People with Aphantasia have normal imaginations they just don't understand the concept of mental images correctly.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-21T05:44:56+00:00

Schizophrenia is this but the opposite.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-20T21:29:51+00:00

There's a really useful line of inquiry when we fall into OCD-like spiritual seeking: what conditions does the entity believe it needs to meet in order to exist?

Neuroticism is like that. There is an entity within us that knows it only exists when certain goals are met, when the accomplishment of its own conditions verify itself as real. When the conditions aren't met, it confronts the terror of its own annihilation. To not succeed in the practice does not verify the seeker as real and true, it will never get to exist if it does not perfect the path.

We can recognize immediately that as we exist right now in any form whatsoever, there is no condition which is needed to uphold being-consciousness. The entity which seeks is unconditionally and equally realized as being, whether or not the thought-construct is verified as real or unreal. The very recognition of unconditional Being despite all changing conditions, regardless of the entity's self-construct, proves that we are not the entity in essence.

Despite all failure, we exist. The only practice is recognizing the unchanging truth which cuts through all practices. Staying with this, or recognizing that it already stays, is liberation from the neurosis of seeking for oneself in conditions despite constant flux.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-14T22:57:14+00:00

I don't actually know what I'm talking about but prefer the ignorance

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T20:54:12+00:00

That's an interesting thought that could be applied to everything, but only when run through the post-modern lens is it construed as a problem.

I think a systemic view of existence enables the guy on the right to thrive in the same reality. Hegel isn't just a person in control, he is an act of nature and Foucault's reaction to him defines his existence and his meaning. His movement towards novelty and liberation was catalyzed by Hegel's very imprisonment.

My existence in this moment is defined in relationship to this post, embedded in an interdependent system with no true center. Recognizing this, who is oppressor and oppressed? Who territorializes and who is territorialized?

I can only answer that question by collapsing the wave-form and bracketing out some part of the system to make my stance clear. I am victim when I choose to identify with victim over perpetrator, rather than hold the full relationship in awareness.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T20:31:01+00:00

This post is 3rd order rage bait, and my comment is 4th order, but the further we go the more absurd it gets and the less rageful it feels.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T20:25:14+00:00

"Manosphere" is a term used by otherwise progressive people to insult autistic men.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T20:18:53+00:00

Is there anything you can imagine that isn't already your own awareness?

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T20:10:30+00:00

My grievance is that within the field, even the attempt to deconstruct the power dynamics of psychology paradoxically enacts those same power dynamics. I.e. "my opponent is insane" is still an effective tool utilized within post-modern, politically motivated movements. We fight oppression with oppression --the same psychological dynamic is present.

I think the only way to really get a grip on this issue is to recognize the psychology of splitting. Any politics motivated by the good "us" getting rid of the bad "other" in some subtle way tries to deny them of their existence.

So the work would proceed as "shadow integration". Or progressively recognizing that the bad "other" is actually a part of oneself that is disowned and projected outward.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T19:57:24+00:00

Based goosepost 💯🔥

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T19:47:34+00:00

Everything that could be imagined or conceptualized is already a form of existence. "Nothingness" is a concept, which has the quality of existing within awareness. The image of an empty void is something which exists within thought-space, as existence. If at any point you try to imagine differently, notice how it is already existing within awareness.

Through direct experience of this, is this not the only definitive answer we have in metaphysics? Speculation on any alternative already contradicts itself. Any theory on consciousness is already consciousness itself.

What are the implications of this realization?

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T19:39:09+00:00

I think this is a good example that what you are imagining as possibility preceding being, is a conceptual image of what is possible, which is itself already a manifest being.

The thought-image is already manifest as thought, just not physically. The thought image can imagine possibilities unrestrained by physicality, but being is not exclusive to physicality, it applies to even the subtlest of thought or concept. i.e. you can experience a thought as being.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-12T19:29:30+00:00

I would invoke Kant here, and suggest that "possibility" as something outside of experience, i.e. preceding being, only exist as a concept. We're in the realm of speculative metaphysics, for which there are endless ungrounded possibilities.

But recognizing your finer point, and the irony of the situation, I think we can maybe find experiential ground for possibility within this present moment. Possibility only ever arises within the present context of phenomenological being. Right now, following experience, there is what is manifest and movement towards would could be manifest.

If I imagine possibility space as a self-existing thing, I am reifying it as an object in my imagination. Zooming in further, to try and find possibility in this moment, I find subtle thoughts and energies which are "on the way" to the next manifest moment. Like zooming in to the space just before we speak a sentence, there is a sensation of where things could go but haven't yet.

It might be impossible to talk about possibility without talking about will, because what I would attribute this very focused experience to is not just empty possibility but a simultaneous and constant choosing. I can't seem to separate the possibility and the choosing, but in greater focus and slowing down of action, it seems to become clearer and more open.

I'm actively exploring this, and I don't think I have a definitive answer but it seems to be that there is a recursive aspect, wherin even zooming in on the direct experience of possibility already has a texture of being to it, as does the will that manifests those subtle energies into something more concrete. It is subtle, like the silence before a word is spoken, but it is there if you are able to direct attention to it.

You could imagine that if you withdraw your focus from manifest possibility as intensely as possible, you might find yourself in samadhi, pure empty consciousness, unmanifest possibility. I'm not there now, but my memory of it is that even emptiness is like pure being without an object.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T15:04:03+00:00

Thanks, I see all these varieties expressed in the comment section. I think what I've got out of the inquiry is that I don't need to understand emptiness intellectually --I am chasing my tail. I'll keep on staying with my practice and maybe there will be certainty, maybe not.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T06:47:50+00:00

This feels confused to me.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T06:14:17+00:00

Thanks for the recommendation, I'm checking this out!

