Consciousness

It’s Now and Never

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

It’s Now and Never

The one not satisfied now,
Is the one not satisfied ever,
For the time that is not now
Is the time that will be never.

Everything happens now,
Nothing happens later,
And the difference between those times
Is as real as the equator.

So you can make your future plans,
But to bring them to fruition,
Now and never later
Is when you press ignition.

Now is when you do all the things you do—
There is no later time to say
“I should have done that then,”
For every time that time arrives,
It is always now again.

—Saint Andrew of Snohomish

The You-ing of Doing

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

The You-ing of Doing
Do you precede do,
Or does do precede you?
Or are they just sides of the same?
The answer depends on your own point of view
In your doing of life’s living game.

I think if you’re first 
You’d do less of your worst
And more of your best without fail,
And remember just how you started your trip
On your personal consciousness trail. 

But if you come after the doing,
You have what you need for a you-ing—
To get self-aware there must be something there, 
For a self-sense to begin accruing.

Do you really do,
Or does doing do you?
Or is that the same by two names?
Are there nouns without verbs or verbs without nouns
In the doing of life’s living games?

—Saint Andrew of Snohomish

Here and Gone

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

Here and Gone
You may choose whatever paths you will
As you travel up and down life’s hills,
But between the time you’re here and gone,
You cannot depart from the path you’re on.

For every change in your chosen way,
There will never be a time to say
That you are not on the path you’re on—
If there were you would be not here, but gone.

And when you’re gone after you’ve been here,
You are not so far away, but near.
Although you’re gone, you are never there.
When you are not here, you’re not anywhere.

Perhaps nowhere is the same as here—
There is no distance between the two, 
But nowhere is so pure and clear,
When you look at it you see right through. 

—Saint Andrew of Snohomish

I in the Sky

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

I in the Sky
There is a body projecting you,
that is the one doing the things that you do,
and this body called yours can know through and through,
but can’t know what it knows, so for that it has You.
For that it has I, to be more precise.
But who is this I that thinks that it is
the one who does all of the work,
taking credit for things that it does not do,
like a know-it-all ball-hogging jerk?

This I is a network of thoughts that are thunk 
with the body from whence they came,
a network that changes like everything else
but tends to think that it’s the same.
And all of the thoughts that it thinks of itself
are hash-tagged with I, me, and mine,
including the thought of a thinker of thoughts
which thinks it thinks all by design.

But what are thoughts really, and do they exist?
They do, but they are not real.
Like rainbows appear out of shimmering mist,
they color the sky of the mind.
But without the sun the rainbows aren’t there,
and without the moisture that moves through the air,
and without the observer there’s nothing to find,
no colors, no thoughts, an I of no-kind.

Thoughts are reflections of what is out there,
and what it feels like from inside I’s lair—
an inside and outside contrast and compare, 
made up of the game of there-and-not-there.
Neurons fire up or stay powered down,
as reaction-reflection to what is around,
patterning patterns of senses we’ve found
to help us rise off of the ground.

And if you know all of this, can you hope,
to fix mistakes you think that you make?
Or will you just bind yourself up with a rope
that seems real but really is fake?
Whatever you do will be what you do,
and done by the body projecting you,
which is the one watching “I,” its reflection—
the great “I” which rises in every which way,
in endless waves of resurrection.

—Saint Andrew of Snohomish

Concept of You

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

Concept of You
What is a concept,
And what does it do?
What is a concept?
A concept is you.
For you cannot conceive
Yourself without it,
So there really is 
No doubt about it.

You’re a concept,
An Idea,
An Abstraction too,
And You is your symbol 
For doing by who.
You is a hashtag,
For all that you care
To attribute to one 
Who’s not really there,
Who seems to live inside
A skull that grows hair,
But when we look inside skulls
We find nobody there.

Concepts, ideas,
Abstractions, oh my—
Symbolic thinking
That helps you get by,
In this game full of symbols
We made to get high,
That we’re forced when we’re born
To play till we die—
Concepts, ideas
Abstractions, oh my.

If you were not a concept
Then you still could not think,
Of yourself without concepts,
You could not make that link.
And while it’s true that
There’s much more to you than your thinks,
The rest of you smells
But doesn’t know if it stinks,
As stinks is a thing
Only concepts can think.

