goldisheavy

I like private messages, they are handy sometimes. But at the same time, I think this is a great discussion. Why should other people be deprived? If something is hard to say because it's not comfortable -- that I can understand. If that's the case, a private message is fine. Nonetheless, if we can share our deepest weaknesses with others, that's a good thing. Imagine an immortal who is afraid of something? Is that possible? So the less afraid (anxious/insecure) we are, the closer we move toward immortality (or more accurately, toward feeling as if we are immortal instead of being immortal beings who feel as if we are mortal). Your description seems to involve a lot of external things, such as various countries, for example. This is interesting and is relevant. Nonetheless, it's hard to get a grasp of where the person is at in the spiritual sense by the geography of one's residence. The only thing I can determine for sure is that you are dead serious about your path. Most notably what is missing is your vision of the future. If you can, try to relax and envision the best possible future for yourself. In that future, what is your life like? Can you describe even just one day of that life? I'm asking about your truest and deepest wish here. The reason I ask is as follows. If someone is in the New York City and they want to go to Florida, I say "Go south." If someone is in the Mexico City, and they want the same thing, I say, "Go north." But if someone is in the New York City and they want to go to Toronto, I say, "Go north." So in other words, I won't be helpful to you until I learn what you want. If I don't know what you want, I'll just suggest whatever I want for myself.

I don't think a state of no beliefs is ever possible. If the person fears something, that's evidence of beliefs in action. For example, if I fear death, it may be because I believe death is oblivion and I want life instead of oblivion for myself. That's just a tiny example. I agree with a lot of this. I don't believe in tabula rasa mind. I believe children have certain propensities from past lives, and this may include certain problems as well. So it's not only that we're trying to get over the psychological damage of the childhood, it's also the case, in my opinion, that we're trying to get over the damage caused by countless lives of beliefs that make life difficult and that make the universe seem like a threatening place. I don't buy this at all. The message might be from others, but we have a choice to believe the message or to reject it. We often don't feel justified in rejecting messages because we believe something like, "But who am I to say something good about myself? Shouldn't others be the main judge of my character?" And so on. We have many beliefs about who we are, and our identity is validated in a certain manner according to those beliefs. In society we constantly get the message that we should let others judge us and then we should accept that judgment at face value. So if someone says "I am great" we say, "No, don't say that about yourself. Instead, wait for others to say so." And we consider this to be useful and helpful. This kind of "I am what others say I am" is so deeply engrained in us as a belief, that when we are reborn into a new life, and if we have shitty parents, we just accept all the garbage they tell us about ourselves. It's not likely to happen because raw Dao is stupidly scary to a human being. Dao embraces both structure and lack of structure, while humans crave structure. Dao embraces all complementary opposites, while humans have strong preferences for one of the opposites. For example, I believe that I am a being who is limited in space and time. In other words, I believe my body is much smaller than the world and my time in this life is much smaller than all time. None of this can actually be proven to be true. It's just a belief. But based on this belief I've experience great fear when I experienced huge space in meditation and in visionary experiences (such as those that occur during special very vivid dreams). So why am I so afraid of endless vastness? Well, it's obvious to me. I am used to conceiving of myself as something small (body) inside something large (the world). When I feel myself as something endless inside of which appear small things, that's scary. And this type of fear is not something we learned in childhood. This fear is much more existential and much more fundamental than whatever the society, friends or parents can beat into you.

That might take a huge amount of courage because not all of us have convention at the core of our being. So all the conventional individuals will have an easy time with this injunction, but all the non-conventional ones will need to express themselves in their diaries, memoirs, philosophical treatises, and so on... because there aren't many ears who can hear certain things.

Emotions are based on our beliefs and our perceptions. When perceptions match our beliefs about what is positive, we have positive feelings. When perceptions match our beliefs about what is negative, we have negative feelings. Feelings are simply echos of beliefs, and they are aroused by changing perceptions. Perceptions are more dynamic than beliefs, which in many important cases don't change even in a lifetime. Anger is aroused when we believe something is not how it should be, and yet we also believe there is a damn good chance to fix the problem. When something is not how we believe it should be, and we also believe there is no chance to fix it, then we experience depression instead of anger. So anger is a more hopeful and more positive state than depression. An angry person feels like there is something that can be done to improve things, but it isn't being done. Sometimes the anger is delusional, and sometimes the anger is correct and appropriate. I think depression is always delusional though. I don't think depression is ever correct. Beliefs are more fundamental than feelings. Feelings are very useful echos that give away our true beliefs if we want to examine the feelings sincerely while looking for understanding, instead of trying to manipulate our feelings in a mechanical way without bothering to understand the underlying causes and conditions of those feelings.

