Is anyone else an atheist with BC besides me?
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3jaysmom,
I don't know if I ever posted the short phrases that I use. If I have, forgive the repetition.
To all, one does not have to be a Buddhist to get benefit from this type of meditation. The first part is to meditate on oneself, then ones family, friends, acquaintances and finally meditate on people who upset you. Just change the "I" to a name.
May I be well and happy*
May I be safe and free from harm**
May I be free from anger and ill will***
May I be at peace****
May my heart be filled with loving kindness.*****
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*this refers to being mentally well and happy regardless of the ups and down of life.
**this refers to being safe from wrong action and causing harm to myself or others,
***this refers to the anger and ill will that can enter my mind and my actions due to a lack of compassion.
****this refers to having equanimity.
*****this refers to having a mental attitude of metta (loving kindness) towards myself and all living beings.
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3jays, if you've got that it's your reaction, not the others, then you're half way there. My philosophy is to look at my reaction in the past and attempt to love that too. If I can recognise in the moment I'm reacting and become the observer (mindfulness), it takes the sting away and I return to a more calm, sensible person. Definitely a work in progress for me!
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I don't follow any teachings ..I do read abundantly and try to find my own paths..
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SoCalLisa,
What do you mean when you say your read abundantly but don't follow any teachings? Are you equating teachings with a formal religion? I am confused because it sounds as though you read extensively but don't take anything from your readings.
I read and use the teachings of Gotama as a moral philosophy, but I would not call myself a follower of Buddhism as a religion. I also like the thoughts of Epicurus. Epicurus lived around the same time as Gotama and held many similar ideas.
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thanks, notself.. i read, esp what you write! lol and my beliefs are taken from many of my readings, even though i have religious beliefs different from buddhism, i have learned so much from you ladies, and YOUR knowledge.thanks, shelia, for your insights, which were helpful.
i tend to think its' all about me, in the bad way. its' just an inch to the right to its all about me in the good way.. now, to learn to move that inch, eh?!! 3jays
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I am about the same place you are. Moving into true compassion and kindness towards everyone is a great challenge. I have brief instances when I live up to metta and I am always surprised at the positive results. Now if I can take those brief instances and string them together into an entire life, I will really have something.
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Hi Sheila - Thanks for letting me know about Mooji, Buddha at the Gas Pump (gotta go to the library for a few hours of UTube) and Esther Hicks - and i agree, there are degrees of enlightenment and some stop at an earlier degree. I think Siddhartha Gautama and Jesus may have seen it all.
The reason i like Eckhart Tolle is that he's non-sectarian (or some call him Buddhism Lite) don't know if you're familiar with American beer but i think that's a play on Bud Lite.
I have a good friend who is moving, this week, to Australia. she's going to Corindi Beach,near Coff's Harbour, NSW. Leaving her cold, clammy stone house in England forever! I'm just waiting for her last call before they cut off the phone.....she lived there before and can't wait to return.and I'm saving my credit card points to fly there some day...
Cheers,
Arlene
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notself, no I am not searching for anything
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Oh. I didn't ask if you were searching for anything. Rather, I asked if you took anything that you read into your daily experience of life. Does anything you read have an affect on your approach to problems or situations?
For example, I find that meditation helps me understand my own motivations and reactions. My meditation is not a search but is more sitting still and looking at the way things really are.
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It is so nice that you are a happy camper and so am I..
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Lisa, one of your pics would make me a happy camper - thought I had stumbled into the wrong thread. I'm not trying to stop any conversation, just really thought I had clicked on the Buddhist thread which I did read part of the other day. As I said before part of it is intriguing but for the main it's just not my thing.
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Hi River Rat, yep there is a Buddist thread, and I stay out of it as well as the others
dealing with religion
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river rat
A spring rose for you and our other non thesists
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Lisa, thanks. I swear I think I can smell it, but then again I am so anxious for spring to get here. This winter has been too cold and snowy for me.
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Me too RiverRat..even tho we don't get snow, it is so nice to
see tha changes in the seasons..we don't get much hot weather
either in the summer..but I like be nice a warm rather than
freezing. We played tennis this am at 0800 and it was 55 and
kinda dark..but then the sun came out and warmed us all up..
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SoCalLisa,
I hope I didn't offend you by asking questions that you do not wish to answer.
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Hi Arlene,
You'll find most who have reached enlightenment are non sectarian as religion is just another form of ego. Those who still stay in their religion probably do so to keep the respect of their followers and also as a means of keeping some social order.
I came here from England in my 20's, having lived in a hot climate in Central Africa as a child, I never got used to cold, cramped, depressed England. I was the first to emigrate and most of my family followed me. I have friends who live near Coffs Harbour but it's a full day's drive from where I am. At the moment I'm tied to living near my mother who has Alzheimer's but I'd love to get away to somewhere more picturesque. Otherwise I'd like to move closer to Mum as she lives in a lovely area, but I'm wary of being too near the coast now I've seen what a tsunami can do!
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Wow Sheila, what a life you have led...I only lived on one other continent and that was for only four years..I hope you find the best spot for you!!
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Thrilled to report the Robins are back in Western MA. There must have been 30 of them in the fields around my little house - all seemed to be very pregnant
Such a beautiful sight, even tho they had to jump around large places of snow to find "bare" ground/brown grass, they all seemed almost as happy to be here, as we are to see them. 0 -
Glad to hear that Caerus
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Lisa, I also travelled all round Europe, also visited Morocco, Singapore and the Canary Islands. If only I had your photographic talents I could have some lovely photo's to show.
It's never too late to travel, it's worth it even on the smallest budget.
