Thinking about death

[AshvinP]

These exercises look like Buddha's teaching to gain equanimity in pain and pleasure, and cessation of suffering, so technically I'd say these are not a method to recognize one's true nature. However if one were practicing the above, one would be more likely to stumble upon one's true nature then if one were not practicing any self examination.
Recognizing one's true nature is the undoing of a separate self, of being in or of the body.
I was in a mindfulness meditation how-to session and I asked: If i experience self as unbounded pure awareness (Samadhi) . . . the response was to come back to the breath. So based on this I'd say mindfulness meditation is not a method of recognizing one's true nature.

BTW, I am not suggesting the above are to be avoided . . . I'd say these are admirable skills.

Ok, so this is the core difference between the intuitive thinking path and the standard 'nondual' approach, which we have discussed many times with you and Eugene. Basically, we say that the 'undoing of a separate self', or the undressing of the clothing put on by the core spirit in each incarnation, can only be done through the portal of intuitive thinking, which involves exercises aimed at purifying, strengthening, and enlivening the whole human being in the activities of willing-feeling-thinking. The core spirit undressed of its normal body-soul layers would necessarily pass through the spheres after death and gain insight into them. That is one way we can know for sure that the 'nondual approach' does not actually undress the layers - it would be impossible to expand into genuine unity with the universal Spirit and fail to notice these after-death spheres.

Here all the various misunderstandings and accusations come in. The intuitive thinking path is projected as examining crumbs and stains on the table, tinkering around in the 'dual world', or something similar. The precise knowledge of the after-death spheres is accused of being outright fantasy and lunacy. It simply isn't entertained that maybe the current nondual approach is missing something essential for unity with the universal Spirit. It isn't conceived that the intuitive thinking path is exactly about undressing the layers of the separate self and experiencing the core spirit at ever-higher stages of unity with the World-creating perspectives of the Cosmos. I don't think anyone is interested in exploring all of that again because the reasoning we offer will simply be ignored.

[lorenzop]

Ok, so this is the core difference between the intuitive thinking path and the standard 'nondual' approach, which we have discussed many times with you and Eugene. Basically, we say that the 'undoing of a separate self', or the undressing of the clothing put on by the core spirit in each incarnation, can only be done through the portal of intuitive thinking, which involves exercises aimed at purifying, strengthening, and enlivening the whole human being in the activities of willing-feeling-thinking. The core spirit undressed of its normal body-soul layers would necessarily pass through the spheres after death and gain insight into them. That is one way we can know for sure that the 'nondual approach' does not actually undress the layers - it would be impossible to expand into genuine unity with the universal Spirit and fail to notice these after-death spheres.

Here all the various misunderstandings and accusations come in. The intuitive thinking path is projected as examining crumbs and stains on the table, tinkering around in the 'dual world', or something similar. The precise knowledge of the after-death spheres is accused of being outright fantasy and lunacy. It simply isn't entertained that maybe the current nondual approach is missing something essential for unity with the universal Spirit. It isn't conceived that the intuitive thinking path is exactly about undressing the layers of the separate self and experiencing the core spirit at ever-higher stages of unity with the World-creating perspectives of the Cosmos. I don't think anyone is interested in exploring all of that again because the reasoning we offer will simply be ignored.

Are you suggesting there is an Eternal Ashwin and Lorenzo, an Eternal what is is to be Ashwin and an Eternal what is means to be Lorenzo?
Eternal immutable states of mind as Ashwin, as Lorenzo, as Cleric (and etc.) to be found as our true natures?
Or Eternal but not immutable - - - can have fun\knowledge of all spheres as Lorenzo for an Eternity?
Or, is the willing-feeling-thinking as Ashwin, precise knowledge of the after-death spheres; are these cast off upon genuine unity with the universal Spirit or at some point?

[Federica]

Idealist. Assumptions based on data.

What is data, for you as idealist?

The data of "human" experience.

Are you saying that the way "consciousness uses life forms", for example, is part of your own human experience?

[AshvinP]

Ok, so this is the core difference between the intuitive thinking path and the standard 'nondual' approach, which we have discussed many times with you and Eugene. Basically, we say that the 'undoing of a separate self', or the undressing of the clothing put on by the core spirit in each incarnation, can only be done through the portal of intuitive thinking, which involves exercises aimed at purifying, strengthening, and enlivening the whole human being in the activities of willing-feeling-thinking. The core spirit undressed of its normal body-soul layers would necessarily pass through the spheres after death and gain insight into them. That is one way we can know for sure that the 'nondual approach' does not actually undress the layers - it would be impossible to expand into genuine unity with the universal Spirit and fail to notice these after-death spheres.

