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Most importantly by teaching me it is my responsibility to develop absolute certainty in what it is to be deluded and what it is to be free of delusions. I then at least know the direction to go in. Staying there always in waking, sleep, dream, and death is then up to me and my karma. By encouraging us to make a ngöndro a lifetime path. Ngöndro is what differentiates delusion from non-delusion. Through the example set by our teachers and the stories of masters of our tradition. The attainments and the humility. Through the teachings. Every major teaching I’ve attended and studied had admonitions regarding arrogance and narcissism, ignorance, and related delusions. Through the practice itself. This is the connection to non-delusion. The view/practice/actions/fruition are undifferentiated and must be precise. Through recognizing, continuing, returning... And through the cultivation needed to stabilize. I wouldn’t make it my project. Your attainment is yours alone and my own is all I can influence. I don’t need yours as a reference point so there is nothing more to be said or done. Having certainty in my own view is all that is necessary. It cannot be discerned via forum, it cannot be proven by quorum, nor judged by sly practitioners, even on the holy day of Purim! So worry not of others’ minds dear One, though hold them in your warm embrace. I will return when you’re still enough to have me, ... and if you don’t come easy, I may need smack your face.

no voices, only the wonder of living. like the voiceless wonder of your first fuck. or the feeling of waking up and seeing it is , and has always been perfect, even the fear, the pain, the shit. just like being in a dream, and seeing that you are dreaming, and not taking it so serious. not that a dream is un-real, but it is also not as real as we think it is. that kind of feeling.

I've been very blessed in my life to have many resoundingly deep and exquisitely loving relationships with many wonderful beings and not all of them were humans. I've now arrived at the point in my life where quite a few of these have died and released their body forms. My dream life has always been extremely vivid, rich and lucid, from the age of four and throughout my entire life, I have two types of dreams. The small dreams that are fluff and blather and non sequitur types that are often vivid, but don't pull much emotional/intellectual connection and are often forgotten quickly. And then I have BIG dreams. Dreams so intense, vivid and real that they often make many real life experiences pale by comparison and they can shape and change my fundamental perspective of life by the depth of their impact and I can recall every moment of them now as clearly as I can recall the birth of my son. One of my oldest and dearest friends is scared to death... of death. He always has been as far back as he can remember... He fears that we are just obliterated on death. Based on one of my earliest experiences going out of body during a nightmare when I was four, I have never had a fear of death, inherently having the experience that my essential nature is not tied to the atoms of my body, no matter how fun they are to interact with... My question is this... How often do you dream of the dead? And when you do... is it significant? or is it the same as when you dream of friends, loved ones, animals who are still alive? He almost never remembers his dreams, but when he does, they are BIG ones and they usually help him out in his life with answers or support in his most difficult dealings. However, he has never once dreamt of anyone who he knows who has died and this fuels his fear that there is no essence to us after death. He is always very intrigued when I tell him of my big dreams that involve those I love who have released bodily form. and so I've grown more curious to hear and pass along to my friend when next we speak, what sorts of experiences others have had, if you care to share...

With those edibles I mentioned earlier, I gradually worked my way up to 1 full gummy (5 mg active ingredient). I don't like the effects during daytime, but I do when I take it half an hour before bed, chased with a drop of cognac. Once in bed, I turn on a sci-fi audiobook, on very quiet, and fall asleep into the plot. My mind collaborates with the narrative by creating its own plot lines, then the next evening I rewind to where I fell asleep and compare. Here's an example: The plot: George Bush, while president, has a tooth installed by an undercover Russian agent posing as a dentist, which is a kind of very intricate radio that can be receiving voices transmitted via special equipment (on just one specific wavelength, so there's no interference from any other sources). The FSB (Federal Security Service of Russia) find a guy with a very powerful and artistic voice, and train him with daily seances combining a sensory deprivation tank, a cocktail of psychedelics, and readings (right into the inside of his head -- he has the same kind of radio tooth installed) of all the most prominent religious texts ever produced -- chiefly biblical but also a bit from other traditions. The goal is to get him to tap into the "voice of God" that would sound absolutely genuine and then start transmitting right into Bush's head, impersonating God and giving him instructions. And so on. Then my dream-mind has a lot of fun with all the variables. ))

A hairdresser’s dream! She called, and told me of it. ”Yes, I dreamt it too.”

