Buddhism

rinpoche is reknowned for presenting the essentials of buddhism in a palatable way that makes sense to westerners. this is the book i started with, and i still refer to it all the time as a reference. he also founded the rigpa organization in the u.s.a. (www.rigpa.org).

i get the impression they went out of fashion in the 70s, perhaps not new age-y enough => my copy of his book abt zen has a hilarious cartoon of the bodidharma on the cover (grumpy old indian monk who went to china and invented a. zen and b. martial arts)

i thought that was damo suzuki!

that would be an interesting twist

I see that Bob Six asked about Brad Warner upthread: I picked up Warner's new book yesterday. I'm learning from it, and I must say it's VERY refreshing and eye-opening (having only been familiar with Kapleau, Watts & "the two Suzukis") to read someone whose metaphors illuminate a point for me rather than disguise it. I've always had a level of difficulty with the naturalistic metaphors born of a monastery-dweller's mind, but Warner's reference points are accessible and clear.

i went to a temple with my mum and a friend. i am very much non-spiritual (and atheist) but i started crying when they were praying ( is that how you call it)? really weird.

You can be Athiest, Buddhist, and spiritual too.

i thought pregnant ladies cried basically all the time, though

Sometimes they don't. When they're beating on you.

KASUNG REPRESENT

humansuit otm both times

anyone ever tried the kind of buddhism where you chant out loud? whats that called?

chantric buddhism

thanks, i'll be here all night. and in the next life.

just a bit of fun, you guys

Hahaha. :-) Yeah, I guess the *preggership* does weird trix on me. ;-)

You can be Athiest, Buddhist, and spiritual too.

I realize that. What I wanted to say is that I am very wary (?) of *letting* go. I realize I'm in the wrong, not wanting to join anything. But I know that by admitting I am atheist, I am also joining a group. Still it's a very interesting form of Buddhism that my friend practices. She's very serious about it. My mother now also joins them occasionally and even knows how to recite in Japanese.

Seriously though, it was extremely weird. From the moment I heard them recite out loud in group, I had to hold back tears. And then suddenly I cried. Only for a few minutes.

I don't think athiests are a group. At least, they aren't a very good one. I'm still waiting to be sent on my athiest mission, to tell Africans there is no God. Was that bad to say? I'm working and it's 11 on Sunday night, so whatever.

I am nominally Buddhist. I say that because unfortunately I don't believe many of the major tenants of Buddhism as it is practiced now. Reincarnation is unlikely and at any rate not useful. I don't remember my past lives, so they don't do anything for me. As for the idea, common in Tibetan Buddhism for one, that you can obtain Buddhahood and then never experience ANY pain because your karma is cleansed - I don't think that's true either, and many Buddhists have elevated Buddha Shakyamuni and Amitabh into God-figures, whom they worship, which I think is anathema (sp) to what the Buddha taught.

Still, meditation is great, and I enjoy that aspect of the community, since discursive thought is not the fastest road to letting go of the things you should ... I can't go here. It's too late. But as long as I am letting go into something that doesn't require "faith," I'm comfortable with that.

Christopher Hitchens doesn't like Buddhism either.

xpost Well, it's all relative, isn't it? I mean, for one thing, I would never go on a mission to preach about the fact there is no God. I don't need anyone else to join my group, nor realize that there is no God. (I don't want to debate the fact the difference between knowing and believing. I don't think it is relevant that *I* or anyone else believes there's no God. Doesn't change the fact that s/he is absent.) Still I belong to a group anyway. I'm not expressing myself (or rather what my husband considers) very well. I wanted to say that he (and I, as I agree with him) also have some set belief and in a sense am not that different from someone who does believe (in a God). Shit, does that make sense?

Anyway, deep down I always sense that I could swing the whole other was: to devote myself to Buddhism (or any other belief). I tend to be radical but try not to push that on others (anymore). I can't really talk about my experience (yesterday) being in that shinto buddhist temple. I did, I talked to my mom about it, and I fucking cried again. How fucking weird is that? I do believe it's also the fact I am in Japan: it always makes me *weak in the knees*. It's as if there's some mysticism that is lacking (for me anyway) in Europe.

In a sense I also realize that I am bad in the sense that I don't want to join in belief because it requires (it would for me anyway) some energy and input. I would not want to be... lazy about it. Does that make sense? I don't like being half-arsed about (these things). I like to be obsessed about my interests. (See music, knitting,...) I'm a bit anal about things. And I would not want to give this up if I would commit myself to it. I did when it came to music, but, fuck, buddhism is something entirely different.

I'm babbling sorry.

hey stevie - why not just try meditating, maybe study a little dharma, practice with a sangha and see how you like it. no point in making a big deal out of things before you even begin (or ever really).

anyone ever tried the kind of buddhism where you chant out loud? whats that called?

well all schools have chanting, but you're probably thinking of Nichiren - known in the west for having many celebrities in the fold. considered by many to be somewhat theistic.

KASUNG REPRESENT

HAI!

Oh it's Nathalie. But nevermind. I should try it out. Maybe read a book first. Take it slow.

Christopher Hitchens doesn't like Buddhism either.

-- Mordechai Shinefield, Monday, 4 June 2007 08:36

The Atheist Pope has spoken.

(I realize you're not suggesting he's an authority etc)

Hey Nath, Shunryu Suzuki (Zen Priest & author of one of the most widely read texts on Zen Buddhism in English) wrote that after a long absence from the monastery, hearing the chants moved him to tears too! You're in good company.

xposts

I notice Mr. Hitchens says a great many things. It is his forte.

jhoshea r u a vegetarian

no

ok jus wonderin

i am about to check out

the way of liberation (watts)
this is it (watts)
the training of the zen buddhist monk (suzuki)

none of the other books that you recommended (e.g. by Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche) were available.

this library BLOWS

Whenever clouds gather, the nature of the sky is not corrupted, and when they disperse, it is not ameliorated. The sky does not become less or more vast. It does not change. It is the same with the nature of mind: it is not spoiled by the arrival of thoughts; nor improved by their disappearance. The nature of the mind is emptiness; its expression is clarity. These two aspects are essentially one's simple images designed to indicate the diverse modalities of the mind. It would be useless to attach oneself in turn to the notion of emptiness, and then to that of clarity, as if they were independent entities. The ultimate nature
of mind is beyond all concepts, all definition and all fragmentation.

"I could walk on the clouds," says a child. But if he reached the clouds, he would find nowhere to place his foot. Likewise, if one does not examine thoughts, they present a solid appearance; but if one examines them, there is nothing there. That is what is called being at the same time empty and apparent. Emptiness of mind is not nothingness, nor a state of torpor, for it possesses by its very nature a luminous faculty of knowledge, which is called Awareness. These two aspects, emptiness and Awareness, cannot be separated. They are essentially one, like the surface of the mirror and the image, which is reflected in it.

-Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

jhoshea i have questions

Impertinency!

me too.

that quote appears contradictory to me. I mean presuposing there is such thing as "mind" of course , but if the mind is "beyond all definition, conception etc" why is this person attempting to define and conceptualise it?

no the quote made sense, i have other questions

"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully."

oh, Buddhism

"no the quote made sense"

Care to share? Pls dont be INDIFFERENT! Im real!

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00000J6AS.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

2/10 points for effort mind.

http://www.forumspile.com/Flame-Bring_it_(Western).jpg

why not just enlighten me dude

re: Brad Warner - he's the real deal

I may be one of the few people on the planet who's sat with both him and Kapleau. Different styles, same Zen.

all the advice i've seen about meditation time is pretty similar. it's better to start really short and to build up. don't try to sit for so long that it's a chore. like 5 minutes everyday consistently is better than 3 hours today and nothing for months. kinda like exercise.

that quote appears contradictory to me. I mean presuposing there is such thing as "mind" of course , but if the mind is "beyond all definition, conception etc" why is this person attempting to define and conceptualise it?

ha you have just hit the krux of the difference between the 2 major schools of thinking on emptiness in tibetian buddhism. you are rangtong, river wolf is shentong.

any questions i will happily answer - my apologies for not noticing this was updated yesterday.

lolita gives excellent advice imo xp

I've been especially exhausted lately due to my schedule, so morning zazen has been a real challenge. Difficult to sit without dozing off. I'm trying to follow the advice of the Roshi at my local center and just "open my eyes wide" when I feel myself drifting, but it's difficult. To compensate I'm trying to do mindfulness breaks throughout my day, though I'm sure 'compensation' is the wrong way to think about it.

I may be one of the few people on the planet who's sat with both him and Kapleau.

Cool. Have you read his newest book? Quite good...haha excuse me, 'skillful.'

that quote appears contradictory to me. I mean presupposing there is such thing as "mind" of course , but if the mind is "beyond all definition, conception etc" why is this person attempting to define and conceptualise it?

I think you will find that, upon closer reading of the quotation, the author of it was not attempting to define and conceptualise "mind" so much as using a process of elimination to name some misconceptions one might have about "mind". Likewise, when the author says that "the nature of the mind is emptiness", he is not so much attempting a definition as he is using a finger to point at the moon. You should not mistake the finger for the moon, nor should you understand "mind" to be the same as "emptiness".

The author is trying his best to use an inadequate tool (language) to give useful hints and indications, while warning you that, in the same way that the map is not the territory, you will have to supply a leap of understanding to get from one to the other.

Most bright children quickly figure out what might be called "the dictionary problem" - that dictionaries purport to define words, but can only define words by using other words, which are in turn defined by other words, which require further words for their definition, and so on. I'm sure this hasn't escaped your notice.

Buddhists do not dismiss this problem as a silly children's paradox that one quickly learns to ignore. To a buddhist, this conundrum helps to reveal a basic fact about human suffering. Knowing this fact, they feel compelled to teach it to others, but because of this fact, they must learn how to tie knots in smoke. If it seems a bit tortuous sometimes, it is not because they are more flawed than the rest of us, but because they are compelled - by the iron law of compassion - to impart what cannot be spoken, mimed, or pictured. If that seems easy to you, try it sometime.

well done.

i'm a have to look up shentong now

while i think the point abt language is valid and relevant it doesn't totally address the question - if emptiness is free from concept how can it be said to be imbued w/the qualities of buddha nature: wisdom, compassion and strength.

this question has for a long time been a fault line the buddhist world. and emptiness is generally considered to be the most intellectually challenging buddhist topic. so i doubt we're going to arrive at any definitive answers here.
but i will go ahead and recommend this book:

http://www.snowlionpub.com/data/img2/prstme.jpg

PROGRESSIVE STAGES OF MEDITATION ON EMPTINESS is a clear, brief (unusual for the genre) exposition of five different views of emptiness with corresponding contemplative meditations. written by Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche one of the truly great meditation masters and buddhist scholars in the world today. so so good - lots on shentong and rongtong.

Shentong...is a philosophical sub-school found in Tibetan Buddhism whose followers hold that the nature of mind is "empty of other" (i.e., empty of all qualities other than an inherent, ineffable nature), in contrast to the “Rangtong” view of the followers of Prasangika Madhyamaka, who hold that all phenomena are unequivocally empty of self-nature, without positing anything beyond that. According to Shentongpas, the emptiness of ultimate reality should not be characterized in the same way as the emptiness of apparent phenomena.

its not really good beginner general overview type of book - but if you're interest in a manageable introduction to madhyamika - it is great.

xp

Cool. Have you read his newest book?

I have not, though I should. I'll add that I grew up Zen Buddhist and have a pretty severe allergic reaction to the way Zen has been appropriated in the american marketplace (zen spas, zen candles, $350 zen massages etc etc), so when I caught one of my earnest-LA-yogini friends with a book called HARDCORE ZEN a few years back I was pretty scornful. Oh great, another 200 pages of bandwagon-jumping BS and yoga journal platitudes dressed up as rebellion etc etc.

So then I started flipping through it, and I was all like damn if this guy doesn't actually get it. Turns out he's a really good guy, too. And a total dork, which is a really valuable lesson in itself.

yeah, i've really liked a lot of what i've read by warner so far (just online articles).

i've knocked out two watts books in the last four days, but i think i need stuff closer to the source

fwiw, it seems to me (a total rube) that making the distinction between shentong and rangtong is itself a bit of a koan --- actually teasing out the differences between the two schools hardly seems elementary (to me), but that undertaking the effort to do so would probably prove fruitful

yeah progressive stages of mediatation on emptiness approaches it from that point of view like this is the shravaka approach to emptiness why dont you try to understand it?

obv tho khenpo tsultrim is firmly in the shentong camp.

Oh great, another 200 pages of bandwagon-jumping BS and yoga journal platitudes dressed up as rebellion etc etc.

So then I started flipping through it, and I was all like damn if this guy doesn't actually get it.

