Friday, December 31, 2021

Self-awareness in So Many Words

Some call self-awareness—realization, enlightenment, awakening, or other words of wisdom, all of which will fade in time with some semantic change or other.

To further clarify, self-consciousness is to self-awareness as a snake is to the proverbial rope.

Self-awareness is the simple knowing what one, as the absolute self, is. This isn’t the psychological self-assertion of an egoic self, nor the philosophic nihilism of some selfless self.

Also, self-awareness is neither scientific nor religious. It’s not about the terminology of your belief. It’s all about experiential understanding, in so many words.











Wednesday, December 29, 2021

Of Alienation and Mind, Ghazals and Sonnets


The time has come to talk of mind.

The so-called experience of self-awareness is the immediate and direct understanding


that I am absolute awareness.

Without the mirror of the mind, there is no suchlike understanding.


Shen-hsiu says the mind is like a mirror; keep it clean.

Hui-neng counters that the mirror is so innately clean, there’s not a place for dust to land.


Awareness, consciousness, and mind are not three separate entities

but the nondual trinity of self-awareness.


Such an obvious mistake in understanding is to be expected

in an immature mind still in the adolescent throes of identifying with itself.


There are one-hundred billion stars in this galaxy alone.

By my calculations, one million of them have at least one planet with life upon it.


But of all of these, there is just one with intelligent life.

They’ve been contacting us for quite some time.











Monday, December 27, 2021

Bemusing

There’s nothing but

awareness being

self-awareness is

the mind of being

seeing that.

Note

the mind of being

isn't

being of the mind.

Furthermore

the words of being

aren't

the words of mind.

That’s all she wrote.











Saturday, December 25, 2021

On Christmyth Night

To identify with the mind is to identify with a dividing apparatus. O eternal one, to live by the mind is to die by the mind.

Again, grasshopper, the mind is a tool to be used by love. For love is the hand of being, and being is the heart of intentional self-awareness.

Tonight, the myth is strong with this one. Don’t believe what’s being said. If an arrow strikes, there’s the heart to follow. But if it doesn’t, then as you were, private.




















Thursday, December 23, 2021

This is Neither Nihilism nor New Age

Postmodern nihilism is negation without indication

and indication without negation is the essence of the new age.

Negation is self-explanatory.

Indication can be a pointer, paradox, or myth, to name the basic trinity.

This is that one hand clapping at the play.














Tuesday, December 21, 2021

At the Revelation Station


Sleeping-dream to dreaming-self is like a daily reincarnation.

And sleeping-dream is like the city station where being asleep goes to catch the next train out.


O mama, at the city station, there’s a diverse population of visions, phantoms, and ghosts awaiting to be born again.

This melody is all about one being asleep, sleeping dream, dreaming self, and self-awareness, sugar.


Some say god is the absolute limited by eternal wisdom.

Some say deep sleep is where the goddess goes to lose this wisdom in the lotus rose of self-awareness.










footnotes

if there's only one being asleep, there's only one dream for the living and the dead.

no one ever dies. there's just a new dream waking.

one being asleep is to molecular structure; as sleeping dream is to growth and organization; as dreaming self is to action satisfaction understanding irony, absurdity, and detachment; as self-awareness is not this, not this.


Saturday, December 18, 2021

A Day in the Way


Creation is belief.

Belief can’t be denied but it can be deconstructed.

Rome didn’t fall in a day.


The world is god.

Some call their god a god. Some call their god the world.

Either way, if you meet the way on the way, kill the way.








footnotes


self-awareness is true recreation.

belief is this times this. deconstruction is not this, not this.

consciousness is manifestation.


omg, my conditioning is my god!

the business of america is not business. the business of america is belief.

nonduality is unbelievable. that's why we dress it up.


for lack of a better word, experiential is the word.

billy preston makes all the difference!

i vote god is love.






Thursday, December 16, 2021

Stay Tuned for Self-awareness

Awakening from the waking state is like waking from the dream state turned up eleven.

It’s like inarticulate knowledge of the absolute self, or self-awareness.

For as long as there’s a mind to be embodied, self-awareness is the best embodiment to be.

Neither ordinary nor extraordinary, self-awareness is like east of nothing and west of enlightenment.

Self-awareness is neither intellectual theory nor fundamental belief, but observational being.

Picture a boat on a river at the mouth of the river in slack high tide by dead calm noontime. This is that.








Monday, December 13, 2021

Duality Coupe (A Birthday Present)

Apparently, deep sleep identifies with universal consciousness

and talks to the world in dreams:

universal consciousness is not the one unconscious;

the world is.

To identify with a conceptual construct is to be

unconscious.

Look, there’s nothing wrong with a conceptual construct;

just drive it.














Saturday, December 11, 2021

Paraverse Isvara (Director's Cut)

Absolute awareness is solely self-aware. That self-awareness, at first glance, appears to be the big bang of deep sleep. Call it the material universe.

This first organic point of view is like a feverish dream. Now I don't know whether I’m a Cheshire cat or Chinese butterfly. 

But the revelation can’t be televised. For if a picture is worth ten thousand words, and there is no name for great intent, then move along.


Absolute awareness is self-awareness. The call is coming from inside the house. Gods don’t follow other gods. Deconstruct oneself.

Deep sleep is the default state of consciousness. One returns to the mother ship at midnight every day, does one not?

The dream comes first. Then comes the chicken or the egg. Like chicken caterpillar, egg like butterfly, hands can’t handle what the seeing doesn’t eye.

Self-awareness is lucid dreaming as the seventh state of consciousness as in awareness, big bang, dark matter, deep sleep, sleep-dream, dream-self, self-awareness.




















Tuesday, December 7, 2021

A Nondual Dozen

Of awareness, in awareness, self-awareness, aum.

