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Among Tibetans there is a saying that a person who thinks he is better or above others because he is wiser, more capable, more knowledgeable or learned is like someone sitting on the highest peak of the highest mountain. And what is it like on the peak of that mountain? It is very cold there. It’s very hard. It’s very lonely and nothing grows there. On the other hand, the person who cultivates humility and puts himself in a lower position is said to enjoy living on the fertile land of the planes.
~ Khandro Rinpoche
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personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
Joseph Goldstein reads this passage from the book Bangkok Tattoo by John Burdett. It's on the harsh side, but rings fairly true.
You see, dear reader (speaking frankly, without any intention to offend), you are a ramshackle collection of coincidences held together by a desperate and irrational clinging, there is no center at all, everything depends on everything else, your body depends on the environment, your thoughts depend on whatever junk floats in from the media, your emotions are largely from the reptilian end of your DNA, your intellect is a chemical computer that can’t add up a zillionth as fast as a pocket calculator, and even your best side is a superficial piece of social programming that will fall apart just as soon as your spouse leaves with the kids and the money in the joint account, or the economy starts to fail and you get the sack, or you get conscripted into some idiot’s war, or they give you the news about your brain tumor. To name this amorphous morass of self-pity, vanity, and despair self is not only the height of hubris, it is also proof (if any were needed) that we are above all a delusional species. (We are in a trance from birth to death.) Prick the balloon, and what do you get? Emptiness. It’s not only us-this radical doctrine applies to the whole of the sentient world. In a bumper sticker: The fear of letting go prevents you from letting go of the fear of letting go. Here’s the good Phra in fine fettle today: “Take a snail, for example. Consider what brooding overweening self-centered passion got it into that state. Can you see the rage of a snail? The frustration of a cockroach? The ego of an ant? If you can, then you are close to enlightenment.”
Like I say, not everyone’s cup of miso. Come to think of it, I do believe I prefer Pisit, but the Phra does have a point: take two steps in the divine art of Buddhist meditation, and you will find yourself on a planet you no longer recognize. Those needs and fears you thought were the very bones of your being turn out to be no more than bugs in your software.
You see, dear reader (speaking frankly, without any intention to offend), you are a ramshackle collection of coincidences held together by a desperate and irrational clinging
The rest of the quote is good too, but I feel like this is one of the most wonderful, concise, unpretentious (and that is very important), and fun summaries of Buddhadharma I've yet to encounter.
We are deluded?
Who would have guessed. Most of us hopefully. It is harsh @person ...
BUT somehow through our delusion we can recognise the reality of our state.
Now what?
Real compassion extends to each and every sentient being, not just to friends or family or those in terrible situations. To develop the practice of compassion to its fullest extent, one must practice patience. Shantideva tells us that if the practice of patience really moves your mind and brings about a change, you will begin to see your enemies as the best of friends, even as spiritual guides. Enemies provide us some of the best opportunities to practice patience, tolerance, and compassion.
How to Practice: The Way to a Meaningful Life
We can choose to take refuge in the brilliant sanity of enlightenment, the Buddha; trust the process of the path, the Dharma; and rely on the experience of those who guide us along the path, the Sangha.
"All the various types of teachings and spiritual paths are related to the different capacities of understanding that different individuals have. There does not exist, from an absolute point of view, any teaching which is more perfect or effective than another.
A teaching's value lies solely in the inner awakening which an individual can arrive at through it. If a person benefits from a given teaching, for that person that teaching is the supreme path, because it is suited to his or her nature and capacities. There's no sense in trying to judge it as more or less elevated in relation to other paths to realization."
.
~Chögyal Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche.
.
Emaho!
6
federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
"All the various types of teachings and spiritual paths are related to the different capacities of understanding that different individuals have. There does not exist, from an absolute point of view, any teaching which is more perfect or effective than another.
A teaching's value lies solely in the inner awakening which an individual can arrive at through it. If a person benefits from a given teaching, for that person that teaching is the supreme path, because it is suited to his or her nature and capacities. There's no sense in trying to judge it as more or less elevated in relation to other paths to realization."
.
~Chögyal Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche.
.
Emaho!
I needed some of this today, then grew very tired with the thread. It is a Monday, where I am not feeling aligned, there is some anger, some impatience, some disappointment, and unfulfilled, exasperating desire. I am watching it all, so that it does not spill over, and I end up being less than patient or disrespectful to folks. I have not felt this way, or rather it has not been so intense in quite some time. In practice this morning it was there but subdued as I sat. I am trying to not let it be anything, but my ego loom, has collected a lot of yarn, and is trying very hard to make a sweater. This thread and Pablo Casals cello are managing to redirect me for a bit. Thanks @Bunks
4
federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
@Rojeho, I liken this kind of feeling to having just changed my baby's nappy (diaper) whereupon they immediately proceed then t have the biggest, smelliest most disgusting dump I could imagine... What the heck did they eat?? Oh and the cat's brought in a half-eaten bird and vomited the rest in the middle of my sitting room carpet - cream deep-pile, obviously.... and the dog's left a mountain of hair on the back seat of my just-valeted car...
