Non-duality - multiplicity

[bewell]

quote:Originally posted by emc

- How is that 'separation' possible? It is a great mystery - how can Oneness be divided into individual blobs of awareness?

How, asks emc, can undifferentiated singular Reality produce the multidimensional cosmos with its infinite forms?  According to a popular Hindu doctrinal proverb, "Shiva without Shakti is unable to effect anything." Shiva, is the "transcendental static principle... incapable of creation."    Multiplicity is explained as the work of Shakti, "the dynamic, creative principle of existence" (quotations above and to follow are from from Feuerstein's Shambala Encyclopedia of Yoga, I was just flipping through, and this page popped out at me).

"Shiva without Shakti is likened to a corpse..."  Sparkle, the idea of introverted non-duality (as distinct from the extroverted, eyes-open, non-duality you refer to in your post) is, mythically explained, the notion of union with Shiva -- such union with the One is beyond experience/scenery.  During such union, the body of the yogin is corpse-like and insensible and also maximally pervious to Kundalini-Shakti.  Shiva (the One) in union with Shakti (the power of creating multiplicity) thus become the god and goddess of yogins par excellence... Yogani's marriage of bliss consciousness and ecstatic conductivity.

In introverted deep meditation, we seek a transcendent stillness, a silence that renders our bodies pervious to pranic awakening.  Then when we open our eyes and go into our daily activities we carry that inner experience with us.  But of course it is not only us meditators that have that inner marriage of silence and energy, it is, as the myth suggests, cosmic.  We can relax, and trust, we are not alone.

[bewell]

quote:Originally posted by emc
"Experiences do not beget
greater experiences. Practices do."  Yogani

So true!

[emc]

"How, asks emc, can undifferentiated singular Reality produce the multidimensional cosmos with its infinite forms?"

I'm very sorry, bewell, but I have to correct you on that one, since you put words in my mouth.

I am asking of the multiplicity of non-form consciousness, not the form-side of it. It all boils down to the question:

Who is waking up?

Not the mind, since the mind can NEVER wake up, it's not designed for that.
Not the body, since body and mind are compatible and the very same.
Not the ONE universal consciuosness that is eternally aware and enlightened allready.

Who is waking up? Who is making the choice to continue with practices? Who has the choice to stay true or fall asleep again? Some kind of "individual consciousness" that is widening until it reaches a state of eternal oneness. But who is it? Who am "I" that is still believing the stories of my mind? Who is getting rid of the mud? That's what's baking my noodles at the moment.

[emc]

Originally posted by Sparkle

quote:When we look at a flower we see the flower, if we strip it of all it's identifications of, flower, petal, colour, texture, smell, beauty and any other thought that comes in - we are still looking at that flower - it does'nt dissapear - it exists - it is separate from the wall next to it.
It is our identifications with it that make the duality - in our minds.
In non-duality the flowers are still there, as Christi says, the forest is still there, the multiplicity is still there, but without the identifications it is non-duality. - - - Everything is temporary, is impermanent, moving in time, but our experience of it in the "now" is the flower, is the tree, they don't disappear when we come into the now.
If we have the experience of emptiness or spaciousness whilst engaging in life, we still feel the ground, still see the flower.

I am very sorry Louis, but during and after the retreat this idea became very untrue for me. It is not the identification only as you (and Christi) put it. The identification prevents you from seeing Truth, that's what's troublesome with the identification. And truth is there is actually no flower, only the appearance of it. It is only from a separated state you think the flower is really there and that it should be "separate from the wall next to it". The flower and the wall is actually One. There is no separation between them.

"In non-duality the flowers are still there" To me, it actually disappears and becomes absolutely transparent when you let duality drop. That's why you fall in love with form. It's a miracle form exists, as a programmed Matrix. In non-duality nothing exists. It is emptiness. Nothingness. But consciousness (or intelligence) is somehow containing ideas that are being reflected as form (someone writes the program for Matrix). Plato's allegory of the Cave comes strongly to me as I write.

quote:Imagine prisoners, who have been chained since their childhood deep inside a cave: not only are their limbs immobilized by the chains; their heads are chained in one direction as well so that their gaze is fixed on a wall.

