What if you didn't have a name?

[Catwoman]

Ah Bruce.

My quote above referred primarily to Brianna & Marichiko's little tiff earlier on in this thread. Read the posts leading up to that comment and you should then understand its context.

If you go back and read my posts slowly, thoroughly, you will see that I agree with you. Of course this is all there is. Now. Not illusions of religion or an original self.

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Get off your ass and do something productive. Do something useful. Do something worthwhile and you won't have time for endless circular musing.

Now you're talking. You're absolutely right. Living is not thinking, philosophising, 'musing' (although it would be stupid to ignore our thoughts - we just need to accept them and move on). So get off the internet and go feed some starving children. Go and build a house for the homeless. The thing is, we are living in a life that is dominated by thought/image and is largely cerebral. We have moved away from the essence of survival, reality, and got lost in psychobabble. I am sorry that you cannot differentiate the discussion above from this general 'psychosis' as you quite rightly call it. Without meaning to sound patronising, there is a lot one could learn from truly understanding the message above.

But maybe you already know all of this. Maybe you don't see your personality as all-important, maybe you understand your family is just another evolvement of nature, perhaps you don't buy branded goods or watch pointless TV or concern yourself with anything other than true living - eating, sleeping, sex, stillness.

If you have already put all this into practice I can only admire you.

Originally Posted by ashke

Are you asking what you think the essence of your Self would be if you were stripped of all external influences?

I wasn't really asking. The self is just now. Nothing more nothing less. Coming up with a description of now is most likely impossible and probably irrelevant as long as you're living 'in' it.

Marichiko thanks for the info. I realised some of what I was saying was similar to Buddhism but not to that extent. I don't know about coming back to ease the suffering of every fellow being (although it is a comforting possibility), but I agree:

Originally Posted by marichiko

The power of the Bodisattva Vow for me is what it implies about the manner in which we lead our lives in the here and now.

"Before enlightenment, chop wood and carry water; after enlightenment chop wood and carry water" sums it up pretty well.