Capital

Hmm, the following is my opinion on the matter. There 'is' not a creator, because 'is' is a form of 'to be' and... that's really already too far. Once something 'is', it has already been created, and that means it is as illusory and waning as everything else. Even stars and solar systems and galaxies come to an end. The universe will, I feel, and then it will perhaps be created again. Do not take me too seriously. They say one only speaks who understands little.

To be honest, one needs no great ability to communicate with other human beings to have great compassion for them and/or a connection with the unnameable. From my small time on this board, I've found Vajrahridaya to be a source of both thought and conflict. He shares a view that I had never considered, and he shares it with apparent knowledge. Many don't agree, and he is not exactly as humble as one would expect, but I find when I'm not lying to myself that neither am I. And why should this anger a Taoist? Are these 'incoherently expressed words' not just pointless black shapes on a screen?

One of my teachers in high school showed me this video. Anyone who cares about the earth, yet scoffs at this video, needs to meditate on their beliefs.

I will say a prayer for him.

I don't know the situation well, so I certainly won't say that venting your anger on your wife isn't justified, as long as it stays at needed words. Still, I find that in life the more justified something aggressive feels at the time the more foolish I feel afterward, when the more root emotion that fueled it- such as the sadness I think you may need to face- has passed. That's as much as I'll say on the matter, as I've not had a girlfriend, let alone a wife, so matters of the heart are currently still a mystery, and I have little reason for giving advice on them.

Thank you for the response! I don't understand what that parable was trying to convey fully, as some parts rang true, and other made little sense to me. I will continue to reread it.

Is one supposed to feel the nature of the world, and somehow follow its directions? How is one to know the response 'the situation demands'? When you say react naturally, what nature are you following?

Throw away anything you have for making it in your house...

This is probably a question that has circulated multiple times; still, it is bothering me, and I am unsure how to approach it. What in 'me' is me? I am not my body, I feel, nor my mind; this I firmly believe: yet they are my means of perceiving the world around me (I believe mind and body are the same thing, but that's something of a tangent..). My identical twin brother is among the many that surround me that swear that we are nothing but a mind and body and that 'I' am but a complicated mixture of hormones, chemicals, and electronic signals. I've taken anatomy classes and psychology classes, and I thought I felt that way for years. Yet, I can't help but hold firmly in a belief in something that is 'me' that is neither flesh nor synapse. I have a mental formulation that is the word 'soul', and it is what I usually think about when thinking about 'me'. To be honest, I do not know my soul, and I can't help but fear that reaching for the 'soul' that I made in my thoughts is not the same as reaching for the soul that makes up my 'essence'. I guess my real question is, how do I feel for my 'soul' or whatever it is when I have no idea how to feel for it, and what I assume I am going to 'feel' it through likes to think its the soul (i.e. my mind/body)?

More that I should meditate on. Thanks! That's a really good question... Another I'd like to ask is 'What is not me?'

Thank you all for the replies. I'll meditate more now on what you've written.

I'd like to mention that Judaism originally sprang from Ancient Mesopotamia. They were also around a lush river valley... Unfortunately, it flooded all the time, which is where you get the GREAT FLOOD (*doom*) of the Old Testament. I love all religions, but I do have to agree that, as religions go, the three 'Abrahamic' traditions have the most chance of creating radicals.

My question is how you move that to something that is not solitary and helps the community, which is a strong part of the Tao. That feeling of being completely free from thought and conscious connection is wonderful, but you can't function like that in any way I can think of. Is there a way to? Is it possible to help others, and yet be free from it all yourself?

Well, last night I was meditating, and something quite new and intense happened. I was was listening (sort of) to the song Reflection by the band Tool while deep in, and my focus was on 'listening' to the body without my mind making me literally listen, which is what the song was for. It's odd, but it's easier for me to pay no regard to a noise that I know well, rather than one that is unexpected, so listening with ear-buds to a song that I have heard a hundred times is better than the echoing quasi-silence of the night. I wasn't focusing on my Qi or my breathing, though I was aware of the latter becoming completely automatic at some point, yet still as deep and soft as I have been consciously making it before then. What happened came out of the blue, and it's hard to describe because it was when I started my analysis of what exactly I was feeling that it stopped. It was like my conscious mind turned off, and I sunk completely away from it. That's when I realized that even with it completely gone, I (being me, Kyle, Capital, whatever) was still there. At that exact moment I felt my entire body for the first time in a way I never have before, because for the first time I was my body. I was in every part of it, and I could fell every sensation so much stronger. Then I started to analyze what was happening, and in a moment the feeling was almost entirely gone. My conscious mind sucked me back up into my head. When I woke up this morning, though, I felt completely worn out, besides the fact that there is way less tension in my body than I think I've ever experienced. It's odd to be so relaxed yet so completely tired and beat. I do feel a lot better though, for some reason, after writing all this. I want to go back and do it again, but my conscious mind is now so caught up on the idea that I can't relax properly. Kyle

Hey everyone! I probably should have lurked more before writing my intro, but there was some section or another that I couldn't get into without registering and writing this, and I just had to say fuck it. Now I'm trying to think of something to write. Ah; my real name is Kyle. That's a place to start. My mom wanted to name me Dilan... eurghh. You all can call me Kyle or Capital. I chose Capital as my screenname because the word (in the old Brit exclamatory sense~ That's splendid news! Capital!) amuses me enough to bring up a real smile every time I see it, and that's more than reason enough to have it as my screen name. I guess you could say that I'm a general all around beginner, though that doesn't bother me, as that simply means I have the rest of this lifecycle (whether I die tomorrow) ahead of me. I'm only 19, I'm fresh out of High School (and silly procrastination kept me from college this first semester), and I am only beginning to understand what I should be beginning to understand as it pertains to philosophy, Taoism, Religion, Qigong, spirituality, and my admittedly shallow dabbles in Taijichuan. I guess that's what I'm doing here. I found a link to this site and read through a few pages of discussion, and I liked the frank and relaxed discussions I saw here, as opposed to the stuffy arrogance I've found consistently elsewhere (Is it arrogant to dislike the arrogant? That question has always bugged me). I'm hoping my activity here will help me to open up philosophically/spiritually, as another forum I frequented helped me to open up intellectually. My main problem is my complete lack of direction. When everything looks so pretty, but offers nothing truly tangible to 'hold on to', you start spinning constantly to try to see all of it at once, and then you just end up falling on your ass. This forum could just be one of those things, but I got good vibes pretty instantly (as I did with the other forum I talked about, and didn't with all the others), and I trust myself, so we'll see. Anyways, I'm not really sure what exactly this forum focuses on in a 'good introduction', so I'll wait and respond to what responses come. Peace

Marblehead: Yea, I'll definitely be in school next semester. I have the grades and the SATs. I'm not the type that could do long without some sort of learning. The main reason I'm not in a good college yet is because of a rather pathetic amount of procrastination, as I said; the reason I'm not in school at all is because of a bunch of odd, and rather frustrating, circumstances that ended up being completely outside of my personal control. Then again, had I started earlier, the problems could have been solved before the final deadline... ----- kekeke Being out of school though fully, I have to say, has been a rather fulfilling experience by itself. I have been a lot less stressed, and I've lost a good portion of the excess weight I had gained over those long, lovely years of adolescence. I also began really meditating then, and I think that is what actually made all the difference.