Quick note on idealism (last message)

[Guest guest]

Namaste Sadaji, Gregji, Madathilji,

 

That will do for now. We have achieved the aim of this list, which

is not to 'convert' anybody but to make our views clear. I now think

I understand each of you. It is then up to me (or any other reader)

to decide whether we agree or not.

 

So, for what it's worth, I'll just give some reactions to what you

said, in order to illustrate my residual ignorance. This is not to

continue the discussion, since we must get back to Ananda's current

topic.

 

Besides, if this discussion continues, my 'stream of consciousness'

may turn into my 'scream of consciousness'. :-)

 

 

Regarding Sadaji,

>Now, can you say the unity of the total waking mind

>is different from the individual minds in the dream

>subjects - the fire man, the owner and the spectators -

>in addition to the inert building, the water hose,

>the water, the fire etc.

 

The dream analogy has always been one of my favorites. I am

intrigued to see you using it somewhat differently than I do. At any

rate, it does help me to understand your view better, and it gives me

something to think about.

 

For me, the dream analogy shows how the material world does not

exist, so that everything is reduced to consciousness. In the dream,

the other people and objects seem real, but when I wake up I realize

that they were all figments of my imagination in my consciousness.

 

However, I see a major difference between the dream and waking

states. When I am awake, I am quite sure that the other imagined

forms called 'people' are associated with other 'waking dreamers'

like myself. There is no such association for the people in my

dream. They are just like the people on a movie screen, nothing but

pictures. I feel quite sure of this, though I wont take up time to

say why.

 

So, as far as I am concerned, the dream analogy shows how the

material world is unreal, but we have to be careful when talking

about other conscious beings. This is how it seems to me, at least

when I reflect upon MY OWN dreams.

 

However, your discussion does raise an intriguing possibility as far

as the DREAMS OF BRAHMAN are concerned (not my own personal dreams).

I do wonder whether you and I might not actually be dreams of

Brahman. This is suggestive, and I would not be surprised if the

dreams of Brahman are quite different from my own personal dreams,

where the images of other 'people' are nothing but 'inert images'.

After all, this is Brahman we are speaking about, the Infinite

Consciousness and Source of Reality. Something to think about...

 

 

Regarding Gregji,

>Something you have called a stream of consciousness

>is also an object, unable to see another. Unable to

>see anything at all, even "its own contents."

 

Well, for me, the stream of consciousness idea arose in the following

way. In my normal dualistic state, it does seem as though there is a

subject and an object, two distinct entities. However, when I

contemplate my immediate awareness, without allowing thoughts or

preconceptions to intrude, I realize that 'subject' and 'object' are

both just labels corresponding to the same 'immediate awareness',

which I also call a 'stream of consciousness'.

 

So the point is that the stream of consciousness 'swallowed up' both

subject and object. Now you want to make the stream of consciousness

an object in its own right! I'm not saying that's illegitimate, but

it is a line of thinking quite contrary to how I arrived at the

stream of consciousness idea, as I just explained.

 

Well, another intriguing notion to contemplate...

 

 

Regarding Madathilji,

>You have the capacity in you to feel the pain of

>the entire world if you know that you are the pain.

>YOU CANNOT THEN HURT YOU.

 

I can't help noticing that sentence in capital letters. My Swamiji

says something similar. I interpret it to mean that the mind decides

whether any experience will be pleasant or painful. It is only

painful if seen as not-self. If we see everything as self, then all

pain can be 'transmuted' to pleasure, or at least neutralized. Good

news, if I can subdue my mind in time. Better start practicing.

 

 

As a final word, I'd like to think that one can make spiritual

progress, even if one has only a partial understanding of Advaita.

 

For example, the 'witness' practice has been very helpful for me. At

the most basic level, it is simply the common-sense wisdom to stand

back, try to be detached and not take everything personally. This is

simply maturity, and I've been making a bit of progress lately. :-)

 

But at a more subtle level, I think that any attempt to see reality

as 'consciousness only' has a purifying effect, however naive and

elementary our understanding. I know that this has been the case for

me. Any attempt to see the world as consciousness automatically

makes us more 'spiritual' to some degree, because consciousness and

spirituality are essentially the same thing. When we realize the

former, however slightly, we achieve some of the latter.

