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Pink...?BRONZE Member
Mistress of Pink...Multicoloured
6,140 posts
Location: Over There, United Kingdom


Posted:
I was watching a programme i recorded the other day, and on it, a monk asked a man, "Who are you?"

The man couldn't answer straight away. (infact he never answered). At first i was thinking, that's a simple enough question why isn't he answering?. Then i thought about it myself; who am i?
Of course, the obvious biological answer came to mind, i am a product of my mum and dad, and also I am a product of my upbringing.
But i didn't think that's what he meant.

How would you interpret the question? How would you answer it? Is it answerable?

Never pick up a duck in a dungeon...


rowanleemember
99 posts
Location: west coast


Posted:
Who?
oh, just me.

That is an easy one!
wink wink

But,Why does it matter?
For that matter, does it? ( matter ?)
ubblol

What-
Energy, incorporated. ( spirit matters)

How?
Hmmn. Now thats a question I consider relevant.

Where?
Call me anything, place me anywhere, look at me through the looking glass, or not at all: still just me.
ubbrollsmile

wherever you go, there you are


WonderlushBRONZE Member
Haven't you heard? I come in six-packs now.
134 posts
Location: Los Angeles, California, USA


Posted:
I am everything I have ever experienced, come into contact with, loved, hated, or known....yet I am none of these things.



I have assumed many roles throughout my life, but no single one defines me.



I am a riddle that changes with each passing minute, yet the key is universal and unchanging: joy, kindness and love. hug



I am me.

If you can talk you can sing / If you can walk you can dance


ShuBRONZE Member
Retro Fyre Wizzard
538 posts
Location: Pietermaritzburg (KZN), South Africa


Posted:
Written by: Wonderlush



I am everything I have ever experienced, come into contact with, loved, hated, or known....yet I am none of these things.






Good one there!



I am me

Nothing more

nothing less



I am a person, a human being, born with hundreds of thousands of years of history, teachings, knowledge, ability and understanding!



I am the product of my past, present and future choices, emotions, passions and experiences.



I am my own! I own nothing!



I am everything i ever wanted to be and everything i still want to be! I am all these, and yet, none!



I am me

Nothing more

nothing less

Regards hug

Shu
(Ice-E FyreStorm - Group Manager & Performer)

You know those people your parentals warned you about?... I'M ONE OF THEM! ubbloco
Yes, i do bite!!


arsnHow do you change this thing???
1,903 posts
Location: Behind the couch...


Posted:
Icer, your answer is how I would answer this, I too believe the the question "Who are you?" is asking just that! The question posed is not "What are you?" or "What around you makes you, you?"

"Who are you?", now you could answer with your name, but are you really the sound people make to get your attention? and if so, why do some people choose to change their name? Do they not know who 'they' are, or are they more aware of themselves and who 'they' are? But again, this is still only a sound, not who you are.

Are you a lover, a teacher, a brother, a sister, a proformer, etc. or are these your relations, or occupations, etc. (Quoting from the movie 'Fight Club', "Tyler Durden says, your not your job.")

To truely know who you are, let go of everything you think you are. This is why close to everybody will never be able to honestly answer the question. Would you be perpared to answer for everything you have ever given negative energy to?

Now, I'm not going to say "I know who I am" because I don't truely know for myself. I'm not yet ready to face who I really am, I like 'what' I am for now. I am known as arsn, I am known as Troy, but as I stated before, this is only a sound (or text on a screen) that will respond to.

meditate thankx

I can't hear you... I have a banana in my ear.

"You mean I'll have to use my brain?... but I use staff!!!" ~ ben-ja-men


Pink...?BRONZE Member
Mistress of Pink...Multicoloured
6,140 posts
Location: Over There, United Kingdom


Posted:
I agree with you there arsn.
Out of all the answers so far, I think I agree most with yours.

Never pick up a duck in a dungeon...


Hubert_CumberdaleSILVER Member
[psylocibin fingerbobe].
479 posts
Location: London, United Kingdom


Posted:
Out of interest - which religion did the monk belong to?

Pink...?BRONZE Member
Mistress of Pink...Multicoloured
6,140 posts
Location: Over There, United Kingdom


Posted:
Um he was a Catholic Benedictine monk.
If anyone saw it, it was from the programme "the monastery"

Never pick up a duck in a dungeon...


Hubert_CumberdaleSILVER Member
[psylocibin fingerbobe].
479 posts
Location: London, United Kingdom


Posted:
Buddhists have an interesting answer.

