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.
i watched a Joeseph Campbell seminar called "Mythos". I was heavily into Occultism, had researched Catholic Doctorates such as Aquinas,John of the Cross, and Metaphysical Christianity.
I figured that having a well round understanding of these systems helped me. When Campbell described the Chakra's and how one traverses them at death i was aghast. I knew i hit gold. I told my gf at the time/ who now is my wife . "I bet if you reverse the death order in the chakras you can figure out what brings death on and meditate on stoping death" what i thought i found was an alchemical path . Like The Secret Of the Golden Flower. What i actually found was a map of subtle conciousness and a real way out.
My wife seeing something,bought me my first buddhist book " Tibetan book of the Dead" not actually a beginners book at all !. I didn't know what to make of it. I was scared , arrogant , and willing so i read the entire thing and thought i knew the whole spectrum. LOL. Then something inside said these aren't just words, they are terms and have real meaning , read it again.
I read the commentary by HH the Dalai Lama and fell asleep. LOL
Then i read the preliminaries.
In short i worked from the most complex system down to the simplist. I knew that i found the truth because little by little the words in the beginners books fit into the spectrum of the TBOD.
That was five years ago and many many books ago. I guess i found my elixir the philosophical gold. I truely feel that i have seen the stone of the philosophers.
For me what tipped the balance was a very stressful job and I knew i was getting too focussed on the incorrect things.
But I almost feel as if I started this journey much earlier.
I had a mental breakdown including a strong vision that people were more than we normally thought. That they weren't cartoon characters.... or not how we would like to fit them into our needs. Instead they were awarenesses..
Acompanying that awareness was a burst of energy. I literally spoke in tongues for about 15 minutes which was an attempt to do something with that energy.
This experience happened right after a huge depression that lasted 72 hours over a romance gone bad. Multiple people on the street asked me if I was ok so I know my face looked horrible pain. It was some of the worst pain I ever experienced.
Then after the burst of energy my mind became unhinged and I had psychotic phenomenon. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder because I sought help at the student health center. They referred me to the hospital. I was reading everything as a code. I recognize the maps of the newspaper the main character makes in 'A beatiful Mind'. I made the same code maps of ordinary speach. Hidden messages.
I came to buddhism trying to cope with the sluggishness my medicine made me feel along with depression. I was curious about the burst of energy and insight I had that was so beatiful and I got back to that eventually. But initially I wanted something to help me in my depression.
When I first meditated in a book on the topic by Kathleen McDonald it didn't feel good until I stood up. But that 3 seconds of relief kept me tuned in.
The buddhist teachings continued to help me. My main problem was getting attached to thoughts and states of mind.
However I haven't shared this with anyone in great detail, so I'm going to take this opportunity to do so here, since the OP did ask after all.
Buddhism was revealed to me through the seeds of my own unsettled sense of ego. For as long as I can remember I have struggled with trying to identify myself and label my identity to fit into what I thought I needed to be. My constant struggle was trying to place a face and name on myself. Constantly asking myself "Who am I? What should I be? Who do I need in my life and what is wrong with me?" This torment became exhausting. One of the large areas of my struggle with ego was focused on my romantic relationships. I was constantly trying to validate my image of myself by trying to find "The perfect girl" for me.
No matter whom I was engaged with in a relationship, I was never satisfied. I was projecting the same thinking onto her. I was trying to put an identity, a label, an image of her and incessantly comparing her to my "ideal." Since my "ideal" was an ever shifting phenomena, this led to a number of failed relationships, due to my own unhappiness with self.
Fortunatley, through an online dating website of all places, I met a girl who had a certain demeanor which was conducive to calm and selfless behavior. Her serenity and calm presence rubbed off on me and allowed me to see how I was manifesting these unsettled thoughts on my own. During my previous relationships I never took the time for this pausing, and resting, long enough to have the necessary insight.
After we developed a romantic relationship approaching the one year mark, I began to do the same nonsense I always did. I became restless and started craving someone new, someone to fit my ideal and keep me entertained. I tortured myself with worry and anguish trying to figure out what it is I wanted. I was so concerned with the thought, "What do I want?" and "What do I need?" I had never paused to ask, "Why do I want that?" And even if I had, I wouldn't have been able to explain it.
So due to all this unsettled thinking, I was on the verge of abandoning this relationship, just as I had to all of those in my past. I was convinced that I must be better than this situation, and I deserve someone better.
