Life only in Questions for Erich Forum

RSS
Email

0 Points

Life only

Author	Comment
drrona		#1041	[-]
Posts: 15521 May 20 08 8:51 AM Asst. Administrator Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	excellent story share, karen s. thanks for sharing that good words for me to hear right now for sure and powerful practice to do consciously especially at the times it's needed most. thanks love rona "I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world." Mother Teresa
noswrite		#1042	[-]
Posts: 6135 May 29 08 12:47 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	"At 35, Kurzweil was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. Unsatisfied with his medical treatment, he stopped taking insulin injections and crafted his own diet and supplement program. Today, at 54, he shows no signs of the disease. He plans to outwit the medical establishment on a grander scale by achieving eternal life." Raymond Kurzweil "I made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it short." - Blaise Pascal
beckyn		#1043	[-]
Posts: 1003 Jun 20 11 1:54 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	i've been thinking a lot of LIFE ONLY or "death is a fake." i've been reading emmett fox - who was part of the "new thought" movement in the early 1900s. His secretary was the mother of one of the AA founders and his teachings influenced the spiritual development of AA. here's more informatin about him. http://emmetfox.wwwhubs.com/ he lectured and taught on the bible - but, his teaching is very different from the christian/biblical teaching that i've been exposed to. the following is an excerpt from the entry for June 20 in the book - "around the year with emmett fox." "There is absolutely no reason to fear death. the same God is on the other side of the grave as on this side. However, most people do fear death, partly as fear of the unknown, and partly as the result of false teaching. *Actually there is no death in the sense of extinction*. To understand death, you have to realize that you really possess not one body but two. You have not only the physical body, but also a second body made of a form of energy too fine to be seen. This etheric body interpenetrates the physical body as air fills a sponge. There are people who can see the etheric body because they have the power of contacting much finer vibrations than can be perceived by the ordinary physical senses. It is the etheric body that is the repository of all your thoughts and feelings. it is the 'psyche' of the psychologist. that is why personality survives death; because it resides in the etheric that passes over intact, and not in the physcial that breaks up into decomposition. During sleep, trnace, and under anesthesia, when the etheric may leave the physical body, it remains attached to it by an etheric ligament called in the Bible the Silver Cord. The cord is so elastic that the etheric body can go very long distances and still remain attached to the physical corpus. . . . The next world is acutally all around us here. the so-called dead are carrying on their lives here where we are now, but in their own world and in their own way. The reason we do not see them around us or collide with them is the same reason that one radio program does not interfere with another - they are on different wavelengths." this is just a slice of his teaching/ideas, but erich, how does this fit with you what you mean by life only? i don't have direct experience - yet - of what he is saying, but i'm open to hearing him because of what i have learned from you, erich - including letting go of everything i think i know....
Lillylulu		#1044	[-]
Posts: 4289 Jun 22 11 6:48 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	what timing. i was just thinking about this thread this week. i never ran across mention of the Silver Cord in the Bible. do you have the reference? someone last nite just mentioned too that the Chakras were mentioned in the Bible. wonder where that is too? Ma Nithya Atma
Erich Schiffmann		#1045	[-]
Posts: 5478 Jun 22 11 9:49 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I’m less concerned with the actual mechanics of it—silver cord, no silver chord—and more just enamored of the fact of it. That there’s no such thing as the extinguishment of Being, and that your being and my being is the specific identification of Omnibeing. Our existence is guaranteed, is inevitable, is eternal because that is the nature of Life, Truth, Being. There may be multiple bodies. I don’t actually know. That’s what some people say. Raj says there is really only one body, and I trust him the most. One body, and that one body is either being perceived clearly in its totality/actuality or you are having a blurry partial view of it, in which case it will appear as though there are multiple bodies. And that this one real body is made of light and is actually indestructible, and it’s right there where your dense physical body seems to be. In fact, they are the same body. What we are calling our physical body is simply the unenlightened light body, the light body which has become dimmed through our attempts to densify our presence as a means of defense. Which, as we are able to increasingly relax and let go of our defenses against what we now perceive to be a hostile world, but which in fact is the Awesome Movement of Life, misperceived, then there will be the appearance of more light, more glow, more radiance, more obvious Light as being the substance of what we are. I’ve seen this a few times, so I know I’m not just blowing smoke. But getting the idea of eternal life, and of there being an ongoingness to things—in a sense—seems like the point to emphasize. And I’m happy to hear him speak of it with such confidence.
beckyn		#1046	[-]
