Posts Tagged ‘David Bohm’

The best things in Life are Forever FREE!
~ Ron’s Memoirs

The soul of man has been separated from its source,

wandering in exile in a strange land –

“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –

ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,

and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”

~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master




Introduction to “The best things in Life are Forever FREE!
~ Ron’s Memoirs”


Dear Friends,

At age ninety, I’m updating my memoirs to emphasize my most significant spiritual perspectives and insights learned so far during this precious human lifetime.

Today’s “Forever FREE!” posting was originally inspired by “The Best Things in Life Are Free”, a frequently popular song composed in 1927 for the musical play “Good News” during the economic stock market boom that preceded the 1929 Wall Street stock market crash, which led to a worldwide great economic depression.

In prior postings, I’ve shown how all musical art can communicate deep feelings of instinctive wisdom beyond words, until we gratefully Awaken Spiritually as ONE LOVE beyond time.

And I’ve found these lyrics to be spiritually insightful and inspiring:

Prelude

“There are so many kinds of riches,
And only one of them is gold.
Though wealth you miss,
Remember this :
Worthwhile things cannot be bought or sold.
The best things in Life are FREE!”

Refrain

“The moon belongs to everyone—
The best things in life are free
The stars belong to everyone
They gleam there for you and me
The flowers in spring, the robins that sing
The sunbeams that shine
They’re yours!—They’re mine!
And love can come to everyone—
The best things in life are free!


My following summary and comments about today’s post will help explain the spiritual prescience of these lyrics; that although we are each unique, we are each dharmically destined to Awaken Spiritually as ONE LOVE beyond time.

Summary

Always remember that our ultimate identity is immortal Cosmic Consciousness as ONE LOVE.

We’ve appeared on Earth to experimentally experience illusionary time, space and duality as ego-embodied supposedly separated forms, but we’ve never really been separate from Mother/Father/God – our Eternal Source.

To be alive is to BE LOVE. Infinite Eternal LOVE is all that exists.  As Jesus taught ‘We and our Mother/Father/God are One’.

There is no death. Death is just an energy transition, until we’re formlessly dissolved as ONE LOVE. It is an illusory belief that our lives end when our mortal bodies no longer function.

So we’ve nothing to fear. Nor need we accept as “real” any perceived Earth-life threats to our immortality.

Remembering that our separation from ONE LOVE never happened, we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.


Background

Over forty five years ago, I began seeing Earth-life as an experiment in dense 3D space/time, with each human soul on a unique dharmic path to solving that energy experiment by forever following their Heart.

Recently, I’ve been optimistically predicting that our Earthly experiment in time will soon end, as a “critical mass” of human souls imminently awakens from eons of matrix thralldom. I foresee that Mother/Father/God will (as destined) soon honor Earth-Mother’s Nature to preserve it, rather than allow it to cataclysmically end.

I’m optimistic because our separate 3D Earth-world of mental fears and sufferings was not Divinely planned, but collectively chosen by human souls to experimentally experience illusionary time, space and duality, as an imagined separate reality.

And I’m especially optimistic since I’ve realized that Human souls have nothing to fear – EVER, because our illusionary perceived earth-life separation from Mother/Father/God as Infinite Eternal LOVE never happened.

Ron’s explanations of why The Best Things In Life Are Forever FREE!

1) What Humans call “Life” is an illusory concept in space/time and duality.

“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,

they are modes in which we think.”

“The distinction between past, present, and future 
is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”

“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”

~ Albert Einstein

2) Time is an illusion, of every Earthly human soul’s separation from its Eternal Source.

The soul of man has been separated from its source,

wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –

ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,

and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”

~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master

3) The human soul’s fate in space and time is subject to free-will karmic cause and effect.

“Every Cause has its Effect;

Every Effect has its Cause;

Everything happens according to Law;

Chance is but a name for Law not recognized;

There are many planes of causation,

But nothing escapes the Law.”

~ The Kybalion

4) In illusory space/time and duality, the soul remains in form as a potentially infinitely expanding energy entity, until dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God, its Source.

5) As each unique soul evolves to ever ascending energy planes, it transcends all ego-mind fears to exist lovingly and dharmically, forever free of unhappiness and disharmony.

“Love is what we were born with.

Fear is what we learned here.

The spiritual journey is the relinquishment – or unlearning – of fear
and the acceptance of love back into our hearts.”

~ Marianne Williamson

“The world is a prison and we are the prisoners:

Dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out!”

~ Rumi

“You have been a prisoner of a little pond,

I am the ocean and its turbulent flood.

Come merge with me, leave this world of ignorance.

Be with me, I will open the gate to your love.”

~ Rumi

“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear,
. . . . and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”

~ 1 John 4:18


6) The unique key for each soul’s transcendence of fear is found within each One’s Sacred Heart.

“The way is not in the sky.

The way is in the heart.”

~ Buddha

“

You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”

~ Rumi

“There is a light that shines beyond all things on Earth,
…
beyond the highest, the very highest heavens.

This is the light that shines in your Heart.”

~ Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7

7) Until dissolved as formless ONENESS, each soul is a multi-dimensional fractal hologram, appearing infinitely in form.

“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.

The horizontal threads are in space.

The vertical threads are in time.

At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.

And every individual is a crystal bead. 

And every crystal bead reflects not only the light 
from every other crystal in the net,

but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”

~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of Ancient India, 7000 years old

“Objective reality does not exist” ….

“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm

“Every particle of the world is a mirror.

In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”

~ Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century

8) Ultimately, Humanity’s illusionary perceived earth-life separation from Mother/Father/God – our Eternal Source never happened. So we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.


“Nothing Real can be threatened.

Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the peace of God.”

~ A Course In Miracles



“Perception is a mirror not a fact.

And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”

~ A Course In Miracles



“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen.

In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation.”

~ Swami Vivekananda


Conclusion and Dedication

As each unique soul evolves from the illusory space/time duality third dimension [3D] to ever ascending energy planes, it transcends all ego-mind fears to exist lovingly and dharmically, forever free of unhappiness and disharmony.

This “Forever Free” posting is deeply dedicated to inspiring each of us
to lovingly follow our Sacred Heart until it is dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God,
as ONE LOVE

Invocation


May these writings inspire and encourage
each of us to lovingly follow our unique Sacred Heart
until it is dissolved as destined into Mother/Father/God
as ONE LOVE.


And so may it be!

Ron Rattner


Al Jolson, Mario Lanza, and Frank Sinatra Singing The best things in Life are FREE!



Interdependence Way,
On Independence Day
~ A Revolution of Consciousness

“At the center of the Universe dwells the Great Spirit and —
this center is really everywhere, it is within each of us.”
~ Black Elk, Oglala Sioux
“We did not weave the web of life.
We are merely strands in it.
All things are bound together. All things connect.”
~ Chief Seattle
“All things are our relatives;

what we do to everything, we do to ourselves.

All is really One.”

~ Black Elk, Oglala Sioux

“Independence is impossible!”
“Whatever we think, do, or say,

changes this world in some way.”

~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Remember God, forget the rest.

Forget who you think you are,

to know what you really are.”

~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“We are not merely mortal drops
in an ocean of ephemeral forms,
but the eternally Infinite Ocean of Universal Awareness,
appearing as drops!”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Nothing Real can be threatened.

Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the peace of God.”  

~ A Course In Miracles (ACIM)
“You are “gods”;
you are all children of the Most High.”

~ Psalm 82:6
“You are the light of the world.”

~ Matthew 5:14
“Hear O Israel the Lord our God, the Lord is ONE”

~ Deuteronomy 6:4; Mark 12:29
“Though One, Brahman is the cause of the many…
The One manifests as the many,
the formless putting on forms.”
~ Rig Veda, 1500–1200 BCE
“All things come out of the One and the One out of all things.”
~ Heraclitus, 500BC
“Reality cannot be found except in One single source,
because of the interconnection of all things with one another.”
~ Leibniz, 1670
“That which permeates all,

which nothing transcends and which,

like the universal space around us,

fills everything completely from within and without,

that Supreme non-dual Brahman—
that thou art.”

~ Shankaracharya


Interdependence way

Interdependence Way, On Independence Day
~ A Revolution of Consciousness


Dear Friends,

Happy July 4th, 2023, US Independence Day holiday!

Almost 250 years ago on July 4th, 1776, our founding fathers declared their independence from British royal rule. Their declaration later led to the founding of the United States of America, which has become the richest and most powerful empire in the history of our precious planet Earth.

July 4th has become a popular American national holiday now celebrated by many US citizens without their mindful contemplation of its deeper meaning.

But today’s July 4th, 2023 SillySutras posting – like thousands of other prior SS postings – is dedicated to our mindful contemplation of how these Independence events can help us lead ever happier and more fulfilling lives while our eternal souls are incarnate on planet Earth in mortal physical bodies, which inevitably deteriorate and die.

As explained in the the recent “Egocide” posting, it is impossible to avoid some ego identification with consequent karmic suffering when existing incarnate on Earth, as supposedly separate from each other and all other life-forms. Only when we end our beliefs and behaviors as supposedly separate “I”-Egos, do all our sufferings end. That happens when we are ONE as an infinite Ocean of Divine LOVE, rather existing as mere separate “I”-drops in that Infinite Ocean.

As revealed by Sri Ramakrishna Paramanansa, although ego is unavoidable on Earthly incarnations, we quicken our transcendence thereof by choosing beliefs and behaviors which are loving and helpful, rather than selfish.


This posting is dedicated to inspiring our realization that until we so transcend Ego, worldly independence is impossible.

Ancient Vedic and Buddhist non-dualist scriptures have revealed that this Earth world arose from, and is interdependently part of, only ONE Eternal spiritual Source or GOD.

Therefore, until they disappear forever, all life-forms in this world always exist interdependently, not independently.

Long prior to Mid-East monotheism, the ancient Rig Veda revealed that

“Though One, Brahman [God] is the cause of the many…
The One manifests as the many, the formless putting on forms.”

