Is there time involved – becoming, getting better, and all of that – outside of the self? It might seem that way, but I am not interested in how things seem. Any growth within the self is limited to the desires, prejudices, and beliefs therein. Time may be part of the fuel mixture of that vehicle, so to speak, but outside of the self, does it exist at all?
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Does time exist outside of the self? hmmm – I assume by self here, you mean sense of individual.
To me, time is an attention effect. To explain, awareness is aware of itself. This creates a sense of space. In the liveliness of that aware space, mind arises and thus the flow of experiences. If a sense of uniqueness arises, identity is formed, separating the observer from the observed, dividing inside and outside. This causes the idea of individuality to arise. When individuality observes the flow, it sees like itself, so sees individual increments, a sense of change, a series of events. From this series of changes arises the idea of time.
In that way, both the sense of being individual and the sense of time are both perceptual effects of the movement of awareness. So, a little like optical illusions. As you suggest, it may seem that way.
Neither time nor the sense of self exist outside of mind.
A post that is only a question. Interesting. Does the question or the answer exist outside of mind?
I see your server is 16 hours ahead – it’s Saturday afternoon here – you are already tomorrow
Isn’t it fascinating how we have built devices to track time and insist on this?
Time, Time, Time.
Since I am in the future, I’ll check the winning lotto numbers and send them back to you in the past. Then, we’ll split the winnings.
No.
We’re you expecting more?
But seriously, I enjoy these little posts. Considering the short length, a simple question fits the bill quite well.
I am not planning to write these posts as “question only,” but we’ll see what happens.
Time is indeed very much in the moment. But that moment can be seen as a vast canvas, sort of the space of time. The past playing off into the distance, the play all interrelated and balancing. The future is very curious. We can say “will happen” is not present. But in another way, the future is there but taking place in an awareness we do not have and in a conceptual framework that is as yet foreign. Like a child imaging calculus.
But more locally, the BC Lotto 649 is now $35 million. +5% for US$. (laughs)
By the way: lets toast the end of Wall Street tyranny.
Best regards.
iamasimpelman
Davidya,
I don’t know anything about any of that, but it sounds nice. To say one is in “the moment” is meaningless, as you have seen. And I am sure I have said it, or something like it, many times.
All of us, writing on this subject, or similar subjects, have probably described this thing that has no business being described.
Takuin can find no moment to be in. But what can he do? Wait for the next moment in order to find out?
Liberation is cruel, for it is all so simple. But human beings create the cruelty by trying to make it complicated.
Is there anything as simple as life?
iamasimpelman,
I don’t know much about that, but I will trust you to do what is right.
I am all for the end of tyranny, but I cannot imagine any tyrant existing outside of ourselves. The worst tyrant is not the one that stares back in the mirror; it is the thought about the one that stares back in the mirror.
It is a strange thing…to stare into the mirror with nothing looking back.
Yes, words really do fail.
“Liberation is cruel”… hmmm, it is hard on all the complexity we add to it.
“to stare in the mirror with nothing looking back”
Curious, I would not describe it that way. More, everything. To look and see bottomless infinity. To look and see the infinite self looking back. To look and see the rich fullness of potential, about to explode into expression.
Even more curious is touch. To touch something and be touched. To feel contact reverberate through yourself, circling back like awareness.
But perhaps words fail again…
I think we are saying the same thing, Davidya.
I chose the word “nothing,” because if there is this liberation, or whatever, it cannot be known in the sense of memory, knowledge, or accumulation. So it isn’t as if one looks, and suddenly, they are told what is there. (Told in the sense of remembering)
One might be a seeker, and they go to a teacher that says, “It is nothing.” Or they go to a teacher that says, “It is everything.” Either way, what will they do with the words they hear? It is the job of the seeker to make these things into a system of practice, or to reject them out of their own tightly held system of practice. But maybe we are too hard on the seekers, eh?
I like to think of the seeker – the real seeker – as the person destroying the constructs he or she is given, and not the person building them up even higher.
To see beyond the construct…or perhaps it is better to say, to see without the construct.
But maybe I am just a romantic at heart.
It is a strange thing…to stare into the mirror with nothing looking back.
this is wounderful hitting me. Thank you Takuin.
One more very short you tube, last one, best one from karl renz
One sentence out of it:
Thats what you are.
