"Tantra Illuminated: The Philosophy, History, and Practice of a Timeless Tradition" In-depth, scholarly, and yet practical wisdom for everyday living --- If you are reading this you should read this book. After meditating for fifty years, I have come to many realizations, and it was absolutely amazing to see how much was described eloquently in this text. If you are seeking wisdom, you will find much to contemplate here. Additionally you will encounter a vast set of spiritual beliefs, which were embraced by a huge part of humanity, and were systematically buried by less intelligent cultures. The seeds of a new renaissance of understanding of what it is to be alive.
@@christopherwallis751 I posted the review first and decided to copy it to here. Might take a while to get through the Recognition Sutras, as I like to stop and think a lot about concepts along the way.
I have not read the comments but your now is my past and your future. This is true of all digital recordings. I can listen to an old time radio show which was there now. This message I am writing is someone else’s future. Time is subjective based on the vantage point. The same is true of emotional memory. I can smell brownies and think of my grandmother and feel nostalgia. I can project potential feelings onto potential futures. I can be open now. Many times, many nows, many realities. It never matters to me if there is free will or not, but for me the most compelling argument is that we have the ability to discuss it. But, if it is a non-dual reality then of course it has to be both free will and pre-determined as well as completely random. I don’t understand how it’s true but it feels true for me. But then maybe there are more possibilities than anyone from a human vantage could see
Again me, after seeimg this Video for the x time. This time it landet different: My mind exploded. My life is an ecstatic picture made up of colors from space and time. A joyful discovery of what is already there, just undiscovered by me. No need, shouldn't, I should have... more. Pure freedom in the delicious randomness of a dance. Thank you so much, Hareesh!
The first video on this you posted was the first video of yours I watched and it practically talked me down from a ledge lol. I felt incredibly relaxed and was laughing the rest of the day.
Amazing. I feel like your words spoke to my heart and were understood and felt deeply even though at times my mind was a bit blown! I didn’t see the first two videos but am very impressed how you put all of this into words here…. I’m not sure I would even begin to know where to start! Thank you 🙏🏻
My third time through this lecture and now it begins to click. The key is to realize deeply that time is an experience, a slice, a perspective, not a fact or thing. Then the mind can open to relativity.
Beautiful, such a gift you have in communicating these deep spiritual and scientific life changing theories if believed and lived fully from love. Thankyou so much for not being able to choose to be any different from who you are and how you express consciousness through you that is Hareesh. 🙏💎🍀🌠🤗💗
On some level I know that I *haven't* "grokked" this teaching. I really, really want to.... so badly that it almost hurts. But I also can accept where I'm at, and that it will come eventually. I'm reminded of the part of the Introduction you wrote to the Recognition Sutras where you discuss "spiritual immaturity" and the importance of not "making yourself the agent of the process". So I'll just keep practicing "getting out of the way" and trust understanding/awakening to unfold. Blessings to All!
@@stasik901 that's kind of the wrong question, since 'self' is a cognitive illusion or a mental construct. we are all on a journey, but nobody's "making" the journey.
@@christopherwallis751 question was for Ian bc it seems like there is a struggle of belief That journey we are (all) part of still needs a perspective, right? It's just hard for us to become the 360° observer
@@stasik901 As Hareesh points out, this question is difficult to answer (but I'll try). The issue is, in your question, which "you" is being referred to? The socially constructed, illusory "you" of the Ego? Or the transpersonal, infinite "you" of pure awareness? "I" (ego) know a lot about nondual philosophy on an *intellectual* level, but "I" (ego) recognize that "I" still, for whatever reason, have difficulty viscerally/directly experiencing and embodying these teachings "I" have been studying. Also, in the course of "my" practice, "I" have come to realize that "I" (ego) have little to no control over the speed and precise nature of "my" awakening/liberation journey. "I" have had enough experiences with what might be called "kundalini" moving through "my" bodymind - quite literally - without "me" directing it or controlling it, to know that there is *something* much larger and wiser than "me" (ego) which is obviously deeply involved in this process/journey. "I" (ego) am not quite sure what is keeping me identified with this body/mind and preventing me from directly realizing/feeling that this "force/power" (kundalini) *is* "me", but instead of stressing out about it and trying to *force* "myself" (ego) to "get it", I've found that being patient and accepting where I am to be a much easier (not to mention less stressful) way of approaching my sadhana. This is what I meant by "not making myself the agent of the process"... "I" (ego) am practicing "getting out of the way" of "I" (kundalini/śakti). Does that make sense?
Thank you so much, Hareesh ji. I loved how you emphasized the need to feel this, instead of just understanding it intellectually. If you will allow me, I have one observation. You say that everything happens as it must, as an unfolding of the whole matrix (I am paraphrasing). If so, where does this 'little bit of randomness' that you speak of come from? To me it sounds like what we call randomness is simply our inability (or 'computational capacity') to know it all. Doesn't that tell us, at least intuitively, that nothing is random? And that our sense of free-will too is a part of that non-random matrix? In other words, what happens happens because it must, and we insert the idea of 'randomness' only because we can't grock it all.
well, I don't really understand quantum mechanics well enough to speak to this, but they tell me that it includes a tiny bit of randomness in the sense that what we call the future is not quite perfectly predictable, even if we had all the relevant data points.
Lovely video. I've frequently thought of it in the following way: we have complete, total, undeniable free will....of a certain kind, not the kind that is typically concentualized. We are confused about where exactly the will "lives." Because, this kind of free will is not causal and temporal and experiencable, but rather is acausal and atemporal and lies outside of the scope of the contents of experience, even as it suffuses them and is never seperate from them. The main thrust of my argument is that "we often confuse the objects of our experience with the subjects of our experience," and that while we are correct in assuming that the subject has free will, we frequently ascribe the mantle of subjecthood to objects which are not subjects! For instance: the world and our body are sensory experiences of our consciousness, as is our mind, as are our emotions. But consider: sights cannot see. A sight is a manifestation of phenomena in the visual sphere. It is an experience. Sights do not see, but we would say that they can "be seen." So sensory data cannot be a subject, it cannot choose, it is an object. Nor can sounds hear, nor can smells smell. But nor can thoughts think, or feelings feel! The location that we ascribe volition and subjecthood to most frequently, the mind with it's thoughts and emotions, is also an experience! It is an object! Even the "feeling of choosing" is itself a feeling, an object! So then we have ruled out all objects as subjects, thank heavens. But what are we to make of consciousness as the subject? We can understand that the subject gives rise to its objects, but we know from our experience of consciousness that it does so in a regular way, from the perspective of a body in space and sequentially through linear time. And from the perspective of physics, we have understood that time and space are relative and ultimately are features of our experience as well. Space and time are ways of looking, then. While not objects of consciousness themselves, they are means of experience, and are not the subject. They are not subjects! So then subjecthood must lie outside of space and time, even as it pervades them! So when we invoke the space-time loaf, we are acknowledging that it is a concept corresponding to a manifestation, a possible vantage point of our consciousness, which would include everything, everyone, every time and place, any and all experiences, all as one unified whole. And that this, ultimately, is itself taken as one big object of consciousness, the grandest possible object. And that as an object, it is still not a subject. And so finally, given the ground that we have tread, we can understand something very important: that we do not experience our subjecthood at all. It cannot be experienced: objects of consciousness are experienced directly, and the features of experiencing are experienced indirectly, but the experiencER is not an object that can be experienced directly or indirectly! It is unbound, totally free, the unseeable ground of everything! It can only be pointed to indirectly by concepts, which are objects of course. It pervades and transcends the spacetime block. It is only from this vantage point that we can approach anything like a free will, anything like a "free chooser" which can do and manifest and experience anything and everything, and from any perspective, unconditioned by causal conditions (which of course are only features of linear, temporal perception). But if this subject has absolute free will, then you as one of the limited perspectives that was freely chosen to be experienced *also* have the same kind of free will, it inheres in you through the identity between yourself and the Subject. It is merely that "choice" is not how you think it is, it does not originate from where you think it does, and it is not what could be called the "mundane volition" that is experienced as an object of the mind from the perspective of a samsarin.
Consciousness is and you can be consciousness in a dance with the Sentient Mystery. You cannot know consciousness, knowing is a function of the mind. All objects, things, are fabricated illusion, and the verb that they are fabricated from is the Dancing Sentient Mystery (poetically the Goddess). In Pure Being the duality dissolves and Consciousness and the Sentient Mystery are one - inseparable. The mind and words work on duality and so we talk in this way, Consciousness and Conscious Of, but in pure being when the mind stops, and the active Spirit is centered... Amazement, Wonderment, ... Words cannot really go there. Peace.
yay! Great topic. I once had a spiritual experience of a quite tangible sense that all time is one so I have a personal experience of exactly what you are talking about and just love hearing the intersect bewteen quantum physics and spirituality in these words and langauge. Interesting profound and life changing :-) . Thanks for helping us let go of regret, self recrimination, This is true personal freedom.
