Imaginary Funds. . .

Money you earn in a dream never gets in the bank. . . - Annette Nibley

Haw River Black and White

Dreaming. . .

Ever notice how in a dream, the characters, including "your" character, almost always accept the premises of the dream-reality without question? Whether that dream consists of a world where you are being chased by robotic androids, or a world where you signed up for a full course load and then forgot to go to class all semester and are about to flunk out, or even a world where you can fly at will, it is ever-so-rare that you think "this doesn't make sense" and discover that you are in fact in an unreal dream world. On rare occasion the dream character might partially or totally remember his condition -- we call that lucid dreaming.

Given that truth, is it any surprise that so few people question the premises of the material world, the nature of selfhood and personal identity, and the absolute profundity of conscious awareness? Is this world just a larger and more elaborate version of the dream worlds we experience every night while asleep? Who is the dreamer who is imagining himself to be our character? What would constitute "lucidity" in this world?

The Matrix

Do you want to know what IT is? The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us, even now in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, when you go to church, when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth. - Morpheus, The Matrix

An optical delusion of consciousness. . .

A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. - Albert Einstein

Green

Crumble

From John Wheeler:

If there is no “separate self”, then there is no basis for suffering, seeking, gaining, losing. In fact, the whole spiritual edifice, including the awakening, the path, the teacher, the student, the getting and losing it and so forth simply crumbles into non-existence.

Last Light

Fallen Trees

Sunset Lake

Looking Inland

Forest Path

Hunting Island

Luminous Trees

The Natural State

John Wheeler is one of the clearest writers at describing the true nature of what we are. From his website:

This is about knowing yourself, not analyzing appearances. Body, mind, feelings and experiences come and go. They are all appearances, but they are not your abiding being. If all those things come and go, what is it that always remains in spite of those changing appearances? There is the sense of being, which is both present and aware. Do not just verbalize this, but recognize it as fact, as direct experience and knowing. Your own being is the one constant.

*

When appearances are negated, what remains? Did you disappear? Aren't you present and aware? That presence-awareness is your real abiding nature. You cannot negate that. It is the abiding essence. You do not have to try to identify as that. That would be conceptual. You are naturally and effortlessly that. You cannot deny your being and its aware nature. There is no subsequent process. To try to "go forward" from there would only be going back into thought. Just pause in that gap and notice that you are already what you are seeking.

*

All appears in the space of knowing presence. In the end, it is that simple. That is you. There is no "you" apart from that. There is nothing to do, ultimately, because that is what you are.

*

Once the interest in the beliefs and identities drops away due to not taking them as real, a lot more space and openness is present. To the mind used to its old stories and opinions, this perspective may appear bland or empty. Just settle in with that seeming "no thing", which is your real nature. In truth, it is clear, bright, vibrant and full of life.

Day's End, Land's End

Theodicy Explained

Theodicy. The "ace in the hole" for atheism. How can a loving God allow the innocent to suffer so terribly?

There is an answer, but it requires us to abandon a long-standing assumption about who we actually are.

Does the existence of movies that contain conflict or suffering also raise theodicy questions?

Do you ever read a book or go watch a movie with conflict or suffering in it? Why? Why not (as so delightfully parodied in the movie version of "A series of unfortunate events") just go watch a movie about a happy little elf?

If it's all right for you to go watch a movie and vicariously identify with the characters, their lives, stories, pains and triumphs, why do you complain that God / Awareness does the same thing and creates / lives the universe through you and every other apparently separate being?

Theodicy is answered because every joy, every sorrow, every love, every hate, every life, and every death is experienced by the One Consciousness / Brahman / God. You think that you are separate, but that is the dream-character believing in the identity provided by the dream.

God allows the innocent to suffer because God wanted to experience all of it, everything, beautiful and horrible, as part of this grand story called life -- and that innocent child suffering is actually God suffering.

A wise man once said:

"Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these, ye did it unto me".

He meant it. Literally.

Lake Clouds