All tree, no forest Is that like all hair, no skin? A hairdresser's dream!

All tree, no forest Is that like all hair, no skin? A hairdresser's dream!

All tree, no forest Is that like all hair, no skin? A hairdresser's dream!

Hi fellow bums, I'm turning to you, more experienced travellers on the Way to ask for help. I don't know who else to seek for support in this subject, because few people I've met have embraced taoism, and their answers doesn't seem to help either. I had a dream: to become a writer and live writing. It all started when I discovered this passion, when I was 16 years old, but I only had the guts to follow it four years later, after spending that time working on jobs I hated and following a career that made me unhappy. When realizing how unhappy I was, I decided to leave everything and follow this dream, as unreal as it seemed to me, because I had few people giving me support to chase it. I dropped off university, and slowly started to change my career from graphic design to writing-related activities. As one step further towards what I wanted, I decided to join a course that made me write a lot, so I applied myself to one of the hardest vestibulars (a brazilian special exam for admission in universities in Brazil) in Journalism. It took me a lot of commitement and dedication, but I made it. I think it's worth mentioning that I never felt so happy than when I was writing. It was an experience that made me explode in excitement. I don't write for admiration, ego-boosting or fame. I write because what I feel when writing, I haven't found out anywhere. But then, I decided to take a better look at the spiritual subject. It started with Aikido, and then Meditation, and then I got into the cultivation practices I first saw here on The Tao Bums. After reading so much of Taoism and Buddism, I start getting in touch with concepts of "abandoning the self", "dedication to enlightement" and other stuff that seem to imply so much on "abandon" this dream. Thing is, all this stuff started to make me question my dream, and slowly, I stopped writing. It's not anything related on writer's block, but more over on "not doing it because it's an attachment." And to be truly honest, in comparison to writing, I don't feel as blissful when meditating. I must admit that I do not write "enlightened," beautiful stuff with "conscious" messages. In fact, I'm a big fan of writing detective noir stories, and writing humanistic dramas (Henry Miller, Phillip Roth and Bukowski, for example) filled with sexploitation, violence and other nasty content of urban settings. But the more I hear on abandoning it, and the more I decide to give my writing career up, I feel unhappiness. I don't want to abandon my dream, as I don't want to stop seeking enlightement the spirit. Am I not ready to follow enlightement because of this? I feel confused, and I'd like to see some other bums opinion. Namaste,

I like this line of reasoning. If we are dreaming and know everything is a dream and cannot hurt us, is there still fear? I would say fear stems from attachment. If we do not have an attachment to something, is there any fear involved if that thing is compromised.

I had been going through a period when my meditation was not going well. I usually do breath counting and sometimes metta bhavana. I was going to stay at a community in the countryside, which had a building set aside for meditation. Each morning there is a one hour silent meditation. I thought this was just what I need. First two days, just an hour of monkey mind each morning. In the house that I stayed in there was a large collection of books which I enjoyed browsing through. I saw a quote in one book that struck me as really beautiful and I had the idea of meditating on it. So on the third morning I gave it a try. I don't recall anything except a sort of day dream in which I was standing in a wheat field. The sun was very hot and was hurting my eyes a little. I was clothed differently, my arms and legs were bare. Then the gong sounded end of session. A whole hour had gone in what felt like seconds. I was a little puzzled but had a very strong feeling of peace which was with me for most of the day. That was about 5-6 years ago but when I think about it I can still feel the sun on my face and the wheat against my legs and left hand. It was all so incredibly real. Strangely I could not recall a word of the quote nor could I remember which book it was from. I have no idea what I experienced that morning.

Speaking for myself ,I dont hate you. I figure you had a dream ,for that mental object to constitute proof, you should require of yourself some indepemdent evidence that the conclusion you reached ,is indeed memory of a real event and conclusively not dream.

Even psychologically oriented healers are getting more and more into the body these days because body-level healing works. In fact, there´s a whole discipline dedicated to healing emotional difficulties through body awareness -- somatic psychology. Witness the wild popularity of Bessel Van Der Kolk´s tome The Body Keeps The Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. There are lots of people who wouldn´t dream of telling you about their childhood abuse but don´t mind mentioning that their stomachs hurt. For this reason, the stomach provides a way in. Insisting on staying on a psychological level -- talking about feelings -- can be subtely disrespectful and, in any case, doesn´t work. Just bringing someone´s awareness to their body and helping them stay there is often profoundly healing. I´ll venture that often enough that´s all that´s really needed.

