What is the most valuable thing in your life?

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Woodart
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What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Woodart »

What is the most valuable thing in your life? Is love the most important thing? How about money or power? Is your child and family the most valued aspect of your life? How about education and health? I think it is important to understand what we value most. It gives us perspective and understanding of who we are. To “know thyself” is an admonition and echo from ages past which still speaks to us today.

I guess it could be argued that no one thing is most important. Perhaps, that a combination of things is most important. I ask you to you to profess and define what is most important to you. I think the answers will surprise us all.
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-1-
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by -1- »

Too many valuables, not enough negotiables. Can't rank them, sorry. Variety is the spice of life, change is the mother of all perception, "Most" or "favourite" always changes, values topple each other, maturity grows, people mature, if I say "this is the most valuable thing in my life" then tomorrow it will become false.

Sorry.

-- Updated 2017 March 11th, 3:50 am to add the following --

Good question, though, undoubtedly.
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Woodart
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Woodart »

I assert that there is something all humans possess which is more fundamentally valuable than anything else. It is consciousness. It is in consciousness that all of our experience is held. Everything we have and value is in consciousness. It can be argued that the only thing we own is consciousness. Our bodies are vessels for the existence of consciousness and we are just renters - tenants in our bodies. All of our experience is in our minds eye. Through the eye of consciousness the entire universe is unveiled. The most valuable thing is consciousness.
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Rr6
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Rr6 »

I saw a study some years back giving percentages of what most men and women think about.

Sex and money were top of the list.

Love of sex and love of money?

Love of children fills what time-space of minds considerations?

Of course all of the above may vary depending on specific individual circumstances. Age, single-married, children-no-children, etc.

Primary is for the individual to feel competent at something. The most financially valuable thing may vary from person to person based on their circumstances.

Car, house, train, boat, ship, company, country etc...

r6
"U"niverse > UniVerse > universe > I-verse < you-verse < we-verse < them-verse
Woodart
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Woodart »

I think it is hard to argue that anything is more fundamental or valuable to each of us than consciousness. Our consciousness contains everything that we physically and mentally experience. Love, hate, sex, God, trees, mountains, stars, galaxies all are only in our minds eye. I am not saying that trees or galaxies are not real or separate entities from ourselves. What I am saying is that our individual contact with them is only experienced through our individual awareness. Our awareness is the framework upon which all our experience is filtered. Our awareness holds the entire universe, God or no God, ourselves and everything we have ever done or will do. So I ask you, what is this thing – consciousness?
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Rr6
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Rr6 »

That is for sure woodart. However, animal consciousness--- if accessed and not in coma of unconscious or crazy{ sanity } requires oxygen and water. So our consciousness tells us whats most valueable is;

1} air,

2} water,

3} sanity,

4} food,

5} shelter,

6} Sex

123 ABC thats how easy biological life can be...sung to M. jackson tune
Woodart wrote:I think it is hard to argue that anything is more fundamental or valuable to each of us than consciousness. Our consciousness contains everything that we physically and mentally experience. Love, hate, sex, God, trees, mountains, stars, galaxies all are only in our minds eye. I am not saying that trees or galaxies are not real or separate entities from ourselves. What I am saying is that our individual contact with them is only experienced through our individual awareness. Our awareness is the framework upon which all our experience is filtered. Our awareness holds the entire universe, God or no God, ourselves and everything we have ever done or will do. So I ask you, what is this thing – consciousness?
"U"niverse > UniVerse > universe > I-verse < you-verse < we-verse < them-verse
Pelegrin_1
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Pelegrin_1 »

Beyond the necessities... As close as possible, independent thought and reasoning. Well, that's my answer off the top of my head.
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by -1- »

Pelegrin_1 wrote:Beyond the necessities... As close as possible, independent thought and reasoning. Well, that's my answer off the top of my head.
What exactly is independent thought? I thought thought always gets predetermined to be what it is. Meaning, thought is not a random event, but a caused event, and the effect can't escape the chain of causality.

You may have wanted to say "my thoughts are sometimes different as opinions from others', and I have an ability to reason why I'm right and why I'd be wrong if I were not different." This is not independence, though. It's differentness.
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Pelegrin_1
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Pelegrin_1 »

-1- wrote:
Pelegrin_1 wrote:Beyond the necessities... As close as possible, independent thought and reasoning. Well, that's my answer off the top of my head.
What exactly is independent thought? I thought thought always gets predetermined to be what it is. Meaning, thought is not a random event, but a caused event, and the effect can't escape the chain of causality.

