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We should not, i think, throw away the fact that Brad Warner has a personality ; he's a punk, after all, ahahah... He just says what he thinks, bluntly, and with a provocative tone, always. It shakes things up a bit, which, personally, i like, but it might also be annoying for some, it is understandable. There is kensho in zen literature, especially in Rinzai zen. In rinzai, they strive for enlightenment, and godos in the zendos can yell at you to "try harder" to "get enlightened". You have a few description and stories of kenshos in the Three Pillars of Zen. Brad talks about them as well in a few of his books. Honestly when you read the experiences of kensho, it just sounds like guys on acid having a great trip, then, well, they go back to their lives and have to live as anyone else. In soto zen, which is Brad Warner's lineage, masters talk about kensho as well and don't deny its existence, but it's no big deal. You won't find any serious soto zen master who tells you that he achieved anything. On the contrary. Read Kodo Sawaki's "to you", he says it time after time : zazen is good for nothing, it has no purpose, it does nothing. So in this paradigm, kensho is certainly not something to strive for. It's just a state, and like any other state, it comes and goes. Soto zen is really about life as it is, in the most simple way, and does not deal with other stuff. Personnaly i think that Brad Warner, in this article, is perfectly in line with his soto zen lineage, which is Kodo Sawakis lineage. Edit : about lists : yeah he obviously spoke too fast on this point, but at the same time, it's not because there are lists in buddhism that we should cling to lists and make them our way of life. Edit 2 : Here is what Kodo Sawaki writes on Satori, Kensho, practice, etc. He was one of the great masters of soto zen, master of Nishijima, who was Brad's teacher. quote:
Ugrok fucked around with this message at 17:48 on Mar 27, 2014 |
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Mar 27, 2014 17:39
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ashgromnies posted:Brad Warner's perspective(Zen) is that Kensho is an initial awakening that must be furthered after initially being reached. Buddhahood or full enlightenment is different; he was referring to kensho rather than full enlightenment when he said that it needs to be cultivated afterwards. Really, i think his perspective is that he does not care at all about kensho or enlightenment. But we should ask him on his blog !
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Mar 27, 2014 17:52
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Thank you all for the discussion, it's really great to be able to talk about this ! The Mole, i think the poem you quoted is from Dogen's Shobogenzo. Which is the best buddhist book ever. If only i could understand a tenth of it, of course...
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Mar 27, 2014 18:54
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Allow me to derail ! Do any of you know of any teachings on "time" (or have anything interesting to say about it) ? I don't know if it's because of practice, but lately i am more and more disturbed by the feeling of impermanence. The fact that every second that passes is gone forever drives me really anxious (which is strange, cause it did not a few weeks ago, ahah - it's like an existential anxiety, as in "how can i live and exist if things just keep disappearing and reappearing all the time ?"), and i would like to have a wider buddhist point of view on this kind of suffering, and time in general. I know a bit of the work of Dogen, but that's it. I don't know if it's a good idea to investigate this, though, but oh well. Thanks in advance !
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Mar 28, 2014 19:01
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Well, you know, it feels like every second i live is just gone and can never be lived again. It's really really sad. And there is the anxiety : where does that sense of permanence come from ? How can i be the same, moment after moment, when in fact everything that makes me is forever lost, moment after moment ? It's exactly as pricjly pete described : what the hell am i going into if nothing stays from moment to moment ?
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Mar 29, 2014 06:42
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Thanks a lot for all you wrote, guys. I feel exactly what DT Suzuki says, in zazen : sometimes, you are just with the flow, and things are okay. I think it is really when you somehow get out of it, because of mental chatter or of overconceptualization, that you suffer. I read "opening the hand of thought", and i loved it. It emphasizes a really simple practice, without "toys", as Uchiyama says. Uchiyama was a disciple of Kodo Sawaki, and this is my favorite lineage. It's a good read.
