FROM A SITE VISITOR: Just read something today and almost realized something about the "now" that you said years ago, about how life is like watching a movie. I was struck with the realization that we are not moving linear with or through time during our lives but are in one place the "now", and life is moving by us. Of course, there is that great tendency to want to sneak a peak at the past and future.
F.: Also remember that the only reason to watch the movie is for entertainment’s sake. If you want to reflect on what happens during some past scenes of the movie, go ahead (as long as you are aware of the fact that the past was just an imaginary part of the fictional play/movie and was not real). If you want to guess at the outcome, guess away about the future (but be aware of how futile that is and how it will distract you from what is happening on screen now and how you’ll likely miss out on what is real NOW).
Also, as a reminder, note how the witnessing of the movie can be done without any awareness of the body and can actually help you forget things like the body, body pain, “mind games,” and personas when non-attached witnessing is happening. You can actually be out of your mind during the witnessing too, enjoying a no-brainer movie which requires no thinking on your part. Just sit back and watch and relax and enjoy. That exercise can remind you of what witnessing and Pure Witnessing are really all about. During those moments when you’re merely witnessing the drama on the screen, not involved with it, not attached to outcome, not aware of body or “mind,” you are free. You have left behind “the world.” You are no longer taking seriously that flight of the imagination that is called “the world.” At that moment, you aren’t concerned with "the world," with “relations,” with work, or with anything as long as you remain fully engaged in witnessing only.
In that dark void, the light that is striking you is just a reflection off the screen, so even though certain images on the screen are being registered, you can be in touch with reality and know that it’s just a play on film, just a movie, just a movement of reflected images that are not at all what they appear to be. The actors on the screen look very real, but if you touch the screen—as you touch Reality—You realize that the actors aren’t real, that their words are scripted by others, that they are not the characters they are playing, and that they are nothing more than artificial representations.
When the lights come on, the fantasy (which allowed you to believe for a time that the actors and what they were doing was real) ends as well. Once the movie ends, the screen goes blank. The energy that was operating the equipment that allowed the false images to be seen still remains, but the chimera produced by the imagination ends.
Ultimately, You are the light in which all in this relative existence appears. The Realized know it’s not real; those trapped in personas take all of the nonsense that they think they are seeing to be what is real. The question is, then, are you spending a few hours a week witnessing the movie for the illusion that it is, or are You steadfastly in touch with Reality…24/7? Please enter the silence of contemplation.
F.: Also remember that the only reason to watch the movie is for entertainment’s sake. If you want to reflect on what happens during some past scenes of the movie, go ahead (as long as you are aware of the fact that the past was just an imaginary part of the fictional play/movie and was not real). If you want to guess at the outcome, guess away about the future (but be aware of how futile that is and how it will distract you from what is happening on screen now and how you’ll likely miss out on what is real NOW).
Also, as a reminder, note how the witnessing of the movie can be done without any awareness of the body and can actually help you forget things like the body, body pain, “mind games,” and personas when non-attached witnessing is happening. You can actually be out of your mind during the witnessing too, enjoying a no-brainer movie which requires no thinking on your part. Just sit back and watch and relax and enjoy. That exercise can remind you of what witnessing and Pure Witnessing are really all about. During those moments when you’re merely witnessing the drama on the screen, not involved with it, not attached to outcome, not aware of body or “mind,” you are free. You have left behind “the world.” You are no longer taking seriously that flight of the imagination that is called “the world.” At that moment, you aren’t concerned with "the world," with “relations,” with work, or with anything as long as you remain fully engaged in witnessing only.
In that dark void, the light that is striking you is just a reflection off the screen, so even though certain images on the screen are being registered, you can be in touch with reality and know that it’s just a play on film, just a movie, just a movement of reflected images that are not at all what they appear to be. The actors on the screen look very real, but if you touch the screen—as you touch Reality—You realize that the actors aren’t real, that their words are scripted by others, that they are not the characters they are playing, and that they are nothing more than artificial representations.
When the lights come on, the fantasy (which allowed you to believe for a time that the actors and what they were doing was real) ends as well. Once the movie ends, the screen goes blank. The energy that was operating the equipment that allowed the false images to be seen still remains, but the chimera produced by the imagination ends.
Ultimately, You are the light in which all in this relative existence appears. The Realized know it’s not real; those trapped in personas take all of the nonsense that they think they are seeing to be what is real. The question is, then, are you spending a few hours a week witnessing the movie for the illusion that it is, or are You steadfastly in touch with Reality…24/7? Please enter the silence of contemplation.
