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Stepping off into the void
nakazcid
Somewhere in Dixie, y'all Veteran
So if I achieve Nirvana, I get off this crazy merry-go-round called samsara. But then what? As far as I know, the Buddha makes no promises in this regard. Cessation of existence would also entail the cessation of suffering. Is non-existence what we have to look forward to after enlightenment?
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if we don't exist after, what makes you think we exist before, ha ha ha.
Isn't that what's called nihilism or something?
It's been talked about a time or two before, here n there about no-person vs. non-person or something like that. Buddha did NOT say we didn't exist, but I'm not so well versed in it to carry on the conversation much longer and we all have our opinions about what this all means.
Well there is not supposed to be a soul, so you may find that you just surrender and become part of the great is-ness.
Okay, so if there's not 'supposed to be' a soul, then why or how do you explain the Buddha telling stories about him being a tree or a frog or a bird in past lives? It seems like if there's no 'soul' or no person, then those stories are just stories... I don't know.
@nakazcid
"Nirvana"..second only to the word "enlightenment", for being the most commonly discussed fingers pointing at the moon that get confused for being the moon itself.
The difficulty with most mental mastication's of nirvana
is that to the degree that our identity still rules the roost,
any serious examination of nirvana inevitably presents
views that are still subject to suffering's cause.
but
Nirvana is simply the absence of suffering's causes.
Only an identity still bound to suffering's cause
equates suffering's cessation to a state non-existence.
There is this on Anatta, which is the Buddhist doctrine of no-soul or no-self. As I understand it, we are supposed to be a process in consciousness with karmic baggage attached.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn12/sn12.015.than.html
The "void" as it is so portentously named is only void in comparison to something else, something that is, so to speak, not-void. But if that is true, then the "void" falls into a dualistic mud puddle and the name of the Buddhist game is not dualism.
I once asked my Zen teacher whether our efforts/practice were "dualistic." "No," he replied. "Then are they monistic?" "No," he replied again. "So what are they then?" And he replied, "Maybe it's sort of a pointless point."
The void, from a 'deluded' point of view, is enough to scare the pee down anyone's leg. Someone or something seems determined to take away all my Tinker Toys. But I have a hunch it's not really all that bad. In fact, I think you get to keep your Tinker Toys; you just learn not to leave them scattered all over the living room rug.
Okay, but what do YOU say about that? Would you elaborate just a bit on your view?
It's saying that everything arises in dependence on conditions, nothing exists independently from it's own side...not-self, emptiness.
You could go further and say that there are only changing conditions. Realising this removes attachment, clinging and therefore suffering.
"Sabbe sankhara anicca" = all conditions are transient.
Okay - so what do you think Buddha was getting at (if anything) with his tales about being other creatures or things in past lives?
Karma is an example of dependent arising. With the traditional view karma extends over many lifetimes, a cycle of rebirth.
What I'm trying to get at is, if he was aware of being another person or creature in past lives, then how does he account for that - no soul, no nothing? I don't know if those stories were only for children, but I don't think so. (I'm probably missing the point.)
@nakazcid
I can only speak from personal experience, which might be subject to all sorts of Buddhist brain washing but it appears that only karma's inertia continues on beyond our cellular death.
The coalescence of many many karmic momentum's are just what each new expression of sentience inherits. Everybody experiences them, but fewer recognize them for what they are.
In some developments of meditative awareness, they can unfold as movies of those karmic slivers that although they have no more substance than a celluloid film, still have the power to effect people.
If a meditation practitioner becomes aware of one, and is able to allow that movie to unfold and accept it as a meditator tries to do with any arising phenomena, then the delusive influences behind that karmic stream can finally gain some resolution.
You are just a patron in a movie theater, you are not the movie.
@how
Mind. Blown.
I need to masticulate on that one for a while. Maybe even meditate on it. Thanks.
Thats very close to my experience with voice fragments in hypnagogic sleep states, except that in the case of voice fragments they often seem to need a prompt. Often that is an exercise in insight and delicacy and compassion, asking or saying the right thing to bring out 'their story', at which point the fragment unwinds and disappears. I've often wondered where these were karmic in nature, the certainly seem to be decreasing in frequency over the months.
You can not and you will not. In other words Nirvana is void of achievement.
Again, samsara is nirvana, so which are you going to get on or off?
Non existence as in zero conflicted thoughts and emotions and rainbows for brains? Nope.
None existence in the sense of being unborn, unselfish, un-becoming ... seems about right ...
No .. But as the old saying goes "Before enlightenment chop wood and fetch water after enlightenment power installed and plumbing fixed !"
We will no longer sweat the small stuff....
We in the sense of beginner, practitioner, advanced prepper, enlightened and post-enlightened are not movie stars. Not the movie. Not the projectionist. Not the audience or owner.
@how is exactly right, the theatre is empty but still
we find ourselves aligning with identity.
Maybe the next film will be a block buster ... will have to wait for the real ...
"Is non-existence what we have to look forward to after enlightenment?"
Yes in the sense the delusion of a real separate self is destroyed, no in the sense that delusion is replaced with reality, i.e, the seeing of your true universal SELF.