I have no idea who Liu I-Ming is. So can you please describe what have you learned so far, especially the most important and the most life-changing aspects. Please use your own words and please avoid the sectarian jargon if possible. Try to use normal English to talk about your experience on the path. Once you describe what you have learned and how your life has changed as a result, please describe your vision of the future. What kind of life do you envision for yourself? What do you want the most? What are you afraid of the most? If you can type this up, I believe not only can I help you, but even just you typing all of that up will be an experience for you. You might even get your answer from simply formulating your question in a comprehensive and complete way.

I watched these videos with great interest. Thank you for posting these. It's kind of surprising that I learn interesting stuff like this on a spiritual forum. Maybe I should visit a physics forum to learn something interesting about spirituality.

I feel your pain.

This bit is absolutely preposterous. It may be a word I initially introduced to describe what you're advocating. But you seem to have adopted it later on. You can say it's an exaggerated word, but I chose that word on purpose, to highlight the issue. You don't agree with such characterization, but I insist that yes, it is how I characterize your approach. If this causes you to want to characterize what I advocate less favorably as a form of rhetorical vengeance, then go ahead!! Wu-wei is ignorance as most people understand it and apply it. What I described potentially conflicts with the idea of wu-wei. On purpose. It's not a whoops on my part.

Why do I need to do that? For what purpose?

People don't get angry for no reason. If you are angry, there is a reason for it. What is it?

Who is using the word ignore? I suppose Santa Claus dropped it in there.

Last one for me as well. Deeply assumed beliefs do not melt away in this manner. I assume you've been eating your own dog food. Are your deeply assumed beliefs melted by now? Just give your honest assessment. When you go to assess your beliefs, do not look at how you altered what you profess. Instead only look at how you live your life. If the way you live has changed, then your beliefs have changed. If how you live is the same, your beliefs haven't changed. The extent to which you live differently is the extent to which your beliefs have changed. I can't see it yet. What you say is not quite similar enough to what I am saying from my point of view. You made subtle points? Mind tell me what the subtle points are? Are you serious? You won't even admit to your own words now? Should I bold it for you? Does your browser have a search function? Control-F or Command-F? You didn't say stop. You said something like, paraphrased, "As you turn your attention away from the surface thoughts to what lies beneath them, they quiet down, blah blah blah" Something like that. OK, and a tip for you as well. If someone keeps disagreeing with you over the same things, do not continue to insist that you are in fact in agreement. Obviously something prevents the person from agreeing. That something may be insignificant in your own mind. Hell, it might even be invisible to you. But it's likely very significant to someone else. I may. It depends. Maybe I should just rewrite some of your posts in the manner that would cause me to agree with them to let you see what the differences would be?

Can't and don't want to are different things.

I was raised as a hard physicalist without any religion. I had spiritual experiences since childhood and I believed I lived before I was born, etc... but all this I was taught to ignore and forget (somewhat successfully, since the programming lasted in a secure fashion until I was 20, when I started to have doubts). I've never been much of a follower. I've always been on one path: my own. I've never switched from it in the past and never will. I've studied the following: Shirdi Sai Baba (this was surprisingly good) Avadhuta Gita (brilliant) Bhagavad Gita Patanjali Yoga Sutra Some general Vedanta Some Advaita such as Ramana Maharshi All of Castaneda's books Richard Bach's books Tao Te Ching (second best) Chuang Tzu (the best) Lieh Tzu (third) Hua Hu Ching Wen Tzu Seven Taoist Masters I've read so many Buddhist writings that it's not even worth mentioning them one by one: Theravada, Mahayana, Zen, Vajrayana, a dash of Tendai, some Mahamudra, a bunch of Dzogchen tantras, etc. Chaos Magic (Spare) Lucid dreaming (very little reading, mostly personal practice) Some Sufi writings, especially Rumi. Some New Age books. A few Native American books A few about the Australian aborigines. Some writings from the Russian Opheni tradition (you probably won't find it online unless you know Russian), which is supposedly rooted in Greek mysticism. Lots of books published by Rabbi Laitman about Kabbalah, including his Zohar translations (most in Russian, but he publishes some English books too). And lots more that I forgot already, but the impact of which I carry within myself. None of what I read is my path. My path is uniquely my own. I reject wholesale following of any tradition, no matter how good or sexy it is. This even includes Dzogchen or Buddhism, which are among my favorites. I am not an ist and I don't want any ism. I also strongly and forcefully reject any religion that calls its followers to slaughter people from another religion.

