This aliveness is our most intimate knowledge and does not depend on what one believes.
I was present at a playoff baseball game last night. The energy in the crowd was palpable. I looked around and felt aliveness everywhere. There was a shared understanding of the game and the situation at hand. There was no "belief" involved whatsoever (for me, but it seemed to be the case for everyone). Sure, after the fact, all sorts of "beliefs" might rear there head about mistakes, bad calls, who was wrong/who was right, but in the tense moments, it just felt like "aliveness". Pretty cool, to say the least!
I know this is a peculiar situation to relate to what you said about aliveness, but it really is how it felt!
l write this upon discovering your book depending on no-thing and reading a post on your blog. I am wondering how you can say we know nothing and at the same time dismiss the deep spiritual concepts that have been with us since the beginning with such certainty and crudeness? You claim that all of these spiritual teachers, including Jesus, are not aware of the Truth and are just putting on a show. How can you be so sure? Perhaps there is a reason so many flock to 'their' teachings? Perhaps the deep resonance with ancient words and teachings alludes to the Divine Mystery that is the human condition. You say that you are awake. Surely others are awake, too. And awake to what exactly, if not the Truth of God, Source, Divine Conciousness? Being awake to the fact that the human body does indeed 'die' and decompose back into the earth is not necessarily Enlightening. What is En-Light-ening is coming to peace with this in the midst of understanding the Great unnamable Truth. The Way of the Gods and Buddhas. The Tao. It is all here, in this moment, and no words are necessary to speak it into existence. May Peace be upon you and may your days be blessed. // J
PS I was looking to email but found no handle. Feel free to answer me via email if you prefer DS
If you mean are we JUST bodies, that's a strange question. Did you ever consider Gary to have been JUST a body? I'd bet not.
If you never thought of Gary as being just a body, then what are you wondering about?
It seems clear to me that each of us manifests as a unique flow of perceptions, feelings, and thoughts, AND a body. If that flow stops, the body is not called by a name anymore. Why? Because it was never the body that bore the name--it was the flow we called by name. Without that flow--that aliveness--a body is only a corpse.
Thank you, I get caught up in the matter vs consciousness bullshit and discount my own experience of this aliveness. It’s not an illusion exists! And I get to experience it.
I love this line:
This aliveness is our most intimate knowledge and does not depend on what one believes.
I was present at a playoff baseball game last night. The energy in the crowd was palpable. I looked around and felt aliveness everywhere. There was a shared understanding of the game and the situation at hand. There was no "belief" involved whatsoever (for me, but it seemed to be the case for everyone). Sure, after the fact, all sorts of "beliefs" might rear there head about mistakes, bad calls, who was wrong/who was right, but in the tense moments, it just felt like "aliveness". Pretty cool, to say the least!
I know this is a peculiar situation to relate to what you said about aliveness, but it really is how it felt!
I don't find it peculiar at all, Scott. Yes, this aliveness everywhere does not depend on what one believes.
So many of us miss that, so ardently do we burn to be given "answers" to ultimate questions.
Awake, I say, is when that fire dies out, and we find ourselves here in the now without such answers and even without questions.
Some years ago, a colleague and I were chatting about zen, and he said "But what lies BEYOND zen?"
My perspective then, and consequently my reply, was "Nothing"....I thought then that zen was the ultimate philosophy and practice.
Now, I would, I think, give the same answer - but because the question feels meaningless, and the response is "no-thing".
In gratitude for your sharing.
Such a clear description of what I and myself really is. Could "awake" be as simple as just really understanding that?
Dear Robert,
l write this upon discovering your book depending on no-thing and reading a post on your blog. I am wondering how you can say we know nothing and at the same time dismiss the deep spiritual concepts that have been with us since the beginning with such certainty and crudeness? You claim that all of these spiritual teachers, including Jesus, are not aware of the Truth and are just putting on a show. How can you be so sure? Perhaps there is a reason so many flock to 'their' teachings? Perhaps the deep resonance with ancient words and teachings alludes to the Divine Mystery that is the human condition. You say that you are awake. Surely others are awake, too. And awake to what exactly, if not the Truth of God, Source, Divine Conciousness? Being awake to the fact that the human body does indeed 'die' and decompose back into the earth is not necessarily Enlightening. What is En-Light-ening is coming to peace with this in the midst of understanding the Great unnamable Truth. The Way of the Gods and Buddhas. The Tao. It is all here, in this moment, and no words are necessary to speak it into existence. May Peace be upon you and may your days be blessed. // J
PS I was looking to email but found no handle. Feel free to answer me via email if you prefer DS
Robert, I was with my husband Gary, when he died. The experience of having a body without that aliveness of Gary, made me really wonder…
Are we a body?
Condolences on your loss, Laurie.
If you mean are we JUST bodies, that's a strange question. Did you ever consider Gary to have been JUST a body? I'd bet not.
If you never thought of Gary as being just a body, then what are you wondering about?
It seems clear to me that each of us manifests as a unique flow of perceptions, feelings, and thoughts, AND a body. If that flow stops, the body is not called by a name anymore. Why? Because it was never the body that bore the name--it was the flow we called by name. Without that flow--that aliveness--a body is only a corpse.
Thank you, I get caught up in the matter vs consciousness bullshit and discount my own experience of this aliveness. It’s not an illusion exists! And I get to experience it.