dwai

The Clarity Aspect in Buddhism

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20 hours ago, dwai said:

Just by what I’ve seen of his behavior, I question his realization as a practitioner  — but then, I’m a nobody :) 

 

... you certainly are :)

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How to hunt .

 

" You see that little boy over there, watch him.  He has spotted a crab and he is after it .  Watch how he stalks it and observes it , he is totally fascinated, so much so that the rest of the world has virtually  ceased to exist . Its his whole concentration and focus, nothing else matters to him in this moment . He is intensely watching how it moves , how its eyes work, how it eats .  He is learning about it . He has become one with the crab, there is no difference .  Yet, although he follows it with all his focus, he doesnt step on  an oyster and cut his foot, he doesnt tread on a mangrove root ,  he weaves in and out, his body takes care of that , but his mind is now on the crab and nothing else . "

 

Spoiler

Being ' empty'  , remaining full of function, having uninterrupted  wisdom, dissolving  subject /object and having clarity .

 

 

 

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On 7/29/2021 at 5:40 PM, dwai said:

I thought this is apropos because I noticed that some (many) people misunderstand emptiness. 

 

Of course, many also reify clarity into a self. It can be a tricky balance, often requiring a lot of teacher input. 

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2 minutes ago, forestofemptiness said:

 

Of course, many also reify clarity into a self. It can be a tricky balance, often requiring a lot of teacher input. 

If it is considered an "individual self" then I consider it reification. As Atman/Brahman it is not so. :) 

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On 1.8.2021 at 1:56 AM, Nungali said:

 

It takes effort to let go .  Not as much effort as the 'original grasping' .....  but over time, we forget about that and it appears 'automatic / without effort ' .

 

Hmm yes, the way cleaning up takes effort.

 

Effortless action seems to be mostly something Daoism/Zen Buddhism focus on. Uncle Al refers to it (e.g., in the Book of Lies), but then, he was heavily influenced by Eastern philosophies. I am curious... Are you aware of this principle specifically in the context of Hermetic philosophy?

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3 hours ago, Michael Sternbach said:

 

Hmm yes, the way cleaning up takes effort.

 

Effortless action seems to be mostly something Daoism/Zen Buddhism focus on. Uncle Al refers to it (e.g., in the Book of Lies), but then, he was heavily influenced by Eastern philosophies. I am curious... Are you aware of this principle specifically in the context of Hermetic philosophy?

 

No .   I read  TTC at a young age .  

 

But I see it  as more than  ....  ' effortless action ' ,  more   like ,   ' best results with least  effort '    ( well, on my part anyway ;) )   .

 

 

.

Edited by Nungali
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On 8/2/2021 at 9:23 AM, dwai said:

If it is considered an "individual self" then I consider it reification. As Atman/Brahman it is not so. :) 

 

From a certain Buddhist perspective, reification would include any "is" "this" or "that." Not that such reifications are not helpful at a certain point, but the Buddhist path is in my opinion one of radical non-grasping from the start. 

 

A monk asked, ‘Master, why do you say that mind is Buddha?’

Mazu said, ‘To stop babies from crying.’

The monk said, ‘What do you say when they stop crying?’

Mazu said, ‘No mind, no Buddha.’

The monk asked, ‘Without using either of these teachings, how would you instruct someone?’

Mazu said, ‘I would say to him that it’s not a thing.’

The monk asked, ‘If suddenly someone who was in the midst of it came to you, then what would you do?’

Mazu said, ‘I would teach him to experience the great way.’

 

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1 hour ago, forestofemptiness said:

 

From a certain Buddhist perspective, reification would include any "is" "this" or "that." Not that such reifications are not helpful at a certain point, but the Buddhist path is in my opinion one of radical non-grasping from the start. 

 

A monk asked, ‘Master, why do you say that mind is Buddha?’

Mazu said, ‘To stop babies from crying.’

The monk said, ‘What do you say when they stop crying?’

Mazu said, ‘No mind, no Buddha.’

The monk asked, ‘Without using either of these teachings, how would you instruct someone?’

Mazu said, ‘I would say to him that it’s not a thing.’

The monk asked, ‘If suddenly someone who was in the midst of it came to you, then what would you do?’

Mazu said, ‘I would teach him to experience the great way.’