You may have wanted to say "my thoughts are sometimes different as opinions from others', and I have an ability to reason why I'm right and why I'd be wrong if I were not different." This is not independence, though. It's differentness.
I'm not exactly sure that independent thought cannot exist. Now sure, one needs background information, a repertoire of mental development from previous contact with ideas and reasoning, but from that one can, I believe with personal experience, develop independent thought and reasoning. Though and reasoning that goes beyond previous accumulated knowledge, or even into new areas of thought that hadn't previously been part of that background experience. Once the mental processing has been activated, there is no reason why it cannot venture into previously unexplored thoughts and reasoning.

-- Updated Tue Mar 28, 2017 6:20 pm to add the following --

That should've said, "I believe 'from' my own personal experience"
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Lark_Truth
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Lark_Truth »

Valuable? Can you clarify what you mean by that Woodart?
Do you mean like:
- the most precious
- the most worthwhile
- the thing that we paid the most for
- the thing that makes us the happiest
Truth is Power. Reason is Wisdom. Intelligence is Experience. Hope is Bright!
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by -1- »

Pelegrin_1 wrote:Thought and reasoning that goes beyond previous accumulated knowledge, or even into new areas of thought that hadn't previously been part of that background experience [is independent thought]. Once the mental processing has been activated, there is no reason why it cannot venture into previously unexplored thoughts and reasoning.
In this sense Tesla and Kepler and Galileo and Einstein all had independent thought. According to your working definition.

I contest, however, that the word "independent" is the correct word to use by its original and prevalent meaning.

Galileo, Einstein, you, me, and everyone on these forums have come to thoughts that are brand new. But they are not independent. They are dependent on previously accumulated knowledge, and on reasoning ability. By dependence I mean that without relying on those those things previously occurred, there would be no new thought.

Your mistake in choosing the word is not your mistake. It is rampantly used by all writers and speakers. It is a commonly accepted expression to mean "new thought". But I cringe every time I hear "independent thinker", etc., because I know it's a misnomer and it hurts me.

Not your fault. It's the community that bastardized this word and created the wrong usage for it, then proliferated the usage.

To me it's like making spitting in public popular, or farting in elevators socially encouraged.

-- Updated 2017 March 28th, 7:57 pm to add the following --
Lark_Truth wrote:Valuable? Can you clarify what you mean by that Woodart?
Do you mean like:
- the most precious
- the most worthwhile
- the thing that we paid the most for
- the thing that makes us the happiest
I could answer your question for Woodart, O Lark-Truth, but can you please first clarify what you mean by "clarify"?

- explaining it better
- picking one of the choices you presented
- saying whatever comes to mind first
- making it clearer
- clarifying it for you

Thanks!!
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Lark_Truth
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Lark_Truth »

Did you intend that as a kind of joke, -1-? Because har har.
To clarify what I mean by "clarify" is" to explain it better"
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Woodart
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Woodart »

Woodart wrote:So I ask you, what is this thing – consciousness?

No one took the bait - so I will:

There are two fundamental attributes of consciousness. I call them gifts. The first gift is volition – we have the ability to choose. We not only have the ability to choose, in fact we are obligated to choose – something. We make choices all the time, every day. The second gift of consciousness is love. Love and all of its attributes and permutations are present in consciousness. Love is a continuum of feelings that spans the gamut from extreme positive, to the extreme negative - all the way to hate. In order for love to exist we must be able to define its opposite – hate. Love in all of its transformations is emotion.

Our predilections for one thing or another is a curious blend of want and desire. In other words – volition and love or emotion is what forms most of our awareness or consciousness. The substance of our consciousness is mostly concerned with emotion and will. There are other aspects to awareness like recognition, memory and sensory input; but volition and love most fully define our individual consciousness. There is another special aspect of consciousness call pure awareness or stillness. Let’s set this characteristic aside for the time being, perhaps we will discuss it later.

Well let’s be practical and ask where does consciousness come from? I would say the Holy Spirit but this answer is amorphous. So let’s not argue about the existence of God. Let’s focus on what we know and feel and can prove to ourselves. We know consciousness exists and that we all have it. And we know or sense consciousness has two main characteristics – volition and love - desire and emotion. Is there a logical association between volition and love and our behavior that we can be certain of? Can we deduce a causal relationship in human behavior which explains it? I think we can.

Consciousness is not so much a thing as it is a phenomenon. It is consumed with experience and yet everything is claimed and defined in it – both physical and metaphysical. Aside from the spiritual dimension love can be explain on a very practical level. Love exists and is initiated between a mother and a child. From the moment of conception a mother loves her child. Why, because it is not different from her – it is her. A mother loving her child is the same as loving herself, because they evolve as one being. Where did a mother learn love? Answer – she learned it from her mother. Love is born in the mother-child bond. Love of self is learned from a mother or mother figure.

Love has another attribute which reverberates in consciousness - desire. Love speaks to the existence of will in consciousness. Love and will co-create each other in consciousness. There is a symbiotic relationship between the two. Love is not solitary, nor is volition. They need each other in order to exist. We need a push or predilection in order to make a decision. A will needs a desire and a desire needs a will. They don’t exist separately.


