the inevitability of love and indifference

[David Quinn]

Pye,

David, the only way to eliminate the "crude concepts of gain and loss" is to cease valuing [anything] altogether.

It can be eliminated when one no longer seeks any personal reward in the values that one is pursuing.

Your being one of those cognizant people who transfers immediate sensing to the values offended or served beneath them is how you serve truth (your uber-value), after your manner. That light-to-nothing remains of the register of your senses/feelings is what enables you to serve truth here, where you are "indignant" with a poster's prattle, or "bored" with someone's one-liners or "impatient" with the lack of evolution in someone's path or "happy/satisfied" when a poster has rendered something the way you see it.

These are imperfections. To the degree that I display any of these emotions, I am falling away from the path of true insight.

That the husk of immediate sensation that exposes these values to you falls away imperceptibly does not render them useless, au contraire. Truth (your sense of things) is first registered/felt, before we re-adorn it with more words. It's unfortunate such an allergic reaction to the word "emotion" prevents you from seeing its most subtle workings in both life and reason. Killing the messenger (sense-ation) is the work of paranoid and petty kings. Why kill it when it means to dissipate anyway . . . . and so we let it go . . . .

A sage doesn't have to kill it. There is nothing inside him to kill. He is entirely empty.

The idea that one has to kill the emotions in order to become a sage is misguided. It is a case of grabbing the wrong end of the stick. The emotions disappear in and of themselves when one reaches true insight.

When you cease to value anything, most especially truth, you will find the utter end to your feelings, or your life.

It is impossible for us, as conscious beings, to cease valuing altogether. An egotist necessarily values happiness and security as a result of his falsely believing in his own existence. A sage necessarily values wisdom as a result of his lengthy path to wisdom.

What we can do, however, is cease being attached to anything. When a person abandons attachment to everything in the world as a result of his attachment to truth, and when he then abandons even his attachment to truth, he becomes a sage.

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[clyde]

David, do you feel any emotion?

[David Quinn]

Why do you want to know?

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[clyde]

David;

There is no need for you to answer me, though you should know the answer for yourself.

An enlightened human being sees reality as it is. If a phenomenon arises, the enlightened human being sees the phenomena arise and pass away; if a sensation arises, the enlightened human being sees the sensation arise and pass away; if a perception arises, the enlightened human being sees the perception arise and pass away; if a feeling arises, the enlightened human being sees the feeling arise and pass away; if an emotion arises, the enlightened human being sees the emotion arise and pass away; and if a thought arises, the enlightened human being sees the thought arise and pass away.

clyde

[David Quinn]

That is true enough. The enlightened being is unattached to whatever arises within him. But this doesn't affect the reality that the causal conditions for emotion to arise in an enlightened being are no longer there.

So your point is kind of meaningless in a way. It is like saying that if a giraffe arises inside the enlightened person, he will see the giraffe arise and pass away. While that is true, it doesn't change the reality that the causal conditions for giraffes to arise within him are not there.

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[clyde]

David;

It seems the question is: what are the causative conditions that give rise to emotions?

It is my understanding that emotions arise within the bio-electrochemical matrix of the human body; that being so, the enlightened human being will, on occasion as determined by conditions, experience emotions.

clyde

[David Quinn]

Deluded thoughts also arise within the bio-electrochemical matrix of the human body, and yet they don't arise in the enlightened mind.

You're forgetting that perception is an essential link in the causal chain which leads to emotion arising. It isn't entirely bio-electrochemical through and through. It is because the enlightened person operates through an entirely different perception of the world to that of ordinary people that his bio-electrochemical matrix doesn't receive the instructions needed to trigger emotions into being.

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[clyde]

It is because the enlightened person operates through an entirely different perception of the world to that of ordinary people that his bio-electrochemical matrix doesn't receive the instructions needed to trigger emotions into being.

Is this based on your personal experience? Have you ceased experiencing the arising and passing away of emotions?

In any case, the key is not what phenomena arise, but the enlightened human beings lack of attachment thereto.

clyde

[Pye]

.

Effortlessness . . . . has no meaning in an absence of things . . . .

do you get what I'm saying? I can't think any other way to say it . . . . .


.

[David Quinn]

The sagely promotion of wisdom is effortless in the sense that there is no longer any resistance to such activity inside the sage. He doesn't have to whip up motivation in order to counter opposing forces, such as the egotistical desire to remain protected and safe in the future, or the craving for emotional forms of happiness. These opposing forces have completely vanished.

