On the Gradient of Thinking

[Stranger]

Lorenzo, you seem to adopt a nihilistic position denying the manifested world of forms, and denying the activity of consciousness that creates the world of forms, any value and reality. The Reality of Consciousness is like two sides of the same coin - what Consciousness is and what it does - and both sides are real and inseparable from each other. When we only see one side and disregard the other, our vision will inevitably be incomplete and distorted.

"Into blinding darkness pass they who are devoted to the unmanifest, and into still greater darkness, as it were, they who delight in the manifest. Whoever understands the manifest and the unmanifest as going together, (he), by overcoming death through the manifest, attains immortality through the unmanifest"
Isha Upanishad

"Experience is one seamless, unnamable, intimate whole. It is thought alone that divides this intimacy into an apparent multiplicity and diversity of objects and selves, thereby imagining a "me" and a "not me".

Awareness is never veiled or hurt by any appearance of the body, mind or world, although it is intimately one with all such appearances.

To be present in and as that is seen is to participate in life, not as a fragment amongst other fragments, but as Love, intimately one with all seeming objects and selves."

Rupert Spira

[Stranger]

Somebody comes into the Zen Center with a lighted ciga­rette, walks up to the Buddha-statue, blows smoke in its face and drops ashes on its lap. You are standing there. What can you do?

This person has understood that nothing is holy or un­holy. All things in the universe are one, and that one is himself. So everything is permitted. Ashes are Buddha; Bud­dha is ashes. The cigarette flicks. The ashes drop.

But his understanding is only partial. He has not yet understood that all things are just as they are. Holy is holy; unholy is unholy. Ashes are ashes; Buddha is Buddha. He is very attached to emptiness and to his own understanding, and he thinks that all words are useless. So whatever you say to him, however you try to teach him, he will hit you. If you try to teach by hitting him back, he will hit you even harder. (He is very strong.)

How can you cure his delusion?

Since you are a Zen student, you are also a Zen teacher. You are walking on the path of the Bodhisattva, whose vow is to save all beings from their suffering. This person is suffering from a mistaken view. You must help him under­stand the truth: that all things in the universe are just as they are.

How can you do this?

Dropping Ashes On The Buddha, by Seung Sahn

[AshvinP]

Not denying anything you've written above - however, I am not referring to conscious activity. I am referring to what could be called 'states of consciousness'. The field of psychology has recognized 3 general states of consciousness, sleeping, dreaming and waking. The Upanishads recognize several additional states of consciousness, but that's another topic.
For example, waking state (WS) . . . WS is not the result of conscious activity, does not require any understanding, does not need to be invoked. We don't need to constantly or frequently affirm or check it ( don't need to 'I am aware, I am aware, I am aware'. . . ) We don't need to learn how to be awake, nor follow any laws or conventions to be awake.
WS is not the result of conscious activity, WS is a manner of being aware and present that allows certain modes of conscious activity to take place.
Dreaming is not the result of conscious activity, dreaming is a manner of being aware and present that allows certain modes of conscious activity to take place.
Sleep is not the result of conscious activity, sleep is a manner of being aware and present that allows certain modes of conscious activity to take place.

What you are referring to as 'states of consciousness' is CA that has been learned instinctively. The reasoning here is similar to a mathematical virtuoso who can simply do calculations 'in his sleep' saying, "There is no conscious activity here, I don't need to invoke anything, mathematical calculations simply perform themselves in my head while I am aware and present". Of course, this reasoning neglects all of the natural, cultural, and individual history of CA that went into developing the instruments, faculties, knowledge, etc. by which such an effortless skill can be attained. Humanity is in the same situation regarding all such things that are effortlessly accomplished, like 'being aware and present'.

Sleep is a black box of experience for most of us, so all we can say (without higher CA states) is that something mysterious happens to renew our soul and bodily life each time we sleep and we only remember the overarching continuity of self through these mysterious sleep states through CA.

