Number of posts per day limits - a suggestion

[Steve Petermann]

For another one-handed backhand, how about Shapovalov, kind of a lefty version of Stan, only without the tattoo and a lot more failures ... maybe he should get that tattoo too

Oh yeah! Tsitsipas too. Both are so powerful and beautifully done. I'm old school and have a one-hander as well so I guess that's why I like to see some pros using it. Of course, Federer's is eternal.

[Eugene I]

2/ Realizing the common thread in all the above kinds of states - that they are ultimately sum of perceptions interpreted by the intellect - and instead turn towards the actual spiritual activity that manifests in it. Through the methods that I often describe it is possible to break the shell of the intellect and instead of succumbing into no-thought or diminished trance state, we break into immeasurably more lucid state where we find ourselves as a spiritual being that, so to speak, moments ago had its hands tied, its mouth gagged. And here's the extraordinarily difficult place that modern man simply can't even conceive the direction of. And the reason is that this direction requires us to conceive of something that is greater than us, something that our intellectual thoughts can not fit because these thoughts live as overtones on top of the spiritual activity of that being that is our true self. Once we experience ourselves from this higher perspective, it is a direct experience of a different kind. I can question if my perception of red comes from the optical nerve or as a dream image but I can't question the fact that I'm thinking. I'm thinking both in the dream and in the sensory world, the difference is what ideas I attach to the perceptions. Similarly, higher cognition transforms spiritual activity in such a way that the higher order fully self-conscious and meaningful flow of the Spirit contains within itself the overtones than when experienced without their living context we know as intellectual thoughts. You see, there are no perceptions here that we must interpret and wonder if they are true or illusions in the same way that our thinking is not a matter of interpretation - it simply is because it's the reflection of our own spiritual be-ing.

If the above 1/ and 2/ don't at least approximately hint at the fundamental difference between the two, I don't think there's point to continue any further.

That sounds fantastic, so I assume in the higher cognition you should be able to trace the origins and development of your sense perceptions as well, right? If this is so, can you explain why exactly your sense perceptions when you are observing physical phenomena are following physical laws (per Schrodinger and other equations) with amazing accuracy. Can you observe and trace exactly how the Spirit is manifesting such sense perceptions?

[Cleric]

I ask again, anyone, please, provide examples for other paths of experience that lead reliably, safely, verifiably to the inner spiritual nature of man, and do not depend on accidental, abnormal, anecdotal events such as trances, substances, abductions, NDEs, mediumism (fancily called channeling) etc.

I don't think terms like "reliably" and "verifiably" are helpful terms for those seeking their spiritual bearings. They are fraught with the dangers of dogmatism like we see in so many religious and spiritual traditions. Here's some examples. In Hinduism with regard to the Vedas terms used are, Śruti (what is heard), apauruṣeya (not created by humans), and anubhava (direct experience). And in Christianity whoever wrote the gospel of John attributes this to Jesus:

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Both the Bible and Koran are thought by many to be the infallible word of God. The list is long for this type of assertion.

Do I think there can be a direct experience of the divine? Yes, because I believe there is a divine transcendent depth to all things. However, that depth is present in finite beings with our own limitations, predispositions, and histories. Accordingly, the experience of the divine is received within the ambiguities and limitations of finite beings. This should rule out any dogmatic assertion of reliability or verifiability. Does that mean it has no powerful influence on us? Absolutely not! Theologian Paul Tillich, in his terminology, used the phrase: "the state of being grasped by the power of being-itself." He also recounts a life changing experience he had of Beauty-Itself in his article "One Moment of Beauty"

So, with this powerfulness of the divine presence, the term I often use is "compelling". Something about an experience or metaphysical idea is compelling to us. Does that mean it isn't flawed? No, but something about it seems right. I talk about this in the music metaphor, "A Music Metaphor, Consonance and Dissonance". Another metaphor I use in that post is the House of Mirrors at a carnival. If we look in a curved mirror we see a distorted image. That's not really us. There is a dissonance with who we think we really are. Our divine depth can also give us a feeling of dissonance when we encounter either our own metaphysical thinking/intuiting/feeling or that of another metaphysical formulation. Or there could be a consonance. Something seems right about it. As finite creatures, it is always a mixture of the two that spurs us on to continue our spiritual growth.

