Jetsun

I just hope by the time it is activated there is some kind of decent opposition to the Tories to prevent any disintegration of workers rights and environmental protections which they are bound to try to implement in the name of national progress.

Merkel allowed so many immigrants into Europe for completely practical or selfish reasons - because Germany had the lowest birth rate and highest ageing population in the Western world, without an new influx of people the entire economy would eventually stagnate. Refugee influx helps halt decline in Germany's population http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2016/jan/06/refugee-influx-helps-halt-decline-in-germanys-population?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Copy_to_clipboard

What was his post about?

To trust the universe I think it to take it on its own terms, which basically means to perceive it directly without the mind projecting its issues and requirements onto it. While the universe has a harsh element to it the large proportion of suffering is caused by the human ego, or collective egotism, at least in my experience I have found the universe to be much kinder than my own mind. To see the truth that it is the mind which causes most of the problems then the trust of universe increases, to the point where you feel grateful for all the things the universe sends you to wake you up out of the tyranny and limitations of living from the mind.

TM is one of the most studied meditation techniques and it has been proven to have a lot of life benefits such as increased health and brain function, which are pretty useful effects, yet it doesn't mean it is a technique which leads to awakening or enlightenment. In terms of hypnosis you could say the waking state is a kind of trance state and there are positive and useful trance states which can be created with things like TM and many other meditation techniques, but I dont think you can break a trance using another trance, all you can do is improve the quality of the state.

I was reading about this guy Peter Ralston who after practising martial arts for many years decided to go back to the absolute basics, strip everything down and find out what the basic fundamental principles were behind doing simple things such as throw a punch, where the energy originates and the optimum body positions for it to flow etc. He even ended up relearning the fundamentals of things like the optimum way to stand and walk by understanding the underlying principles behind them. The result was that he was the first non-Asian ever to win the World Championship full-contact martial arts tournament held in the Republic of China.

From the mystic perspective life is giving you exactly what you need to awaken / deepen in your awakening. But if you would like a helping hand I can do a distance Vortex healing for you if you are interested?

I don't know if the subconscious stuff is true for you either, but I know it can be true. In my own experience of two retreats so far are that I had moments of complete desolation where I had to go to the woods just to cry and moments where I felt almost untouchable so strong and powerful that nothing could touch me. With more awareness later on I could see that it is all the play of the mind. But I know someone who did a Vipassana retreat and they said all they got out of it was pain. The retreats I did were with Adyashanti and were in a Zen style but far more modern in the sense that we got chairs to sit in, we had three decent meals a day including regular foods and caffeine and sugar etc, so isn't anywhere near as Spartan in approach, yet still incredibly difficult at times in terms of what can come up in the silence. Adyashanti has said in his first ever meditation retreat his mantra for the entire time was "never again, never again, never again" and he said he only clung on and stayed by his fingertips and had an absolutely awful time, yet the weeks after all sorts of realisations emerged so even though it was terrible there were things happening underneath.

I have never been on vipassana retreat but in general meditation retreats aren't fun as they bring up all your defences and puts pressure on the force of unconsciousness within you, so it's hard to know if the voice telling you to leave is a genuine voice of concern or just unconsciousness (Mara) tricking you. It's basically little different than Buddha under the Bodhi tree or Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemene, you may be tempted by power or assaulted by inner attacks and forces.

I don't buy a lot of the bullshit about Trump and in some ways he is quite refreshing, the main thing which worries me about him is that he is clearly incredibly sensitive and insecure so can't take any criticism without becoming hyper defensive. That is a worrying characteristic when many have said one of the main character traits to be a good president is having thick skin.

It is a huge assumption that the Faun Gong leader is this Buddha. I have seen absolutely nothing to suggest he is anything except another cult leader, absolutely no signs of the meditative experience and powers of a Buddha.

I think it was Wayne Liquorman who said something like chasing the meditator is a bit like a dog chasing it's own tail, except that if we do it enough we might have the good fortune of dissappearing up our own ass.

In terms of ultimate compassion there is a compassion inherent in the universe, similar to gravity in that there is a pull of love which draws us back in after we have drifted too far into a sense of seperation from the whole. This isn't an earned or cultivated compassion, anyone can realise it even if you are a mass murderer. Also the higher forms of compassion are very hard to understand intellectually, for example the compassionate force represented by the wrathful bodhisattva deities can cut through you like a knife and can feel terrible, but ultimately works in your best interests. I know someone who once went to get Darsham from Papaji in India and one time Papaji completely exploded in furious anger at him tearing him to pieces, he thought he would leave and that Papaji was just a crazy man but all the other deciples told him he would realise that it was a great blessing, and in time he did realise that it was great prajna compassion in action. I think many of our ideas around love and compassion can be quite immature and sugary, which is the risk when trying to cultivate it from our own limited understanding.

