The Nature of the sensory world or do we really *know* the ultimate ground of reality?

[Cleric K]

Of course, I agree with such distinction between the image of imagination and a memory of some percept happened in the past. or a percept happening now. Similarly, I can have an imagination of a picture, draw it and show it to you, and for you it becomes a lawful visual percept and will be recorded in your memory. Or, I can communicate it to you telepathically with a similar result. Likewise, the images or ideas in the Divine or higher-order beings precipitate into our precepts, but I agree that it may involve some communication mechanisms unknown to us in our human form, so you are right, we cannot extrapolate our human cognition mechanisms to the Divine on the Cosmic scale.

But what we can extrapolate is the common "ground" of the reality that we all share: the Divine exists in the same way we exists (so there is only one Existence in the whole Cosmos), the Divine consciously experiences in the same way we consciously experience (so there is only one Awareness in the whole Cosmos), the Divine exercise intuitive and imaginative Willing and Thinking the same way we do, because it is the same Willing-Thinking acting everywhere in the whole Cosmos. And so, this same Existence-Awareness-Willing-Thinking produces ideations and imaginations in the same way everywhere in the whole Cosmos, and by communicating these ideations and imaginations across the Cosmos between its individuated spiritual activities the ideations/images on the "transmitting" side of communication precipitate as percepts on the "receiving" side. If we would not share the same common ground, if we would not be "made" of the reality of the same common nature, we would not be able to communicate. The very fact that we communicate means that we share the same common nature of reality "through" which we communicate that does not change in time or space or from one person to another. And because this nature is common, it is indivisible. This simple intuitive realization of the common ground is reflected in philosophical thinking as the idea of "ontological monism", but we do not need to refer to abstract philosophy to intuitively understand it. Anyway, sorry for "going nondual" again , but this is not to argue against what you said above. I'm listening to you and waiting for the next steps.

The bold text is really the subtle troublemaker. From our phenomenological perspective we pass judgement about the ultimate nature of reality. But what gives us the right to do that? What justifies us to say that "the Divine exercise intuitive and imaginative Willing and Thinking the same way we do?" You answer with "because it is the same Willing-Thinking acting everywhere in the whole Cosmos". But this is circular reasoning. We support our point by simply postulating it to be so (here we're questioning not that ultimately all spiritual experience is part of a unity but whether the way/form we experience our consciousness and spiritual activity - even in the enlightened state - is the same as the way it is experienced by a higher Divine being).

Now you'll of course object that this has nothing to do with logical reasoning but that it is direct intuition. Yet this is the point where we have to be maximally honest with ourselves. And we can do that only if we really observe as tightly as possible what we're really doing with our thinking spiritual activity when we pass such judgments.

There have been so many attempts to point this out to you by Federica, Ashvin and me. I tried even to illustrate it in many ways - the Cantor Dust fractal, the Moiré patterns, the nested eyes and the eye at the periphery and so on.

The whole point is as simple as it can be and it has been stated numerous times - we should not conflate our general intuition that reality is something Whole, with the idea that our present (enlightened) consciousness is already representative of what consciousness can be in the higher orders. There's simply a logical disconnect here. These are two completely independent things.

We can take the first one and set it to be our high ideal. Then every day we can make small steps and in the course of evolution we'll discover more and more of the reality of that ideal. But to say that it is the same Willing-Thinking acting everywhere in the whole Cosmos, is a completely ad-hoc statement. We are not in a position to claim that just because we have reached a state where we feel to be boundless consciousness. It is one thing to feel as boundless, it is completely different thing to claim that the way this boundlessness is experienced is fundamental for every spiritual being all the way to the Divine.