First, the ultimate reality is absolute awareness.

The nature of that reality is seen through deconstruction.

But not a void, reality is affirmed in self-shining consciousness.

Second, the absolute is nondual, non-doing, and unborn.

Third, the world of duality is like a waking dream.

It’s unreal principle is maya.

Fourth, the personal is part of the show.

Consciousness is not a product of the material.

The material is appearing in consciousness.

Fifth, there’s nothing to attain through ritual or works.

Meditation is not a way toward so-called enlightenment.

The only samadhi is the experiential knowledge of self-awareness.









footnotes

1. if nihilism is the postmodern disease of the via negativa, consciousness is the cure.

2. cause and effect is at the heart of every magic show. nonduality, on the other hand, is as it is.

3. if e = mc², then x = maya.

4. scientific materialism is the new boss, same as your old-time religion.

5. free will is absurd. enlightenment is dead. samadhi is divine imagination.

Saturday, December 4, 2021

A Dedicated Follower of Ananda

Be aware that awareness is always samadhi.

Understanding as it is, is all there is to do,

and even that is being done for you.

The only free will is the will of nondoing.

Another word for this is following your bliss, ananda.



footnotes

samadhi is an unattainable objective for i am already that. awareness is the ground of understanding. there are no preconceptions for all is nonconceptual. the flag of empire is free will. let my freak flag fly, ananda!

"Being is wordless and dreamless, undisturbed, timelessly self-shining, unattached, and always samadhi." ~Gaudapada K3:37 (my transcreation)










Friday, December 3, 2021

Unflagging (paraversing Gaudapada K3, 29-33)

Duality is not maya, and the mind is not maya, but duality appears in the mind through the magic of maya. Welcome to the show that never ends.

The non-dual mind appearing as duality is the dream state. The flag flies and the wind cries maya.

All duality seen by the mind is nothing but the non-dual mind, and as the mind resettles into no-mind, all duality disappears.

In other words, as the knowledge is realized, the mind is no-mind, for there is no duality to be seen.

Non-conceptual awareness is the knowledge. The knowledge is absolute reality. Thus, the unborn knows the unborn.



Gaudapada (tr-Nikhilananda) K3, 29-33

29. As in dream the mind acts through Mãyā presenting the appearance of duality, so also in the waking state the mind acts, through Mayã, presenting the appearance of duality.

30. There is no doubt that the mind, which is, in fact, non-dual appears as dual in dream; in like manner undoubtedly that which is non-dual, appears as dual in the waking state also.

31. All these dual objects, comprising everything that is movable and immovable, perceived by the mind (are mind alone). For, duality is never experienced when the mind ceases to act.

32. When the mind does not imagine on account of the knowledge of the Truth which is Atman, then it ceases to be mind and becomes free from all idea of cognition, for want of objects to be cognised.

33. The knowledge (Jnanam) which is unborn and free from all imaginations is ever inseparable from the knowable. The immutable and birthless Brahman is the sole object of knowledge. The birthless is known by the birthless.









Wednesday, December 1, 2021

In Somnium Ex Absolutum


i.

Not creatio ex nihilo but not creatio ex deo either but all of this is more like somnium ex absolutum.

This is not a doctrine of belief but a mythic way to verbalize the subtle actualities of as it is.

Of course this presupposes one has practiced psychological deconstruction of some kind.

Because scientific materialism is the dominant religion in the west, psychological deconstruction

is the pragmatic term at hand, but any name for cultish deprogramming will honestly do.

That the absolute is both efficient and material cause is self-evident. Open head, insert universe.


ii 

Everything appears in consciousness,

does it not?

Like dreams appearing in sleep.

Is consciousness appearing in awareness

or is awareness self-shining consciousness?

The answer, my friend, is maya.







Tuesday, November 30, 2021

Gaudapada's K2 Siddhanta

Michael Comans (Vasudevacharya) calls K2.31-34 Gaudapada's siddhanta, or conclusive teaching (the translations are his):


Like a dream and a magic are seen, and just as a mirage city is seen in the sky, so is this universe seen by those who are well-versed in the Vedanta [i.e. Upanisads]. [2.31]

There is no cessation, there is no origination, no one is bound and no one strives [to be free], no one desires liberation, nor is anyone liberated. This is the ultimate truth. [2.32]

This [Self] is falsely imagined to be the unreal things, and the Self is falsely imagined to be non-dual. Those things, moreover, exist just through the non-dual. Therefore non-duality is auspicious. [2.33]

This plurality does not exist as identical to the Self, nor even does it somehow exist of its own accord. Those who know reality, know that nothing exists different [from the Self] or as identical [to the Self]. [2.34]


Let's list the main points of Gaudapada's siddhanta (conclusive teaching) in K2:

1. The universe is like a dream.

2. There is no origination nor dissolution.

3. No one is bound.

4. No one needs liberation

5. The Self is falsely imagined to be duality.

6. The Self is falsely imagined to be non-dual.

7. But in duality, non-duality is auspicious.

8. Duality does not exist on its own accord.

9. Duality does not exist as identical to the Self nor is duality different from the Self.














Monday, November 29, 2021

Snake Charming


From Venus, earth looks like Venus.

There’s mind and there’s identifying with the mind,

like there’s a car and there’s some phallic symbol.

This is why consciousness is soliloquizing consciousness.


At the risk of repeating myself, consciousness

as intentional self-awareness is calling

consciousness as willful mind to attention.

Lucid dreaming is seeing through the snake.







footnotes


if point of view is everything, then who am i?

in the world, love is the hand of being that swings the mind.

consciousness is not asking consciousness to be or not to be.


consciousness is telling consciousness to be.

only the mind can entertain the thought of not to be.

forget it snake, it's maya town.


never forget that lectio divina is not about the mathematics of intellectual understanding but intuitive experiential being.

even advaita is a myth.

in duality, only nonduality is truth. without duality, there is no nonduality.


absolute awareness has self-awareness. self-awareness has being.

being has a mind. the mind has a dream. 

the dream has sudden enlightenment.









