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 Deviate
newbie
Registered: 04/20/03
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 what are individual beings? 
#3796997 - 02/18/05 02:32 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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if everything is one and the self in everyone is the same, then what exactly are individual beings and how do they interact with each other? why is it that if something damages my body i feel pain but there is no feeling in someone elses body? isn't pain what leads away from enlightenment to begin with? we are born feeling oneness but as we grow up we notice pain in our body and so we come to believe ourselves to be the individual body. i've read teachings and had experiences with point to the notion that we are all the same being. but do we all eventually come to experience the life of every indivudual being/body there ever was and if not then who is the individual that experiences it? why am i experiencing my life right now and not yours? who or what am i? what is the difference between us?
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CaptainJailew
Apathetic and Idon't care
Registered: 11/10/04
Posts: 398
Loc: Central Texas
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Re: what are individual beings? [Re: Deviate]
#3797083 - 02/18/05 02:59 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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That is going to be a billion answers and I am sure Sinbad is going to be all over this one tomorrow. I'm just going to chill and see what he has to say, because I'm too lazy to read through that entire battery of question marks.
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Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds" - Albert Einstein
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 redgreenvines
irregular verb
Registered: 04/08/04
Posts: 38,169
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finger puppets of an amazing 5th dimensional multipede
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger
Registered: 03/12/02
Posts: 24,855
Loc: Pandurn
Last seen: 1 year, 2 months
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Re: what are individual beings? [Re: Deviate]
#3797245 - 02/18/05 05:10 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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A very interesting, necessary question, my friend.  
In one sense, there certainly are individual, seperate beings. This individual self is an amalglam of their body, the programs occuring in their mind, and one's awareness and consciousness (regardless of the speculative source of this).
The differences between one individual and another are merely the differences in experience and the physical differences of their bodies. I personally do not feel these differences are very substansial - in essence, there is no difference between one human being and another, just the difference of our physical bodies and where they have taken us. 
As far as one's experiences through an individual being, why we experience this and not life through the eyes of that person, etc. etc... who and what are we.... I don't know what answers can come up. I think it is important to emphasize awareness. The experience of being human itself - as this runs through all of us, and awareness is necessary for that experience to be had. The awareness is always there, the only difference is what body/mind it is filtered through. I personally feel that this is what needs to be focused on, not the trivial differences that result, as awareness is the common thread that links not only the different experiences of our own life, but also the lives of everyone.
Every aspect of life exists in a constant state of change... but awareness stays the same, like the constant outline of the mushroom, while the colours constantly flow about....   
 
Peace.
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If I should die this very moment
I wouldn't fear
For I've never known completeness
Like being here
Wrapped in the warmth of you
Loving every breath of you
  
 
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder
Registered: 12/09/99
Posts: 14,279
Loc: South Florida 
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Re: what are individual beings? [Re: Deviate]
#3797288 - 02/18/05 06:06 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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Perhaps a reading of Ken Wilber's works like The Atman Project, would be welcome at this point of your life. The various 'selves' of which we are usually aware - the embodied ego, our various social selves, our intellectual identity, etc. belong to the domain of individuality - awareness of inner and outer datum that are 'filtered' through many more idiosyncrasies of our specific loci in space-time. I mean, our physical-astral-causal body nexus; the node in space-time that is as a 'point' apart from other points in the gridded fabric of the space-time continuum.
The Universal infrastructure of Reality is the Oneness that you are referring to. It is sometimes experienced as one's Real Self, but usually encountered as wholly (or Holy) Other. It is NOT one's ego, and to identify with It as ego is not only the 'sin' of hubris - pride, it has been the cause of the excution of mystics in all the Western religions (like al Hallaj the Sufi mystic who said "I am Truth" and had his hands and feet cut off before being crucified like the Jesus whose experience he experienced). When one's ego identifies with the Universal 'I,' the Biblical "I AM," a pathological inflation of the individual's ego occurs - paranoia, delusions of grandeur results. This is why in the West, GOD is referred to as 'Other.' St. Paul didn't say 'I am Christ,' he said "I live, yet not I, Christ liveth in me." An entire post could be dedicated to the paradox, spiritual subtlety and profundity of this little declaration alone.
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γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger
Registered: 03/12/02
Posts: 24,855
Loc: Pandurn
Last seen: 1 year, 2 months
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Interesting thoughts. 
So was Jesus egocentrically attached to Christ Consciousness, or was he simply speaking for Christ Consciousness as an impartial translator? 
Peace.
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If I should die this very moment
I wouldn't fear
For I've never known completeness
Like being here
Wrapped in the warmth of you
Loving every breath of you
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NariusFractal
Sat Chit Ananda
Registered: 12/19/02
Posts: 804
Loc: USA
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Read Alan Watts "The Supreme Identity"
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You are the microcosm of the macrocosm.
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Sinbad
Living TheMoment
Registered: 12/23/04
Posts: 2,571
Loc: Under The Bodhi Tree
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Yes Markos, when people usually have awakenings or mystical experiences, one of two things normally occur. Either self grasping kicks in and the individuals sense of self tries to own the experience (ego grasping), or the person tries to ignore or run away from that experience (also self grasping), because it is in essence a completely naked, open, totally honest state of awareness that we are generally not accustomed to, although it is our real nature.
Usually our minds are hibituated to clothing our experiences with this sense of self, and try to cover up this naked awareness. When it is exposed its easy to fall into either trap because this knowledge is unfamiliar and in complete contrast to our usual closy guarded sense of self, our distorted views about who we really are.
