Our tradition urges us to convince, but to convince means to settle to the other’s conditioning.

Instead, Challenge!

Challenge your own thought until there seems to be no answer! After doing so, then challenge others.

They might give you an answer or you might leave them thinking, but at least you have dared to go into your limits. The only way to progress when it seems a dead end is to put forth things that are not commonly combined.

For example, why does a person who loves to measure and believes in the reality of science ignore the reality of the present moment? Get the contradiction?

This is the point:

Measurement is in the present moment, and although some might want to argue that measurement requires the past in order to create a present. At the end, the measurements have to be written down and recorded in a way that is not simply inside the mind. Therefore, measurement has to be touched in a certain point only in the present moment as a collective experience in order to state it is true.

However, if the present moment is so fundamental for the process of measurement. Why are those who believe in measurement lost in the past? Why does a philosopher of science use the mind as a source of truth ignoring the fact that science is not based in mental abstractions at the end of the process?

I know there are many “possibilities” that might fire back at me such as the reality of math, but let us remember that math can be a theory unless proved real by physics, computation, etc. Although, I am crossing fine lines of perspective here…

My main point is:

Why does the measure-lover type of person use the past as a devotional source of truth? What about the present moment? Why ignore it so categorically? Why do they so blatantly reject the notion of the “sublime” if it is an actual experience in the present moment which could be measured through science?

A counter example, what happens with a person that does not care about the reality of our collective truths such as science? How can you ignore the reality that can be measured and bring actual results? Is it because it is easier to escape, and say it is all a weird dream? What about the pain and suffering of those who cannot ignore this “reality”?

Why ignore the reality of science and the fact that one can actually measure in the brain the way the so called “sublime” modifies a physical aspect of ourselves? Why can they become so self-absorbed, but still use any device that exists due to such measurable reality?

In my perspective, both, the non-measurement person believer and the measurement person believer, are right and wrong. Instead of working together, they keep fighting over particulars that might serve a purpose.

Yet, that is not enough to reach a better understanding of the truth:

We need to work together, not against each other, through a challenge type of approach.

What do I mean?

01 Learn to use the other’s own words against him/her. This requires a certain type of knowledge in order to twist him own belief against him, and a little bit of mental agility. If you actually challenge a person through their own beliefs, then one might actually see our own limits and move on to something more challenging.

02 Use the exact opposite argument that the other person is expecting to have. If you are debating with a measurement type, argue in favor of non-measurement and vise-versa. Do it with intelligence, not as a childish debate.

Be careful! If a person is stubborn because they base in their beliefs a certain type of inner security stop doing it. You will get nowhere and it will wear you down.

03Be flexible, and learn to observe how the flux of ideas are not a static build but a fluid notion that constantly changes. The idea of a static truth is so pervasive that we end up again always fighting for a never-agreement. I am not being absolute here, but if the debate is stuck in a walked path called “the truth” by a traditional current of thought that bases their inner security in a belief, then were are we walking toward?

Now, how do you bridge these two? How can you convince them that there acutally is a double position (measurement and non-measurement) or even broader position we might not be aware of?

An empirical multidisciplinary person can do such a gigantic task, but it requires self discipline. Just as one learns to play an instrument although one could have the paradigm of being inept in music, and at the end ends up mastering it. If one hates math, then by trying to understand something, not to marry to it, but to understand it, then an inner paradigm is released, and so forth.

With empirical I mean a person who does not base his inner security in a belief, that changes his belief when he sees that he is wrong, and is capable of recognizing openly their mistake.

Then, one can actually begin to learn how to explain to others something that might seem totally counter-wise as something coherent and with a certain truth. Truths are tricky, but if they are tricky then how can one convince others?

Ha! Not convincing! Of course… Is it? Maybe not?

For example, if I know that brain science can measure the sublime in Zen, why reject the notion of such reality? What if the the unmeasurable can be measured, not by the observer, but by the observing?

Note: Not the observed, but the observing. The observer within the sublime will not feel measurement, but the observing will. A single shift in perspective can cause a new way to challenge our tradition, and thus create a better society that actually cares about ourselves, not only solving the problem of truth.

Is in the present moment the only “place” to find out the “truth”? Do you see the point? There is a lot of depth here, but I will not spill the beans! Think by yourself, and find it out!