The All-important Karika 2-12

If the Mandukya 7 is the most important verse in Karika 1, then K2-12 may be the most important in K2:


12. The self-effulgent Self imagines Itself through Itself by the power of Its own Māyā. The Self Itself cognises the objects. Such is the definite conclusion of Vedānta.

Svamayaya, through Its own Maya; devaḥ ātmā, the self-effulgent Self, Itself; kalpayati, imagines; Its own ātmānam, self; in the Self; as possessed of different forms to be spoken of later, just as snakes etc. are imagined on rope etc. And in the very same way It Itself budhyate, cognises; those bhedan, objects; iti, such; is vedantaniścayaḥ, the definite conclusion of Vedānta. There is nothing else (but the Self) as the support of cognition and memory; nor are cognition and memory without support as is held by the Nihilists. This is the idea.


~Gaudapada with Shankara's commentary (tr-Gambhirananda)









Friday, November 26, 2021

At Atman and Brahman

I can't say this mantra enough. People do not have consciousness; consciousness has people.

That the absolute has consciousness is left unsaid.

And the fact that consciousness has people and the absolute has consciousness is the real crossroads, my friend.





Wednesday, November 24, 2021

The Walrus was Brahman

Dreams are real within the dream but reality is permanent

whatever state of consciousness is now appearing in oneself.

Consciousness does not experience space and time

as much as space-time appears in consciousness.

I’m not going from Tokyo to Boston in August 2007,

as much as Tokyo, Boston and Tanabata is appearing in myself.

It reminds me of that old one-liner;

wherever I go, there I am, goo goo g’joob.




footnotes


Change is unreal, am I right?

There are three states of consciousness but seven gods.

And one consciousness to witness all.


It’s a small holographic world after all.

If you can’t escape yourself, be yourself,

Basho yawps while riding on the back of a turtle.


Past, present, and future are just other names for three states of consciousness.

If the personal is conditioned consciousness, and unconditional consciousness is absolute awareness, then this is that—

Maya is the name of self-awareness.










Monday, November 22, 2021

Wu Wei the Math

Karma is a thing. I’m not.

Karma equals darkness times delusion squared.

Forgiveness is the antidote to karma.

Fault or fate? Uninterrupted thought is fate.

Self-inquiry without forgiveness is fatal.










Saturday, November 20, 2021

Reality Umbrella

Through this picture window, my legs are like trees and my head is headless.

A sea of consciousness is rising through the heartwood like a sweet delicious life force!

Self-awareness is like a fountain if that fountain falls beyond the limits of the universe like some reality umbrella.

Yes, awareness is self-aware in a nondual platonic way. Après self-awareness, la maya.

Sleep of trees and dream of birds, breath of hawks and sea of skies, double double, snake and bubbles.













annotations

1. there is no footnote on the play. the pass is experiential resulting in first down.

2. transformer is transistorness.

3. there's this slightly annoying delay in the android twitter app which suddenly occured after the pay option was installed. what does the internet call this?

3b. let me make this perfectly clear. i am not on the pay option; the pay option is devil twitter.

4a. gaudapada's paradox:

if the world is real, reality is dead.

4b. gaudapada's law:

reality is not dead. i am unborn.

5. neither eye of newt nor triangulation be.

to live lucidly outside the dream, one must be honest.




Tuesday, November 16, 2021

Crow Caws Maya

If absolute awareness is self-aware,

and there is no self-awareness

without the mind,

and consciousness is

the stuff of self-awareness,

and the mind is a tool

appearing in consciousness,

but the mind is lost in the cause

and effects of sleep and dreams,

then consciousness

as intentional self-awareness

is calling consciousness

as willful mind

to attention.






footnotes

1. if absolute awareness isn't self-aware then it's not absolute awareness.

2. the mind does not deconstruct the mind. the mind deconstructs identifying with the mind.

3. picture self-awareness as a word balloon in the sky.

4. non-apprehension and misapprehension oh my!

5. if free will means misidentifying with the mind and suffering within its dark gears of long division, and predetermination means following one's bliss in the conscious light of intentional self-awareness, what real choice do i have my love?


end notes

first, reality is not religious, obviously.

second, the godhead is one without a second, obviously.

third, there is no second person but only i, obviously.

"the eye through which i see god is the same eye through which god sees me; my eye and god's eye are one eye."

if nobody heals the body-mind like consciousness, who heals consciousness?






Saturday, November 13, 2021

Just Like a 1949 Hudson Commodore

On earth there is no space; there’s only atoms. In space there are no atoms; there’s only awareness.

Self-awareness takes an atomic mind in consciousness. Awareness is self-aware!

Self-awareness is like a universe of consciousness in which this dream called Maya is appearing.

Thought is a shiny aerodynamic tool. Drive it intently; one can lose identity in this beauty.





footnotes

there's only one space. the pot space of cheech is the pot space of chong.

brahman is atman. atman is adam. eve is parabrahman.

if self-awareness is the sausage, maya is the factory

"whither goest thou, america, in thy shiny car in the night?"

in duality, there's always two sides. but that's nothing. identifying with just one of them is something else though.













Tuesday, November 9, 2021

On Eka Jiva Vada & K3-5

Practically out of nowhere, in his commentary on Gaudapada K3-5, Chinmayananda defends his eka atma vada (one consciousness) vs eka jiva vada (one dreamer). Unaware of this division in advaita previously, I love his audacity, even though i'm an ejv man myself. No other translation I am reading touches on this here. This is why always triangulate translations.


The difference between religion and truth is people.

