Dzogchen/Awareness

[Ground]

Originally Posted by naturesflow

I wonder if in the context of all the D awareness shown by you, whether someone trying to decipher through their mind, whether in fact, they would eventually have to be awakened deeper through that "ground of being" to actually understand it deeper..The mind would in some way try to make it fit something, yet the opening to your own ground of being would just feel or sense it as something already known. Like a switch on auto, doing the "ta da" drum roll and Boom! There it is. Full immersion, full knowing, the full realization of you as all that..

'to understand it deeper' actually is understanding that there is nothing to understand. 'Nothing to understand' is the ground of being.
The metaphorical kinds of words, the similes and symbolism used for pointing out is like hitting a bell to evoke sound. But it is not the sound that authentically represents what is pointed out but it is its evocation and immediate fading away thereafter, i.e. its dissolution into space, the space which neither comes nor goes and does neither move nor change.

[naturesflow]

Originally Posted by Ground

'to understand it deeper' actually is understanding that there is nothing to understand. 'Nothing to understand' is the ground of being.
The metaphorical kinds of words, the similes and symbolism used for pointing out is like hitting a bell to evoke sound. But it is not the sound that authentically represents what is pointed out but it is its evocation and immediate fading away thereafter, i.e. its dissolution into space, the space which neither comes nor goes and does neither move nor change.

Well... yes that all makes sense.

I suppose I was looking on the surface of things which can take us out of alignment from what is=ground of being. But it is all perceived mind/body separation. Which in the end when it falls away, changes much of that perception.

[Ground]

Originally Posted by naturesflow

I suppose I was looking on the surface of things which can take us out of alignment from what is=ground of being. But it is all perceived mind/body separation. Which in the end when it falls away, changes much of that perception.

Thinking in terms of 'body and mind' is inappropriate in this context and belongs to the sphere of views of other approaches.
The crystal is emitting the five lights. Its spontaneously perfect potentiality for emission of five lights may be imputed to some 'inner' and the appearing five lights to some 'outer'. However there is also the mirror. Initially the mirror may reflect some 'outer'. However with coarse and subtle conceptuality subsiding the mirror spontaneously reflects some 'inner', i.e. the 'outer' five lights being the reflection of the 'inner' potentiality. In this way 'inner' and 'outer' merge. In the context of the crystal there is just the center which actually is the center of the heart and the universe of phenomena and possibilities concentrically surrounding it. 'Phenomena' here are both, conventionally 'inner' phenomena like thoughts or feelings and conventionally 'outer' phenomena like stones or trees. From the perspective of the crystal both, thoughts or feelings and stones or trees are of 'one taste', are equally spontaneously perfect self appearances of the spontaneously perfect precious sphere which is likened to a crystal here.
Then the five lights are also enclosed in boundless empty space which neither has center nor periphery.

[Ground]

Originally Posted by Ground

'to understand it deeper' actually is understanding that there is nothing to understand. 'Nothing to understand' is the ground of being.
The metaphorical kinds of words, the similes and symbolism used for pointing out is like hitting a bell to evoke sound. But it is not the sound that authentically represents what is pointed out but it is its evocation and immediate fading away thereafter, i.e. its dissolution into space, the space which neither comes nor goes and does neither move nor change.

Still it is not the case that any words, any simile or any symbolism can 'hit the bell', i.e. evoke resonance within mind which then reveals the ground of being in the aftermath of its own dissolution. So the linguistic means should be able to evoke a concordant intuition which when it dissolves reveals the ground of being without conditioned remainder. It is comparable to the emptiness which is the conclusion of rational analysis and which is called concordant emptiness because it is a concept which lacks the experience of emptiness. However whereas in the context of madhyamaka emptiness philosophy realization of emptiness is a non-conceptual but conditioned intuitive experience in the context of Dzogchen philosophy 'realization' of the ground of being is not even an intuitive experience. Sill it is not the case the 'realization' of the ground of being is mere nothingness because of its lucent nature.

Madhyamaka philosophy appeals to conceptual thinking in order to attain emptiness on the intuitive level. Dzogchen philosophy appeals to intuition in order to reveal lucent emptiness as ground of being.

[Ground]

This note is This note

Originally Posted by Longchen Rabjam, The Precious Treasury of The Way of Abiding, Padma Publishing 1998

The ineffable nature of things is that they are empty by virtue
of their very essence.
In the vast expanse of awakened mind, equal to space,
however things appear, they are at the same time ineffable by nature.

The ineffability as the 1st topic of this work puzzled me for some time. It just seemed inconsistent that Longchen Rabjam called 'ineffable' what he used so many words for as a means of expression contradicting his own thesis of ineffability.
Calling something 'ineffable' is inconsistent from the outset because merely calling it 'ineffable' belies its ineffability. Only silence would be the appropriate expression of ineffability.
So the only reason appeared to be that Longchen Rabjam referred to the mode of consciousness in Dzogchen to which one is introduced to. In this mode actually all phenomena are inexpressible and 'ineffable' because the tool of language is completely lost. But when writing his work he obviously wasn't in this mode of conscisousness where the tool of language is completely lost. So what did he refer to when saying that things/phenomena are ineffable? He mentioned it. He referred to their emptiness as their reality. I.e. the reality of things is ineffable. The expression of things using linguistic labels, designations, is not the expression of their reality! And their reality is the reason why things actually are ineffable!

