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DividedQuantum
Outer Head


Registered: 12/06/13
Posts: 9,818
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visionary vs. mundane experience 2
#26686267 - 05/21/20 06:13 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Psychedelic and visionary experience can be infinitely valuable as they offer us a glimpse behind the curtain separating sensory, three-dimensional reality and higher-dimensional reality. The objective vistas and real truths afforded by these experiences are totally invaluable to a mind that is receptive to their language. However, the aforementioned sensory reality should not, as it so often is by psychonauts, be relegated to an inferior position out of hand.
After all, we spend our entire childhood and much of our lives developing an awareness of and attunement to a world that would be ineffable and meaningless without them. In a very deep sense, the usual here and now, as we perceive it without the use of psychedelic or mystical experience, is where we live and must not be trivialized. More than that, it is in a sense very real.
Do you feel that altered states are superior to normal consensus awareness? Can one exist without the other? Would it not be reasonable to suppose that evolution did not design us to be high all the time -- if, indeed, we are not naturally high all the time?
I don't mean to suggest a trivialization of altered states. Merely that Mother Nature seems to lean toward keeping us grounded. Or is this an illusion?
-------------------- Vi Veri Universum Vivus Vici
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The Blind Ass
Bodhi



Registered: 08/16/16
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Our natural state is like the Goldilocks zone. A launch pad for every other state, which after traversing for a while, we naturally return home to because it’s our equilibrium. The natural or “mundane” state is just as mystical as any altered state, and without it nothing would make sense. We’d have nothing to compare it too. Between our mundane state, and dream state while asleep - pretty much anything that can be deduced from an exogenous psychoactive induced state can be had.
I see too often that one “perceived the truth” in an altered state, or that they “know reality as is - or that one knows the nature of mind clearly”- and that somehow when one comes back down to mundane reality is not “it” also.
I think language, and by extension- the inherent dualizing mental faculty that is intellect, is in no small part responsible. But also that one can be aware of that function and still cherish the nonduality of true and false, and know all perceived moments of the one timeless moment directly and tacitly & simultaneously and at once immanently transcendent. It’s like there is a primordial stream of conscious awareness - and even mystical experiences and altered states are transient in the flow of it. States can be influx, but that stream doesn’t seem to unstream while alive, so far as I know.
I also see people (I’ve been there and done it myself ) mention that one had an enlightenment experience in the past while in an altered state, or even while in their “mundane” state - but that in the here and now it is lost, and that it needs to be “gotten back to” again. As if it’s lost and something to be gotten over and over again through an altered state only.
That seems delusive, or put another way - stopping short of the whole truth.
I take serious issue with that notion, mostly because it’s like pretending to forget the essential truth of things, in favor of the delusive dream of an ignorant sleep.
There is no other reality from this one - it’s the same reality, regardless of the state.
* sorry for the shitty writing, I kind of just spit that one out,
-------------------- Give me Liberty caps -or- give me Death caps
Edited by The Blind Ass (05/21/20 07:59 PM)
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pineninja
Dream Weaver



Registered: 08/17/14
Posts: 12,468
Loc: South
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Neither of them exist without the other.
You must embrace them both.
If you get caught in either you aren't getting "it".
-------------------- Just a fool on the hill.
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DividedQuantum
Outer Head


Registered: 12/06/13
Posts: 9,818
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience [Re: The Blind Ass]
#26686424 - 05/21/20 07:29 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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I agree with both of you. The subject reminds me of Bohm's implicate-explicate order hypothesis. Very briefly, the explicate order represents what is evident to our senses -- our macroscopic, consensus reality. The reality that Newton's laws describe. The implicate order is the higher-dimensional tapestry which underlies it -- out of which it manifests. Then the explicate order re-enfolds, to further inform the implicate order so that it can unfold into a slightly more novel explicate order in the next instant.
So, the explicate order is really a very particular and special manifestation of the overarching implicate order. So, in essence, there is no fundamental difference between the two. And the implicate order would be rather amorphous without an explicate order full of planets and animals, just as the explicate order cannot exist without the implicate order because it is a special form of the implicate order itself.
There is a world of information pertaining to all this, but I think it suffices that this model gives an intriguing unification of the two realms, and couches them in a coherent and constructive way. Either way, I think you two have hit the mark already.
-------------------- Vi Veri Universum Vivus Vici
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Rahz
Alive Again