Ha this has been the reaction from literally EVERY person I know that's seen it, scorned it, THEN read it (myself included).

Hey guys did you know the British Library offers pretty, high quality pictures of their copy of the Diamond Sutra (printed in 868!)? Check it.

Hi AImless contrdictions dont rly bother me --in the name of the father, son and holy spirit-- as for the paradox I guess dictionary words can be seen as invisible social realities, at least as long as they are diffused and accepted, but I dunno, if you hadnt nticed words arent really my ting, never have been.

jhøshea I have a few more perhaps naive questions but I know nothing about Buddhism beyond the letting go notion. My reply up thread to river wolf was a poorly disguised dig bout perceieved indifference towards the external world by buddhists, do buddhists have a negative view of external reality and what are the consequences of this? xcuse any probable miscontruction-- Im thinking the " lol caring bout shit" stoner zen sterotype.

ALso in general terms can you tell me about salvation and nirvana as you see it?

I might venture that Buddhists don't have a "negative" view of external reality, but hold that the distinction between internal and external is an illusion that should be shattered. Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as the external world to be negative about. There is only "thus."

Put another way (and of course speaking strictly within my own limited understanding of the soto zen tradition): it's not that I don't care about the external world or believe that it doesn't matter. The aim of my practice is to realize (ie live out the fact) that from moment to moment there is no division between "me" and the material world. There is just the quiet hum of the Moment itself. As I understand it, the concept that the material world is illusory is a way of pointing at the truth that, in the Moment, there isn't any disinction between "internal" and "external."

Ha, I hope this has clarified rather than confused the issue for you, my limited understanding makes all this more difficult to put into words.

thnks BH, bear with me, is this "quiet hum" seen as an end in itself or a means for something else, if that makes sense?

thnks BH, bear with me, is this "quiet hum" seen as an end in itself or a means for something else, if that makes sense?

In the beginning of your search, the mountain is just the mountain. In your search, the mountain is no longer just the mountain. Once you obtain the way, the mountain is just the mountain again.

Paraphrase of something I like.

If I may inject my own interpretation into the conversation, it's like this. Buddhism is about realizing, on an everyday, every moment basis that you have no separate self from everything else. It is this notion of separate self that causes pain - jealousy, fear of death, etc. So obtaining the here and now in practice is a means to deeply understanding this. To deeply understand this, you have to let go of conceptions of understanding, and just practice. In the end, the practice itself is the end.

This is why in Soto Zen they say that as soon as you sit to meditate, you are already enlightened. My interpretation.

before you even begin to meditate you are already enlightened

we are all enlightened but we dont even know it

work hard to clean off the no-mirror? no thanks

i'd rather dance and sing and burp my way to truth

master go ahead and try to hit me with that stick, i'll show you the wood sutra and be on my merry way

xposts

Yeah I'd be strongly inclined to agree with humansuit there: meditation is enlightenment. We are all already awakened, we're just so burdened with judgements, confusion and fear that we don't normally realize it. In meditation we realize (ie "make real") our awakened state.

I look at it like this: meditation is preparation for standing up and living life. In meditation you realize your essential unity with the moment. Fantastic, but only the one who is fully open to the Moment in daily life is truly Awakened (ie a Buddha, Enlightened Person, though I don't really like those terms because they suggest there is a singular "goal" for meditation rather than presenting it as the ongoing process that it is).

The struggle in meditation comes in learning how to sit with our quiet minds. The better we get at it in meditation, the better we will be at it in our daily routine. The better we get at living in the Moment in our daily lives, the clearer life will be.

I suspect Jhoshea might provide answers very different from mine, I'd be interested to hear them.

^^^ i think i agree with this, but that's mostly because i've only really been reading zen things lately (v. the Tibetan stuff jhoshea is into).

i think what bothers me about non-Chinese/Japanese Buddhism is the apparent reliance on karma and reincarnation to motivate people to live compassionately. A literal belief in reincarnation seems totally incompatible with what I understand to be Buddhism. Unless the concept of "rebirth" is meant to convey an understanding of impermanence. I am continually reborn with each passing moment, etc.

(what i mean, by the way, is that chan/zen/seon makes sense to me precisely because it seems to rest on one, simple, ineffable truth, while tibten/pure land/all those other flavors i don't know yet seem practically judeo-christian in their belief in the supernatural. i like all the artwork tho)

i'll show you the wood sutra and be on my merry way

favorite ever

This is why in Soto Zen they say that as soon as you sit to meditate, you are already enlightened. My interpretation.

also i believe that the central message here is otm

do buddhists have a negative view of external reality and what are the consequences of this? xcuse any probable miscontruction-- Im thinking the " lol caring bout shit" stoner zen sterotype.

yeah it's a tricky thing, easy to veer from emptiness to nihilism - or conversely from from devotion to total religiosity. and i don't see how not caring is a good thing in the context of a tradition that takes compassion as its motivation. maybe you try to care a little more about other people's external circumstances and less about your own. basically not caring is a crude interpretation of non-attachment which has more to do w/shifting your interest from self centered to compassionate - more the result of meditative realization than a decision to just not give a fuck.

a story i've heard many times: soon after arriving in america in 1970 chogyam trungpa rinpoche met shunryu suzuki roshi. they hit it off immediately. there was some sense, that in those nascent days of western buddhism, they were each others' only allies. and over the brief time they spent together they developed a deep respect and bond.

when suzuki roshi died in 1971 trungpa rinpoche attended his funeral. there was a quiet contemplative atmosphere - all his students holding themselves together like good little buddhists. at some point trungpa rinpoche was given an opportunity to say a few words. he got up in front of the assembly, sat down, and started weeping. like how can one man produce so many tears, total waterfall. his tears were flooding the place.

so everyone loses it and the whole funeral is crying. gone from behaving like buddhists should, to genuine people heartbroken at the loss of their teacher and friend.

is "behaving like buddhists should" an love-filled yet ironic comment, in this case?

yeah you know confusion affection etc

Because Buddhists should just act like they want to act, like the old monk who dropped his rake in the garden and sprinted into the monastery at dinner time just because he was hungry.

well forms are there for a reason and it's good to practice them - just not in a deluded manner. this is not a let your freak flag fly type of situation.

Oh let us not argue about who is and is not qualified to judge what 'delusion' means. Let's just keep it light and airy.

"Asking where the Buddha is, is like hiding stolen loot in your pocket and declaring yourself innocent."

self-delusion of course. wasnt trying to imply that i was in any position to judge anyone's realization or anything.

Okay, I can dig it.

Since pure awareness of nowness is the real buddha,
In openness and contentment I found the Lama in my heart.
When we realize this unending natural mind is the very nature of the Lama,
Then there is no need for attached, grasping, or weeping prayers or artificial complaints,
By simply relaxing in this uncontrived, open, and natural state,
We obtain the blessing of aimless self-liberation of whatever arises.

DUDJOM RINPOCHE

"Zen is like a spring coming out of a mountain. It doesn't flow in order to quench the thirst of a traveler, but if the travelers want to help themselves to it, that's fine. It's up to you what you want to do with the water; the spring's job is just to flow."

--Alan Watts.

i think what bothers me about non-Chinese/Japanese Buddhism is the apparent reliance on karma and reincarnation to motivate people to live...

My mother said she was going to talk with her ancestors (in the shinto temple). I immediately switched the subject. I am sorry, I can't really follow her that far. :-( I mean, shit, I'm happy for her if believes in it, but I... no, reincarnation and talking to ancestors is sth I don't really *buy*.

This is what I meant when I cried in the shinto temple: I am touched by the spiritualism but once I start to understand the words they are singing/saying, I slowly back away. :-( I hate myself for it.

im not really sure who this gentleman is but i just had to post this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkICMrNG78M

this guy

no really guys
this guy

irritating

If Brad Warner is the real deal, he sure has a funny way of showing it. But, so did Trungpa, right? I don't think he really "gets it" after reading a few of his angry blog entries, but I'm not going to get all involved in picking him apart. He's trying, he's helping, good for him.

Just for kicks, how do you think he compares to Noah Levine, the other Buddha punk? I'd say "Dharma Punx" has a more attractive cover than "Hardcore Zen." Noah likes to talk about anger in a sort of helpful way, too, and has made a nice line of dharma punk-wear for kids. He flips the bird less and all-around seems more of a positive guy (for a guy who makes a living out of "rage turned inward"). So, I'd say Noah is "more Buddhist."

It's funny that Tibetan and Zen are the two most popular forms of Buddhism among Americans and here we have two examples of violent western culture regurgitating it in a form more appealing to self-centered knowitalls.

well its pretty hard to judge whether or not someone gets it. best thing is to narrow the field to those whore linage-approved who've at least had proper training. all these self-styled people, you have to ask yourself, why would someone want to be a dharma teacher?

uh who're aka who are yeah

all these self-styled people, you have to ask yourself, why would someone want to be a dharma teacher?

To make a lot of $$ of irresponsible writing and "dharma" clothes? ;)

"dharma" clothes? = a nice line of dharma punk-wear for kids

http://www.dharmapunx.com/img/prd/big/ats_hoodie_script.jpg
http://www.dharmapunx.com/img/prd/big/ts_mad.jpg

whore lineage-approved is a brilliant typo.

Thich Nhat Hanh is my favorite Buddhist author and teacher. His biography of the Buddha, Old Path White Clouds, is also my most recommended text for beginners and enthusiasts alike.

Zen Keys is great also since it compares Zen and Dzogchen.

Quick story. I was traveling through Europe back to the US a week after Richard Reed, the shoe bomber. I was coming back from a very rough journey, in which I gave away all of my clothes and shoes except for what I had on. So here I am, unshaved, unwashed, wearing hiking boots, and my last stop was India. I stopped in to buy the latest Thich Nhat Hanh book, I think called "Anger," which just has that title on it, and a picture of a lit match.

Needless to say, when I got to customs the guy looked at me like I was about to bomb a plane. Luckily, no cavity searches were involved.

Hmm. That story isn't very good in print... o well!

Just for kicks, how do you think he compares to Noah Levine, the other Buddha punk? I'd say "Dharma Punx" has a more attractive cover than "Hardcore Zen." Noah likes to talk about anger in a sort of helpful way, too, and has made a nice line of dharma punk-wear for kids. He flips the bird less and all-around seems more of a positive guy (for a guy who makes a living out of "rage turned inward"). So, I'd say Noah is "more Buddhist."

Dharma Punx didn't really do anything for me as far as encouraging me to practice, so Warner's my guy.

i actually sorta like that meditate and destroy t-shirt

'defy the lie' and 'against the stream' smack too much of the 'be extreme for jesus!' form of christianity i once adhered to.

yeah also what do those slogans have to do w/anything

ha otm.

i like the sanskrit font

i do kinda like the 'meditate and destroy' one, but i'm not giving noah levine $20 for it.

i generally don't pay for t-shirts as a rule

best thing is to narrow the field to those whore linage-approved who've at least had proper training.
-- jhøshea,

Tell us more about this dharma whore lineage, jhøshea.

Hey guys, this isn't quite the same as heading to your local Center and sitting with a teacher, but this guy Jundo Cohen has committed to "sit zazen online for the next 9 years." He gives a short lecture (at the moment he's slowly working through Dogen's Fukanzazengi), then sits for about 20 minutes. It's become a regular part of my lunch hour, thought I'd pass it along for those here that don't have access to a local Center.

http://treeleafzen.blogspot.com/

That little kid is so cute! "When you play hopscotch, you jump." Then, he grabs his mom's face while she's meditating. The only reason I watched that far is because I knew he was going to fuck with them once they started meditating. "Poppy, what are you doing?"

http://photos1.blogger.com/photoInclude/blogger/7867/2425/1600/mani-lake.jpg

http://photos1.blogger.com/photoInclude/blogger/7867/2425/1600/mani-lake.jpg

What is that?

Big frozen lake with the mantra om mani padme hung that Google-map/satellite caught.

Wow. So the mantra...miraculously appeared on the ice? Or presumably it was carved by monks or something?

carved, I'm sure! which is nice, I think.

I keep wanting to revive this thread cause I like dharma chatter, but I'm not sure what to talk about.

{blinks very calmly}

I've had about 30 cdr's of Alan Watts lectures in storage for years and I just got them back, SWEET. For the past several nights I've been listening to them as I go to sleep. Can't think of much to discuss now, though. If this lecture series is difficult to find (I've tried searching them online and p2p and didn't see anything) I'll ysi em if ya want.

{sneezes violently, wipes his nose on his sleeve, blinks calmly again}

Watts relates this helpful Zen tale:

A monk said to Master Bodhidharma, "Master, I can't find peace of mind. Please help me."

Bodhidharma said, "Place your mind before me and I'll pacify it."

