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Considering that everything is precievied, analyzed and interperted in our own mind, is anything at all objective, or is it just a dream?

Perhaps my dream of becoming a lead singer isn´t as unrealistic as I thought.

I'm open to it, but have doubts about its reliability, ie the ability to do it consistently or on demand. Almost like it's a percentage thing, some people will have a higher percentage of hits, but nowhere close to 100% reliability. Such inconsistency makes study maddening. I was hoping by now we'd have greater proofs in the astral or dream state fields, not that I've researched it lately, in the past, there were amazing clues but nothing consistent. Certainly lucid dreams, dreaming while knowing your dreaming and gaining control is considered possible and learnable. Astral projection kinds of stuff, has tantalizing anecdotes but as far as I know, no easily lab reproducible on demand, proof.

Just last night I had a dream about riding a bus. I can’t remember ever having a dream that I was riding a bus, despite having ridden the school bus during my entire public schooling. Immediately before going to sleep I was a little bummed out about something. I had randomly run into a video related to Authenticneigong.com on Youtube, and went and checked on the site. There is a 2-day workshop coming up in just a couple weeks! My automotive insurance payment is due at the end of the year, and it is almost the exact same amount as the entry fee for the training. I don’t have enough money right now to pay for both. I’m at a point in my life where I only use my car a few times per week. First this morning I pulled up the local transit routes and see stops right at most of the places I drive to. Plus whatever extra walking or skateboarding for the last mile to and from the house is surely worth the exercise. Might be time to finally shake up my transportation paradigm. I am stubborn as hell though, so even there’s room for procrastinating until the February work shop.

Santinhos! Tenhas doces para mim? The way I was thinking was this. While Dream Yoga etc. concentrate on realising the dream state - that is the nature of mind as revealed in the state of dreaming - the actual content of dreams are information which we could use to unlock energy and also as a guide on what to concentrate on - or which direction to develop in. This does happen a little haphazardly in many traditions where the mystic has a dream which causes them to change their path - but you don't hear much about using it consistently as a main practice. I think potentially any dream, but particularly recurring or very luminous or vivid dreams can be important. I have had, at one time in my life, numerous precognitive dreams, very accurate and specific. These too seem to point to some kind of significance - although it may be simply they demonstrate a connections to non-linear time (which was an idea I was going to talk about in the Khonsu-mes thread but haven't got round to it yet).

I've mostly taken reassurance from some of the dreams I've had. Lost a friend back in the early days, and yet she was there in a dream, as a waitress, offering me a meal--then everyone was there, all my family and friends, a celebration of something. Now so many decades later, I see that the dream was about love absent "doing something", or "going somewhere", and that I can practice the same. A dream from a few days ago, as I wrote to two friends of mine: "I dreamt we three were about to have dinner, a mid-afternoon affair like Thanksgiving. I was putting on a good shirt, and slacks. I realized the things in my visual field seemed to be a bit more patterned than usual, and figured that we must have ingested an entheogen of some kind, although the patterning was still just subtle." Never had a dream like that before, as far as the patterning, in my life! I went to the dentist that day in my waking life, and I realized that the patterning was my latest writing playing out. Hope you've read it, Apech--you know I value your opinion, and find it inspiring (the piece is in the signature, the one with "Shunryu Suzuki"). As usual, the dreams I describe above were the last ones before I woke up. Those tend to be the most organized for me. I wonder, is that the same for you? I always search for parallels in my daily (and spiritual) life that may be represented in these dreams, and I usually find them.

I think that an interesting thing to explore is the information regarding the future that dreams bring us. I would say that at least 70% percent of our dreams are premonitory. What can be a positive aspect of experiencing this is an increase of detachment and concern towards our personal life and future. You realize that if events are somehow pre-written it makes no sense to "tense and struggle" that much. Paradoxically this releases more energy to be applied in a positive way. You even get more tolerant regarding your personal imperfections. An example to ilustrate this: one morning, some 20 years ago, I wake up and the last dream image that was on my mind was of a Capoeira group performing their acrobatic martial art. I remember that it was a tense morning with my at the time girlfriend. We're having a quarrel that gets worse and worse untill we start shouting at each other. To avoid things to escalate I leave the appartment furious and decide to take a bus to a park of my preference which is calm and soothing. During the bus ride I'm feeling bad for what had happened and especially that circumstances made me lose my self control and explode in rage. I get to the park... there on the lawned open apace what do I see? A group of Capoeira people performing their acrobatic martial art... Spent quite some time, untill this day probably, 🙂 thinking of what had happened. One thing for sure, it was easier to forgive "my" (?) bad temper after this experience.

I experience both lucid dreaming and astral projection. The experiences are most certainly real and can be developed. Keeping a dream diary, and attempting to recall dreams each morning was probably the most helpful advice to achieve lucid dreaming. There are a few theories on dreams. Some say they are visions of significance, and maybe even into the future, others that it's just a brain dump of useless things that happened during the day. Bi tend to think it's a mixture of both. Most of it is rubbish, but every once in a while you get a representation of some aspect of your subconscious mind, and it feels more profound since you are experiencing it. Definitely a tool worth cultivating for anyone on a spiritual path.

I have researched this a bit, making YHVH into a man requires ignoring A LOT. For example, I think it's Eze 16? I think this is one of the favorite examples... ~checking~ Yes! Eze 16. So, in this chapter a metaphor is setup in the begininng of the chapter, but those who want YHVH to be a man, skip that introduction. Then, they also skip the end where the metaphor is made more obviously non-literal. If it's true that YHVH is a man, then, these authors, scholars, etc, would not need to skip things. They wouldn't need to exaggerate. But, if people want YHVH to be a man, for whatever reason, they won't care about what's actually written. All it will take is Daniel 7 where the ancient of days is on a throne. That's it. Done-deal. It won't matter that it's a dream. They have what they want, like you said at the beginning, a Sky-Daddy. OK. I think you know how I feel. There's nothing wrong with the fatherly image if it is a feeling in the heart. Like I said, there's a little telephone in there with a direct line to The Father. But intellectually it doesn't quite work.

