--- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > --- In [email protected], "Rick" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > Here is something from Shvetashvatara Upanishad IV.6: > > > > "Two birds of beautiful plumage, comrades Inseparable, live on the > > self same tree. One bird eats the fruit of pleasure and pain; The > > other looks on without eating." > > > > It seems that awareness is necessary for thoughts to happen but > > thoughts are not necessary for awareness to happen. Awareness > > without thinking is still awareness of something, only there > > are no thoughts. Can't really think about it but I'm sure we > > have all experienced it. > > I almost never get involved in theoretical discussions > of enlightenment, and won't this time either, except > to note that it would seem that the description of > "full enlightenment" would have more to do with the two > "birds" becoming one and dropping the petty distinctions > between actor and witness than it would with one of them > being an actor and one being a witness. > > Life in full enlightenment would seem to me to be about > fully enjoying both the fruit of pleasure and the pain, > in the knowledge that neither is separate from Self, > and that both are *just* as much Self as is the silent > "witness." Any state in which there is still a > "witness" separate from one's thoughts and actions > would seem to me to be merely a step along the way, > not the end point of the "journey." > > In other words, still ignorance, just of a different > sort. > > Unc
Perhaps pain is also ignorance. RAC To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
