My misconceptions

[Tommy]

I have read so many people ask about phases or steps or levels of advancements. The thinking is that when one spends more time than others in practice or meditation then they are further advanced. Like taking a university course, the more time spent passing courses will eventually bring one the diploma. Except here it is of enlightenment. So, is it my misconception that there really is no levels of advancement. No phases that one goes thru to reach enlightenment. It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

My misconception that it depends on whether a person is readily able to accept the impetus to be pushed beyond this mind. For some it may take years of practice before this state. Others are near and have had experiences they are not ready for. Thus thinking they may be crazy. That is until they meet a real teacher.

 

Sometimes I see a person who spouts rhetoric and sayings from whatever they have recently read. Maybe even someone who has had experienced Kensho but has no idea how to move forward. Then there is the one up man. Must always be one up on the next person. There are so many different people. Am I wrong to think there is no phases or levels? That it is mostly a hodge podge of people in different areas. All trying to find their way?

 

Sorry, I am not very smart. Just a simple person. I have many misconceptions. But, I am willing to learn?? Maybe??

[stirling]

19 minutes ago, Tommy said:

I have read so many people ask about phases or steps or levels of advancements. The thinking is that when one spends more time than others in practice or meditation then they are further advanced. Like taking a university course, the more time spent passing courses will eventually bring one the diploma. Except here it is of enlightenment. So, is it my misconception that there really is no levels of advancement. No phases that one goes thru to reach enlightenment. It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

It isn't a cognitive skill or conceptual understanding. What you really need to know is fairly simple, and in fact, too much reading on the topic can cause more damage than good. As far as phases, it depends on your intention for your practice.

 

20 minutes of sitting a day will improve the quality of your life, make you less reactive, calmer and often more joyful and accepting. This is the beginning benefit - it improves your life as a "self". Some never go beyond that... which is fine. 

 

Beyond that, if you keep up or better still intensify your practice, work on your attachment and aversion, sit for 40 minutes (ish) a day, those benefits deepen. If you are fortunate a teacher will help you use your meditation to demonstrate "emptiness" to you, and you can then learn to allow it to well up during your day, and recognize that it does so naturally and always has. 

 

Perhaps one day there is the simple recognition that "self" and all other appearances are "empty" and always have been. This is "awakening", or "stream entry". This is the part where you are in college, but what you must come to study is where you are stuck... what you are clinging or averse to, and how you construct your own reality. You must learn to become adept at dropping how you contrive the events in your life and become an expert at how to surrender to the reality of how things are. This practice deepens your understanding of the emptiness. Eventually this way of seeing becomes predominate and you are never again fooled by your delusions.

 

19 minutes ago, Tommy said:

My misconception that it depends on whether a person is readily able to accept the impetus to be pushed beyond this mind. For some it may take years of practice before this state. Others are near and have had experiences they are not ready for. Thus thinking they may be crazy. That is until they meet a real teacher.

 

Some aren't interested don't care to try. That's fine - it's not important that anyone wake up. Others will want understand the nature of reality, or even stop the suffering that their mind causes them. They will take this pursuit quite seriously. Either way, practice creates results, and having a teacher who can help you understand what happens is VERY beneficial.

 

19 minutes ago, Tommy said:

Sometimes I see a person who spouts rhetoric and sayings from whatever they have recently read. Maybe even someone who has had experienced Kensho but has no idea how to move forward. Then there is the one up man. Must always be one up on the next person. There are so many different people. Am I wrong to think there is no phases or levels? That it is mostly a hodge podge of people in different areas. All trying to find their way?

 

Yes, seekers come in different flavors. Some are confused and lost conceptual ideas about how they think it all works. Some might think it is some kind of competition, but there is only one metric - are you awakened or not. Can you see emptiness in all appearances in this moment, always. Rest assured that there is no greater suffering than lying or exaggerating your understanding. 

[Lairg]

The central precondition to first stage enlightenment is control of the personality.

