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December 2008 
EGO, A DRAMATURGICAL PERSPECTIVE, PART ONE
maxie
Ego: Conception, Gestation and Birth
"A Dramaturgical Perspective of the Role Played by Ego in the Process of Evolution"
Part One: In the Beginning
At Play in the Field of Consciousness, where Source is all abstraction, where perfect dreaming bliss awakens to confront its Self-awareness; there finding beauty and relationship from which all love arises.
FIRST THINGS FIRST
What means these words: "Ego, Conception, Gestation, Birth, Dramaturgical, Perspective, Role, Process, and Evolution?" Well, the dictionaries and encyclopedias are full of attempts to render these primary abstracts into contexts large and small. What is important to realize is that they are abstracts and as such require context into which they might be drawn, reduced, and partially explained. For the purposes of Part One of this discursion on the dramaturgical perspective of the ego, let's start with Dramaturgy, a word most likely unfamiliar to many.
Dramaturgy: "Dramaturgy can also be defined, more broadly, as shaping a story or like elements into a form that can be acted. Dramaturgy gives the work or the performance a structure. More than actual writing, a dramaturg's work can often be defined as designing." (from Wikipedia)
Dramaturgical: " relating to the technical aspects of drama." (from WordNet)
When I say "dramaturgical perspective" I am speaking from the experience of a lifetime of fascination with drama, performance, and play righting (as in getting it "right", not just "writing" it)
Why discuss Ego from the dramaturgical perspective? Well, one of my most resilient and persistent operating conclusions is that life is drama. We are its performers and script consultants being guided by a dramaturgical will emanating across the quantum boundary from the Source where all abstraction lives in categorical harmony. Even when we sleep and the outside world drops away, still the dream center of our psyche spins pure drama into the playhouse of our beings. Every single action we take, even choosing "non-action" is a performance of our selves in response to the "acting" going on around us. This "acting" includes the weather, the economy, our sex lives, fashion, job selection, choice of home, political affiliation, hobbies and secrets - all is performance. From the stories of our lives, where most of us spend most of our private time in rumination, we draw both the material and incentive for our self-portrayals.
As the ego plays such a powerful role in the concoction of our performance, it seems fitting to discuss it from a dramaturgical perspective.
Ego: "The self, especially as distinct from the world and other selves. In psychoanalysis, the division of the psyche that is conscious, most immediately controls thought and behavior, and is most in touch with external reality. An exaggerated sense of self-importance; conceit. Appropriate pride in oneself; self-esteem." (from Wiki)
Now here is a word the definitions for which make those of dramaturgy seem non-existent by comparison. Library rooms may be filled with treatises on the ego whereas dramaturgy might occupy but a shelf. As to the definition for ego above, I respectfully disagree and will proceed below to show exactly why I believe the above definition(s) to be woefully misrepresentative. Essentially, I believe that the ego is not the self, or some territorial aspect of the psyche, so much as a tool for contemplation. As a tool, it has certain properties. These attributes are, I believe, highly specific, limited, and designed by Source as a boundary phenomenon. What the ego does at its most pure is set the stage for contemplation and performance. I believe that the ego has two physical, or "geometric," to be more specific, attributes: circularity and sphericity with the latter obviously the full rendition of the former.
Role: another word with compound meanings. In the context of this Part One, the Kosmic view of ego, I propose to use the word "role" as that part "played" by the ego in the unfoldment of reality as we perceive it outside of ourselves - as distinct from the psyche while knowing somehow that the entire Universe, including this vexacious big "God" notion is somehow contained within the broad "confines" of the psyche.
Process: that endeavor by which consciousness expands and awareness unfolds to include the sense of full participation in the mysteries of life.
Evolution: hmmm . . . the play of consciousness as it unfolds reality moment-to-moment both within and without throughout the Universe. Pinpointing this, I can only say that the evolutionary moment is expressed on the quantum boundary where that which is implied in the field of all possibilities (the implicate) becomes manifests into "fact," (the explicate)
CONCEPTION
What is an abstraction anyway? Is it just a nebulous potential that exists only as a bit of knowledge? Or is it more, perhaps even more than we might imagine?
We do know that the infinitude of all possibilities includes certain autonomous realms such as "temperature," "amplitude," "frequency," and "distance." Taken separately, these regions show common properties like length, altitude, and intensity for instance. In fact, it seems that abstracts are defined by other abstracts in a multi-dimensional weaving of sorts. In this sense an abstraction has some of the same properties as a continuum. An abstraction introduces the notion of a field, or container where increments of measure and orientation provide a grid for locating relative values. A continuum can be easily imagined to have a shape, like a squash or a cucumber for instance. Only by such imagining will the abstraction take form out of the dispersion of all possibilities. Thus the abstraction does not coalesce as a discrete realm of possibility until it is contemplated.
As an abstract is contemplated, its shape emerges as influenced by the preconceptions of the imagineer. Often, in abstract contemplation, key relative values like extremes of hot and cold can suggest a strong, linear image, when, if all of the subtleties of "temperature" are taken into consideration, the real shape might not appear linear at all, but more three-dimensional, even faceted perhaps.
Considering the Source as the field of all possibilities, then it must be that all abstractions are included in the Source. From the abstract perspective, their shaped continuums are self-distinguishing and, though not "things" in the strict sense, they do seem to enjoy a primordial "existence" as pure potential, but with an interesting feature - shape, a geometry which arises when the abstract's field is contemplated. Some of these abstract shapes are strongly linear while others are more voluminous. It is possible to imagine that the fully contemplated and differentiated field of all abstractions could look like fat shapes or bubbles interspersed with filaments of the more linear abstractions. It may be assumed that a perfectly realized Source could "arrange" these fully contemplated abstracts in an organic and potentially functional array.
BIRTH
Conventional wisdom supposes that, from a jot of near perfectly dense no-thingness, the Kosmos exploded into being, continuing yet to explode within itself these past 13.7 billion years, thus causing the accelerated expansion of both consciousness and the universe. The following will include conjecture regarding conditions that preceded initial expansion as well as conditions which ensued thereafter. In particular, a direct correlation between conditions present in the primordial state (Primordial) which went "first," and the emanations which came "second," (Manifestation, or Kosmos) will be drawn to show the fundamental role that "ego," in both the Kosmic and psychic senses of the word, plays in the unfoldment of reality. Part One, will concern itself with the Kosmic origins and manifestations of ego, while Part Two to come will address the Psychic field of play.
