I have a question about awareness I have a beginning understanding of awareness and
the inward path and taking that here you speak of taking that awareness out into
experience the knowing into experience and it seems to me that often in experience in
experiencing experiences you have choice and you could go right or left this path
of that you make a decision is it awareness and knowing that makes
the decision or what is it that happens when you have an experience and you make a choice
if you are if you're asked a question would you prefer to your coffee so the question would you
prefer to your coffee is a thought and you answer coffee coffee is a second thought so
during the question would you prefer to your coffee the choice has not yet been made and by
the time you've answered coffee the choice has already been made so the choice takes
place in between those two thoughts now what is present between two thoughts awareness just
awareness yes so there is no separate chooser of the coffee thought after the second thought
coffee appears a third thought may appear I chose coffee yeah the chooser is created with
that thought or in fact that is the chooser is not created with I thought it is imagined with
that thought there is nothing to the chooser other than that thought in other words when
we say I chose coffee the I refers to an entity that is not present anywhere during this cause
of chain chain of causation right which is why I have the question because I couldn't
it because we say I say I chose right or I decided but it really isn't there's no
I couldn't figure out where the I was yes the the I that chooses or decide so it's not there
so awareness is self determinate so awareness has between the question coffee or tea and the
answer coffee its awareness that slips in there no no awareness doesn't slip in there
your TV screen doesn't slip in between two movies well that's right the screen doesn't choose the
screen has no choice right yes that the screen doesn't choose because as soon as it started to
choose that would be it's part of the movie that would be the movie okay so there it is no such
thing as choice your choices so thought number one would you prefer to your coffee when thought
number one is present thought number two coffee is non-existent yes cos you can only have one thought
at a time so thought number one hit would you prefer to your coffee that thought vanishes pause
the background of awareness is revealed thought number two coffee but when thought number two
coffee is present thought number one would you prefer to your coffee is non-existent so where
there is no causal connection between them but then thought number three comes in and says I
considered not thought number one the question and I answered thought number two the answer so
thought number three creates a chain of causation between thought number one and thought number two
and causes eight choice and then have to find an agent of that choice which equals i I made
the choice but there is no that there is no agent of the choice naturally there is no such thing as
a choice there is the quest do you want tea or coffee pause there is the next thought coffee
so the agent that links them all together is created by the third thought know what links
them all together is the fact that they all appear on the same screen it's the background
of awareness that links them all together so all that the three thoughts have in common is
the background of awareness but with the third thought the third thought I chose creates an
eye the third thought creates the eye which is supposedly present throughout each of the three
thoughts that eye is not present that true eye is the background of awareness so how long does the
chain go on because it it seems as though some decisions some how long does it chain go on yes
thought number four which imagines that the chain exists in time because thought cannot no awareness
the screen which is eternal not everlasting the screen is not in time but thought number four
doesn't know that thought number four can't see the screen although it is made of it and so it
imagines that what is really the screen what is really eternity it imagines that it is time and
then thought number four says okay there must be a causal link between all these thoughts and they
take place in time so the whole idea of time causality choice is the minds childish way of
trying to make sense of something that it cannot know about there's no choice or cause in eternity
okay let me sit with that for a while thank you I know what you want to do you want to sit with
it for a while and think about it but thinking about it it's just gonna make it worse you have
to hear it and get it oh not here oh yes that's it and it's also okay to think about it because
in the process of thinking about it that there can be this yes of course but you have to just get it
okay it's not very helpful I don't get it yet but I'm hopeful primarily because it seems to me in
my experience of my life that things are linked that things are linked so to think of thoughts as
separate events from each other I get that but to think that or to perceive that there's no
connection is is difficult for me to grasp and so maybe the what I was thinking what I was thinking
is that the connection was awareness yeah you're right exactly the connection between things is
awareness but because thought knows nothing will because find the finite mind cannot know awareness
it conceives as the connection between things as time the finite mind thinks that things are
connected in time and that each thing causes the other but what the finite mind doesn't
realize is that the time which it imagines to be true is a reflection of its own limitations in
reality there is no time and therefore there is no real causation in time or choice in time between
objects or events because the the finite mind is looking at reality through its own limitations and
in projecting its own limitations onto reality time doesn't really exist time is is the filter
it's the it's time is like the glasses that the mind wears through which it looks at the world the
time is in the glass is not in the world the time is in the minds limitations it is the limitation
of mine it's not really there in reality what is really there in reality is consciousness but when
the mind looks through its own limitations it sees eternity as time and having seen
having superimposed time onto eternity it then imagines causality duration that's that choice
etc so causality choice duration they belong to the dream but the dream all takes place in an
instant in Mary's mind okay that makes sense so it's time it's the time got it I think it's it's