Sorry for the late reply. I’ve been sick the last few days. Feeling much better now. During that time I was (almost religiously!) practicing Spring Forest. After a few months of celibacy combined with training for 6 hours a day and some intermittent fasting, I was able to reach a permanent blissed out state. Then I stopped feeling chi as strongly as I did, and the chi always felt cold. The buzzing in the ears came after. I later on figured out that the lessing of sensation was natural. After a long period of celibacy, I needed a system that didn’t require it to reach advanced levels. I just happened upon FPCK when I really needed it, and right away I could tell its special. After finding FPCK I have no need to practice anything else. I get more out of one FPCK exercise then I do complete systems. Plus, I would want to mix the energies. Within the first week of practicing FPCK, GM Doo Wai appeared to me in a dream. Mind you, I had never seen this man before. I found out who he was after I did some research. He told me he was surprised I was able to reach him there; and told me some information about the lineage. …So I have zero doubts that FPCK is lifetime system. I haven’t seen anything else quite like it. It’s funny you mention Sifu Gary! While I haven’t trained with him directly, I am subscribed to one of his channels. Much like yourself, he is no nonsense, speaks his mind, and doesn’t waste your time. His podcasts about various martial arts disciplines are always interesting. Wow, doing all that at 71 is wild! He is an inspiration to us all.

Most people search for wisdom teaching and once they find it, they devote themselves for it. However, in the case of Dr Yannis Toussulis, it was the other way around, Dzogchen teachings found him. Dr Yannis Toussulis had a lucid dream of Ekajati (the principal guardian of the Dzogchen) pointing to him to practice under Khenchen Palden Sherab Rinpoche and take a form of Vajrakilaya Yidam. He practiced under Khen Rimpoche for a while but then he converted to Sufism (Qadri Rifai) later and left Dzogchen practice. Do you think his good fortune because of past lives karmic connections? How would moving through different schools affect spiritual progress?

On this matter I would advise anyone to start by first reading Carl Jungs autobiography, "Memories, Dreams, Reflections". It explains very well the process he went through discovering the alchemical symbology in his own dreams as well as other sacred symbology. The works of Mircea Eliade are fascinating on this matter as well. They will make you realize that there are symbols willing to speak to you that were always present in your life and that you never noticed 🙂 So, if you're willing to sacrifice your sleep for some time and have a dream journal at your bedside table you will learn alot about yourself and mostly that what's sacred and you feel is so far is indeed so near and so aware of you. Some twenty years ago I've kept a dream journal for about two years and don't regret the investment.

I'm starting this thread because I'm looking for information - I'm not an expert in this. But I just want to distinguish what I'm asking about and what I'mm not. There are two areas I'm not really wanting to focus on, i.e.: 1. Lucid Dreaming and Dream Yoga - I think these have been covered elsewhere and I see them as particular techniques for achieving something (worldly or not). 2. Jungian or Freudian dream analysis - while I can see the advantage in understanding the content of dreams I find the intellectual constructs around dream interpretation unhelpful (even though you can get some clues from here). What I'm really interested in is unlocking the information and energy in dreams through feeling and using this specifically as a path. I know some on here do this and I wondered how they go about it. I've had a mixed history of success in this area - but mostly as a result of trying lucid dream techniques like dream diaries and so on. In the end I found this unhelpful - it seems to me that through dreams our 'minds' or possibly our spirit is telling us things about ourselves and our situation. Quite often I wake from a dream which seems significant - and that feeling stays for a short while but then, quite quickly afterwards I can't remember the dream at all or only parts of it. I wish I could recapture more information from the dream. I also have similar recurring dreams which seem to be about my state of health (or otherwise). Anyway I would be interested in what people have to say about this.

Its a story with a basic 'folk theme' that appears in a few guises . A version appeared of it in Idres Shah book of Sufi short stories . It covers that dynamic of life where ; various frustrating paths have been followed , that seemingly end in failure and despair. yet knowledge and skill , seemingly unrelated, are learned along the way, and she maintains her ' virtue' . At a crucial moment , in dire circumstances , our heroine realises her particular skill sets and knowledge can come together to supply a solution . And from that her purpose is discovered and her original dream fulfilled ... although not in the way she had first imagined . [ I have a full 'fleshed out' version of the story , if you would like to read it . ]

I think this is a complex subject. The first point to make is, I think that the mind naturally visualises in dreams or just when thinking of an object and seeing it in your mind. Some people claim not to do this, just as some people claim not to dream. I've met a couple of people with this position which at first I found astounding as I am quite a visual thinker and dream a lot. Since I am sure this is a natural function of our minds I can only conclude that these people either are blocked or just have never learned to notice their visual perceptions. When I first learned meditation I tried visualisation techniques - but quickly dropped them. In fact it was when I dropped any intermediary technique including counting breaths etc. that I made a significant breakthrough. Years later when I started Vajrayana practice there was a lot of emphsis on visualisation - which I must admit I didn't take particularly seriously (at first). I was very casual about it - but in the end I found this was probably the right approach. For instance if someone says think of your mother or other loved one and an image of them comes up - you don't put any effort in. Similarly if say I study a picture of a yidam like Chenrezig for some time - then when I image the same on my head or in front of me the image just pops up fully formed with more or less no effort. I think that Damo and Mizner are mistaking the techniques used with visualisation with 'just imagining'. So for instance just thinking of a line of energy going up your spine or whatever this is unlikely to have any result at all. So they a right about that. In fact the result would be inhibiting because it would block your ability to relate to the energy flow directly. However in meditation generally, the whole of the mind has to be encompassed - and this includes visual thought-forms and images. If as you say you rest your intent - preferably in the LDT - then the mind is released and images can flow in a more distinct and vivid forms. A kind of controlled day dreaming. This becomes important when trying to become unified or whole, since all of your mind/body must be engaged.

