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SubjectVerbObject posted:Sorry, I was trying to not give a lot of detail, figuring if it was just my ignorance it was no good naming names. The guy is alive, Tibetian, but in the US now, and is the heart son of the root lama of an uncommon lineage. The group is rather new, so some of what I am seeing could just be setting up a proper Sangha. Is this in relation to Refuge or Boddhi Satva vows? For Bhoddi Satva, you are supposed to give up something precious to you, which may be what you are reading about.
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Jan 5, 2015 20:09
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SubjectVerbObject posted:Sorry, I was trying to not give a lot of detail, figuring if it was just my ignorance it was no good naming names. The guy is alive, Tibetian, but in the US now, and is the heart son of the root lama of an uncommon lineage. The group is rather new, so some of what I am seeing could just be setting up a proper Sangha. Depends on the lineage and so on I guess. Normally it would be pretty uncommon to be selling statues of an alive dude, but not necessarily of previous incarnations of an alive dude. It is difficult to say without information about the lineage and so on. If you're worried about speaking ill publicly of a legitimate lineage or somesuch, you're welcome to PM me and I can look into it privately. With tulkus and so on, generally people are more interested in the office than in the person who has it, but a heart son of a lineage master still isn't all that great for gold statues. If you're discussing His Eminence Garchen Rinpoche, heart son of Jigten Sumgon from the Drikung Kagyu lineage, people really, really like Garchen Rinpoche. I have never heard of gold statues of him or such, but there are lots of amulets and medallions of him, he's a very highly respected yogi and lineage holder of the Drikung Kagyu and Drikung Yang Zab traditions. If he's who you're talking about, the center is legit and the outside signs are present, but not the bulk of it. There's a lot of depth under the objects and so on. Garchen also has a lot of compassion for many students of various capacities, so some people need amulets and gold statues to best function. Some people need a guy who can provide extremely intense, deep insight, and he can also do that. He has a lot of different presentations for those of different capacities, as qualified gurus do. But on a lower level, there is a lot of devotional work. That lineage is also part of a Mahamudra line with a specific emphasis on guru devotion and merit accumulation, so you can kind of expect a sort of "hero worship" appearance on the exterior.
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Jan 5, 2015 20:18
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Max posted:Is this in relation to Refuge or Boddhi Satva vows? For Bhoddi Satva, you are supposed to give up something precious to you, which may be what you are reading about. No, it is one of the first things you see when you go to the web site. They raised a lot of money to buy him golden statues and now are fundraising to bring over folks for installation and consecration.
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Jan 5, 2015 20:19
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SubjectVerbObject posted:No, it is one of the first things you see when you go to the web site. They raised a lot of money to buy him golden statues and now are fundraising to bring over folks for installation and consecration. Oh are these golden statues of him or a center buying golden statues generally? That's a pretty common thing in Tibetan Buddhism. It's a worldly function but it's nice to have worldly things. My guru has commented before that some people, especially Zen people, and even him, sometimes, find Tibetan shrine rooms way too much like a "drama stage" and this can be distracting, but it's just part of the culture involved. Worldly, samsaric beings like us revere beings by building bigass gold statues of them and blessing them. See for example the US Jowo Rinpoche, or "precious statue," a replica/emanation of the Jowo Rinpoche in Lhasa, which is a pilgrimage site and can offer liberation by seeing among other things. Also, devotional statues and so on are believed to help instill devotion in the minds of beings, and also provide objects to make offerings to and so on for the purpose of generating merit. Any image of the Buddha or guru or so on is sacred, but golden precious ones seem more so. And spending more can indicate deeper devotion, which means greater karmic connections and better results, and so on. However, buying gold statues of the current lama seems very strange to me, since the reason we use statues and so on is in the absence of the actual object, it's an inferior substitute, and making a gold statue of an alive dude makes no sense as it's better still to make offerings to the alive dude.
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Jan 5, 2015 20:27
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Not of him, but Buddha Shakyamuni, Padmasambhava and Longchenpa. I think it is something they are rightfully proud of, so it is front and center. It was just a little off putting, looking for information and the first thing you see is fundraising. On reflection, this is no different than any other religion, or even any non-profit, but my ignorance of the cultural context was the root of my confusion.
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Jan 5, 2015 20:45
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Gotcha. Yeah, whereas East Asian Mahayana folks love giant big Buddhas, Tibetans tend to instead love medium-big golden Buddhas. That doesn't set off red flags for me. Longchenpa, eh? Is this a Nyingma school or Drikung Kagyu Yang Zab?