 

So we should not think that we must fully understand everything

before we can start to make some progress.

 

Hari Om!

Benjamin

[Guest guest]

Hey Benjamin-ji,

 

IMHO it's OK to continue this topic a bit. Since my approach to it is based on

Sri Atmananda's teachings!

 

You wrote,

 

>So the point is that the stream of consciousness 'swallowed up' both

>subject and object. Now you want to make the stream of consciousness

>an object in its own right! I'm not saying that's illegitimate, but

>it is a line of thinking quite contrary to how I arrived at the

>stream of consciousness idea, as I just explained.

>

>Well, another intriguing notion to contemplate...

 

 

I agree - it *is* a different approach. But then, how can this stream of

consciousness *not* be an object? In the way you speak of it, it is a

numerically distinct member of a group of similar things. I.e., Ben's stream,

Greg's stream, etc.

 

Pranams,

 

--Greg

[Guest guest]

Namaste Greg-ji.

>IMHO it's OK to continue this topic a bit. Since

>my approach to it is based on Sri Atmananda's teachings!

 

Well, you're a moderator, so this is your prerogative. I feel a bit

sorry for Ananda, though. He started his Topic 8 on 'Merging Back'

way back on 16 Dec, and since then only three responses.

 

>I agree - it *is* a different approach. But then,

>how can this stream of consciousness *not* be an object?

>In the way you speak of it, it is a numerically distinct

>member of a group of similar things. I.e., Ben's stream,

>Greg's stream, etc.

 

Well, when you put it like this, it sounds like you might have a

point. But I know that you work in a law firm, so you might have

picked up some tricky verbal manipulation skills. Especially in

NYC... :-)

 

Seriously, though, this is interesting. I might argue that Greg's

stream is not an object TO ME, since I am not aware of it. When I

say that I believe that Greg's stream exists, I mean that there is a

stream just like mine, but which has your contents. (Of course, the

stream does not really belong to someone named Ben or Greg. Ben and

Greg ARE the streams; or we could simply label the streams as 'Ben'

and 'Greg'.)

 

In other words, I understand 'object' to be something in my

awareness, which I falsely take not to be in my awareness. You are

not in my awareness ... that is, your consciousness is not in my

awareness. So you don't qualify as a possible object under this

definition.

 

By the way, I want to add something else to what I said in my

previous message. There I said that even if our understanding of

Advaita is limited in some way, I still think that it is spiritually

beneficial to try to see everything as consciousness, in some sense.

I would add that seeing everything as consciousness makes our

consciousness more *sattvic* (pure and luminous). This has been my

experience, even though the sattva be slight. It just works that way.

 

Hari Om!

Benjamin

[Guest guest]

Namaste Benji.

 

Yes. You got me right.

 

Yet, there is a temptation to add, although you said your post is the

last on the subject.

 

What I said is an insight that occurred to me very spontaneously in a

dream. Will you believe that? If yes, here it is, although I had

mentioned it in one of my early messages on this forum. Can't locate

it right now.

 

I hail from Kerala (India), a place very famous for its elephants.

We grew up watching elephants at temples. If you ask the children

there what they want to be when they grow up, you will find at least

a dozen who want to be mahouts!

 

In my dream, there is this elephant, all emaciated - a virtual bag of

bones - and in tears, passing by. I felt sorry for the animal,

called it to my side and put my arms around its neck (Mind you, my

dream arms were really long enough to go round an elephant's neck!).

I started weeping with the elephant and tried to console it. It was

then that I realized that my back was against a solid wall and the

elephant's temple was pressing against my chest. There was pain, I

heard my ribs cracking, I was suffocated. Then my favourite advaita

percolated into the dream stuff. I had a sudden realization that the

elephant was me, its temple was me, the pain was me, the cracking of

my ribs and suffocation was me. How could I hurt myself?