Yes, of course, if we have a common truth we might believe peace shall arrive, but why wait for that moment? Why not find peace within ourselves first? What if what we have been taught is “the truth” is actually a belief?

Photo Credits: Howard Dickins

If you grew in a certain tradition of belief that uses the notion of heaven in order to gain security of our future after death, then the question is not where, but does it exist? Does heaven exist? There are some possible answers: Yes, no, irrelevant, or perhaps.

Let’s go with perhaps…

People who live and are raised within a set of traditions and beliefs that claim heaven does exist must ask themselves, where is heaven? If you just answer, heaven is the sky or heaven a special place after death…

Please, ask: Why do you believe in heaven if you have no idea of where it is? How can you believe in something that is impossible to define in a spectrum of locality or space?

You might answer: Well, that is what faith is all about…

I will ask again: Is your reality based on pure belief? Why? Is this a choice you made? Did you family brain wash you with the idea, and now it gives you so much security that you cannot live without such faith? How painful is it to read this? Are you willing to rationalize what is deeply ingrained within your mindset?

If you can’t rationalize, stop reading because I will challenge you. I will make you ask questions you might not want to know about, so please. Stop.

If you are willing to risk your mindset and hard core beliefs in order to know where is heaven, then keep reading.

Let’s define the other case: What happens if you are one of those who believe that heaven does not exist?

In such case, I ask: What is heaven? Should we define heaven as a place where mythological figures sleep and live in pleasure? Could heaven be something abstract, but we tend to create a tangible concept out of it because that is all we know?

Perhaps, but where is it?

If it is an abstraction, then there is no actual locality. If one choose to search for such a place, then one might want to possess the concept in order to believe. In the process of possession, one might lose the reality of the concept in order to feel secure with such concept. What do this mean?

If the concept of heaven, is not a real place but an abstraction, then where is it? Of course, in the mind! Is this true?

All abstractions are in the mind of the one understand such concept. Now if heaven is in the mind because it is an abstraction, can we actually convert an abstraction into something concrete?

Of course, how? Imagine an idea… I have an abstract idea, the idea of happiness. In the back of my mind, there is this concept called happiness. However, it is an abstract idea unless I am experiencing happiness in the actual moment I bring to reality my abstraction.

Therefore, in the same manner, could we create from the concept of heaven, a reality, one that is not in a strange place, but here in the present moment?

If we ask this, then we have another question: Well, what if my abstract concept of heaven is not the same as yours? Does that invalidate my concept of heaven? Is a consensus needed in order to achieve a concept of heaven?

In order to answer, I ask: Does the fact that you feel happiness erase its reality if the person beside you is angry and can’t feel your happiness? Of course not or does it? Take a deep breath, and test this out.

Be yourself heaven! Find heaven as an actuality within yourself as a reflection of your inner haven. The way to achieve this is to realize within yourself that heaven is not a place, but an actual reality expressed and felt within.

The paradigm shift in this idea is to ask: Is heaven inside of yourself? Could it be that heaven is not a place one will find after death, but a reality inside of me? Could I realize through experience that heaven is me? Could it be possible to live a heaven within this reality (i.e. this objective place conceptualized as Earth) through my own experiences of fulfillment and love?

Could heaven be here already, but we are so stubborn with those traditional beliefs that we lose sight of what is actually in front of us always?

Think it out! Observe yourself! Find out through your own experience, and defy my thought after understanding what I mean.

If you simply reject this because you are attached your traditional beliefs, then ask: What will happen if heaven does not exist? What will happen if heaven does exist?

What would change if we were able to live heaven here and now, instead of waiting for a non-reality (i.e. not in the present moment) to occur?

Photo credits: First image By Luz A. Villa
Second by ✿ nicolas_gent ✿
Third By h.koppdelaney

You’ve got to put it to the test in a VERY serious manner.

With this purpose in mind, I will give you some questions that could lead you to this answer, but at the same time I will contradict myself. This is to make you think because there are many currents of thought to answer this question, including yours and mine. Yet, I am going to approach to it through a different lens, a practical and experimental one.