GESTATION
It is proposed that Primordial consciousness came to realize that, within its infinite potential, certain discrete abstractions were held. It is proposed that pure consciousness evolved from an at-rest state of utter bliss to a Tantrically differentiated state through a sequence of unfolding abstractions including awareness, curiosity, beauty, attention, and cause which appeared in turn before the awareness of the Primordial. It is proposed that pure consciousness evolved as it contemplated this sequence of arising abstractions. With the exception of some reference, this continuum of abstractions, is not the subject of the following. Rather, what will be discussed are conditions that occurred with cause, as that realization state of Primordial evolution reached maximum density just prior to the birth moment of the Kosmos.
For purposes of illustration, the following image is offered: Imagine "space" as the lungs filling with air to the point where expansion is complete. Imagine both the Primordial and Manifestation states as two aspects of this same breath - as an inspiration and an expiration. Imagine that the Source is breathing the Kosmos in and out with particular attention to holding two counts at peak and another two at breath's end. Oddly enough, this pranic breathing method is highly recommended by many meditation and yoga masters.
Imagine pure consciousness awakening from the dream of utter bliss during its two count pause at the peak of inspiration. Self-awareness dawns upon this awakening and with it awe, realization, affection, gratitude and curiosity. Attention, or the particular ability to focus awareness, would then follow as a means to explore, refine, synthesize and incorporate the field of abstractions - the limit of Source's capability to experience itself "at that time." Is it possible, at this point, that Source began to yearn for more than just the experience of itself as pure potential? That Source may have realized the profound, inherent, structural beauty of all abstractions as thoroughly contemplated and structurally organized into a self-sustaining and inter-dependent wholeness? Might Source have realized that this perfect abstract concoction could be manifest into such as a material realm, where the same process of rising awareness that Source had undergone, might be fractalized again and again and again? Could Source, transfixed by the beauty of this potential evolve intention and cause sufficient to change state and birth the Kosmos? Hmmmm . . .
May structural principles be found within this field of consciousness, awareness and all other abstractions? Integral theory seems to think so posing spirals, quadrants, and lattices as a framework of "maps" to the territory of being. But beyond that, beyond the map, is there a design principal underlying all?
The most dominant theme in the universe seems to be the energetic relationship between the circle and the spiral. Nothing can exist or be perceived without these two factors interacting. In fact, this inter-relationship may be the essential structural principle of the universe. The circle and spiral are governed by the irrational numbers known as Pi = 3.1416 and Phi = 1.618 respectively. It has long been considered that both Pi and Phi may be phenomenally complex codes that somehow hold the secrets of the universe and indeed they might. But all efforts to discover any patterns in these numbers have failed despite the sequences being carried out to billions of decimal places.
Spirals in the form of radiation pervade the universe. Indeed, radiation (vibration) is what makes up all "things" when "things" are summarily reduced. So how does the circle come into it? Imagine the rifling, or curved grooves cut on the inside of a gun's barrel. The barrel's operation and affect on the flight path of the bullet are governed by the nature of the rifling which causes the bullet to spin and stabilize in flight and the fact that the barrel, micrometer by micrometer, is characterized by circular cross-section. Tornados, whirlpools, and galaxies like our own are other examples of spiral energy being contained with in the circular cross section of either collapsing or opening cones. Acceleration in flight occurs when transition from open to narrow to open again occurs in the throat of a carburetor for instance. Within this narrowing space, both frequency and amplitude of passing gas, fluid, or radiation can increase as the energy level of the flow increases. How can this possibly happen? What would offset the slowing down of the flow of radiation passing through a narrowing gap? It is supposed that the inherent, organizing, stage-setting power of the abstract principal of the circle is brought to bear on the spiral causing the spiral to be "informed" by the organizing principal of the circle thereby becoming capable of "packing" itself more efficiently without losing energy to frictional attenuation.
Countless experiments with wind tunnels have demonstrated this effect but no theory exists to explain the how of its workings.
Below, we will attempt to describe how these irrational numbers became evident in the primordial and hence available to Source intention when Source evolved cause to birth the Kosmos.
To me, pure consciousness, the Witness state, God, Tantric Stasis, The Primordial, Source, Turiya State are all more or less synonymous, all versions or state locations for God. At once unbound by any restriction of location or occupation by any "thing" yet "containing" the potential for everything.
In pure Awareness the Witness state is charged with the potential for words but not the presence of them. Thoughts, composed of words and in some case images or sequences that can be described with words, manifest at the interface between pure awareness and the field of perception. Thus there is a continuum between the Witness state and Perception. Where attention focuses between these two poles is a function of attitude, intention, motivation, choice, and necessity. In the awakening mind, perception routinely causes the arousal of curiosity. The questioning mind will oscillate between the perceived, carrying curiosity through the inventory of our experience (story) as remembered in words and images, back to the boundary of pure awareness and there it waits in patience for intuition.
Somehow, this supposed cyclical and evolutionary process of Source-mind, expresses from the primordial "location" across the quantum boundary between the implicate state of all possibilities and the explicate state of unfolding "reality." When curiosity evolved to intention and cause arose, the abstracts and their continuums achieved realization at perhaps a center point of Self-awarness. Picture this Self-consciousness aware, at the center of the fully differentiate and inter-dependent field of abstractions. Contact has been established between Source-as-aware and the entire field of inter-related abstractions. At center, source extended this perfect awareness out into the field, and, seeking to experience the beauty inherent in the abstract, realized its wish to experience itself through the manifested evolution of these abstractions and the frequency technology contained in Pi (perhaps the angel Lucifer) and Phi, the beauty principle of the Shakti.
Thus this "wish" or desire for experience of Self mirrored in the manifest would require sacrifice of Source's independence but perpetuation of the One's autonymy in the fragmentation which resulted from the eruption of OM.