This is so simple. Consider the image that is used very often:



Yes, we can say that it is all the same convoluted consciousness but this is only a general statement. Let's say our Earthly state is at the center, where our conscious experience results from the many times folded Cosmic potential. When we dissolve the intellect we unfold only one of the convolutions. Yet the geometry of our consciousness is still several convolutions folded. We simply have no right to claim that this geometry (and thus the specific way we experience our consciousness and spiritual activity) is the same everywhere. We can do that only by assuming that we have completely deconvoluted the Cosmic structure and there's nowhere to deconvolute further. This however we simply can't know. It's like walking backwards (without seeing where we go), passing through few gates then stopping and saying "That's it, I went trough the final gate. There are no more gates behind me. There's even no need to turn around and verify if this is really the case. I'll just trust my intuition which tells me that I've reached the foundational level. At this level the spiritual activity of the Divine is practically of the same form as mine, only more free and powerful."

This is all so simple that trying to explicate it further only makes it look more complicated than it really is.

Until this point is cleared it won't be possible to continue further in our studies. It's because we assume an unnatural position, where we imagine that all reality consist of floating decals and worst of all, we imagine that this is how things look for the Divine too. We practically put the lid on our own progress by believing that we've already fully deconvoluted the Cosmic manifold.

It's been said many times. At every step our form of consciousness can be likened to a Moiré pattern, where we live in the interference pattern but don't yet know what interferes. At every deconvolutionary step our self-consciousness awakens at a deeper level. Only now we're in position to cognize something of what has been interfering. But this is still only one step. Even this higher state is still a folded one for which we don't cognize directly what interferes.

Here we should draw the distinction. We can even at this moment say with confidence that we're One with all that which interferes and is folded multiple times, and the Moiré patterns of whose interference is the geometry and phenomena of our present state. But this ultimate Oneness is an eternal ideal for us. With every deconvolution something of it is unfolded and unveiled. Thus only in retrospect we can see what we have been One with (and now there are still higher levels which are still folded and within whose interference patterns we exist).

I don't think we can make things any more clear than this. The rest is up to the individual. One simply has to investigate tightly the cognitive process and ask themselves "What gives me the certainty that I have already unfolded the whole Cosmic structure? If I place before myself the question 'what if there's more to be deconvoluted?' how do I react to that question? How do I excuse pushing it away?"

[Stranger]

I don't think we can make things any more clear than this. The rest is up to the individual. One simply has to investigate tightly the cognitive process and ask themselves "What gives me the certainty that I have already unfolded the whole Cosmic structure? If I place before myself the question 'what if there's more to be deconvoluted?' how do I react to that question? How do I excuse pushing it away?"

There are some points to clarify here. I agree that my statement "the Divine exercise intuitive and imaginative Willing and Thinking the same way we do" is an extrapolation in a sense that it refers not necessarily to the way we currently will and think on the lower level of cognition, but how we are in principle capable of willing and thinking when the full potential of the higher cognition is developed. And you are right in saying that achieving this potential is an asymptotic process in time. This is because the cognition levels are hierarchically structured and convoluted in a manifold.

However, the aspects of Being and Experiencing are different. There is only one way to "Be" and we are all sharing the same way across the Cosmos and with the Divine. Likewise, there is only one way to consciously Experience (if you know what Experience-Awareness I am talking here about). These two aspects of reality never change, the only difference is whether we notice it in our cognition and attention or not, and whether our cognition is developed enough to recognize/realize it. So, realizing the aspects of Being and Awareness is not a matter of asymptotic never-ending process, but a matter of an instant recognition, but the moment of this recognition may not happen for many lifetimes until the cognition is sufficiently developed. The Being and Awareness are not convoluted and not structured, it is a common "ground" or "space" in which the convolution of structures takes place. This may sound abstract until we actually experientially see that all activity of thinking and willing on all levels available to us and all structures of the ideal content are always "contained" withing the same Being and Awareness (or, in other words, they are always "present" and "experienced" in the same way).

As an analogy, we can look at our earliest childhood memories and compare them with our current state. We will see from this comparison that we were thinking and cognizing in more primitive ways compared to current, but we and the world existed (were present) and we consciously experienced in exactly the same way. So, the way we cognized the world changed, but the way we and the world are present and the way we consciously experience any phenomena never changed.