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I too have traveled a great deal and usually spent a few months to several years living in the various countries (not sure) and continents (6) I chose to explore. I can't seem to stay for long. I'm considering moving again. I've mostly recovered (as much as you can) from having BC and losing my husband. My feet feel the need to wander again.
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Wow - all you travellers! I've been mostly tied to a few spots in southern Ontario - where i can report - my first snowdrop is in bud and about to bloom! no robins yet.. yesterday afternoon I spent hours scraping the deck in a t-shit and bare feet after we shoved off the last of the snow - march 15? - must be a record for deck-scraping.
sheila - I like what you had to say about enlightenment and religions. I once met an enlightened man - at a dharma centre. he was a Canadian who had gone to the east in the 50s, probably with monks of the Theravada tradition, later travelled, was recognized by one of the Karmapas of Tibet and crowned.
I was at a retreat centre he'd established here. he was scathing, on the topic of ego - I'd known nothing about that topic till then - I kept trying to hide behind the person in front of me - but I did receive an empowerment. I was actually there as a volunteer cook while I was studying Mahayana Buddhism at university - the whole thing burned me out, trying to cook and do puja for Green Tara and driving to dharma talks, which I actually love -but I was scared, found the "religious" part - pujas, too weird. But understand all that better, now. I was told by my teacher at school, who knew him, that he would challenge me in whatever way I needed it. he challenged me, all right. the foundations of my ego began to shake. I had to leave. Still, I am so glad and will forever remember that empowerment. Hopfully a seed was planted in me. so when i began reading Eckahrt Tolle, right away, I began to 'get" it. the ego. And all that Namgyal rinpoche (the enlightened man) had to say came flooding back, and made sense.So, understandably, extending metta to youir enemies is very, very hard. chipping away at the old ego block.
Notself - so when you say you practice Buddhism as a moral philosophy, you don't involve yourself with notions of karma, rebirth etc.? You stick to the arrowroot cookie as opposed to the super duper oreo cookie with whipped cream on top (Tibetan) - as my teacher used to say? what about Buddha nature? maybe i should be on the Buddhist thread for this...sorry for going on.
hey we might reach 40F today - we're havin' a heat wave!
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Oh I can imagine having your ego challenged... stomach wrenching. It's amazing how desperately we cling to our image of our self even though it's totally false. We can be devastated because something happens that doesn't even touch us physically, such as an insult or falling out with someone.
I first came across 'The Power of Now' as I browsed in a book shop. I had no idea what it was about or who wrote it but as I read a page or two at random I felt weak at the knees and a strong desire to sit down even though I was still clueless about what he was saying. I thought, "he's going to want me to meditate and I don't have time for that." But I had no choice except to buy it. It opened my eyes and my heart.
I'm not into karma etc either. I like to keep it simple.
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Ha ha, I just realised, you said, "he was scathing, on the topic of ego." I find it amusing that those who say they are without an ego still get angry. (Laughing at him, not you). Isn't ego just another story? I think it's possible to get to a stage where we love everyone and everything; ego, death, violence. If we can love our enemy then we can't say they are doing something 'bad'. Love and acceptance of all is my ultimate goal but I have so far to go and that's OK. I accept where I am now.0
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flannelette,
I don't believe in rebirth. There has never been a clear explanation in the suttas about what is reborn. I have good company in my lack of belief. Ananda, the Buddha's closest disciple, did not believe in rebirth either. There is a poem in the Commentaries that comes close to explaining that there is no eternal 'self' or a rebirth of a specific 'self'. It talks about the rebirth of phenomena. I interpret that as something like the Law of Conservation of Energy. Here is the poem. I find it both beautiful and comforting when I contemplate my own death.
"Mere suffering is, not any sufferer is found
The deeds exist, but no performer of the deeds:
Nibbana is, but not the man that enters it,
The path is, but no wanderer is to be seen.
No doer of the deeds is found,
No one who ever reaps their fruits,
Empty phenomena roll on,
This view alone is right and true.
No god, no Brahma, may be called,
The maker of this wheel of life,
Empty phenomena roll on,
Dependent on conditions all."
- Visuddhimagga XIXKarma is a different story. The word means action and in the current usage also the result of action. Anyone can look at the decisions made in life and see the results. Good decisions had good results; bad decisions had bad results. Easy Peasy.
Since I don't believe in rebirth, the karma carryover into the next life or from previous lives is also problematic. The Buddha was a man of his times. Granted he was a genius in figuring out how the mind works and how one can eliminate suffering through the control of the mind, but he was still a product of the religious culture surrounding him.
It is possible that he taught within the religious framework to people who would not otherwise understand his point or to scare them into moral action. He never answered the questions, "Is there a self? Is there no self?" He only explained that this or that is not self and that no conditioned thing existed independent of change. It is possible that he didn't have the language to explain all that he figured out. Just as we have difficulty in explaining what it means to have a diagnosis of cancer. Language has always been a problem in communicating extremely complex ideas.
The phrase "buddha nature" does not appear in the suttas that I read. It only appears in Mahayana sutras. The idea of having an ideal state which became some how muddy and needs to be cleaned sounds a great deal like original sin. Perhaps I don't understand what is meant by 'buddha nature'. The cause of suffering, as it is explained in the oldest teachings, is ignorance, aversion, and clinging.
Sheila,
I don't understand what you mean by saying "If we can love our enemy then we can't say they are doing something 'bad'." Could you clarify this for me?
I think that we can love our enemies and feel compassion for them while still understanding that their actions are 'bad'.
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UP, UP AND AWAY IN MY BEAUTIFUL BALLOON
EDITED, OOPS THE PHOTO WASN'T VERY GOOD..
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Was the picture taken in San Diego County or in Clovis, New Mexico? I would love to take a balloon ride some day.
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