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Monday 28 Aug.


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Greg Goode's newest compilation: Buddhist Numbered Lists, is
now online.

http://www.nonduality.com/goode4.htm

Please note that this page takes about thirty seconds to
load with a DSL connection. Eventually it will be
re-formatted for faster loading.

Thank you.

Jerry Katz

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From: Gregory Goode <goode@DPW.COM>
Subject: Re: Re: Royal/Hinduism/Buddhism/Yoga

Hi Royal,

Sorry it took so long to get back to you on this! You say -

Perhaps I could ask you to expound further on point 3 -- "Hinduism
and Buddhism both have instantaneous and long progressive paths"? In
my study of yoga, I was taught that the soul comes from the Supreme
Consciousness/Infinite/Divine, is purified through countless
incarnations (the grand illusion) through the physical/astral cycle
to the astral/causal cycle and finally achieves blissful reunion with
the Infinite -- That Which Is. How does this relate to the Absolute
Self of Hinduism and the No Self of Buddhism?

Tiny partial listing of instantaneous and progressive paths:
Buddhism
- Instantaneous (Ch'an, Zen, Pure Land,
Japanese Jodo Shinshu)
- Progressive (Vipassana, Theravada,
tantric and many other Mahayana forms)
Hinduism
- Instantaneous (advaita from Gaudapada
(MANDUKYA UPANISHAD), advaita from
Krishna Menon (ATMA DARSHAN), various
forms of Western advaita
- Progressive (Orthodox hinduism, orthodox
Advaita Vedanta from some schools in the
U.S. such as the Chinmaya Mission and the
Arsha Vidya Gurukulam; qualified non-dualism
as in the Ramakrishna Mission (many U.S. branches),
devotional paths (ISKON, Guru Mayi, Ammachi),
and also many westernized advaita paths.

In general, the "instantaneous" is more instantaneous when there has been
some preparation in the progressive paths.... :-)

You also ask a very good question - what about different teachings
vis-a-vis consciousness? Such as that we progress through a reunion with
consciousness, or a merging with consciousness, or taking one's stand now
already as consciousness, or a no-self teaching, or seeing all things and
people as not having a self.... There is no kind of teaching that is right
for everyone or wrong for everyone. The best criterion of a good fit is --
what speaks to your heart?

And a teacher! The real teacher is your innermost Self or true essence,
whether there is a human being occupying that role helping out or not. The
human teacher can come in many forms - books, friends, e-mail, etc. "Do I
need a living human teacher?" The question is its own answer. The more
strongly you feel the force of the question, the more you will seek - and
find - a human teacher!!

Love,

--Greg

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Hi Gregji,
I notice that time and duality
are issues that emerge
in this discussion
about teachings and no-teachings,
instantaneous and gradual paths.

Any teaching, be it the teaching
of no-teaching, or the teaching
of a specific path, involves a duality:
the duality of Awareness and the
teaching (or no-teaching) with which
awareness is confronted.

Any description of truth, whether it
be "instantaneous" or "gradual"
involves time: the time it takes
for the description to register
and be understood, or to register
and be understood as not understandable.

The upshot is this: the concept "timelessness"
is not timelessness. Time is involved in
hearing the word, and infering a meaning (or
no-meaning).

The path of no-path is not the path of no-path:
a duality is involved in whatever meaning
or non-meaning is associated with the concept
of a pathless path.

The dilemma is involved once there is communication
of any kind. Communication takes time and
involves duality. Noncommunication doesn't help
either, as by noncommunicating there is the implied
or overt separation of states
(the one who doesn't communicate and the one who
expresses perceived lack of awareness or a sense
of suffering).

Thus, It isn't a path nor is It a non-path.
It doesn't have a means for approach, nor
does it lack a means for approach.
It doesn't confer meaning, nor is it
meaningless.

Its timelessness isn't timelessness.

Its boundless clarity can't be communicated,
nor can it be noncommunicated.

Namaste,
Dan

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Hi Dan-ji,

The Zen analogue to what you're saying here is, "When you have the tip of
the hair on the tail, you've got the entire lion." The distinctions
between the paths (like the paths) are neither time-bound nor timeless,
neither instantaneous nor time-consuming. Like everything else, it is
neither anything nor nothing, neither X nor -X. And for this very reason
that it is said that we eat and sleep, and that some paths are
instantaneous and some are gradual!

