Just as I apologized to void...I wasn't being pessimistic just giving another perspective. I have truly risen above finally gotten to a point that I care in a sense if ppl like me but don't give a damn what anyone thinks of me. Bc I figured out we are all our own worst critics beating ourselves up all day. So I know your judgements is mediocre compared to what your self talk is doing behind the scenes.
That's a God given talent bro. Seriously..there's probably not many beings on earth you couldn't connect with. People pay billions and sadly some sit in depression bc they can't connect. I try and spark up a conversation with a stranger daily.
I don't deny it's a gift. It very much so is. Let me put it another way, it connects me to others, but doesn't necessarily connect them to me. With this gift, another way we could say it, I am able to tune into others frequencies and align from that point more so than many can to mine.
I thought remaining SILENT in this thread was the highest achievement
You're blessed to have someone around whom you can be yourself with. We need to know who we are to be genuine. It's like a work in progress all the time. I get what people mean, but it goes so much deeper. We can start by reframing it to "trust yourself" and "know yourself," and maybe later on a real "be yourself" becomes a possibility.
It is good that smoking helps you. This practice is very similar to tantra. We embrace life and ourselves, and by doing so, we transform reality. The basis of goodness and love is always here. Just smoke away with awareness and respect. The flow of life will show the way. Our stuff and resistance are the fuel for the road to ourselves.
The philosophical stickler in me has to comment on this. I see it as we're shifting some aspects of our phenomenology of reality. Not to say we don't "change" "reality" on our own sometimes (I put it in quotes because I find it questionable).
Oh, I see. I'll reframe then: it's hard to find someone whom you can be yourself with. Most of them would follow your friend: be yourself inside the boundaries I define. True freedom is a rare occurrence.
Our "reality" is based on stories we tell ourselves. Engaging with them tends to clear stuff and produce a more coherent storyline. I don't know about direct perception of the world. Maybe it's the next step after homogenizing our narrative.
Thanks for sharing what you meant. In a certain sense we meant the same thing. I only think subjective reality when someone says that. Otherwise when I hear someone say "reality" I tend to interpret that in the way it seems to be most descriptive used by others, which is a definition that appeals to the "objective" world and "consensus reality."
I'm not a big believer in objective reality. It's supposed to exist and we kind of know it by inference, but all experience is subjective in the end. Even if we use tools, it's our perception that creates the final image. I can't deny the world, but it's my picture of it that I see.
We can never escape our own phenomenology. It's a paradox. A catch-22. Even when we use tools, we're shifting our phenomenology. The debate of scientific realism vs antirealism highlights this well. Objectivity is really an attempt that we ought to shoot for, but will never be successful at reaching. This seems to be misunderstood very often.
Sri Ramana would ask "Who is seeing?"
I might ask him what is who lol.Sri Ramana would ask "Who is seeing?"
I think this metaphor is more to show that we can't see objective and subjective at the same time
If we truly go beyond ego into pure awareness, even the world becomes real from that viewpoint.
It was my feeble attempt. His "who" is just a pointer to "I" or ego. It's not a question, but a mnemonic device to look at yourself all the time.
Yeah, trying to imagine it would be just ego games. I agree with Sri Ramana that ego is the best candidate for an exit door. We come into the world through the ego, and most likely it's the exit. What's on the other side is indescribable. If it lies beyond ego and its language apparatus, then even sages' words are just approximations.And that's kinda the scope I was alluding to. I have very good objective attempts, even to the point of self-destruction, but there's always a subjectivity i can't escape.
Without ego, it's hard to say, one becomes so... indifferent.
One love