They have a concept called annata, which roughly means 'no self', or 'no ego'

The reasoning goes like this: I am not my body, because I think too, I am not just my thoughts, because I have emotions, I am not just my emotions... etc. Their view is that there is no 'central bit' that defines "who I am" and no one thing that comprises "me", so therefore we are all just collaborating parts, under the general illusion that "I am me" ... if you get my drift

polaritySILVER Member
veteran
1,228 posts
Location: on the wrong planet, United Kingdom


Posted:
umm I guess my answer was pretty buddhist, in my usual obscure way.

I only found out that my beliefs are similar to buddhism when I took an online belief test (Mahayana Buddhism). Kinda wierd thing to find out.

Anyway, the whole who/what difference for me comes down to whether conscious (and to a degree unconscious) awareness is involved, what can be applied to inanimate objects and actions, and event the physical body. Who implies something much deeper.

The paradigm I work with considers everything to have started as nothing (which like the infinite cannot be conceived of by a mind, as true nothing cannot contain the mind that would concieve it, the same way the infinite can't fit in a mind). From there everything is created as a perfectly ordered and mathematical fractal, the patterns of which are evident in simple universal rules like polarity and union of opposites, conservation of energy, balance of the system, and change in the direction of increasing complexity, all of which are evident in all systems.

While this comes across as an extremely scientific and wholly unreligios kind of view, consciousness is somehow a factor of the fractal algorithm, and gives everything a completely different twist.

That original emptiness was in essence the very epitomy of consciousness, as far as I have been able to understand what consciousness is. If you take away everything that you cannot be absolutely certain of, you end up with Renee Descartes' famous 'I think, therefore I am'.

Thought, and existence, does not require any other thing to exist, so an infinite nothingness is the basis of thought. paradoxically while being complete nothingness, it also contains the totallity of existence, in that it exists, and is the totality.

It also follows the law of union of opposites, being both infinite, and nothing. Between any two opposites is a balance point, in this case oneness. One, infinite nothingness.

Both Islamic art and the philosophy of Plato and Archimedes contain the foundations of the numerical system, where from simple rules shapes and space are developed from the existence of one center, into ever more complex shapes and forms, each one being a progression of the previous.

From 1 point, to 2 points making a line, then 3 describing an area, and 4 containing a volume. The fifth describes two volumes, sharing a common area. The changes progress with each one giving an exponentially greater number of possibilites that can be derived from the existing state and it's aspects.


While our thinking is very anthropocentric (along with many people's view of their creator), thought itself is not limited to humans, and maybe in simpler forms is responsible for the actions of all things, right down to the level of sub atomic particles.

Scientists hate it when quantum theory is used to support metaphysical concepts, but it is where the two fields meet. The interpretation of quantum theory that would allow for thought to influence the state of individual quantum events, is where science meets a metaphorical black hole, ready to swallow up the whole field, and change it into something else. If the mind can influence the outcome of an experiment, then the beliefs of those involved in the experiment may influence it, and scientific method is no longer capable of being observed.

What the scientists don't realise is that this is also true for the whole of metaphysics. Quantum theory, when applied, would put the whole of that field into a much more rigid structure, and reduce the huge amount of the nonsense that comes under the heading of metaphysics, so that those fields that are legitimate can be focused on, and studied using the relevant methods of both fields.

There is scientific evidence that expectations can influence the outcome of an experiment, when it is reduced to the study of single quantum events. However the science is as much steeped in dogma and fixed beliefs as the then 'science' of the day, the church that enforced the belief that the world was flat, and that the sun revolved around it. Because of this resistance to change, it will be the modern 'kooks' who are going to progress understanding, the same way those who were witches or alchemists did, back when the church dominated our beliefs.


----


To be omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient, a creator must experience reality through becoming lesser parts of the whole, so essentially, everything is part of that creator, and exists within 'his' own image.

There are two greetings that I find sum up much of this:

The Mayan 'In Lak'ech' or 'I am another yourself' and the Sanskrit 'Namaste' :
Written by:


I honor the place in you
in which the entire Universe dwells,

I honor the place in you
which is of Love, of Truth, of Light and of Peace,

When you are in that place in you,
and I am in that place in me,
we are One.




or the simpler “I honor the divine in you which is also in me.” smile

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

Green peppers, lime pickle and whole-grain mustard = best sandwich filling.


linden rathenGOLD Member
Carpal \'Tunnel
6,942 posts
Location: London, UK


Posted:
i am sam

i can tell you my complete life story (including the bits i wasnt aware for) and that is also me

i am a fuel reliant series fo chemical processes

but to echo wonderlush

i am a fractured reflection of every single event in my excistance seen through a filter of genetics and pre - conceptions - that is who and what i am

and to truely know yourself you must die - because at that point your 'being' is no longer in flux. while living all the introspection in the world will still not reveal who you are as the introspection will change yourself

hope that makes sence :P it probably is just echos of what has gone before smile ubbrollsmile

back


nearly_all_goneSILVER Member
Pooh-Bah
1,626 posts
Location: Southampton, United Kingdom


Posted:
I am a man lost amidst the dreams he's creating, but found within the world. People don't understand me and I don't help them understand, which hurts them.



