The Illusion Of Suffering Part 4

Many people end up telling themselves 'It's all over. The story of my life is beyond repair.'

The thing is...the 'story' forms in the current moment and reflects emotional states. Human life is like a bunch of movie scenes that nobody is making and nobody is directing since humans do not have free will and are mere dream entities.

All you are looking at is a mirror that continuously shows various emotional states.

If the emotions change, the 'frangmented disjointed movie scenes' will change too. There is no logic, continuity, depth in these human non-stories. All they do is reflect instantaneous emotional states.

What you think your life story is, is not true vision. It is delusion. Hallucination.

"Vision already holds a replacement for everything you think you see now." ACIM Lesson 023.

Reactions in the mind-body should be observed as these statements are read. An unseen layer of tension and resistance may be seen as this blog entry is read.
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Real comfort can come from nowhere except from deep within.

And it is ever present.

The 'Buddha within.' is always at peace. The deep, calm, serious, peaceful person who is reading these words...

The Buddha within is your default state. Always was.

'Buddha in the Veins'.



'Buddha in My Blood'.



And to all those of you who are suffering very badly...

Here's to the beautiful wonderous dream...which is already unfolding in your life, but you're not able to see it currently due to heavy hallucinations induced by horrible feelings floating in your vicinity...

(Olivia Newton John - Magic)

Dust In The Wind

Kansas sings 'All we are is dust in the wind'....

We are not even dust in the wind actually.

Some facts about our existence.

1. We live for 80-90 years, the universe is approximately 13 billion years old.

2. We are inconsequential on the cosmic scale. Take a look at the following animation, made by using images from rense.com.

The Sun's diameter is 109 times that of the earth....i.e. its volume is 109*109*109=1.3 million times the volume of the earth.

You need 1.3 million earths to fill up the volume of the Sun!

The above graphic shows that the Sun is invisible on a scale on which Antares (photo 5) is a supergiant. Antares' diameter is 700 times the diameter of the Sun...i.e. its volume is 700*700*700=343 million times that of the Sun.

i.e. You need 343 million Suns to fill up the volume of Antares!

Let us look at some more facts.

A star named "VY Canis Majoris" has the largest diameter out of all known stars, 1800 to 2100 times that of the Sun.

i.e. You need 9.3 billion Suns to fill up VY Canis Majoris!

Let us look at some other facts.

A star named "LBV 1806-20" , located approx. 40,000 light-years from the Sun, is 38 million times brighter than the Sun.

i.e. you need to put together 38 million Suns to get the brightness of one LBV 1806-20!

If the Sun is as bright as a 1 watt bulb........LBV 1806-20 is as bright as a 38 million watt bulb!

Despite its phenomenal brilliance , LBV 1806-20 is virtually invisible from the solar system. Its distance from us is so huge that its light gets obscured on the way.

The distances within our galaxy are so huge that even a star that shines brighter than 38 million Suns is invisible to us!

Antares, VY Canis Majoris and LBV 1806-20 are just three stars.

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, has 400 billion stars...

And the Milky Way is just ONE tiny galaxy among more than 130 billion galaxies in the known universe.

Total number of stars in the universe is estimated to be: 50,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. (50,000 billion billion).

Kansas rightly sings...'All we are is dust in the wind'......but isn't our pride beyond imagination?

So the questions are........

Where do we stand? What is our importance, if any, keeping in mind the frightening scales of distance and time, in the cosmos?

Kansas sings:

"Just a drop of water in an endless sea
All we do
Crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see
Dust in the wind
All we are is dust in the wind,
Nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky..."

(Sarah Brightman singing 'Dust in the Wind' and 'Who Wants to live Forever'.)

The Illusion Of Suffering Part 3 (Thich Quang Duc)

On June 11, 1963, Thich Quang Duc, a Buddhist monk from Vietnam, burned himself to death at a busy intersection in Saigon as a protest against repressive policies of the Catholic Diem regime. Buddhist monks asked the regime to lift its ban on flying the traditional Buddhist flag, to grant Buddhism the same rights as Catholicism, to stop detaining Buddhists and to give Buddhist monks and nuns the right to practice and spread their religion.

While burning, the monk Thich Quang Duc showed no signs of discomfort, pain or fear. He was at peace. It is said he was not under the influence of any drug at the time.

Assuming that this incident happened exactly as is reported...it points to something.

It points to the illusion of suffering. In my view.