And the Buddhist Heart Sutra said that everything originates only “interdependently” from emptiness [“anatta”].

July 4th, 1776, Background


On July 4, 1776, thirteen American colonies declared their independence from British royal rule, in an historic document inspired by Thomas Paine’s Deist philosophy and written by Thomas Jefferson. The Declaration of Independence proclaimed that under “the laws of nature and of nature’s God” government is established by people to secure their life, liberty, and happiness, and is to be overthrown as illegitimate if it no longer does that.



The US founding fathers recognized, that governments and their chartered transnational organizations do not exist by Divine right; that they are established by people to serve people – not to exploit or oppress them – and that they are illegitimate unless they serve human rights and happiness.



Since July 4, 1776, “the laws of nature and of nature’s God” have prevailed, but the world has changed immensely: The thirteen North American colonies have become the richest most powerful empire in world history, much vaster than the British empire which it succeeded. Human population has grown meteorically, from approximately 800 million (with 2.5 million people inhabiting American colonies) to over 7.9 billion and growing rapidly.



Through amazing technological and scientific advances the world has become much smaller and most humans have become part of an instantly interconnected and largely interdependent global community, sharing critical information in an unprecedented new age of world-wide ecologic, economic, political and social crises and opportunities. Yet despite this amazing technological advancement much of humanity continues to suffer illusionary psychological separation from each other and Nature, fostering insanely unsustainable ecological desecration of our precious planet, and barbaric exploitation of vulnerable beings and other life-forms, which threaten extinction of all Earth life as we’ve known it.

Yet as in 1776 such psychopathic insanity is still initiated and perpetrated by a few “rulers” or “leaders”, and by greedy transnational institutions evading equitable taxation and distribution of wealth who all self-destructively thrive on always increasing their power and control over others.

Nonetheless they are still allowed by most of humankind to insanely exploit and desecrate our world.

However, in the almost 250 years since 1776, there has been an unprecedented awakening of humanity, and we are now experiencing a revolution of human consciousness with unprecedented worldwide social and cultural unrest.

Deeply disturbed by irrational and immoral interruptions of their normal lives more and more people are psychologically awakening to our sacred connection with, and deep moral responsibility to cherish and preserve, all life on our precious planet Earth.

Moreover today’s July 4, 2023, Independence Day holiday coincides with the the first of four consecutive full super-moons after the 2023 summer solstice, which spiritually and energetically is extremely sacred for both Hindus and Buddhists, as Guru Purnima (the first Guru’s birthday) and as the day when the Buddha gave his first sermon.

Beyond today’s day of spiritual sanctity, we are also experiencing exceptionally advantageous cosmic energies, and rare cyclical and astrological planetary alignments, which are energetically elevating a “critical mass” of humankind to ascend beyond illusionary Third Dimension ego consciousness toward previously unimagined Fifth Dimension heart/mind telepathic awareness.

And currently confronted with apparently imminent global catastrophe, humankind are realizing on July 4, 2023, (as did visionary English-born Deist philosopher Thomas Pain) that under “the laws of nature and of nature’s God” independence is impossible; that everything and everyone is interdependent, not independent.

So faced with possible catastrophe ending Earth-life as we’ve known it, our global human family can awaken to avert extinction by transcending critically mistaken and illusory Ego-mind beliefs in separate independence, with realization that independence is impossible; that everyone/everything is interconnected and interdependent, with no-one/nothing existing independently, except Nature’s God.

Therefore, let us use this rare opportunity to revolutionarily and compassionately transform the world, so that all life forms everywhere consciously exist cooperatively and interdependently, not selfishly and exploitively.

Closing Invocations

May we revolutionarily and compassionately transform the world!

May all life forms everywhere exist interdependently,

As uniquely conscious and cooperative instruments of Light and Love,

May we so interdependently co-create an ever better world as ONE Eternal LOVE

– Happy, Harmonious and Peaceful –

As Nature’s God ever intended it to BE!


And so may it be!

Ron Rattner

Crossroads: Labor Pains of a New Worldview:

Our urgent need for a new interdependent worldview – how we need to collectively change our beliefs to change our world – is expertly explained and portrayed in this excellent one hour documentary movie, already viewed online by over one million concerned people.


Forever Ending Our Experiment With Time ~ Ron’s Memoirs


“The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master

“What is life?
It is the flash of a firefly in the night.
It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime.
It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
~ Crowfoot, 1890

“Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.”
~ Buddha

“In the end these things matter most:
How well did you love?
How fully did you love?
How deeply did you learn to let go?”
~ Buddha

“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha

“

Forever 
Ending Our Experiment With Time 
~ Ron’s Memoirs

Introduction

Dear Friends,

This memoirs chapter gratefully celebrates my ninetieth and most spiritually significant year. Because I’m still learning from ever-changing life experiences, as an elder seeker of Self-Realization I’m updating my memoirs (while still physically incarnate) to emphasize and explain my most crucial spiritual insights learned so far from this precious human lifetime.

Background

I was born in Chicago IL on election day November 8, 1932, when Franklin D Roosevelt was first elected 32nd US president, during a great economic depression era, when most Americans were suffering extremely hard times.

My parents were first cousins (both surnamed Rattner) from Ukrainian families living near Kiev. Their families had emigrated to the USA to escape hatred and persecution for their Jewish religious customs and beliefs. And I’m the last and longest surviving male from this unusual Rattner lineage.

We’re now living at an historically unprecedented time when survival of all humans – not just Jews – appears threatened by a Ukrainian war. After eons of territorial earth wars, technological advances now seemingly threaten us with planetary nuclear, biological, or ecological catastrophe, arising from worldwide hatred, exploitation, and insanity directed at people with differing appearances, customs, or beliefs.

Until now all my most auspicious spiritual experiences have happened since my spiritual awakening over forty five years ago from Newtonian reality, and previously presumed mortal self-identity as a physical body-form. Since then, I’ve been experiencing an ongoing inner evolutionary process that is opening my intuitive Heart to formerly unimagined loving realizations about our eternal Self-identity and Reality.

Optimistic Predictions

Thus I now optimistically foresee that we’ve reached an unprecedented turning point in human history, when our species is awakening to a prophesied enlightened Earth age with elevated energies, transcending eons of previous fears and sufferings as perceived energy thought-forms in time and space in which Humans have mistakenly believed ourselves separate from Eternal God-given Love.

For the first time in our recorded history we are now forced to realize that, because of advanced technologies, any more war could trigger an omnicidal nuclear, ecological, biological, or radiological catastrophe insanely ending earth-life as we’ve known it.

In my most recent memoirs chapters, I’ve optimistically predicted that our Earthly experiment in time will soon end, as a “critical mass” of human souls imminently awakens from eons of matrix thralldom by evil entities, which cannot survive in energies beyond illusionary fearful lower realm space/time separation. I foresee that Mother/Father/God will soon honor Nature to preserve it, rather than cataclysmically end Earth-life as we’ve known it.

I’m optimistic because our separate 3D Earth-world of fears and sufferings is not chosen by Human free-will, nor Divinely planned. And I’m especially optimistic because I’ve realized that Human souls have nothing to fear – EVER; that our perceived earth-life separation from ONE LOVE is a mental illusion that never happened.

Therefore, this memoirs chapter is intended and dedicated to encouraging us to live unselfishly and compassionately, beyond all fear, blame, or judgment as demonstrated by rare mystic masters and avatars, and especially by the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, who in this Christmas season inspires many souls as the paragon exemplar of Universal LOVE and forgiveness.

And so may it be!

Ron Rattner

My conclusions about forever ending our “experiment with time”

1) What Humans call “Life” is a mentally created concept in space and time.

“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think.”
“The distinction between past, present, and future
is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein

 

2) Time is a karmic illusion, of every incarnate human soul’s separation from its Source. Each human soul is an eternal being of LIGHT, which appears unique in time as a polarized and mentally created energy-entity:

The soul of man has been separated from its source,
wandering in exile in a strange land –
“I am stranger on earth” (Psalm 119:19-20) –
ever yearning to return to that from which it first sprang,
and cleave to the Soul of all souls.”
~ Ba’al Shem Tov, Hasidic master

 

3) The human soul’s future in space and time is always subject to free-will karmic cause and effect.

“Every Cause has its Effect;
Every Effect has its Cause;
Everything happens according to Law;
Chance is but a name for Law not recognized;
There are many planes of causation,
But nothing escapes the Law.”
~ The Kybalion

 

4) In space and time, the soul persists Forever in form as an infinitely expanding energy entity, until dissolved as formless into the Source Light of the Whole – of Mother/Father/God.

5) Psychological fear is the greatest impediment and deterrent to each soul’s evolution to ever ascending energy planes. Such inner fear subjects souls to thralldom by evil entities, which cannot survive in energies beyond illusionary fearful lower realm space/time separation from Source.

“Love is what we were born with.
Fear is what we learned here.
The spiritual journey is the relinquishment – or unlearning – of fear and the acceptance of love back into our hearts.”
~ Marianne Williamson

“The world is a prison and we are the prisoners:
Dig a hole in the prison and let yourself out!”
~ Rumi

“You have been a prisoner of a little pond,
I am the ocean and its turbulent flood.
Come merge with me, leave this world of ignorance.
Be with me, I will open the gate to your love.”
~ Rumi

“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear,
. . . .
and the one who fears is not perfected in love.”
~ 1 John 4:18

“[D]eep down, at our cores, there are only two emotions:
love and fear.
All positive emotions come from love,
all negative emotions from fear.
From love flows happiness, contentment, peace, and joy.
From fear comes anger, hate, anxiety and guilt.”
~ Elisabeth Kubler-Ross & David Kessler

 

6) The unique key for each soul’s transcendence of fear is found only Within each One’s Heart – within the One Creator.