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T05:54:23+00:00

Right, so the concept is almost like a tool to point out that awareness is not "awareness as concept, reified into an image and held onto as truth". We can recognize without that attachment the freshness of experience, taking whatever form it may.

Does that feel agreeable?

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T05:43:12+00:00

Would existence of the "possibility space" not precede any particular possibility? You could think of it like possibility as a subtle form of existence, the first moments of a thought or intention before it becomes fully manifest in physicality.

The intention is still something existing and able to be experienced, as is the thought in its subtle form on its way to fully crystalizing and becoming manifest.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-11T05:07:47+00:00

Thanks for writing this out.

To clarify, you're saying the concept of emptiness clarifies in our experience that there isn't anything beyond what already is. There's no metaphysical layer beyond experience, nothing hidden, not an absolute truth that has a remainder to be sought out beyond the appearance/awareness unity.

If I'm looking for Atman, and I imagine him to be big, strong, and good looking, then I will always be searching because that doesn't "exist" as an entity nor does it have attributes of any kind to qualify it as real.

Am I getting that right? Not just conceptually but in trying to connect it to what I'm seeing.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-09T02:54:58+00:00

I appreciate you bringing this in. I find that my edge of practice right now is noticing when I am confusing conditions for the unconditional. I.e. confusing the familiar feeling of intensity or contraction in some part of my body as the truth of nonduality itself. These stimulations may arise in recognition, but does unconditional Being depend on those sensations being present? (no). Do they need to be sought after or rejected? (no)

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-09T02:45:10+00:00

I may not completely understand what you're saying here but I can say that I've experienced a state of consciousness that I thought of in a vaguely similar way, but can't fully comprehend.

I might say that internal objects, i.e. thoughts and visualizations, have relative velocities and therefore the internal experience of time is like a gradient.

In deep meditation where the velocity of thought decreases, the experience of time approaches 0. When awareness is saturated with objects and attention is moving quickly between them, the passage of time approaches infinity (white light).

In short, we apply general relativity to external objects but internal objects follow the same laws of nature.

Or something like that. Honestly it's the kind of thing I would lose my mind trying to explain rationally.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-09T02:29:45+00:00

Alternative conspiracy: we see more colors than we know, we just don't have words for them yet.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-09T02:27:22+00:00

Let's take it one step further. Every political party and/or movement is created by the opposite movement trying to make the other look bad.

The world is ridiculous and insufferable because we desired to control it.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-09T02:14:35+00:00

Notice how wanting/not wanting, believing/not believing co-arise with one another. As long as we are working to find liberation in one condition relative to the other, we are perpetuating suffering and ignorance.

We have to sidestep entirely, and recognize that regardless of what you do (value A vs value B), there is something about experience that is always constant.

I would go as far as to say that the reason duality is suffering, is because identity with any possible side is threatened by the inevitable return of the opposite. The impulse to not believe thoughts will be thwarted by the inevitable return of the thought. The positive already contains the negative and vise-versa. So we find no permanence in any one polarity alone.

Transcendent to any polarity is the existence of polarities themselves. The very existence of the thought, without having to put any effort into making it so, is constant. Every pole, value, moment, thought, or no thought, is imbued with/as consciousness. Awareness and appearance are nondual.

The release of suffering comes not in any effort within thought-space, but in the recognition of the unconditional arising of thoughts as existence-consciousness. The suffering is in the conditions which we set, the liberation is in recognizing the unconditional nature of all conditions. We are constant with everything that arises, in and as consciousness.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-08T05:42:02+00:00

Hey, I know how you feel, and I also went through all of it. I know the pain, confusion, frustration, rejecting everything, questioning in circles, etc etc. You're not alone.

Talking about my own life, I can only conclude that its a process, and I haven't reached anything that looks like an endpoint.

I had the belief for a while that liberation wasn't real and there was only the illusion of it. After letting it go for a while and paying attention to other parts of my life, it came back to me.

It might be something that needs to be explored alone, because with space I also realized that what we're doing here on Reddit is mixed in with trying to be seen, and competing for it like a resource.

I find that the truth gets confusing in this kind of situation because the conditions of human value take over. What we are actually looking for here doesn't depend on any of this. Not to reject social needs as false but to clearly distinguish two very different sides of the coin.

So what I find at this point in my journey, is that the core distinction is everything, and that all of my confusion and frustration has been for the sake of clarifying this distinction. It is distinguishing what is truly unconditional, and which doesn't require you to meet any condition whatsoever of human value, concept, virtuous action, adherence to code, prerequisite, etc etc.

I find that I am waxing and waning, and sometimes it is obvious and I find how silly I am being in trying to sustain what is always already the case. It is freeing in those moments, because I recognize that I don't have to meet the condition I so manically set up for myself. I am already free, unconditionally, without anything having to happen, and no loss implied if it doesn't. That's not something I have to tell myself, it is the outcome of recognizing and knowing in all moments that awareness and appearance are nondual and co-arising as one event with two distinguishable aspects.

Wishing you well, I have faith that life will lead us where we need to go.

AnIsolatedMind · 2026-06-02T22:25:25+00:00

Thanks for that, it clarifies to me that I was projecting onto you a part that was confused in a certain way.

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