As a matter of fact is, billions of people are deluded and that is why they suffer. And when you wake up to truth, you will not have any doubt about it. I never said inferrential knowledge is useless in all situations. I said it is useless when it comes to awakening. Well, I mean, largely useless, not totally. It can be helpful if it helps you establish 'Right View' but still, a conceptual inferrential understanding does not in itself lead to awakening. What is ironic? I think I didn't say 'direct experience' as a problem, I say it is the uninvestigated framework of inherency and duality that is a problem, and those are views, proliferations, not direct experience. But those views can shape how we view a direct experience. Through contemplation (as in Vipassana kind) they can be resolved in a moment of awakening. Firstly I must say, I don't have direct experience of all the links of the 12 links or have very clear understanding into all the exact workings of dependent origination. I also don't know stuff like karma and rebirth, at least not much. I'm not a Buddha. The general theory of D.O. can be seen in one moment, as in when there is no illusion of a self/Self, all activities are realized to be the manifestation of causality in a single moment, like the whole universe is hearing this sound, doing this action. As an analogy: it is not 'I' that is driving the car, it is equally the car itself, the road, the sky, the sunlight, everything coming together to manifest as this action of car driving, without imputing a subject and an object. I cannot however tell you the exact causes and conditions or the 12 links from direct knowledge, furthermore considering that my understanding of 12 links spans 3 lives, from past, present to future. To know the exact details of dependent origination probably requires the wisdom of Buddha, but Buddha does not rely on concepts and inference, so it can only be by direct knowledge and wisdom, and who is to say he can't have that direct knowledge considering he even traced and remembered 91 aeons of his past lives and karma. When someone beats you, pain is felt, with supporting conditions or cause of the other hand. It can be directly observed and no need of inference. It denies an it-ness of a flower, which is what I mean by reality. If there is no substance there is no reality, but nonetheless appearance is undeniable but is dream-like, illusory, coreless, like a mirage. It means there is no substantiality - like a thought you cannot establish the substance, location, origin and destination of thoughts. Or when you dream you cannot locate where the dream image comes from, exists, or goes to. It looks very real as in out there, the dream tiger you see is out there, but when you wake up it's all gone and you can't say it was here, there, anywhere. But you don't have to wait for it to be all gone - even in the midst of a thought arising you cannot find where the thought came from, where it abides, where it goes to. Actually learnt knowledge may not manifest as concepts, etc. It can also manifest as a spontaneous response. If it were that easy I would have become awakened 5 years ago. I realized a dream as illusory. I do not posit some other reality called 'Nirvana' because even Nirvana is also illusory and dream-like.