THE FUNCTION OF PI AND PHI (The irrational numbers 3.1416. . . and 1.6180. . . respectively)
Pi: Try this: close your eyes and "look" at the field which appears in the darkness of no "sight." At first it just appears as dark though some light will penetrate the lids unless you are in a very dark space. Even then, many of us see lights and other "things" playing themselves out on the screen of our closed lids. Slowly, while looking at this murky and mysterious play, move the head back and forth and watch what happens. Something seems to be moving with us, even if the room that we are in is pitch black. This something, I propose, is the "perceiver" in us, paying "attention" to whatever might arise when the "eyes" change their orientation.
Next, look deeply at the entire field of view available to this "perceiver." At first, nothing in particular will distinguish itself. Slowly, with focused attention, it has been my experience that a shape will emerge. At first, it will not appear as a "shape" per se, with inclusive boundaries, but more like a set of large parentheses - one on the right, and one on the left. If continued, these parentheses would conclude in a circle if we could "see" the missing part "above" and the missing part "below." As simply as possible, I propose that this "circle of our capacity for attention" is the inestimable gift of ego, or the pure potential for us to address a certain part of "reality" as distinct from another part. It is important, vitally, and beyond my powers of insistence, to see this power as not the stage or the players or the props, but merely, and precisely the stage boundary itself. Its circularity, which is really sphericity when you take the Kosmic view, is the most optimal geometry in that it includes the most potential with the least effort - the sphere being the most efficient surface-to-volume geometry yet discovered.
So, what's up with the missing top and bottom pieces? Well, I suppose they represent what is "hidden" from us "above" and what is hidden from us "below." Deeper into meditation, these missing pieces do appear as "mind" rests, the vision clears, and the pearl of Siddha Loca comes into view.
Basically, the play of Yin and Yang, the essential fractal of reality, is contained within the circle. It is as simple as that. Without the circle, the radiant, spinning forces of Yin and Yang would just fly immediately off into dissipation and oblivion.
Phi: Oh boy, does this one require some arm-waving (heh heh.) Let's go back to the moment just before the big bang, ok? On the in-breath, the One has drawn the entire apparent Kosmos back to its unimaginably dense and pluperfectly differentiated state. All abstractions both spacious and linear are coherently inter-related. The One, in Its infinite wisdom, knows that to sustain Its own evolution, It must breath again so as to expel the abstractions in such a way that they, evolved in the previous cycle, may yet again take the stage, so to speak, and perform the unfoldment of reality again in such a way as to befit what they have learned in their previous "incarnation."
Phi governs the geometry of the spiral (radiation) as well as the interactions of intersecting vectors of radiation (multi-dimensional reality.) Again, without the interaction of the confining circle Pi, these radiant vectors would have no focusing "containment" no boundary for their "stage" and would not sustain themselves long enough to manifest a gnat's patootie.
Phi maintains the One's realization that attention will be drawn to beauty, that reality, unfolding in magnificence will draw the attention of us sleepwalkers more and more back to the Source, more and more towards that realization point within where we are behaving exactly like God as we contemplate abstractions, practice the principles thereof, and learn to sacrifice our independence in favor of autonymy.
That's about all that I am capable of in the moment and I hope you find this entertaining. I promise to work on the other half of this as time permits. The other half being how ego plays its role in the individual psyche.
With great love and blessings,
Michael
Access: Public
This makes fascinating reading, Your gnat's patootie made me laugh.!!!!
thanks Zephyr - I got pretty darn confused there towards the end. Part two may clear some of the loose ends up.
best,
Michael
You do continue to amaze, my friend.
At times I get lost in the intricacies of your words because the concepts are hard to follow. At other times though, I'm soaring right along with your magnificent mind, and every image, every turn of phrase, carries meaning directly transmitted to the mind that I call “self-revealing” because it includes linear thinking but exists beyond that, self-contained in spherical grandeur - infinitely - and in the end beyond measuring of any kind.
An interesting comparison occurs to me just now: I've always loved simplicity. So much so, that my mind almost automatically tends to reduce, distill… everything to its simplest essence or flavor. And so the bottomline will always be: It simply is a mystery - and still remains unsaid.
Unexplained – though you're sometimes getting so close , one could almost say, yeah, that's It!
Love,
m
Hello my friend, Exciting concepts, nice to see someone carrying this out so ferensicly, after reading your Part 1 the Beggining and EGO CONCEPTION, GASTATION AND BIRTH and constantly keeping in mind the title of this continum thesis, and also having seen your website to get a better feel for your though patterns. Question: if I may ask. How would you explain the thought, through many observed channels of awareness that at birth and death are so similar and the burst of blinding light comes forth in consciousness at death and how all that atomic energy field gets put back into a gestation and manifest itself inside ourselves for the term of our body life? Or is it that the energy field is bigger then we?, which makes us huge beings, and our physical body is inside this field, where we get all our info, there by having sensors more developed then the body can totally translate. Looking forward to your comments or maybe it will be in Part 2.
Love,
B
Beata, interesting thoughts there, and I think the field is much larger or how else can we experience ESP? I believe it is also larger for other creatures having experienced ESP with a dog once that could no way be put down to coincidence.
I enjoyed the brilliance of your thinking a great deal…and, I guess, could dialogue about lots of your elegantly-arranged and nicely-dense theorising…but will confine myself to one aspect here, the number Pi…
If I look into a circle I can see that its centre must be somewhere within my field of vision…yet i can never locate it because the exact centre is, by definition, extensionless..if it has extension, there would be a central point to its infinitesmial length….and a central point to that…so the centre exists, but not in the way we like to think of it as existing…and this would be restating Nagarjuna's argument for the emptiness of phenomena and our egoic powers of imputation…
The irrationality of the number Pi suggests to me a failed attempt to create a finality, definiteness and precision in samsara where there is none…because the radius of a circle cannot be calculated with exactitude, only ratiocinated in the a priori crucible of Euclidean math…
So we are this bindu within the sphere…our being is empty yet, as the kashmiri shaivites maintain, full , because this singularity is nothoing less than ishwara, shiva/shakti conjoined, a creative plenitude….which, like the bindu, exists but not in the way we think it exists….and it pulses out rhythmically into creating what you nicely call the “circle (sphere) of our capacity for attention”…
I would suggest that this pulsing happens very very quickly… the kumbhaka between inhalation and exhalation of our pulsing attention field is the still point between moments where one experiences luminosity, particularly when vipassana has been preceded by anapanasati, which gets us in touch with the breath cycle…Leonard Cohen; “There is a crack in everything/that's where the light gets in..”