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Mar 29, 2014 18:06
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It should also be said, to be honest, that practice is hard. Don't get into meditation thinking that you will sail a tranquil river, and that everything will be beautiful. It's also about confronting our most profound difficulties - as persons and more generally as human beings - and at times can really be very difficult and unsettling. There are no rules, though. Sometimes you sit down while feeling great, and while sitting you feel like a total crap ; sometimes life is really hard, and when you sit you feel totally great. All of this comes and goes. It's a neverending, ongoing process, and the key is to just keep doing it and not attaching to what you feel, which is really hard when things seem to fall apart. So don't begin if you do it only to feel good. Being human is also accepting that sometimes, life sucks. I'd say if your life showed you time after time that you don't get out of problems by fleeing them, but rather by confronting them face to face, then buddhism might be a path for you. If you want to have a general idea about practice, i would recommend the books of Pema Chodron, "the wisdom of no escape", for example. It really describes very well what you go through when practicing, and the "peaceful and compassionate warrior" state of mind. You can also read "zen mind, beginner's mind" from shunryu suzuki for a very complete view of zen practice. Edit : just as Rhymenoceros above, i started practicing to get relief from stress and anxiety, and to face some tough questions about who i am and what do i do with this life, whatever it is. Of course it did not work, ahah, at least not in the way i planned at the time. During the course of my practice, i've had very good times, and very difficult times as well (going through one at the moment, which might explain the overly dramatic tone of this post, ahahahha, sorry about that). Ugrok fucked around with this message at 14:41 on Mar 31, 2014 |
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Mar 31, 2014 11:20
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Indeed, thank you for your writings here, paramemetic. It IS awesome.
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Apr 2, 2014 10:36
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Also, keep in mind that what you call "suffering" might not be the same thing as "dukkha", which is what the buddha talks about. It is translated "suffering", but "suffering" covers a lot of things in our languages. "Dukkha", from buddha's point of view, is insatisfaction with things as they are, which is useless and causes useless pain. The cessation of dukkha is not the same thing as the cessation of pain, or difficult feelings. The cessation of dukkha is just to deal with things as they are, without being disappointed by anything. If you hurt your foot, you feel pain. Dukkha would be to complain about the pain and wanting it to go away, suffering because it does not go away when you wish, etc, adding unnecessary suffering to pain... But dukkha is not the same thing as the absence of pain. I don't think buddhism claims that you can be free of pain of any kind, or of any suffering of this kind. What you can free yourself of, from the buddhist point of view, is the dissatisfaction with what is, wether it is painful or pleasant. From this point of view, every suffering moment in your life is an opportunity to practice, so it can be viewed as you said from a christian point of view : suffering, in this life, allows you to evolve as a human being. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 20:28 on Apr 18, 2014 |
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Apr 18, 2014 20:24
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In soto zen, every master says that zazen and "real life" are just the same thing. There really is no distinction between practice and non-practice. But to see this, you have to practice. I think Dogen's massive Shobogenzo was written just to answer this question : "why practice ?". It's a really tough question. There is also - in soto zen - no need to try to be mindful, as if you "try", it is already wrong. Just do what you do. Which is exactly what zazen teaches. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 18:46 on Apr 27, 2014 |
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Apr 27, 2014 18:39
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Popcornicus posted:Here's a different take from Thanissaro Bhikku on the definition of mindfulness. Thanks a lot for another great article by Thanissaro Bhikku ! I love what he writes as well. This is a really good take on what to call "mindfulness", which is a tricky subject. I think Brad Warner wrote about it as well. Nishijima was very wary of the concept of "mindfulness", as he says in this post : http://gudoblog-e.blogspot.fr/2008_05_01_archive.html I think it is a dangerous concept because it can lead very easily to false views. If you tell someone to be mindful, he will naturally understand that he has to always pay attention to what he is doing, that he always has to watch himself do what he does. Which implies that he somehow has to separate himself from his actions and that he exists separately. Which is the total opposite of practice... I don't know for sure, but i really think it is an unnecessary word, that brings more trouble than it solves. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Apr 28, 2014 |
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Apr 27, 2014 23:49
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Excuse me ickbar, but what you are describing here has nothing to do with buddhism whatsoever. Not that i know what buddhism is about, ahahah ! But it's easy to tell that it's not about magical fantasies. I think telling these kind of stories in the "buddhism" thread might just give false ideas to newcomers. So, newcomers, if you want magical stories, just read your local trash newspaper about ufos and zombie cows, and leave buddhism out of the equation !