Registered: 11/10/05
Posts: 9,230
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: Psychedelic and visionary experience can be infinitely valuable as they offer us a glimpse behind the curtain separating sensory, three-dimensional reality and higher-dimensional reality. The objective vistas and real truths afforded by these experiences are totally invaluable to a mind that is receptive to their language. However, the aforementioned sensory reality should not, as it so often is by psychonauts, be relegated to an inferior position out of hand.
After all, we spend our entire childhood and much of our lives developing an awareness of and attunement to a world that would be ineffable and meaningless without them. In a very deep sense, the usual here and now, as we perceive it without the use of psychedelic or mystical experience, is where we live and must not be trivialized. More than that, it is in a sense very real.
Do you feel that altered states are superior to normal consensus awareness? Can one exist without the other? Would it not be reasonable to suppose that evolution did not design us to be high all the time -- if, indeed, we are not naturally high all the time?
I don't mean to suggest a trivialization of altered states. Merely that Mother Nature seems to lean toward keeping us grounded. Or is this an illusion?
Certaintly not superior, but seems that evolution designed us to solve problems, and thus to have problems. The complexity of state of mind is beyond our general ability to solve so we gnaw away at the little things, lest normal reality seem to mundane. But when things are good is it not due to the reverberations of recent experience, psychedelic or not? We need unordinary experiences, of any kind to keep the spirit moving on. Psychedelics could be considered a way of getting one's drama in.
Drama is meaningful, so hopefully, it's not just blowing off steam. But people take what they can get it seems and it's often not helpful, yet still preferable to mundane reality alone. In the absence of problems, people create them.
-------------------- rahz comfort pleasure power love truth awareness peace "You’re not looking close enough if you can only see yourself in people who look like you." —Ayishat Akanbi
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The Blind Ass
Bodhi



Registered: 08/16/16
Posts: 26,657
Loc: The Primordial Mind
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience [Re: Rahz]
#26686499 - 05/21/20 07:56 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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I find dreaming - and the branches of it, ie. Day dreaming, normal asleep dreaming, lucid dreaming, OBE dreaming, and others, etc. all to fulfill that role. All had naturally, and some if not all of the above are basically had universally & daily in our species.
The mundane “state(s)” and visionary states are not incommensurate, they are complementary.
-------------------- Give me Liberty caps -or- give me Death caps
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Moses_Davidson
Non-Prophet


Registered: 05/21/20
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience [Re: pineninja]
#26686687 - 05/21/20 09:24 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Hmmm... *thinking on that one*

Well... those are deep waters.
Nobody here is going to say I've ever had any heroic experiences, but I have, over my years on this earth, had a few profound spiritual experiences through prayer. Here is my fallible opinion, after spending perhaps not enough time pondering this: Sometimes we dream things up, a false impression perceived by our the neurons in our brains as a spiritual experience... but sometimes there is an intersection between the physical and spiritual worlds... like the intersection of two planes, both of which are real. I believe people experience both of these produced, and induced experiences.

So, experiences may be produced by our neurons or may be the physical interaction with a spiritual reality, and these can be difficult to discern. Also, a genuine encounter with a spiritual/alternate plane being (like an encounter with a physical being) may or may not include a load of bologna.
So, we use our mundane sense of logic to interpret of our spiritual experiences, preferably with some effort to use discernment. The lens through which we interpret our experiences, our paradigm, will bias our interpretation. I personally prefer to interpret things that are difficult in the light of things that are clear.
It would be difficult for a flat person living in a two-dimensional world to comprehend a three-dimensional person intersecting into their world. A 2d flat person may describe a 3d person's hand as a dot, or five dots, or one oval, depending at what point the hand intersected the 2d plane. Likewise it is difficult for us to comprehend or describe anything in a fourth dimension. The best we could do is describe a cross-section of the 4d thing with our limited 3d brains.
Maybe... (1) the neurally contrived experiences can't exist without our mundane world, but (2) the four-dimensional reality exists without any regard to our mundane world, and (3) our mundane reality would not be able to exist without the spiritual plane, from which it came.
-------------------- "In finance, everything that is agreeable is unsound and everything that is sound is disagreeable." --Sir Winston Churchill "The world may not only be stranger than we suppose, it may be stranger than we can suppose." J.B.S. Haldane "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't." Mark Twain
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sudly
Darwin's stagger

