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You are what you 'think' but you are not your 'thoughts' !
Shoshin
No one in particularNowhere Special Veteran
Kia Ora,
Thus I have heard the Buddha said something along these lines :
"You are what you 'think' but you are not your 'thoughts' !"
So what do you 'think' the Buddha meant by this thought provoking paradox ?
Metta Shoshin 
0
Comments
There is a difference between coming to a conclusion and accepting the conclusion.
Kia Ora Grayman,
In a nutshell...That's a great way to put it...
Metta Shoshin
I definitely don't want to put words into another s mouth
but for me it makes me think....
This is the panoramic view of our existence in meditation.
Existence is as fluidic as are we. Only this instant is static enough to hold what you "think" and to define you. When what you "think" evolves with the next nano second into what you "thought" it applies only to a definition of what has already passed on.
Kia Ora how,
That's a brillant breakdown of the moment to moment thought process ...
I like what Alan Watts says about karma...
Metta Shoshin
Well, our mind produces thoughts the way our stomach produces gastric juices. And it never stops. All of us meditators know how hard it is to wrestle with this seemingly never-ending stream-of-consciousness production.
Sometimes we buy into the thought, which is quite fine if the thought happens to be a positive thought. Problem is when we identify with negative thoughts and get enslaved in the negative emotions they trigger.
"Observe your thoughts with detachment as you observe with detachment the distant flight of birds" (Majjhima-Nikaya, Cularahulovada Sutta)
Our thoughts trigger certain emotions, which inspire certain reactions, which lead to skillful or unskillful actions. The sum of all these actions create certain grooves in our consciousness which lead to the propensity of always tending to react in the same way, given a similar stimulus. Unless we consciously decide to disidentify with the thought and create new patterns of behaviour.
The thoughts we chose to identify with yesterday have determined the person we are today. The thoughts we choose to identify with today determine the person we will be tomorrow.
But we are not the thought. Just the observer. Ideally we should be able to observe our thoughts with enough detachment not to feel impelled to act on them every time.
Actually, the Buddha never actually said That at all.
That so-called translation is wholly inaccurate.
What he actually said, was:
Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought.
If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox.
Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought.
If with a pure mind a person speaks or acts happiness follows him like his never-departing shadow.
Kia Ora Federice,
So in a nutshell (2014 talk so to speak) Buddha (if he spoke English )would say "If you change the way you look at things-the things you look at change!"
Metta Shoshin
No: whichever way you look at things, you formulate your own load to carry.
It's not what is out there that matters ; it's how you view it.
Out there, is what it is.
Your Mental state is your responsibility.
Kia Ora Federice,
OK ...If you change the way you think about things-The things you think about change !
Metta Shoshin
As @federica says Shoshin, the Buddha did not say that, or anything like it.
So you need to address your question to whomever did say it.
>
No, not necessarily.
As @Citta states, the original quote you posted is inaccurate so there's no point debating it.
Sorry, I'm in the car.
I think @Shoshin got quotations mixed, but there is something in that spirit in the suttas. Have to look it up, though, when we're back from shopping.
Metta to all.
I hope you're not driving!
Kia Ora,
I'm sorry I didn't realise one had to be spot on with exact English translation of the Pali verse...I'l try to use the Dhammapada when quoting the Buddha, in fact I have one in my hand right at this moment...
Metta Shoshin
Well accuracy is actually very important.
As is demonstrated by the distinct difference between your quotation and the one I supplied.
Incidentally, I broke a rule:
This is the source of my version :
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/index.html
When quoting external links, articles or reports, it's a mandatory requirement that a direct link to the source be provided.
This eliminates plagiarism, safeguards copyright and permits others to research further.
The accesstoinsight website is virtually matchless in its authority in the provision of reliable and validated translations of the suttas.
Metta Shoshin
> @federica said:
Kia Ora,
Thanks for the link...
Metta Shoshin
It's a very good, thoroughly researched and utterly reliable source of teachings.
That is not to say that it is the final word of authority or that topics are beyond discussion ; but for authoritative and authentic account, it is 100% solid.
You will see many people using it as a source to underpin discussion.
Naturally it is entirely Theravadan in its origin.
There are of course, extremely good sites with Mahayana teachings too, it goes without saying...
See here.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&ei=DTR3U7erOcesPanLgUA&url=http://www.buddhanet.net/l_maha.htm&cd=1&ved=0CCoQFjAA&usg=AFQjCNGQLJkN4NGF0-wQTaa6XXhpRFfJ5w&sig2=4P2LwryDeuPR4xDGKT0kgg
Hi, everyone, back from shopping (no, @federica, it's my husband who drives. I can't drive).
I have in my hand Max Müller's edition of the "Dhammapada."
His translation of the first verses of the twin-verses runs:
"All that we are is the result of what we have thought: it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts. If a man speaks or acts..." ( the continuation is similar to the version you quoted from "Access to insight")
Gil Fronsdal prefers: "All experience is preceded by mind, led by mind, made by mind"
A 1902 edition I have by Albert J. Edmunds (called "Hymns of the Faith") begins: "Creatures from mind their character derive, mind-marshalled are they, and mind-made"
Gil Fronsdal states that these first two verses are among the most difficult to translate.
Similar to "You are what you think," but no relation with "you are not your thoughts," though this idea often comes up in different suttas.
"We see things as we are not as they are." (anonymous) On top of that in a very limited spectrum covered by the senses.
Edit: "We see things as they are not as we are"...was unquoted. No not mine ,for sure. Ive heard it over and over by various people/authors,etc... Wasn't even sure it was attributable. Thanks. Bob
Edit #2. Turns out the origin is unknown. ...