Anyway I have written more than i intended to partly because i had a dream about this last night and synchronously scoped your work here…
Blessings, Jon xx
Jon,
Beautiful, your words and the loving attention that they carry. I chose to not use much of the Kashmiri Shaivite “language” as it is difficult for others to follow who are not so well “versed.” I will spend some time contemplating what you have said and get back before too long. For now, thanks again for the read.
with love,
Michael
Beata,
Frankly, I am exhausted after winding Part One to a close. I have been working on this piece for months - some writing, a ton of reading and endless hours of just being with the notions as they unfolded. I don't yet know the answer to your question about “how it happens” in a life, but I have a few ideas. Like Mashca says above, there are mysteries as to how this unfolds. Some of these wonders will reveal themselves upon contemplation and study, while others just remain illusive. The “how” of a life from birth to death still defies unpacking for me. With time, and study, and devotion and, yes, service this “how” will be revealed. I am sure of it. After a little “time off” I intend to present here in this commentary section, more of what comes up for me. For now, it is great to meet you and I intend to follow through with our communications soon.
love,
Michael
Mascha dear,
More than anyone here, I think you truly know how important this place has been to me. You in particular are part of this, this will and traction to experience the “inside” of life. I agree with you that the “simplicity” is what has drawn me to the well. What an odd challenge, eh? - to take such effort to unpack something so profoundly simple that it defies description. I sense that there is yet more work to do, more to unpack and it concerns the process by which the actual Sound arose. The “abstractions” piece confounds most people as we tend not to give them much currency - but opening to the possibility that God is the great cowboy of all abstractions begins to draw attention to them that they deserve. Whether we are aware of it or not, we “thinkers” are dabbling in abstractions day in and day out. Along with the breath, these contemplations are what we have in common with God, or so it seems to me.
love,
Michael
Dear Michael,
“Be still and know the presence of God” unknown
Benevolence is the spirit in your thesis, that severe concentration that channels your intentions and marvels the information you did not know about and think of at the same time. During these session you can touch your soul or at least get a glimps of it. At these moments the body has no choice but heal itself, because the well being of the mind will take care of it. You have done this for days on end and you are extraordinarily committed to a topic that needs such benevolent input. Great Job. Impressive work.
Looking forward to part two. This is a working progress and when the timing and energy is right, it willmanifest itself through you, and answers will come.
Sun has great powers sand nurtures the world unconditionally, Sunshine belonging to the Sun has inherited the same power, We are Sun's, boys and girls equally….God has put his likeness in man, there by we are God's…. everything and everyone is a gift….LoPhi=Love
Many Blessings,
Beata
I am an intuitive rather than a theoriser, I feel instinctively that our sphere is whatever we intend for it to be. I have noticed in very ill people often their sphere shrinks down and becomes quite close and immediate for them. For others the sphere may become family orientated, community orientated, country orientated, global or even universal..
yes indeed! And the more personal and defended the “sphere” becomes, the more egoically dense and obstructive. Yet, in the sense that “all roads lead to the bridge” even this egoic obstruction is a path in that it will lead to the sort of lessons, however painful, that will lead us back to a more direct path. Imo, holding the more universal perspective, by itself, will lead to less constriction and “taking things personally.” Yet, to get to and “take” the universal perspective, we have to move in faith, and faith, imo, arises from having penetrated the intricacies of the self to the point where we “know” ourselves as we are for the first time. Without the interior search, nothing that we see on the outside can make deep sense to us.
best,
Michael
Mmmn…. the inward journey can be vital and revealing, we may find it hard to forgive ourselves, move on, and still love ourselves. However I do think there is also a route of love compassion and service to others that too can carry us to a more universal perspective and at ONEment
I really like the way this conversation has unrolled, each segment contributing to a kind of group understanding of Michael's magnus opus and setting the stage for this amazing, cosmic, gyrating dance/drama. I look forward the day when the curtain rises on part II.
Zephyr, Beguiner,
I really appreciate you guys hanging in with this as it “moves” from idea to function.
Today, my thoughts are tangled with notions about the change in our sense of what “time” has been and what it seems to be changing towards. I have long suspected that I could have taken the “magician's” route in the past - could have become a great mage with all sorts of magcial powers. I was benefitted some time ago by reading about Rudolph Steiner who Hitler considered to be his greatest enemy.
Steiner was the son of a Prussian beauracrat who was stationed in Poland (i think) and Rudolph was raised in the classic middle class tradition of the male secret society in “masonic” like lodges that flourished in those days. Rudolph rose meteorically through the ranks to become the most adept of the adepts in his lodge by his middle twenties. All of a sudden, he bailed out of the lodge system when he saw that he was developing an attitude that his thinking, his conclusions, his magical powers (siddhis in the Hindu sense) were at his disposal (and thus available to his lodge) to the detriment of others who were not members of his lodge. He came to see that the use of any magic, however white or righteous, was errant in that it attempted to do what God was not ABLE to do for them.
This, imo, is one of the key insights of the past several hundred years and is the foundation, along with the virtually perfect 12-step program, of my sense of what is appropriate for me today.
For me today, it is the virtues I seek to incorporate - they will be my magic powers - and thus my conclusions about transparency. Any power that I might have comes from the Source only and it only operates as “through” me. Any attempt to hold to a magic pattern that bestows a “wealth” of power as an “adept” will lead to my corruption. Been there, done that.
Love,
Michael
one more thing: By returning to our stories with curiosity and honesty - by reaching back into the past with intention to reveal the truth of our experiences, we can/do actually change our futures - thus, the future, always mysterious and potentially frightening, may be conditioned by the work we actually can do something about by clearing up the confusion in our stories.
