Colin Wilson

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Dear Wisdom:

I am begging you
Don't come, don't go,
Misery loves company
Dontcha know.

You say there is a way out?
Don't wanna hear
Don't wanna see
'Cause if its true
Ya know,
That's the end of me.

Signed,
Your old friend,
Ignorance.


http://youtu.be/jE_NkheE5i8
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

We can't say a particular snowflake is doing it wrong.
that would be absurd,
because a snowflake depends on causes/conditions.
thusly any and all snowflakes are unconditionally loved.

wisdom and ignorance depend on human being,
no human being, no wisdom experienced, no ignorance experienced.

the transmission of wisdom depends on there being coaches,
coaches depend on there being grasshoppers,

the getting of wisdom depends on the skillful means of coaches,
the getting of wisdom depends on the readiness of grasshoppers.

dependant arising.
intricate web.

I've lived in the dark which is merely an absence of light.
In that dark an access to coaching caused a 'flash of lightning'.
Everything was illumined in that instant.
An explosion of love broke through.

My ineptitude at coaching causes sorrow in me.
I'm sorry.

The notion of 'an infinitely gentle, infinitely suffering thing'
drives the conversation.
It's not a commitment like Alex's commitment to the ' inherently dangerous World' picture.
The notion is not an abiding attachment,
that wrecks one's World,
it's a memory of where one came from,
and must have presence,
as a carrying,
lightly carrying,
else one would retire to the sofa and eat potato chips.
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Talking Ass wrote: Power is always a subtext here. The having of it and the use of it. If I do not succeed in getting through to you---and I assume I don't---nevertheless I believe I succeed in getting through to my readers. So, no matter if it is silly, jolly, imagined, grey, colorful, pastoral, urban, simple, complex, sane or insane, shrill, modulated or articulate, the energy is what most matters to me. And that energy has nothing to do with your dreary 'philosophy', and with that of your recent side-kick. The whole point is that this *energy* is prefigured not in words and concepts but in something far more vital and central to ourselves.
Certainly you seem very interested in siphoning off this round going energy. Are you so hungry?
It does not surprise me that you do not get this, at all... ;-).
You're mistaken. It's just not as interesting for me as it clearly is to you. There are even bigger fishes to fry, if you want to keep the terminology wrapped in the old newspapers of power.
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Jamesh
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Jamesh »

Talking Ass,

I rarely feel the urge to visit here these days, and I must say I feel somewhat dumbed down as a result - quite out of touch.

For some reason tonight I read quite a few of your posts. Most enjoyable, some quite funny bits, and a considerable lot of views that I agree with, well where they echoed with my own own past thoughts, as is natural with confirmation bias.

I'll probably end up reading most of them, some time. Well done.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Because we're always in a conversation,
speaking into a conversation,
having many conversations,
with many people.
wouldn't it be sensible to look at the nature of conversation?

To me,
people speaking into a conversation are showing their pictures.
like kids showing each other their baseball cards.

I like the experience of Beginner's Mind,
where the machinery of one's conditioning is set aside,
so the kid showing his baseball card can come alive.
Joy is looking at baseball cards,
everybody knows that.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

It's a shame that in a conversation,
the message of emptiness 'struggles' to break through.
This necessary precursor to enlightenment.

Enlightenment doesn't grow on trees,
It is spoken into existence in conversations,
it is coached.
Why can't the showing of it be met with that joy and enthusiasm kids have when they show each other their new baseball cards.

I know it's causes/conditions,
but it's a shame,
how in adults (conditioned mind),
cynicism, complacency, a learned skepticism, an acquired jadedness, even loathing and Acts of defiance,
arise to meet such a beautiful understanding.

No person or thing is self-established. (emptiness).

How can that be so hard to understand?
The clarity of it is so patently obvious.
Why is it met with such chagrin, such disdain, such resistance, such hatred?
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Science tells the 'what happens' this way.
quarks build atoms,
atoms build molecules,
molecules build organs,
the pieces/parts of human being,
of how things exist.
they actually watch these processes unfolding in laboratories, spontaneously arising.