Concepts, ideas,
Abstractions, oh my—
If you are what you think,
This would explain why,
It’s so easy to be terrified when you die.
For thoughts cannot go on with thinking at all,
If the body they think from can’t rise from its fall.
The body won’t mind if it’s time to stay down,
Alone it can’t know if it won’t be around,
But the concept it has of itself, You and I, 
Will keep on conceiving right up till we die,
Right up to the end of its walk toward the light,
Or the end of its darkening descent into night,
But neither the light nor the night’s really right—
Conceptions conceive until their own fall,
Because they cannot conceive no conception at all.

An Ever-Unusual Game

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

An Ever-Unusual Game
(for Alan Watts)
I am what I am,
I am what I do,
And I can be what I am
Because I’m not You.

I am what I think,
I am what I feel,
I’m what I remember,
But am I real?

Some of I Is, 
Some of I’s Not,
And I could not remember
If I never forgot.

You are what You are,
What else could You be?
You are what You do,
You’re You and not me.

You are what You think,
You are what You feel,
And what You remember,
But are You real?

Some of You Is,
Some of You’s not,
And you could not remember
If You never forgot.

But If I don’t know I 
Unless I know You,
And we both feel like I,
What the hell do we do?

If not for You I never was born,
And if not for I You neither—
If not for the both of You and I,
Nothing exists that is either.

If I do something to I,
Or if You do something to You,
Both You and I will find that we
Both do it to I and You.

And if You do something to I,
Or if I do something to You,
Both You and I will still find that we,
Both do it to I and You.

So if all that we do affects I and You,
Then are we different or are we the same?
Or just two-sided parts in a whole of no parts,
In an ever-unusual game?

-Saint Andrew of Snohomish

Star That You Are – Saint Andrew of Snohomish

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

Star That You Are
Everything happens before you become aware of it—
Including you.
And when you realize this to be true,
Relax—
There’s nothing for you to do,
Except what you already are—
Your being is doing,
Your doing is being,
And your you-ing shines on like a star—
A star that shines back on itself and thinks “Welp,
I’m not really shining that well.
I should do my job better
And be a go-getter,
And shine more, or I’m going to hell.”
But shines are directed
By all things connected,
And not by the will of the star.
The will’s just a feeling
That can act like a ceiling,
To keep stars from shining too far.
But even when you find out
That your “you” has no clout,
And that everything’s there before you come about,
You can shine all you want on the shadows of doubt,
But you will still be the star that you are.

-Saint Andrew of Snohomish

Did Jesus Eat Ice Cream?

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

While thinking while driving to work this morning, a question formed in my mind that I don’t remember ever thinking before, and the question was this:

“Did Jesus eat ice cream?”

After all, I’ve been told he knows what it’s like to be me, and I’ve eaten ice cream.

And it was good.

So I know what it’s like to eat ice cream. But does Jesus?

I know what it’s like to eat ice cream, because I’ve eaten it, so if Jesus knows what it’s like to eat ice cream, he must have eaten it too, right? But wasn’t ice cream invented after he died?

Did Jesus sneak back to Earth and eat some ice cream after it was invented?

Does Jesus have ice cream in heaven?

Even if Jesus did manage to eat some ice cream somehow, so he knows what it’s like, does he know what it’s like to me?

If he does, how did he find out?

I thought I was the only one who was having my experiences as me…

Did Jesus take me over when I wasn’t watching?

Is Jesus living vicariously through me?

Am I Jesus?

But if Jesus didn’t eat ice cream himself, how can he know what it’s really like?

And if Jesus didn’t eat ice cream as me, how can he know what it’s really like to me?

But if Jesus did eat ice cream as me, then I stopped existing while he was eating it, and I don’t remember not existing…so I guess he hasn’t eaten it as me yet.

And if Jesus didn’t eat ice cream, what else didn’t Jesus do?

Proof for God

~ Mormon Mouse ~ Leave a comment

If an all-powerful God exists, then there can only be one all-powerful God.

If a god does not know all things then that god is not the all-powerful God.

A god cannot know all things unless that god has all of the same experiences as all things.

A god cannot have all of the same experiences as all things unless that god IS all things.

Only all things has all of the same experiences as all things, therefore ALL THINGS is the one all-powerful  God.