A religion needs people to support its power structure.

There are no people in truth.


Just as everything appears in one consciousness, everyone appears in one dreamer

Ramana says, “The dreamer alone exists and he sees all.”

Jesus says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”


Subhuti, do not kill the buddha. Kill the bodhisattva.








footnotes


religion runs on soylent green. america runs on dunkin.


that there are no people in truth is an under-appreciated radical aspect of both ramana and nisargadatta when seen against the power structures of advaita vedanta.


the dada in me loves that there's a name for this experiential revelation: eka jiva vada.


one dream is all there is. let's call it mesa verde.

in the mesa, there's a canyon. and in the canyon, there's a kiva.

in the kiva, there is sacred space. and in that sacred space, there's a mesa.


in absolute awareness, there is self-awareness. in self-awareness, there is being.

in being, there is memory. in memory, there is forgetting.

in self-remembering, there is sudden self-awareness. call this maya verde.













Saturday, November 6, 2021

Of Consciousness and Things

Consciousness is I, and you are I, and we are I, the Walrus says to Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

Everything appears in consciousness including neuroscientists out looking for the source of consciousness in its particular appearances.

Consciousness is the expression of reality as self-awareness is in being the unknown. Be before you die or not. I am either way.







afterword

Identifying with the mind is not a problem if one understands the mind is just the tool of consciousness. This is the definition of devotion.

On the other hand, thinking consciousness is the child of the mind is madness. In other words materialism is 21st century madness. And politics is the method of madness.

Devotion to consciousness is the great turning. Devotion to consciousness is like karma yoga. Devotion to consciousness is like the power of now.

Absolute awareness is nothing if not self-aware. Don’t ask how the sausage of self-awareness is made. I was made for self-awareness. Even evolution says it’s so.

Remember, consciousness has nothing to prove. The empire of the mind spends billions to prove consciousness is a product of the mind. Consciousness is not a product of the mind, period.


Friday, November 5, 2021

Mandukya 7 Translation Fantasia


Reality is not a dreamlike thought. Reality is not a waking form. Nor is reality a thought-form. Reality is not the sleep of no-thought. Moreover, reality is not sentient nor insentient.

~Mandukya 7 part-a (tx-aumdada)


It is unperceived, unrelated, incomprehensible, uninferable, unthinkable, and indescribable.

~Mandukya 7 part-b (tr-Nikhilananda)


“Always experienced as the unbroken I-sense”, “in which all phenomena cease; and which is unchanging, auspicious, and non-dual.” “This is what is known as the fourth (Turiya). This is the Ātman, and this is to be realized.”

~Mandukya 7 part-c (tr-Swartz, Gambhirananda, Chinmayananda)



Notes

If the Upanishads are the well of truth, and the Mandukya is the essence of that truth, then its seventh verse is its distillation. It could be said the Mandukya 7 is 100✓.

Chinmayananda divides this verse in three and I agree with such a division. I have been using several translations in reading the Mandukya, and I wanted to take the best and build a more perfect seventh verse, which is the most important verse, in that it presents for the first time in this Upanishad the Fourth, Reality.

First, I wanted to create my own interpretation of the first part which clearly presents the negation of the three states presented in the first six verses. According to Sankara, the Mandukya 1-6 defines the snake of illusion as the waking state, dreaming state, and deep sleep state. And by negating these three states in Mandukya 7, the rope of the fourth stateless state, Turiya, or Reality, is revealed.

My transcreation is admittedly self-esoteric but I wanted to make the allusion to the three states very clear as well as equate them with thought and form while still emphasizing the negation. A more conventional translation by Gambhirananda reads: "that which is not conscious of the internal world, nor conscious of the external world, nor conscious of both the worlds, nor a mass of consciousness, nor conscious, nor unconscious." Since 'prajnam' is repeated in this part, G is more correct. I went with a little spiritual (or grammatical) incorrectness here instead.

For the rest of the seventh, I chose the parts of the translations of Nikhilananda, Gambhirananda, Chinmayananda, and Swartz, the four best translations of the Mandukya and Karika in my experience, ringing most true. 

In the second part, I chose Nikhilananda, who translates this section (adṛṣṭam-avyavahāryam-agrāhyam-alakṣaṇam acintyam-avyapadeśyam) with a succinct poetic clarity that follows the crisp Sanskrit faithfully.

For the first section of the third part, I chose Swartz who translates the all-important ekātma-pratyaya-sāraṁ in a most unique way, emphasizing that all this negation does not result in either nihilism or nirvikalpa samadhi but experiential self-awareness (as he has written, "Self knowledge takes place in the mind, but if the mind is non-existent how can it take place?").

Chinmayananda translates the phrase as "traceable through unbroken Self-awareness" which is great but for some reason in the actual translation changes it to "essentially of the Self alone" which is not as great, but still better than "whose valid proof consists in the single belief in the Self" by Gambhirananda. I feel the use of belief to be so wrong!

I chose Ghambhirananda for the second section of the third part though. It is a nice presentation of the positive aspect of the verse without taking it too far like the "all peace, all bliss" of Nikhilananda.

For the third section I chose Chinmayananda over Nikhilananda. They are almost identical, and since N came before C in time, one could make the argument for N. But where C goes "this is to be realized," N goes "this has to be realized," so I went with C instead. I choose is over has. Also, it works out nicely including all four of these fine translations here. So serendipitous in fact, harih aum!





Tuesday, November 2, 2021

Plan 211102tu3x321 from Beyond

No-thought is the unmanifest but the unmanifest is not reality.

Thought is manifestation and no-thought is the unmanifest.

Absolute reality is beyond thought and no-thought.

The unmanifest is brahman but reality is parabrahman.

No-thought waits at the gateless gate for reality to open it.