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[David Quinn]

Clyde,

DQ: It is because the enlightened person operates through an entirely different perception of the world to that of ordinary people that his bio-electrochemical matrix doesn't receive the instructions needed to trigger emotions into being.

C: Is this based on your personal experience? Have you ceased experiencing the arising and passing away of emotions?

I sometimes experience this. When my mind is on song and I am fully aware of the nature of Reality, I am wholly beyond the emotions.

In any case, the key is not what phenomena arise, but the enlightened human beings lack of attachment thereto.

Lack of attachment is only part of the story. If lack of attachment were the only key, then Buddhas would have no problem engaging in irresponsible behaviour, such as child abuse and mindless violence. They would simply watch these things arise and fall without attachment.

You might respond by saying that it would never occur to a Buddha to engage in these things, as he would have no need or desire to engage in such behaviour in the first place, and I would agree. That is precisely my point. Just as it would never occur to a Buddha to engage in child abuse, it would also never occur to him become emotional over anything. He has no need to become emotional because the very thing that the emotions are rooted in - namely, the ego, the belief that we truly exist - is no longer there.

The ego has been pulled out by the roots and completely thrown away, together with all of its emotional branches.

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[clyde]

DQ: It is because the enlightened person operates through an entirely different perception of the world to that of ordinary people that his bio-electrochemical matrix doesn't receive the instructions needed to trigger emotions into being.

C: Is this based on your personal experience? Have you ceased experiencing the arising and passing away of emotions?

I sometimes experience this. When my mind is on song and I am fully aware of the nature of Reality, I am wholly beyond the emotions.

I understand your “sometimes” to mean that other times you do experience the rising and passing away of emotions. I would not contend that you are unenlightened at those times IF you are mindful and unattached as you later described. Do you argue that you are not enlightened because of a phenomenon?

clyde

[David Quinn]

Clyde,

I understand your “sometimes” to mean that other times you do experience the rising and passing away of emotions. I would not contend that you are unenlightened at those times IF you are mindful and unattached as you later described. Do you argue that you are not enlightened because of a phenomenon?

By definition, a person is unenlightened when he is ignorant, when his mind is taken over by the phenomenon of ignorant thought. Since enlightenment is itself a phenomenon which begins and ends in time, its creation necessarily involves the passing away of certain kinds of phenomena.

You recognize this basic principle yourself when you stipulate that enlightenment is a matter of observing phenomena and being unattached to their rise and fall. For you, enlightenment can only occur when the phenomena of mindlessness and attachment have passed away.

In any case, the effort to be "mindful" and "unattached" is a practice engaged by ignorant people. It is training-wheels spirituality, a formulaic attempt to reach something that hasn't yet been attained. It isn't a practice that enlightened people need to do. The enlightened mind is naturally mindful and unattached as a matter of course; these traits emerge as inconsequential by-products of his clarity of insight.

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[Imadrongo]

"Mindful and unattached" -- sounds nihilistic to me. :-(

[clyde]

David;

Given your view, I imagine you sitting and thinking, “Now I’m enlightened,” “Now I’m ignorant,” “Now I’m enlightened,” etc.

This reminds me of the one and only joke I know: Two people are in a car traveling on a road. The driver pulls the car to the side of the road, turns to the passenger, and says, “I think my turn-light isn’t working. Go out and let me know if it’s working.” The passenger gets out of the car and walks to the front of the car. The driver turns on the turn signal and the passenger calls out, “It’s working,” “It’s not working,” “It’s working,” “It’s not working.”

Do no harm,
clyde

[Faust]

Well if they did, you wouldn't see them, would you. I have met people who have done that but mostly they don't come back & start posting about it on internet forums.

do they come back to living with others?

Like most animal qualities, in conscious humans it can be mitigated & even overcome.

it's only overcome if you decide to live a full solitary life in the woods. You haven't overcome full loneliness due to your desire to live around others when there is no reason to be.

[Faust]

"Mindful and unattached" -- sounds nihilistic to me. :-(

yes exactly! That's what I mean. How can we have conscience without love? The two seem unseperable. Kierkegaard had love, what about that?

Kierkegaard also believed in the Self, what about that? What makes QRS think that there's no Self? What do they mean by Self?

[DHodges]

Kierkegaard had love, what about that?

Kierkegaard had a ridiculous infatuation with some chick named Regine. He couldn't let go of it, even after she was married. He seriously needed to grow up. It was pretty pathetic.