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Jul 1, 2014 12:57
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It's not about sterilization or whatever ; it's just that it is completely irrelevant and of no interest at all for anyone who might get interested in buddhism.
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Jul 1, 2014 15:17
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Sorry ickbar, i did not mean to offend you. I tried to make my answer humourous, and apparently i failed, ahah. If people want to believe that guys can teleport on plane engines, well, fine (even if i still find this a bit sad to be honest), but what i was saying was just that it has nothing to do with buddhism. I really don't see how this kind of "information" is helpful to anyone interested in buddhism. For me, stories are more an obstacle than something that can help. Practice is also about stopping to live in the stories we tell ourselves, so adding more stories cannot help. It's still funny, though, i'll give you that ! PS : I don't have to go to asia to hear crazy stories about stuff. Bad newspapers are full of them. Buddhism, for me at least and in everything i read about it, is about reality here and now. Not about stories. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 12:17 on Jul 3, 2014 |
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Jul 3, 2014 12:15
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Dr.Caligari posted:I don't think these tales of mystical experiences detract, or necessarily add, to anything in Buddhism. But I don't think it's any different that Catholic stories of Saints levitating, and if one were to join the Catholic church just in hopes of learning to levitate, they would quickly change their goals, or else just quit. Exactly.
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Jul 3, 2014 13:12
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Pancakes by Mail posted:And finally a question about Zen Buddhism - my local Zen group seems to emphasize that it does not conflict with any belief system, and can be fully practiced by people who are also Christians, Muslims, atheists, what have you. Does Zen Buddhism do away with belief in rebirth? What about karma? Zen seems appealing but I also don't think I'm looking for a tradition that removes crucial elements of the Buddha's teaching. I believe Zen also incorporates many elements of Taoism, correct? This also gives me pause. Excellent answer by Helix. Here is more food for thought about this question : http://hardcorezen.info/what-should-we-think-about-death/2920 Basically, in Dogen's Shobogenzo (one of the most important soto zen book), rebirth is not literally possible. What is dead, stays dead. Ashes won't be wood again. But at the same time, rebirth is sometimes talked about. It's complicated, it seems, but anyway, helix was on point : what matters in zen is not what happens next or whatever. What matters is what happens now. And now, there is, in fact, no death or life. And yes, zen and taoism are very close. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 10:03 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 09:59
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Rhymenoceros posted:If it wasn't in this way, it wouldn't make sense that we can feel the consequences of our actions in this life in the next life (according to karma). It'd be akin to me doing something unskillful and then some other dude feeling the result of it. But maybe "your" actions are not really "your" actions ? Maybe the "other dude" is not really separate from you at all ? Maybe every action has effect on everything, regardless of how we divide the world in categories ? Every moment contains every past moment. Everything i do right now comes from "past" karma. I don't think those ideas about rebirth are about individual lives, but rather about how everything appears and disappears continuously, moment after moment after moment. It's like an endless flux of activity, which sometimes manifest itself as a human being ; but this human being does not own the flux or limit the flux, on the contrary he is "contained" in it, or better maybe, he is it. In this point of view, everything produced is conditioned by previous activity, so it literally has an effect on everyone, everywhere. So maybe saying "i feel the consequences of past life" does not mean that a former version of "you" influences the present "you", it just means that every past life defines your life right now. It's nothing crazy really, it's just that every action conditions the next. It's a basic rule. In the end, maybe there is no distinction between your life and other lives ; it's always the same stream of continuous activity, as paramemetic said already... (This would also be a taoist point of view, i guess). Ugrok fucked around with this message at 14:43 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 14:33
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Yup those are pretty important points... It's always difficult to intricate relative and absolute. I was about to say, to follow paramemetic, that for pain to be felt, there has to be a you separate from the pain ; and if i'm not mistaken (and i might be), buddhism is also about "no self". So the pain happens, but who feels it ? It's an event as any other event, taken in a chain of other events... But i totally agree that those are just words, and that when i feel pain i'd rather not feel it... Maybe we have to acknowledge the absolute while not throwing away the relative. It's a difficult path, a middle path... Thanks for the discussion ! Ugrok fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 17:08
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Thanks paramemetic ! Nothing to add, or remove, from what you said. I was not trying to say that pain is meaningless or should be left alone or ignored. I was just trying to put it in perspective with the question of rebirth, which started the discussion. By considering pain as a simple event, and not putting the emphasis on WHO feels it, then we can understand how it influences the whole chain of events, thus creating "problems" for future "lives".