“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha

“

You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.”
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.”
~ Rumi

“There is a light that shines beyond all things on Earth,
…
beyond the highest, the very highest heavens.
This is the light that shines in your Heart.”
~ Chandogya Upanishad 3.13.7

 

7) Until dissolved as formless ONENESS, each soul is a multi-dimensional fractal hologram, appearing infinitely in form.

“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.
The horizontal threads are in space.
The vertical threads are in time.
At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.
And every individual is a crystal bead.
And every crystal bead reflects not only the light 
from every other crystal in the net,
but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”
~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of Ancient India, 7000 years old

“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm

“Every particle of the world is a mirror.
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”
~ Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century

 

8) Ultimately, Humanity’s illusionary perceived earth-life separation from ONE LOVE never happened. So we’ve nothing to fear – EVER.


“Nothing Real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.”
~ A Course In Miracles

“Perception is a mirror not a fact.
And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”
~ A Course In Miracles

“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen.
In the Absolute there is neither time, space nor causation.”
~ Swami Vivekananda

 

Dedication

These memoirs are dedicated to
encouraging and inspiring us
to more and more behave lovingly,
on our precious blue planet Earth.

May we increasingly live lovingly,
unselfishly and compassionately,
beyond all fears, blame, or judgments
as demonstrated by the life and teachings of Jesus Christ,
who especially in this holiday season
we remember as the paragon exemplar of
Universal LOVE and forgiveness.

Therefore may we ever remember that

“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha

“

 

And so may it FOREVER be!

Ron Rattner

My Miraculous Lotus Flower
~ Ron’s Memoirs


“Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else.”

~ George Orwell, “1984”

“Reality is merely an illusion,
 albeit a very persistent one.”

“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”

“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,

they are modes in which we think.”

~ Albert Einstein

“Objective reality does not exist” ….

“The universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm, Quantum Physicist and Einstein protege

“Perception is a mirror, not a fact.

And what I look on is my state of mind, reflected outward.”

~ A Course In Miracles (ACIM)

“Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.”
~ Niels Bohr, quantum physicist

“I regard consciousness as fundamental.
I regard matter as derivative from consciousness.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist

“We do not see things as they are;

we see things as we are.”

~ Talmud

“Whatever we think, do, or say,

changes this world in some way.”

~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings


Ron Rattner on June 7, 2022, with Miraculous Lotus Flower


Introduction to “My Miraculous Lotus Flower”

Dear Friends,

Today I’m privileged to share with you a recent true memoirs story, symbolizing the fundamental spiritual principle that every incarnate space/time human is unique, with a unique “reality” which we “create” with our thoughts and behaviors. And that to evolve we need to be ever open to new ‘realities’ which transcend our prior beliefs. Hence human societies could not have advanced if we inflexibly believed that the earth was flat, or was the center of our solar system.

My evolving “reality” history

Since my mid-life spiritual awakening, I’ve realized that many prior beliefs and paradigms about “reality” were fundamentally mistaken and limiting; requiring acceptance of never previously imagined new “realities” through open minded questioning and mindfulness, crucial for life-long learning and spiritual evolution.

Thus since 1976, I’ve learned (from mystic masters, quantum science, and out of body experiences) that we each ‘create’ an illusionary space/time “reality” through “an optical illusion of consciousness” with our unique thoughts, words, and behaviors – whereby we mistakenly perceive, project, and self-identify ourselves as supposedly mortal entities separate from each other, Nature, our precious planet, and from our ultimately inseparable Universal essence as infinite LOVE. (See e.g. Our Mentality is Our Reality)

Also, I’ve learned that in this illusionary space/time reality everything is energy [e=Mc2] appearing and disappearing within Universal consciousness. But most humans mistakenly identify only with their thoughts, instead of their consciousness of those thoughts, and don’t realize that cosmically we are merely energy vortices ‘disguised as persons’. However, as we elevate our energies beyond polarizing fears and negative emotions and radiate innate common love and compassion, we gradually transcend space/time sufferings and reap ever increasing karmic rewards, as ‘givers not getters’. And (as in the following memoirs story) those rewards often appear through amazing synchronicities.

My Miraculous Lotus Flower

This miraculous lotus flower story exemplifies my still continuing life-long “reality” realization process:

In December 2017 my former neighbor Simran Alden (a real estate broker, raised in India before emigrating to the US) left a colored flower at my front door taped to an envelope with information about year-end real estate taxes. Because of color blindness, presbyopia, and other age-related visual limitations I couldn’t discern the flower’s botanical identity or color, nor could I see it clearly. It appeared to me to be a very “real” but dried-out cut flower. So to revive and preserve it’s beauty for a few days, I carefully put it into a tube of fresh tap water.

On awakening the next day I saw a beautifully opened flower, which I assumed would soon fade and wither with age. But miraculously it stayed “alive” and beautiful. And I soon believed that the “real” flower was forming roots on seeing as organic material in the water tube.

So I regularly refilled the tube with filtered water (rather than tap water), and delightedly observed my miraculously blooming “real” flower, which I kept in prominent view on my dining room table.

When Simran Alden later phoned me about my condominium’s market value, I thanked her for the flower she’d given me in December, and told her that I was still enjoying its beauty. However, I don’t remember telling her that I believed it to be “real” and had been watering it regularly. Afterwards I emailed Simran a photo of me enjoying the flower. And I enjoyed and carefully watered my miraculous “real” flower for over four more years.

But that suddenly stopped in June 2022.

At the beginning of June, 2022, my 2008 large screen iMac, running a long outdated OS 10.9 operating system irreparably stopped working. The old iMac contained all of my essential digital data, and was not separately backed-up. So I urgently needed to save its data and replace it with another iMac which would still run OS 10.9; or I’d be involuntarily ‘retired’ as an online spiritual philosopher, sponsored by The Perennial Wisdom Foundation.

Thanks to Divine grace and many amazing synchronicities, I’m “back in business” as a spiritual philosopher, and still able to compose spiritual memoirs.

Here is what happened:

On the June 1st ‘death’ of my iMac, I immediately contacted my almost 93 year old long-time friend and computer ‘guru’, “KJ”, about my urgent dilemma. With compassion “KJ” began expertly guiding my replacement of the 2008 iMac with a late 2012 model that would still run OS 10.9. Also he instructed my daughter Jessica about finding a successor iMac on Craig’s List. Jessica successfully found a replacement iMac, and on June 7th she brought it to my apartment. It still needed to be carefully converted to run my OS 10.9 data. And (with “KJ’s” expert assistance) that finally happened on June 23, 2022. The next night “KJ” passed peacefully in his sleep. If “KJ” had departed on June 1st instead of June 24th, I couldn’t be sharing this memoirs story with you.

Jessica’s lotus “reality” revelation

On arriving at my apartment on June 7, 2022 with the 2012 replacement iMac, my dear daughter Jessica Eve Rattner, (now a prize-winning documentary photographer and UC Davis Master of Fine Arts, with keen color and visual perception) iconoclastically shattered my miraculous flower “reality” image. Looking at the flower, she immediately perceived and impishly revealed to me that the tubed bloom was an not an organically botanical flower, but a cotton woven and fabricated pink lotus.

Ron Rattner on June 7, 2022, after learning Jessica’s lotus flower “reality”


As Simran probably knew, the pink lotus is the official National Flower of India, and is prominent in ancient India’s history, art, and teachings. It has long been an extremely sacred symbol of the spiritual path, enlightenment and resurrection.

So I now view the flower as an auspicious synchronistic blessing, but Jessica’s “reality” revelation has compelled me to stop believing it miraculous.

Dedication of “My Miraculous Lotus Flower”

May this lotus flower story auspiciously symbolize the infinite potential blessings of our ever evolving earthly “reality”, which we “create” with our ever changing thoughts and behaviors.

May it remind us to always be open to new ‘realities’ which transcend our prior beliefs, until we ultimately transcend all incarnate “reality”.

Until then may we ever BE kind and compassionate, and pray:

“Infuse us, enthuse us, and use us, to bless all life as Love!”

And so may it be!

Ron Rattner

Seeing the World as “Nothing But Movies”
~ Ron’s Memoirs

“This earth is nothing but movies to me. Just like the beam of a motion picture. So is everything made of shadow and light. That’s what we are. Light and shadows of the Lord. Nothing else than that. There’s one purpose. To get to the beam.” 
~ Paramahansa Yogananda-Autobiography of a Yogi, Chapter 30
“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,
does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha
“This whole creation is essentially subjective, and the dream is the theater where the dreamer is at once: scene, actor, prompter, stage manager, author, audience, and critic.” 
~ Carl Gustav Jung
“I regard consciousness as fundamental. 
I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. 
We cannot get behind consciousness. 
Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist
“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm, quantum physicist


Swami Paramahansa Yogananda January 5, 1893 – March 7, 1952


Ron’s Introduction to Seeing the World as “Nothing But Movies”.

Dear Friends,

Today’s memoirs title was inspired by Swami Paramahansa Yogananda’s above quotation, and by my unprecedented state of mind, since miraculously recovering from near-death taxicab run-down injuries eight years ago.

I now often experience this life like a movie, with scenes of continuing synchronicities enigmatically arising from ever mysterious karmic causes and conditions. But this life-stage has arrived only after many decades of difficulties and experiential evolution, beginning before my mid-life spiritual awakening.

During childhood my entire life seemed very dreamlike, and – like my nocturnal dreams – I’ve forgotten most of it.   

Thereafter, and until midlife, Earth life became my sole “reality”.  Then following a profound midlife spiritual awakening and previously unimagined mystical experiences, I more and more have been blessed to self-identify as non-dual eternal spirit inhabiting a mortal body, in an illusory world.

Thus my life again seems quite dreamlike and synchronistic – often like a masterfully pre-scripted movie, in which I am currently playing a fleeting role as retired lawyer and spiritual philosopher, who is still learning and evolving.