The monk said, "When I look for my mind, I cannot find it."

Bodhidharma said, "There, I've pacified it for you."

Well, Amazon finally got round to sending me Brad Warner's new book that I ordered back in May*, and I read through it in a couple of hours:

The plus points:

- it's an engaging read
- I like his emphasis on the 'here and now' rather than some future enlightenment

The minus points:

- once you understand his take on zen, there's quite a bit of repetition between chapters
- sometimes his jokes and anecdotes come over as a bit of sales patter to get across a point, but he does it well so on the whole it doesn't irritate too much.

Two personal prejudices:

- I didn't like the chapter on athiesm/God and why he's not an atheist. I don't really see what's gained by calling the universe 'God'. What does that add?

- I don't much like his emphasis on regular zazen. I prefer buddhism as a philosphy to a way of effort or hard labour.

*still waiting on the Sandy Denny biog that I ordered at the same time. Thye're going down hill.

What does that add?

Not a lot. It confuses the Christians, who will then want to muddle up Buddhism with pantheism, as they so often do. It does distance you from the militantly anti-religious atheists, which is not a bad thing. It makes you vaguely more acceptable to people who practise god-centered worship. But just vaguely so. They still mostly want to pity you as a wrong-headed apostate, or vilify you as a heretic. Better they ignore you entirely than that.

As I see it, God and any specific notions about God, are mostly just extraneous and misleading, and don't really belong to Buddha's teachings or with enlightenment in general. There is no reason even to address the issue.

^

Bodhisattva Bush

this thread is interesting. i have a weird relationship to buddhism -- zen in particular -- because my parents were/are zen practitioners and i absorbed a fair amount of i guess what you'd call zen ethos growing up, but only in a generalized way. and since there was no real youth-indoctrination program (as practiced, say, by most christian churches) i can't even fake my way through a learned discussion. but i still feel a connection to it, i kind of intuit what it's about, it certainly informs the way i conceive of existence, without ever really seeming like something i wanted to pursue at a deeper level.

one thing i definitely feel about my quasi-buddhist worldview is that i'm sort of inherently comfortable with a lot of things that my christian-raised friends still sort of struggle with (the absence of "god" for one big obvious thing). my head is cluttered with buddhist aphorisms picked up here and there, but one that has stuck with me for whatever reason (and i'm sure i'm misquoting a mistranslation or whatever) is, "everything is exactly what it seems, and behind it is nothing." the whole buddhist idea of "nothing," the void or what have you, i really find interesting and valuable. when i took a college class in existentialism i partly felt like a lot of those guys were really struggling and wrestling with that idea, the "nothingness," where in buddhism it seemed to be accepted, not as a condition of horror or alienation, exactly, but as just the way things are. without despair or hope, because neither of those are really useful responses, just, this is as it is.

i don't know. like i said, my ideas about all of it are more felt than understood. and i certainly don't identify myself as buddhist. but i feel simpatico with it, i think it contains things of real import and significance.

I don't much like his emphasis on regular zazen. I prefer buddhism as a philosphy to a way of effort or hard labour

But your issue here would be with Zen rather than Warner. You can't make music by talking about it.

I just got back from worldwide Padmasambavah transmission from Chogyam Namkhai Norbu rinpoche.

i partly felt like a lot of those guys were really struggling and wrestling with that idea, the "nothingness," where in buddhism it seemed to be accepted, not as a condition of horror or alienation, exactly, but as just the way things are.

This is actually a key reason I came back to Buddhism (and revived this thread back in May). A formerly pretty devoted existentialist, I suddenly found myself wondering why I needed to confront "nothingness" with despair and gnashing of teeth. Sisyphus and the "tragically noble" existentialist characters in literature started to seem like a bunch of silly melodrama to me. Sure, there's nothing behind it all, but why does that have to be a source of anguish?

That's when I started thinking "hey, this is starting to sound familiar..."

BBC doc on the life of Buddhaavailable online.

http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/8953/dscn1585xt8.jpg
http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/5765/dscn1587hn9.jpg

It's good beer.

I'm not one for alienation myself. I'm more all, "Life is good and enjoy it well." (Easy to say when one is living comfortably, though.)

I'm finally getting around to watching the abovementioned BBC doc on the Buddha's life. There's all this talk about these archaeologists that "may now have evidence" of Buddha as a historical figure, etc.

I can't help but think that the discussion about the historical personage of Siddartha is sort of besides the point. We have this collection of teachings called the Dharma. What does it really matter whether these teachings came from a particular personage whose life corresponds to the Siddartha story and the subsequent sutras, or if they were developed over time by a number of insightful people?

I suppose this is another possible meaning of "Kill the Buddha!"

I just got back from worldwide Padmasambavah transmission from Chogyam Namkhai Norbu rinpoche.

-- dean ge, Monday, July 23, 2007 10:13 PM (1 week ago)

should have stayed there, nude spock

r.i.p.

Though surely, if he's been here "since the first day of ILX" like he says, he'll be back.

That's some foreboding shit.

he has many incarnations

ha

hey guys should i make this bag at cafe press y/n

http://img02.picoodle.com/img/img02/9/8/12/f_buddhabagm_4cafe6d.png

I'm more all, "Life is good and enjoy it well."

Ned, I see, is an acolylte of Epicurus. This makes perfect sense and suits my idea of his personality down to the last jot and tittle.

So I just downloaded Dogen's 1200 page Shobogenzo in .pdf form in under 5 minutes.

God I love the internet.

If anybody else is into Zen or Dogen or you just want a fascinating, illuminating and beautiful read, here's the link.

I got into Dogen a few years ago and read some stuff. There's no-one like him. Great use of mind-bafflingly obtuse metaphors('The wolf howl in the dead tree stump' etc). Not renowned for his sense of humour, but hey, he was a serious guy.

My teacher's teacher broke his translation up into 4 volumes, so I don't blame anybody for not wanting to go after the whole thing in one go. I def haven't read anywhere near the whole thing, though I know a couple of guys who are trying for it.

Might I recommend, though, Bendowa and the Genjo Koan.

does a big hoos believe in the crazy magical buddhism with karma and nirvana and shit or the other boring kind

karma in a boring way & pretty much "the other boring kind" down the line

i mean i am the universe and you are me and all that shit, but jim jones still sucks.

When my niece was about two years old we had a fine time while I was babysitting her, by learning about "pieces". I explained the concept by throwing a big piece of paper into the air a couple of times and picking it up; then I tore the paper into little pieces and threw the pieces into the air as we both shouted "Pieces!" She liked this so well we did it about six or eight times.

Oddly, I forget how the subject of pieces came up in the first place. We kind of got sidetracked.

there's a book my dad liked that's called buddhism plain and simple.

-- Maria, Monday, 8 July 2002 10:00 (5 years ago) Bookmark Link

^^^^^ x 2342387462387462834682342

i never finished that one. not for me i guess.

does a big hoos believe in the crazy magical buddhism with karma and nirvana and shit or the other boring kind

or maybe Buddha as the original GTD guy, exalting in the nirvanic bliss of a fully completed non-karmic generating to do list in his moleskin hipster PDA?

Have you tried Racking Your Neighbors on the Wheel of Life-And-Death; A Beginner's Guide to Evil Buddhism?

-- Aimless, Monday, July 8, 2002 12:00 AM (5 years ago) Bookmark Link

or maybe Buddha as the original GTD guy, exalting in the nirvanic bliss of a fully completed non-karmic generating to do list in his moleskin hipster PDA?

-- Bob Six, Wednesday, January 9, 2008 7:42 AM

homie kept his mind clear of distraction and focused on what was in front of him.

A photographer named Michael has been blogging as he attempts to maintain his Zen practice during his battle with terminal illness. It's been a heartbreaking, beautiful read all along.

He died a few days ago.

one of my favorite poems of his

if you go fishing you catch fish

:-)

So I know our tendency here (and really throughout the Big Inter-Sect Sangha in the world) is to focus on common ground and gloss over differences, but I'm curious if anyone else is comfortable sharing the specificities of their practices/beliefs.

Just curious. I'd like our little handful of Dharma ILXors to talk more often!

Hey guys, this isn't quite the same as heading to your local Center and sitting with a teacher, but this guy Jundo Cohen has committed to "sit zazen online for the next 9 years." He gives a short lecture (at the moment he's slowly working through Dogen's Fukanzazengi), then sits for about 20 minutes. It's become a regular part of my lunch hour, thought I'd pass it along for those here that don't have access to a local Center.

http://treeleafzen.blogspot.com/

-- BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Saturday, June 30, 2007 8:19 PM (10 months ago) Bookmark Link

haha I am doing jukai w/this guy over the summer

I'd just like to add, having only read about half the thread, that I do find it quite delightful to read. The sparring is gentle, thoughtful and polite and I wish more of ILX was like this (as well as myself).

Dunno if any of you guys are into hip-hop but these guys are pretty cool. I gather that they're Tibetan? Not completely sure.

http://www.qwantz.com/comics/comic2-998.png

Rode the bus with a talkative, wheelchair-bound Buddhist the other day. He was smart and affable enough, but a bit too taken with his own erudition and spiritual accomplishments. Got me to thinking: Buddhism (as I, ignorantly, understand it) is all about surrendering attachments, letting go of the illusory objects -- pysical, intellectual and emotional -- that seem to compose the world, cutting through the momentary in pursuit of the eternal. But why isn't there a spiritually congratualatory term for fanatical attachment? For being wholly devoted to the merely physical here and now?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_materialism might come close?

Those don't work, because they describe spiritual faults. I'm looking a term that boils down to "being Neruda in his youth".

In the context of Indian dharmic religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism), you're talking about the Charvaka philosophy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charvaka#Astika_schools.2C_Buddhism.2C_and_Jainism_versus_C.C4.81rv.C4.81ka

A Cārvāka's thought is characterized by an insistence on joyful living, whereas Buddhism and Jainism are known to emphasize penance. Enjoyment of life in a tempered manner, much like the Epicureans of Greece, was the Cārvākas' primary modus operandi.
The Cārvākas did not deny the difference between the dead and the living and recognized both as realities. A person lives, the same person dies: that is a perceived, and hence the only provable, fact. In this regard, the Cārvākas found themselves at odds with all the other religions of the time.

Rejection of the soul as separate from the body led the Cārvākas to confine their thinking to this world only.

Cool. Have you read his newest book?

Update: Yes I have. It's grebt! More satisfying in many ways than Hardcore Zen, if/because written for a smaller audience.

Also highly recommended: Bring Me The Rhinoceros. Different in style, but equally excellent.

But why isn't there a spiritually congratualatory term for fanatical attachment? For being wholly devoted to the merely physical here and now?

There is: it's "zazen" ;-)

A Cārvāka's thought is characterized by an insistence on joyful living, whereas Buddhism and Jainism are known to emphasize penance.

Now hang on just a minute there!

does a big hoos believe in the crazy magical buddhism with karma and nirvana and shit or the other boring kind

aw ethan you've got it all wrong - the boring buddhism has karma and nirvana and shit; they're just not magical! You might like early Tibetan Buddhism, which has monks flying around and stuff.

one of my favorite poems of his

:-)

;_;

:-)

The philosophy of the Cārvākas is what I'm looking for, but in a sense that elevates engagement with the world to an act of spiritual devotion. So that each instance of desire, compassion, sacrifice, joy and pain is an avenue to spiritual communion. (Perhaps that's exactly what they did/do -- I don't know.)

I asked this question to the guy on the bus, but I don't know that I was able to communicate it clearly: is Buddhism predicated on an unstated dissatisfaction with the material world? Phrased unkindly, the Buddhist (like many spiritual seekers/masters) seems to turn up his/her nose at the given, material world in favor of something supposedly better.

Or perhaps I'm only revealing how little I understand...

Keep in mind that there are a lot of different schools of buddhism, but at least within the Zen tradition the answer is a pretty emphatic no, there is nothing to be dissatisfied by in the material world, and there is nothing better.

You're looking for a mild form of Tantra then, which is not incompatible with Buddhism at all; see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajrayana_Buddhism.

The Charvakas were closer to being humanistic atheists, to use a modern analogue

I'm not sure I see the connection between Vajrayana and the fanatical/ecstatic embrace of worldly attachments as a spiritual path. Then again, a Wiki article may not be the best place to start...

Zen might accept such an approach as being in keeping with one's Buddha nature, but again, it isn't specifically devoted to this idea.

I don't know that it's worth wasting time on, or that this is the best place to discuss it, but the idea's been kicking around my head for a few days...

And oops, kinda misread (or at least point-missingly replied to) roger mex's post. Agree that zen doesn't seem to repudiate the world as given, but I don't really know much about it.

I don't know if you're going to find a "fanatical embrace of worldly attachments" in any traditional form of Budddism, honestly; attachments cause bondage, and are to be transcended.