So the question arises...HOW he could self immolate without feeling pain and discomfort and fear.

The answer could be that he had seen through the illusion of pain, fear, suffering and all such emotions. He had realised that such emotions cannot be real.

So what is the evidence that this HYPOTHESIS (that pain and suffering are an illusion) has some substance to it?

There can be no undebatable evidence really. Only pointers.

Many spiritual teachers say we humans are going through the 'dream of suffering'. Plenty of them say it. Not just one or two.

Our experience with sleep proves that only when the dream is over does one realise that it was all a dream, and never happened. We were just THINKING that it was happening. (If we think something is happening, it does not mean it is happening, of course.)

This...to me...is a very strong pointer.

But the strongest pointer is that mystics have been talking about the 'dream of suffering' for thousands of years.
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The fleeting nature of this life is self evident. The audio-visual quality of memories of what happened just 10 minutes back are no different from the audio-visual quality of memories of what happened 10 years back.

CONCLUSION:

The audio visual quality of memories of what happened 10 minutes back, logically speaking, should be stronger than the audio-visual quality of memories of what happened 10 years back....but is it?

This question opens one's mind to a huge number of questions. One answer forms, then another one forms, the mind dances.....but this question is worth remembering, from time to time.

Just the mere consideration of this question, and WATCHING mental-emotional reactions as this question is considered is a good way of seeing how one's perspective towards this question evolves.

As one's perspective towards this question evolves, a certain amount of detachment from life occurs. Which is always a good thing.

The Face Of Sanity

Sanity exists, in this world...!!

Control Freaks and Love

This post is just hypothesis, a flight of fancy. It is important to WATCH mental-emotional reactions that appear as this post is read, nothing more. No conclusions need to be drawn on how the blog owner looks at life and people!

In engineering, there is a term called 'degrees of freedom'. It refers to movement---lack of it, or ability for it, in a mechanism or machine part.

All engineering is about limiting and controlling the 'degrees of freedom' in a machine (or mechanism), so that it works in whatever way the designer wants it to work.

So a machine is nothing more than a set of components that control each other, communicate with each other in a strict manner, and move in set, predictable patterns.

So what are people who enjoy limiting the 'degrees of freedom' in other humans?

The graphic below, of a machine like skull and bones, has 'meat meter' written on its forehead. This is a very accurate representation of such people, because such people are just 'meat meters' who meter and barter human meat on a daily basis.

Such people can't be called alive, because they do not treat other people like they were alive.

They are machines because they want to control, restrict, and want others to be like them---move in set, predictable patterns that THEY wish to see. Such humans are nothing more than the 'Central Processing Unit' that controls and runs a computer.

Such people (machines pretending to be humans) treat even their own children like they would treat a machine. Control, restrict, bend, crush.

Machines in human form have robotic emotions. If one watches such people carefully, one will realise that one is talking to some kind of a machine...the proof will evidence itself in terms of the more or less predictable and C-grade emotional reactions in such people....and a total lack of mercy. Only pretense of mercy. Machines in human form just 'operate', optimise the flow of human meat through their systems. That's all.

No one who is sane will admire and respect a control freak who's passion in life is to take away other people's freedom and restrict them in some way. Restricting or wanting to restrict another human even in ONE way means that you have a 'machine' controlling your head.

So there is no such thing as 'conditional love'. It has to be unconditional. Machines put conditions on their environment, not life.

A person who is a control freak is not a free person. A control freak responds to control. A person who wants to control also wants to be controlled, although it may not be obvious. It is not human, it is just a machine. Binary machine. The binary states being 'Control me' and 'I want to control you'. These are signs of machineness. Nothing else.

Attributes of a machine walking around in human form:

1. Stresses too much on discipline and protocols and procedures.

2. Wants to control, restrict, bend, optimise, barter.

3. Wants to spy on you because it wants all the information possible on you, so that it can control you.

A great song by Pink Floyd....named 'Welcome to the machine' has the following lyrics.

'Welcome my son, welcome to the machine....
Where have you been?
Its alright we know where you've been.
What did you dream?
Its alright we told you what to dream.'

The Illusion Of Suffering part 2 (Learn To Be Still)

This is part 2 of my blog entry 'The Illusion Of Suffering'.

The lyrics of this song 'Learn To Be Still' by 'The Eagles' run very deep..they talk of the need to be STILL and WATCH what is going on in one's life, in one's mind...in the world in general.