Behind the prisoners is an enormous fire, and between the fire and the prisoners is a raised walkway, along which puppets of various animals, plants, and other things are moved along. The puppets cast shadows on the wall, and the prisoners watch these shadows. When one of the puppet-carriers speaks, an echo against the wall causes the prisoners to believe that the words come from the shadows.

The prisoners engage in what appears to us to be a game: naming the shapes as they come by. This, however, is the only reality that they know, even though they are seeing merely shadows of images. They are thus conditioned to judge the quality of one another by their skill in quickly naming the shapes and dislike those who play poorly.

Suppose a prisoner is released and compelled to stand up and turn around. At that moment his eyes will be blinded by the sunlight coming into the cave from its entrance, and the shapes passing by will appear less real than their shadows.

The last object he would be able to see is the sun, which, in time, he would learn to see as the object that provides the seasons and the courses of the year, presides over all things in the visible region, and is in some way the cause of all these things that he has seen. / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_cave

We still see trees and flowers, but they are now perceived as mere reflections.

At the retreat we were all saying to each other "Oh, what a beautiful reflection you are"... There was only itself seeing a temporary reflection of itself. This brings a natural drop in fear of death. Earthquakes, fires, vulcanos... wouldn't have mattered - it would not be hurting "me" in any way. Impossible, since I am eternal, was never born and can never die. "I" only watch the transformations of energy - in and out of form - even 'my own' body becomes ridiculous - it was never 'mine'. I am way outside of it (as well as inside of it, receiving sense-perception signals) and it is only a piece of cloth I happen to wear at the moment. I will still be here when this particular body goes back to dust. As long as I think a flower is real I believe it can be born and then die. It can't. It can only pass through form. Truth is eternal.

My reaction when this "I'm not my body" hits me now and then (the flip-flopping) is hilarious - the body starts to DANCE! It is taking dance steps and I am watching it with an enormous bubbling joy and amazement. What is life doing with the body? I don't know. Haven't got a clue. (And this is what's causing my confusion right now... who is not knowing?) It feels as if movement occurs for its own sake. Just for the enjoyment of it, as if life force in the legs just wants to move rhythmically and get the experience of dancing. I watch the film. Body dances. I watch and enjoy enormously, and if a car would smash me I have this certainty that I'd be there watching the body get smashed and the joy would be undisrupted.

(edit)
It reminds me of a line from Byron Katie:

Life doesn't happen to you. It happens FOR you!

"If we have the experience of emptiness or spaciousness whilst engaging in life, we still feel the ground, still see the flower." When we ARE that emptiness, we feel the ground and know it as ourselves - we salute that ground as a miracle and we make love to it while walking on it. Itself sensing itself.

A story: Bernie shared one day that he had great troubles seeing us. If he didn't make an effort we were just black to him - nothing. That's sort of his natural state. "Going into Matrix" is only happening to him due to this great love of form and the urge to help others to clean their houses. Talking about Truth is the only mission.

And my God, I just happened to continue to read on the wiki page:

quote:Once enlightened, so to speak, the freed prisoner would not want to return to the cave to free "his fellow bondsmen," but would be compelled to do so. Another problem lies in the other prisoners not wanting to be freed: descending back into the cave would require that the freed prisoner's eyes adjust again, and for a time, he would be one of the ones identifying shapes on the wall. His eyes would be swamped by the darkness, and would take time to become acclimated. Therefore, he would not be able to identify the shapes on the wall as well as the other prisoners, making it seem as if his being taken to the surface completely ruined his eyesight.

(I'm on the verge of excusing myself for taking these big words into my mouth, as if it happens prematurely, and perhaps it is so, but I'm trying to allow myself to express things even in this confused state.)

[emc]

Shanti, you posted a quote from Yogani: "In truth, we probably won't say much, and just go do the dishes and take out the trash. Nothing changes, even as everything does." (Where did you find that?)

