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Biology of Illusion
Here are some words about “illusory or reality” and the need for caution when I speak about either to self and other.
It’s mind that confuses reality and illusoriness, not the brain. The brain cannot tell the difference between a so-called “real” external, physical stimulus and an “imaginary” internal one. It simply relays electro-chemical energies.
Once the “real” or “imaginary” stimulus trips the neural circuitry and the brain responds to synaptic firings, I end up feeling what I feel, hearing what I hear, tasting what I taste and thinking what I think.
While these first impressions may be compelling, I need to maintain spaciousness of mind as to whether it is snake or coiled rope I encounter. And to remember that brain is a loyal but not infallible servant.
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Peter, you do find the soft spots.
Using the term "need" often unnecessarily raises the bar. Typically to me "need" presages a requirement of bodily or psychological survival. Or sometimes it stands for a mandatory action, not quite a gun to my head. And sometimes it just means I need to do something if I want this other thing. If I don't want this other thing then don't do the required something.
To the extent I think I find myself enmeshed in some refining process of understanding, I sense the need not to jump to conclusions. Every time I think I have a "gotcha!"' I find out I don't. So this term "need" is evolving, a work in progress for me. Therefore it is still a bit mushy. Most likely it's still probably a "want" trying to dress up as a "need".
Words, do I really need them? Can't seem to comfortably live with them and can't seem to live without them.
Thanks again for your feedback.
To me, a need is synonymous with an imperative. In other words, there is no choice.
It seems to me that even pure conscious energy/love, the ground of all being, All That Is (paradoxically that which cannot be expressed in words), obeys its own imperative to create and express itself as all things, imagined or 'real,' including these words. Otherwise, how would this dialogue, or this universe, even be possible?
Why would 'All That Is' even begin to express itself, if there were not an imperative to do so? And thus, why should our own body-mind, that unique human expression of "All That Is' created in its own image, not also obey an imperative to create and express itself.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. In other Words, they are inseparable. Thus, the creator obeys its imperative and becomes the creation. There is no other choice. They are one ever-evolving process, in this one eternal moment. It is that which we are, it is that which we do. Always was, always will be. Might as well get used to it, because apparently there is no end to this beginning. ;-)
Funny, danalomas. When I read your preferred term of "imperative to create", I see the phrase as a mask for "will".
Which implies that All That Is has a will. A will to create. Or that the ocean has a will to create waves.
I tend to be cautious about assigning anthropomorphic qualities, including that of possessing a will, to emptiness/ nothingness. Or the source of everything.
I would tend to agree with that observation. However, it should be said that perhaps there is a subtle difference between 'will' and 'imperative.' To me,'will' implies a choice, whereas, 'imperative,' implies no choice. In other words, it must be thus. So "Thy 'will' be done on earth, as it is in heaven," becomes Thy 'imperative.' So yes, in that sense, the ocean has no choice but to create waves.
Again, if there is no imperative to create, why would anything, either 'real' or 'imagined' or 'illusory' even exist at all? Why is there not absolutely nothing, in which case, this conversation would be impossible?
"Again, if there is no imperative to create, why would anything, either 'real' or 'imagined' or 'illusory' even exist at all? Why is there not absolutely nothing, in which case, this conversation would be impossible?"
Glad you asked. They're wave questions, of course. It seems, to me, that the imperative to create answers certain questions to you. The ones that you cited, for example.
It's natural for a wave to want to understand the ocean in wave terms. The imperative to create is one such example. So is the question why.
But there's a difference between a wave understanding the ocean and being the ocean. And I suspect the the latter requires us to drop our efforts to understand the ocean as a wave... and just be it.
All this talk of waves and oceans is making me seasick ;-)
Strange you should bring up this wave/ocean metaphor. I just returned from Margarita Island, where I walked along the beach every morning at daybreak with the waves crashing on the shore, as the sun rose from the sea like some golden god. The sound of the waves, the immensity of the sea, the reflected fire of the sun, the sensation of the wind on my skin ...
it was the only affirmation I needed of the awesome beauty and mystery of this creation.
You're right of course, and I can only smile at how we can ever fail to see it, in our efforts to understand it.
I like that thought ... 'Just be it'... or 'let it be'... or even 'just be.' Verbing, as PH would say
The fewer words the better (:
Thanks Peter
Dana, thank you for the reminder of the bigger picture and the underlying imperative of no apparent choice.