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Jan 5, 2015 21:00
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Paramemetic posted:Gotcha. Yeah, whereas East Asian Mahayana folks love giant big Buddhas, Tibetans tend to instead love medium-big golden Buddhas. That doesn't set off red flags for me. Longchen Nyingthig is what I can find looking at their web site. Really I am still at the google stuff and see where it is. I looked at some of the Drikung Kagyu sites and the one in the mountains looks nice, but this time of year is almost unreachable due to snow or ski traffic. My problem is I am not really close to anything.
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Jan 5, 2015 21:43
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Paramemetic posted:Longchenpa, eh? Is this a Nyingma school or Drikung Kagyu Yang Zab?
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Jan 5, 2015 21:50
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Nessus posted:I want y'all to know I saw Longchenpa and read it "Likchenpa" for a full minute. I honestly don't know how to pronounce these names. Words like "Rinpoche" sound distinctly french to me, so I speak them like a french word. But maybe that's wrong and the "ch" is more like a k? Dunno.
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Jan 6, 2015 08:31
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midnightclimax posted:I honestly don't know how to pronounce these names. Words like "Rinpoche" sound distinctly french to me, so I speak them like a french word. But maybe that's wrong and the "ch" is more like a k? Dunno. There are several Pali words that I was pronouncing incorrectly in my head until I heard them spoken by a monk. I'm still not sure about ekaggatārammana.
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Jan 6, 2015 15:48
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Rin-po-chay, that's how it sounds.
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Jan 6, 2015 16:04
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Yeah, any questions on Tibetan pronunciations I can field. I am a lazy student, but I've learned that much at least. Granted there are like a thousand different dialectic pronunciations so.
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Jan 6, 2015 16:06
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Paramemetic posted:Yeah, any questions on Tibetan pronunciations I can field. I am a lazy student, but I've learned that much at least. Actually that's a sort of interesting question, how are Japanese Buddhist sects taken in the greater Buddhist community?
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Jan 6, 2015 23:48
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The closest English approximate is kah-djoo or kah-kyoo. It's a tough word to be spot on with because it's not quite voiced but not unvoiced, and depending on if the speaker is from a tonal dialect or not they may or may not make it more like a g like George or a kind of non-committal k. You can basically get away with pronouncing it like Godzilla monsters but with an a instead of ai sound. As for Japanese in the greater Buddhist community, I can't speak for the greater community but so far as I know there's not any animosity. There are some weird Japanese sects that I don't know if they count as Buddhist, like I think SGI? But even those are just, "welp enjoy your other religion, other religion dudes" and not like "fake Buddhists, condemn!" or something. But then again I tend to be more tolerant of other Buddhisms. Maybe this is a good question for Wafflehound haha
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Jan 7, 2015 11:59
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Trip report! I attending an open mediation with the Sangha I had mentioned before. Basically, they are getting a do over. The teacher was out of town, so they were using his absence to undertake some major construction. There were scaffolds in the middle of the main room. Not many people were there, and about half were new or visiting. It is in a downtown area so it seemed like they got some walk in folks who just wanted a place to sit. One thing I found different was the mediation. The form was basically the same, but it was very casual compared to Zen. By this I mean people had Starbucks cups by them they they would drink from, some folks had small desks that they were reading from, and there was a group of folks doing prostrations in back. There wasn't the stillness I associate with mediation. Still a good time, but there were more distractions. So I am a little torn. Thursdays are a day I have open and a lot of places have intro/open nights then, but only are a few are as close as this one. One of the other places is a Zen center. Next week is a Tsok, and I was told that would be a better introduction, so I may go back. Also, starting in Feb there is registration only ngondro training on Thursdays, so there may be some days that I cannot attend. This brings up another point. I am married with a kid, and have cub scouts, house stuff, sports, etc. My wife is involved with her church, so we would be unevenly yoked. How do people manage the time commitment? When I told my son I was going to meditate, he said, in his best I am 9 and know everything voice "Dad, you can do that at home!" Of course he is right, but I am looking for more than just sitting in a spare room and quieting my mind. I guess what I want is a consistent practice, and I am looking for a hook to draw me in.
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Jan 9, 2015 05:35
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SubjectVerbObject posted:This brings up another point. I am married with a kid, and have cub scouts, house stuff, sports, etc. My wife is involved with her church, so we would be unevenly yoked. How do people manage the time commitment? When I told my son I was going to meditate, he said, in his best I am 9 and know everything voice "Dad, you can do that at home!" Of course he is right, but I am looking for more than just sitting in a spare room and quieting my mind. I guess what I want is a consistent practice, and I am looking for a hook to draw me in. I have a hard time with this too, especially with my center an hour + away. I don't have every Sunday off, and when I do I feel bad about leaving what could be 'family time' for a half a day. It can be discouraging. I just do the best I can for now and do what I think is 'right', in regards to balancing everything. But regardless, we are fortunate to live in a time where we have unlimited Dharma talks and resources at our fingertips.