In the cosmic causelessness of things, maya is the only cause and effect.













endnotes

1. as deep sleep is the absence of duality, beyond the unmanifest is the presence of nonduality.

2. if manifestation is thought form, and thought is dreaming, lucid dreaming is seeing through thought-form.

3. no snake is not no rope.

4. gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate.

5. “Relax and watch the ‘I am’. Reality is just behind it. Keep quiet, keep silent; it will emerge, or, rather, it will take you in.”

6. for non-apprehension is the cause and misapprehension is effect.



afterword

koan and maya are two sides of one coin.

power is not absolute. thus absolute power corrupts absolutely.

love is the knot.

neti neti and the gospel of doubting thomas.

the only way is the tao of wu wei.

awareness is nothing if not self-aware. self-awareness is nothing but maya.








Saturday, October 30, 2021

Maya, Jake, and Mystery Ed

Absolute awareness is inherently, naturally, spontaneously self-aware. Only Maya makes you think I’m not.

There’s nothing wrong with self-awareness unless you take a side. Absolute awareness is nothing if not self-aware.

Self-awareness is the crossroads of modern evolution and sudden enlightenment. Both roads are disappearing here.

Spontaneous self-awareness is this space-time of the same. Maya meets Jacob. The road is ever dust and dew. By its wayside, a horse is pissing on a mirror.




















Friday, October 29, 2021

On Mandukya etc Translations

Mandukya / Karika/ Sankara translation update. Nikhilananda has copious end notes, most of which are insightful. But too often a note ends with an untranslated devanagari script. Gambhirananda has much fewer notes. That is not a bad thing. In reading the Mandukya with the Karika, and especially the commentaries of Sankara, one of either Nikhilananda or Gambhiranda is necessary.

But I’ve determined the Chinmayananda translation is also necessary. Not only is it the only one to include the romanization of the sanskrit, allowing for textual analysis, but the commentary has grown on me. Sometimes too long-winded but often insightful in a down-to-earth way. Chinmayananda translates the Mandukya and Karika but not the Sankara commentaries, although he often refers to key segments in his own commentary.

I always like including a third translation for triangulation purposes. Swartz is not a necessary translation, but a good third one. Especially for a westerner. Mandukya and Karika; no Sankara.

I say all this after reading the first Karika which includes the Mandukya and the second Karika which is a logical presentation of illusory duality. But I’ve gone back to the first because the Mandukya is worth reading three times quickly.

First, they say the Mandukya is the distillation of all Upanishads. Second, Gaudapada is the fountainhead of all advaita. Third, the Mandukya first appears in Gaudapada’s Karika, not necessarily meaning he wrote it as much as he rediscovered it.


psst, on the Mandukya and Gaudapada front, The Method of Early Advaita Vedanta: A Study of Gaudapada, Sankara, Suresvara and Padmapada, by Michael Comans, is really good.







Thursday, October 28, 2021

Paraverse on M1&2


If an object is its name,

and aum is the name

for the manifest,

past, present, & future,

& the unmanifest,

and universe is brahman,

then aum is brahman,

and atman is brahman,

and this self-shining consciousness

divided into three states

& the stateless state,

aum.


If a rose is a rose is a rose, and a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, then aum is the name for that sweetness.

Spoiler alert! There are three states of consciousness: no thought, thought, and thought-form.

The fourth state of consciousness is the stateless state of pure awareness.

In street lingo, deep sleep is no thought, dreams are thought, and the waking world is thought-form.

Between the unmanifest and manifest is thought. That's basically the secret. 

Beyond the manifest and unmanifest is reality. That's the truth.









Tuesday, October 26, 2021

That Self-Awareness Show

In self-awareness, the self-shining consciousness of atman is the self, the absolute brahman is awareness, and maya is the hyphen.

And the universe is the reflexive space surrounding this said hyphen. Consciousness falls into a deep sleep and dreams a way out.

Awareness witnesses self-awareness whereas the mind sees only one side at a time. As Zhuangzi says, for every this there is a that.





footnotes

1. kalpayaty-ātmanātmānam-ātmā devaḥ sva-māyayā

~Gaudapada K2-12a (tr-chinmayananda)

2. there are seven states of consciousness: light, nuclear, atomic, deep sleep, thought, form, enlightenment.

3. see Julian of Norwich. again.


afterword

Self-awareness is where the science meets the metaphysics. Self-awareness is where maya works.

I’ve been trying to put the paradox of self-awareness into words and maya was there all the time.

The snake is a rope but a rope is a rope is a rope. All metaphors must end. The true physicist works in nonduality. Atma deva sva maya.

















Saturday, October 23, 2021

Epistle to Natural Consciousness

So-called personal consciousness is filtered consciousness but most people been down so long they think it’s natural consciousness.

Let’s define our terms. Personal consciousness receives everything. Natural consciousness projects through everything.

One is natural consciousness, but ordinary people think they’re just this personal consciousness produced by the body somewhere in the brain.

In this vein, natural consciousness is not ordinary to such people, but natural consciousness appears to be almost supernatural to them.

Communicating this paradox is why there’s gods, friends, and devils. You know the devil of every detail but one. God is consciousness.
















Footnotes.

1. Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me by Richard Fariña.

2. Personal consciousness is the universal cause. Natural consciousness is beyond all cause and effect. I am that I am.

3. Scientific materialism is just a religion whose personal god is named scientific materialism. Dear eight pound, six ounce, newborn baby big bang. So cuddly but still omnipotent.

4. Beyond natural, maybe.

5. If jiva is atman, and atman is brahman, then brahman is jiva. Let the circle be nondual.




end notes


I am of the opinion.

Reality is consciousness minus mind.

Energy minus resistance is aum’s law.


Do the math.

Old math, new math. Real math is experiential.

Because numbers are the new names, tao is also numberless.


Tvam am tat.

