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Monday September 25th


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Bruce:


I wonder if there is really
any difference in the instance
when one isn't directly and
personally culpable. In my
dictionary of American English
this is the primary definition
of "shame":

"a painful sense of having
done something wrong, improper,
or immodest"

The primary definition of
"guilt" is:

"the fact of having committed
an offense, especially againt
the law"

However, looking further,
there are these two alternate
definitions:

"blameworthiness"

and

"a feeling of responsibility"

It seems from here that what
Ralf and others mean when
they use "shame" is outside
the conventional definitions.
When the fact of human
violence is squarely looked
at, it has no nationality,
ethnicity, or religion -- it
is an innate propensity of
the fact of incarnation, it
is an aspect of the animal
side of human nature, it is
there whether we choose to
look at it or not.

Even the most peaceful
(wo)man is not devoid of
the potential for violence
or even outright atrocity,
(s)he is watchful and aware
of it in every moment, and
when it occurs allows it to
arise, flower, and die
without either judgement or
infliction upon the world.
Note this is very different
from denial and repression,
where the urge is shoved
aside only to explode into
the world as assault, war, or
the subtler forms of violence
that pollute everyday life.

So, from here is seems that
shame in the most constructive
sense is simply the light of
in-the-moment awareness shone
on the seeds of violence that
are in all of us, German, Jew,
American, Indian, Muslim,
Hindu -- these labels don't
really matter, they are just
ways we explain our violence
and justify it to ourselves.
The visceral call to protect
and inflate the ego by violent
means knows no boundary and is
in everyone!

The same clear awareness that
sees the incarnation-intrinsic
nature of human violence also
sees the moral implications of
violent expression and thereby
renders one harmless among ones
fellow incarnates. When the
huge karmic burden incurred by
violence is observed, only a
mad(wo)man is violent.
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Alexandra Welsh:

...
Maybe the old concepts attached to the Master/Disciple
relationship are changing, but to me without
commitment to go the whole way with someone who is
always a step ahead, to have someone pointing out
continuing identities, and without a place where
things are going to be provoked, (admittedly NDS
serves this function on a VIRTUAL REALITY basis),
there is going to be distraction, floundering,
journeying off into Enlightened and other identities,
speaking from a place of knowing - which is always
risky! To me there needs to be some intense way of
keeping this awakening ever alive.
...
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Sandeep Chattergee:

Somebody (Victor???) wanted this in plain English or something to that
extent.

A conceptual two bit attempt.........

> This is a rarely seen text of extreme nondualism:
>
> --------------------------------------------------------
>
> Mahayanavimsaka of Nagarjuna
>
> ADORATION TO THE THREE TREASURES
>
> 1
>
> I make my obeisance to the Buddha who is wise, free from
> all attachment, and whose powers are beyond conception, and
> who has kindly taught the truth which cannot be expressed
> by words.

A painting of the sky, even if the painter is Learnado da Vinci, is never
THE sky.
It is "about" the sky, a version.
And all versions are bound, limited, "dead".
And yet it is only the conceptual, phenomenal context that communication
(with words or otherwise) is possible, ergo, the communication itself is
conceptual, no matter who the communicator is.


> 2
>
> In the transcendental truth there is no origination
> (utpada), and in fact, there is no destruction (nirodha).


Nothing has ever happened, existentially speaking.

In a dream, there is orgination, there is destruction, there is movement,
there is change, there is becoming and there is unbecoming.
There is chaos and out of chaos, stars are born, black holes formed.

There are World Wars, there are holocausts, there is shame of the
vanquished, there is pride of the victor, there are Mother Theresas and the
pride of charity.

All nuances of the dream.

Wake up in the morning sipping a cup of tea, the issues of the dream, the
great ethos and pathos, are they of any import?
Did they really occur?

> The Buddha is like the sky (which has neither origination
> nor cessation), and the beings are like him, and therefore
> they are of the same nature.