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Jan 9, 2015 14:40
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Regarding meditation, I think almost everyone's meditation is more casual than Zen, haha. Tibetan meditation can be as casual or as strict as one wants, but there is a general sense that for example the best way to overcome an itch that is distracting someone is to scratch it. If thirst arises and is distracting just take a sip. In Shamatha to Mahamudra it is suggested that if you are slipping off into dullness, drink strong Chinese tea, or get up and walk around. There's less of a sense of requirement for the sitting itself to be in such and such a form. That said, it sometimes as a result lacks a bit of discipline. It's obviously best if you can just be with an itch, or thirst, but not if it becomes a ground for conceptual grasping. As for time obligations, I think we all struggle with this in the West. Practice the best you can based on your causes and conditions. If you don't have the karma for daily practice, don't practice daily, if you do, do. If you have access to a guru who can help guide your practice definitely rely on them, they are able to adjust or tweak practices according to schedules. Tibetan Buddhism tends to be tolerant of this generally, you will find a lot of deity yogas will have things like the "extensive" practice, and then the "concise" and "exceedingly concise" versions of the same practice. The latter a Tibetan can usually crank out in about 15 minutes or so if they're feeling ambitious. As for them thinking Tsok is a good introduction, that's pretty interesting. I always wince a little when people drop in randomly on our monthly Lama Chopa with Tsok, since it's a devotional practice involving offerings to the lineage master, which can be confusing to people who think "who the hell is this Jigten Sumgon I'm here for Buddha what." Tsok itself is just a ritual food offering / feast, if you want to be pro take some kind of food to share to that Tsok, fruit is ideal, lots of people bring cookies and nuts as well usually. Just roll in and be like "here I brought this for Tsok" and they'll be all  Edit: There is a running gag with my guru about me being his laziest disciple because my work obligations prevent me from attending all the time. It's a kind of subtle encouragement as well as poking fun, but it helps me stay mindful of Dharma even, maybe even especially, when I can't be with the Sangha.
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Jan 9, 2015 15:12
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I went to a Tsok at a local Nyingma place and it was a good time. Sitting around and eating and talking with people was a nice chance to get to know people a bit more.Paramemetic posted:As for Japanese in the greater Buddhist community, I can't speak for the greater community but so far as I know there's not any animosity. There are some weird Japanese sects that I don't know if they count as Buddhist, like I think SGI? But even those are just, "welp enjoy your other religion, other religion dudes" and not like "fake Buddhists, condemn!" or something. I've noticed that there's a lot of overlap among practitioners (going both ways, too) between Zen and Tibetan Buddhism, albeit people usually seem to gravitate much more towards one or the other. As far as I've seen there's a lot of mutual respect. Ironically, most of the long-term practitioners of Vajrayana I've met (i.e. senior citizens, basically) were at a really low-key local Zen sitting group. It's been interesting because while Zen can be pretty irreverent, that irreverence is largely directed internally.. It would be considered extremely poor form in Zen to go out and poo poo on someone else's practice or tradition or whatever. If anything, in fact, people with a background in something other than Zen have been treated with really as much formal respect as anyone I've seen turn up to sit. Maybe it is just that we have a lot of Tibetan Buddhists here in Oregon, but they turn up regularly and have been, in my experience, thoughtful and pleasant to have around. If anything, the Zen people I've met have been quite knowledgeable about Tibetan Buddhism due to a lot of them having checked it out in some depth, too. Tibetan Buddhism is seen as a bit more ritually elaborate and obviously has a much bigger emphasis on deities and a few other more specific practices (phowa especially), but both have really informal sides and far more elaborately formal sides, as well. As such, I'm really curious, too, how Zen is seen by people in Tibetan traditions. I know there's a ton of overlap in Oregon (and California, too, from what I understand), but I don't know how much that's the case elsewhere.
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Jan 9, 2015 15:36
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When I practiced Zen, there was a huge focus on zazen, and not much else. This made a bit of sense because it was just a local group with a nun leading things, and some of the sittings were at a local college. There wasn't a lot of time for anything else giving the time we had space was limited. It sort of worked out though because it was a very religiously neutral introduction. What I mean by that is they could introduce the basics to anyone without putting folks off. At one point we were using the basement of a Catholic church, and the priest and 2 nuns would join us. Once we got a space of our own it became much more formal. Formal = statues, prostrations, massive chanting. Parametric, in Tibetan Buddhism, is the purpose of meditation to put yourself in a state for more esoteric exercises? If so I can see your point about scratching itches or whatever is distracting. I'm not a Zen authority, but the focus in Zen was always on attaining a no mind state. The-Mole, I remember an Alan Watts story about some westerner hearing about the crazy irreverent Zen masters and going to visit a monastery in Japan. He was amazed to see the master bowing to a statue of the Buddha. He mentioned his amazement to the master and said "I thought you would be spitting on the statue or something." The master looked at him and said. "You spits, I bows."
