THE “RELATIVE DILEMMA,” Part One

Welcome to this site where those interested in non-duality, specifically in the Direct Path Method of the Advaita Vedanta Nonduality Teachings, can submit questions and where discussions focus on “our” original nature and on dwelling in the natural state. The Nisarga or natural system of yoga, as presented by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj of the Navnath sampradaya lineage, is offered.

FROM A SITE VISITOR: (Reference is to the 17 February 2008 posting) Today you wrote about the re-purified (or unblocked) consciousness. Which is it, or do those mean the same thing?

F.: First, please understand this: many persons residing in the neighborhood from which these posts are offered commute to work in a large nearby city. Some drive a car to work; some travel via mass transit; others pool in large, company-owned vans.

Conservation and environmental issues notwithstanding, it matters less to them how the journey is completed and more that the journey is completed. The same is true for those seeking to complete the “journey” to Full Realization. The suggestion is, don't become so focused on wording used at one step of the "journey" that you stop moving along the "path."

The word “dilemma” (Greek, “di”=“two” and “lemma”=“alternatives, choices or propositions”) refers to a “difficult situation” where a person is forced to choose between two propositions, neither of which is a satisfactory alternative.

(For example, in some “relationships,” dictatorial types lay out this ground rule that is rooted in the reasoning fallacy called “impossible conditions”: “It’s either my way or the highway.” Related reasoning fallacies that dominant human thought include “abandoning discussion”; “affirming the consequence”; “apriorism”; “post hoc”; and “false conditions and alternatives.”)

The “relative dilemma” is that persons, programmed with concepts of duality, are limited to “impossible conditions” and thus face “difficult situations” throughout the entire relative existence. A “dilemma” that certain women born into one particular religion face is either (1) continue to live and continue to be beaten if you show an ankle in public or (2) die and become a sex slave to martyred males in your religion.

The most common dilemmas have all been generated by those who claim to be “religious” or “spiritual” and who claim that those roles allow them to define clearly what is right or wrong, what is good or bad, and what is moral and immoral. In the process, they claim those categories can be applied absolutely throughout a relative existence.

The caution here is to avoid being trapped in a seeker’s dilemma such as this: either (a) there must be one correct set of words that I must find to explain what happens to the consciousness after programming or (b) I cannot complete the “journey” to Full Realization.

The fact is, several views of what happens, as relates to the consciousness post-manifestation, have been set forth by various Advaitin teachers:

(A) Some Advaitins consider the consciousness to have been warped or distorted via programming and conditioning and thus capable of being re-purified via the Advaita Teachings which can purge the beliefs which result in distortion.

(B) Some consider the consciousness to be pure but blocked from knowing ItSelf in its purest state because of learned concepts and ideas that have been accumulated in “the mind.”

In this regard, you may have seen postings here that referred to the “miasma” (Greek, “pollution” or “contaminated air that leads to sickness” or “a thick vaporous atmosphere or fog that prevents clear seeing”). An accumulation of concepts is like an accumulation of fog that prevents the consciousness from seeing clearly.

The related Advaitin pointer is that concepts (learned ignorance) generate a fog that prevents the consciousness from functioning as the Pure Witness or True Self.

(C) A more exact view of “the relative dilemma” is that it is a consequence of persons being programmed, being conditioned, being taught ignorance, and having learned ignorance, after which the consciousness no longer knows ItSelf only but is distracted (by dualistic concepts) from its originally-singular awareness of its Pure, True Self.

The relative result is that persons do not understand their original nature and are thus prevented from dwelling in a natural state during the consciousness’s period of manifestation. That is the more relevant pointer for the seeker on the "path." Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
RELATED TO TODAY’S POST:

Click THE ESSENCE OF THE TEACHINGS

and

Click FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality)

and

Click CONSCIOUSNESS

and

Click AN ADVAITA VEDANTA RETREAT

“BASIC DUALITY”? or NO DUALITY? Part Two, The Conclusion

FROM A SITE VISITOR: The manifestation of consciousness results in "basic duality", without which I couldn't have write this mail.So the basic duality must exist in order to understand the unicity, meaning, only in the relative we can understand the significance of absolute from the absolute view point. Post manifestation, post "basic duality" there is no "one" to understand the absolute. Is my understanding right? Raja

(Continued from yesterday)

R.: only in the relative we can understand the significance of absolute from the absolute view point

F.: YES, to the degree that it is only while the consciousness is manifested and functioning as the Pure Witness that the Absolute can be known and understood. NO, as far as understanding “the significance of the Absolute.” There is no significance to the Absolute.