I am loved, and I am loving, but I am selfish and often insensitive.



I am just a bead within Indra's net, and as such I aim to be mindful in my actions.



However, I am going to accomplish my dreams, despite the huge obstacles they present, even though I realise this is going to hurt everyone close to me.



These are the things which are important to the way I feel and the way in which I exist within the world. They are the only things which are important motivations to me, and therefore the basis of all my thought and action on a personal level. I think that what motivates you is what makes you who you are, and if you can be true about the things which motivate you then you can find your place within the world and understand yourself.



I think it's an important question to ask, even if you can't ever hope to adequately answer it.

What a wonderful miracle if only we could look through each other's eyes for an instant.
Thoreau


SethisBRONZE Member
Pooh-Bah
1,762 posts
Location: York University, United Kingdom


Posted:
I would disagree with the statement that to know yourself, you need to meditate, or have some psycho-analysis or something like that. I know that I am Lazy, Selfish and Arrogant, but I also know that I am one of the most compassionate people i've ever met, I am very selfless, a good listener and considerate about how others feel. But I don't need hours of Meditation, or a psychologist to tell me that. I know.

Polarity, have you looked into other forms of buddhism? Like Theravada, or Pure Land? (Even Zen, if you don't mind getting hit with a broom!) You mind find some other stuff that fits your views.

And ultimately, if you start from "I am thinking therefore I am" then it is rationally impossible to define yourself further without reference to outside phenomena. Like if you say, "I am nice" then that is only possible to establish by examining the actions of people who aren't.

After much consideration, I find that the view is worth the asphyxiation.
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I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.


DragosaniGOLD Member
sunset seadragon
679 posts
Location: some little fluffy clouds, Belgium


Posted:
one of the most haunting sentences I read:
"I am you, and you are love, and that's what makes the world go round"
Clive Barker wrote this.Read the great and secret show and Everville
BTW prob one of the most haunting books I read.

“A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.” - Oscar Wilde
Jointly owned by FreyaJ, Birgit and Aurinko


EeraBRONZE Member
old hand
1,107 posts
Location: In a test pit, Mackay, Australia


Posted:
I am mainly water, with a bit of protein and other stuff, a whole heap of elements thrown together by shear chance.

And so much more than the sum of my parts.

There is a slight possibility that I am not actually right all of the time.


raincuspnewbie
11 posts
Location: PA


Posted:
i am the world in the eyes of my children.

if everything happens for a reason,
why are there so many excuses?


Hubert_CumberdaleSILVER Member
[psylocibin fingerbobe].
479 posts
Location: London, United Kingdom


Posted:
me tarzan, you jane

Fine_Rabid_DogInternet Hate Machine
10,530 posts
Location: They seek him here, they seek him there...


Posted:
Im Henry.... I have little significance in any of all this smile

The existance of flamethrowers says that someone, somewhere, at sometime said "I need to set that thing on fire, but it's too far away."


Boo_BunnyBRONZE Member
Sparkely arty Mormon rainbow fairy
933 posts
Location: infront of you, United Kingdom


Posted:
I am Gemma.

I am a child of God.

I am loved heart

Property of Fine_Rabid_Dog


jeff(fake)Scientist of Fortune
1,189 posts
Location: Edinburgh


Posted:
I'm Jeff.

Mabey I'm missing something but that's how I respond when asked the question.

Now if I had been asked 'what are you' then thats a whole different matter. Guess I just don't go in for the pretentous philosophy much...

According to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle of Quantum Dynamics, we may already be making love right now...


nearly_all_goneSILVER Member
Pooh-Bah
1,626 posts
Location: Southampton, United Kingdom


Posted:
Written by: Sethis


if you start from "I am thinking therefore I am" then it is rationally impossible to define yourself further without reference to outside phenomena.



*negative sounding gameshow beep thing* You can't presume the "I". All you can truly say is "There is thinking". It has been argued many times that beyond that it is impossible to presume that the thinking belongs to a subject. Therefore it is in doubt, therefore the Cartesian sceptic must reject it.

Mwah-ha-ha.

What a wonderful miracle if only we could look through each other's eyes for an instant.
Thoreau


SethisBRONZE Member
Pooh-Bah
1,762 posts
Location: York University, United Kingdom


Posted:
But logically, because thinking is a process, rather than an static end, then there must be something that exists as a "platform" for the process to exist in/on. The most logical platform is the concept of "I" because you can only assert that *you* exist, not anybody else.

