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Losing our borders
David
A human residing in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Ancestral territory of the Erie, Haudenosaunee, Huron-Wendat, Mississauga and Neutral First Nations Veteran
If "self" is just made up borders caused by the interaction of skandhas, when we see through "self" or even die, would we not then blend in with the rest rather than disappear?
Or is this another imponderable I'm not supposed to talk about?
Or is this another imponderable I'm not supposed to talk about?
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Comments
Getting the right answer may be impossible around here, but that won't stop anyone from trying.
Which makes sense if you think about it. If everything is one, then even "one" can no longer be. Because in order for there to be one, there must first be something that is not-one. If there is nothing to distinguish "not-one" then there is nothing to distinguish "one" either.
So he describes everything becoming one, and then dropping that one. And that is when your "true self" appears. But it's not about everything disappearing IMO. It's about seeing that "oneness" no longer has any usefulness when there is in fact nothing that is "not one" to begin with. The whole concept of "one" vs "not one" is left behind. To keep "one" is to still be keeping duality, just the other side of it that is normally kept (AKA not-one). Non-duality dispenses with the whole situation altogether.
Third Patriarch of Zen in his "Verses on the Faith Mind" talks on this too. "Verses on the Faith Mind" one of my favorite zen scriptures.
IMO.
Blend & disappear!
With Self and alive, it's far more fluid with much wandering back and forth through door number 3. Practice runs for the main event.
Sounds like the middle way.
I don't believe in immigrants because we all come from the same place. If I had my way, all geographical borders would be for preferential reasons only.
United countries of Earth.
We DO have a self, let's admit it. It's sitting in front of your computer. Genetics are a great expression of karma (the kind you get stuck with), and no matter how non-self-is and awakened you get, you'll always look the same (but older) and have the same mannerisms, the same creative flairs, the same preference for salty foods, etc.
I'm gonna guess the same temperament, too, because that is often genetic. Quick to laugh, a slow fuse, just like Mom or Dad. I suppose the more awake we are, the temperament we're born with is 'tempered' as we are less and less reactive.
Tempering happens as you get older whether you are a practicing Buddhist or not. I used to be very self-conscious, which is a MAJOR example of the made up self. I used to be quick to take offense and get defensive. That has cooled over the years (note 'nirvana' has the meaning of 'cooling'), and now that I am committed to the Dharma, I've wondered about that.
When there is less 'self', how other people behave or what they say bothers you less (less reactivity). I'm talking about being insensitive or rude, not murder. When a person is very reactive, they are saying "I I I I ME ME ME!!!" in so many words. I work with a gal who hears 'disrespect' in other's tone when no one else does . . . this is obviously a very tender skandha for her. I've watched people be insulted and been astounded that they don't get embarrassed, instead behave with quiet dignity.
The more "I" on your mind, the more reactivity, or so it appears. So perhaps a nicely awakened person would appear calm, easy going, and unflappable. That doesn't sound like "blending in" to me
I don't think we can use our minds to cook up 'what it will be like when I'm more Awake" because our minds are the source of most of our problems, and aren't reliable in that way.
Gassho
“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”
--attributed to Einstein but true authorship unknown.
in buddhism the are two self. The first one is the material one, the ego, the I, but the
second one is not under the influence of matter, it survives dead of the phsical body.
You don´t belief? I do understand that and you better read Dighanikayo, the longer
collection of the Pali-Canon.
sakko
Yeah, now I get what YOU are saying. Every now and then, when I'm meditating or caught unaware I get a brief experience of 'losing the boundaries' or of 'no boundary'. It comes and goes, and leaves a bit of itself behind so that I don't just believe it, I know it is true. Fade into the background? What background lol? I doubt speech or intentional movement is possible, not that those things might even occur to one absorbed into awareness like that . . . Unless you are sitting in a cave staring at the wall like Nagarjuna for nine years, that state of complete absorption into What Is is NOT likely to happen and persist into daily relationship and work life. It's enough to know the truth of it
Gassho (and a hug)
Death = 'no self' apart from 'magical post life resurrection Buddhist schools' - good luck with that. Lady Gaga dharma fun for all the family.
Spiritual 'No self' = 'dead'/blended/most certainly GONE
Are we on the borders of self elf shelf or Non self yet?
Gone from where?
When there is no self there is no death and not no death.
If fact, no self = impossible to discuss life or death in any meaningful way.
http://www.interluderetreat.com/meditate/ppsutra.htm
http://www.great-grandma.com/aquakeys/toltec/tales-of-power-part_2-chapter_05-island-of-tonal
Put simply, no self means nothing has been born. If nothing has been born there is nothing to die.
And yet, clearly something has been born. What has been born? A body? With no self?
Why is the body real and not the self?
Why waste time trying to figure it out?
It's confusing to me when someone talks about no self and death in the same breath.
For means of communication, that which is taking the third is the self.
I'm not even sure how "self" got all tied up in permanence anyways. Self is temporary so we have to change what we call it?
Kinda silly if you ask me.
No wonder people think Buddhism is confusing. We make it unnecessarily so.
Mountains are once again mountains, rivers are once again rivers and selves are once again selves.
If it was otherwise, we should have stayed under the damned tree.
The diamond sutra says that a Bodhisattva says that they are not a Bodhisattva because otherwise they would be trapped in an idea of a self, a lifetime, and a lifespan. Yes I agree
In the OP....I really liked the imagery of the word 'blend'. It doesn't discount
who is typing/Buddha nature/decision maker, but acknowledges the emptiness at the same time.
Are you suggesting that somehow physical pain can be felt without the mind? (Edit) Or mental pain felt without the body? How would that work?
Well I think we can as long as we agree that we are bought into the illusion.
It's when we try to pick and chose which parts are real and which aren't that it gets confusing.
The self that does not exist is just another concept because even if it can't be considered a self it still must be considered to be.
It's just that being is a verb. Nouns are misleading if we don't realize they are just tools of convenience.
Right. While discussing birth and death, leave no-self out of it.
Seeing through doesn't mean to obliterate, lol.