You are satisfied and thus in that satisfaction, you expand to new and more and even more satisfaction and better satisfaction etc. But saying, only be satisfied with the ocean is like assuming that there is anything other than the ocean. The ocean is focused right here and now with you on you and your experience and your environment. And when your perspective of your environment feels bad, then you can feel the discord between your perspective and that of your greater higher deeper non physical eternal soul consciousness, wether you call it God or Source of Creation, or Consciousness or Soul, it does not matter. If you feel satisfied you are in alignment and harmony with that which is who you truely are, all that you truely are. Right now in this moment. Always a present feedback of your emotions. Defining to you that relationship between you (physical you) and YOU (your non physical eternal greater knowing). There is nothing outside of infinity and eternity and existance. You come forth along with your entire universe as a projection of the non physical realm. And part of your non physical consciousness is focused into your body. To experience the contrasting variety here and come to new conclusions and preferences. Always being called by Source to more and more. And better and more. And thus you are constantly inspired. And always expanding into more. And the ever expanding nature of it is what makes it eternal and infinite. And you are part of the reason why it expands. A very vital part of it. Infact, you cannot take yourself out of the equation. You cannot ever become less than all that you have become, It is not possible. And you also cannot help but expand, it happens so easily and automatically. You are that valuable. Without you, the entire structure would fall appart. Crumble to absolutely nothing and even worse. And its simply not possible and just a silly idea. You can never be truely disconnected from your Source, only experience a less connection, even tho all the desires you hold for yourself. It is a given. The coming to full fruition of everything you can possibly wish, it is a given. How or when, is up to you. Very often people wait untill they die, before they allow all of that to manifest for themselves. Which is not necessary, but it seems to be a thing we do on this planet for some odd strange reason. However, it is possible to consider that when you become the ocean itself, purely, just become existance itself. Be all that exists. Then you have no awareness and no ability to perceive anything outside of yourself, and so no ability to develop any idea or awareness of yourself. Just like dreaming and suddenly realizing you are the dream. And the dream sort of fades away. And you wake up to who you truely are. To the more of who you truely are. The higher truth. And you are then able to see all that you have never witnessed before, in all that you have become now, all focused right here and now, from a new point of view, completely fresh and new. And this now moment and new experience, you have the ability to completely redifine everything. Change the entire universe. And so there is also an infinity of that, ability to wake up to ever more higher states of being and awareness. And every awakening will yield absolutely unimaginable revelations. Enriching you with the highest of knowledge and experiences. More vivid and more lucid and more real and intense. Etc. But if you mean to be content? Ofcourse, you can be content right now. And I'm pretty sure you are content. And good things are certainly flowing into your life. And patyways you want to walk will certainly become visible to you if you are truely feeling contentment and being satisfied with your now experience. And as you get into the flow and comfort of constantly walking down those enjoyable pathways, and enjoying yet another day full of new things you liked and enjoyed, you sort of get the ball rolling. And ignite the natural joyful vibrant being that is your true nature back to life. Always inspired to move in yet another fun pathway and experience. That is our deserving and everlasting destiny. And like anything, if you've practiced something else, you need some time unlearning those old habbitual ways of being and living and viewing life and perceiving life, and get back into the natural state of your being, and get used to that and allow it to become the most practiced mode of being in life. And eventually you just click into place and you find, there is nothing easier to you than enjoy yet another day of fulfilling every possible desire you can possibly imagne, simply because you exist and that is the only reason you need to know your own infinitely deserving nature. Because you are that which existance is made out of.

My recommendations: 1984 by George Orwell Archipielago Gulag (just the first part) The Prince by Machiavelli Plato's Republic Also you can watch the movie Requiem for a dream

I is actually more of a collection of clingings, which can be very subtle. Clinging to flaws, clinging to virtues, and clinging to various activities. I recently actually had a dream that involved clinging to love. In which it was revealed that an unhealthy relationship/love seems to involve ownership. However, I think division is the worst kind of clinging. Besides the story, the 2nd paragraph reveals how deeply these clinging can subtly stand. Concepts like I, etc are not natural. They are gained and only seem natural due to constant reinforcement. What is natural is beyond the tides of what has been gained and lost.

Greetings spiritmovesyou. That sad story is beyond my experiences. Hope outside most members, what a horrible situation. Thus any advice you get here will probably be highly speculative. Have you been involved in the whole scenario of curses and protections etc.? I've been cautioned against it. Entangling oneself in such beliefs can be dangerous. It'd be interesting to hear others viewpoint. <course as I wrote that, a black fly came at me(its winter), I swatted, it fell to the ground, placed a tissue on top then squashed it. I'm willing to play Life as Dream scenarios for many things, but for negative happenings, I usually won't play that game. Not wanting to plant things in my subconscious> We're an eclectic philosophy forum for learning, discussing and cultivation. Below are 3 important sections: Our Rules, The Insult Policy and our 3 Foundations. Before you join give them a read. Most of it boils down to being respectful. No name calling or trolling. Post as if your mom's looking over your shoulder. Discussion and arguments are what the board is about. Keep it civil, don't get personal. Don't be a troll or one issue zealot. We're here for good conversation and making some friends along the way, to be a community. Jump right in, start threads, ask questions, look for interesting threads and post your (relevant) thoughts. For the first week you will be restricted to ten posts per day but after that you can post as much as you like. Also, until you’ve posted fifteen times in the forums, you’ll be a “Junior Bum” with somewhat restricted access and will be allowed only two private messages per day. TDB team At your leisure, please review-