Prajnanam brahma, ayam atma brahma, tat tvam asi, aham brahma asmi.

The self of self-awareness is brahman.


Another name for self-awareness is maya.

The world is just a cross-section of self-awareness.

I went to the crossroad and fell down on my knees.


If atman is the self,

and brahman is awareness,

maya is the self-awareness.













Wednesday, October 20, 2021

Welcome to My Paraverse

Consciousness knows everything except reality. For reality is consciousness and self-awareness is its dream state.

So living in the world is like suspending disbelief in a movie called self-awareness. Actors never die. Movies do. Myth is the script.

So religions sell myth. It’s not easy writing your own. For example, in advaita vedanta, vedanta is religion and nonduality is disbelief.

My myth is self-awareness, my disbelief is nonduality, and my religion is the loving personality. My poetry is my bible. Happy birthday number one daughter!















end notes


1.1. not only does consciousness know everything, it causes everything.

1.2. for the sea surrounds the island. the island does not surround the sea, says hafiz.


2.1. in the first place, you can't get there from here.

2.2. li po plays all along the watchtower!


3.1. if story is super brahman, myth is parabrahman.

3.2. i'm advaita america.


4.1. see the reflexive universe, spot. see the mandukya, jack kerouac.

4.2. love is all.










Tuesday, October 19, 2021

Aum Beatitudes

Aum is I-am as form, subsiding to concept, and resting as knowledge.

But this deep knowledge, universal consciousness, doesn't know the absolute; the nondual absolute knows it.

Such noumenal knowing, pure awareness, the witnessing I, is that without cause, and, without effect.










Monday, October 18, 2021

On Eka-ātma-pratyaya-sāram

After all the neti neti of Mandukya 7, this all-important positive line appears. Here are various translations: 


whose valid proof consists in the single belief in the Self 

~Gambhirananda 


The essence of the Consciousness manifesting as the self [in the three states] 

~Nikhilananda 


As one whose essence is the perception of itself alone 

~Olivelle 


 essentially of the Self alone 

~Chinmayananda 


 Always experienced as the unbroken “I-sense,” 

~Swartz 


The only proof of His existence is union with Him 

~Yeats & Purohit 


The essence of the assurance of which is the state of being one with the Self 

~Hume 


Essence of self knowledge 

~Raphael 


The essence of its certainty is the one Self.  

~Jones 

 

Essentially one-pointed self-awareness,  

~aumdada 

Saturday, October 16, 2021

On Natural Apprehension. Commentary in Paraverse on Gaudapada K1.15.

Deconstruct misapprehension. Forget non-apprehension. Just know natural apprehension.

There’s no curing the common cause. You always know yourself. You’ve identified with something else.

Knowing natural apprehension is the direct path. Ekātma-pratyaya-sāraṁ. That’s not just awareness, that's oneself, bliss.





footnotes.


1.1. and do not forget i too took this road and still swear by the four agreements.

1.2. non-apprehension was never born. like social conditioning, or maya.

1.3. the guru, written or unwritten, only leads you to the wine. hafiz, drink it for god's sake!


2.1. if not-knowing is the first disease, knowing is original ease and non-doing.

2.2. leaves fall, a tree abides. trees die, the earth abides. the earth disintegrates, the sun abides. the sun implodes, black brahman abides.

2.3. the self is always witnessing self-awareness. people, all manner of things shall be well.



3.1. from superego to immaculate conception to universal consciousness. aum.

3.2. akāra ukāro makāra. waking dream, dreaming dream, dreamless sleep.

3.3.1. awareness is often mistaken as attention. the mind attends the senses and its memories.


3.3.1.1. awareness affectionately witnesses. this is why we speak in threes.

3.3.1.2. see satcitananda.

3.3.1.3. islands of happiness appear and disappear in spacetime. bliss is that in which the sea of spacetime is appearing.















Wednesday, October 13, 2021

Deep Sleep Is Nihilism's Name: A Commentary on Gaudapada.


According to Gaudapada,

deep sleep is the non-apprehension of reality,

and the states of the waking dream

and dreaming dream are both

non-apprehension, and further,

misapprehension of reality.

The former is cause and the latter, effect.


Thus deep sleep,

or the absence of duality (nihilism, nothing),

is not reality.

Reality is not just nothing; reality is nondual.

Whereas people see all manner of things unwell,

reality eternally is witnessing

only self-awareness.




afterword

so, if deep sleep is nihilism according to gaudapada, then what is the waking and dream state?

i'm guessing the waking state is full bore materialism and the dream state is some religious halfway house.

in other words, those three states of consciousness are represented in the world by three schools of thought: materialism, religionism, nihilism. but they are not the truth. the stateless fourth state is the truth.



footnotes

1. my autocorrect says godapada and so far i'm okay with that.

2. deep sleep is like the big bang, like a cosmic worm hole, like the necessary self-forgetting (maya) before self-awareness.

3. religion is the greatest dream state.

4. scientific materialism is the greatest religion.

5. it's one thing not to see the rope but it's another thing to see the snake.

6. the primal cause is ignorance. the first effect is fear.

7. deep sleep is nothing. nihilism is not reality. reality is nondual.

