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Dealing with a Christian Boyfriend.
My boyfriend is a Christian. We often have discussions about our different beliefs. He gets a little upset and I try to explain myself as clearly as possible. I do have a couple questions, and he asked them and they stumped me a little.
When you meditate on something...like...lets say you've had a bad day, so you go home and meditate on it, what exaclty are you thinking? Are you clearing your mind of all the problems that occured, isn't that kind of like running from your problems. Or is it more of putting your mind at ease...
Is meditating like praying?
I tried to explain to him that Buddah isn't a God. And you do not worship him, you simply follow his wisdom. And I even said that some buddhists believe in God.
I struggle so much when I try to explain myself, and it just confuses him. Like some of the things I do he says, "that isn't the buddhist way" Of coarse I take this as a smart allec comment, but I let it go because I continue to tell myself that he just doesn't see things the way I do.
Gees..I've got a ways to go..:)
When you meditate on something...like...lets say you've had a bad day, so you go home and meditate on it, what exaclty are you thinking? Are you clearing your mind of all the problems that occured, isn't that kind of like running from your problems. Or is it more of putting your mind at ease...
Is meditating like praying?
I tried to explain to him that Buddah isn't a God. And you do not worship him, you simply follow his wisdom. And I even said that some buddhists believe in God.
I struggle so much when I try to explain myself, and it just confuses him. Like some of the things I do he says, "that isn't the buddhist way" Of coarse I take this as a smart allec comment, but I let it go because I continue to tell myself that he just doesn't see things the way I do.
Gees..I've got a ways to go..:)
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Comments
In some ways, you and your boyfriend are a microcosm of the meeting between Buddhism and Christianity everywhere!
The first thing that may help is to understand that 'meditation' means something different to Christians and to Buddhists. In Christian terms, Buddhist meditation is closer to what is called 'contemplation' or ascetical prayer/mysticism. Christian meditation comes closer to the more esoteric forms of Buddhist meditation based on visualisation, similar to the great spiritual classic The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola.
"Meditating on...." often resembles what Ignatius called the Examen, which is a reflection on our actions and motives, whereas a simple meditation to still the mind is a preparatory exercise in Christian praxis, disposing the person to listen to God speaking within. For many Buddhists, it is an exercise in bringing the attention under conscious control and then of fixing the attention at a single, "diamond" point.
Your boyfriend has, of course, not noticed that he is laying himself wide open when he suggests that some action or inaction on your part is "not very Buddhist": how many of his actions can be termed "very Christ-like"? I am sure you are too Buddha-minded to point this out to him! When did he last walk past a beggar and ignored them? See what Jesus had to say about seeing him naked, hungry and in prison.
Persevere with compassion in your heart and, by your example, he may yet become a better Christian than he imagined possible! Your regular practice of meditation can be associated with his personal practice of prayer: after all, the Christian scriptures enjoin the believer to "pray always" (or, as I like to say, "pray all ways"!!!!) Christians and Buddhists can sit together in silence with no problem.
In my opion iy is not running away from your problems. It is taking a closer look at why you react the way you did and letting it go. For Example, I have to deal with upset customers. Sometimes it makes even me angry. So when I get home, before I might take my bad mood out on my family I meditate. I look at why it made me angry. And was it really worth raisng my blood pressure so to speak. After discovering why it made me angry, I usually find out that in truth it really wasn't worth all the hassle and let the feeling go. So I guess you can say yes it is somewhat to calm your mind and get rid of negative feelings.
As for worshipping Buddha,I deeply respect his teachings although I follow Native American traditions, in those traditions, meditation was used for prayer. It is a way to connect with the spirits of the world and the creator.
I ho[e this helps.
Good point, Simon.
In my understanding of Buddhism - meditation is an integral part of it's belief - if not the major component.
How many Christians take prayer seriously and do it on a daily basis? Not any that I know of. Christianity in their life is just a label they wear every Christmas and Easter.
By seeing someone that meditates daily on their beliefs - might nudge someone in a different faith into re-evaluating their participation in their faith.
-bf
I give myself a bit of breathing space...
"Oh, wow! That's a good question! And it deserves a good answer, so let me meditate on that, so's I can give you a succinct reply! Thanks for that!"
It tends to work quite well.... it 'massages' their Ego, because they think they've stumped you, and it gives you more time to lay them flat with a verbal left hook....!!
It never hurts tho' to say.... 'I don't know. let me think on it and i'll get back to you.....'
Well we are Buddhists, we are not God. We are imperfect, we all make mistakes at times. Thank him for reminding you, though. It's still better for him to be a smart alec than ignore you totally and steer you off-course your dharma practice.
I think you do meditation no service by saying it is "simply thinking".
Buddha Nature... The way we were at Birth... as Prana correctly points out.
Christ himself said: 'Suffer the little Children to come unto me, for such is the kingdom of Heaven....' He meant exactly that. In order to get back to God-Nature, people would have to shed all the crap they'd accumulated, and go back to the purity and innocence of a child.
Strip everything away, and we're all like that. Whether we're Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Moslem, Hindu or Sikh.
And I have posted this in completely the wrong thread. I can't delete it. So everyone, just ignore it. :doh: :buck:
Apologies !!
One of the crew maintains that meditation cured his acne but I have my doubts!
One of the crew maintains that meditation cured his acne but I have my doubts!
how many members of the crew do u have ??
and how do u quote things?????
How many in the 'crew'? Very much a catch-as-catch-can. While I was home ed-ing Jack, we sued to be about 6. Since he went back to school, this has grown to (sometimes) 8 or 10, and sometimes just Jack and me. I let them know when we shall be having "Quiet Time" and they come or not as the mood takes them. Also, if they get all heated, as any group of ados will, they sometimes ask me if we can have some quiet! The first time a 14year-old asked me if they could have some Quiet Time, I was flabbergasted but I exist to serve them, apparently.
Quoting: are you asking about how to show it as a quote in a post? If so, there are a couple of ways: if you want to quote someone's post, click on the button marked 'Quote' at the bottom right of the post you want to quote. You can then edit out what you don't want - this is also a very good way of misrepresenting another's post! LOL
Another way is to cut-and-paste. With the text pasted and still highlighted in your reply, you can click on the last button in the editing icons above your reply, which looks like a speech bubble. This will wrap the necessary HTML tags around your selected text.
Personally, I usually use cut-and-paste and type in the tags before and after. The tags you want are [*quote] and [*/quote] (omitting the stars).
I found all this out by trial and error so I may have missed something, being entirely self-taught in HTML. And, if this is not what you meant and I have been "teaching my grandmother to suck eggs", I apologise if I have been patronising.
BTW, if, like me, you use lots of cut-and-paste, and like to review them or go back to see what's worth keeping or whatever, I have found a little program which is a marvel:
http://www.intelexual.com/products/yc3/
Now you've lost me....!!
The little program is called Yankee Clipper. When you highlight and copy a text or picture, it is copied to your Clipboard. When you 'copy' sometjing else, it over-writes previously copied things. With Yankee Clipper, each copy is kept, so that you can go back to earlier stuff.
It's really useful: for example, I have a 'boilerplate' (permanent copy on YC) of accented letters so that I can put them into posts or my writing as I use a standard QWERTY keyboard and cannot remember the ASCII key-strokes!
Is that any clearer?
Thanks Simon, always a pleasure....!!