May 14, 2005
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In a comment…..
Although I love thee, Doug, I think for once, I disagree.
I think too much, you know this, and this thinking has lead to… the idea that the Now is important, of course, but I do believe it’s the future that drives us? Reminds me of the story of the POWs, remember that one? That post was from quite a while ago… but the ones that created a mind-projected future just screwed themselves in the end. But you can still think about the future and let it give you momentum for the Now without creating a future for yourself”
I think too much, you know this, and this thinking has lead to… the idea that the Now is important, of course, but I do believe it’s the future that drives us
Is thinking about something the same as the experience from which the thought derives its original substance?..Its validity if you will?
The future is a now yet to unfold …it isn’t the future that drives us … it is the Now, The now is the only time you can experience life.
All experience is your presence observing the moment …
This is the only real “thing”
When you seek to understand it you choose a process that casts the experience into a mental representation of it.
Your presence determines the quality of your perception of that experience …and the depth of your presence in the Now is the variable of the openness to that unfolding experience..
If divide your attention by ”going into your head” you lose a crucial depth to your awareness by limiting your perception to the range of your mindform expectations… you are timebound.
Thinking as the comment suggested
”thinking of presence”
Thinking can give you the idea of presence…but not the experience…
One is a mental image and “in your head”
The other is beyond.. a feeling realization of connectivity with presence and all that is.
It is not your thoughts that lead you to the conclusion that the Now is important
You life has shown you this from your own experiences.
The now isn’t important because you think it is
It is important because it is all that is
The now is all you will ever have
Your past is the memory trace you store of a recording of receding NOW’s
And the future you anticipate (in the best case of mental construction) is a happening you can reasonably expect from your understanding of initial conditions and then their resultant cause and effect progression into time…little action themes we play out mentally in our heads, as if this mental movie will describe the Now before you experience it’s unfolding.
Both the future and the past are no more than models in your head
It’s fine to have such models…. All our society depends on them and they have gotten us to the top of the food chain …the draw back to such models are that we mistake these models for the real world..
The distinction between model and experience becomes blurred and so adds confusion to your perception… concepts like wealth or money often become topics of argument.
Language, and even the symbolic way I am using words here are based on mental models and can be described as memes. Memes can be very powerful in themselves and even become the reality so many people believe in.
The most powerful model we confuse with reality occurs when we base our “believe” in our own identity upon the ”idea” of who we are…and not the life that is the experience of living itself
The now is the space in which your entire life unfolds
You are correct about looking into the future. You can do so freely with presence if you watch the separation in your attention. And stay present as the observer of your thoughts.
Looking forward in your mind becomes problematic when you seek yourself in
It.
When I get this job, when I find that relationship or obtain a new car…. Extra.
…. Then I will be OK and happy.
The “I” that you know is a mental image…and the happiness these thing bring to you, a self justification of the ego to go on thinking in your behalf. It seeks to provide and enrich your life… What a deal!…what a price.. And so we trade money for time….Our present, for hope.
Ask your self this
What in this moment is lacking?
A powerful question that can take you out of the time bound mind and allow you a moment of clarity
“Hm, more to this, but my brain won’t cooperate, and I’m not even sure that’s exactly what I wanted to say either. So, you get incomplete thoughts tonight… whoops.”
It is a perfect demonstration of the inability of mental images to fully describe what you are feeling ..
Thoughts and mental images only point to the reality that unfolds it is not the reality… In the same way a map point to a geographic location.
Agreement or disagreements about such topics are fun to discuss, certainly, but what counts is putting it to the test.
Do so with all beliefs…. put them to the test and Transform them into experience.
Find out for yourself.
and you will find your ~Self
Comments (17)
nothing is missing in this moment.
i’m getting all my ooky stuff out tonight.
Firsttt off, I like the post. Don’t necessarily agree with it all, but whatever, it’s all candy.
Hm, I agree that the Now is the only time you can experience life–it’s kind of hard to argue that. Common sense, almost. And I also agree that the future is a Now waiting to unfold, the unknown until it becomes known through time and experience (kind of another “duh?”… but I guess not to most).
Maybe saying that the future is what ‘drives’ us isn’t putting it into the right words.