That from which the dream manifested can neither originate or cease.
>From a conceptual, phenomenal context any reference to that, any attempt to
depict that, can only be a painting of the sky, hence conceptual.

And yet the "wave" as an symbol of the illusory phenomenal world, when you
pick up a wave in your hand, all you get is water.
The illusory mirage is nothing but the sun's rays.

This illusory phenomenal world is not different or apart to that which
manifests it.
It is an objective expression of what can be called as pure subjectivity.
Potentiality actualizing it's potentiality.
They are not two and are thus of the same nature, same essence.

> 3
>
> There is no birth either on this or the other side (of the
> world).

When nothing has ever happened, what birth, what death.


> A compound thing (samskrta) originates from its
> conditions.

A dance.
The dance is a dance, because a dancer is dancing.
The dancer is a dancer becuase a dance has come to be.
Where is the separation between the two?

Potentiality actualizing it's innate potentiality, not as something separate
to it, but itself appears to itself, without any change to itself.

> Therefore it is sunya by its nature.

The term "sunya" has been much mis-understood to mean "dead nothingness"
Since nothing has ever happened, a conceptual terminology used is sunyatta,
but a sunyatta of total potentiality.


> This fact
> comes into the range of knowledge of an omniscient one.

In a conceptual entity, the apperception of the true identity may "occur".
Not as an act of will, but through pure non-volitionality on part of the
conceptual entity.



> 4
>
> All things by nature are regarded as reflections.

As appearances in Consciousness.


> They are
> pure and naturally quiescent, devoid of any duality, equal,
> and remain always and in all circumstances in the same way
> (tathata).

Tathata means "Isness".
There is an "isness" in all things, to all objects within a dream.
An object in a dream cannot follow any other alloted role except it's
"isness".
Like wise the conceptual entity which has assumed on itself the mantle of
being a subject to all the object he/she observes, is itself an object which
can do nothing but follow it's "isness".

A conceptual entity, a biological computer that we are, has no volition but
to follow the program of it's isness.

So if shame is arising at this moment, if great profound thoughts of
non-duality are arising at this moment, or you are busy cutting the throat
of an innocent bystander, the conceptual entity is just following it's
"isness".

The concequences of the enactment of the "isness", faced by that conceptual
entity is also entirely as per the "isness" of what it is to be.


>
> 5
>
> In fact, worldings attribute atman to what is not atman,

Atamn or soul, is just the ego's attempts to perpetuate itself.
Seeing the temporal nature of the current identity, the body-mind complex,
it latches on to a more permanent option, Atman , which it expects to last
few lifetimes.,<s>


> and in the same way they imagine happiness, misery,
> indifference, passions and liberation.


The need to be, by the conceptual entity, thereby establishing that it is
something apart from a mere cognized object, is just the "me-entity" or
"personal doership" in operation.
With this "entitification", the pandora Box of happiness (which immediately
gives birth to what misery is supposed to be), indifference (which
immediately gives birth to what passion is supposed to be), liberation
(which immediately gives birth to what bondage is supposed to be), the
Pandora Box is open.

And thus the "me-entity" suffers or is happy, for it sees that sometimes the
actions which it believes it is taking, gets it what it hoped to get in the
first place (and hence it is happy) and sometimes it doesn't (and hence it
suffers).

The "me-entity" further realises that there is no guarantee as to which of
it's actions will produce what and that the Life it knows is totally
uncertain, death may occur for no reason or rhyme.

And thus is born the sense of "insecurity" which in turn drives it's seeking
of solace, consolations or icons of security like Meditation, the Holy
Bible/Gita/Koran, or a Guru, or in today's times, Web based Lists which
discusses/debates such spiritual matters.

It seeks to dis-identify with the body because it sees the temporal fraility
and looks for more permanent solutions, like identifying with the Holy
Spirit, Consciousness, God, whatever.
Anything which can assuage the insecurity.

And the joke is that when and if the recognition takes place, occurs, there
is no recognizer left, to affirm, confirm or validate.