It's impossible there is a separate self doing anything except by imagination.
It's impossible for there to be boundaries except by imagination.

Why is the way it is so desparately resisted.
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Kunga
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Kunga »

wisdom without compassion is dangerous
compassion without wisdom is dangerous

there is no wisdom without compassion
cousinbasil
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by cousinbasil »

Kunga wrote:wisdom without compassion is dangerous
compassion without wisdom is dangerous

there is no wisdom without compassion
Then there is no danger.
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Kunga
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Kunga »

cousinbasil wrote: Then there is no danger.
Yes, the danger is when someone ignorantly thinks they're compassionate
and does something stupid out of compassion...like helps a poor
person on the street, and gets mugged in return.

Ignorance is void of wisdom/compassion.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Emptiness is discovered in the recognition of 2 Truths.
conventional reality/ultimate reality.
the Cross is meant to represent these truths intersecting and human being on the cross 'struggling'.

Once upon a time there was an old Zen Master named Nonoko who lived alone in a hut in the woods. One night while Nonoko was sitting in meditation a powerful stranger came to the door and, brandishing a sword, asked Nonoko for all his money. Nonoko continued to count his breaths while saying to the stranger, All my money is on the shelf behind the books. Take all you need but leave me ten yen. I need to pay my taxes this week.

The stranger went to the shelf and removed all the money except ten yen. He also took a lovely urn on the shelf.
Be careful how you carry that urn, said Nonoko. It can easily crack.
The stranger looked once more around the small barren room and began to leave.

You have forgotten to say thank you, said Nonoko.

The stranger said thank you and left.

The next day the whole village was in an uproar. Half a dozen people claimed they'd been robbed. When a friend noted that Nonoko's urn was missing, he asked Nonoko if he too had been a victim of the thief.
Oh no, said Nonoko. I loaned the urn to a stranger, along with some money. He said thank you and left. He was pleasant enough but careless with his sword.

Life is struggle,
You have to pay the bills and cook the food at the very least.

Can you see how recognising emptiness is the unstruggling of struggle?
How one gets free of afflictive emotion.
How one's mind stills.

Can it be seen that no-one can do the dirt on you but yourself?
that you make it mean what it means?
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

No-one can damage you.
You have to gather yourself unto yourself.
You are responsible.

How many times have you settled for silly friends instead of no friends at all?
How did that work out?

If you get hit by a car.
You are responsible.
You took every step that was required to take to get you in front of that car.

No-one can do the dirt on you.
You are responsible.
If you deign to help, you deign to help.
The helpee does what the helpee does.
That's the helpees responsibility not yours.

You are the causes/conditions arising that constitue the pattern you.
own that.
live your pattern.

No blame. You can't blame the herd for your misery. For your lacklustre.
You are responsible.
Take that responsibility.
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

No-one can damage you.
You have to gather yourself unto yourself.
You are responsible.


You are the causes/conditions arising that constitue the pattern you.
own that.
live your pattern.
Dennis, I see and agree wholeheartedly with what you are saying. Two questions:

1. Do you see the appearance of the individual causal pattern in all sentient beings as being the same thing as the appearance of the natural realm, and then, of its evolution in man into the appearance of the human imagination?

2. What is your vision of what happens when the individual human causal chain [the gestalt of imagined attachments] has been completely crucified or cleared of all of its affects/effects/conditions?
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

It's a matter of grokking the situation.

How conventional reality crosses ultimate reality.

We can nominate identification as a separate self as the cause of the struggle and then the chain becomes effect, effect, effect, effect, effect, effect, effect....