P.S. I'm happy to continue this in PMs, rather than on this thread, because it's showing signs of moving off topic. Alternatively, it could be moved to the Metaphysics thread.

After much consideration, I find that the view is worth the asphyxiation.
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I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.


rowanleemember
99 posts
Location: west coast


Posted:
jeff( fake) , why do you consider philosophy pretentious?All of it, or just some of it?

I always think of philosophy as asking questions , and considering possibile solutions. Pretentiousness I associate with people or ways of being that make assumptions, and *dont* ask questions because they think they already have the answers...

Debate when done well, is a process of discovery.

I even ask questions about why people ask questions, curiousity driven. Not that I philosophize much though, many of the systems of logic are too refined for me...

Hope this is not too off topic...
smiles, Andrea

wherever you go, there you are


Analemmaenthusiast
384 posts
Location: West LA


Posted:
To quote correctly it was not only

I am thinking therefore I am. It came from:

Dubio ergo Cogito, Cogito ergo Sum . . .

I doubt therefore I am thinking, I am thinking therfore I am.

Important difference!!!!

hug Andrea

Andreas

spank

meditate

To learn - read. To know - write. To master - teach . . .


SethisBRONZE Member
Pooh-Bah
1,762 posts
Location: York University, United Kingdom


Posted:
Well picked up, most people bastardise it into "I think, therefore I am", but I wanted to retain the actual point that thinking is current, which is what your point underlines. Thanks for the clarification in any case!

peace

After much consideration, I find that the view is worth the asphyxiation.
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I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.


DixieGOLD Member
old hand
740 posts
Location: Darkest Bedford., United Kingdom


Posted:
I'm nobody. And... Well, that's all I have to add really.

Important Notice.
Can be found elsewhere.

This signiture has malfunctioned and can currently display no information. This matter will be rectified shortly.


ShuBRONZE Member
Retro Fyre Wizzard
538 posts
Location: Pietermaritzburg (KZN), South Africa


Posted:
Written by: Ken Wilber



...discovery begins at the moment you consciously become dissatisfied with life. Contrary to most professional opinion, this gnawing dissatisfaction with life is not a sign of "mental illness", nor is it and indication of poor social adjustment, nor a character disorder.



"For concealed within this basic unhappiness with life and existance is the embryo of a growing intelligence, a special intelligence usually burried under the immense weight of social shams. A person who is beginnig to to sense the suffering of life, is at the same time, beginning to awaken to deeper realities, truer realities."


Regards hug

Shu
(Ice-E FyreStorm - Group Manager & Performer)

You know those people your parentals warned you about?... I'M ONE OF THEM! ubbloco
Yes, i do bite!!


SethisBRONZE Member
Pooh-Bah
1,762 posts
Location: York University, United Kingdom


Posted:
*applauds*

Damn Straight!

After much consideration, I find that the view is worth the asphyxiation.
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I may disagree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.


ma'tinaBRONZE Member
multiplex
611 posts
Location: somewhere..., Germany


Posted:
what we love, we are.



- Rumi -







I am soul within soul within soul within soul...



tina ubbangel



p.s.: ...think about karma..................... hug
EDITED_BY: ma'tina (1127911839)

- Ho Sa -
kisses & peace & love to beautiful madges
*rever le temps le prendre*


DrudwynForget puppy power, Scrappy's just gay
632 posts
Location: Southampton Uni


Posted:
On the Body and the Soul:

When water fills a jug, it takes the shape of the jug. But the water is not the jug, nor is the jug the water. But when you pour a soul into a body, it becomes body-shaped and it is not the same soul any more.

The body defines, changes, thinks for itself, and it defines part of you. therefore it is part of you, and you are part of it. My thoughts are influenced by the million experiences I've had, my emotions and my soul define what I feel and dream, and my mind is the 3 as one.

So I can say: I am my thoughts, my emotions, I am my soul, I am my body. I am the sum of my experiences.

Yet I am none of these.

So who am I? I know I am, but I don't know who. Am I who you see, or am I who I see? Am I more than I know, am I everything? Am I nothing?

I know the answer. I am.

But knowledge is nothing without understanding, and to understand the answer will take a life time.

Spin, bounce, be one with the world, because it is yours to enjoy...


GidgBRONZE Member
Super Gidg!!!!
8,506 posts
Location: Portland Oregon USA


Posted:
I can tell you WHAT I am. To discover WHO I am you will have to get to know me.

Growing old is mandatory; growing up is NOT.
Proud member of the HoP DPS.
Sanity is a highly overrated state of mind.
I'm normal ... it's everyone else that's crazy.

Gidg


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