really it's really impossible to think about these things because thinking by definition superimposed
super imposes its own limitations on whatever it thinks about it's like trying to look at white
snow through orange glasses you just can't do it the snow will always appear in accordance with the
color of the glasses you are wearing everything the mind knows or perceives is filtered through
its own limitations filtered through to limitations of thought and perception so
through the filter of thought thought has a single dimension through the sink the filter of thought
time is superimposed onto reality and through the filter of perception space or three dimensions are
superimposed onto reality so it is the limits of the filters of thought and perception that
bring time and space out of the eternal infinite nature of consciousness into apparent existence
so the time and space that we seem to see your experience are reflections of the limitations
of our mind not what's really there to take this is an example I sometimes use imagine it upon an
imagine of the edge of the pond there's a weeping willow and though the willows branches are dipping
into the pond and it's a it's a windy day so that the branches are dipping in and out and on the
surface of the pond there is a creature that can only experience in two dimensions because of the
limitations of its mind it can only experience two dimensions forwards backwards and sideways but it
cannot perceive anything above it or below it it has no knowledge of depth all it can see is what's
on the surface of the pond now this creature floats up to the edge of the pond where there
are these branches dipping into the pond what does the creature see the movement of the branches in
order to see the branches it would have to be able to see above the surface of the water and
below the surface of the water so the creature knows nothing of branches but the branches do
intersect with its world on the surface of the water so what does the creature see the surface
of the water but where it where the branches intersect the surface of the water how does the
two dimensional creature view the branches going down to the water wouldn't they see them moving in
and out of that dimension how would that appear to the two-dimensional creature no he can't see
up and down you can only see on the level of the well it would look static right well it would be
static your branches were static but the branches are moving oh all the creature will see our lines
you will just see lines yes the branches although they're three-dimensional branches the creature
can only see the surface of the lake so all it will see our lines as the branches go down into
the water because they get thicker as they go down the creature the line will get longer and then
as the branches come up out of the water the line will get shorter and at some point when the branch
comes out of the water the line will disappear so in other words the the two-dimensional creature
will just see a cross-section of what is really there and it will think that the cross-section
that it sees is a crew representation of what is really there right it doesn't realize that
what it sees is just a fragment a cross-section of what is truly there and the reason it only
sees a fragment is because of the limitations of its own mind the creature will say all that's out
there are lines and all that ever happens is the lines get longer and shorter and sometimes
they disappear and occasionally they join up that's all it will experience that's all it's
world will consist of and it will be because it is not aware of the limitations of the mind through
which it perceives the world it will project its own limitations its own two-dimensional
limitations onto the world and think that that those two dimensions are really there in the world
of course a three-dimensional creature sees a totally different world a four-dimensional
creature that is our minds we perceive three dimensions of space and one or time
but maybe our four-dimensional world is itself a limited cross-section of
something quite different how do we know how do we know that all of this is what's
out there independent of our minds we don't because everything we know or
perceive is perceived through the filter of our own mind and therefore appears as
a reflection of our own mind that is why it is futile to expert to investigate the nature
of the world without first investigating the nature of the mind through which it is known
because you can't know the rules unless you know about your limitations okay well
you can't know the words unless you know the essence of the mind through which it
is known if the mind is limited the world will appear as a reflection of those limitations if
you're wearing orange glasses the white snow will appear orange but what happens when we
discovered that the essential nature of the mind has no limitations what kind of world would be
perceived by such a mind that world could have no limitations it would be unlimited
in other words the mind that nose would be unlimited and the world that is known would
be unlimited how many unlimited realities can there be unlimited no to think about
the question again how many unlimited realities can there be one exactly that is why place open
the doors of perception are cleansed everything would appear to man as it truly is infinite when
the mind through which we know the world is cleansed of its limitations the world that is
known by that mind will similarly be cleansed of its limitations and will appear infinite
in other words the whatever the essential nature of the mind will be known to be the same as the
essential nature of the world what seemed to be two separate realities mind on the inside
and matter on the outside will be realized to be the same indivisible reality and that
is the essence that understanding atonement is meant by non duality it is the essence of all
the great spiritual and religious traditions in Christianity when it says I and my father
are one this is precisely what Jesus what Jesus was meaning what what I essentially
am and my father that is the ultimate reality of the universe they are one it's just a it's
a religious way of saying what we're saying here in more contemporary terms when the
Sufis say there is only God's face they mean there is only a single reality from which all
selves and objects derive their apparent apparently individual self for being all
the great religious and spiritual traditions contain this understanding as there as they
cause the core understanding that informs all the great religious and spiritual traditions
thank you