We have to 'get' the situation that's created out of the separate self syndrome.
Immediately, every bastard is shit scared of each other.
Survival is paramount.
Joy and love are given the arse and 'cunning' is the name of the game.
The machinery of it...stimulus/response, stimulus/response, stimulus/response.
Grok the machinery that sets in train from the identification as separate self.
The construction of a hard outer shell around oneself to protect oneself from being dominated.
Forming inauthentic alliances to help one's self 'to get through the night'.
The attachments to drugs, comfort eating, sex, relationships to block out the pain.
Identifying as a 'Culture'...struggle
Identifying as a Religion...struggle

All that,
empty and meaningless.
What is your vision of what happens when the individual human causal chain [the gestalt of imagined attachments] has been completely crucified or cleared of all of its affects/effects/conditions?
'I can see clearly now'
Beginners Mind.
Astonishment.
free, happy.
true nature.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

The way I get GF is that it is a conversation for transformation where the machinery of identification gets dismantled.

It's not meant to be a Philosophy Restaurant.
The kind of activity where you look at the menu.
And think:
For entree,
I like paganism, don't like buddhism, thanks but no thanks.
perhaps a sprig of christian for seasoning.

For mains,
I'll have a portion of Neitschke, a little Tao on the side, a generous dollop of Sartre.

For dessert,
perhaps some dessicated Heidegger, a tad Merleau-Ponty, not too rich...
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Pam,
I'll have to tell you the story of Dennis.
He was being coached in language as soon as he was born like a parrot gets coached to mouth words and Dennis didn't know what it meant but if he got the words right his parents would hug him for some reason that escaped him.
He was being given a message by his parents.
He didn't get the message until he was about 3.
The message was:
You are Dennis, you are 3, you are Australian, Geelong is your football team.
You are on your own kid. Sink or swim.
You better shape up and follow the rules.
Do what we tell you or our love is withdrawn.

Dennis was 'fearful' and had to watch his step.
Suddenly he was self-conscious and vulnerable.
A sense of a separate self.

He had 2 rules in play.
1. Look out for danger in a dangerous world.
2. Look for a growth opportunity.

Dennis, for safety, kept well away from anything looking dangerous.
Dennis, for growth and security, started attaching himself to people and ideas that looked good, that looked like they had power, that could fortify Dennis.
Trouble was the attachments lost their charm.
When an attachment lost charm, Dennis was 'lost'.
The stimulus/response was to pull another attachment out of the World.
Round and round it went.

One day Dennis realised there's nothing there,
Dennis experienced Void.
The Context for Dennis was completely shifted.
Appearance was known as appearance, as impermanent, as insubstantial, as empty and meaningless and devoid of any rational purpose for attaching to other than a very light attachment.
Heavy attachment was realised as troublesome and an experience of struggle. Dennis wasn't fooled by appearance.

The sense of a separate self looks very much like a design flaw in human being that causes untold misery,
it would be better if it was coached out of human being.

Would that constitute a Vision Pam?
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Dennis, for reasons unknown to me, I missed reading your very thoughtful responses to me in this thread until today.
Dennis: The way I get GF is that it is a conversation for transformation where the machinery of identification gets dismantled.
This is how I see the GF forum as well.

As for the story of Dennis, I believe you are telling the story of every man who becomes burdened with the weight of the multiplicity of his identifications, none of which are original of his own mind, every one given him by others who have not yet awakened from the nightmare of the sense of a separate self. Certainly I see myself in your story, and I agree that what is left once the heavy attachments to the idea of self have been liberated is but a light attachment, which I identify as a subtle breath attachment to I AM itself.

As for your thought that the sense of a separate self looks very much like a design flaw in human being that causes untold misery, I would say that once one realizes that they are the God of every thought they think, including the thought of separation, they also come to realize that there can be no flaw in that which is always and ever whole and complete, that is, their I AM THAT I AM.