That is why statements like the I am the Holy Spirit, Consciousness, etc are
oxymoron statements.

The question then that arises is why does this me-entity come to be in the
first place.
First of all, it does not come to be, it appears to be in operation, like a
mirage.
It appears to be, so that a "me and 'you" appears to come to be and Life ,
which is only a complex of multitude relationships between a "me" and "you",
Life comes to be.
Without the "me and the 'you, the duality of this me/you, Life cannot be as
we know it.

For this dialogue which is part of Life, there has to be a "Sandeep" and
another who is not-Sandeep and then the game of dialogue can merrily carry
on.

Whereas the truth is that it is really Consciousness dialoguing this
particular EMail based conversation with Consciousness.


> 6 - 7
>
> Birth in the six realms of existence in the world, highest
> happiness in the heaven, great pain in the hell,--these do
> not come within the perview of truth (i.e. cannot be
> accepted as true); nor do the notions that unmeritorious
> actions lead to the extreme misery, old age, disease, and
> death, and meritorious actions surely bring about good
> results.


Good actions, bad actions, doing, not-doing, believing, not believing, all
issues of the dream.
Waking up, sip the cup of tea.


> It is owing to false notions that beings are consumed by
> fire of passions even as a forest is burnt by forest
> conflagration and fall into the hells, etc.

A conceptual entity, a dreamed character, has the false notion that he or
she IS, to feel shame, or that it was my Dad's doing so what the hell, and
hence is subject to Heaven and Hell, both states being part of the dream.


> As illusion
> prevails so do beings make their appearance. The world is
> illusory and it exists only on account of its cause and
> conditions.

The world (cognized) exists becuase an illusory congnizer is around to
cognize it.
If nobody heard, did the tree fall in the forest goes a famous Zen kaon.



> 8
>
> As a painter is frightened by the terrible figure of a
> Yaksa which he himself has drawn, so is a fool frightened
> in the world (by his own false notions).

The cognized and the cognizer are both illusions, hence can there be any
cognition whether of fear or joy?


> 9
>
> Even as a fool going himself to a quagmire is drowned
> therein, so are beings drowned in the quagmire of false
> notions and are unable to come out thereof.


So long there is a seeking for liberation, a doing towards seeking, the
seeker fundamentally pre-supposes that he or she is bound.
The seeking and the pre-supposition are two sides of the same coin.
Can't have one without the other.
Like a shadow.
And thus all seeking is trying to stamp out your own shadow.


> 10
>
> The feeling of misery is experienced by imagining a thing
> where in fact it has no existence. Beings are tortured by
> the poison of false notions regarding the object and its
> knowledge.

Objects in a dream, with it great ethos and pathos.
waking up in the morning sip your cup of tea.



> 11
>
> Seeing these helpless beings with a compassionate heart one
> should perform the practices of the highest knowledge
> (bodhicarya) for the benefit of them.


That is why speech takes place by the ones who know, knowing that any speech
is a corruption, falsity.

> 12
>
> Having acquired requisites thereby and getting
> unsurpassable bodhi one should become a Buddha, the friend
> of the world, being freed fron the bondage of false
> notions.

Phenomena is just the objective expression of that which IS.
Knowing it is a illusion, fully participate in it, if that is what comes up,
fully withdraw, when that comes up and vice-versa.
No rejection, no acceptance.


> 13
>
> He who realizes the transcendental truth knowing the
> pratityasamutpada (or the manifestation of entities
> depending on their causes and conditions), knows the world
> to be sunya and devoid of beginning, middle or end.


Nothing ever happened.

> 14
>
> The samsara and nirvana are mere appearances; the truth is
> stainless, changeless, and quiescent from the beginning and
> illumined.

Nothing ever happened, yet that which-is, IS.

> 15
>
> The object of knowledge in dream is not seen when one
> awakes.

Because the one who wakes up, does not consider himself/herself to be merely
another object.
Thus the sleep-dream is understood, but not this waking dream.


