Every aspect of existence that we see outside,
Has a corresponding component of that within ourselves too.
Perception is from resonance/recognition/alignment.
That is why it is said “You only experience the self, not the world”,
OR “You experience the world only as reflected in your self”.
All perception is a kind of resonance between the outer and the inner.
It is not that the outer and inner are separated in time by a linear process.
They simultaneous spawn,
Like how the dreamer character and the dream environment spawn together simultaneously.
Like for example, if you start to hate some aspect of yourself,
At that very instant, you also simultaneously prime yourself into hating all other potential reminders/representations/symbols/patterns of that aspect from the outside.
This is because, reality is ‘experience’,
And experience is fractal in nature.
What you hold in mind, you see outside.
And what you see outside, you hold in mind.
You see similar motifs/patterns/symbols/representations,
i.e. all that reflect the idea that you are holding.
The outer-inner appear to be in a constant state of transaction.
Sometimes an inner change alters the outer perception.
Sometimes an outer change alters the perception of the inner.
So from this level of perspective,
There is not even a you vs an other or inner vs outer.
It is a single swath that instantly manifests together.
The attitudes I hold towards every aspect of existence,
Multiply themselves infinitely and instantly throughout the entire scape of existence.
When saying ‘The attitudes I hold…’, I was implying that I am the determiner.
But actually, when delving deeper, I see that even these attitudes,
Also seem to be ‘appearances’.
Rather then being something I determine,
They seem to be flowing through and expressing through me.
My ability to alter them or control them,
Seems to be determined by how much energy/power I have,
And my level of perception and dis-identification i.e. whether I can even perceive those attitudes as objects in my awareness.
This energy level is again conditional of sort, again the effect of many other cyclic processes.
To dis-identify from anything, you must first have the power/energy to separate yourself from it and see it as an object.
When enmeshed and identified into something,
Even if you can see this enmeshment,
You need enough power/freq/energy to extricate yourself out of that.
It is similar to how we need enough external force to overcome newton’s first law of inertia.
Generally, you function from a certain station of freq,
While accessing all kinds of states from there.
This I call the LOC (level of consciousness) of the subtle body.
I could say, ‘What you are is where you are seeing from’.
What you do not see, will be something you are subject to, and it will rule you from within.
What you do see, is something subject to you, and can be ruled.
For many people, what I see is that, their life-fires/soul are enmeshed and identified with their genetics (to varying degrees/levels).
It is like they are embedded inside those grids, and therefore all of their life fires only serve the demands of those structures.
They are completely unaware of this, because they identify totally with the feelings/perceptions arising from these grids.
It reminds me of animals, how they function only within 2 lines, only within a certain set pattern.
For human beings, it seems,
The bottom line is similar to reptiles/mammals,
But the top line is super high.
The spectrum is vast and there is enormous potential to rise up in awareness.
The 2 kinds of relationships I’ve experienced
I’ve seen 2 kinds of relationships in my life:
# Connections through resonance
# Connections through projection/role-play
Connecting through resonance:
Two minds understand each other when they are attuned/honed to each other,
That is, when both the minds are operating at a similar frequency, they see similar views.
For instance, say you are floating on a hot air balloon.
If you spoke to someone on the ground, his view would be entirely different from yours.
You may be able to talk a little about his surroundings, because you know where he is standing,
Similarly, he might see your balloon and ask you a few questions about that.
But overall, there would not be much to share or connect about.
But suppose you spoke to another person in another hot air balloon at the same height,
Then so much of the view is shared, and thereby you both can easily connect, right?
Two minds can connect if they share the same level of subtleness of perception.
I call this the “LOC” – The level of consciousness of the subtle body.
Generally, things like world view, concerns, ideas, perceptions, thoughts, feelings can be easily shared with another being at the same LOC level.
There is ‘what you are seeing’, and ‘from where you are seeing’.
The LOC is about ‘from where you are seeing’.
If the ‘from where you are seeing’ is common,
Then understanding each other would be very effortless.
Connecting to another being who shares your LOC level,
I call ‘connecting via. resonance’.
Whatever you say to them will be understood fairly easily.
Actually you both already see from the same place.
The talking is more a celebration of the connection already active.
It is a sort of mutual enrichment.
Often there is instant recognition here.
This kind of relationship does not need much time,
And feels comfortable and deep at the start itself.
