Apech

the next layer falls white flakes on the cold mountain moon rise lights the ice.

If you wish to see me as a guru, I don't mind.

the idea comes from strange Buddhists like me

I did! And I am very happy to see this old thread rejuvenated. I think it is a very important aspect of spirituality that 'emotions are the path' - although to be frank I cannot recall exactly what point I was trying to make originally. I seem to be arguing about etymology from a quick read of the OPs. Which is not really the point. While I think neuroscience is very interesting and can be helpful, I have a personal reluctance to place this activity directly in parts of the brain or nervous system. For me the body is a projection, a mysterious and important one of course but being a projection it is not really primary. I would say then that in the storehouse consciousness (alaya) there is all the karmic seeds of past actions, which grow and bear fruit when the right causes and conditions arise. But even saying this is a bit 'theoretical' I think. So perhaps what I would say is that as 'beings' we through the senses (5 of which a physical) we interact with the outer vessel. But our perception is not simple - it is complex (a word which means many folded). The many-foldedness of our experience and thus the universe we are aware of, comes from the fact that we see through the web of stored experience - a web which is bound together by emotional connection, by which I mean energetic influencing. So when I see a particular colour, blue say, or a shade of blue to be specific, I don't just see the specific wavelength of light as a spectroscope would, I 'see' a whole kind of bubble of emotive connections, reverberations, like/dislike structures and memories etc. It sparks a kind of many dimensioned response in me. All this happens (mostly) beyond the sphere of my conscious thought. In fact I would say conscious thought is perhaps only 10% of what is going on. I don't think you need any expensive therapy. It might be helpful of course occasionally - or to just spark some insight in you. I think what begins any appreciation is sitting, what I would call shamatha - or could be zazen maybe - simply because it is releasing the grip of a tight mind and allowing a little more in. If we let go of certain anchors then we can explore a wider vista. And this brings us to the point I think. There is emotion. A broad spectrum. From subtle energy movement to full blown rage perhaps. Navigating this is a path, maybe the path. What does move? What does not move? What changes? What does not change? What is uncertain? What is certain? What is value? What is valueless? What is useful? What is useless? Where shall we go from here?

Then a servant girl, seeing him as he sat in the light and looking closely at him, said, “This man also was with him.” 57 But he denied it, saying, “Woman, I do not know of the model.” 58 And a little later someone else saw him and said, “You also are one of them.” But Steve said, “Man, I am not the originator of the model.” 59 And after an interval of about an hour still another insisted, saying, “Certainly this man also was with him, for he too is a Daobum.” 60 But Steve said, “Man, I do not know what you are talking about, it was Stephen Hayes.” And immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed. (I apologise in advance for my weird sense of humour).

Here's a resource for the Gospel of Thomas http://www.sacred-te.../chr/thomas.htm and it doesn't say copyright for the translation but 'available to the net' - so I guess its all right for us to copy. First two parts for discussion ....

It seems we are not the only ones to identify this issue:

I took the obvious step of reporting the activity to my local NATO field station. A rather bored sounding officer of the watch said he would note it down as 'another UFB siting'. I asked how many others he had received and he said he couldn't comment. He tried to tell me that it was impossible for biological entities to cross breed with artificial intelligences but quickly shut up when I mentioned transhumanism. They think we are truly stupid.

my god ! A flock of those just flew past my garden.

... and the Gothic version:

I went to hotpot.ai and asked it to draw an exparagte creature:

afterhours shebeen and before what could be ours she was what still is.

a private heaven. The field of meadow flowers wide enough for all.

See you later.

mr texts, while normally I respect your views, I regret that on this occasion you are wrong and have missed the point on all counts. I do not wish to derail this thread with an explanation as to why.

A couple of extracts from said conversation.

correct.

I had an interesting conversation with ChatTGP about the obscure subject of comparing Ancient Egyptian ideas with Daoist Nei Dan. It answered all my questions affirmatively and sounded as if it knew what it was talking about, right down to commenting on a single fairly obscure papyrus which I have studied. At first I was amazed, since I am fairly certain this comparison of ideas is unresearched and the papyrus I quoted has only, as far as I know been quite wrongly presented by Egyptologists (reading bizarrely in reverse direction). So I concluded that some trickery was involved here. ChatTGP was just feeding off my questions and giving me the content back in a form which sounded like knowledge - but could not possibly have been so. It was an odd experience. I would say though, that when I asked it normal questions about info which is online it was unerringly accurate and it will make a great research (or cheat) tool.

As humans we stand midway between the gods and hells. This is why the precious human birth is optimal for enlightenment. We taste each of the other realms as you describe - but the beings in those realms are locked in for eons - for them it is totally immersive if you like - while for us - sure we get caught up in say, greed but in never totally consumes us.

Are you an 'ordinary person' then? Have you not heard that the world is an unfathomable mystery?

No I mean that whatever we can conceive as being a light or rainbow body in our minds ... is not the rainbow body. I suggest it will be that once we achieve it we will be able to look back and say 'oh! that's what they meant!'. I think it's the same with all realisations, that we work and study and make effort for years etc. with only a kind of shadowy understanding of what we are trying to achieve. When we break through into actual experience or realisation it all clicks into place and we understand fully what the masters of the past were on about. Until then we 50% question and 50% take on faith.

The word 'realm' as it implies is a domain, like a kingdom, with a ruler. In the Buddhist sense everything which seems to exist is a projection of mind. Thus Buddhas and Bodhisattvas have 'buddha fields' which are realms of their consciousness, where their aspirations create environments conducive to sentient beings achieving enlightenment. Additionally there are said to be six realms in which six different kinds of beings 'exist'. Gods, demi-gods, human, animals, hungry ghosts and beings in hell(s). Reality is perceived differently by the beings in the realms according to the conditioning of their consciousness. Also as Taoist Texts has shown various realms such as the form realm, formless realm, desire realm arise through minds attachment in various ways.

I may have come to this thread a bit late. But for what it's worth I voted 'other' because although the textual descriptions of attainments are intended (mostly) to be literal (except when they are clearly metaphor) - if we are using the word 'literal' to mean 'actual or real' (which is not what it means of course but is how people use it) then the written descriptions cannot express the direct experience in its full sense. So they cannot be literal. I realise this is a completely unhelpful point to make ... but hey!

Rovely Rawter Wabbit.