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.
Wot I haz gained from New Buddhist
lobster
Crusty Veteran
As we all know, NewBuddhist is a meeting between beginners, the experienced, the hardened mid core, dharma waifs, etc . . .
As someone of limited capacity and choices, like many, I try to listen, learn and be as skilful as my scandalous skandhas allow . . .
Here is what I have learned:
be patient with the advanced practitioners, they forget how hard it is for us dharma plebs . . .
be civil to the ignorant, one day they might be wise
kindness is better than theory
people change
don't give up, everyone's situation can improve
examine your buttons when pressed
listen to the message, not the messenger
What have you gained, learned from New Buddhist?
20
Comments
Patience*.
Humour*.
Discernment*
And that occasionally, being able to kick someone's ass is immensely satisfying.
But I say that with love.
(*I've gained/learned... but I cannot say that honestly, hand on heart, I have always succeeded in putting them into practice.....)
All of the above. and.....
I 've learned alot of vocabulary.
I've also learned people can be very accepting and open minded to people different than them, if I give them the chance. Now....what they do after the chance is another ball of wax....hahahaha
I've learned the internet can be a very loving and supportive place.
I've learned the art of edit and proof reading.
I've learned to cut out/cut back on my cussing. ..
...
I've learned to be less angry, and am learning to deal with irritating people, but I sometimes forget, even now... Thankfully, there are people who offer guidance which is accepted with humility
I've learned not to SHOUT...
I've also learned I'm not always right, but neither are other people.
I've unlearnt to take my knowledge as wisdom, and that other's wisdom is often just knowledge (no matter how they convey it)
I've also learned that people are infallibly human, even if they have buddha nature...
I've learned one other thing, but will keep that to myself as I cannot share it...
I've learned that I don't need to get the last word.
I've learned about different ways to practice than my Lama teaches.
I'VE LEARNED THAT TYPING IN ALL CAPS DOESN'T HELP MAKE MY POINT
I've learned that there is no i in denial
I've learned that talk is cheap.
I've gained practice in restraint in speech.
I've learned the importance about not simply asking myself "Does this need to be said? Should I be the one saying it? Is it truthful?" but also in asking "Will saying this help me connect with others, or divide us?"
I've made some wonderful connections here. Some of them were immediate/swift, some of them took a while, some of them still were an eventual result of a lot of head butting but finally willing to be open to the person and realize why it felt we were butting heads. One of those connections even brought together a new, wonderful friendship (between someone from here, and someone not from here who is not a Buddhist). Connecting is good, even when it is painful on the head.
I like that!
Thanks guys,
Tried to get Mr Cushion to explain what he has learned but he just sits there all smug and cosmic looking . . . going 'Attention, attention, attention' . . .
Further things I have learned from the enigmatic Cushion:
and now back to your far wiser insights . . .
I see people coming and going just like in real life. Some people are more open than others. Some are just wary and keep their identity hidden like me. I am slowly incorporating everything I've learned from Buddhism, Newbuddhist or wherever else, towards a better life. I am very far behind as a lay person, but I pray everyday for change.
metta to all
This is the first sangha I've joined and felt comfortable and stimulated enough to let it hang out (and then hang out as in daily checking in to read, whether or not I post).
So it's sort of like I've learned here what one might learn in any kindergarten. I've learned that people who call themselves Buddhist (or not) are SO wonderfully, interestingly, and bafflingly (at first) different. There's a refreshing lack of group-think here.
I visit other Buddhist oriented forums, but here I don't experience pressure to conform to some proper view; there are no overly cherished teachers or traditions we must not question; even the folks trying very hard to resist "Buddhism" are welcome and post often.
There is a lightness and a live-and-let-live atmosphere here, in my experience. I keep saying 'in my experience' because I don't assume what I experience to be the same as others.
We have all these colorful 'manifestations' of the Buddha's prescription in the persons here, from serious monastic-to-bes and . . . and tantric @Lobster (thank gawd), and Christian Buddhists just to name a few. This diversity is not tolerated in any other religious tradition I've explored, and this forum is a bit unique because of this. What that teaches me is that it is a slice of life, rather than a 'flavor' of the month Buddhism forum.
I haz also learned tons about 'right speech', and what it LOOKS like (and what it doesn't) on a sangha-forum. Not so much other's speech but my own, and to become aware of what motivates me to say anything in the first place, not to mention the content of what I say. And lord, how LONG of a say I end up taking, sheesh
I forgot to mention that overall it's a positive experience seeing people coming and going, and not necessarily a bad thing. You learn a lot by watching others. Being watchful has its upside.