So I was utterly stunned by Christopher's Wallis's claim about being able to see the future and that reputable physicists claim this as well. On page 136 of Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos, you can verify that, yes, at least one reputable physicist believes this is possible.
it's not so stunning if you feel/sense/believe that the future has already happened, of course. and how could it not have? there's nothing about today's date (whatever it is) that could possibly demarcate past from future. the process of entropy creates the experience of the arrow of time, but there is no special point along that arrow that could designate it as the 'present'. this is borne out by the relevant equations in both physics and thermodynamics.
Brilliant and clear-- Hareesh's series on free will uses everyday English to explain what is almost inscrutable for us. I was partially freed from guilt when he proposed the rewinding time thought experiment in the first lecture. Now I have to meditate on the idea that everything has already happened to work on anxiety about the future. He explains clearly and eloquently in modern language what Ramana Maharshi expressed in cryptic statements and what Krishna taught in the Gita. Thanks a million!
Thank you Hareesh for your clear, tidying words, which always evoke an incredible inner vastness and calmness in me. Thank you for your time and your enthusiasm with which you give the teachings of this precious school of wisdom to the world. They are like waves that carry on. Thank you! Iti Shivam
The first 2 sutras of the recognition sutras illuminated this concept for me. Thank you for going more in depth. As always. You have a way of explaining things in palatable language that helps me grasp (ish) subjects i once thought too in depth.
Thank you for inspiring words I understand how difficult is to get all elements of reality together space and time certainly are some of these elements of Courier there are other elements that we can use for entering the one reality but I guess it doesn't really matter through which door are we decide to enter the one reality I guess we could say that this is also everyone's free choice from what you said if I understood corectly y time and space are embedded in our experience and personality and that's probably the reason why understanding these categories makes us free I am very grateful to you for reminding me that philosophy can make us free as well as meditation which I strongly believe .
i'm a retired chemistry/biochemistry professor/research scientist. and sad to say, i had more than one colleague who bragged about how many students they FLUNKED ... not seeing that the very # convicted them of less than excellence in education.
Thank you, I really appreciate this follow up to the last video. I sent the last one to my partner so we could discuss it and he was sure you were talking about determinism, I tried to explain how it wasn't determinism but didn't have the words. This video definitely helps make the ideas more understandable. Thanks! ✨
@@christopherwallis751 from what I understood he interpreted what you said to mean we don't have a choice, there is no free will, it's already predetermined. I tried to explain how that wasn't quite what you were saying but my understanding is more feeling based than in a way I'm able to articulate.
Even a cow has freewill but only to extent of its tethering rope. Beyond that lies the realm of imagination. unfortunately the conflation of the real with the imaginary gives rise to confusion.
if you define "free will" such that you think a cow has it, then to be honest you simply haven't understood the argument in these three videos. you seem to be conflating "free will" and the experience of choice. watch the videos again, perhaps?
Hareesh, I have a few questions about the nature of space and time from a nondual perspective, if you don’t mind answering. Your perspective (the block universe) suggests that spacetime exists objectively. How does this fit in with the reality of the one Consciousness? Does spacetime exist objectively as the one Consciousness? Or is spacetime a sort of collective subjective perception that we all share as the one Consciousness? I’ve heard nondual teachers of the Advaita tradition (including Rupert Spira and Francis Lucille) reject the existence of space and time altogether, claiming that all that exists is the timeless and spaceless Now, which is the one Consciousness. Bernardo Kastrup, a Western philosopher and friend of Rupert Spira who promotes monistic idealism, is also of the opinion that spacetime does not exist objectively, but rather is our finite way of perceiving the one Consciousness. I’m having trouble reconciling what I’ve learned about spacetime from them with the very plausible notion of the block universe as you’ve described it here. Could you help clarify this for me?
sure, there's no problem or contradiction here. Spacetime cannot exist objectively, because it is a mode of conscious perceiving. but it's a universal mode for embodied forms of consciousness, and thus it seems to acquire objectivity. but all phenomena, and the Spacetime loaf in which they are embedded, are a manifestation of consciousness and nothing more. what else could it be? the universe seems to exist independently of any single observer because it is the summation of *all* vantage points of consciousness.
I get this to the degree I do, I believe I 'grok' the concept, this being said... the act of surfing in waves of consequential dimension becomes all the more fascinating. When one considers the situation involved in the creation of a significant swell, interfacing with the tides and conditions occurring at the surfing break or spot, all subject to an above average degree of 'randomness' one would suppose and juxtaposing these factors with the effects of one's 'life elements' figuring into the waveriders position in the lineup... I think you can see where this is going. All this contributes to the old adage "only a surfer knows the feeling"... one might conclude that such a high degree of randomness contributes to the spontaneity that makes surfing so compelling. As always, I appreciate your insight so much
Hello Hareesh! I am studying to become a Yoga teacher at Gaia's MA&Y studio. She recommended your book as a must (Tantra Illuminated) and last Sunday I had the pleasure to be at your talk. All the yoga philosophy is new to me. Up to now my line of thinking or believing has been coincidentally more or less the same as what Gary Zukav says in his book The Seat of the Soul, just to give a reference without having to talk much. Do you know him and what he says? But now..... after I started reading your book, watching you in person and watching your video above... I have started looking into life differently. What you say in the video makes sense to me too. Now I must confess I feel a bit divided trying to digest it all. I have so many questions.... I will ask you one for now: If I am aware that a certain characteristic of my persona needs to be improved and assuming that all already happened, is there anything I can do consciously to grow? Or should I just relax trying not to suffer about anything and enjoy the ride? I will appreciate your teaching. Thanks. Cris.
hi! when you say that you have a characteristic that *needs* to be improved, then I know that you have internalized the stories or opinions of others. the notion that something needs to be improved is part and parcel of self-judgement, based in the belief that you're somehow not good enough as you are. however, if you say that you *want* to change a certain characteristic, simply because the opportunity to grow is exciting and interesting to you, well then that's different. so which is it, really? the good news is that if it's the second one, then you can simultaneously relax and enjoy the ride *and* do things to foster your growth.
The realisation that your free will does not exist but you will always agree with your decisions because you are you is true but that that realisation leads to an overcoming of eg self loathing or regret does not follow as those reaction are also 'baked in' to you from past karma or actually past attachment habits. We are habitual beings, that is all that can be said here. or as quantum physics actually says is that we are part of the quantum field not separate entities making free choices.
It takes a photon of light 8 min of our time to emanate from the surface of the sun and radiate to our eyes 93 million miles away. A photon which has no mass is traveling at the speed of light and does not experience time, or rather, time is infinite from that perspective. So even though we matter/energy sensory beings can measure a start and stop in distance and time, the photon cannot. That photon is paradoxically infinite and existed at the beginning of time and at the end of time and at ever moment in between, even though it 'left' our star 8 min ago. I don't know if this helps, but this is the example I give when talking about the future and the past, particularly when trying to ease the angst of fellow seekers striving for some ideal of enlightenment though they are aging. I say look, It's already happened, so just enjoy the journey while it is happening, because the happening is what really matters.
> When Baizhang lectured in the hall, there was always an old man who listened to the teaching and then dispersed with the crowd. One day he didn't leave; Baizhang then asked him, "Who is it standing there?" > The old man said, "In antiquity, in the time of the ancient Buddha Kasyapa, I lived on this mountain. A student asked, 'Does a greatly cultivated man still fall into cause and effect or not?' I answered him, 'He does not fall into cause and effect,' and I fell into a wild fox body for five hundred lives. Now I ask the teacher to turn a word on my behalf." > Baizhang said, "He is not blind to cause and effect." > The old man was greatly enlightened at these words. (Book of Serenity, c. 8) WuMen said: > [When the wild fox monk asserted that the person of great practice] “does not fall into cause and effect,” why did he fall into a wild fox’s body? > [When he heard that such a person] “is not deluded by (blind to) cause and effect,” why did he shed the fox’s body? > If you can focus the eye [of enlightened insight] here on this, then you will know why, long ago on Baizhang Mountain, [the old man] won for himself five hundred lifetimes flowing with the wind. WuMen's Verse: > Not falling into, not being deluded by- > Two faces of a single die. > Not being deluded by, not falling into- > A thousand thousand errors. 🙏
Hi Hareesh and thank you for the video on free will. I also believe in the " everything is happening all at once" idea/fact . I don't understand the special theory of relativity analogy that you used to indicate the possibility of viewing the future. My understanding: an alien 100 million light years away from earth looks at earth through a telescope. He is seeing what was happening on earth 100 million years ago , due to his distance from earth and the time it takes for earth light to get to his planet. If he travels, real fast,towards earth, a distance that is only 50 million light years away from earth , he sees what was happening on earth 50 million light years ago.If he travels all the way to earth , he catches up to the present earth time moment. Why can't he see into future earth? Because the level of light and it's speed, spaceships,telescopes, bodies, planet earth and planet alien , is physical /mental level . It's not a level that can see into the future except by action/reaction calculation - all mental stuff. At this point, in my understanding, I believe that the "everthything all at once perspective" can only be percieved from higher up the tattva scale{kashmir shaivism has 36 tattvas, as I'm sure you know) which cannot be accessed from within the mental/physical and it's technologies.
pls read Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos to understand what I was trying to articulate there. for now, simply imagine an alien 100 million years in the future *and* 100 million light years away. they are seeing what we call "now". when they move towards us, they can see our future, that from our perspective hasn't happened yet. this is because moving towards us changes the "angle of their slice" -- see Brian Greene for explanation.
