But all 5 people agree that there was an accident, which seems to indicate a pretty strong correlation with reality. It might not be the opposite of no relation to reality, more like 160 degrees instead of 180 degrees in the opposite direction. To what degree do you thing perception and reality have no relation? Seems like you are taking me to task for opposing an absolutist statement that you yourself pretty quckily gave ground on. While the senses are fallible, our ability to discriminate between two different things with remarkable agreement seems to indicate that perception and reality are closely entwined. When you move from discrimination between two things to cause and effect the gap grows. A great portion of this gap can be reduced by investigation and education. We are not omnipotent but we will try and create a plausible explanation for why things happen. Many things that we pretend are objective are very subjective. it's an area where perception and reality must often part ways, but to say they have no relation is silly. I really have no idea what you are trying to say in relation to what I said. His shtick was that you are not your thoughts. I've heard this hippy dribble seeping out all over the place. I've head it from the goofy Scientologist, I've heard it from that greasy snake oil salesmen man Tolle. It a great line if you want brain wash someone into opening their wallet, it's not a great way to take control of your own life on terms of you're own choosing. I've dabbled with the cultist and substituting a world view of subtle self victimization with salvation coming in the form of giving up ownership of your critical facilities is usually front in center if you take a look behind the curtains. I am my hands, they are within the ven diagram of me. I'm accountable for their good behavior and health an maintenance. I'm more than my hands but I'm certainly not not my hands. My hands might screw me with their clumsiness or betray my nervousness, sometimes they might even be too weak for the task which I am asking them to perform, but they are my hands. Same damn thing with my brain. I do my best to nudge it toward flexibility, objectivity and just compassion but I sometimes fail. It's still my brain. Not being your thoughts must be great self help advice, it's flies off the shelf. Seems like a bunch of mystic double talk self victimization rationalizing to me. Comforting but I suspect that it's of dubious practical value. If I had to occupy a goofy metaphysical niche id plant myself in the Krishnamurti camp. Work hard to understand yourself, gain self control and knowledge by trying to understand all things in the world an their relation to yourself. He was diametrically opposed to the don't think and it's not your brain crowd. If I've said anything absolutist it's only in that I totally oppose the "you are not you mind, you are not your thoughts," absolutist. Jiddu KrishnamurtiHere you're creating an absolute where one may not have existed in the earlier piece. Being able to watch one's thoughts doesn't mean that people have NO control over their thoughts. But it also doesn't mean they have 100% control over their thoughts.
To live is to find out for yourself what is true, and you can do this only when there is freedom, when there is continuous revolution inwardly, within yourself.
I agree with you, mostly. I believe that your mind is part of you. I even drew a Venn diagram in that blog post similar to your example, and have a section entitled "You Are not Your Arms". I do quote Tolle, though. I think I reduced some of the wording in the interest of brevity to the point that it conveyed meaning I didn't intend. That sentence originally said "Perception of events often has nothing to do with reality." I tend to insert a lot of clarifying words, adverbs, etc. in my first drafts (like, a lot), and remove them to make it more direct and easier to read. So yeah, that was my bad. I do not believe we have no control over our thoughts, but rather that it's harmful to equate our identity with our thoughts (our ego). This is the state in which we have no control over thoughts. I was trying to give ways to change thoughts to allow for self-growth and increased agency, not less. I believe the ability to be separate from and examine our own thoughts, and our ability to override our reactions and modify them over time, is one of the main things that makes us human. And I believe that the vast majority of emotional harm is self-harm, and that this is a pattern that can be overridden and un-learned. jadedog is pretty spot-on with what I believe. Again, thanks for the feedback.