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Jan 9, 2015 16:46
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Regarding Zen, I again don't speak for Tibetan Buddhism writ large but I agree with your assessment that there's a lot of overlap. I believe this is probably especially true of the Dzogchen and Mahamudra sides of things where some of the underlying assumptions are more or less the same and the emphasis isn't on trying to achieve something but rather just recognizing something. There is especially a lot of overlap in concepts like turning words and pointing out instructions and so on. Further, the teaching of meditation itself often follows the same general ideas, with the same kind of process going on with recognition and so on. This makes good sense, as both include the philosophies of Nagarjuna and Vasabandhu as fairly crucial. The Kagyu school in fact follows from Nagarjuna as Tilopa received many transmissions on yogas and so on from Nagarjuna. So I think the general approach to Buddhism is very sympathetic. Different approaches, same fruit, I think. Anyhow I have a lot of respect for Zen and a kind of fascination with it. I think they work very well together, both are good paths. SubjectVerbObject posted:Parametric, in Tibetan Buddhism, is the purpose of meditation to put yourself in a state for more esoteric exercises? If so I can see your point about scratching itches or whatever is distracting. I'm not a Zen authority, but the focus in Zen was always on attaining a no mind state. I don't think I can succinctly state a purpose of meditation in Vajrayana, because it is both a means and an end. Shamatha, just your garden variety meditation, is both the practice of developing mental discipline and taming the mind, and the fulfillment of that practice as realizing the true nature of mind, the practice of meditation doesn't change, the meditator doesn't change, but the realizations come and the path is accomplished and so on. It lacks the kind of rigid disciplinarian structure of zazen and so on, nobody cares if your back is exactly straight, but that discipline comes with time as well. I've found Tibetan practices to be laid back in that there's a real sense that things will sort of fruit and develop on their own so long as one is dedicatedly working on the path. One of the things I find most compelling about Zen is an emphasis on life as the path, which is present also in Vajrayana but sometimes gets lost for people who focus a lot on practices and so on. This is actually a problem of Buddhists in the West, I think, or maybe just me, where because we lack the opportunity to do things like 3 year retreats easily, and generally lack a monastic establishment, and so on, we tend to see those practices when done by Tibetans as the main thing about them that makes them special, when in fact that is just a monk doing his job, the really profound part is their compassion, their lovingkindness, their wisdom mind, and their demonstration of those things in their daily lives. It's commonly said in many traditions that one aims to attain the state of no-meditation, but this doesn't mean they outgrow meditation or don't need to meditate or don't meditate, it just means that they are always in that state of mental stability that comes from well practiced meditation. Shamatha is probably one of the most underpracticed aspects of Tibetan Buddhism, frankly, even by Tibetans, because it isn't really emphasized. For Tibetans in their own culture, they basically just do their life and occasionally have lamas come to bless things, or they dedicate to the religious life. There's not a lot of in between, whereas in the West we have a lot of householder-practitioners, so much so that I suspect this will flourish into a model in its own right soon. But yeah, meditation does not have a "purpose" in that you only do it so you can do something else better. It is true that a meditated, stable mind can perform other rituals more effectively, visualizations and so on come much easier with a stable, calm mind that isn't beset upon constantly by all the distracting thoughts that come up, but we meditate also because achieving the state of mental stability that we have in meditation, along with recognition of the true nature of mind, is in fact the complete accomplishment.
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Jan 10, 2015 03:53
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Can someone explain in simple terms the distinction between Samatha and Vipassana meditation? In particular, when I'm doing breath meditation am I practising one, both or is "anapanasati" a distinct but prerequisite practice for both?
