A better question 'What if you lived for a very long time?'

[thelerner]

Trunk posted this on the 'What if you had a Week to Live' topic. This question is probably more conducive to getting off one's ass and starting a new accomplishment then the One Week to Live question. What would you do, change or focus on, if you knew you would live a very long time. I'll post an answer later. I just thought this was worthy for a new topic.

 

Might be interesting to start by printing ones age.

Edited April 5, 2013 by thelerner

[ChiForce]

To me, it does not matter. Time, in this case, is irrelevant. I have achieved certain degree of cultivation at a very young age and I know people who didn't experience them and died in their old age. Very likely that they would reborn again and going through the cycle of rebirth and death. You live longer may mean that you may experience enlightenment much later in life. Also, knowing that death is at your door in any moment may actually help you to become enlightened faster. It helps you to let go easier. Then, again, knowing that you may die in any given moment may prompt you to do something rash or very egoistic or suicidal or harmful to others (ie mass shooting in public places).

[ChiDragon]

ChiForce.....
What is your own definition of enlightenment....???

[ChiForce]

ChiForce.....

What is your own definition of enlightenment....???

Not that if I have a definition but the first step, at least, is to acknowledge the cyclical and repetitive nature of your current life. As soon as you are aware that you shouldn't go live your life as business as usual, that's a first step to enlightenment. Sadly, if you live long, you would probably resist change. If your life is too short, such as soldiers fighting in wars, changes can happen too drastically and no time to meditate. Obviously, the spiritual definition is the Tao or Nirvana, silly. We all know that, right.....???

[ChiForce]

ChiForce.....

What is your own definition of enlightenment....???

I am reading Master Nan's Working Towards Enlightenment...." and page 71. To him, enlightenment is about exhausting the 5 skandhas, form, sensation, conception, synthesis, and consciousness. They may not be in any order but all 5 of them have to be exhausted (questioned, dealt with, and examined and reexamined) to see the truth. Obviously, these concepts won't matter to anyone if one can not relate these concepts to one's life situation. For an example, you can't say you have exhausted and overcome the skandha of forms if you are still seeing and judging people based on the color of their skins. Or, in my other discussions over in another message board, someone is making an assumption that "blacks or "people of colors" do not practice Buddhism because their life situations weren't privileged enough to do so. That is, they don't have the money to go on retreats and to contemplate the meaning of their existence. It was a funny discussion no less. Hehehehe.... I was shaking my head in disbelief...some individuals are practicing Buddhism while clinging onto the skandha of forms. Idiots.....

Edited April 6, 2013 by ChiForce

[Mal]

"What if you lived for a very long time?"

 

I don't know if I'd do anything different and I'm not sure I'm not already living for a very long time ... at only 39

[C T]

If i could live for a very loooong time, i'd probably become a tortoise, or an oak tree, depending on my mood.

[thetaoiseasy]

..

Edited March 24, 2014 by thetaoiseasy

[oildrops]

I read this question as "What if you had an abnormally long time to live?". Perception might shift in a way to compensate for a longer future life. Think about flies for example, I don't believe it feels to them that they are only living for a few days.

Edited April 7, 2013 by oildrops

[Vmarco]

 

What is your own definition of enlightenment....???

 

For those with a penchant for enlightenment, it would surely be a good idea to have an idea of how to recognize it. For many, enlightenment is having super powers, like those proselytized in science fiction films.

 

For me, enlightenment is the awareness of things as they are. However, to arrive at, or uncover, the way things are, one must first realize the way things are not.

 

As a New Age purveyor said, "we need to draw our attention to what is false in us, for unless we learn to recognize the false as the false, there can be no lasting transformation, and you will always be drawn back into illusion, for that is how the false perpetuates itself"

 

When one becomes serious for an awareness of the way things are, there is a realization that the 6 senses cannot observe the way things are,...for the 6 senses arose from the way things are not.

[BaguaKicksAss]

This one is easy....

 

Practice Bagua of course .

[chegg]

What would you do, change or focus on, if you knew you would live a very long time.