I can't think think off the top of my head which offshoot would support such a view...not even sure if Westernized "Dharma Punx" neo-schools embrace that

its called hedonism and u dont need a tradition to practice it - just go for it homie

lol

http://www.amazon.com/Dharma-Punx-Noah-Levine/dp/0060008954/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219707946&sr=8-1

He mentions he wants to consider becoming ordained (monk/priest) but on a train he starts to have sex with a Swedish woman. He tells us about his new sense of peace, but heads out to a club and begins slam dancing with other dancers because the music is so powerful...

http://cimg2.163.com/ent/2007/6/1/20070601100716547a1.jpg

crazy magical buddhism

Any info/thoughts on shambhala, vipassana, and NKT from ilxors out there? I wish there were a comparison chart widget available--select the traditions of interest, hit "submit," and generate a handy table, just like one could find in Consumer Reports!

aw ethan you've got it all wrong - the boring buddhism has karma and nirvana and shit; they're just not magical! You might like early Tibetan Buddhism, which has monks flying around and stuff.

-- rogermexico., Monday, August 25, 2008 9:15 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark Link

def

boring is beautiful

It depends on what your definition of "is" is.

It's sad to me that Bill Clinton was just being a smartass logic-chopper when he said this. In a Buddhist context it would be much more luminous.

Any info/thoughts on shambhala, vipassana, and NKT from ilxors out there?

google nkt. that's all i'm saying...

i think there is a totally cool poster here who is down w/shambhala. i would trust him.

vipassana is more of (or, in fact) a technique; the other two are almost like brand names at this point, or something.

trust your gut and so forth.

but then again, i sometimes get diarrhea after drinking too much ale, and i haven't sworn off the stuff yet

im buddha

aw, pawsnuts! :D :D

WHOA cult, yikes. Glad I asked.

hahaha my zen teacher just posted this on youtube today

i'd just been posting on my fuckin w/smoothies thread, so going from this to that made me loll

I've got a question, if someone here who practices Zen meditation would be willing to answer it. When you're sitting and watching your breathing, are you controlling it as you're watching it or not? I'm starting to get the suspicion from what I've been reading that you're supposed to be letting the autonomic system do its thing while you're sitting, but I can't seem to be conscious of my breathing without deliberately controlling it.

Nice video BTW!

Ha "autonomic system" is very particular phrasing! Who have you been reading, if you don't mind me asking?

You want to deliberately take a couple of deep breaths as you begin, but from there allow your breathing to occur naturally. Just follow. Provided your back is straight you'll probably find that you naturally begin to breathe more deeply. Or maybe you won't. Either way is fine!

I guess I picked that phrasing up from Brad Warner's teacher Gudo Nishijima, who says that the point of zazen is to keep your autonomic nervous system in balance with whatever your non-autonomic nervous system is.

Either way is really fine? I feel like I should ask a teacher about this in person, but I can't where I'm living at the moment.

Thanks for the reply though!

I'd be happy to ask my teacher (also a student of Nishijima) on your behalf if you'd like.

:)

I'd really appreciate it. Thanks!

Just breathe. If you imagine there is a correct way to breathe, then you will strain to achieve the correct way. Your body already knows how it's done, without any interference from your mind being necessary.

As you follow your breath, it should be like a couple waltzing, with your breath taking the lead and your mind moving smoothly in tandem as your breath leads it.

Hi Justin,

Generally, in Soto Zen, we teach counting the breaths, or observing the breath, merely as a way to settle the mind for beginners. (After a few weeks or months, the training wheels come off, and we begin open, spacious sitting centered on everything and nothing at all.) On the other hand, different teachers, even within the Soto school, will teach somewhat different perspectives on this, and observing the breath can even be a lifetime practice for some!

However, generally, we do not do anything with the breath, except to allow it to find its own, natural , easy rhythm. Master Dogen (the founder of the Soto lineage in Japan) did not really say very much about breathing. In fact, I often think that he could have said more (breathing is so important in the martial arts, for example). But, Dogen did not really seem to say much more than "know that long breaths are long, short breaths are short ... and that they are neither long nor short'. And breathe from the tanden [the physical center of gravity located in the abdomen three finger widths below and two finger widths behind the navel], ... in other words, breathe deeply ... but know that they come and go no where.

About breathing during zazen, Dogen Zenji said in The collection of Dogen Zenji's formal speeches and poems (Eihei-koroku), vol. 5: ...

In the Small Vehicles, of which Dogen disapproved}, there are two elementary ways (of beginner's practice): one is to count the breaths, and the other is to contemplate the impurity (of the body). In other words, a practitioner of Small Vehicles regulates his breathing by counting the breaths. The practice of the Buddha-ancestors, however, is completely different from the way of Small Vehicles. An ancestral teacher has said, “It is better to have the mind of a wily fox than to follow the way of Small Vehicle self-control.” Two of the Small Vehicle schools (studied) in Japan today are the precept school (Shibunritsu) and the school based on Abhidharma-kosa (Kusha).

There is also the Mahayana way of regulating breathing. That is, knowing that a long breath is long and that a short one is short. The breath reaches the tanden and leaves from there. Although the exhalation and inhalation are different, they both pass through the tanden. When you breathe abdominally, it is easy to become aware of the transiency (of life), and to harmonize the mind.

My late teacher Tendo said, “The inhaled breath reaches the tanden; however, it is not that this breath comes from somewhere. For that reason, it is neither short nor long. The exhaled breath leaves from the tanden; however, it is not possible to say where this breath goes. For that reason, it is neither long nor short”. My teacher explained it in that way, and if someone were to ask me how to harmonize one's breathing, I would reply in this way: although it is not Mahayana, it is different from the Small Vehicle; though it is not of the Small Vehicles it is different from Mahayana. And if questioned further regarding what it is ultimately, I would respond that inhaling or exhaling are neither long nor short.

http://global.sotozen-net.or.jp/eng/how ... zazen.html

It is, after all, goalless "just sitting".

We usually just let the breath settle into a natural rhythm. I find that 2 or 3 breaths per minute is a sign of a very balanced Zazen. Let it come and go so naturally that you forget you are breathing.

I will be giving a "sit-a-long" talk on this within a day or so, as part of our "Zazen for Beginners" series:

http://blog.beliefnet.com/treeleafzen/2 ... l-b-1.html

Gassho, Jundo

^^^ that's the answer from Jundo, if that wasn't obvious

We could do a zen version of the "Who Would Win in a Fight" poll. But the winner would be Joshu's dog.

btw i have been trying to be more active w/some kind of practice lately. still need to make it over to the zen center one of these days :-/

We could do a zen version of the "Who Would Win in a Fight" poll. But the winner would be Joshu's dog.

― Aimless, Tuesday, January 27, 2009 3:58 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark

dunno i'd probably vote for shit on a stick

surely it would be a wildman of the dharma

Worrying about your breathing defeats the purpose of meditation ^_^

a wildman of the dharma

looooooool

Breathing is one area that yoga has explored more deeply than Buddhism.

HOOS, thank you for asking your teacher for me and posting his response, especially so quickly! I think that pretty much answers my question and I thought that it was very inspiring. Thanks to Aimless and Autumn Almanac too for your advice.

Side question, but I'm really interested in studying the evil Buddhism that the top post on this thread makes mention of. Can anyone suggest a book for me to read?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_at_War

What Make You Not A Buddhist -- Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse

^^^^ just read this, really liked it!

My zafu finally saw some action today. Key question--will it tomorrow?

I was reading a section from Opening the Hand of Thought that really struck me this afternoon. I don't have it in front of me to quote it, but the gist was something like this:

We may have had many afternoons with friends or lovers in which time seems to pass without our noticing. We watch television or read a book or spend a morning in bed and before we know it many hours have passed, and we wonder "Where did the time go?" When we sit zazen we are sitting with the very passage of time. With nowhere to go and nowhere to be, we feel every moment like a cool breeze on our skin.

yo

http://blinkwax.com/pics1/dharmadan.jpg

like

yoooooo

Thanks HOOS, it's free for download at the author's website as well!

Yeah I've actually been reading the .pdf lol

ha i just downloaded it

The whole idea of like actual goal-oriented practice is really refreshing to me. Like ok, a moment of zazen is enlightenment itself--I get it, I've felt it, but there's more to learn and my mans Dogen seems supremely uninterested in what else there might be. To be completely honest I've always naively written off stuff about "higher forms of meditation" as dogma in saffron robes, but actually digging into this stuff in a practical way is really incredible and (forgive me) enlightening.

Like, I'd hear a dude start talking about jhanas and I'd just tune out. I feel pretty foolish about that now lol

rejected display name--the arHOOS steendriver

o noes u on that theravada shit now

Right I mean I'm kinda...I've been skeptical for a long time and I'm even re-reading what I wrote the other day about Dogen and kinda going O_O @ myself, but I've never really taken Insight practice seriously until now and suddenly it's like I've been looking at the Dharma with one eye closed all this time. I'm trying to do insight & zazen practice on alternate days and they seem to complement each other well. A lot of the people who follow Ingram really closely seem to say that plunging full on into Insight gets you the benefits of Concentration practices without the extra work, but I'm not sure I'm willing to give up the grounding practice of following the breath just yet.

Plus feeling all my awareness pulse in and out of existence kind of freaks me out.

What's there to be afraid of? Serious question.

"Plus feeling all my awareness pulse in and out of existence kind of freaks me out."

How is this feeling different from almost sleeping, or waking up before you want to wake up?

How is this feeling different

It's like the difference between jumping into a swimming pool and showering with the showerhead set to *pulse*. The latter is very distinct and a much stranger sensation. Frightening only because it's unfamiliar.

What's there to be afraid of? Serious question.

― Aimless, Monday, July 13, 2009 5:46 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

The unknown. A lot of Vipassana teachers warn about a dark period just after a major peak, and that worries me a little too. I need to find a local Insight teacher before I go too much further, but I'm plunging forward nonetheless.

Is the feeling more distinct because you are not groggy while it's happening? I have this theory that there are a lot of protective sleep mechanisms (remaining immobile, forgetting dreams) that are for our own good, and maybe blunting this awareness pulsing is one of them.

http://img2.mtime.com/mg/2008/28/84712e35-35a9-4ff4-a2c5-4bb70a0b4c40.jpg

开棺

恶臭陈秽，
何云美味，
掩鼻伤心，
为之堕泪，
智者善思，
能勿悲愧。

http://img2.mtime.com/mg/2008/28/adeb74fd-0c9e-4ebd-a08f-2443478a53fe.jpg

乞命

吾不忍其觳觫，
无罪而就死地，
普劝诸仁者，
同发慈悲意。

http://img2.mtime.com/mg/2008/28/b566c9f2-73cf-4c3b-b2ac-7a2a3031bfc3.jpg

"我的腿！"

挟弩隐衣袂，入林群鸟号，
狗屠一鸣鞭，众吠从之嚣，
因果苟无徵，视斯亦已昭，
与其啖群生，宁我吞千刀。

http://www.aimwell.org/

btw

i lol @ "download this website" every time i pull up the page

Is the feeling more distinct because you are not groggy while it's happening?

That's certainly plausible, but I'm sure that most of the clarity comes from direct application of attention vs. the gauzy unfocused haze coming out of sleep.

Like the difference between background dinner music & listening in the dark with headphones?

I'm struggling to analogize here. Maybe the difference between shading with the side of a pencil and tracing on a tracing desk.

Am I getting you any closer here?

Sorry, that last question came off poorly-toned.

Feeling your it-ness melting away is vertiginous. Reflex wants to yank you back from the edge.

Jump! Jump! Jump! Jump!

<3

I like that my bookmark means that every once in a while, I get a reminder that says "Buddhism has new answers". Makes me think.

lol

I've joined Dharma Overground, the message board Ingram founded for people to discuss and assist others in this kind of practice. I've asked a couple questions and received helpful answers and I think anyone else who's looking at the book and attempting these practices may find the board helpful as well.

http://dharmaoverground.wetpaint.com/

When I clicked on this, the sidebar ad was "Obama asks moms to return to school Finish your degree Using Gov't Grants" and the ad represented moms with video of a lady doing crunches.

lol

they need hosting like anybody

Hoo boy. Things happenin.

I was just on my lunch break and, with 3 minutes to go on my break & having just read a really terrific and attitude-free set of instructions on jhana access, I wanted to see if I could dive right in. And I did. I got from reading instructions to the 2nd jhana (for the first time) in under 180 seconds! I'm just sort of shocked that--after having struggled to get to the 1st jhana earlier today for a full half hour--I was able to blow past it and into 2 so quickly thanks to some clearer instructions.