I felt I had to respond to this first, before I go on to the next bit ( as it gives some background to my take on things and hopefully some relevance to my next post : I and many others agree , but in my experience those others have been the indigenous ... that have not had their culture totally ruined . I'd say it's 'point' is to 'continue' . That can be via the 'sacrifice' of individual survival ... actually the the 'survival of life' might well depend on the transience of it's ' units' . We do ... being units of life . Maybe the Universe is a really BIG 'life unit ' ? and being born . Well, like I say about social media and IT ... at least I will be dead before I could see the horrible results . But then again ; https://www.noemamag.com/life-need-not-ever-end/ Well .... eveeeeeeentualy . Meanwhile ...... Thats like saying I am too stupid to make myself immortal . We can be sure of nothing ... for all I know , when I die, thats it .. zippo ... finata ! I still remain grateful and appreciative that I had a chance to experience life , and for the life I had . Its a dream Bro .... when that big snake , asleep underground , dreaming this all up , wakes up ... then the Dream finished ... everything gone .... you and me too ! Yes. I can give you another 100 reasons why as well . Now, hang on a minute Maybe it is already doing that ... but I think it has little to with us ...... teenie little bio-units that we are .

I remember that book. Many years back , I read it with some naive excitement . I never guessed back then that I would find myself working a form of alchemy and producing 'elixirs and stones' for the Aussie BD agricultural market . I have retired from that now though . I'll offer this to you as you might find it interesting , it covers a similar area to The Elixir and the Stone ( being ; " an alternative history of the intellectual world. Perhaps for the first time it puts into their true context those shadowy alchemists and magicians who have haunted the imaginations of people for centuries. " ... as the critics said of it ) , but this IMO tops it - I think its rather essential reading to get a grip on the tradition ; Patrick Harpur , 'The Philosopher's Secret Fire - A History of the Imagination ' " The visionary tradition of spirits, gods, and demons continues to subvert our rational universe, erupting from the shadows in times of intense religious and philosophical transition. In this dazzling history, Patrick Harpur links together fields as far apart as Greek philosophy and depth psychology, Renaissance magic and tribal ritual, Romantic poetry and the ecstasy of the shaman, to trace how societies have used myths to make sense of the world. ... ... Patrick Harpur is an acclaimed author, best known for his philosophical works, which include The Philosophers' Secret Fire: A History Of The Imagination and Mercurius: The Marriage Of Heaven and Earth , the latter of which, after being out of print for several years (and fetching a small fortune on auction sites like eBay) has finally been re-released in a paperback edition. ' ( - Damn .... I got an old copy of 'Mercurius' sitting in a book box in the shed ... looks like I just missed out on a 'small fortune' . ) I also recommend his 'Daimonic Reality' . [ " Lake monsters, Yetis, UFOs, crop circles, guardian angels and visions of the Virgin Mary can all be described as apparitions, and this book weaves together an account of them. It argues that only in the last three centuries or so, and only in Western culture, they're as lively as ever. But, the author suggests, they can be made intelligible again by appealing to a different world-view. Three of the chief models for understanding mind and world are Jung's "Collective World", which is used to illuminate the links between the apparently disparate experiences being dealt with." ] ... where the author is coming from : ' In his book, Daimonic Reality, Harpur argues that the human psyche extends beyond the confines of the physical human body, and that it may in fact be a part of our reality. He also notes that during most of human history, civilization has had another, "shadow reality" of folklore, except the current society which is strongly attached to the material. The following is a quotation from Daimonic Reality: Hitherto, I have taken "soul" to refer to two distinct, but unrelated, images. Firstly, soul is synonymous with the daimonic realm itself, the realm of Imagination, and is really an abbreviation for the collective Anima Mundi, or World-Soul. Secondly, soul refers to whatever images the World-Soul itself uses to represent itself. Archetypally, this image is usually feminine and appears, for example, as a female daimon or goddess who, as Jung would say, "personifies the collective unconscious." Now the third use of "soul" refers to the image by which we, as individuals, are represented in the World-Soul. Traditional views of human nature have always allowed for (at least) two "souls" of the latter kind. In ancient Egypt, for instance, they were known as the ka and the ba; in China, hun and p'o. One of these souls inhabits the body and is the equivalent of what, faute de mieux, we call the ego. I will call it the rational ego to distinguish it from the second soul, variously called, in other cultures, the shadow-soul, ghost-soul, death-soul, image-soul and dream-soul, for which our culture has either the word "soul" or else no word, because it is not generally believed to exist. However, it does exist and can be thought of as an ego, in the sense that it confers identity and individuality. It enables us, that is - like the rational ego - to say "I." But it is an ego, not of consciousness, but of the unconscious; not a waking, but a dream ego; not a rational ego, but an irrational ego. I will call it the daimonic ego. Like the rational ego, it has a body - not a physical one but a dream-body, a "subtle" body such as daimons are imagined as having, an "astral" body as some esoteric doctrines say: in short, a daimonic body. " - Wikipedia