Ugrok fucked around with this message at 18:09 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 18:07
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Okay, i'm actually going through a real life situation, really concrete, that i wonder how buddhism would deal with. My cats brought fleas to the house. So i ended up killing tons of fleas with insecticide and stuff like that. How am i supposed to deal with that ? I mean, i can't let hundreds of insects bite me and my pets all night ! The itches are horrible ! It's a funny situation because, as a zen practicioner, i try to respect life but i also try to be very practical. There is no way to get rid of the fleas without killing them. If i don't kill them, they will just grow and grow in population and totally plague my house, and i will get bitten a lot, maybe endangering my health and the one of my closed ones. But at the same time, i feel horrible killing thousands of living beings. It's a great situation for practice, because it gets me to see how i react to problems : trying to eradicate them. I also get to work on my body sensations since the bites can really itch. And i also can watch how my mind can really create stuff : there are lots of times, especially at night, when i feel itches erverywhere but there is nothing on me and no bites. Just thinking about itches makes me itch, it is really funny. Anyway, i did not find an acceptable "buddhist" solution to this. I'm just acting out of my instinct on this one : things are threatening me, i just try to get rid of them. It's my natural way of reacting, which, maybe, should be trusted as well. I try to think about this situation with the four noble truths : life is dukkha, you bet it is ! Itching is maybe the best thing there is to feel dukkha. The law of cause and effect, and impermanence : well, i know that things don't last, and will change. But those changes could be difficult. And when you get bitten and it itches, it's quite hard (but not impossible) to consider this like a passing phenomenon that no real self feels (3rd truth). Really quickly, you are back in fight mode and make this "your" problem. It's not always easy to just watch things happen ! And if i follow the path to liberation, the 4th truth, that is if i follow precepts like "no killing", i end up covered in bites and eaten alive, ahah ! Any ideas ? Ugrok fucked around with this message at 14:06 on Aug 2, 2014 |
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Aug 2, 2014 13:57
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Thoughts about thinking (ahahah) : Nowadays i think the problem with "thinking" is not the "thinking" itself, but the fact that we don't really go to the end of thinking, we don't really look at what it is and how it works. We just think and choose, more or less unconsciously, to believe it. But when we really look at thinking, as did for example a famous buddhist philosopher like Nagarjuna, we can understand that, as all things, it is "empty" ; and that if we push the logic behind thinking to its ends, it just falls apart as an existing, self sufficient thing. Just as when we look at what is a cup for "real", we can find nothing that makes it a cup and not a shovel. But of course, a cup is not a shovel ! Thinking is no probem as long as we understand deeply that it is a convention. It is not to be rejected, nor approved. So, i think that what is overrated is not "thinking" itself. What is overrated is the belief that thinking can resolve all our existential problems and that everything in life can be met with logical thinking and pure reason. In fact, thinking can be and is, as much as anything, part of the path to awakening. I think a lot of buddhist schools offer a path that is almost entirely based on thinking and that leads the practicioner to understand gradually that relying on thought only is not reasonable (ahahah). Zen koans are an example, of course. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 14:58 on Sep 8, 2014 |
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Sep 8, 2014 14:54
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Hello guys ! I got a philosophical question about the heart sutra, especially about emptiness, that i would like to submit to the craziest and most analatycal buddhists out there : Often it is said that what we see is "not real", meaning that, basically, what we see is only effects ; the "real" cause cannot be seen. For example if i watch a cup, the only thing i really see is the representation of a cup. It is made of interactions between my eyes and nervous system (among many other conditions) and "something that is a cup" (but we can't call it a cup, since a cup is what we perceive and is already conventional - we will call it "the real cup", even if we can't know it). But in the philosophy about emptiness (Nagarjuna for example), it is also said that cause and effect are not the same, not different, and not "not same and not different" nor "both same and different". The link between cause and effect is empty. So, if what we see is only "effect", it is empty as well : the representation of the cup is not the same as "the real cup", but not different, and not "not same and not different". So, if i get it right, what we see is emptiness itself ? Since it is also said that the only way to realize (meaning to live in reality) anything is emptiness, and since what we see is emptiness, then what we see is totally "real" ! So, is it really right to say that what we see is not real ? Would'nt it be more accurate, in the context of the heart sutra, to say that it is not real, not unreal, and not "not real and not unreal" nor "both real and unreal" ? Thank you for your time !
