Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Philosophy Club

[Eckhart Aurelius Hughes]

This is a discussion forum topic for the November 2022 Philosophy Book of the Month, In It Together: The Beautiful Struggle Uniting Us All.


Consciousness (i.e. presence) and eternal timeless reality are real, but time and the future are demonstrably not.

Subjective consciousness is the borderline paradoxical experience of a unique present within an objectively timeless and otherwise unchanging eternal reality. That is so much the case that you can generally use the words 'consciousness' and 'presence' interchangeably. There is no future and there is no time, and yet there is presence. By that, I mean you, the real you.

To me, inner peace is finding your heavenly happiness in that eternal present, or more accurately in the eternal itself and the beautiful infinite depths of your unique present within it, and the dreamy seemingly paradoxical interplay between those two.

The opposite of inner peace, then, is the hellish delusion that salvation and happiness exist in the future, which itself doesn't exist, as if unhappily suffering in time is a price to pay for some 'happily ever after' that allegedly exists in the fantasy land called "the future" the path to which is miserable time, none of which exists. If you place your happiness in the future, you've placed it into non-existence, and damned yourself to suffer in the eternal lands of the real. It's like hating being in the hamster wheel, so you run full speed forward in hopes to get out of it. But all there is is that hamster wheel, and there is no such thing as out of it. It doesn't matter where you run, you'll always be here. But you don't always have to hate here, and you don't always have to run out of only hate and fear.

Another way of describing the borderline paradox of our condition is that time creates nothing (since it doesn't exist) and yet free-spirited creativity exists, and indeed some would even call the whole timeless 4D universe itself capital-C Creation. Can you run just for the free-spirited love of it? You'd be surprised what you can do in a hamster wheel if you love being there.

Poetically speaking, heaven is Sisyphus if he is happy pushing the boulder up and down the hill. To be happy, he must find his happiness in the eternal, because time creates nothing, because time does not exist.

Hell is waiting for a happily ever after. If you wait for that, you will wait forever.

If you are looking for true happiness, look deep, deep, deep into the present.

There is many words for what you will find there, and none are fully right or fully wrong. What I know more than I know anything is the futility of words and the reality of the indescribable. And, whether you fully know you know it yet, I know you already know it more than you know anything.

Look deep into the present, meaning your unique present




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My book, "In It Together: The Beautiful Struggling Uniting Us All", is available for purchase from all major book retailers in both ebook and hardcover format.

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[Okoth David]

Some argue that consciousness is a product of the brain's neural processes, while others ponder its connection to the fundamental nature of reality. Exploring these ideas raises profound questions about the nature of time, perception, and the self.