It was writer Anaïs Nin who said "We see things as we are, not as they are."
@dharmamom, Muller's translation, while worthy, did not benefit from the vast font of information available to us now, with regard to language, nuance and originality.
This is but one review :
The translation is strictly nineteeth century prose, and exhibits both pros and cons of the genre. At times the translation may not suit our criteria for either accuracy or aesthetic refinement.
>
So while his work is a truly awesome and ground -breaking piece of literature, his style is steeped in the need to be readable and informative rather than succinctly accurate in conveying the original message.
Please don't be offended or think I am devaluing your opinion or contribution.
He meant well and his intention was admirable and matchless. But for accuracy, there is an amount of 'wanting'...
>
Absolutely what I was conveying. Thanks.
Thanks ,corrected! Bob
I'm not offended, @federica. Just so that you know that other translations begin the verses differently.
I know nineteenth-century European scholars are not so highly regarded these days, yet Max Müller's translation has managed to endure the test of time.
Jack Kornfield, in his "Teachings of the Buddha," uses Thomas Byrom's translation of the Dhammapada. He's an Oxbridge specialist and his translation of the two verses resembles Müller's:
"We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world."
As with everything, both translators have their admirers and detractors.
I think the important thing to remember is that it all begins within our mind: our reaction to what we perceive should be Mindful and our response skilful.
Hence the "first" spoke of the wheel being Right View.
Analysis of perception is of paramount importance.
OK after a bit of research it seems it really may be unattributable. Dug this up. That's not to say I shouldn't have put it in quotes though I figured everyone has heard it before....
"When Nin wrote the adage she did not take credit for the notion. Instead, she pointed to a major religious text: 2
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/03/09/as-we-are/
Bob
Good work, Bob!
Right little Sherlock ain't you? So, it's from The Talmud... Interesting...
Thanks, and lol! I looked up Anais and it seemed to me it felt much older...so a digging I went!
As to it's true origin the link states its unclear:
"In conclusion, this saying has been used by Anaïs Nin, H. M. Tomlinson, Steven Covey, and others. However, its origin is not known, and it is not possible to provide a precise ascription. Hence, the expression should be labeled anonymous. The assignment to the Talmud does not have strong support. Perhaps future discoveries will help clarify matters."
Bob
Well, given that we read it here, joint credit to both you and @dharmamom...
http://www.fakebuddhaquotes.com/all-fake-buddha-quotes/
This site is a good source for a large number of falsely attributed Buddha quotes. There isn't anything on the quote in the OP though.
No, but "what you think you become" is there...
http://www.fakebuddhaquotes.com/what-you-think-you-become/
:The thing about the fake quotes that is most concerning is the way that most of them are not merely uncanonical, but worse
they distort the real teaching.
Sometimes this is obviously the case. But sometimes its subtle..which is even worse.
Another good reason for accompanying any outside source with its link or origin. Being able to get to the root of the matter is often important, particularly when in-depth Sutta or 'scriptural' discussion takes place....
@Shoshin
As soon as you have a thought it is a memory. Whereas thinking could be the same thing as consciousness. Even memories interpretation changes. For example two people have the same memory but they both remember different things. Since the present immediately becomes memory and because memory is not accurate that means that consciousness is not always accurate. So if we say thinking is ourbself that is unfortunate because it would mean that inherent to our minds we cannot become enlightened. That's not particularly bad for those who believe in one life. I mean we can still be as happy as our consciousness allows regardless of its inaccuracy. But for those who want to actually become Buddhas it would say that we have ignorance nature instead of Buddha nature.
Kia Ora,
Thanks for the insight Jeffrey
Originally my intention was to start a discussion on "What is a thought ?" And "Can one really change ones way of thinking ?"
I guess in the long run, the level of contentment that comes from experiencing the Dharma firsthand, is the only proof one needs that it works...
Metta Shoshin
Kia Ora
And thanks for the information...
Metta Shoshin
You are what you 'think' but you are not your 'thoughts' !
The 'thoughts' is not doing the 'thinking'.
(are....)
If I am what I think then I have been an imaginary flower in bloom.
Sometimes I am thinking but no thinker to be found.
One morning Chuang Tzu awoke from his sleep.
Coming before his students, he said,
"Last night I dreamt that I was a beautiful butterfly fluttering through the fields. Now I awaken. My question is this; how do I know if I am Chuang Tzu, who dreamt himself a butterfly, or if I am a butterfly, now dreaming itself Chuang Tzu?"
My opinion is that thoughts are just part of mental consciousness. It depends on the purpose of what you are labeling, and how you are tying an individual person to their basic functions.
Thoughts can be a person if you are referring to thoughts as a human trait, such as when speaking of his or her thoughts.
What is in the thoughts in and of itself cannot be the person though, because some people have delusions of being someone or something they are not.
Thoughts are just one skandha saying to the chaos, "I am".
Form, sensation activity & consciousness say no less.
Attachment to any of them is always to be watched for.
Spot on...we are culturally conditioned in the west to identify most closely with mental events and to assume that they are more 'ourselves' than other fleeting events...like our digestion or our perspiration.
The Buddha did not teach that.
He taught that all are transient arisings.
" Thinking about thinking is just more thinking"
"I think, therefore I think I am?"
Kia Ora,
Transient alas are all component things,
Subject are they to birth-And then decay;
Having gained birth to death the life flux swings,
Bliss truly dawns when unrest dies away !
Metta Shoshin
creating volitional formations at present is 'think'
created volitional formation at past is 'thought'
so 'think' or 'thought' can not be i or my
they are 'a process' of 'form, feeling, perception and consciousness' (name and form)