Being STILL and WATCHING is all that needs to be done. From a certain point of view, it is not incorrect to say that stillness and awareness grow on their own, without anyone doing anything. (See my blog entry 'The Dance Of Life'.)

Evolution is a process that happens on its own. But one must be aware of the value and the healing that stillness and watching provide.

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'Learn To Be Still' lyrics:

It's just another day in paradise
As you stumble to your bed
You'd give anything to silence
Those voices ringing in your head
You thought you could find happiness
Just over that green hill
You thought you would be satisfied
But you never will-
Learn to be still

We are like sheep without a shepherd
We don't know how to be alone
So we wander 'round this desert
And wind up following the wrong gods home
But the flock cries out for another
And they keep answering that bell
And one more starry-eyed messiah
Meets a violent farewell-
Learn to be still
Learn to be still

Now the flowers in your garden
They don't smell so sweet
Maybe you've forgotten
The heaven lying at your feet

There are so many contradictions
In all these messages we send
(We keep asking)
How do I get out of here?
Where do I fit in?

Though the world is torn and shaken
Even if your heart is breakin'
It's waiting for you to awaken
And someday you will-
Learn to be still
Learn to be still

You just keep on runnin'
Keep on runnin'
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They sing 'Its just another day in paradise'....then they sing 'maybe you've forgotten the heaven lying at your feet'.

They seem to be saying that life is already perfect, that life never went wrong at all. That all suffering is an illusion.

There are so many contradictions
In all these messages we send
(We keep asking)
How do I get out of here?
Where do I fit in?

Though the world is torn and shaken
Even if your heart is breakin'
It's waiting for you to awaken...

And someday you will...

(Just) learn to be still...


Over here they are saying that thinking about the deep, painful questions of life is of no use. The mind does not have the ability to answer such questions.

The essence of the song is...'Learn to be Still'. Through stillness and calm watching of what is going on, awareness of life will grow and as awareness grows, all answers will come on their own, when the time is right.

Waiting for answers, desperately seeking answers to painful questions is a part of the illusion that the mind has built. The mind does NOT want any answers, the mind does NOT want to solve any problems. And it cant.

Only stillness, WITHOUT slipping into what Pink Floyd so beautifully expresses as the 'Comfortably Numb' condition, is the answer.

As stillness comes, awareness grows and understanding of life deepens. And painful questions answer themselves. Slowly but surely.

Life seems to flow in a vaxing and vaning manner because it is in the nature of the ego to vax and vane.

.......

The Eagles sing 'Its just another day in paradise'....then they sing 'maybe you've forgotten the heaven lying at your feet'.

These statements are not at all vague. So many spiritual paths say that suffering is an illusion.

Here are a few paraphrases....I do not have the sources at my disposal currently.

'Only that which is real is real, and deep down life know what is real. Illusions fight with themselves all the time, and illusions will wear themselves out when the time comes.' --- A Course In Miracles.

'A Course In Miracles' says that only illusions fight with themselves. Life does not fight with itself. The illusion that life is fighting with itself will wear out when the time comes.

'Stillness Speaks'--Eckhart Tolle.

All through this book named 'Stillness Speaks', and in his other books, Tolle insists that humans are in the grip of illusion. That real life is not and cannot be in conflict with itself.

Eastern mysticism talks of 'Maya' and insists that suffering is an illusion.

Such messages that come through, about the illusion of suffering, are everywhere. More examples will be added to this blog entry, in time.

Luminous Emptiness

"The Death Process as Described in "The Tibetan Book of the Dead."

I. The Moment of Death, and the Clear Light of Pure Reality.

First of all there will appear to you, swifter than lightning, the luminous splendor of the colorless light of Emptiness, and that will surround you on all sides. Terrified, you will want to flee from the radiance, and you may well lose consciousness. Try to submerge yourself in that light, giving up all belief in a separate self, all attachment to your illusory ego. Recognize that the boundless Light of this true Reality is your own true self, and you shall be saved!

Few, however, are those who, having missed salvation during their life on earth, can attain it during this brief instant which passes so quickly. The overwhelming majority are shocked into unconsciousness by the terror they feel...." - Tibetan Book Of The Dead





This image reminds me of a book named 'Luminous Emptiness', by Francesca Fremantle, a disciple of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, the founder of Naropa University, a university dedicated to Tibetan Buddhism and other miscellaneous eastern mystical schools.

Here is a short story I wrote based on this photograph:

"Luminous Thunder of Consciousness"

As the colourless light of emptiness reveals itself to the girl...she feels afraid.