The other kind of relationship I have had is via. projection/role-play.
These kinds of relationships are mostly from external situations (sharing the same environment, context etc.)
What are called ‘situational relationships’ would come under this.
# Like the roles of being a colleague/coworker/college lab partner/project partner/college friend in the same class, neighbor next door etc.
# I would also include specific interest group connections under here.
Because interest group connections are also somewhat goal based – Check this out, What do you think of this? etc.
They are fairly circumscribed and specific to a certain frame and scope.
# Also, any work related relationships would come in this category.
Like even the relationship you may have with people standing in the same queue as you to buy movie tickets.
# Even healing group members are not necessarily at the same LOC level.
For instance, Two people might connect with each other from their unresolved anger issues, or through their common addiction to something, but their LOCs could be vastly different.
# Even relations with family members, relatives etc. could fall here.
Because they too are certain frames of role-play.
# Even romantic relations are often projection/fantasy/role-play based.
If it does not have enough of resonance elements, then the relationship would fizzle out quickly, i.e. after the ‘enjoyment of the novelty/projection/role-play/fantasy/specific-quality-admiration based interaction’ is completed.
My musings on death
Death fills me with a sense of deep awe, respect, wonder, and a sacred silence.
I bow down to its power.
Death fills me with a kind of gratitude.
That I have had the privilege of having this stream of experience,Â
And to be a witness of this body’s inner life process.
Every death is liberation from the form.
Seen from a higher perspective, death isn’t a separate unconnected event.
Birth and Death are part of a singular continuum.
They are different parts of the same process, the same thread,
That continues on inexorably.
We have all done this countless times before,
Living from different points of view.
When moving from form to form, it is the point of attention that shifts.
All forms are temporal in nature.
Every form that is born also dies.
We descend into form and ascend back into the formless.
Birth and death are the grandest events that can happen to anyone.
Birth and Death happen to us as ‘consciousness’.
We are not born and we do not die.
We are the eternal substance (consciousness),
Witnessing the plays of both birth and death,
And all that happens in the middle we call our lives.
There is only consciousness, and there is only the work
There is no inside-outside.
There is no self-other.
There is no you-world.
There is no body-environment.
There is no voluntary-involuntary.
There is just the one.
All of these are distinctions made by the mind,
Like throwing a net from a boat into seamless sea water,
And then calling each square of the net a label.
We create mental maps and use them to control and navigate in our life.
But the map is distinct from the territory.
The map is the lens through which we view the territory.
The territory is one undivided ocean of consciousness.
Reality/Territory appears to us as experience,
Based on how we see it through the maps of our mind.
Each map is a perspective.
And the multiple maps you carry in your mind,
Are like multiple perspectives to see the territory.
But the territory itself is like an unbounded kaleidoscope,
And it contains all of what all of the maps reveal.
We think we are born and we die.
But it is only the persistent appearance that dies.
In fact if you observe each moment,
Things are continuously arising and passing.
We see events because of our lack of vision.
When anything is seen very minutely,
We see that things happen in a continuous stream (continuum).
If life is the bird, its 2 wings are creation and destruction.
Our experience is like a continuous music in time.
Life on earth in the body is the theme of the music now.
This theme will shift and another kind of music may play,
Once the physiological process is completed.
So one very broad perspective of looking at this is:
There is only you and your karma unfolding.
The true completion of your birth,
Is when you complete the karma of the birth.
From this perspective – there are no situations/people/places,
Rather there is just an appearance to work with, whatever it appears as.
How does one complete karma?
In my understanding, it is by transformation.
We penetrate the darkness that surrounds our lives with our light,
And transform it.
We do this until we fulfill the potential (desire) in this birth,
And attain integration, enlightenment, and wholeness.
Then another cycle might begin in the next.
Consciousness creates its own darkness,
Filled with puzzles and possibilities (maya),
And then opens up a point of light (awareness),
With the desire to keep expanding its sphere of reach.
Why perspective is so important
Suppose:
I took photos with an awesome DSLR of only cowdung in a place,
And sent you a collection of 150 such photos,
What would you think?
That the whole place is nothing but a pile of shit?
But the reality of that is, all the dung was spread quite a bit.
Each picture might have looked larger than life on your HD screen,
But the actual place was completely different,
A neutral normal ordinary place with everyone going about their usual business.
Now let’s take the opposite case:
The opposite phenomenon may happen in a place like Instagram.
