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The paradox of gaining mind
Jeffrey
Veteran
in Meditation
For years I have had the paradox of wanting to feel better and that taking me away from the present. This was interesting to me from Jackson Peterson's FB page:
If there is any practice in Ati, which there isn't, it would be simply to notice your current thought or mental event. That single thought is the sum total of your karma from infinite lifetimes. At the moment it dissolves due to its impermanence, there is the absence of infinite lifetimes of karma.
Realizing the emptiness of thoughts or mental events upon the arising is realizing the emptiness of samsara.
Nirvana is always just one thought away for citizens of samsara.
Ati means the Varjrayana I think.
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Comments
I am not exactly sure what you mean @Jeffrey; can you clarify it for me, I've just sat down with a fat G&T and maybe thats already putting me to bed mentally.
I don't know how to explain it differently? What are you getting from the quotation?
I can't get the whole quotation to go without that 'yellow' crap. But I don't know how to explain the quotation. What are you getting from it?
What I'm getting is that there is nothing beyond the present thought or experience and nothing left when it's gone. And every previous moment conditions the present.
that's a sobering 'wake-up-call' type of comment, and worth noting...
Ahh, I think I get where you are coming from @Jeffrey, and the only way I can answer you is with my favourite buddhist image again:
@robot, although @federica finds it sobering, I find it like this - AAAAAaaaaarrrrrggghhh when you find that you exist in the moment and see and experience the true beauty of just being able to experience it, not from a selfish perspective but from a headless form, you know the present is magical, past is past, future has not arisen; but here is now - wow; WOW!
Sometimes I just want to bash my head against a wall with frustration, but realise that won't make you see it my way (btw the half moon in London is amazing; it is set against the backdrop of samantabhadra's midnight blue colour, with a pure white contrasting half moon - I am going to explode, oops just remembered to breath again.......... Brown paper bag covers mouth...
Please feel free to see it your way.
Thank you, @robot! An explanation at this hour of the night is always welcome. That matcha mug is not working.
@Jeffrey, it's a good post. I'm just wondering if we have not discussed nirvana/samsara/impermanence ad infinitum the past week.
Or maybe I need my pillow, sorry. Long day.
@dharmamom sleep well!
Thank you, @anataman. And you're not gibbering. We love you.
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That's how I read it too.
Here is one of my favorite quotes for you anataman. I've used it before, but it seems like a good time to break it out again
" I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me. But it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. And then I remember to relax, and not try to hold on to it. And then it flows through me like rain. And I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. Don't worry, you will someday."
Lester Burnham
We can observe in ourselves and others the dependence on the past, future or current experience. We can examine the dependence on emotional or other arisings from ourselves and others. We can also be caught up in 'spiritual gibbering', emotional empathy and other identifications. Such is the nature of dukkha. However as this quote implies we are gaining independence from our personal karma and entering a 'universal stream' . . .
Hope that is helpful
Gaining mind? I mostly feel like I'm losing mine, especially if I try to consider karmic connections - didn't the big guy say that stuff was imponderable?
Kia Ora @Jeffery,
You might find these couple of quotations from books I read (Zen) of food for thought interest (I'm not good at remembering authors and titles only how the words on the pages resonates with me ) These may help you along the path as they did me....
"Awareness is fundamentally non-conceptual-before thinking splits experience into subject and object...It is empty and so can contain everything, including thought...It is boundless-And amazingly it is intrinsically knowing !"
And this:
"Every moment is a moment of events and no moment passes by without an event...One can not notice a moment without noticing events taking place in that moment...Therefore the moment one tries to pay bare attention to is the present moment !"
Metta Shoshin
)
Ati or Maha-Ati was a term used by CTR @Jeffrey to denote Mahamudra/Dzogchen.
He saw them as essentially non- different and used the phrase in order to reflect that.
In Sanskrit it means ' primordial '.