The light comforts her, assumes various forms to amuse her and console her...but still she feels afraid.

"The human forms around you are just dream phenomena, not people says one. I look like a being to you but I am not a being. In fact, all the beings around you are formless life, conscious emptiness, pure innocent platonic love, talking to you."




"Just hear what we have to say", say the formless beings in chorus.

"If you do not understand what you hear, have faith...and keep listening, keep watching...and allow life to flow through you without resistance, allow the words to flow without resistance...all we are doing is shining the light of awareness on the demonic forces that are around you, so do not be afraid, just watch, and hear our words, and the light will grow...the demonic energy will transmute into bliss..."

"To do our job, we have to say and do crazy things...we cannot explain why, you won't understand right now."

"Just quietly listen to, and watch the dance that formless life does, as it displays its platonic love, its wonder, its power. Do not fear...we are here to restore you, not destroy you."

"Liberation through hearing during the Bardo phase, like the book 'Luminous Emptiness' says..."

"You will feel ok as your awareness increases and you see the reality of the pseudo-horror around you..."

And the dance continues...

Dreidel

Lyrics of 'Dreidel' by Don McLean. A wonderful song about life's dance, and how it makes us dance.

I feel like a spinning top or a Dreidel
The spinning don't stop when you leave the cradle
You just slow down
Round and around the world you go
Spinning through the lives of the people you know
We all slow down
How you gonna keep on turning from day to day?
How you gonna keep from turning your life away?

No days you can borrow, no time you can buy.
No trust in tomorrow. It's a lie.
And I feel like I'm dippin' and divin'.
My sky shoes are spiked with lead heels.
I'm lost in this star car I'm drivin'.
But my air sole keeps pushin' big wheels.
My world is a constant confusion.
My mind is prepared to attack.
My past a persuasive illusion.
I'm watchin' the future it's black.
What do you know?
You know just what you perceive.
What can you show?
Nothing of what you believe.
And as you grow, each thread of life that you leave
Will spin around your deeds and dictate your needs
As you sell your soul and you sow your seeds
And you wound yourself and your loved one bleed
And your habits grow, and your conscience feeds
On all that you thought you should be
I never thought this could happen to me.

I feel like a spinning top or a dreidel.
The spinning don't stop when you leave the cradle.
You just slow down.
Round and around the world you go
Spinning through the lives of the people you know.
We all slow down.
How you gonna keep on turning from day to day?
How you gonna keep from turning your life away? Oh..

I feel like a spinning top or a dreidel.
The spinning don't stop when you leave the cradle.
You just slow down.

The Dance Of Life

The play of this life...all a happening, nobody is doing much. All events that unfold in this world are happening on their own. People are just puppets who are a part of the happening, they are not doing much. Even the little that they do is an illusion.

What people are actually doing* is totally different from what they THINK they are doing.

It is a 'Living Dream' that is unfolding. Eckhart Tolle terminology.

The 'Living Dream' is based on an 'awakened reality', but it's a fictitious version of the 'awakened reality'.

*The 'Living Dream' does not have any doership, only an illusion of doership.

The following video shows how life moves in this world...no one is doing anything...it is all flowing on its own.

Link: SnabbStart

Panis Angelicus

Two versions of Panis Angelicus that I am fond of...

By Luciano Pavarotti and Sting, 1992:

By Chloe Angnew, a beautiful singer from Ireland. Very pretty girl and sings well too.

Himalayas on Roerich

I was always fascinated by the Himalayas and their surrealistic, mystical beauty. My last trip to the Himalayas was 5 years ago, and I remember the fantastic timeless feeling they instilled in me. Time seems to have come to a standstill, in the obscure recesses of the Himalayas.

Here is a wonderful photograph named 'Himalayas on Roerich'. Named after Nicholas Roerich.

Nicholas Roerich (1874-1947) was a russian who spent most of his life in the Himalayas, painting them with a crazy passion. Nicholas Roerich is considered a mystic by many.




This photograph reminds me of a poem I wrote in my college days.
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"The orange glow of the evening sky,
teases my senses, allures me

I take a walk
and sit outside the 9th block

And watch mother nature's hypnotic dance

Sometimes ferocious, sometimes tender

Fast, furious, fierce, feisty...

I get mesmerised by her beauty...

and wish that the moment freezes eternally..."
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**9th block was the name of my college hostel.

Image link: Himalayas on Roerich.