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Sep 10, 2014 22:30
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Hello guys ! Sorry, i did not mean to create a fight out of this. Thank you all for your answers, which have been very helpful. The linguistic approach, i feel, as paramemetic said, is really important and i did not see that at first. Maybe this is why Nagarjuna is especially cautious when talking about this stuff, using formulas like "not the same, not different, not both same and different", etc. Maybe it's a bit like in zen koan : there is a logically unsolvable stuff here, and this somehow "stops" the mind ; maybe what is left in that state of mind is a taste of emptiness. But there is also what i feel is a problem in all his : how can compassion come from this realization ? Is compassion the will to act for the benefit of all the beings living in this relative world, but knowing, at the same time, that none of this is ultimately "real" ? Or is it that there is no "real" or "unreal", so what we get to work with is just this, this life we experience all the time, and that we just have to learn to know it very well and trust our feelings about it to do right action ? But i thought it was "not knowable" ! Aww dammit, i need some paracetamol again
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Sep 11, 2014 12:48
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Yup, you're right on about the defenses... It's funny because all those questions came at a time when, in my practice, i felt at ease, beginning to be able to just stay with what's there without questioning it and without the need to know... At least that's what i thought, guess it was just a trick i played on myself ! It's useful to see that we are never what we think we are, and i will try not to forget that lesson. Being at ease or thinking you are at ease is not something to cling to.
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Sep 11, 2014 13:06
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From the zen perspective, for example, you have, on one hand, Suzuki's Zen Mind Beginner's mind, or Nishikima's work, which are written in a very easy-to-understand language, as if a friend was explaining things to you. On the other hand, you have Dogen's Shobogenzo, which sounds like psychedelic poetry sometimes but conveys the same (non-)ideas. I'd say i love both approaches and i find them both really important. What is important is the ability to go from one to the other. Sometime, nebulous and really formal, classical writing, has a strong effect on the reader because the meaning is not easily accessible, and it is in fact why it is written like that : cause ultimately, there is no "real" meaning, there is nothing to attain. So i think this old fashioned style of writing is really important in showing this. On the other hand, it's really great to be able to read "easy", "real life" stuff. But i would do both, really. Reading Dogen helps me understand what Suzuki says ; reading Suzuki helps me understand Dogen. It's really complementary, for me.
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Sep 16, 2014 17:09
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Here is an example of a comparison between Suzuki and Dogen. They both talk about separating practice, enlightenment, and every day life. It's also about "emptiness" (sunyata). Suzuki : "Even before we practice it, enlightenment is there. But usually we understand the practice of zazen and enlightenment as two different things : here is practice, like a pair of glasses, and when we use the practice, like putting the glasses on, we see enlightenment. This is the wrong understanding. The glasses themselves are enlightenment, and to put them on is also enlightenment. So whatever you do, or even though you do not do anything, enlightenment is there, always." Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. Dogen : "When all dharmas are seen as the Buddha-Dharma, then there is delusion and realization, there is practice, there is life and there is death, there are buddhas and there are ordinary beings. When the myriad dharmas are each not of the self, there is no delusion and no realization, no buddhas and no ordinary beings, no life and no death. The Buddha's truth is originally transcendent over abundance and scarcity, and so there is life and death, there is delusion and realization, there are beings and buddhas. And though it is like this, it is only that flowers, while loved, fall ; and weeds, while hated, flourish." Dogen, Shobogenzo (Genjo-Koan). Both texts do not really exactly match in meaning, but they approach the same stuff in different styles. I find both really interesting and complementary. You understand Suzuki better thanks to Dogen ; you understand Dogen better thanks to Suzuki. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 10:31 on Sep 17, 2014 |
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Sep 17, 2014 00:29
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I think everyone goes through the "trying to understand everything" phase. Just keep on practicing. It passes. Then it comes back. Then it passes again. Like everything else, ahah ! The thirst for truth is a really good thing for practice, which is paradoxical because practice is there to end suffering, and most of our suffering is due to wanting to know and perfectly grasp everything we meet, ultimately, completely, etc. Don't struggle with the questions, leave them be. Or better, you can do as is done in a famous koan ; sadly i don't remember the details, but it's about turning questions into exclamation. Question : "Who am I ?" Answer : "Who am I !" From time to time, practice also has to do with becoming a living question, a living contradiction, and being ok with that.