First of all, what is the objective of meditation? Some might believe it is to reach enlightenment, so I ask… What is enlightenment? Is it a supernatural thing? Although, this could be deeply phenomenological I still want to be cautious. We cannot simply accept something that is out of our experience (although this experience might be false, will not go here right now, but it is about how our senses and brain tricks us); we need to ask questions because blind belief has a done a lot of damage to our societies.

So, let’s put an idea forward as a possibility of enlightenment:

Love, the feeling of loving when it is overwhelming and completely embracing to the point your ‘self’ is not longer that ‘self’.

You could have felt this when you were hugging your child, even a dog, or simply by being totally out of time and space when doing something for you or others in a brief moment of space and time, a deep fulfilling moment. My point in comparing it to this: I want to bring enlightenment to something experimental, something that can be actual in yourself, but is not dependent of your desires of wanting to be ‘enlightened’ but in giving “yourself”.

Now, to be very clear I am not saying this is enlightenment, but I am not saying it isn’t either: I am just setting a ‘common’ ground that will put forward the possibility of love being enlightenment.

Now, if love is enlightenment? Then, ask yourself: What could be the most incredible moment of love I have lived? Why haven’t I lived it constantly? What is stopping me from living a constant wave of love within myself?

These questions are very interesting because they could lead you to ask: Who am I? Who is that ‘myself’? Who is this being ‘I’ who thinks I am which is constantly talking to me? Is there a moment in our minds where there is complete silence of chatter? Does chatter stop when I love? Can I be aware of something without the need of words and chatter? Can I be aware of the words and chatter without judging them, but loving them?

Loving my CHATTER?! Could that mean love myself? Could loving ‘myself’ mean enlightenment? Is this egoism? How does egoism differ from ‘enlightened’ love? Could egoism mean my chatter, and ‘enlightened’ love the awareness of the chatter? Could it mean to love the chatter, but at the same time improving it by being aware of what is going on inside of it without judging harshly (with love)? Am I that chatter? If I can be aware of my chatter, can I be aware of the things that surround me without that chatter? If I am able to see everything around me without chatter or judgments, can I feel that love that makes it all bloom?

Don’t make your need for answers or ‘quest’ be the opium of your mind, let it rest, so when it does speak to you, you will be ready to hear.

Now, awareness… How does it relate to meditation and the idea of enlightenment? Well, meditation is said to take you to this state of silence, but is this silence necessary? Isn’t awareness more fulfilling than meditation? Could awareness be the silence when observing deeply our chatter or nature? Could meditation be at tool that we believe is the ‘method’ without seeing that the tool as a tool is meaningless if there is no understanding of what it does and how it does it?

With awareness, you can have chatter, but you are aware of it. With awareness, you can have silence, and be aware of it. In awareness, there is love… Why? You have to love to see the awareness or you have to be aware to see the love. It is in actual experience that this can be realized, not as a myth of enlightenment, but as an actual thing that can be achieved when you decide to put your effort into it.

In meditation there is the belief that there is a ‘method’, and methods don’t work for everybody. So, we must doubt the method, and find our own ways to see our minds ‘through’ our own forms of meditation or reflection. You can try the method, but don’t be blinded by the method… You are the ultimate source of meditation… You are the experience that is observing everything that happens around you.

You Choose!

Meditation, awareness, love, enlightenment, or another… Whatever you choose, do it, but try to ask why? Find your own answers, and if they lead you to fulfillment (a deep sense of love)… There is something good there to be explored, if they lead you to depression and suffering: STOP. Analyze yourself.

Ask: What am I afraid of? Nothing…? Then, let it be for a while, stop the questions, live and experience of being in the tree of life. Perhaps, in the moment you least imagine… An answer will pop! You will know it is time to ask the questions, again. However, don’t ignore it totally… Listen.

It is all about deep observations, awareness, love, YOUR method of meditation, and perhaps enlightenment, and again be cautious… Self-delusion is always a possibility, yet… I ask: Is the love you feel an illusion? How is it real? Could it be even more real? Could you live it to its full potential? What is that potential?

This goes way into the way we process information through a possible prediction system (Hawkins, Blakeslee) or an interpreter (Gazzaniga) in the brain that creates justifications to sustain beliefs.

The studies about how the brain works are in process, but in between…

We have an urgent thing to answer: What is violence? Where does violence come from? Where does violence lie within us?