 

That means control of physical desires, control of emotional desires and control of thoughts

 

Men tend to achieve in that order.  Women can sometimes control the heart before the mind

 

Control of the personality allows stillness

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 18 hours ago by Lairg

[Tommy]

1 hour ago, Lairg said:

The central precondition to first stage enlightenment is control of the personality.

That means control of physical desires, control of emotional desires and control of thoughts

Men tend to achieve in that order.  Women can sometimes control the heart before the mind

Control of the personality allows stillness

Then I guess that I will never find enlightenment in this lifetime.

I have no control over my physical desires. 

When I am hungry, I eat. When I am tired, I sleep. No control there.

I have no control over emotions.

When I see my wife, I feel love there and a gentle peace.

When I see something outrageous like a person being hurt.

My empathy or compassion goes out. I feel emotions. No control

Then my thoughts comes without my intentions or control over them.

Where it is cold, I seek the warmth.

Yeah, enlightenment is not for me then.

 

When I was younger, I had always wanted to experience the awakened mind. Find liberation.

As I am much older now, I have seen my friends and my relatives pass away. 

A few years ago, my mother died. Then a couple of years after, my father died.

I use to think enlightenment would give me emotional distance from situations.

Sort of to be in the world but not a part of it. Now it doesn't make sense not to feel emotions.

I don't seek enlightenment. It doesn't hold a value for me. It isn't something I can share.

It isn't something that can be traded. It is what it is. To me, just a word written in some books.

 

I do like to be on forums where I can meet some very interesting people.

And I am grateful for the lessons I have learned here.

Yeah, sorry for my misconceptions.

Edited 17 hours ago by Tommy

[Apech]

@Tommy I think you might be as enlightened or even more enlightened than most of us.

 

Don't you though feel or sense something mysterious about our existence.  When you  feel or think these things don't you think it's kind of extraordinary that it's happening at all?  In my moments of clarity I feel like this ... a kind of wonder about it all.  Maybe you don't - not that it matters.  

 

[liminal_luke]

10 hours ago, Lairg said:

The central precondition to first stage enlightenment is control of the personality.

 

That means control of physical desires, control of emotional desires and control of thoughts

 

Men tend to achieve in that order.  Women can sometimes control the heart before the mind

 

Control of the personality allows stillness

 

 

Since my inhibitory impulses are out of control, I´ll take the Devil´s Advocate position and say that control is usually illusory, overrated, often desired and seldom achieved.  The whole idea of control is perhaps misconception Numero Uno.  Seems to me that the more we try to be in control and less we are.  If control is possible at all, I think it requires humility and surrender, requires us, in short, to be less and less controlling.  

Edited 8 hours ago by liminal_luke

[Tommy]

I thank all of you for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Personally doubt being enlightened at all.

Just have a mind that is curious about the truth.

Like the saying goes, there are three things that can not hide forever

The Sun, the Moon and the Truth.

I know the first two. Still working on the last one.

 

Wonder about the world and its mysteries?

Yeah, being a simple person, I do wonder at things I just don't understand.

For example, why observing the electrons passing thru the double slit would change the outcome of the pattern behind the double slit?

My wondering doesn't change anything. Other than confuse my mind for a moment. Then move onto other things.

The world is full of paradoxes. And as human, we all just live with what there is.

 

Being on a Forum allows me to express my thoughts and learn.

I think learning is what keeps one open to new possibilities.

[stirling]

13 hours ago, Lairg said:

The central precondition to first stage enlightenment is control of the personality.

 

That means control of physical desires, control of emotional desires and control of thoughts

 

Men tend to achieve in that order.  Women can sometimes control the heart before the mind

 

Control of the personality allows stillness

 

My experience is that precisely the opposite is true. Realizing that "you" have never HAD control is the way forward. Mastering stillness from a Zen perspective is very much similar to the classic Tao model - you simply stop pushing against reality with your thinking mind. You stop feeding the cycle of thoughts and eventually the thinking mind tires and stillness arises naturally. 

[stirling]

11 hours ago, Tommy said:

I have no control over my physical desires. 

When I am hungry, I eat. When I am tired, I sleep. No control there.

I have no control over emotions.