Thank you for your vision; spirit touching spirit. :-)
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

do you access the possibility of the experience of 'oceans of grief' expressing itself freely...

the notion of an infinitely gentle, infinitely suffering thing caught in the social machinery,
having its 'grief of separation' unlocked,
released?
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Dennis Mahar wrote:do you access the possibility of the experience of 'oceans of grief' expressing itself freely...

the notion of an infinitely gentle, infinitely suffering thing caught in the social machinery,
having its 'grief of separation' unlocked,
released?
I not only access the possibility of such a reality, I AM [the living Word] of this reality. To use a spiritual metaphor to explain who and what I am in relation to the suffering that is humanism attachment, I am God, in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself. What I have discovered is that wisdom and compassion for those who are yet to discover wisdom go hand in hand. This is why there is no such thing as nihilism or a void of nothingness in man's consciousness; at all times, thought is an active principle whether the thinker is guided by ignorance of the I AM or by wisdom of the I AM.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Pam,
As for your thought that the sense of a separate self looks very much like a design flaw in human being that causes untold misery, I would say that once one realizes that they are the God of every thought they think, including the thought of separation, they also come to realize that there can be no flaw in that which is always and ever whole and complete, that is, their I AM THAT I AM.
Recognising 2 truths, conventional reality/ultimate reality.
Ultimately there's no flaw.

inside the machine, looking at it,
Nietzsche got the cause/condition as human gullibility and reason as the way out.
Existentialists saw it as 'fallen into a World'.
The Adam and Eve thing has it as 'disobedience'.
Mythologists get it as 'Snow White (true nature) bit on the poison apple and fell into a swoon'.

'Design flaw' works as distinction as cause/condition.
What I have discovered is that wisdom and compassion for those who are yet to discover wisdom go hand in hand.
Yes, mood and understanding.
This is why there is no such thing as nihilism or a void of nothingness in man's consciousness; at all times, thought is an active principle whether the thinker is guided by ignorance of the I AM or by wisdom of the I AM.
Experience of Void is neither nothing or nihilistic.
Void is the dissolution of one's conceptual structures before one's very eyes.
Everything one thought or emoted about 'World',
pfft!,
gone,
vanished,
non conceptual awareness.

Of course one builds and borrows significant language/conceptual structures to explain it.
One distinguishes.

Many people are fine with 'World' and many thrive in it.
Most, probably, comfortably numb inside support structures of attachments.
Only suffering overtly when the house of cards looks like breaking down and people are amazingly resilient in getting it back in place.

Pam, if you are in conversation with an aquaintance, who is in a complaint or breakdown mode,
to tune into that you have to have immersion in conventional reality otherwise you wouldn't know what they're talking about,
and in that conversation you would be, not only listening intently, you would also be in some moments, pointing out Ultimate Reality..
You would be noticing the design flaw in that persons thinking/feeling and presenting other possibilities for that person to look at in order for them to break through.

The distinction, 2 truths, a foot in both camps, safely and surely navigating 'World'.
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Recognising 2 truths, conventional reality/ultimate reality.
Ultimately there's no flaw.

inside the machine, looking at it,
Nietzsche got the cause/condition as human gullibility and reason as the way out.
There is a scripture in the bible that applies to what Nietzsche discovered: "Come now, and let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Reasoning the things of God and man is indeed the way out of humanism or conventional reality, bringing man to the AlphaOmega point of revelation of his true nature, that of spirit or ultimate reality. AlphaOmega is the Void, and a man who discovers the AlphaOmega within himself has discovered "the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture." At this stage of enlightenment reasoning the things of God is still used to bring one back to rest, and for me, as well, I stay at rest by clothing myself with identifiers of I AM that sustain my consciousness as to intent and purpose of wisdom such as I mentioned above, identifiers such as I am God, in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself.