It's a shit-storm and the only one who can clear it up is me.
Just one thing at a time. Just one.
Just one step at a time.
Just one.
You don't need to clear up your mind-mess in one fell swoop.
Go at it a morsel at a time.
Work out what you immediately need to make yourself feel better, whatever that might be.
Then go at it slow but sure...
Be calm.
Know that one way or another, we've all had times like this, and there's a way in, an abiding, and a way out.
So be good to yourself. Don't beat yourself up about this.
This too shall pass.
By paying attention calmly, in all situations, we begin to see clearly the truth of life experience. We realise that pain and joy are both inevitable and that they are also both temporary.
~ Sylvia Boorstein, Don’t Just Do Something, Sit There
Sages, too, endure the same mundane circumstances as we—they fall sick, suffer injuries, meet with unwelcome changes—but their wisdom sees past the incidental to the universal, to the certainty of change that is best coped with by equanimity. Wisdom does not alter the world; it lets the sage transcend the world.
—Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano
3
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose,
do not like,
do not dislike,
all will then be clear,
make a hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart
if you want the truth to stand clear before you
never be for or against
the struggle between for and against is the mind's worst disease.
@person said:
The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose,
do not like,
do not dislike,
all will then be clear,
make a hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart
if you want the truth to stand clear before you
never be for or against
the struggle between for and against is the mind's worst disease.
Seung Sahn
I like it but strange to apply to trivial things like watching your sports team and hoping that they win!
0
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
@person said:
The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose,
do not like,
do not dislike,
all will then be clear,
make a hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart
if you want the truth to stand clear before you
never be for or against
the struggle between for and against is the mind's worst disease.
Seung Sahn
I like it but strange to apply to trivial things like watching your sports team and hoping that they win!
Funny. I suppose it means I have to give up on my lifelong support for my team to be enlightened. On a more mundane level I sometimes talk about my team with rabid fans and I'll bring up things they could do better or are failing at and the rabid fan gets all upset because they want so bad to believe that our team is perfect.
@person said:
The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose,
do not like,
do not dislike,
all will then be clear,
make a hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart
if you want the truth to stand clear before you
never be for or against
the struggle between for and against is the mind's worst disease.
Seung Sahn
I like it but strange to apply to trivial things like watching your sports team and hoping that they win!
Funny. I suppose it means I have to give up on my lifelong support for my team to be enlightened. On a more mundane level I sometimes talk about my team with rabid fans and I'll bring up things they could do better or are failing at and the rabid fan gets all upset because they want so bad to believe that our team is perfect.
It's not about giving up...it's about seeing the futility in it all...
2
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
Not a Buddhist quote but Marcus Aurelius is considered a stoic philosopher, and stoicism has much in common with Buddhism. I randomly came across this quote and loved it.
“The best revenge is not to be like your enemy.” -Marcus Aurelius
3
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
edited October 2018
Another non-Buddhist Buddhist, the stoic Epictetus
“Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants.”
“Don't explain your philosophy. Embody it.”
“Man is not worried by real problems so much as by his imagined anxieties about real problems”
“It's not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.”
“The key is to keep company only with people who uplift you, whose presence calls forth your best.”
“Any person capable of angering you becomes your master;
he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.”
“People are not disturbed by things, but by the views they take of them.”
“You are a little soul carrying around a corpse”
“He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has. ”
“Caretake this moment. Immerse yourself in its particulars. Respond to this person, this challenge, this deed. Quit evasions. Stop giving yourself needless trouble. It is time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now.”
The Venerable Muttātherī has given us a short and sweet list of five things she is thankful of the bhikkhunīsaṅgha (assembly of nuns) for:
I'm free, well-freed.
Freed from three crooked things that bent me down:
My mortar, my pestle, my husband.
Uprooting craving leading to being,
I'm free from age and death.
All of creation, the entire universe, is 'friendly' towards being; thus all things that come, come to aid us in our enlightenment. Therefore, be thankful for everything.
“In our daily life, we might think, ‘Wouldn’t it be amazing to be like Chenrezik?’ and then make efforts to become someone on the mahayana path and turn into a bodhisattva. Though we might try hard to embody these ideals, we have deep-seated habits and a powerful ignorance that work against us, so we are continually defeated and victory is elusive. In the beginning of practicing Dharma, we want it to go well and we are happy to meditate. But gradually as time passes, we often become distracted, and so it is difficult to achieve our goal.