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Jan 14, 2015 12:40
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Crack posted:Can someone explain in simple terms the distinction between Samatha and Vipassana meditation?[ This can be kind of a confusing subject as opinions and interpretations vary, even among teachers from the same tradition. Thanissaro Bhikkhu has a pretty good discussion here: One Tool Among Many Basically, samatha meditation refers to a practice which seeks to focus the mind to an extremely calm, tranquil state. The mind is thus purified to an extent, and the meditator is able to reach states of absorption called jhanas, of which there are several, each with different qualities and characteristics. Vipassana doesn't seek this extreme kind of focus. Instead, the mind is calmed to a point where one can clearly see the arising and passing away of thoughts, feelings, sensations, etc, with the end goal being the eradication of ignorance by truly understanding impermanence and nonself. Some teachers claim that only one technique is necessary. Others say that both must come into play to some degree. Others claim that they can not actually be separated. One approach that seems popular is to use samatha as a base to establish powerful levels of concentration and focus, and then turn that focus toward investigating phenomenon as they arise and pass away. This kind of investigation can't be done while in jhana, apparently, but there is a level of concentration prior to jhana called "access concentration" that apparently allows this kind of activity. It can get complicated. quote:In particular, when I'm doing breath meditation am I practising one, both or is "anapanasati" a distinct but prerequisite practice for both? I'm not entirely sure, but I believe the technique you are using during meditation really determines what form of practice you are doing. For example, almost any intro to meditation, whether samatha or vipassana, will use the breath as the meditation object. The way in which you use the breath seems to play some role in how things play out though. I seem to recall that samatha meditation focuses on the feeling of the breath as it contacts the skin of the nostril, while many vipassana teachers will have the student focus on the rising and falling motion of the abdomen. I don't fully understand why these would make much of a difference. Ajahn Sujato wrote a book called A Swift Pair of Messengers which is freely available and discusses this topic with a ton of relevant sutta passages if you really want to nerd out. It is a fairly easy read and doesn't get too technical.
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Jan 14, 2015 17:19
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There is no mind
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Jan 14, 2015 17:35
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Mind preceeds all mental states.
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Jan 14, 2015 17:54
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Paramemetic what do you think? Mystery third option maybe?
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Jan 14, 2015 18:01
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Conventionally, there is mind. Absolutely, there is neither mind nor no mind. While at some level it is useful to recognize that mind itself is emptiness, this is in fact a problem when it leads to nihilism. "There is no mind" is a nihilistic statement that is not helpful, despite, on an absolute level, being true. By way of demonstrating this, take the statement "there is no mind." This is a conceptual statement, possessing subject and object and dualistic reasoning (existence and non-existence). A conceptual thought is thought by a conventional mind, therefore in order to make the statement "there is no mind" there must be a mind. Neveretheless, the mind that thinks "there is no mind" cannot be found anywhere. Thoughts come and go like clouds in the sky, rising and falling without permanence and based only on interdependent origination. Because the conventional mind is impermanent and arises only based on causes and conditions, it cannot be said to exist absolutely. This is a muddled topic because "mind" is a tricky word that can refer to many things in English and lacks nuance. It could be referring to the conventional mind, the mind of this samsaric being, or it could be referring to the Dharmadatu and Dharmakaya of which all phenomena are projections, and which is itself ultimately an expression of emptiness. So I would say, don't worry about it. Practice meditation, these things will become more clear with a stable mind. In my tradition, Shamatha is a practice of stabilizing the mind, and from this mental stability one can naturally gain recognition of Mahamudra or Rigpa, seeing impermanent by pointing the calm-abiding mind at itself and recognizing its empty nature. But that does not arise based on doing a technique right, or putting in so many hours to level up your meditating, but rather the fruits come when the conditions are ripe. We ripen conditions by practicing, so practice, and don't worry so much about things like "is mind emptiness or is mind real." You know the answers to these things academically (though I suspect Pete and I have wildly different understandings of the academic teachings due to differences in tradition), so knowing that, just practice. I have recently transcribed a teaching by my guru that I will share when I get a moment that I think speaks to this topic however. Paramemetic fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Jan 14, 2015 |
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Jan 14, 2015 20:48
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Paramemetic posted:Conventionally, there is mind. Absolutely, there is no mind. While at some level it is useful to recognize that mind itself is emptiness, this is in fact a problem when it leads to nihilism. "There is no mind" is a nihilistic statement that is not helpful, despite, on an absolute level, being true. This is a great post. I'd also say "don't worry so much about jhanas" either. And if you don't know what a jhana is you're a step ahead.
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Jan 14, 2015 21:09
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he1ixx posted:This is a great post. I'd also say "don't worry so much about jhanas" either. And if you don't know what a jhana is you're a step ahead. You can certainly get hung up on them, but they are a pretty important part of what the Buddha taught, and he mentioned them a lot. I think, like most things, they should be understood and not obsessed over.