Posts: 1003 Jun 22 11 12:39 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	hi lil - i don't know what the silver cord reference is in the bible. i'll probably look it up just to know what he was referring to. interesting stuff erich. yes - no question that he is confident and speaks authoritatively about it. this from the june 21 entry of his book: "Perhaps the most startling change that the disencarnate has to meet is the fact that thought is the normal means of communication, and therefore there is no deception. you pass for what you are and that is the end of the matter. What is it that determines the kind of place to which you will go after death and the sort of people among whom you will find yourself? you will go to the sort of place and be among the sort of people for whom you have prepared yourself by your habitual thinking and your mode of living on this earth. remember that death makes positively no chang in you; you are the same person that you were before it happened. no one 'sends' you anywhere. you naturally gravitate to the place where you belong. you do not 'meet God' on the next plane any more than you do on this plane. of course, he is fully present on the next plane just as he is on this plane; but there as here, He is to be contacted only in one's own consciousness. Heave is that perfect state of consciousness in which one is in full realization of the divine Presence. If you can reach to that level of consciousness while still in this world (and a few have succeeded in doing so), you are in heaven now and your awareness of God will be intensified with death." I don't do his teaching justice with just these few excerpts. he was a prolific writer and speaker and most of what i have read is about realizing and living life here in union with god and harmony with others. Erich - what you wrote here is new to me: "Raj says there is really only one body, and I trust him the most. One body, and that one body is either being perceived clearly in its totality/actuality or you are having a blurry partial view of it, in which case it will appear as though there are multiple bodies. And that this one real body is made of light and is actually indestructible, and it’s right there where your dense physical body seems to be. In fact, they are the same body." i'll be thinking on this. you're the best. thanks for being here.
beckyn		#1047	[-]
Posts: 1003 Jun 30 11 2:33 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	more from emmett fox - this from his book "the ten commandments" pg 138-139: "Now, whatever you believ in is going to happen to you, not the things you think you ought to believe in, not the things you say - we often say what we think is correct, what we think is expected - but it is what you really believe in that happens to you. For instance, we really believe in age. We really believe in the calender. We really believe, we can say what we like, but most of us really believe that every year we are 365 days older - except leap year, when we are 366 days older! And so people age as per schedule, and take on from the race mind the ills and ailments that go with that age. Some people look a few years younger than the calendar says and some look a few years older. That is the only difference. When we cease to believe in that, we shall cease to manifest it. . . . What you really believe in will happen to you, and you cannot avoid it. Therefore, it is important that you see to it that you believe in the goodness, and mercy, and love, and omnipresence of God."
Kit Spahr		#1048	[-]
Posts: 241 Jul 10 11 10:01 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	This quote from somanaut, Gil Hedley, fits in in a lovely way here I think... My body will be "used up" quickly by geological standards. I will not learn, understand, or do everything possible with this one body, but I can "dig in" to the banquet of life and discover all that I can while I am living this gift. I believe our learning and loving are forms of "heavenly treasure" which shape the wave of "who I am," a wave that extends without end~~~ so nothing learned, or loved, is ever lost.
beckyn		#1049	[-]
Posts: 1003 Jan 17 12 3:56 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Emmett Fox: "You are Spirit. Spirit cannot die and was never born. Your true self was never born and will never die. You are eternal, divine, unchanging Spirit, in your true nature. The whole universe is a spiritual creation but we see it in a limited way. You have sometimes seen a window made of fluted glass, and you know that if you look at the street through this window everything will be distorted. Nevertheless, you know that the distortion arises from your seeing wrongly. Our false vision causes us to know ourselves only from a seeming birth to a seeming death; but this is illusion too. This distorted version of Spirit is really what we know as "matter." Eucken says, 'Reality is an indpendent spiritual world, unconditioned by the apparent world of sense' - and this is substance." i don't know who Eucken is that Fox is quoting. thrills me when i see your teaching - life only AND the window analogy - show up in different voices from different places and completely different times and spiritual traditions. the truth is not harsh but it is insistent.
Erich Schiffmann		#1050	[-]
Posts: 5478 Jan 17 12 8:39 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	That is a lovely quote, thanks! Keep in mind that if you are seeing an illusion, as in through the fluted glass analogy, then the real thing is right there (!) where the illusion seems to be. It’s not somewhere else. That’s why the teaching is, “Look through the appearance to the realty that’s got to be there.” If the real thing weren’t already there, you wouldn’t be able to have an illusory experience when looking through fluted glass! What you’re looking at is not unreal. How you’re seeing it is. That’s why I’ve been suggesting, “Don’t try to change the world, change the way you are looking at the world.” Look without knowing and see what you see. Your Emmet Fox quote is nearly identical to Raj’s Teaching. The follow-up on that is, “Your true self was never born and will never die. You are eternal…” and therefore what we call “my body,” what you look like, because it is the visibility and tangibility of your Individuality is as eternal as you, as well. Which means, you are not really leaving your body when you seem to die. Something else is happening. “The truth is not harsh but it is insistent.” Most excellent!