When celebrities etc. take photos of places from strategic spots,
Wearing exotic dresses, and add magical filter effects,
All this would make the place itself look like a dream fantasy.
Based on watching all these exotic posts of such places,
I’m sure many might have traveled with their family with the hope of getting some taste of that same magic.
And maybe what they found was that the places fell far short of their expectation?
Maybe they were just usual ordinary places with everyone doing their usual stuff?
The kind of information pouring into our HD digital screens,
Can seriously warp our perception about everything.
It is of course not only pictures but also narratives of different events that hugely shape our perception and experience.
A very interesting story I read a while ago was about this very perceptual distortion.
The story is titled: The island news network, I think.
The story goes like this:
In a group of 100 islands, each island had its own news station.
Whenever there was a shark attack, which would happen once in 2 years in one of the islands, that would get reported in that island-specific news channel.
Then later they unified all of the islands and created a single news channel.
Now the news of the shark attack started showing up in the citizen’s HD screens every 2 weeks.
It was so frequent, and shown in such detail, that everyone in all the islands entirely stopped swimming.
So the amount of information in the world is infinite.
We have to be aware of the balance of our perspective and be conscious about this kind of warping and distortion that can so easily happen, considering how we have abundant access to audio/video/writings in today’s INFORMATION AGE.
I took photos with an awesome DSLR of only cowdung in a place,
And sent you a collection of 150 such photos,
What would you think?
That the whole place is nothing but a pile of shit?
But the reality of that is, all the dung was spread quite a bit.
Each picture might have looked larger than life on your HD screen,
But the actual place was completely different,
A neutral normal ordinary place with everyone going about their usual business.
Now let’s take the opposite case:
The opposite phenomenon may happen in a place like Instagram.
When celebrities etc. take photos of places from strategic spots,
Wearing exotic dresses, and add magical filter effects,
All this would make the place itself look like a dream fantasy.
Based on watching all these exotic posts of such places,
I’m sure many might have traveled with their family with the hope of getting some taste of that same magic.
And maybe what they found was that the places fell far short of their expectation?
Maybe they were just usual ordinary places with everyone doing their usual stuff?
The kind of information pouring into our HD digital screens,
Can seriously warp our perception about everything.
It is of course not only pictures but also narratives of different events that hugely shape our perception and experience.
A very interesting story I read a while ago was about this very perceptual distortion.
The story is titled: The island news network, I think.
The story goes like this:
In a group of 100 islands, each island had its own news station.
Whenever there was a shark attack, which would happen once in 2 years in one of the islands, that would get reported in that island-specific news channel.
Then later they unified all of the islands and created a single news channel.
Now the news of the shark attack started showing up in the citizen’s HD screens every 2 weeks.
It was so frequent, and shown in such detail, that everyone in all the islands entirely stopped swimming.
So the amount of information in the world is infinite.
We have to be aware of the balance of our perspective and be conscious about this kind of warping and distortion that can so easily happen, considering how we have abundant access to audio/video/writings in today’s INFORMATION AGE.
The ascent to Shiva and descent to Maya
The influx into the earth plane of density,
And the vacating of the earth plane of density,
Are like Shiva moving in and out of Prakriti/Maya/Matter.
This is birth and death.
Breathing/Heartbeat/Sex/Birth-Death,
Waking-Sleeping/Day-Night/Light-Darkness,
All of this goes in-out, in-out, in-out…
In a state of vibration.
Like a dazzling flashing strobe in consciousness.
At the microcosmic the vibrations are incredibly rapid,
While in the macrocosmic, the flux of day and night takes 24 hours say.
We find ourselves in the middle.
Macrocosmic(slower vibration) —“Us/We”— Microcosmic(faster vibration)
Maybe for the earth, each of our lifetimes is equal to a blink on an eye for it.
The life forms on earth would be like multicolored sparking,
And shimmering coming from a revolving diamond in the presence of light.
We are experiencing all of our lifetime in this unique perspective.
As a mote on earth, living what feels like around 85 years of lifetime.
What a wonder it is!,
When all of our life is seen from such an expanded perspective.
And the vacating of the earth plane of density,
Are like Shiva moving in and out of Prakriti/Maya/Matter.
This is birth and death.
Breathing/Heartbeat/Sex/Birth-Death,
Waking-Sleeping/Day-Night/Light-Darkness,
All of this goes in-out, in-out, in-out…
In a state of vibration.