 

 

in the "midst of Brahman" no teacher or teaching is needed to or could nail Brahman down... 

Edited by old3bob
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On 8/1/2021 at 4:15 AM, steve said:

 here years ago during the Buddhist wars.


The great Internet Buddhist wars? When and where did this happen?

 

What was it about? Entirely compassionately helping others to let go of their illusions that were exchanged on message boards?

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2 hours ago, virtue said:


The great Internet Buddhist wars? When and where did this happen?

The Buddha Bum Wars, when the majority of posts on this forum were from a small number of extremely prolific Buddhist posters debating a small number of Hindus about which tradition is more enlightened in thread after thread which spanned dozens of pages each.  2008-2011ish.  There was at least one dramatic conversion, and a subsequent de-conversion. The participating Buddhists have all moved on (and one has passed on), some of the Hindus are still here, some aren't.  

Edited by Creation
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1 hour ago, Creation said:

The Buddha Bum Wars, when the majority of posts on this forum were from a small number of extremely prolific Buddhist posters debating a small number of Hindus about which tradition is more enlightened in thread after thread which spanned dozens of pages each.  2008-2011ish. 
 

Mea Culpa (Hinduism/advaita vedanta represent yo!) 

Quote

There was at least one dramatic conversion, and a subsequent de-conversion. The participating Buddhists have all moved on (and one has passed on), some of the Hindus are still here, some aren't.  

Ooh.…didn’t know about that — do share some of that gossip 😜. I know lucky7strikes became a Sadhguru follower sometime later…but iirc last time I saw a post from him, he was still practicing sadhguru’s Kriyas.

 

On a more serious note, I think sequestering our Buddha bums to their own sub-forum was the solution :)

 

And a somber note on Vajrahridaya’s passing - was deeply saddened to learn about that. 

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1 hour ago, dwai said:

Ooh.…didn’t know about that — do share some of that gossip 😜. I know lucky7strikes became a Sadhguru follower sometime later…but iirc last time I saw a post from him, he was still practicing sadhguru’s Kriyas.

Seth Ananda had a major breakthrough contemplating some of the things the Buddha Bums were saying, and became a Tibetan Buddhist for a few years, but eventually went back to Hinduism.  You must have forgotten about that once he came back over to your side :P

 

Reflecting on the main participants in the battles, I wonder how your comrade-in-arms Harsha is doing?  I remember liking his posts quite a bit. 

 

Lucky7strikes was doing Kunlun and Sadhguru's kriyas back in the day - I heard he got some energy imbalances with that combination.  He also had a major falling out with some of his Buddha Bum comrades, but is still involved in Dzogchen last I heard (which, strangely enough, was quite recently, I randomly stumbled upon some people who know him). 

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1 hour ago, Creation said:

Seth Ananda had a major breakthrough contemplating some of the things the Buddha Bums were saying, and became a Tibetan Buddhist for a few years, but eventually went back to Hinduism.  You must have forgotten about that once he came back over to your side :P

Didn't know that. I always thought that Seth Ananda was a Kashmiri Shaivism initiate -- why would he need anything else. His teacher is quite accomplished in the KS field (iirc).

1 hour ago, Creation said:

Reflecting on the main participants in the battles, I wonder how your comrade-in-arms Harsha is doing?  I remember liking his posts quite a bit. 

That's a good question. I don't know (he was posting as SiliconValley iinm).I don't really know him personally. 

1 hour ago, Creation said:

Lucky7strikes was doing Kunlun and Sadhguru's kriyas back in the day - I heard he got some energy imbalances with that combination.  He also had a major falling out with some of his Buddha Bum comrades, but is still involved in Dzogchen last I heard (which, strangely enough, was quite recently, I randomly stumbled upon some people who know him). 

I think we've all done some growing up since the (in)famous Buddhabum wars :) 

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53 minutes ago, skyblue said:

Are the threads still there? I'd love to give them a read.

Here's one -- 

 

TBH I've forgotten most of these discussions. Do a forum search and you'll find many. 

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1 hour ago, skyblue said:

Are the threads still there? I'd love to give them a read.

Search through the posts of the users Vajrahridaya (RIP) and xabir2005, almost all of them will link to such threads. 

