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So what are we then?
ravkes
Veteran
So I've heard it said. You're not your thoughts, emotions, blah blah.. you're aware of them.
I'm also seeing that reality doesn't very much care about our supposed desires, it acts according to what it wants to do.
"MERR I'M NATURE, I DON'T CARE IF THERE ARE PEOPLE HERE" "GO TSUNAMI, GO EARTHQUAKE"..
Not trying to poke fun, but err.. it really doesn't care.
You can't really control other people either, heck you can't even control yourself.. most of us are controlled by desire, habit of thought etc..
And y'all will come back with - LOL NO, DUDE BUDDHA SAID IF YOU DO X AND X YOU CAN OVERCOME THIS, that very well may be true but why in the heck do we have to deal with all the suffering and crap in the first place..
LOL MAN KARMA, no dude.. that doesn't make any sense..
This entire world is insane.
So who's directing the show? Who are we? Who am I?
EDIT: I just realized that we have no choice over death too..
We have like 10% control and 90% is up to nature
I'm also seeing that reality doesn't very much care about our supposed desires, it acts according to what it wants to do.
"MERR I'M NATURE, I DON'T CARE IF THERE ARE PEOPLE HERE" "GO TSUNAMI, GO EARTHQUAKE"..
Not trying to poke fun, but err.. it really doesn't care.
You can't really control other people either, heck you can't even control yourself.. most of us are controlled by desire, habit of thought etc..
And y'all will come back with - LOL NO, DUDE BUDDHA SAID IF YOU DO X AND X YOU CAN OVERCOME THIS, that very well may be true but why in the heck do we have to deal with all the suffering and crap in the first place..
LOL MAN KARMA, no dude.. that doesn't make any sense..
This entire world is insane.
So who's directing the show? Who are we? Who am I?
EDIT: I just realized that we have no choice over death too..
We have like 10% control and 90% is up to nature
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Comments
This, monks, is the Noble Truth of Suffering (dukkha): birth is suffering; aging is suffering; illness is suffering; death is suffering; presence of objects we hate is suffering; separation from objects we love is suffering; not to obtain what we desire is suffering. In short, the Five Components of Existence are suffering.
This, monks, is the Noble Truth concerning the Origin of Suffering: verily, it originates in that craving which causes rebirth, which produced delight and passion, and seeks pleasure now here, now there; that is to say, craving for sensual pleasures, craving for continued life, craving for nonexistence.
This, monks, is the Noble Truth concerning the Cessation of Suffering: truly, it is the complete cessation of craving so that no passion remains; the laying aside of, the giving up, the being free from, the harboring no longer of, this craving.
This, monks, is the Noble Truth concerning the Way which leads to the Cessation of Suffering: verily, it is this Noble Eightfold Way, that is to say, right views, right intent, right speech, right conduct, right means of livelihood, right endeavor, right mindfulness, and right meditation.
Peace, my friend. Control has always been an illusion. We take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. We're all in this together.
I know that many do not like this interpretation of reality, since it kinda robs them of their individuality - a too big of a truth to swallow for the ego, perhaps.
No, I have no clue why or how do we exist. But I do know, that some thoughts can only bring us suffering and suffering is not very cool. So if I do not want to suffer, I could meditate, in order to see reality as it is - to see through all the delusions. But as I'm feeling super lazy, with 0 energy and 0 motivation, I'll just sit here and do nothing really useful.
\o/
I believe that the Buddha taught that the "why" part is totally irrelevant. So it really does not matter "why" and it is a waste of time to even concern yourself with such things. The "who shot me with a poison arrow" analogy speaks to this very thing. Have you heard it? A guy gets shot with a poison arrow and then he sits there pondering where it came from, who shot it, what it's true nature is, etc, etc. None of which is actually productive since none of the above will remove the arrow. If you just sit there trying to figure out who, what, why, you just end up dying from poison. Buddhism does not concern itself with who or why the first arrow was shot, it is only concerned with removing it.
In a few sentences. AFAIK. A speck of Infinite Mind jumped into the fertilized egg and stays there for about 80 years. IM takes biological form, in a human body with sense organs and a brain (which is just an organ too). IM is detached from "IT" which is HUUUGE and, because it's detached, is a mere teeny tiny speck and occupies a biological form "IT" (IM's "origin") is totally imponderable now; it's forgotten.
All that's left for 80 years is this: We know suffering and hardship is "wrong;" the world of "survival of the fittest" is just a nasty thing. Why is it this way? Who the frick knows!? All we know is we have been plunged into it. What do we do? We try to eliminate suffering and achieve happiness for ourselves and others (BTW, the difference between selves and others is zero). That's all there is to it. BTW, THAT'S a pretty big job we have!
That's as simple AND as profound as anything we can know for sure. Apparently that's what countless person-hours of meditation have come up with after comparing notes. Works for me. IM_H_O? Every other explanation is either wrong or too complicated and embellished.
I hope that helps a bit.
Wake up, breathe, enjoy this life and stop struggling to find some complicated answers. All the answers are exactly the simple ones we come to if we stop clinging. Enjoy the experiences you have, help others who are suffering, be free and flow with the stream of life.
Not needed...
This has nothing to do with earthquakes, wars and overpopulation though (just to mention a few possible problems).
At any given time, the entire world population will die, within say eighty years or so.
That’s billions of deaths, and somehow they never reach the news.
What does that mean? What are we then?
We are dust in the wind.