Here all the various misunderstandings and accusations come in. The intuitive thinking path is projected as examining crumbs and stains on the table, tinkering around in the 'dual world', or something similar. The precise knowledge of the after-death spheres is accused of being outright fantasy and lunacy. It simply isn't entertained that maybe the current nondual approach is missing something essential for unity with the universal Spirit. It isn't conceived that the intuitive thinking path is exactly about undressing the layers of the separate self and experiencing the core spirit at ever-higher stages of unity with the World-creating perspectives of the Cosmos. I don't think anyone is interested in exploring all of that again because the reasoning we offer will simply be ignored.

Are you suggesting there is an Eternal Ashwin and Lorenzo, an Eternal what is is to be Ashwin and an Eternal what is means to be Lorenzo?
Eternal immutable states of mind as Ashwin, as Lorenzo, as Cleric (and etc.) to be found as our true natures?
Or Eternal but not immutable - - - can have fun\knowledge of all spheres as Lorenzo for an Eternity?
Or, is the willing-feeling-thinking as Ashwin, precise knowledge of the after-death spheres; are these cast off upon genuine unity with the universal Spirit or at some point?

Not at all. What we experience as our 'personality' is exactly what falls off as a layer of clothing across the threshold. Basically, that is the sum total of our memories, beliefs, feelings, desires, habits, collective associations, and so forth, as we experience those things in our concepts. The inner experiences and associations themselves point to realities, but our concepts of them, which are normally the only things we experience lucidly, cannot survive the threshold. We normally have no real clue about these realities.

So what is willing-feeling-thinking and the after-death spheres apart from our concepts of them? That's the question. There is a reality to these aspects of inner life that can be non-conceptually known, in full lucidity, but there is nothing to directly compare it with in normal sensory experience. Cleric has tried to approximate descriptions of these things many times and it's up to us to struggle with our imagination to get a feel for it.

What do you think about the following? Thinking through these stages is not the same as experiencing them non-conceptually, but we can at least try to work our way to some idea of what it all means. And if we can't understand it, we should maybe consider that this is not because it is speaking of crumbs and stains in some weird terminology, but something completely different and unsuspected from our current perspective that is entirely beyond anything we currently encompass in our perceptions and concepts.

To get into a position where we can address this topic we need to undress the layers of our soul life – our sensory perceptions, intellectual thinking, attraction and repulsion of feelings. If modern man is to do this in meditation, there’ll be practically nothing left from our familiar conscious life. This is a state similar to the deepest dreamless sleep. Yet if we have worked to unite with the “I am” impulse, something remains in that state – the consciousness of willful becoming through time. Without uniting with this will, we can only remember that some duration of time has been experienced but with no continuity of our self-consciousness.

Let’s try to approach this through a mathematical example. We see a triangular form. It impresses as perception and evokes certain intuition – that of ‘triangle’. Then we can turn away from the perceptions and summon a memory image of the triangle. Now we’re doing elementary geometry, our geometric intuition is being expressed into a thought-image of our own making. Here we already have something analogous to Imaginative cognition. The difference is that we’re expressing intuition that is frozen. It is as a fixed standing wave in an ideal world. Mathematical intuition is timeless. It consists of timeless relations. They have temporal character only insofar as we need to serialize these relations in thoughts. For example, when we think of the natural numbers, they are not subject to time. We need time to count through them but their relations are something timeless. Two is always between one and three – this is an eternal relation. This has nothing to do with Platonism. There’s no need to fantasize mathematical intuition as some exotic metaphysical realm. It is a simple fact of experience – when we move through mathematical ideas we simply experience their timeless relations in the meaning of our thoughts. Because of this frozen nature of mathematical intuition, when we’re thinking math we’re always alone. It is as if we walk through a frosty kingdom and any movement that we sense can only be our own, reflected in the ice crystals. The difference with Imagination in the wider sense is that in the latter we no longer feel alone. The reflections in our imaginative pictures are not only of our own movement but also of a kingdom teeming with life. It is as if we’re expressing in images intuitive life that continually changes underneath us on its own accord.

