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I thought you were enlightened

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endlessness said:
HF, that was a good post indeed. I often feel humans as just the prologue to something more evolved, something we can be. I agree with intuitively feeling these different level of consciousness/understanding in people, and also in the oscilation that happens within limits. Also the idea of jumps in these levels.

I think the idea of enlightenment is interesting as something akin to a mandala that buddhists visualize when meditating, setting your intent towards this higher goal. I resonate a lot with your idea of it being a permanent process in tune with the universe's continuous change.

At the same time I see too many people on the "spiritual" path getting hunged up on this idea, losing sight of the moment and the extreme importance of the day to day. Also I often see too much repetition of what others say instead of actual personal thoughts spoken with one's whole being and the weight of actual experience.

I was just talking to my girlfriend about this, about how there seem to be these levels, and you can always understand whats below you, but you can never understand whats above you. And when we achieve different levels of consciousness, we revisit our previous knowledge and add new layers of subtlety to it. It's an interesting paradox that on one hand, the answer's are always "there", but at the same time we need to suffer and make effort, go through struggles and experiences, to realize these truths.

<3 Existence
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Kinda glad to see this thread resurrected. Good posts by everyone here.

I was thinking today that the two most useless words are God and enlightenment.

God has to many obscure definitions to be of much use in practical conversation unless one is within their own religion.

Enlightenment has become something utterly fantasy like. People expect an enlightened person to be able to fly and remote view, and raise the dead etc, etc. When I read the old scriptures I don't get that at all. To me an 'enlightened' person is someone that takes life in stride. We are all bound to get shot with an arrow of sorrow once in awhile. But the average person continues to shoot themselves with more arrows of agony lamenting the great injustice that was done to them while the 'enlightened' mind simply acknowledges that an arrow was shot.

Enlightenment is a permanent quest. Even the great masters continued to practice stilling the mind.

Endless I could not agree more with you about the endless repetition of the great one's words. Learn the words of others, but then make them your own. Just like an improvising musician will 'steal' licks from others, but he internalizes them and they come back out different., personalized.

This is also why I find guru devotion a hard concept. Sure have respect for the man and what he achieved, but having complete devotion to him does what exactly? People need to believe in themselves more.

Great posts everyone.

Peace
 
@endlessness & @joedirt

I agree with both of you in this. Though, I must say that I would be rather disappointed if this higher being that we humans are evolving towards was not more super-human than simply being able to go with the flow and take shit in stride. According to brother joedirt's rather mundane version of an enlightened being, I have met many thousands of people who might qualify.

I hold the bar somewhat higher when it comes to this, and I have encountered and experienced enough super-human abilities to know that there is certainly more. Many of you have probably had glimpses of telepathy while tripping at least. I am also convinced that telekinesis and levitation are not beyond the realm of what is possible.

At any rate, I won't try and turn this into a debate about siddhis and super powers. 8)

As for the usefulness of the terms G*d and Enlightenment... it is a mixed bag. Where there are better, more specific terms that can be used, I am all for using those terms. In general I prefer a sharper, more nuanced word or phrase. And yet, there are plenty of times when I find the two words in question perfectly suited for what I am discussing.

I guess it is a matter of different strokes for different folks.

I will just say that anything can be parroted by those who don't grok what they are echoing. Anything can be repeated ad nauseum until it seems to lose all meaning. (Pick any word and say it 100x in a row and see how it becomes something completely foreign.) The fact that people misuse and cheapen things is not IMO a reason to discard the originals.

JD brought up music and improvisation... this is something near and dear to my heart. While people most certainly do ape other musicians, and one can internalize and eventually transcend one's influences to be able to play with passion in one's own voice... it is also relevant to remember that there are only 12 notes. Even with octaves, rhythmic figures, tone and timbre... there are really only so many combinations of these 12 tones. Only so many chords that are possible, only so many scales etc. So it is not really a surprise if people trod on similar ground.

I also have a problem with the whole guru worship... but I give thanks to every master I have ever learned from. From the deepest bottom of my heart I give sincere thanks and praise to those people who showed me how shit works. I never worshiped my Kung Fu masters, but I DID have an immense amount of respect for them... and a willingness to follow their lead even when I didn't quite see where they were going with something.

I guess what I am saying is that simply copying the masters is pretty lame, but what guitar player wasn't influenced by Jimi Hendrix? Learning riffs from Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd is pretty much the de facto jumping off point for anyone who wants to play rock music IMHO. And the world would be a sorrier place without those shining lights to inspire us.
 
Just wanted to clarify one thing.

I play guitar and have played in a few jam bands. There is nothing wrong with copying other musicians. In fact copying by ear is the best way to learn the art of improvising. The improviser's hands play the music in his head. The average Joe musician, that simply knows a bunch of scales, listens to the notes his hands play with his head. The difference is subtle, but the outcome is the difference between say a Duane Almman and any random musicians that can play a blues scale over 145 12 bar blues.