Thanks for your response. I do agree with you that the blog posts are overly simplistic. However, I don't agree they're completely without meaning. Well, that's sort of the point. One can't know that. I can make a percentage that I believe, but that's about it. It would be just a thought about my belief. No one can actually know. On the one extreme, we could all be in The Matrix, having a shared experience not based on reality. (Fair disclosure: I haven't actually watched the Matrix. It's just often the example given.) On the other extreme, a single individual could be having a certain experience not shared with anyone else that they are certain is reality, if they were say, a paranoid schizophrenic or having some other type of hallucination or delusion. From their perspective, they can't know how much reality and perception are correlated. As a practical matter, people generally agree that our perceptions through our senses are real, even if the interpretation is not always accurate. My bad for using an example that led so far away from the context of the article. The context of the article was within the bounds of when someone is feeling emotional pain. When someone is feeling emotional pain, {almost} all thoughts that lead to the emotional pain are subjective. That's where moving more to the absolute has some meaning. When people are in emotional pain, their thoughts on it are largely subjective. In that context, perception (of the reasons for the emotional pain) and the reality (of the situation) are often (or maybe always) not (necessarily) related. One could argue, as many have, that the same event can cause some people to feel emotional pain and others to feel emotional joy, so the relationship between the event (reality) and their perception of it is not necessarily correlated. Here's why it matters. If you believe that the event (reality) caused the emotional pain, then you have no power to change the pain you're in since you can't change the event. If you believe that your perception causes your emotional pain, then you can change your perception (belief about how you're interpreting it), regardless of the event. If perception and reality were the same, you'd be stuck with the emotional pain. When people say 'you are not your thoughts', it's generally shorthand for you don't control every thought that goes through your mind. At the same time, you do have responsibility for the actions you take with those thoughts. Saying that you are not your thoughts and you have responsibility for your actions together simultaneously is not conflicting. As for its practical value, it probably has more value for those people who have reached the end of their ability to will themselves to change or it was taken from them. It's been said, if you can't change your reality, you have to change your beliefs. If one thinks that their beliefs and their reality are the same, and they can't change their reality, that can leave them in a bad situation. You might do this intuitively. For example, if someone was a pro athlete and believed that their only source of success and value is from being a pro athlete, if they somehow became paralyzed, they'd have to change their belief. If they had the persistent thought that their only value was from being a pro athlete, despite being unable to do it anymore, it might be practical for them to know that they are not that thought. I tried looking for some quotes to see if I could verify this. I found this quote, which goes in the other direction. Jiddu Krishnamurti Being able to be aware of every thought and not "be" every thought says that you are not your thoughts. There has to be a you who is the observer. Is that the same guy?To what degree do you thing perception and reality have no relation?
Many things that we pretend are objective are very subjective. it's an area where perception and reality must often part ways, but to say they have no relation is silly.
Not being your thoughts must be great self help advice, it's flies off the shelf. Seems like a bunch of mystic double talk self victimization rationalizing to me. Comforting but I suspect that it's of dubious practical value.
He [Krishnamurti] was diametrically opposed to the don't think and it's not your brain crowd. If I've said anything absolutist it's only in that I totally oppose the "you are not you mind, you are not your thoughts," absolutist.
Meditation is to be aware of every thought and of every feeling, never to say it is right or wrong, but just to watch it and move with it. In that watching, you begin to understand the whole movement of thought and feeling. And out of this awareness comes silence.
No, not really. I'm not seeing the point of it. You're conflating brain and thoughts. One is tangible, the other is not. It's trivially true to say that you own your body parts. It would be different to say that you own your thoughts. Until thoughtcrime is illegal, you're not responsible for every stray thought that flashes through your mind. People are responsible for their actions, including communicating their thoughts, but they're not responsible solely for their thoughts. That's like saying that you own a book, so you're responsible for taking care of the book. But that's different from owning every idea and concept within the pages of the book. You seem to imply these ideas are scams. They are if you paid for them. But these ideas about meditation and witnessing thoughts are as old as Buddhism. I've never read Eckhart Tolle. I've watched a couple youtube videos he was on. He did give me a slimy feeling, telling people not to worry about money as he sat there making millions from his books. But he sure didn't originate these concepts.I am my hands, they are within the ven diagram of me. I'm accountable for their good behavior and health an maintenance. I'm more than my hands but I'm certainly not not my hands. My hands might screw me with their clumsiness or betray my nervousness, sometimes they might even be too weak for the task which I am asking them to perform, but they are my hands. Same damn thing with my brain. I do my best to nudge it toward flexibility, objectivity and just compassion but I sometimes fail. It's still my brain.