on being old in Bali

  

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It has been suggested that the linear theory of time is related to the experience of time in the Northern (and Southern) hemispheres, where it is marked by seasonal changes: life begins in the spring, matures in the summer, and dies in the fall, to begin a new cycle the following spring. 

Bali, however, lies in the region of tropical rain forests near the Equator where there are no reasons to synchronize the growth schedules of all livings things. Instead, the processes of growth and decay proceed at different rates all over the forest, all the time. A flower is on a short, rapid growth cycle; a tree, a much longer one; a rock, longer still. 

The cycles mesh in this world, the Middle World, to create life.


—J. Stephen Lansing

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Fortunately, some are born with spiritual immune systems that sooner or later give rejection to the illusory worldview grafted upon them from birth through social conditioning. They begin sensing that something is amiss, and start looking for answers. Inner knowledge and anomalous outer experiences show them a side of reality others are oblivious to, and so begins their journey of awakening. 

Each step of the journey is made by following the heart instead of following the crowd and by choosing knowledge over the veils of ignorance.


—Henri Bergson

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Once you realize that the road is the goal and that you are always on the road, not to reach a goal, but to enjoy its beauty and its wisdom, life ceases to be a task and becomes natural and simple, in itself an ecstasy.


—Nisargadatta Maharaj

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The universe is a machine for the making of gods. —Bergson

   

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What we perceive as space is the end result of visual information processing. It is an approximation of space that is no different than the space you would see if you would wear a Virtual Reality headset. Slap on a VR and look at how it simulates space. 

The space you see in a VR is no different than the space you see in objective reality. Both are rendered approximations of space simulated by virtualization in the brain. That space doesn’t exist inside the brain so why does it overlay and seem to encompass such great distances if it’s all in your head?

This is part of the interface and how the mind has evolved the ability to process information. The mind produces a virtualization of space and projects an overlay to approximate the space as perceived by sensory constraints. We never see true space as we have only ever observed the approximation of space through virtualization. And this is true for everything that you perceive. It is all an approximation and interpretation of information gathered by limited senses. 


—Ian Wilson
Immersion Into the Human Experience

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This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real. 

Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up laughing at 

what you thought was your grief.

—Rumi

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[Philosopher] Whitehead’s panpsychism posits that all actualities – “actual entities” – transition from potentiality to actuality by perceiving the universe around them, choosing what perceptions to internalize, and then becoming objective/actual based on those perceptions. This is an iterative process, moment to moment to moment … 

This process takes place in literally every part of the universe in perpetuity, from subatomic particles to humans to perhaps even more complex structures beyond our current understanding. 

It is a perpetual oscillation between potentiality and actuality that produces the universe in each moment.


—Tam Hunt and Christof Koch
Eco, Ego, Eros

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Whatever happens. Whatever
what is is is what
I want. Only that. But that.  

—Galway Kinnell

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