In the Buddhist tradition these two approaches are called "gradual enlightenment" and "instant awakening", and there have been fierce debates between the Buddhist schools about which approach s "right". Finally, they settled to some common understanding that actually both of them are valid and do take place, with some aspects of reality being realized through a gradual unfolding of convoluted layers, and other aspects being realized instantly. The higher cognition ones (Willing-Thinking) are the aspects which unfolding follows through an asymptotic process, while realization of the existential aspects (Being-Awareness) happens instantly (even though there may be different levels of the clarity of such realization).

[Federica]

I don't think we can make things any more clear than this. The rest is up to the individual. One simply has to investigate tightly the cognitive process and ask themselves "What gives me the certainty that I have already unfolded the whole Cosmic structure? If I place before myself the question 'what if there's more to be deconvoluted?' how do I react to that question? How do I excuse pushing it away?"

There are some points to clarify here. I agree that my statement "the Divine exercise intuitive and imaginative Willing and Thinking the same way we do" is an extrapolation in a sense that it refers not necessarily to the way we currently will and think on the lower level of cognition, but how we are in principle capable of willing and thinking when the full potential of the higher cognition is developed. And you are right in saying that achieving this potential is an asymptotic process in time. This is because the cognition levels are hierarchically structured and convoluted in a manifold.

However, the aspects of Being and Experiencing are different. There is only one way to "Be" and we are all sharing the same way across the Cosmos and with the Divine. Likewise, there is only one way to consciously Experience (if you know what Experience-Awareness I am talking here about). These two aspects of reality never change, the only difference is whether we notice it in our cognition and attention or not, and whether our cognition is developed enough to recognize/realize it. So, realizing the aspects of Being and Awareness is not a matter of asymptotic never-ending process, but a matter of an instant recognition, but the moment of this recognition may not happen for many lifetimes until the cognition is sufficiently developed. The Being and Awareness are not convoluted and not structured, it is a common "ground" or "space" in which the convolution of structures takes place. This may sound abstract until we actually experientially see that all activity of thinking and willing on all levels available to us and all structures of the ideal content are always "contained" withing the same Being and Awareness (or, in other words, they are always "present" and "experienced" in the same way).

As an analogy, we can look at our earliest childhood memories and compare them with our current state. We will see from this comparison that we were thinking and cognizing in more primitive ways compared to current, but we and the world existed (were present) and we consciously experienced in exactly the same way. So, the way we cognized the world changed, but the way we and the world are present and the way we consciously experience any phenomena never changed.

In the Buddhist tradition these two approaches are called "gradual enlightenment" and "instant awakening", and there have been fierce debates between the Buddhist schools about which approach s "right". Finally, they settled to some common understanding that actually both of them are valid and do take place, with some aspects of reality being realized through a gradual unfolding of convoluted layers, and other aspects being realized instantly. The higher cognition ones (Willing-Thinking) are the aspects which unfolding follows through an asymptotic process, while realization of the existential aspects (Being-Awareness) happens instantly (even though there may be different levels of the clarity of such realization).

Eugene, I may be wrong, my impression is that your understanding is changing, you must be feeling it, but at the same time it's uncomfortable and a part of you is tempted to reach back to your well established (in you mind habits) reference points, such as the Buddhist tradition, and all its subtleties that you have inquired and are well acquainted with. You are using it to contrast the bright logic that is being unfolded under our eyes. It's a resistance, as it's been said. It's your ideological shield. But there is also a part of you who cannot unsee that there is something fundamentally real and crucial in this breach that Cleric and Ashvin have opened. I am certainly not more advanced than you, I might have a few intuitions that you seem to oppose some resistance to, but you are so much at ease in so many ways, I am just taking the liberty to giving you my impressions.

However, the aspects of Being and Experiencing are different.
....
....
....

How is that? How did Oneness get that technical? No, these are not "different aspects".

So, realizing the aspects of Being and Awareness is not a matter of asymptotic never-ending process, but a matter of an instant recognition

There's no instant eureka recognition! It's progressive. There are convolutions, layers, we expand inside them, we uncover them one by one. It's a progression driven by regular work. We (and you too) are right now the living proof of that progression.


I feel you are clinging to technicalities, and grids, and distinctions, as a rampart.
But there's nothing, in this unfolding reality-understanding, that you need to protect you against.