There are people who talk about freedom of the mind, and its emptiness. It is my concern that their beliefs and their concepts about all these theories fill the same void religion fills. The only difference is that their ideology changes to their new adopted behaviors of meditation or whatever ‘fashion’ is available to them that makes them feel good or safe.

The problem of ideology and belief is the lack of questioning the fundamental reasons: Who are we? What is a concept? What is to think? How do we think? What is love? What is to observe? Etc. These questions may seem obvious, but it is in that trap that we have been living, a trap that can no longer be contained. It is ready to explode.

There are philosophers, religious figures, and others who have attempted to give answers to these questions. However, it can no longer be a state of complete denial where deep thought is left for some, it is our responsibility to ask questions, and try to answer them, not for the sake of knowledge, but your own fulfillment.

Now, it seems easier and more tempting to just read a ‘guru’, and believe everything he says, instead of challenging him and giving him your own level, you as ‘he’ as the same capacities, the only difference is that he made a living by being ‘a guru’. You haven’t chosen that path.

Most of us have to work or do things to survive and being a guru is not an option, unless you are one of those writers who say to know everything about the world, but in fact are a bunch of copy pasters from different traditions of thought.

Therefore, this post today will be to challenge you…

I dare you to think! To ask questions. To forget about the ‘guru’, to face life with all you’ve got, painful or not, it is all we actually have, our experience, and if we continue to rely on those ‘mythical figures’ (academic, political, or religious) we will fail to see our mistakes, and will be keep doing them for centuries to come.

So, how to ask questions? With more questions, without “definite answers”, however you will gain new perspectives about life. You will be able to see how there is no actual “true” or “false” (in a deep sense), but perspectives that have different ways of seeing and experiencing life. As I said before, these questions are not about finding perfect answers or new beliefs… It is about experiencing life in a new way… BEWARE the guru, the knower, the whatever… better know thyself!

Let’s confront the gurus, prophets, philosophers, etc, and realize in yourself the correct perspective of what they are saying. Got a belief? Challenge it. Challenge your own belief. Don’t fall into the your own guru bias. You have to be very careful, very aware of your thoughts, and how they arise, and how they dissolve. Why? You use your thoughts to understand life. It is a source of your ‘experience’, you cannot simply trust your senses because it is ‘obvious’ to do so, you need not only to challenge others, but to challenge yourself to the extreme. This might sound difficult or extraordinary, and it might be… Until you realize how relevant, and transcendent for your experience it is to see beyond concepts, to observe beyond beliefs, to actually LIVE, and instead of being in a ‘virtual reality’ of yourself.

Ask questions: Use one question, and answer it with another until you have a bag of questions you are constantly trying to answer day and night. You will reach answers, doubt those, and start again. Why do we want to feel security of knowing? Is there something else beside knowledge? What about experience? Is experience knowledge? How can live an experience if I am always thinking about nonsense? Or is the experience a thought? If experience is a thought, then… Is all reality a product of thought? Is there something beyond thoughts?

How can you assure that the mind is never empty? How can you assure everybody lives a mind without emptiness? Why is emptiness so important if you have never had your mind empty? Isn’t that same “idea” of emptiness the same thing that “prevents” you from being empty? And if you reach emptiness how can you be sure that there is this divine? And if it is divine, how can you be sure that divine is not obtained through untraditional non explored ways that only you can reach through self-contemplation with or without thoughts? Why do mediators want to empty the mind? Isn’t the mind already empty, but we strive to “live” the illusions due to the security felt by what we know? Why would you want to achieve one-mindedness if one-mindedness already is? Why try to achieve something that is not achievable because it already has been achieved?

Why is there a classical sense of traditional meditation? Is meditation total awareness (Including your thoughts whenever they arise and non-thoughts)? What happens when there are no thoughts? Is this possible? How can you assure that there is no possible existence without thoughts just because you haven’t experienced a life without ‘constant thoughts’?

For example, I am observing the conflict inside my head without judging, but just listening to it and trying to understand it. Could this be meditation? Why should you follow a tradition about what is a ‘meditative state’? What is justice? What is freedom? Do you really have free will? If so, could the idea of having free will a belief that you want to nurture to feel security and feel you have control over something?

Ask about contemplation, how does contemplation relate with thought? How could awareness of these conflicts change things? What is contemplation? Could there be a state of constant awareness?