Those of us used to watching the arisings and their stilling/settling will be aware of their nature as temporary insubstantials. Void of real being. Projections. Phantasms. Imaginings.
The stillness is a sort of real. More real we might say as the stillness of stillness comes into focus ... and beyond ...
Personally I don't have one of those. If I did, it would be another fake arising.
To misquote the film "Gladiator", when the void smiles at you all you can do is smile back.
There was a cartoon I read once where a little girl being taught about world religions said she'd figured out a loophole in this Nirvana and Karma and rebirth stuff. The trick was to be just bad enough in this life to be reincarnated as a sacred cow in India.
In the cosmology that Buddhism came out of, yes the goal is to escape the round of birth-and-rebirth. The extinguishing of the self means "you" aren't thrown back into samsara, either as human or animal.
But people don't really want that, any more than Christians really want to spend eternity standing around God and singing his praises. And when Buddhism is practiced, the goal is happiness in this life, not locking the door to future incarnations.
I'm no wizard but I think we stop coming back here as a function of the universe and instead disolve or dissipate into a kind of spiritual fertilizer.
I think we'd have the rest of this life to live as an example first.
Is non-existence what we have to look forward to after enlightenment?
Is non-existence not what we are already doing?
Thanks for the input everyone. Let me say that I have found basic Buddhist practice tremendously helpful. It's increased my peace of mind and improved my attitude towards others and life in general. Yet pursuing deeper practice seems to lead to something terrifying - a complete loss of self. Yes, I'm clinging to the notion of self very hard, but I'm not sure I want to let go. What's left if there's no self?
The answer does not seem to be non-existence, but the Buddha doesn't seem to have a clear answer - or at least one I can understand. The best bet may to be take @Cinorjer 's pragmatic approach, and practice Buddhism to improve my lot in this life.
How would that be possible?
Seeing, hearing, thinking, and so on. Experience without the assumption of an experiencer.
There really is no void, only our craving creates a void. Without craving we are free flowing life energy. Seems that way anyways.
@David I suppose that depends on whether or not you think the universe is a Hologram.
Are we really here in the first place? There's a theory right now that the accepted status of the universe can only be true if it's all a "hologram." I'll try to find the article and post it shortly.
I think the void is there, the aim is to engage with it. Usually we obscure the void with self-view and all that stuff.
Dhammapada Verse 93:
"He whose cankers are destroyed and who is not attached to food, whose object is the Void, the Unconditioned Freedom — his path cannot be traced, like that of birds in the air."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.07.budd.html
This is one of the most confusing parts of Buddhism to me. If there is no experiencer, how can anything be experienced? If there is no doer, how does anything get done?
No doer is "figurative" for the "non-attached to conventional self" doer I believe.
I don't.
That doesn't really mean anything though. I mean... How can something that doesn't exist get tricked into thinking it exists?
Nouns are convention. Everything is action.
I am not a being, I am simply being.
The experiencer is the product of the seeing, hearing, thinking, like a clock is the accumulation of the gears, the hands, the face. There isn't some partless entity called a clock in there that owns its parts, its the same for the self.
Try this https://www.ted.com/talks/julian_baggini_is_there_a_real_you
I get that self is a process rather than a thing. That's not my stumbling block.
I seem to run across two possible interpretations of Buddhist practice. One is that practice gradually whittles down the self until there is nothing left. The other is that practice is aimed at realizing that self is an illusion.
If the self is an illusion, that leaves a couple of questions. Firstly, what the heck is running the show if there is no self really there? And if I do realize that me, myself and I are just illusions and aren't real, wouldn't I just end the silly pretense of existing?
I'm not sure what "self" is supposed to mean exactly but I don't believe in nothing.
Separation is the illusion, not existence. I see the individual self as a tool of expression and a very useful one at that.
Probably but if you don't exist you are unable to ask the question in the first place so I can't lend too much credence to the idea.
The sense of self arises from the process of being. Are you frightened of sleep when the sense of being is largely gone? Buddhist practice is waking up not a shutting down you don't wake from.
You need to understand 'dependent origination'.
http://opcoa.st/0jWXB
You mean a sense of suicide would arise because there is nothing really living? Eh ... hello?
(I feel @Shoshin explains it much better in the next post)
Karmic patterns=Chain reaction-Sequence of events ....Habitual behaviour patterns...
~Quote~
"It is not so much that we have a self, it's that we do self-ing. The self has no inherent, unconditional, absolute existence apart from the network of causes it arises from. in and as !"
@nakazcid in order to come to terms with the whole Anatta 'not-self' 'no thing'
one really needs to acquire experiential understanding/knowledge, which goes beyond ones limited intellectual understanding...In other words through "meditation" ...
The cushion ...is all knowing and has all the questions and answers in one
Yes, it's about close observation of experience. Sensations, sights and sounds, feeling, seeing and hearing - what is going on, what is it really like?
"Herein, Bahiya, you should train yourself thus: 'In the seen will be merely what is seen; in the heard will be merely what is heard; in the sensed will be merely what is sensed; in the cognized will be merely what is cognized.' In this way you should train yourself, Bahiya.