“At the start, we think it will be easy, but as we actually engage in meditation, it turns out to be more difficult than we had thought, so we worry. ‘It’s too difficult. I’m not up to this. It’s only for people with high realization and refined awareness.’ If we have such thoughts, we shouldn’t pay too much attention to them. No matter what work we may do, sometimes we will succeed and sometimes not. That is just the way things are.
“When we are practicing the Dharma, one of the most important things is that we have a deep-seated confidence in ourselves and our practice. No matter how often we might fail, the courage of our Dharma practice gives us the confidence to try again. We can be inspired, thinking ‘I’m going to succeed. I will make it happen.’ No matter how many problems we might have, we do not get discouraged, thinking ‘It’s just not working,’ but we simply continue to make an effort. Why? Not just this lifetime, but from beginningless time, we have been dealing with difficulties. When we remember this simple fact, having a rough time will not make us downhearted. We can motivate ourselves to keep going, knowing that like before, even if we have problems, we can eventually succeed.
“From another perspective, having difficulties is a sign that we are making an effort. If we were not trying to do something, there would be no problems. When they arise, it means that we are on the road to accomplishing some objective, so we need not feel despondent, but see these complications as part of a larger picture.”
At one time, the Buddha dwelt at Śrāvastī in Jetavana in Anāthapiṇḍada’s park.
At that time the Lord said to the myriad monks: “Presently, here with you, I speak of the uncreated dharma, and to that uncreated, the path there-leading. Listen carefully, think wisely, what is the uncreated dharma?"
He said, “Of greed and craving, there is permanent exhaustion, of aversion, rage, ignorance, and delusion, there is perrmanent exhaustion, of all vexing afflictions, there is permanent exhaustion. This is the uncreated dharma. What is the treading to the uncreated, what is the path there-leading?”
He said, "The eight ranks of the path of the sages, true views, true intentions, true words, true karma, true livelihood, true efforts, true mindfulness, true samādhi, this is that which to the uncreated is the path there-leading.”
Buddhavacana this sermon was thereafter, many monks heard the Buddha teach it, and, joyful, they practised.
"Like this is the uncreated, like this is that which is difficult to realize,
with no moving, no bending, no dying.
Lacking secretions and smothered in the dark, it is the island shore.
Where there is ferrying, it is the crossing.
It is dependency’s ceasing, it is the end of circulating transmissions.
It is the exhaustion of the flame, it is the ending of the burning.
Flowing openly, pure and cool, with secret subtlety and calm occultation,
lacking ailment, lacking owning, nirvāṇa."
It was also, like that, said.
(Asaṁskṛtadharmasūtra 無為法經 Sermon on the Uncreated Phenomenon T99.224b7 Saṁyuktāgama sūtra #890)
One day, there were myriad elder monks dwelling in Kauśambī at Ghoṣitārāma.
At that time, there was the monk Chà Mó dwelling also in Kauśambī by the badarikā orchard, his body was increasing in iterations of woe and sicknesses.
At that time, there was the monk Tuó Suō keeping watch over the sick. At that time, Tuó Suō came to the myriad elder monks, bowed to the myriad elder monks’s feet, then to one side retreated to reside there.
The myriad elder monks spoke to the monk Tuó Suō: “You, go to the monk Chà Mó, speak: ‘The myriad elders implore you: Does your body slowly come to find peace? Do suffering and misery not increase, is it yes?’”
At that time, the monk Tuó Suō, subject to the myriad elder monks' dispensation, came to the monk Chà Mó and told to Chà Mó their tellings, saying: “The myriad elders beseech you, your body slowly comes to find peace, sufferings and miseries do not increase, yes?”
Chà Mó spoke to Tuó Suō saying: “I am sick and not recovering, I do not find peace, myriad hardships accumulate without salvation, tremendous and mighty suffering aches me, I presently suffer and endure much. It is like the slaughter of a bull, the sharp knife having cut into the live stomach, to fetch its inner organs, that bull’s stomach pain is the very same as what I am enduring! My present stomach pain is greater than that of the bull’s. It is as if two warriors clutched one weak man, suspended him attached above a fire, burning his two feet, my present two feet’s burnings are greater than his.”
At that time, Tuó Suō returned to the elders, according to what Chà Mó had said, he told them of his great sickness, entirely explaining to the elders.
At that time, the elders returned Tuó Suō, dispatching him to come to Chà Mó, that he might speak to Chà Mó, to say: “The Bhagavān has taught these five aggregates of binding, which of these five? The rūpaskandha, vedanā, saṃjñā, saṃskāra, vijñānaskandha, you, Chà Mó, can only poorly observe that these five aggregates of binding are without you, and are nothing to you belonging resolutely.”
At that time, Tuó Suō subject to the elders taught likewise thereafter, went forth to speak to Chà Mó, saying: “The elders speak to you, the Bhagavān speaks of these five aggregates of binding, you poorly observe they are without you, and are nothing to you belonging resolutely.”