beckyn		#1051	[-]
Posts: 1003 Jan 17 12 11:04 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	yes - i hear what you're saying. i read something fox wrote about problems where he suggested that people not to look to God to solve the problem - but rather to look at the problem and see god right there - in the midst of it. my mantra for the last month or so has been - "God is here" i don't repeat it often enough througout the day. if i look for god HERE - right in front of me. eyes open. i may start seeing god where i have not been able to before. i use "God" but i'm meaning Love, Life, the Essence, the Divine, the True, Intelligence, Spirit. but really - to be honest - i do mean GOD. supreme being. you wrote: "What you’re looking at is not unreal. How you’re seeing it is. That’s why I’ve been suggesting, “Don’t try to change the world, change the way you are looking at the world.” Look without knowing and see what you see." i think the counting meditation with eyes open helped a lot today to do this. the other one i still try frequently - remember when you suggested (it's here on the board somewhere) that when someone is talking to say "blah blah blah blah" in your mind?? i don't think i'm making it up. anyway that helps sometime also - but i also feel a little disrespectful when i do it. i think because my blah blah is carrying judgment. the counting and the numbers are more neutral and less charged. thanks for picking out that line - "the truth is not harsh but it is insistent." that came to me and i wrote it, but i felt uncomfortable because it seemed like i was making a pronouncement that i was not qualified to make. but it is still ringing true and necessary for me - so i'm glad i posted it and thank you for pointing it out. BIG LOVE erichji - it's fun hearing you and chatting with you like this. i forgot and i've missed it
Chaya2		#1052	[-]
Posts: 1585 Feb 4 12 5:38 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Erich, you said: ".. unenlightened light body, the light body which has become dimmed through our attempts to densify our presence as a means of defense. Which, as we are able to increasingly relax and let go of our defenses against what we now perceive to be a hostile world, but which in fact is the Awesome Movement of Life, misperceived, then there will be the appearance of more light, more glow, more radiance, more obvious Light as being the substance of what we are. I’ve seen this a few times, so I know I’m not just blowing smoke." Could you elaborate on this ? About what you saw, specifically? I've been disconnected for quite a while here... and having a hard time finding my way back in.
Erich Schiffmann		#1053	[-]
Posts: 5478 Feb 4 12 7:26 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Sure! Such an excellent topic, and a big part of the shift that’s happening on the planet. The shift from seeing things as material to seeing them as spiritual, as Spirit, which is Light… is my guess. Imagine yourself as a glowing presence. Imagine further this was just the way you were made. You had nothing to do with it. You just showed up as an easy-to-see, obviously-what-you-are, glowing, luminous being. And you were with other luminous beings. But, for one reason or another, you wanted to hide. You didn’t want to be seen, for whatever reason. You had a secret you didn’t want anyone to know about, so you hid part of yourself. And when you did that, your light dimmed a bit. You turned the dimmer switch from full-on to something less. You were no longer uninhibited radiance. Or you became afraid, for whatever reason, and you reflexively tightened up. You contracted, you densified. And as it turns out, the more you densify, the darker you get. You enter endarkenment, rather than enlightenment, illumination. The spacious, radiant light body becomes what we are now experiencing as a dense, physical body. We assess the world to be a hostile environment, and so we live in a defensive or aggressive manner. But Life is not the enemy. Life is what we are. And we are not actually in hostile territory. We’re in the middle of the Kingdom, the Awesome Movement of Life. The more fearless you become, therefore, and the less secretive, the more you’ll glow, the healthier you’ll be. So, back to that paragraph. If you try to defend your presence, and you would only do that if you were wanting to hide the truth, for whatever reason, or if you were fearful, for whatever reason, then you densify your presence. If you knew you were invulnerable, you would not engage in self-defense. You would know you needed no defense. You would not dim the light of your presence by contracting. But most of us are “on guard” pretty much all the time. It’s just the way we do our thing. It’s our approach to life, our stance against life. That’s pretty close to what I mean. If you don’t want to be seen, for whatever reason, you’ll dim your light. You’ll turn the dimmer switch. You’ll turn your light down. We do this because we think there’s safety in the darkness. But this is what kills us. But that’s a whole other story… I would suggest Mirror Gazing. Gaze at your reflection until you see yourself as Light. That’s what it looks like. Like a 3-d holographic energy body, still you, but luminous, glowing, utterly flexible. If you are seeing it, you are being it! Then look at things in the same way. Gaze at a rose until you see it transform. It’s still what it is, but you’ll see it morph from what it was, from how you were seeing it, to a 3-d holographic energy presence. Like on Star Trek. And, if you are seeing it, you are being it! Then look at people like that, etc And, again, if you are seeing it, you are being it! This has been important for me. The way to be it more, then, is to look for it! Give recognition to people and things. Look for God in everything you’re looking at. Simply let go of your usual assessment, then see what you see. This is part of what will precipitate the shift in perception. A miracle, remember, is defined as a shift in perception. The shift in perception is about no longer thinking we are in a material world, and recognizing, instead, that the world we’re in is a spiritual creation. Amen. Over and out. Love. Last Edited By: Erich Schiffmann Feb 4 12 7:30 PM. Edited 1 times.