As human beings, many people like certainty. This is especially true for things that impinge on our existential concerns. However, life has a way of challenging that certainty. Does that mean we can't make a commitment to some life orientation? No. We can have what I call a "faithing fallibilism" where we commit to something we think is important but do so with humility and knowledge that we may be wrong. Here's a post — No Matter that talks about this. It's about a tattoo that the great tennis star Stan Wawrinka had put on his arm.

Steve, I'm in harmony with what you speak of but what I refer to goes even further. Please see my previous post. Theology stops short at the 'feeling of the divine presence in everything'. And this is another of the 1/ types where we have perceptions (feelings in the case) and we attach meaning to them through thinking. As said, I have nothing against this, in fact I fully embrace it, and I'm sure there are many people who have been inspired by your essays, and this is worthy of respect.

Yet theology can't cross into the divine transcendent depths, it can only feel them. The reason is within the linked post - we have the powerful religious feelings (in the most positive sense of the word) and we understand them through our thinking as the Divine present in everything. Yet if we want to have the experience of the Divine transcendental from within (and not only as feeling that we think about) we need to transfigure thinking itself. How come? The Divine Word works in us and expresses itself as our microcosmic verbal thoughts. The Word feels its Divine nature everywhere yet it has turned 'inside-out' within itself and now comprehends itself only as thoughts. As long as the Word only continues to think about the feelings pointing at its Divine nature, it keeps itself locked within the realm of human thought. It must trace its own origins, it must follow the thread of the spiritual activity that expresses itself in every intellectual thought and this thread will lead it back to itself but now as a higher being which says "I was enchanted in the rhythms of perceptions, feelings and microcosmic thoughts about them. It was me all along it was my Word that was expressing in every thought, yet I didn't know myself in my fullness. In a similar way a man doesn't know himself in fullness while he dreams. He doesn't realize while dreaming that he is an aspect of his waking self that has become enchanted by the dream imagery and has forgotten its waking essence. Yet when we wake up we say "I was there in the dream, even though I didn't have conception of my waking self at the time". This leads us to /2 from the linked post - the direction that humanity fiercely avoids with all strength. The direction which would reveal to us that there's something much greater living and thinking through us, that in our waking state we're only dreaming, enchanted by the senses and feelings, yet denying fervently that it's our destiny to work for our awakening and allow our true self to come to his waking consciousness and see how he was dreaming itself in us.

[Eugene I]

Yet theology can't cross into the divine transcendent depths, it can only feel them. The reason is within the linked post - we have the powerful religious feelings (in the most positive sense of the word) and we understand them through our thinking as the Divine present in everything. Yet if we want to have the experience of the Divine transcendental from within (and not only as feeling that we think about) we need to transfigure thinking itself. How come? The Divine Word works in us and expresses itself as our microcosmic verbal thoughts. The Word feels its Divine nature everywhere yet it has turned 'inside-out' within itself and now comprehends itself only as thoughts. As long as the Word only continues to think about the feelings pointing at its Divine nature, it keeps itself locked within the realm of human thought. It must trace its own origins, it must follow the thread of the spiritual activity that expresses itself in every intellectual thought and this thread will lead it back to itself but now as a higher being which says "I was enchanted in the rhythms of perceptions, feelings and microcosmic thoughts about them. It was me all along it was my Word that was expressing in every thought, yet I didn't know myself in my fullness. In a similar way a man doesn't know himself in fullness while he dreams. He doesn't realize while dreaming that he is an aspect of his waking self that has become enchanted by the dream imagery and has forgotten its waking essence. Yet when we wake up we say "I was there in the dream, even though I didn't have conception of my waking self at the time". This leads us to /2 from the linked post - the direction that humanity fiercely avoids with all strength. The direction which would reveal to us that there's something much greater living and thinking through us, that in our waking state we're only dreaming, enchanted by the senses and feelings, yet denying fervently that it's our destiny to work for our awakening and allow our true self to come to his waking consciousness and see how he was dreaming itself in us.