The earth’s sun is a source of energy, but does it have any significance? Only to those who take themselves to be significant individuals and only to those who believe that the happenings on this planet have, or have ever had, any significance (as opposed to being much ado about nothing).

Those same beliefs about significant individuals and significant happenings could lead a person to consider the Absolute “significant.” Other persons might consider the Absolute to be significant if they identify the Absolute with a physically-present “supreme being” or with a group of “supreme beings,” which it is not.

(Is it possible that some vestige of past religious training is behind that comment, causing you to equate erroneously the “Absolute” with some physical god or gods who supposedly play a “significant role” in the lives of humans?)

As for the expression “from the absolute view point,” if the reference is to (1) the clear view of the entire functioning of the totality that can be witnessed post-Realization and to (2) the clear view available during the period of manifestation while the re-purified (or unblocked) consciousness is abiding AS the Absolute, so it is.

However, if the term “from the absolute viewpoint” implies that there is something “in” the Absolute state that can view something or that there is someone “in” the Absolute state who could view something, then such a conclusion would not be the truth.

R.: Post manifestation, post "basic duality" there is no "one" to understand the absolute. Is my understanding right?

F.: NO & YES:
NO: Again, there is no basic duality.
YES: Post manifestation, there is no “one” to understand the Absolute. Peace and Light. Please enter the silence of contemplation.
ADDITIONAL EXPLANATION RELATED TO TODAY’S POST:

Click WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I DIE?

and

Click THE ESSENCE OF THE TEACHINGS

and

Click FROM THE I TO THE ABSOLUTE (A Seven-Step Journey to Reality)

and

Click CONSCIOUSNESS

and

Click FROM THE ABSOLUTE TO THE NOTHINGNESS

and

Click AN ADVAITA VEDANTA RETREAT

“BASIC DUALITY”? or NO DUALITY? Part One

FROM A SITE VISITOR: The manifestation of consciousness results in "basic duality", without which I couldn't have write this mail.So the basic duality must exist in order to understand the unicity, meaning, only in the relative we can understand the significance of absolute from the absolute view point. Post manifestation, post "basic duality" there is no "one" to understand the absolute. Is my understanding right? Raja

F.: Hello, Raja. First, thanks for a question that does not deal with “what if” scenarios and “what would you do if” scenarios. When those type questions were received in the past, they were not answered, as you know, because…

(1) they ignore the fact that the cause of all is all, so predictions about what would happen before all causes have happened would be useless, and (2) because they assume a do-er exists when it does not.

Now, you’ve submitted an inquiry that is relevant to your positioning on “the path,” so thank you. It’s content will be addressed.

R.: The manifestation of consciousness results in “basic duality”

F.: NO: There is no "basic duality," or any other kind. There is perceived duality, which is a misperception. To see the I AM THAT; I AM as duality is to see rain and snow as dualities. Imagine H20 could talk. It could say, “I am H20 which is currently manifested via a space or form that persons perceive as rain and label as such. At other, colder times, persons will believe that I am something different and call me 'snow'.

“In both cases, their perceiving is in error and their labels are nonsense. I am not ‘rain’ and I am not ‘snow.’ I am H20. Just because it might appear to persons that I am manifesting as many different things, and just because they might label me “river” and “lake” and “stream” and “ocean” and “mist” and “steam” and “clouds” and “hail,” does not make it so. I am H20, only.”

To understand that I AM THAT; I AM does not suggest duality, imagine the manifested conscious-energy expressing its nature in this fashion instead: "I AM THAT Which is temporarily manifested as this I-AM-ness; however, be not mistaken about my 'True Identity,' contrary to any appearances or labels: I AM THAT."

R.: the basic duality must exist in order to understand the unicity

F.: NO: Consider what you just said. To paraphrase, you have said, “A lie must be believed in order to understand truth,” tantamount to saying, “You must believe that H20 as rain and H20 as snow really and truly are two different things if you are to ever understand H20.” See the fallacy in that reasoning?

