A conversation with a friend:
~~~
Magdi:
In the dream, the sense of separation is very prevalent… ignorance is the most popular religion today.
Friend: Yes, the dream character is seen as a real separate entity
M: And is felt to be real… felt to be me… I-the body mind
Friend: yes, the bondage is strong
M: It is in the body that the me-sense gets established … the me-feeling. That is where it stubbornly anchors itself.
Friend: and even if this is totally false it is established as a fact, and society lives from that.
M: Yes. When I feel I am the body mind, I also feel you are a body mind… Me and the other. That is separation.
Friend: It s felt that the reactions of that organism are your reactions
M: It is the identification as a separate organism that leads to suffering… We fail to see that the hand and the foot belong to the same body.
Friend: out of the same substance
M: Yes. The reality is the reality of awareness and not of the hand or the foot…The reality of the hand and the foot are, at best, as real as the reality of awareness/consciousness.
Friend: that is why I say consciousness has no pain
M: At times, Consciousness takes on the form of pain (bodily sensation of pain) via the organism…but consciousness remains untouched, unstained, beyond suffering.
Friend: pain is felt but who is aware but awareness?
M: Yes. The tool, the instrument, is the body mind… The reality of consciousness
IS… Irrespective… While the body reacts, consciousness remains untouched, unmoved with pain or without pain.
Friend: suffering is just the conviction that I am a body mind that has pain
M: The body may have pain, but I am not the body. The body is an important instrument for the body but not for consciousness. Suffering is the identification.
The establishment of the Self is when the reality of consciousness is revealed in your direct experience as the only reality in the presence as well as in the absence of forms…The reality of consciousness does not depend on forms… It is real of itself.
Friend: yes. it is always here and does not need a form, does not need a me feeling
even if the me feeling appears
M: Yes. From the absolute perspective the me-feeling is simply a bodily sensation and an I-thought. But from the perspective of ignorance (I am the body mind belief), it is suffering. It is the feeling of mortality.
Friend: yes. So the switch is necessary to avoid suffering
M: That is what the exploration is about. To wake up from the bad dream of unhappiness and realize the eternity and infinity of consciousness.
Friend: if it was not because of suffering this exploration would not happen. That is how the budhha started his exploration
M: Indeed… the end of the journey is causeless peace and happiness. Unshakable and not dependent on anything worldly.
Friend: or just simply the absence of suffering, peace under all circumstances. Like Mandela in jail and probably like Ramana with cancer
M: Yes, … independent of circumstances, free of circumstances… except the dream becomes happy and not time in jail.
Friend: jail time expires
M: Yes.