I guess it would be easier to attain a high level of awareness where the past and future can be seen as easily as streaming , than befriending an alien from 100 million light years away and 100 million years in the future, to tell me what the future will bring.
Very interesting and profound! Believe it or not I got this this, this morning before I saw your video. It striked me that everything already happened and that we get to just watch it unfold, as a way of reality enjoying itself from within itself. It is almost like consciousness pierced through time and space. And now I got another realization - that what we call the present moment is consciousness itself which is our essence and moreover consciousness limits itself to experience reality one moment at a time, one perspective at a time. And so it is the same one consciousness that experiences every moment from every vantage point there is. If that is so then perhaps we may explain experiences that get hints of the future or of other beings vantage points, like the one I had this morning. Perhaps it is possible to break through this limitation and experience a vaster array of the time space spectrum in an intentional way? Hareesh are you aware of such powers\siddhas?
2 года назад
It is very curious indeed because it is not the first time when I got an insight and then I watched a video or listened to podcast that explained the same insight in detail. I wonder if this is trick of the mind or is this a kind of synchronistic premonition?
This is Philosophical Materialism, that cause and effect from the beginning of time determines all of time. This includes that Consciouness is an illusion created by the material brain and is an illusion. Special relativity is observational (Functions for Measurements), not reality or the state of the present, but even if one assumes it was not transcended in General Relativity, no speed allows one to see into the future (that is not what it states). Even your vision of the room you are in is in the past because light takes time to get to your eyes in the material view. The future is a multiverse of statistical likelihood, it has not already happened! Premonition is shown to have statistical accuracy in peer review experimentation, but is never deterministic, nor can it always predict the future which has not yet fallen into the present. The past has happened and is forever fixed and you will live with all your choices forever. The present consciousness has free will and that is not determined by your predisposition, but by your intent. Your intent is not the result of cause and effect, but is the refinement of your spirit. In living beings the logical or most desirable choice is not always made and this is not because of cause and effect, nor randomness as in chaos. We are non-dual in the sense that all is one. Our material bodies will only hold our eternal consciousness for a while. Our consciousness is non-dual and in union with each other, with the Earth, the galaxy, and universe and each level is higher consciousness. The Earth is a living being and we are cells in the Earth. I would have quit at the last video, but had started to put down notes and dropped my pen exactly when I read the title of the concluding video. It took my wife and I several minutes to find the pen, moving the chair and finding two dog balls and a different pen and a pencil, until the pen searched for was found, The sound of the pen hitting the floor was really the pen hitting a wooden brace in the chair. This is synchronisity, this is the Sentient Mystery (Bhagavati Devi if you wish) playing games with me. Therefore I watched the last video propounding Philosophical Materialism and while Tantra Illuminated was a great read, I believe these three videos are not true. The Sentient Mystery creates and nurtures Consciousness as a sacred and divine play and even when providing my Consciousness with synchronicity which has no causal source, nothing aligned for the play as it happened with the pen, and it did not happen until it happened, but the Mystery did inspire me to write to whomever is to read this, do not accepy Philosophical Materialism that the Universities of the West ingrain in disciples. You are truly free to make choices and you can intend synchronicity into your life and be guided by the ongoing here and now creativity of the Sentient Mystery. This text is spontaneous, Peace.
@@christopherwallis751 I watched all 3 videos and also took notes, as is my habit with anything which I am spending the time to contemplating. I have been meditating deeply for 50 years now and have contemplated time for many of those years (and I am Very versed in Relativity which does not include seeing into the future regardless of the motion of one's frame of reference). Please read my post a little closer and contemplate it. Experientially the synchronicities I am aware of in my life are definitely not caused by the past. There is much greater consciousness than human consciousness or the influence of material and mental momentum from the past. Through meditation we may commune with the greater consciousness which has will and intent. Through our intention we may draw into our lives greater interaction with the Sentient Mystery of the Totality. The future has not happened yet and is still indeterminate. I am not denying the momentum of the past and yet that is only one factor! The multiverse of future probabilities is not infinite, but rather has a specific nature, and it is attracting living consciousness in toward greater awareness, yet most do not listen and instead allow the past momentum to blow them along. I know that one may spontaneously apply one's spirit in the dance with the Mystery, the total unity, and override the momentum of the past. This is an art which meditation can assist with achieving, but many meditate without finding the keys. It is a matter of being in harmony and resonating with the greater will. The totality is living and conscious, vastly more powerful than a human can understand, and yet knows us intimately and offers us the option to choose to dance with it in bliss and ecstasy. 'Everything has already happened' is a mental illusion, a philosophical theory which is not true. 'All effects are caused by the past' is false Philosophical Materialism. Pure Consciousness and Spirit Intent are transcendental to cause and effect. Maintain meditation while active in life and you will see the Totality (Mystery, Goddess, Whatever Name you wish, not material illusion) cast synchronicity playfully and fiercely to teach these truths. May you soon be blessed with a synchronicity which opens you to the truth of the greater will/spirit which transcends cause and effect. Peace.
@@ShakuhachiSpirit totally agree that what we call the present is not solely caused by what we call the past -- it's also caused by what we call the future. and I also agree that will/spirit transcends cause and effect. but what you seem to be missing is the fact that there is no 'present' -- i mean, there is the Eternal Now, obviously, but there's absolutely nothing special about today's date (whatever that date might be) that qualifies it as the 'present'. the future is already determined for precisely the same reason the past is determined -- because there is no future and past. there's nothing special about your vantage point in spacetime (or any particular vantage point) that would make it demarcate 'past' from 'future'. the question is, how could you possibly think otherwise?
@@christopherwallis751 There is something very special about the present, which is the essence of why we are incarnated in the present which is continual transformation through the encountering of change. The special thing about the present is it is here that we have free will to choose. Free Will is not boundless, but falls under the limitation as imposed by the design of this realm and the specific changes which the spirit of the unified totality puts into our present. Our individual spirit which has will and intent is refined in the present and the present, this life is ultimately precious. In this sense there is something very special about each person's vantage point, it is where we interact personally within our unique point of view and with our unique situation and changes we encounter which are the expression of the sentient mystery to us personally to learn and grow. The concept of time as a loaf is not a Theory, it is a thought experiment, which physicists perform in intricate detail in order to possibly get a glimpse at something they do not understand. The lay term would be speculative fiction. If Ze Alpha rapes Ze Beta, I have a big issue with saying it was already written already in the loaf of time. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course. Another thought experiment (speculative fiction) is the infinite parallel universes. This thought experiment states that if Ze Alpha rapes Ze Beta then in another time stream this did not happen, so don't worry about it. I have a big issue with saying it did not happen in some other imaginary time stream. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course. Another thought experiment (speculative fiction) would say that at some point Ze Alpha will merge with Ze Beta and experience all their trauma, so don't worry about it. I have a big issue with this excuse as well. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course. No matter the speculative fiction to mitigate guilt, for Ze Alpha to make use of this incarnation, Ze Alpha needs to admit guilt (get real about have made an grievous error) and needs deep repentance to change course. Ze Alpha may indeed require some serious professional assistance in correcting the error of their way. Ze Alpha does not need to hurt themself in any way or make matters worse, but needs to correct the momentum of their incarnation, their present life. There is no progress in an incarnation or in the maturing of an individual in any choice (in the present and through their given free will) not guided by Compassionate Love. I am not claiming to be free of error. We are all here to grow and learn together. Refining one's living according to choices guided by Compassionate Love is the challenge and the opportunity which this life gives us. I want to thank you for this dialog and for your thoughts. Perhaps we have more agreement than disagreement here, but words are tricky (especially since our language is defined by dualism) and the clarifying of our communication is essential as the tool we use to share our lessons and help each other grow. Asa scholar of the sacred texts you have given us all a very valuable gift. As a person of deep meditation I am sharing my reflections (my confusion about your words) so that we may all have a clearer understanding for our servant minds to assist our active spirits. Peace and Blessings.
If everything has already happened at the future is set in stone like with the physics thing you said, including spontaneity, then what is even the point of any spiritual practice let alone at all if our efforts don't determine wether they'll be effective at all considering the concept that the future already is?
I humbly believe that mentioning or putting in the middle of the reasoning a distant Big Bang that occurred, does not help at all. That Big Bang is a thought and a dogma of a science far removed from the most divine mysteries. Another joke from Śiva 😀. Still, it's very nice to hear from you.
The alien cannot see in our future. By moving towards us they only accelerate the viewing of our past, but they cannot go beyond the point in time we are now - at that point they have hit the earth. So the physicist's explanation of "everything has already happened" is limited to the our past. And then I say: "Well, duh."
Moving towards us would blueshift what the aliens see, away from us the light originating from us and arriving at the aliens‘ telescope would be redshifted. In both cases it takes some time for the light to travel from here and now to there. If they are 100 light years away from us (regardless how they move), it will have taken 100 years for photos to travel that distance. In that case the aliens (in their now, at their place) would see what happens now here at our place. Understood from here, the aliens 100 years in the future see what we do now. Still, there is no way that they see into our future. Activities which have not happened don‘t give off or reflect any light yet, and light takes time to travel, so there‘s nothing future to see yet, only always some now.