Registered: 01/05/15
Posts: 10,798
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Quote:
DQ said: just as the explicate order cannot exist without the implicate order because it is a special form of the implicate explicate order itself.
-------------------- I am whatever Darwin needs me to be.
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,532
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: Moses_Davidson]
#26687734 - 05/22/20 09:35 AM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Quote:
Moses_Davidson said: ... our mundane reality would not be able to exist without the spiritual plane, from which it came.
I take exception with "from which it came", which is not clear by any means, since what you call a spiritual plane may be entirely different from what anyone else considers a spiritual plane, and there is no need to connect with any imaginary origin story in order to appreciate the "thatness" or "isness" of any thing.
Origins are interesting when they can be traced, we can learn and share a great deal by following evidence.
you could start by attempting to describe what your spiritual plane is, but if it is defined in terms of belief, which is defined in terms of spirituality, then we have a circular definition which is not an followable trail at all. It is more of a come dance in my circle, and that is ok for yucks, but there could be a more appropriate place for it (like the forum for spirituality and mysticism)
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laughingdog
Stranger

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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: redgreenvines]
#26688222 - 05/22/20 01:29 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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DQ said: "Do you feel that altered states are superior to normal consensus awareness? Can one exist without the other? Would it not be reasonable to suppose that evolution did not design us to be high all the time -- if, indeed, we are not naturally high all the time?"
Would seem biology partly answers the question, if high all the time one would either starve or the wild animals would eat one or in the city get robbed or run over or starve.
Also deep meditative states cannot be maintained indefinitely
So good teachings say the middle way is equanimity and mindfulness and compassion. And accept that balance is the way.
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Yellow Pants



Registered: 05/14/17
Posts: 1,386
Loc:
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: laughingdog]
#26688304 - 05/22/20 02:22 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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The more evolved the more pull upwards into mystical experiences. Maybe a crawfish seeks to get high but I have to assume no. And why do the two states need to be separated. I think it’s like a gradient where you get some mystical experience and then not so much. Mother Nature pulls down but compared to our human world this may seem mystical. I’m not sure. Paganism ?
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,532
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: laughingdog]
#26688366 - 05/22/20 02:58 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Quote:
laughingdog said: DQ said: "Do you feel that altered states are superior to normal consensus awareness? Can one exist without the other? Would it not be reasonable to suppose that evolution did not design us to be high all the time -- if, indeed, we are not naturally high all the time?"
Would seem biology partly answers the question, if high all the time one would either starve or the wild animals would eat one or in the city get robbed or run over or starve.
Also deep meditative states cannot be maintained indefinitely
So good teachings say the middle way is equanimity and mindfulness and compassion. And accept that balance is the way.
I think this is interesting. Altered states include a range of perceptual enhancement (reverberance) from (a) mild and moderate which makes one potentially more receptive state and more widely aware of what is happening, to (b) intensely layered which puts one more into a dream/visionary state.
the dream/visionary state (b) could also connect with 'consensus' type events and a psychonaut may be able to retrieve that insight in a positive way, but usually it is more revelatory of personal psychological inclinations and resistance, the work one does to better understand one's self.
In the meantime, 'normal' and 'consensual' awareness is a loose bag of bobbleheads - so called consensus is generally all over the map.
you talk about meditative states - probably related to jhanas - these are not maintainable - true.
however you can sort of maintain a way, or getting on a path, that keeps awakening, opening up to what is happening, not like concentration meditation but not completely unlike vipassana - this is closer to (a) mild or moderate tripping in tune with 'vibes' or changes or *energy* sensed but not necessarily recognized.
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lostintimenspc
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: redgreenvines]
#26688854 - 05/22/20 06:28 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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The Blind Ass! That is really good.
I definitely recommend The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell for anyone interested in this topic.
We don't really choose our desires.
That's why you blow out the flame, ie. Nirvana, and then the cosmos decides your desires for you, which are then pure and eternal and what you were born for.
Making enlightenment essentially maturity.
No one is doing what they think they are doing, the universe decides that.
-Daniel
-------------------- LSD, mushrooms and DMT are different structural levels within the same magically simulated mystery sometimes blandly called 'life' Your life, your call.
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The Blind Ass
Bodhi