Michael, mon vieux,
I love that you've written this, it is a magnificent musing of grand design, elegantly crafted and passionately envisioned. It feels like it would translate into wonderful opera or ballet …. the section on conception, gestation and birth particularly comes to mind in that regard …
That said …. I simply cannot buy into the notion that Source / Primordial consciousness (or at least what I understand this to mean) has ever been or will ever be separate from the infinite potentiality of manifestation that has ever come into becoming in beginningless time or might ever do so in endless time. To me the idea of “.. pure consciousness awakening from the dream of utter bliss ..” is suggestive more of the Peak of Cyclic Existence, the highest of the Formless Realms (yet still within time, within samsara) rather than the unborn, self-arisen primordial wisdom that is not limited or conditioned by time in any way, that just is self-awareness (without ever being asleep or a-dream) effortlessly manifesting, without discrimination, and as primordially pure self-perfection, whatever appears to be arising, due to primary and secondary causes, from the perspective of the perspective taker/holder.
For the same reasons I cannot buy into the proposal (other than within the context of a grand myth or story) “.. that pure consciousness evolved as it contemplated this sequence of arising abstractions ..”
However I do very much like and resonate with what you'd affirmed earlier, that “.. the evolutionary moment is expressed on the quantum boundary where that which is implied in the field of all possibilities (the implicate) becomes manifests into “fact,” (the explicate) ..”
And for some reason I keep getting an image of you as an Errol Flynn type in tights swinging down on a rope onto stage from your 4p perspective above …. ;-)
I'll end as I started. I really love what you're doing here, Mikey. (I've for a long time wanted to call you Mikey …. hope you don't mind!!)
With much love and appreciation,
Lol
Lol,
A pleasure to read your words. Errol Flynn! What a comparison! Let's see, so far since I got here to Zaadz, I've been likened to James Joyce, Richard Widmark, Rod Serling, Johnny Cash, and now, Errol Flynn. Hmmm …can't quite pick up the theme yet, (heh heh) and yes, you can call me Mikey, though my real nickname is Maxie or, mackateedeedumbserboy, which is what my favorite aunt still calls me.
Let's go over this paragraph of yours:
“I simply cannot buy into the notion that Source / Primordial consciousness (or at least what I understand this to mean) has ever been or will ever be separate from the infinite potentiality of manifestation that has ever come into becoming in beginningless time or might ever do so in endless time. ”
Why not? I'm not saying it is “separate” - differentiated or distinguished perhaps, but definitely not separate. Its the effulgence thing. Let's just say that this is the only Kosmos, though there certainly may be more, but for now, let's say that this one is it.
Is it a one time event, this big bang, or is it cyclic?
There is no evidence that it is a one-timer, but there is a conditional sort of evidence for cyclic in that “cycle” is so evidently manifest. The apparent universe is full of cycles. And then there is the effulgence - the expanding and accelerating scope. Expansion could be the result of a source explosion that radiated outward from the singularity, but acceleration? That implies that Source, when cause sufficient arose, exploded into an apparently perpetual dissemination of Itself which would give rise to acceleration. Primordial Source may thus be explicating reality from everywhere. If that is separation, well then, it is a profoundly intimate sort of separation as that is what quantum theory seems to be showing us.
Beginingless time and/or endless time would seem to be accounted for in a cyclic universe.
“To me the idea of “.. pure consciousness awakening from the dream of utter bliss ..” is suggestive more of the Peak of Cyclic Existence, the highest of the Formless Realms (yet still within time, within samsara) (OK) rather than the unborn, self-arisen primordial wisdom (wisdom of what?) that is not limited or conditioned by time in any way, that just is self-awareness (without ever being asleep or a-dream) effortlessly manifesting, (manifesting what? with what intention?) without discrimination, and as primordially pure self-perfection, whatever appears to be arising, due to primary and secondary causes, (wherefrom do these primary and secondary causes arise except from distinction?) from the perspective of the perspective taker/holder.
“From the perspective of the perspective taker/holder” not quite sure what you mean here Lol, unless you mean the 4p, which is what I have used to contemplate this “thing” by standing outside of it and watching it happen.
Whew, on this one! Now I know what it is like to read someone who can “pack it up” as much as I do. (heh heh)
I sense that there is a “perfect” state, a perfection of a cycle. All is there at the peak of turiya. There and “then” it is perfect and timeless but reverts to transition as that is Its nature which is evolutionary I propose else why the abundance of evolution in the gross? And, if in the gross, why not evolution in the subtle? If in the explicate, then why not in the implicate? Is there a rule somewhere that says that the Source cannot evolve? To me that is a consensus without a basis in evidence. It may just be a supposition, that Source cannot evolve, I mean.
Thanks for the thoughtful read there Lol. I would have expected nothing less.
love,
Maxie
Namaste Maxie!
There are two things hugely influencing my point of view here. The first is an inability to accept a Creator by any name or description. Why? Because it invariably involves dualism … the notion of a someThing or someOne seeming to have dualistic perceptions, ideas, intentions, and then dualistically creating causes – as exemplified by the proposal “.. that pure consciousness evolved as it contemplated this sequence of arising abstractions ..” or the idea of “.. pure consciousness awakening from the dream of utter bliss during its two count pause at the peak of inspiration ..” and then ”Self-awareness [dawning] upon this awakening and with it awe, realization, affection, gratitude and curiosity.”
And I don't really have any alternative answers / solutions as to the why and how of the beauty and order of this accelerating coming-into-being after the Big Bang, or the wonders that are Pi and Phi. Which is why I like the word Mystery when it's capitalised. It's all just too big, too deep, too complex to comprehend.
But so to is the infinite / near-infinite complexity of collective karma when you factor in beginningless time, and infinite sentient beings having “by now” already created an infinite number of causes each 'existing' somehow/where as a potentiality, if not already partly expressing / having expressed as the secondary causes needed by primary causes to come into fruition. And perhaps the noble intentions and aspirations of countless bodhisattvas becoming buddhas, the pure energy of their compassion (thug-je), has always already been at least one potent catalyst for the continuing emergence of Beauty Goodness and Truth in the unfolding Kosmos … part of the mix, so to speak.