I remember I asked Bernie one time during the retreat when we were walking beside eachother under the trees in silence: "There's no need to speak anylonger? Why do we talk to eachother?" And he just answered "Oh, talking has it's place as well." But we all became more and more quiet, just smiling toward each other (=ourselves... ourself? Our Self... ).

[Sparkle]

emc said:

quote:I am very sorry Louis

No need to be sorry emc, I'm quite happy to eat the crumbs from your table , or anyone elses here for that matter[]

 

quote:A story: Bernie shared one day that he had great troubles seeing us. If he didn't make an effort we were just black to him - nothing. That's sort of his natural state. "Going into Matrix" is only happening to him due to this great love of form and the urge to help others to clean their houses. Talking about Truth is the only mission.

This all sounds like a third eye experience. In one of the  courses I attended years ago we used to set up aura seeing exercises. It was commonplace in this setting that people would disappear in front of you, it happened me many times. If you want to see how easy it is, just put your hand in front of you in a dimly lit room against a light coloured background and keep looking at your hand through your third eye. You might see colours or white light or a blurring of your fingers or your whole hand might disappear. In fact the disappearance was annoying to me because it always disappeared before I could see any colours[]

So seeing people disappear in front of you, especially in a high energy setting is not such a big deal. I'm not suggesting that Bernie is not a big deal, I gather he is. But this experience and others which come through the third eye only, don't tell me much, apart from, nice scenery.


 

quote:Nothing changes, even as everything does

This is the key emc. It is what all the great masters seem to say, nothing changes and yet everything does. In other words you start with a flower, it disappears and then you end up with the flower again[]. It's just that there is a different perspective. I seem to have a vague recollection of you saying something similar yourself, in the aftermath of that retreat, but maybe not.

I'm not trying to suggest that you are wrong in what you say, and in fact it might be just a word mis-interpretation thing. And as I say I'm quite happy to eat the crumbs from your table.
I also should have known better that to get into this debate, in the first place[], I usually carefully avoid them, but that's life[]

 

quote:It all boils down to the question:

Who is waking up?

Maybe I'm mis-understanding but is this not the same question as "Who am I"?

Peace and joy[]

[bewell]

emc wrote:  "A story: Bernie shared one day that he had great troubles seeing us. If he didn't make an effort we were just black to him - nothing. That's sort of his natural state."

Sparkle wrote: This all sounds like a third eye experience. In one of the  courses I attended years ago we used to set up aura seeing exercises. It was commonplace in this setting that people would disappear in front of you, it happened me many times....it always disappeared before I could see any colours[]

Shanti quoted Yogani: "Nothing changes, even as everything does"


What a wonderful exchange:  expressing unusual, blessed experiences in words.  Such wisdom.  Gaining perspective.  I'll eat whatever crumbs you may miss, Sparkle.

[emc]

Louis, thank you for your input. It's nothing to debate, really. It is to be lived.

Nice to hear about your third eye experience. Did they leave a "black hole", or did you see the background clearly as if they weren't there at all? Or did the background disappear as well?

(Are they real if they dissapear so easily and become like air only with a different measure of perceiving??? )

The noodles have stopped baking. An angel in form of a friend uttered the magical words sending my right arm up like an antenna, bringing shivers, tears and joy. She talked about a film about illusionists, then we glided to this subject. When I presented this paradox I'm struggling with in my mind, she said: But wouldn't the fun go away if we knew how the trick was made?

I went into trying to figure out what it would be like to be the ONE: I would be very bored with being allmighty, all seeing, resting in a perfect state, therefore I'd create multiplicity and oblivion, so that I can discover myself over and over again, with a thousand eyes, all fresh, all new, all from different angles. Haha! What a gigantic joke this is. IT is the greatest illusionist, IT is giving itself a show of illusions but to enjoy it we must forget about it first, so IT created the illusion of existence from which it could wake up to itself again and again, but with NO understanding of how it actually works. That's the fun of it. If we knew how it works - the game would be over, and nothing would be fun anylonger. It would be back to boring square One. The love affair would be over. As if someone told the end of the film. No possibility to discover anything anylonger, no thrill.

