larger self

Sure we are all our own individual being, maybe only in existence to experience itself. Which is great, and our body vessel is a constant paradox to our being self, which creates the contrast between the two and encourages the realization. But now that more and more people are becoming conscious of their own self being, it seems as though people are “waking up”, more so now then ever. So great we are all becoming conscious of our self beings, letting it guide us a little more then before, and becoming refreshed and feeling fulfilled in doing so.

The more i experienced and researched this, i keep hearing of a “group consciousness”, and that there is a shift that has just recently started in mankind. Talking about a larger self in this thread, i wonder if humans as a whole are experiencing and living as one big organism. And as more and more people shift into a new consciousness, it seems as though this “one big organism” is ready to evolve into something new or improved.

@ Martijn There is a lot to soak in here. Thanks you so much for addressing so many of my questions, that helps greatly and I know I will have more. I’d like to attend some Buddhist retreats in the future as well; would you recommend them? I feel a very deep connection to Buddhism, though I hesitate to identify myself with any one idea because I know any answers only lie within life itself and that all these ideas are simply another tool on the journey. I’m very much on the spiritual side of all this, but I hesitate to say that it nears religion, though many will beg to differ. I am not believing in any idea, it’s more like the self that would or can believe in anything is disappearing and melting into experience. Or to believe that that is what’s happening is the belief itself? I’m turning in circles.

@ Everyone: What do you all think the difference is between a belief, and experiencing the realization of something you take for deep wisdom? Like those moments of mindgasm where it feels like that great feeling when you remember something, but it’s like remembering X 100000, and it’s as though my entire core being has been lit alive and changed forever, and I could never forget it again? What are these moments as opposed to simple beliefs? No difference? Just another case of each persons reality being so true to them that they can feel it?? But what if these moments of wisdom hold nothing to believe in but the very essence of life itself? When I think about these wisdom, it doesn’t feel like a belief. It feels like I become life, a little bit more. The ultimate truth lies within there being no ultimate truth? Where does believing in a higher self, one consciousness, and all being connected cross into the line of spirituality and religion? I am getting frustrated with myself because I can’t seem to find the right words for the question that’s nagging. Any responses to this would probably still help, but I gotta stop babbling. I think bottom line is that when I begin to use labels and beliefs and goals with myself, I am limiting the process, the journey of stripping away my ego self? Those very truths I gain by stripping away the ego are just something else by which to distract my thoughts? OK BABBLING DONE FOR REAL.

I also try to keep in mind:

“When you get the message, hang up the phone.”

@ Leland it would be pretty cool to witness another universe just like ours from the same “beginning” and see the differences of growth from our own.

This passage I just arrived at is perfect, it seems to sum up a lot of my past few days of questions. From Watts’ The Spirit of Zen:

“But because truth is alive it will not be bound by anything which shows no sign of life–namely, a conception whose validity is held to depend partly on the fact that it is unchangeable. For once we imagine that we have grasped the truth of life, the truth has vanished, for truth cannot become anyone’s property, the reason being that truth IS life, and for one person to think that he possesses all life is a manifest absurdity. The part cannot possess the whole.”

This actually fits with a quantum theory that electrons traveling in a vibration are actually parts of the electron going one way and part going the other way. With this logic, all of existence is basically one massive vibrating electron(which may or may not be sentient), and as a series of progressively smaller systems, (creation, omniverse, universe, galaxy, solar system, planet, species, organs, tissues, cells, molecules, atoms, quanta[quarks], and finally pure energy, perhaps we are part of a looped system, where the very origin of creation, the higher “organism” is the same as the infinite energy that is within the quanta?

But what does it matter, my stoned mind tells me that if we could ever fully comprehend what basically amounts to a pure concept of God, then our little brains would just explode, which would be awesome.