 

 

I asked a similar question years ago. The response I got was to watch the movie "Bicentennial Man". It would not be very pleasant watching your loved ones die one after another.

 

But reading some of the Bible, I vaguely recall a guy called "Job" who found God, God gave him crap loads of benefits including living until the 4th generation of his offspring (that made him a great-great-grandfather?) which would have been a long time in those days.

 

 

 

I personally, would end up trying to follow the 'will' of my spirit, help people out and do some preaching. or "doing the work" as it's called in the spiritualist scene. Which is what I'm doing now

 

 

 

 

Blessings of Longevity

:wub: :wub: :wub:

Edited January 26, 2014 by chegg

[idiot_stimpy]

What if you never die, and were never born...

[Captain Mar-Vell]

...

 

Often have I been given cause to meditate upon the story of Job.

 

...

[idiot_stimpy]

Ultimately, everything in this world you can't take with you. Better to work through the fear of this now instead of it being too late.

[chegg]

...

 

Often have I been given cause to meditate upon the story of Job.

 

...

 

Tell us if you come up with anything

 

 

Bless you Captain

:wub: :wub:

[chegg]

"If the Book of Job reaches across two and a half millennia to teach anything to men and women who consider themselves normal, decent human beings, it is this: Human beings are sure to wander in ignorance and to fall into error, and it is better — more righteous in the eyes of God — for them to react by questioning rather than accepting. Confronted with inexplicable injustice, it is better to be irate than resigned."

 

—William Safire, The First Dissident

Bless us all

:wub:

[Eric23]

I'm 59, and lost both of my parents in the last couple of years. My grand mother lived to 103. So these days my views of living to an old age have changed. After witnessing the decline in health and just wishing for an end to suffering, my wish would be to die quickly from whatever it is that that the universe sends to finish me off. Until that time I think that being active, both physically and mentally is crucial. If one has to scale back a bit with age, so be it, just keep doing it. I'm also convinced that when the pain gets too much, it's time for medical marihuana.

[goatguy-too]

When I am climbing the mountain with my goats I have Tylenol, rum and Hydrocodone so that whatever the pain level there is something to take my mind off it. (I rarely use any of it, but have it just in case). Age gives us so many different ways to experience pain, and with sufficient reflection on the things we never accomplished an accute awareness that we are not in control.

 

If I new I was going to live a long time I would be tempted to take more reckless chances; perhaps attempt to catch bullets with my teeth ;-)

[Captain Mar-Vell]

...

 

"If the Book of Job reaches across two and a half millennia to teach anything to men and women who consider themselves normal, decent human beings, it is this: Human beings are sure to wander in ignorance and to fall into error, and it is better — more righteous in the eyes of God — for them to react by questioning rather than accepting. Confronted with inexplicable injustice, it is better to be irate than resigned."

 

—William Safire, The First Dissident

Bless us all

:wub:

 

That's the dumbest comment on the Book of Job that I have ever heard.

 

Bill Safire?

 

You gotta be kiddin' me.

...

[chegg]

...

 

That's the dumbest comment on the Book of Job that I have ever heard.

 

Bill Safire?

 

You gotta be kiddin' me.

...

 

ROFL !

 

It didnt strike me as being particularly deep. Who is Bill Safire ?

 

 

edit: Just found out who Bill is. Explains it.

 

 

Bless you Captain

:wub: :wub:

Edited January 28, 2014 by chegg

[RiverSnake]

I love what i am doing right now and the life path i have chosen. I don't see any end in sight to my enthusiasm and love for my current trajectory. If i had another week or another 100 years to live and i won the lotto and was set for life, i don't find it likely that my path/bliss would change much.

 

My 2 cents, Peace

Edited January 28, 2014 by OldChi

[thelerner]

I love what i am doing right now and the life path i have chosen. I don't see any end in sight to my enthusiasm and love for my current trajectory. If i had another week or another 100 years to live and i run the lotto and was set for life, i don't find it likely that my path/bliss would change much.

 

My 2 cents, Peace

That's, how you want to live.

In the word of 5 for Fighting,

Never a wish, better then this.