I suggest placing attention roughly somewhere well below the ground level, say 12 feet into the ground. You can also focus on your feet, but I found it better to focus below the body altogether. Also visualizing pervasive velvety black helps sometimes (especially if your visual field is disturbed in some way and/or needs rest).

You probably didn't mean to put that "not" where I put the [sic] mark. Actually stopping the thought was helpful. I used to think that if I would stop my thoughts, I would magically become sagely and all kinds of wisdom and experiences would pour on me. When nothing whatsoever was happening for a long time I started to question the method and started examining the meaning of what was happening to me. I realized that whatever I intended to happen is exactly what happened. Since I only intended to get silent, I only got silence. Since I never intended anything else, I never got anything else. It is then I realized that my beliefs have everything to do with my meditation practice because beliefs affect the manner in which I exercise my intent. Remember that I used to think the mind was the brain. So stopping the thought left me in exactly the same state as before, minus the thoughts. I still had the same brain. Same body. In short, same everything. When I considered that I am not the body and the mind is not the brain, right that same day I had an experience in meditation. (I considered that possibility very seriously and when I meditated I no longer acted as a body or as a brain, but as a spirit, if you will, or as an infinite mind). So for something to happen I had to change my worldview first. So stopping thoughts ended up being very beneficial because it taught me that thoughts are insignificant. They are not important. Having them on or off makes no difference (or the difference is basically ornamental). If I didn't learn that inner verbalizations were not that important, I would be stuck in the Zen count to 5 nonsense till this day, for sure. Thank heavens this didn't happen to me. I realized the method was broken after only a few months of that silence nonsense at the most. I still enjoy silence. And now that I know what intent is like and how significant beliefs are, I can use silence to make whatever else I am doing more pleasant sometimes. Silence is not a game changer. It's not a big deal. If you make silence your meditation object for the purpose of absorption, that can also yield interesting results. But the intent here is not silence, but absorption into silence, which is very different. The rule is this: whatever you intend is what you get. You intend silence, you get silence. You intend absorption, you get that. You intend to broaden your attention, you get broadening of your attention. Intending X and getting Y instead doesn't happen unless you're confused and you actually don't fully appreciate the true nature of what you are intending (or trying to). I gave you a list of quotes where you do advocate it. You don't advocate it in a flat out manner, that's true. But you still slide it in there in a subtle way. Ooops..... Why except? Why? Why? Why???? You were doing so well but then you threw that except in there. This is why we cannot move forward. No exceptions, Todd. If you enjoy silence, that's fine. It doesn't make anything easier to see, except of course silence itself. I suppose if it makes your seeing more enjoyable, it makes it easier in that sense. (Just eat some chocolate during contemplation for the same effect!) You probably read about this on some Zen forum or in a Zen book, and it gives you a sense of accomplishment and pride in your practice, so it may be positive in this specific way. When Zennies start talking about counting breaths without thinking, you can join in and tell them your impressive count. That will knock their socks off, for sure. But what about you? Verbalizing a belief that you hold under contemplative examination makes those beliefs easier to see than just being silent. Why so? Because it takes a bit of energy to silence yourself. Silence is not natural. It has to be practiced bit by bit. When you want to examine your beliefs you shouldn't split(*) your attention into two separate tasks: 1) examine the belief and 2) keep silent. Those are two different goals for all those people who cannot remain silent effortlessly. (*)For those who can be silent effortlessly indefinitely the two goals become orthogonal, but for all others (99.9%) they are contradictory and they do split the attention. How do I know all this? Hmm... Well, I tell you what, I didn't read this bit from a book or on a Zen forum anywhere. OK, so why do you say ignore???? Where is the smiley face for me crying big tears??? You correct yourself perfectly well in the parens... so why not just erase what's outside the parens and make what's in the parens the main content???? The stuff you say in the parens is perfect. Ignoring and including are two hugely, hugely different things. I can't understand how anyone can get confused about this or mix the two. The stuff you wrote in parens is great, outside the parens is junk that has to be erased. Maybe if you wrote what you actually thought, these conversation would go differently? It appears that if I am lucky, your real actual opinions accidentally slip through in parens and generally around the corners. And the main content of your post is not what you actually think. I won't do that because just look at this post!! We are having huge issues in this very post. Why bother re-reading other posts if this posts is insane already in its own right? Man... you make me want to slap myself in the head. With a hard object.

