It's not just you and your'e not going mad Star, if you are then I am too. Sometimes I've wondered if I'm alone and the others around me arn't real or not human. Could it be because we are different or have different idea's to other people or is it that everyone at some stage in their life think the same way. Think we will never get the answer to our question and that it will be one of life's mystery's. :confused:

Cis

Technically I would say yes; as surely everyone in your life is some sort of prop to make your life what it is? You are only in charge and control of yourself, and everyone else is doing the same except in their own individual ways...

Just my thoughts.

I thought this when I was 12 and it literally expanded my mind to infinite possibilities - isn't life rich?!!! 🙂

... it literally expanded my mind to infinite possibilities - isn't life rich?!!! 🙂

And with infinite possibility nothing can be fixed yet for there to be any kind of possibility to exist at all, there must be forms and distinctions, including "me" and "you" and "them." Yet we are only fixed for a moment; a moment that has been preceded by the moments that have brought us to where we are now, amidst the moments of all those other things that come into being, which remain for a while and then transform.

There has to be aloneness and limitlessness repeated infinitely and indefinitely - you can't have one without the other and you can't have anything at all without both and the ceaseless flux of interconnectedness between the two.

As the Heart Sutra says: "Form is emptiness and emptiness is form."

Voidness is the infinite possibility out of which everything emerges and yet it remains the deepest nature of things that exist also. However, if experience becomes dissociated as this realisation is glimpsed; experience may becomes like dream, the dreamer can become a little surprised at the dream they are dreaming and wonder, perhaps with a little panic, if all is just their dream.

This is just a trap. All you need to do is come back down to earth and see the reality of it all. The middle way is between these two extremes: emptiness and form, while both remain in a coexisting duality. Perhaps emptiness and form are just different sides of what is really there, which is beyond words, it can only be know by us but not spoken of. It merely appears to be a duality when we speak of it.

Norbu

Well,it is good to know that I am not loosing it,but who had the right to make me ME, in this body and in this time?,who decided and was it really predestined,?.I wonder how many never get the chance to live on earth,how many more combinations are there,is it infinite.I feel like a fly on the wall,trying to figure it all out,was I aware that I was in the womb???

... who had the right to make me ME...?

Just the way it is... "Who" wants to know?

... in this body and in this time?

Just the way it is... There is no other way than that.

... was it really predestined?

For there to be anything there has to be cause and effect, yet for there to be anything there also has to be effect with no cause. Somewhere between these two is the way things are.

I wonder how many never get the chance to live on earth,how many more combinations are there,is it infinite.

There has to be limitless possibility yet that limitless possibility has to follow simple rules and out of the combination of simple rules and limitless possibility comes new, more complex rules and more possibility. Potential is limitless yet has to take for to become the way it is.

I feel like a fly on the wall,trying to figure it all out...

How boring would it be, if we knew it all? Where would the limitless have gone, if we did know it all, if it was possible to know all elements of cause and effect? Nothing could exist if this were possible because there would be not causeless formations.

... was I aware that I was in the womb???

But it is fun to speculate!

Norbu

Hi guys,this may sound strange,but has anyone thought that they are the only one here on EARTH,and that everyone else is only a prop?,I know this is weird but sometimes I ask myself why I am ME?,just a thought and was wondering if Im loosing my mind?:eek:

Yes it is possible. I mean from your perspective.

Yes it is possible. I mean from your perspective.

can you explain what you mean please.

When asked, "Is it true that we are all, really, One?" Andrew Cohen used to say "Yes, and it's you. And the entire responsibility of evolution rests on your shoulders. When are you going to do something about it?"

:hippy:Hello Star.

You are not alone in thinking that, many a time ive asked the question
why i was here, only to come to the conclussion i was here to suffer for everyone else.
a friend took me to her church, now i dont normally go, but this is so different, it is very much like the gospel churches, very free, people dancing in the aisles.
and my friend read a piece from the bible to me, and my responce was as if it was written about me,
cant remember what it was she read but it made a huge difference, to how i think of myself being here,
all i can remember was she read it from john, about a blind man.
asking jesus why he was put into the house with a family so different to him.and jesus said to learn how to teach others in the work i have planned for you.

take care

Thanks Blackcrow,you know what I mean.:)

Hi Star!