There is a need for dominating the Will of another when it comes to enforcing Law and establishing Order. In defense of our Will and ideals we will fight on the street, in the home, in the courts, on the field, and in the schools. The need to hold your Will as the highest form of understanding is a necessary part of becoming successful. This is the first lesson to master should you want to be welcomed into a spiritual home. Doing so proves that you understand nobility and the value of your wealth. The path of pure surrender is a valid form of mysticism that has been used to gather Wisdom and power, but it is not the rite of the empowered. The path of devotion is also a valid method. The Gods love when their people recognize the gifts that have been bestowed upon humanity. They love that we honor and praise them. All people have the right to defend their ideals, wealth, health and liberty. God is all in All. God is all that is, and we are within all, and within God, the All. We have been given storehouses of knowledge and lands to discover within our bodies. We use our minds to contemplate an idea, what we are witnessing, and what we are engaged in. Our minds are formed around what we have been taught, and what we have experienced. We consider the Gods and Goddesses from whom the Wisdom came from, and what they represent, and how well they represented it. What did they learn, and what do we learn. Then, we decide to agree or dispute or refine. We all have our ideals of perfection, An Agnostic leaves room for doubt, but a devout practitioner knows and is certain. Yes, we do not know where this all came from, we have to choose to believe by the proof of the success of our society. One must choose an ideal and perform the action based on what they believe. We want certainty and faith. Faith in ourselves, and Faith in our higher power. Faith has provided us with a lesson, and a pattern to society. A Faith in a God or Goddess will get you to a point of perfection if one continues to refine one's understanding of what that God represents, and what they taught us. The fact is, that if one does not have actual evidence of the God, one must choose to believe and agree based on its Wisdom and the results. This is not blind faith, for the world is the representation of the Gods and the result of their interaction with humanity. When you participate in a method, you are entering into communion with a spiritual storehouse. All Wisdom is sacred, and it is preserved because it brings us benefit and practicing Wisdom gets the attention of the Gods. Following the current manifestation of the Wisdom to its origin will lead you into contact with the spirits and people that identified the process: the artists and Saints. The Gods are above. When we are in doubt we reach up with our minds with a question. Our bodies are the temples of Heaven, and so we reach up with a question, and come to an answer, sometimes verbally. Listen to what you think or are inspired to imagine, for it was sent to you from the Spirit of a God. We put it into action and decide if we like the outcome. Did it satisfy our understanding of what was Wise? Did it produce a good result? All is mind, and ideas are spirits. The Gods have discovered and preserved them from the simple to the complex. They have mined the earth and the body to find their properties and purpose. This is the birth of science. We combine the fuel and fire to ignite the form to illuminate, activate, and warm the object. We measure it and create Geometry and Algebra to construct what we desire. This is the method that we use to create our world, and the Gods use it to create our bodies. Science is about identifying the elements and how they combine to create more complex elements. When we started to investigate the outer world, we advanced far enough where we were able to look within ourselves and find the properties and purpose of what was inside. This is the outer and inner method of discovering what the Gods put inside us, and what the Gods put outside of us. There are mystical methods of entering your body to discover what you are made of. The Gods put a storehouse of images and lands for us to dream in, to educate and test our souls. This greatly influences who we become, should we pay attention. All Wisdom is sacred, all the world is sacred, but it is not all Holy in the eyes of everyone. The religions are formed around the spirit that they declare, and they have ceremonies that honor their Gods and represent the myth and meaning of the life of the God, and throughout history, we have had the rise and fall of Gods and cultures, and in this Age, we have opened the storehouse of history and are exploring the methods and morals of what they had learned, because we want to liberate ourselves from one method in order to advance into the Age of Industry and experience. This is a Golden Age in the history for our race. We are free to explore all ideas and methods to discover who we are, and what we want, with the hope of discovering a new element, or tool, or moral lesson. All Gods are real, and the God of your choosing will lead your spirit. The Jews have their God and method of knowing right and wrong, the Christians have their God and method of knowing right and wrong. The Muslims have their God and method of knowing right from wrong. The Hindus have their Gods and method of order. Most of our morals and Laws right now are in line with the major faiths. The ancient kingdoms had different morals and methods, and other countries have their method that we experiment with because humanity has opened this door. We have many cultures, and all cultures offer something Good. In the West mankind has taken the risk to liberate themselves from the prophecy of the Bible because history tells us that mythological tales of Creation and prophecy don't come to pass. Cultures and religions rise and fall, and all religions promise immortality. It would seem that, since God is all in All, that it only makes sense that we all take part in immortality regardless of the time and place or participation in the Sacred Rites. Depending on your faith practice, and what you provided in the world, and how well you performed your duty, the Ascended Governors will decide if what you did with your liberty provided for Humanity. You may accomplish immorality by other means than religion. The Gods preserve great people, and the meek ones, the poor in spirit, the disabled and imperfect, and the poor in wealth. That is why you should give Good Will to all people, and look inside them for what is Good, and what is Evil. When you understand virtue and morality, you will be empowered by the Gods and encouraged to take action. They love virtue, and charity, and generosity, and ambition. Devotion and kindness are the most perfect things to practice. What matters is the soul, and your deeds and thoughts are recorded on your body. When you die, The Gods will ask the living about you, and decide the outcome of what you provided. The Gods admire that we pursue greatness, perhaps more than obedience to the current method. We have Free Will, and we can pursue life in the direction we desire. Within each of us is the impulse to want, and when we desire something, it is coming from the interaction of the Gods on our curiosity. Desire leads us to investigate and chase down what we believe we want to experience and understand. This is the spirit of Wisdom and the individual working together to train us in action for the sake of ourselves and our efforts to discover our purpose. All paths have been established by the Gods and humanity as we participate in what is Wise. We decide what to practice and believe based on what the system provides. They are all united in purpose: the promotion of life