The Gate

Hi Ian

There's a gentle but firm not going to thought with whatever comment, suggestion or scenario it might be offering up. Or if found in thought, the default is to release to the openess that is absent of the addition of thought.

This brings focus and appreciation to that other than thought. The ever changing happening of sensation is appreciated and welcomed. In being there, there is no not allowing of it, or move to thought to provide some alternative fabrication.

Being as/with what is is undivided, whole, simple.

Beautiful.

Just out of interest, what was it that Ilona asled and that led to your looking? The way you spoke of it made it sound like a particular moment?


Do things still seem clear, that there’s no separate self?


Love

Jon

Hey Jon,

As part of Finding the Mind Screen Ilona asked Do you remember if you had a bicycle and what was it like?

My answer did not address her question. Instead I remarked how I had no way to know if the particular image that appeared was true or accurate, nor that any subtle sensation it was accurate validated it, that perhaps even an alien might have planted that thought without my knowing.

I have been guided to look at this before but on this occasion there was an accompanying felt shift. Later upon waking there was a knowing along the lines of that character really does not have to be taken as real, regardless of thought. The character being confined to thought is actually a huge clue as to its lack of realness. Likewise thoughts pointing out the positives or negatives of the character.

That a thought appears in no way validates it is both simple but has vast consequences for the being who gave so much credence and attention to it.

There is clarity that the character Iain was only ever a thought known. This leaves lots of unknowing in its wake as everything is held up for question as it appears.

with thanks

Hi Ian

Thank you for telling me about this. It’s interesting that you slept on it and on waking things were clear.

Well, you may already know the form at LU Gate? At this stage, you having told me without doubts that things are clear now, we ask some final questions. Would you be interested in having a go at answering these? They can sometimes be helpful.

Love

Jon

Jon, I would welcome those questions and their review.

Thank you.

Hi Ian,

Ok, here goes:


How does it FEEL now? (This is different from asking for a kind of conceptual explanation).


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) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

Describe intention & give examples from experience.

Describe free will & give examples from experience.

Describe choice & give examples from experience.

Describe control & give examples from experience.

What makes things happen? How does it work?

What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

6) Anything to add?


7) How does it FEEL now ?


Love

Jon

Hi Jon,

I do consider these questions each day but have not got around to full answers yet. I suppose there is no rush.

much love

Hi Ian,

No rush but as and when the answers start to form do write them and we can look at them together.

Much love

Jon

That's generous of you to offer to go over these Jon.

How does it FEEL now? (This is different from asking for a kind of conceptual explanation).

There was a warmth and excitement that it was known. This warmth can still show up but there is no enduring somatic change, the patterns of sensations here are as before, with corresponding thought labels. There can be a freshness when it is remembered the character showing up in thought has no realness.

If anything there seems more exposure to sensation with less interest or pull to what thought suggests is wrong or right.

While there is only ever the now, there remains/seems an oscillation from serenity/quiescence across most days and week.

I might wake and feel a sensation of unease. There is a disinterest and disbelief in what appears in thought about this, and accordingly more inclination to 'stay with the feeling'. 'Later' there may be quiescence type sensations and thoughts about how Iain and things are okay. It is known these are only thoughts. It is seen how much refuge was taken in thought before in general, and seemingly in response to sensations. How much attention was given to the commentary. It Feels disconcerting / exposing to have lost interest in thought much of the time and accordingly be more exposed to the mystery of now and these sensations showing up.

I know how much we like to look for the FEEL here. I also know how we like to say that the shift can be so subtle it can be missed.

Sorry to take long to reply. I have the other questions.

Hi Ian

Hey, no, don’t apologise. It’s good to read what you’ve written and I’m very interested. Also, to see what you make of those questions.

Thank you for writing and speak soon,

Jon,

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.

Thought presents as a flow of suggestions. The content of thought may be given credence. Thought also has content suggesting that what appears in thought is valid. Thought includes images and words about a character.

It might be said that thoughts about the seperate self go way back (e.g. to when thoughts first appeared), and have reoccured many times, but equally it could be said there is only now to know what is appearing in thought. I don't have to wait long for a thought to appear of, or about Iain. There does appear to be both familiarity and credence given to these thoughts about this character. It is only after the thought, when looking in the rear view mirror, that it is seen and known that it was only a thought and the content was not real. So, the character Iain that appears in thought has no realness.

I was asleep in thought, in as much as thought content was believed to have validity and credibility. It's possible to wake up and it is seen and known that while thought appears there is no need to believe in it like before and take it as a valid guide.