Most of us make up stories, to try and define who we are. Something like "My name is Tom i have lived in Seattle all of my life and Ive had so and so experiences". This is usually how we perceive ourselves to be, a collection of experiences that make us who we are. But there is a fault with this view, our experiences are constantly changing, we never stay the same from one moment to the next, so this view of who we think we are is really just a constantly, changing, updating work of fiction that overshadows, or clothes how we really are.
This is the reason why our lives are so exhausting, we are continually holding together this pretense, this illusion about who we are, always ignoring our basic humanity in favor of a lie which makes us temporarily feel safe and comfortable.
The truth is that death could happen at any minute, but of course we ignore this fact because it makes us feel uncomfortable. Instead we hold the deep rooted lie that we are going to live forever, which we all know isnt true, but ignore that fact to keep our ego's safe.
We need to understand that this fictitious notion of self, is the root cause of all of our misery. This is what keeps us from knowing true, everlasting happiness. Its like we exchange our basic state of happiness, for a lie, that we believe will protect us from the misery in life, when in reality it is the very cause of all our agitation and restlessness. Peace comes from recognizing the truth of our situation within our own minds. This requires constant observation and a firm commitment to discovery of the truth within us which is utterly naked and stands alone.
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Edited by Sinbad (02/18/05 10:51 AM)
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Gomp
¡(Bound to·(O))be free!
Registered: 09/11/04
Posts: 10,888
Loc: I re·side [primarily] in...
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Re: what are individual beings? [Re: Sinbad]
#3797671 - 02/18/05 09:22 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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""why am i experiencing my life right now and not yours?""
Because of our 'memes, limited' attention on focus.
""who or what am i?""
you are who you are as what you are..
""what is the difference between us?""
unreal, realities.
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Disclaimer!?
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder
Registered: 12/09/99
Posts: 14,279
Loc: South Florida
Last seen: 3 years, 2 months
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Re: what are individual beings? [Re: Sinbad]
#3797906 - 02/18/05 10:40 AM (19 years, 1 month ago) |
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The great blessing of living a long life is the gradual loosening of our grasping mind. I watched my father deteriorate and die over a couple of years. At first, his desires for even simple things began to diminish rapidly. He cared about less and less and eventually it really got down to the moment-to-moment, here and now of in-breath, out-breath, in-breath, out-breath. So, meditation does prepare one for permanent ego death in ways that one doesn't even anticipate.
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γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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Sinbad
Living TheMoment
Registered: 12/23/04
Posts: 2,571
Loc: Under The Bodhi Tree
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You mean the Great blessing of a long death, not a long life.
At the moment of death, even the longest of lives seems depressingly short.
I always pray for a natural death, in the way you have described. Im not sure whether i am sufficiently prepared for a sudden one yet. And that uncertainty probably points to the fact that indeed i am not.
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Edited by Sinbad (02/18/05 11:35 AM)
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder
Registered: 12/09/99
Posts: 14,279
Loc: South Florida
Last seen: 3 years, 2 months
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Funny you should ask that. Last night I just ordered a book called OUR CHRIST: The Revolt of the Mystical Genius from Edward R. Hamilton, Bookseller (great prices!) It addresses the controversial issue that Jesus did not endeavor to become a supernatural hero, or to found a new religion.
The extreme Hellenism that entered Christianity through the Gospel of John reversed the formerly Hebrew notion of Jesus as a 'man anointed by GOD' and turned Him into 'GOD clothed with flesh.' This was never a Hebrew idea, it was an idea based on the mythic mind of Greeks: the Hero - born of a god and a mortal woman, like Heracles (Hercules). What the TRUTH about Jesus is is a multi-levelled question. The Jesus of faith and the Jesus of history have always been two streams of thought that run parallel, but which intersect at points only to run parallel again.
I have taken Christology while in seminary, and the various schools of thought that address your question are numerous. Just what is the dual nature of Jesus the Christ? How is the human and the Divine combined in His nature? Is Jesus' Divinity a matter of 'species' or a matter of 'degree?'The Bible says that Jesus "emptied Himself" - 'Kenosis.' He was a humble man, and so, not egotistically inflated as a psychotic would be. He is constantly quoted as speaking of GOD, not Himself. Of Jesus it should be remembered that He did not rise from the dead...He was raised from the dead BY GOD. Subtle but profoundly different. Not about Jesus the man (ego), but about the 'Suffering Servant' of GOD - the unique vehicle of GOD's Holy Spirit. If Jesus were not ontologically different from the rest of humanity, He would not have the Presence of the Transcendent GOD about Him, which would mean that He would not be "the door" to Infinity, but would embody ontological limitation - ONLY GOD's Immanence, but not GOD's Transcendence. Why then follow Him, He would be as any other holy man?
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γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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RJLR
No greater love
Registered: 02/11/05
Posts: 418
Loc: France, keepin' tabs with...
Last seen: 14 years, 1 month
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I heard that if you were to take a cave man and brought him up in our times he would probably turn out to be just like any of us... I think it's your time that make the person that you are... we live in very individual times... perhaps if we lived in close net communities and each person was needed of he's or her unique talents, or knew their role in the community, and life was hard so you didn't have time to relax or worry about anything except just surviving. then may be you would feel one with your peoples.
Today it seems like you've got time and energy to think and be creative and imagine, so you grow away from the oneness thing, and live and understand things on many different leaves from every one else. Which is cool cos you get to chit chat about it and receive another world of experience from some one. 
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Gotta to spread the word about:
http://www.johnnyganjaseed.com/johnny.htm
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