[AshvinP]

As an analogy, we can look at our earliest childhood memories and compare them with our current state. We will see from this comparison that we were thinking and cognizing in more primitive ways compared to current, but we and the world existed (were present) and we consciously experienced in exactly the same way. So, the way we cognized the world changed, but the way we and the world are present and the way we consciously experience any phenomena never changed.

Federica made some good points here. It is reminding of our pre-Stranger debates about the duality of being-experiencing vs. thinking-willing. There is a snapping back. Remember, Federica only learned of Steiner/Anthroposophy less than a year ago and, as you know, finds it currently difficult to get through the archive lectures, so the fact that she is also seeing this same trend can't be written off as some SS bias.

It's hardly important what we say about the ontological status of these things - whether they are all unified and so forth - but how they are functioning in our current thinking perspective. It is the same duality between the 'nature of reality' (being-experiencing) and the 'structures/mechanisms of reality' (willing-thinking). You are very clearly holding these as two parallel or orthogonal aspects of our intuitive stream of becoming, which then conveniently allows for 'realization of Divine Oneness in an instant' and reserves for ourselves a not-so-humble, experiential identification with the eternal Godhead. Even if at the most abstract level we can say there is a timeless-changeless pole and a temporal-changing pole to reality, the phenomenological fact is that we only progressively awaken to the former through the gradually evolving forms/processes of the latter. To resist that fact, you snap back to splitting the poles apart and allowing for the 'pure' experience of timeless being.

Yet your own analogy works against you. In what way can you claim that, between our early childhood and current day, 'we consciously experienced in exactly the same way'? Only if you imagine there was some parallel process of 'conscious experience' which was not always entangled with our thinking and cognizing. So now you have to deny the most clear cut phenomenological facts of our individual becoming from childhood to adulthood. And if we really stick with the given facts, we see that even our 'plain existing' has not remained the same. There are gaps in experience throughout our entire lives during sleep, in which we have no clue where and how we existed. Even ignoring those gaps, most only have continuity of consciousness back to the first few years after our birth, and most have no idea whether we will continue existing in the same way years, decades, lifetimes, epochs from now.

[Federica]

(...)

GrantHenderson,
I know that the overview of the General Discussions page gives the impression that I'm monopolizing every topic, but this is actually not true, one can open any thread and see it directly. I was just thinking it would be good to have you participating specifically in this new thread.

[Stranger]

I feel you are introducing technicalities, and grids, and distinctions, as a rampart.
But there's nothing, in this unfolding reality-understanding, that you need to protect you against.

It is not about protecting from anything, it is about knowing the reality. I'm referring to the Buddhist tradition only as an example of insights that have already been achieved in this tradition. It is just like Cleric and Ashvin use the quotes from Steiner to support their points. I am not a religious believer but I use traditions as a source of knowledge already attained by people who lived before us, with understanding that this knowledge needs to be internalized in order for us to become the living and experiential knowledge and not abstract.

Anyway, I regret that I "went nondual" again here I would suggest to drop this discussion about the "ground of reality" because we already discussed it hundred times before with no agreement reached. If you are interested in exploring it further within the Western stream of knowledge, I would refer you to Hidegger's "Being and Time" where he pointed to the fundamental nature of Being, and to the works of David Chalmers where he pointed to the fundamental nature of Awareness (again, taking it not as an abstract philosophy, but as a pointer to intuition about the internalized direct experience). But I am still interested to hear from Cleric about the nature of the sensory world.

[Federica]

I'm referring to the Buddhist tradition only as an example of insights that have already been achieved in this tradition. It is just like Cleric and Ashvin use the quotes from Steiner to support their points. I am not a religious believer but I use traditions as a source of knowledge already attained by people who lived before us, with understanding that this knowledge needs to be internalized in order for us to become the living and experiential knowledge and not abstract.

There is one crucial difference. Steiner was of this world 100 years ago. The Buddhist tradition dates back to another epoch. Thousands of years have passed. Man's stage of evolution, understanding, spiritual and physical configuration were different then. That tradition was living for the people of that epoch, it cannot be livingly experienced in the same way and with the same purpose by us.