In July of this year (2010), I spent a week without seeing or talking to her. In that time I did my best to calm down and relax into my current scenario in life. I reflected on my physical situation, and realized all of my physical needs were met. In fact I even realized that I was living quite the charmed life. I had a gorgeous condo in a beautiful city. I had a job I loved, money in the bank, a family who loved me, a friendly room mate, a happy well behaved dog and most notably, a beautiful and happy girlfriend who gave me no reason to be displeased. I realized that the source of my unhappiness and grief, was me. It was my desire and craving to fill a void. A void which only existed in my mind. A void which could not be filled.
This understanding brought upon a sense of calm and acceptance in me. I found myself uttering the words, "It doesn't matter." often. This realization in itself had a softening affect on my mentality. I began to accept things as they are and chill out.
A couple weeks went by and while browsing the internet I found an article which was an interview with the Dalai Lama. I had no idea who the Dalai Lama was, except that he was a figure of Buddhism. I read through the interview and noticed that he seemed to be a rational and calm person. This intrigued me since this guy made a lot of sense.
I was unfamaliar with Buddhism so I did my basic "googling" of Buddhism and I was led to Buddhanet.net. I read a writing on there about the Four Noble Truths. As I read that article I recall feeling an intense sense of excitement and connection, as though what I was reading was truly profound. I was stunned at how seemingly simple the concepts were, and the incredible insight they contained.
This reading led me to other writings on "Intuitive Awareness" and I began to understand. Today I find myself completely immersed in Buddhist reading. I just today finished the book "Understanding Our Mind" by Thich Nhat Hanh. This has given me the awareness and insight I never before could have imagined. I've began meditating daily and I am truly at peace.
I'm astonished everyday of how naive I was yesterday. I love that feeling.:rolleyes:
I used to be a Hindu till this January..... And then I thought I had to have a firm foundation in all other religions so that I can be firm in mine...... Then I started reading religions....
Christianity; Taoism; Islam; Buddhism; Hinduism(of course); Jainism; Sikhism; Judaism... Only when I was reading did I realize that anything can be true... And I din't have any proof for what I was believing in... The religion that influenced me immediately upon reading and cleared all my doubts was Buddhism...... (For there was this question forever:What is the proof of god's existence? Can I see him? If I need to do something to see him, he's not being impartial OR kind...) And immediately I knew Buddhism was my thing... and I converted..... I am a Hindu Brahmin by birth so my parents are very orthodox and don't like me practice Buddhism..... But now, upon further research in Hinduism(don't ask me to quote anything, cause I forget where it is from, but I remember what it is-and I am not lying), I have found that, the first god was formless, and was known as "Upadhi" which was nothing but the sound "AUM" created by the fast movement of the universe.... This kinda tallies with the Buddhist idea of prana... But still I am a buddhist as you don't need to dig in so much to discover truth for it is given openly out... And now, I am trying to tell my parents this but I am not able to as they know a lot of mantras, veda, etc and think they know everything about Hinduism(though they don't accept it) and are not ready to believe anything that I say... They say they believe in Advaita(non-dual philosophy) but still they don't accept my story :P....... So what i am trying to say is that Hinduism was also the same as Buddhism though it has been modified these days because people want to believe what they want to.....
And,
I have found another thing..... Which IS very startling, but true......
There are some schools of Hinduism which say that the soul is not the "I" and there can be nothing which can be quoted as "I"... That is Anatta, if I am not mistaken?
Personal suffering -- Compulsive gambling, failed relationships, poor performance in school, drugs..
Then came LSD - Which I almost committed suicide while taking because I realized I didn't know what life was.
Then came panic attacks, which forced me to find solutions..
Then I came across Adyashanti.. and Buddhist practice.
I no longer take drugs or drink, I have a loving girlfriend, I've improved in school.. BUT 'I' still succumb to gambling every now and then .. Working on it..
I'm astonished everyday of how naive I was yesterday. I love that feeling.:rolleyes:
I want to get to this point. I have the same feeling but don't really like it yet. I'm still dealing with a lot of negative feelings and am struggling with a lot of change in my life. The light at the end of my tunnel still seems very far away. But at least it's there now.
After lots of people told me I'd benefit from Buddhism, I went on the website of a local temple and read this. This is what truly spoke to me and made the decision easy:
The Second Noble Truth is that the cause of suffering is Ignorance. And the ignorance of oneself is the greatest ignorance.
The Third Noble Truth is that Ignorance, the cause of suffering, can be overcome.
I read Huston Smith's "The World's Religions," and the chapter on Buddhism just really resonated with me.
And just today at school, we had Phakchok Rinpoche come to my Asian Studies class and talk about Buddhism generally. I felt like everything he was saying about suffering, self, etc was just so.... natural and logical. Even more so than my previous so-called "rational and logical" atheist beliefs.