@@heulseier but that's the point, they *have* happened. read Brian Greene's "fabric of the cosmos" book to understand the argument here, don't rely on my wholly inadequate summary of it. motion changes the angle of that slice of the spacetime we call 'now', such that 'now' can include our future from the alien's point of view, or vice versa. The future has of course already happened because there's nothing to demarcate it from the past, which I assume you believe has already happened. the arrow of time is created by entropy, and there's nothing that could possibly demarcate a special point on that arrow that one could call the present. so there's no such thing as the present, except as a way of talking about one's vantage point in Spacetime.
@@christopherwallis751 Thank you for the pointers! The narrator of the video seems to work from the assumption that the future does *not* "exist", though, in the same sense as past and present do (11:20). Yes, different observers slice up Block Time differently, but "nothing, not even information, can travel faster than light." Even if Block Time is understood as the complete span of time and space, this understanding would be necessarily seen from a metaphysical "outside in" vantage point, not experientially, from the perspective of some consciousness here or out there, always (as I understand the narrator) confined to "the universe we see around us, carried to us by light." Regarding Brain Green's book, there is this video ruclips.net/video/3ZNTVNeSWKI/видео.html where Green talks about his idea of the "fabric of the cosmos", I'll check that out before turning to the book, thanks again for the suggestion.
@@christopherwallis751 from what you are trying to accomplish-- Why Portugal-- if you don't mind me asking? Why not at the heart of the great empire? The time is right and the need is great for spiritual revitalization is here and you have the fuel. The time is right but is the place? Certainly I could be wrong but I wonder.
Good video however I'm still not understanding why this is simply not determinism. If I cannot help being who I am and couldn't have behaved other than how I have in the past (ie causally inevitable), then how is this not determinism? Accepting that we are determined I think opens us to the reality that we are inextricably part of the fabric of the cosmos and that the self is empty of any sort of separate and substantive identity, which as you mentions frees us of guilt and shame. We are endless natural processes at work. Carving out a piece of this endless process, and calling it myself which is separate from everything else, and which is born and dies is reification. Determinism has a bad rap I think :)
Indeed. 99% determinism and 1% random fluctuations, probably, but whatever the percentage is, the imagined separate self has no control over anything. not even itself.
I haven't formed an opinion on the subject of will. Is it possible that perhaps certain people just have a different perspective than you do? Like that analogy of the elephant?
well, this isn't really a matter of opinion. this is about trying to get at the facts of the matter -- the nature of reality regardless of our opinions about it. but 'will' does not need to be the operative word in this discussion, necessarily.
Namaste, thank you for these videos. It has been fun to watch and listen to your words about something that is so challenging to put into words. Some words that came to me about this series are: “ Free will…free from what? Since consciousness is everything, this inherently includes any possible ‘future.’“ My experience is that this adventure of ‘living’ is so profoundly free all actions are forgiven or ineffectual to alter pure consciousness. However, consciousness can create lasting change on this form. Thank goodness! That’s the fun of it! In a moment of profound awakening when I really got this, I suddenly realized the only action left to do during life is to love. Love the self: as this form and all forms. This profound freedom does not mean that it is possible for this form to be separate from Divine Will. How much letting go can actually be done by one form? Letting go of this idea of ‘free will’ was certainly a huge letting go and sigh of relief for my body and mind, that is for sure! Many blessings to you Hareesh and to all who are watching this and playing with these ideas and experiences. OM.🙏🏼🪷💖
it's not a metaphor. spacetime is one thing. time *is* space. we are literally traversing spacetime, and we can't help it. even if you sit still, you're moving through it.
@@christopherwallis751 I think there’s good reason to differentiate time and space. Look at something like Zeno’s paradox. Also it appears as if your argument is based on the juxtaposition of events which i don’t think can be justified
12:55 - No alien could see into our future. You must have misunderstood the analogy. The current consensus in physics is that we can see into the past, but not the future. Here's why: When you gaze at the moon, you are not seeing it as it is in the present moment - rather as it WAS 1.3 seconds ago. This is because it took that amount of time for light reflected by the moon to travel to your eye. The speed of light is fast, but it is still finite. The furthest stars we see at night with the naked eye are so distant that you are actually seeing them thousands of years in the past. Think of it like sound - after you see a lightning strike, it takes time for the sound of thunder to reach you. Now imagine that you are this special "alien" who tries to observe the future by travelling towards the source of the lightning strike. All that will happen is that the alien hears the sound of thunder sooner than if they remained stationary. That is NOT seeing into the future. The earliest anyone could ever perceive the thunder is if they were stood exactly in the location of the lightning strike at the time. That way, the sound would be heard instantaneously, practically in the present moment, but crucially, no sooner.
I perfectly understand what you are saying, but the analogy doesn't work. sound is not light. please read Brian Greene's book, the fabric of the cosmos, to understand what I spoke about here so imperfectly.
For clarification. Things are not deterministic or even random in part. Quantum has shown that things are stochastic. i.e. not random but highly complex patterns that are inevitable but too complex to be determinable. So the tennis match is going to finish a certain way but the someone shouting in the crowd could be the cause no matter how much the best player practiced. Nothing is deterministic but stochastically complex. And for the telescope example, you are wrong. The alien doesn't have to move its just that the light takes years to reach it so it is seeing our past but never our future. If it moves towards us it will see our light sooner and sooner so closer and closer to our present. Never the future. but only our future relative to them. Grief good luck explaining that.
I think we can agree on that: "highly complex patterns that are inevitable". But this is still (a nuanced version of) determinism, regardless of the fact that we could never perfectly predict outcomes.
@@christopherwallis751 Quantum says that we can never predict outcomes at all, its all probabilistic. Further, Einsteins's Loaf explains that all that we see around us is in the past and closer we get to the object the closer we get to the the objects present. Nothing to do with ITS or any 'future'. Get everything in this field right and this bit of the puzzle is easy.
@@christopherwallis751 Yep I've read it. I can see where you are getting the idea from. But it only applies to distant objects because we are seeing them in their past. If we move towards them we travel to their present which would have been our future view of them if we had stayed still. This is nothing to do with Earth's future already existing only the future of the distant universe already exists. Sorry.
Excuse this rude question that has been bothering me since the beginning of this series but, if the Consciousness is absolutely free, isn't this freedom found in each of its expressions? And, in this case, doesn't that contradict what you have been showing us so brilliantly?
yes, this freedom is found in each of its expressions. no contradiction. consciousness is so free it becomes every possibility, including you. you are as you are and could not be otherwise -- that would negate consciousness's free expression as you. pretty hard to put this into words, but there's no contradiction.
@@FaYT02 yeah. the main point is, the freedom of consciousness lies in the fact that it became you, and me, and all beings and existent things. its radical freedom expresses as this incredible range of possibilities.
@@christopherwallis751 🙃 It's not really possible to "understand" such a thing, of course ! All that remains is to "wait" to experience what Buddhist philosophers have called the "absence of obstruction" (if I'm not being silly)... And, in the meantime, I will save this series of valuable teachings so that I can listen to them again from time to time. 🙏
Isn’t the belief in free will essentially a beliefe in that you are equal to the God himself? So that you are not subject to the laws of physics even though you are made of things that are subject to those laws? Funny that probably the biggest defenders of the notion of free will are atheists :)
"Tantra Illuminated: The Philosophy, History, and Practice of a Timeless Tradition"
In-depth, scholarly, and yet practical wisdom for everyday living --- If you are reading this you should read this book.
After meditating for fifty years, I have come to many realizations, and it was absolutely amazing to see how much was described eloquently in this text. If you are seeking wisdom, you will find much to contemplate here. Additionally you will encounter a vast set of spiritual beliefs, which were embraced by a huge part of humanity, and were systematically buried by less intelligent cultures. The seeds of a new renaissance of understanding of what it is to be alive.
how beautiful, Ron, thank you. Could you post this on the Amazon page for the book as well? I would be most grateful.
@@christopherwallis751 I posted the review first and decided to copy it to here.
Might take a while to get through the Recognition Sutras, as I like to stop and think a lot about concepts along the way.
Incredibly clarity discussing incredibly complex topics. Thank you Hareesh!
I have not read the comments but your now is my past and your future. This is true of all digital recordings. I can listen to an old time radio show which was there now. This message I am writing is someone else’s future. Time is subjective based on the vantage point. The same is true of emotional memory. I can smell brownies and think of my grandmother and feel nostalgia. I can project potential feelings onto potential futures. I can be open now. Many times, many nows, many realities.
It never matters to me if there is free will or not, but for me the most compelling argument is that we have the ability to discuss it. But, if it is a non-dual reality then of course it has to be both free will and pre-determined as well as completely random. I don’t understand how it’s true but it feels true for me. But then maybe there are more possibilities than anyone from a human vantage could see
Again me, after seeimg this Video for the x time. This time it landet different: My mind exploded. My life is an ecstatic picture made up of colors from space and time. A joyful discovery of what is already there, just undiscovered by me. No need, shouldn't, I should have... more. Pure freedom in the delicious randomness of a dance. Thank you so much, Hareesh!
☺️
so happy to hear.