[lorenzop]

Lorenzo, you seem to adopt a nihilistic position denying the manifested world of forms, and denying the activity of consciousness that creates the world of forms, any value and reality. The Reality of Consciousness is like two sides of the same coin - what Consciousness is and what it does - and both sides are real and inseparable from each other. When we only see one side and disregard the other, our vision will inevitably be incomplete and distorted.

"Into blinding darkness pass they who are devoted to the unmanifest, and into still greater darkness, as it were, they who delight in the manifest. Whoever understands the manifest and the unmanifest as going together, (he), by overcoming death through the manifest, attains immortality through the unmanifest"
Isha Upanishad

"Experience is one seamless, unnamable, intimate whole. It is thought alone that divides this intimacy into an apparent multiplicity and diversity of objects and selves, thereby imagining a "me" and a "not me".

Awareness is never veiled or hurt by any appearance of the body, mind or world, although it is intimately one with all such appearances.

To be present in and as that is seen is to participate in life, not as a fragment amongst other fragments, but as Love, intimately one with all seeming objects and selves."

Rupert Spira

You are correct in that I don't endorse 'the manifested world of forms', not sure how that makes me a nihilist. Very few people recognize this layer\world of forms: Rupert Spira, Buddha, Ramana Maharishi etc. do not.

[Stranger]

You are correct in that I don't endorse 'the manifested world of forms', not sure how that makes me a nihilist. Very few people recognize this layer\world of forms: Rupert Spira, Buddha, Ramana Maharishi etc. do not.

I think you misunderstand Rupert, listen to him here From 'I Am Nothing' to 'I Am Everything'

Likewise, Ramana taught:

Question: “Brahman (the Supreme Spirit) is real. The world is illusion” is the stock phrase of Sri Sankaracharya. Yet others say, “The world is reality.” Which is true?
Sri Ramana Maharshi: Both statements are true. They refer to different stages of development and are spoken from different points of view. The (spiritual) aspirant starts with the definition, that which is real exists always. Then he eliminates the world as unreal because it is changing.
The seeker ultimately reaches the Self and there finds unity as the prevailing note. Then, that which was originally rejected as being unreal is found to be a part of the unity. Being absorbed in the reality, the world also is real. There is only being in Self-realisation, and nothing but being.
From Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, talk no. 33

Similarly, the stage of realization in the Buddhist tradition is described as a total acceptance of the world of forms:

"Within the womb of the expanse, spontaneously and always present,
Samsara is all good, and nirvana is good too.
Appearance is all good, and emptiness is all good too.
Birth and death are all good; pleasure and pain are all good.
I and other are all good; believing that things last forever and denying them completely are all good.
Its nature is like a dream, without any basis.
Everything is all good—great spontaneous presence."
Longchen Rabjam

So basically, as Ramana and Rupert explained, there are three stages of spiritual development on the nondualist path. First is the confused stage where we perceive the reality fragmented and dualistically, dividing the reality into ourselves and other selves and objects as if they are real separate entities. Second is the stage of seeking of the ground of Being where we turn away from the seemingly fragmented forms and look for the true nondual nature of reality. This is the "neti-neti" stage that involves some degree of nihilism towards the world of forms, but that nihilism is only transitional. Once we experientially discover the ground of Being as a living experience and make it a stable samadhi, we turn again to the world of forms and find that it is inseparable part of the oneness of Being. The world of forms is now fully embraced and accepted as nothing else than the Being itself manifested in a variety of beautiful forms. This is the state of Love in completeness and integration. And then we can continue to go deeper in exploring the spiritual world of living thinking-willing-feeling and peel the layers of the structures of this world of forms to discover the deeper layers of its living reality, but now beings fully integrated and inseparable from the wholeness.

[lorenzop]

These quotes\references point to the direct perception and appreciation of the unboundedness of Being in all things and all beings. I am That, this is That, all this is nothing but That.
This appreciation can have a flavor of a culture or a deity, or a master. There typically is a spirit of devotion to this perception of unboundedness of Being.
They are not pointing to some immortal ideas, relative essences or forms.
If asked, out of compassion for their followers, I doubt any of them would deny the existence of immortal forms . . . Christians seem to find their forms, Hindus their forms, etc.
They don't speak to these forms however.

