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Attachment

shanyinshanyin Novice YoginSault Ontario Veteran
edited January 2011 in Buddhism Basics
I started forgetting alot of things I never could have predicted I would forget.

When Buddha/Buddhists talk about attachment, what exactly do they mean?

Comments

  • whiterabbitwhiterabbit Explorer
    What does forgetting things and attachment have to do with each other? I'm not being facetious, I'm just not sure how to answer you question.
  • shanyinshanyin Novice Yogin Sault Ontario Veteran
    My thought reaction was the statement doesnt... like...

    If you could pretend the statement wasn't there would that help?

    I might have missed the point.
  • shanyinshanyin Novice Yogin Sault Ontario Veteran
    <3
  • dr_arpiedr_arpie
    now when you say forget. do you mean you dont understand what attachment really is anymore?
  • DhammaDhatuDhammaDhatu Veteran
    edited January 2011
    in buddhism, attachment is to take delight in things or remain holding on to things

    for example, if you were a sports star when you were young, the mind keeps referring back to that to maintain one's self-image

    or if you had an old love, the mind keeps longing for & thinking back to that old love

    attachment is also regarding things to be "I", "me" or "mine"

    the buddha taught when the mind stops regarding things, including mental objects, such as memories, as "I", "me" &/or "mine", then they fade from the mind

    or when we stop delighting in something, sure, it starts to fade from the mind

    so "forgetting" can be an effect of non-attachment, where one stops delighting or holding onto things, or where one, on the enlightened level, starts to regard mental objects as being merely mental objects or phenomena (rather than "me")

    kind regards

    DD

    :)

  • shanyinshanyin Novice Yogin Sault Ontario Veteran
    now when you say forget. do you mean you dont understand what attachment really is anymore?
    It means if someone asked me to define it I would say: something which is not technically not absolutely part of the whole thing but it becomes part of it, such as a silencer on a pistol is an example of an attachment. Then I would say I'm pretty sure there's another meaning, which I used to know, say 3 years ago, but I don't remember it anymore.

    Thank you all.
  • shanyinshanyin Novice Yogin Sault Ontario Veteran
    edited January 2011
    Dhamma do you mean effect *of* non-attachment?
  • whiterabbitwhiterabbit Explorer
    I agree with DD except that I'm not sure non-attachment and forgetting are at all the same thing.

    Non-attachment shouldn't necessarily mean you forget about something, but instead that it no longer has power to affect you. For instance, I remember that when I was a child I got made fun of a lot for my last name, but that has no effect on me anymore, even if someone were to make fun of my name now, I would feel bad for THEM, instead of myself.

    On the other hand, I've forgotten a lot of things I did in high school, but I kind of wish I remember (my friends have good stories that I just for the life of me can't even remember doing), and so am attached to the memory that isn't even there anymore.

    Other than that though I think DD has a great definition of non-attachment as far as my understanding goes.
  • DhammaDhatuDhammaDhatu Veteran
    Dhamma do you mean effect *of* non-attachment?
    yes

    :)

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