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Jan 14, 2015 21:24
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The following is on this same topic, taken from edited transcripts of my precious guru's commentary on the Gong Chig, from chapter 6, the Vajra Statement on View, Meditation, and Conduct. It is discussing statement 6.2 and a few following, which go:Jigten Sumgon posted:6.2 Some say that the appearance of the variety of external appearances are unconnected with the inner mind, but this tradition states that all phenomena of samsara and nirvana are one's own mind. Khenpo posted:Jina[?], the regent of the Buddha Shakyamuni, has taught in the [Invincible Maitreyana?] explained that there is nothing else other than mind. After one realizes that this mind is itself non-existing, wise people having understood that both mind and reality do not exist, and rest in the Dharmadatu. Please accept these edited transcripts with the understanding that this is a tentative rough draft, and I have only finished these few paragraphs in the last couple days. They have not been reviewed for accuracy and while I am confident in the accuracy of the teachings of my lama as well as the root text upon which he's commenting, they have not been reviewed and so errors and misunderstandings may be present as a result of my own lacking. Still, the topic is close enough to what specifically was being discussed that I feel it's appropriate to share with the same above caveat that really it shouldn't be worried about, just practice and the actual realization will come over time. In the root text, it goes on to discuss specifically some statements on meditation, which I'll also share. I have not yet edited the commentary on these points however and don't think it's best to post the raw audio transcripts as it is pretty easy to misunderstand the teachings if you're not familiar with the kind of ESL that Tibetans are prone to. Jigten Sumgon posted:6.10 Some say meditation means the Samadhi of Shamatha, accompanied by bliss, clarity, nonthought and so on, but this tradition states that meditation is familiarization with the path of realization. And then some edited commentary specifically on the importance of practice and attaining actual realization rather than focusing on the words of intellectuals. Again, this has not been reviewed for accuracy. Khenpo posted:Elaborate explanations concerning view on the dharmadatu which is free from elaboration are only the words of intellectuals leading to the extremes of eternalism and nihilism, oh what suffering! Paramemetic fucked around with this message at 19:44 on Jan 7, 2020 |
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Jan 14, 2015 21:55
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I will read those links when I have a bit of time. The book I read (ages ago, so I might not be 100% correct) originally was Mindfulness in Plain English which was pretty explicitly vipassana but emphasised developing concentration before mindfulness. I earlier read something that said samatha was developing focus and a 1 pointed mind, which is what confused me. To some extent I think they must be related to some degree. It would be very inefficient to learn how to see thoughts arising and passing when you have a ton of thoughts every minute, likewise I think to develop a truly focused mind there must be some awareness of thought etc as if you aren't aware how do you know you're truly concentrated. But I'm only really getting into a daily schedule of meditating now (after meditating very infrequently over the past year) and I'm not very advanced, so I guess I'm practising the fundamental practice for both. You managed to clear it up a bit though, so thank you, and I'm sure the links will help even more. I find semantic stuff like this quite interesting for some reason, probably because I'm a nerd and unclear definitions irk me. I'm glad my dumb question somehow managed to spawn another interesting discussion. (though if you haven't figured it out 'a posting ghost' is Tautologicus's new username)
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Jan 14, 2015 23:09
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Generally I think drawing distinctions on what is and isn't this or that type of meditation from the perspective of trying to use the right foreign term is not that useful. With the guidance of a qualified teacher, just follow whatever instruction they give on meditation. Until then, just focus on calming the mind and gaining mental stability. Mind calming exercises like focusing on an external object for support (looking at a pebble for example) or an internal object (breathing, for example) while simply letting any thoughts that arise go and returning to the support object are not only a staple for more advanced meditations but also are even foundational in Western esoteric practices, as they allow one to concentrate mental energies on a given task or visualization or so on much more efficiently. Crowley most likely popularized this today after he studied tantra briefly, but it is what it is. These are very basic meditations that are good for anyone because developing that kind of calm mind and stability of mind is the foundation for preventing distraction from the path. So if there's no qualified teacher to teach meditation, this kind of meditation will at the very least not hurt anything, as this is always a fruitful thing to develop, and requires no special instruction beyond how to do it and help with any problems that may arise. Once one has an authentic guru, whether or not this or that practice is called shamatha or vipassana isn't important.
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Jan 15, 2015 07:05
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Crack posted:I will read those links when I have a bit of time. The book I read (ages ago, so I might not be 100% correct) originally was Mindfulness in Plain English which was pretty explicitly vipassana but emphasised developing concentration before mindfulness. I earlier read something that said samatha was developing focus and a 1 pointed mind, which is what confused me. To some extent I think they must be related to some degree. I think they are related, and I think the tendency to classify them individually might be a recent development. There is one sutta that discusses them as distinct methods but I'm phone posting so I don't have it handy. If you like the style of Mindfulness in Plain English, he has another book about samatha meditation. I think it is called beyond mindfulness in plain english. It is a good and simple introduction to developing concentration, which is nice as this style of meditation has a lot of nuances in terms of meditation objects, stages of absorption and different qualities of those stages and so on.
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Jan 15, 2015 19:05
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Paramemetic posted:
This is the most important thing, for sure. You're helping yourself no matter which method you are practicing.
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Jan 15, 2015 19:09
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Prickly Pete posted:I think they are related, and I think the tendency to classify them individually might be a recent development. There is one sutta that discusses them as distinct methods but I'm phone posting so I don't have it handy.
