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.
Balance
Okay this is a topic I have been thinking about a lot, and wanted to get some advice from members here...
I do a lot of "in the moment" kind of stuff. We only have this one life, right? So I go to a lot of electronic / dance concerts and dance for hours with my friends. I also work out at the gym because I admire the Greeks and want to have the body of a Greek Olympiad.
But where do you draw the line? Is the key to enjoy these experiences but also realize that they will someday be gone? I know that someday my skin will sag and my bones will be weak. But why should that stop me from having the best body I can right now? I'm not trying to look like Arnold or anything, just have a fit, toned, body with a few bulges here and there...
I do a lot of "in the moment" kind of stuff. We only have this one life, right? So I go to a lot of electronic / dance concerts and dance for hours with my friends. I also work out at the gym because I admire the Greeks and want to have the body of a Greek Olympiad.
But where do you draw the line? Is the key to enjoy these experiences but also realize that they will someday be gone? I know that someday my skin will sag and my bones will be weak. But why should that stop me from having the best body I can right now? I'm not trying to look like Arnold or anything, just have a fit, toned, body with a few bulges here and there...
0
Comments
no, but it is very difficult to get one this fortunate again.
There is nothing wrong with taking care of your body and having a good time. just make sure it doesnt become the primary concern of your life and that you remain mindful and aware of your mind and what is happening around you.
That's really just opinion, even within Buddhism. I'm not sure but I get the feeling Sambodhi may not agree.
xD
Just remember it's called the Middle Path. Try to base your decisions on that. You need a healthy body in order to develop in other ways, so taking care of your body is important. It's when it becomes an obsession that it becomes an issue.
Go for it. Recognition of Dukkha and entry onto the path is not a compulsion. No one is saying .....this is all dukkha! Look!! . And if they are are, then they are just laying their own trip on you. When the compensations sour....you'll know it. It isnt enough to know it in theory .. you have feel the dissatisfaction. If do dont truly feel it right now, dont worry about it. Have fun. You will.
Its an axiom for all Buddhist traditions.
Whether or not one agrees with the teachings on rebirth is fine but it cant be denied as a teaching of the Buddha.
It can be and has been. Here's one such example: http://newbuddhist.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3516
"We only have this one life, right?" is rhetorical and not the main point of the post, and whether or not we do or don't has no bearing on how one might answer this question.
If the "best body" you can attain is, for example, more muscular than necessary for your daily tasks, then you are spending time and energy on an endeavor that feeds an unwholesome quality (vanity) that is better starved.
also, that thread says nothing convincing about rebirth either for or against.
dont take my word for it though. read the nikaya's and the mahayana sutras, the tantra's and the related commentaries. you will see quite clearly that the buddhist traditions accept literal rebirth as a teaching of the Buddha and they accept it unanimously.
.
personally, i have no doubt about the teachings on rebirth and think that a single-life theory is far more irrational than rebirth as it is taught in Buddhism.
as far as Buddhism is concerned, the denial of rebirth is an extreme view. Its a view that takes one dangerously close the the extreme of nihilism which, also according to Buddhism is the worse of the two extreme views of eternalism and nihilism.
Nobody has to "believe" in rebirth but they absolutely can not deny that Buddha taught rebirth in the literal sense without contradicting the sacred scriptures of the Yana's.
I bet that leads to all kinds of trouble.
strong skepticism about rebirth causes people a lot of struggles with the path and teachings.
its a complex and sophisticated teaching that is difficult to understand and it takes a lot of effort, as new people encounter the teachings they have to come into it with an open mind or they wont let themselves learn the subtleties of the teaching.
As far as Buddhism is concerned, the denial of "the single-life theory" as you call it is an extreme view. It is a view that takes one dangerously close to nihilism because, if we have an infinite number of rebirths, this life isn't so important. Of course, that's just another point of view and one possibility. In truth either concept can lead to such views. For many people, the concept of rebirth may be helpful.
The Buddha, instead, did not deny or confirm the concept of rebirth. He held that such questions were unimportant to his teachings (Malunkyaputta is just one popular example). Rebirth certainly came up throughout his teachings, and was used as a teaching tool, but he did not teach it.
If you want to believe he taught it as fact, and that helps you on your path, that's fine. If you deny it and that helps you, great. If you just don't care either way, hurrah.
It does? I see the teachings as much more significant and important than I did before. I choose to not worry myself with things I can only speculate on, and to not blindly follow tradition, as the Buddha himself warned against.
I'm still waiting for that bolt of lightning. :eek2:
The denial of a single life theory in no way diminishes the importance of this life. If it did why would the teachings be so absolutely packed with repetitious discussion of the preciousness of this very life?
If we disregard this opportunity for practice we are wasting a life that has the leisures and endowments that make Buddhahood possible. The argument that a rebirth is somehow closer to an extreme view than a single life theory is untenable in every way imaginable and has been refuted by Buddhist scholars and masters for millenia.