These questions are not easy, some may find them too difficult to answer because that means to change your entire way to observe and experience the world. You will change, and in this change if there is no peace, but more conflict, your answers are creating more and more beliefs that do not have a foundation of truth.

Keep asking! How? Why? Yes… Keep going!

What is truth? What is peace? What is violence? How does violence work within the mind? Is our nature violent? Why? Why could you accept a concept like that seeing the implication of such violence in the world? Could concepts and beliefs be the source of violence? Could our identification of ourselves with these beliefs create violence to defend these beliefs that create us security? Where does true security lie? Could security be related with violence? What would happen if we understood security? Would fear disappear? What is fear? How is fear felt? What are the consequences of fear? How does frustration relate with fear and anger? Can you live without anger? How is fear helpful? What are the limits of fear? Are we really free? What is freedom?

Grab a book if you need inspiration. Yes, keep reading until you are tired to death, but do not fall into the trap of the tradition you are reading. Build a safe zone if necessary in order to rest, but then… Keep going!

Changing the way you experience life, love!

Forgiveness makes you a better human being, and it gives you peace of mind and makes you a compassionate, loving heart.

We have been programmed to think that we need forgiveness by those who we have hurt, so things may remain the same. Yes, we have been taught that if the one you offended forgives you, then nothing happened. However, things did happen, so consequences never remain the same.

If you hurt someone, consequences will always arrive. There is a famous saying,” Do to others what you would like others do to you.”  What is the reason behind this? To remove the blindfold we have been living for some many centuries and realize that we are all one. This might sound outrageous or be even felt as another “belief” that has no true foundation.

However, I invite you to read to see the “philosophy” behind this concept: Your body does not end where your skin does. Your mind thinks this way because your body has a senses that defines itself through them producing the experience of life…. That “external” experience that seems to be “independent” from your conscious self.

Yet, ask your lungs; they need oxygen provided by trees’ leaves.  Ask your liver; it needs nutrients food provides. Ask the apple going down your esophagus; Are you already me or are you still an apple? In fact, your consequences do not end where your skin does, why should we then believe we are just “the name given to us at birth”? Why do we believe that our skin and senses define who we are? Could there be something else, but we are blinded by what we “believe”? Before the world “seemed” flat, and now we know it is round…. Tell that to people who lived that period of time, and believed that.

If we really take sometime each day from our lives to understand this, we will eventually give new perspective to the meaning of forgiveness. Let’s break this down a little bit more:

To give forgiveness means you have the power to forgive. Do you really have such? In a way, it could seem you do. However, think about it a little more. Ask again, do you really have the power to forgive someone in such a way the consequences of the act the person seeking forgiveness will not eventually appear in his/her life? …..

If you want to learn to forgive, do not give forgiveness as it is only a word. Instead, act with compassion and love.

The answer is no. You do not have the power. You may be friends/husband/any relationship of that person as if nothing had happened, but the consequences are way beyond our control.

This means that when you forgive, you can release yourself from the dreadful feelings associated with anger, frustration, despair, and the internal pain caused by suffering. As I stated in the beginning of this text, you are the one who will be most be benefited from forgiveness by becoming free from the act of selfishness done by that person who caused you pain.

Although, you don’t have the power to remove the consequence of a determined act, you can wish for the person who harmed you to be forgiven beyond yourself and really be compassionate for him because he/she does not know the consequences of his deeds and how these will hurt him back. You can wish that he/she realized that each time you harm, you are also harming yourself.

Nothing is independent; existence is an entwined ball of actions that always bounce back. However, we want to believe otherwise, so each time you do something selfish, it is justified inside your mind. Never the less, if you observe carefully the ones who do most harm, are most miserable. It is a fact that is hidden behind the glare of popularity, fame, or power.

It is then when you will really forgive and you will become free from suffering. Are we ready to be free? Or will be something too tough to assimilate? Give it a try, and comment!

Photo Credit: by OliBac

Let’s analyze why do people fight, perhaps even till death for a creed? Could it be possible that those who fight, and impose others their beliefs are afraid of losing their security because it is placed on those beliefs?

Why do they fight? Perhaps, it is a selfish belief or a belief that is not true.

If what is being said is the truth, others will reach that truth. It is only a matter of time… So, why do people fight defending a belief they are certain is for real? Perhaps, they are afraid of opening their eyes, and realize that their belief is not true.