and invention, but their methods differ, and so they ultimately separate. All of the Masters welcome an applicant, and they are open to ideas of disagreement. But you will not be acceptable until you come to understand them, for they are in power and authority, while we are clouded by elements of ignorance, and our own ideal. Some groups will refuse to honor history and use everything in their power to overthrow the Order in the name of their vision. They, too have Divine support. Whatever it takes to bring about a better World. When approaching the Masters or Gods, come with knowledge and purpose. Be certain of what you desire and make your request. Should there be no answer, keep refining your knowledge. All Kings must have a military, and they expect the people of the Earth to defend what is Good in their eyes and the eyes of Heaven. This is the Law of the strong, for only the strong accomplish their Will. You can settle on your place in society and live a life of peace as you participate in the established order, or you can rise in knowledge and power and gain the privilege of authority and wealth, or you can make your plea for the ability to heal and educate. The spiritual path is the desire to become a King, whether over land or simply over one's own self. It is about deciding how one would rule the kingdom, personal or public. The greatest rites in the eyes of the Gods are total sacrifice in the name of the people. The greater the wealth of your possessions that you offer, and the clearer your vision, the better the odds of being acceptable in the eyes of All. In war, the invaders believe they are free to kill and take resources as a reward for their victory. As a citizen, we cannot do these things, we have to honor the laws of our land. All Kings have their armies of Angels and Demons to bless and refine the citizen. Demons are there to provoke us into realizing and appreciating the vision of the God King. A curse is an opportunity to make oneself perfect, and to invent something from Sin. In the pursuit of being an acceptable Adept, one unlocks observations of understanding. The entrance into the Grades of initiation towards Mastery begins with the right to pursue whatever takes one's interest. These initiates go into the world and combine their inner truth with the outer truth and measure the result of what they witness and experience. They choose their next action based on what they review and how it satisfies their intentions. They develop their Will and philosophy, and declare their Wisdom. The Gods are always watching over humanity. When you have reached awareness, they will knock on your door. The prime motive for allowing liberty is the hope that someone will have an answer to Chaos. In the pursuit of the quest to conquer Chaos, one is taught the lessons of the designs of the Gods and Masters. Eventually, the Initiate must accept that Everything Is, and they can stop there and live in peace and comment on what they observe, or they can keep going, and refine all that was given them in the cavernous journey of entering the Abyss. Rise, fall, challenge, submit, create, destroy, declare and learn. It is a constant quest of refining oneself, defeating one's ignorance, and bringing something worthy of the effort of contacting the Masters. The expression of life lies in the illustration of the identity of a person, place, or thing and what it does, and the result of what it does. It is commenting on where it belongs and where it came from, where to put it, and how to identify its use and value. It is the act of illuminating how to enjoy it, and what responses it creates in the self and others. This is where we get moral tales. There are those below that want mankind to break the mold in order to let the new idea travel and interact to define the use and result of its mixing with the established order. When all roads have been exhausted, the Lords decide if it is prime and where to place it in the design. We are unique individuals, sent from Heaven to swim in the waters of Order to test the established pattern and decide if it is good. Through our journey, the Gods will create methods and identify elements and reward and curse those who have roles in the Creation, in order to improve all aspects of the Tree of Life. One aspect of Chaos is the total opponent of Order. All myths and religions define Chaos and give it a personality. However, Chaos possesses new materials for invention, and so, Chaos is worthy of honor and worship. One method to gain the favor of the All, is to have a perfect Will of sacrifice for God, who is All in all, and is all people. So long as your intention is Wisdom, you are in line with the design of the Gods. The Gods visit us all, asking our opinion, observing the fruit of our efforts, gathering ideas from your examples and how you put their examples into the work. Because society has evolved through religious practice of social order and discipleship, it is Wise and honorable to choose to praise it and give thanks. We have to choose to believe, based on the result of evolution. There could be a Heaven for each of us, where we enjoy what we did in life. We may or may not have Free Will to choose what we do and be at the mercy of our choices. If God wastes nothing, and expects Order and Law to prevail, one will assume that we are refined for the sake of returning to life and contributing to the evolution of Humanity. It could be also, that we unite with the Divine governors in some fashion as we are in this life, and placed and preserved in an immortal position of observing and contributing, much like a Saint would be. There are many points of view that are Eternal in their Wisdom, so there could be many Houses of Wisdom to access and participate in. If Alchemy is the science of the Gods, then we mix ideas and properties of ideas, and combine them to create life and observe the stories and what those stories reveal to us. It all contributes to the Sacred Wisdom of our History. The process is to identify a prime idea, unite it with other ideas, send it on a journey to interact with other ideas, and separate them and examine. All the great Adepts start with what they know and believe, they make a commitment to the Gods that they understand, and the Gods answer, igniting the spirit of taking on a greater cause. If the Initiate persists, they will find the gate into the world outside of matter and find the hidden God who has influenced humanity throughout the Ages. There is nothing that we can say with certainty about the nature and reason of this God, only that we have named it and it has been involved in all cultures through the Adepts. Historically speaking, we have learned to define life according to what we approve of and denounce: Good and Evil. The gate of which is guarded by the thought that all is Chaos, and so, the Adept must organize life into an order and outline what is good and what is bad. Entrance into the mysteries begins with examining Chaos, and as the initiate considers the order of what they have participated in so far in life, they reassess and confirm or deny the actions they saw and partook in. From there, they use this singular pointed focus and create an observation of the interplay of it with all of life- say, love or freedom. They do this until they have refined their knowledge and appreciate the order of things. Once they are enlightened, they can then contribute to improve it, and comment on it. This is how philosophy came to be. Once you create a philosophy you can then create laws, and religions, and methods of using the mind. You can name things and bring them to life with colorful language. This is how we created civilization, it is sacred, and when one realizes it, one can then see the sacred in all life.