Your poetry here, if considered carefully or apprehended in a flash!, is a
good antidote to the desire to have nonduality appear *as nondual*. How
can we expect that That which is the sum and substance of everything, to
look like anything in particular and *not* like something else?

Love,

--Greg

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Hi Greg-ji,

Yes.

The true teaching *is*.

Because it *is*, it
can't be found anywhere.

Love,
Dan

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Hi Dan - ji,

No.

The true

teaching is *not*

Because it is *not*

it can be found everywhere

Aroha

Pou

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Hi Pou-ji,

By saying
it is *not*,
you affirm
that it *is*.

See, you have found it
everywhere!

But what have you found?

If you have found anything,
you've lost it again.

Namaste,
Dan

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Dearest Dan -ji

By saying it *is*

you affirm it is *not*

See it is *nowhere* to be found

But what is it you have lost?

If you have lost anything

you will find it again

Hari Om Tat Sat

Pou
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Dearest Pou-ji,

I've lost my mind,
and it will
never be found
even once!

Namaste,
Dan
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Kia Ora Dan -ji

Nga mihi nui ki a koe ara me to whanau hoki

(greetings to you and also your family)

Arohanui

(much love)

Kia kaha

(stay strong)

Pou

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Hey guys,

Is?, is not? - I'll split the difference with you:

Anything, teaching or a cup of tea,
neither is nor is not.
This is why learning and tea-drinking happens...

Saludos,

--Greg

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Hi Greg-ji,
I'll have my tea with
a slice of Nagarjuna's lemon,
please.

I'll be the one leaning on the bar,
without a leg to stand
on.

When I say the truth *is*,
that's my cup of tea.
My tea is quite plain, and
neither 'is' nor 'isn't'
changes its flavor.

If you try to take my cup away from
me, you'll see it never leaves
my hands.

You can have all you want. Spill it
and you'll never get wet.

One sip at a time,
Dan

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From: raaaa1234@webtv.net
Subject: FWD; OSHO...(CON'T)

Imagine what it would be like if we are PAID to have FUN in life.(Instead of
being
paid for "working.") And imagine what if would belike if the more fun we have,
the
more we get paid. How would wechange our lives, today, right
now?
Even more radically, imagine what it would be like if we were told that if we
didn't
have a high level of fun at every moment, we would be brutally killed. How would
ourbattitude toward death
change?

Hope these words are useful to some.

love,

sky
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Yeah, but this jerk adds, this circle jerk of ours ("this thing of ours," as
the mafia
says) is also more than just mutual masterbation. I mean,you know how much it
takes
to get another to "do it" for you, and "do it right"! And vice
versa!
And when we do it right: GOD, BABY, GOD, GOD, GOD!!!!! We are not humanity,
we are
OH, GOD, GOD, BABY!!!! (Definition of
Advaita.)
love hand

sky

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Oh, please tell me where the slaughterhouse is. There, I've asked.

Love, Mark

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This way.... this way..... this way to the slaughter house of love

Mark you should be working for Saatchi & Saatchi groover

Pou

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Laughing Buddha..

And that's why Buddha laughed because he realized he was God dreaming he was
Buddha. You know 'John Smith' the actor who plays the part of King Lear in
the Shakespearian play here in London, never ever forgets that he is John
Smith. Should he ever forget momentarily, he only has to look on his pay
cheque and he will see written there 'John Smith'. Having said that, we who
go to watch the play get very excited when John Smith loses himself in the
identity of King Lear in the same way that Buddha laughs, so do those who
awaken from the dream from believing they were 'me'.

I guess it's like, and not for a moment here do I forget that I am writing
to the enlightened NDS club, which are all the different parts of me. John
Smith becoming so identified with the part of King Lear and losing his
reference points to re-identifying as John Smith and needing to go to a
psychiatrist to be reminded that really you're John Smith and that you have
three sons: Simon, Peter, and Paul. It's such a relief for John Smith to
remember who he is really so that he can get on with his day to day living
and play his various roles in the theatre company.

I guess that's why Buddha laughs.