The next step is to turn attention to what we’re doing when we think the mathematical thought-images. For example, if we take the triangle, we can try to visualize it as if we trace its edges with our ray of imagination, as if it is the tip of a pencil. When we become familiar with this activity we can try to disregard the imaginative element and focus entirely on the experience of how we will our thinking gestures. It’s no longer about how our thinking gestures are perceived in imagination but how it feels to be the active force that propels them. This gives us a hint about Inspirative cognition, where we live not in images of the living kingdom but in the interference of thinking gestures that impresses in the images.

Finally, we need to relinquish even our thinking gesticulation and remain in the pure intuitive meaning of the triangle. This is exceedingly difficult to do without practice but in the end, the idea of triangle becomes the intuitive form of our “I”. We always live in such intuitions. They are present all the time as our intuitive background, as the meaningful context which gives us the feeling that our reality ‘makes sense’ and that we have a certain sense of orientation within it. To reach Intuitive cognition is to live entirely within this intuitive context, which is identical to our sense of what we are as a spiritual being. So when we think ‘triangle’, this is normally convoluted in several layers of inner life – the perception, the image, the thinking gesture – yet our sense of being is actually identical with the intuition of a triangle that we currently think.

When we live in Intuitive cognition, we are not focused on images, there’s no movement of thoughts, no pushes and pulls of sympathies and antipathies, but only the intuitive awareness of our being’s becoming. Someone may imagine that what is thus described is identical to the mystic’s pure awareness but there’s one great difference – the latter lacks the awareness of being one with the intuitive intent that metamorphoses the state. Without this, such a state is felt to border on the absolute nothingness, where all existence sinks into oblivion. Only through the union with the “I am” force, we can exist in that nothingness because through that force the intuition of our existence is being continually recreated as a fiery phoenix.

[lorenzop]

I am not getting what you (and Cleric) are trying to say . . .
I think we agree that 'being Lorenzo' and 'being Ashwin' are not eternal . . . but are you saying "willing-feeling-thinking" is eternal, or could be?
Not sure about that, but I would offer\begin with Sat Chit Ananda as reality.
Sat as Being\Existence Chit as Consciousness\Knowing Ananda as Bliss
Sat Chit Ananda as eternal. If by "willing-feeling-thinking" you are suggesting something like Sat chit Ananda then we have a starting point.

[AshvinP]

I am not getting what you (and Cleric) are trying to say . . .
I think we agree that 'being Lorenzo' and 'being Ashwin' are not eternal . . . but are you saying "willing-feeling-thinking" is eternal, or could be?
Not sure about that, but I would offer\begin with Sat Chit Ananda as reality.
Sat as Being\Existence Chit as Consciousness\Knowing Ananda as Bliss
Sat Chit Ananda as eternal. If by "willing-feeling-thinking" you are suggesting something like Sat chit Ananda then we have a starting point.

This is the whole thing - we are not postulating some concept as eternal. Because if we are very honest, all we have right now are concepts of "willing-feeling-thinking" and "Sat Chit Ananda". This is exactly the trap we need to avoid if we want to start from the here-and-now and radiate outwards, rather than abstracting to our concept of the eternal and trying to reduce the rest of reality to our concept.

The only safe way is some sort of phenomenology - staying close to the reality of inner experiences in a state of lucid cognition, where we can trace exactly what we are contributing to the experiences and what we aren't. We have to honestly confront that, to begin with, we know little more than our concepts and corresponding perceptions. This is easy to see in our usual life. For ex. if I punch someone and give them a black eye, I can easily trace what my activity has contributed to their physical state. But if I tell a few lies to someone, I have little clue how my activity is influencing the soul state of that person and perhaps others connected with that person as well. I am practically ignorant of the inner threads that weave my lies into the objective state of the World. What is imperceptible remains much more mysterious even though I know there is some objective influence at work.

These are real simple things to notice in the course of our living experience and our philosophy-spirituality should become more concrete to that living experience as well. That is the only way to remain faithful to the here-and-now, without diverting into floating abstractions, and expand the here-and-now to encompass a broader tapestry of threads that weave our inner activity into the World state. This is the process of discovering one's true nature. Our true nature is what builds up and evolves the World, but that process is obviously a mystery to our mere conceptual thinking to begin with. It's interesting how, by doing simple phenomenology of this sort, we share in the life of the Cosmos.