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Sep 17, 2014 10:36
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Reginald Ray is/was the teacher of Shadowstar if i'm not mistaken, a goon who posted a lot in buddhism thread a few threads ago.
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Oct 6, 2014 13:21
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Back with another stupid philosophical question ! In buddhism it is often said that reality and mind are "alike". There are a few ways of seeing this, one for example is saying that mind and matter work together to make reality. Another way is quite dangerous, and is to believe that everything that happens happens because you are there to make it happen ; it's the classical koan zen thing, "if a tree falls and nobody is here to hear it, does the tree fall make any noise ?" At the same time we cannot picture things happening without us witnessing em one way or another ; i mean, if i don't hear about war in afghanistan, then war in afghanistan simply does not exist for me. Is my mind creating the war in afghanistan ? In zen there is sometimes the distinction between "small mind", meaning, individual mind, and "big mind", which could be called "emptiness" i guess. But i can't quite see how they are interlinked. Maybe all individual minds work together to create the reality we all live in ? Because when we think about it, our way of seeing things comes from what we learned, from our parents and cultural background ; we call a building "building" because of this education that comes from others, so in a way, even our individual mind is constituted with an infinity of fragments of other human minds... But yet, there is stuff out there that is "just happening", without us humans having nothing to do with it, even if it is impossible to envision it from "outside" our consciousness ! How does this poo poo work in buddhism, ahah ?
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Oct 9, 2014 16:29
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YOU TELL ME !!!! Aahahah
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Oct 9, 2014 22:48
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The Dark Wind posted:Perhaps more of an intellectual question, but is there a reason for why ignorance/marigpa/avidya happens? If our fundamental ground is this perfect nature, how could there ever have been at any point an opening or space for defilements to arise? Where did they come from? If they came from that ground itself, then how could that ground be perfect if it also allowed confusion to arise? Is confusion actually perfect too? Why meditate if this is the case? How did we get to the point where the illusion of suffering became so solid that we felt the need to do something about it? This is basically the question that led Dogen, the founder of soto Zen, to practice and study during his whole life. You could look at his work, maybe ! One "scientific" and totally incomplete answer would be that, for evolutionary reasons, our psychological and physical system work to make us believe that we exist separately from everything. This is a great way to survive, for mere biological reasons. If there is an individual that feels he is different from the lion that chases him, then this individual will flee. Basically, this individual will grasp what pleasures him, and reject what disgusts him - thats why he will always suffer. All of this is based on the belief and experience that he exists separately from things, and that things affect him in a way or another, and that things exist outside of him, as solid, independant entities. This is a perfect system for survival. This strong belief is ignorance, and it's totally rooted in our perception of reality - all of it, not only thought : our visual system, our senses, everything. So we could say, adopting this perspective, that ignorance rises from this need to survive. At the same time, all of this is like the rest : emptiness. So this same distorted view of reality is the path, and is not to be rejected. It's not escapable. What is escapable is the total strong belief that it is absolutely true and that we have to cling to it, defend it, fear it, etc. Meditation and buddhism teach us just this : what we see, what we feel, what we think and believe, is just our view, is just delusion, it's just a movie, it's a story with a lot of stuff that, in fact, we don't really need to live, even when we think we do. Which does not mean it has to be rejected or destroyed or anything ; it just has to be seen as it is : a story, a movie. Then life gets better because, as you can enjoy watching a terrifying movie, you can enjoy living life even when it's hard, basically having, at the same time, your deluded history, and a larger point of view. Moreover, when you begin to see your life like this, you understand that you can write the drat story anyway you want. That's why meditation is important : by living and observing your ever changing psycho physical activity, you begin to understand the way it works, the way your own story unfolds, allowing you to understand that it is a story, and also allowing you to make this story lighter. And if you meditate and practice a lot, i guess you could even become storyless. PS : it's just how i see things at this point, i'm by no means a buddhist teacher or specialist, take all this with a pinch of salt or just see it as random internet bs. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 23:59 on Oct 14, 2014 |
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Oct 14, 2014 23:26
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Tautologicus posted:Life doesn't get better, but it doesn't get worse. It stops getting better or worse. Well, for me that seems like an improvement ! Ahah !
