day job

If the question is how do we achieve the critical mass of freedom for all, it cannot happen without you first or without you last. To obtain freedom for yourself, and as quickly as possible, is the most compassionate thing that you could possibly contribute to your fellow. As I am healed the whole humanity is nearer to wellness.

 

Two questions. What is "final enlightenment" and why is it not compatible with having a 9-5?

 

Final enlightment would be mastery and full understandment of everything. Being a free spirit who can travel out of body at will, being able to enter samadhi at will, having control over energy, such as being able to minupulate physical matter, being totally free of ego. Full god realization, direct perception of god at will.

We keep coming back down, I want to stay up forever, no lsd needed.

Now a 9-5 could be possible with enlightment, but the point is to live in nature, to relish in the beauty of silence, to go where everything is flowing with the tao. I wouldn't need a 9-5, I could live under a tree for years without food and water, and be in bliss! I would like to live in nature because it is so beautiful, so free! I love nature, and what is more beautiful then the Himalayan mountains, they are silent, they are blessed, they are free, and there is most likely a community of enlightened beings up there!

Basically its easy to get distracted in the regular world, so many things going on, so much dedication to physical events. In the hills you are alone, absolutely undisturbed, you can concentrate on the soul purpose of becoming enlightened.

 

I've got some bad news for you then

 

What would be that bad news? Do you think it is not possible?

 

There is a community of enlightened beings right here.

I have done what you dream of doing. The first thing you will find yourself contending with alone in the woods, is having to chop wood and carry water every day. However, these are very simple tasks. Any jackass can haul shit around. Learn first to do a simple thing without effort and distraction and then you can move on to intoning bread.

 

I do see there is a community of enlightened beings right here. So there some here and there some there, Id like to explore! Sounds crazy but you can be even more enlightened.

So I will do simple things, I won't have any problems, life will be calm and peaceful. I will live wildly and freely, I already do, this city can't tame me, I need a bigger jungle.

 

Right on.
Hint, the world is not valuable for what it has to offer.

 

All sentient beings are essentially Buddhas.
As with water and ice, there is no ice without water;
apart from sentient beings, there are no Buddhas.
Not knowing how close the truth is,
we seek it far away
--what a pity!
Hakuin Ekaku Zenji

Look for Buddha outside your own mind,
and Buddha becomes the devil.
Dogen

The clues are all around you inthydreams, but you will find nothing in the forest that is not in the city that is not in your closet that is not in your heart.

 

Seconded....

You're not going to be bending matter with your thoughts, I'm sorry, but just WANTING something doesn't make it happen.


Because technically reality is simply a perception, you could, in your own (and rather more deluded than most) reality, do this sort of thing, but you are missing the point of meditation, drugs, really everything. It's not to stick your fingers in your ears and hum, it's too understand so you don't need to do this.

 

I'm listening to Siddhartha by Hesse, audiobook. Just started now, and heard something I had to post:

... Was Atman then, not within him? Was not then the source within his own heart? One must find the source within one's own self; one must possess it. Everything else was seeking. A detour. Error.

 

even if you did achieve final enlightenment and lead by example for the betterment of humankind, there would still be those that couldn't care less about your life -- people stuck in a narccisistic cycle driving their attention inwards.

obtaining freedom for yourself can only bring this society so far. as long as there are those things which hinder the human spirit then there will always be people falling victim to those things. as long as there is something to be freed from, then there is a problem. the shackles of human society, even if overcome by yourself, still exist. it is these shackles that must not only be overcome, but eliminated alltogether.

although these shackles are infact an illusion, many people do not act accordingly. they do not realise life for what it really is. it is the realisation that the shackles are actually an illusion which is the real freedom from restraint. if every single being realised life for what it was, and freed themselves from the illusion, then all the things which damage the human spirit would be removed from society. people would act differently because the core components of their lives would be different. the restraining forces which are given power due to ignorance and investment in the illusions would lose their power.

this is a war, for the unalienable rights of human kind and the human spirit.

 

Nothing can damage the human spirit, just as nothing can create it, and anything done by a human is by definition 100% in accordance with the behavior/laws/mechanics/nature of the human spirit.

 

it can be damaged, if enough power is given to the illusion that it is damaged. just because something is in accordance with nature it does not mean that it should be done. nature has a dark side, too.

 

A fish lays a hundred eggs of which only a small fraction reach maturity. Not one of those eggs that didn't reach maturity, lived or died in vain. No greater love than to give a life for a friend. As for the narcissistic. The well have no need of a physician. Society is the person you associate with.
We first remove the log from our own eye.

Not a war. There is no degree of difficulty lest we find it easier to say I hate you than I love you.

 

How did we go from talking about our day jobs to talking about how to release ourselves from the cycle of rebirth?

 

All things are lawful but not all things are helpful. Helpful is a matter of timing. Shadows move around according to the inclination of the sun.

 

It's a life work.

 

because, what better dayjob is there than learning how to free ourselves? this is our highest purpose.

 

but it doesn't do much good if you can see when the rest of the world is blind.

very well put.