Oneness

[Skyhaven]

Recently I have spend a lot of time thinking about oneness, and my personal 'separate' me. I have written some of it down. I thought I'd share this with you guys:

When we think of a concept like an apple or an electron, we think these things exist separately from everything else. Are the fish really separate from the ocean in which they swim? The concepts we use, the words to describe reality, are phenomena inside our head, they are not really out there.

On the level of quantum physics it has been discovered that you take two subatomic particles like electrons, in certain instances, when you do something to one, it will always effect the other no matter how far apart they are. It's kind of like the stories you hear about identical twins where one is hurt and the other feels the pain.

In physics there seems to be absolutely no process that explains that a signal could be sent back and forward instantaneous. Einstein even said you can't have instantaneous signals because that would violate the time barrier.

But maybe instantaneous communication isn't going on at all. Maybe at a deeper level of reality every particle of the universe collapses into cosmic unity, and they are not signaling each other.

So the separation between concepts like electrons isn't even there, furthermore there the separation between people isn't there also. Explaining like for instance in psychic phenomena like how can one person have the exact some thought as the other on the exact same moment.

Or even how we think other people are separate from ourselves, how some people go about hurting other people thinking it's not hurting themselves.

[ulli]

The feeling of separateness is very real to lovers when they are not together. So that creates a longing for unity.

But no matter how much one wants to intellectualise oneness, it is still one of those rare or even unattainable states, as you said.
Yet it exists as an ideal. And as such it triggers continuous movement.

[Skyhaven]

The feeling of separateness is very real to lovers when they are not together. So that creates a longing for unity.

But no matter how much one wants to intellectualise oneness, it is still one of those rare or even unattainable states, as you said.
Yet it exists as an ideal. And as such it triggers continuous movement.

You're right Ulli, the feeling of separateness is very real in that situation, at least it seems very real. There are so many of these situations: feeling alone, feeling small, feeling left out and so on.

It absolutely triggers continuous movement, I used to go about these situations by seeking companionship, or standing up for myself, or letting my voice be heard, which are good things, but there is always a strive/struggle feel to this.

So I then start to ask myself, I am I really alone, or small, or left out? And at this point the intellectual part really helps me a lot to calm those feelings.

[Anchor]

Oneness and manyness are the same (a paradox?) but the reason we might think they are different is the point of perspective from which we frame our concepts and thoughts.

Take this forum. A brief walk through the headings of on the threads on the first few pages of "todays" threads. Many are dramatic, rather mundane and potentially fear inducing - but this is a part of our world - seen from different perspectives.

If we take a moment, perhaps in silent contemplation, to zoom out our perspective so that the Earth is simply a little dot amongst countless millions of stars - it all changes. That drama is still there, along with the other microscopic drama's in nature going on under our very noses. Like right now the european brown hares burrowing away in my field (grrr).

It seems to me that we are incapable of holding a viable concept of infinity unless we approach that using abstract mental tools and frameworks.

You get to the point where a lot of it seems abstract and then you find just trying to talk about it requires a measure of abstraction simply to select the right words.

Ooops I rambled..... stuff it, I am going to post this anyway :)

I rest content that all is one, and all is well.

[chocolate]

This all depends on your point of view.

If you think about the fundamental core of reality (pardon the cliche) it is an expression of the idea/mind/concept/etc. ( 'In the beginning was...' ) fill in the blank.
So in that case you can think of everything being an expression with different parameters of the one core principle. But if you think of the parameters determining what expresses as what then you land in the area of 'separateness'.
For example, I can create lines in a drawing starting from the line category and going deeper into differentiating them. At one point when you see the original line and the line representing an electric circuit or insulation ( in architecture a line representing EPS insulation looks wavy and fluffy, nothing in common with straight continuous line) you may not recognize both as one type of ' expression' ( a line category ). Something like that.