Cleric, and what makes you think that the awakening to your waking self is not just another dream?

[Cleric]

Cleric, and what makes you think that the awakening to your waking self is not just another dream?

It is. There are layers of the dream, there are levels of the higher Self. I was just keeping things simple. But every higher level brings us closer to the perspective of the Eternal Eye of the One, revealing more and more of what the World is in its reality (and together with this our previous enchanted selves).

But the key difference is that once we realize our 'vertical' nature, we no longer see it like a mere dream because now at all times we know that we live along a gradient of consciousness, levels of selves, nested like Russian dolls, and we know how to relate to these levels and harmonize them. Today people are dreaming because they don't know and don't want to know that they have higher self that they can awaken to. Instead they prefer to hijack and squeeze as much as possible from the dream. YOLO!

[Cleric]

PS: The dream analogy is limited because in our dreams and waking state we use practically the same mode of cognition - thinking - even though in the dream it is much more enchanted and flowing along the dream imagery, to the extent that absurd things don't make any impression on us - things that we couldn't miss in our more alert waking form of cognition.

The transition to lucid dream is interesting because suddenly we awaken to our Earthly self, even though still within the dream imagery. This makes for an analogy but it's really limited because it can't convey the way cognition changes between the intellectual mode and that of Imaginative consciousness. I tried to do this in many different ways, for example by saying that the intellectual thoughts are like 'folds' within Imaginative consciousness (the perspective of Manas). When spiritual activity becomes entrapped in these folds, we feel ourselves as intellectual ego that thinks about perceptions.

[Eugene I]

It is. There are layers of the dream, there are levels of the higher Self. I was just keeping things simple. But every higher level brings us closer to the perspective of the Eternal Eye of the One, revealing more and more of what the World is in its reality (and together with this our previous enchanted selves).

But the key difference is that once we realize our 'vertical' nature, we no longer see it like a mere dream because now at all times we know that we live along a gradient of consciousness, levels of selves, nested like Russian dolls, and we know how to relate to these levels and harmonize them. Today people are dreaming because they don't know and don't want to know that they have higher self that they can awaken to. Instead they prefer to hijack and squeeze as much as possible from the dream. YOLO!

Well, if I'm dreaming a dream in a dream and then wake up from a dream in a dream into a dream, I don't see how it's a Russian doll dream. It's simply a dream all the way through, which just appears to be a transition from a dream-in-a-dream into awakening from a dream-in-a-dream into a dream.

And I also can have a dream in which I see how my dream is generated by higher level structures of higher cognition. But then, isn't it just another dream about how the dream in a dream is dreamt?

[Eugene I]

The transition to lucid dream is interesting because suddenly we awaken to our Earthly self, even though still within the dream imagery. This makes for an analogy but it's really limited because it can't convey the way cognition changes between the intellectual mode and that of Imaginative consciousness. I tried to do this in many different ways, for example by saying that the intellectual thoughts are like 'folds' within Imaginative consciousness (the perspective of Manas). When spiritual activity becomes entrapped in these folds, we feel ourselves as intellectual ego that thinks about perceptions.

Lucid dream is exactly when you know your are dreaming and everything you are experiencing is a dream, including yourself. If you still think that you are experiencing some reality "beyond" the dream, you are still dreaming non-lucidly. It's just that you lucidly awakened from a dream-in-a-dream realizing (in a dream) that you were dreaming, but now you think you are "awake", while you are actually still dreaming.

But the "Eternal Eye of the One" is the very seeing of the dream. Not seeing by "you", because "you" are just another dream character in a dream.