It doesn’t really matter if my beliefs are real or not, but what do those beliefs cause me.

For example:
I might believe in God, so I behave loving and caring toward others because God is love. Or I don’t believe in God, so I behave loving and caring toward others because peace and love are some of the most wonderful aspects of life.

Who is wrong? The one who believes or not? None, why? Both are living according to their highest sense of humanity. I still don’t understand why we prefer to be blind, to fight, to be intolerant, and abusive toward those who don’t share our “common” standards.

We don’t need to have the same beliefs to be in peace, but we do have to be humble and loving to those who don’t share our same ideas because understanding will bring us peace. It is in those differences that humanity learns how to grow, and become better through generations of thought.

When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it–always. Mahatma Gandhi

We could all be wrong, but a loving life will be enough to understand we are humans, and therefore capable of doing mistakes. So, there is no need to fight, but there is a necessity of understanding…

Diversity is beauty.
Admiring it is love.
Love brings diversity.
So, those who accept diversity,
and admire it will live a peaceful life.

Mostly, understand ourselves because as we pretend to get to know others when we are actually strangers to ourself.

How can we spend so much time with others when we don’t spend time to observe ourselves? Could it be that we are afraid of the unknown within ourselves?

Life is from the inside -> out, but it takes some courage to admit it because if it comes from the inside:

I am responsible for each action taken by me and the train of thoughts chaining me to those actions.

That scares the hell out of a lot of people. They prefer to be blind, than to see something although they might not like what they see at first sight. However, remember if you choose to leave blindness… Those things that scare you will end up being wonderful because the translation of the senses into thoughts tend to be biased.

The only way to live peace is to give peace. Don’t expect it to come from someone or something else.

Let’s learn each day something new, so we may become better and better; loving more and more.

How? I guess there could be many solutions, but at the end each one of us has to observe him/herself. What may function to me, may not work with you…

So here they are: Ideas, just that… words you will translate into your own belief system. Shake them, doubt them, and create your own wonderful world.

Photo Credit: by Philofoto

What will we be tomorrow?

If things have changed, they can change again. Pretty convinced things won’t change? Ask those who banned Galileo… They surely will be on your favor.

So, what we now call miracles will some day be explained, and we will be living them constantly because we will be able to repeat them consciously, through the scientific method.

It is miracle if you wish to look at a natural occurrence as a rare one. It is a miracle if your soul admires completely the lived.

“According to many religions, a miracle, derived from the old Latin word miraculum meaning ‘something wonderful’, is a striking interposition of divine intervention by God in the universe by which the ordinary course and operation of Nature is overruled, suspended, or modified.”1

However, miracles are created by the eye of the beholder… Do you believe in the impossible?

Then, it shall occur because that perspective will change the way you look at the world.

Isn’t it a miracle we can have such a developed understanding of our surroundings we can read this on the Internet with a computer?

Les make an example about persepctives:
First concept: Olives.
Concept’s attributes: Bad, slimy, and ugly.
Consequence: I don’t interact with olives.

Why is it important to understand the influence of concepts in our daily lives?

Imagine…

I have been told olives are bad, slimy, and ugly. So, I never eat olives. Or once, as a child I ate a rotten olive. So, I never taste another olive in my life.

For a strange reason, I see my best friend indulge those olives, so I decide to try them again. I love them after that.

Why did a concept (the idea) stop me from enjoying olives? Yes, but concepts can also save us from a bitter experience.

However, how many concepts have been induced, and never really confronted by us? How many concepts do we really know we have? How many concepts have been questioned by you before establishing as a truth?

How many concepts produce fights and many deaths?
How many concepts produce peace and truthful freedom?

Concepts can act in several ways:

• Limiting our forms of communication (If thought is established as the producer of all sorts of communications)
• Establishing a determined pattern by which we can communicate

What type of communication are we talking about? Thought produces or beyond thought produced?

If we analyze the concepts that damage us, and those that help us we can begin to understand the influence of others on us. We can stop being what others say we are, but to analyze who we really are by oneself. That way concepts can become a way to communicate, but not a limit that doesn’t permit communication.

…The Eye of the Beholder can change it all…

Photo Credit: By alicepopkorn