This does not provide any answers, and further thought can no longer be gone to as a source of validity. It is an awake step that allows for an exploration of life happening with this belief no longer at its centre.

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.

The dream of somehow being able to improve, fix or resolve the character, me is lost.
There feels much more exposure to the roller coaster of sensation. While thought content may seem influenced by sensation, falling into a sequence of thoughts offering ways to resolve uncomfortable sensations is seen to be ineffective.
Thought content is seen to be very a limited and finite layer appearing. It has a very limited repertoire.
It is no longer possible to seek refuge in thought as it is remembered that the suggestions offered lack validity and are misleading echoes.

thanks, Iain

Hi Ian

Good to hear from you.
Thank you for posting those two answers.

I appreciate that writing answers to these questions can take time so it’s good that you felt free to deal with them in more than one post. It’ll be great to read your answers to the remaining ones, when you’re ready.

All the best.

Jon

Hi Jon,

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

In the late summer as part of her Awakening Now Ilona asked Do you remember if you had a bicycle and what was it like? My answer did not address her question (one of a sequence in the module Finding the Mind Screen about how thought content appears with a seeming corresponding physical location). Instead I remarked how I had no way to know if the particular image that appeared was true or accurate, nor that any subtle sensation it was accurate validated it, that perhaps even an alien might have planted that thought without my knowing.

I had been guided to look at this before but on this occasion there was an accompanying felt shift. Later upon waking there was a knowing along the lines of that character really does not have to be taken as real, regardless of thought. The character being confined to thought is actually a huge clue as to its lack of realness. Likewise thoughts pointing out the positives or negatives of the character.

That a thought appears in no way validates it was both simple but had vast consequences for the being who gave so much credence and attention to it. There was clarity that the character Iain was only ever a thought known. This left lots of unknowing in its wake as everything was held up for questioning as it appeared.

7) How does it FEEL now ?

I spent some time feeling somewhat vulnerable and exposed. Looked at afresh, the world felt like quite a bizarre place filled with these strange conscious animal beings going about life, and somehow I had either ended up as one, or was as though trapped in a movie the content of which was the unfolding life of one, that is 'me'. I had been asleep to this as familiar and normal hower now I was awake and it was jarring and uncomfortable. It is not what I would have chosen and there was no way out. I felt trapped and potential sources of refuge felt like yet further pieces of the trap. It was seen that I was inexorably heading towards my death, or rather a further stage of the dream/illusion where I was informed that I would be dying soon and this would likely be accompanied by pain and distress about what I should do (or rather be unable to do) and frustration and loss that I had been unable to figure out the mystery of life or how to become reconciled to it. I have elderly friends and work with vulnerable people some late in life and suddenly I was exposed to the knowing that I was in the same situation as them, where I had been in quite effective denial of this earlier. Each moment presented as a new frame in 'Iain's life' except now the fantasy that I could somehow break through this had disolved. This was unpleasant.

Later there was less of a confusion or fear based experience and I felt in ease to meet the ebb and flow of experience with compassion. Unfolding consciousness with her seamless ever changing content was received by (or rather as) unconditional love. There was no longer any fight or need to grasp. I imagined how Ramana might have experienced reality as simply being God, a seamless alive wonderment that was fully allowed and emersed, and in which any sense to push back or fight would have been rediculous as it was all un-separately him (but absent of any clinging identity). It was like that. This was more pleasant.

5) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

Decision is an illusion. It is a fictional concept derived from a wider narrative about volitional individuals or characters who might somehow be able to progress towards a preferred choice from a selection. Though content is ever changing, and it may be supposed that this allows for one particular thought to be chosen and somehow acted out, however that is rediculous given there is no volition behind what thoughts may appear, nor any volition that there be a conscious experiencer here in the first place. Thought content appears, and may feel compelling, but that does not make for decision. We seem to live in some bizarre consensual reality based upon a limited version of volition including decision making. If decision were a thing I would actively pursue to decide a route away from the suffering, frustration and disappointment of my life but that is impossible.

5a) Describe intention & give examples from experience.

Thought content is quite limited and loops and repeats. I have a pattern of unmet needs and particular fears that I revisit most days, in effect fetishising over these. In this way there could be said to be said a form of intention. Obsessions appear, with repeated plans of how to get or avoid certain things seen as good or bad, this is instinctively taken as 'real' or valid, and this continues ad infinitum. For example, I am lonely and desperately wish to be loved and like a furious toddler raging that I was unable to garner the love I needed (on my entirely selfish terms) from my parents so endlessly hunt like a hungry ghost by scrolling though dating apps most days. The intention is that my needs somehow be met, and this fosters a flow of reinforcing behavour ('I must try this', 'if I don't I could miss out and feel more lost') that informs further intentions.

