Welcome home! Please contact lincoln@icrontic.com if you have any difficulty logging in or using the site. New registrations must be manually approved which may take several days. Can't log in? Try clearing your browser's cookies.
Let's get real
Xrayman
Veteran
Alright, let's see who the realists are.
I think that I truly understand about 1% of the stuff that some of you expound on this site.
Relax, you will remain nameless.
Is this because I'm a dumbass?
Your honesty is appreciated. (With respect to how much you all understand of the teachings, you can lie all you want about if i'm a dumbass)..
regards,
:-/
I think that I truly understand about 1% of the stuff that some of you expound on this site.
Relax, you will remain nameless.
Is this because I'm a dumbass?
Your honesty is appreciated. (With respect to how much you all understand of the teachings, you can lie all you want about if i'm a dumbass)..
regards,
:-/
0
Comments
It's precisely because you really DO understand far more than you think you know, that you realise how much you don't need to know.....
Believe me, you, as much as all of your friends here, are NO Dumbass....
I hope just not to know it, but to live it!!!:bowdown:
Don't worry - Bible scholars didn't figure out all the mysteries of the Bible overnight.
It's a learning process.
-bf
I would almost think the Dharma is deeper - because we have no "god" to rely on to help us through our learning.
I really like the thought of having a "Crutch".
-bf
I must confess to being lazy online, as far as multiple long posts go. I guess that would be a little bit "sound-byte-ish," of me, eh? Btw, does anyone know the exact origin (time, date, context, & place) of the coining of the word, "soundbyte"? I'm interested in finding out, because I think that was a watershed moment in history.
I confess to being a critic of some ministers who go on and on, without a message. I complain: "Why does it take so long for someone who has nothing to say, to say it?"
I tire of endlessly long, unbroken wordy-things, because I'm a Dumas, I guess. There must be some truth hidden there, however deep, but it will never be revealed to me by "that man."
It's interesting that the ancient Greek word for "truth," Aletheia, basically means an "uncovering" or revelation of something [hidden]. Also interesting that our words often are just gloss covering up our silent, unknowing spaces.
Better just to have a good friend than to be "in-the-know," without one.
Better to Make EveryOne Thy Friend.
Not Buddhist, but sets a nice meditative mood:
Away from the sight of thy face my heart knows no rest nor respite, and my work becomes an endless toil in a shoreless sea of toil.
To-day the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove.
Now is the time to sit quiet, face to face with thee, and to sing dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure.
As far as I know, everyone on this forum, especially me, and probably almost everyone on earth is 'trapped and bound within samsara'
Ironically, in the Buddha's time you could always have requested help from the Buddha or an Arahat (enlightened one) but today, this is not possible.
The best we can do is explore and understand the teachings (dhamma) and talk with our fellow followers of Dhamma, with the hope of guidance.
Ultimately, this is your journey. Others can show you the way only..
Such people have supernormal abilities (this isnt really significant here), but more importantly, they no longer create karma, and they truly see (I wish I had a better way to describe that).
The Dalai Lama (IMO) is a great man. Perhaps one of the greatest alive today. But I doubt he is an Arhat.
Again, yes, my personal opinion here. I have met neither nor am I truly qualified to judge as to who is or isnt.
Even those who are still on the journey, can help others.
I must take issue with your statements: “For obvious reasons, one cannot pass the negative effects of karma (bad karma) onto others." and "Every individual alive is responsible for his or her actions alone."
A Google search for "Collective Karma" will yield 175,000 results, many of them quite instructive. Here's some words on the subject by Thich Nhat Hanh in a June 4, 2004 interview for thinking peace, entitled This Is What War Looks Like:
from: http://www.thinkingpeace.com/pages/arts2/arts214.html
Q: There is a collective sense of shame among many Americans about the activities depicted in these photos. Buddhists believe individuals are responsible for their actions through karma, but is there any such thing as collective karma? At a national level?
TNH: "An act of cruelty is born of many conditions coming together, without any separate, individual actor. When we hold retreats for war veterans I tell them they are the flame at the tip of the candle, they are the ones who feel the heat, but the whole candle is burning, not only the flame. All of us are responsible.
---"The very ideas of terrorism and imagined weapons of mass destruction are already collective karma in terms of thinking and speaking. The media helped the war happen by supporting these ideas through speech and writing. Thought, speech and action are all collective karma.
---"No one can say they are not responsible for this current situation even if we oppose our country’s actions. We are still a member of our community, a citizen of our country. Maybe we have not done enough. We must ally ourselves with bodhisattvas, great, awakened beings, around us to transform our way of thinking and that of our society. Because wrong thinking is at the base of our present situation, thinking that has no wisdom or compassion. And we can do things every day, in every moment of our daily life to nourish the seeds of peace, compassion and understanding in us and in those around us. We can live in such a way that can heal our collective karma and ensure that these atrocities will not happen again in the future."
I for one, find it very hard to look askance at anything Thich Nhat Hanh says.
--Karen Armstrong from Buddha (PENGUIN LIVES series)
I absolutely agree....But they can't "show you the way", as you stated, unless they have witnessed the way themselves.... that is to what I was specifically refering... helping each other is what we all do on this forum, this wonderful online Sangha, everyday....
" 'Tis better to travel HOPEfully, than to arrive".....?
Hi Hope. Yes, but if your fellow followers have limited knowledge you may end up draggng each other down. I feel that the "best you can do" is seek the most respected teacher that you can find for instruction.
Like the saying goes "Praise Allah, but first tie your camel to a post"
Hmm... but even the most respected teacher you can find is still... trapped in Sansara..
Yes its good to learn from those much wiser.. but at the same time even ones peers have a lot of good knowledge to share...
... just my theories..
Some people have witnessed the first stage of this journey. they can steer people in the right direction, as far as what they know at least.. (IMO)
Everybody's progress is different, but I wouldn't ever presuppose i was on a 'higher' or 'lower' stage or level than anyone else...Knowledge and understanding are not the criteria I would personally use to define somebody's progress. I would say that their attitude and level of Love and Compassion towards others is by far a more reliable gauge, no matter what learning they have absorbed... It's not how much or how little you know, it's what you do with it. ...IMO.
No we don't Simon, because we trust the system to ensure that they are qualified and experienced if not 100% well before they are allowed to practice on us.
Great respect, star brother, but I don't think the analogy stands up.
There are lots of concepts of what it is to be awakened that simply don't measure up to reality. The truth is though that there are awakened human beings living today, who are available to those wish to make use of them. The supernormal abilities are little more than a sideshow though, of no importance.
I wish I knew who they were and where they lived.
I just want to get ON with it.
But I'd probably still hold myself back, somehow.
Or the leeches..