The human delusion of "I"

[MediumTex]

MT, you truly are a wizard. Your powers of communication are awe-inspiring.

Really?

It was just a little subjective reality Mad Libbing.

[Pointedstick]

It's not about the words you choose, it's about the psychological understanding of the person you're talking to that guides your choice of which ones to use. In any event, I am impressed, as usual.

[Benko]

i enjoy these conversations, seeing and experiencing the struggle to intellectually resolve the paradox of the individual that has no "I" and the "I" that is not individual. especially when intellectual understanding is the very barrier to the experience that the conversation is trying to help us leap over...
it all sorta reminds me of  zen koans about the sound of one hand clapping..

You might want to check out I am That.  See the reading instructions here:

http://www.thewayofseeing.com/article_reading.html

i plan to.... i found and posted a link for the PDF version in an earlier post

[MachineGhost]

Without the "I" you can't even say "I want to attain a 'non-I' spiritual enlightenment."

The most profound thing I ever read was: "I am awake." -- Buddha

[MachineGhost]

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[doodle]

Whoa! Is that how I am hardwired? Maybe some of the connections need to be resoldered in my case. :-)

[Benko]

The most profound thing I ever read was: "I am awake." -- Buddha

It is worth being REALLY CLEAR that he is talking about enlightenment.  And as one progresses spiritually one discovers that there are no problems "out there" i.e. in the world, all the "problems" are within.  DeMello (e.g. The Way to Love) talks about this in very understandable terms.

***NB The above is for the people reading this thread who have interest in spirituality e.g. what could possibly make someone say something like that?  Maharaj (I am That) talks about it also.

[Benko]

DeMello (he was either enlightened or very close):

http://www.demellospirituality.com/awareness/27.html
"...life is a mystery, which means your thinking mind cannot make sense out of it. For that you've got to wake up and then you'll suddenly realize that reality is not problematic, you are the problem. "

The word "you" there means the conditioned personality, the body mind, etc.  This is all stuff added to us after birth, and NOT what we really are.

[MachineGhost]

The word "you" there means the conditioned personality, the body mind, etc.  This is all stuff added to us after birth, and NOT what we really are.

"You" may not be what we really are BUT "you" is what we are purposely experiencing.

[doodle]

This video outlines some of the ways in which physics is beginning to corroborate the views of eastern philosophic and religious traditions with respect to unity and interdependentness. It is astounding how different "reality" is as it exists in the way our senses and minds perceive it, from the reality that science is beginning to uncover. Fascinating stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MwT2_dovG9M&sns=em

[Benko]

There is an old (and super true saying):

We see things not as they are, but as we are.  There is a great book called

Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal and Human Minds Louise Barrett

which if you read it and think about it, it can really help you understand how this comes about.  This book has nothing to do with spirituality (as such), it helps us understand that the model of our brain as computer, etc. is totally wrong.

[Gosso]

I'd love to hear the conversation of one ant describing to another ant what a human is.

[doodle]

I thought this was a pretty interesting idea related to this topic. From a book im reading:

We may intuitively feel that our "self" is deep inside us, but when I'm asked who I am, I typically say things like "I'm a doctor," or "a New Yorker" and so on. In other words, we identify our "self" by all its relations and relationships in the outer world. All those ways of being my self I can't do alone; who I am is actually defined by the existence of others and my relation to them. Buddhism emphasizes this aspect of the self using the term "dependent co-origination".  Rather than being something internal and private, the self exists as the ever changing intersection of a whole universe of events and relations.

[Gosso]

I thought this was a pretty interesting idea related to this topic. From a book im reading:

We may intuitively feel that our "self" is deep inside us, but when I'm asked who I am, I typically say things like "I'm a doctor," or "a New Yorker" and so on. In other words, we identify our "self" by all its relations and relationships in the outer world. All those ways of being my self I can't do alone; who I am is actually defined by the existence of others and my relation to them. Buddhism emphasizes this aspect of the self using the term "dependent co-origination".  Rather than being something internal and private, the self exists as the ever changing intersection of a whole universe of events and relations.

We all need a persona to present to the world, ie we have a mask we wear to allow us to interact in the world.  But once you return home or are alone it is important to remove the mask and realize that it is for show and not to fully identify with the mask, or else you get all screwed up.