Like a dazzling flashing strobe in consciousness.
At the microcosmic the vibrations are incredibly rapid,
While in the macrocosmic, the flux of day and night takes 24 hours say.
We find ourselves in the middle.
Macrocosmic(slower vibration) —“Us/We”— Microcosmic(faster vibration)
Maybe for the earth, each of our lifetimes is equal to a blink on an eye for it.
The life forms on earth would be like multicolored sparking,
And shimmering coming from a revolving diamond in the presence of light.
We are experiencing all of our lifetime in this unique perspective.
As a mote on earth, living what feels like around 85 years of lifetime.
What a wonder it is!,
When all of our life is seen from such an expanded perspective.
Sanity is relative
The concept of sanity is relative.
Relative to the:
1. Level of vision
2. Level of perception
4. Level of consciousness (LOC concept from David Hawkins)
5. Number/breadth/height of perspectives you can see
6. The dynamic range of perspectives you can hold at a time
7. The extent of your spatial vision
8. The extent of your temporal vision both forward (future) and backward (past)
Relative to the:
1. Level of vision
2. Level of perception
4. Level of consciousness (LOC concept from David Hawkins)
5. Number/breadth/height of perspectives you can see
6. The dynamic range of perspectives you can hold at a time
7. The extent of your spatial vision
8. The extent of your temporal vision both forward (future) and backward (past)
Whose expectations determine our behavior and self?
Are others responding to what you expect from them? OR Are you responding to what others expect from you?
Are you conditioning others’ behavior? OR Are others conditioning your behavior?
Are we being the way we are because we are that way? OR as a response to what the other expects?
Are we ACTING or REACTING?
Do you expect to be treated a certain way? and that is why the other is simply fulfilling your own request? OR Are you simply behaving in accordance and taking on a role based on the other’s expectation?
These questions are like koans that lead you beyond.
Both sides are true.
Between the self and other, there is total mutual inter-relationship.
Deep psychoanalysis will at times tell you that if you are constantly abused then somewhere you are playing a 50% role of enabling it. You allow and attract such people and even allow their behavior because you want them to do that to you.
And the converse can also be explained. That if the other is a narcissistic bully he conditions your role i.e. to be a hostage for his rageaholic monologues etc.
So what is the truth?
Is your own expectation attracting such treatment? OR Is the bad other forcing you to behave that way to protect yourself?
Is our role and behavior in life conditioned by what others expect from us?
OR are others simply complying with what we expect from them?
Both are true and are simultaneous.
Since the mind can only grok one side at a time, we may bias ourselves to either seeing the self as responsible or other as responsible.
But in truth, both are happening simultaneously.
This simultaneity of occurrence cannot be grasped in one thought, it goes beyond the capacity of the linear mind to hold.
So we can examine only 1 at a time, but both are true.
From that higher level, we can see that there is only god.
The self, the other, their relationship, who is doing whom etc. is like the perspective puzzle of “Do you see 6 cubes or 7 cubes?”
The truth is – it is 6, it is 7, it is both, it is neither, all of the above, neither of the above, all of the above and beyond, neither of the above and beyond etc.
Are you conditioning others’ behavior? OR Are others conditioning your behavior?
Are we being the way we are because we are that way? OR as a response to what the other expects?
Are we ACTING or REACTING?
Do you expect to be treated a certain way? and that is why the other is simply fulfilling your own request? OR Are you simply behaving in accordance and taking on a role based on the other’s expectation?
These questions are like koans that lead you beyond.
Both sides are true.
Between the self and other, there is total mutual inter-relationship.
Deep psychoanalysis will at times tell you that if you are constantly abused then somewhere you are playing a 50% role of enabling it. You allow and attract such people and even allow their behavior because you want them to do that to you.
And the converse can also be explained. That if the other is a narcissistic bully he conditions your role i.e. to be a hostage for his rageaholic monologues etc.
So what is the truth?
Is your own expectation attracting such treatment? OR Is the bad other forcing you to behave that way to protect yourself?
Is our role and behavior in life conditioned by what others expect from us?
OR are others simply complying with what we expect from them?
Both are true and are simultaneous.
Since the mind can only grok one side at a time, we may bias ourselves to either seeing the self as responsible or other as responsible.
But in truth, both are happening simultaneously.
