I don’t know. I’m just doing this because it seems like the right answer, not really because I want to. I don’t want to be wrong so it feels like this is the only choice I have. It’s so bad that I feel like I need to know what Buddhism thinks about any topic: loneliness, love, job, aspergers, etc. It just feels like I have no opinion
Pretty much any monk (at least the ones I have spoken with at some Buddhist centers) and most who write in articles or publications centered around Buddhism (Lions Roar, Tricycle, etc).
But why? What’s the next step?
Say you do find out what Buddhism thinks about this or that topic; and, having done that, you would then — what? How would your life then be different?
Care to ***cite ***one of these publications saying “don’t imagine anything or enjoy anything”?
Because stuff like this is literally the first article I found on Lion’s Roar, and that has 3 practitioners saying exactly the opposite.
You know, it’s possible to study what Buddhists believe, without actually believing it yourself.
Then you have not truly given yourself permission. It is not Buddhism that’s enslaving you, it’s you.
The best advice you are ever going to get along these lines was penned ~420 years ago by one William Shakespeare:
So long as you are content with your choices around spiritual beliefs (or any other non-provable beliefs), “right” and “wrong” don’t really enter into the equation. They can’t because there is no objective right or wrong in sprituality. Go with what gives you comfort, period.
Yes, there’s a reason I specifically mentioned strawberries.
C’mon, man - you know it’s always a bad idea to read internet comment sections.
This is what I tend to think about when someone brings up strawberries.
They actually don’t say the opposite since they don’t really reference imagination at all. One talks about the middle way between ultimate truth and mundane in which he says there are no mountains and rivers, so in essence the “correct” answer is that there is nothing.
It’s similar to this: Pema Chödrön’s Six Kinds of Loneliness | Lion’s Roar
About not having a reference point. I find it confusing how they talk about virtue and good when not being biased or attached is part of their teachings.
But I can say for sure there are plenty of articles on those publications that deride imagination as choosing to be unconscious and living in illusion. One of the authors on that link you provided even said that it’s about training one not to get lost in the mind and that’s what imagination entails at times.
I would love to go with Shakespeare, I love his tragedies. But there is no self to be true to, according to Buddhism that is.
The self is provable by observation. As in, even if you are deceived up the yin-yang, you still are observing reality from a perspective. Cogito ergo sum, yo - the one thing you can always be certain of, that even the most hardline skeptic can’t honestly deny, is that one’s self exists in one form or another - and that it is individually conscious.
Anybody who denies that the self exists is thus disproven before they even get out of the gate.
So yeah, you exist. Period.
(…Okay, so technically I can only be certain I exist, but that’s still enough to disprove any mythos where selves don’t exist.)
What do you think a sentence like
From that perspective, “to rest in nonconceptual, open, ‘don’t know’ mind” isn’t so much to stop or transcend thinking as to simply let thoughts be “just thoughts” and to know that the mind is doing its thing. Thinking is simply what the mind does, in the same way that ears hear and eyes see.
is about?
Ermm, did you miss the end of that lesson?
After enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters are waters.
That’s the exact opposite **of nothing.
I’m not even going to bother reading that link, as going by your reading of that first article, I’m sure you’ve misinterpreted what it says.
Then cite one that explicitly says that. Quote from it, where it says that.
Buddhism is inherently going to be tricky for anyone not brought up with it to properly understand. It deals with some fairly high level concepts. It has its own unique terminology. There may be some clouding from the distance through time to its origin and the diffusion into different branches. And it has undergone sometimes multiple translations.
You shouldn’t expect it to be easy, or to feel bad if you don’t get it. But you should at least allow for the possibility that if its expressed main goal is to extinguish suffering, and instead you find it is increasing your suffering, that maybe you don’t understand it.
Also, while it is certainly possible to benefit from reading about Buddhism, to get the most out of it, and more importantly, avoid common and potentially dangerous errors, it is better to be a part of a community (Sangha). You could say the same about almost any discipline.
Separately, while your angst might have been triggered by topics Buddhism touches on, those issues would exist regardless and you may want to address them on their own terms. You can have a discussion about whether joy is compatible with detachment without having to reference Buddhism.
If this remains an ongoing chronic frustration for you, you probably would benefit from a face to face addressing of it.
The one that I linked. And you missed the point about the ULTIMATE truth being that nothing exists. It’s not the opposite of nothing. When they say enlightenment it’s when you realize what the capital T is.
As for letting the mind do it’s thing that’s pretty much avoiding imagination since imagination is about going where it takes you and getting lost in it.
Hmm, then you are screwed. So Sorry.
Then quote where it says that.
Quote it.
I say again, give an actual quote.
It does NOT say that anywhere in that article.
The closest statement, the only one using the words “nothing exists”, is :
. That is, we start to understand that nothing exists on its own; all things exist in relation to all other things.
Which isn’t **remotely **the same as what you’re spouting.
No. *That’s *daydreaming. Imagination is “the faculty or action of forming new ideas, or images or concepts of external objects not present to the senses.” That’s it. And that’s exactly what that earlier quote was about.
I think part of your problem is that you use made-up definitions of words and then expect others to understand you.
They said that thing don’t exist, and that all there really is is consciousness, and that you are alone. Not exactly things that alleviate suffering. Personal I would like to think that it only relieves it if you stick at the base level.
I mean someone earlier in this thread said that physical reality was just a veil. How am I supposed to respond to that? Seems like it’s just good for an existential crisis.
Underline added. How about responding with a shrug and a chuckle? Just like you would if someone told you Jesus was the son of God, born to a virgin, who ascended up to heaven after being crucified. People believe weird shit, but you don’t have to let it get you down.
It did say it when it said there are no rocks or rivers