Also I don't discount that there are super powers and such. It's just that to someone from my position, I'd just like to gain perfect control of my own mind and be able to rise above every situation in life with immediate and sincere grace. Something I am a LONG way from being able to do.

I have seen enough on psychedelics to understand/believe that there is potentially something much grander than this already profound reality. I mean not only that, but just plain sober meditation has grown significantly deeper since I started many years ago. I don't deny that things like telepathy exist...I think there are all sorts of states of consciousness that we simply don't understand yet....kinda like endlessness said: We can understand that which is below, but that which is above is likely as impossible for us to grasp as it is for fish to grasp how we humans spend our lives.
 
Hyperspace Fool said:
I guess what I am saying is that simply copying the masters is pretty lame, but what guitar player wasn't influenced by Jimi Hendrix? Learning riffs from Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd is pretty much the de facto jumping off point for anyone who wants to play rock music IMHO. And the world would be a sorrier place without those shining lights to inspire us.
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Not to derail the thread too far (though I do believe music can be a path to enlightenment or whatever you want to call it too) but I agree with you HF. Outright copying of a master is pretty unoriginal but like you said, most rock guitarists will use similar licks to Jimi Hendrix even if they don't know it, so impactful was Hendrix' influence on rock music. I myself, am a massive fan of Hendrix, so I'm not surprised when I hear licks that come out of my instrument that bear resemblance to his work...

What I have found after two decades of playing music is that it's the way you interpret and approach the material and how you put your feelings across that matter. I'm glad to have gotten to a point that when I listen back to my playing when I improvise I can hear little bits of influence and approach from the musicians I admire (be it Hendrix, Omar Rodriguez Lopez, Dave Gilmour, Les Claypool or Larry Lalonde etc, etc...). I have even found in the last few years that I find influence outside of music, I get inspired by Terence Mckenna's improvised raps or the tone I get from an Alex Grey or Dahli painting and subconsciously recreate that with my instrument, or at least try.

Anyway, enough thread sabotage :oops:

I agree that the word enlightenment has become a loaded term and can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. The best thing is to use your meaning of the word and do what you can to attain that. Find your own path and your own journey, after all, we are the ones behind the wheel of our own view of reality. And most of all, try and enjoy it while it lasts.
 
Threads are made to be sabotaged.

8)

At any rate, I agree with both of you once again. My somewhat loaded comment about just copying the licks of masters being lame hinged on the word JUST. If you stop there, and never become a creator of novel sounds and licks yourself... then it is kinda lame IMHO.

Of course JD and IPTOS both sound like they didn't stop there and are musicians worthy of the name. From what you both said, it sounds like you guys would both be tunesmiths right up my alley.

And, because you mentioned Les... I would say that there are musicians who reach such a level of unique expression that no one could ever truly ape them. You might be able to cop some Primus licks, but you will never be able to imitate all the weirdness that Col. Claypool brings to what he does. And, not for lack of trying, the two most fanatically copied musicians of the modern era (Bob Marley & Jimi Hendrix) are still as original as they were in their own time. Mahogany Rush and even SRV were not replacements for Jimi. None of Marley's kids can hold a candle to him. This is just how it is.

I'm not saying we shouldn't cover songs or copy the masters... the contrary, actually. I just say we shouldn't stop there. As much as I loved to go see Dark Star Orchestra, a band which on a good night could almost match, and in moments of brilliance, even outshine the concerts they were copying... they were still just a cover band. (DSO played entire historic Grateful Dead shows note for note, beginning to end) The Dead changed an entire culture and left an indelible mark on music, merchandise, psychedelics, concerts and much much more. They wrote a pantheon of songs that will never die. DSO, as great as they were... added nothing novel to the world. Something to be said for keeping a scene and spirit alive, though, when the founders and masters have left the building or fragmented into shadows of their former glory...

Anyway... :p
 
Be here
now.


The Experience of No Self

"it is ironic is it not, that the thing that terrifies oneself the most, which is the absence of self (a terrifying notion to a lot of people), is actually the exact same thing which gives rise to liberation, the liberation of self."


Psilocybin and Personality

"A review of studies on factors affecting response to psilocybin found that after dosage, the strongest predictor of alterations in consciousness was the personality trait of absorption (Studerus, Gamma, Kometer, & Vollenweider, 2012). Absorption is defined as a person’s tendency to have episodes of “total” attention where a person’s awareness is fully engaged in whatever has their interest. The degree to which people had “mystical” type experiences while on psilocybin was related to their individual proneness to absorption"


Absorption > No Self > Enlightenment
 
bodhi said:
Be here
now.


