When i think of individuals, I think of a complex pattern in the universe. When I type this here, my pattern is having an effect on the world. When I teach kids or get taught, my pattern is interacting with the world. My pattern is most strongly interacting with the pattern of matter that I consider myself, but even the material that makes me up is completely different approximately every 7 years (tissue is replaced).
When I die, the pattern that I consider myself will change. Instead of directly holding the matter together in an active pattern, it will dissociate, but my pattern will continue to exist in the effects that it caused throughout my life.
And none of those effects have anything to do with a self. We are all a confluence of events taking part in other confluences which all combine to be the one action of the universe.
Free will IS an illusion. How we live with that realization defines how we will move forward as a race and if we move forward at all.
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Vi veri veniversum vivus vici. (By the power of truth, I, while living, have conquered the universe)
The self is not a fixed entity but a dynamic process of relationships
You & I, no distinction. - Tat Tvam Asi
Become Who You Are |