I find myself in one of those ever changing, existential swinging mood arcs, back and forth, a-rhythmically, between transcendent awareness and embodied awareness, for lack of a better description.
From the transcendent awareness perspective the cosmos is seen as impersonal, no right or wrong, up or down, divine or profane, neither purposeful nor purposeless. It simply is as it is; the mysterious unknowable source.
However, from embodied manifestation/human being perspective, it’s very personal as seen and heard and experienced from my particular point of view.
Thus I’ve come to see and absorb how awareness, consciousness, the cosmos, the universe apparently awakens to itself through this human manifestation. Awakening may be inevitable, it may not be necessary, and may occur to some and not to "me."
To the extent there is a spectrum of consciousness and for the sake of illustration, I envision rock consciousness, ant consciousness, dog consciousness, human consciousness, planetary consciousness, solar consciousness, cosmic consciousness, etc, etc.
As it turns out, “I” am manifested as human being accessing human consciousness. So a question that gradually emerged was, "Why am I knocking myself out looking for the supernova of cosmic awakening out there?"
Why not start where I am and explore human consciousness to the extent that relative reality is subsumed within absolute reality, and there really is no separation between water droplet consciousness and oceanic consciousness and everything is everything is interconnected?
So there is this movement for me now from mind to heart, from the impersonal analytical to the personal and emotional, from the safety of the castle, moat and facade of public persona to the vulnerability of naked self, here I am.
I can’t help but see there is a human scale to awakening that I am only now appreciating, where suffering and grief and loss and confusion and fear and aloneness and communion and friendship and compassion and loving kindness and open heartedness are all part of the trip, this human condition of ours.
I believe there are no gated communities and safe harbors of consciousness, where this is acceptable and that is not. And I experience this inner dialogue, monologue, between mind saying no, not this, and heart saying yes, this too. I see that the heart is as consciousness is, as absolute reality is, whereby nothing and no one is excluded. And the seeing has not prevented me from being painfully jostled on this hard and bumpy ride and landing in a ditch when attention was distracted by an intriguing observation.
Sometimes I speak from the personal perspective and sometimes from the impersonal. And I see from time to time there is that which never changes and there is that in form which ever changes.
So I’ve grown accustomed now, more or less, to the back-and-forth and forth-and-back of this movement whereby the heart inevitably breaks and heals and breaks and heals in the course of an intransigent requisite tenderizing, again and again and again in order that compassion and loving kindness eke forth in me.
I guess this is part of the maturation process and so far I have found no short cuts though I’ve looked and looked and looked.
Be that as it may, I am always appreciative when Self speaks to Self on this journey of unfolding. And sometimes word of mouth is better than a map when trying to find a rest area or gas station.
Regards
Thanks for the feedback Tony. I couldn’t have expressed it more eloquently.
I (whoever or whatever ‘I’ may be) am in a space now where everything seems perfectly natural to me. Like the waxing and waning of the moon, the ocean tides, the seasons, even life itself, these cycles of the human psyche, the flowing back and forth between the personal and the impersonal, pure unconditioned consciousness and culturally conditioned self-consciousness, waking and dreaming, left-brain and right-brain, certainty and uncertainty, stillness and restlessness, etc, are no different.
Why, or how, should it be otherwise? Why do we divorce our own humanness from the natural ebb and flow of nature? Any attempt to dwell solely in one state or the other is to deny our own wholeness and oneness with the natural processes of life. Should we ever lament that the moon isn’t always full, or a cherry tree isn’t always in blossom, we would certainly see the folly in that. And yet, somehow we believe that we should remain in some unchanging state of being. I say embrace it all, for it all has its natural and rightful purpose in the bigger picture, and yes that means even death itself -- whether that be the death of the ego-structure or the body.
It may be over-simplifying, but I sometimes believe that we just need to put our faith in our own natural being and becoming, and stop all this fretting. But I suppose even that fretfulness has its role to play. So I don’t even sweat the fretting anymore. Like everything else in Nature’s scheme of things, it comes and goes, ebbs and flows, and its all perfectly natural.
Cheers
Hiya, Tony.
"While these first impressions may be compelling, I need to maintain spaciousness of mind as to whether it is snake or coiled rope I encounter."
I confess, Tony. Whenever I hear someone use the word "need", it makes my ears perk.
Is this truly a need of yours?
TIA