Life changing. What a relief - not doing guilt any more. Grief - that's a form of Love. Thankyou Hareesh so much x
The first video on this you posted was the first video of yours I watched and it practically talked me down from a ledge lol. I felt incredibly relaxed and was laughing the rest of the day.
wonderful to hear!
Free, free, free!! Thank you, much love Hareesh!!
Amazing. I feel like your words spoke to my heart and were understood and felt deeply even though at times my mind was a bit blown! I didn’t see the first two videos but am very impressed how you put all of this into words here…. I’m not sure I would even begin to know where to start! Thank you 🙏🏻
My third time through this lecture and now it begins to click. The key is to realize deeply that time is an experience, a slice, a perspective, not a fact or thing. Then the mind can open to relativity.
yes -- time is not different from space in exactly that way. and the implications of that are huge.
Beautiful, such a gift you have in communicating these deep spiritual and scientific life changing theories if believed and lived fully from love. Thankyou so much for not being able to choose to be any different from who you are and how you express consciousness through you that is Hareesh. 🙏💎🍀🌠🤗💗
Thank you for the video! I understood it conceptually, not sure about clicking though 🙂
On some level I know that I *haven't* "grokked" this teaching. I really, really want to.... so badly that it almost hurts. But I also can accept where I'm at, and that it will come eventually. I'm reminded of the part of the Introduction you wrote to the Recognition Sutras where you discuss "spiritual immaturity" and the importance of not "making yourself the agent of the process". So I'll just keep practicing "getting out of the way" and trust understanding/awakening to unfold.
Blessings to All!
wow, beautiful humility.
Since you put out blessings I'd like to formulate a question
If not you is making the journey, who do you believe is?
@@stasik901 that's kind of the wrong question, since 'self' is a cognitive illusion or a mental construct. we are all on a journey, but nobody's "making" the journey.
@@christopherwallis751 question was for Ian bc it seems like there is a struggle of belief
That journey we are (all) part of still needs a perspective, right? It's just hard for us to become the 360° observer
@@stasik901 As Hareesh points out, this question is difficult to answer (but I'll try). The issue is, in your question, which "you" is being referred to? The socially constructed, illusory "you" of the Ego? Or the transpersonal, infinite "you" of pure awareness?
"I" (ego) know a lot about nondual philosophy on an *intellectual* level, but "I" (ego) recognize that "I" still, for whatever reason, have difficulty viscerally/directly experiencing and embodying these teachings "I" have been studying. Also, in the course of "my" practice, "I" have come to realize that "I" (ego) have little to no control over the speed and precise nature of "my" awakening/liberation journey. "I" have had enough experiences with what might be called "kundalini" moving through "my" bodymind - quite literally - without "me" directing it or controlling it, to know that there is *something* much larger and wiser than "me" (ego) which is obviously deeply involved in this process/journey.
"I" (ego) am not quite sure what is keeping me identified with this body/mind and preventing me from directly realizing/feeling that this "force/power" (kundalini) *is* "me", but instead of stressing out about it and trying to *force* "myself" (ego) to "get it", I've found that being patient and accepting where I am to be a much easier (not to mention less stressful) way of approaching my sadhana.
This is what I meant by "not making myself the agent of the process"... "I" (ego) am practicing "getting out of the way" of "I" (kundalini/śakti).
Does that make sense?
Thank you so much, Hareesh ji. I loved how you emphasized the need to feel this, instead of just understanding it intellectually.
If you will allow me, I have one observation. You say that everything happens as it must, as an unfolding of the whole matrix (I am paraphrasing). If so, where does this 'little bit of randomness' that you speak of come from? To me it sounds like what we call randomness is simply our inability (or 'computational capacity') to know it all. Doesn't that tell us, at least intuitively, that nothing is random? And that our sense of free-will too is a part of that non-random matrix?
In other words, what happens happens because it must, and we insert the idea of 'randomness' only because we can't grock it all.
well, I don't really understand quantum mechanics well enough to speak to this, but they tell me that it includes a tiny bit of randomness in the sense that what we call the future is not quite perfectly predictable, even if we had all the relevant data points.
Lovely video. I've frequently thought of it in the following way: we have complete, total, undeniable free will....of a certain kind, not the kind that is typically concentualized. We are confused about where exactly the will "lives." Because, this kind of free will is not causal and temporal and experiencable, but rather is acausal and atemporal and lies outside of the scope of the contents of experience, even as it suffuses them and is never seperate from them.
The main thrust of my argument is that "we often confuse the objects of our experience with the subjects of our experience," and that while we are correct in assuming that the subject has free will, we frequently ascribe the mantle of subjecthood to objects which are not subjects! For instance: the world and our body are sensory experiences of our consciousness, as is our mind, as are our emotions. But consider: sights cannot see. A sight is a manifestation of phenomena in the visual sphere. It is an experience. Sights do not see, but we would say that they can "be seen." So sensory data cannot be a subject, it cannot choose, it is an object. Nor can sounds hear, nor can smells smell. But nor can thoughts think, or feelings feel! The location that we ascribe volition and subjecthood to most frequently, the mind with it's thoughts and emotions, is also an experience! It is an object! Even the "feeling of choosing" is itself a feeling, an object! So then we have ruled out all objects as subjects, thank heavens. But what are we to make of consciousness as the subject? We can understand that the subject gives rise to its objects, but we know from our experience of consciousness that it does so in a regular way, from the perspective of a body in space and sequentially through linear time. And from the perspective of physics, we have understood that time and space are relative and ultimately are features of our experience as well. Space and time are ways of looking, then. While not objects of consciousness themselves, they are means of experience, and are not the subject. They are not subjects! So then subjecthood must lie outside of space and time, even as it pervades them! So when we invoke the space-time loaf, we are acknowledging that it is a concept corresponding to a manifestation, a possible vantage point of our consciousness, which would include everything, everyone, every time and place, any and all experiences, all as one unified whole. And that this, ultimately, is itself taken as one big object of consciousness, the grandest possible object. And that as an object, it is still not a subject.
And so finally, given the ground that we have tread, we can understand something very important: that we do not experience our subjecthood at all. It cannot be experienced: objects of consciousness are experienced directly, and the features of experiencing are experienced indirectly, but the experiencER is not an object that can be experienced directly or indirectly! It is unbound, totally free, the unseeable ground of everything! It can only be pointed to indirectly by concepts, which are objects of course. It pervades and transcends the spacetime block. It is only from this vantage point that we can approach anything like a free will, anything like a "free chooser" which can do and manifest and experience anything and everything, and from any perspective, unconditioned by causal conditions (which of course are only features of linear, temporal perception). But if this subject has absolute free will, then you as one of the limited perspectives that was freely chosen to be experienced *also* have the same kind of free will, it inheres in you through the identity between yourself and the Subject. It is merely that "choice" is not how you think it is, it does not originate from where you think it does, and it is not what could be called the "mundane volition" that is experienced as an object of the mind from the perspective of a samsarin.
Consciousness is and you can be consciousness in a dance with the Sentient Mystery. You cannot know consciousness, knowing is a function of the mind. All objects, things, are fabricated illusion, and the verb that they are fabricated from is the Dancing Sentient Mystery (poetically the Goddess). In Pure Being the duality dissolves and Consciousness and the Sentient Mystery are one - inseparable. The mind and words work on duality and so we talk in this way, Consciousness and Conscious Of, but in pure being when the mind stops, and the active Spirit is centered... Amazement, Wonderment, ... Words cannot really go there. Peace.
I'm glad that I found this again. Very freeing information.
yay! Great topic. I once had a spiritual experience of a quite tangible sense that all time is one so I have a personal experience of exactly what you are talking about and just love hearing the intersect bewteen quantum physics and spirituality in these words and langauge. Interesting profound and life changing :-) . Thanks for helping us let go of regret, self recrimination, This is true personal freedom.
So I was utterly stunned by Christopher's Wallis's claim about being able to see the future and that reputable physicists claim this as well. On page 136 of Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos, you can verify that, yes, at least one reputable physicist believes this is possible.
it's not so stunning if you feel/sense/believe that the future has already happened, of course. and how could it not have? there's nothing about today's date (whatever it is) that could possibly demarcate past from future. the process of entropy creates the experience of the arrow of time, but there is no special point along that arrow that could designate it as the 'present'. this is borne out by the relevant equations in both physics and thermodynamics.
🌸🐈⬛thank you for your clarity OM
Brilliant and clear-- Hareesh's series on free will uses everyday English to explain what is almost inscrutable for us. I was partially freed from guilt when he proposed the rewinding time thought experiment in the first lecture. Now I have to meditate on the idea that everything has already happened to work on anxiety about the future. He explains clearly and eloquently in modern language what Ramana Maharshi expressed in cryptic statements and what Krishna taught in the Gita. Thanks a million!
Thank you so much 🙏🏼🌟♥️
Gratitude Hareesh
WOW. Thank you so much Hareesh ❤️🙏
Thank you!
Thank you Hareesh for your clear, tidying words, which always evoke an incredible inner vastness and calmness in me. Thank you for your time and your enthusiasm with which you give the teachings of this precious school of wisdom to the world. They are like waves that carry on. Thank you! Iti Shivam
The first 2 sutras of the recognition sutras illuminated this concept for me. Thank you for going more in depth. As always. You have a way of explaining things in palatable language that helps me grasp (ish) subjects i once thought too in depth.