Registered: 08/16/16
Posts: 26,657
Loc: The Primordial Mind
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: lostintimenspc]
#26688863 - 05/22/20 06:32 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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I find his writing very accessible and coherent. 1000 faces is a classic in my book, no pun intended. I’ve never picked up one of his books and not been compelled to check it out.
Some libraries give me hardcore butterflies when I see their selection of works & authors. Campbell is always amongst them 
His work just has a way about it that I find deeply enriching, fun, and rings true in a way that connects with me. Deep feels.
Wish I could have talked to him in person over coffee or tea.
-------------------- Give me Liberty caps -or- give me Death caps
Edited by The Blind Ass (05/22/20 06:44 PM)
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Moses_Davidson
Non-Prophet



Registered: 05/21/20
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: redgreenvines]
#26690218 - 05/23/20 11:46 AM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said:
I take exception with "from which it came", which is not clear by any means, since what you call a spiritual plane may be entirely different from what anyone else considers a spiritual plane, and there is no need to connect with any imaginary origin story...
you could start by attempting to describe what your spiritual plane is, but if it is defined in terms of belief, which is defined in terms of spirituality, then we have a circular definition which is not an followable trail at all. It is more of a come dance in my circle, and that is ok for yucks, but there could be a more appropriate place for it (like the forum for spirituality and mysticism)
Here's an image from NASA's WMAP team:

The point labeled "Quantum Fluctuations" existed before time-space & matter, and is not subject to time-space. The Quantum Fluctuations existed in some sort of a different something (plane, spiritual realm, other dimension, or whatever you label you prefer for it), and caused our universe to exist.
So, "from which it came" is not an origin story. This is the general consensus of the scientific community.
What we choose to label it doesn't affect it.
-------------------- "In finance, everything that is agreeable is unsound and everything that is sound is disagreeable." --Sir Winston Churchill "The world may not only be stranger than we suppose, it may be stranger than we can suppose." J.B.S. Haldane "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't." Mark Twain
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laughingdog
Stranger

Registered: 03/14/04
Posts: 4,828
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Do you feel that altered states are superior to normal consensus awareness? Can one exist without the other? Would it not be reasonable to suppose that evolution did not design us to be high all the time -- if, indeed, we are not naturally high all the time?
I refer to biology again: Sex provides ecstasy -- but not 24 7, in fact a lot less! for very good reasons not 24 7. Same with happiness. Altered sates fall into the same category, as regards the survival of organisms. the workings of biology do not follow human preferences.
It takes a few pages to explain every step of the relevant biology, elegantly, & in detail. the book "The pleasure Trap" does so in detail; It is covered with in the first pages: 7- 24 , although the rest is also useful. the author may be found on utube as well - if anyone is seriously interested. The logic is both straight forward & impeccable.</font>
Edited by laughingdog (05/23/20 01:19 PM)
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Moses_Davidson
Non-Prophet



