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andrew macnab submitted the following "I"deas:

I the projector and the projected other appear together.
Without each other they don't exist.
No other no I, no I no other.
Knowing other or knowing I is shutting the doors.
Known is past, present reality always unknown.
There is no I in the present.
Only constant presence.


no attributes no identity unknown unknowable
unknowing
unnamable no one

not presence of I not presence of presence
not even presence of absence only presence

.............

"neo" asked - is swearing really needed to give our
message of love?

and received the following succinct answer (with love)
from Sarlo:
Fuckin' right!

The longer answer is: "Our – a dubious proposition,
BTW. Do we have some corporate identity to project here?
– message of love" cannot be expressed in just sugary
sweet terms. As Osho has said, too much sugar will just
give you diabetes. Some salt is needed for balance.

There may be some conditioning lurking against improper
language.
Have a look.

..........

Larry wrote: Awareness still seems like something apart
from "me". Any thoughts on this?

Dan answered (in the way only he koan):
First question here: is the awareness that seems like
something apart from "me" an idea of awareness, or the
actuality of awareness?
If it is an idea of awareness, then it is not awareness
itself that seems apart from me, it is the idea of what
awareness is.

Second question: what is the nature of the "me" that
perceives itself to be apart from awareness's actuality?
Can there ever be a "me" apart from awareness, or does
not "me" occur as: awareness of "me"?
What is the awareness that is aware of "me", that is
always already the case whenever "me" appears?
What is the "me" that appears assume kind of object - or
is it the subject? Indeed, what exactly is it,
is it really detectable - where is it located? What is
the "me" other than assumptions that a "me" must exist,
should exist, is desired to exist,must be there because
memory images occur, seems to be there as an
assumption in comparative thought processes, is assumed
by "others," has been named, etc.?
If the "me" is merely assumption and inference, then how
real is it in the face of "What" or "Who" is not
inferential - already
there before any assumption can be made, or thought can
occur?


..............

Harsha submitted the following news story (w/ thanks to
AHENRY@us.oracle.com
http://reality.sgi.com/relph/humor/serene.html)

Monk Gloats Over Yoga Championship: 'I am the serenest!'
he says

LHASA, TIBET - Employing the brash style that first
brought him to prominence, Sri
Dhananjai Bikram won the fifth annual International Yogi
Competition yesterday with a
world-record point total of 873.6.

"I am the serenest!" Bikram shouted to the estimated
crowd of 20,000 yoga fans, vigorously pumping his fists.
"No one is serener than Sri Dhananjai Bikram-I am the
greatest monk of all time!"

Bikram averaged 1.89 breaths a minute during the two-hour
competition, nearly .3 fewer than
his nearest competitor, second-place finisher and
two-time champion Sri Salil "The Hammer" Gupta.

The heavily favored Gupta was upset after the loss. "I
should be able to beat that guy with
one lung tied," Gupta said. "I'm beside myself right now,
and I don't mean trans-bodily."

Bikram got off to a fast start at the Lhasa meet, which
like most major competitions, is a
six-event affair. In the first event, he attained total
consciousness (TC) in just 2
minutes, 34 seconds, and set the tone for the rest of the
meet by repeatedly shouting, "I'm
blissful! You blissful?! I'm blissful!" to the other
yogis.

Bikram, 33, burst onto the international yoga scene with
a gold-mandala performance at the
1994 Bhutan Invitational. At that competition he
premiered his aggressive style, at one
point in the flexibility event sticking his middle toes
out at the other yogis. While no
prohibition exists against such behavior, according to
Yoga League Commissioner Swami
Prabhupada, such behavior is generally considered
"unBuddhalike."

"I don't care what the critics say," Bikram said. "Sri
Bikram is just gonna go out there
and do Sri Bikram's own yoga thing."

Before the Bhutan meet, Bikram had never placed better
than fourth. Many said he had
forsaken rigorous training for the celebrity status
accorded by his Bhutan win, endorsing
Nike's new line of prayer mats and supposedly dating the
Hindu goddess Shakti. But his
performance this week will regain for him the number one
computer ranking and earn him new
respect, as well as for his coach Mahananda Vasti, the
controversial guru some have called
Bikram's "guru."

"My special training diet for Bikram of one
super-charged, carbo-loaded grain of rice per
day was essential to his win," Vasti said. The defeated
Gupta denied that Bikram's taunting was a
factor in his inability to attain TC. "I just wasn't
myself today," Gupta commented. "I wasn't any
self today. I was an egoless particle of the universal
no-soul."

In the second event, flexibility, Bikram maintained the
lead by supporting himself on his
index fingers for the entire 15 minutes while touching
the back of his skull to his lower
spine. The feat was matched by Gupta, who first used the
position at the 1990 Tokyo Zen-Off.

"That's my meditative position of spiritual ecstasy, not
his," remarked Gupta. "He stole my thunder."
Bikram denied the charge, saying, "Gupta's been talking
like that ever since he was a 3rd century Egyptian
slave-owner."

Nevertheless, a strong showing by Gupta in the third
event, the shotput, placed him within a lotus petal
of the lead at the competition's halfway point. But event
number four, the contemplation of unanswerable riddles
known as koans, proved the key to victory for Bikram.

The koan had long been thought the weak point of his
spiritual arsenal, but his response to
today's riddle - "Show me the face you had before you
were born" - was reportedly
"extremely illuminative," according to Commissioner
Prabhupada.

While koan answers are kept secret from the public for
fear of exposing the uninitiated
multitudes to the terror of universal truth, insiders
claim his answer had Prabhupada and
the two other judges "highly enlightened."

With the event victory, Bikram built himself a nearly
insurmountable lead, one he sustained
through the yak-milk churn and breathing events to come
away with the upset victory.

............

xan responded to a question about whether alcohol could
assist in the
"achievement" of enlightenment:

Ideas about whether or not you should not
relax too much show your sincerity about
enlightenment, which I appreciate.

As someone else said, I much prefer the word
Awakening, since the term "enlightenment" has
too much confusion around it from overuse and
abuse. Much like the word "God".

If there is one thing in the way of awakening
it is ideas, even the best and most sincere.
In fact many people miss the utter simplicity
of Truth just because it is not in the realm of
ideas. Words and ideas at best can direct you to where
to look.
That place is your present awareness.

This is 'just being awake', in this moment.
First see what you are aware of.
Then notice the awareness itself.
It is what you are eternally and Now.

Only you can know if drinking wine or any
other activity supports your conscious
resting as awareness while thoughts,
feelings and sensations come and go.

It's that simple.

.............

And finally - I've tried to include some of the
"extermination" discussion here:

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