The very first Buddhist temple I came into contact with was Tibetan and I studied there for a while. I found the approach to have quite a scholarly focus, although this varies from school to school. The temple itself was very colourful.
Jeroen
Dear New Buddhists,
I hope everyone is happy and at ease.
I like to study everything, but I was just wondering how you guys felt about Tibetan Buddhism?
I was very much impressed with Lama Jigme Rinpoche and the Padma Rigdzin Ling Buddhist Temple.
www.padmarigdzinling.org
Thank you
Sukha
Hard to say really, a few thoughts come to mind though.
Its likely something that has been building up. It could be an emotion from elsewhere in your life that is bleeding over. It says more about your particular relation with spirituality, or these forms of spirituality, than spirituality itself. I've learned from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and taking cold showers that doing things you find valuable and beneficial even when you don't feel emotionally motivated to do so has value.
person
What do you think it means, this mood? I very rarely have feelings of this type, once every half decade or so, and I think they are significant. A sense of dissatisfaction, repulsion, almost disgust can be a kind of sickness, I think it would be wise to pay attention.
Jeroen
This morning I woke up with a deep sense of dissatisfaction over all things spiritual. I often do my meditation in the morning, but today I did not feel like it at all. Maybe it was the dream I had (about trying to catch a group of mice and hamsters with my bare hands) but even reading spiritual books made me feel repulsed.
I tried thinking of Papaji, of Nisargadatta, of Osho, and none of it felt like it was of any worth. It was as if in the night there I had communed with some deep part of myself, and it had told me, these things were not proper guides. And there was an emotional reaction on my part, I believed and actually felt something real about this.
Once someone in a similar mood went to see Nisargadatta, and he said it was a valuable state in which deep work could be done. Oh the irony, that a valueless piece of writing should be giving me advice.
Jeroen
I think that a meditation practice is a beckoning to the disassembly of our ego based identity.
If one's meditation has been limited to specific externals factors (like moods) then that process of disassembly will inevitably lead you to whatever attachments keep that ego structure still standing.
What you call a dissatisfying mood is actually what your practice has been beckoning to.
This dissatisfying mood is your teacher, either as the limit of how far into the deconstruction you are currently prepared to venture into..or the door through which such limitations can be transcended.
One of the primary reasons for setting up and keeping to a formal meditation schedule is to help us move that practice beyond the limitations of our likes and dislikes.
I suspect your current dissatisfaction holds the potential of deeper meditative depths beyond what you have yet to have experienced.
how
My first reaction when reading the OP was to say that maybe (!) there is another area of life which warrants your attention at this time, instead of spirituality.
The other option, which comes to mind now, is that you might have overdone something, such as reading, etc.
Tilopa’s six words of advice…
First short, literal translation - Later long, explanatory translation
1 - Don't recall - Let go of what has passed
2 - Don't imagine - Let go of what may come
3 - Don't think - Let go of what is happening now
4 - Don't examine - Don't try to figure anything out
5 - Don't control - Don't try to make anything happen
6 - Rest - Relax, right now, and rest
Jeroen
I was watching The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King on DVD a few days ago, and suddenly somewhere in the middle of the film the disc started to hang, the picture would pause and after a minute or so would pick up again. It turns out the disc has degraded due to age…
So I did a little research, and it seems that DVDs are only good for something like 20-30 years in the usual conditions. That disc was bought in 2004 or so, so it has had a good run, but this was a bit of a shock to the system.
You see, I have a sizeable DVD collection, most of which date from before 2010 and I feel it would be a shame to throw them all in a skip at some point. I always thought DVDs were a bit like vinyl records, good for a very long time unless you scratched them, but apparently not.
Jeroen
May the New Year bring you joy, peace, love and a victorious life.
Happy New Day, Hour and minute second. We are the victors!
lobster