nick a- people wouldnt have to have different pereceptions- the different perceptions come from attatching emotion to objects and shapes and colors. if you attatch emotion to the shapes you see (witout conciously reflecting on them) it distorts reality. if you got chocked by a necklace when you were a little kid, and then you see a necklace lying on a shelf at your freinds house, you then might unconciously precieve your freinds house as bad, and get a bad feeling, without even knowing why. thats why to be in the true reality of the present you have to observe the world only through your senses, what colors, shapes, and smells and sounds are at your freinds house. you have to feel everything as it it, with no past emotion. …lucid dreaming is defined as becoming concious within a dream- you know your dreaming while your dreaming. its like conciously exploring your mind from within your mind, with all of your senses.
CP
I’m not too sure about this. A real movement would require us to be different from what we ARE. I see a lot of current talk as similar to New Years resolutions. They don’t last long. Its like people sitting around discussing what they will do with their first billion dollars. But absent is that detail of where this billion will come from. Balanced higher consciousness leading towards awakening will have to come from serious inner work which is not all that flattering and in these days of immediate gratification, I don’t know if it could happen on a large scale. You will however see more books and hear more fine speeches and platitudes. As far as results; that remains to be seen.
It is hard to swallow. I recall it was for me. Yet once you see the truth to that statement it is very clear. There is no seperation, there is no division. The mind is whole, thought create the illusion of division. You, I, and them. The table, the cup, the chair. That is the illusion created by thought. This is why we have wars, this country, this nation, against that nation. Since we are seperated within, we are seperated without, and there is conflict. When one realizes that there is no seperation, one does not wish to harm his neighbour because he realizes that the neighbour is himself.
Its funny I did not intend that to resemble a bible entry in anyway. I think that Jesus, is likely the most misqouted man in all of history. It seems to me that this man was preaching awareness, and not the distorted religion that christianity has become.
re: “I am awake.” They’re falsely imagined words. Pertaining to the ‘awake state’, they make no sense.
re: I cannot see how you cannot differentiate between the conscious and unconscious within ourselves.
‘Different’ doesn’t mean separate. What is the unconscious and can it unfold and reveal itself in awareness. It wouldn’t be ‘unconscious’ anymore, would it?
The physical world is not an illusion. The psychological realm is the illusion and illusion is a reality.
Since you are the self, ‘having a self’ is a delusion. The fundamental illusion is the “thinker” of thoughts. The ‘thinker’ is a fabrication of thought, an error of thinking. “Purpose” is a fabrication of thought.
Rounder,
It’s no trouble at all to understand ‘Heaven’ as ‘Nibbana’ and ‘God’ as ‘centerless field of awareness’, is it?
Rounder
Imagine a hundred dollar bill as a unified whole. It is “One”. However it can also manifest as combinations of lower fractions. The essence of the hundred dollar bill can exist for example as a fifty, a twenty, two tens, a five, four ones, a fifty cent piece, a quarter a dime, two nickels and five pennies. The point is that this essence of the hundred dollar bill can exist as a whole or in combination of fractions of itself.
Existence is this way for me. There is the ultimate wholeness and qualitative fractions of itself that compose creation within itself.
If humanity exists on one level as parts of a common whole and on another level as individualities, why does it necessarily lead to violence? I am suggesting that the awakened man will see the forest and the trees simultaneously in perspective. The idea wouldn’t be to ignore the individualities but to nurture them just as we try to nurture a forest and its trees at the same time. I am suggesting that the awakened man will not only honor and respect individualities but understand purpose in nurturing individualities. We don’t kill because of separation but because separation is not understood from a higher human perspective which would be natural for the awakened man. If all we have is corrupt separation lacking higher consciouosness, violence simply cannot be avoided.
I agree with you as far as Jesus and Christianity. Over the years, so many “improvements” have been made that it has lost its essential purpose of awareness, awakening, consciousness leading to re-birth. Now all that is visible is Christendom IMO.
K
Maybe not to you, but to me it makes perfect sense. 
Why not. A car is unconscious. Consciousness allows us to see it as an organization of materiality while unconsciously we define it by its function. The unconscious manifestations are results of the interactions of basic universal laws within materiality that are revealed when we become conscious of them.
While as sleeping men, our conception of self and the thinker is inadequate, this does not mean that "objective’ thought associated with the consciousness of awakening does not reveal objective human purpose.
Nick,
Dogs were borderline, but let’s not start introducing automobiles. We’re talking about this:I cannot see how you cannot differentiate between the conscious and unconscious within ourselves. , the human psyche.
K
A person with a certain degree of conscious self awareness can observe their own unconscious automatic thoughts. It is like listening to a tape recorder. Also but much harder, a person with a degree of self awareness can observe the onset of unconscious negative emotional reaction.
John referred to this in the Bible:
This is real separation. It requires consciousness to distinguish between the spirits (emotions) that have a conscious origin and the others that are unconscious and arising from our personal inner corruption but non the less, very tempting.