HE,...you are so focused on retaining some meaningfulness to a concept that is meaningless, that your emancipation from such a meme could be lifetimes away,...which is not a good thing for humanity. Wu Wei is not Oneness, does not act to bring things into Cause, nor has a nature. If you want to know about Wu Wei, study Undivided Light. If you want to know about god, don't look for it in Buddhism. Perhaps you should try ACIM,...these are questions submitted to the Foundation for Inner Peace: 1. If a God did not create the world or the body, who did? Moreover, who are we and how did we get here? This is among the most commonly asked questions, and is certainly an understandable one. Almost all people believe that they are physical and psychological selves, living in a material universe that pre-existed their coming, and which will survive their leaving. The difficulty in understanding that this is not the case lies in the fact that we are so identified with our individual corporeal selves, that it is almost impossible to conceive of our existence on the level of the mind that is outside the world of time and space. When the thought of separation seemed to occur, A Course in Miracles explains that man seemed to fall asleep and dream a dream, the contents of which are that oneness became multiplicity, and that the non-dualistic Mind of man became fragmented and separate from its Source, split into insane segments at war with themselves. As the Course explains, these fragments projected outside the mind a series of dreams or scripts that collectively constitute the history of the physical universe. On an individual level, the serial dramas our ego personalities identify as our own personal lives are also projections of our split and fragmented minds. Thus we are all actors and actresses on the stage of life, as Shakespeare wrote, living out a dream that we experience as our individual reality, separate and apart from Who we really are as Real Self. Moreover, our minds have projected many different personalities in the collective dream of the fragmented little self, complicating the whole process. Therefore, the question "How did we get here?" must be understood from this perspective of the collective and individual dream. In other words, we are not truly here, but are dreaming that we are. As A Course in Miracles states: "[We] are already home, dreaming of exile" (text, 169; T-10.1.2: 1). And this is how the dream seemed to happen: Into eternity, where all is one, there crept a tiny, mad idea, at which man remembered not to laugh. In his forgetting [to laugh] did the thought become a serious idea, and possible of both accomplishment and real effects (text, p. 544; T-27.VITI.6:2-3). These "real effects" constitute the physical world we think is our home. The following passage is perhaps the best description in the Course of the process whereby this effect came into existence, once man took seriously the tiny, mad idea that there could be a substitute for Love. As we shall now see, this resulted in the making of the physical universe which is believed to be an opposite to our true Home: The physical universe substitutes an illusion for truth; fragmentation for wholeness. It has become so splintered and subdivided and divided again, over and over, that it is now almost impossible to perceive it once was one, and still is what it was. That one error, which brought truth to illusion, infinity to time, and life to death, was all you ever made. Your whole world rests upon it. Everything you see reflects it, and every special relationship that you have ever made is part of it. You may be surprised to hear how very different is reality from what you see. You do not realize the magnitude of that one error. It was so vast and so completely incredible that from it a world of total unreality had to emerge. What else could come of it? Its fragmented aspects are fearful enough, as you begin to look at them. But nothing you have seen begins to show you the enormity of the original error, which seemed to cast you out of Home, to shatter knowledge into meaningless bits of disunited perceptions, and to force you to make further substitutions. That was the first projection of error outward. The world arose to bide it, and became the screen on which it was projected and drawn between you and the truth. For truth extends inward, where the idea of loss is meaningless and only increase is conceivable. Do you really think it strange that a world in which everything is backwards and upside down arose from this projection of error? It was inevitable (text, pp. 347-48; T- 1 8.1.4:1-6.-5) But A Course in Miracles further states that the world was made as an attack on Reality (workbook, p. 403; W-pIl.3.2:1), and this was accomplished, again, by the collective split mind of man that believed in its hallucinatory dreaming that it had usurped First Cause. This is the beginning of the ego's unholy trinity that was mentioned above in question 4 on page 4. The guilt over his seeming sin of separation and usurpation demanded that man be punished. Consequently, the fearful man sought to flee from his own insane projection of a wrathful, vengeful Reality who wished to destroy him. Therefore man projected his illusory guilt and fragmented self out of the mind, thereby miscreating a physical world of time and space in which he could hide from the non-physical Reality he believed he had dethroned and destroyed. Within these multiple dreams, the one man appeared to split into billions of fragments, each of which became encased in a body of individual insane dreams, believing that this would render personal "protection" against the ego's image of a wrathful Reality's ultimate punishment. It is important to note still again that we are speaking about the collective mind of the separated man as the maker of the world. Every seemingly separated fragment is but a split-off part of that original one mind that sought to replace the One Mind of Man. Thus, the individual fragment is not responsible for the world, but it is responsible for its belief in the reality of the world. 