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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: redgreenvines]
#26690689 - 05/23/20 03:37 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Quote:
redgreenvines said:
Origins are interesting when they can be traced, we can learn and share a great deal by following evidence.
you could start by attempting to describe what your spiritual plane is, but if it is defined in terms of belief, which is defined in terms of spirituality, then we have a circular definition which is not an followable trail at all. It is more of a come dance in my circle, and that is ok for yucks, but there could be a more appropriate place for it (like the forum for spirituality and mysticism)
You know, I really agree with this a lot.
A whole lot... in fact, if I may pull up a soap box...
Some quantum physicists like to talk about what did or did not create the universe. This is often presented as if it were scientific, when in fact, it IS great for yucks... but is really is spirituality or mysticism. To present such ideas as if they were scientific is misleading. I think there is a difference between the physics, the philosophy, and the religion of quantum mechanics.
Physics is pure science... testable in repeatable experiments. It gives us inviolable principles that run the sub-atomic world. Exempli grati, how an electron can move from one energy level of an atom to another.
The philosophy of quantum mechanics uses logic to describe the causal relationships at the quantum level, such as the role of human observation.
Now, it becomes religion when academics stray from the repeatably testable things and attempt to guess what is behind cause and effect in quantum occurrences. This type of conjecture, especially about "what caused the quantum fluctuations that caused the big bang," is great for yucks... but really folks, take it down the hall to the religion classroom. Its pseudo-science. "Multiverse" discussions about the Big Bang are great, and I respect the religion of people who believe that stuff, but lets call a spade a spade.
A lot of academics clung to the static state theory, the infinitely oscillating universe model, the plasma model, attacks against Einstein's theory of relativity,... and other embarrassments to good science and academics with a dogmatic adherence to these absurd theories of academic gymnastics. Nowadays, the scientific community all sees these as silly.
So, I while I think it isn't a spiritual statement to say that the natural universe (where the laws of nature-- Newtonian laws, quantum laws, laws of general and special relativity, et alli all govern) was created by non-natural quantum fluctuations... any discussion about the cause and nature of the quantum fluctuations are inherently non-natural (id est, supernatural) discussions.
-------------------- "In finance, everything that is agreeable is unsound and everything that is sound is disagreeable." --Sir Winston Churchill "The world may not only be stranger than we suppose, it may be stranger than we can suppose." J.B.S. Haldane "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't." Mark Twain
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redgreenvines
irregular verb


Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 37,532
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: Moses_Davidson]
#26691096 - 05/23/20 07:47 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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that special place where we do not have solid information nor even reasonable substitute information, that place we refer to as the unknown.
the unknown is not especially spiritual.
I relate the spiritual as something transcendent and moral that we create ourselves (or not). Something related to an unknown creator who acted 13 billion years ago in some incomprehensible way is not spiritual it is a scientific mystery that will unravel for those who can ask the right questions, for me it is out of scope. I can say that I know of nobody for whom it is in scope to ask a good question about the time before time.
I imagine that those questions will provide resulting technology like warp drive, food synthesizers, and matter transporters. That wont be particularly spiritual either, but it will be fun.
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Rahz
Alive Again



Registered: 11/10/05
Posts: 9,230
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: redgreenvines]
#26691323 - 05/23/20 09:57 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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What if everyone lives long and prospers?
-------------------- rahz comfort pleasure power love truth awareness peace "You’re not looking close enough if you can only see yourself in people who look like you." —Ayishat Akanbi
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Moses_Davidson
Non-Prophet



Registered: 05/21/20
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Re: visionary vs. mundane experience - anything to follow here? [Re: Rahz]
#26691377 - 05/23/20 10:25 PM (3 years, 8 months ago) |
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Here, here! I'll lift my glass and drink a dram to those points.
Tonight on my walk along the river a beautiful fog set in over the cow pasture, and I saw a deer run down my path. The only mushrooms I found were a clump of something that an animal had been eating, and I could not identify because most of the caps were gone. None the less, it was so beautiful and tranquil. I think my ability to appreciate these things is more than it used to be.
Back to the OP, If the visionary state is induced by prayer, meditation, cacti, or golden teachers... maybe that visionary state is the academia which provides teaching to be applied in the practitioner's world.
-------------------- "In finance, everything that is agreeable is unsound and everything that is sound is disagreeable." --Sir Winston Churchill "The world may not only be stranger than we suppose, it may be stranger than we can suppose." J.B.S. Haldane "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't." Mark Twain
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