So I don't have a similar inability to accept a notion of infinite sentient beings somehow, by the means of collective cause-and-effect, co-creating this Illusion that we duallistically grasp onto and that appears as an apparently evolving Kosmos. Just don't ask me to explain it ;-)
The other huge influence on my point of view is the received wisdom (of the “thus I have heard” kind) coming from and through the Dzogchen teachings, of which I have alluded to in posts gone by on long-dormant iiZ threads …. the concept of Total Thigle (sphere, bindu), or the three primordial potentialities of sound, light and rays (each having secret, inner and outer aspects) being involved in the coming into manifestation of each seemingly discrete moment of existence, or the inseparability of kadag (primordial purity, shunya) and lhundrub (self-perfected potentiality of / for manifestation) and so on ….
You asked some questions of my first comment which I will answer as concisely as I can – for further “explanation” I'd need to refer you to various written sources.
I wrote: “.. rather than the unborn, self-arisen primordial wisdom .. ” and you interjected ”wisdom of what?”, to which my response is: this wisdom is the inseparability of the kadag and lhundrub referenced above.
I wrote: ” .. that just is self-awareness (without ever being asleep or a-dream) effortlessly manifesting ..” to which you interjected ”manifesting what? with what intention?”, to which I can only respond … manifesting lhundrub, as referenced above. As for intention, I can't speak on that. But a verse known as “The Gift of the Teaching” (from a practice of Chod) and attributed to the historical Buddha, may be helpful here.
All phenomena are like a reflection
Clear, pure and lucid,
Beyond definition and explanations,
But always arising from causes and karma.
The[ir] essence is non-dual and never established,
This is the condition of all phenomena, know this.
You asked (of primary and secondary causes): “.. wherefrom do these primary and secondary causes arise except from distinction?” I'm not sure I understand the question, but I am informed that primary and secondary causes arise out of the spectrum of possibilities of intention of individual sentient beings giving rise to actions of body, voice/energy and mind of said sentient beings who are existing in the relative condition known as samsara.
You wrote: ” “From the perspective of the perspective taker/holder” not quite sure what you mean here Lol ..” Expressing it (hopefully correctly) from the point of view of AQAL, one of the tetra-arising perspectives of any occasion is 1p in the UL. From the point of view of how duallism is normally envisaged within Buddhadharma, the self-grasping self-identity, the perceiver (the perspective taker or holder), grasps at the self-existence of an object (or perspective) because there is the (temporary) lack of non-dual awareness, which itself would allow perspective-holder subject and perspective / object to simultaneously co-arise as interdependent non-self-existing “phenomena”. But however and in what form they appear is always in relation to the “karmic vision”, if you like, of the 'perceiver'.
That's my (or more likely, somebody else's) tuppence worth.
Love,
Lol
Lol,
Ok, the duality, non-duality wrangle is hard to approach and I can appreciate your reluctance to entertain anything that suggests duality. My sense is that whatever may cause the “God/Man” division or separation, is illusory. What is or is not illusory runs deep into many layers of the manifest. What I see in common with the Source, what we do, or can do, that the Source, (within us as us) is think abstractly. Most of our thoughts that are bound in illusion are about are life situations and the “facts” and Mysteries (struggles with contradicting facts) - virtually all of what we think about is polluted with not just knowledge, but the selfishness that is attached to it.
If it is true, and it seems so to me, that we are not just like God, but somehow God (I know this is a toughie) then what would be the mode of behavior that would indicate this primal identity? In short, I believe it to be abstract thinking and compassion - all else is selfish, power-of-knowledge illusion. For me, much of the vexacious nature of this incarnation, arises from a sense of urgency about what I feel to be a rapidly approaching evolutionary moment where our sense of things is in for a profound change.
I see the realm of human “spirituality” moving forward while still carrying a burdensome complexity that is loaded with everything from competitive interpretations of the sutras to bloody arguments about the succession of Popes. Where in this tangle is the simple heart of it? Source did not create spiritual complexity to confound or mislead us. Imo, all the heads-up wrangling has not led away from complexity but deeper into it.
Take the duality test for instance. The only way around it to non-duality is to accept the fact that somehow, you are God. Ok, if so, how so? What is it about us that is God-like? If it is so far buried within and hidden, how did it get so lost? I contend that it is the way we think that buries us in illusion. Abstract thinking, contemplation, and practice nullify or replace the normal mode of fact/situation-based thinking.
Btw, what do you think about the notion that the ego is Pi?
love,
Maxie
Maxie :-) ,
I've been wanting to comment on this blog for awhile now, but have just found it hard to come up with enough hours in the day… But now that Lol has joined and you two are engaged in such an interesting conversation here, I am drawn here like a magnet…
I will join in directly with my own comments hopefully later today. For now, I wanted to share a passage on “Creation” from a Dzogchen tradition – here translated in a particularly dense way by Herbert Guenther (trying to stay close to the “packed-ness” and precision of actual Dzogchen terminology, but also revealing the influence of folks like Heidegger…)
~*~
Before there was any shrouding
By either Samsara or Nirvana
There was self-existent pristine cognitiveness, a primordial purity in
Its facticity, an openness beyond demonstration and verbalization;
Its actuality, a sheer lucency shining from deep within;
And its resonating concern, the very energy of excitatory intelligence,
Abiding as an interiority of ultimate purity.
Facticity, abiding as gestalt, suffered neither displacement nor transformation;
Actuality, sheer lucency, manifested as authentic utterance;
And resonating concern was spirituality, abiding as excitatory intelligence.
Although facticity abided as formal gestalt, there was neither face nor hands;
Although actuality abided as lucency, there was no color;
Although resonating concern abided as excitatory intelligence, there was no oscillation.
In itself a radiant interiority, it was the ultimate ground for the universe to evolve.
It abided as the ground for the fact that, auto-dynamically,
From its formal gestalt the gestalt triad manifested,
From its lucency, spontaneous presence manifested as complete engagement in the scenario
developed by Being, and
From resonating concern, excitatory intelligence manifested as pristine cognitions.
This was the primordial state of affairs.
