The Gate

well done.
Sit with that for the rest of today, now, we'll pick it up again in the morning
xx

Ok, thanks. A lot to take in or maybe not?! Xx

Not, but am about to go to yoga xx

Is there a difference between sensing and describing?

Absolutely there is. Sensing is immediately felt but describing is via thought and is, in a way, at one remove. X

Yes, good.
And good noticing on the longer exercise yesterday.
Have a go at this one next...

Wherever you are sitting right now, look for an object to use. Don’t pick up the object or turn it around, only look at what can be seen without touching it or turning it.
Have one?

Now look at it and describe what you see. Give yourself a bit of time with it. Just look, nothing else.
Done?

Now describe the back side of the object.
How is it known what the back side looks like?
What tells what it looks like?
How can it be known that there is a back at all? That the object is 3D?
Can this be known in direct experience?
Can an object be known at all?

xx

Hi Sioned
It’s a patterned ceramic pot with a lid and the light is shining on the lid.
I can’t see the back of it so from memory it’s the same on the back. Nothing, whilst only looking, definitely tells me about the back, it’s only guess work and memory. It can’t be known directly, only using thought.
Like the apple exercise this object can’t be known in or of itself but only seen.
X

Yes.
Let's explore the idea of memory next.
Almost everybody believes that a memory thought I'd referring to something that has happened. And that a memory thought is a different thought to a non-dual memory thought.
Do you agree?

Bring a memory to mind now, and look at it.
Look at what is actually going on.

I’m not sure what you mean exactly about the difference between a non dual memory and a memory thought.
I’m thinking of a memory now..it’s of my son holding my grandchild.
The non dual memory is a seeing, a picture without a particular thought. What is going on is a seeing or arising or appearing in nothingness.
Now if I have memory of a telephone call it’s more of a hearing memory but I have to go to thoughts about it to have a memory about what was said and a seeing picture of who I was talking to. But it arising in nothing, bit like a cloud in space.

It was an auto-correct error!.
Should have referred to the belief that "a memory thought is a different thought than a non-memory thought"
Sorry about that, Deborah.
Good looking nonetheless.
What is the exact difference between a "general" thought and a "memory" thought?
X

Oh right! A general thought has a slightly lighter feel as long as it’s not owned too much and drawn into or become one which acts as a centre around which a whole story can be developed. More like clouds passing. Less attached. A memory thought, unless it’s fleeting, can be more owned and visceral.It can be more pictorial and other thoughts and sensations can gather around it like iron feelings to a magnet.

Oh yes and a memory thought is attached the thought of a time in the past therefore a belief in time and on a linear scale.

Great!
How is it known EXACTLY that a " memory" thought refers to something that has happened?

It’s not known exactly as even photographs are only known in the seeing of them now as I see them. As I remember an event it arises In the ‘remembering’ of it but that feels like a real visceral knowing and I want to add that it comes from within but within who I ask? So it’s a sensation of knowing....but to no one. I can’t be sure as even if someone confirms the memory it’s just a kind of fleeting happening to no one. Difficult one! X

Just ruminating on a totally different thing. Would it be true to say that selfing or sense of selfing happens although there’s no self? So as long as selfing carries on but there’s no buying into it then all is just that? Like seeing happening but there’s no seer?