When I see my wife, I feel love there and a gentle peace.

When I see something outrageous like a person being hurt.

My empathy or compassion goes out. I feel emotions. No control

Then my thoughts comes without my intentions or control over them.

Where it is cold, I seek the warmth.

Yeah, enlightenment is not for me then.

 

Sounds like you are doing great, to me. How fortunate.

 

11 hours ago, Tommy said:

I use to think enlightenment would give me emotional distance from situations.

Sort of to be in the world but not a part of it. Now it doesn't make sense not to feel emotions.

I don't seek enlightenment. It doesn't hold a value for me. It isn't something I can share.

It isn't something that can be traded. It is what it is. To me, just a word written in some books.

 

Practice allows you to see how the "second arrow" turns reality into a much greater, longing struggle/suffering. 

 

Quote

“When touched with a feeling of pain the ordinary uninstructed person sorrows, grieves, and laments, beats his breast, becomes distraught. So he feels two pains, physical and mental. Just as if they were to shoot a man with an arrow and, right afterward, were to shoot him with another one, so that he would feel the pains of two arrows…” - Buddha

 

There is the event that causes pain and discomfort, then there is our story about the pain and discomfort which is MUCH worse. That is what can be changed. 

[forestofclarity]

16 hours ago, Tommy said:

It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

I think the level analogy may be misleading, because it implies there is something to gain. I like the melting analogy (this is in classic Zen literature, such as Hakuin and Chinul)  better because it captures the process a bit more precisely in my mind. A few points:

 

1. It is not either/or, it is a spectrum. Melting ice takes time, but there are certainly degrees. 

2. It is about relaxing and letting go rather than picking something up. We have everything we already need, there is not something new to add. Rather, it is about opening and expanding more than anything. 

3. The process is natural refines the more you do it. At first, it may be very gross, very conceptual, very effortful. These tend to reduce naturally on their own with practice. 

 

Ice is ice. A rough block sitting outside and a finely sculpted castle  look very different, and function very differently, but their nature is the same. 

 

 

[forestofclarity]

16 hours ago, Tommy said:

It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

I think the level analogy may be misleading, because it implies there is something to gain. I like the melting analogy (this is in classic Zen literature, such as Hakuin and Chinul)  better because it captures the process a bit more precisely in my mind. A few points:

 

1. It is not either/or, it is a spectrum. Melting ice takes time, but there are certainly degrees. 

2. It is about relaxing and letting go rather than picking something up. We have everything we already need, there is not something new to add. Rather, it is about opening and expanding more than anything. 

3. The process is natural refines the more you do it. At first, it may be very gross, very conceptual, very effortful. These tend to reduce naturally on their own with practice. 

 

Ice is ice. A rough block sitting outside and a finely sculpted castle  look very different, and function very differently, but their nature is the same. 

[Lairg]

3 hours ago, stirling said:

Realizing that "you" have never HAD control is the way forward.

 

On the other hand Christianity is introducing the concept of being a co-creator with God.

 

Hopefully co-creators are not random in their actions

 

The Hindu concept of Atma is interesting.  In the human context that operates as spiritual intent - setting a direction.  In most humans spiritual intent rests upon outcomes without specifying process.  Process is delegated to other intelligences.

 

 

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by Lairg

[Nungali]

7 hours ago, liminal_luke said:

 

Since my inhibitory impulses are out of control, I´ll take the Devil´s Advocate position and say that control is usually illusory, overrated, often desired and seldom achieved.  The whole idea of control is perhaps misconception Numero Uno.  Seems to me that the more we try to be in control and less we are.  If control is possible at all, I think it requires humility and surrender, requires us, in short, to be less and less controlling.  