Anyway, I regret that I "went nondual" again here I would suggest to drop this discussion about the "ground of reality" because we already discussed it hundred times before with no agreement reached. If you are interested in exploring it further within the Western stream of knowledge, I would refer you to Hidegger's "Being and Time" where he pointed to the fundamental nature of Being, and to the works of David Chalmers where he pointed to the fundamental nature of Awareness (again, taking it not as an abstract philosophy, but as a pointer to intuition about the internalized direct experience). But I am still interested to hear from Cleric about the nature of the sensory world.

This literature corner is ridiculous. It's enough Eugene, please ditch this role, it doesn't suit you well.
I think you should read again the last lines in the last post from Cleric.

[Stranger]

There is one crucial difference. Steiner was alive 100 years ago. The Busshist tradition dates back to another epoch. Thousands of years have passed. Man's stage of evolution, understanding, spiritual and physical configuration were different then. That tradition was living for the people of that epoch, it cannot be livingly experienced in the same way and with the same purpose by us.

The Buddhist tradition is alive now, it has been and still is in constant development.

This literature corner is ridiculous. It's enough Eugene, please ditch this role, it doesn't suit you well.
I think you should read again the last lines in the last post from Cleric.

I think ditching two of the most important Western philosophers of the 20th century is rather arrogant position. I can't help noticing that arrogance is one of the hallmarks of Anthoposophists

[Cleric K]

There are some points to clarify here. I agree that my statement "the Divine exercise intuitive and imaginative Willing and Thinking the same way we do" is an extrapolation in a sense that it refers not necessarily to the way we currently will and think on the lower level of cognition, but how we are in principle capable of willing and thinking when the full potential of the higher cognition is developed. And you are right in saying that achieving this potential is an asymptotic process in time. This is because the cognition levels are hierarchically structured and convoluted in a manifold.

However, the aspects of Being and Experiencing are different. There is only one way to "Be" and we are all sharing the same way across the Cosmos and with the Divine. Likewise, there is only one way to consciously Experience (if you know what Experience-Awareness I am talking here about). These two aspects of reality never change, the only difference is whether we notice it in our cognition and attention or not, and whether our cognition is developed enough to recognize/realize it. So, realizing the aspects of Being and Awareness is not a matter of asymptotic never-ending process, but a matter of an instant recognition, but the moment of this recognition may not happen for many lifetimes until the cognition is sufficiently developed. The Being and Awareness are not convoluted and not structured, it is a common "ground" or "space" in which the convolution of structures takes place. This may sound abstract until we actually experientially see that all activity of thinking and willing on all levels available to us and all structures of the ideal content are always "contained" withing the same Being and Awareness (or, in other words, they are always "present" and "experienced" in the same way).

As an analogy, we can look at our earliest childhood memories and compare them with our current state. We will see from this comparison that we were thinking and cognizing in more primitive ways compared to current, but we and the world existed (were present) and we consciously experienced in exactly the same way. So, the way we cognized the world changed, but the way we and the world are present and the way we consciously experience any phenomena never changed.

In the Buddhist tradition these two approaches are called "gradual enlightenment" and "instant awakening", and there have been fierce debates between the Buddhist schools about which approach s "right". Finally, they settled to some common understanding that actually both of them are valid and do take place, with some aspects of reality being realized through a gradual unfolding of convoluted layers, and other aspects being realized instantly. The higher cognition ones (Willing-Thinking) are the aspects which unfolding follows through an asymptotic process, while realization of the existential aspects (Being-Awareness) happens instantly (even though there may be different levels of the clarity of such realization).

How do we reach the intuition of Experiencing and Being? Through our concrete living experiences. At first approximation we start with sensory perceptions, feelings, thoughts. From these we can generalize our intuitions. For example, we can encompass various visual perceptions and reach the overarching intuition of color and light (in the phenomenological sense). Similarly for everything else. Then we reach more and more overarching intuition that seems to encompass everything. We can call it many names, experiencing, be-ing, becoming, existing and so on. It’s the most general intuition that we can conceptualize, which captures the fact of experiential existence. Everything else 'fits' within this most general intuition.