So deeply appreciate this time of year and this morning was quite the gift. Upon waking, was greeted by two dragonflies ringing in their next generation, embracing one another while hanging inverted from our festival lights outside our kitchen. While my partner this life and I have been adventurous in our embracing, I can't recall any inverted hanging encounters. Quite the sight! My dream transition into waking was being welcome in the home of Three Wyrd Women.

That's a rather broad sweep you're making there! I love the Ancient Aliens series for the many weird observations and speculations it brings to attention. And I am quite familiar with David Icke, Alexander Collier, Tom Smith, Len Kasten, Erich von Däniken, and other proponents of "the extraterrestrial worldview," as you call it. They don't always agree with each other, but that's inconsequential to me. I don't take anyone's scheme at face value, but prefer to make my own critical reviews and distinctions. There's a sad tendency among conspiracists to uncritically accept "the (anyone's) extraterrestrial worldview" in a neat package with Hollow-Earth theory, Hollow-Moon theory, Flat-Earth theory, the moon landings being fake, and/or Trump being the saviour of humanity from the Illuminati, and what-have-you. In fact, some seem to be more than ready to accept any claims at all, as long as they are sufficiently at odds with mainstream thinking! 🙄 I see no evidence for any of the known religious founders to be of extraterrestrial origin. I find much wisdom and truth in the words of Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, Laotzu, and others--they are representatives of human spiritual ingenuity to me. True, a number of religions have been misrepresented and used for political reasons, but this is generally not their founders' fault. On our expeditions into unfamiliar lands, we need to tread carefully. There's so much we don't know out there! Drawing from ancient mythology, modern mythology (the category which the aforesaid authors fall into), whistleblower reports, occult teachings, and not least my own dream/astral travel experiences, I develop my own take on humanity's past, present, and potential future involvement with extraterrestrial civilisations in my upcoming book trilogy Spacepunk. While nothing in it is implausible in my view, I am presenting it as science fiction, and for good reasons--and if any reader would see it as nothing more than an allegorical narrative, that's fine with me! 🙂

He says a lot of things, that is his job. He also says that he is not running a cult.. repeatedly. "Hey, I am not robbing you, yes, I am taking all your money, but it is not robbery? Why? I said, so." People clearly don't know anything. Esoteric and Exoteric teachings are different. You can practice Exoteric for your whole life and will never know the difference. Exoteric teachers drink, smoke, behave like monkeys because they are monkeys. The teaching is incapable of changing who you are. Even if we don't look at the value of the content and study materials. Damien is a discounted version of Andrew Tate, his dream is to make Hustle University. You are confusing prerecorded echo-chambers lectures with live platform teaching and master personally checking students reports. There is not a single minute of Damien personal time spent into you studying in his Academy. He does not know 99% of "customers" in his online netflix. Just to be clear here, I am not interested in Damien's students or followers. I have only responded to your association of Damien and morals/ethical conduct. Also, I like Damo, the Bodhidharma one. Zen teachings of Bodhidharma is a book I often recommend to beginners.

The watcher is always above the mind. The watcher is never part of the mind. The mind is just like a TV screen on which thoughts, dreams, imaginations, projections, desires, and a thousand and one things go on passing. The watcher is not on the screen, he is sitting in the movie hall. But the problem arises when the watcher becomes identified with something on the movie screen. ~ Osho Don’t be under the illusion that while watching the film you really remain a watcher. Don’t be mistaken. You become a participant too; you don’t remain outside the film. Once you are inside the theater, for a short while you enter into the film as well. You begin to like someone in the film, and you dislike someone else. You feel sorry for somebody, while you feel happy about someone else. After a little while you become identified, you become a participant in the film. It will be indeed difficult to remain a witness in life if we cannot manage to do so while watching a film. ~ Osho It is the self-aware screen of awareness, upon which the drama of experience is playing and out of which it is made, that becomes so intimately involved with the objective content of its experience that it seems to lose itself in it and, as a result, overlooks or forgets its own presence, just as a dreamer’s mind loses itself in its own dream at night. ~ Rupert Spira In reality, which means in our actual experience, all experience is one seamless substance. The duality between the inside self and the outside object, world or other is never actually experienced. It is always imagined. ~ Rupert Spira Mind is madness. Only when you go beyond the mind, will there be Meditation. ~ Sadhguru

That's great! We can only convey convincingly what we have personally understood. While I am certainly aware of the important role played by perception, I would argue that this and other realms (including our own existence in them) are structured and determined -- at least to a significant degree -- by mathematical/physical/metaphysical laws and principles which are neither arbitrary nor illusional. I am sure that that's why we see so many mandalas in Buddhist art. Yes, it may all turn out to be something like a dream at the end of the day. But we should be careful not to confuse different levels of reality with one another. What you can experience very much depends on how far down the rabbit hole you're willing to go. Yes, sometimes. And sometimes it's important to acknowledge what you perceive as valid and real. I rather like that. True, language has its limitations. But I believe that it can do more than what so many spiritual seekers give it credit for. My question still stands: What are the descriptions of the 'emptiness realisation' in other spiritual systems? And I am not only asking you, but also myself, and anyone who may have something to share on this topic.

