Is consciousness the real illusion

[movingalways]

Originally Posted by Greenslade

The mind forms thought, the unconscious creates it.

Since you believe duality is true, I am not surprised you interpret two distinct causal sources of thought.

[MikeS80]

Originally Posted by anthony c

According to non duality there is no ego but only consciousness or personal consciousness which when transcendent there is only pure consciousness.
According to this video that too is an illusion. What is your take on this video?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Lm3G0_4YKU

Doesn't consciousness simply mean being awake? That also includes the ego being awake.

You are either awake or you are not awake.

Having a perspective that consciousness/wakefullness is an illusion, is having a perspective that everything you are conscious/awake to, are also all illusions, being awake to spirituality, is also an illusion. if this is the case, then what is the point of being conscious/awake at all. You posting the video and the video itself is an illusion, so why even watch the video?

[MikeS80]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

The illusion is "I am conscious" whereas I would say we are Consciousness itself.

If you are not conscious/awake, then whom is conscious/awake for you? Nobody! Being conscious/awake, also means that we are consciousness/wakefulness itself.

Being conscious, simply means being awake. Being awake is something local, personal/individual.

Atman is the one whom is conscious/awake and atman is whom you are!

Originally Posted by MikeS80

If you are not conscious/awake, then whom is conscious/awake for you?

Being conscious, simply means being awake. Being awake is something local, personal/individual.

Consciousness simply Is, regardless of state of mind (waking, sleeping or dreaming) or body (alive or not). It exists independent of mind and body.

"I am conscious" is a statement of duality. It's the contents (ego/Ahamkara) thinking it's the container. There's me and my consciousness.

Atman is not conscious but Consciousness Itself (Brahman), and since you are Atman you are also Brahman. I'm not talking about the "you" of ego/Ahamkara but the only "You" there is and that's Brahman.

[hazada guess]

Consciousness simply Is, regardless of state of mind (waking, sleeping or dreaming) or body (alive or not). It exists independent of mind and body.


Yes.

[MikeS80]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

Consciousness simply Is, regardless of state of mind (waking, sleeping or dreaming) or body (alive or not). It exists independent of mind and body.

Will you know consciousness exists without having a mind and body?

Originally Posted by MikeS80

Will you know consciousness exists without having a mind and body?

Here's the closest I can answer. On rare occasion in the deepest state of meditation body, mind, space and time drop out as when the timer goes off it's like a blink of the eyes from mind's perspective, however Consciousness doesn't drop. Call it an experience of absence (of mind). Advaita would say you know you slept like a log for the very same reason and that is You experience waking, dreaming and deep sleep but have no memory of deep sleep, yet you know you slept peacefully. Same thing only much more stark because with meditation it's a contiguous span of 35 minutes +/-.

So yes, as far as I can tell and from examining my own experience it would seem Consciousness is independent of mind and therefore body too.

[Ewwerrin]

Originally Posted by MikeS80

Will you know consciousness exists without having a mind and body?

I believe that the mind can know nonduality. It is extremely simple. Simple to infinity. For the mind to more commonly know it, the very precise simplicity of it, we need dedicated humans to apply and test the knowledge of it in more areas of the human being/life.

Once the value of it is spread out, through succesful application, humans will naturally addopt it as common knowledge. It might be that, in the beginning, only a small philosophical advantage exists for those who have acces to it. This gives an investigative advantage. Recognizing truth from falsehood. It may not be very easy to recognize real nondual understanding from the outside, due to potential linguistic limitations, to communicate it, not to mention, many people are attempting to survive based on false/incomplete teachings.

But this is just my current perspective, as I have not yet been able to falsify my current nondual theory. Still looking to test it to its fullest. And I do not even claim ownership to it, except my personal relationship with it.

Also for every big discovery or important piece of knowledge, new names are created, new words, to describe them and refer to them. And some may even coincide with older concepts that then also revive, if the concept proofs valuable in real practical terms also. That is really the key. To apply it. I believe that is where the difficulty may arise.