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Jan 15, 2015 19:21
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Anything by Bhante Gunaratana is going to be an easy read and super informative. I'm not saying this with a Theravada bias either - Mindfulness in Plain English is pretty commonly regarded as probably the best introduction to meditation across any Buddhist tradition that I am aware of. He also has really great Dhamma Talks on his website.
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Jan 15, 2015 19:50
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a posting ghost posted:Rin-po-chay, that's how it sounds. 
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Jan 15, 2015 20:04
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Does anyone have personal experience with mahasati meditation? I have been practicing breath meditation for a few weeks, but would like to get some in person training. However the closest center to me primarily teaches mahasati. From googling it seems a bit complicated and I'm wondering if going will just upend my breath practice.
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Jan 18, 2015 14:43
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I know you guys may be sick of having non-Buddhists walk in and ask for E/N spiritual advice because "Buddhists are all wise and poo poo", but I'll go ahead and do it anyway. I've been practicing some meditation to deal with nasty feelings and be a better person, but I've hit a snag. I've gotten the basic hang of mindfulness stuff, but now I'm trying to move on to compassion-related thoughts to kill bitter-misanthrope tendencies and it's giving me trouble. Not thinking ill of humanity in general isn't such a huge problem, or at least there's noticable progress, but there's one specific thing I can't get past: I really, really hate my grandfather. I'm not going to get into the awful specifics, but believe me when I say there are genuine reasons. The man is a sadistic, manipulative psychopath who has done no end of harm to everyone around him. Despite his old age and poor physical condition, he's still in my family's life ruining it, hurting my parents especially, and while there are legal proceedings going on to change that, it's a rather sluggish process. Now, I'm generally a peaceful and forgiving type of dude most of the time, but gramps has done much more bad stuff to my loved ones than myself and the whole chimp brain "protect your family" thing kicks in with laser focus. When I try to meditate on compassionate and calm feelings about my grandfather or at least try to be neutral, all I can feel is seething hatred, which the reflective, meditative state seems to make even more intense. These days his life sucks a lot, largely as a result of his evil or bad decisions in the past, but I can't muster empathy even for that - in fact, I catch myself reveling in it. Which is obviously completely horrible. I really don't want to have that kind of toxic poo poo kicking around in my head, and since it's not usual for me at all, it's worrying. It's one thing to openly admit someone is an enemy, but stewing in bile or taking joy at another's suffering (no matter how much it may seem "deserved") is another, and I'm getting that "beware that you yourself don't become a monster" vibe. The usual techniques tend to bring this out rather than help deal with it, or rather I mainly worked on negative feelings towards the self and this is a different ballpark. Do you guys have any good sources on what practices are good for quieting down hatred for another human being?
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Jan 19, 2015 19:57
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Hey ! I know there are folks who will answer precisely to your request. I'm sure there is a technique to do this kind of stuff. But i just would like to say that Buddhism is not about transforming yourself in a perfect, peaceful and all loving robot. You are a human being, you will feel hatred, violence, aggressiveness of all sorts during all your life. From the zen school point of view, this is not a problem. The fact that you see that you are hateful (and that you see that as a problem) shows that you are mindful enough. From there i think it is a wrong approach to try to change the feeling itself. Just seeing it is enough for you to change : it allows you to not act on it, etc. Paradoxically, the first step to alleviate your hate might be to allow yourself to be hateful. Maybe you have good reasons to be hateful, who's to say ? Things won't get fixed by denying the feeling and not admitting that you feel the right to be hateful. Unconditional love means you deal with what you are right now. If you are hateful, then it's ok. If you are full of love, it's ok too. The thing practice does is that it allows you to see it happening as a big theater of the mind. But it won't suppress your feelings nor should it ! So my advice, from the zen point of view (again, i'm sure there are others good advices coming), is to not try to do anything, while practicing, about your hate. Just stay with it physically and get out of the trains of thought it involves you in, when you notice you are involved. That's all. If you try to suppress it or replace it with "better" feelings, you will experience what you are describing : putting fuel on the fire. Don't try to suppress, don't try to replace anything. During practice, stay with things as they are and don't change a thing. Things change by themselves. There is also an advice in Shantideva's "Way of the boddhisatva", which tells : "don't be angry towards a person, be angry towards the anger". But it's just an advice, and it has no effect whatsoever if you don't practice ; still, it may help to change your point of view... Ugrok fucked around with this message at 11:56 on Jan 20, 2015 |
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Jan 20, 2015 11:47
