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Mark Force
Trad climber
Ashland, Oregon
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Aug 23, 2016 - 02:17pm PT
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Aug 23, 2016 - 04:48pm PT
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^^^ The Adventures of Nasrudin
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Aug 23, 2016 - 07:48pm PT
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Seems the boy's confused, those are scientific renderings!
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Aug 23, 2016 - 09:50pm PT
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Craig wrote:
1. But I guess I'm interested in how an enlightened person differs from a normal well balanced open minded person.
2. Once you become enlightened, does it last for the rest of your life?
or can it come and go?
3. How many people would you estimate that are enlightened that are alive today?
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Again, I could use some help here. My experiences are very limited, and I can only answer from my experiences.
1. I’m not sure what a “normal well balanced opened minded person” is or looks like, Craig. Would that be a person who lives a life in consensus reality? Can you name or think of a person who satisfies that definition for you? I can only think of just a couple, at best. Those people seem largely free of anxiety, guilt, worry, and they seem to be full of sincerity, humor, goodwill. But they do seem to exhibit cares.
The very few people who have claimed to be liberated that I have met are that, but they appear to have no cares. Reasonable people might call them fools. They are free. (They have been liberated mainly from what they thought was themselves.) They appear to be at-peace with themselves, although they can express anger or other emotions genuinely or authentically and think nothing of it. Indeed, the only thinking that seems to go on is what’s been called “operational thinking,” not discursive thinking (which tends to focus on the “I” centrally).
Oddly, to me, all liberated beings have all had basically kept their own personalities (which I can’t quite explain to you why). When I’ve asked them about reality, they respond immediately without any hesitation as though they were simply telling me the color of the wall behind me. Nothing seems to bother them. I think I am a person and I think there are persons all around me, but to them personhood seems to be a linguistic construction, essentially a fiction. They also seem to be completely engaged without artifice or guile present.
Who do you know who walks the earth in complete freedom? A liberated person appears to from what I see.
2. There appears to be difference between enlightenment or realization and liberation. The former two provide insights that may last for quite sometime or for just a little while: that is, a realization of non duality (viz., there is no difference between the perceiver, the perception, and that which is perceived). Almost everyone who seems to be liberated says that realization or enlightenment does not last for long initially, but it opens a door and one never fully returns to the old being or views. One realizes that non duality exists (“I’ve *seen* it”), and one tries to find one’s way back because it is a powerful experience.
There are many journals and books that talk about this intermediate stage and the sufferings it can bring to people who want to be in a nondual state once again. It appears that seeing non duality must be fully assimilated into being to become liberated, and folks report that that process on average takes 7-25 years to complete. (Look at Adyashanti’s book for a descriptions and discussions of the so-called issues: “The End of Your World: Uncensored Straight Talk on the Nature of Enlightenment”) Many people come to understand the issues of realization cognitively, but that doesn’t count for anything. (In fact, it adds another layer of delusion.) One has to *see it* directly. (The rest is simply conceptualization, and conceptualizations cannot be applied to non duality.)
Once one is liberated, has fully assimilated all realizations, then they are done (liberated). However, what that really looks like is not what one might want (See, Jed McKenna’s new book, “Dream State: A conspiracy theory”) because there is no longer a “you” or “I” (as you experience it now) to, er . . . enjoy it.
3. I think there are more liberated people in the world at any one time than one might imagine. If I think about those beings I have met or have experienced, I might say very few. But all of those beings are teachers, and there is no reason for me to assume that all liberated beings want to be teachers or find themselves in the roles of teacher. Indeed, it seems, there is nothing *to teach* or that can be taught about enlightenment / liberation (not really). Furthermore, what can one really say about such things? As the saying goes, the more you know, the less you can say productively.
Lama Tsong Khapa wrote that the spirit of enlightenment was to hang out here in conventional reality until all beings were liberated. Other masters have said that the best thing one could do for the world was to achieve liberation, and magnetically or charismatically, one would influence the greatest number of beings. That is: “Doing” anything does nothing. Not even teaching . Other masters (Tony Parsons, for example) says there is nothing to teach because being is all already liberated (but is just not aware of it).
So there could be many beings who are liberated but are simply a part of the common social fabric everywhere.