Belief in duality blocks any possibility of understanding the unicity. It is not “basic duality” that must precede any understanding of the unicity; it is, instead, manifestation and Realization that must happen in order to understand the unicity. Please enter the silence of contemplation. (To be continued)
RELATED TO TODAY’S POST:
“The Advanced Advaitin Seeker’s Package”: From the I to the Absolute, Consciousness/Awareness, and From the Absolute to the Nothingness. To order, visit http://floydhenderson.com/order.htm .

ONE WHO HAS BEEN SEEKING “ALL HIS LIFE” IS NOW INVESTIGATING THE ADVAITA “PATH,” Part Five, The Conclusion

FROM A SITE VISITOR: If I'm not my body and and am aware of my consciousness even if I lost most of it's parts and I'm becoming conscious that I wasn't created so don't die but i return to the source or the field of consciousness from whence i came after my manifestation-am I conscious of this return? Thanks in advance. Bill

[Continued from yesterday]

F.: These Advaita teachings can lead to an understanding that alleviates all fears, many of which are rooted in the frightful dogma of duality that is used to program and control children and adults. Freed from belief in dualistic dogma, persons are freed from their fears of hell instead of heaven, of fire instead of pleasure, of punishment instead of reward. (Obviously, deception-based desires will also fade away.)

Realized, nothing will be scary. What is to fear? Can you hurt the energy that is ready and waiting at the plug in your kitchen wall? No. I cannot be harmed. I AM energy, not a body, not a mind, and not any of the personas that were assigned or adopted prior to Realization.

B.: But at the same time I think you saying that once realized this happens anyway. That is that I begin living as if the who that was once bill is still around but is not attached to anything. Am I on the right track?

F.: Yes. Consciousness can manifest “within” a space, but it cannot “attach” to anything. I AM truly free.

B.: This is kind of blowing me away.

F.: That’s what the “journey” is about: blowing away the “me,” (in fact, all of the false “me’s”). Then You will know the Me—the consciousness temporarily manifested as the Am-ness. I Am for now the beingness itself, not a "human being" nor one destined to be a "supernatural being" some day. That is why you are told, when you speak of Me, speak of Me as the I AM, not as “floyd” or “a person” or “a body.”

B.: So my being scared about this (when my consciousness fades from a space called bill) is generated not from moving to know who I am but comes from that body mind personality trap or prison I have created that I hold on to with great desperation. That's got to produce fear. How can energy fear? I think I'm getting it.

F.: Agreed, except you did not "create" the trap or prison. The trap/prison came about because your programmers and conditioners believed unquestioningly the false ideas and concepts which they were taught and which they subsequently passed down to you.

That has been the "heritage" or "legacy" of persons for thousands of years. Relatively speaking, the masses bequeath something far more damning than their damaged genes, than their familial dysfunctionalism, than their egocentric traditions. They pass down from one generation to the next their distorted thinking, their delusional "minds," their nonsense, and their learned ignorance.

And of the most consequence, relatively speaking, they pass down their admonitions to question nothing and to move through the relative existence with blind faith in anything and everything that comes from the mouth of someone who has been appointed to, or who has assumed, a position of "authority."

Want to see what that kind of existence is truly like? Then cover your eyes with a blindfold before leaving your home this morning, and then try going through your daily routines with that handicap. Then you will understand what it is like for the more than six billion persons who stumble through the relative existence...not seeing clearly, blind to Reality, moving through their relative existence as if asleep and dreaming, and believing that whatever way they see is accurate perceiving. So it is, but so it need not be.

That experiment would also likely remind you of the way that you have moved through the relative existence so far, but these teaching offer to you the pointer that you need never return to that mode again. Peace and Light.

B.: Thanks again Bill.

F.: Please enter the silence of contemplation.

RELATED TO TODAY’S POST:

AN ONLINE COURSE IN THE ADVAITA VEDANTA PHILOSOPHY (You may visit http://advaitaclasses.blogspot.com/ for details.)

Also:

[Several books are offered for beginners. More information regarding the “Advaita Beginner’s Package” is available at http://floydhenderson.com/order.htm ]

LIBERATION is a guide to elimination of personality; BULLSHIT is, among other things, an invitation to reject cultural influences to accumulate (including the accumulation of money and excess property and personas and more and more religious beliefs and/or spiritual knowledge and co-dependent entanglements that are intended to provide “happiness”):

Click LIBERATION

and

Click IT’S ALL BULLSHIT