Thank you for inspiring words I understand how difficult is to get all elements of reality together space and time certainly are some of these elements of Courier there are other elements that we can use for entering the one reality but I guess it doesn't really matter through which door are we decide to enter the one reality I guess we could say that this is also everyone's free choice from what you said if I understood corectly
y time and space are embedded in our experience and personality and that's probably the reason why understanding these categories makes us free I am very grateful to you for reminding me that philosophy can make us free as well as meditation which I strongly believe .
i'm a retired chemistry/biochemistry professor/research scientist. and sad to say, i had more than one colleague who bragged about how many students they FLUNKED ... not seeing that the very # convicted them of less than excellence in education.
Thank you, I really appreciate this follow up to the last video. I sent the last one to my partner so we could discuss it and he was sure you were talking about determinism, I tried to explain how it wasn't determinism but didn't have the words. This video definitely helps make the ideas more understandable. Thanks! ✨
well, it depends on how you define determinism.
@@christopherwallis751 from what I understood he interpreted what you said to mean we don't have a choice, there is no free will, it's already predetermined. I tried to explain how that wasn't quite what you were saying but my understanding is more feeling based than in a way I'm able to articulate.
in that case this video is a good antidote to the misunderstanding!
Thank you 🙏🏻
Even a cow has freewill but only to extent of its tethering rope. Beyond that lies the realm of imagination. unfortunately the conflation of the real with the imaginary gives rise to confusion.
if you define "free will" such that you think a cow has it, then to be honest you simply haven't understood the argument in these three videos. you seem to be conflating "free will" and the experience of choice. watch the videos again, perhaps?
Hareesh,
I have a few questions about the nature of space and time from a nondual perspective, if you don’t mind answering.
Your perspective (the block universe) suggests that spacetime exists objectively. How does this fit in with the reality of the one Consciousness? Does spacetime exist objectively as the one Consciousness? Or is spacetime a sort of collective subjective perception that we all share as the one Consciousness?
I’ve heard nondual teachers of the Advaita tradition (including Rupert Spira and Francis Lucille) reject the existence of space and time altogether, claiming that all that exists is the timeless and spaceless Now, which is the one Consciousness. Bernardo Kastrup, a Western philosopher and friend of Rupert Spira who promotes monistic idealism, is also of the opinion that spacetime does not exist objectively, but rather is our finite way of perceiving the one Consciousness.
I’m having trouble reconciling what I’ve learned about spacetime from them with the very plausible notion of the block universe as you’ve described it here. Could you help clarify this for me?
sure, there's no problem or contradiction here. Spacetime cannot exist objectively, because it is a mode of conscious perceiving. but it's a universal mode for embodied forms of consciousness, and thus it seems to acquire objectivity. but all phenomena, and the Spacetime loaf in which they are embedded, are a manifestation of consciousness and nothing more. what else could it be? the universe seems to exist independently of any single observer because it is the summation of *all* vantage points of consciousness.
@@christopherwallis751 that actually makes a lot of sense, thank you
@@christopherwallis751 🌾💕
I get this to the degree I do, I believe I 'grok' the concept, this being said... the act of surfing in waves of consequential dimension becomes all the more fascinating. When one considers the situation involved in the creation of a significant swell, interfacing with the tides and conditions occurring at the surfing break or spot, all subject to an above average degree of 'randomness' one would suppose and juxtaposing these factors with the effects of one's 'life elements' figuring into the waveriders position in the lineup... I think you can see where this is going. All this contributes to the old adage "only a surfer knows the feeling"... one might conclude that such a high degree of randomness contributes to the spontaneity that makes surfing so compelling. As always, I appreciate your insight so much
Hello Hareesh! I am studying to become a Yoga teacher at Gaia's MA&Y studio. She recommended your book as a must (Tantra Illuminated) and last Sunday I had the pleasure to be at your talk. All the yoga philosophy is new to me. Up to now my line of thinking or believing has been coincidentally more or less the same as what Gary Zukav says in his book The Seat of the Soul, just to give a reference without having to talk much. Do you know him and what he says? But now..... after I started reading your book, watching you in person and watching your video above... I have started looking into life differently. What you say in the video makes sense to me too. Now I must confess I feel a bit divided trying to digest it all. I have so many questions.... I will ask you one for now: If I am aware that a certain characteristic of my persona needs to be improved and assuming that all already happened, is there anything I can do consciously to grow? Or should I just relax trying not to suffer about anything and enjoy the ride? I will appreciate your teaching. Thanks. Cris.
hi! when you say that you have a characteristic that *needs* to be improved, then I know that you have internalized the stories or opinions of others. the notion that something needs to be improved is part and parcel of self-judgement, based in the belief that you're somehow not good enough as you are. however, if you say that you *want* to change a certain characteristic, simply because the opportunity to grow is exciting and interesting to you, well then that's different. so which is it, really? the good news is that if it's the second one, then you can simultaneously relax and enjoy the ride *and* do things to foster your growth.
Where is the next video? I have been waiting for hours.
haha it's coming! be patient and meditate ;) ps I have guided meditations on this channel
The realisation that your free will does not exist but you will always agree with your decisions because you are you is true but that that realisation leads to an overcoming of eg self loathing or regret does not follow as those reaction are also 'baked in' to you from past karma or actually past attachment habits. We are habitual beings, that is all that can be said here. or as quantum physics actually says is that we are part of the quantum field not separate entities making free choices.
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Off topic, not related, but i practiced Kashmir Shaivism a long time and speak to my cat like you do
It takes a photon of light 8 min of our time to emanate from the surface of the sun and radiate to our eyes 93 million miles away. A photon which has no mass is traveling at the speed of light and does not experience time, or rather, time is infinite from that perspective. So even though we matter/energy sensory beings can measure a start and stop in distance and time, the photon cannot. That photon is paradoxically infinite and existed at the beginning of time and at the end of time and at ever moment in between, even though it 'left' our star 8 min ago.
I don't know if this helps, but this is the example I give when talking about the future and the past, particularly when trying to ease the angst of fellow seekers striving for some ideal of enlightenment though they are aging. I say look, It's already happened, so just enjoy the journey while it is happening, because the happening is what really matters.
🙏
> When Baizhang lectured in the hall, there was always an old man who listened to the teaching and then dispersed with the crowd. One day he didn't leave; Baizhang then asked him, "Who is it standing there?"
> The old man said, "In antiquity, in the time of the ancient Buddha Kasyapa, I lived on this mountain. A student asked, 'Does a greatly cultivated man still fall into cause and effect or not?' I answered him, 'He does not fall into cause and effect,' and I fell into a wild fox body for five hundred lives. Now I ask the teacher to turn a word on my behalf."
> Baizhang said, "He is not blind to cause and effect."
> The old man was greatly enlightened at these words.
(Book of Serenity, c. 8)
WuMen said:
> [When the wild fox monk asserted that the person of great practice] “does not fall into cause and effect,” why did he
fall into a wild fox’s body?
> [When he heard that such a person] “is not deluded by (blind to) cause and effect,” why did he shed the fox’s body?
> If you can focus the eye [of enlightened insight] here on this, then you will know why, long ago on Baizhang Mountain, [the old man]
won for himself five hundred lifetimes flowing with the wind.
WuMen's Verse:
> Not falling into, not being deluded by-
> Two faces of a single die.
> Not being deluded by, not falling into-
> A thousand thousand errors.
🙏
and what do you suppose that means?
so, i was always going to ask this question?
of course! ;)
OK. LET SAY EVERYTHING IS DETERIMED. SO WHAT HAPPEND BEFORE BIG BANG?
AND WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF LIFE THEN?
why do you think there should be a purpose? why not just enjoy the astonishing miracle of existence?
Hi Hareesh and thank you for the video on free will. I also believe in the " everything is happening all at once" idea/fact .
I don't understand the special theory of relativity analogy that you used to indicate the possibility of viewing the future.
My understanding: an alien 100 million light years away from earth looks at earth through a telescope. He is seeing what was happening on earth 100 million years ago , due to his distance from earth and the time it takes for earth light to get to his planet. If he travels, real fast,towards earth, a distance that is only 50 million light years away from earth , he sees what was happening on earth 50 million light years ago.If he travels all the way to earth , he catches up to the present earth time moment. Why can't he see into future earth? Because the level of light and it's speed, spaceships,telescopes, bodies, planet earth and planet alien , is physical /mental level . It's not a level that can see into the future except by action/reaction calculation - all mental stuff. At this point, in my understanding, I believe that the "everthything all at once perspective" can only be percieved from higher up the tattva scale{kashmir shaivism has 36 tattvas, as I'm sure you know) which cannot be accessed from within the mental/physical and it's technologies.
pls read Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos to understand what I was trying to articulate there.
for now, simply imagine an alien 100 million years in the future *and* 100 million light years away. they are seeing what we call "now". when they move towards us, they can see our future, that from our perspective hasn't happened yet. this is because moving towards us changes the "angle of their slice" -- see Brian Greene for explanation.
@@christopherwallis751 thanks I'll read it.