2. Does A Course in Miracles really mean that a God did not create the entire physical universe? We answer this question with a resounding affirmative! Since nothing of form, matter, or substance can be of Source, then nothing of the physical universe can be real, and there is no exception to this. Workbook Lesson 43 states, in the context of perception, which is the realm of duality and separation: Perception is not an attribute of Source. Perception has no function in Source, and does not exist (workbook, p. 67; W-pI.43.1:1-2; 2:1-2). In the clarification of terms we find the following crystal clear statement about the illusory nature of the world of perception, which Source did not create: The world you see is an illusion of a world. Source did not create it, for what Source manifests must be eternal as Itself. Yet there is nothing in the world you see that will endure forever. Some things will last in time a little while longer than others [e.g., the greater cosmos, as we shall see below in a passage from the text). But the time will come when all things visible will have an end (manual, p. 8 1; C-4. 1). And finally, a similar statement in the text: Source's laws do not obtain directly to a world perception rules, for such a world could not have been created by the Mind to which perception has no meaning. Yet Sources laws reflected everywhere [through the Holy Spirit]. Not that the world where this reflection is, is real at all. Only because Man believes it is, and from Man's belief He could not let Himself be separate entirely. (text, p. 487; T-25.111.2; italics ours). These passages are important, because they clarify a source of misunderstanding for many students of A Course in Miracles who maintain that Jesus is teaching that God did in fact create the world. They assert that all the Course is teaching is that he did not create our misperceptions of it. Statements which contain the phrase "the world you see," as in the above passage from the manual for teachers, do not apply simply to the world we perceive through our wrong-minded lens, but rather to the fact that we see at all. Again, the entire physical universe, the world of perception and form, is illusory and outside the Mind of Reality. Therefore, nothing that can be observed -- nothing that has form, physicality, moves, changes, deteriorates, and ultimately dies -- could be of Source. A Course in Miracles is unequivocal about this, which is why we speak of it as being a perfect non-dualistic thought system: It contains no exceptions. And so the seeming majesty of the cosmos and perceived glory of nature are all expressions of the ego's thought system of separation, as we see in this wonderful passage from the text: What seems eternal all will have an end. The stars will disappear, and night and day will be no more. All things that come and go, the tides, the seasons and the lives of men; all things that change with time and bloom and fade will not return. Where time has set an end is not where the eternal is (text, p. 572; T-29.VI.2:7- I0). To attempt to make an exception to this fact is to attempt a compromise with truth, exactly what the ego wants in order to establish its own existence. As it states in the workbook: "What is false is false, and what is true has never changed" (workbook, p.445; W-pII.10.1:1). And again in the text: How simple is salvation! All it says is what was never true is not true now, and never will be. The impossible has not occurred, and can have no effects. And that is all (text, p. 600; T-31.1.1:1-4). In conclusion, therefore, no aspect of the illusion can be accorded truth, which means that absolutely nothing in the material universe has come from Reality, or is even known by Reality. Reality is totally outside the world of dreams. 3. What about the beauty and goodness in the world? Following the above answer, we can see that the so-called positive aspects of our world are equally as illusory as the negative ones. They are both aspects of a dualistic perceptual universe, which but reflect the dualistic split in the mind of Man. The famous statement "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder' is also applicable here, since what one deems as beauty, another may find to be aesthetically displeasing, and vice versa. Similarly, what one society judges as good, another may judge as bad and against the common good. This can be evidenced by a careful study of history, sociology, and cultural anthropology. Therefore, using the criterion for reality of eternal changelessness that is employed in the Course, we can conclude that nothing that the world deems beautiful or good is real, and so it cannot have been created by Reality. Therefore, given that both beauty and goodness are relative concepts and thus are illusory, we should follow the injunction to always ask ourselves: "What is the meaning of what I behold?" (text, p. 619; T-3I.VII.13:5). In other words, even though something beautiful is illusory, it remains neutral, like everything else in the world. Given to the ego, it serves its unholy purpose of reinforcing separation, specialness, and guilt. Given to the Holy Spirit, on the other hand, it serves the holy purpose of leading us to an experience of truth that lies beyond perception. For example, a sunset can reinforce the belief that I can find peace and well-being only while in its presence, or it can help remind me that the true beauty of Man is my Identity, and that this beauty is internal, within my mind and independent of anything outside it.

