Zen is about finding your true self. But it doesn't exist, and that's the mystery of our existence. In a world of representations, cognitive dissonance, and alternative facts, it's good to immerse yourself in the essence of existence, in a non-dual being. Thinking helps very little here, because thinking is actually always thinking about something, reflecting on something. Thinking is an activity that refers to something, that deals with representations of the world. That which...
The snake in paradise seduced Eve into eating a fruit from the forbidden Tree of Knowledge, which distinguishes between good and evil. Why was the Tree of Knowledge forbidden? Why did the snake seduce Eve? What did the fruit taste like? When I asked myself why I wanted to talk about this, I felt like Eve standing before the tree, talking to a snake who was trying to seduce me into eating the fruit. Do...
Enlightenment – Illumination: The Paradox of Enlightenment: Here's the thing about enlightenment. Someone recently asked me if I was seeking enlightenment. I was a bit taken aback. But because I really respected this person, I tried to be honest – yes, no, um, I don't quite know, actually yes, if I'm being completely honest… Why all this hedging? Why not just say directly, yes, I am, like you did, when you answered that you thought most people were seeking…
Connection
For the last two years, I've been diving quite deeply into the Upanishads, have practiced some yoga, and have explored the system of yoga a bit. I've delved into my own body, my own senses, my own consciousness. I've seen that there are a large number of levels and that there's no reason to assume that more levels don't exist. Two years ago, I simply denied most of what I'm experiencing here. It is...
Many have the idea that we live in a world made of matter, following the laws of physics and various theories such as the theory of evolution. This is strange, because matter as such doesn't really exist, E=mc² stands for this. I don't really understand this formula, but it symbolically represents that in the end everything is energy, possibly even just vibration as the string theory claims. Then there is the physics of the macrocosm and the microcosm. They contradict each other...
I read Sri Aurobindo slowly and with long intervals. Why not read a lot and quickly, absorb everything, and finally bring order to my mental world, which wants to break free from the consequences of rational monotheism? Why don't I give my intellect the freedom, concentration, rest, and strength to embark on one of life's greatest adventures? As a student, I once swam very naively in the Rhine, somewhere near Basel, where the water was clear and cold, fast and broad green mountain landscapes…
Fate, karma, causality, laws of nature, determinism – these are all different expressions of the idea that the universe follows a predictable logic. They imply that what has happened has logically arisen from what preceded it, and that the present is likewise determined by the past. We consider this logic to be reasonable and rational, logically sound. Yet, when we assume that the future is equally determined by the present and the past, we dismiss it as superstition, irrationality, or unscientific. We resist it…
When the rational mind roams through the worlds of knowledge, explores the library, or searches for the causal laws of the universe, it is meticulous work of building knowledge systems. These systems initially have little in common with the world of experience, or even the inner world. Only through contemplation does the mind pause and consider the systematized, abstract representation as an image of the world, as a worldview. It is intuition that anchors this image in a deeper reality. When can we say...
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