5b) Describe free will & give examples from experience.

I don't really have more to add from my answer to 5 in the preceeding post. While there is an inescapable inseperable watching of life unfold here, there is certainly no volition in how the content shapes up. Free will is part of a dream, part of an imagined attribute of a character appearing in thought.

5c) Describe choice & give examples from experience.

5d) Describe control & give examples from experience.

There was no choice in being here, and no choice or control over what happens. While endless examples of cause and effect may be given, that does not make 'choice' or 'control' cause and effect or similar a thing.

5e) What makes things happen? How does it work?

Questions about or references to things happening tend to remind me of a particular radical non-duality speakers book 'Nothing Happening'. In truth I don't know. I like the prevailing view that there simply is experience, and an apparent happening, because the alternative would be nothing, so why not there be something as opposed to nothing.

5f) What are you responsible for? Give examples from experience.

I didn't make this. I don't make the thoughts that show up. I'm not able to influence experience as it unfolds. I am not able to provide experiential examples to things that don't exist.

6) Anything to add?

Thanks,

Hello Ian

Thank you very much for writing your most recent answers.

One thing that I could say right now is that several questions are qualified with the statement “give examples from experience” . You have done that for at least one of those but in several cases you haven’t.

It’s easy to understand why you didn’t, because how is it supposed to be possible to give such examples? But things like “free will” can be part of the illusion, (even if that now sounds like nonsense) . So it is possible to highlight a situation where , conventionally , it might well be argued that such and such is my free will.

Here is an example: I like to learn to play guitar. This takes practice and some persistence. The thought “I’ll need to do some practice today” appears and conventionally it could be argued that practice can only happen due to “my free will”. I’m looking at the guitar right now. Later, when there’s time, practice will happen but there is no free will to be found. The practice happens and that’s that. Free will is an enshrinement of the idea of a chooser or a decider and yes, there can be thoughts of choosing and deciding but practicing the guitar happens when it happens… or not.

So it is possible to show with everyday examples how something that might be imagined to be happening actually isn’t.

Please have a look at your latest answers and see if you could find some examples from experience . They certainly don’t have to be complex.


Love

Jon

Hi Jon,

Happy New Year. Thank you for being here.

Sorry for taking time to reply.

For years I thought self enquiry and non-duality modalities in general, and LU seeing more specifically as (rather naively) equating to some upgrade in wellbeing. 'Getting this' would mean life was easier, happier and somehow more free (whatever that might mean). That there would be reassurance and reconciliation with the at times, confusing and uncomfortable experience of being. I'm sure there were attempts to caution me this was not the case, but of course these were disregarded in the always-on seeking to find more okay-ness. After all, it was accepted that awakening modalities were the answer to suffering, dissatisfaction, a lack of self acceptance and the wish to be recognised, to be special. It would be pointless to adopt blame for this, as fundamentally I am a being in a flow of seemingly good and bad experiences and entirely vulnerable to wishing to be more okay, and less not okay.

Instead, to borrow a word from a friend, it all seems very stark. It is as though belief in a me, and unexamined familiarity with a body here and participation in a familiar ongoing dynamic with other bodies and characters is a dream like hypnosis and while in ways illusory, is in place for a 'purpose'. A purpose in as much as to look outside it is extremely stark and disconcerting. It is simply a bizarre mystery as to why, or what is going on, but moreover there is an absence of comforting places to turn or answers to be got. The Being is scrambled and there is a wish to scurry back to the dream as a comfort zone where things kinda make sense (in a dream like illusory way), and there is hope and answers. Of course, when the bizarre mystery is known, it is no longer possible to be asleep in the preceding dream.

This doesn't answer the remaining questions on doer-ship however.

5) Describe decision & give examples from experience.

This thing called thought appears. Thought Images and words are known and it is conceived that a response is needed. There are conceptions that to respond and act is different to not doing so, that there will be an outcome, a change in the seeming real world and experience. A multitude of thought options might appear with the sense that one or more may be pursued as better or right, with others disregarded or left for later consideration. It then becomes important, focused, that actions and further thought processes be followed so that this thing be got or achieved.

For example, earlier there was the thought I am cold, then the thought I could put the heating on, then but that will cost money and to do it now might mean I do it more and more often and that will have consequences, and there will be later opportunities to have the experience of heating. In conjunction there was the experience of my perceived body and mind moving towards the thermostat only to then return to bed.

Thanks, Iain