Retrospective realization of the apparent perfection of my lifetime’s evolutionary history has instilled in me unshakable and irreversible faith in God and Nature, and unspeakable gratitude for their blessings – especially since my miraculous survival and recovery from near death injuries sustained eight years ago on being run down by a taxicab.

At almost age 90, as I contemplate my inevitable (and possibly imminent) physical death, I keep wondering how we can best ‘be in this world but not of this world’ while remembering that we are immortal spirit – not mere embodied mortals – experiencing unique lifetimes, karmically predetermined to help us learn and see our true self-identity. And how we can keep alert for constant potential lessons and blessings in our lives.

I have been blessed with unforgettable fleeting ‘peek’ spiritual experiences demonstrating that earth life is like a ‘light show’ – an illusory play of consciousness. Yet, I’m often deeply moved by the insanity, violence and suffering now rife on our precious planet, and often wonder how we can best address it.

Questions.

As we awaken from the illusion of our apparent separateness from each other and Nature:

Is it possible for us to live in this impermanent world of inevitable suffering, without responding compassionately and emotionally to the immense miseries and apparent injustices experienced everywhere by countless sentient beings?

How can we most skillfully and compassionately address ubiquitous world misery, injustice and suffering?

Discussion.

Each of us has a unique perspective with unique karmic causes and conditions. So I am unqualified to offer specific spiritual advice to anyone else. But, encouraged by my Guruji to share spiritual learning experiences, I offer the following views, in case they may help others.

I believe that even highly elevated incarnate beings cannot always live emotionally detached from ubiquitous misery and suffering. But that we can all best respond compassionately and intuitively, rather than react reflexively, while peacefully remaining self-identified as incarnate universal spirit, rather than as separate ego-minds.

Recently I learned that – even while experiencing transcendent states of consciousness – Indian Holy Man and Avatar, Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa, suffered bereavements on deaths of a nephew, older brother, and beloved attendant. Similarly Swami Paramahansa Yogananda experienced deep bereavement on death of his mother, and significant emotional trauma following a betrayal and lawsuit by his former trusted childhood best friend and assistant, Dhirananda.

Yet, Yogananda later explained in Autobiography of a Yogi, Chapter 30, his view that:“This earth is nothing but movies to me.”

But (except for psychopaths) aren’t we all often autonomically emotionally attuned with others when with them or thinking of them, and even in viewing videos, movies and plays?

Background

In my student days I learned of maniacs like Hitler in Nazi Germany, Mao in Communist China, Stalin in the U.S.S.R., Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and numerous other dictators who were then bestially causing untold murders and misery. Naively, I then believed that my country the U.S.A., and its Western allies, represented only virtues of good and democratic decency, and that after the demise of World War II era psychopaths, the world would be restored to a utopian age of peace and prosperity. But I was wrong.

I slowly realized that the U.S.A. was becoming a violent and totalitarian police state, rather than a socially benevolent democracy – especially beginning with the legally unprecedented and undemocratic U.S. Supreme Court selection of George W. Bush as 43rd US President (after patently flawed Florida elections).

Bush’s inauguration was soon followed by outrageous false flag terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, which purportedly justified a preplanned series of unprovoked and unlawful U.S. invasions of sovereign middle East countries on the fraudulent pretense that they threatened us with further “terrorism” because of (non-existent) alleged “weapons of mass destruction”.

So (like Professor Howard Zinn), I began feeling that I was living in an ‘occupied country’; that the so-called “American dream” of Presidents Ronald Reagan, et.al. had become a global nightmare of a rapaciously violent uni-polar empire threatening all life on Earth.

Current perspectives.

Never before did I imagine how far purportedly democratic world societies and the U.S. government ‘of by and the for the people’ would degenerate. Nor until recently did I realize that neither of the two dominant U.S. political parties provides an alternative to a rapaciously violent worldwide American empire threatening possible nuclear or ecologic or biologic catastrophe.

Optimistically, I believe that the present post-pandemic “new normal” era has been a “red pill” portent of the end of empire; that it is awakening a critical mass of concerned humans who will no longer tolerate current global hegemonic tyranny with unsustainable, unjust, immoral, and criminal exploitation of life on our precious planet; and, that we will at long last democratically and compassionately avert human caused calamity, by ending totalitarian governments by and for psychopathic billionaires, and replacing them with democratic governments by and for all people and all life on our precious planet Earth.

Aspirations.

May current global insanity and suffering soon awaken humankind to a new democratic era of compassionate concern for all life everywhere. Yet may it also inspire us to realize, like Swami Yogananda, that this world is “nothing but movies”; that it is an illusory mental projection of shadow and light displayed to help us “get to the beam” – which is the Eternal Light of LOVE.


Invocation.

Whatever happens in this ever impermanent illusory world of inevitable suffering, may we never forget our eternal oneness with Nature and all earth-life, and may we ever emanate universal peace and happiness, while realizing that this world is “nothing but movies”.


And so shall it be!

Ron Rattner


Infinite Potential ~ Dawning of a New Age


“That which is truly alive in the living being is the energy of spirit,
and this is never born and never dies.”
~ David Bohm

“Space is not empty. It’s full.
It is the ground for the existence of everything,
including ourselves”
~ David Bohm

“Objective reality does not exist” ….

“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm


Dr. David Bohm ~ December 20, 1917 – October 27, 1992


Introduction to “Infinite Potential ~ Dawning of a New Age”

Dear Friends,

We have reached a rare turning point in modern human history. Confronted by dire anthropogenic threats to extinction of life on Earth as we’ve known it, our species is awakening from eons of darkness to a prophesied new enlightened Earth age, as we realize our infinite potential as wholeness and oneness with our eternal spiritual Source.

Thus a “critical mass” of Humankind will soon be energetically uplifted to co-create a compassionate world, dynamically harmonious with Nature and all life everywhere – a “new reality” foreseen for millennia by non-materialist mystic seers.

Today’s posting commemorates the imminent advent of this awakened new age by posthumously honoring Dr. David Bohm a brilliant theoretical physicist, philosopher and author, who Einstein called his “spiritual son” and the Dalai Lama his “science guru”. Dr. Bohm’s groundbreaking theories may soon scientifically confirm ancient spiritual wisdom, and support humankind’s “critical mass” realization of our previously unimagined infinite potentiality.

This posting includes an introductory outline of Dr. Bohm’s history, followed by a carefully culled collection of key Bohm quotations, and a highly recommended embedded documentary video titled “Infinite Potential The Life and Ideas of David Bohm”.

It is intended to help us intuit, envision and co-create the dynamic new reality we want to see.

Infinite Potential The Life and Ideas of David Bohm

Embedded below is a highly recommended documentary film about Dr. David Bohm. Here is an almost verbatim summary of the filmmakers’ description of its contents, followed by a brief addendum of relevant facts about Dr. Bohm’s historic relationship with Albert Einstein.

The Life and Ideas Of David Bohm

An incredible journey into the nature of life and Reality with David Bohm, the man Einstein called his “spiritual son” and the Dalai Lama his “science guru”.

A brilliant theoretical physicist, Bohm got the attention of the greatest minds in science, including Robert Oppenheimer, who became his thesis advisor.

Bohm’s scientific insights into the underlying nature of reality and the profound interconnectedness of the Universe and our place within it are ground-breaking and transformational.

But his revolutionary ideas were way ahead of their time and posed a threat to the scientific orthodoxy, which dismissed him and forced him into exile.

His questioning of the scientific orthodoxy was the expression of a rare and maverick intelligence. He shows us that the nature of reality is infinite and believed in a “hidden” regime of reality – the Quantum Potential – that underlies all of creation and which will remain beyond scientific endeavor, an idea echoed by many mystical traditions.

We are all participants and observers in the emergence of a reality…the Observer is the Observed. Bohm shows us that we are all co-producers of a possible future in which personal and global transformation is possible.

He invites us on a journey into the heart of our being, into consciousness itself…

Addendum re Dr. Bohm’s historic relationship with Albert Einstein.

For the last twenty two years of his life Einstein was a fellow at the Princeton Institute For Advanced Study where he met and befriended Dr. David Bohm, then a young member of the Princeton University physics department. Dr. Bohm became Einstein’s Princeton protégé who Einstein called his “spiritual son”, and with whom he exchanged letters after Bohm’s forced departure from Princeton during the notorious McCarthy era of American politics. Perhaps better than anyone else Dr. Bohm learned how Einstein had intuitively formulated his revolutionary theories.

With that understanding, Bohm conceptualized reality as “undivided wholeness”. And Bohm realized that the profound implications of Einstein’s insights have not yet changed mainstream physicists’ predominantly Newtonian mental models of solidity, invariance, and three dimensional space/time, influenced by their benefitting from immense weapons industry investments.

And in his writings, Bohm (a rare scientific maverick) explicitly explained how a new mode of dynamic thinking beyond physics was required to enable recognition and resolution of the many anthropogenic difficulties causing insane and dire threats of extinction of Earth-life as we’ve known it.

Thus Bohm used many new words for the holistic principle of “undivided wholeness”, such as “implicate order”, “quantum potential field”, and “holomovement” to express that nothing is static; that everything is in “universal flux”, a dynamic interconnected process of infinitely becoming.

Bohm’s innovative conceptualizations of “undivided wholeness” were intended to radically shift our thinking about reality, away from terms of separation, to motion or process. Similarly Bohm also tried to imagine ways of using language which emphasized verbs, rather than separate subjects and objects.

Despite his immense achievements, Bohm is still relatively unknown because of Robert Oppenheimer’s influential opposition to Bohm’s theoretical work, which Oppenheimer could not mathematically refute. Realizing that Bohm radically challenged mainstream physics, Oppenheimer called Bohm’s ideas, “juvenile deviationism,” saying that, “if we cannot disprove Bohm, then we must agree to ignore him.”


Dr. David Bohm, Quotations Collection Concerning Physical Reality, Spiritual Philosophy, and Cosmology



“That which is truly alive in the living being is the energy of spirit,
and this is never born and never dies.”

