The Gate

So much for intention... Ha ha ha. Must be a form of sabotage as disconnection from LU results in complete immersion in self/story. Painful, yet also simply what's here.

Ix, if you separate the SENSE of self from an actual self, is there any evidence or experience of the actual self ?

Story of self + sense of self = sum total of self; without sense of self, there's just story. Gigantic freight train of story (at the moment) but story none the less. Subtracting sense of self seems a bit like taking the wood out of the chair, but I guess that lays at the center of the misunderstanding...

trust that the organism is totally competent to take care of itself. No I required to do that.

So much freedom in this, when story doesn't shadow trust/okayness

Story of self + sense of self = sum total of self; without sense of self, there's just story.

Do you 'know' this in your bones ? (or is it just a head thing ?)

love that you're back.

vince

Yes, very good to be home again, in a variety of senses.

ixturtle wrote:
Story of self + sense of self = sum total of self; without sense of self, there's just story.
Do you 'know' this in your bones ? (or is it just a head thing ?)

Coming back from a week in story land, it seems mostly a head thing. There have been times when it seems totally obvious and so, if not in the bone marrow, at least resides in the musculature... But maybe the coming and going means that its still just mental gymnastics?

Story of self is generally more distinctly fictitious than sense of self... But even the distinction between the two is all all story, yes?

Can you SEE that the Sense of self is a construct. That it's the result of sensory input and assumptions ? Remember the rubber hand illusion ?

love

vince

Can you SEE that the Sense of self is a construct. That it's the result of sensory input and assumptions ?

I've been keeping this one ruminating for the last 36 hours to see if anything drops into place. I see both the sensory input and the assumptions... and I understand the rubber hand phenomena... but i feel like i'm looking all over the place for my eyes. so obviously there and yet i can't SEE them. i know, this SEEING is seeing (acknowledging) what's NOT there, which is a little different.

in 20 years i'll bet there will be a brain electrode process that will make this seeing instant. or maybe we'll figure out how to nurture/develop little brains so they grow up socially functional but without the self baggage.

more thought stuff though. what's here now is typing, tiredness, heading to bed.

peace to you my friend,
ix

ps. thought i would share this story from one of my students since you had talked about ripple effects: "I was really worked up last week about the Marathon Bombing because my boyfriend lives in Watertown just a few blocks from where the shoot out took place. There is also a lot of brush and overgrowth behind his house and I was thinking that it would be a place that the younger brother could easily hide out. I was really anxious and glued to the television. Once they found him in the boat though, something unexpected happened-- I just felt myself overcome with compassion for this young man. I mean, I don't condone anything that he did, but he's just a kid and who knows what his experience has been. Laying in bed that night I was reflecting on this feeling of compassion, which was surprising in and of itself, when I suddenly realized, if I can have this feeling of compassion for this kid who set off a bomb at the Boston Marathon, why can't I have compassion for myself? That was such a realization for me, and really showed me what an impact this practice has had on my life: to know that this kid deserves my compassion and so do I."

i feel like i'm looking all over the place for my eyes.

SEEing is (of course) a metaphor for a kind of 'knowing'. A 'knowing' that's not a belief. Is this possible ?

I suddenly realized, if I can have this feeling of compassion for this kid who set off a bomb at the Boston Marathon, why can't I have compassion for myself? That was such a realization for me, and really showed me what an impact this practice has had on my life: to know that this kid deserves my compassion and so do I."

This is a big one !
How is the compassion for him, different or separate to the compassion for R ?
How is he separate from R ?
Can he be anything other than a story for R ?
Can R be anything other than a story for R ?

peace IS,
Thanks mate.

v

SEEing is (of course) a metaphor for a kind of 'knowing'. A 'knowing' that's not a belief. Is this possible ?

yes, i believe it's possible to know something without it being a belief. there are a zillion things that are known right now (at least in a relative sense-- fingers typing, etc.) i can think all sorts of things about fingers typing but there is also a more fundamental knowing of the experience as it happens. (of course, whether the whole experience is an illusion, well I have zero "knowing" of it as such so i'm going to "assume" that the appendages of this meatsack are pressing buttons that have a simultaneous effect on the screen== but maybe that assumption makes even the knowing a belief? )

How is the compassion for him, different or separate to the compassion for R ?
How is he separate from R ?
Can he be anything other than a story for R ?
Can R be anything other than a story for R ?

funny-- this was my student's story but you (my story of you anyway) have made it MY story-- which i guess it is since she's my story so her story would be part of my story.
ANYway, via media he's obviously a story. given that i seem to have multiple 2 degrees of separation links to the guy so there's a sense of it being more "real" but this meat sack's experience of those friends are projections to be sure, so their stories are surely my stories.
what if i end up being one of his teachers one day? That physical presence would feel a bit less like story, but still it's just what's arising as experience.

Can R be anything other than a story for R ?

Funny that i seem to "know" that others are being experienced but resist this last bit-- scrambles my head a bit. Meat sack nodding off multiple times so meat sack pushes submit...