I guess it would be easier to attain a high level of awareness where the past and future can be seen as easily as streaming , than befriending an alien from 100 million light years away and 100 million years in the future, to tell me what the future will bring.
@@gimmsomtrth LOL correct ;)
Very interesting and profound! Believe it or not I got this this, this morning before I saw your video. It striked me that everything already happened and that we get to just watch it unfold, as a way of reality enjoying itself from within itself. It is almost like consciousness pierced through time and space. And now I got another realization - that what we call the present moment is consciousness itself which is our essence and moreover consciousness limits itself to experience reality one moment at a time, one perspective at a time. And so it is the same one consciousness that experiences every moment from every vantage point there is. If that is so then perhaps we may explain experiences that get hints of the future or of other beings vantage points, like the one I had this morning. Perhaps it is possible to break through this limitation and experience a vaster array of the time space spectrum in an intentional way? Hareesh are you aware of such powers\siddhas?
It is very curious indeed because it is not the first time when I got an insight and then I watched a video or listened to podcast that explained the same insight in detail. I wonder if this is trick of the mind or is this a kind of synchronistic premonition?
This is Philosophical Materialism, that cause and effect from the beginning of time determines all of time. This includes that Consciouness is an illusion created by the material brain and is an illusion.
Special relativity is observational (Functions for Measurements), not reality or the state of the present, but even if one assumes it was not transcended in General Relativity, no speed allows one to see into the future (that is not what it states). Even your vision of the room you are in is in the past because light takes time to get to your eyes in the material view.
The future is a multiverse of statistical likelihood, it has not already happened! Premonition is shown to have statistical accuracy in peer review experimentation, but is never deterministic, nor can it always predict the future which has not yet fallen into the present. The past has happened and is forever fixed and you will live with all your choices forever. The present consciousness has free will and that is not determined by your predisposition, but by your intent. Your intent is not the result of cause and effect, but is the refinement of your spirit.
In living beings the logical or most desirable choice is not always made and this is not because of cause and effect, nor randomness as in chaos. We are non-dual in the sense that all is one. Our material bodies will only hold our eternal consciousness for a while. Our consciousness is non-dual and in union with each other, with the Earth, the galaxy, and universe and each level is higher consciousness. The Earth is a living being and we are cells in the Earth.
I would have quit at the last video, but had started to put down notes and dropped my pen exactly when I read the title of the concluding video. It took my wife and I several minutes to find the pen, moving the chair and finding two dog balls and a different pen and a pencil, until the pen searched for was found, The sound of the pen hitting the floor was really the pen hitting a wooden brace in the chair. This is synchronisity, this is the Sentient Mystery (Bhagavati Devi if you wish) playing games with me. Therefore I watched the last video propounding Philosophical Materialism and while Tantra Illuminated was a great read, I believe these three videos are not true.
The Sentient Mystery creates and nurtures Consciousness as a sacred and divine play and even when providing my Consciousness with synchronicity which has no causal source, nothing aligned for the play as it happened with the pen, and it did not happen until it happened, but the Mystery did inspire me to write to whomever is to read this, do not accepy Philosophical Materialism that the Universities of the West ingrain in disciples. You are truly free to make choices and you can intend synchronicity into your life and be guided by the ongoing here and now creativity of the Sentient Mystery.
This text is spontaneous, Peace.
look inside. can you help but think as you do about this? or do you not feel compelled to hold exactly this view? in what sense is it 'chosen'?
ps, Ron -- did you actually watch the video to the end?
@@christopherwallis751 I watched all 3 videos and also took notes, as is my habit with anything which I am spending the time to contemplating. I have been meditating deeply for 50 years now and have contemplated time for many of those years (and I am Very versed in Relativity which does not include seeing into the future regardless of the motion of one's frame of reference). Please read my post a little closer and contemplate it.
Experientially the synchronicities I am aware of in my life are definitely not caused by the past. There is much greater consciousness than human consciousness or the influence of material and mental momentum from the past. Through meditation we may commune with the greater consciousness which has will and intent. Through our intention we may draw into our lives greater interaction with the Sentient Mystery of the Totality.
The future has not happened yet and is still indeterminate. I am not denying the momentum of the past and yet that is only one factor! The multiverse of future probabilities is not infinite, but rather has a specific nature, and it is attracting living consciousness in toward greater awareness, yet most do not listen and instead allow the past momentum to blow them along.
I know that one may spontaneously apply one's spirit in the dance with the Mystery, the total unity, and override the momentum of the past. This is an art which meditation can assist with achieving, but many meditate without finding the keys. It is a matter of being in harmony and resonating with the greater will. The totality is living and conscious, vastly more powerful than a human can understand, and yet knows us intimately and offers us the option to choose to dance with it in bliss and ecstasy.
'Everything has already happened' is a mental illusion, a philosophical theory which is not true. 'All effects are caused by the past' is false Philosophical Materialism. Pure Consciousness and Spirit Intent are transcendental to cause and effect. Maintain meditation while active in life and you will see the Totality (Mystery, Goddess, Whatever Name you wish, not material illusion) cast synchronicity playfully and fiercely to teach these truths.
May you soon be blessed with a synchronicity which opens you to the truth of the greater will/spirit which transcends cause and effect.
Peace.
@@ShakuhachiSpirit totally agree that what we call the present is not solely caused by what we call the past -- it's also caused by what we call the future. and I also agree that will/spirit transcends cause and effect. but what you seem to be missing is the fact that there is no 'present' -- i mean, there is the Eternal Now, obviously, but there's absolutely nothing special about today's date (whatever that date might be) that qualifies it as the 'present'. the future is already determined for precisely the same reason the past is determined -- because there is no future and past. there's nothing special about your vantage point in spacetime (or any particular vantage point) that would make it demarcate 'past' from 'future'. the question is, how could you possibly think otherwise?
@@christopherwallis751 There is something very special about the present, which is the essence of why we are incarnated in the present which is continual transformation through the encountering of change. The special thing about the present is it is here that we have free will to choose. Free Will is not boundless, but falls under the limitation as imposed by the design of this realm and the specific changes which the spirit of the unified totality puts into our present. Our individual spirit which has will and intent is refined in the present and the present, this life is ultimately precious. In this sense there is something very special about each person's vantage point, it is where we interact personally within our unique point of view and with our unique situation and changes we encounter which are the expression of the sentient mystery to us personally to learn and grow.
The concept of time as a loaf is not a Theory, it is a thought experiment, which physicists perform in intricate detail in order to possibly get a glimpse at something they do not understand. The lay term would be speculative fiction. If Ze Alpha rapes Ze Beta, I have a big issue with saying it was already written already in the loaf of time. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course.
Another thought experiment (speculative fiction) is the infinite parallel universes. This thought experiment states that if Ze Alpha rapes Ze Beta then in another time stream this did not happen, so don't worry about it. I have a big issue with saying it did not happen in some other imaginary time stream. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course.
Another thought experiment (speculative fiction) would say that at some point Ze Alpha will merge with Ze Beta and experience all their trauma, so don't worry about it. I have a big issue with this excuse as well. Ze Alpha needs serious and deep repentance to change their course.
No matter the speculative fiction to mitigate guilt, for Ze Alpha to make use of this incarnation, Ze Alpha needs to admit guilt (get real about have made an grievous error) and needs deep repentance to change course. Ze Alpha may indeed require some serious professional assistance in correcting the error of their way. Ze Alpha does not need to hurt themself in any way or make matters worse, but needs to correct the momentum of their incarnation, their present life.
There is no progress in an incarnation or in the maturing of an individual in any choice (in the present and through their given free will) not guided by Compassionate Love. I am not claiming to be free of error. We are all here to grow and learn together. Refining one's living according to choices guided by Compassionate Love is the challenge and the opportunity which this life gives us.
I want to thank you for this dialog and for your thoughts. Perhaps we have more agreement than disagreement here, but words are tricky (especially since our language is defined by dualism) and the clarifying of our communication is essential as the tool we use to share our lessons and help each other grow. Asa scholar of the sacred texts you have given us all a very valuable gift. As a person of deep meditation I am sharing my reflections (my confusion about your words) so that we may all have a clearer understanding for our servant minds to assist our active spirits. Peace and Blessings.
If everything has already happened at the future is set in stone like with the physics thing you said, including spontaneity, then what is even the point of any spiritual practice let alone at all if our efforts don't determine wether they'll be effective at all considering the concept that the future already is?
@@capuletca You're confusing determinism with fatalism. They're not the same thing.
@@christopherwallis751Oh I see, I was confused for a second I guess I'm misunderstanding something then. Thank you 🙏
@@capuletca please look at this:
breakingthefreewillillusion.com/wp-content/uploads/DETERMINISM-VS-FATALISM-infographic.png
@@christopherwallis751 Thank you!
I humbly believe that mentioning or putting in the middle of the reasoning a distant Big Bang that occurred, does not help at all.
That Big Bang is a thought and a dogma of a science far removed from the most divine mysteries. Another joke from Śiva 😀.
Still, it's very nice to hear from you.
the "Big Bang" is not required for the argument to work, though.
The alien cannot see in our future. By moving towards us they only accelerate the viewing of our past, but they cannot go beyond the point in time we are now - at that point they have hit the earth.