Kierkegaard also believed in the Self, what about that?

He was also kind of a dick, what about that? Seriously, this is the guy who didn't like Christianity because it wasn't Christian enough for him.

His philosophy is at about the same level of Ayn Rand, IMO. Rand wrote mostly out of a reaction to Communism, and thus embraced Capitalism whole-heartedly simply because it wasn't Communism. Similarly, Kierkegaard's writings are best understoond from the viewpoint of Freudian psychology - it's all about his father, really. He wanted to be more his father than his father was.

Rand and Kierkegaard start from some assumption about how the world is that they do not allow themselves to question. They do not allow themselves complete intellectual honesty and integrity.

[keenobserver]

Even if what you say about K is true, isnt it possible this was during his earlier years, and that he lived wise and honorably later in life?

[windhawk]

There are many paths, and the profound awareness that the temporal is simply just that, temporal in no way means that life, attachment to things, people or dogs for that matter cease. This "nothingness" is not really a state where you want to stay unless you're committed. But why commit before your time?

Let me put this another way. I sail, and try as he might, the wise sage cannot sail without a boat. He can surpass the need to sail, but why? It is a harmless pursuit, which in my personal case, leads to a profound sense of oneness (yes, just like training wheels). I Do Not pursue unity because I am not ready. I Do Not play with it. When my time arrives, I will know it, and I will be prepared. I have been on both sides, what more can one say about it? A teacher, I am not.

I cannot speak for others, but what I've found is not nothing, but "no thing", and it cares not only for itself, but for us as well as all creatures. A love that loves itself. To me, Plotinus had it about right, and his Neoplatonic ideation is only indirectly related to Eastern mysticism. To speak of the mystical "as if" is to not grasp it. There is no correct path other than the one which has been put in motion.

There are degrees of meditation, and to live constantly in awe is not for everyone. My experience came before I even reached the university, and as the product of a shoddy Public School system, I didn't even know that such an experience was possible. If it's possible for a dumb white-kid from the suburbs to reach the ultimate state while completely lacking in preparation, then I would attest that the years of preparation some say are necessary are nothing more than living an authentic life, attachments, neuroses and all.

Practice mindfulness, and for God's sake, do it in a sailboat.

[Dan Rowden]

How exactly does sailing on Lake Michigan provide a sense of oneness?

[windhawk]

Just finished a piece, "On the Mystical Aspects of Fairing the Sea in Ships with Sails" I have not yet sold it ;-)

In my personal experience, whilst sailing solo, I almost immediately reach a state of mindfulness, which to me has always meant an apprehension of the oneness of the world. It is a natural outgrowth from my childhood, which being in the 60's, meant that we were living in "interesting times." I simply could not understand what in the hell was going on, when all one had to do was to Look at the World to see that we're all part of one thing. This, they do not teach you about in Public Schools. My wife, an avowed agnostic, was raised in an exclusive all-girls Catholic setting, it took me two years of study in college to equal her understanding of faith, religion, etc. and on & on.

It has taken me another 25 years to understand what was going on when I look at the world. There's so much to do subconsciously while sailing, the wind, current, set of the sails, and if done correctly, which means with forehandedness, there is no need to "think" thus freeing the mind. It is much like riding a bike, you're probably aware that in order to turn left, you turn the handle bars right, but until you actually watch yourself do it, you might not be aware of it.

Forehandedness sounds like self-induced paranoia to the non-sailor, but in reality, it can be a gateway to a quiet mind.

[Dan Rowden]

Well, I suppose sailing could be a quite meditative activity. As to the "oneness" of everything - it's a pretty mundane insight, don't you think? Don't we all know it anyway? In what sense does our behaviour indicate we don't?

[David Quinn]

If a person needs to sail in order to become aware of the oneness of everything, then it means that he isn't tuning into this truth in the rest of his existence.

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[windhawk]

Is it the oneness that is the metaphorical concept we all grasp? I don't think it is, at least not given the strife in the world, even such strife as which constitutes our struggle for survival.

The best example from Eastern thought, of which I'm very much ignorant, is the story of the Monk who went to Yosemite, and upon seeing the falls for the first time, remarked how similar the drops of failing water were to man, in that it struggles to break free of the oneness of the river, and while falling lives free unto itself in a futile struggle to then be subsumed back into the river of which it was always a part of, even while apart.

No, I don't think that that type of oneness is what is usually meant. Perhaps, I'm wrong?