It’s been said: At first there was a mountain, then there was no mountain, and finally there is a mountain again. In the Eastern mythological story of the Ten-Ox Herding Pictures, the seeker looks for enlightenment, finds pieces or partialities, and struggles to see and understand it all. Along the way, one fully realizes enlightenment and becomes and lives as a no-thing in an empty world of strict appearances. In the final pictoral or stage, one fully assimilates enlightenment / liberation and returns to their old role and position to live out a life seemingly in the mundane world—only now with full realization of what and how things really are everywhere. (A similar story is told about Jonah and the Whale.) Here / there, in this last image, nothing is special, nothing is important, nothing is distinctive, and nothing can be evaluated. There is no good or bad, right or wrong. Everything is different from every other thing, yet everything is the same (just an appearance). All paradoxes are reconciled and resolved as heads and tails are on a coin. A liberated yogi goes about his or her business almost invisibly. It’s like they are living in a dream; the dream is real, but nothing in it is.
So to return to the first question, I don’t think one could tell who is liberated and who is not without some realization him or herself. It would not be at all obvious.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Aug 24, 2016 - 01:04am PT
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I like your distinction between liberated and enlightened. My own experience is that we have many small enlightenments, and once in awhile a big one, but none liberate us, they are just markers along the way. Often, it takes several years after an enlightenment experience to fully comprehend its significance.
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WBraun
climber
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Aug 24, 2016 - 07:33am PT
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Oddly, to me, all liberated beings have all had basically kept their own personalities
That's because personality is eternal.
Every living entity has individuality and personality that is eternal.
The ego is eternal and when it comes in contact with the material energies is when it falls down.
Not that the ego has to be killed only needs to be purified and cleaned of material contamination and bondage.
Not that when one becomes liberated one merges into the impersonal brahmin and loses it's individuality and personality.
The non material is still full of variegatedness not zero.
That's called mayavadi philosophy originally propounded by Shankaracharya on purpose although he hated to do it and in the end he completely revealed against it.
If fools want to be fools they are given foolish knowledge masqueraded as truth to lead them due to their minute independent free will.
Ultimately it will lead to pain and suffering and only then will one change.
When one studies the material world one will see that it is a direct reflection of the spiritual domain.
This why the material world is real although temporary and the spiritual world is eternal.
There's a ton more but it's more then likely not understood by this group here....
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Aug 24, 2016 - 08:02am PT
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Thanks both of you for contributing.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Aug 24, 2016 - 03:13pm PT
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Nice reply, Mike.
. . . the only thinking that seems to go on is what’s been called “operational thinking,” not discursive thinking (which tends to focus on the “I” centrally)
But I would disagree that discursive thought focuses on the "I". Do you consider research in physics or mathematics to rely upon discursive thought? Of course, there are researchers who thrive on obtaining results before their peers, but that trait in itself does not seem to necessarily intersect with discursive thought. Nevertheless, an interesting commentary.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Aug 24, 2016 - 03:57pm PT
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I'm not sure I've been COMPLETELY clear...
I am NOT a supernaturalist.
:)
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Aug 24, 2016 - 07:07pm PT
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jgill: Do you consider research in physics or mathematics to rely upon discursive thought?
Good question. Yes and no. It depends. Would it feel automatic, a natural part of living, like making eggs in the morning for breakfast, or gathering the things to wash windows? Does the thinking arise naturally, or are calculations of intentions, objectives, approaches, values, trade-offs, etc. considered and undertaken?
If I arise tomorrow morning, feel compelled to trim the trees, and then go about getting my tools together and then walk out on to the land and begin cutting, then that seems operational. I’m just functioning.
On the other hand, if I’m irked by how a part of my land looks, and tell myself, “I’d better get out there and trim that %^#$@* stuff” and then arrange activities so that I darned sure get that stuff done so that I can say that I got it done, then that seems to entail discursive thinking to me.
When thinking occurs without regard to how I’m going to get ahead somehow, then that looks to me to be simply operational thinking. The thinking arises automatically (perhaps even anonymously or autonomically) in the body-brain naturally, without care, as if there were no serious concerns.
I feel fairly certain that there is little to no “play” to be found in discursive thinking; hence there is little-to-no improvisation or unconscious creativity in discursive thinking. Discursive thinking seems to me to be fairly serious.
I am sure that the thinking in research in physics and mathematics could exhibit operational thinking over discursive thinking, no doubt, in some who *are* themselves the very embodiment of the process of research without regard for personal aggrandizement. That would show up as pure engagement in my book: no “I”; just the work.
“BUT, work is unpleasant, ugly, no fun! How could anyone not be personally dissatisfied or unhappy with it and want to finagle their way out of it?”
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Aug 24, 2016 - 07:43pm PT
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That was a good one, Quacker
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Mark Force
Trad climber
Ashland, Oregon
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Aug 24, 2016 - 07:49pm PT
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What about a super naturalist?
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Aug 24, 2016 - 08:38pm PT
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A matter of definition, I suppose. Like much on this and the other thread.