Chà Mó spoke to Tuó Suō, saying: “I, in these five aggregates of binding, am able to find no me, and they are nothing to me belonging.”
Tuó Suō returned to address the elders: “The monk Chà Mó spoke, saying: ‘I, in these five aggregates of binding, observe and find no me, and they are nothing I own.’”
The elders again dispatched Tuó Suō to speak to Chà Mó, to say: “You, in these five aggregates of binding observe and find no me, and they are nothing I own, thus āsravāḥ are all-ended, and you are an arhat, resolutely?”
At that time, Tuó Suō, subject to the elders’s teachings, came closer to the monk Chà Mó, speaking to Chà Mó, saying: “The monk is able to thusly observe the five aggregates of binding, thus his āsravāḥ are all ended, an arhat he is, resolutely?”
Chà Mó replied to Tuó Suō, saying: “I observe these five aggregates of binding and find no me, and are nothing I own, but it is not that my āsravāḥ are all ended and it is not that I am an arhat resolutely.”
At that time, Tuó Suō left and returned to the elders, addressed the eldesr: “Chà Mó spoke: ‘I observe these five aggregates of binding and find no me, and are nothing I own, and yet it is not that my āsravāḥ are all ended and it is not that I am an arhat resolutely.’”
At that time, the elderes spoke to Tuó Suō: “You will again return to speak with Chà Mó: ‘You say: “I observe these five aggregates of binding and find no me, and are nothing I own, and yet it is not that my āsravāḥ are all ended [and it is not] that I am an arhat.” The front and end of your notion are incoherent.’”
Tuó Suō, subject to the elders’s teachings, went forth to Chà Mó: “You say: ‘I observe these five aggregates of binding and find no me, nothing to me belonging, and yet it is not that my āsravāḥ are all ended and it is not that I am an arhat.’ The front and end of your notion are incoherent.”
Chà Mó spoke to Tuó Suō saying: “I in these five aggregates of binding, observe and find no me, and nothing to me belonging, meanwhile I am not an arhat, I with my pride, my desiring, this I-making. I am not yet resolute, not yet knowing it, not yet having severed from it, not yet having vomited it out.”
Tuó Suō left and returned to the elders, himself speaking to the elders: “Chà Mó said: ‘I in these five aggregates of binding, observe and find no me, and nothing to me belonging, meanwhile I am not an arhat, I with my pride, my desiring, I-making, I am not yet resolute, not yet knowing, not yet having severed, not yet having vomited.
The elders once more dispatched Tuó Suō to speak to Chà Mó, to say: “You speak of having ātman, how to you have ātman? It is that your form is ātman? It is that ātman is other than your form? Feelings, thoughts, formations, consciousness, this is "me?" Am I other than consciousness?”
Chà Mó spoke to Tuó Suō saying: “I do not say that my form is me, nor am I other than form; nor that feelings, thoughts, formations, consciousness, are me and mine, nor that I am other than consciousness, thus in these five aggregates of binding I have pride, I have desiring, these are I-makings. I am not yet resolute, not yet knowing, not yet having severed from it, not yet having vomited it out.”
Chà Mó spoke to Tuó Suō saying: “What vexation moves you, spurring you on to directions contrary? You fetch a cane, that I may come, I myself with my cane, will approach the elders, I beseech you, give me my cane.”
At that time, the myriad elders, in the distance, saw Chà Mó with his staff on his way coming, themselves spread out a seat for him, found a place to rest his feet, themselves went forth to greet him, to take his robe and alms bowl, ordering that he promptly sit, exchanging words to reassure the weary, speaking to Chà Mó saying:
“You speak of having ātman, how to you have ātman? It is that your form is ātman? It is that ātman is other than your form? Feelings, thoughts, formations, consciousness, this is "me?" Am I other than consciousness?”
Chà Mó Bhikṣu spoke:
“It is not that form is me, but it is not that I am other than form; there is no feeling, thought, formation, or consciousness that is mine, yet I am not other than consciousness, thus in these five aggregates of binding I have my pride, I have my desiring, this I-making. I am not yet resolute, I am not yet knowing, not yet having severed, not yet having vomited. It is like the flowers. The utpala, paduma, kumuda, or puṇḍarīka flower's. It is like these flowers' scent. Is it the roots' scent? Is the scent other than the roots? Is it the stem's, the leaf's, the whiskers', the fine constituents' or the coarse constituents' scent? Are the fine constituents other than the coarse constituents? It is so said, no?"
The elders responded: "No, resolutely, Chà Mó! It is not the utpala's, the paduma's, the kumuda's, the puṇḍarīka's roots’ scent, but it is not that the scent is other than root, so too also it is not the stem's, the leaf's, the whiskers', the fine constituents', or the coarse constituents' scent, so too also it is not that the fine constituents are other than the coarse constituents."
