Intellect

[Guest guest]

David - thank you for sharing this - it fits my philosophy of acceptance and no

questioning- I have always been one to want to understand all things - I want to

know how it works - what makes it run-how to fix it and how to use it.

 

Now with K there is a feeling of detachment in a way - detaching from the

knowing until it is given - not asking just accepting and embracing - seems to

contradict what so many others are espousing- and at times I wonder if I am way

off base- yet we each have our way of dealing with the gifts and finding how to

live with the gifts.

 

This is hard to explain clearly but thank you for sharing this view makes sense

to me

e

[Guest guest]

I put this quote from Tattwa Shuddhi out there in the hopes we could start a

thread on the mind/intellect, its antics, machinations, and wondrousness too.

Please contribute to this with your thoughts, experiences, and insights. We all

have minds and must encounter/interact with them in ways that many others do not

as part of our individual journeys.

 

I would temper the advice given in the quote somewhat. I feel we go partly

through the mind to experience spirit. Most of us start our journeys either

dwelling primarily in the mind or the emotions or both. These cannot always

simply be bypassed/transcended, though the cultivation of bhakti and devotion

goes a long way towards transcending the mind. For me, the cultivation of

bhakti, devotion, and constant mantra use, keeps me out of the mind a lot of the

time. I spend less time actually " thinking " about things.

 

The mind is sometimes referred to in Buddhism as " the monkey mind " , since it

jumps all over the place like a skittering monkey.

 

Sometimes the mind must be satisfed sufficiently to allow it to calm down and

leave us alone, so that we can experience that which is beyond the mind's

intelllectual understanding. To satisfy the mind sometimes require reading,

studying, learning, and contemplative reflection.

 

Often messages from our higher selves, the Kundalini, the Divine, disincarnate

helpers, etc., etc. come through and are distorted by the mind into symbols.

Dreams, visions, etc. Sometimes we have to use the mind to penetrate the

symbolism and understand what is being shown. These symbolic (and sometimes not

so symbolic) messages from the Divine also manifest in the form of outer

experiences.

 

So I would not be so fast to completely discard the use of the mind in the

spiritual process - just recognize its limitations.

 

As with western psychology, there is a vast literature in Hinduism and Buddhism

categorizing, classifying, etc. all the mind's facets and behaviors. I think

many who started out with inner transformational aspirations got caught up in

the intellectual/academic joy of categorizing and classifying and did this for a

few lifetimes or more - for some, monasteries were a lot like universities.

This was part of their purification process before they could experience that

which cannot be described in words. They produced many, many words: documents,

commentaries, expositions, etc. Finding the supercharged ones that were written

by the sadhus in the caves rather than the purely mental commentators can

sometimes be challenging. For me, the ones by the sadhus in the caves shift my

awareness into bliss, clarity, or stillness when I read them.

 

I have found that some study of the different ways of understanding the mind is

useful to help appease the mind - one can step back and look at one's inner

situation and perhaps understand which aspects of our being are at play.

Sometimes just recognizing/understanding is enough to appease the mind, release

identification with it, and allow the awareness to go beyond it.

 

Love and blessings,

 

David

[Guest guest]

Intellect

in•tel•lect \ " int-€l-'ekt\ n 1 : the power of knowing : the capacity for

knowledge 2 : the capacity for rational or intelligent thought esp. when highly

developed 3 : a person with great intellectual powers

© 1995 Zane Publishing, Inc. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary © 1994 by

Merriam-Webster, Incorporated

 

Good idea David: as with me understanding the intellect one has to understand

perceiving reality. Meaning that one has to dissolve all illusions to understand

the underlying truth to any event. This has been my dream quest from childhood,

trying to understand reality.

In my estimation of intellect it is based on a compendium of information from an

association with outside intellect: in quantum physics this is quantum

entanglement and the philosophical dogma surrounding it. I'm choosing a

scientific approach at this point because most people do not recognize most

great noted scientist as having OBE's or even of having an idea of the greater

spirituality.

This following is from my Druid forum newsletter:

Druidic Craft of the Wise

Transmutation: Changing Energy Fields

 

Einstein tells us that everything is energy, and the study of physics tells us

that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but only transformed from one

thing into another.

 

Quantum physics tells us that the vibrational state of a thing changes when it

is observed. In other words, the energy we bring to an observation creates what

we observe. So what is observed changes depending on what kind of an observer

there is looking at it.

 

If it's true even at the sub-atomic level, that when you change the way you look

at things, the things you look at change, then it can be understood that we can

change what we look at by what we bring to what we look at. For example, if we

bring hostility to what we look at, we will not only perceive hostility in our

observations, but we will also create it just by the nature of the vision we

have when we look at what we are observing.

 

How do I look at things?