”The essential quality of the infinite… is its subtlety, its intangibility.
This quality is conveyed in the word spirit, whose root meaning is ‘wind or breath.’ This suggests an invisible but pervasive energy to which the manifest world of the finite responds.”

“Consciousness is never static or complete but is an unending process of movement and unfoldment.”


“Space is not empty. It’s full. It is the ground for the existence of everything, including ourselves”

“We could say that practically all the problems of the human race are due to the fact that thought is not proprioceptive.”

“To change your reality you have to change your inner thoughts.”

“Thought creates our world, and then says ‘I didn’t do it”

“If our troubles originate in a kind of ‘ocean’ of thought and language, in which we are submerged, but of which we are only dimly aware, it would seem reasonable to begin immediately to inquire into the actual function of our thought and language. To do this requires, of course, that we give this function our serious attention. We do give such attention to a vast range of things, including nature, technology, politics, economics, society, psychological problems, and so forth. Why should thought and language be the one field left to function automatically and mechanically, without serious attention, so that the resulting confusion vitiates most of what we try to do in all other fields?”

“Objective reality does not exist” ….
“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”


“What appears to be a stable, tangible, visible, audible world, is an illusion.
It is dynamic and kaleidoscopic — not really “there”. 
What we normally see is the explicit, or unfolded, order of things, rather like watching a movie.
 But there is an underlying order that is mother and father to this second-generation reality.”

“It is proposed that the widespread and pervasive distinctions between people (race, nation, family, profession, etc., etc.) which are now preventing mankind from working together for the common good, and indeed, even for survival, have one of the key factors of their origin in a kind of thought that treats things as inherently divided, disconnected, and “broken up” into yet smaller constituent parts. . . . . Each part is considered to be essentially independent and self-existent.”
 
“The notion that all these fragments is separately existent is evidently an illusion, and this illusion cannot do other than lead to endless conflict and confusion. Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today.” 
 

“Thus, as is now well known, this way of life has brought about pollution, destruction of the balance of nature, over-population, world-wide economic and political disorder and the creation of an overall environment that is neither physically nor mentally healthy for most of the people who live in it.” 
 


“Individually there has developed a widespread feeling of helplessness and despair, in the face of what seems to be an overwhelming mass of disparate social forces, going beyond the control and even the comprehension of the human beings who are caught up in it.”

“some might say: ‘Fragmentation of cities, religions, political systems, conflict in the form of wars, general violence, fratricide, etc., are the reality. Wholeness is only an ideal, toward which we should perhaps strive.’ But this is not what is being said here. Rather, what should be said is that wholeness is what is real, and that fragmentation is the response of this whole to man’s action, guided by illusory perception, which is shaped by fragmentary thought.”

“From the point of view of the species, death is part of this whole process. You could say that species have evolved in such a way that individual members last a certain time. Perhaps a certain kind of species would be better able to survive if the individuals didn’t last too long. Other kinds could last longer.”

“Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today.”

“During the past few decades, modern technology, with radio, TV, air travel, and satellites, has woven a network of communication which puts each part of the world in to almost instant contact with all the other parts.”

Yet, in spite of this world-wide system of linkages, there is, at this very moment, a general feeling that communication is breaking down everywhere, on an unparalleled scale.

“We are all linked by a fabric of unseen connections. This fabric is constantly changing and evolving. This field is directly structured and influenced by our behavior and by our understanding.”

“We are internally related to everything, not [just] externally related. Consciousness is an internal relationship to the whole, we take in the whole, and we act toward the whole. Whatever we have taken in determines basically what we are. Wholeness is a kind of attitude or approach to the whole of life. If we can have a coherent approach to reality then reality will respond coherently to us.”

“Ultimately, the entire universe…has to be understood as a single undivided whole.”

“The question is how our own meanings are related to those of the universe as a whole. We could say that our action toward the whole universe is a result of what it means to be us.”

“[T]here is a universal flux that cannot be defined explicitly but which can be known only implicitly, as indicated by the explicitly definable forms and shapes, some stable and some unstable, that can be abstracted from the universal flux. In this flow, mind and matter are not separate substances. Rather, they are different aspects of our whole and unbroken movement.”

“We could say that practically all the problems of the human race are due to the fact that thought is not proprioceptive.”

“The ability to perceive or think differently is more important than the knowledge gained.”

“Space is not empty. It is full, a plenum as opposed to a vacuum, and is the ground for the existence of everything, including ourselves. The universe is not separate from this cosmic sea of energy.”

“Ultimately, all moments are really one, therefore now is an eternity.”

“Thought runs you. Thought, however, gives false info that you are running it, that you are the one who controls it. Whereas actually thought is the one which controls each one of us.”

“In Nature nothing remains constant. Everything is in a perpetual state of transformation, motion and change.”

“In the long run, it is far more dangerous to adhere to illusion than to face what the actual fact is.”

“Individuality is only possible if it unfolds from wholeness.”

“Dialogue is a space where we may see the assumptions which lay beneath the surface of our thoughts, assumptions which drive us, assumptions around which we build organizations, create economies, form nations and religions. These assumptions become habitual, mental habits that drive us, confuse us and prevent our responding intelligently to the challenges we face every day.”

“Suppose we were able to share meanings freely without a compulsive urge to impose our view or conform to those of others and without distortion and self-deception. Would this not constitute a real revolution in culture.”

“Deep down the consciousness of mankind is one. This is a virtual certainty because even in the vacuum matter is one; and if we don’t see this, it’s because we are blinding ourselves to it.”

“In some sense man is a microcosm of the universe; therefore what man is, is a clue to the universe. We are enfolded in the universe.”

“There is a difficulty with only one person changing. People call that person a great saint or a great mystic or a great leader, and they say, ‘Well, he’s different from me – I could never do it.’ What’s wrong with most people is that they have this block – they feel they could never make a difference, and therefore, they never face the possibility, because it is too disturbing, too frightening.”

“Perhaps there is more sense in our nonsense and more nonsense in our ‘sense’ than we would care to believe.”

“Consciousness is much more of the implicate order than is matter… Yet at a deeper level [matter and consciousness] are actually inseparable and interwoven, just as in the computer game the player and the screen are united by participation.”

“…consciousness is a coherent whole, which is never static or complete, but which is in an unending process of movement and unfoldment.”

“If you engage in positive thinking to overcome negative thoughts, the negative thoughts are still there acting. That’s still incoherence. It’s not enough just to engage in positive thoughts when you have negative thoughts registered, because they keep on working and will cause trouble somewhere else.”

“Thought is constantly creating problems that way and then trying to solve them. But as it tries to solve them it makes it worse because it doesn’t notice that it’s creating them, and the more it thinks, the more problems it creates.”

“Similarly, thought is a system. That system not only includes thought and feelings, but it includes the state of the body; it includes the whole of society – as thought is passing back and forth between people in a process by which thought evolved from ancient times.”

“When you are thinking something, you have the feeling that the thoughts do nothing except inform you the way things are and then you choose to do something and you do it. That’s what people generally assume. But actually, the way you think determines the way you’re going to do things. Then you don’t notice a result comes back, or you don’t see it as a result of what you’ve done, or even less do you see it as a result of how you were thinking. Is that clear?”

“Dialogue is really aimed at going into the whole thought process and changing the way the thought process occurs collectively. We haven’t really paid much attention to thought as a process. We have engaged in thoughts, put we have only paid attention to the content, not to the process. Why does thought require attention? Everything requires attention, really. If we ran machines without paying attention to them, they would break down. Our thought, too, is a process, and it requires attention, otherwise its going to go wrong.”

“We have the idea that after we have been thinking something, it just evaporates. But thinking doesn’t disappear. It goes somehow into the brain and leaves something-a trace-which becomes thought. And thought then acts automatically.”

“We haven’t really paid much attention to thought as a process. we have engaged in thoughts, but we have only paid attention to the content, not to the process.”

“In nature nothing remains constant. Everything is in a perpetual state of transformation, motion, and change. However, we discover that nothing simply surges up out of nothing without having antecedents that existed before. Likewise, nothing ever disappears without a trace, in the sense that it gives rise to absolutely nothing existing in later times.”

“The notion of a separate organism is clearly an abstraction, as is also its boundary. Underlying all this is unbroken wholeness even though our civilization has developed in such a way as to strongly emphasize the separation into parts.”

“Then there is the further question of what is the relationship of thinking to reality. As careful attention shows, thought itself is in an actual process of movement.”

“If we can be cheered up by positive images we can be depressed by negative ones. As long as we accept images as realities we are in that trap, because you can’t control the images.”

“It is proposed that a form of free dialogue may well be one of the most effective ways of investigating the crisis which faces society, and indeed the whole of human nature and consciousness today. Moreover, it may turn out that such a form of free exchange of ideas and information is of fundamental relevance for transforming culture and freeing it of destructive misinformation, so that creativity can be liberated.”

“Ego-centeredness is not individuality at all.”

“Thought reflexes get conditioned very strongly, and they are very hard to change. And the also interfere. A reflex may connect to the endorphins and produce an impulse to hold that whole pattern forther. In other words, it produces a defensive reflex. Not merely is it stuck because it’s chemically so well built up, but also there is a defensive reflex which defends against evidence which might weaken it. Thus it all happens, one reflex after another after another. It’s just a vast system of reflexes. And they form a ‘structure’ as they get more rigid.”

“What is needed is to learn afresh, to observe, and to discover for ourselves the meaning of wholeness.”

“Thus, in a dialogue each person does not attempt to make common certain ideas or items of information that are already known to him. Rather, it can be said that collectively they are making something in common”

“Yet, in spite of this world-wide system of linkages, there is, at this very moment, a general feeling that communication is breaking down everywhere, on an unparalleled scale.”

“Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today.”

“The system [of thought] doesn’t stay with the difficult problem that produces unpleasant feelings. It’s conditioned somehow to move as fast as it can toward more pleasant feelings, without actually facing the thing that’s making the unpleasant feeling.”