There are several points to be noted. The emphasis on self-existent pristine cognitiveness, which is synonymous with Experience-as-such, makes it quite clear that the big bang was not the explosion of a lump of matter into some preexisting void, as is often popularly believed contrary to what scientists understand it to be. Experience-as-such is neither matter nor a mind which, in a very special sense, might be claimed to “react on the world by … collapsing it from a superposition into reality.” Rather, it seems that Experience-as-such or self-existent pristine cognitiveness is more like an algorithm for dealing with (calculating) the results of actual experience (observation) and, in addition, a pointer to an autopoietic dynamics, which can be described only in terms of the immediacy of Being's auto-projectivity as a splitting into near copies of itself, which then may rush off in opposite directions, giving birth to the universes of Samsara and Nirvana. Furthermore, the reference to a triadic character of facticity, actuality, and resonating concern, apart from constituting symmetry transformations, may also be conceived as a pointing to a multitude of universes, which continue multiplying. In addition, each such expanding universe contains, as it were, a multitude of individuals as participant observers of that universe that they inhabit, being thereby bound within their own universe of limited dimensions. Each individual is therefore unaware of that larger dimensioned n-state universe, the ground and totality of all possible universes which as a 'superposition of N states is observed as a single state An(q) n( ), not because of a projection into that state alone but because the entire universe divides into n-states…'
In the light of these remarks, Longchen Rabjampa's account gains added significance. It is no mere turn of poetic diction when he describes Being's auto-presencing as (1) concern-like, (2) lucency-like, (3) gestalt-like, (4) pristine cognition-like, (5) nonduality-like, and (6) freedom-like. His use of the tag like (ltar) clearly indicates that none of these modes can ever be considered as actual, preexistent, eternally operative parameters, being but modes of the ground and totality auto-presencing as the n-state universe Being itself. Every reference to and (partial) experience of this auto-presencing is necessarily a limited profile, akin to (like) the totality. As a referring expression (a single state) it can never retain the essentially indeterminate spontaneity of the totality (n-states).
Thus Longchen Rabjampa states:
From this ground (gzhi), the ground-totality presencing (gzhi-snang) occurred as follows:
Its spontaneous presence, radiating from deep within as an interiority,
Was outwardly propelled by motility so that its intrinsic outward-tending glowing (gdangs) manifested.
When the “shell” of this spontaneous presence exploded,
Six modes of presencing and two passageways manifested.
The singular, internally radiating excitatory intelligence
Was propelled by motility, the outward-tending glowing of excitatory intelligence,
So that its inner glow was outwardly thrust.
By its concern-like auto-presencing
The auto-creativity of excitatory intelligence became outward tending glowing.
By its lucency-like auto-presencing, like a rainbow,
All and everything as the coming-into-presence of the continuum that is Being
was suffused by luminosity.
By its gestalt-like auto-presencing, clustered gestalts
With no center and no periphery encompassed the universe.
By its pristine cognition-like auto-presencing
Translucent galactic realm (zhing-khams) emerged.
By its nonduality-like auto-presencing
All and everything shared in its dissipative character, having neither center nor periphery.
Impure – it appeared as a passageway to Samsara.
The presencing of six lifeforms, like a dream;
The downwardly gravitating radiance, like openness-turned-physical.
And still this coming-into-presence abides as the impetus for going further and
further astray.
Pure – it appeared as the pristine cognitions passageway:
Nirvana's self-manifestation from the primordially pure ground;
Its upwardly dispersing radiance, like the sky. And still
This coming-into-presence abides as the impetus for exercising freedom.
While the six presencing modes are the exploding ground,
The two passageways are invitations to enter;
The entering is either Samsara or Nirvana.
These are the ways in and through which ground-totality presencing
occurs.
Due to the indeterminate character of Being-qua-Existenz, divergent processes develop, which yet remain pervaded by the intelligence of the universe. The cosmological scale on which this intelligence operates, is reflected in its open creativity (rtsal), its prismatic play (rol-pa), and its manifestations of beauty (rgyan). More specifically, these three facets reflect the working of self-existent pristine cognitiveness. Thus [Longchen Rabjampa states]:
The facticity of this self-existent pristine cognitiveness is not in any way anything; its actuality is radiantly diaphanous; and its resonating concern rises as any engagement. In this continuum, which is the ultimate primordial transparency of inseparable excitatory intelligence and open-dimensionality, all and everything that comes-into-presence, and is interpreted as Samsara and Nirvana, abides as its self-manifesting, auto-presencing, and intrinsic freedom in mere playfulness, beauty, and creativity. Moreover, the shape in which this excitatory intelligence expresses itself, is utterly dissipative as Being's openness and radiance; from this dynamic reach and range, which is nowhere and nothing, due to the creativity of the five colors of Being's spontaneous presence, what is found externally as world and internally as embodied sentience, has become present as a beautiful adornment of the auto-manifesting process, the prismatic play of pristine cognitions, and a ceaseless creativity. Yet in this coming-into-presence there is no reality value; rather it is like the appearance of a dream that has come about as the creativity, adornment, and play of an auto-manifesting process having no objective reality.
This process – creative, playful, and imbuing everything with beauty – leaves traces of its activity in and as the images that constitute our experienced world. All of them are pure symbols in that they are but self-presentations of Being-qua-Existenz…
The intelligence of the universe (Being), to which one has become gradually attuned (Being-becoming-Existenz), unfolds as the intelligence of our existentially constituted life-worlds and their projects (Being-qua-Existenz). In this unfoldment, the configurational character of Experience-as-such, itself a transformative flux, becomes evident as a multidimensional texture of perceptual, valuational, conceptual, motivational, and stabilizing operations, each having its own field character and yet operating in intimate interplay with all other operations. The interactions of these operations constitute life-worlds as worlds of meaning in which the experiencer feels “at home”…
Bruce,
I suppose we have that rascal Lol to thank for this. Deep and welcome gratitude arises. I am beginning to experience life in the abstract. As my attention shifts towards abstract contemplation/practice and away from the burdensome complexity of my life situation, I begin to sense the abstracts of peace and freedom as palpable conditions of being. Its that simple. More soon. Glad (that's the short form of Grateful) you are aboard.
We've a following sea now and the sky looks clear ahead.
love,
Maxie
A masterly rendition and a joy for me to read, B.