Discursive (Oxford Dictionary):
1 Digressing from subject to subject: ‘students often write dull, second-hand, discursive prose’
1.1(Of a style of speech or writing) fluent and expansive: ‘the short story is concentrated, whereas the novel is discursive’
2 Relating to discourse or modes of discourse: ‘the attempt to transform utterances from one discursive context to another’
3 Philosophy ,(archaic) Proceeding by argument or reasoning rather than by intuition.
Sometimes thread posters use the word in a derogatory sense, equating the discursive with number crunching and other routine, unimaginative intellectual tasks.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Aug 24, 2016 - 08:46pm PT
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Well, 'discursive' comes from the Latin meaning 'apart to run' and I like to think of it in that primary sense a lot in regards to thinking, imagining and problem solving. It's true: apparently many don't like their 'discursive thinking' or their 'discursive mind' for various reasons so I've read and heard - but I guess I'm a lucky one because I love mine and consider it indispensible to my 'mental life' and its uses, joys and other things.
re: super naturalists
My favorite super naturalists that come to mind... (1) Ed Wilson (2) Carl Sagan (3) Richard Dawkins (4) Charles Darwin. Heck, I'll add in there Neil dg Tyson and Thomas Clark too.
Here's a sleeper... Encountering Naturalism, by Thomas Clark
https://www.amazon.com/Encountering-Naturalism-Worldview-Its-Uses/dp/0979111102/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1472097370&sr=8-1&keywords=Encountering+naturalism+clark
If discursive thinking as a mental faculty weren't essential to surviving and flourishing, it probably wouldn't have evolved to the impressive strength and power it has.
I hear drugs like Ritalin - and disciplines like meditation - can tame this discursive thinking 'monkey mind' for those who think theirs is out of control.
...
In case you missed it... Sarah Haider...
http://heatst.com/culture-wars/repressive-burkini-bans-will-do-more-harm-than-good/
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WBraun
climber
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Aug 24, 2016 - 09:03pm PT
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The intelligent class clean and throw their garbage out.
The gross materialists think cleaning out their minds is unintelligent ......
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Lorenzo
Trad climber
Portland Oregon
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Aug 24, 2016 - 09:34pm PT
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WBraun
climber
Aug 24, 2016 - 09:03pm PT
The intelligent class clean and throw their garbage out.
The gross materialists think cleaning out their minds is unintelligent ......
Do camp 4 residents still dumpster dive?
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Aug 24, 2016 - 09:47pm PT
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I can't imagine a woman being able to swim in a burkini.
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BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
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Aug 24, 2016 - 10:40pm PT
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I hear drugs like Ritalin - and disciplines like meditation - can tame this discursive thinking 'monkey mind' for those who think theirs is out of control.
And i hear peeps shooting Testosterone cause they havent mind enough to up matter.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Aug 24, 2016 - 11:27pm PT
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These strike me as somewhat outsized statements:
I feel fairly certain that there is little to no “play” to be found in discursive thinking...
I'm someone who derives an oddly liberating serenity and finds no small art in pruning, sweeping, mopping, digging, and snow shoveling. Do those involve 'play'? Sometimes. I similarly find an expansive and opening experience in running, tightrope and especially in distance swimming. Playful? Sometimes. Now none of those are typically examples of discursive thinking, but I can get in similar states, with play, when developing software and discursively attempting to riff through many different contexts (compsci, architecture, art, language, anywhere) to find parallels, patterns and designs which I can adapt or reuse in whatever context I happen to be working in at the moment. And the discursive is fast an furious at times in the process, but again, it can be enormously liberating, creative and quite playful. Though I will admit other times it can be an ever-deepening pit of hell where no amount of discursive thinking will help you claw your way through or out.
...hence there is little-to-no improvisation or unconscious creativity in discursive thinking.
I would have to most vigorously disagree. Some of the most interesting things happening in material science, chemistry, physics, biology, medicine, genomics, computers, electronics, communications and you name it aren't happening in each of those individual silos, but rather at the intersections and edges where they all meet in various interdisciplinary team efforts which have been becoming a staple of late. And think about it - you don't get breakthroughs simply throwing people from different disciplines together. You need those team members to rub against each for friction, misunderstand each other to percolate, struggle mightily for common language, confound each other with differing perspectives and then let the whole mess simmer until lights start to pop on and ideas start igniting. Disruption and challenging the status quo is the name of the game. Many, maybe even most, of the insights and breakthroughs that occur in such teams comes from the 'unconscious creativity' necessary to find common ground in the overlay of each disciplines' typical discursive thought patterns.
Discursive thinking seems to me to be fairly serious.
Can be; doesn't have to be.
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