Now when you talk about hurting anybody thus hurting yourself, that would also depend on your point of view.
If I break my hand -- if you cause my hand to break -- I doubt you will feel in the same way the physical pain I would feel, even though we are from the same 'family parameters'. Sure, if you get to be 'at-one-with me' you will feel a certain degree of my pain based on your own experiences and library of life events, but it is not quite the same, isn't it. I will go to bed with a cast on my hand and possibly won't be able to sleep, while you will have to switch your attention to your own life and my pain will disappear as quickly and fully as it has appeared.

It is one thing to intellectualize and spiritualize life, and another to be submerged in it. These are two distinctive points of view, in my own experience.
But no doubt, at the core of it everything is the one thing.
I just doubt we as humans should be thinking more about the core of reality, and less about why do we exist as these ' separate' units in this connected reality.

What Skyheaven is talking about did not appear to me as if he refers to the 'lovers' situation, but that could have been a miss on my part.

[Skyhaven]

Oneness and manyness are the same (a paradox?) but the reason we might think they are different is the point of perspective from which we frame our concepts and thoughts.

Take this forum. A brief walk through the headings of on the threads on the first few pages of "todays" threads. Many are dramatic, rather mundane and potentially fear inducing - but this is a part of our world - seen from different perspectives.

If we take a moment, perhaps in silent contemplation, to zoom out our perspective so that the Earth is simply a little dot amongst countless millions of stars - it all changes. That drama is still there, along with the other microscopic drama's in nature going on under our very noses. Like right now the european brown hares burrowing away in my field (grrr).

It seems to me that we are incapable of holding a viable concept of infinity unless we approach that using abstract mental tools and frameworks.

You get to the point where a lot of it seems abstract and then you find just trying to talk about it requires a measure of abstraction simply to select the right words.

Ooops I rambled..... stuff it, I am going to post this anyway :)

I rest content that all is one, and all is well.

Hi Anchor,

Most of the time I get lost in the abstractions and concepts, eventually asking myself what is the point. This is also a paradox, the more words used to describe something, the less clear things get.

It's like the saying: "the words are fingers pointing at the moon; if you watch the finger you can't see the moon"

But then again it is nice to have fingers pointing at something if your searching for something.

[Skyhaven]

This all depends on your point of view.

If you think about the fundamental core of reality (pardon the cliche) it is an expression of the idea/mind/concept/etc. ( 'In the beginning was...' ) fill in the blank.
So in that case you can think of everything being an expression with different parameters of the one core principle. But if you think of the parameters determining what expresses as what then you land in the area of 'separateness'.
For example, I can create lines in a drawing starting from the line category and going deeper into differentiating them. At one point when you see the original line and the line representing an electric circuit or insulation ( in architecture a line representing EPS insulation looks wavy and fluffy, nothing in common with straight continuous line) you may not recognize both as one type of ' expression' ( a line category ). Something like that.

Now when you talk about hurting anybody thus hurting yourself, that would also depend on your point of view.
If I break my hand -- if you cause my hand to break -- I doubt you will feel in the same way the physical pain I would feel, even though we are from the same 'family parameters'. Sure, if you get to be 'at-one-with me' you will feel a certain degree of my pain based on your own experiences and library of life events, but it is not quite the same, isn't it. I will go to bed with a cast on my hand and possibly won't be able to sleep, while you will have to switch your attention to your own life and my pain will disappear as quickly and fully as it has appeared.

It is one thing to intellectualize and spiritualize life, and another to be submerged in it. These are two distinctive points of view, in my own experience.
But no doubt, at the core of it everything is the one thing.
I just doubt we as humans should be thinking more about the core of reality, and less about why do we exist as these ' separate' units in this connected reality.

What Skyheaven is talking about did not appear to me as if he refers to the 'lovers' situation, but that could have been a miss on my part.

Hi Chocolate,

I'm not sure I got the first part of your reply. As for your 'hurting hand' comment: No I wouldn't literally feel your pain, but on a deeper level I would if I broke your hand (in an aggressive manor), because I strongly believe in the idea of "what you put out is what you get back".

No I didnt specifically point at the 'lovers' situation, but on a deeper level it also applies in that situation.