[Stranger]

These quotes\references point to the direct perception and appreciation of the unboundedness of Being in all things and all beings. I am That, this is That, all this is nothing but That.

That's definitely true. But that does not stop the beings who attained to the unboundedness from being actively involved in the manifested world.

...They don't speak to these forms however.

Don't they? What does it take to continue to be involved in the manifested world? It's communicating with beings, just like we are communicating on this forum. Spiritual science and religions are saying that, in addition to communicating with the beings of the Earthly realm, we can also communicate with the beings of higher spiritual realms. What's wrong with that? It's a community of beings on all levels, and we participate in its continuous evolution. When we get ahead, we help the beings who got stuck or got behind. We can also communicate with those beings on the higher levels who are ahead of us in prayer. I just don't see any contradiction or problem here.

[lorenzop]

'speak to the forms' I mean they don't address the existence of immortal ideas and forms (ie Platonic Ideas)
Obviously they speak to other people, saints, animals, etc
For myself, I don't believe these immortal forms exist except as an artifact of a culture or religion. For example, a mass of folks may worship the sun . . . Ra . . . because of the porous nature of the mind, this could create a Ra Form\Idea. Here in US, Trump's followers may have created a MAGA hive. Donald Hoffman's theory includes conscious agents creating a shared reality.

[Stranger]

'speak to the forms' I mean they don't address the existence of immortal ideas and forms (ie Platonic Ideas)
Obviously they speak to other people, saints, animals, etc
For myself, I don't believe these immortal forms exist except as an artifact of a culture or religion. For example, a mass of folks may worship the sun . . . Ra . . . because of the porous nature of the mind, this could create a Ra Form\Idea. Here in US, Trump's followers may have created a MAGA hive. Donald Hoffman's theory includes conscious agents creating a shared reality.

Exactly. It's not about "immortal ideas". We all live in a manifested shared ideal reality. This reality is imaginatively created by collective Consciousness. We are all co-creators. Higher order beings are the primary architects of its structures, but still we all participate in it. It's all created by willing and thinking of conscious beings on all levels. If this world structure would not exist, nobody would be able to attain the direct perception and appreciation of the unboundedness of Being. This is because such attainment is the result of evolution, and evolution is made possible by the manifested world in which the conscious beings live, learn and evolve.

When some nondualists say "oh, this world is a dream, an illusion, it makes no sense, just dump it" do not appreciate the fact that the very realization that "this world is a dream" is a result of their evolution within this "dream" over countless lifetimes.

[lorenzop]

'speak to the forms' I mean they don't address the existence of immortal ideas and forms (ie Platonic Ideas)
Obviously they speak to other people, saints, animals, etc
For myself, I don't believe these immortal forms exist except as an artifact of a culture or religion. For example, a mass of folks may worship the sun . . . Ra . . . because of the porous nature of the mind, this could create a Ra Form\Idea. Here in US, Trump's followers may have created a MAGA hive. Donald Hoffman's theory includes conscious agents creating a shared reality.

Exactly. It's not about "immortal ideas". We all live in a manifested shared ideal reality. This reality is imaginatively created by collective Consciousness. We are all co-creators. Higher order beings are the primary architects of its structures, but still we all participate in it. It's all created by willing and thinking of conscious beings on all levels. If this world structure would not exist, nobody would be able to attain the direct perception and appreciation of the unboundedness of Being

Thanks for the clarification - agreed. However I'm inclined to NOT add any burdens or requirements in The Way. I don't believe it's required that we participate in this or that . . . though participation could certainly speed progress!
Incidentally, a few decades ago, I had an 'interaction' with an unknown Master, perhaps Tibetan, who appeared and filled the room at the right time with solid advice. Appeared a few times . . . communicated without words . . . then never appeared again since.