So the physicist's explanation of "everything has already happened" is limited to the our past. And then I say: "Well, duh."
incorrect, actually. you might want to read more on this.
Moving towards us would blueshift what the aliens see, away from us the light originating from us and arriving at the aliens‘ telescope would be redshifted. In both cases it takes some time for the light to travel from here and now to there. If they are 100 light years away from us (regardless how they move), it will have taken 100 years for photos to travel that distance. In that case the aliens (in their now, at their place) would see what happens now here at our place. Understood from here, the aliens 100 years in the future see what we do now. Still, there is no way that they see into our future. Activities which have not happened don‘t give off or reflect any light yet, and light takes time to travel, so there‘s nothing future to see yet, only always some now.
@@heulseier but that's the point, they *have* happened. read Brian Greene's "fabric of the cosmos" book to understand the argument here, don't rely on my wholly inadequate summary of it. motion changes the angle of that slice of the spacetime we call 'now', such that 'now' can include our future from the alien's point of view, or vice versa. The future has of course already happened because there's nothing to demarcate it from the past, which I assume you believe has already happened. the arrow of time is created by entropy, and there's nothing that could possibly demarcate a special point on that arrow that one could call the present. so there's no such thing as the present, except as a way of talking about one's vantage point in Spacetime.
please see this video (and then read Brian Greene's book for more info):
ruclips.net/video/EagNUvNfsUI/видео.html
@@christopherwallis751 Thank you for the pointers! The narrator of the video seems to work from the assumption that the future does *not* "exist", though, in the same sense as past and present do (11:20). Yes, different observers slice up Block Time differently, but "nothing, not even information, can travel faster than light." Even if Block Time is understood as the complete span of time and space, this understanding would be necessarily seen from a metaphysical "outside in" vantage point, not experientially, from the perspective of some consciousness here or out there, always (as I understand the narrator) confined to "the universe we see around us, carried to us by light." Regarding Brain Green's book, there is this video ruclips.net/video/3ZNTVNeSWKI/видео.html where Green talks about his idea of the "fabric of the cosmos", I'll check that out before turning to the book, thanks again for the suggestion.
Are you still in Portugal?
yes i live there
@@christopherwallis751 from what you are trying to accomplish-- Why Portugal-- if you don't mind me asking? Why not at the heart of the great empire? The time is right and the need is great for spiritual revitalization is here and you have the fuel. The time is right but is the place? Certainly I could be wrong but I wonder.
@@Iofhoracemaat oh I'm still teaching in the U.S., if that's what you mean! :)
And how about reincarnation? This is also predetermined?
Can you please make a video about it?
it's not that it's predetermined, it's that it's already happened -- all incarnations. everything already IS.
@@christopherwallis751 Everything already has happend? This is what you mean? If so one thing not. My experiance.
Good video however I'm still not understanding why this is simply not determinism. If I cannot help being who I am and couldn't have behaved other than how I have in the past (ie causally inevitable), then how is this not determinism? Accepting that we are determined I think opens us to the reality that we are inextricably part of the fabric of the cosmos and that the self is empty of any sort of separate and substantive identity, which as you mentions frees us of guilt and shame. We are endless natural processes at work. Carving out a piece of this endless process, and calling it myself which is separate from everything else, and which is born and dies is reification. Determinism has a bad rap I think :)
Indeed. 99% determinism and 1% random fluctuations, probably, but whatever the percentage is, the imagined separate self has no control over anything. not even itself.
I haven't formed an opinion on the subject of will. Is it possible that perhaps certain people just have a different perspective than you do? Like that analogy of the elephant?
well, this isn't really a matter of opinion. this is about trying to get at the facts of the matter -- the nature of reality regardless of our opinions about it. but 'will' does not need to be the operative word in this discussion, necessarily.
Namaste, thank you for these videos. It has been fun to watch and listen to your words about something that is so challenging to put into words. Some words that came to me about this series are: “ Free will…free from what? Since consciousness is everything, this inherently includes any possible ‘future.’“
My experience is that this adventure of ‘living’ is so profoundly free all actions are forgiven or ineffectual to alter pure consciousness. However, consciousness can create lasting change on this form. Thank goodness! That’s the fun of it! In a moment of profound awakening when I really got this, I suddenly realized the only action left to do during life is to love. Love the self: as this form and all forms.
This profound freedom does not mean that it is possible for this form to be separate from Divine Will. How much letting go can actually be done by one form? Letting go of this idea of ‘free will’ was certainly a huge letting go and sigh of relief for my body and mind, that is for sure! Many blessings to you Hareesh and to all who are watching this and playing with these ideas and experiences. OM.🙏🏼🪷💖
Talking about time in terms of spatial metaphors is inherently problematic because it is removed from our actual experience of time or duration
it's not a metaphor. spacetime is one thing. time *is* space. we are literally traversing spacetime, and we can't help it. even if you sit still, you're moving through it.
@@christopherwallis751 I think there’s good reason to differentiate time and space. Look at something like Zeno’s paradox. Also it appears as if your argument is based on the juxtaposition of events which i don’t think can be justified
you might *think* there's good reason to differentiate them, but that doesn't make it so.
@@christopherwallis751 Einstein was wrong. Bergson was right. Determinism is incoherent
12:55 - No alien could see into our future. You must have misunderstood the analogy. The current consensus in physics is that we can see into the past, but not the future. Here's why:
When you gaze at the moon, you are not seeing it as it is in the present moment - rather as it WAS 1.3 seconds ago. This is because it took that amount of time for light reflected by the moon to travel to your eye. The speed of light is fast, but it is still finite. The furthest stars we see at night with the naked eye are so distant that you are actually seeing them thousands of years in the past.
Think of it like sound - after you see a lightning strike, it takes time for the sound of thunder to reach you. Now imagine that you are this special "alien" who tries to observe the future by travelling towards the source of the lightning strike. All that will happen is that the alien hears the sound of thunder sooner than if they remained stationary. That is NOT seeing into the future.
The earliest anyone could ever perceive the thunder is if they were stood exactly in the location of the lightning strike at the time. That way, the sound would be heard instantaneously, practically in the present moment, but crucially, no sooner.
I perfectly understand what you are saying, but the analogy doesn't work. sound is not light. please read Brian Greene's book, the fabric of the cosmos, to understand what I spoke about here so imperfectly.
Callum, please see this video: ruclips.net/video/EagNUvNfsUI/видео.html
For clarification. Things are not deterministic or even random in part. Quantum has shown that things are stochastic. i.e. not random but highly complex patterns that are inevitable but too complex to be determinable. So the tennis match is going to finish a certain way but the someone shouting in the crowd could be the cause no matter how much the best player practiced. Nothing is deterministic but stochastically complex.
And for the telescope example, you are wrong. The alien doesn't have to move its just that the light takes years to reach it so it is seeing our past but never our future. If it moves towards us it will see our light sooner and sooner so closer and closer to our present. Never the future. but only our future relative to them. Grief good luck explaining that.
I think we can agree on that: "highly complex patterns that are inevitable". But this is still (a nuanced version of) determinism, regardless of the fact that we could never perfectly predict outcomes.
@@christopherwallis751 Quantum says that we can never predict outcomes at all, its all probabilistic. Further, Einsteins's Loaf explains that all that we see around us is in the past and closer we get to the object the closer we get to the the objects present. Nothing to do with ITS or any 'future'.
Get everything in this field right and this bit of the puzzle is easy.
@@mickdun7294 not true, you need to read Brian Greene's Fabric of the Cosmos. motion changes the angle of the slice of the spacetime 'loaf'.
@@christopherwallis751 Well I have been wrong before so another book to read.
@@christopherwallis751 Yep I've read it. I can see where you are getting the idea from. But it only applies to distant objects because we are seeing them in their past. If we move towards them we travel to their present which would have been our future view of them if we had stayed still. This is nothing to do with Earth's future already existing only the future of the distant universe already exists. Sorry.
Excuse this rude question that has been bothering me since the beginning of this series but, if the Consciousness is absolutely free, isn't this freedom found in each of its expressions? And, in this case, doesn't that contradict what you have been showing us so brilliantly?
yes, this freedom is found in each of its expressions. no contradiction. consciousness is so free it becomes every possibility, including you. you are as you are and could not be otherwise -- that would negate consciousness's free expression as you. pretty hard to put this into words, but there's no contradiction.
@@christopherwallis751 Thanks for you answer. I understand. I mean, I understand that it's pretty hard to put into words. ☺
@@FaYT02 yeah. the main point is, the freedom of consciousness lies in the fact that it became you, and me, and all beings and existent things. its radical freedom expresses as this incredible range of possibilities.
@@christopherwallis751 🙃 It's not really possible to "understand" such a thing, of course ! All that remains is to "wait" to experience what Buddhist philosophers have called the "absence of obstruction" (if I'm not being silly)...
And, in the meantime, I will save this series of valuable teachings so that I can listen to them again from time to time. 🙏
Isn’t the belief in free will essentially a beliefe in that you are equal to the God himself? So that you are not subject to the laws of physics even though you are made of things that are subject to those laws? Funny that probably the biggest defenders of the notion of free will are atheists :)
@@AndreiKübar-v1g true that!