Hi Luchana!👋
I took some time to take one more look at all of the question and get as specific and authentic as much I could.
1) Is there a separate entity 'self', 'me' 'I', at all, anywhere, in any way, shape or form? Was there ever?
There is no "self" "separate self", "me" "I", there is no "thinker", "doer", "controler". It never was. There never will be, 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.
The ilusion of a separate self is a deep rooted uncouncious asumption thought, wich is belived to be the center of experience to wich things happen or/and has posesion of experience. Things happen "to" him/her. Feelings and thoughts are "there's", actions same.
It starts from a very early age through repetition of the ideea of you-yours. When we are being taught body parts coloors, spaciality, time, what is right or wrong, what is happening to us, what feelings are and how we should react to them. Mostly done by parents but also by caretakers , relatives, other kids, the hole enviorment and people around.
"It" becomes fully habitual and uncouncious, and it's hard wired into our body.
The tought of "self" associates every other learned thought that arises and instantly "takes possession" of it. Same with emotion. Is just habitual thought referencing another thought that apears regarding everything that was previously learned and defined or/and belived. It's imprinting of a sensation with a thought/information/ideea that becomes what is called emotion.
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.
I can speak from the las few days but the shift for me happend in January.
It felt like a joke. Something so extremely simple yet totally overseen. Something so close, closer then the "you" that you thought you were but also totally overlooked. Awe was the main state wich dwelled inside for a month and a half allmost. How coud I've missed this?! Is the most "hidden in plain sight" "thing" in the world.
After that, doubt began to lurk and question every thing that happened in experience. Working with LU helped seeing through that and made it even clearer, or as clear as before, that doubt was again, just a thought, hiding a remaining asumption of a self choosing, or in need to choose something. It was an imaginary gap between things to be chosen from when in fact there was no need to chose. It was a mind mechanism of pros and cons wich persisted to be held in place in the form of a "must" choose.
4) What was the last bit that pushed you over, made you look?
When first this was seen through in January the thing that made it possible was the abandonment of seeking. Accepting fully that "this" seeing was never going to happen, ever. Not in my lifetime. Maybe it's not for me, maybe it's not "God's will" and in that split second of full acceptance evething fell away and just "pure conciosness" as it is called by some, remaind. The "seeker" just dissolved like smoke. It's belived now that that was possible because seeking was the only thing that occupied the mind space for months( no job, no obligation, nothing to do but just seek).
When doubt fell away, with your help Luchana, the thing that made me look and push through was a combination of 3 things.
1. Getting sick and tired of the suffering caused by doubt.
2.Your skillfully adresed questions
3.A determination and willingness to do anything it takes to see through what ever this is even if this is the last thing I do.
5) Describe decision,
intention,
free will,
choice and control.
Decision seems to be just an alignment of precondition belief and meaning given in the mind and by the mind to set in motion action to a specific interpreted result. It's not real per se.
Intention seems to be charged thougt that is a result of a belief and conditioning and has the purpose to achive something, to do something. It can or cannot be preceded by decision. It can be spontaneous, out of conditioning. In itself is just a thought + sensation, just like feeling is.
Free will seems to be as same as decision. The ilusion of choices resides in the false asumption that is a me existing and able to make a choice. When there's no "me", choice is evident to be an automatic series of thoughts and belifes that align regarding a pourpouse wich also is a thought. Thouth references though that references though and so on so forth.
What makes things happen? How does it work? Give examples from experience.
I used to drink my morning coffee behind the block where my mother has a small garden. There I noticed a flower that blooms only at sunset and stays blooming until noon. Admiring the flower's color and shape sparked curiosity (a thought) to find out what it was called. Then another thought arose asking what the name of the flower was for, then another describing what it was for, then another describing what it was not for. Then came the acceptance that all these thoughts existed and when the conclusion cameas the thought that said "it does no harm to anyone to know the name of the flower as a matter of fact" accompanied by a feeling of satisfaction, I automatically then stood up and went to the window to ask my mother what the name of the flower was.
What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.
No one is responsible for anything because no one exists as a true separate self. So-called choices, decisions, mistakes or successes are nothing more than happenings resulting from conditioning the mind with the content provided by the environment. A thought occurs, if it is thought by another thought to be "good" or "right", the body moves according to the belived thought.
The identification is inoccent, the believing of thought is inoccent, the conditioning is inoccent. Being responsible for something happens only in the world of the separe self where is a "me" that believes that has free will.
6) Anything to add?
Yes. In the las few days since I took time to look very close at this questions a new experience began to appear. Especialy in the morning or in the afternoon if a try to take a nap or meditate for an hour, at some point, a very clear seeing apears. It's like a sensation of freedom from the knot in the chest, and neck is gone or a focused attention on somethin "out there" goes away..is like I'm just a payr of eyes seeing a very sharp landscape with no particular focus...it's like all its at maximum focus, there are no more separate focus points. It last for a few seconds and then return to usual.
Thank you!🫶
