a sharing

[gerrit]

I felt I had fooled myself once again. I became quite angry at John and sent him an email claiming that he was selling us cool aid as in Jim Jones.

I am at that stage right now. I'm trying to be an adult and have a little more patience before launching into a tirade about John being a false messiah who, believing himself to be true, is feeding people well-intended lies that are hard to disprove. I guess it's also anger at myself for believing in something that every sensible person would agree is a too good to be true proposition. What Eric talked about in the Open House Meeting (2012/04/18) seemed like further attestation that nothing is really going on here other than circumstantial experiences. Still, by John's own admission, the pudding cannot really be tested for proof until about 4 years in, so I'll just have to withhold any conclusion for some time. As I said, the only thing that is helping me (which has NOTHING to do with the looking) is positive cognitive thinking, so I endorse that.

I was sort of scared (more sad) that I realized that this looking, knowing whatever it is I am, IS NOT FRED. Fred and all of his thoughts, emotions, memories, mental and physical feelings will not come along with me when the looking moves on. As much as the effects of me feel so real they will not follow me and I suspect I (the looking) will immediately forget that they ever existed. Sad but only to this temporary construct. In the same way that I would feel sad when I gave away a favorite toy when I was a child. it may sound silly but as George Harrison sang all things must pass. At the same time as this body grows old, wrinkly and achy I won’t be that sad to see it go. Also the end of emotions and feelings is something that I don’t think I will miss.
If this did not exactly answer your questions ask me more. I like your train of though and don’t be afraid of the end of things. You might be pleasantly surprised at what remains – you!

Your last sentence is more along the lines of my own view of death. However, I guess I disagree very much with the popular feeling that something will be lost in death. Nothing will be lost. It's not exactly true that "knowing whatever it is I am, IS NOT FRED". Yes, you are prior to these things, but nevertheless Everything is you. All of life is coming out of you. It's not "you going for a ride"....you Are the ride. There is nothing apart from You to be lost. The mystery of this divine drama is that somehow we experience it through one of its characters and so feel that we are a separate entity, but we are the whole drama and its source at the same time. We fear to lose the mind & the memories & and meaningful experiences, but all of that meaning is coming out of us as if it were holographically projected, haha. You cannot lose meaning because meaning comes from you, it's already complete inside, whether manifested or not.

Being a former musician, I guess my experience of music is the best analogy for me. Take the example of a musical note (maybe the tonic note). Now, the whole piece of music is filled with varied meanings & experiences & emotions etc., but somehow when I come back to that final tonic note, all of the meaning of the entire piece is somehow encapsulated by this singular expression. It is as if the whole piece had expanded out of this singularity (which itself is infinitely loaded with potential meaning)...like the Big Bang or something. So that's how death is. We return to the tonic note...from whence all of our loves and joys and experiences came in the first place. We don't lose the things we love....we lose our apparent separation from them. And who knows, maybe we're "reincarnated" in some way (as a Martian or a photon or kinetic energy) and the game continues. Either way, as you said, YOU (the brimming note) can never be lost.

Hope that offers something.
Gerrit