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Buddha and Mind

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Re: Buddha and Mind

#91

Post by _y5hn »

Trasmatta wrote: post #68
carrolldunham wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The behavioural expectations are explicit in all the Buddhist traditions. You're also mixing up a temporary state with what's supposed to be an irreversible permanent change of nature. Of course, the notion that the rigors of virtue are just part of 'social conditioning' that a meditator will slough off is deliciously tempting to people want to have their cake and eat it too. "Freedom from desire but oh, should one h…

My point wasn't "the West has it wrong, you have to dive into the Eastern traditions for the real answers". It was more, "it's really complicated in Eastern traditions already, and we've muddied the water even further by adding our own expectations and biases on top of that". So what I mean is that some people, like Culudasa, probably experienced a brain state that might be called "enlightenment" in some contexts. Bu…

There are many states, of brain and matter. None of them - none, behavioural concerns or even desires or not, have anything to do with enlightenment. It's even meaningless to appoint so and so enlightened. In fact, stating such displays the ignorance.

No tradition have exclusive rights either.

What we can do is point the direction, what it is not, etc., when someone is seeking realization.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#92

Post by Trasmatta »

nsomaru wrote: post #80
Barrin92 wrote: post #48

Think the article is right in its diagnosis of mindfulness. Jack Dorsey going on a meditation retreat so he can go back and be even more productive at building the things that send everyone to meditation retreats has always been kind of funny to me. The trend to turn spiritual practices into some sort of self-help healthcare to me is honestly just abysmal. In many ways it is worse than just not doing them at all. C.S…

I studied Vedanta in India at an Ashram for 4 years continuously without break. One of the things my master would emphasise a lot was that physical yoga is the first stage on the spiritual path and meditation is the last. But he says they are easy to teach and have become completely commercialised in the West only because they are both really easy to instruct. He cautioned us against the perils of meditation when you…

Thanks for your insight and perspective. Reading about things like this resulted in me mostly stepping away from meditation some time ago. I still find some of the mindfulness skills I learned useful for managing stress, but I've decided not to take it deeper than that.

(One other reason: I had a horrific experience on a dissociative drug that, on further research, seemed to mirror the experience of many meditators who hit that brick wall you mentioned. It was the worst experience of my life, and if I risk hitting that wall again through meditation, it's not worth it for me.)

Re: Buddha and Mind

#93

Post by _y5hn »

300bps wrote: post #17
Falandafa2021 wrote: post #8

Meditation is about quieting ones mind to ultimate stillness. This is where the ego disolves which is not exactly in alignment with the culturally dominant materialism that we find surrounding us (i.e. the quest for money power and status) all things that rely on an inflated ego. Using meditation to improve in moving up in society is like using wood logs to put out a fire.

All the meditation I've done taught me that it was about being aware of what was happening in the present moment - i.e. mindfulness. Most of the meditation I've studied taught me that quieting one's mind was not the goal and further not possible.

It is possible, for some, through extreme practices. But it is also regarded as destructive to the person.

It's a science to this, not just one end game. Different meditations have different purposes, etc.

What is my purpose? May be a good question to ponder for direction.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#94

Post by _y5hn »

acituan wrote: post #22
Falandafa2021 wrote: post #8

Meditation is about quieting ones mind to ultimate stillness. This is where the ego disolves which is not exactly in alignment with the culturally dominant materialism that we find surrounding us (i.e. the quest for money power and status) all things that rely on an inflated ego. Using meditation to improve in moving up in society is like using wood logs to put out a fire.

Ultimate stillness is death, and the ideas of nirvana while leaving folks behind is but a single school in Buddhist thought. I find it to be anti-humanist romantic escapism. Another version of nirvana brings back the learnings to other humans and help alleviate their suffering. Ego inflation causes a lot of the suffering for sure, but you can’t function as a human without ego either. To deny it is to deny humanity, t…

Death is never the first step, though it will be the last. Well-written :)

Re: Buddha and Mind

#95

Post by akomtu »

nsomaru wrote: post #80
Barrin92 wrote: post #48

Think the article is right in its diagnosis of mindfulness. Jack Dorsey going on a meditation retreat so he can go back and be even more productive at building the things that send everyone to meditation retreats has always been kind of funny to me. The trend to turn spiritual practices into some sort of self-help healthcare to me is honestly just abysmal. In many ways it is worse than just not doing them at all. C.S…

I studied Vedanta in India at an Ashram for 4 years continuously without break. One of the things my master would emphasise a lot was that physical yoga is the first stage on the spiritual path and meditation is the last. But he says they are easy to teach and have become completely commercialised in the West only because they are both really easy to instruct. He cautioned us against the perils of meditation when you…

That's a common and probably valid in general way to look at westerners. However another reputable source said something to this extent: people in Asia have the right culture, the right mindset, but they have it too easy and their progress is so slow; westerners, on the other hand, are so immersed into materialism, their mind is so busy with shiny things, that they have no time for things that matter and their society is unsuitable for anything spiritual, but it is for this reason any achievement on the west counts as many on the east.

