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[GilesC]

Originally Posted by Edwin

How true ! ( not just this quote, the entire post, but I wanted to specifically answer to this part ).

I have been knocking into that dead end for quite some time. There seemed to be a fence, and for some reason, the longer I kept banging into the fence, the more wonderful I imagined the other side had to be. Mystical.
Once I would be able to cross that fence, all my troubles would be over, I was convinced of that.

Reminds me of Quantum physics.
Electrons can go from one place to another without passing through any of the "space" inbetween.

Usually, people cannot accept such a concept and even debunk it as one of the "theories" of science that they have yet to explain. Yet, without this quantum principle, we wouldn't be as technologically advanced as we are. Did you know that something as simple as the memory card in your camera or phone (I know it's for Compact Flash, and I assume the same for the other types), relies on the above principle. The bits (0 or 1) stored in the memory of such devices is determined by which side of a barrier an electron sits. When we write to these devices they cause the electrons to jump instantaneously from one side of the barrier to the other. It doesn't jump "over" the barrier. It doesn't jump "through" the barrier. It simply disappears from one side and appears on the other. Now that's cool.

And about 4 weeks ago, thanks to some emails from a newfound friend who is an Advaita teacher, I realised that there was no fence. More shockingly, I had been in "point D" all that time, and imagined myself to be in "point A". Even the fence turned out to be imaginary.

Or, more succinctly, "point A" is "point D", simply that the ego attaches to something and creates the dualistic belief of "other".
(and now to replace some of my lost post...)
The Ego in Vedic philosophy (the teachings of Advaita (a.k.a Not Two)) is known in sanskrit as Ahankara. Ahan (or Aham when used as a word alone) is the True Self or the unchanging observer that we all are. Kara is anything in the "creation" (physical or abstract/conceptual). When Ahan becomes attached to anything in the creation we get AhanKara, the ego; a mistaken belief that something belongs to us (even if that is as subtle as a perception or as obvious as some material belonging) and this creates the dualistic belief of the self (small S) being something seperate from "other".

One of the ways to understand this is self inquiry. This worked well for me. Instead of wondering what it is, try to find out what it isn't.

Indeed. Instead of looking for what you are, simply let go of what you are not.
e.g. You are not your emotions as you can observe these arise within you and you can observe them going again, but you are still the same observer after as you were before; you are not your memories or thoughts as, likewise you are the same observer after they arise as you were before them and you observed them rising up. And you are not your body as you are still observing even as your body changes or even if something drastic happened such as losing a limb; you don't lose that observer. The observer is unchanging and always present. This is your true Self (big S).

Letting go of what we are not is not a case of saying, well I don't need my thoughts or memories so I'll discard them, I don't need my body so I'll get rid of it etc. as this is not the purpose and we have a need for these things as tools in the physical universe we live in. The idea of "letting go" is to become aware that these things are not our True Self, so that, for example, when an emotion does arise within us, we can choose to stop our mind/ego attaching to it and bring ourselves back to the present moment and deal with the situation without letting such things get in the way. Awareness is the key.

The first time I actually made mind work for me instead of the other way around. When you have chipped away everything that you aren't, all that is left, has to be you. At that point it is as if a candle is lit in a part of the brain where it used to be dark. You "know" your true self to be there, and not with the intellect. To me it initially felt like a blind spot. Yet that blind spot was the source of my being. When I tried to find out it's size and shape, that was when I realised that the Self is shapeless, therefor endless. Left hemisphere shutdown... cannot compute...floating point error

LOL! Indeed this is so. There is often "fear" that prevents us letting go to the extend of BEing our True Self, but we do find, with meditation, that we experience this more and more. It is a little bit of a misconception (conception = conceived by the mind, therefore it is not truth by it's very nature) that by "going inside" when we meditate we are "looking for something" smaller within ourselves. The thing is, when you really experience it, you realise that it's a bit like the Tardis on Dr. Who., you step inside and suddenly the whole Universe is you, you are the universe. There is no words that can truly describe it because it is everything and nothing all in one; the "Emptiness" that Buddhism talks of, but which is anything but empty.

And as far as all those wonderfull things I imagined are concerned... It's not what I expected. It's less amazing, not at all mystical. Just natural. Things are as they should be.

This is the joy of the Practical Philosophy class that I attend that teaches along the lines of Advaita. It isn't just theoretical philosophy, it is something we can put into practice each week and discuss in the classes. Only through first hand experience can we know it to be true. It is not something that can be bestowed upon us as we already have it naturally in (as an aspect of rather) our True Self.

This is a most wonderful thread and I'm thoroughly enjoying everyones contribution.

Hugs

Giles