more. Please let me know if you'd me to send them to you?

All best,

Jon

Please do!

[JonathanR]

OK, here we go.

1) Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?

2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you see it now.

3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.

4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?

5) Can you talk about decision, intention, free will, choice and control? What makes things happen? How does it work? What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

6) Anything to add?

Have a go at answering these,

best wishes,

Jon

[FyodorFinder]

1) Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?

No. If there is something separate from this, I cannot know it, because all I know is this. If something were separate from this, how would I know it?

All the separate self "is" is illusion. It is "I think, therefore I am" - the assumption that there is a thinker separate from thought. But that assumption - that apparently separate "I" - is also a thought. All thoughts happen in and are made from the amness / sense of being that is foundation. It's the only thing going on. I cannot find another "where." And again, if there was another somewhere, separate from all of this, how could it at once be separate and intimate?

It's an illusion of being.

Separate self = thought = being in quotation marks.

2) Explain in detail what the illusion of separate self is, when it starts and how it works from your own experience. Describe it fully as you see it now.

"I shouldn't be scared." It's a thought like that. Or, well, it used to be something like that, that would suggest separateness.

Then another thought, "Yeah, that's true - I wish I didn't have to feel this way all the time. I gotta work harder at that."

This is the apparently separate self at play.

It's really this simple: a thought happens. Something else seems to react to this thought. This opinion about that thought seems as if it's different from that thought - after all, evaluation suggests something other or objective.

But all that's happened is one thought has happened and then another thought happened. Because one thought reacted to another, it can seem like a narrative is happening between two things. But really just one thing is going on - thought.

The illusion of the separate self always starts in thought. But everything takes place in this sense of being - this place where I don't know what's happening, who/what it's happening to, but I know it's happening. So, a thought happens. In being. As being. Another thought happens and it seems like something different because it's a reaction. Being, not being concerned with much other than experience, believes itself to be the thinker thought - the reactor. It takes on the opinion of separation; it imagines itself as separate. Thus, it begins to suffer and lives the illusion. But the illusion is always supported by this foundation of amness. The illusion is rooted in being, and is being.

3) How does it feel to see this? What is the difference from before you started this dialogue? Please report from the past few days.

It feels very wholesome. It feels like coming back home. It feels like meeting old friends.

The difference between before and now is all aspects of experience are welcomed in. There was suffering related to seeking post-awakening. Now, it's seen that seeking too is another uncontrollable aspect of this magical mystery tour.

4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?

You asked me, "Could thoughts about seeking and awakeness be prevented from appearing?"

"Who or what could do the preventing?"

5) Can you talk about decision, intention, free will, choice and control? What makes things happen? How does it work? What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

My friend forgot her water bottle at the yoga studio and got upset that "she" forgot it. But this implies somewhere some "thing" was remembering to not forget, and then forgot that she was remembering. It doesn't make sense. Forgetting happened. That's it.

This is essentially the whole thing with free will / choice / decision / control. Stuff happens. I don't know how, because I'm flowing too. I can't explain how this is happening. Any apparent choice arises the same as thought. It just does. Will, choice, decision, and intention all require thought. If there's no thinker of thoughts, then they arise as any thought arises: from nothing, to nothing. Free will is the same illusion as the separate self.

What am I responsible for? It seems this go much better without belief in the separate self. It would seem best to remain as awareness of awareness. But if that's what was already happening, only as an illusion, then it doesn't seem like Being is responsible for much other than the play of the world.

[JonathanR]

Hi F,

Thank you for those great answers.

If our conversation here seems to disappear from the Gate forum, look for it in a different section called Archive. I'm not saying it will happen but if you can't find it here look for it there.


I'll be in touch soon.

All the best

Jon