I've tended to concentrate on volition more than anything else, even at times when I shouldn't. It interests me the most. Thoughts are similiar, you think you're doing them, you're not. At a low level it feels virtually identical.
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Replying to @iwelsh @Failed_Buddhist
impulses and thoughts arise, you don't control them, they aren't you, and I've found that the insight is startlingly unpleasant in raw form: feel like a puppet being jerked around by BS.
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Replying to @iwelsh
Right! Like, I don't actually know how I'm typing this. Thoughts arise, then intention, then impulse, and then my fingers just move. It's utterly mysterious.
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Replying to @Failed_Buddhist @iwelsh
Concentrating on volition is the most powerful way to go, imo. When you see that everything you thought *you* were doing is actually happening on its own, it shakes you to your core.
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Replying to @Failed_Buddhist @iwelsh
Though, if I were a teacher, I wouldn't recommend it to a beginner. If one doesn't already have good emotional self-regulation, it can be destabilizing. I suspect that shattering the sense of agency is even scarier than getting no-self, because it makes you feel totally helpless.
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Replying to @Failed_Buddhist @iwelsh
Also, apparently there are people who have allegedly gotten no-self that still somehow believe they have free of will. Which I just find completely bizarre. Who has free will, exactly? If you think you're choosing your thoughts, intentions, and actions, you're still confused.
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Replying to @Failed_Buddhist
it sometimes seems like one can "choose between". Even that is an illusion (on what basis do you choose?), but there can be this increased sense of freedom/choice because of the increased awareness.
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Replying to @iwelsh @Failed_Buddhist
it feels like ordinary people are completely robots and that you somehow are less. At the ultimate level you aren't, but there is a feeling you're awake and they're sleeping. Hard to talk about.
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Replying to @iwelsh
It's not that you're really different than anyone else on any fundamental level, or better than anyone else; you just happen to be aware of the fact that you're a robot, while others think that they're a self. It is hard to talk about.
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Replying to @Failed_Buddhist
Well, I think one can retain a self. Of course, to do so, that self has to do nothing, so... ;)
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Heh. Fine. You can have a self, but you can't be one.
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