The Experience of No Self

"it is ironic is it not, that the thing that terrifies oneself the most, which is the absence of self (a terrifying notion to a lot of people), is actually the exact same thing which gives rise to liberation, the liberation of self."


Psilocybin and Personality

"A review of studies on factors affecting response to psilocybin found that after dosage, the strongest predictor of alterations in consciousness was the personality trait of absorption (Studerus, Gamma, Kometer, & Vollenweider, 2012). Absorption is defined as a person’s tendency to have episodes of “total” attention where a person’s awareness is fully engaged in whatever has their interest. The degree to which people had “mystical” type experiences while on psilocybin was related to their individual proneness to absorption"


Absorption > No Self > Enlightenment
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This is fascinating. I have often said that I think the real mystical experience from psychedelics happens when a lot of factors come into play at once. One of them being, for me at least, deep meditation going into the experience. This absorption you speak of is what gets me there. It allows me to not get taken aback with amazement. When I really go for the clear light of the void I use raw focus to ignore all the colors and sounds. Just pure focus on the void between thoughts. Psychedelics being mind expanding and all seem to expand upon what I'm doing and act as a rocket of sorts to this most amazing transcendental state.

This may surprise some, but I can actually see the psychedelic tapestry that we all see with closed eyes...with marijuana and meditation. No it's certainly not like a good aya dose, but it's there. Faint, but ever moving and morphing.

The mind is a fascinating thing.
 
Hyperspace Fool said:
And, not for lack of trying, the two most fanatically copied musicians of the modern era (Bob Marley & Jimi Hendrix) are still as original as they were in their own time. Mahogany Rush and even SRV were not replacements for Jimi. None of Marley's kids can hold a candle to him. This is just how it is.
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Funny you mention SRV, he was one of my first musical heroes as a wee lad and I was actually on a big SRV kick just recently. He definitely wasn't as revolutionary or original as Hendrix and no replacement for sure, but he is a good example of what I was talking about earlier and was someone who has taken things from the past (equal dosings of Hendrix and Albert King) and was insanely expressive with it and at his best, at least in my opinion, an amazing open channel for cosmic energies...

By the way HF, that wasn't a dig at you 😁 Just my opinion on a guitar master. As for Les... easily one of the most original musicans of the past decade or two. Maybe we should start a new thread, ha ha. And a nexus music collab or something!
 
No Worries IPTOS, I was a fan of SRV as well. While he was rather derivative of Jimi, King and other great bluesmen, he had enough of his own Austin twang and shining spirit to bring something new to the table. Wasn't trying to put him down, just more of an example of the pros and cons of aping the masters... kind of overextending the whole music metaphor, I suppose.

Anyway, another thread might be in order. If you start one along these lines, I will surely chime in. You may have to PM me to get me to notice though. (I haven't been all that diligent with watching for threads I wasn't already participating on lately.)

P.S. I actually have a very cool and unusual bootleg of Stevie Ray playing in David Bowie's touring band during rehearsals for the Let's Dance tour. I guess the lore is that after he played awesome (if subdued for him) session work on that album, Bowie was absolutely going to take him on tour... however, SRV's manager, seeing dollar signs, played hardball and tried to re-negotiate a price that was too high and pissed Bowie off due to the deal already having been sealed, and him already being on the plane to leave for the tour. There are conflicting versions of the story, and David has since said that he would have paid more, but the decision was made by his road manager to cut Stevie while he was actually incommunicado in the air! Anyway, I have a copy of the only existing live recording of SRV playing with David Bowie... a lengthy 2 CD rehearsal that totally RIPS. Stevie is letting loose and given a lot of space to solo, David is in good humor and improving lyrics, and the band is very tight. While the Let's Dance album is basically decent glossy pop for the most part... this bootleg is pure Rock & Roll with a lot of David's early gems (Ziggy Stardust, Moonage Daydream etc.) given an injection of bluesy awesomeness. Stevie even managed to take some songs that I was relatively indifferent to (like Station To Station), and make them shine. And the bootleg has my favorite version of Cat People ever.

Anyway, just thought I would mention that.
 
Hyperspace Fool said:
No Worries IPTOS, I was a fan of SRV as well. While he was rather derivative of Jimi, King and other great bluesmen, he had enough of his own Austin twang and shining spirit to bring something new to the table. Wasn't trying to put him down, just more of an example of the pros and cons of aping the masters... kind of overextending the whole music metaphor, I suppose.

Anyway, another thread might be in order. If you start one along these lines, I will surely chime in. You may have to PM me to get me to notice though. (I haven't been all that diligent with watching for threads I wasn't already participating on lately.)