This simultaneity of occurrence cannot be grasped in one thought, it goes beyond the capacity of the linear mind to hold.
So we can examine only 1 at a time, but both are true.
From that higher level, we can see that there is only god.
The self, the other, their relationship, who is doing whom etc. is like the perspective puzzle of “Do you see 6 cubes or 7 cubes?”
The truth is – it is 6, it is 7, it is both, it is neither, all of the above, neither of the above, all of the above and beyond, neither of the above and beyond etc.
The whole is your home
Home is the [largest perspective], the [whole’est perspective].
To leave home is to depart from this [largest perspective] into a [narrowed perspective].
All journeys away from home are journeys into [narrowed perspectives].
In fact the narrower your perspective gets, the more far away from home you go.
The most crazy journeys involve stepping into the most far out narrowed perspectives.
Home (metaphysically speaking) has little to do with your physical location or with certain people we call family etc.
Those are factors that ENABLE us to RELAX enough to ACQUIRE that kind of WHOLE PERSPECTIVE.
The more one relaxes and feel safe(the less the fear), the more that one can open up to the largest perspective.
And generally a physical location and known people (since you know them for many years they are much more predictable and cause the least anxiety/fear) is a good formula for our mammalian brain to PERMIT this ENLARGEMENT of PERSPECTIVE.
Since [Fear] is one of the biggest contractors of perspective, finding home is about finding freedom from fear.
Fear is what takes you away from home, and the absence of fear is what brings you back home.
Also, another important point is, [Right Action] comes from [Right View] (Buddha).
So the BEST POSSIBLE ACTION will always come from the WHOLE’EST PERSPECTIVE.
Narrower your perspective, the less you can see, and your action would be at a certain level of discord with the whole as a result.
A great demonstration of this principle is in the Samurai warrior training of Wu-shin(which means no mind).
They literally defocus their eyes on a neutral point far away, when enemies are running towards them with swords.
Imagine! Can you defocus and relax yourself like that when someone is coming to kill you with a sword?
For an ordinary person, his attention would almost get rapture’d and hyper focused on the sword alone and all he would see would be the sword and little else.
Think about it. If the samurai only focused on the sword, how would he take the best action?
The calmer you are, the less fearful you are = the broader your perspective = the better your action would be.
So ‘Home’ is also the place for the emanation of the best actions.
Whatever place keeps you in your highest spirits with least fear, will result in the BEST ACTIONS and BEST OUTCOMES.
To leave home is to depart from this [largest perspective] into a [narrowed perspective].
All journeys away from home are journeys into [narrowed perspectives].
In fact the narrower your perspective gets, the more far away from home you go.
The most crazy journeys involve stepping into the most far out narrowed perspectives.
Home (metaphysically speaking) has little to do with your physical location or with certain people we call family etc.
Those are factors that ENABLE us to RELAX enough to ACQUIRE that kind of WHOLE PERSPECTIVE.
The more one relaxes and feel safe(the less the fear), the more that one can open up to the largest perspective.
And generally a physical location and known people (since you know them for many years they are much more predictable and cause the least anxiety/fear) is a good formula for our mammalian brain to PERMIT this ENLARGEMENT of PERSPECTIVE.
Since [Fear] is one of the biggest contractors of perspective, finding home is about finding freedom from fear.
Fear is what takes you away from home, and the absence of fear is what brings you back home.
Also, another important point is, [Right Action] comes from [Right View] (Buddha).
So the BEST POSSIBLE ACTION will always come from the WHOLE’EST PERSPECTIVE.
Narrower your perspective, the less you can see, and your action would be at a certain level of discord with the whole as a result.
A great demonstration of this principle is in the Samurai warrior training of Wu-shin(which means no mind).
They literally defocus their eyes on a neutral point far away, when enemies are running towards them with swords.
Imagine! Can you defocus and relax yourself like that when someone is coming to kill you with a sword?
For an ordinary person, his attention would almost get rapture’d and hyper focused on the sword alone and all he would see would be the sword and little else.
Think about it. If the samurai only focused on the sword, how would he take the best action?
The calmer you are, the less fearful you are = the broader your perspective = the better your action would be.
So ‘Home’ is also the place for the emanation of the best actions.
Whatever place keeps you in your highest spirits with least fear, will result in the BEST ACTIONS and BEST OUTCOMES.
Journey to the Abstract 