 

This then is the real issue here… how do I look at things? Einstein said the

most fundamentally important question that you will ever ask yourself is this,

" Do I live in a friendly or a hostile universe? " The way you look your world

will determine what your life experience is going to be. So when you change the

way you look at things, literally the things you look at change.

 

When we put a couple of tiny particles of the atom into a particle accelerator

and smash them into each other to find what they are made of, science tells us

we find nothing, we find no-thing. From this we learn that particles do not

create particles. Particles come from this no-thing-ness. Physics Nobel Prize

winner, Max Planc, said in his acceptance speech as he was given this prize,

that " There is no matter as such. " This is scientifically true. Matter comes

from the invisible world of the spirit or soul or mind.

 

© Reproductions Permitted: http://druidcraft. net

 

Max Plank (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Planck)

 

So with all of our senses being with fault how can a person truly know what they

experience is real? As most of our intellect is based on what we mostly see with

our eyes. Not that I would propagate the use of any illicit substance but my

interest in this subject was rekindled on November 04, 2009; there was a program

on National Geographic Explorer called inside LSD,

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/explorer/4094/Overview

 

http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/explorer/4094/Overview#tab-facts

 

There is an odd point here; it is where they mention the Hollow Mask Illusion.

It is looking at two pictures that appear exactly the same and ask if there is

any difference between the two. The odd thing is that normal people don't get it

right or less than 3% of them get it right. People suffering from schizophrenia

or on mind-altering drugs spot the difference immediately.

 

Because I was able to spot the difference I thought I would post a few links and

findings so you could decide for yourself weather you are also a `NORMAL' or one

of those people that sees beyond the average everyday illusions of life.

 

 

Akiyoshi's illusion pages

http://www.psy.ritsumei.ac.jp/~akitaoka/chicollo2009.html

Akiyoshi KITAOKA, Professor, Department of Psychology, Ritsumeikan University,

Kyoto, Japan

studying visual perception, visual illusion, optical illusion, trompe l'oeil

AIC2009

 

http://www.psy.ritsumei.ac.jp/~akitaoka/index-e.html

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLoK3Xo4qQg

 

Maybe it is the underlying theme of what I am in search is of seeing everything

how it really is. And that bridge to others so they can strip away the illusions

for themselves.

 

The way this pertains to kundalini is that it will change you whole way of

perception, a new intellect, or a paradigm shift. As what I have perceived

chrism to advocate there is not a right or a wrong in what you perceive it's

where you go from there.

[Guest guest]

Very interesting... I enjoyed reading this on an intellectual level...lol ! 

Thanks for posting.....  I find that sometimes I  use my intellect quite a lot

and other times it is given up and does not exist for a time.  I  am

reaalising of late that I am less able for intellectual discussion on many

topics... that was something i really enjoyed and now I do not so much.  It is

not important  for the most part to be involved and I am opting out. 

 

 

 

 

 

________________________________

djgottlieb <dgottlieb

 

Fri, November 13, 2009 1:59:48 PM

Intellect

 

 

I just got a book called Tattwa Shuddhi by Swami Satyasangananda. My first

impulse was to open it at random. Here's where I landed:

 

Intellect, An Obstacle in Sadhana

 

It has been stated time and again in all the textbooks on tantra and yoga that

an aspirant should try to eliminate all intellectual barriers in respect to his

spiritual sadhana. As long as you approach your sadhana through an intellectual

process of logic and reasoning, your experiences will remain static. The level

of mind that you are trying to reach is beyond the entanglements of intellectual

bantering. Questions such as, " Why am I doing this sadhana? " " What do these

visions mean? " " Am I making any progress? " " Where are all these experiences

coming from? " " Where will all this lead me? " are bound to arise in every person.

However, these and other intellectual acrobatics have to be avoided.

 

Use your intellect for your worldly day to day life by all means because it is

necessary and serves a purpose. However, in sadhana, this same faculty becomes a

hindrance and is an obstacle. That is why Sri Aurobindo has said, " Intellect was

the helper, intellect is the barrier; transcend intellect. " This should be the

motto of all sadhakas. Intellect is all right up to a point; it is through

discrimination of your intellect that you began the practices of yoga.. However,

in order to go higher you will now have to step over it. This may not be

possible all the time, but should be maintained at all cost during the period of

intensive sadhana.

 

Faith, love, and devotion are the mediums through which the higher experiences

begin to manifest, because these qualities absorb and nullify the cold and

calculating reasoning of the intellect. Therefore, let us approach this sadhana,

not through the itellect but through the transforming emotions of bhakti. In the

Srimad Devi Bhagavatam, Devi says that jnana and bhakti are the two pathways

that lead to her. Try not to hinder your progress through by the process of

analysis. Drop these tendencies, which exist in every ordinary person, and try

to enter the realm of pure experience by elevating the awareness beyond the

barriers of intellect through bhakti or devotion.