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.
What is your motivation for practicing?
Jason
God EmperorArrakis Moderator
Everyone,
I am primarily motivated by my desire to improve my ability to skillfully approach the human dilemma of suffering by (i) attempting to reduce the amount of suffering I experience due to unpleasant emotions and mental states as well as from how my mind relates to physical pain and discomfort, and (ii) attempting to reduce the amount of harm and suffering other people experience as a direct result of my actions.
Sincerely,
Jason
I am primarily motivated by my desire to improve my ability to skillfully approach the human dilemma of suffering by (i) attempting to reduce the amount of suffering I experience due to unpleasant emotions and mental states as well as from how my mind relates to physical pain and discomfort, and (ii) attempting to reduce the amount of harm and suffering other people experience as a direct result of my actions.
Sincerely,
Jason
0
Comments
charlene here again, I try myself meditating when i feel the depression was getting me inside, i felt like to be strong inside. Mind and soul has been playing together for long time and now i think i m getting to basic fields where I can see each part of mind and soul bouncing together...
emmm... i am sure i had a point..
charlene
Beyond that, perhaps it’s compulsion that drives me. There are times when I don’t feel like practicing – which is like saying I don’t feel like feeling better, I know – that I end up doing it all the same. I have even, stupidly enough, tried not to practice and have never gotten very far…This is not to say that I’m always at the top of my game – far from it! – but that I’m always engaged in at least a small degree of practice, even if it’s just remembering to make an effort at being understanding or compassionate, or remembering to come back to my breath.
What soul?
Good Day ...
Palzang
What keeps me meditating? Discipline and hope.
Word.
-bf
I started to try to find peace in my life.
And now, I find that I've had more un-peace to deal with than I did before I started!
-bf
Regards,
Nirvy
Actually, that was just a kidney STONE. Not a ROCK.
-bf
(P.S. if you have had KSs then, sorry).
I'v got my eyes on you BF...
It's always "alll about xray" isn't it?
Take a chill-pill, my friend. I said I wouldn't tell anyone about your ED problem.
Ooops! Did I say that out loud?
-bf
You remind me of the first extended period that I spent on retreat. It was really quite scary. May I tell the story? (Silly to ask, 'cos I am like "doubting Pilate" and don't wait for a reply)
I was in my early 20s and had ben on week-long retreats before. Now I was a novice and it was time for the 30 days of silence and prayer that is the Long Retreat. We were all very enthusiastic (and very young): this was what we joined for!
The First Week went quite well. The silence didn't seem oppressive or artificial: it was like a cool stream, refreshing and welcoming on a hot day.
The Second Week was harder and felt like the sort of challenge that is accepted with joy.
By the Third Week, boredom was setting in. The daily routine seemed stale, the meditations long and fruitless. At some moment during that week, it all changed. Suddenly, I felt as though I was pitched into some sort of echo chamber. I described it, to my Novice Master, as being like shouting down an empty well. As I sat or knelt or lay in meditation, there was no simply silence (I certainly had no bells or angel voices) but a horrible echoing void. At the same time, my body felt dreadful: uncomfortable, edgy, twitching. The echoes jangled in my ears, harsh, discordant and mocking.
In the end, it passed and, left just a nasty memory.
Since then, over the years, I have experienced the same thing occasionally in meditation and, as my practice has widened into a moment-by-moment, all-day thing, it sometimes happens out of a clear blue sky. I have never been able to pin down what starts it, nor what stops it. All I know is that it is frightening and discouraging. I've also learned that, if I try to evade it by turning away from meditation to distractions, it lasts much longer than if I sit with it.
I don't know if this matches, in any way, your own experience but I offer it to you as a fellow-pilgrim who is still very much a learner-driver on the Noble Eightfold Freeway.
Because I actually did this during my working week, and still mingled with others who carried on as normal, my focus was more outward, observing their patterns and reactions to me - silent for once, and verbally unresponsive.
I suppose that because this was not a vocational practise, and I had much to amuse and bemuse me, I never stopped to consider then, what mental, meditative opportunity, potential or benefit it could have brought me, but I was nevertheless conscious of an extraordianry awareness of just how easy it was to simply keep my mouth shut and neither react, nor respond to the apparent and seemingly crass ignorance of those around me.
They would deride my efforts, and talk about me as if I was not there, alluding to my work and projects with a careless regard for my feelings, presence or possible input.
But even though I have not experienced the gamut of feelings Simon had during his three weeks retreat, I can equate with the feelings he describes.
I would be interested to know Simon, what you made of them - what conclusion you have come to with regard to their significance or meaning - what you may perceive they indicate... and what your Novice Master opined....?
Not that I personally am proffering any form of "diagnosis"... I just feel it warrants deeper discussion. here or elsewhere as you might see fit....
My Novice Master (known in the Soc as Mag. Nov.) was a wise old bird. He checked first that I was eating and sleeping properly. Then he explained how strongly we resist our own efforts to reach the silent place where "all is done". I was genuinely terrified by the experience but he was so calm and supportive that I carried on, into the Fourth Week. The 'echoing' lasted about four days and the meditations became a real struggle but, with his encouragement, I persevered. He gave me "ex ops" (outdoor work) in the vegetable garden and, because the 'echoes' were disturbing my sleep too, gave me the early morning Mass to prepare and serve: that was important. It was a very old priest and myself, alone in a small chapel, taking the celebration slowly and meditatively.
Since then, I have experienced the same thing a few times and it has always been a pretty scary time but, having gone through it and come out the other side before, I know now that it is only a stage on the journey into silence. It is hard to describe exactly what happens but it has also helped me when working with clients who "hear voices". Although I knew, all the time, that there were no actual voices separate from me in that echoing void, it 'sounded' as if there were.