Chà Mó again asked: "It is what's scent?"
The elders replied: "It is the flower's."
Chà Mó again replied: "I, too, am thus so. It is not that my form is me, yet I am not other than form; there is no feeling, thought, formation, or consciousness that is resolutely mine, yet I am not apart from consciousness. So I in these five aggregates of binding see no me, and they are nothing I own, as such is my pride, my desiring, I-making, not yet resolute, not yet knowing, not yet having severed, not yet having vomited. Elders, hear my exposition of analogy. Worldlings and sages, on account of metaphor attain to understanding. Such an analogy is this: The wet-nurse has a cloth, she pays the launderer to wash it, he washes it with all kinds of grey broth, he rinses until glistening. The filth still remainders lingering in fumes, there must be applied to it all kinds of incenses & perfumes, he knows how to cause these fumes to vanish. Like this, one must inquire into what extent the sage disciple severs from these five aggregates of binding, with true insight there is no me, and there is nothing I own, enduring these five aggregates of binding I have pride, I have desiring, I-making, not yet resolute, not yet knowing, not yet having severed, not yet having vomited. Afterwards, in these five aggregates of binding, further investigation is undertook, profound insight into saṃsāra is attained, this form, this form’s origin, this form’s cessation, this feeling, thought, formation, consciousness, this consciousness’s origin, this consciousness’s cessation. And so, in these five aggregates of binding, with profound insight into saṃsāra, after that, my pride, my desiring, these I-makings, are all entirely cast away, this is called penetrating insight into the true aspect.”
When Chà Mó spoke the dharma, those elders’s manifold contaminants became immaculate with their attainment of the pure dharma eye.
(Khemakabhikṣusūtra 差摩比丘經 Sermon of the Monk Chà Mó T99.29c06 Saṁyuktāgama sūtra #103)
"Life is suffering.
Stop identifying with your emotions and remain analytical.
Everything is just as it is."
-Shivah Solomon
???
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JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
@Buddhalotus said:
"Life is suffering.
Stop identifying with your emotions and remain analytical.
Everything is just as it is."
-Shivah Solomon
???
I don’t know whether that is good advice... being analytical all the time encourages a certain coolness and a distance, and a continuous peering-closely to take the self apart. It’s certainly good to be able to do it, but as a way to spend a majority of time I wouldn’t recommend it. It’s better to just be the Watcher and not involve the mind.
That said, identifying with the emotions is also not ideal. Spending time being aware of the emotions and living close to them is a good thing, but if you identify you are continually taken on a roller coaster ride involving mind, ego, and all kinds of other reactions. So not identifying and creating a little distance is healthy, I think. Interesting quote...
Psychologists talk about people who are co-dependent because they don't have a sense of self. What psychologists mean when they say a person has no sense of self is very different from what the Buddha meant by no-self or selflessness. People with psychological problems actually have a very strong sense of self in the Buddhist sense, although they may not in the psychological sense of the word. Psychologically, they don't see themselves as efficacious individuals in the world, but they still have a very strong sense of "I": "I am worthless." When somebody criticizes them, they don't like it. They get into co-dependent relationships to protect or to please this "I." When they fall into self-pity, their sense of an inherently existent "I" is very strong. Thus they still have self-grasping even though they lack a psychologically healthy sense of self.
Buddhism recognizes two kinds of sense of self. There's one sense of self that is healthy and necessary to be efficacious on the path. The object of this sense of self is the conventionally existent "I." The other sense of self grasps at an inherently existent self that never has and never will exist. Within Buddhism, when we talk about realizing emptiness, we're negating the false self, this self that appears inherently existent to us. Thubten Chodron from Cultivating a Compassionate Heart: The Yoga Method of Chenrezig
I remember reading that translators had a hard time finding a word that conveyed the notion of lack of self-esteem in Tibetan to the Dalai Lama, because he said that there was not such thing for Tibetan Buddhists.
Being born in a human form was considered fortunate enough, given the vagaries of samsaric lottery, so people already set out in life with a wholesome conception of self.
Naturally, this "self" is not what we would define as "ego."
Ego builds and reinforces boundaries, while a Buddhist notion of "self" seeks to shed layers of individuation and inter-be.
It's already implied. It takes time for an acorn to become an Oak, but the Oak is already implied in the acorn. So in any lump of rock, floating around in space, there is implicit human intelligence - sometime, somehow, somewhere. We all go together.
So don't differentiate yourself, and back up against this and say "I am a living organism in a world of dead junk, rocks and stuff." It all goes together. Those rocks are just as much "you" as your fingernails. You need rocks. What are you going to stand upon?
In reverence for the root gnosis of the heart, the dharmakāya,
for the ever present good law of the heart, the lotus terrace,
for the inborn adornment of the trikāya, the thirty-seven sages dwelling in the heart,
for the that which is removed from seed and fruit, the upright key to the universal gate,
for all boundless concentrations, the sea of virtue, the root perfection,
I prostrate, bowing to the hearts of all Buddhas.