On the way home, the beautiful full moon caught my attention and smiled at me. Rumi's poem came to my ears:

From the beginning of my life
I have been looking for your face
but today I have seen it.

Today I have seen
the charm, the beauty,
the unfathomable grace
of the face
that I was looking for.

Today I have found you
and those that laughed
and scorned me yesterday
are sorry that they were not looking
as I did.

I am bewildered by the magnificence
of your beauty
and wish to see you with a hundred eyes.

That's the point. The wish to be seen with a hundred eyes. If it was only one eye watching itself it would be static. Multiple consciousnesses that forget who they really are creates the possibility to awake all the time. What a thrill!!! What a trick! And if it is seen how that trick is done, the game is over. So... that's the mystery. And the "don't know"-state is a blessing. We're here to have fun and enjoy the illusionists show.

I no longer wish to dwell a moment longer on this question, but a thousand thanks for your inspiring posts, pushing this release to take place!

PS: Louis, you wrote:

quote:
Nothing changes, even as everything does

This is the key emc. It is what all the great masters seem to say, nothing changes and yet everything does. In other words you start with a flower, it disappears and then you end up with the flower again. It's just that there is a different perspective. I seem to have a vague recollection of you saying something similar yourself, in the aftermath of that retreat, but maybe not.

It made me look for the first things I wrote after the retreat, and this is actually the very first thing I wrote in a mail to Yogani, showing this profound shift in reference point and perspective:

quote:I have been blessed to meet myself as pure stillness in action, nothingness and the unified universe mirroring itself with its paradoxical multiplicity in a seemlingly solid body with the name Bernie Prior. I was afraid of getting "guru attached", but there is absolutely nothing to be attached to. How can it ever be possible to get attached to anyone? He is nobody. He is totally black, he's not there! I am him, that is - nobody. And you are nobody. And we are all one. Life is the pure feminine, the void, and the pure masculine, pure consciousness, both a polarization from the nothingness, constantly making love, manifested in Earth existence, the miracle of human bodies born out of, through and by action, seemlingly solid but actually nothing.

Note the "seemingly solid" part... It's not the way it seems! The only thing that makes us believe it's solid is the limitied sense-perception organs we are blessed with. If we would have eyes that could detect quantum particles - we would only percieve a lot of... SPACE, no?!

PPS (Good heavens, I'm doing a Kirtan! Is this normal this Kirtanman development?):

I found these clear lines from Yogani, on what's real and what's scenery, in a mail:

quote:When the "I am goes" (vibrationally) in deep meditation, all that is left is reality, which is inner silence, and that is what we are cultivating as a full time presence. The screen behind the movie of life. Cultivating what is already there. It is a tricky business. :-)

[emc]

*camera zooming in, emc in front of a beautiful, mystical forest, fog*
*focus on face, looking bewildered*

- Now, do you begin to understand why I find it very, very difficult to understand what grounding is these days?

I'm supposed to stabilize... and ground... in the illusion?!?! [:O] which is... nothing?...

*turning around, starting to walk away*

- (mumbling) ... in the scenery?... stabilize... in the unreal... (mumble, mumble)

... it's only a phase...(mumble, mumble)...

... mystery... (mumble) ...acceptance...  

*walking out of the picture to the right*
*still picture of background forest with beautiful fog in front, silence*

(Stop laughing, Yogani! )

[Christi]

quote:I am very sorry Louis, but during and after the retreat this idea became very untrue for me. It is not the identification only as you (and Christi) put it. The identification prevents you from seeing Truth, that's what's troublesome with the identification. And truth is there is actually no flower, only the appearance of it. It is only from a separated state you think the flower is really there and that it should be "separate from the wall next to it". The flower and the wall is actually One. There is no separation between them.

 

quote:*camera zooming in, emc in front of a beautiful, mystical forest, fog*
*focus on face, looking bewildered*

- Now, do you begin to understand why I find it very, very difficult to understand what grounding is these days?  

I'm supposed to stabilize... and ground... in the illusion?!?!  which is... nothing?...