“Another problem of fragmentation is that thought divides itself from feeling and from the body. Thought is said to be the mind; we have the notion that it is something abstract or spiritual or immaterial. Then there is the body, which is very physical. And we have emotions, which are perhaps somewhere in between. The idea is that they are all different. That is, we think of them as different. And we experience them as different because we think of them as different.”

“Thought is creating divisions out of itself and then saying that they are there naturally.”

“This is another major feature of thought: Thought doesn’t know it is doing something and then it struggles against it is doing. It doesn’t want to know that it is doing it.”

“My suggestion is that at each state the proper order of operation of the mind requires an overall grasp of what is generally known, not only in formal logical, mathematical terms, but also intuitively, in images, feelings, poetic usage of language, etc.”

“individual thought is mostly the result of collective thought and of interaction with other people. The language is entirely collective, and most of the thoughts in it are. Everybody does his own thing to those thoughts – he makes a contribution. But very few change them very much.”

“We have reversed the usual classical notion that the independent “elementary parts” of the world are the fundamental reality, and that the various systems are merely particular contingent forms and arrangements of these parts. Rather, we say that inseparable quantum interconnectedness of the whole universe is the fundamental reality, and that relatively independent behaving parts are merely particular and contingent forms within this whole.”

“And thought struggles against the results, trying to avoid those unpleasant results while keeping on with that way of thinking. That is what I call ‘sustained incoherence.”

“There is no reason why an extra-physical general principle is necessarily to be avoided, since such principles could conceivably serve as useful working hypotheses. For the history of scientific research is full of examples in which it was very fruitful indeed to assume that certain objects or elements might be real, long before any procedures were known which would permit them to be observed directly.”

“Then there is the further question of what is the relationship of thinking to reality. As careful attention shows, thought itself is in an actual process of movement. That is to say, one can feel a sense of flow in the stream of consciousness not dissimilar to the sense of flow in the movement of matter in general. May not thought itself thus be a part of reality as a whole? But then, what could it mean for one part of reality to ‘know’ another, and to what extent would this be possible?”

“A new kind of mind thus beings to come into being which is based on the development of a common meaning that is constantly transforming in the process of the dialogue.”

“Real dialogue is where two or more people become willing to suspend their certainty in each other’s presence.”

“People are no longer primarily in opposition, nor can they be said to be interacting, rather they are participating in this pool of common meaning which is capable of constant development and change.”

“We can’t simply take the way things seem and just work on that, because that would be another kind of mistake thought makes-taking the surface and calling it the reality.”

“Anybody can use science and technology without fundamentally altering his own frame of mind which governs how they are used.”

“The treatment of the indeterminacy principle as absolute and final can then be criticized as constituting an arbitrary restriction on scientific theories, since it does not follow from the quantum theory as such, but rather from the assumption of the unlimited validity of certain of its features, an assumption that can in no way ever be subjected to experimental proof.”

“The question of relevance comes before that of truth, because to ask whether a statement is true or false presupposes that it is relevant (so that to try to assert the truth or falsity of an irrelevant statement is a form of confusion).”

“If each one of us can give full attention to what is actually ‘blocking’ communication while he is also attending properly to the content of what is communicated, then we may be able to create something new between us, something of very great significance for bringing to an end the at present insoluble problems of the individual and of society.”

“In relativity, movement is continuous, causally determinate and well defined, while in quantum mechanics it is discontinuous, not causally determinate and not well defined.”

“One thus sees that a new kind of theory is needed which drops these basic commitments and at most recovers some essential features of the older theories as abstract forms derived from a deeper reality in which what prevails in unbroken wholeness.”

“Thus, in scientific research, a great deal of our thinking is in terms of theories. The word ‘theory’ derives from the Greek ‘theoria’, which has the same root as ‘theatre’, in a word meaning ‘to view’ or ‘to make a spectacle’. Thus, it might be said that a theory is primarily a form of insight, i.e. a way of looking at the world, and not a form of knowledge of how the world is.”

“But what is [the] quality of originality? It is very hard to define or specify. Indeed, to define originality would in itself be a contradiction, since whatever action can be defined in this way must evidently henceforth be unoriginal. Perhaps, then, it will be best to hint at it obliquely and by indirection, rather than to try to assert positively what it is.

One prerequisite for originality is clearly that a person shall not be inclined to impose his preconceptions on the fact as he sees it. Rather, he must be able to learn something new, even if this means that the ideas and notions that are comfortable or dear to him may be overturned.

“But the way people commonly use the word nowadays it means something all of whose parts are mutually interdependent – not only for their mutual action, but for their meaning and for their existence.”

“A corporation is organized as a system – it has this department, that department, that department… they don’t have any meaning separately; they only can function together. And also the body is a system. Society is a system in some sense. And so on.”

“So one begins to wonder what is going to happen to the human race. Technology keeps on advancing with greater and greater power, either for good or for destruction.”

“From the outset, however, this whole controversy has been plagued by tacit assumptions, very often of a philosophical rather than a physical character.”

“This kind of overall way of thinking is not only a fertile source of new theoretical ideas: it is needed for the human mind to function in a generally harmonious way, which could in turn help to make possible an orderly and stable society.”

“violence doesn’t stop merely by saying, ‘we’ll act based on love’, because that can become just an idea that gets absorbed into the system.”

“If you are going to ask what state of feeling goes with understanding, I am afraid that it will have to be described by the word “love”. This word has unfortunately been used in so many false ways that it hardly means anything nowadays. Yet, I think that by implication, the meaning will come across. For example, some parents claim they “love” their children, but do not understand them. Is this really possible? If they do not understand what their children actually are, then the beings for whom they feel love must be imaginary, just projections of the parent’s own minds. Thus, what the parents actually “love” is not their actual children, but rather, some projections of themselves. Such a love is evidently false. Evidently, there can be no real love without understanding. Vice versa, can there be understanding without love? If we hate something, we reject it and do not understand it. . . . If we are indifferent to something, we will never undertake the arduous task of understanding it. If something pleases us, we will be afraid to look at its dark side, and again we won’t understand it, i.e., see it wholly and totally. So it seems that the only feeling that will lead to the action of understanding is love.”


Infinite Potential – The Life & Ideas Of David Bohm



We Are The Universe!

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”

~ Albert Einstein
“Objective reality does not exist” ….

“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm, Quantum Physicist
“Every particle of the world is a mirror.
In each atom lies the blazing light of a thousand suns.”
~  Mahmud Shabestari, Sufi Mystic, 15th century.
“There is an endless net of threads throughout the universe.

The horizontal threads are in space.
 The vertical threads are in time.
At every crossing of the threads, there is an individual.

And every individual is a crystal bead.
 And every crystal bead reflects not only the light
 from every other crystal in the net,

but also every other reflection throughout the entire universe.”
~ Indra’s Net – from the Vedas of ancient India, 7000 years old
“Reality” isn’t REAL!

“Reality” is a holographic theater of the mind,
where we are microcosmic mirrors of the macrocosm.

~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings





Introduction

Dear Friends,

The following written and recited poetic verses, together with explanatory comments and above quotations, supplement the related “What Is The Universe?” posting.

Both postings propose that cosmically “We Are The Universe”. They are intended to help us open our hearts to all beings and all life everywhere.

Please consider them accordingly.

Ron Rattner


We Are The Universe!

The “universe” is like a cosmic hologram:

An ever changing but persistent illusion
appearing in an eternal, immutable,
infinite ocean of Awareness –

Awareness arising from pure potentiality.

Each of us is an integral, pin-point part of the whole picture,
which wouldn’t be complete without us.

But, though we appear as only a speck of the Whole,
we are like parts of a hologram;

Hidden within each of us is the whole cosmic picture,
and the awareness screen
on which we envision and project the picture.

In our Essence, we and the “universe” are ONE.

So, we are the “universe”.



Ron’s audio recitation of “We Are The Universe”

Listen to


Ron’s reflections on Non-dualism and “We Are The Universe”

Dear Friends,

Today’s We Are The Universe! posting together with the related “What Is The Universe?” posting propose that cosmically “We Are The Universe”.

These and many more SillySutras writings pertain to non-dualism – an important philosophy which has inspired many recent Silly Sutras writings about spiritual evolution and the nature of “reality”.

From childhood we have been taught to self-identify only with an illusory and disempowering ego image; with a separate body, name, gender, and story about who and what we are. We are taught that we are each born into Nature as limited mortal beings; but not that Nature is our nature, or that we are Beings of Light sharing limitless immortal cosmic consciousness with all life-forms.

Thus, for countless ages human ignorance of our true identity and immortality, has resulted in our hallucination of separation from Nature, from each other, and from our sole Self and spirit, with consequent destructive selfishness and suffering.

Yet, for millennia sages, seers and mystics have been trying to tell us that we inevitably suffer from radically mistaken self-identity; that our self-identity and reality are not what they appear to be; that it is possible to limit or avoid most suffering of ordinary human existence through experiential self-identification with the unseen Eternal spiritual Source of all space-time causality ‘reality’.

Soon after my mid-life change of life, I began discovering enduring wisdom teachings about the Vedic path of Advaita, the oldest extant school of Indian Philosophy. Advaita means non-dualism, and its teachings are about experiencing non-dual Self Realization via focused self-inquiry – relentlessly asking “Who am I?”.

I first found these teachings in books by or about legendary Indian sages J. Krishnamurti, Swami Vivekananda, and Shri Ramana Maharshi; also in New Dimensions Radio interviews by Michael Toms, and in KPFA radio lectures by Alan Watts, contemporary Western philosopher/teacher of Eastern spiritual wisdom, from which I learned about similar Buddhist and Taoist non-dualist philosophies.