(Venerable Ānrán, 胎藏金剛菩提心義略問答鈔 Garbhadhātuvajradhātubodhicittārthasāsananirdeśa "Treatise on the teaching of the gnostic heart of the womb realm and diamond realm" T2397.1.470c5-8)
The eagle that is flying high in the sky should not forget that it will come down one day to see its shadow.
~ Guru Rinpoche
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federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
"Your shadow will follow you. At times it will be in front of you, and at others, beside you. But your shadow will never ever be ON you. It cannot have that power."
(A line I overheard from some tv programme I was watching, can't even remember what it was about. Just struck me as a good metaphor for fighting 'The Black Dog'.)
I heard the other day that “humans are like smartphones, memes are like apps” which provoked a bit of humming and thought.
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personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
“Understanding someone’s suffering is the best gift you can give another person. Understanding is love’s other name. If you don’t understand, you can’t love.”
― Thích Nhất Hạnh, How to Love
Hearing this quote today opened up a door into understanding the way that wisdom and compassion naturally arise from one another or actually are one another.
"When the intellect ventures into where it does not belong, it becomes lost in it's own confusion !" ~Zen~
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personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
The potential for realization is universal and present for all of us. True benefit will come from your own efforts, for your efforts to bring benefit you must take your life into your own hands and examine your mind and experience. From this point of view nobody could be kinder to you than yourself. Nobody could have a greater effect on you, or actually do more for you than yourself. The Buddha said, I have shown you the path to liberation, now liberation depends on you. This is really true. If you don't take your life into your own hands not even the Buddhas can make a difference, its up to you.
~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
“We do not say that because things are empty they do not exist; we say that because things exist they are empty.” A Prasaṅgika-Madhyamaka Tibetan saying
@person said:
“We do not say that because things are empty they do not exist; we say that because things exist they are empty.” A Prasaṅgika-Madhyamaka Tibetan saying
How so?
I don't get it?
0
personDon't believe everything you thinkThe liminal spaceVeteran
@person said:
“We do not say that because things are empty they do not exist; we say that because things exist they are empty.” A Prasaṅgika-Madhyamaka Tibetan saying
How so?
I don't get it?
Emptiness is a property of things not a transcendent reality underlying the conventional that is the really real. Without the conventional world of things there is no such thing as emptiness. Additionally the conventional is only able to exist and function because it is empty. If things had a true essence they couldn't change and interact.
IOW emptiness isn't nihilism, it isn't about negating reality. The object being negated is only our mistaken perception of reality.
I added an edit IOW, also the link is pretty dense but has all the ideas. I'm sorry, its not a simple subject and can be hard to sum up briefly and concisely.
I added an edit IOW, also the link is pretty dense but has all the ideas. I'm sorry, its not a simple subject and can be hard to sum up briefly and concisely.
Is emptiness like with philosophy, where you can think yourself into nothing? https://www.iep.utm.edu/perc-obj/
Or is it like mysticism where; existence = God dunnit? Or is it like where in poetry:
I was so full
I was empty
Thinking Nothing
I saw Everything
Clearly I was deluded
A Buddha in a swamp of Light
A dark lightening
Emptying nihilism
Comments
~ Khandro Rinpoche
Joseph Goldstein reads this passage from the book Bangkok Tattoo by John Burdett. It's on the harsh side, but rings fairly true.
The rest of the quote is good too, but I feel like this is one of the most wonderful, concise, unpretentious (and that is very important), and fun summaries of Buddhadharma I've yet to encounter.
We are deluded?
Who would have guessed. Most of us hopefully. It is harsh @person ...
BUT somehow through our delusion we can recognise the reality of our state.
Now what?
Real compassion extends to each and every sentient being, not just to friends or family or those in terrible situations. To develop the practice of compassion to its fullest extent, one must practice patience. Shantideva tells us that if the practice of patience really moves your mind and brings about a change, you will begin to see your enemies as the best of friends, even as spiritual guides. Enemies provide us some of the best opportunities to practice patience, tolerance, and compassion.
How to Practice: The Way to a Meaningful Life
—Lama Tsony
I think that says it all....
When you are with others, watch your speech.
When you are alone, watch your mind.