We should not forget however, that this general intuition is only as rich as the concrete instances of be-ing. For example, if I’m color-blind and perceive only one or two hues, I’ll still have the general intuition of color. Yet this intuition won’t give me by itself the concrete intuitions of other colors. So if I say “There are many color combinations but they will always fit in my experiencing of color”, I’m only partly right. Let’s say that I have an operation and somehow my other cone cells are made functional. It is true that the new colors will have something in common with my general intuition of color but it will also be true that my general intuition itself will be expanded through the encounter of new concrete instances of color.

And note that this example still relates to a kind of experience that we more or less can relate to. For example, before the operation I can already have some anticipation for the way my intuition will be expanded. I surely won’t expect the new colors to be heard or smelled. I have some general orientation for the domain of experience from 'direction' of which I can expect the new colors. But what about some other form of experience that I have nothing to compare with?

This should be taken into account in the case of your example with the child and the adult. It is true that much feels to be the same but there’s one very important detail that we shouldn’t forget: both the child and the adult states are still embodied Earthly states of consciousness. So it’s not that surprising that our general intuition of existing has more or less the same shape of the envelope. But what about the state when our life and soul bodies finally are loosened from the physical? How can we be sure that our Earthly intuitive envelope (even if mystically enlightened) is general enough to fit whatever the new experiences will be? Obviously, at death the envelope will be forced to expand but here we want to investigate these things before that moment.

If we reason through these things without prejudice, we’ll have to admit that in no way we’re doing ourselves any favor by trying to cement our intuition and deciding that “now this is what experiencing is in its essence.” The simple fact is that we don’t know of experiencing in-itself, as some pure experiencing without anything to be experienced. I know that you’ll oppose me that it is possible to experience experiencing itself and this is the pure experience. Yet this doesn’t change the fact that we’re still experiencing a concrete instance of experiencing, no matter how general and all-encompassing we conceive it to be. When we try to pinpoint that which is always the same and we declare it to be the fundamental blueprint of experiencing, we simply place a limit on what we consider to be possible for the infinite Divine potential.

We should really try to feel how this soul tendency – to feel that we have grasped the foundations of experiencing – works against our development. This can be observed even in ordinary life, especially as people age. The more experience people accumulate, the more their intuitive envelope expands. Yet in the domain of the sensory spectrum, this envelope reaches certain limits. And we can already feel this in our age with the abundance of sensory stimuli that we receive through the various media. Our senses are oversaturated and it becomes less and less likely that something that we see on youtube will surprise us. Instead, we feel that it’s all reached the state where sensations are simply reshuffled. As a simplified example, we can take paper and pencil. There are infinite possible figures that can be drawn, yet at some point we begin to feel that whatever is drawn will still fit the intuitive envelope of graphite smeared over flat paper. We can’t expect, for example, the drawing to pop up in the third dimension.

For such reasons, esoteric schools have always emphasized that we need to preserve our ability to feel amazed, to feel in awe. This we can do only if we cultivate the mood “you’ve seen nothing yet!”

So in this sense, the conviction that we have reached the foundations of experiencing, has a paralyzing effect. I know that you’ll immediately object to this, you’ll say that reality is multidimensional, fractal, infinite and so on. Yet by trying to support the conviction that you already know what experiencing is, what be-ing is, what consciousness is, even without aiming for it all reality begins to be seen as graphite on the paper. Reality is unknowingly placed into the envelope of our cemented general intuition.

And the paradoxical thing is that you already know that this is the case, yet you don’t want to address the root cause. You feel that you hit a hard limit, that by meditating on this intuitive envelope (the intuition of pure be-ing), you clearly see that this envelope is not filled any further with new phenomena, let alone phenomena that reveal something of the structure of the higher worlds and their beings. Yet the blame for this is completely externalized. It is assumed that the Earthly conditions are unconductive, that the expected phenomena are completely orthogonal to our present state and so on.