Actually, this was VERY much my view in childhood - I was totally convinced that this was the case. I was sure that nobody existed beyond my field of vision - that the stage was set and the characters acting purely to make up the 'film' of my life!

XXX

Just stumbled across this discussion and it is so relevant to the podcasts I am listening to at the moment on 'A Crash Course in Miracles'.
The course teaches that nothing is real, we are all in a 'dream' (they also use the metaphor of a 'movie'). Other people are the actors in our dream/movie. This can be difficult to grasp but still I will include a quote:

"This introduction is how A Course in Miracles begins. It makes a fundamental distinction between the real and the unreal; between knowledge and perception. Knowledge is truth, under one law, the law of love or God. Truth is unalterable, eternal, and unambiguous. It can be unrecognized, but it cannot be changed. It applies to everything that God created, and only what He created is real. It is beyond learning because it is beyond time and process. It has no opposite; no beginning and no end. It merely is.
The world of perception, on the other hand, is the world of time, of change, of beginnings and endings. It is based on interpretation, not on facts. It is the world of birth and death, founded on the belief in scarcity, loss, separation, and death. It is learned rather than given, selective in its perceptual emphases, unstable in its functioning, and inaccurate in its interpretations."

Star dust,this is fascinating,thanks for posting,now I feel privilaged to have these thoughts in the first place,it puts alot into perspective,for me personally.

Star its very abstract but listening to the podcasts (do you have Itunes?) really helps to grasp the meaning of what it is all about.

"When you have been caught in the world of perception you are caught in a dream. You cannot escape without help, because everything your senses show merely witnesses to the reality of the dream."

The course teaches that the only thing that is real is love and nothing that is unreal can be threatened. The woman who wrote it says she channelled it straight from the Holy Spirit. I am not a devout catholic but I find the course fascinating

That also struck a chord with me, Star.

I remember first thinking the same thing when I was a child.

xxx

That also struck a chord with me, Star.

I remember first thinking the same thing when I was a child.

xxx

Do you still think that now???,and whats it like in France,where do you live??I really love France.

Hello,

I just thought I’d add a little to this interesting thread. ACIM is quite right – what we experience through our material senses is not spiritual reality, but is like a dream. Spiritual reality (what Jesus described as the Kingdom of heaven) is here and now and exists right where disharmony, disease and death seems to be.

In 1866, Mary Baker Eddy on what was expected to be her deathbed had a glimpse of this and got up, healed. She wrote:
[COLOR="Blue"]
That short experience included a glimpse of the great fact that I have since tried to make plain to others, namely, Life in and of Spirit; this Life being the sole reality of existence. I learned that mortal thought evolves a subjective state which it names matter, thereby shutting out the true sense of Spirit. (Miscellaneous Writings 24)

Divine Love is infinite. Therefore all that really exists is in and of God, and manifests His love. (Science and Health 340)

Entirely separate from the belief and dream of material living, is the Life divine, revealing spiritual understanding and the consciousness of man's dominion over the whole earth. This understanding casts out error and heals the sick, and with it you can speak "as one having authority." (Science and Health 14)

The objects cognized by the physical senses have not the reality of substance. They are only what mortal belief calls them. Matter, sin, and mortality lose all supposed consciousness or claim to life or existence, as mortals lay off a false sense of life, substance, and intelligence. But the spiritual, eternal man is not touched by these phases of mortality.

How true it is that whatever is learned through material sense must be lost because such so-called knowledge is reversed by the spiritual facts of being in Science. That which material sense calls intangible, is found to be substance. What to material sense seems substance, becomes nothingness, as the sense-dream vanishes and reality appears. (Science and Health 311)

And, to show that these are not simply beautiful, abstract concepts, here is proof that there is practical metaphysical law behind them.