Pabongka Rinpoche
http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/22512/favorite-buddhist-quote
I needed some of this today, then grew very tired with the thread. It is a Monday, where I am not feeling aligned, there is some anger, some impatience, some disappointment, and unfulfilled, exasperating desire. I am watching it all, so that it does not spill over, and I end up being less than patient or disrespectful to folks. I have not felt this way, or rather it has not been so intense in quite some time. In practice this morning it was there but subdued as I sat. I am trying to not let it be anything, but my ego loom, has collected a lot of yarn, and is trying very hard to make a sweater. This thread and Pablo Casals cello are managing to redirect me for a bit. Thanks @Bunks
@Rojeho, I liken this kind of feeling to having just changed my baby's nappy (diaper) whereupon they immediately proceed then t have the biggest, smelliest most disgusting dump I could imagine... What the heck did they eat?? Oh and the cat's brought in a half-eaten bird and vomited the rest in the middle of my sitting room carpet - cream deep-pile, obviously.... and the dog's left a mountain of hair on the back seat of my just-valeted car...
It's a shit-storm and the only one who can clear it up is me.
Just one thing at a time. Just one.
Just one step at a time.
Just one.
You don't need to clear up your mind-mess in one fell swoop.
Go at it a morsel at a time.
Work out what you immediately need to make yourself feel better, whatever that might be.
Then go at it slow but sure...
Be calm.
Know that one way or another, we've all had times like this, and there's a way in, an abiding, and a way out.
So be good to yourself. Don't beat yourself up about this.
This too shall pass.
I needed that too. Thank you @federica
There is no right or wrong, but right is right and wrong is wrong ~Seung Sahn
The article is pretty good too.
By paying attention calmly, in all situations, we begin to see clearly the truth of life experience. We realise that pain and joy are both inevitable and that they are also both temporary.
~ Sylvia Boorstein, Don’t Just Do Something, Sit There
Sages, too, endure the same mundane circumstances as we—they fall sick, suffer injuries, meet with unwelcome changes—but their wisdom sees past the incidental to the universal, to the certainty of change that is best coped with by equanimity. Wisdom does not alter the world; it lets the sage transcend the world.
—Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano
The perfect way is only difficult for those who pick and choose,
do not like,
do not dislike,
all will then be clear,
make a hair's breadth difference and heaven and earth are set apart
if you want the truth to stand clear before you
never be for or against
the struggle between for and against is the mind's worst disease.
Seung Sahn
I like it but strange to apply to trivial things like watching your sports team and hoping that they win!
Funny. I suppose it means I have to give up on my lifelong support for my team to be enlightened. On a more mundane level I sometimes talk about my team with rabid fans and I'll bring up things they could do better or are failing at and the rabid fan gets all upset because they want so bad to believe that our team is perfect.
It's not about giving up...it's about seeing the futility in it all...
Not a Buddhist quote but Marcus Aurelius is considered a stoic philosopher, and stoicism has much in common with Buddhism. I randomly came across this quote and loved it.
Another non-Buddhist Buddhist, the stoic Epictetus
483 total quotes https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/13852.Epictetus
“To think in terms of either pessimism or optimism oversimplifies the truth. The problem is to see reality as it is." Thich Nhat Hanh
"You cannot ask the darkness to leave:
you must turn on the light"
~Sogyal Rinpoche
The Venerable Muttātherī has given us a short and sweet list of five things she is thankful of the bhikkhunīsaṅgha (assembly of nuns) for:
-Therīgāthā 1.11, Hymns of the Elder Nuns
All of creation, the entire universe, is 'friendly' towards being; thus all things that come, come to aid us in our enlightenment. Therefore, be thankful for everything.
Karmapa Teaches on the Practice of Chenrezik
(Asaṁskṛtadharmasūtra 無為法經 Sermon on the Uncreated Phenomenon T99.224b7 Saṁyuktāgama sūtra #890)
(Khemakabhikṣusūtra 差摩比丘經 Sermon of the Monk Chà Mó T99.29c06 Saṁyuktāgama sūtra #103)
"It's easy to wear a smile
and be pleasant when one's life flows along like some sweet song... ("Karma") 
But a person worthwhile is the one who can still wear a smile
. when things in their life go all wrong" ("Dharma") 
~Goenka~
"Life is suffering.
Stop identifying with your emotions and remain analytical.
Everything is just as it is."
-Shivah Solomon
???
I don’t know whether that is good advice... being analytical all the time encourages a certain coolness and a distance, and a continuous peering-closely to take the self apart. It’s certainly good to be able to do it, but as a way to spend a majority of time I wouldn’t recommend it. It’s better to just be the Watcher and not involve the mind.
That said, identifying with the emotions is also not ideal. Spending time being aware of the emotions and living close to them is a good thing, but if you identify you are continually taken on a roller coaster ride involving mind, ego, and all kinds of other reactions. So not identifying and creating a little distance is healthy, I think. Interesting quote...
I think, @Kerome, that what is meant by the quote is more on the following lines.
In Buddhism, we are encouraged to see reality exactly as it is, striving to be as objective as possible.
And not to get too carried away by our emotions about a situation.
Sometimes we are prone to overreact by our reading on a situation and maybe our reading is wrong.
