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Just a question
First of all Happy new year to all!!
I have a little question about enlightement( sorry about the spelling I have been doing french homework and I am not in the english frame of mind :S). Is it possible to reach enlightenment without mediatating? I dont mean never meditatated before, I mean you havent medietated that day or in awhile. Ugh I dont know how to word this properly, ok Iam just going to tell what happened and you can tell me what you think if it was just a false sense of enlightenment or something else.........
Ok, for my birthday last year my friend gave me this little stone type thing that has Chinese or Japanese writing on it. About a week ago I was cleaning my room and it was about 1am, all that was on for light was my reading lamp that cast shawdows and streams of light all over my room. I was just about done when I spotted the stone thing under my computer chair, so I went over to pick it up, but it was the strangest thing-the way it was lying there, as if it knew something I didnt, a stream of light was shining right on it, it was kinda of eriee I beant over and picked up, but as soon as my fingers touched it... it was if all my responsablitys were gone all my worrys, like I was free from everything, as if I was on the outside looking in,like I had contained knowledge I never knew possible, no longer the star of the movie I call my life, but the audience. It was one of those feelings one will never froget.
Please criticise and say what what you think... even if you think I am completely pyshco.
I have a little question about enlightement( sorry about the spelling I have been doing french homework and I am not in the english frame of mind :S). Is it possible to reach enlightenment without mediatating? I dont mean never meditatated before, I mean you havent medietated that day or in awhile. Ugh I dont know how to word this properly, ok Iam just going to tell what happened and you can tell me what you think if it was just a false sense of enlightenment or something else.........
Ok, for my birthday last year my friend gave me this little stone type thing that has Chinese or Japanese writing on it. About a week ago I was cleaning my room and it was about 1am, all that was on for light was my reading lamp that cast shawdows and streams of light all over my room. I was just about done when I spotted the stone thing under my computer chair, so I went over to pick it up, but it was the strangest thing-the way it was lying there, as if it knew something I didnt, a stream of light was shining right on it, it was kinda of eriee I beant over and picked up, but as soon as my fingers touched it... it was if all my responsablitys were gone all my worrys, like I was free from everything, as if I was on the outside looking in,like I had contained knowledge I never knew possible, no longer the star of the movie I call my life, but the audience. It was one of those feelings one will never froget.
Please criticise and say what what you think... even if you think I am completely pyshco.
0
Comments
But for an instant, you had a sudden glimpse of what it's like....
That's the impression I get from what you describe, anyway.
I have had a couple of similar experiences, and I don't meditate half as much as I should.
I am changing this.
I am increasing my meditation, not to become enlightened, but just to practise as I feel I should.
"A monk asked Joshu: 'What is the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming to China?'
Joshu replied, 'The oak tree in the garden.'
If this question leaves you with the slightest doubt, then you need to resume questioning.
This may be of use:
Zen Master Bassui's Talk on One Mind
But I have A QUESTION FOR YOU:
If this world was not made for you, for whom was it made?
I don't know if that question is in any way similar to what ZenMonk just quoted:
"A monk asked Joshu: 'What is the meaning of Bodhidharma's coming to China?'
Joshu replied, 'The oak tree in the garden.' "
But You are certainly much dearer to the Lord than a mere oak. If it is your karma to be fully enlightened, so be it. If not, consider the mirror. A mirror can reflect light, including the bright light of the sun -- and only a great fool would make a mirror if there was no light to reflect. Now, I don't know who made the world, but I know it was no fool. The world is a very great place, made for great things, and you are part of it.
This world was not made for Buddha, but Buddha for the world. This whole world belongs to you, be at home in it.
May Bliss Precede You on Your Path
Let Your Way Be Strewn With Bliss
Littered Behind You Be Your Road With Bliss
May Bliss Become Your Very Name.
Unattached to the fruit of your actions ever,
Free from Delusion,
May You Ever Find Your Way Free!
There is nothing to criticize.
Yes, it is possible, although, highly unlikely. Discernment can certainly arise without meditative states, but for most people to view the subtlest levels of stress [and understand them through discernment] the required tool is meditative states.
Awakening is characterized by the complete absence of fabrication.
Sankhara literally means "putting together", and carries connotations of jerry-rigged artificiality. It is applied to physical and to mental processes, as well as to the products of those processes. Various English words have been suggested as renderings for sankhara - such as "formation", "determination", "force", and "construction" - but "fabrication", in both of its senses, as the process of fabrication and the fabricated things that result, seems the best equivalent for capturing the connotations as well as the denotations of the term. - Glossary
Even the wonderful feeling/state you experienced had some form of stress or fabrication involved in it. It may not be discernable at first, but it is still there. You could say that it is like entering a brightly lit room and being blinded by it. Once your eyes adjust, however, you can see what you didn't notice before -- the presence of stress. This is where meditative states come in.
The more we experience these states, the more we can look at them with discernment. We do this in order to explore exactly where there is disturbance, and where there is none -- albeit on a very subtle level. It's easy to see the suffering of burning your hand in a fire, but it is not so easy to see the suffering in the fabrication processes of the mind. The more you explore these states, the more you will see that there is still stress, impermanece, and not-self. Eventually, this can lead us to awaken to the "Deathless", or that which is free of stress, conditions, and fabrications.