> Similarly the world disappears to him who is
> awakened from the darkness of ignorance.


In deep sleep, all your profanities and all your profoundities, all your
relationships and all your ethis and pathos, all are no more, as temporarily
you the "me-entity" are no more.

> The creation of illusion is nothing but illusion. When
> everything is compoond there is nothing which can be
> regarded as a real thing. Such is the nature of all things.

Nothing has ever happened.
Happenings are ony with the conceptual context of space and time, which
themseves are conceptual constructs.

> 16
>
> One having origination (jati) does not originate himself.
> Origination is a false conception of the people. Such
> conceptions and (conceived) beings, these two are not
> reasonable.

When nothing has happened, there is no origination, there is no cessation.


> 17
>
> All this is nothing but mind (citta) and exists just like
> an illusion. Hence originate good and evil actions and from
> them good and evil birth.

Good, Bad, Evil, all dynamics of the dream, within a dream


> 18
>
> When the wheel of the mind is suppressed, all things are
> suppressed. Therefore all things are devoid of atman
> (independent nature), and consequently they are pure.

No conceptual entity has volition.


> 19
>
> It is due to thinking the things which have no independent
> nature as eternal, atman, and pleasant that this ocean of
> existence (bhava) appears to one who is enveloped by the
> darkness of attachment and ignorance.

To a "me-entity", with a sense of personal doership, hence having the issue
to become something , enlightened or a buffoon, for this "me-entity" it
subject to the rise and crash of the "wave".

> 20
>
> Who can reach the other side of thc great ocean of samsara
> which is full of water of false notions without getting
> into the great vehicle (i.e., Mahayana) ?

Without apperception of the truth, all doing is round and round the mulberry
bush.


> How can these false notions arise in a man who thoroughly
> knows this world which has originated from ignorance?


Once the apperception "occurs", where is the "me-entity" left to have any
notions, right or wrong?


Dobeee Dobeee Dooooo


Sandeep

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

Hiya Andrew,

> Dear Sandeep,
>
> I enjoyed your rewording of Nagarjuna, found it somewhat brilliant in
fact, as I find
> many of your posts. However...
>
> >
> > A painting of the sky, even if the painter is Learnado da Vinci, is
never
> > THE sky.
> > It is "about" the sky, a version.
> > And all versions are bound, limited, "dead".
> > And yet it is only the conceptual, phenomenal context that communication
> > (with words or otherwise) is possible, ergo, the communication itself is
> > conceptual, no matter who the communicator is.
> >
>
> ...this doesn't seem quite right to me. I think I understand the intent
but...
> The sky in a painting is not a version of any other sky, neither a sky
in the 'real'
> world, nor a sky in the mind of the artist. It is not about anything but
itself. It
> appears in the process of painting, and in the viewer's eye. The sky in a
painting is
> simply what it is.


I totally agree.
I was only using a symbology to hopefully provide clarity that words cannot
convey what is wordless (wordless being another word and hence also a
corruption).

Truly a painting or for that matter any thing is just that.
Nothing more, nothing less.
And that is in fact how Life functions.



> There is a difference between a painting and a map or a blueprint.
> Look at Turner's or El Greco's skies, they do not depict any sky ever seen
before. The
> act of putting paint on a surface like the act of writing fiction is in
effect the
> creation of a new reality, within its own limits, what exists there exists
there
> independent of the reality outside the frame, though interestingly it is
not self
> aware, but needs a viewer outside of it to be aware of it.

Absolutely.
Take the example of the mirage occuring in desert.
The occurrence of the mirage offcourse depends on the exact atmospheric
conditions for it to take place but more importantly it needs a pair of eyes
at that exact angle of the sun's rays, for the mirage to take place.
If the pair of eyes was not present at that precise time at that precise
moment, would there be a mirage?

If there were not a single sentient being cognizing the cognized, would the
cognized "universe" be?