P.S. I actually have a very cool and unusual bootleg of Stevie Ray playing in David Bowie's touring band during rehearsals for the Let's Dance tour. I guess the lore is that after he played awesome (if subdued for him) session work on that album, Bowie was absolutely going to take him on tour... however, SRV's manager, seeing dollar signs, played hardball and tried to re-negotiate a price that was too high and pissed Bowie off due to the deal already having been sealed, and him already being on the plane to leave for the tour. There are conflicting versions of the story, and David has since said that he would have paid more, but the decision was made by his road manager to cut Stevie while he was actually incommunicado in the air! Anyway, I have a copy of the only existing live recording of SRV playing with David Bowie... a lengthy 2 CD rehearsal that totally RIPS. Stevie is letting loose and given a lot of space to solo, David is in good humor and improving lyrics, and the band is very tight. While the Let's Dance album is basically decent glossy pop for the most part... this bootleg is pure Rock & Roll with a lot of David's early gems (Ziggy Stardust, Moonage Daydream etc.) given an injection of bluesy awesomeness. Stevie even managed to take some songs that I was relatively indifferent to (like Station To Station), and make them shine. And the bootleg has my favorite version of Cat People ever.

Anyway, just thought I would mention that.
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WOW! That recording sounds sweet. :shock:
 
Cheers for that HF, I will definitely try and hunt it out online, sounds intriguing. I definitely didn't take what you said as a dig at SRV. I oscillate between being indifferent about him (especially when I'm listening to more boundary pushing music) to being completely enraptured, his heart and soul always end up winning me back over. I will get around to starting a thread more specific to this conversation at some point...
 
El & IPTOS Here is a blog with links to mp3s of the bootleg. http://vivalesbootlegs.blogspot.ch/2009/02/david-bowie-stevie-ray-vaughan-dallas.html

320kbps so they should be fine. 2 of the three links seem to still be operative.

This isn't where I got the show, having traded it for it the old fashioned way back in the day in massive tape and CD swapping sessions with another OCD collector.

At any rate, you should be able to check it out this way... haven't bothered downloading these mp3s as I have long ago ripped my old CD to lossless files. Who know's this might even be a better copy (lower generation master tape or whatever)...
 
the yogi is detered by niether material joys, or dragged down with the sufferings of the material world. He seeks only happiness threw his own spiritual journey. nothing matters cause in the end all will be well....

easier said then done, and nope not enlightened at all. more confused yet even more assured than ever, what a wonder full state to be for a while......
 
unclesyd said:
easier said then done, and nope not enlightened at all. more confused yet even more assured than ever, what a wonder full state to be for a while......
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Being a yogi has never been an easy path. No spiritual quest is gonna be easy, it has to be lived through, not imagined!

Today there are many distractions and many so called 'responsabilities' that it makes sense that anyone borne into the luxury of the West at least give this life a go at living in balance, before leaving it all behind, because i believe that is the path such a person should walk, to have 'walked the walk', so to speak, like Buddha did.

You have to have experienced life before you can make an educated decision if it grooves with you or not. To let go of it without having this knowledge is simply nothing more than running away. Don't listen to others, make up your own mind from living this life out, or it's all meaningless-hence the direct felt personal experience!

To me, it's still possible to live a very spiritual life in the West and amongst it's challenges, it just means avoiding the nonsense and focussing on what's important.

Your life, your choice..and it doesn't really matter in the end, as long as you enjoyed it.
 
Bump!

Very good topic for discussion. It is so crucial to act responsibly and respectfully in the Nexus. The first post inquires much of what I value within appreciating others on this forum. Thank you!

:thumb_up:
 
vovin said:
If you truly are on the path towards growth my friends it is important to embody that which you seek. By doing so you will shift your mentality towards that goal.
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Peace, love, curiosity, inner-nonreactivity coupled with patience to observable phenomena. I absolutely love the nexus, glad I can participate in helping to bring this mentality to others.
 
Hyperspace Fool said:
@endlessness & @joedirt


I hold the bar somewhat higher when it comes to this, and I have encountered and experienced enough super-human abilities to know that there is certainly more. Many of you have probably had glimpses of telepathy while tripping at least. I am also convinced that telekinesis and levitation are not beyond the realm of what is possible.
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Stagnation is death (not ego death, just death!)

I've experienced full-on telepathy with another person. First words, then images. The other person had experience with psychedelics but was sober at the time. I believe that if scientists would have been there with their equipment, they would have had their proof too!

That experience, manifest of itself, not attempted by either of us but naturally happening, has made me think many times that you might be right, there might be even more seemingly impossible abilities that would prove possible. It's certainly... possible!

That said, before going beyond anything, one should learn what one is going beyond, so one doesn't go beyond (discard) something mindlessly but does so mindfully :)

Doc Buxin said:
*BUMP*
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Hey Doctor Heartmedicine, thanks for resurrecting this :)
 
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