If one is involved with serious inner work and cannot differentiate between the conscious and unconscious here, you can really do yourself harm.
There is no one to exit. You are the conditioned state.
Yes but you see, I believe we are also the unconditional state. We have yet to bring it into the reality.
so
In that, I believe there is a self - inherently - the god that we have been praying to. (Just my own belief)
[quote=“Nick_A”]
Hi CP
What! short of time! That’s no excuse, we need you.
lol…sorry Nick…but I’m working lol… squeezing in some quickies where I can 
For anyone that cares to answer… How important do you think meditation is to “awakening.” If you believe it is important, why is it important?
Nick,
The unconscious (and we’re talking about the psyche, not automobiles or fruit) is only the unconscious, until it is revealed in awareness. That pertains to the rest of what you posted.
This is a very powerful statement that I have not used to express the failibility of the ego in awhile. The thinker is the thought, they are not seperate. Very simple I cannot understand why more people do not grasp such a thing.
Nope 
The actual hundred dollar bill cannot manifest as something else. See the hundred dollar bill is just paper and ink. It is the idea that you associate with the hundred dollar bill that gives it its value, and it is this idea that can manifest itself in different patterns.
Looking at the hundred dollar bill as it is, seeing it for what it is a mere peice of paper would be an intelligent observation. Would be pure perception. The awakening we are talking about. You would not create the illusion that the bill has any value to it whatsover. This is holistic seeing.
Now looking at a hundred dollar bill as having value, and being able to manifest into different configurations is illusion. You are distorting the actuality of the moment. You are creating seperation, and this is a property of reductionism.
It leads to violence because the individualities, or Ego/self’s see themselves as seperate. Infact create seperation, and division. When there is seperation, and division there is conflict, conflict leads to violence.
Are we really seperate nations? America, Canada, Iraq, Australia, England? or are these ideas merly illusions. Illusions which bring about division, conflict, and therefore violence.
“Nationalism is an infantile disease, the measles of mankind” A. Einstein
I say that it is illusion, I say that truely there is no seperation, seperation is just an illusion created by the self.
Hi Praxis
As I understand it,you cannot develop higher conscious awareness with excess tension in the body, a busy mind, and filled with negative emotion. Meditation relaxes the body, quiets the mind and allows us to let go of negative emotion. In this way we become open in a way that is part of awakening. When conscious inner attention is present in this quiet state, it can lead to something.
K
An unconscious psychological process cannot become conscious just because we become aware of it. If it did, we would remain prisoners of our negative emotions.
Try it and see what happens. Instead of expressing a negative emotion just observe its effects on you without expressing it. This is not suppression since you want to observe it. The way to observe it is to allow the experience of a negative emotion without expressing it. “Know thyself.”
Meditation is such a commonly thrown about term. I would wonder what you mean by meditation. To me meditation is not a ritual, meditation need not be done where it is quiet, and peaceful. I would say it is a self investigation. A passively aware state, where you are not judging or comparing, yet merley in a state of awareness, in a state of listening. To me it is very important. Meditation allows you to understand the properties of thought, allows you to be aware of your own thoughts, and see the nature inherent in them. If you cannot see, and understand the nature of thought, then you will forever be its prisoner.
Mostly when I hear people speak of meditation they are talking about self hypnosis, this may be helpful for awhile, but ultimately the root of the problem remains. They may find some sort of peace while alone, in the quiet of the backyard, but when they find themselves in a distressful situation this technique yeilds no benifits.
Hi Rounder
You must have not noticed that when describing the fractioning of the hundred dollar bill I said the “essence of”. it is this essence that is divisible. Of course we ascribe value to it so it is purely subjective without any real objective value. I just don’t know how else to describe this objective “fractioning” that comprises creation other than from a subjective analogy.
Our corrupt ego sees itself as separate differently than our objective separation. I don’t know if you believe in astrology at all but in ancient times it wasn’t as it is now caught up in people’s egos. It was and still is part of the science of “types”. Human beings differ objectively according to their type. Do you think that twelve apostles were chosen by Christ as a random number. He needed to teach this group of individuals inner development in a setting that included the basic human types so that they learn from each other.
So why I agree with you as far as subjective imagined differences, I also am convinced in the truth of objective human “types.”
Nick,
What you said doesn’t mean anything and you are missing the point. If there is consciousness of the unconscious, it is no longer the unconscious. The whole shlamiel : ) can be exposed.
K
As sleeping people, are we able to accurately say things like this? Wouldn’t it be better to verify it for yourself through your own inner work. If you spoke of personal experience, it would make more sense.
It is like when you said:
This may be true for sleep. In sleep the thinker and the thought are the same since the conscious thinker is asleep.
Awakened man I believe would be capable of objective thought which consciously discerns the quality of the moment itself and as such would be different then our random associative dual thought.
Rounder,
A couple of questions I’m compelled to ask since you brought them up. What’s your understanding of “the nature of thought?” Also, what distinguishes hypnosis from meditation?