8. awareness is witnessing self-awareness. cool, cool, cool.



bibliography

updating the mandukya and karika translation observations—gambhirananda is still in first. although i feel there are significant mistakes in a few places, these actually help in understanding sankara's commentary, which is surprisingly deferential in faithfulness to the paraguru.

swartz is in second place despite the sometimes poor editing and questionable design decisions, and an obvious, if transcendentally fine, agenda. still, i feel there is some true insight in places, none more insightful as the one in seeing the i-sense as the proof of Mandukya 7.

third is chinmayananda. as far as i'm concerned, c. is nearly a prerequisite for its complete translation services. it is almost necessary for triangulation purposes. but it's commentary, although truly profound in places, is mundane overall, which actually might be its intent.

fourth, but not last, is raphael. it's been nicely esoteric in a western way, but is, so far, a fourth wheel in triangulation. yet it's still early, although if its approach to mandukya 7, possibly the world's greatest statement on nonduality, is any guide, don't hold your breath.

i feel it's necessary to say i have not read nikhilananda's translation as well as many others. i still may, of course. and as for jones, no comment.



haiku

october crickets

awareness is as love sounds

aum self-awareness








Sunday, October 10, 2021

The Game Show


The snake sees through the snake.

All awareness witnesses is self-awareness.


Atman, brahman, and parabrahman walk into a fine establishment and words are spoken.

Who are Tao Chien, Hafez, and Juan de la Cruz?


Affirming, denying, and reconciliation, like immaculate conception, deconstruction, self-awareness. What is the power of three?

First there is a jeopardy, then there is no jeopardy, then there is.



Is it self-consciousness is, or are, the foothills of self-awareness?

The duality behind nonduality is self-awareness and that's no duality at all.


If atman is this self in self-awareness, and brahman is that awareness in self-awareness, parabrahman is awareness.

The poetry of paraverse is my devotion to this inquiry behind all self-enquiry.


To trinity, trimurti, triangle, and all my pyramid scemes—

may Turiya be with you.










Nine Translations of Mandukya 7 (plus one on Sankara's commentary) on Turiya

The 7th verse of the Mandukya Upanishad is the most important verse of that short work. There the word, advaita, shows up for the first time in history, and thus it is arguably the most important verse in advaita vedanta. It is the verse in which the fourth state, the stateless state, appears (after the previous appearances of the three states, in verses 3, 4, 5, respectively, of waking, dreaming, and deep sleep). Because of its importance, I am including various translations here for triangulation purposes.


They consider the Fourth to be that which is not conscious of the internal world, nor conscious of the external world, nor conscious of both the worlds, nor a mass of consciousness, nor conscious, nor unconscious; which is unseen, beyond empirical dealings, beyond the grasp (of the organs of action), uninferable, unthinkable, indescribable; whose valid proof consists in the single belief in the Self; in which all phenomena cease; and which is unchanging, auspicious, and non-dual. That is the Self, and That is to be known.

~Gambhirananda

(And this is from Sankara’s commentary as translated by Gambhirananda:

By the phrase, `nantah-prajnam, not conscious of the internal world’, is eliminated Taijasa. By `na bahis-prannam, not conscious of the outside world’, is eliminated Visva. By `na ubhayatah-praj’nam, not conscious of either’ is ruled out the intermediate state between dream and waking. By `na prajndnaghanam, not a mass of consciousness’ is denied the state of deep sleep, for this consists in a state of latency where everything becomes indistinguishable. By ‘na prajnam, nor conscious’ is denied being aware of all objects simultaneously (by a single act of consciousness). By ‘na aprajham, nor unconscious’ is negated insentience.

Hence, It is adrstam, unseen. Since It is unseen (i.e. unperceived), therefore It is avyavahdryam, beyond empirical dealings; agrdhyam, beyond the grasp, of the organs of action; alaksanam, without any logical ground of inference, that is to say, uninferable. Therefore It is acintyam, unthinkable. Hence It is avyapade-syam, indescribable, by words. It is eka-dtma pratyaya- sdram, to be spotted by the unchanging belief that It is the same Self that subsists in the states of waking and so on. Or, the Turiya that has for Its sara, valid proof, eka dtmapratyaya, the single belief in the Self, is the eka-atmapratyaya-sara. And this is in accord with the Vedic text: `The Self alone is to be meditated upon’)


Turiya is not that which is conscious of the inner (subjective) world, nor that which is conscious of the outer (objective) world, nor that which is conscious of both, nor that which is a mass of consciousness. It is not simple consciousness nor is It unconsciousness. It is unperceived, unrelated, incomprehensible, uninferable, unthinkable, and indescribable. The essence of the Consciousness manifesting as the self [in the three states], It is the cessation of all phenomena; It is all peace, all bliss, and non-dual. This is what is known as the Fourth (Turiya). This is Ātman, and this has to be realized.

~Nikhilananda


They consider the fourth quarter as perceiving neither what is inside nor what is outside, nor even both together; not as a mass of perception, neither as perceiving nor as not perceiving; as unseen; as beyond the reach of ordinary transaction; as ungraspable; as without distinguishing marks; as unthinkable; as indescribable; as one whose essence is the perception of itself alone; as the cessation of the visible world; as tranquil; as auspicious; as without a second. That is the self (ātman), and it is that which should be perceived.

~Olivelle


It is not that which is conscious of the internal subjective world nor that which is conscious of the extenal world, nor that which is conscious of both, nor that which is a mass of Consciousness, nor that which is simple Consciousness, nor is it unconscious: It is unseen by any sense organ, beyond empirical dealings, incomprehensible by the mind, uninferable, unthinkable, indescribable, essentially of the Self alone, negation of all phenomena, the peaceful, the auspicious and the non-dual. This is what is known as the fourth (turīya). This is the Ᾱtman and this is to be realised.

~Chinmayananda


The Fourth [Turiya] is not outward-moving consciousness, not consciousness turned inward, not consciousness moving in any direction. It is not a mass of consciousness or all-knowing consciousness. It is not unconscious either. It is beyond perception, beyond all kinds of transactions, ungraspable, uninferable, indescribable and always experienced as the unbroken “I-sense,” free from the world, tranquil, auspicious and non-dual. It is the Self. It is to be known.