I believe that the science of consciousness could begin arising in the future, and that nonduality will become more and more sought after, when that happens. It has been significant and sought after by humanity for as long as time has been believed to exist. I doubt it will change anytime soon in this appearant timeline. Nonduality will always be important. It is the foundational core or all knowledge. If the foundation is corrupt, it can cause endless problems. This is mainly why it will always be so significantly significant.

For the most part, I believe, that people say that nonduality doesnt exist, or cannot be known, because they have given up on it. It is near tormenting to a non curious mind, not to mention, life is already difficult enough for many, without this quest for nondual understanding/knowledge. But to me, the difficulty of life always makes me wonder, what is it exactly that exists, that is thus what all difficulty is made out of? Also the same question of who am I, who is it exactly that is responsible for my life? I would only want to communicate it as clearly as possible if I did truely, truely found the ultimate answer/truth.

I have already given up way too many times to count. It is pointless for me to announce my surrender. "Guys the mind cannot know, I give up." I can say that all day long. But when duality arises, in tormenting fashion, I always realise that giving up has never been an option to begin with it. That even the difficulty of the journey or process only exists to remind us that we are ment to enjoy it. Willingly.

[Ewwerrin]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

So yes, as far as I can tell and from examining my own experience it would seem Consciousness is independent of mind and therefore body too.

I would say interdependent perhaps, because many have also experienced consciousness flowing through different timelines, and when they return, they realise that their physical body and time and space reality is "made out of the very substance/nonsubstance that is called consciousness." There is no seperation there.

True nonduality, wether it is understood or not, will always APPEAR to unify. Never seperate or segregate. But it will not ever unify anything. Rather, it will BE the absolute unification / oneness of all things. The common thread of existence itself. But that is also just my current perspective. I still have to develop my theory and similtaneously test it to infinity. Which is nearly impossible. But in that journey, allot of stepping stones, bread crumbs, and values are very potentially found/left behind. So the journey is never pointless, even if it fails utterly. Often the failure can even be a misunderstanding that then also becomes a key for those who come after. Similar to how Einstein failed to proof the ether wind. And was dissapointed and surprised to fail and even proofed its opposite. And now we look back and see how his failure was actually the failure itself. In other words, the failure was to believe in the very experiment that actually infact falsely "disproofed" it. Why did that happen? Life circumstances. This constant need to proof things to other humans that caused a deviation from the actual thing that matters. Proof it to oneself. To remember the prime desire. To find nondual realisation. And not wait for suffering to remind it to us.

This is simply how life is. We simply dont know. We cannot ever truely know, untill we have found nonduality. Then it becomes nearly impossible to even experience any failure at all. Which is always a good thing. And we may even look back at all the failures of past generations, and even realise something far greater about their true value, than mere failure/succes. But we dont have a nondual language yet. So we cannot speak of those things yet. But we certainly have the languages of all those countless ancestors and civilizations who all had a profound desire for nondual realisation. No matter how many different words they used to express this profound desire, with the relative and thus lackful ideas we always have had about it, regarding it.

It is good that we can meditate, to close the gap between physical and non-physical. But we also need to bring those nonphysical realisations back into physical reality. So that we can define both in perfect terms. I have never used meditation for escapism, because that just expands the duality. The only true escape from resistance, is to find an absolute nondual realisation. Which will be easily communicatable, and if not, due to circumstances, it will give one the ability to apply it all by themselves, untill such timing comes that humanity is ready to learn about it. When the desire becomes truely sincerely conscious. Which has sadly always been under very dire circumstances. But this is not a limitation or source of sadness for those who do have a nondual realisation. That is why the ultimate truth will always prevail in the end. But it is nice if humans can experience that also for themselves.

Originally Posted by Ewwerrin

I would say interdependent perhaps, because many have also experienced consciousness flowing through different timelines, and when they return, they realise that their physical body and time and space reality is "made out of the very substance/nonsubstance that is called consciousness." There is no seperation there.

What happens to Consciousness when the mind-body complex is no more? If there's an interdependence then Consciousness isn't infinite, unchanging and absolute as it's added to and subtracted from with each birth and death.