Also, as is the standard effect of the 2nd jhana, I'm feeling really really terrific right now.

I so want to learn single-point meditation but for some reason I never sit down and say "Ok, now i will do this"

Is breath-awareness really the best foundation you can have? I want to know where to start cos I feel like there is something in me that can get pretty far out there with this stuff but I'm kind of at a loss for a proper 'proven' place to start from...

Breath awareness works best for me, but something else may work best for you. Some of Ingram's suggestions in the book if you do want to focus on the breath:

If you are using the breath as an object, you might try purposefully visualizing it as sweet, smooth waves or circles that are peaceful and welcome. Try breathing as if you were in a garden of fragrant roses and you wish to experience the fullness of their fragrance. Perhaps these tips
will help illustrate the kind of non-resistant and peaceful presence that can help one attain these states. Tune into sensations in and around the primary object that feel good. Harbor no guilt, anxiety or fear related to the depths of pleasure, ease and well-being. The spiritual life need not The Concentration States (Samatha Jhanas) be some sort of relentless, austere grind, particularly when doing concentration practices.

Also, here's one of the articles I was mentioning earlier. Hope you find one of these helpful.

http://www.leighb.com/jhana3.htm

Also, in the way of further breath concentration suggestion--as a dude who's spent the better part of a couple years trying to follow the breath with lots of frustrating difficulties getting settled--can I just say that noting the rising and falling of the abdomen as I breathed (giving the mind a little twig to play with while maintaining concentration) was like suddenly finding the key to start the ignition of concentration practice.

In The Jhanas Gunaratana goes in pretty good on the variety of ways to access samatha. Take a peek at the chapter--

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/gunaratana/wheel351.html#ch2.2

I guess one doesn't "access" samatha, but I'm still working on getting all the new terminology straight. Transmission outside the scriptures left me with a lot of catching up to do.

Spent the last few days doing a lot of thinking about the idea of arhatship as a goal vs. the Bodhisattva ideal. If you know me much at all you know that the idea of 'saving all beings' speaks to me deeply, and so the Bodhisattva vows in particular have always meant a great deal to me. There were days where I found myself wondering 'how exactly is sitting on a pillow helping to save any beings, let alone all beings?" For the most part, though, it meant something to me to engage with the world in a compassionate way and feel that it was a part of my practice. Coming from that side of the aisle, the idea that I should focus on liberating my own mind so that I can be an enlightened being is a little jarring. Arhat or Bodhisattva??

Then I read this:

The conflict essentially arises as a result of conceiving the arahant and the bodhisattva in terms of self-view. When there is no clinging to any view, the picture radically changes. The Buddha said, “Held by two kinds of views, some hold back and some overreach; only those with vision see.” The former means some people are life-affirmers, delighting in the things of the world. When teachings refer to letting go and cessation, their minds recoil and hold back. By “some overreach,” he means nihilists who rejoice in the idea of non-being, asserting that when the body dies, this self is annihilated. They feel this will be true peace. “Those with vision” see what has come to be as having come to be. They cultivate dispassion toward that and are at ease with its cessation.

As long as self-view has not been penetrated, the mind will miss the middle way. The “ending of rebirth” ideal will tend to get co-opted by the nihilist view, whereas the “endlessly returning for the sake of all beings” ideal will tend to become permeated with the eternalist view.

When the sense of self is seen through, the middle way is realized. Whether we talk in terms of emptiness of the arahant of the Pali Canon, or in terms of the absolute zero of the Heart Sutra or the infinite view of the four vows, these are merely modes of speech. They all derive from the same source, the truth of the way things are. They are simply expedient formulations that guide the heart to attunement with the reality of its own nature. That attunement is the middle way.

The View from the Center

There are many teachings that illuminate this perspective; for example:

As long as space remains,
As long as sentient beings remain,
Until then, may I too remain
And dispel the miseries of the world.
—Shantideva, Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life

To the average Theravadan, this verse by Shantideva might seem antithetical to the path. It appears to run completely counter to that principle to get out of the burning house as soon as one can. However, the practice of the middle way involves taking up compassion teachings along with their partner, the emptiness teachings. These two elements are like the wings of a bird—they can’t function properly without each other.

If we reflect closely on this verse, another layer of meaning opens up: as long as space and identity are held to have substantial reality, the mind has not realized enlightenment. True insight involves recognizing that space, time, and being are imputed qualities that have no absolute existence.

Thus the Southern idea of “me going” and “others left behind” must be missing the mark. Similarly, the Northern view of “this individual being will persist through infinite time for the sake of other beings” has also fallen into wrong view. The practice of the middle way dissolves the illusion that “I” can “go” and “others” can “stay,” or vice versa. It radically reconfigures the concepts of time, space, and being.

So the aspiration can validly be as it is in the verse; but if space no longer remains, if no beings remain, if their nature is recognized as conditioned and therefore empty, what does that say about the “I” who would be “staying”?

The irony is that upon knowing that time, space, and beings have no substantial reality, the “I” is “gone” too—gone to suchness, come to suchness: Tathagata.

Sri Ramana Maharshi once remarked, “A good man says, ‘Let me be the last man to get liberation, so that I may help all others to be liberated before I am.’ Wonderful! Imagine a dreamer saying, ‘May all these dream people wake up before I do.’ The dreamer is no more absurd than this amiable philosopher.” His analysis astutely sums up the issue: only when the heart is free of all self-view can it attune itself to reality; a precise balance is needed.

In The Vajra Prajna Paramita Sutra, we find passages that voice a similar understanding:

Subhuti, what do you think? You should not maintain that the Tathagata has this thought: “I shall take living beings across.” Subhuti, do not have that thought. And why? There are actually no living beings taken across by the Tathagata. If there were living beings taken across by the Tathagata, then the Tathagata would have the existence of a self, of others, of living beings, and of a life. Subhuti, the existence of a self spoken of by the Tathagata is no existence of a self, but common people take it as the existence of a self.

We save all beings by realizing there are no beings. The perfection of wisdom is to see this fact: ultimately, the truth is not self and not other; there is no arahant, no bodhisattva, no birth, no death. Though the heart might incline to compassion, it’s only when we cultivate this wisdom element as well that there is going to be true spiritual fulfillment.

Experience shows that in order to realize a fulfillment that maximally benefits all, we need to know our traits and learn how to balance them out. If we’re a wisdom type—intent on realizing nibbana to get out as quickly as possible—then it’s necessary to develop compassion. We need to lean toward people and things. Or, if we’re an altruistic type, feeling, “I’ve got to stay around until everyone else has been saved,” then we need to incline toward the emptiness of things.

In the equipoise of the middle way, the infinite and the void are sustained. They complement each other; they balance each other out.

Helpful.

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/302/fenriz.png

wait

lol?

Well since I"ve revived this anyway--

My practice fell off hard right at the beginning of August, but in the last couple days I've jumped back in. I'm trying to start a sitting group here on the Southside, I'm sitting about an hour a day in three sets of 20 mins, and I'm hitting a wall at 2nd jhana.

But w/e. Keep sitting, it'll come.

It kinda goes against the all-or-nothing approach I take to ideology in my life (fundamentalist youth minister in training to militant atheist &c) but I'm letting myself take a slightly more syncretic approach to the Dharma. Not sure if I'm completely comfortable with it yet, but I'm reading Therevada stuff along with my Zen texts & a little Trungpa sprinkled in. It's weird. I still feel like I need to pick a lineage and stick to it, but I feel like that's hard to do without a teacher in the area.

eh

i need to start sitting again

sufi buddy of mine sits for 2 hours a day :-/

He has externalized his fourth chakra through his nose?

What Make You Not A Buddhist -- Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse

still wanna know if anyone else has read this, or if it's just wee-wee buddhism lite for western herbs

also just got zen at war from the library and have read the first chapter---v interesting! but will have to wait until after exams :-/

http://www.jetcityorange.com/Buddhism/Heart-Sutra-wordle.gif
word cloud of the heart sutra

gbx i have heard from friends that the book is quite quite good! can't vouch personally

Soooooooo siddhis. Fuck.

what do yall think about that dolly llamer fella

I enjoyed Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh- it tries to highlight the similarities between Buddhism & Christianity, although I'm convinced those too are not entirely reconcilable. Still, it was interesting.

I also enjoy Gary Snyder's zen influenced poems

btw read through Shambhala: Way of the Warrior over the winter and came away kinda unimpressed. it was my first (and thus far only) trungpa book. should i try elsewise?

HOOS's insights & thoughts about his practice fill me with suc joy & affection & inspiration - your practice, in itself, ups downs & all, just knowing that it's going on, is a tangible good to at least one other sentient being!

also. The Posting Of The Fenriz Pic is actually a v. v. advanced Zen practice seldom achieved, esp. in Kali-Yuga, so you should feel pretty stoked about that

q for u horrible idolators:

the world's foremost (only?) buddhist theocracy, bhutan, prohibits mountaineers from climbing the peaks in their stretch of the himalaya. since these places aren't ~actually~ sacred (they're just some dumb fucking mountains, god), what is the buddhist rationale for this? a man stands on a rock at the top of a mountain, another man poops, who cares. etc.

(nb - i am only the most armchairiest of armchair mountaineers (and "buddhist"), i'm just curious about this bit of dogma)

spiritual cooties

I cannot swear to it, as I am only guessing. I think the rationale goes roughly like this:

The source of suffering is desire. (<- One of the Four Noble Truths).

Mountaineers bring with them new, strange desires from outside Bhutanese traditional culture. Whether it is the desire to climb the mountain, as approached through a western perspective, or familiarizing remote villagers with new western luxuries. These novelties are unsettling and not especially worthwhile. Iow, mountain climbers will just stir up suffering in novel ways the culture is poorly equipped to deal with.

Afaik, the bhutanese regime does not reject all western values or products, but it prefers to mull them over and admit them in increments. It is paternalistic, but seems to work for them at least as well as the free-for-all chaos most of the liberalized west embraces.

that's kinda what i had assumed, but thx!

i mean, i had guessed that attaining a summit is its own kind of ~grasping~, but it also seemed to me that bestowing sacred status to a mountain was antithetical to some buddhist teachings.

bhutan is pretty cool iirc - don't they conduct a nation-wide happiness survey? they are one of the most happy nations in the world iirc.

i really want to go there so bad :-/

don't bhut-an it

j/k! you should totes go. here's what I was talking about, gross national happiness

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_National_Happiness

~gross!~

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJJa3s_U0wA&feature=player_embedded

Am re-reading this guy's book Sit Down & Shut Up alongside a re-read of Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha. I'm drawn to the Theravada side because, in a word, the Mahayana gets so fuckin boring. Warner does a good job of jazzing up the concepts with his style of writing, but that doesn't change the fact that the core practice of Soto style is trying really hard to do nothing and ignore whatever happens in your head, where the Theravadans I'm reading insist on inducing specific stuff to happen in your head while you sit--that's way more ~exciting~ and speaks to my to-do-list mindset, you know?

And yet maybe a practice that speaks to & even nurtures my productivity neuroses is the opposite of what I need.

Thoughts, anybody?

i dont think ive ever done theraveda style meditation but doesn't the little vehicle thing refer to the nirvana or bust, monk-like devotion? i kinda like the way mahayana loops back around into reality

Well there's been somethin of a renaissance in the last few decades of lay westerners coming to Theravada teachings without doing the whole "shaving your head and moving to nepal" thing, though of course that's exactly what most of these ~renaissance teachers~ did for their training before they brought it back to the states for lazy Buddhists like me.

caring abt people: zzzz
chillin out: a+

oh god this thread just fills me w/loathing, so i am clearly the best to make pronouncements on dharma, this brad warner guy judging by 3 minutes of googling is p much embodies everything tedious and half assed abt young western teacher bros who think they know what buddism is all abt, theyre always writing and talking abt what the buddha really taught, how convenient

----

i mean, i had guessed that attaining a summit is its own kind of ~grasping~, but it also seemed to me that bestowing sacred status to a mountain was antithetical to some buddhist teachings.