Hi EMC,


When you walk through a forest, there is the appearance of the trees to our gross physical senses, the touch, the smell, the sight. As our inner senses open, there is also the awareness of the inner life of the tree, the flow of prana, the awareness of the radiance of love from the tree. As our consciousness expands we come to know that the tree is conscious of us, and can speak to us and we can speak to it. As we become conscious of the inner being of the tree, we can see that it is shining from within, and we can see its inner light through its external (physical) appearance. So its external form becomes transparent as we see its inner light more clearly.

A tree is a soul form, a spark of divine consciousness. The ground of our being is the same as the ground of its being. A tree is not just a movement on a screen. It is God, and is real as we are real. If we kill a tree, we kill part of our self. Every time we walk past a tree, it knows we are there. It recognizes us, and it knows how we are feeling. It knows how our meditation is going because it is aware of the changes in our light bodies.

This is true not only of trees, but of flowers and all living things. This is why we must care for the earth, not just for our own sake (to preserve it for human existence), but because the Divine is manifest in all of creation, and we are the guardians.

When we ground, it has meaning because we are attuning ourselves to the synergetic resonances that are manifest in nature, and we are reconnecting with our own being (with our supreme self).

So no need to wonder around in a daze in a non-existent universe! Actually when angels look at humans, they wonder why we are wondering around in a daze in a non-existent universe so much of our time.

Christi



 

[Christi]

Hi Louis,
 

quote:

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EMC wrote:
A story: Bernie shared one day that he had great troubles seeing us. If he didn't make an effort we were just black to him - nothing. That's sort of his natural state. "Going into Matrix" is only happening to him due to this great love of form and the urge to help others to clean their houses. Talking about Truth is the only mission.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Louis wrote:
This all sounds like a third eye experience. In one of the courses I attended years ago we used to set up aura seeing exercises. It was commonplace in this setting that people would disappear in front of you, it happened me many times.

I may be wrong, but I suspect that when Bernie says that some days he finds it hard to see people at all, he does not mean that when he stares at them they just look like a black blob. I suspect he means that he simply sees everyone as God, and as such they are just part of his own supreme Self. Then who is there to see?

He would simply be in bliss and silence, seeing his divine form everywhere, in everything. What would be the point of speaking, and who would he be speaking to? So he has to come down from his normal state of perception, and come into our illusory world, even to speak to people.

It would be interesting to check this with him. Maybe the next time someone sees him they could ask him and let us know?

[Anthem]

quote:Originally posted by Christi

When you walk through a forest, there is the appearance of the trees to our gross physical senses, the touch, the smell, the sight. As our inner senses open, there is also the awareness of the inner life of the tree, the flow of prana, the awareness of the radiance of love from the tree. As our consciousness expands we come to know that the tree is conscious of us, and can speak to us and we can speak to it. As we become conscious of the inner being of the tree, we can see that it is shining from within, and we can see its inner light through its external (physical) appearance. So its external form becomes transparent as we see its inner light more clearly.

A tree is a soul form, a spark of divine consciousness. The ground of our being is the same as the ground of its being. A tree is not just a movement on a screen. It is God, and is real as we are real. If we kill a tree, we kill part of our self. Every time we walk past a tree, it knows we are there. It recognizes us, and it knows how we are feeling. It knows how our meditation is going because it is aware of the changes in our light bodies.

This is true not only of trees, but of flowers and all living things. This is why we must care for the earth, not just for our own sake (to preserve it for human existence), but because the Divine is manifest in all of creation, and we are the guardians.

When we ground, it has meaning because we are attuning ourselves to the synergetic resonances that are manifest in nature, and we are reconnecting with our own being (with our supreme self).

So no need to wonder around in a daze in a non-existent universe! Actually when angels look at humans, they wonder why we are wondering around in a daze in a non-existent universe so much of our time.

Thanks for this post Christi, I feel more connected from reading it and it resembles my perspective as well. There are periods when I vanishes and there is only experiencing and only the emptiness is real, but as I live more in my senses and less in the mind, the world has become more real, more vivid. Objects appear like they are under a spot light, every detail around me is amplified. The here and now becomes more fascinating and reality is inspiring me to experience it and to choose it over the shadowy thoughts of the mind. It becomes easier to be present when the here and now is an experience of love, connection and peace. Even when it's not pleasant to be in the here and now, say in periods of emotional turbulence, I stay present anyway, knowing that life is pointing me back to my heart.