But why ignore the other possible explanation? That by holding our conviction that we’ve already reached the essence of what be-ing and consciousness are, we’re holding from within, the borders of our intuitive envelope? Why is it so difficult to conceive of the possibility that we may have seen nothing yet? That if we surrender that envelope we may be amazed and discover an inflow of experiencing that in the most literal sense we could not have imagined before?

[Stranger]

How do we reach the intuition of Experiencing and Being? Through our concrete living experiences. At first approximation we start with sensory perceptions, feelings, thoughts. From these we can generalize our intuitions. For example, we can encompass various visual perceptions and reach the overarching intuition of color and light (in the phenomenological sense). Similarly for everything else. Then we reach more and more overarching intuition that seems to encompass everything. We can call it many names, experiencing, be-ing, becoming, existing and so on. It’s the most general intuition that we can conceptualize, which captures the fact of experiential existence. Everything else 'fits' within this most general intuition.

We should not forget however, that this general intuition is only as rich as the concrete instances of be-ing. For example, if I’m color-blind and perceive only one or two hues, I’ll still have the general intuition of color. Yet this intuition won’t give me by itself the concrete intuitions of other colors. So if I say “There are many color combinations but they will always fit in my experiencing of color”, I’m only partly right. Let’s say that I have an operation and somehow my other cone cells are made functional. It is true that the new colors will have something in common with my general intuition of color but it will also be true that my general intuition itself will be expanded through the encounter of new concrete instances of color.

And note that this example still relates to a kind of experience that we more or less can relate to. For example, before the operation I can already have some anticipation for the way my intuition will be expanded. I surely won’t expect the new colors to be heard or smelled. I have some general orientation for the domain of experience from 'direction' of which I can expect the new colors. But what about some other form of experience that I have nothing to compare with?

That is not an appropriate analogy for Being, because Being is not a spectrum, it is a "binary" aspect: you either exist or not. you can not exist in a "gray" or "red" way, or in more "dim" or more "bright" way. So, you are either aware of the existential aspect of Being or not. But as I said, "there may be different levels of the clarity of such realization".

This should be taken into account in the case of your example with the child and the adult. It is true that much feels to be the same but there’s one very important detail that we shouldn’t forget: both the child and the adult states are still embodied Earthly states of consciousness. So it’s not that surprising that our general intuition of existing has more or less the same shape of the envelope. But what about the state when our life and soul bodies finally are loosened from the physical? How can we be sure that our Earthly intuitive envelope (even if mystically enlightened) is general enough to fit whatever the new experiences will be? Obviously, at death the envelope will be forced to expand but here we want to investigate these things before that moment.

If you apply this argument to Being, it becomes pretty laughable. It's like saying that in addition to possibilities to exist and not to exist, there is also another possibility to exiexist, and may be even to exiexiexist

But yes, you can definitely apply this argument to the levels of cognition, because there is a wide spectrum of such levels based even on what we know in our human form, and so there is likely much wider spectrum of it beyond the human form.

If we reason through these things without prejudice, we’ll have to admit that in no way we’re doing ourselves any favor by trying to cement our intuition and deciding that “now this is what experiencing is in its essence.” The simple fact is that we don’t know of experiencing in-itself, as some pure experiencing without anything to be experienced. I know that you’ll oppose me that it is possible to experience experiencing itself and this is the pure experience. Yet this doesn’t change the fact that we’re still experiencing a concrete instance of experiencing, no matter how general and all-encompassing we conceive it to be. When we try to pinpoint that which is always the same and we declare it to be the fundamental blueprint of experiencing, we simply place a limit on what we consider to be possible for the infinite Divine potential.

We should really try to feel how this soul tendency – to feel that we have grasped the foundations of experiencing – works against our development. This can be observed even in ordinary life, especially as people age. The more experience people accumulate, the more their intuitive envelope expands. Yet in the domain of the sensory spectrum, this envelope reaches certain limits. And we can already feel this in our age with the abundance of sensory stimuli that we receive through the various media. Our senses are oversaturated and it becomes less and less likely that something that we see on youtube will surprise us. Instead, we feel that it’s all reached the state where sensations are simply reshuffled. As a simplified example, we can take paper and pencil. There are infinite possible figures that can be drawn, yet at some point we begin to feel that whatever is drawn will still fit the intuitive envelope of graphite smeared over flat paper. We can’t expect, for example, the drawing to pop up in the third dimension.