I'm looking more into the various Buddhist temples/communities around my area atm, and preparing to tell my devoutly Christian parents and my girlfriend about this new happening in my life. I haven't been this excited about something like this... since maybe forever?
Dunno really. I remeber talking with my apprentice about Buddhism, in the vaguest sense, at work one day. At some point after I found myself in the religion isle at Barnes and Noble. I picked up a self-help book masquerading as Zen and managed to find the Buddhism in it. It all just made perfect sense to me after that.
Buddhism is the only thing I've never had to try to believe.:D
Comments
I used psilocybin mushrooms and my experience eventually led me to Buddhism too.
I figured that having a well round understanding of these systems helped me. When Campbell described the Chakra's and how one traverses them at death i was aghast. I knew i hit gold. I told my gf at the time/ who now is my wife . "I bet if you reverse the death order in the chakras you can figure out what brings death on and meditate on stoping death" what i thought i found was an alchemical path . Like The Secret Of the Golden Flower. What i actually found was a map of subtle conciousness and a real way out.
My wife seeing something,bought me my first buddhist book " Tibetan book of the Dead" not actually a beginners book at all !. I didn't know what to make of it. I was scared , arrogant , and willing so i read the entire thing and thought i knew the whole spectrum. LOL. Then something inside said these aren't just words, they are terms and have real meaning , read it again.
I read the commentary by HH the Dalai Lama and fell asleep. LOL
Then i read the preliminaries.
In short i worked from the most complex system down to the simplist. I knew that i found the truth because little by little the words in the beginners books fit into the spectrum of the TBOD.
That was five years ago and many many books ago. I guess i found my elixir the philosophical gold. I truely feel that i have seen the stone of the philosophers.
But I almost feel as if I started this journey much earlier.
Acompanying that awareness was a burst of energy. I literally spoke in tongues for about 15 minutes which was an attempt to do something with that energy.
This experience happened right after a huge depression that lasted 72 hours over a romance gone bad. Multiple people on the street asked me if I was ok so I know my face looked horrible pain. It was some of the worst pain I ever experienced.
Then after the burst of energy my mind became unhinged and I had psychotic phenomenon. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder because I sought help at the student health center. They referred me to the hospital. I was reading everything as a code. I recognize the maps of the newspaper the main character makes in 'A beatiful Mind'. I made the same code maps of ordinary speach. Hidden messages.
I came to buddhism trying to cope with the sluggishness my medicine made me feel along with depression. I was curious about the burst of energy and insight I had that was so beatiful and I got back to that eventually. But initially I wanted something to help me in my depression.
When I first meditated in a book on the topic by Kathleen McDonald it didn't feel good until I stood up. But that 3 seconds of relief kept me tuned in.
The buddhist teachings continued to help me. My main problem was getting attached to thoughts and states of mind.
However I haven't shared this with anyone in great detail, so I'm going to take this opportunity to do so here, since the OP did ask after all.
Buddhism was revealed to me through the seeds of my own unsettled sense of ego. For as long as I can remember I have struggled with trying to identify myself and label my identity to fit into what I thought I needed to be. My constant struggle was trying to place a face and name on myself. Constantly asking myself "Who am I? What should I be? Who do I need in my life and what is wrong with me?" This torment became exhausting. One of the large areas of my struggle with ego was focused on my romantic relationships. I was constantly trying to validate my image of myself by trying to find "The perfect girl" for me.
No matter whom I was engaged with in a relationship, I was never satisfied. I was projecting the same thinking onto her. I was trying to put an identity, a label, an image of her and incessantly comparing her to my "ideal." Since my "ideal" was an ever shifting phenomena, this led to a number of failed relationships, due to my own unhappiness with self.
Fortunatley, through an online dating website of all places, I met a girl who had a certain demeanor which was conducive to calm and selfless behavior. Her serenity and calm presence rubbed off on me and allowed me to see how I was manifesting these unsettled thoughts on my own. During my previous relationships I never took the time for this pausing, and resting, long enough to have the necessary insight.
After we developed a romantic relationship approaching the one year mark, I began to do the same nonsense I always did. I became restless and started craving someone new, someone to fit my ideal and keep me entertained. I tortured myself with worry and anguish trying to figure out what it is I wanted. I was so concerned with the thought, "What do I want?" and "What do I need?" I had never paused to ask, "Why do I want that?" And even if I had, I wouldn't have been able to explain it.
So due to all this unsettled thinking, I was on the verge of abandoning this relationship, just as I had to all of those in my past. I was convinced that I must be better than this situation, and I deserve someone better.