[naturesflow]

Originally Posted by Ground

Thinking in terms of 'body and mind' is inappropriate in this context and belongs to the sphere of views of other approaches.
The crystal is emitting the five lights. Its spontaneously perfect potentiality for emission of five lights may be imputed to some 'inner' and the appearing five lights to some 'outer'. However there is also the mirror. Initially the mirror may reflect some 'outer'. However with coarse and subtle conceptuality subsiding the mirror spontaneously reflects some 'inner', i.e. the 'outer' five lights being the reflection of the 'inner' potentiality. In this way 'inner' and 'outer' merge. In the context of the crystal there is just the center which actually is the center of the heart and the universe of phenomena and possibilities concentrically surrounding it. 'Phenomena' here are both, conventionally 'inner' phenomena like thoughts or feelings and conventionally 'outer' phenomena like stones or trees. From the perspective of the crystal both, thoughts or feelings and stones or trees are of 'one taste', are equally spontaneously perfect self appearances of the spontaneously perfect precious sphere which is likened to a crystal here.
Then the five lights are also enclosed in boundless empty space which neither has center nor periphery.

So where are you in all this?

[Ground]

Originally Posted by naturesflow

So where are you in all this?

Not findable under rational analyses, i.e. ultmately empty like all these similes and what they imply. So I am merely through imputation of 'I', 'me', 'my', 'mine' and 'myself'. But that is valid for everything and everybody else, i.e. everything and everybody appearing as 'other than me' exist only on the basis of imputation but not inherently.
With this wording there is an infinite regress implied because everthing I say arises as still another object only through imputation, i.e. without inherent truth. And that groundlessness of everything actually is what the expression 'the ground of conscious being' stands for. So the ground of conscious being actually is a groundlessness, i.e. an infinite emptiness which is lucent due to its potentiality of becoming conscious of this or that.

[Ground]

Originally Posted by Ground

The ineffability as the 1st topic of this work ... He referred to their emptiness as their reality. I.e. the reality of things is ineffable. The expression of things using linguistic labels, designations, is not the expression of their reality! And their reality is the reason why things actually are ineffable!

If this is so then he actually refers to the direct experience of phenomena as being 'ineffable', i.e. to the direct perception of their emptiness. Otherwise the expression 'empty phenomena' would be an appropriate expression and thus phenomena could not be called 'ineffable'.
So phenomena are called ineffable because the concepts expressing them are not the phenomena in reality similar to the concept 'sweet' not being the reality of the experience of the taste of sugar.
In the moment a phenomenon appears and one names it 'this is {that name}' it is at the same time absent in an ineffable way because the concept accompanying the name is not the phenomenon but only appears as if.

This phenomenal side - the phenomena arising in one's mind - is amended with 'In the vast expanse of awakened mind, equal to space,' which refers to the original nature of mind which again is emptiness. So there is no difference between the nature of mind and the nature of phenomena both are empty and therefore in this context appropriately called 'ineffable'. 'Space' being the metaphor for the nature of mind can be equally applied to the nature of phenomena ('spacelike' emptiness).

[Ground]

To continue the sequence of this posting and that posting:

So it is becomes clear that the theme of ineffability which is the 1st of the four essential dzogchen themes refers to the simile of the mirror: the natural mind is empty of concepts, empty of intuitions, empty of feelings and emotions and thus it reflects phenomena like a mirror, is unaffected by phenomena which appear to it ineffably absent as itself appears to itself.

At the same time this ineffability it is like space, the other simile, since natural mind actually is like space in that everything may appear in its scope because it is unrestricted by concepts, intuitions, feelings and emotions, unrestricted by these allegedly concrete phenomena of ordinarily conditioned mind and therefore without any frame of reference. This entails the second theme of dzogchen which is openness. So even if phenomena spontaneously appear to natural mind they are - due to their emptiness, their ineffability - open like natural mind. Phenomena are not mind nor anything other than mind. Their common nature is openness like boundless space.

So one may see that the first and the second essential theme of dzogchen, ineffability and openness, refer to the similes mirror and space of the ground of being. It is not only its essence emptiness but also its nature of spontaneous presence, the inhering potentiality to reflect unaffectedly - like a mirror - and to accomodate unaffectedly - like space - whatever may possibly arise.
The two themes ineffability and openness like the two similes mirror and space thus refer to the dzogchen approach called trekchod (releasing tensions, cutting through rigidity) which is the basic and indispensable initial approach to reveal the timeless empty knowing often called 'timeless awareness' ('timeless' here meaning 'atemporal' since it is empty of the concepts and intuitions of past, future and present), which is the ground of [conscious] being.

[Ground]

As to openness in addition a quote:

Originally Posted by Longchen Rabjam, The Precious Treasury of The Way of Abiding, Padma Publishing 1998

Since manifest phenomena - the world of appearances
and possibilities - and nonmanifest natural* mind
do not waver from what simply is, unembellished,
there is freedom from concepts, with no framework of limit or center.
The nature of openness abides, supreme and uninterrupted.

Even as they appear, all phenomena that manifest as objects
have no aspects or substance, and so there is expansive openness.
Moreover, mind - self-knowing awareness - is not divisible
into earlier and later
and so, just as it is, constitutes an expansive openness, like space.
With the past having ceased future yet to come,
and no remaining in the present, the scope of natural* mind
has no foundation or substance and transcends being an object
that can be characterized.
Natural openness is the infinite dimension of space.

* in the original translation it reads 'awakened' which I consider to be inappropriate because it should refer to the original, i.e. natural state and 'awakened' has the inappropriate connotation of something new manifesting