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Guildencrantz posted:I really don't want to have that kind of toxic poo poo kicking around in my head, and since it's not usual for me at all, it's worrying. It's one thing to openly admit someone is an enemy, but stewing in bile or taking joy at another's suffering (no matter how much it may seem "deserved") is another, and I'm getting that "beware that you yourself don't become a monster" vibe. The usual techniques tend to bring this out rather than help deal with it, or rather I mainly worked on negative feelings towards the self and this is a different ballpark. Do you guys have any good sources on what practices are good for quieting down hatred for another human being? The usual problem with these requests in this thread I think isn't that we're sick of people assuming we're all wise and whatever because we're Buddhists. I mean, we're not all wise because we're Buddhists, or we'd be Buddhas, but we do tend to many of us want to help others. For me, the bigger issue is that anything we say as Advice On The Internet people with regards to Buddhist approaches to solving life problems will be platitudes. I mean, the general Buddhist wisdom in response to any problem, without the wisdom of someone who can apply it pragmatically, comes across as just super trite and dismissive. "Oh my life is miserable" "oh okay stop being attached to outcomes" "oh." It's just kind of dismissive generally when it's not applied tactfully. Since you're asking specifically about meditation technique stuff, I guess I can try to stumble through some advice just in hopes it helps by accident somehow. In this case, I don't think it's probably best to focus on trying to be compassionate towards the old man specifically. Obviously it is best to have compassion for all beings, and if you cannot have compassion for your worst enemy then welp. But that is the last bridge to cross. First it is important to develop genuine compassion towards all beings. At first it is very hard to love your worst enemy like your own mother, and it's not reasonable to expect anyone to do that perfectly and immediately or even with a lot of practice without developing it universally. So rather than bringing up afflictive emotions immediately trying to too quickly focus on your compassion and love towards your grandfather, first start with your mother. Then the rest of your family. Then people you don't know at all. Then maybe even bugs, mosquitos, cockroaches, spiders, etc. Finally when you can really feel compassion and lovingkindness towards even poisonous snakes and other frightful animals, try to feel that same compassion towards your enemies. If you start to feel afflictive emotions, anger, hatred, and so on, then I think maybe stop immediately and return to your family and so on, feeling compassion towards them. It sounds like your anger is arising not because of any particular hatred towards a dude, but rather because of what the dude is doing, and that's okay. It also sounds like you know that the solution to the anger cannot come from him, it can only come from inside your own self. So that is very good! Don't focus on him. If you feel yourself getting angry at him, instead look at that anger and think about how silly it is that you should be miserable because of whatever is arising. Even when you're angry at a person it's just as well to be angry at the weather, it's not at all helpful to be really angry and upset because it's snowing. Even no matter how angry you become, still it's snowing! Still it's raining! So rather than looking at trying to be compassionate towards him, which brings afflictive emotions, instead look at the emotions themselves. You hate a person, but that's just a silly thing, the same as hating a rock, or hating a river, or hating traffic. When you recognize how silly that is, then that's good. Some advice from Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche on meditation speaks briefly to meditation generally but specifically mentions anger: Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche posted:As we meditate, we simply sit straight and watch the breath. So what does that do? It creates space. In fact, the technique itself is just a trick. The main point is to recognize all these thoughts and distractions that are constantly bombarding us. We still get angry, but we know that we are angry—this kind of anger has so much humor. We can actually drive it in certain directions—we have more control. This is a general meditation for just calm abiding, but it's really important to also develop the mental stability that comes from calm abiding meditation as well as meditations like metta, and so on. I think generally in this thread we have a lot of really great, dedicated meditators and practitioners, but a lot of us focus on sort of specific meditations like metta, exchanging self and others, and so on, and these are really great practices! But as a result I think sometimes I especially tend to deemphasize the importance of calm-abiding. I could do a lot better at practicing it, personally. Every so often when my thoughts get cluttered with work or whatever, I realize immediately "oh I've lost my mindfulness and lost my calm-abiding" and then even after just two or three minutes of calm abiding it's like my entire life is better, and I realize it was really silly of me to be upset at all. So I think it's important to practice calm-abiding as well, not just metta or so on. Metta is really good, research shows that even just a few minutes of it can make us feel better and socialize better and so on, but without mental stability it becomes a lot of effort to maintain that compassion, and we can lose it easily. With more mental stability, which comes from calm abiding, then even just a moment of metta practice can go without being disturbed by afflictive emotions arising. So that's also something to consider. I really hope this is in any way helpful, but ultimately I suggest that if you think you can find some comfort in the Buddhist path, and I think you can, you should find a qualified lama who can give some instruction directly and who knows what the hell he or she is talking about, because they can give much better advice and they know a lot more. Even if you don't intend to take refuge or follow the Buddhist path, if you ask a lama for advice like this I think they will give better advice than I can. And of course if you're really suffering immensely you could consider some therapy, because the meditative path is a longterm solution to a longterm problem. For acute solutions to acute problems counseling and so on can be much better for helping with a family issue. But again that is just another thing to consider, since I don't know the specifics of what's going on with your family.
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Jan 20, 2015 14:51
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