Only earthly humans at their current state of development can use our thinking to divide the whole phenomenal spectrum into categories and arbitrarily try to derive one part of the spectrum from another, or to abstract the whole spectrum into a single concept - like "willing-feeling-thinking" or "Sat Chit Ananda" - and reduce everything to that concept. No non-human or incorporeal perspective does that. By faithfully pursuing the phenomenology of intuitive thinking, we are already beginning to participate in the Divine life of the Cosmos. We are resisting our habitual opinions, preferences, assumptions, etc. about 'reality itself' and thereby the core spirit grows more conscious of its true nature. It is like the spirit is flowing through the pipes of our soul-life and bumps into an assumption, like "eternal reality is Sat Chit Ananda", and suddenly awakens. It says, "hey, this assumption has always been there, filtering all the infinite possible thinking states I can traverse into only those that conform to its premise, but now I have become conscious of it and can choose to flow around it and explore a greater palette of states."

The more the spirit consciously bumps into these aspects of the soul-structure, instead of being dragged around and getting dammed up by them, the more it can undress them and flow right through them. I am not sure if any of this makes sense to you as a starting point. There is a lot of talk about remaining true to the here-and-now, but as soon as we do that, trying to build a gradual gradient of experience, the response is to abstract out to some concept of the eternal. Can you see this pattern? It is exactly these tendencies that our spirit needs to voluntarily bump into and awaken to so that the accumulated layers surrounding its core can be undressed and its true nature can shine through.

[lorenzop]

"willing-feeling-thinking" or "Sat Chit Ananda" . . . these are words we use as a concession to having a conversation . . . we can't use words and at the same time call them a trap, or the real zinger . . . it's a trap if Lorenzo uses words and concepts, but not a trap if Ashwin does.
I'm worn out from your writing style so we'll end it here.

[AshvinP]

"willing-feeling-thinking" or "Sat Chit Ananda" . . . these are words we use as a concession to having a conversation . . . we can't use words and at the same time call them a trap, or the real zinger . . . it's a trap if Lorenzo uses words and concepts, but not a trap if Ashwin does.
I'm worn out from your writing style so we'll end it here.

Yes, but while I use the words as symbolic pointers toward a direction of inner activity we can engage, like symbols on a map before we start hiking on the terrain, you are using the words to encompass the actual 'nature of reality' from the outset, confusing the symbols for the terrain itself. You want to see if the words I use, like "willing-feeling-thinking", fit with your preconceived understanding of the "eternal". That is your starting point. If it doesn't fit with your preconception of the eternal, you ignore everything else. From all the infinite possible thinking states you could traverse, only those that fit with your preconception manifest in your consciousness. This is why the here-and-now eludes you, Lorenzo. It is because you only pay it lip service while abstracting out to your preferred conception of the eternal as your starting point, ignoring the only place where you have lucid experiential certainty of anything resembling the eternal, which is the very activity of conceiving that always manifests in the here-and-now.

That's fine - I didn't expect you would try to follow along in good faith after all these years of the opposite. Mostly these things are written for the benefit of others who are following.

[Ben Iscatus]

Lorenzop, I think you might fairly say that Ashvin wants his cake and eats it. When he talks about such ideas as thoughts being living elementals or the immorality of using solar power, he is not building “a gradual gradient of experience”. He has already decided on the nature of reality – how it works, what is moral and what is not. You are just as entitled to your extrapolations as he is to his.

[AshvinP]

Lorenzop, I think you might fairly say that Ashvin wants his cake and eats it. When he talks about such ideas as thoughts being living elementals or the immorality of using solar power, he is not building “a gradual gradient of experience”. He has already decided on the nature of reality – how it works, what is moral and what is not. You are just as entitled to your extrapolations as he is to his.

Good to see you are still following Ben

Indeed, the various aspects of our soul-life that we abstractly lump together and call "me" are living elementals, playing off of each other in the most varied ways. What else could they be, dead abstractions? Carl Jung was another great phenomenologist who verified this.

Among his many contributions, Jung introduced the concept of the complex, an intricate and enigmatic aspect of our inner world that holds immense power in shaping our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.

To comprehend the significance of Jung’s exploration of the complex and its relevance to our lives, one must embark on a journey into the intricate tapestry of the human mind. At the core of Jung’s philosophy lies the belief that our psyche possesses an autonomous nature, capable of exerting influence and manifesting itself in myriad ways.

The complex, as Jung postulated, represents a pattern of emotions, memories, experiences, and desires that have become emotionally charged and sequestered from our conscious awareness. These autonomous entities within our psyche possess their own distinct characteristics, acting as independent centers of energy that influence our perceptions, decisions, and interactions with the world.

Also, I'm wondering if you have any ideas to share about the topics discussed on this thread?