Thanks Takuin again for your open heart and your kindness.
warm regards.
iamasimpelman
forgot the link of kar renz here it is
http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=RT_7ETUM1cc
have a look.
best regards
iamasimpelman
iamasimpelman,
It is nothing, but Davidya is correct as well. It is everything. This seems to be a paradox, but it is quite reasonable and simple.
This is where language may become more hindrance than help. It is easy to say all of this, but the real burden lies with the listener. How does the listener approach it? Is there an expectation of result? A desire to have a certain end? All of these things are implied in the process (if process is the right word).
The listener already holds the answers, but who they are sometimes screams so loudly that it is impossible to hear.
Thanks again for the vids. I am enjoying them.
Takuin
“It is the job of the seeker to make these things into a system of practice….”
” the real seeker [is] the person destroying the constructs he or she is given…”
Wow! No wonder I keep coming here.
Yes, we build cages for ourselves with the instructions for our freedom. But perhaps this is as it should be, for the effort needed to break free may only strengthen us and makes our freedom all the more satisfying. Only a thought and not a belief ( you’ve taught me well, Davidya).
On the matter of time I feel that it and space are dependent on each other. Time would have no meaning without movement and vice verse. So just as we impose artificial geographic boundaries we call borders, we devise arbitrary segments of time in order to manage it. Not all divisions are without some logic or natural references though, like the phases of the moon or a sidereal year. But these are localized phenomena and on a galactic scale may have no meaning or counterparts.
But I think Takuin, you were speaking of time as it is used by mind, yes? There, as Einstein showed, it is completely relative. But relative to what? (I know, the speed of light, but we’re talkin’ strictly mind now.)
I don’t know what astrophysicists would do, but I would calibrate all movement in the universe to a central hub if there was one. A place of stillness. I would do the same with time. If time is relative then the fixed point that it would have to be relative to is Stillness. I’m not sure if I’m conveying what I mean very well, so I’ll just stop there.
Peace to All
Eric,
Thanks for your great comment. You have clearly pointed out the usage of time in the outward, chronological sense. Those things, it seems, are fairly clear to all of us.
I was speaking of time as it occurs within the mind. But this is not a functioning of time quite the same as what may happen in the phenomenal world (or whatever you want to call it).
I meant more of the idea of time to attain, to acquire. “I will become greater, I will get more, I will be better,” and so on. I use the term “time,” but it may be confusing in some way.
Is there a fixed point, or a place of stillness? Is stillness relative to anything?
The astrophysics I’ve seen suggests each galaxy is centered on a white or black hole. Hardly stillness. The universe does not appear to have a central hub in space but actually does when described from the outside. But in neither case is it a “place” of stillness. Both remain values of dream.
Stillness is that which underlies existence. I would suggest it’s only place is everywhere. (laughs)
Or are we getting semantically fussy
@Takuin;Ok, I see what you mean. Then time it seems would just be part of the illusion that we are not already what we are. It is a function of the idea of separation from source. If we are conditioned to pursuing a goal in the future then we are less apt to think that “now” has any value except as it facilitates that goal. Thank you for pointing out that I assumed stillness is static, fixed, when there is no real reason to. The word would suggest it but that doesn’t necessarily make it so. One more belief to shed. (laughs)
@Davidya; You say it much better that I. It is not just semantics. Stillness is everywhere. It is also everywhen. (laughs) You have forced me to realize though, that experience of stillness is filtered through or by perception as we bring the memory of it back into time. Not that the memory is invalid, but distorted so as to fit into a framework that the mind/brain can handle. At least that’s how I see it this morning, tomorrow it may appear as something else completely. One more good reason to let go of beliefs. (chuckles)
Eric – it is only to remember that memory (laughs) of an experience is not the same as being it. It is just a flavour. What becomes always trumps what has been.
Eric,
Perhaps. But it might be more related to the idea (or illusion) that we should be something else. It is always, “I am greedy, but I shouldn’t be. I am lazy, but I should be productive.”
If that is where one is, that is where one begins. It is nothing to be ashamed of. People want to be free of that before they begin meditation, for example. NO! That is where one begins. With the fact.
The should be is not a fact; the wanting to be is. All of this begins with what we have. As painful as it may or may not be.
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