In July of this year (2010), I spent a week without seeing or talking to her. In that time I did my best to calm down and relax into my current scenario in life. I reflected on my physical situation, and realized all of my physical needs were met. In fact I even realized that I was living quite the charmed life. I had a gorgeous condo in a beautiful city. I had a job I loved, money in the bank, a family who loved me, a friendly room mate, a happy well behaved dog and most notably, a beautiful and happy girlfriend who gave me no reason to be displeased. I realized that the source of my unhappiness and grief, was me. It was my desire and craving to fill a void. A void which only existed in my mind. A void which could not be filled.
This understanding brought upon a sense of calm and acceptance in me. I found myself uttering the words, "It doesn't matter." often. This realization in itself had a softening affect on my mentality. I began to accept things as they are and chill out.
A couple weeks went by and while browsing the internet I found an article which was an interview with the Dalai Lama. I had no idea who the Dalai Lama was, except that he was a figure of Buddhism. I read through the interview and noticed that he seemed to be a rational and calm person. This intrigued me since this guy made a lot of sense.
I was unfamaliar with Buddhism so I did my basic "googling" of Buddhism and I was led to Buddhanet.net. I read a writing on there about the Four Noble Truths. As I read that article I recall feeling an intense sense of excitement and connection, as though what I was reading was truly profound. I was stunned at how seemingly simple the concepts were, and the incredible insight they contained.
This reading led me to other writings on "Intuitive Awareness" and I began to understand. Today I find myself completely immersed in Buddhist reading. I just today finished the book "Understanding Our Mind" by Thich Nhat Hanh. This has given me the awareness and insight I never before could have imagined. I've began meditating daily and I am truly at peace.
I'm astonished everyday of how naive I was yesterday. I love that feeling.:rolleyes:
Christianity; Taoism; Islam; Buddhism; Hinduism(of course); Jainism; Sikhism; Judaism... Only when I was reading did I realize that anything can be true... And I din't have any proof for what I was believing in... The religion that influenced me immediately upon reading and cleared all my doubts was Buddhism...... (For there was this question forever:What is the proof of god's existence? Can I see him? If I need to do something to see him, he's not being impartial OR kind...) And immediately I knew Buddhism was my thing... and I converted..... I am a Hindu Brahmin by birth so my parents are very orthodox and don't like me practice Buddhism..... But now, upon further research in Hinduism(don't ask me to quote anything, cause I forget where it is from, but I remember what it is-and I am not lying), I have found that, the first god was formless, and was known as "Upadhi" which was nothing but the sound "AUM" created by the fast movement of the universe.... This kinda tallies with the Buddhist idea of prana... But still I am a buddhist as you don't need to dig in so much to discover truth for it is given openly out... And now, I am trying to tell my parents this but I am not able to as they know a lot of mantras, veda, etc and think they know everything about Hinduism(though they don't accept it) and are not ready to believe anything that I say... They say they believe in Advaita(non-dual philosophy) but still they don't accept my story :P....... So what i am trying to say is that Hinduism was also the same as Buddhism though it has been modified these days because people want to believe what they want to.....
And,
I have found another thing..... Which IS very startling, but true......
There are some schools of Hinduism which say that the soul is not the "I" and there can be nothing which can be quoted as "I"... That is Anatta, if I am not mistaken?
Love And Light,
Nidish
Then came LSD - Which I almost committed suicide while taking because I realized I didn't know what life was.
Then came panic attacks, which forced me to find solutions..
Then I came across Adyashanti.. and Buddhist practice.
I no longer take drugs or drink, I have a loving girlfriend, I've improved in school.. BUT 'I' still succumb to gambling every now and then
Thank you.
I want to get to this point. I have the same feeling but don't really like it yet. I'm still dealing with a lot of negative feelings and am struggling with a lot of change in my life. The light at the end of my tunnel still seems very far away. But at least it's there now.
After lots of people told me I'd benefit from Buddhism, I went on the website of a local temple and read this. This is what truly spoke to me and made the decision easy:
The Second Noble Truth is that the cause of suffering is Ignorance. And the ignorance of oneself is the greatest ignorance.
The Third Noble Truth is that Ignorance, the cause of suffering, can be overcome.
And just today at school, we had Phakchok Rinpoche come to my Asian Studies class and talk about Buddhism generally. I felt like everything he was saying about suffering, self, etc was just so.... natural and logical. Even more so than my previous so-called "rational and logical" atheist beliefs.
I'm looking more into the various Buddhist temples/communities around my area atm, and preparing to tell my devoutly Christian parents and my girlfriend about this new happening in my life. I haven't been this excited about something like this... since maybe forever?
Buddhism is the only thing I've never had to try to believe.:D