A

[emc]

Thank you for your reply, Christi. We all have our own point of reference, and I appreciate you sharing yours. It triggers a response here.

"When you walk through a forest, there is the appearance of the trees to our gross physical senses, the touch, the smell, the sight. As our inner senses open, there is also the awareness of the inner life of the tree, the flow of prana, the awareness of the radiance of love from the tree. As our consciousness expands we come to know that the tree is conscious of us, and can speak to us and we can speak to it."

From where I sit, the question is - who is separating the tree from the "us"? As if there's an interaction going on between the tree and the "us". Interaction needs two... I am the tree, the soil it is growing in, the air around it. I am the perceiver and the perceived.

"As we become conscious of the inner being of the tree, we can see that it is shining from within, and we can see its inner light through its external (physical) appearance. So its external form becomes transparent as we see its inner light more clearly. A tree is a soul form, a spark of divine consciousness. The ground of our being is the same as the ground of its being. A tree is not just a movement on a screen. It is God, and is real as we are real. If we kill a tree, we kill part of our self."

Death is equal to life - every death is celebrated in the universe: it keeps things moving, leaving space for new form to take place. The Self is eternal and is never born and can never die. Nobody ever died on Earth. Nobody was ever born. Only the mind's idea of death as something terminal exists. If we "kill" a tree, it changes form and no part of existence is hurt or diminished in any way. Impossible. How can a shadow be killed?

Every time we walk past a tree, it knows we are there. It recognizes us, and it knows how we are feeling. It knows how our meditation is going because it is aware of the changes in our light bodies. This is true not only of trees, but of flowers and all living things.

Everything is awareness and alive in existence, not only 'living' things, but also 'dead materia'. Everything has its own consciousness. Even the air is aware. Feel the embrace of a breeze... The loving gaze from your toiletseat... The mountain's constant greeting with its slow movement...

"This is why we must care for the earth, not just for our own sake (to preserve it for human existence), but because the Divine is manifest in all of creation, and we are the guardians. When we ground, it has meaning because we are attuning ourselves to the synergetic resonances that are manifest in nature, and we are reconnecting with our own being (with our supreme self)."

That sentence resonates with me somehow, except from the "reconnecting". There's no need to reconnect - you're always IT and always has been - to connect it takes Two. For One it is just necessary to remember. But there's something about that resonance that rings a bell... The tickle... The joy of movement... the ripples...
 
"So no need to wonder around in a daze in a non-existent universe! Actually when angels look at humans, they wonder why we are wondering around in a daze in a non-existent universe so much of our time."

That's why the action part is there... engage in the world. Move. As stillness. But don't fall asleep again. Remember what's real (eternal, timeless, beyond life and death). Stay aware. Stay home.

Thank you for a lovely post, Christi. It caused a movement of thoughts...

I’m tied up
in the prison
which has yet to exist

Not having played
the game of chess
I’m already the checkmate

Not having tasted
a single cup of your wine
I’m already drunk

Not having entered
the battlefield
I’m already wounded and slain

I no longer
know the difference
between image and reality

Like the shadow
I am
And
I am not

/Rumi

[emc]

"The here and now becomes more fascinating and reality is inspiring me to experience it and to choose it over the shadowy thoughts of the mind."

Lovely, Andrew

[Christi]

Hi EMC

 

quote:From where I sit, the question is - who is separating the tree from the "us"? As if there's an interaction going on between the tree and the "us". Interaction needs two... I am the tree, the soil it is growing in, the air around it. I am the perceiver and the perceived.

I think you have been reading too much Advaita Vedanta EMC!

You are conscious, and you are aware of the tree. The tree is conscious and is aware of you. You cannot see yourself through the eyes of the tree and it cannot see itself through your eyes. So there is separation.

Why say there is not separation when there is separation?