Love Pou


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I like the stories about sages who laugh, not only in the face of death, but
over the
din of slander. I think it's easy to die among friends, but the sage who, while
being
roasted alive, quips, "I think this side is done now" gains most of my
admiration.
The otherwise obscure sage who, before being publically hanged, said, this is
good,
at least now I'm getting some of the attention I deserve.
Christ's grace under fire seems cool. But we never hear about the guy or gal who
laughed in the face of unanimous slander. How could we, no one witnessed it who
has
anything but slander to offer about that person?
Sometimes "villains" are portrayed as having died laughing, but with demonic
glee,
rather than enlightened laughter.
What if we were to see them as actually enlightened?
What if we were to stop slandering completely, and see everyone as enlightened
Buddhas?

love,
sky

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is no there. There is only here.
Here is neither here nor there. Only now, eternal now.
"Cliche!" mon amie. ;^) ;^)

love,

sky
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> Mark wrote:
>
> It seems to me that the ego wishes for immortality and
> elevation, and I hear people who I respect saying that
> there is immortality and not so much elevation - but
> being high (such a dirty word...) - available, but that
> the egoic drive for survival obscures it. I hear it said
> that it is already there, always has been, always will be
> but the idea that it is not, and the panic that such an
> idea creates causes all of our suffering.
>
>

The most complicated thing to explain, to someone who hasn't
been there, is the sense of complete impossibility of "all this".

There are a thousand and one explainations for how the mind works,
the parts of the brain that cause one sensation or another, mysterious
combinations of memory and sensory feelings, for to create sensory
memories that combine to form emotions etc, etc.

A sensation arises in the brain of "my being". As concocted and
distorted as it may be, an esscence arises, where there should be
absolutely nothing. Where does this esscence "actually come from?"
and where is it "actually going".

I know about myself! So all the scientists, and all of the philosophers
can try, it's their nature, to explain this! They use self defined rules,
supposedly "impartial". Well, it doesn't matter. All of the rules
are based on observation and emulation, definitions of consistencies.
The rules emulate the nature of what we see, using logical models.

What they do is explain how all these things manifest, within the
known physical infrastructure, but what none of them do is explain
how the fuck can the physical infrastructure be!

Like I think I've said before, my sense of being is floating around
in a cloud of electrons and protons (muons, pions if you will). Is
it those protons which have my escence, or are we missing something?
Are we just inventing too many "object" to qualify the image.

It's perhaps not so strange that the answer revolves around questions
of ego and mortality. It's like, there IS or there ISN'T. That's how
it seems. I wasn't the least bit concerned about the period before
my birth! Somewhere along the line there, I came to be. Somewhere
along the line it appears I will cease to be. So I came to be,
and that had to be explained. I don't know why, that's the nature
of THIS.

Now, there are probably as many explainations as to what is going to
happen after, as there is for what THIS is. Interesting!


Before I came to be, were there explainations as to what it would be
like.. to be? Not that I'm aware of. It seems I wasn't aware of anything
before I came here. Was there something then before that? From here it
seems so. The Earth and mankind has been around for 10s of 1000's of years.
Before I came to be then, what portion of my time would that 10,000
years represent? Somehow that doesn't compute! It's like "I" wasn't.
Did "I" care?

What seems possible, is that there was being, but it just wan't
recognizable.
It's not a physical state. There's a strong sense, and the scientists
are learning to prove it, that time only exists here. It seems that while
we are here we are living a possible explaination for what THIS is.

Light of somethingness, giving dimension to PURE BEING, which is what
it has always been.

PURE BEING, how could we know what it is without THIS?

Don't worry about what comes after, THIS is your explaination.

Love Dave

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Marcia Paul wrote:
>
> The decision is
> not in our hands. "Thy Will be done on Earth, as it is in Heaven."
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'Nga Ko re ro' wrote:

> Marcia, I accept that you believe what you believe. But I do not believe in
> the concept 'thy will be done'.
>
> What I do believe is 'thy will is being done'.

Hi :-)

I don't see the difference. Heaven is a state of consciousness
which is now.

But anyway......I have a question. I have been pondering
what it means to not let the left hand know what the right
hand is doing. In this context, I see the left hand as day to
day ordinary consciousness and the right hand the silence
you address in your post; The I Am. How I experience
it is this left hand (personality, the machine as John Duff
puts it) just runs and if pointed in the right direction, it
does a pretty good job. "Hello, how are you? Do you want
butter on your toast or just jam?" It just gets into trouble
when it tries to take over. Good servant but terrible master.
But you can't let it know that it isn't the master. That is where
the trouble starts. The real master, the left hand, is silent.
But then what is the right hand doing? Does it work for the
Good? This is where I believe there is more to this game
than the mere recognition that who I Am is not the left hand.
Does this make sense? Speak to me. :-)

Marcia



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It is not necessary to meet your guru on the
physical plane. The guru is not external.

- Neem Karoli Baba

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