It's funny, I haven't read any Guenther for twenty some years now. I found some of the imagery in the third volume of Kindly Bent to Ease Us dazzling, wonderfully inspiring, beautifully poetic – and yet overall I found the text rather dense and not so easy (ok, pretty damned difficult!) to grasp cognitively. What you've rendered here (btw, what is the source?) I can grasp cognitively because I now better understand the context …. but, who knows, maybe I have developed a tad cognitively over the last twenty odd years.
One of the key teachers working under Namkhai Norbu, whom he entrusts to teach extensively at a Santi Maha Sangha 'base' level (distinguishing between Sutra, Tantra and Dzogchen) is Jim Valby, who studied as a translator under Dr. Guenther for quite some time. This has inspired me to contact him and find out to what degree (if at all) he still uses that particular psychological and philosophical model through which to language his translations.
Maxie, what to say about we being God? As you know I was brought up a Catholic and in my mid-teens got somewhat disenchanted from this 'way'. In the early to mid seventies when LSD was quite definitely a significant teacher for me, I remember in the middle of a humdinger as if turning my gaze to the depths within and simply knowing that whatever God is/was, was at my innermost centre. From then on all other ideas of God ceased to hold any meaning or relevance for me. As an annutara tantra (vajrayana) practitioner I have at least been given full permission to enact, within sadhana practice, the ritual of consecrating the five meats and the five nectars and transforming them into the inner offering of dudtsi (amrita) having inestimable qualities. No priest any longer necessary to consecrate bread and wine. Having been blessed on numerous occasions to receive direct introduction a la Garab Dorje's Three Statements and so enter into the transmission of the glorious Dzogpa Chenpo, I no longer concern myself with who or what God might be.
As fo the notion that the ego is Pi … that might just be pie in the sky! Seriously, I liked what you had to say about what we see when our eyes are closed. For me, when I'm able to more deeply relax into namkha arted, the soft unfocussed gaze into space, my awareness does very easily assume a soft 'sphere of attention' within which all the sense consciousnesses are wide-open-receptive, and the outer, inner and secret spaces (ying) can reveal themselves as inseparable, non-dual. The same is the case when my eyes are closed and my gaze is resting gently on the back of my eyelids. If I am (as is usually the case) in more dualistic vision, then this same sphere of awareness becomes more like a lens through which my frontal self as if peers out into the world …. until I catch myself and rediscover nature of mind. And on it goes.
Love,
Lol
Lol, Bruce,
Been traveling for a couple days and am just settling in for a long-winter's phlebotomy session. I hope to have some meat on the table for you jokers pretty soon.
I love that you two have engaged this thing - makes me feel downright at home.
love,
m
Bruce,
I have read and re-read your post several times and, while searching for the kernel of your undelying “comment” have come to a certain state of rest with both Guenther and Rabjampa's visions. Like Lol, I find it intitially “thick” but not impenetrable. I would love to take these apart word for word with you one day on the beach. Here is not the place and the medium for this kind of effortful and limited exchange. I am comforted as to both of your sources expression of the Primordial's state of being re: perfect cognition and the nature of cause that arose to birth its expression. My instincts in these matters is that, despite the fabulous arm-waving poetry of it all, that the truth is even more simple and elegant than words can express. it is this frontier, this utter simplicity, that truly intrigues me. I, like others, have my big brain so stuffed with “knowledge,” assumptions, predispositions, and antagonisms that there is just not the space for this elegance to arise of its own, except when in deep meditation or tantric ecstasy. For now, I choose to leave it at that while knowing that to read what you have put down again and again, that slowly, imperceptibly, my awareness will rise and transcend the arm-waving poetry towards a simpler and more utilitarian appreciation - as that is what I seek, really, when all is said and done, is to look both within and without and see the same thing, this God-mind expressing itself to and through me as me.
The Hiedegger influence is one I have not tracked through this line though I have great respect for him. How ironic that his thought was expropriated by the Nazi's and for a time, he was their darling. How that must have vexed him, eh? And with Hannah Arendt for a lover!!
Lol,
This ego-as-Pi idea will not leave me alone. The more I entertain the notion that most of what I know, if not all of it, is dust attached to the lens, the more that I practice contemplation with the end result of becoming capable of the “virtuous abstracts” the less constricted the knowledge becomes and the more open and available my mind is to the glories of awareness as a state. I suspect that it is the ego, pure and simple, which allows pure awareness to focus into attention.
Even when waking, the scope of our vision is bounded in circularity. It is not hard for me to imagine how this viewpoint has become associated with godliness, that the circle, the sphere, and sphericity have been confused with perfection, when it is more just a condition or a tool, a gift for which to be grateful and respectful. I love my “ego.” I respect it as a tool and a gift. I choose to use it with discretion and compassion. Using it, I choose to focus my attention on the development and implementation of my gifts to serve, not exploit or self-aggrandize. The mind unclutters as the facts merge each into their own abstract category. Capable, I may now allow myself a practical communion with God-mind and get on with the business of “not-doing” in the selfish mode while “doing” in the surrendered state of blissful service. In the end, I feel that “perfect cognition” lies along these lines.
love,
Maxie
Everyone, having a grand time reading the great minds behind the scenes, holding up the world by your Light and Love. Like minds unite, Abraham was told by God to get 11 like minds together, and the city of Jerusalem would be saved, he couldn't do it. so the story goes something like that, Well since then the like minds have attracted to each other and we can surely say there are more then 11 here in this team alone. We keep this up and we will surely save the planet and beyond.
God “the creative force” at this very moment without yesterday or the future of tomorrow.
Let's not get away from this moment this very benevolent moment. the more presence the more health.. Breathe. Every syllable is wrapped in silence emerging from the great silence abyss, listen well. You are inside this great silence abyss. watch and listen. Come to the real presence 100% here-now. Don't allow the brain to work for itself, for a thought will take a thought for itself tomorrow. The Creative Force of God is in the present moment..
Yesterday is dead and tomorrow is dead. Now you live, in health. Loving, blissful,….You are all magnificent. This moment there is nothing wrong, Breathe,
LOPHI,
Beata
Michael
Check out the Sacred Geometry, by Dan Winter Fields of Form, The Wrap Factor, When I look at your website I was reminded of Dan Winter's work, I think the two of you would have a field day of show and tell. http://www.danwinter.eu/