Best Of
Re: Shame vs Guilt
From a language POV…I grew up using the word shame as a description of OTHERS guilt, not necessarily a different word…just a location difference, haha. Here or there.
For example, when I perform an action, if an icky bad feeling arises, I recognize it as the feeling we call guilt……If I see/notice another person do something that in my opinion they should feel guilt, but they appear not to…I say “ that person has no shame, I swear”.
Or…” they did such and such, and bec they felt shamed or shame, they tried to make it up to me or make things right with the group.” Or…I feel guilty bec I think I might have shamed him too hard
I learned at an early age that self loathing and self hatred solves nothing and becomes mental poison very quickly and does serious long term damage. Guilt is healthy emotion/feeling and should be used as a signal for some kind of change in that situation.
Understanding that all people make mistakes and you just have to take accountability, adjust accordingly and move on….And knowing that…flows into compassion for forgiving others for their mistakes.
Vastmind
Shame vs Guilt
These are two emotions that are similar but have a meaningful distinction. Guilt is the feeling that we've done something wrong, bad, hurtful, etc. and want to correct or make it better. Shame is the feeling that we've done something wrong, bad, hurtful, etc. because we're wrong, bad, hurtful. Guilt promotes improvement, shame locks us into defeat.
A short 24 second clip
https://youtube.com/clip/Ugkx-rJNmjDA5nvQ0uZtaBxhSnS6OR_XbrVA?si=2pfgZS-yCr3GF20K
person
Re: Shame vs Guilt
Two major components of certain religious movements are Shame and Guilt.
They are used to keep people down, subservient to the religious "leaders" or justify violence against the "others".
On an individual level, Guilt and Shame are quite destructive. Yes , they can be turned into potentially constructive tools, they are ultimately unbearable weights carried uselessly upon one's shoulders.
Buddhism tells us to discard these boulders. Instead, replace them with ever growing compassion, empathy , courage and love for self and others.
Lionduck
Re: Shame vs Guilt
While it’s true that they can be destructive, in their natural form they can be helpful. Without anyone providing any weight to them, they are the natural reminders that our feelings provide when we’ve done something “wrong”. Of course, when other people start to play on them, be they priests or parents, these emotions can go very wrong.
I remember once reading in a Tibetan Buddhist text that shame is the most useful of the emotions, and that someone who no longer feels any shame can’t be trusted. So perhaps non-Christian cultures look differently on shame and guilt than those who have the concept of Original Sin thrust at them at an early age (a fate I luckily avoided).
I believe that these feelings are there to be set right, not to be ignored. If you feel ashamed of something you’ve done, or guilty about something, set about righting the balance and making your heart clean again.
A story about emotion (and shame, and forgiveness, and what came after)
Jeroen
Re: Right vision and conditioning
The right vision: To see clearly without preconception, without prejudice, without judgement.
Current events tell us that, for a great many, this is a all bu impossible task.
Lionduck
Re: Right vision and conditioning
@Jeroen said:
I have heard… that in Buddhist circles right vision — a crucial element of the path to enlightenment — is defined as being in accord with the Dhamma. Does that not mean that a practicing Buddhist is expected to learn what constitutes the Dhamma, and live by it? It would seem that one has to learn all the sutras of the Buddha, to truly be able to be in accord with it.It sounds to me like you would have to turn yourself into a living library of Buddhist sutras, many of which are several thousand years old and have been transcribed and translated many times. Does that mean that you have to live in the footsteps of ancient sages all the time?
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I think you're holding it all a bit too tightly. Like @how said, finger pointing at the moon, its not about getting the finger perfect, its about getting to the moon.
It sounds to me that this is a form of conditioning. That you apply yet another layer of conditioning onto the mind, on top of parents, school teachers and society, to acquire right vision, to see things “in the right way”. But what then happens to the unique you, the person you were born as?
I think this is along the lines of my comment that kicked off our disagreement on the other thread. The Buddhist path is a form of conditioning, subject to all the worldly laws of impermanence, dukkha and so forth. But it is said, with exemplars, that it will lead to freedom. Where we then set down the raft once on the other shore.
It seems to me that to truly live an original and authentic life, you need to shed as much of your conditioning as possible.
I strive to be authentic as well to some degree. But I feel I have qualities I'd like to change and areas I'd do well to develop. I also think some of my authenticity lies in my conditioning. Like what I have uniquely learned about the world. A good example, not about me, is someone from an abusive home who uses that conditioning to help others who are in similar situations.
Humans have a dual nature, in that they are cooperative and also tribal. I'd say society does well when it helps channel our instinctive qualities in prosocial directions.
person
Re: Right vision and conditioning
Right vision, right view… I obviously wasn’t entirely awake this morning.
Jeroen
Re: Right vision and conditioning
@Jeroen said:
I have heard… that in Buddhist circles right vision — a crucial element of the path to enlightenment — is defined as being in accord with the Dhamma. Does that not mean that a practicing Buddhist is expected to learn what constitutes the Dhamma, and live by it? It would seem that one has to learn all the sutras of the Buddha, to truly be able to be in accord with it.
The Buddhist Dharma can be likened to a diamond where each of its facets is a reflection of all of the others. Within each facet is an understanding of its whole.
@Jeroen said:
I have heard… that in Buddhist circles right vision — a crucial element of the path to enlightenment — is defined as being in accord with the Dhamma. Does that not mean that a practicing Buddhist is expected to learn what constitutes the Dhamma, and live by it? It would seem that one has to learn all the sutras of the Buddha, to truly be able to be in accord with it.
Here, a finger pointing at the moon gets mistaken for the moon itself.
@Jeroen said:
It sounds to me that this is a form of conditioning. That you apply yet another layer of conditioning onto the mind, on top of parents, school teachers and society, to acquire right vision, to see things “in the right way”. But what then happens to the unique you, the person you were born as?
What is conditioning but the patterning of a previous moment affecting the arising of the next. How could consciousness even arise without it? The Buddha's path towards suffering's cessation is just a conditioning that when in contact with arising phenomena, lends itself more toward responses of selflessness than selfishness.
It seems to me that to truly live an original and authentic life, you need to shed as much of your conditioning as possible.
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Is there a baby in that bathwater you're throwing out?
When is a search for an original and authentic life not just another spa day for an Ego?
how