Have you ever experienced a high fever? When I was small and running a temperature, I thought I heard shouting and arguing when there was none. This was similar to that.
In his teaching on Awareness by Breathing meditation, the Buddha spoke about breathing in and out "releasing the mind". The mind resists such a release, I think. It seems like death to it. One of the strongest distractions it can throw at us is distraction through fear and fear is so often greater when the object is hidden, lurking, just out of sight.
I would add that I haven't experienced this for quite a few years now. Other distractions, yes, but the distraction by fear seems to be a tactic that my mind has given up as a bad job.
ROTFLMAO!! :ukflag:
And as for the remainder, thank you for expanding.
Fear is some deep smelly stuff, isn't it?
Palzang
Simon...
I'm glad that you pointed out some of the things that you did in your post. I think that sometimes we get caught up in the newness of something - and then fall into the trap?, mindset?, that to question something or point out the reality of how it's affecting us will somehow diminish us.
As with meditation ...
I think some people think that we should praise meditation or point out how much it's impacted our lives and how wonderful it is and blah, blah, blah.
We never take the time to point out that it was a pain in the ass or we couldn't focus or it didn't seem to be getting us anywhere, etc.
Sometimes the practice is just that. It's practice. We haven't perfected anything so we must continue to practice until we get it right. Whether it's meditation or Enlightenment.
I know for me that I actually turned to Buddhism because of the teachings and to deal with certain issues I had. Now I find that I have a whole new set of issues to apply Buddhism to!
I think I am coping better. But, that could also just be life experience, age and maturity(? don't laugh...) rather than my practice. Who knows.
-bf
hahahahahahah maturity hahahahahah whatever dude!
teee heeee hhahahahahaha
okay I'm fine now.
teehee
At the risk of sounding like someone who's playing it too safe, I really don't know what would hold a deep fear for me, or that would stimulate such a resistance as to prompt me to seriously question my practise, or evaluate the perceived effect to examine the source, origin, subconscious fabrication...
I hope you understand my meaning. I would never purposely (or otherwise!) trivialise or belittle the issues others have encountered........
There again, I haven't tried everything yet....
I guess there may be two levels of looking at this...
the practical, day-to-day mundane level stuff,
and
The deeper, inner, more spiritually oriented stuff.
I'm more inclined, currently, to be experiencing a really hard time with the former.
No matter how much I study the attachment factor, there are just some temporary, transitory, material, ephemeral things that worry the crappadoodiddly out of me....
I KNOW on an intellectual level how illusory it all is. I know all about dropping it, not sweating it, not worrying, not letting it drag me down, not being hampered by things that in the big scheme are about as significant as a flea's fart....
I know all that.
It's doing it. :rolleyesc :grumble: :om:
Maybe I should explain a bit more. I've been reading about the mind and how the original mind has no defilements, it's clear and open and serene. But we don't experience that because our minds are chasing moods and mental formations etc. and we're taking these things, these impermanent thoughts, feelings, reactions, aversions and so on, seriously which is what causes the trouble. I get that. The part I don't get is how to stop chasing after them, how to stop clinging to them.
I'm trying to let certain negative feelings go at the moment (some bad memories). I'm trying not to get caught up in them, not defining them as "me" or "mine" but I'm failing. The situations that gave rise to these negative emotions, like anger and so on, are in the past yet when I remember them they feel like they happened yesterday, the emotions are still as fresh now as they were when I was right in the midst of the situations. The only thing I seem to be able to do is use mindfulness to bring me back to the present but that feels almost like I'm dismissing those feelings and for some reason I feel like it's important to get over them once and for all. I know it's an ego issue and I've had success in the past with taking my ego out of the equation. But now I can't remember how I did it and I'm just floundering.
Oh man, I sound like a major whiner! Ugh! Oh, wait....I'll try gratitude. Maybe that'll work. I guess I'll just have to use the simpler methods for now until I get a little further down the path and can wrap my head around annica, dukkha and annata a little better.
Yeah, the gratitude is definitely working. Now I feel like laughing at my silly self and my silly agonizing.
Thanks for letting me rant.
The problem is none of us get impermanence. That's why we're still here revolving in samsara. If we did actually get impermanence, we'd practice our buns off to get out of it!
Palzang
metta
_/\_
"....And treat those two Impostors just the same...."
'IF' only....!
The first time I heard of Buddhism was at the age of 7 when I read Kipling's Kim and met Teshoo Lama, Kim's guide and friend.
Years later, and still a great fan of Kipling, I realised how important Buddhism is in his work.
i think it's better to realize that they essentially ARE the same thing. Just different sides. I know this cause I hang with them all the durn time!
metta
_/\_
stepping outside of 'knowing' may be of help with instigating teachings. the idea that we're 'getting it wrong' can get in the way often. we are not what we think, literally - so try not to be too hard on yourself.
to bridge specifically: letting go is for me the path and that includes letting go of wanting to let go! zazen and patience my great sister in the sky.
as for the original question:
initially motivation came from dissatisfaction with secular life. now practise flows from a compassion greater than myself and the real purpose in my living: to free all beings from suffering.
It is obvious from your post that you are using your time there to great benefit. The jump from the desire for self-liberation to the desire to liberate all beings from suffering is a great one but a necessary one to make real progress on the path. So happy for you, and I pray that all your practice is fruitful for all our benefit!
Palzang
Suffering and why is what got me started on my Buddhist path......................
Don't be too hard on yourself. Carry on as you are doing. My guess is that a moment will come when you say to yourself: "I could really do with finding the silence between my thoughts again" and meditation will call to you again.
Read the 'kind' writers, like Thich Nhat Hanh or HHDL..... Let their kindness flow through you.
And, above all, remember that you are much loved.