We have nothing to cling to. We are free.
Beautiful.
Thank you all for your wonderful answers.
Somewhere along the way we forget that it all really doesn't matter that much, and that's something to be happy about.
we are existence itself, experiencing itself for the sake of itself.
how can we be separate from existence? we can pretend.
Only when we mistake the finger for the moon we are blind.
But I don’t want to fall into hairsplitting with you Taiyaki!
I love your posts.
With metta,
Todd
the question should get you to work negatively. first figuring out what you aren't. then positively. figuring out what you are. then finally whats left after it all.
- Taizan Maezumi
Are the birds and insects suffering?
Human beings have invented this world in our mind.
We have the biggest brain & we suffer the most.
Solution; lobotomy or meditation.
Nobody created this world for us to suffer in.
Where are you, god? When I needed you for answers?
Matthew 6: 28-29.
...."What he was trying to say was that human anxiety and concern about physical and material needs, though understandable, are not the key to the true understanding of existence. "Is not life more than food, and the body more than raiment?" God knows we have need of these things and our worry and anxiety about them will not add one hour to our span of life, in fact it may do just the opposite. Moreover, greed and selfishness, which are the cause of most wars and human conflicts, are rooted in an underlying anxiety about material goods. We are afraid that the other guy will have too much of whatever it is we think we need and so we resolve to get ours first and horde the rest for future days."
I always loved that quotation.
Very Buddhist!
hell, it worked for the Buddha, didn't it?
This is what we as Buddhists strive for; Understanding Suffering, and ceasing suffering.
The dual arrows, and all that....
The dual arrows, and all that.... "
Where is the Hinduism in this statement? I am not seeing it. She correctly reflects this:
"I teach one thing and one only: suffering and the end of suffering."-The Buddha
With metta,
Todd
Metta to you too.
All the best,
Todd
The Swing points out, That's precisely what the Buddha came to teach.
All the things mentioned - "starving, thirsty, has cholera, aids and is on the verge of death" - are physical afflictions that one can transcend and either simply suffer as the physical affliction, without permitting that suffering to affect the state of Mind, or are also social constructs that befall a person, but which although affecting them in a bodily sense, need not affect them in a mental sense.
One learns to transcend that suffering through meditation and Mindfulness - something the Buddha did for 6 days before attaining Enlightenment. he was beset by the arrows and temptations of Mara, but was able to deflect such attacks and temptations through his meditation.
I hope I've clarified that sufficiently for you.
So what in that do you see as 'Hindu asceticism'?
Is there an official buddhist line regarding free will vs determinism?
Life is a series of moments, one leading to the next. No one determined it, but it is determined by this moment, and this moment, and this moment. It flows. Cause and effect, conditionality, dependent co-arising, these are the teachings of the Buddha. We are a part of the bigger picture, but everything of "us" is a smaller component that is not really us either. It is form/matter, feelings, perceptions, thoughts, consciousness... conditioned aggregates.
There is will. There is choice. There is mind and form. There's just no "you" on an ultimate sense, only in a conventional sense as referring to the conditioned five aggregates of which your awareness perceives itself a part of.
It's like when you close your eyes, start watching your breath, and random thoughts start popping up. You will them to stop, but they don't. At some point you realize... those thoughts aren't you. They can't be, as your intent/will is that they do not arise and they pop up regardless. They're conditioned arisings, and they belong to no one. The internal monologue in your head isn't you thinking, it's thoughts that are perceived in your body's voice, because you think that they're you, that they represent your self/soul. Try changing the voice to any other voice, and immediately it's just thought (not self).
Same goes for feelings, for perceptions, for the body, and eventually for all forms of consciousness/awareness itself. It all goes eventually (as being thought of as "self"), seen as belonging to no one and arising/passing due to conditions, causal interactions with the other aggregates internal and external.
I think, therefore there are thoughts.
I think I am, therefore there is delusion.
[The way i understand it, cause and effect is determinism. If every 'skillful choice' we make is just an outcome of events that came before, then how is that free will?
Is there an official buddhist line regarding free will vs determinism?]
As long as you identify with your thoughts, there is free will. But if you accept that you are not your thoughts, then there is only cause and effect.
free will: choosing your cause/effect. or choosing not to involve yourself in cause/effect.
most people are unconscious of cause/effect. when you become conscious of cause/effect you have the rare opportunity to change your cause/effect aka your condition. or drop it altogether. that is what we call enlightenment.
it's an existential realization though and not an intellectual exercise. wisdom is life changing when we open up to it. when we're not open it's all in the head or just philosophy.
But practice must be unwavering, assiduous, constant, continuous and devoted.
There is no reason why any human being - not just a monk - can apply this to their lives.
@pegembara
@taiyaki
Wow, I think I just learned something.
So, it's a bit like jumping off a cliff and learning to fly on the way down?
Now I'm freaked out.
Metta _/\_
Once you accept that, you're at peace. It doesn't bother you so much. You're not alone in this, every one and every thing shares the same nature of impermanence. No unchanging thing ever came into existence to begin with, life is flowing.
Everything you see, that's you. This post you are reading, it makes you at this moment. And also it's not you. Because there is no you.
Form is emptiness, emptiness is form.
By the way it is not determinism (so don't worry
by seeing the emptiness, you see the fullness. emptiness is a fullness. it is infinite potential and the infinite mystery of reality as it is.
how you interpret reality as it is...is your chimera. touch the still point where words cannot reach. that's all that matters.