 

...if you dare :P

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18 hours ago, Creation said:

The Buddha Bum Wars, when the majority of posts on this forum were from a small number of extremely prolific Buddhist posters debating a small number of Hindus about which tradition is more enlightened in thread after thread which spanned dozens of pages each.  2008-2011ish.  There was at least one dramatic conversion, and a subsequent de-conversion. The participating Buddhists have all moved on (and one has passed on), some of the Hindus are still here, some aren't.  


What are the few most relevant threads to read if there were only a few to best summarize the discussions in this war?

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7 minutes ago, Earl Grey said:


What are the few most relevant threads to read if there were only a few to best summarize the discussions in this war?

I'll give you my personal executive summary, inaccuracy guaranteed because I wasn't interested in reading them for the most part.  I invite dwai to give his own summary if he wants. 

 

Vajrahridaya and xabir2005: We experienced the True Self per Hinduism, then we let it go and it was way better when we did.  We know other people who have done the same thing [produces quotes of first hand accounts of this]

dwai and other Hindus: That's impossible, you/they must not have actually experienced the True Self. 

Vajrahridaya and xabir2005: Yes we did [produces a bunch of quotes in support of their view]

dwai and other Hindus: No you didn't [argues against contents of quotes].  Anyway, Buddhists have a True Self, they just call it something else.

Vajrahridaya and xabir2005: No they don't that's a misunderstanding.  And yes, we did. 

[xabir2005 copies and pastes more extremely long quotes, and Vajrahridaya makes long, deeply impassioned posts about his own journey]

dwai and other Hindus: You don't really understand Hinduism OR Buddhism

etc

 

You'll notice that my summary focuses on the contributions of two Buddhists, because they actually claimed to first experience the thing Hindu's call the true self, and then the negation of the absoluteness of it.  This is an extremely interesting claim to me, as it is based in first hand experience of both traditions, whereas "My guru said/my traditions scriptures say" was not interesting enough to me to read more than a little.  As I mentioned, one of the more open minded posters arguing for the Hindu view gave real consideration to what the Buddhists were claiming and had a breakthrough, and then tried to be Buddhist for a while, but eventually went back to Hinduism because "Theism called more to his heart" or something like that.  I was able to find that thread, if anyone's curious,

 

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Since Seth has been mentioned several times....didn't he go over to some type of magical/sorcery path?  It's been a long time but I remember some later posts like that and I don't recall them being about Buddhism or Hinduism.

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Years ago, I remember reading impassioned screeds on the forum about obscure (to me) philosophical differences between adherents of various eastern spiritual traditions.  Perhaps that was the Buddha wars people are talking about?  There was a lot of jargon I didn´t understand but the level of discord seemed silly to me at the time.  Why not just sit and be aware of something -- or nothing in particular -- and be done with it?  Given how forum discussion has evolved since, those discussions now seem almost saintly. 

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3 hours ago, Creation said:

because they actually claimed to first experience the thing Hindu's call the true self, and then the negation of the absoluteness of it. 

 

I don't think either actually worked in a Vedantic tradition, however, or had their "realization" confirmed by a lineage master (in either tradition as far as I know).

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10 minutes ago, forestofemptiness said:

 

I don't think either actually worked in a Vedantic tradition, however, or had their "realization" confirmed by a lineage master (in either tradition as far as I know).

 

The biggest misconception is that the Self can be “experienced”. It is really not an experience at all — rather it is a realization/recognition, followed by a permanent shift of perspective from that of a limited mind-body-personality to pure awareness. 
 

Advaita Vedanta teachers will say, “if you can experience it, it is not the Self”.

 

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9 minutes ago, dwai said:

 

The biggest misconception is that the Self can be “experienced”. It is really not an experience at all — rather it is a realization/recognition, followed by a permanent shift of perspective from that of a limited mind-body-personality to pure awareness. 
 

Advaita Vedanta teachers will say, “if you can experience it, it is not the Self”.

 


The opening shot that begins Buddha Wars II? 

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1 minute ago, Earl Grey said:


The opening shot that begins Buddha Wars II? 

WIll most likely be Buddha Wars Z :P 

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1 minute ago, dwai said:

WIll most likely be Buddha Wars Z :P 


As long as it’s more Buddha Wars: A New Hope is Born rather than the prequel trilogy and most definitely wish that it will not be Buddha Wars: The Last Siddhi.

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