As in deep sleep, the sentient cognizer is absent (temporarily) and it's
cognized universe is no more.

If this can be trully appercieved (and that is not upto the volition of the
entity trying to appercieve), what garbage, what guilt, what shame, what
values, what seeking, can you carry on your shoulders anymore?

Cheers

Sandeep

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Dan Berkow:

My mindful limitations seek
to say That which no mouth can speak

Limited and pitiful I sit
contemplating "what is It?"

The quest of thought has
come to naught...
So I return all I have bought.

Love,
Dan

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Greg Goode:


Hello Alexandra,

Thank you for your nice note, and welcome to NDS! As far as teachers and
personalities and teaching techniques go, here's a perhaps odd thing that
happened. For me, there was an intense search to find what the "me" entity
is made of. Through lots of books, lots of very deep and prolonged
contemplation and inquiry, this search came to its natural, blissful
conclusion. I had not yet met a human teacher. This had always been fine,
because books have always spoken to me in a very non-abstract, direct,
personal, feeling-type way, energetically very "present."

I had never spoken to anyone about any of this - I never knew anyone who
was interested. This was so large, great, explosive, fantastic, clear,
plain and perhaps hidden at the same time, that I wanted to talk to others
about it! Besides beliefs, and desires having come to an end related to
"me" and "others," I had lots of academic experience in psychology and
philosophy. The result of that was that, besides the spiritual, there has
always been an intellectual interest in consciousness, the mind, what the
world is made of, etc. So I wanted to talk, to share, so I actually
started looking for places where people talk about this.

I found it -- I did encounter conversations about these things, in a
context where there was a teacher, and many friendly, nice people with whom
friendship was instantly formed. (I had been new to New York City and
hadn't met a lot of friends yet.) This new social group was very nice.
Satsang and other kinds of teachers started coming to NYC. About 2 per
month for several years before the rate slowed down. I travelled on my job
and ran into even more. Hanging out with my friends who were devoted to
these teachers, I helped host and assist many of the travelling teachers,
got to know them and listened to many other people's experiences with them.
I witnessed lots of character, lots of personality, lots of issues, lots
of drama, lots of the same quirky and wacky preoccupations, sufferings, and
agitations that some of their own devotees have. Sometimes the teacher
suffers more and not because "they are taking on the karma of their
students." Sometimes it's plain old love or money issues. No difference
between teacher and student, except that some people want to teach and have
the panache and confidence and personality for it, and others don't. Full
stop. In some cases, I came to know the "gurubais" or "dharma
brothers/sisters" of some of these teachers. That is, I came to be
acquainted with some of their social and spiritual context before they went
onto the satsang trail, and in some cases, even before their own search
began. In short, I was exposed to lots and lots of everyday stuff that is
at great odds to how many teachers present themselves on the podium.

I think one helpful lesson in all this is that the age of the guru-disciple
model is phasing out. It's sort of analogous to the fact that we don't
revere politicians the way we used to in the 1950's - people see too much,
know too much, are exposed to too much. In this age, perhaps the
guru-disciple model is being replaced by the "friend model" -- people say
the same stuff about consciousness and the Self, but on the telephone, over
coffee, on the internet. You used to have to spend thousands of dollars
and travel to exotic locales to hear this stuff. Now, it's as close as
amazon.com or this very list!

All this isn't to say that there are not truly skillful teachers out there.
There are!! But most of them come to see teaching as something that is
different from just being consciousness/Buddha nature. It is a separate
skill. So they don't interpret their every move as issuing faultlessly out
of the nature of consciousness itself. Instead, it is seen as part of a
very long process of seasoning, about teaching and learning, not just about
being.

You ask if I partake of that most difficult of relationships. Not in a big
way. I have had several very very good teachers, and have myself tried to
help others. In one case, I had a very persistent and fascinating question
that a very good teacher unknowingly answered by handing me a book! And
sometimes people come to me with questions about what their teachers say or
do, sometimes the teaching stops making sense, sometimes the resonance
comes to an end. One person was even pronounced "enlightened" by a very
famous satsang teacher, but he still had questions that were very important
to him that he confided his teacher was unable to answer. I worked with
him for over a year!