[AshvinP]

I ask again, anyone, please, provide examples for other paths of experience that lead reliably, safely, verifiably to the inner spiritual nature of man, and do not depend on accidental, abnormal, anecdotal events such as trances, substances, abductions, NDEs, mediumism (fancily called channeling) etc.

I don't think terms like "reliably" and "verifiably" are helpful terms for those seeking their spiritual bearings. They are fraught with the dangers of dogmatism like we see in so many religious and spiritual traditions. Here's some examples. In Hinduism with regard to the Vedas terms used are, Śruti (what is heard), apauruṣeya (not created by humans), and anubhava (direct experience). And in Christianity whoever wrote the gospel of John attributes this to Jesus:

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Both the Bible and Koran are thought by many to be the infallible word of God. The list is long for this type of assertion.

Do I think there can be a direct experience of the divine? Yes, because I believe there is a divine transcendent depth to all things. However, that depth is present in finite beings with our own limitations, predispositions, and histories. Accordingly, the experience of the divine is received within the ambiguities and limitations of finite beings. This should rule out any dogmatic assertion of reliability or verifiability.

Steve, Eugene, and Dana,

This is why I am convinced (well, one of the few reasons I am convinced, but an important one) that the antipathy and general failure of understanding is not primarily due to either Cleric's imaginative spiritual or my 'lawyerly' conceptual approach. In fact, since we are approaching the same spiritual content from two 'sides' of the consciousness threshold, so to speak, it should be even easier for you guys to triangulate the meaning of what is being conveyed. Nevertheless, you (Steve in this instance) keep repeating the same points which Cleric has addressed. Instead of responding to what he is saying, it is as if you never read what he wrote and decided to go with a pre-written script. For the record, I do not think this is done consciously - I think you guys are actually trying to read what he is writing - but the way it appears is as I said above. There is a profound and repetitive lack of understanding of what Cleric is writing, even though the writing itself is very elegant and immanently logical.

His entire approach from start to finish is about avoiding "the dangers of dogmatism" in spiritual traditions. Let's think about what dogma really comes from - it is the mere intellect trying to grasp at the richness of spiritual ideas by connecting together a bunch of its mineralized concepts. Since that cannot be done, it must eventually use a symbolic placeholder (like a "creed") to encompass the spiritual truth and move on. These are not living symbols, renewed by the Spirit of higher cognition, but dying ones, so over time they naturally become more and more lifeless and rigidified. That is when we end up with the worst sorts of dogmas in the modern age, spiritual and secular alike. You recognize this has happened, Steve, but you are not identifying the root problem (abstract concepts not renewed to life by Spirit)! So your "solution" is, we must all learn to live within the "ambiguities and limitations of finite beings". Leaving aside the clear fact that no one can live that way without descending into totalitarian and nihilistic tendencies...

There is no fundamental reason we must live that way! Because, as Cleric is repeatedly illustrating in his comments, there is such a thing as higher cognition which expands consciousness and taps into the life of the Spirit by which all forms and symbols in the 'physical' plane are renewed (reborn, transfigured, baptized in the Spirit, etc.). These are not random and arbitrary connections we are making here - anyone who studies these things and pays close attention will see the inner logic (not to mention you find this approach detailed throughout esoteric Wisdom traditions). That inner logic will then make sense of many 'mysterious' phenomena, like the unfolding of mythology, philosophy, science, and religion in human history. It is through that reasoned sense-making we can perceive how the constraints to knowledge and expanded consciousness are self-imposed, or, more appropriately, intellectual "ego-imposed". Again, neither he nor I have asked you to simply accept the approach, but to actually consider it carefully - that cannot be done until it is first understood.


PS - Dana, I just included you because of your response to Steve. I have no idea whether you understand Cleric's approach or not, since you play those cards pretty close to your chest

PPS - I didn't realize Cleric already responded to Steve, so if anything I wrote conflicts with what he wrote, ignore mine. But I don't think that should be necessary.

[Eugene I]

Cleric, and you still haven't answered: how exactly the Spirit produces sense perceptions exactly according to the Schrodinger and other physical equations?