https://singjupost.com/anil-seth-your-brain-hallucinates-your-conscious-reality-full-transcript/ Here is the full transcript of neuroscientist Anil Seth’s TED Talk: Your Brain Hallucinates Your Conscious Reality. Anil Seth – Neuroscientist Just over a year ago, for the third time in my life, I ceased to exist. I was having a small operation, and my brain was filling with anesthetic. I remember a sense of detachment and falling apart and a coldness. And then I was back, drowsy and disoriented, but definitely there. Now, when you wake from a deep sleep, you might feel confused about the time or anxious about oversleeping, but there’s always a basic sense of time having passed, of a continuity between then and now. Coming round from anesthesia is very different. I could have been under for five minutes, five hours, five years or even 50 years. I simply wasn’t there. It was total oblivion. Anesthesia — it’s a modern kind of magic. It turns people into objects, and then, we hope, back again into people. And in this process is one of the greatest remaining mysteries in science and philosophy. How does consciousness happen? Somehow, within each of our brains, the combined activity of many billions of neurons, each one a tiny biological machine, is generating a conscious experience. And not just any conscious experience — your conscious experience right here and right now. How does this happen? Answering this question is so important, because consciousness for each of us is all there is. Without it there’s no world, there’s no self, there’s nothing at all. And when we suffer, we suffer consciously whether it’s through mental illness or pain. And if we can experience joy and suffering, what about other animals? Might they be conscious, too? Do they also have a sense of self? And as computers get faster and smarter, maybe there will come a point, maybe not too far away, when my iPhone develops a sense of its own existence. I actually think the prospects for a conscious AI are pretty remote. And I think this because my research is telling me that consciousness has less to do with pure intelligence and more to do with our nature as living and breathing organisms. Consciousness and intelligence are very different things. You don’t have to be smart to suffer, but you probably do have to be alive. In the story I’m going to tell you, our conscious experiences of the world around us, and of ourselves within it, are kinds of controlled hallucinations that happen with, through and because of our living bodies. Now, you might have heard that we know nothing about how the brain and body give rise to consciousness. Some people even say it’s beyond the reach of science altogether. But in fact, the last 25 years have seen an explosion of scientific work in this area. If you come to my lab at the University of Sussex, you’ll find scientists from all different disciplines and sometimes even philosophers. All of us together trying to understand how consciousness happens and what happens when it goes wrong. And the strategy is very simple. I’d like you to think about consciousness in the way that we’ve come to think about life. At one time, people thought the property of being alive could not be explained by physics and chemistry — that life had to be more than just mechanism. But people no longer think that. As biologists got on with the job of explaining the properties of living systems in terms of physics and chemistry — things like metabolism, reproduction, homeostasis — the basic mystery of what life is started to fade away, and people didn’t propose any more magical solutions, like a force of life or an élan vital. So as with life, so with consciousness. Once we start explaining its properties in terms of things happening inside brains and bodies, the apparently insoluble mystery of what consciousness is should start to fade away. At least that’s the plan. So let’s get started. What are the properties of consciousness? What should a science of consciousness try to explain? Well, for today I’d just like to think of consciousness in two different ways. There are experiences of the world around us, full of sights, sounds and smells, there’s multisensory, panoramic, 3D, fully immersive inner movie. And then there’s conscious self. The specific experience of being you or being me. The lead character in this inner movie, and probably the aspect of consciousness we all cling to most tightly. Let’s start with experiences of the world around us, and with the important idea of the brain as a prediction engine. Imagine being a brain. You’re locked inside a bony skull, trying to figure what’s out there in the world. There’s no lights inside the skull. There’s no sound either. All you’ve got to go on is streams of electrical impulses which are only indirectly related to things in the world, whatever they may be. So perception — figuring out what’s there — has to be a process of informed guesswork in which the brain combines these sensory signals with its prior expectations or beliefs about the way the world is to form its best guess of what caused those signals. The brain doesn’t hear sound or see light. What we perceive is its best guess of what’s out there in the world. Let me give you a couple of examples of all this. You might have seen this illusion before, but I’d like you to think about it in a new way. If you look at those two patches, A and B, they should look to you to be very different shades of gray, right? But they are in fact exactly the same shade. And I can illustrate this. If I put up a second version of the image here and join the two patches with a gray-colored bar, you can see there’s no difference. It’s exactly the same shade of gray. And if you still don’t believe me, I’ll bring the bar across and join them up. It’s a single colored block of gray, there’s no difference at all. This isn’t any kind of magic trick. It’s the same shade of gray, but take it away again, and it looks different. So what’s happening here is that the brain is using its prior expectations built deeply into the circuits of the visual cortex that a cast shadow dims the appearance of a surface, so that we see B as lighter than it really is. Here’s one more example, which shows just how quickly the brain can use new predictions to change what we consciously experience. Have a listen to this… (distorted voice) Sounded strange, right? Have a listen again and see if you can get anything… (distorted voice) Still strange. Now listen to this. (Recording) I think Brexit is a really terrible idea. Which I do. So you heard some words there, right? Now listen to the first sound again. I’m just going to replay it… (distorted voice) Yeah? So you can now hear words there. Once more for luck… (distorted voice) OK, so what’s going on here? The remarkable thing is the sensory information coming into the brain hasn’t changed at all. All that’s changed is your brain’s best guess of the causes of that sensory information. And that changes what you consciously hear. All this puts the brain basis of perception in a bit of a different light. Instead of perception depending largely on signals coming into the brain from the outside world, it depends as much, if not more, on perceptual predictions flowing in the opposite direction. We don’t just passively perceive the world, we actively generate it. The world we experience comes as much, if not more, from the inside out as from the outside in. Let me give you one more example of perception as this active, constructive process. Here we’ve combined immersive virtual reality with image processing to simulate the effects of overly strong perceptual predictions on experience. In this panoramic video, we’ve transformed the world — which is in this case Sussex campus — into a psychedelic playground. We’ve processed the footage using an algorithm based on Google’s Deep Dream to simulate the effects of overly strong perceptual predictions. In this case, to see dogs. And you can see this is a very strange thing. When perceptual predictions are too strong, as they are here, the result looks very much like the kinds of hallucinations people might report in altered states, or perhaps even in psychosis. Now, think about this for a minute. If hallucination is a kind of uncontrolled perception, then perception right here and right now is also a kind of hallucination, but a controlled hallucination in which the brain’s predictions are being reigned in by sensory information from the world. In fact, we’re all hallucinating all the time, including right now. It’s just that when we agree about