Awakening is not really possible to explain in words. It is beyond a simple experience, feeling, or emotion. It is not a place, and it is not a seperate reality. It is something which the mind must be inclined to open up to. But, before that can happen, we must develop the appropriate conditions for it to happen. If there was no need to "do" anything to achieve this, the Buddha wouldn't have taught the Noble Eightfold Path. This is where virtue, concentration, and discernment come in. They are the path to this Awakening. They are conditioned, but they are conditions that can lead us to that which isn't.
I hope that my ramblings have not confused you more, but have instead helped to answer your question.
I wish you well in your practice.
Jason
Yes, he did.
Please read: Mind Like Fire Unbound
Good night.
Jason
Thank you for the good wishes, Canon, and may they return to you a thousand-fold! Also thank you for a post which has taken me into many places of fruitful reflection.
Is it not a wonder that each language takes us into a new vision of the universe? Spelling is only the outward and visible sign of an inner mystery, a 'sacrament' if you like. Even within a language family, difference of weltanschauung bring us different meanings for the same word, as the (semi-)humourous sniping about Americanisms by UK speakers demonstrate.
Your experience: It is salutary to discover that such experiences come 'of their own acciord' rather than by being forced. They are not the intended or sought outcome of meditation but the literature suggests that they occur as "epiphenomena" of the process. Almost without exception, the teachers, be they Christian, Sufi or Buddhist, whom I have read and heard emphasise that we must not allow ourselves to be drawn into the false glamour. In terms of the Whel of Existence, we are tempted to the 'god' state where "every prospect pleases". If we stay there, we may be happy, we may even be spiritually powerful, but we are not Awake! Among Christian writers, it is worth reading John of the Cross, who was deeply suspicious of his own 'visions' and understood that they are high-level distractions.
There is a book, written in the Nineteenth Century by the Tibetan sage Dudjom Lingpa. It is a terrifically hard read and is decribed as follows:
"This text belongs to the category of atiyoga, the highest of the nine vehicles that constitute the Buddhist path. Moreover, it is from the short lineage of Dudjom Lingpa, a direct transmission of the Great Perfection approach so powerful that even hearing it read aloud ensures that the lsiteners will eventually escape the suffering of cyclic existence.
Although there are no restrictions on who may read this book, it should be remembered that to benefit fully from the Nang-jang (*), one must receive empowerment, oral transmission and teaching from a Great Transmission master (sic)."
(*): This is the book's subtitle: Refining Apparent Phenomena.
The book in question is entitled Buddhahood Without Meditation (Padma Publishing, CA. 1994).It was on my umpteenth reading of this book that I asked myself the basic question: why do I imagine that buddhahood is "achieved" by meditation? It already is. When my mind is stilled and my body calmed, I dissolve into it. The aim is to live in that "light" even when mind is active and body busy!
Once again, thank you for being the seed from which these thoughts have grown (flowers or weeds? you decide) and, if you have done, thank you for reading them.
P.S. My favourite logion from the Gospel of Thomas is: I am always more surprised that we are blind to the moment-by-moment mystery than that we manage to glimpse it.
"Our salutations to the Leader of our soul. Our salutations to the compassionate spirit who is one without a second, formless, nameless, attributeless, and who also has innumerable forms, names, and attributes; who is beyond all duality, and who is the source of Existence-Knowledge-Bliss. May He guide us and inspire us in our meditation and spiritual realization
"Let us relax our body and mind, getting rid of all
alien and unbecoming thoughts and feelings.
"Please breathe gently through the nostrils, thinking
that you are drawing in what is pure and abiding
from the atmosphere.
"Please think that there is a wall of light around
you protecting you from all obstacles.
"Please think that body, mind, and senses are rebuilt
by divine materials which are pure and fit for
meditation.
"Please think that you are spreading loving and
peaceful thoughts to the whole universe.
"Let us meditate on the abiding Presence of the
all-loving Being, seated on the throne of our heart,
radiating, joy, light, and peace."
(Thursday evening class Meditation warm-up
Ramakrishna Vedanta Society, Boston)
Thursday Lecture Concluding Benediction:
"May He who is Father-in-heaven of the Christians, Holy One of the Jews, Allah of the Muslims, Buddha of the Buddhists, Tao of the Chinese, Ahura Mazda of the Zoroastrians, and Brahman of the Hindus lead us from the unreal to the Real, from darkness to Light, from death to Immortality. May the all-loving Being manifest Himself unto us and grant us abiding understanding and all-consuming divine love.
Peace, peace, peace be unto all.
WE NEED MORE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD LIKE YOU.
"How did Jesus meditate?"
- And before anyone could supply a response, he himself answered the question...
"He was lost in Love, lost in Love, lost in Love....."
Federica, how beautiful!
I'm new here. Just reading these discussions has been helpful.
I've saved so many links to things I haven't discovered yet I'll be
reading for the next 25 years!
I think I'd rather meditate, though.
But then again, I can do both!
I wonder if she meditated? She seemed pretty serene to me.
I do so like to have tha last word..... shucks!!
.......Must work on that.....!! :tongue2: :thumbsup:
"[I have] enormous faith, but it's not attached to any one in particular religion.... My mother was one thing, my father another. In Holland they were all Calvinists. That has no importance at all to me."