Jesus had it right in describing the Holy Trinity. The Father represents the global (higher) self, the Son represents the incarnation of the Father – Man; or Self, and the Holy Spirit represents consciousness – the witness of the duality of external and internal.
The All, The Self, and the Duality between them. But three in the same. To say any of the three is less prominent or important than the other two is folly. It is a perfect triangle and can only function as a triangle. We reason linearly, not triangularly, so we cannot grasp it – we only live it.
In more scientific terms; the Father is simple energy, probability and the laws of physics – these make up the form of the physical self, including the entirety of the mind. And they ultimately govern our distinct environments and societies. Creation. Excitation. Male Energy.
The Holy Spirit represents existence and consciousness. What IS. What happens. The harmony among all things. Pure experience of reality. . or, Nothingness. Laxity. Female Energy.
The Son represents the individual, the being that is detected by the ego. It is not actually the self because the self cannot have an absolute definition other than an imaginary algorithm of infinite complexity, it only hints at what the self is by relating to its environment, pretty primitive. It nevertheless plays the role of controller, because neither of the creation energies alone would be suitable to do it alone. If it identifies with itself, though, it will rob itself of consciousness and thus become vulnerable to its environment and therefore become off balance and not something of its true nature. SELF ABSORBED.
These are also defined by psychologist Carl Jung in regard to the nature of our personal psyche, which models itself after the universe. Three parts; the Animus, Anima, and Shadow. Father, Holy Spirit, and Son, respectively. His work is worth looking up if you haven’t familiarized yourself with it.
Alignment between Male and Female leads to enlightenment. I see error in the majority of eastern spirituality practice, as they prefer the Female over the Male and waste their humanity in solitude and laxity. And the error in the nihilistic self-righteous view is that it prefers the Male over the Female and waste their lives in excitation, over-involvement with stimulus of their daily lives. TRUE alignment will lead to true expression of self. Life as bliss and beauty. A few known geniuses of ancient times and of the renaissance achieved this state of being and perhaps many of our prehistorical ancient ancestors. And of course Jesus and the Buddha. This explains their nonsexual or bisexual preferences.
Is it healthy? Maybe not. I think certain people need to be born into these roles though in order to guide the race. But in general maybe Dudes should stick to the Male role (as defined by our society) and Chicks should play the Female role. Or maybe evolution means to shift the paradigm into such that we would be creatures who express both sexualities and are either naturally immortal/non-sexual or still mortal but bisexual and therefore, in both circumstances, be more grounded with reality. Intelligence is the product of our species, so this makes a lot of sense; but the human conscience (conscious identification with the Son, Shadow) is interfering.

@Dan Deep stuff, and it makes a load of sense. I love the trinity-logic.

I agree fully about the extremes of eastern and western culture, but extreme poles are needed for magnetic attraction, yin and yang make balance by being opposites. We’ve reached far on both ends, and now it’s starting to fuse together.

Similarly, you can be über-manly/womanly and still have a good balance between masculine and feminine. I would go as far as to say that balance is really a necessity to be just that. The more you cultivate one, the more you attract the other, so it balances out. To master the form one must cultivate both. How manly or womanly you are then, is more about core alignment. Males are males and females are females.

Also, there is no masculine role for ordinary people in western society, only feminine. Similarly, there is little room for the feminine in the east, although it’s not as extreme.

@Manimal The triangle, it’s a really sturdy tool for navigating spiritual confusion.
Now that you point out that you can be extremely masculine or feminine and it indeed yields a balanced individual, which is totally true, I am doubting my previous musing about a paradigm shift in evolution. I guess what the real problem is is that superficial manhood is now the norm and as a result, femininity has been disassociated from by the masculine-drawn population in general. Seen as weak. In the West anyway.

I like what you say in your last paragraph. We really need more manly men who openly embody feminine traits (and pull it off) in our society. Role models. Because I don’t see aggressive females pulling it off any time soon. They are met with too much resistance even from the female population.

Well, I don’t see anything masculine about any of the guys in western society. They’re mostly just a bunch of lost boys trying to fit in, and they all have a very feminine behavior. It’s tragic.

Haha, too true.

Manliness is defined by it’s context. It just so happens that a lot of western culture is completely rubbish and material minded. I like to think of manliness as a mindset derived from the values of a cross between spartan warrior, medieval knight, renaissance man, Odysseus straight from Homers Odyssey, and of coarse James Bond. We have good role models out there, you’ve got to dig a little.

I agree it’s definitely important to have a solid balance between masculine/feminine energy and traits.

@Dan, your post made it seem like being present is a feminine quality, is this true?