― drink more beer and the doctor is a heghog (gbx), Friday, April 2, 2010 9:08 PM (9 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this im sure has nothing to do w/bhutans reasoning, nor does the dharma as actually practiced resemble the heady western psychologized ideal, id hazard to guess their motivation lies in a combination of thoroughly absorbed pre buddhist animistic traditions and really really not wanting to be nepal

its interesting the dharma completely accommodated all sorts of voodoo magic and now its accommodating western psychological self regard

I think it's interesting that you're interpreting Warner's Soto boringness as Western self-regard w/o a word for the self that chases crazy visions in the jhanas.

btw i realize my judgement of bro warder is snap and unfair - he just seems v much a piece w/a lot of other things people are doing mucking around - there are people who i grew up w/who are writing dharma books! and they are so boring and meaningless - everyone seems v uncomfortable w/the power and culture of irl buddhism - its too messy - theyd rather wonder abt whether buddhists have a responsibility to recycle and vote - the dharma punx are of course the nadir of this movement

correct

this is what im talking abt!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YDXCzNwO-A

like more than once i've thought of getting involved with the ~interdependence project~ but it seems more like dharma social club--buy our t-shirts! come to our picnics!--

xp

lol yes founded by one of my esteemed peers smh

caring abt people: zzzz
chillin out: a+

― ice cr?m, Saturday, January 29, 2011 8:26 PM

love this post

I mean I think it's a question of whether or not we ~want the Dharma to take root in the West~ and shit, what would a truly western incarnation of the teachings look like, covered in the same number of cultural doodads that it picked up on its growth in Asia? And I think part of the answer, unfortunately, is that the same way the teachings picked up unfortunate cultural accoutrements throughout history, the same is occurring now as it gets bound up in the sorta 21st century-stuff-white-buddhists-like machine

imo the way tho it adapts is not through navel gazing by people who are too afraid to do more than scratch the surface - the way that darmha will take root in the west is by people practicing it wholeheartedly - then after like three generations you have something that maybe looks a little bit different on the surface but retains the same core potency - and no one particularly tried to or worried abt changing it

as a cavat i will say its totally fine and good for people to present the teachings so that the people theyre speaking to will understand them - teachers who have actual meditative realization should by all means feel the most free to play w/this - unfortunately a lot of entry level dudes are confusing this approach and modifying things they dont particularly understand to suit their own neurosis

i mean if you cant wrap yr head around calling yrself a buddhist maybe stay home and think abt it, the conceptual barriers only get larger from there

my atheist friend's parents who are christians have been trying to get him to go to a local buddhist meeting so he can have "some kind of spiritual view on life" cuz they know there's no way he'll ever go to a christian church. i think they're attempting to edge him along a sliding scale of belief until eventually he's going to church with them every week. he doesn't want to go, anyway. seems stupid, because he is more philosophical and ethical then most religious people i know as he is.

btw if you ever want to meet some westerners who have humbly dedicated themselves to the dharma check out these doodz, yes they are singing and enjoying themselves, deal w/it *sunglasses*

http://grab.by/8FcB

imo the way tho it adapts is not through navel gazing by people who are too afraid to do more than scratch the surface - the way that darmha will take root in the west is by people practicing it wholeheartedly

I don't claim to be able to assess whether anybody else is practicing wholeheartedly or not, but it does seem to me that there are a lot of people thoroughly engaged in a panoply of practices, and I think that exactly qualifies as the kind of planting the teachings in the soil here that we're talking about here. I--me speaking for me (in THIS thread that's funny)--don't think we can speak of the dharma with the kind of certainty that you're deploying here.

Dogen's practice in Japan in 1200 was the same as Warner's practice in 2010, and I don't think we can say that Dogen designed the Soto lineage with our hangups in mind. I agree with you that the accoutrements are silly, but I--speaking for me, as a rep of a diff lineage!!--don't think we can discount other lineage's practices as less advanced or 'shallower.'

I know this is a thing we won't agree on, but you know, such as it is.

Now somebody call me a weak-kneed syncretic.

Of course I say that knowing plenty of post-hippie Soto cats who disdain anything other than zazen as 'chasing acid trips,' so I'm not really repping anybody's opinion but my own here.

i dont think accoutrements are silly particularly, in fact i think theyre v important, they just need to be the accoutrements that enlighten rather than obscure - and i agree there are lots of people practicing wholeheartedly, certainly more wholeheartedly than me, and thats wonderful

my point i guess is basically: a) there are people who annoy me and are dumb b) they should stop

hahaq

^^ shh secret lojong slogans

lorong slogans

lolong lolgans

lol

Almost all Mahayana Buddhists regard themselves as practicing a superior form of Buddhism, the “large vehicle” of greater aspirations, higher view, and deeper compassion, which they contrast to a so-called “Hinayana” or smaller, inferior vehicle. Many Theravadins regard themselves as practicing a “pure” or “original” form of Buddhism, rather than degenerate Mahayana. Because the term “Hinayana” originated in Mahayana sectarian polemics and has never been a self-designation used by any Buddhist group, I make a special effort to discourage use of this term whenever I teach Buddhist history in a Mahayana or Vajrayana context. Many Westerners who practice a Tibetan-based form of Buddhism find it difficult to accept and assimilate this change into their speech habits no matter how many times the reasons for doing so are explained. Nevertheless, I continue to argue that the term “Hinayana” simply needs to be dropped from our vocabulary. In a pluralistic, diverse Buddhist world that is informed by an accurate understanding of Buddhist history, the term “Hinayana” is deeply inappropriate. I also suggest that the idea of progressive stages of development from “lower” to “higher” may not be the best way to understand Buddhist internal diversity.

boom

eh its part of the samaya vow to not denigrate other forms of buddhism fyi - so i mean this lady who thinks shes thinking big is just going over something thats considered already settled from a tantric pov - and i think you know being ecumenical is good as far as being open minded but if youre using it to not relate to or understand the philosophical differences in varied traditions than its just stupid

and of course she has absolutely no business just changing buddhist terminology just to suit her personal beliefs

extremely weak sauce over all

btw i am aquatinted w/her, one summer at shambhala mountain center she wore this gross cat sweatshirt around all the time w/three cats on the front facing forward and on the back were their raised tails hind legs and everything - nagl

i mean that whole essay is so buddhist challops - as if practitioners are sitting around worrying abt the origins of mahayana, thinking abt how lame theravada is - they are not! they are trying to understand how to work w/their minds, how to be kind to people

ps academia is the worst

Now somebody call me a weak-kneed syncretic.

This seems wrong and pointless, but you asked politely, so... you are a weak-kneed syncretic.

**sigh** People have such strange fetishes.

take it to tmi u 2

gross u guys

doesnt nondualism nullify this entire argument?

w/r/t little/big vehicle

i think when discussing the concept of emptiness, its not like calling shenanigans, its not going to make practical differences disappear

yea i guess i dont know enough about the differences between the schools and i have a sneaking suspicion that everything i know about buddhism comes from mahayana

from a vajrayana pov all three vehicles are essential and practiced simultaneously - so its quite easy to make too much out of the big/little naming convention - which isnt even really particularly a comment on theravada but rather describes aspects of the tantra tradition - like imagine a teacher in a remote valley in eastern tibet in 1897 caring or even knowing abt whats going on in south east asia

i mean he doesnt even know who the dalai lama is

which isnt even really particularly a comment on theravada but rather describes aspects of the tantra tradition

but dude come on you can see where theravadins might take umbrage at the naming convention: 'hey u lil guys are great and we totes respect your less evolved practices'

i mean maybe this is concern trolling if you like, but i have read bhutanese dudes insisting that this amounts to centuries of disrespect for what they do

i think when discussing the concept of emptiness, its not like calling shenanigans

i love buddhism board descrip

form is emptiness, emptiness is not shenangians

aw man i've only been able to skim most of this recent activity :(

its part of the samaya vow to not denigrate other forms of buddhism fyi - so i mean this lady who thinks shes thinking big is just going over something thats considered already settled from a tantric pov

you realize that from the opposite perspec tho this is kinda 'hey we didn't mean it like that yall dealwithit.gif' right i mean

and of course she has absolutely no business just changing buddhist terminology just to suit her personal beliefs

down with this tho, hate this 'i'm not even really a buddhist' line of bs

what makes you not a buddhist by dzongsar jamyang khyentse

loved this, btw

i mean jho i realize nobody is gonna be droppin t bombs on u itt i'm just sayin

xp

http://grab.by/8FcB

wnkiw

i think its ok to challenge jho itt

i mean that whole essay is so buddhist challops - as if practitioners are sitting around worrying abt the origins of mahayana, thinking abt how lame theravada is - they are not! they are trying to understand how to work w/their minds, how to be kind to people

― ice cr?m, Monday, January 31, 2011 5:56 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

i mean ok yes you are kind of negating the whole rest of my discussion with this post i'm just saying this is a thread that exists in the ~dharma community~ and it's not exclusively the domain of stuff-white-buddhists-like types

i think its ok to challenge jho itt

― ullr saves (gbx), Tuesday, February 1, 2011 12:11 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

oh right i just mean i'm not gonna ~blow his mind~ with some secret shit he didn't know abt

re: ari & rose, i wish that gif was drunkenly animated in 25 minutes

i spent a couple minutes like

'would not get enlightened with??'

'would not chant with??'

'would not visualize with??'

theyre awesome deep individuals you would no doubt enjoy meeting, the silliness of that jpg they had nothing to do w/excepted

anyway i feel like the lesser vehicle scandal if there is such a thing is exquisitely silly, and to all my theravada brethren i say 'do yr thing gangsta'

fair enuf

sorry if i sometimes project my resentments onto u as the sole vajrayana rep on this borad

roll on yo

if its discussed in such a away as to elucidate the teachings then fine, otherwise im totally w/e

hi 5

i mean i could see the dalai lama making a pronouncement saying 'dont call it the lesser vehicle call it the essential vehicle' and that would be a nice gesture but nothing particularly wouldve changed abt the teachings because the problem wasnt really a problem in the first place

I mean I'm just always wary of situs where I find myself saying to an offended party 'guys you really don't have a reason to be offended here'

i mean symbolic gestures that have no concrete effect still have meaning, you are not a dude i have to tell this to

(((cause u are smarter than me on this stuff is why i don't have to tell u)))

thats why i said it would be a nice gesture!

fundamentally the vajrayana teachings dont at all shit on the theravada, the teachings of lesser middle and greater vehicles are totally ok and dont do that, irl many things im sure have been said on both sides - so basically what im arguing is that its a semantic point - people are welcome to be upset by it but its not saying what they think its says is all

irl both parties think they do dharma better is where the friction really lies imo - i say practice wholeheartedly and ill do the same in like 40 years we can compare our realization - that would prob be the best for everyone involved and the world

This is truly a BigEndian vs. LittleEndian quarrel (as described in Gulliver's Travels).

one vehicle: those that can't do teach
the other one: do or do not there is no try
tibetans: (((d~_~b)))
syncretic enthusiasts: highlander + robots + actual trees

lol

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/09/india.dalai.lama/index.html

huh

yeah

this has been a long time coming obv and china's been regularly reiterating that they were gonna decide who DL's next reincarnee was, glad to see this happened now instead of while dude was on his deathbed or something

feel like it has to be in some way motivated by all this stuff in araby, too---ppl got a yen for freely elected leaders these days imo

earlier today i tweeted a podcast abt 'redesigning buddhism' just because it tied in with a 'redesign' event i was doing here in dc

i immediately felt dumb about it and deleted the tweet

lol

http://youtu.be/o-LhjW3jY7M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-LhjW3jY7M

4my said this morning, "Dad, I want to be reincarnated as a Grandma"

Went to the Soka Gakkai center south of town yesterday with my Philosophy of Religion class and listened to them for the class period talk about their organization and watched them chant. I had made sure to read a bit about the history of SG beforehand and it appeals to me through its focus on an internal personality shift rather than mysticism. The presenters seemed a wee bit glib and not as reverent as I'd expected, but it seemed a part of their inclusiveness and the "everydayness" of them. I'm interested, but I'd like to read more of Nichiren's writings.

Any experiences, anecdotes? Is this a dangerous cult or what?

no one? ice cr?m, hoos?

sry i dont know anything abt them that i didnt just learn from a quick google

I've not heard of it before either. Was it a 'community' like thing, or is it (because you say the "internal personality shift" appealed to you, too) really focused on the individual?

sry i dont know anything abt them that i didnt just learn from a quick google

― ice cr?m, Thursday, October 13, 2011 3:20 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

I will chime in though that I am p tired of glib everydayness as a teaching method but I'm the kind of guy that looks at binary code for fun so

Thanks anyway.

I was wondering if I should probably read up on more basic Buddhist texts before investigating Nichiren/SG. Where would I start?

And I agree Hoos — that was pretty much the only thing that bothered me about it. I guess the philosophy has to appeal first to my intellect (but maybe this is sort of antithetical).

and I guess the glibness comes from the fact that they were black kids who grew up on the south side of Chicago and not scholars

feel like if you find something that engages you you should just jump in, you can always look into other buddhist things along the way, cause realistically many of the philosophical underpinnings of the dharma are v difficult and subtle, you could spend years trying to understand them before you feel comfortable making any sort of move

Hmm, yes, Soka Gakkai. This story might be of interest. (The cover was its own issue.)

http://www.ocweekly.com/2011-03-10/news/soka-university-of-america-aliso-viejo-gakkai/

of you could always use the internet!

thanks, that's +/- what I intended to do — I've read a bit of D.T. Suzuki in the past but whatever benefit I got from it was shortlived, I guess because I became bored because it didn't feel very applicable or I just didn't understand it.