I believe love has a spiritual dimension and origin that precedes all of physical existence. However, the defining of God is difficult, if not impossible. Therefore the practical unfolding of the mother-child bond is enough concrete proof of loves origin and existence. We do not have to answer first cause. We do not have to explain how or why the universe exists – it just does. We don’t have to say God created love. We can see a real origin for love and we know it exists, it is true. The mother child bond is enough of an explanation for love. We don’t have to know the origin of the chicken or the egg. We don’t have to explain or prove the universe exists. We know love exists and we know where it comes from. Love is very practical.


However, we are not always aware that loves is the basis of all civilization. Society is held together by collective agreement. The first collective agreement is between a mother and child for the relationship to persist. The mother-child bond is the basis of all relationships – family, hunter/gatherer group, village, town, school, commerce, city and nation. We live in society by collective agreement. All of our institutions are held together by collective agreement and all of these institutions are patterned after the first collective agreement. I would call the mother-child bond the first contract. It is a contract that surpasses all others. It is the mother of all contracts literally and figuratively.

-- Updated March 28th, 2017, 6:01 pm to add the following --
Lark_Truth wrote:Valuable? Can you clarify what you mean by that Woodart?
Do you mean like:
- the most precious
- the most worthwhile
- the thing that we paid the most for
- the thing that makes us the happiest
What I mean or what I ask - is there a thing which surpasses everything else in your existence in value? I say it is consciousness because everything is contained in it. All other values are a subset. Now a person could argue that life is the greatest value, but we need consciousness in order to appreciate life. This is the existential principle – existence precedes essence.
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Pelegrin_1 »

-1- wrote:
Pelegrin_1 wrote:Thought and reasoning that goes beyond previous accumulated knowledge, or even into new areas of thought that hadn't previously been part of that background experience [is independent thought]. Once the mental processing has been activated, there is no reason why it cannot venture into previously unexplored thoughts and reasoning.
In this sense Tesla and Kepler and Galileo and Einstein all had independent thought. According to your working definition.

I contest, however, that the word "independent" is the correct word to use by its original and prevalent meaning.

Galileo, Einstein, you, me, and everyone on these forums have come to thoughts that are brand new. But they are not independent. They are dependent on previously accumulated knowledge, and on reasoning ability. By dependence I mean that without relying on those those things previously occurred, there would be no new thought.

Your mistake in choosing the word is not your mistake. It is rampantly used by all writers and speakers. It is a commonly accepted expression to mean "new thought". But I cringe every time I hear "independent thinker", etc., because I know it's a misnomer and it hurts me.

Not your fault. It's the community that bastardized this word and created the wrong usage for it, then proliferated the usage.

To me it's like making spitting in public popular, or farting in elevators socially encouraged.
I'm curious as to whether there is an unintended error in the part of bolded.

But now I'd like to ask if you can give me an example of something related to an individual human existence that could rightly be described with the word "independent", in your opinion.

We also describe a young adult as being "independent" if he or she is no longer dependent on his/her parents, but that too doesn't mean that he/she isn't dependent on others, such as an employer, a partner, the work of employees, or something else. Perhaps, based on your very specific idea of "independent", the word could be incorrectly used in numerous contexts.

-- Updated Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:41 pm to add the following --

Specific or "strict" use of the word.
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Rr6
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Re: What is the most valuable thing in your life?

Post by Rr6 »

Woodart wrote: However, the defining of God is difficult, if not impossible.
Not at all and I've laid it out clearly in various threads as The Cosmic Hierarchy: "U"niverse/"G"od. None have offered any rational, logical common sense that adds to or invalidate the 7 or more givens in my cosmic hierarchy outline/list.

Closed triangle /\ set is representative of embracing love.
Open triangle set Y is representative of radiating love.

Choice inherently/intrinsically means access to metaphysical-1, mind/intellect/concepts. Animal kingdom is that biological set that meets the criteria for choice, to varying degrees.


Minimal consciousness is twoness i.e. otherness ergo awareness via line-of-relationship and 4th aspect inherent/intrinsic to those the three;

1} observer O

2} observed O

3} line-of-relationship between those two O----O, or as O()O

4} background against which the above three take place.

The background for a finite, occupied space Universe is the macro-infinite, non-occupied space.

Oxygen is the most valuable thing.

Then water,

then food > shelter/clothing > health > love > sex > love.

"U"niverse > Uni-V-erse > I-verse < you-verse we-verse < them-verse

The truth exists for those who seek it, those who don't, and those who scoff at it. imho

123, ABC thats how easy Universe can be..sung to M. jackson and Jackson 5 tune.

r6
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