Thank you. I fixed my post. If this is what you want to discuss, then let's do it. But then let's forget everything else. We have way too many things under discussion now. It makes it hard to have a quality conversation because we're always talking about 2-3 different things each time from 10 different angles. Let's just pick one thing. If this is the thing, that's fine. Let's stick with this thing. I don't enjoy it as much as in the beginning because I often repeat myself. I find repeating certain things to you over and over and I don't like that. Instead of challenging things I say you tend to try to go around them in very squishy ways. I observe what you're doing and I find consistently disagreeing in roughly the same ways again and again. I did reply, but I would prefer it if we could focus on one point. Like, if you can pick the most disagreeable or the most wrong point, and talk about it briefly but strongly, so that I can see in an obvious way what you think is wrong with it. I noticed that too! You're quite a trickster.

Yes it can. No they do not. Remember the difference between being committed to a belief, and being aware of a belief as a possibility? Being aware of possibilities is what gives you options. Commitments tend to close options (depending on the content of belief you commit to they sometimes open options instead of closing) more often than not, and contradictory commitments leave us paralyzed, helpless, angry and full of inner turmoil (and eventually lead to depression and suicide). It's a superb option. It's often the only option that actually works and has transformative power. I am noticing a pattern Todd. I notice that I often find myself having to repeat things to you. At the same time, you repeat the same thing to me worded differently each time, while occasionally also back pedaling on some things you've said (lack of awareness on your part). But I continue to not be receptive because I find many things you say to be in error. We are not making headway because you're not willing to allow my experience into discussion. You think when I am telling you that simply being silent prolongs status-quo is just me talking out of my arse, when in fact I've done it and seen it first hand. For a relatively long time too! So if you think you can contradict my personal experience, it's a nonstarter. Not to mention I see a logical reason for why it is that way and why it should be that way. So it's a double nonstarter. This kind of fuzzy wishy washy conversation is exactly why I asked you to try to focus and narrow down your complaint. Pick one of the six points and try to express your complaint clearly in no more than two brief paragraphs. This will allow us to focus our disagreement and make it obvious what it is we disagree about. So at least we'll know what we disagree about. Currently I feel like I am the only one who knows what I disagree with you about and why. I feel like you don't know if you disagree with me or not, and you also don't know why. It's really crazy, if you think about it.

