There is no escape from no duality
sciencebuff
San Francisco, California New
I get the impression a lot of people new to Buddhism and even some (seeming) buddhas themselves have the impression that enlightenment is something you want, that it is desirable in some way or deserving of work and commitment.
From my perspective, what neither of these parties seem to fail to realize is that any state of bliss a buddha achieved did not come without either immense work, suffering or both. What goes up must come down and vice versa. That is, they created a duality to a enjoy the state they are in.
Any associated description of eternity or timelessness is, in my opinion, a description of a long lived but ultimately temporary state, or a reference to the eternal nature of consciousness itself.
Duality for me is the true nature of the universe. It explains so much: how something (the universe) exists where nothing should. It is nothing in the end because all energies cancel themselves out. It also explains why roughly (or probably more accurately EXACTLY) half of life sucks overall and why free will is such a big question. Our consciousness is as helpless and bound by laws as the particles that make up the matter of what we (think) we see around us.
The Buddhas teachings seem to be completely in line with this. He never makes any lofty claims about the true nature of the universe, except to seem to say that it is the background in which duality occurs (outside all conceptions, craving, aversion, etc) . He also makes it clear that all things are temporary.
I don't think this stuff is all most people think it's cracked up to be unless you're REALLY at a crossroads in life and are in immense suffering. Even then, I think you will trend to enlightenment if it's your time, regardless. Furthermore, I know the dualities of pain or karma anyone is in would eventually play themselves out, with or without Buddhism/meditation.
This understanding seems to be about as close to enlightenment as I've ever been. I've felt a strong sense of peace with this along with the awareness of the pain and suffering it took to get here and the knowledge that that peace won't last long.
Comments
I think of the teaching on the 8 worldly winds: pain and pleasure, gain and loss, fame and infamy, praise and blame.
We don't get one of these pairs without the opposite. So do we have a Buddha who loses, pains, is infamous, and to blame? Or maybe we have a Buddha who is not attached to either pair? Still it would seem odd to contemplate a Buddha in pain or loss etc because isn't Buddha supposed to be beyond that?
What I was trying to say is that he absolutely was not beyond those things. The buddha abandoned his wife and kids and went through immense suffering to the point of suicidal ideation ("I'll either become enlightened, or die") to get to that point. He was nearly formless in nirvana, but not completely as he still had his human body. Some assume that the parinirvana he was to achieve after his death was to be the ultimate formless state of existence. If my own meditations are anything to go by, or probably more importantly, physics and the creation stories of the major religions, COMPLETE formlessness is associated with an absolutely irresistible urge (pain even) for form/creation.
In my opinion the Buddha would indeed really have achieved the ultimate state after death, akin or identical to God, but I think that inherently comes with more form.
If there ever was an idealized final state existence for consciousness, I don't think anything would exist. There needs to be some impetus for anything to exist at all. I really believe there is always some unsatisfactory element for every state of consciousness. In nirvana it was the body (not to mention all the work he put in to get to that blissful state) and for parinirvana I would imagine it to be lack of form.
Buddhism talks about long lived blissful states of existence and argues that Nirvana is different than these sorts of states. They understand that enlightenment takes work and sacrifice, but argue that these efforts are the only truly reliable efforts towards a lasting relief from suffering.
I'm sure I don't really understand your views here but I'd say that duality is the nature of samsara, or conditioned existence. I tend to look to the philosophy of Taoism as a framework to understand existence and Buddhism as a way to transcend it.
Thanks for your thoughts, we used to have lots of interesting speculation like this around here.
I tend to shy away from such strong statements, a lifetime of science has taught me such absolutes are unlikely. Although I find it hard to conceive of consciousness without form it may possibly exist.
I don’t know if duality is the nature of conditioned existence, it may be more a matter of perception. Our mind seems to separate the world into subject and object, us and them, almost as a matter of course, but quantum mechanics seems to say the real is made of the unreal and the universe is a mysterious process at heart, and in fact a nondual nature of reality may reveal itself once one goes beyond the mind.
Certainly there seem to be people who have experienced the universe as nondual, which often goes along with the dropping away of personality. So unless they were all fooled by the minds infinite capacity for imagination, you’d think there might be something there. I don’t have any personal experience in this, I’m happily residing in don’t know mind.