People set goals for themselves, goals for the future, what they want to have accomplished and how they want to accomplish it. Most don’t realize that the journey, the Now as it progresses, is the important part, not the destination or the accomplishment itself. But setting their eyes on that goal, on what they hope the future will bring, is what pushes them through that journey, what pushes them to continue experiencing the Now and to continue to be aware of it as it unfolds as each second passes.
There. That’s what I meant.
:love:
i try to keep this in mind but so often fail… call me, if you like…
Ahh, what’s going tonight with the multiple of comments on mara’s page? I… don’t know exactly. I’ve heard bits and pieces, but don’t ask meeeee, I wouldn’t know.
You’re amsuing, Doug. Always have been, but I’ve found a new reaons why. Not so sure I’ll tell you why yet, though… :fun::heartbeat:
*drool* You just described thing to me that I could only interpret their meanings before… thank you! I am already beginning to feel a difference in the way I experience the present, and what you said about the future and the past only being models of what did happen and what we may desire to happen helps alot as well… these are only manifestations of our own consciousness and so… I now see that we cant really classify things as being in the past or the future when there is really no such thing as either, as the present is never endingly progressional and all time is now…. they are interwoven and bound together by not only experience but probability and willingness to put forth what we already have…
I shall have to practice this present-life feeling more often.
-Slip
Me? Cryptic? Now Doug, where did that come from? wink
Nah, I just can’t tell ya why I find ya amusing through xanga, I guess. Some women might take offense to it… but I find it amusing! Wooo, does that make me a bitch? Probably so… oh well
:rolleyes:
hey you probably dont remember me but i am nicks friend james. i just wanted to say that i have read things in the present that has occured already… sorry i wanted to sound smart… and i really like the piece on being our own god… umm so…. ummm….everyone here is smarter than me so im gonna go
I think in this instant you do have to find out for yourself. It is an enhahing question though…
your theories are sometimes confusing almost cold can you use more examples of your own practical experiences as to give a more human “feel” to application of above mentioned & in ur previous post ? just for the record & to help with understanding these theories D thanx magi
1. YES
1. First you have to quit objectifying me
1. I am funkin with ya
1. It is all One
1. Whatver you wanna see say do be.
1. You already know
1. That you dont
1. :giggle::lol::love::wave:
:sunny:
In this moment, I am wondering, “what could be missing?”
BE blessed!
~!Steve
“The future is a now yet to unfold.”
I read the first words of the entry waiting for exactly that phrase from you. Sometimes we think so much alike it’s scary.
But perhaps we’ve just been connected in the Universal “now” before it’s “time”, and we both understand the inevitable, (which of course has already happened.)
FROM “The Universal Blog”: “In the Universal, there is no concept of time, and “now” is “forever”. I believe that the idea for corporeal souls to “experience” their total existence is a marvelous one. So seldom do we actually “stop for a moment” to realize how special and wonderful our existence really is. When we finally pass from this existence, the existence itself becomes a “postcard” or “placeholder” for our experiences, and it is absorbed with the billions of existences which have passed before or are still to come, either here on Earth or anywhere else in the Universe that life exists. Each “moment”, each “now” is “frozen” in an otherworldly notion of “time” so that the Universal Mind can infiltrate, absorb, and experience again these “moments” as if they are happening, “now”. To the Universal Mind, “now” is all that “exists”. The past, future, and present is all mixed up in the “now”.
Well, “now” I’ve got to go. ”Now” is a good time for the Renaissance Faire.
Michael F. Nyiri, poet, philosopher, fool
Haha… so you read the post within the split second it was up? That’s talent! I decided to take it down… it’s gone. Why? Becauseeee… it just is. :p
:love:
a wonderful reminder of a key concept i continue to master over time. As i was reading the way of zen the other day, it presented the idea that there wasn’t even a present because there can only be a present in contrast to something else, that time was just itself. I feel this is the next step when past and future are fully put into their place and people just simply live in the now. Was wondering what your thoughts about this idea were? It’s a shame that the entire system of western thought is looking away from the present to the future and past.
I am waiting to look in to the mirror and find no reflection at all. That I simply am…but one, not two.
Very true words, Dos. :goodjob: I totally agree with.