Alexandra, if you're still trogging through this message (sorry so long!)
and are interested in more biographical details, Jerry has a page for me at
(http://www.nonduality.com/goode.htm)

Love,

--Greg

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Jivano and Harsha:


A clear example how spiritual teaching works
was given by Mark.

Ramana Maharshi answered to the question
"How can I attain Self-realization?" as follows:

>Realization is nothing to be gained afresh: it is already there.

The statement itself comes from Ramana's space: it is allready
there from Ramana's point of view. For the questioner (who is obviously
greedy to attain something - and attain it the easy way
by questioning somebody else) this becomes a bait.....
snip...
___________________________________________________________________
I love your analysis Jivano!
Perhaps you are making it more complicated than it needs to be.
Ramana Maharshi is simply stating the simplicity of His Space.
He is indicating that His Space Is Your Space. See It. Be It.
And It Is All Pure Space.
Pure Space of Consciousness in which manifestations occur and disappear.
The Simplicity of Being is overwhelming.
Know It. See It. Be It. You Are It.
That is the Beginning, Middle, and the End.
You Are It. Your Very Being Is It.

Love
Harsha

________________________________________________________________________________\
_____

Joanna West:


Moving from moment to moment

endless love

all is one

the world is in me

crying, laughing

birth and dead

never ending

never beginning



Joanna

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Jutta Helga Martha:


Hi Marcia,

somewhere I read that you are with Gurdieff! I love Gurdieff!
A friend of mine gave me a video with movements from Japan 1949 with
Frau de Salzmann talking. The quality was very bad, technically but
still I was impressed! I cannot describe the impression, what it did
to me: beyond words!!!!

And I read a lot of books written by Gurdieff deciples, their has
always been such interest in the work of Gurdieff - in this special
doorway of the devine ...........

But I never met an alive Gurdieff desciple, at least I was not aware
of it. I was OSHO Sannyasin for 18 years, the seeking dropped...

Through very close friends who support my growth in consciousness in
utter integrity I discovered AVATAR. Now most of the time I integrate
resisted parts of my personality with the AVATAR tools from Harry
Palmer. These tools for me a pure gold! They are in a way the
culmination of all I learned the last 20 years.

But really, I used everything to teach me how to be integrate
devineness into humaness. There are so many ways to it. Every being
can teach me if there is willingness to learn.

I prefer the firery, strong expressions of the devine, strong
spirits, strong doorways and gentle hearts at the same time because
of their life experiences. I love to choose those humans as teachers
who are brutally honest and not compromising. Because, I believe,
this is what this form "Jutta" needs to learn and to express more.
And I learn a lot out of sharings amongst human beings.

Somebody wrote here in the NDS that the time of masters is may be
out. May be there is a new way to learn via collective process.
Maybe????

Sometimes it feels as if there were lifetimes with silent surrender,
still realizations in cages, in wholy places, in monastries and
churches. This time god wants to express it in the marketplace, in so
called "normal" life.....

E.G. I tasted Tiohar, or Shantimay yes

the ocean tastes salty from every side .........

But I go the roothless ones, they touche my heart deeply. Some devine
expressions are just my taste, because through them I feel mirrored
more deeply! The different in my choise in the end just a thought, a
concept, last tries to hold onto something?...

Looking for something outside there is vanishing more and more. It
was a play which doesn´t serve me anymore. This concept of seeking
something is useless, more and more useless the more "I" put the
attention onto "the self".
I am that, I am that what the seeker was seeking for lifetimes.

Dan would surely make a wonderful poem out of my mindful limitations


love to you

Jutta H.M.

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_____


Ralf Wienken:


Dear Jutta,

and under the surface of the ocean is the only place in the universe
without rain.

Ralf

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