A woman was told by a dentist that she needed urgent dental surgery and he sent her to hospital with her X-rays. As she drove, she decided to spend the two hours before he had booked the surgery praying through expressing gratitude for the spiritual nature (or unseen reality) of everything that came into her experience during the time before the surgery.

She saw in the cars on the roads, symbols of mobility, agility, usefulness and comfort. She saw that the lines on the roads symbolised safety, control, order, harmony. Traffic lights spoke to her of obedience, perfection, alertness and honesty. As she looked at the houses, she saw originality, beauty, colour, design, substantiality and inspiration. Trees that gave shade and homes for animals, evidenced supply, provision, loveliness, purification of the universe.

When she arrived at the hospital, she continued to include and embrace everyone she met, with love. They took another set of X-rays, and the dentist examined her tooth, but could not believe his eyes as the new X-rays showed no need for surgery. In two hours, filled with love, gratitude and spiritual perception, the whole picture changed.

Originally from The Christian Science Journal, May 1987 and taken from God, Physics and Metaphysics by J Geis.)

Hi guys,this may sound strange,but has anyone thought that they are the only one here on EARTH,and that everyone else is only a prop?,I know this is weird but sometimes I ask myself why I am ME?,just a thought and was wondering if Im loosing my mind?:eek:

Only as a child, about aged 8-9. It was before science fiction and horror had really hit the screen, but I got it into my head that maybe everyone else in the world were a kind of conspiracy, all just watching me. That I was the only "real" person, yes. Quite scary as a child, for maybe three months, to think that if you turned round fast enough, you'd catch them out! And I still grew up to be sane (some would say....!).

V

Actually this concept is key to the philosophy of sanatana dharma (popularly known as Hinduism.) The idea is that all is maya or illusion and that reality itself is relative. I also remember reading a great book about the awakening of an American guy, now known as Satyam Nadeen, whilst he was in a high security American jail. He postulates that we are all merely actors in our own soap operas which unroll and develop as we go along. However, not only are we acting in our own dramas, we are the writers and audience too. It's hard to describe but at the time I read it, it made perfect sense. Another spiritual writer, Andrew Harvey, describes a visit to a Buddhist monastery in Ladakh where he experienced everyone around as being two dimensional, like those Thai shadow puppets that are on sticks (IYKWIM). I might as well mention here the old riddle: if a tree falls in a forest and there's no one there to witness it, does it make a noise. And the Zen koan 'What is the sound of one hand clapping.'
You've had a truly fascinating thought, star. Very profound.
xxx

Cheers Sunanda,kinda thought that too.Would love to get my hands on these books.

I dunno about Ireland, Star, but here in England we can request books from our public libraries. Otherwise there's always Amazon. Here's what I recommend:
From onions to pearls by Satyam Nadeen
Collision with the Infinite by Suzanne Segal. (This is truly fascinating - about an American woman who loses her sense of personal self. Again, have a look on Amazon and read the customer reviews.)

Collision with the Infinite by Suzanne Segal. (This is truly fascinating - about an American woman who loses her sense of personal self.

On Suzanne Segal, it's true that she did, Sunanda. But remember that I read it at your recommendation? In reading it, I got the feeling she wasn't actually 'mystical' or 'insightful' but that something was wrong? I got a bad feeling as I read. It sounded to me like what psychology calls a depersonalisation state. She was attracting 'followers', yes, but because she seemed to view the world so differently ...

But the copy of the book I got was more recent and updated. She actually had had a brain tumour, and this affected her thoughts and perceptions, and it killed her by the time my edition came out.

(Of course, a philosophical sort might say that the tumour did give her insight, but it sounded to me just as though she was in melt-down, and she did psychologically kinda crumble over time. My later edition had an addendum by someone after her death. As I recall, it was kind of apologetic - "it was actually a tumour, folks".)

Not to scare anyone into thinking they have such a thing! Depersonalisation states can be a weird state the brain goes into after trauma or during stress. I got it a few times in my 20s. One was with me all the way from Kabul to Delhi over weeks, and I could hardly cope with the world, but that's another story.... Well, OK, the after-effects of a powerful drug experience, which turned me off the practice for life!

V

Thanks Sunanda,will check that out