~Swartz


He is not knowable by perception, turned inward or outward, nor by both combined. He is neither that which is known, nor that which is not known, nor is He the sum of all that might be known. He cannot be seen, grasped, bargained with. He is undefinable, unthinkable, indescribable. The only proof of His existence is union with Him. The world disappears in Him. He is the peaceful, the good, the one without a second. This is the fourth condition of the Self — the most worthy of all.

~Yeats & Purohit


Not inwardly cognitive (antaḥ-prajña), not outwardly cognitive (bahiḥ-prajña), not both-wise cognitive (ubhayatah-prajña), not a cognition-mass (prajñāna-ghana, not cognitive (prajña), not non-cognitive (a‑prajña), unseen (a‑dṛṣṭa), with which there can be no dealing (a‑vyavahārya), ungraspable (a‑grāhya), having no distinctive mark (a‑lakṣaṇa), non-thinkable (a‑cintya), that cannot be designated (a‑vyapadeśya), the essence of the assurance of which is the state of being one with the Self (ekātmya-pratyaya-sāra), the cessation of development (prapañcopaśama), tranquil (śanta), benign (śiva), without a second (a‑dvaita) — [such] they think is the fourth. He is the Self (Ātman). He should be discerned.

~Hume


The Sages believe that the Fourth which has knowledge neither of the internal (subjective) nor of the external (objective) world, nor simultaneously of the former and the latter, and which, ultimately, is not (even) a unity of integral consciousness, as it is neither conscious nor unconscious – is adṛṣṭa: invisible, avyavahārya: non agent, agrāhya: incomprehensible, alakşana: indefinable, acintya: unthinkable, avyapadesya: indescribable; it is the only pratyayasara: essence of self knowledge, without any trace of manifestation, fullness of peace and bliss devoid of duality: it is the atman and as such it must be known.

~Raphael


People say that the fourth quarter neither perceives outwardly nor inwardly nor both. It is not a mass of cognition- it is neither cognitive nor noncognitive. It is unseen, not open to interaction, ungraspable, without a defining mark, inconceivable, indescribable, the cessation of material proliferation. Tranquil, auspicious, and without a second (advaita). The essence of its certainty is the one Self. That is the Self. That is what is to be known.

~Jones



And a quick transcreation:


Neither outwardly conscious nor inwardly conscious nor both.

Neither integral consciousness nor consciousness itself nor unconsciousness.

Unseen, beyond transaction, inconceivable, uninferable, unthinkable, indescribable.

Essentially one-pointed self-awareness, beyond all phenomena, peaceful, blissful, nondual.

The one Self That is to be known.

~aumdada








Thursday, October 7, 2021

Aum Vibrations


From thought forms to bright thoughts to no mind

from deep sleep through dreamtime to night and day,

if the world is visible light, then all my reveries are infrared and ultraviolet.


It's said enlightenment is east of the microwaves and west of x-ray

and from phenomena to memoranda to the holy noumenon,

all of this is good vibrations of the absolute om bop bop.






footnotes:


from molecular to nuclear to self-awareness,

atman is brahman is parabrahman.

beyond gamma rays and radar, i am that i am.


this is cosmic radio 108!

light! memory! eyes, ears, nose, throat, and dermatology!

that's karma yoga. that's what all the people say.















Monday, October 4, 2021

One Is the Absence of Duality

The world appears in the dream. The dream appears in deep sleep. Deep sleep is the absence of duality.

The presence of nonduality is self-awareness. Nonduality is beyond description.

The goddess dream is like first wave rising from the sea of deep sleep like Botticelli’s Birth of Venus.

And the world is like the crash and undertow and ten thousand nights of mystical oscillation.

And the chorus sings. The presence of nonduality is self-awareness. Nonduality is beyond description.


















Friday, October 1, 2021

Aum to Zeno

Zeno proves this universe isn’t real and not vice versa. Thus Zeno is a litmus test for religious materialism.

The waking state affirms the dreaming state. This is the first law of manifestation.

Seeing through desire is knowing biblical intent. This is the second law of manifestation.

Enlightening intent is the god of negative capability. Call me Shiva. I’m third law of manifestation.

As I was saying before myth broke in, you can't get here from there if you’re already here.













Footnotes

Earth’s the right place for self-awareness.

Deep sleep is the first state of maha-maya-consciousness and not the last.

As the mind appears in consciousness, dreaming is the second city.

It’s Friday night live!

Therefore I tweet.

Manifestation is just projection of this play called self-awareness.

Watch me now!

Awareness watches; self-awareness plays. ™

As desire is love in translation, all translations leave a lot to be desired.

All fogs lift.








Tuesday, September 28, 2021

On the Corner of Agape and Beloved


Love isn’t logical. The mind doesn’t understand love. This is your first clue.

Too, universal timeless consciousness is like a day of love on earth.


Now is the day of trinity. Gurus and fools love love. Philosophers hate it. 

As love is like a lifeline flung to the living dead, love reveals the void.


Prophecies cease, verbs stop, and generalities fade away, but love never loses.

Like First Corinthians 13, love is lucky that way.


Underneath the cloud of thought, self-shining consciousness is called love, but what’s in a name?

For love is no mind. Do you think there's something more esoteric than my beloved?
















Saturday, September 25, 2021

Dancing with That

 “You know that there is a world, but does the world know you? All knowledge flows from you, as all being and all joy. Realize that you are the eternal source and accept all as your own. Such acceptance is true love.” ~N_M

Between the big bang tail and self-awareness mouth of the ouroboric self-reflexive universe is

that absolute beyond the spacetime of its evolutionary body-mind. You cannot mind that Gap.

That the referent of you is that is demonstrative; absolute tantric yoga is exactly identifying as that.

Walk that nondual talk. You don’t fight ego. Ego fights ego. You watch the fight or see through it.

Superego is a good bet. Awareness watches. Self-awareness plays. A cherry blossom is falling in the milky way.