Think Different!
lobster
Crusty Veteran
Is that an Apple slogan?
Maybe so but perhaps of value ...
One of the wisest quotes on this forum which aunty @federica posted was this:
"Women are 99% spiritual, and 1% practical, and that men are 99% practical and 1% spiritual. But it is as much effort for the women to conquer that final 1%, as it is for the men to overcome their 99%"
It is outstanding, probably from Taoism (anyone know?) and illustrates two fundamentally different approaches.
The 'feminine' way of thinking is more akin to the Tao or what in Sufism is called the scatter methodology. It is loose, moves in different directions. Changes. Yin.
'Male' thinking is more akin to dharma, logic, science. Precise focussed. Yang.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sufi-Salafi_relations
However each requires the other for balance. The classic duality in Buddhism is expressed as compassion and wisdom. I would suggest that many of us may require a shift into more soft thinking or focussed thinking. One does not negate the other ... they are different.
Just as @SpinyNorman manages to think of more than vanilla ...
Do you recognise a tendency and possibility in your thinking? [lobster has to rely on only 100 000 neurons]
... and here are the dangers of wrong thinking click on red highlighted text link ... gosh ... tai chi can lead to bisexuality ... who would have guessed ... 
Next we will be reading that transubstantiation leads to a wafer with your Sundae Whine ... must learn to think right. Iz plan!
Comments
I am rather fixated on vanilla actually, so I need to open my mind and consider different possibilities, neapolitan perhaps?
Don't overlook French vanilla or vanilla bean
Why would we want to overcome the practical?
The yin and yang are complimentary to each other and so is practicality and spirituality.
One without equal measure of the other leads away from harmony.
Just yesterday I was telling my half-eaten container of Double-Berry Cheesecake just how much I loved it. (omg)
The men want to solve tricky problems how to keep their tribes alive, while the women spend their time in nursing, telling to each other how to cook, and of course, in gossiping.
Perhaps this is about recognitition of tendencies within our approach ...
Very rigid thinking, as in there is only one right way, does not allow for the possibility of maturing, growing up, being influenced, seeing the others person viewpoint and so on.
Can we contemplate the possibility that somone else with equally strong opinions or a different mindset is sincere? Is it only the person who we disagree with that is misguided?
Too obvious? Ah well ...
You know, reading that 'blog' actually made me feel physically nauseated....?
I mean, seriously? Jeeesh....
"How do you write women so well?"
" I think of a man, then take away reason and accountability."
Melvin Udall
Indeed.
I read sufficient to get a gist of it. However incredulous thinking seems to be prevalent. Can we be independent of our clung to certainties?
Is 'right thinking' a direction? For me it certainly is.
But isn't there something to breaking gender roles? After all, we aren't living in tribes any more.
Also (and maybe I'm getting too metaphysical here) how about Trinity, does that work better or worse than duality - or do we actually need a singularity?
Just throwing these in there.
Oi dunno...
Yes.
For example I would like to see a Theravadin school that made the males subservient to the most novice nuns. Good training for female empowerment and male humility.
The empowerment of our respective position is tied in with embracing dormant aspects of our being.
We are only partly talking gender, rather I suggest we are moving towards an understanding of our personal preferences sometimes being too narrow.
Part of the trained mind is it can manifest or emphathise with contrary, alternative and even unskilful directions, without being swallowed, captivated or wallowing ...
http://www.quietspaces.com/poemHanh.html
Kibbutzim and other communes specifically structured their organizations to break gender roles. Over generations, traditional gender roles returned.
Some gender roles would be hard to get away from without some quite invasive surgery.
I feel you meant in jest but sadly when men and women are mentioned this is all people think about.
Any sort of thinking that aligns us with a narrowness including an inviolate set of 'rules' such as the eight fold path, will inevitably confine and align us with ... well we can all come up with examples ...
Hope that is right thinking ... otherwise it is torture in the hell realms for me ... 'not my claws' ... too late ... torn off ...
Well, it was partly jest but realistically, I am not going to be the one to breast feed.
I'm all for equality as long as it goes hand in hand with justice.
That is, treating everybody as if they have the same strengths and weaknesses does no justice to unique talents or needs.
I'm more talking about masculine (yang) and feminine (yin), instead of man and woman here though. I know women that are more masculine than some men and men that are more feminine than some women.
I wouldn't get behind a school of thought that had different rules for men and women or that assigned communal tasks based on gender.
Everybody is different... That's one of the only things we all have in common.
Indeed.
The alignment with gender is very powerful and deeply effects our thinking. Obviously.
What I am trying to introduce is an idea of being/thinking that centers on our capacity to engage alternatives and independence from social and other areas of role conformity.
This personal devils advocacy is seen formally in the dharma debate used in the Sangha.
http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/dharmadata/fdd52.htm