Like I said before, throughout the Buddhist scriptures rebirth is an axiom. Its an accepted truth. I for one trust that the Buddha had insight into the nature of reality and would have explicitly told us differently if that were the case.
And there are far more scriptural resources in support of rebirth than there are against it and to be honest the reference to the places where one can read that he taught that such questions where unimportant are tired, irrelevant and used by a skeptical ethnocentric viewpoint to alter the teachings into something that we in the west are more comfortable with.
What will happen if I neither accept nor deny rebirth? :eek:
i think you'll be ok.
Because the problem is, you have some notion of the gross impermanence of your body (the fact that it will end/change drastically one day). But that even as you know this, the body that appears and that you know will undergo change, is actively understood to be a self.
A healthy mind in a healthy body. This is a good kind of balance. Enjoy your youth but don't neglect your mind. Exercise both as hard as you can.
grackle
However where we go wrong I believe, (AKA enter into imbalance), is through what is called by some, "Wrongful Identification." In other words, we think that we are the body, or my body is me. In this way, we enter into the world of suffering, because what happens to the body is than seen as happening to our very self.
What you are really seeking is complete satisfaction, and I think you will come with time to see that your body is not the proper place to look for it. This is obvious because the body is so unreliable, so changable, and so temporary.
This is what our journey is all about, ridding ourselves of ignorance, or wrongful goals that only produce suffering.
S9
All things come and go. They arise and they end. If you can see that, just see that, and nothing else, then it doesn't matter what you do with the rest of your life.
You are quite right. Life goes on pretty much as usual during our Buddhist practice.
And yet, there is an end to some thing isn’t there, just previous to suffering, (even if it is a micro-second before)?
This thing that is ending, we call ignorance, or the wrongful identification, which brings on suffering in its wake, naturally.
We wrongfully identify with hurtful thoughts, and just because we think of them, we (knee jerk) call them me. Sometimes we even love these hurtful thoughts because they are so familiar and have traveled with us for such a long, long time.
Yes, they come and go, but seeing them go doesn't change our relationship to them, because like any loyal companion, we simply expect their return, and welcome these hurtful thoughts back, again and again.
This is habitual mind; and Buddhism wants us to pick up a broom and cleans house.
S9
__________________
Not per se, but the basis for most pursuit of entertainment, wealth, etc. is the bolstering of some self-concept, which on one level is the definition of suffering.
Physical exercise is (or should be) as important to Buddhist practice as mental exercise. We are not only a mind, after all. There are three aspects to our existence: mind, body, and spirit. All three must be nurtured for optimal health. While it may be possible to awaken without caring for the body, it is surely much harder. The mind is not separate from the body, a fact often forgotten or disregarded. The Buddha said, "To keep the body in good health is a duty, for otherwise we shall not be able to trim the lamp of wisdom, and keep our mind strong and clear."
It is proper and healthy to care for and maintain oneself, just as we might care for and maintain an apartment where we live, with the clear understanding it is only a temporary abode. As long as we are careful to prevent prudence from turning to obsession, our attention to health and fitness will serve us well.
I believe that when we speak of "ignorance," everyone seems to come up with what exact ignorance we are speaking about.
I don’t believe that everyone is on the same page or examining the same ignorance.
Some people are talking about right behavior, represented in both act and/or thought.
Some people are speaking about an Ultimate kind of ignorance, if you will, more like ignorance of the big picture, or what exactly is going on here, as in "Am I any thought or action at/all, no matter how rightly it is performed?
What is your considered opinion and why?
S9.
I think that some people are under the impression that Enlightenment is found in the mind, and so they sit on a cushion real still and obscessively try to still their thoughts.
Lo and behold, every time they get up off the cushion and try to maintain the stillness of mind, which they found, or carry it with them into their lives; this stillness slowly, but surly, fades and much disappointment accompanies this continual event.
I think, it might be a good thing for these persons, after seeing this same outcome, again and again, to consider that what they are looking for isn’t found in the mind, isn’t captured and held onto with much effort. Just perhaps,what they are actually looking for is always present all of the time, if we could only stop forcing the issue, and look directly at our own Buddha Nature.
How do you see this?
S9.
I appreciate your posts, even if I don't always get around to answering them.
I think you are on the right track. Enlightenment is really a sort of letting go, or surrendering. You can't attain it on purpose. This is why the eightfold path is such a brilliant teaching. Buddha made no promises of salvation. You can't teach someone how to grow a tree. Only a tree knows how to grow a tree. Instead, he taught us how to prepare the soil and make it fertile, so the seed of enlightenment might take root.
A fertile mind is an empty mind. Imagine a garden full of weeds. What can grow there but more weeds? Likewise, the mind is a component of the body. How can a mind be healthy and restful in a body that is corrupt?
Mind, body, and spirit. Nurture these every day, and everything else will fall into place.
Namaste,
AD