Psychologists talk about people who are co-dependent because they don't have a sense of self. What psychologists mean when they say a person has no sense of self is very different from what the Buddha meant by no-self or selflessness. People with psychological problems actually have a very strong sense of self in the Buddhist sense, although they may not in the psychological sense of the word. Psychologically, they don't see themselves as efficacious individuals in the world, but they still have a very strong sense of "I": "I am worthless." When somebody criticizes them, they don't like it. They get into co-dependent relationships to protect or to please this "I." When they fall into self-pity, their sense of an inherently existent "I" is very strong. Thus they still have self-grasping even though they lack a psychologically healthy sense of self.
Buddhism recognizes two kinds of sense of self. There's one sense of self that is healthy and necessary to be efficacious on the path. The object of this sense of self is the conventionally existent "I." The other sense of self grasps at an inherently existent self that never has and never will exist. Within Buddhism, when we talk about realizing emptiness, we're negating the false self, this self that appears inherently existent to us.
Thubten Chodron from Cultivating a Compassionate Heart: The Yoga Method of Chenrezig
I remember reading that translators had a hard time finding a word that conveyed the notion of lack of self-esteem in Tibetan to the Dalai Lama, because he said that there was not such thing for Tibetan Buddhists.
Being born in a human form was considered fortunate enough, given the vagaries of samsaric lottery, so people already set out in life with a wholesome conception of self.
Naturally, this "self" is not what we would define as "ego."
Ego builds and reinforces boundaries, while a Buddhist notion of "self" seeks to shed layers of individuation and inter-be.
It's already implied. It takes time for an acorn to become an Oak, but the Oak is already implied in the acorn. So in any lump of rock, floating around in space, there is implicit human intelligence - sometime, somehow, somewhere. We all go together.
So don't differentiate yourself, and back up against this and say "I am a living organism in a world of dead junk, rocks and stuff." It all goes together. Those rocks are just as much "you" as your fingernails. You need rocks. What are you going to stand upon?
Alan Watts
(Venerable Ānrán, 胎藏金剛菩提心義略問答鈔 Garbhadhātuvajradhātubodhicittārthasāsananirdeśa "Treatise on the teaching of the gnostic heart of the womb realm and diamond realm" T2397.1.470c5-8)
The eagle that is flying high in the sky should not forget that it will come down one day to see its shadow.
~ Guru Rinpoche
"Your shadow will follow you. At times it will be in front of you, and at others, beside you. But your shadow will never ever be ON you. It cannot have that power."
(A line I overheard from some tv programme I was watching, can't even remember what it was about. Just struck me as a good metaphor for fighting 'The Black Dog'.)
Humans are like nature's apps.
Eleanor Shellstrop - The Good Place
I heard the other day that “humans are like smartphones, memes are like apps” which provoked a bit of humming and thought.
Hearing this quote today opened up a door into understanding the way that wisdom and compassion naturally arise from one another or actually are one another.
"When the intellect ventures into where it does not belong, it becomes lost in it's own confusion !"
~Zen~
The potential for realization is universal and present for all of us. True benefit will come from your own efforts, for your efforts to bring benefit you must take your life into your own hands and examine your mind and experience. From this point of view nobody could be kinder to you than yourself. Nobody could have a greater effect on you, or actually do more for you than yourself. The Buddha said, I have shown you the path to liberation, now liberation depends on you. This is really true. If you don't take your life into your own hands not even the Buddhas can make a difference, its up to you.
~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche
Engineers of canals guide the water;
fletchers make the arrow straight;
carpenters shape the wood;
the wise mould themselves.
https://www.poetseers.org/the-poetseers/lord-buddha/poems-by-buddha/the-wise/index.html
“We do not say that because things are empty they do not exist; we say that because things exist they are empty.” A Prasaṅgika-Madhyamaka Tibetan saying
How so?
I don't get it?
Emptiness is a property of things not a transcendent reality underlying the conventional that is the really real. Without the conventional world of things there is no such thing as emptiness. Additionally the conventional is only able to exist and function because it is empty. If things had a true essence they couldn't change and interact.
IOW emptiness isn't nihilism, it isn't about negating reality. The object being negated is only our mistaken perception of reality.
https://emptinessteachings.com/2014/09/11/the-two-truths-of-buddhism-and-the-emptiness-of-emptiness/
Right!
Clear as mud now
Do you have a dummies version
I added an edit IOW, also the link is pretty dense but has all the ideas. I'm sorry, its not a simple subject and can be hard to sum up briefly and concisely.
@lobster's quite dense ....so no problem
Is emptiness like with philosophy, where you can think yourself into nothing?
https://www.iep.utm.edu/perc-obj/
Or is it like mysticism where; existence = God dunnit? Or is it like where in poetry:
I was so full
I was empty
Thinking Nothing
I saw Everything
Clearly I was deluded
A Buddha in a swamp of Light
A dark lightening
Emptying nihilism