I am slowly incorporating everything I've learned from Buddhism, Newbuddhist or wherever else, towards a better life. I am very far behind as a lay person, but I pray everyday for change.
Interesting.
In many ways I feel many of us accumulate:
A practice, wisdom, experience, behaviour etc. There is benefit in that. However I also feel that a big part of the path is what we leave behind. The commitment and intent to change really does come from knowing how far behind we are . . . and in a sense always will be . . .
I have learned to shut up and learn, so that my half-truths, added to the others' half-truths, hopefully add up to one glimpse of real Truth. I have learned that the more you talk, the more you realize how little you know.
I've learned that I have a dependency on @lobster to feed my cushion fetish that I developed here on NB
I learned how to forgive, still learning on how to forgive myself though.
How can a website be a sangha?
It can't. The people writing posts and participating on the website are a kind of sangha.
Oh ok thank you @Hamsaksa, I was a bit worried for a moment lol
Some prefer to call a lay group of practioners a gana as oppossed to a sangha.
Call us what you want. Take refuge. ..
..
I'm curious...@Hamsaksa...what are the different 'kinds' of Sangha?
It has been my understanding, some schools save the word for monastics only and some use it to include the whole community...laymen and laywoman inlcluded.
EDit: It can also refer to only noble ones ( stream enters) ...so you can even be monastic but not a sangha....right?.....Depending on who's criteria you use.....
Just me personally....I use it around NB as a reference to the group/people who have taken refuge....and continue to take it.
I've learned that I can genuinely care about people that I have never met and that those people care, too.
I use the word Sangha pretty interchangeably. When I am with (either in discussion online or in person) the students who are studying under my teacher, they are a Sangha. But so are the people here. I guess to me, it has more of a global sense of people who are studying/following/interested in the Buddhist path in some capacity. That includes people online and in person. When I take refuge every morning, it is the Sangha in a global sense that I am considering. The actual refuge my teacher uses (and so what I usually use) refers to the Sangha as the "supreme assembly" and to me that implies more than simply the few dozen people in our physical group, it implies a global sense.
I had no idea the word 'sangha' was so exclusive, but then again I bumble around in general without much respect for 'exclusivity' until I am told LOL . No idea about the different kinds of sanghas. You all are teaching me, here
Some schools/traditions use it as exclusive...some use it as inclusive ..
..
I personally use it as an inclusive global term as karasti described.... I thought you meant something different...Sorry...I wasn't implying you needed a 'teaching' ..
..
Did you mean the people can be a sangha, but not the site? ..... Maybe I should quit while I might be ahead ....lolololol...I think I just misunderstood your point...
In all seriousness, that I am not a Buddhist, but a wannabe Buddhist.
In metta
Thanks guys,
Sangha is traditionally the monastics. However a community of practitioners may include those more serious than many who are monastics. It is often used to denote practice members supporting and empowering each other's path.
Calling oneself a Buddhist may be a big claim. I feel I wanna be a Buddhist too.
From the diversity of insights, levels of commitment, practice etc, we find our closest understanding or apt description may be along the lines the Middle Way expounds.
It is all too easy to reflect on our condition and alignment and decide how part of us is secular, part spiritual, part circumstantial.
In some ways it is like an empty cushion. Nearly anybody can sit on one, the only difference between when no one sits, we sit or the enlightened sit is . . . arising labels . . .
We are all in reality monastics - who goes through their life not in the solitary confinement that is their saggy flesh and bones.
Heres another cushion for your collection:
I am always up for a teaching
and it's good to know how one word can denote very different things, I like to speak AND understand the language being spoken wherever I go.
You weren't the only person confused by my use of 'sangha' to describe us here forum members on NB. That's a teaching all on it's own . . .
How Lobster said it here:
That's what I meant inside my head when I used the word above
Sangha can mean in a sense exclusivity. The sangha could be restricted to those beings who realize the kleshas are essenceless.
how to agree on a topic in the end with the thing that - we agree that we disagree.
I am a new member here on new Buddhist. As much as I want to learn about Buddhism on newBuddhist, I also want contribute. I joined because
Welcome.
You'll get plenty of that here.
But be warned - 'variety is the spice of life!
Nice to have you aboard!
Plus, the website looks good on my mobile as well. So a lot of love for those making this forum happens and those who are sharing their knowledge on here.