For such reasons, esoteric schools have always emphasized that we need to preserve our ability to feel amazed, to feel in awe. This we can do only if we cultivate the mood “you’ve seen nothing yet!”

I actually feel in awe everyday when knowing the Being-Awareness as the ground of being, this is one of the most awesome mysteries of reality. And this knowing also keeps me in awe about the richness and beauty of the world of forms and its structures.

So in this sense, the conviction that we have reached the foundations of experiencing, has a paralyzing effect. I know that you’ll immediately object to this, you’ll say that reality is multidimensional, fractal, infinite and so on. Yet by trying to support the conviction that you already know what experiencing is, what be-ing is, what consciousness is, even without aiming for it all reality begins to be seen as graphite on the paper. Reality is unknowingly placed into the envelope of our cemented general intuition.

And the paradoxical thing is that you already know that this is the case, yet you don’t want to address the root cause. You feel that you hit a hard limit, that by meditating on this intuitive envelope (the intuition of pure be-ing), you clearly see that this envelope is not filled any further with new phenomena, let alone phenomena that reveal something of the structure of the higher worlds and their beings. Yet the blame for this is completely externalized. It is assumed that the Earthly conditions are unconductive, that the expected phenomena are completely orthogonal to our present state and so on.

That is a very twisted interpretation again. The "envelope" of Being is constantly being filled with ever-fresh and new phenomena in the unfolding process of its infinite creative potential with all the structures of higher worlds and beings in it. The Divine knows its Being, but it does not preclude it in any way to continue creating the Reality. And you misunderstand again the point that I explained so many times before: it is not Earthly sensory phenomena that unconducive here, it is our dualistic perception of it that is incoherent with reality.

But why ignore the other possible explanation? That by holding our conviction that we’ve already reached the essence of what be-ing and consciousness are, we’re holding from within, the borders of our intuitive envelope? Why is it so difficult to conceive of the possibility that we may have seen nothing yet? That if we surrender that envelope we may be amazed and discover an inflow of experiencing that in the most literal sense we could not have imagined before?

The knowing of the Being does not preclude us in any way from pushing the borders of the envelope into the "horizontal" dimension of your green line diagram, and in the horizontal dimension it is very conceivable that we so far have seen nothing and have not imagined before yet, and there is yet a lot to uncover and discover. The horizontal structural dimension and the vertical existential dimension do not contradict or restrict each other in any way, but complement each other. So, I am still very interested in pushing the envelope of the horizontal dimension and discovering the depths of this structures. You keep trying to convince me that I need to do it, but affirmed that I'm interested many times before. So, count me in and let's move on, you promised to tell us more about the nature of the sensory world, I'm all hearing.

But I keep wondering why you are so stubbornly opposed to reaching to and realizing Oneness in the "vertical" existential dimension, even though this was the call of all spiritual traditions and their founders including Christ, Buddha and so on? What's wrong with integrating the development in both vertical and horizontal dimensions of reality in a wholistic approach? Why do you reject the fundamental Oneness of the Reality and a possibility for us to know it inwardly and experientially, if Christ called us to do exactly that in this human life? And notice that it is exactly the Lucifer's agenda to keep us ignorant about our Oneness in the fundamental ground of reality, and keep us divided in the world of duality that exists not on Earth but only in our minds and in the artificial structures of the Lucifer's hierarchy (which I have no interest in studying). These structures are incoherent and orthogonal to the Divine structures created in Oneness, exactly like St. Paul said "what fellowship can light have with darkness?" (2 Corinthians 6)

But the thing is: if you keep so fiercely rejecting the possibility of reaching to Oneness in our human life, then knowingly or unknowingly, you are working for Lucifer, which means that the structures you are reaching to also belong to the Lucifer's hierarchy. I am interested in expanding the knowledge into the structures of horizontal dimensions, but not of the dualistic realm of Lucifer and not in the company belonging to the Lucifer's hierarchy.