Nietzsche was correct in his discovery of the way out, but from what I understand of his life, he did not expand his awareness enough to enter in the door of the resting point of AlphaOmega. Perhaps, because of his exposure to the ignorance of conventional religion, he could not allow himself to "be held in the arm" of spiritual thought.
Pam, if you are in conversation with an aquaintance, who is in a complaint or breakdown mode,
to tune into that you have to have immersion in conventional reality otherwise you wouldn't know what they're talking about,
and in that conversation you would be, not only listening intently, you would also be in some moments, pointing out Ultimate Reality..
You would be noticing the design flaw in that persons thinking/feeling and presenting other possibilities for that person to look at in order for them to break through.
I no longer immerse myself in conventional reality when I am conversing with someone who is suffering their attachments. Rather, I stand unmoving on my AlphaOmega point, allowing them to say what they need to say, guiding them gently to where I am standing so they can catch a glimpse of what I am seeing. I use conventional terms so they 'stay with me', but I do not enter into a sympathetic or empathetic relationship with the content of their suffering. Instead, I hold to the truth that it is their responsibility to find their own source or center where suffering the things of "what matters to me" is unknown.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Treading carefully here.

If philosophy is these branches:
metaphysics
epistemology
politics
ethics
aesthetics

Nietzsche threw religion out of metaphysics, existentialists declared the end of metaphysics.
The Buddha steered a middle path between essentialism (religion) and nihilism.

The reason is there's no radical transformation in religion for human being.
Human being is dumbed down in slavish herd behaviour.
Human Being is terrified of wrathful God and is beholden to depraved, corrupted clergies exploiting this fear mercilessly.
Religion is disgusting and unfit for pigs.

epistemology became Reason and not Belief.

politics and ethics (the way we treat each other).
making Earth our meaning.
applying reason to this existence.
Jesus' political/ethical statement was 'love thy neighbour as thyself'.
Buddha's eightfold path.
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Before one can understand the depth of what Jesus meant when he said "love thy neighbour as thyself" one has to realize that Jesus was neither political or ethical, for these are things of intellectual humanism, the very things he came to crucify in his consciousness. Jesus was a radical teacher of spirit consciousness, of the single eye of nondual awareness of his Father in heaven: "The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness."

In telling his listeners to "love thy neighbour as thyself" Jesus was using the language of human comprehension to suggest the wisdom of the AM nature of spirit. He used language such as this because most who came to hear his words were still under the influence of conventional religion and were not ready to hear of the singular Christ, A = A.

The Buddha also taught on different levels of understanding.
Dennis Mahar
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Dennis Mahar »

Both those characters Jesus and Buddha taught of 'After-life'.
That if human being undertook specific policy in action in this life then specific consequences would arise 'after-life'.

Effectively,
they were Rhetorical Politicians for 'After-life' and set a Political (policy) and Ethical standard for this life in order to benefit in after-life.

Politicians.
Campaign speeches.
Matters of belief.
Pam Seeback
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Re: Colin Wilson

Post by Pam Seeback »

Both those characters Jesus and Buddha taught of 'After-life'.
That if human being undertook specific policy in action in this life then specific consequences would arise 'after-life'.

Effectively,
they were Rhetorical Politicians for 'After-life' and set a Political (policy) and Ethical standard for this life in order to benefit in after-life.

Politicians.
Campaign speeches.
Matters of belief.
Dennis, with all due respect, if this is your understanding of the teachings of Jesus and Gautama, then you have not understood the substance of their words.

"After-life" is an oxymoron, for there is no beginning or ending to life, which is the lesson at the heart of the teachings of both Jesus and Gautama. Have you actually studied their words, or are you yourself guilty of that which you accuse them, which is the spewing forth of rhetoric of what you have heard about the teachings of Jesus and the Buddha and not what you know of them?

You speak of being lightly attached to causes and conditions. What is holding you to this view? What will happen when you are no longer attached? Both Jesus and Gautama brought answers to this question. Was it not you who acknowledged that the unconditioned Void [heaven/nirvana] is not a vacuum of nothingness?

Perhaps if you study the meat of their teachings you will cease being caught between the two worlds of awareness, that of being attached to humanism and that of trying to be free of these attachments.
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