 

Control sounds dangerously close to oppression , to me .   There is this thing in similarity between  dealing with children , dealing with yourself , drives and emotions etc  and dealing with a skidding motorcycle      

 

Sometimes trying to 'control ' things makes it worse  .  I'd say  subtle persuasion, at the best  ...... things may arise , be felt .... but in my view its the 'output' or end result that is important , 

 

Once , someone to me ;   '' But,  why are you not jealous ? '' 

 

'' Oh, I am .... but thats for me to deal with .... internally ,  I dont see what yelling, stamping my feet or being violent would achieve , except making me feel worse about that later .  ''

 

 

[liminal_luke]

12 minutes ago, Nungali said:

 

 dealing with a skidding motorcycle       ''

 

 

The skidding motorcycle gets to the heart of things: motorcyclists with good control live longer.  But one does not learn such control by being controlling -- at least not in the oppress-a-child I´m-the-master-of-the-universe sense of the word.  Vehicular control is a matter of responding precisely to external conditions.  We can´t necessarigly change conditions as they arise, but we can dance with them skillfully.  There´s a lot of humility and surrender in the dance; it´s in allowing things to be as they are -- and then acting appropriately -- that control is achieved.

Edited 1 hour ago by liminal_luke

[Keith108]

19 hours ago, Tommy said:

I have read so many people ask about phases or steps or levels of advancements. The thinking is that when one spends more time than others in practice or meditation then they are further advanced. Like taking a university course, the more time spent passing courses will eventually bring one the diploma. Except here it is of enlightenment. So, is it my misconception that there really is no levels of advancement. No phases that one goes thru to reach enlightenment. It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

My misconception that it depends on whether a person is readily able to accept the impetus to be pushed beyond this mind. For some it may take years of practice before this state. Others are near and have had experiences they are not ready for. Thus thinking they may be crazy. That is until they meet a real teacher.

 

Sometimes I see a person who spouts rhetoric and sayings from whatever they have recently read. Maybe even someone who has had experienced Kensho but has no idea how to move forward. Then there is the one up man. Must always be one up on the next person. There are so many different people. Am I wrong to think there is no phases or levels? That it is mostly a hodge podge of people in different areas. All trying to find their way?

 

Sorry, I am not very smart. Just a simple person. I have many misconceptions. But, I am willing to learn?? Maybe??

 

Hi Tommy,

 

Each of us has everything we need (even though, originally there is no "each of us").

 

Enlightenment is a step back into our true self, not a step forward into some altered state. 

 

There is no "advanced" Buddhism.

Complicated is not advanced, it's just adding frost to snow.

There is no higher or lower, no phases, no levels.

 

Trace back your thoughts, opinions, ideas, beliefs...where do they come from? Ask yourself that sincerely, and the clouds will clear. It helps to work this through with a teacher.

 

That's just my bs though, you have try it out yourself. 

 

_/|\_

Keith

 

Edited 34 minutes ago by Keith108

[old3bob]

19 hours ago, Tommy said:

I have read so many people ask about phases or steps or levels of advancements. The thinking is that when one spends more time than others in practice or meditation then they are further advanced. Like taking a university course, the more time spent passing courses will eventually bring one the diploma. Except here it is of enlightenment. So, is it my misconception that there really is no levels of advancement. No phases that one goes thru to reach enlightenment. It is nothing like taking a college course?

 

My misconception that it depends on whether a person is readily able to accept the impetus to be pushed beyond this mind. For some it may take years of practice before this state. Others are near and have had experiences they are not ready for. Thus thinking they may be crazy. That is until they meet a real teacher.

 

Sometimes I see a person who spouts rhetoric and sayings from whatever they have recently read. Maybe even someone who has had experienced Kensho but has no idea how to move forward. Then there is the one up man. Must always be one up on the next person. There are so many different people. Am I wrong to think there is no phases or levels? That it is mostly a hodge podge of people in different areas. All trying to find their way?

 

Sorry, I am not very smart. Just a simple person. I have many misconceptions. But, I am willing to learn?? Maybe??

 

human beings and I'd say all other types of created beings evolve, devolve or change... Spirit/Buddha nature/The Self/or your preferred term/ do not.  But with beings that are going through particular  changes  one could say there are changing levels, states, or phases.  Imo such is depicted in the Tibetan wheel of life.  Cryptic like sayings about the absolute have different strokes for different folks.

 

 

Edited 10 minutes ago by old3bob