What is this then: I don't know how you manage to observe the observer as if it were an object of some kind. Do you mean the body? First of all, if you simply stop surface verbalization, I maintain that there will be no significant change. I know this because I've done just this and nothing changed. So this is indeed what I claim! By failing to attribute this claim to me you're actually mischaracterizing what I am saying. That's because focusing on specific beliefs is very distinct from focusing on miscellaneous surface verbalizations. The difference is one of content. If your surface verbalizations are those that arise during belief inspection, then focusing on the meaning of those verbalizations is correct. If your surface verbalizations are "I need to go grab something to eat, blah blah blah, I need to run to the ATM, blah blah... tank of gas, blah blah blah blah" then focusing on the meanings of those verbalizations is a waste of time. So meanings matter. The content of surface verbalizations matters. Hugely. Your discursive mind is volitional. You have an insane degree of influence over it. In fact, it's probably the one single thing we have the best control over in the entire bodymind. If this aspect of you is not volitional, nothing is, and you're a helpless zombie. Because the discursive mind is volitional, you can vary its topic, tempo, and tone, just to name a few things. Of those the topic is the most important! Turning your discursive mind to the topic of wisdom is infinitely more productive than the same time spent in silence. Silence can also be useful, but for the most part, silence is non-transformative and it tends to status-quo. Being silent in your mind is the same thing as being silent with your mouth. It's the same, except the mind silence is a tiny bit more silent than the mouth kind. The meaning of both is the same and so is the effect. When you raise your voice, do you become more attached to your beliefs? No. Of course not. When you lower your voice you don't become less attached either. Beliefs must be consciously and purposefully examined for change to occur. Like I said before, there is a special kind of silence that is transformative, but to experience it you need special preparation, which most people don't have. It only does that if that's your intention! The problem is, when you tell people to get silent in their minds, they do... just that. They just get silent. They don't shift their attention to the whole. At the same time, when you say, "Shift your attention to the whole" it will work fine without telling people to shut up. Silence has minimal value. Instead of going with naive formulas that every Zen forum is brimming with, look at your life and see how it works there. That's what I do. That's why I can see how useless silence is. I am very good at staying silent. So I know what the heck I am talking about. The value of silence is rest and relaxation. That is it. Gosh.... Sometimes I get so tired talking to you. You can't see the difference between saying, "ignore the word" and "shift your attention to the entirety of the post"? If you really can't, we need to stop talking. I don't want to talk to you anymore if you think the two suggestions are equivalent or if you think that suggesting to ignore that one word is automagically going to result in noticing the rest of the post! The mind just doesn't work like that. In case I am not crystal clear yet, you precisely do not suggest to turn attention to the whole. Instead you precisely do suggest to ignore that one word in the post, assuming that attention will turn to the whole automatically as a result and I tell you over and over again this automatism is just not there in the mind. It's only when I strongly push you that you start to talk about turning attention to the whole. If I didn't push you, we'd never hear you talk like that under your own steam and you'd just keep telling people to be silent, as if it's some high Zen practice or something. (it is not!) You get exactly what you intend every time. That's how intent works. If you want to be silent, you get silence. You don't get broader attention. If you want broader attention you need to intend to broaden your attention. That's a totally different intent from intending to be silent and while the two intents can be combined, they are completely orthogonal. You seem to have no appreciation for meanings. You think only in terms of mechanics. You don't get how different words have different meanings, how beliefs are meaningful, how various descriptions are meaningful in different ways. For example, you treat discursive mind as one whole thing without differentiating its contents. This shows you don't think much of any meanings that occur therein.

This is powerful, powerful stuff right there! No wonder you didn't want me to tell people about it. I guess I was giving people access to a powerful method you wanted to keep to yourself? Could this be true? /half-joking

I'm not sure what you mean by "flesh". As for how deep, well, see if you can stop believing in gravity. I think if you examine one of your beliefs from time to time, eventually you'll get a sense to how committed you are to it. Try to imagine how your life would be different if you didn't believe it, or believed something different. Well, I was using Todd's word. It's a cool word, but I normally don't talk like that. Normally I would use the word "commit" or "vest". So we vest into our beliefs, or commit to them. As for how exactly, this is best answered in practice. You can try to pick some kind of relatively insignificant and non-contradictory belief, something that you think should be easy to get yourself to believe. It may be a good idea, while you are at it, to pick a belief that is relatively positive and helpful. Then affirm this belief as if you already believe it. At first you'll feel like you're lying to yourself. As you do this, visualize yourself as if you already believe it in your mind's eye. Then each time you affirm your new belief, you might feel like it's less of a lie. This will be true if you're accepting it. If you're not accepting it, then there is no point in forcing yourself. There may be a good reason for non-acceptance. But either way you'll get your answer. You'll see if beliefs are easy to change or not. Whatever you do, the most important thing is to always be honest to yourself. If your beliefs are changing, you'll feel it very clearly. So there is no need to pretend. If your beliefs don't change in this type of exercise, that's valid. So I just described how to acquire a new belief. It's also useful to disempower certain beliefs, such as those beliefs that are holding you back in an way that you consider reasonably unhealthy. To disempower a belief, you'd have to bring it up for examination in your mind's eye. Examine the effects this belief is having on your life. The imagine what your life would be like if you believe something different. Then you may ask yourself is this belief is absolutely necessary? If it has some positive function, can that same function be served by a healthier belief? So when you start to question a thorny belief in this way, eventually it will at least weaken. The key in this process is to always be sincere before yourself. Pretending is a dangerous game when we pretend to ourselves. All beliefs can be changed in a sincere way. So there is no point in pretending. Beliefs can change authentically as a result of an honest change of heart during an honest conversation with yourself, or silent introspection, or during a dream or during an even stranger or more mundane occurrence. It's not a good idea to make anything I say here into some kind of rote practice. If your life is good, don't mess around with your beliefs. If there is a pain point somewhere, then it may be worthwhile to investigate beliefs around the pain point. Sometimes you may also find that some types of pain are not something you will want to eliminate, because you'll realize that to eliminate certain types of pain you'd have to change your beliefs in such a way as to shock your conscience. In cases like these you may choose to purposefully let pain be painful.

