An Observation About Life (page 5)

codeblue

Evil, I hope I get the PM soon...still haven't received it. I will read it with much attention...

Thanks,

CodeBlue

In case you don't get PM here is some postings I have done on that.... I don't want to hijack JT's thread by talking about Enlightenment instead of QM.

http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/91385/1.ashx

codeblue

Evil: I just read your thread...I must get more info about it....Maybe I can find that book you referred to at the library.

tetrapod.sapien

evil,
that's some pretty intersting stuff. you impress me as someone who has really done some reading on this subject.

code,
i think i know what you are talking about. it is hard for me too, especially after being a wit, and having a black or white, good or evil, dogmatic answer for everything. now i am 28 and just addressing "being" in a real way for the first time in my life! i find it fascinating though. i can sense the potential for healing and the inner peace, and that excites me.

EvilForce

tetra...

This is one of the most harmful part of the Dub's IMHO. Everything is black and white. Right and wrong. Reflexive, judgemental, and automatic. They really do a poor job of preparing their followers for their eventual mortality, but hey "Millions Now Living, Will Never Die" eh?

In Dub land you never had to accept life as it was for it was going to be perfect and wonderful soon, just hang in there.

As a Dub I was shown what Buddhists believe in the JW handbook....sounded like circular logic at the time. Little did I realize it I was in the circular trash can with the WTBS.

So I appreciate your seniments Tetra, and have done quite a bit of studying and living my life according to various eastern principles I am not yet a "zen" master.....LOL

trevor

James Thomas

Once again you have, in my opinion, introduced the most meaningful thread on this board. You are so right about stilling the mind completely and being in the present moment totally. Your advice on breathing is also helpful.

Friends who cannot sleep or stop the turmoil in their minds have asked me for advice because they know I meditate. I give them two tips.

1) The first is - NO WORDS. Sit still and look into your mind and watch whatever appears in a dispassionate manner. Watch the colours/colors, patterns and images. If you can do this without words intruding for even a few moments you will enter an altered state of consciousness. Here true peace and attention to the moment can take place. If you start thinking with words you are not there.

2) Breath in, and HOLD |the breath for just a moment before breathing out. In that moment be aware of what you feel or see. It is very telling.

I do not want to appear to be lecturing and most of you probably know all this or think I am nuts. But this works for me and if one person finds what I have said helpful then this post will have been justified.

purplesofa

Just a few weeks ago I finished reading The Power of Now. I had to read it very slow and really take in what was being said. They were new thoughts and concepts, and I had to take the time to think of the old message and replace it with a new one. Before I ever finished the book I knew I needed to read it again as the progressive learning and understanding would make it where I could accept the concepts at higher levels.

One of the most damaging things about the constant emphasis on the future paradise, where all hopes and happiness, peace, and love are to exist...........it totally takes away any life or living in the NOW. I remember for years, every thought, every decision was for some way off in the future promise. I felt nothing in the present, enjoyed nothing in the present, did not even feel the pain of the present. That worked for a little while but soon depression, anxiety, restlessness, unhappiness, complacency, almost catotonic(sp) at times........DETATCHMENT set in.

I could not hold my world anymore for something in the far away future and furthermore I had no guarantee I would even attain it.

It is totally amazing how small we can make our world.

So, thank-you very much for your past posts and this thread JT, and your suggestions and sharing of your thoughts and yourself. It has helped me tremendously.

EvilForce and poppers.......thank you too for your input.

purps

LittleToe

Excellent thread.

If I may be so bold: I'm in heaven now!

JamesThomas

Poppers, thank you for commenting directly to some of the questions and concerns which have come up. I enjoy your explanations and clarity, which helps all of us.

Tetra, you said "I can sense the potential for healing and the inner peace, and that excites me." This "sense" within you, this innate wisdom and knowing, allow conscious-awareness to go deeper there. As Poppers said, you have just been reminded of what you already know. Go deeper into the knowing. That is really what all this is about. There is no belief system or religion here, nothing to learn really. It's about clearly realizing what IS already.

Codeblue, yes, I suggest starting the book from the beginning. Be very patient with yourself. Do not look at the book as if it is pages and pages full of information you must absorb. It's not at all. Most of it is extremely redundant as he expresses the same thing in different ways to help in understanding. Basically what the book suggests is that the consciousness which is reading this now, repeatedly take a nonjudgmental step back out of the mental and physical process of thought and emotion that there can be a clear differentiation between the thoughts and emotions and the always pristine consciousness which witnesses it all (this is very much in line with what Trevor has shared with us in his post).

Though an intellectual grasp of what's going on here seems to help, it is the actual wordless inner-seeing that is important. The clarity of vision we seek is here now. There is no need to force or try and make it happen as we do so many other things in our life. It's more an allowing, an opening, a trusting, a surrendering to the living Truth of what we really are. Sincerity and earnestness are key.

Taking the time to just sit and silently look within and watch the dynamics of mind and emotion, is very helpful. Walking, and being very present with every step and how it feels in the body, and the breeze on the face, etc, is very helpful. Being present with a friend and just silently listening and looking upon their face (without mental judgment or commentary), is wonderful. Don't look for results, don't reach into the future. As the song GBL, shared said "The more we move ahead the more we're stuck in rewind." Breath, Be present is all. Allow the flower to bloom.

It does not hurt to humbly pray. Not so much to a deity far away as we once did, but rather direct heartfelt feelings to the inner most yearning for Truth and wholeness within you. For it is this yearning that calls us Home to realization of our true Being. Which just happens to be the living Truth of everything. Discover what you really are, and you discover what everyone and everything really is.

Steve, being scientific minded can be a plus. Just make the subject of open and nonjudgmental "OBSERVATION", your own mind and emotions. Notice that what is watching is not really touched or tainted by anything that can be objectified (which is everything but That, which is seeing).

Purps, yes it seems being a Witness really programs the mind to chronically dismiss the moment and reach for an abstract future. The wounds that it leaves though, can be a doorway to what we seek, if there is deep presence and meeting with them. It's as if what we may conceder the worst in us, becomes a blessing.

j

JamesThomas

Java,

It certainly seems true that when we have our basic needs met, we are open more to just being present. But I have read of many extremely poor and ill people awakening to their true Being. People who owned or had basically nothing. Even some prisoners in Hitlers concentration camps, were said to have awakened.

Maslow's Hierarchy, is quite a list of needs, all pretty much based on the unquestioned assumption that we are a shared of existence, a fragmented broken entity in need of many, many things. Are we really? Indeed the mind has created a grand story, an running autobiography of who and what I am and my needs, but am I truly these things? Right now, void of story, what am I? At the core, what am I really? Is there a Reality, a Truth, a completeness, a Wholeness, more real and true than the needing entity I believe myself to be?

Perhaps consciousness gets stuck is a hierarchy of needs, and can not see out of it, and rarely even considers that it can. It can.

Thanks, for posting that Java.

Please forgive me for seemingly proselytizing. I am not selling or offering anything here. Just reminding what reads this that It is infinitely more, and infinitely less, than what it believes itself to be.

j

An Observation About Life

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