Clouds and Shadows

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.” 

 ~Philip K. Dick

Reality Check

"All there is, is Reality,

and any illusion, any appearance, any shadow,

cannot but be a reflection of that very Reality.

Illusion cannot have an independent existence."

 

 ~from Peace and Harmony in Daily Living by Ramesh Balsekar

What do we know?

Fifteen quotes examining the nature of reality and how knowledge is acquired:

"Because of conceptualization, our sense-experiences inform us with an incorrect picture of the world.   When we see a mountain, we do not see it in its suchness, but we attach to it all kinds of ideas, sometimes purely intellectual, but frequently charged with emotionality.  When these envelop the mountain, it is transformed into something monstrous...Instead of living in a world presented to the Primary Nature in its nakedness, we live in an artificial, "cultured" one.  The pity is that we are not conscious of the fact." ~from Zen and Japanese Culture by D.T. Suzuki

"We do not see things as they are, we see things as we are."  ~The Talmud 

"The map is not the territory."  ~Alfred Korzybski

"There are no facts, only interpretations."  ~Friedrich Nietzsche 

"We can all see how other people's BS (belief system or bullshit :p) makes them blind and "stupid" at times, but we find it very hard to notice how our own BS is doing the same to us. This is what anthropologists call 'acculturalization.'  Following Gurdjieff, I prefer to call it hypnosis... Every politician knows how to induce hypnosis, and very damned few people on the whole planet know how to de-hypnotize themselves. The world is not governed by facts or logic. It is governed by BS (belief systems)."  ~Robert Anton Wilson

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd." ~Voltaire

"Your beliefs can be like fences that surround you. You must first see them or you will not even realize that you are not free, simply because you will not see beyond the fences. They will represent the boundaries of your experience."  ~from The Nature of Personal Reality by Jane Roberts

"Reality leaves a lot to the imagination."  ~John Lennon

"In religion and politics, people's beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second hand, and without examination."  ~Mark Twain

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."  ~Albert Einstein 

"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."  ~William James

"When you question your stressful thoughts, you come to see that everything that has been troubling you is just a misunderstanding.  You realize that what you believe isn't necessarily so.  This is the beginning of freedom.  The Work always leaves you a kinder, clearer, happier human being." ~from Question Your Thinking, Change The World by Byron Katie

"Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world." ~Arthur Schopenhauer

"The empiricist... thinks he believes only what he sees, but he is much better at believing than at seeing."  -George Santayana

"We accept the reality of the world with which we're presented, it's as simple as that."  ~The Truman Show

On Living

"Living is no laughing matter:
you must live with great seriousness
like a squirrel, for example-
I mean without looking for something beyond and above living,
I mean living must be your whole occupation."

~Nazim Hikmet

This Is It

"The ultimate truth is so simple;

it is nothing more than being 

in one's natural, original state."

~Ramana Maharshi

Looking into the Nature of Experience

"Many of our ideas and beliefs about ourselves and the world are so deeply ingrained that we are unaware that they are beliefs and take them, without question, for the absolute truth." ~from The Transparency of Things by Rupert Spira

The Butterfly Dream

“I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke.  Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?”
~Chuang Tzu

A Law of Nature

"People do what they do. That's what they do. And that is it."

~from Pass the Jelly by Gary Crowley

It's nice to be able to count on something.  Byron Katie often says that she can trust people completely to do what they do and she's never disappointed:

"Everyone and everything is doing its job perfectly - no mistake."

Shining

" Three things cannot be long hidden:
the sun, the moon, and the truth."
~Buddha

Paradigm Shift

"According to Webster's, a paradigm shift is a fundamental change in approach or assumptions.  It is interesting that Webster's uses assumptions rather than facts.  We live our lives trusting our mind to tell us how things are, but is it telling us the facts, or just assumptions based on input over the years, and how it sees the world?"  ~from Oneness by John Greven

Loving What Is

"The only time we suffer is when we believe a thought that argues with reality. When the mind is perfectly clear, what is is what we want."  ~Byron Katie