It’s a weird little thing that I came up across. No logic, well nothing that proves the initial premise, that “you are everything, even life itself”. It seems like a story woven based on personal experience. Yet I can’t say that such a story isn’t helpful in the same way as religion in order to cope with life.
To give an excerpt from the link:
”
By making friends with my yearning for wholeness and learning to inquire into the nature of myself and the world with greater focus and discernment, it became apparent that what I had been searching for was Self- intimacy. I now describe this profound intimacy as oneness or “radical aloneness”—which comes from reconnecting with our own Aliveness. Reconnecting in this way showed me that my true Self wasn’t restricted to a body or personality, nor was it limited to the confines of time and space, and it couldn’t be described or quantified. It was all things: the full breadth of life. I realized that I had always been alone, radically alone; not merely as an entity, but as life itself. The same applies to you. You too are the same life. I invite you to inquire with me into your present scope of self and to begin to gently push down the boundaries that contain and confine you.
Contemplate this: what you are (beyond the self- concepts) is boundless and all-inclusive. Marvel at the idea that you (beyond the confines of “me”) are transcendent of time and space. Within that “you” that we call the Self, you arise as many focal points of universal Consciousness that project duality. Radical connection, then, can be revealed through putting things into perspective, through learning to “see” clearly and expansively. It is revealed by first connecting with our own Aliveness—localized consciousness, or Being; our basic sense of existing— and then coming to recognize that Aliveness is not divided into separate subjective egos.”
He talks about inquiring deeply and such but the question then arises “isn’t this really what I am or does it just feel that way”. I know that meditation does change the brain to give a sense of oneness and all that, but is it the truth or just a product of meditation. I have said to myself that there is a difference between being unlimited and feeling unlimited, and I think those who preach about nonduality seem to not want to accept their limitations.
Then there’s a bit about pegging his book towards the end.
But overall it just seems like any other spiritual writing, placing too much stock in experience.
What I don’t get is what makes these people believe they are infinite and unbounded? Just because they throw away all “concepts”? That might create the illusion and feeling of being so but I think any honest person would say that isn’t true. Our senses can lie, we have biases, and thats just a few. Taking away all labels doesn’t make you infinite anything.
Well, I’ve had what I thought was an out of body experience. They can be induced with electronic pulses to the brain. And there’s drugs that release you from all sensations of your body. It’s an achievable state. But to say that it is reality is what makes no sense. You are literally altering your senses to achieve that state. Even if you do it without drugs, it’s still an alteration. Anyone looking at you while you’re doing it can see you are still sitting there, not floating off to Jupiter. You can collect no data showing you went anywhere. No one has done something as simple as read a number written on a piece of paper in another room, let alone become one with the whole universe.
I don’t think it’s a matter of going anywhere so much as “realizing something”. As the link says it was the realization and reconnection with your aliveness, that you are radically alone since you are life, you are everything. Of course there is nothing to support that. I thought it was in terms of atoms and molecules like how you are made of the same thing as everything else, but I doubt it.
Some might say the alterations are revealing the truth, but what makes those any truer than anything else? I know I have had a few experiences as well but they don’t mean anything unless you make it so. I had some dreams that felt like precognition but there was no way to know if it was truly so or if I was just acting them out unknowingly. There’s no reliable test to confirm it. Same with the experiences people claim, they interpret things differently.
The common thread of proof in all these writings is some kind of personal experience, and that’s about it. If I wasn’t raised on spirituality I wouldn’t consider it to be an actual thing. I do know that believing something to be so has a powerful effect on humans. Like when I believed solipsism to be true, everything felt unreal and illusory and I was so isolated. It wasn’t until I stopped believing it that the sensation stopped.
As of yet I have no reason to believe these people aren’t any different. I notice they suffered from some form of depression or anxiety, etc. They claim it was a catalyst for change and awakening, but I think their brains cracked in some way to cope with the suffering.
As of yet I have no reason to believe these people aren’t any different. I notice they suffered from some form of depression or anxiety, etc. They claim it was a catalyst for change and awakening, but I think their brains cracked in some way to cope with the suffering.
Good observation. It reminds of the guy who used to write down his dream interpretations and go to security cameras and show them. That way if they came true, he had a time stamp on them. Before he started that, he had some dream involving a number and something that looked like and an airplane tale, then a plane with that number crashed. It completely freaked him out and he wanted to have people listen to him and study him. A psychologist explained that this is something that can happen when people have experiences that they think are meaningful, but really they aren't. His actions were erratic, but to him they were sensible because he convinced himself they were meaningful. A lot of people disrupt the world with stuff like this.
The weird part is that I try to rationalize what they mean by it. When I try to disagree they call it mind, ego, delusion, etc. It’s just hand waving things away.
I used to think I could dream the future. I would have dreams of real life and then later on when they happen I had deja vu. Of course considering that all these events involved me doing something I thought that maybe I was unknowingly making them happen. Not to mention the dreams were random and it’s entirely possible that given enough time an event would happen that is similar to what did in a dream. To truly claim future vision it would have to be an occurrence that did not involve me doing anything (so far no such thing has happened).
I just think that if I didn’t get raised spiritual that I wouldn’t buy this stuff. But because I was I can’t help but think there is some crazy wisdom or hidden meaning, that I might be missing out and I MUST KNOW in order to be true.
Many of the words used in the quote from the OP mean nothing to anyone except the author. They redefine words used to describe intensely personal feelings by using other words that have also been redefined. What your left with is almost meaningless to you or me.
I have no doubt that whoever wrote that felt they were plugged into the universe and life itself, but that feeling is not transferrable, so you can’t read about it and magically feel the way they did.
You need to discover your own way of feeling valued by, and involved in, the world. It’s a long inward looking journey more than an internet search.
Maybe unplug from social media (or, even better, all media) and spend a few days just existing. Don’t analyze or investigate or search for anything, only eat, sleep and go out into the world and observe without judgement.
If you don’t understand, watch a video about someone who does epic hiking expeditions or ultra-marathons. They regularly reach a point where they kind of ‘lose themselves’ and feeling like they are truly part of the universe rather than an individual human. It’s that state of mind you’re looking for. It might not be more difficult to do in a city, so maybe get into nature as much as possible.
OOPS! I Never pay attention to dates (ask my wife about that the day after our anniversary if you need proof).
It’s interesting to see how an ancient thread sounds exactly like one that could have been started this morning. Quite a good [bad?] indicator of the progress made.
I suppose the silver lining is that he’s still here talking to us.
I guess I happened upon a page that showed a bunch of testimonies from a lot of people talking about how he helped them with this sort of “knowledge” and so at the time I took that to mean that what he was saying was right.