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Oct 14, 2014 23:55
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Thanks guys, very nice conversation.
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Oct 15, 2014 09:48
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"Living and dying in zazen : five zen masters of modern Japan". It's great, with a lot of stories about Kodo Sawaki, Uchiyama, and some guys who spend their lives homeless meditating in parks and building stuff with grass. A really good book. I thought a bit about practice making you able to "see your story and begin to write it differently". I think i was wrong ; after thinking about it, this way of putting it makes you the center of the world. In fact, a story, to be able to "work", has also to be recognized by others. So it's about writing a story that fits with others and do them good. Not just writing your own story, which would necessarily be completely deluded even in the conventional world. PS : a bit shocked by "being homeless allows you to meditate more". Being homeless allows you to struggle a lot, get into fights, die in cold nights, get bothered all the time by police, etc. I don't think being homeless is a good way of practicing nowadays. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Oct 15, 2014 |
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Oct 15, 2014 23:19
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Well yeah, intuitively, reading this without much thinking, i'd say this sounds like nazi bullshit. For buddhists i think, enlightenment is not conditioned by body or mind. The whole point is to get rid of body and mind conditions. Which means that however crippled, deaf or "bad" you are, you can get enlightened. It might even give you some more perspective and might help the practice somehow.
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Oct 21, 2014 22:33
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@Paramemetic : don't be too harsh on yourself, though. I mean, it's all well and all to say "well, stuff are just arising and ultimately they are all the same, it does not matter, it's just me making them cool or uncool in my mind, so what's the problem ?" ; but if you get in a car crash and lose your legs, well, this story might be a little harder to tell to yourself. It is just another story, in other words. Seeing that things are just conventional and just, basically, how we make them look in our minds, does not mean that they are not important. Our conventional reality is all we got, and even the fact that we suck in it and that we make lots of mistakes in it should be respected. Basically we follow two rules in this conventional reality : we avoid suffering and seek happiness. I really think there is nothing wrong with that ; it's just that the way we do it is, most of the time, silly, because we are deluded. So maybe craving for a job title is not going to "really" make you happy ; but at the same time, it's part of the way you see happiness for now, so maybe it should not be completely discarded as silly, or stupid. It is just what it is. Nothing is stupid or silly : we just are the way we are. It is often said that delusion and enlightenement walk hand in hand. There is no point in blaming oneself because we are not in adequation with what we think is the "ultimate truth" or "ultimate way of happiness". This is just delusion again because we will never, ever, know "ultimate truth" ; such a thing is not coherent, it's just like wanting to know square circles.
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Oct 24, 2014 22:54
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Paramemetic posted:I'm amused too that you think that was being harsh on myself. Ahaha, indeed this is funny, it says much about how i take other people's words (as complaints, when they are not) ! Well to be honest i think it's not just me, but also a trap of language itself, since when using "silly" we seem to imply that it is somehow "wrong". Which is silly. Ahahaha ! Thank you anyway, and i'm glad you are okay and having fun with it all !