(xps)

I'm an egghead normally, but what I liked about Buddhism is how it teaches you to not trust intellect all the time ... that's what I got from it, at least (which, tbh, I have only a kiddie pool of depth in the subject), and that words, ideas, and concepts take us away from reality. I enjoy life a lot more when I shut down that conceptualization or narrative engine and just exist.

I always looked at Buddhism as a practice rather than just an intellectual exercise, and I'm sure you guys know better, but it's helped me a whole lot in appreciating life more. If Buddhism isn't about everydayness, then what good is it. Cool window dressing for the ego? Another idealistic abstraction like any other religion?

I have to leave for work rn but I'll read that article later

ive found alan watts books and talks to be great introductory material for a lot of eastern concepts; as a westerner, he's often able to use metaphors that are much easier to grasp than a lot of the eastern thinkers. also he's got good charisma and a level a showmanship that makes it easy to listen to what he's saying

checking out his podcast might be a good start

yeah someone else recommended Watts as well — I've just started the more comprehensive book of D.T. Suzuki's writings and A Primer of Sōtō Zen so I'll come to him after I finish those.

http://i.imgur.com/FmMQM.jpg

^^

^^

^^

^^

^^ pointing @ the moon

imho its quite a bit more compelling to read pith instructions that speak in person terms rather than more formal approaches like dt suzukis - not that theres not room for that but it can all seem kinda beside the point particularly if youre just getting familiar w/the subject matter

along w/zen mind beginners mind off the top of my head id recommend

shambhala sacred path of the warrior - chogyam trungpa
what makes you not a buddhist - dzongsar jamyang khyentse
ruling your world - sakyong mipham
rainbow painting - tulku urgyen

what makes you not a buddhist - dzongsar jamyang khyentse

^^

Zen Mind Beginnes Mind is a Bible.

Thanks a ton icey

I actually looked for Zen Mind Beginner's Mind at the library but it wasn't there (or at least it wasn't in the same section as the other books on Eastern religions).

I will look for all of those.

sweet dude!

:)

Already posted this on FB but I'll post it here, a good article on Soka Gakkai.

Thankfully there are several non-crazy temples available in town. Thinking of visiting this one.

also how authoritative/comprehensive is "A Buddhist Bible"? I read the blurb in the library about how it was Kerouac's and the Beat Generation's way into Buddhism.

speaking of culty buddhism things, i saw this over on theworsthorse.com: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/01/20/close_encounters_of_the_buddhist_kind

Picture this: millions of followers gathering around a central shrine that looks like a giant UFO in elaborately choreographed Nuremberg-style rallies;

UH

i mean srsly

frightening

read the entire thread earlier today, lots of nice discussions. is hobart paving still posting under another name?

string this today:

http://i40.tinypic.com/1zlpwlg.png

*starting*

string where you are

I'm so strung out

also picked up Crazy Wisdom and What Makes You Not A Buddhist from the library

I am just gonna list these two titles from that steve jobs zen article here for future reference (aka in case of zen emergency break glass)

Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind

yes trungpa v much

Steve jobs reading list hit a lil close to home, finding out his teacher was koben chino Rossi was like whaaa

Lol iPad spell check 'koben chino roshi'

buddhism

get into it

how u doin hoos

sorta working to fling myself at the cushion as a moment of peace in the day, looking for something resonant in old reads. day is rough lately, mainly a cocktail of brain chemistry & grey weather with a sprinkle of unfortunate events. but those details are prob for another thread.

also just read this

I've become disturbed by my tendency to privilege speed and multiplicity over depth and quality.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Saturday, May 12, 2007 11:38 PM (5 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and successfully freaked myself out, because in all the writing and thinking i'm doing lately i'm still struggling with this same problem.

oh man, that was actually closer to 6 years ago. jesus.

struggling with your mind's tendencies is normal

i've been on a sōtō tip lately

xp the speed and multiplicity bias might be better suited to our era though, where productivity is key and everyone has multiple commitments. i tend to get lost in individual projects and lose sight of all my responsibilities. i've been practicing mindfulness meditation -- just basic breathing exercises -- in order to make "transitions" easier, like, to gently shift my attention away from something "absorbing" to something that is more "urgent." i think it will be helpful.

i kinda made that realization when i was trying to study 3 languages at once this semester. i felt like i was making progress, but that progress would've been much more useful if i had just focused on one thing at a time.

what dharma books have y'all been reading?

right now i'm working through phra payudh's buddhadhamma and it is a nice densely detailed description of theravada theory and practice. it's been criticized as being too dryly theoretical but i actually appreciate this since there's so little writing on theravada in english (or at least it seems so).

also got a book on dōgen by thomas cleary called rational zen which looks really good; will post abt it here once i've finished it.

before last week i had no idea buddhist nationalism existed: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/04/969-the-strange-numerological-basis-for-burmas-religious-violence/274816/

i think buddhist nationalism is a major component of the conflict in sri lanka too.

i mentioned this in the other thread 969 came up on but there's also the DKBA, a group that was once part of a unified karen insurgency in burma that basically sold out the KNLA in the 90s and its remaining (mostly christian) fighters.

restless souls by phil thornton is a good primer for the karen's struggle in burma, despite the author's pretty obvious sympathies with the KNLA. i think a good amount of the DKBA defected back to the KNLA recently since the book was published but i know less about that

Zen At War is great on Buddhist nationalism in WWII.

there's so little writing on theravada in english (or at least it seems so).

― clouds, Tuesday, April 30, 2013 3:57 AM (11 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

check out mastering the core teachings of the buddha imo, less dry! also free online.

thanks, i will!

dude has a very particular approach that might be offputting, sorta approaches practice in a 'WE WILL **PUMP** U MIND' way but its motivating at least

i'd like to read more about this stuff too

see, i don't mind dry though. it kinda makes a nice antidote to the elusive simplicity of most popular eng-lang dharma writing that tries too hard to make the dharma seem relevant to the "computer age" or w/e (which is still probably one of the greatest challenges for anyone wanting to practice).

there is too often a "gaining idea" behind the impulse to learn about meditation, etc. i would never criticize someone who is simply stressed the f out and needs some kind of anchor wanting to learn about meditation but at the same time i feel the approach is missing the point.

also being a book nerd insulates you from falling into possibly dangerous b.s. sects led by and comprised of people who don't possess skillful means or the right mindfulness.

Well that's the thing about MCTB, the book I mentioned a while ago--the practice is almost presented as a method, with a series of steps to follow and milestones to pass, to enlightenment. And you're pushed to achieve "the next level" with super brass tacks like "to break into third jhana you should focus on the warming sensation at the top of your head--if you're struggling, try visualizing this really specific thing." Was thinking about it earlier and it's almost like the gamification or whatever of the practice--i half expect duke nukem to jump out of a chapter and be like "unlimited physical bliss unlocked, you're a badass meditator"

okay, i will set aside my skepticism and check it out. :)

welp add another tragicomic egomaniac to the rolls http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2013/05/10/congressman-mark-sanford-_n_3248161.html

Dammit, enlightenment is not just some thing that happens to you because you meditate that lets you sleep better.

tm is the religious equivalent of believing you are saving the world by shopping at whole foods

that western dude's appropriation of eastern religious practices is so much less respectful than all the other western dudes' appropriations

idk. i think there are therapeutic elements of buddhism you can get with without the metaphysics or w/e. specifically, the practice of meditation is good for people, whatever their ideas are on things. it shouldn't be mistaken for actual buddhism, but it shouldn't be criticized, necessarily. like shopping at whole foods. people should eat healthy things and, if possible, buy their vegetables from the least bad vendors.

The value in buddhism is so much more than "meditation is good for people" that coupling what Mark Sanford does with "buddhist practises", as the article does, is a travesty.

yeah i didn't mean to be seen as defending that. maybe the idea of meditation as a therapeutic activity should be more distinctly secularized, so people won't get confused and think it is "buddhism."

ya pretty much all religions have had a meditative tradition at some point, just mostly theyre p marginalized these days

catholic contemplative bros are among my favorite bros

where you guys stand on the proliferation of yoga as purely a fitness activity?

i mean me personally i'm of two minds, namely 'omg cultural appropriation' vs 'yo this is literally good for a human being to do and big up people doing it'

notably my opinion as regards yoga as a spiritual practice, whether 'appropriation' or 'literally good,' is p much absent

yoga as far as like the stretching thing from india is not really a spiritual practice in the first place, i mean it has spiritual aspects inherited from hinduism the vedas etc but also a lot of it comes directly from gymnastics and its been a competition sport for abt as long as its been around in its modern form

i am glad lagoon is posting in this thread again

mark sanford drew me back in

nothing to contribute except that all people who practice buddhism are irl buddha bros, peace

according to david gordon white, yoga was picked up/remade by indian nationalists in the C19 as a sort of clean living desi masculine gymnastics before it enjoyed its westernised, feminine modern form, and the details of previous incarnations are p sketchy. his book on this topic has a good cover:

http://i151.photobucket.com/albums/s156/pustakalaya/white_yogis.jpg

yeah feeling the cover/title altogether

cf

http://www.allthingshealing.com/Portals/2/Stock-Photos/Yoga/YogaBodyPic.jpg

to answer the question tho, a HOOS is pretty otm. plus a thing that's been observed is, if folks practice steadily for enough years, other aspects of the practice begin to present themselves whether or not that was anyone's desire or expectation going in.

but then I also know high-profile yoga teachers who are p much floundering if they're not demonstrating fancy arm balances and would be the last people to look to for irl counsel or even just stillness so eh.

fb friend always sharing this Boob Russell guy's blog posts. Anyway, this is how Bob would break down buddhism, to an extent

lol

That's pretty standard stuff for a big cheese evangelist type guy. The dalai lama is 'the Pope of the buddhist religion' and the buddha was a false prophet, so believing in his teachings would send you straight to hell. The only slight deviation from SOP is that he tries to be sort of polite about it.

Add: It's sorta like he says "This dalai lama seems like a nice chap. Same goes for this Buddha guy. But face it, all these buddhists are going to hell." The he shrugs, quotes the bible and implies, "Hey! I didn't make these rules. Almighty God, our Father, did. Nothing to be done about it. Stick with Jesus... or you'll regret it."

This is how a mafia godfather talks when he's feeling mellow.

Haha. Yes, the mellow tone ending with pasted false prophet quotes gets me

what kind of stuff is there out there in the literature that's on fear?

more interested in "this is how you overcome it"

should i just listen to this on repeat?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fgT9zGkiLig

Is there any thing in particular that you fear? Or is it just that you are constantly swimming into a strange and unknown future which seems chaotically out of control?

As for listening to that song on repeat, it would certainly give your mind a focus during the time you were listening, but when you switched it off you would be none the wiser, because your mind would clinging to the song and you would not understand your actions. You need to focus your mind no matter what is around you.

"too much" probably isn't a bad answer.

http://arstechnica.com/staff/2008/12/fearless-apples-macworld-expo-exit-is-part-of-its-dna/

"It’s sort of weird but I think it’s really important to do things that scare you, or try to confront things that scare you, it’s just always better, at least for me. I like doing things that terrify me, because it’s how I get to the next level. I just like confronting things that are scary and not letting my fear of something change my approach to it, as much as possible."

http://grimes-claireboucher.tumblr.com/post/43017818600/grimes-interview

Try to find a quiet place and sit quietly. It is a good first step. While you are sitting there another step to take may occur to you. The internet is not such a place.

alright thank you. if anyone has anything on fear for me to read, toss it over please

Try the film Fearless with Jeff Bridges.

ok cool

markers try pema chodron - taking the leap

i will. my library apparently has it. thank you

markers I'd really love to hear what you think of the Pema Chodron book if you've gotten around to it.

I'm reading bell hooks' really fantastic book "All About Love," where she draws heavily from the Buddhist writers Pema Chodron, Jack Kornfield and Sharon Salzberg among others to examine what love is, and how our everyday notions of what it means to give and receive love often fall apart. In it she writes that to love is to "extend the self to include another."

This got me thinking, and it occurred to me that we live in a society and culture that values the self above all: self-preservation, self satisfaction, self advancement. Because this is the case, the extension of the self--love--requires the demolition of the walls erected by these values. In this way love becomes an act of defiance, and an act of love a courageous detonation of the boundaries built and encouraged by our dominant culture and systems of oppression. To love is to accept dangerous vulnerability in the belief that on reaching out we might find someone who is reaching for us, too.

Ultimately of course, to love in the fullest and most compassionate sense requires not only destruction of the walls that divide us from one another, but a realization that there's no self to protect or other to be divided from. But I only understand that in my brain. I haven't quite learned to feel it in my bones yet.