After initial perplexity, I gradually became convinced of the ultimate Truth of non-dualistic teachings, as eloquently explained by Swami Vivekananda that:

“…this separation between man and man, between nation and nation, between earth and moon, between moon and sun . . does not exist, it is not real” ; and that
“Your own will is all that answers prayer, only it appears under the guise of different religious conceptions to each mind. We may call it Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, but it is only the Self, the ‘I’.”
~ Swami Vivekananda – “Jnana Yoga”


Non-dualism has even seemed quite consistent with the primary prayer of my early Jewish acculturation:

“Hear O Israel the Lord our God, the Lord is ONE”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4; Mark 12:29


Yet, while accepting Eastern non-dualism wisdom teachings, I have continuously displayed preponderantly devotional propensities of praying, calling and crying to the Divine. And in reading hagiographies I have most identified with Saint Francis of Assisi and Shri Ramakrishna Paramahansa – both extremely ascetic and devotional holy men – more than with the wisdom teachers who introduced me to non-dualism.

Until retirement, while maintaining my busy law practice I found limited time to read and reflect on non-dualism teachings, except on weekends. So I used to jestingly tell spiritual friends that on weekdays I prayed and cried as a devotional bhakta, but that on weekends I became a “Seventh Day Advaitist”.

Ultimately, I’ve become an every day – not just a seventh day – Advaitist. So whimsically I sometimes say that I am now a devotionally open-minded “Advaitist-fundamentalist”.

While accepting non-dualism, my primary path seems devotional. Over forty years since beginning to cry for God, I still frequently display devotional tendencies of spontaneously praying, singing, and calling to the Divine. Apparently, my Guruji was quite prescient in naming me Rasik – “one engrossed in devotion”.

As a devotional “Advaitist-Fundamentalist” I have composed many poems and essays encouraging the heartfelt path of ‘non-dualism’ – including today’s “We Are The Universe” quotations and poem.

May these writings help remind, encourage and inspire us to open our hearts with deep empathy and compassion for all people and all Life everywhere.

And so may it be!

Ron Rattner


We Create “Reality”

Embedded below is a helpful 10 minute YouTube video montage titled “We Create “Reality””, previously linked on the related What Is the Universe posting


What is the Universe?

“There is no reality but God,

says the completely surrendered sheik,
who is an ocean for all beings.”
~ Rumi
“Everything you see has its roots in the unseen world.
The forms may change,
yet the essence remains the same. ….
The source is within you
And this whole world is springing up from it.”
~ Rumi
“You are not IN the universe,
you ARE the universe, an intrinsic part of it.
Ultimately you are not a person,
but a focal point where the universe is becoming conscious of itself.
What an amazing miracle.”
~ Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth
“Through our eyes, the universe is perceiving itself.
Through our ears, the universe is listening to its harmonies.
We are the witnesses through which the universe becomes conscious of its glory, of its magnificence.”
~ Alan Watts
“In oneself lies the whole world,
and if you know how to look and learn,
then the door is there and the key is in your hand.
Nobody on earth can give you either that key or the door to open,
except yourself.”
~ J. Krishnamurti
“The world, indeed, is like a dream and the treasures of the world are an alluring mirage! Like the apparent distances in a picture, things have no reality in themselves, but they are like heat haze.”
~ Buddha
“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,
does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
~ Albert Einstein
“Nothing perceivable is real. Your attachment is your bondage. You cannot control the future.
There is no such thing as free will. Will is bondage. You identify yourself with your desires and become their slave.”
~ Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Objective reality does not exist” …. “the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm
“Reality” isn’t REAL!

“Reality” is a holographic theater of the mind,

where we are the unseen Source
of the World we see.”

~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings

 



What is the Universe?

Q. What is the Universe?

A. The “Universe” is a word – an idea –
symbolizing Humankind’s perception of a space/time/causality “reality”.

But, space/time/causality
is an illusionary relative reality
of apparently separate forms and phenomena;

An ever impermanent appearance of
ONE eternally immanent Ultimate Reality –

An Ultimate Reality which is Infinite Potentiality
beyond space/time/causality;

An Ultimate Reality beyond conceptuality –
unimaginable, incomprehensible, and inexpressible;

An Ultimate Reality eternally and infinitely
appearing and disappearing
as ephemeral forms and phenomena,
from infinite space/time perspectives;

An Ultimate Reality eternally and infinitely
expressing and experiencing

ITSELF!



Ron’s audio recitation of “What is the Universe?”

Listen to


Ron’s explanation of why “We Are The Universe”

Dear Friends,

Have you ever read or heard that: “We are the universe” or that “You are the world”?  Such statements have been attributed to various prominent spiritual teachers, including Alan Watts, Deepak Chopra, J. Krishnamurti, and Eckhart Tolle.  

Only after my midlife change of life did I encounter and begin wondering about these teachings. Understanding their meaning has proved very helpful in my life.  So today I have posted the foregoing important quotations and a brief essay/poem, which were inspired by what (I think) I’ve learned about these teachings.

Soon after my midlife awakening as pure awareness – which cracked, but didn’t destroy, my self-woven ‘karmic cocoon’ – I was given numerous glimpses of previously unknown clairvoyant and psychic phenomena which persuaded me that the universe didn’t work the way I’d been taught or thought.   

Having realized – but not always remembered – that I was pure awareness and not just my physical body and its story, I began wondering about the true nature of this world and the universe which we seem to inhabit.   To satisfy my newly aroused cosmic curiosities I began reading teachings of Indian philosopher J. Krishnamurti  who was then known worldwide as a contemporary sage. Initially I read a  Krishnamurti book which was was intriguingly entitled:

“You Are The World”.

The book included a Krishnamurti  talk at Stanford University containing this perplexing statement:

In oneself lies the whole world, and if you know how to look and learn, then the door is there and the key is in your hand. Nobody on earth can give you either that key or the door to open, except yourself.”


   
What did Krishnamurti mean?  How could the whole world be within us? 

Though puzzled, I was determined to understand Krishnamurti’s enigmatic assertion.  And gradually that seemed to happen.  

Ultimately I deduced that since Ron was pure awareness encompassing a transient body/mind, so too was everyone and everything else in space/time; that, therefore, all humans share common Cosmic consciousness which encompasses, perceives and projects the world.  

But, because  we  mistakenly perceive and believe ourselves to be separate from each other and Nature, we suffer individually and societally from the universal law of cause and effect – karma.   Thus, our misconceptions of separateness create an illusory world of suffering.

However, as gradually we unselfishly open our hearts with compassion beyond personal desires and affections, our karmic sufferings diminish, and we reap increasing happiness.    As astutely observed by Albert Einstein:


“A human being is a part of a whole, called by us ‘universe’, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest… a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is, in itself, a part of the liberation, and a foundation for inner security.” 

( N. Y. Times , March 29, 1972)


Einstein also revealed to us that what we perceive as ‘reality’ “is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”; and that  “space and time are not conditions in which we live, they are modes in which we think”.

Mystics say that ultimately, upon Self Realization of our true divine identity, our sufferings ceace. In the meanwhile, we avoid or reduce suffering by behaving with remembrance that this space/time world isn’t really real, but an “optical delusion of .. consciousness.”    So, according to the Buddha,


“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,

does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”


To help us “escape the suffering” of this crazy world, today’s profound quotations and “What is the Universe?” essay/poem can remind us of our true divine self-identity as Universal Awareness – that we ARE the Universe. Also embedded below is a highly recommended and very pithy 10 minute YouTube video montage titled “We Create “Reality””

May these writings and video encourage and inspire us to live ever happier and soul fulfilling lives, as gradually we compassionately open our hearts to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature – as we remember that we are the unseen Source of the World we see.

And so may it be!

Ron Rattner

We Create “Reality”



How Can We Think More Objectively?

“Objective reality does not exist” ….

“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”

~ David Bohm, quantum physicist
“This whole creation is essentially subjective,
and the dream is the theater where the dreamer is at once:
scene, actor, prompter, stage manager, author, audience, and critic.”

~ Carl Gustav Jung
“We are formed and molded by our thoughts.
Those whose minds are shaped by selfless thoughts
give joy when they speak or act.
Joy follows them like a shadow that never leaves them.”
~ Buddha
“Those who know how to think need no teachers.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“Objectivity is an illusory impossibility.”
“All concepts are mental projections of Cosmic Consciousness.
But for name – subject and object are same.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings




How Can We Think More Objectively?

Q. How can we think more objectively?

A. We can’t. Objectivity is an illusory impossibility.

Thinking objectively is an oxymoronic misconception.
All thought is subjective; so everyone thinks subjectively.

All concepts are mental projections
of Cosmic Consciousness.

But for name – subject and object are same.

To transcend thinking in the ‘subject-object’ box,
we can intuit our wholeness – as and beyond subject and object.

And realizing that Cosmic Consciousness is our eternal essence,

We can more and more think intuitively, holistically, compassionately and lovingly – but sparingly.

So, with our Heart, not our head,
may we think less, and BE more –

NOW!


Ron’s comments about thinking “objectively”.

Dear Friends,

Do you accept ideas of individual or institutional “objectivity”?

If so, you may question the above posting which contends that scientifically and spiritually: “Objectivity is an illusory impossibility”; that without a separate subject there can be no separate object, and that “our (apparent) separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”

Like most Westerners I grew up imbued with ideals of honesty and “objectivity” of our scientific, academic, journalistic and judicial institutions. However, as a social justice lawyer in increasingly dystopian times, I’ve become skeptical of those “objectivity” ideas and ideals.
  
But only after my midlife spiritual awakening, did I begin realizing that ultimate objectivity is an illusory impossibility; that the idea of objectivity refers only to a pre-relativity Newtonian world-view of apparently separate energy forms and phenomena, in which we’ve mistakenly measured matter and phenomena which are perceivable, but excluded Cosmic consciousness – the non-dual immeasurable and imperceivable matrix and Source of all our ego-mind conceptions of ‘reality’.