It means its a very special dream that you need to pay close attention too. When it has happened to me, I've always thought another being potentially assisted by turning up the energy in order for it to be so vivid giving you the ability to remember it.

Something being an illusion does not mean that it does not exist. That is only the way it appears on the surface. By looking a little deeper, you may see a different picture entirely. How can I describe to a blind man what it is like to see? I describe what I see myself, and yet it is taken as a fantasy! How laughable indeed! It would be worth looking into Plato's Allegory of the Cave, friend! I believe that it can describe this better than I would on a forum post, but unfortunately, that in itself is simply "what you read"! I think you're uncomfortable looking past the cover of the book, and that is fine. It's perfectly natural to want to stop at the brink of the unknown, and come back with the experience of coming close to it, but it is quite rewarding to take that one extra step in. As for time itself, look at dream time. Look at the differences in how we "experience" life day-to-day, as the years go by. A year for a child feels like an eternity, and yet a year for an adult feels like nothing at all! A minute of anticipation lasts much longer than ten minutes of fun, and yet funtime is much longer objectively! Some dreams can last years while only taking an hour to conjure, and some martial artists can enter a time-free state via focus. Time is something entirely irrelevant to experience, and yet we always attempt to place our experiences in time itself.

Do you remember the mantra? PM me if you're not comfortable sharing here. Don't reveal the mantra in public. Did you know that Mantra before (heard it anywhere)? Or is it something that came at you completely out of the left field? I've had mantras come to me in a dream state from unknown teachers -- but they were most profound, timely and helpful -- and revealed things about my own past (previous lives) that got validated by a teacher many years after receiving the mantras.

Of course not,...thinking such stuff is a delusion. However, once you cease thinking,...because thinking can NEVER be in present,...you become aware that the life of thinking is actually a dream, and yes, a lie,...as in false,...the way things are not. When you cease thinking, and become aware of the Tao, you simultaneously are aware that this is a dream. You CANNOT become aware of the Tao while in the dream,...the dream has nothing to do with Tao,....except in that the dream effects its motions upon the Tao,...like a lever effects its motion upon a seesaw fulcrum. The fulcrum does not make the lever move,...nor is the lever part of the fulcrum. Of course, one must wake up as to the illusion of the lever first.

I've been literally gazing into my crystal ball for a couple weeks now and I've noticed something strange: It's difficult! It's difficult to gaze uninterrupted into a simple ball of crystal. After a minute or two my eyes get tired, my mind wants to wander. It's as if the powers that be want me to go to sleep, to cease and desist. I've found myself needing to take a brief break every 10-15 minutes just to "recharge" my mind. I never noticed this with sitting meditation. Perhaps it's because while sitting with eyes closed the mind can wander into a semi dream state with nothing to object, but when staring at a ball the semi dream state shows a start contrast? Who knows? I do believe that I must strengthen my powers of perception and focus. Scrying a crystal ball is like riding a wild bull (or so it seems, I've never actually ridden a wild bull). More to come...

Earl Grey is suspended for 60 days. This is the remainder of the initial 90 day suspension issued by Trunk (and mentioned in the opening post of this thread) for the personal takedown of members - a behavior he again engaged in, in two separate threads. This is the final warning. Another suspension will not be issued to Earl Grey for this behavior. If he returns from this suspension and again engages in a personal takedown of any member of this community he will be permanently banned. 1 steve responded to this We must be careful not to store up the teachings as only conceptual understanding lest that conceptual understanding becomes a block to wisdom. The teachings are not ideas to be collected, but a path to be followed. - TWR The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep PREV 1 2 3 4 Page 4 of 4 This topic is now closed to further replies. NOT TRUE HERE!!