My opinion about this meditation thing is that there's something in it, but telling people not to try because it may accidentally destroy their mind is laughable. By the time one develops will so strong and concentration so stable that it may cause issues, one must already be knowledable enough.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#96

Post by xelxebar »

emacsen wrote: post #62
xelxebar wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One of the paradoxes of Buddhism, but specifically Zen, is the idea that the practice teaches you to be able to handle enormous stress. Practioners [sic] are taught to stay in meditation through physical distress, through mental distress, even while being hit with sticks, etc. This is a form of training. Let me pick on this bit, because I have experience here. That sounds like a crappy, knockoff kind of zen. Any gr…

> That sounds like a crappy, knockoff kind of zen. If it is, it's a long standing one. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keisaku The stick is meant to "wake up" practioners but it's also used to help them learn to endure pain. But also, simply sitting in place for long periods can be painful- knee pain, lower back pain, etc. are common. Zen training is about letting of the need to react to it, accepting it and continuing…

Even the wikipedia article you site says nothing about "learning to endure pain". Usage of the keisaku/kyousaku like that is not unheard of, but these stories get recounted as problems to avoid, not as models to follow. In my experience, the keisaku can really provide a spike of motivation, both hearing it echo throughout the zendo, as well as receiving the strike yourself. Any "pain" is on par with that of stiffly clapping ones hands; it might tingle a little bit.

Leg pain is also, of course, a thing, but this is purely incidental in my experience. Modulo special circumstances, the lotus position is really good at minimizing pain when sitting for extended periods. Of course, if your legs are not flexible enough to sit in lotus, then even zen monks will sit in half- or even quarter-lotus. I've even seen exceptional cases of people sitting in other positions for medical reasons, but over time, most gravitate to full lotus.

> Zen training is about letting of the need to react to it, accepting it and continuing, just as one learns to endure and not react to thoughts that arise, or emotions that come and go.

That's way too complicated. I'd be inclined to say that zazen is about folding your legs and sitting. Everything that happens in that space is orthogonal to your butt on the cushion, which is such a freeing feeling to directly encounter oneself.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#97

Post by chewz »

Barrin92 wrote: post #48

Think the article is right in its diagnosis of mindfulness. Jack Dorsey going on a meditation retreat so he can go back and be even more productive at building the things that send everyone to meditation retreats has always been kind of funny to me. The trend to turn spiritual practices into some sort of self-help healthcare to me is honestly just abysmal. In many ways it is worse than just not doing them at all. C.S…

> C.S. Lewis once said that one can believe that Jesus is the son of god or a charlatan

C.S. Lewis was a Christian so he is using two-value logic. Most Asian philosophies is based on four-value logic hence difficult for Westerners to comprehend in full.

Jesus could have been liar or god or both or neither.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#98

Post by guerrilla »

Barrin92 wrote: post #48

Think the article is right in its diagnosis of mindfulness. Jack Dorsey going on a meditation retreat so he can go back and be even more productive at building the things that send everyone to meditation retreats has always been kind of funny to me. The trend to turn spiritual practices into some sort of self-help healthcare to me is honestly just abysmal. In many ways it is worse than just not doing them at all. C.S…

> C.S. Lewis once said that one can believe that Jesus is the son of god or a charlatan, but nothing in between.

Horrible example considering that all evidence suggests that "in between" is the right answer: that Jesus was a Jew teaching Judaism to Jews and that was what the cult was centered around for hundreds of years before Jesus was elevated to being the son of God. It's strange that he'd assume the story had not changed.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#99

Post by fishmaster »

_y5hn wrote: post #84
Trasmatta wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but overlook other passages about meditating over a corpse at a charnel ground As morbid as that is, I feel like I would actually gain a lot of value from doing that...

And, if birth is possible, why wouldn't rebirth be possible, or even the extreme default? It just seems silly to deny possibilities.

What is silly is saying that everything is possible until proven otherwise. It's possible when it's discovered, otherwise it's not.

Re: Buddha and Mind

#100

Post by _y5hn »

fishmaster wrote: post #99
_y5hn wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And, if birth is possible, why wouldn't rebirth be possible, or even the extreme default? It just seems silly to deny possibilities.

What is silly is saying that everything is possible until proven otherwise. It's possible when it's discovered, otherwise it's not.

Ok, let's wait until someone else discovers then.
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