"When, Bahiya, for you in the seen is merely what is seen... in the cognized is merely what is cognized, then, Bahiya, you will not be 'with that.' When, Bahiya, you are not 'with that,' then, Bahiya, you will not be 'in that.' When, Bahiya, you are not 'in that,' then, Bahiya, you will be neither here nor beyond nor in between the two. Just this is the end of suffering."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .irel.html
One ordinarily assumes that a thinker think thoughts and exists independent from thoughts. Actually without thoughts, there is no thinker. There is no separation.
I think therefore I am is incorrect. It should instead be I think therefore I think that I am.
Contemplate this. Thoughts or thinking without an actual thinker. Reading these words without an actual reader. Things still get done without the false assumption of a doer. I suppose language has a lot to answer for the wrong assumption of a real entity eg. I, you, him, them. Useful for communication purpose but also problematic.
"Why now do you assume 'a being'? Mara, have you grasped a view? This is a heap of sheer constructions: Here no being is found.
Just as, with an assemblage of parts, The word 'chariot' is used, So, when the aggregates are present, There's the convention 'a being.'
It's only suffering that comes to be, Suffering that stands and falls away. Nothing but suffering comes to be, Nothing but suffering ceases."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn05/sn05.010.bodh.html
So separation between self and "other" is the illusion? That's really interesting, and relieves one of my fears that the self has to be destroyed in order to achieve nirvana.
My conception of self is one that I had pieced together from intuition and Western philosophy. Basically, my conception was that the "self" is the origin of will and motivation. Hence, without self there would be no motivation. This conviction has been deeply held by me for a long time at unconscious levels, and is hard to shake. In this view of the self, a self-less being wouldn't want to get up in the morning, brush it's teeth or even eat. If it could even talk, it would not refer to itself as "I" or have any notion of ownership. Thus self-lessness (in my misconception) would probably be something close to catatonia. Assuming that cessation of the notion of self is necessary for enlightenment would hence lead to a loss of the will to live. Frightening stuff...
Maybe that sounds crazy, but that's what's been going on in the back of my head. It took me quite a while thinking about "self" for me to realize what I was thinking unconsciously.
So, two questions. Is cessation of the notion of self necessary for nirvana? (From what I gather here, probably not.) Is the self the source of motivation or will, and if not, what is the source of volition?
Is there a particular form of meditation useful for exploring anatta?
The approach I use is based on satipatthana, some people refer to it as vipassana. The basic idea is to observe one's experience closely and develop insight into how insubstantial and transient it is.
That is three questions. You iz so naughty
Is cessation of the notion of self necessary for nirvana?
No. It is not an empty skull zombie Buddha in experiential Nirvana. A self experiences Nirvana BUT what it experieces is empty, not-self, unborn, neither arising or leaving, non dual etc.
Is the self the source of motivation or will, and if not, what is the source of volition?
Craving.
Is there a particular form of meditation useful for exploring anatta?
You can contemplate and explore anatta without meditating BUT to know it you will have to examine the nature of arisings in attention/mindfulness/meditation.
http://opcoa.st/0jycV
... and now back to the partying ...
I think in most schools it is, actually.
Understanding the science of emergence may help
This is an interesting essay on the concept of Anatta: http://www.insightmeditationcenter.org/books-articles/articles/anatta-and-the-four-noble-truths/
Essentially, the speaker contends that the principal of Anatta is in direct opposition to a specific Indian concept of Self or Soul. Nowhere in the suttas does Buddha specifically say there is no self, at least in the conventional sense. When directly asked, he declines to answer. I find this reassuring, but I'm not sure it's an "orthodox" interpretation. Does anyone have a different take on anatta?
Its not that nothing exists at all, its that they don't exist the way we perceive them, as discrete entities.
^^^Also, since we posted at the same time just want to mention my previous post so you see it.
Some people try to introduce the idea of a "true self", but this isn't supported by the suttas. To put it in simple terms Buddhism = Hinduism minus Atman and Brahman. If you re-introduce an Atman into Buddhism you get Advaita Vedanta. There's nothing wrong with Advaita Vedanta, but it is good to be clear about the difference.
"The negation of an imperishable Atman is the common characteristic of all
dogmatic systems of the Lesser as well as the Great Vehicle, and, there is, therefore,
no reason to assume that Buddhist tradition which is in complete agreement on this
point has deviated from the Buddha's original teaching.
It is therefore curious that recently there should have been a vain attempt by
a few scholars to smuggle the idea of self into the teaching of the Buddha, quite
contrary to the spirit of Buddhism. These scholars respect, admire, and venerate the
Buddha and his teaching. They look up to Buddhism. But they cannot imagine that
the Buddha, whom they consider the most clear and profound thinker, could have
denied the existence of an Atman or self which they need so much. They
unconsciously seek the support of the Buddha for this need for eternal existence- of
course not in a petty individual self with small s, but in the big Self with a capital S."
https://sites.google.com/site/whatbuddhataught/chapter-6