Ultimately I’ve intuited (and irreversibly concurred with quantum physicist David Bohm) that “Objective reality does not exist” that ….“the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram” . Thus that all humanly perceived forms or phenomena are merely impermanent holographic projections of immeasurable consciousness – of ONE Reality beyond space/time causality/duality.

Despite last century’s revolutionary scientific discoveries of relativity and quantum physics, most materialistic mainstream scientists remain reluctant to recognize the impossibility of accurately describing Nature through ‘objective’ measurement. Nor do they yet confirm Nobel Prize-winning physicist Max Planck’s description of matter

“as derivative from consciousness”; so that “science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of Nature.  …. because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are part of Nature and therefore part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.”


So still only cutting edge scientists recognize verity of Einstein’s relativity revelations that

“there is no matter”; that “what we have called matter is energy, whose vibration has been so lowered as to be perceptible to the senses”; that “our (apparent) separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”


The foregoing Q and A essay and quotations are shared to help us understand how scientifically and spiritually “objectivity” is an illusory abstraction, causing mistaken belief in the supposed objective ‘reality’ of what we subjectively project and perceive.

Dedication

May reflection on these writings help inspire our evolutionary realization that space/time’s relative ‘reality’, like a mirage, is merely an illusory subjective mental projection of Cosmic Consciousness – our eternal essence and ultimate sole Source and Reality.

And so may it be!

Ron Rattner


What’s really “Real”?

“Reality is merely an illusion,
albeit a very persistent one.”;
“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think”.
~ Albert Einstein
“I regard consciousness as fundamental.
I regard matter as derivative from consciousness.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel laureate physicist
“The very study of the physical world leads to the conclusion that consciousness is an ultimate reality and, all the possible knowledge, concerning objects can be given as its wave function”
~ Eugene Wigner, Nobel laureate physicist and co-founder of quantum mechanics

“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness”; “reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”; “space and time are not conditions in which we live, they are modes in which we think”.

“That which is impenetrable to us really exists. Behind the secrets of nature remains something subtle, intangible, and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion.” ….“Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe.”
~ Albert Einstein

What appears to be a stable, tangible, visible, audible world, is an illusion. It is dynamic and kaleidoscopic — not really “there”. What we normally see is the explicit, or unfolded, order of things, rather like watching a movie. But there is an underlying order that is mother and father to this second-generation reality.
~ David Bohm, Physicist and Einstein protegé
Theory of Everything:

E = mc2 = Consciousness = Self.
 ~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings


Introduction to What’s really “Real”?

Dear Friends,



Have you ever wondered what’s really “Real”? Or what isn’t “Real”?   
Do you see “reality” as only physical, measurable, perceptible, or comprehensible? Where for you does earthly “reality” end, and ‘unreality’ or illusion begin – if anywhere?

Mystics say that we’re experiencing life on Earth to learn what’s really Real; that experientially we discover that in this always changing three dimensional world only unchanging consciousness persists; that our inner I AM observer is Absolute Reality and Source of all our thoughts, experiences and perceived forms and phenomena.

Thus the nature of “reality” is a spiritually crucial question, addressed for us herein, with numerous quotations and detailed explanatory discussion.



May these writings and reflections help inspire our ever increasing happiness, as we lovingly and harmoniously ascend spiritually toward THAT which is really “Real”.


And so may it be!



Ron Rattner

Explanation of What’s really “Real”?

Our ideas of reality are spiritually crucial. Knowingly or unknowingly they deeply affect our beliefs about who and what we are; and, our beliefs about who and what we are determine our thoughts, behaviors, experiences and philosophies of life, both individually and societally.

Thus, human reality paradigms which do not recognize our essential Unity with Nature and all its life-forms have proved environmentally, economically, internationally and inter-personally disastrous.

“…this separation between man and man, between nation and nation, between earth and moon, between moon and sun. Out of this idea of separation – – – comes all misery. But the Vedanta says that this separation does not exist, it is not real.”
~ Swami Vivekananda


How different would be our behaviors if we truly realized and always remembered that we are part of Nature, deeply connected and unified with all life-forms; that our apparent separation from each other and Nature is a perceptual illusion!

“Our separation of each other
is an optical illusion of consciousness.” .
~ Albert Einstein


Jesus legendarily told us that with faith human potentialities are unlimited:

“All things are possible for one who believes.”
~ Mark 9:23

“If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
~ Matthew:17-20


But limited beliefs about “reality” are conceptual cages confining us in a kind of psychological prison, restricting realization of our unlimited potentialities.

“The individual feels the futility of human desires and aims and the sublimity and marvelous order which reveals itself in nature. Individual existence impresses him as a sort of prison and he wants to experience the universe as a single significant whole.”
~ Albert Einstein


Culturally, our concepts of “reality” are an unspoken consensus abstraction dependent upon predominantly shared beliefs about what is “real”.

“Reality is only a Rorschach ink-blot, you know.”
~ Alan Watts

“Reality is nothing but a collective hunch.”
~ Lily Tomlin


Until now, most of us have been unconsciously acculturated and indoctrinated with restrictive ideas of self-identity and “reality”, without ever reflecting upon or intuiting who or what we really are and what’s really Real.

Our ideas about “reality” – both individually and societally – differ with different people at different times and different places.

But beyond our ever changing ideas of relative “reality”, isn’t there an ultimate transcendent Reality – which is the eternal Source of all relative realities?   Beyond thought can we experience such ultimate Reality?

In universally seeking happiness, doesn’t everyone knowingly or unknowingly, consciously or subconsciously, remember and intuitively long for the experience of Divine Oneness?

Mystical  “inner explorers” have answered all of the foregoing questions affirmatively. Shamans and Mystics – from both East and West – have for millennia reported their discovery of ONE ultimate, unchanging non-duality Reality; THAT which is beyond definition, comprehension or imagination – yet, everywhere invisibly immanent in and Source of our space/time polarity/causality relative reality.


“Though One, Brahman is the cause of the many…
The One manifests as the many,
the formless putting on forms.”
~ Rig Veda, 1500–1200 BCE

“All things come out of the One and the One out of all things.”
~ Heraclitus, 500BC

“Reality cannot be found except in One single source, because of the interconnection of all things with one another.”
~ Leibniz, 1670

“We are a part of Nature as a whole whose order we follow.”
~ Spinoza, Ethics, 1673

“We did not weave the web of life.
We are merely strands in it.
All things are bound together. All things connect.”
~ Chief Seattle

“At the center of the Universe dwells the Great Spirit and —
this center is really everywhere, it is within each of us.”
~ Black Elk, Oglala Sioux

“Time, space and causation are like the glass through which the Absolute is seen…
In the Absolute there is neither time, space, nor causation.”
~ Swami Vivekananda


And now more and more scientists are agreeing with the mystics.  Matter has melted into Mystery. Physics and metaphysics are merging.
Both science and spirituality agree that Reality is undivided Wholeness.

And for some Quantum physicists – like Nobel laureate Max Planck – beyond “uncertainty” about reality of “matter” there is only consciousness and Divinity.

“I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative from consciousness. We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, as quoted in The Observer (25 January 1931)

“There is no matter as such.  All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter. ”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist

“Both Religion and science require a belief in God. For believers, God is in the beginning, and for physicists He is at the end of all considerations… To the former He is the foundation, to the latter, the crown of the edifice of every generalized world view.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist – Religion and Natural Science (Lecture Given 1937) Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers, trans. F. Gaynor (New York, 1949)


Thousands of years ago, Eastern seers called this permanently impermanent and ever changing world of countless forms and phenomena a dreamlike illusion, maya or samsara; a mere projection of the One Reality – of Infinite and Eternal Existence.

“The world, indeed, is like a dream and the treasures of the world are an alluring mirage!”
“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion, does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha


Einstein intuited that:


“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”


Now many other scientists are agreeing with mystics and affirming Einstein’s observation about the illusion of physical “reality”.

For example, Einstein protege and distinguished physicist David Bohm has questioned any objective tangible reality. Bohm theorized that the universe is fundamentally like a gigantic hologram; that underlying apparent reality is a deeper order of existence, from which all the objects and appearances of our physical world arise and appear in much the same way that a two dimensional holographic film gives birth to a three dimensional hologram in space.

What appears to be a stable, tangible, visible, audible world, is an illusion. It is dynamic and kaleidoscopic — not really “there”. What we normally see is the explicit, or unfolded, order of things, rather like watching a movie. But there is an underlying order that is mother and father to this second-generation reality.
~ David Bohm


Until his death in 1955, Einstein maintained his intuitive view, consistent with ancient mystical insights but challenged by some quantum physicists, that “God does not play dice with the universe”; that the principle of cause and effect (or karma) pervades the phenomenal Universe without exception; that the ideas of chance or “uncertainty” arise from causes not yet recognized or perceived.

Since Einstein’s death, some physicists like his protege David Bohm have advanced theories which reconcile apparent contradictions between universal “causality” and quantum “uncertainty” and “non-locality” and they are thereby ever narrowing remaining apparent disparity between scientific and mystical views of “Reality”.

“Science and religion will meet and shake hands…When the scientific teacher asserts that all things are the manifestation of one force, does it not remind you of the God of whom you hear in the Upanishads? Do you not see whither science is tending?”
~ Swami Vivekananda, London talk, 1896


As presciently envisioned by Swami Vivekananda, science and religion will ultimately agree on the ONENESS of phenomenal “reality”. And realizing such ONENESS, Humanity will at long last – as it must – discard destructive illusionary beliefs and behaviors which have brought it to the brink of ecologic, economic, inter-personal and international disaster.

“Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.”
~ Niels Bohr

“The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena,
it will make more progress in one decade
than in all the previous centuries of its existence.”
~ Nikola Tesla


Thereupon, Humankind and all other life-forms on our precious planet, will harmoniously and peacefully flourish and evolve with Nature with ever increasing happiness, until we spiritually ascend to transcend this wonderful world, as Universal LOVE.

And so shall it be!

Ron Rattner