In terms of neuroscience deliberately and intentionally working with relative compassion will increase those pathways and connections in the brain. Then you are likely to get on with others better and feel more fulfilled , therefore reducing stress. So in that sense compassion can be cultivated.

If you examine the context of your senses from direct experience then the context can be that which is perceiving. take for example a sound in the distance, the sound arises out of something - moves through something - then dissolves into something. you could call that something awareness and the senses arise within awareness as a transient element therefore they cannot define awareness.

You can't observe the observer, the observed and observer can meld into one though

Qi is a term best approached from a Chinese perspective, I recommend the book "The Web that has no weaver" to get an understanding of that perspective. In western terms Qi is so generalised to be practically meaningless, you might as well just say energy. Then tuning into the energetic realms can mean all sorts of things too, but it is always going to be a case of refining perception and sensitivity of the nervous system to subtler and subtler levels. If you can't feel any sort of energy it is because you are too dense and have too many defences up, the main defence being living in the intellect. Not that I mean that as a criticism as we may have needed defences to protect us in the past as life can be rough, often we feel the need to block our sensitivity from the world.

Out means... Well pretty much the same arrangement in terms of payment and immigration . I think you overestimate our bargaining power with the EU Karl, they are not going to break all their rules just for us, or all the other countries will start asking for the same thing and the whole thing goes to shit.

If the banks go under we would still have to pay to bail them out, whether we are in the EU or not, if we want access to the single market we have to pay and do whatever they want. We still have to accept the free movement of people too, so there is little stopping the Jihadi army that Merkel has welcomed into Europe with open arms, Brexit does nothing to stop them coming here. The fantasy being peddled is that we will get a deal which restricts the free movement, but the big business and Tories don't even want that, they will get their cheap labour no matter what.

It's still all being done from the perspective of duality, ie you observing your thoughts and body as if the subject and object are two separate things. So the next step is the collapse of that dichotomy. But from that perspective all levels and ideas of progress are seen as illusory.

There is only a certain amount an ego can do on its own, ultimately it won't destroy itself or undermine it's own existence. It can even use working on itself as a means of ensuring it's own survival. But there is a lot of help from the outside if one is open enough to it, for example if you go see someone like Mother Meera she can blast through some of your bindus or karmic knots in a matter of seconds, which could take you years to work through when working on yourself, but you have to humble yourself enough to kneel down in front of her to receive the blessing.

In before "I'd rather do the first 2 levels of a real system than waste my life on make believe placebo Gong"

If you search for the thinker of thoughts you won't find anyone, well I don't, let me know if you come up with any different. But there is no need to go too deep into this, just sit and close your eyes for a few minutes and tell me that you are in control of every thought which enters your mind. Do you even have any idea what the next thought will be? Sit for half an hour and you will become aware of hundreds of thoughts all which are out of your conscious control.

The teaching of do nothing comes from the perspective that enlightenment or awakening is a natural process of human beings but we interfere with it, our minds are constantly doing even in our sleep, sitting around watching TV is still doing, it actually takes incredible energy and effort to put off enlightenment. So if you do nothing, but really do nothing then enlightenment can complete itself, which is why some of the highest teachings in Buddhism and Christianity is just "be still". But doing nothing is also the hardest teaching also, which is why we usually need to do before we can not-do.

At a certain stage it is best to do nothing, I went to see this guy called Tony Parsons recently in London and he spends an hour telling you that there is absolutely nothing you can do to get enlightened or awakened. Through his teaching a number of students have actually had permanent shifts, but is his teaching useful for the vast majority of people? No I don't think so, but that doesn't mean that it isn't a true teaching, it is just a teaching helpful for a small number of people who are at a specific point. Whereas if you go to see someone like Adyashanti he advocates a lot of practice, the analogy I have heard him use is things like stillness meditation and self enquiry can bring you to the cliff edge, but when you are there there is nothing you can do to make yourself jump, the self protection survival drive is too strong, but if you keep bringing yourself to the edge again and again then you are more likely to get blown over the edge by a "strong wind".