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Is negativity a delusion?
Hi there, I'm new.
Actually I fairly new to Buddhism/meditation, only really developing an interest about a week ago. I have been asking questions about existence to myself though, ever since I was little but had no idea how I'd ever find the answers. I've eventually tried meditation and have had some interesting experiences but I seem to contradict myself sometimes with my ideas. I'm here hopefully to receive knowledge from those with more wisdom.
When I stopped my thoughts and created one-pointedness for the first time, I sort of became aware of what it was to 'exist,' just like a rock or, well, anything. I observed it was impossible to have bad will involved in the state of existing, realised there is no hierarchy, and came to a sort of conclusion that everything that exists is equal and positive. I also noted that there is no real distinction between types of existence, everything is one as long as it exists. You could subcatergorise everything but that would just go on forever and wouldn't really lead to anywhere.
I think on that note I won't go on much further
but I'm thinking if there is a positive there must be a negative. And if existence = positive, non-existence = negative, right?
What do you guys think?
hope to see you around on the forums!
Actually I fairly new to Buddhism/meditation, only really developing an interest about a week ago. I have been asking questions about existence to myself though, ever since I was little but had no idea how I'd ever find the answers. I've eventually tried meditation and have had some interesting experiences but I seem to contradict myself sometimes with my ideas. I'm here hopefully to receive knowledge from those with more wisdom.
When I stopped my thoughts and created one-pointedness for the first time, I sort of became aware of what it was to 'exist,' just like a rock or, well, anything. I observed it was impossible to have bad will involved in the state of existing, realised there is no hierarchy, and came to a sort of conclusion that everything that exists is equal and positive. I also noted that there is no real distinction between types of existence, everything is one as long as it exists. You could subcatergorise everything but that would just go on forever and wouldn't really lead to anywhere.
I think on that note I won't go on much further
but I'm thinking if there is a positive there must be a negative. And if existence = positive, non-existence = negative, right?What do you guys think?
hope to see you around on the forums!
0
Comments
In Buddhism, all kinds of experiences are to be taken simply as a flow of our moving consciousnesses.
As my teacher says, "survival is highly over-rated."
With the four immeasurables, there is a sense of relentless positivity to meditation, though. But perhaps that's just in comparison to my natural personal tendency to negativity.
Right, I thought if there was one there had to be another.
But I heard one of Buddha's teachings was to 'guard your mind against negative thoughts,' and that thoughts were a delusion. I that perhaps thought from this, the realisation that negativity is nonexistent and the realisation that everything is positive could possibly be the state of bliss known as enlightenment.
I think perhaps if anyone were to experience even the slightest bit of negativity at any given time it is a sign they have a least not fully grasped the understanding of existence. Even in extreme physical pain, knowing it is just the cluster of matter you perceive as 'yourself' trying to keep itself together, just like a rock or a planet holds some form of figure. But just like everything else that figure will eventually disintegrate back into it's form of no fixed state and probably eventually move back into it again. I see the world as a big ball of clay, with figures being conjured up on the surface before eventually merging with the main body again, and then repeating the process (life and death). And presumably this ball of clay is part of another source and so on.
If everything's merging and reemerging existence could well be seen as a constantly shape-shifting matter.
Okay I don't really know where I'm going with this now.
Is the universe shape-shifting matter and mind, or just mind? I ask because, again if we fast forward the figures forming on the earth, they have eventually reached the stage (ie. evolved into humanity) where they can question existence, so presumably for this stage intelligence is needed (you don't see too many enlightened dogs and cats around). Is consciousness trying to evolve/form out of the earth's surface, using it's particles (forming creatures) to eventually do so?
Sorry for all these weird-ass questions.
I also throw out two quotes from teachers of Eastern-but-non-Buddhist traditions:
- As long as you are a seeker, you will never find the truth.
- If you define the truth before you have discovered it, that is the truth that you will find.
Weird-ass questions are welcomed. It's the normal ones that get on everyone's nerves.
~ AD
PS: You're on the right track. Just keep doing what you're doing!