 

I then remebered Jesus on the Cross. The nails were him, his

tormentors were him, the cross which he was made to carry and on

which he was finally crucified was him, the blood was him - then how

could cucifixion hurt him? So he smiled. (This, incidentally, is a

thought that my Christian friends have never been able to accept!).

 

I woke up weeping, nay, shedding tears of joy, to the utter

consternation of my wife. She thought I had gone crazy. Yes, she is

right. With advaita, these days I am. The dream was a real catharsis.

 

Benji, as you said, it is the mind that differentiates between pain

and pleasure. That is a very logical understanding. But, isn't an

insight that dawns from an experience like this at least a grade

above such understanding? Advaita grows on us in different,

wonderful ways if we persist to do continuous contemplation. That is

the only way partial understanding can attain fruition as unshakable

and insightful knowledge.

 

Please don't take this as a tall claim. Just an observation at my

current level of understanding if it helps our discussion.

 

And if you like all this, please go straight for an IMAX show and

have an African mammoth charge at you from the screen. Have advaita

to keep you company. You will enjoy it as I did last week and as I

do when I mount dizzying roller-coasters that whirl me mercilessly

upside down. That last one was something that used to scare me in my

young days when I was physically more competent! Iam 57+ now!

 

PraNAms.

 

Madathil Nair

 

___________________

 

 

advaitin, Benjamin <orion777ben> wrote:

 

Madathil said:

> >You have the capacity in you to feel the pain of

> >the entire world if you know that you are the pain.

> >YOU CANNOT THEN HURT YOU.

 

Benji commented:

> I can't help noticing that sentence in capital letters. My Swamiji

> says something similar. I interpret it to mean that the mind

decides

> whether any experience will be pleasant or painful. It is only

> painful if seen as not-self. If we see everything as self, then

all

> pain can be 'transmuted' to pleasure, or at least neutralized.

Good

> news, if I can subdue my mind in time. Better start practicing.

>

>

> As a final word, I'd like to think that one can make spiritual

> progress, even if one has only a partial understanding of Advaita.

[Guest guest]

Namaste Sri Benjamin:

 

Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year to you and everyone in the list.

 

Your persistent discussions with another 'series of' last

but 'serious' message has forced me to provide my 2 cents worth!

 

Mathematicians feel very comfortable using a blackboard for

presentations, because they write, erase and rewrite quite often.

Mathematical conferences always provide blackboards with chalk to

the presenters. David, a brilliant mathematician once presented a

paper in analytical geometry to an enthusiastic crowd of

mathematicians. David wanted to make his paper quite unique and

original and he labelled the horizontal axis as Y and the vertical

axis as X. Unfortunately, the audience were so much used to the

normal convention (X axis horizontal and Y axis vertical). Though

everything what David did was conceptually correct, none of the

audience could follow his theorems and derivations. For sometime,

they all tried to twist their neck and face horizontal to follow him

for a while, but gave up because they couldn't bear the pain!

 

We the advaitins who are used to certain framework of thought

process feel the same way when we try follow your brilliant

presentations. Sri Greg and Sri Sada (also Sri Nair) tried very

hard to explain why they do not want to dicard the conventional

terminology just for the sake of a lone presenter, though presenter

is sincere and brilliant.

 

On serious note, Sankara's advaita philosophy always affirms the

fact that everything is consciousness and this is the Ultimate

Reality.

 

Warmest regards,

 

Ram Chandran

 

 

 

advaitin, Benjamin <orion777ben> wrote:

>

>

> In other words, I understand 'object' to be something in my

> awareness, which I falsely take not to be in my awareness. You

are

> not in my awareness ... that is, your consciousness is not in my

> awareness. So you don't qualify as a possible object under this

> definition.

>

> By the way, I want to add something else to what I said in my

> previous message. There I said that even if our understanding of

> Advaita is limited in some way, I still think that it is

spiritually

> beneficial to try to see everything as consciousness, in some

sense.

> I would add that seeing everything as consciousness makes our

> consciousness more *sattvic* (pure and luminous). This has been

my

> experience, even though the sattva be slight. It just works that

way.

>

> Hari Om!

> Benjamin