There seems to be a bit to unpack here. I do think working towards awakening or enlightenment is a noble pursuit deserving of work and commitment but then, I don't think enlightenment is a state of bliss, nor do I think Buddha was in a perpetual state of bliss even if he was perpetually and completely aware. I think once we hit enlightenment, there is still work to be done.
I see duality as an illusion. Nothing is really seperate from anything else and all borders are convention. I don't believe in "nothing" so I figure there was always something going on.
I feel we have conditional will. The Middle way between the extremes of free will and determinism. We are conditional beings so we are conditioned but we also do some conditioning of our own. The Middle Way is the gift from Sujata that woke Buddha up.
I also think it's good to remember that Buddha most certainly did not leave this wife and son. Sidhartha Gautama left his wife and son. Buddha had yet to wake up through Sidhartha when he left. When he did wake up, he could have gone in any direction but he went back and his wife and son joined the Sangha.
We don't need to escape duality. It's illusion we can use.
What I'm trying to communicate is 1) total enlightenment / pure consciousness is not something desirable per se but is a very neutral state and 2)it's not permanent and I don't think the Buddha tried to make that claim.
Pure consciousness is a timeless state and unless you never want anything to happen ever, I don't think you'd want to remain there permanently.
I get the impression you believe a non dual experience of reality is "good" or something to strive for and the Buddha made it crystal clear that it is neither of these things.
By denying the very experientially real nature of duality, you're denying how you could exist in the first place and why anyone would come to this forum using their ego to seek the duality of relief/suffering. Quantum mechanics says that the universe is a paradox; in terms of consciousness duality is just real as non duality. A buddha like Eckhart Tolle will tell you in no uncertain terms that when you strongly identify with your ego you can virtually BECOME your emotions.
Hinduism holds that the entire universe can never be known in a glance, and I don't believe anyone including the Buddha can be an exception to this. "The fool thinks himself to be wise. The wise man knows himself to be a fool." Buddha knew this and expressed it.
And that work is a duality. Work is generally a type of (controlled) pain for the sake of pleasure or form (that is to stay alive or maintain a desired state of existence) .
Conditioned will is a new one and sounds interesting to me but if I'm to make any assumptions about it by its name I would say that it's will determined by conditioning and is hence not free will, but deterministic.
If the true nature of things is non duality (and maybe even if it's not) he consciousness that did all of this was the same entity (or lack of entity, probably more accurately) .
I’m merely saying that there are some sound scientific arguments which suggest there may be truth to the nondual view. Whether you take that on-board is totally up to you. And I don’t think that excludes it being a Buddhist view, the Diamond Sutra famously says just the same about the unreality of what we consider real as for example Niels Bohr.
I made a typo with "no duality". I meant "duality" but I think it's just as appropriate because I think life is both duality and non duality.
You must have misunderstood but that's ok. It's not an easy topic. Just because duality is an illusion does not mean I deny it. An illusion is a misrepresentation of reality, not a lack.
No thing exists on it's own, it can only co-exist with everything else. Emptiness is inclusive.
When you say duality and non-duality, it seems to me like you are referring to the Two Truths of convention and ultimate or subjectivity and objectivity. Non-duality to me would imply Interbeing, Dependant Origination or non-seperation.
In one of Buddhism's endless lists, neutral states of mind are considered higher and more pleasant than blissful ones. I've listened to and read lots of Buddhism over the years and this is the first time I've heard the claim that the Buddha didn't say that Nirvana was permanent. It kind of goes against the whole notion of samsara being an endless round of birth and the path being the escape. I'd be interested in hearing any argument and sources you may have for this claim though.
This is, of course, entirely your opinion. I'd also add that if you do ever get there, there would be no "you", or craving to get bored from.
It is determinism that allows for a choice to be made between 2 or more determinable options so it is neither of the two extremes. Nothing is free from consequence and we can only choose that which conditions allow but we are indeed responsible for our choices. Especially once we know we are conditioned.
I think of the idea that the future is not just determined by the past, but also by our choice in the present moment. Now maybe our choice is an illusion, but hard to prove one way or another.
The present is already determined by the past, but the present will determine the future. There is always a choice as long as there is an identification with a self aka self-determination, as is the result of those choices. It operates at the level of the conditioned or samsara.
If you want something to happen, it will happen.
If you don't want it to happen, something will still happen.
That is because of identification with forms which leads to both desirable and undesirable outcomes. The price of wanting is to get want you don't want, not get what you want and to lose what you wanted!