Hi again,
Can the character chooses what to feel, what to think, whether go for a walk or not?
Does the character choose this story?
Can it chooses another story, a different one, instead of what already is?
Can the story of Sue be seen as what it is - just a story, including Sue?
The character cannot choose what to feel, what to thing, or what to do. I woke up today from a dream I didn't choose, with feelings that I didn't choose, that changed constantly all day long. I didn't do the things I thought I should do, or thought I wanted to do, or thought would be good for me. I heard words from people and had emotional reactions to those words and none of it was anything I was in any way in control of. Just unfolding, moment after moment.
The story isn't changed by anything Sue thinks or does, though this inquiry seems to create changes, but Sue is not in charge of when she sits down to do it and is not in charge of what happens in the doing of it.
The character of Sue still believes that she can shape the story, even if she can't choose an entirely different story. But the character of Sue can not find anywhere that she is choosing to think thoughts, say words, or take actions. But the belief that there is a "something else" that must be doing those things through her, still has power.
There is no apparent thing separate from anything else, making thoughts appear, words arise, actions unfold. This is both clear and terribly hard to look at, to focus on.
See, the only thing that I can be sure of is what I directly experience with the 5 senses. Everything else requires belief, which is thought. Look, if there is any other way that you can know something as a deep conviction with certainty which does not require thought / belief?
All knowing requires a story. All knowing is... "I" wanted to soft-pedal this and say "incomplete and often wrong" but no. All knowing is fundamentally wrong. Every piece. Because it rests on the original mistake of separation. All knowing is a story with a false foundation. What does that mean to "me", who has built an entire character on and lived an entire life being the one who knows?
All knowing is false. Only sensing what is experienced directly can be known. (And even that quickly spirals into a story and belief.) All knowing is false. Sue can put down the knowing and directly experience what is unfolding, in every moment. Nothing more is needed. Nothing more is real or true. Sue is not real or true. (typing this, feeling a distant sense of its truth, not merged with yet.)
Yes, no reality based on thoughts.
Real is what is left when we stopped thinking about it.
Do you cleary see this?
I see how it must be so. I will attempt to see it as I move through today.
Yes, body is just a label, in actuality there are only sensations. There is no experience of a body - there are sensations.
Let's deeg a little bit deeper
Is there a boundary between the body and the clothing?
Is there a boundary between the body and the chair?
Is there an inside or an outside?
If there is an inside - the inside of what exactly?
If there is an outside - the outside of what exactly?
Is there a boundary between body and clothing? In direct perception? No, there is a field of awareness and sensation in which both are, and co-create. Oh. no. they are not separate from each other or anything else, so they can't co-create anything. Creations requires a creator and a created. There is no boundary between body and clothing in direct perception and there is no boundary between body and clothing and rest of what appears because... none can be found. All is one experience with nothing beyond it to contain or define the experiencing.
I misread your next question and asked myself if there was a boundary between my body and my hair. Like clothing, there is no boundary between the body and the hair (a change in sensory input, yes, but not what thinking mind means by boundary.)
Is there a boundary between the body and the chair? Like the hair, there's a change in sensory input which thoughts wants to make into "proof". A change in sensory input happens within the body, and outside of it. It does not equal or mean boundary or separation. There is no clear boundary between the body and the chair. Body and chair are experienced right now as one unfolding.
Is there an inside or an outside? Suddenly I wanted to laugh at this question because it landed as absurd. How could there be an inside separate from an outside? What does that even mean? I don't know if there's such a thing as a three-dimensional mobius strip but all that can be experienced is feeling that way. No, I don't know how there could be an inside and an outside, from a what-is-perceived perspective. Only in a thought or belief system.
The inside of what exactly? Yes, this is what seems so silly! Is there an inside of me and an outside of me? How on earth did I ever get that idea?? I can't feel my insides (unless nerve cells have a reason to be firing) anymore than I can feel the outsides that are beyond range of my nerve cells. I have no proof that insides are separate from outsides and what would they be "inside of" then? What would the "outsides" be inside of then? There's a endless set of thoughts like Russian nesting dolls and no end to the inside and outside story.
Okay, I will watch to see what I notice today.
Thank you Luchana,
With much gratitude and love,
Sue