Todd, I'll make it really simple for you: 1. Beliefs are psychic structures that are much deeper than what we profess. 2. Beliefs have meanings. 3. Those meanings are important because they structure our experience. 4. Beliefs can be closer to the superficial level or closer to the core level, depending on how strongly we invigorate those beliefs. 5. Beliefs can easily contradict each other in meaning. 6. If the person is vested relatively deeply into two contradicting beliefs, inner turmoil and suffering ensues. So, without bringing something third into the discussion, go ahead and pick one of the points to disagree with. Please stop talking about the discursive mind or the source. It's not important. Instead, consider 1 through 6 and if you have a problem with them, pick just one point, and then go after it. Now, I've been talking to you for a while now. And honestly I don't think you have any disagreements with any of my 6 points. But you keep trying to talk about something. I don't even understand what is the point. What are you trying to say? Are you just replying for the sake of replying? Or do you have a message? You see, I actually have a message. Now, if you don't have a problem with my message, then don't act as if you do. If you do, then don't wobble all over the place, don't back pedal, don't say one thing and then another, just clearly state what your problem is in one or two small paragraphs. Talk about clarity.

OK, so what is it that's mischaracterized? Well, how about some quotes then: These quotes make it obvious what your attitude and view is. You separate what you label as "discursive mind" from the rest of your psyche. You kind of denigrate it slightly and kind of suggest that it's better to demote it somewhat, etc... and all that in a mechanistic way. In other words, you're not willing to engage the contents of beliefs. Nor are you interested in the content of the discursive thought. Your attitude is to let everything sort itself out while you sit there and observe it. I really don't mischaracterize you. You are frustrated with yourself and your own crazy view. Because when I mirror your view back to you, you don't like it. So you are saying that simply abandoning verbalizations abandons commitment to the structures that give rise to them? That is false. I've rejected this idea in every way possible. I've argued against using logic. I told you my personal experience that runs against this. What more do you want? Wrong. It's not all about. That's crazy. Everything matters. Content of beliefs matters. Simply reflect! Observe what you're saying now. You believe that commitment is the only thing that matters. That's your belief! So beliefs do matter, don't they? I'm talking about the content and the meaning and the implications of your beliefs here and not just the mechanic presence of one. See how you stick to that belief very consistently in this discussion? So do beliefs matter or not? Perception limitations are not harmful. In fact perception has to be limited in some way. Even Buddha has limited perception. Why? Because Buddha cannot perceive in an ignorant manner. That's a limitation. So obviously meanings matter. Content of beliefs matter. You cannot solve your problems by treating all beliefs in a mechanical fashion as if what beliefs say is unimportant.

Alas, there is no such thing as verbal understanding. When we verbalize something, it comes from a deeper place than verbal. This is precisely why stopping verbalizations is ineffective. Think of it this way. Imagine you have a wooden block with a carved text. Verbalization is like pressing that block against the paper when the block is covered in ink. So you can get an imprint on the paper. That imprint is a verbalization. However the wooden block is a psychic structure that gives rise to the verbalization. The verbalizations come and go. The wooden block remains and you can make more and more prints from it. So, it's not the printed text that's in conflict! You can have two different wooden blocks that contradict each other. Now then. If you are committed to both of these meanings carried in both of the wooden blocks, you'll suffer greatly. If you simply stop talking it is equivalent to simply ceasing to make imprints on paper. The papers stop coming, but the blocks and the meanings they embody remain active in the psyche. Do you understand now? So when you distinguish understanding into verbal and non-verbal, actually you are making a huge mistake. You're making a gross mistake. You misrepresent the psyche and how it's setup. And the reason you do that is because you never actually examined your psyche on your own. You're simply parroting some texts and what others have said. Put down your formula, and look at reality! Test the meaning of what I am saying and see for yourself.