our hallucinations, we call that reality. Now I’m going to tell you that your experience of being a self, the specific experience of being you, is also a controlled hallucination generated by the brain. This seems a very strange idea, right? Yes, visual illusions might deceive my eyes, but how could I be deceived about what it means to be me? For most of us, the experience of being a person is so familiar, so unified and so continuous that it’s difficult not to take it for granted. But we shouldn’t take it for granted. There are in fact many different ways we experience being a self. There’s the experience of having a body and of being a body. There are experiences of perceiving the world from a first person point of view. There are experiences of intending to do things and of being the cause of things that happen in the world. And there are experiences of being a continuous and distinctive person over time, built from a rich set of memories and social interactions. Many experiments show, and psychiatrists and neurologists know very well, that these different ways in which we experience being a self can all come apart. What this means is the basic background experience of being a unified self is a rather fragile construction of the brain. Another experience, which just like all others, requires explanation. So let’s return to the bodily self. How does the brain generate the experience of being a body and of having a body? Well, just the same principles apply. The brain makes its best guess about what is and what is not part of its body. And there’s a beautiful experiment in neuroscience to illustrate this. And unlike most neuroscience experiments, this is one you can do at home. All you need is one of these. And a couple of paintbrushes. In the rubber hand illusion, a person’s real hand is hidden from view, and that fake rubber hand is placed in front of them. Then both hands are simultaneously stroked with a paintbrush while the person stares at the fake hand. Now, for most people, after a while, this leads to the very uncanny sensation that the fake hand is in fact part of their body. And the idea is that the congruence between seeing touch and feeling touch on an object that looks like hand and is roughly where a hand should be, is enough evidence for the brain to make its best guess that the fake hand is in fact part of the body. So you can measure all kinds of clever things. You can measure skin conductance and startle responses, but there’s no need. It’s clear the guy in blue has assimilated the fake hand. This means that even experiences of what our body is is a kind of best guessing — a kind of controlled hallucination by the brain. There’s one more thing. We don’t just experience our bodies as objects in the world from the outside, we also experience them from within. We all experience the sense of being a body from the inside. And sensory signals coming from the inside of the body are continually telling the brain about the state of the internal organs, how the heart is doing, what the blood pressure is like, lots of things. This kind of perception, which we call interoception, is rather overlooked. But it’s critically important because perception and regulation of the internal state of the body — well, that’s what keeps us alive. Here’s another version of the rubber hand illusion. This is from our lab at Sussex. And here, people see a virtual reality version of their hand, which flashes red and back either in time or out of time with their heartbeat. And when it’s flashing in time with their heartbeat, people have a stronger sense that it’s in fact part of their body. So experiences of having a body are deeply grounded in perceiving our bodies from within. There’s one last thing I want to draw your attention to, which is that experiences of the body from the inside are very different from experiences of the world around us. When I look around me, the world seems full of objects — tables, chairs, rubber hands, people, you lot — even my own body in the world, I can perceive it as an object from the outside. But my experiences of the body from within, they’re not like that at all. I don’t perceive my kidneys here, my liver here, my spleen. I don’t know where my spleen is, but it’s somewhere. I don’t perceive my insides as objects. In fact, I don’t experience them much at all unless they go wrong. And this is important, I think Perception of the internal state of the body isn’t about figuring out what’s there, it’s about control and regulation — keeping the physiological variables within the tight bounds that are compatible with survival. When the brain uses predictions to figure out what’s there, we perceive objects as the causes of sensations. When the brain uses predictions to control and regulate things, we experience how well or how badly that control is going. So our most basic experiences of being a self, of being an embodied organism, are deeply grounded in the biological mechanisms that keep us alive. And when we follow this idea all the way through, we can start to see that all of our conscious experiences, since they all depend on the same mechanisms of predictive perception, all stem from this basic drive to stay alive. We experience the world and ourselves with, through and because of our living bodies. Let me bring things together step-by-step. What we consciously see depends on the brain’s best guess of what’s out there. Our experienced world comes from the inside out, not just the outside in. The rubber hand illusion shows that this applies to our experiences of what is and what is not our body. And these self-related predictions depend critically on sensory signals coming from deep inside the body. And finally, experiences of being an embodied self are more about control and regulation than figuring out what’s there. So our experiences of the world around us and ourselves within it — well, they’re kinds of controlled hallucinations that have been shaped over millions of years of evolution to keep us alive in worlds full of danger and opportunity. We predict ourselves into existence. Now, I leave you with three implications of all this. First, just as we can misperceive the world, we can misperceive ourselves when the mechanisms of prediction go wrong. Understanding this opens many new opportunities in psychiatry and neurology, because we can finally get at the mechanisms rather than just treating the symptoms in conditions like depression and schizophrenia. Second: what it means to be me cannot be reduced to or uploaded to a software program running on a robot, however smart or sophisticated. We are biological, flesh-and-blood animals whose conscious experiences are shaped at all levels by the biological mechanisms that keep us alive. Just making computers smarter is not going to make them sentient. Finally, our own individual inner universe, our way of being conscious, is just one possible way of being conscious. And even human consciousness generally — it’s just a tiny region in a vast space of possible consciousnesses. Our individual self and worlds are unique to each of us, but they’re all grounded in biological mechanisms shared with many other living creatures. Now, these are fundamental changes in how we understand ourselves, but I think they should be celebrated, because as so often in science, from Copernicus — we’re not at the center of the universe — to Darwin — we’re related to all other creatures — to the present day. With a greater sense of understanding comes a greater sense of wonder, and a greater realization that we are part of and not apart from the rest of nature. And when the end of consciousness comes, there’s nothing to be afraid of. Nothing at all. Thank you.

Earlier I mentioned we are talking past each other without any real communication occurring. They way I understand the words and they way you understand them seems to be different. The fact is our experience is all a dream, and none of it is real, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't drive sober or be good people. There may in fact be an external reality out there which our simulated dream like experience is a representation of, and operating under the assumption there is we should behavior morally, and ethically. I am saying don't mistake a painting of a pipe for an actual pipe. What you see and experience isn't the same thing that is happening outside of your skull. It is something different from it. Yet most people live their lives operating under the assumption it is actual reality. It is a holographic simulation, and nothing more.