Chaya2		#1054	[-]
Posts: 1585 Feb 4 12 9:11 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	and infinite gratitude. Last Edited By: Chaya2 Feb 4 12 9:14 PM. Edited 1 times.
lightdancer		#1055	[-]
Posts: 11281 Feb 5 12 11:18 AM Asst. Administrator Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I'll come back and read your response in more detail, Erich, but I wanted to say this is timely - especially the part about gazing at a rose. This morning at church I was up on the front row. I like it there because I get an unobstructed view out the big glass windows onto the trees, grass, and light outside. I like to practice softening my gaze and looking at things, like Erich was talking about. This morning on the altar, there were three white roses, opened up, in a cobalt blue glass vase. I had this really interesting moment. I realized that in order to see this incredible beauty of the rose, which was just blowing me away, I had to have the same quality in myself, in order to even recognize it in the rose. I was following all around the edges of the roses and suddenly, click - just like the feeling of getting online, or the feeling of a magic 3D image opening up - I felt like I was on the beam withe rose. I felt like I was looking right out at it's beauty as it was simultaneously looking at mine...and it was just as interested in me as I was in it. It was a major wow moment for me this morning. I've been really into the power of being vulnerable and being willing to be seen for a long time. But this experience this morning really underscored it for me in a whole new way.
Erich Schiffmann		#1056	[-]
Posts: 5478 Feb 5 12 2:34 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Yes, see and be seen. Give recognition, on the one hand. Let yourself be seen, on the other.
omchantress		#1057	[-]
Posts: 135 Feb 6 12 7:30 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Oh, Erich I love how your wrote that! I can see ways I have been closing in on myself and what you are saying makes me want to jump up and say, "I don't want to hide anymore! I want to be Light!" Thank you for elaborating on this one. Thanks, Carie, for sharing your experience! How beautiful.
Bradley		#1058	[-]
Posts: 1129 Feb 6 12 9:26 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	and OMChantress I love your new pic. Yeah, its sounding like their is no substitute for presence being (present). Which is why we are here NOW. I just had a strange thought right before I was to hit reply. It seems like we are rather far apart. I am at least 3000 miles from say Erich and I am not sure how far anyone is from South Carolina, but to the infinite our yoga mats might as well be touching if not overlapping.
beckyn		#1059	[-]
Posts: 1003 Feb 7 12 6:20 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	i love this discussion. erich - you wrote: "This is part of what will precipitate the shift in perception. A miracle, remember, is defined as a shift in perception. The shift in perception is about no longer thinking we are in a material world, and recognizing, instead, that the world we’re in is a spiritual creation." when we were talking about this last summer, i shared this with you and it keeps coming back to me. i remember this so clearly. when i was in first grade science class - so i must have been 6 or 7, mrs. trennis - i still remember her name - had us do an "experiment." we all stood in front of the window of the classroom looking outside to the playground, and she instructed us to shift our gaze so that instead of seeing through the window - we saw our reflection in the glass. i was blown away! without moving my body or even my head, i just adjusted my focus so that without seemingly moving a muscle - i had an entirely different picture. i saw myself. when you talk about this "shift in perception" i keep coming back to that early experience, because i'm thinking it's not about a big movement, or a lot of effort or work, or even a different perspective - like moving around or backing up to get a different angle. it's adjusting my focus. what i'm looking at/for. carie - way cool about your experience seeing the rose. bradley - overlapping yoga mats - no matter where they appear physically. i like that. thanks for bringing this up again marianne, i'm so sorry you and randy won't be coming to texas.
lightdancer		#1060	[-]
Posts: 11281 Feb 7 12 7:40 AM Asst. Administrator Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Oooh, Becky, that's really cool! Mrs. Trennis sounds like a great teacher. I love to learn experientially, rather than theoretically. Yes, the shift in perception is so gentle, so subtle; not even noticeable to anyone watching. Sort of like a snowflake falling...so soft and quiet. It's like that .34 second Google search, like Erich talks about. It's instantaneous, even. Omchantress, your picture is stunning! And Bradley, I love that mat image, too. Thanks, Becky, for stoking this discussion. I'm loving it.

<< Previous Topic Next Topic >>

Yuku free message boards

Life only