Don't analyze it. Just read it 3 or 4 times an let it percolate...
From; JED MCKENNA’S THEORY OF EVERYTHING
FOR REASONS OF ACCURACY, I sometimes exchange the awkward term spiritual enlightenment for the awkwarder term truth-realization, and even the awkwardest term untruth-unrealization. The last is the least misleading because one does not realize truth. (You want truth? Consciousness is Truth and you are Consciousness. That’s it. Congrats.) Rather, one undergoes the long self-peeling process of unknowing what is untrue – everything except
I Am.[/u] (existence?)
I draw this distinction because realization is the false promise many are making; that enlightenment, for instance, is a realization, and that all you have to do is listen and learn and perform practices and try really hard and be really patient and you will have this wonderful realization and be really enlightened. Realizations aren’t the final destinations they’re often promoted as, they’re just another kind of belief, like a depiction of a place. If the place doesn’t really exist, then a depiction is the best version of it, but if the place does really exist, then a depiction is the worst version of it. We settle for a depiction on the assumption that the place doesn’t really exist, or that we can’t really get there, but if the place is true, then it does and we can. And truth, it does not go without saying, is true. It’s not a realization. It’s the one thing that is not a belief.

love

vince

the long self-peeling process of unknowing what is untrue

Sometimes it feels like I put a hole in the untrue bucket and there is some flow out, but there is also a tap over the bucket that is filling at the same time. when i focus on the hole, it gets a bit bigger and the bucket gets emptier; when i don't, the tap just pores away and untruth level evens out, or even rises.

of course, that whole bucket story is an aspect of the tap... ha ha ha... but it feels like it points to lifeing at the moment.

anyway, "unknowing what is untrue" resonates.
what is untrue?
labels and stories about experience, including labels and stories about the experience of self. the former feels more accessible than the latter.

i read my sweet spot notes today...

o when the mind's chatter is seen as impersonal
o when its recognized that life doesn't require an overlay of labels and stories
o when labels and stories (and resistance and doubt) are seen as part of the texture of this moment
o when what's here is allowed to be here
o when experiencing is all there is-- no experiencer, no experience...

the first four, while not stable, feel accessible/"knowable" in some moments

the last one is something i have to think myself into... "the sense of experiencer can only be known through the experiencing of it and thus is yet another experience, both aspects of experiencing-- so there is only experiencing." my mind submits to the logic of this but it amounts to a belief... and as such is still part of the tap filling the bucket...

Truth is the one thing that is not a belief.

truth is what's here without the filter of labels and stories. Seeing labels and stories as just that, labels and stories overlaid on (or rather part of) lifeing, reveals the "isness" of the moment. that "isness" is truth.

when experiencing is all there is-- no experiencer, no experience...
i have to think myself into... "the sense of experiencer can only be known through the experiencing of it and thus is yet another experience, both aspects of experiencing-- so there is only experiencing." my mind submits to the logic of this but it amounts to a belief...

...and what is it that you know beyond belief ?

yes, i believe it's possible to know something without it being a belief. there are a zillion things that are known right now (at least in a relative sense-- fingers typing, etc.) i can think all sorts of things about fingers typing but there is also a more fundamental knowing of the experience as it happens.

What is in common with all of those things that you know beyond belief ? What is in common with those and the Sense of self ?
Is the Sense of self known beyond belief ?

v

What is in common with all of those things that you know beyond belief ?

They are experienced through the physical senses.

What is in common with those and the Sense of self ?

The part of the sense of self that is the body (and to the extent that feelings show up as sensations in the body) is experienced through the physical senses and thus is known beyond belief.
Personality and story of self, preferences and desires and complaints do not come through the sense doors (accept as they resonate in or act through the body). These all take place in the mind and thus constitute belief. They are perceived in real time, and thus are part of what's here, but there is no substance to them. You can wave your hand through them like smoke.

Is the Sense of self known beyond belief ?

Hesitation arises, but the answer is no. Want to read the above paragraph 100 times today though-- which suggests that it's not quite seen (not quite believed?) Off to work, but will rest in this...

The part of the sense of self that is the body (and to the extent that feelings show up as sensations in the body) is experienced through the physical senses and thus is known beyond belief.

Certainly there are those sensations that you previously ascribed the label "sense of self", but do we depart from the realm of physical sensations (Where a knowing beyond belief...) to the realm of mindstuff to apply any label to it ?


v

do we depart from the realm of physical sensations (Where a knowing beyond belief...) to the realm of mindstuff to apply any label to it ?

yipes, i think i was having this exact same conversation way back in july with derek... round and round I go, it's a wonder nobody is dizzy...

but, letting that story go, as labels are mindstuff, the answer is yes. the instant the label is applied, awareness actually separates (ever so momentarily, though in another sense profoundly) from the sensation itself.

that said, even before the label, the sensation seems to be filtered through the assumption that it's mine. if i look at a pen, its not that hard to see it as just a visual shape with texture and color. when i feel my heart (major sense of self zone), it's not coming in as raw data (despite all the meditating, etc). even before i say "mine" or "heart" or "contraction" (all of which are clearly located in thought), there is this "sense of ownership." i don't know whether this is a super rapid fire back and forth between mind and sensation (so fast it seems that both are experienced at once) that keeps that belief alive or whether the mind acts more like a filter of perception, distorting the raw data as it comes in.

round and round I go,

Is it a circle or a spiral ?
Is it possible that you can ever arrive at the same place ?

the instant the label is applied, awareness actually separates

So the 'self' stuff is purely conceptual. ..and yet you believe it even though it it clearly no more believable than any other story that is created by thoughts ??

filtered through the assumption that it's mine.

Rather than Not doing this, is it possible to allow it free rein, but then to acknowledge that it is habit and recognize the value of just dropping it as a belief ?

peace

vince

Is it a circle or a spiral ?

A spiral for sure-- in one sense, i'm guessing the spiral never ends, even post gate. but maybe at the gate the significance of the spiral dissolves and you just are where you are, realizing that that was always true.

So the 'self' stuff is purely conceptual. ..and yet you believe it even though it it clearly no more believable than any other story that is created by thoughts ??

particularly thick headed dodo, huh? ;-)

Rather than Not doing (assumption of ownership), is it possible to allow it free rein, but then to acknowledge that it is habit and recognize the value of just dropping it as a belief ?

must be possible. intention for that possibility present and accounted for.

you are too cool, vince. appreciation abounds...