I'm kinda with you until the second paragraph, hoos

Seems a bit quantum mystic to me but I am open to more thoughts from you on it (not that you owe me any)

Second paragraph or third?

ha now I've confused myself, let us stipulate the paragraphs are

1 markers
2 I'm reading
3 this got me
4 ultimately

Yeah the last one. For some reason I only remembered reading two paragraphs.

I only understand that in my brain. I haven't quite learned to feel it in my bones yet.

I see what you are saying. If this truth is comprehended only in a sterile, diagrammatic manner, then it has no life in you and you cannot manifest it. Even satori, however magnificent it is, requires daily practise for it to flourish.

I would say that the self is both an illusion and not an illusion, as reflected in the saying that when you seek enlightenment, at first there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is a mountain again. The mountain and the no-mountain are one.

This may be quantum mystic, but (shrugs).

yeah, every day you gotta wake up again

and make the bed, too

Helps me to think of myself as a unique manifestation of a general being. Like an individual cell in a multicellular being. Same DNA, different epigenetics. Make the bed, sure, but backwards cause it's amusing.

so my life needs more buddhist-related ideas in it right now i think

I've been thinking exactly the same thing over the last couple of days, and it's hardly characteristic.

lol well good! that's two of us. let's try to make this thread a little more active. i'm gonna go to the library tonight and will return here to let you ppl know what i picked up.

stuff i'm gonna be looking for: dealing with change. fear.

last time i checked they didn't have the pema chodron book in. but they have other books of hers. anyway

any pointers the more expert among us would like to dispense are welcome. podcasts, books, whatever. i don't think i'll end up a buddhist but that's ok

what's weird is freshman year in college i had the tibetan book of living and dying w/ me and i can't remember why

i think i read this book the monk and the philosopher? did i ever finish it tho

the last one i might've read was the tao te ching

actually got in touch with university friend today, keen on buddhism, to ask about what books he'd recommend. he also had Tibetan Book of the Dead, not really a surprise, and possibly the monk and philosopher book tho I can't recall. interested in monastic teachings.

i have a short book of collected writings by Dogen called Beyond Thinking--it's kinda great and refreshing. mainly just a meditation manual. he describes it (wonderfully) at some point as "sitting uselessly doing nothing."

any pointers the more expert among us would like to dispense are welcome. podcasts, books, whatever. i don't think i'll end up a buddhist but that's ok

the last one i might've read was the tao te ching

― markers, Monday, July 15, 2013 11:45 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

another really good tao is tao lin, also really focused on "just fucking do it."

I'm reading bell hooks' really fantastic book "All About Love," where she draws heavily from the Buddhist writers Pema Chodron, Jack Kornfield and Sharon Salzberg among others to examine what love is, and how our everyday notions of what it means to give and receive love often fall apart. In it she writes that to love is to "extend the self to include another."

This got me thinking, and it occurred to me that we live in a society and culture that values the self above all: self-preservation, self satisfaction, self advancement. Because this is the case, the extension of the self--love--requires the demolition of the walls erected by these values. In this way love becomes an act of defiance, and an act of love a courageous detonation of the boundaries built and encouraged by our dominant culture and systems of oppression. To love is to accept dangerous vulnerability in the belief that on reaching out we might find someone who is reaching for us, too.

love bell hooks and this

markers, search pema chödrön, thich nhat hanh, chögyam trungpa, any translation by red pine

"moon in a dewdrop" is a really good plain english translation of dogen imo

second thich nhat hanh and definitely brad warner--warner gets shit for some aspects of his attitude, and maybe rightfully, but i think his no varnish minimal esoterism take can be especially helpful to people trying to get into this stuff

yeah i remember seeing a friend's copy of "hardcore zen" in like 2004 and doing some monumental eyeroll and then reading it and being all like okay damn if this dude doesn't 100% Get It and i am an asshole. imo warner's "sit down and shut up" is even better.

i've read a number of buddhist writers but always circle back to pema. she's just got a soulful way about her that i love. oh, and xp'ing to markers: "dealing with change, fear" is right in her wheelhouse.

i started carrying around a hand-written copy of the four noble truths and the noble eightfold path. good to meditate on for a few minutes when shit's closing in.

xpost no-soulful, surely

no, soulful, srsly

http://image.spreadshirt.com/image-server/v1/designs/10625895,height%3D150,width%3D150,facepalm-buddha-buw.png

ok i get the objection, if the objection revolves around the concept of the "soul" per se, which is certainly suspect in this context. but that's not what i mean by "soulful". i just mean something with lots of heart and feeling, maan.

totally just buddhist joeks: https://sites.google.com/site/rahulawhatthebuddha/the-doctrine-of-no-soul

i'm pickin up what yr puttin down wrt pema c. mighty heart. unflinching wrt truth and unstinting wrt compassion.

yeah i know about the doctrine! what's funny is i actually "got" your joke (hence my "srsly"), but my insistence (i couldn't resist because of the echo) made you think i didn't... ....i think.....

"unflinching wrt truth and unstinting wrt compassion" ..... nice

yeah i thought you were objectiing to my refusal to recognize that aspect of PC's voice you're hearing as soulful and I was like oh damn i have really confused this thread now.

she's gotten a lot of folks of many and no denominations through a lot of dark nights, i think.

clearing up thread misunderstandings is one of life's simple pleasures.

most Buddhist books are more or less the same.
you only need 2-3 of them and that's all.
it's better to meditate more and read less about it.

more or less the same

lotta weight on that hat hook there

but point well taken

it can be whatever you want. if you want to simply practice, then practice — but a scholastic approach can be deeply rewarding. you might come across a chance line in the blue cliff record (for e.g.) that could give you something to meditate upon.

i saw pema chödrön had a book on how to meditate - has anyone read it? if not, any good resources on learning how to meditate better? i tried it out after reading thich naht hanh and found it pretty helpful, but it was sorta a slapdash kinda thing i made up on my own; i'd like to try and take it to the next level, assuming doing it properly from experienced practitioners will make a difference.

I'm not really familiar with Chodron's meditation style--are you looking for thoughts on the Zen-y 'just sitting' mode or more the 'high level concentration states' style?

not totally sure. what i liked about meditation when I tried it was like ... stopping and being in the moment. becoming highly aware of the present. that's about as far as I got.

I completely forgot, I remember first trying meditation when I was doing this Japanese zen martial arts class, so maybe along those lines. what i did was the "just sitting" style, which is what i was doing on my own, too. i'm not sure what the 'high level concentration' stuff is.

imo it's just a diff kinda practice, diff't approach.

where the zen approach is 'goalless,' 'nothing to achieve,' 'no special state to attain,' there are other practices that encourage you to seek out specific (ostensibly) higher states of mind called 'jhanas' through various visualization techniques and stuff like that.

'zen mind beginner's mind' and 'opening the hand of thought' are both pretty good in the 'just sit' style. if the other style sounds interesting to you there's a slowly growing repository of western-oriented resources for those too--dharma overground's wiki is very helpful and plainspoken.

that said, don't let the jhana stuff intimidate or overwhelm if it's not something that piques your interest--i've found it's appealing to certain sorts of folks (like me) and not others.

i'm a nerd that likes to make lists and has trouble focusing daily so long lists of stuff and 'now try to make your mind do THIS' appeal to me

is buddhism the right answer or is a brain transplant

xp thanks for the reccomendations. i hear you on the mind stuff, that's part of what makes buddhism appealing to me.

without trying to make an epigram or sound too authoritative (i'm not), buddhism isn't the answer — it's a mode of investigating things.

xp to markers

but doesn't it have the ability to make people less fearful? to make them able to deal with change better? doesn't it actually materially improve people's lives?

i don't think it "makes" you do anything so much as help you to realize what you already contain within yourself. you already have the power to overcome fear and changes. everyone has the nature of a buddha, they only need to realize it. what buddhism does is help you strip away all the delusions one builds up simply by living in society and being influenced by things, experiencing things. studying dharma helps you see these things for what they are, as essentially empty.

materially? i have no idea. i think rather the point is to realize that material improvements in themselves are a learned delusion.

ime consistent practice will not make anyone less fearful or better able to deal with change or less torn by the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to etc etc

what it will do is make these states and feelings more intimate, more familiar, less likely to be mistaken for facts. this may afford the practitioner a few more degrees of freedom wrt their own responses when difficult states and feelings arise in response to events.

like, training for a marathon doesn't make it less grueling, but it does help the runner distinguish between "at mile 22 it will feel like I am dying" and "I am dying"

i'm going to come back in a bit and read all your response from yesterday and today. thanks for being cool. i will respond again. (and go to the library tonight with a reading list)

doesn't it have the ability to make people less fearful?

this may be a quirk in the language you chose, but you speak as if buddhism were some external thing that can be introduced into your mind and banish fear and make you feel better, as if it were a pill you take. buddhism doesn't make anything happen. it is both a description of a way of thinking and a record of some of the thoughts that arose when that way of thinking was applied to the world. your mind makes it all happen, just as it does now without being entirely aware of itself.

but seriously, just try living it for a while! that's the best advice anyone could give you. maybe try finding a place where you can practice and talk with people, 'cuz reading will only get you so far.

rogermex and aimless: y'all are both thoughtful and learned dudes, i admire you.

i started getting into Buddhism in the midst of a horrible depression, and found it to actually be sorta dangerous. like trying to use it to cure my life of problems. instead i used it as a way to reinforce my isolation and disconnection from life. for me it's something you should be careful with because it's easy to get carried away with it.

i mean, in one regard it helped me understand my feelings and thoughts better, and see how things are connected, but the higher level stuff was just too much. i think you have to be in a well-grounded place to really go somewhere good with it. that's my personal opinion, at least.

markers, if you're looking for good books on coping with shit, Western psychology has some good stuff available that's a little more to the point and doesn't lead to the truly epic and vast conclusions Buddhism gets at, which can be pretty frightening.

one good one is A Guide to Rational Living by Albert Ellis.

Francisco Varela has a great little book called "Ethical Know How" that borrows a lot from Buddhism but infused with Varela's mathy sciency constructivism.

Oh yes and if you're of a philosophical bent (and I know too are) David Loy's "Lack and Transcendence" is really wonderful and was a big deal to me when I read it about 10 years ago. It's very much concerned with things like fear (of death) and social anxiety.

those sound good, added to reading list

i can't even move on from shit When is it time to let go of a friendship?

or know if i should

I often think the productive paradox that Buddhism confronts but doesn't really resolve is simply "what do I let go of and what do I hold on to?" I think in whatever answer we give to that question there's a grave possibility for error--Buddhism really comes alive for me when it helps me remember, though, that its in my capacity to answer that question for myself.

makes me think of that very fine response attributed to Shunryu Suzuki Roshi on the question of how much eqo is necessary: "Just enough so that you don't step in front of a bus."

clouds, i can't speak for Aimless but i'm just wandering in the dark here, hoping for an occasional sliver of moonlight and glad to have this thread for company.

That Roshi quote is wonderful, thanks for sharing that!

are any of these books especially amenable to helping develop mental superpowers?

I often think the productive paradox that Buddhism confronts but doesn't really resolve is simply "what do I let go of and what do I hold on to?

and the hard part is basically that there is no answer

i mean, give up the cigarettes and sleeping too much, but for a lot of things it's not that cut and dry

if you could depersonalize the conundrum by applying it to say an apple product, the process of figuring out what to leave in and what to leave out is simple, though arduous.

here's the ending to the story:

When is it time to let go of a friendship?

i got the places that scare you by pema and the tibetan book of living and dying from the library. the former to read, the latter to dip in and out of

great man, i hope they help

thank you. me too. i need something. like nowish.

Oh yes and if you're of a philosophical bent (and I know too are) David Loy's "Lack and Transcendence" is really wonderful and was a big deal to me when I read it about 10 years ago. It's very much concerned with things like fear (of death) and social anxiety.

― ryan, Tuesday, July 16, 2013 6:17 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i was trying really hard to remember why this name sounded so familiar and then i remembered that i read his book money sex war karma: notes for a buddhist revolution last winter while i was at like the heart of occupy stuff. that one was pretty good.

at some point today i should read more of my pema book. i started y'all. but seriously.

not only do i need to stop being averse to change more or less immediately but i need to force some change to happen at this point.

like, not just accept it, not just encourage it, but enact it

I relate to that. Is there stuff in that book about learning to be more decisive?

been having trouble meditating for my usual 20 mins (not great to begin with) so i've been trying to do two 10 minute sessions a day.

well, idk about that but there is stuff about change, esp. how it's kind of the way things are. but i need to, like, DO something. somethings, many things, and as soon as possible.