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Oct 25, 2014 17:03
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Hello guys ! I don't know if i understand your position correctly, tautologicus, but it seems to me that you're kind of stuck to the absolute side of the concept of emptiness, which can be a very nihilistic stance - and a very uncomfortable one. I don't know if you read "Dropping ash on the buddha" by Seung Sahn. It's very interesting because he describes, in it, the process of approaching emptiness. Maybe you would recognize the place you're in by reading this. I sure do. There are also a series of talks by John Dunne on Nagarjuna, on the Upaya Zen center dharma podcasts page, that are really good. There is stuff about solipsism too in these talks which is really interesting. I'm not saying this to mock you or anything, tautologicus. It's just that when i'm reading what you write i feel a lot of suffering which i can relate to and which was, in my case (that i admit i maybe too quikly apply to you), due to a nihilistic misunderstanding of the concept of emptiness. And some things helped me that i want to share. Maybe this is all just me projecting stuff on you, and if you feel it is the case, i sincerely apologize. Basically, paramemetic's answer, i found, was spot on. Denying psychological stuff or completely identifying with it are both wrong views in my opinion. Saying "there is practice" and saying "there is no practice" are both wrong views too. Ugrok fucked around with this message at 13:21 on Nov 27, 2014 |
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Nov 27, 2014 13:13
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Hey again, Tauto ! I don't think anything has to be avoided. It's just that there is no abyss. There is no "nothing". There is just... this, our human experiences, illusory and broken and feeling incomplete. It's the whole deal. There is no "abyss" or anything beyond this. This includes our psychological states, our most delusory and stupid behaviors, the way we build stuff logically in our heads and use it, our life as a society, our interactions with others etc etc. We literally build our own world, and we do it together, so we better do it well and take care of each other. This begins by listening to others and accepting to work with them and not against them. Excuse me again if this offends you (hope not as it is not meant to), but you sound like you are definitely against everything / everyone. When you exhaust all the ways, you don't find the abyss or infinite nothingness. This is fantasy. You find what has been there since the beginning : you as a simple human being, doing human stuff, and that's it. What's convenient with nihilism and clinging to "nothing", is that nobody can take "nothing" away from you. It's often described as the last resistance, and as the worst and most difficult clinging to get rid of because it allows to really freeze our identities around it. So you have to deal with it as anyone else, and with everyone else. Pretending you don't is just clinging to the view that "everything is an illusion but I see through it". This is such a hard position to get out of, and excuse me, but you sound like you are right down in it. Really, please read Seung Sahn's "Dropping ash on the buddha". The whole purpose of the book is resolving a koan asking "how to convince someone who is blocked in seeing everything as illusory and thus not reliable". It really sounds like what you are doing right now : you reject everything coming out of places other than you because you think it is all illusory and no one can relate to your own experience and no one has any truth to tell you about it. This is no wonder that you end up in solipsism. But solipsism is a wrong view too, from a buddhist philosophical point of view. There is not a single thing in your own world that does not depend on other minds and that is not made of other's minds. I'm telling you all this cause i've been through it as well and might go through it again one day. In the end it was just a pile of crappy thoughts and beliefs i had to first work on, then let go of. I know you will tell me that you are "beyond belief" or whatever. If you were you would not be posting on an internet forum and you would not argue and you would not even use language and you would not be human at all. We are humans, we live in beliefs and language and made up stuff. Which makes it really non serious stuff when you think about it. Let's have a good laugh at all this ! Thanks anyway for giving us the opportunity to discuss such matters. Wish you the best Ugrok fucked around with this message at 16:55 on Nov 27, 2014 |
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Nov 27, 2014 16:40
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| # ¿ May 22, 2024 10:15 |
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Tautologicus posted:
You're stating the obvious. Open any zen book and you will find this. There is no need to pretend to be an enlightened hero that brings the truth to the stupid SA masses. What you are saying and the description of your experiences are nothing special, really. From my point of view you sound like a nihilistic teenager trying to get attention by using poorly formulated sentences about existential angst. It's okay, really (i did it, and i still do it as well from time to time) ; but maybe you should not post in the buddhist thread, since it's not really relevant to buddhism and not constructive in any way ? Because otherwise people that would be interested in buddhism just come here and see this stuff and might be disappointed by the tone of this "conversation". It's sad because some stuff you say, as obvious as it is to anyone who practices or reads about buddhism, could lead to great introductory and theoretical discussions which i would love to have, but for me your attitude totally ruins it. Wish you the best Ugrok fucked around with this message at 16:11 on Nov 28, 2014 |
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Nov 28, 2014 16:05
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