Meditation

_Simon_

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This is the hard part to swallow for many.

Ha, the day I forgot about my own suffering, suddenly a thousand others filled that void.

Every now and then it returns but the best medicine, I've learned, is to focus on them.
Yeah... years ago when I came upon all this stuff I was on cloud 9, thinking I've found the solution and no more suffering to be had. Then the last 5 years have been an unstoppable avalanche...

Brought me to not fun places of such despair and doubt... but perhaps that's the point... it's breaking down all my "certainties" about life, the things I hid behind, to tell me that no... even that is not "it"...
 

hoshin1600

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Just go back and take the blue pill.

But seriously, I believe enlightenment is a neurological rewire. ( bringing back the op) the brain has plasticity so it can go back to the common state.
 

Oily Dragon

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Just go back and take the blue pill.

But seriously, I believe enlightenment is a neurological rewire. ( bringing back the op) the brain has plasticity so it can go back to the common state.
Yeah and it's funny that certain traditions (like Chan) are basically a mashup of Daoist return to nature meditations and Chinese breathing/body/mind techniques combined with Mahayana concept of enlightenment (and Indian breathing/body/mind techniques).

Before Buddhism came to China, the best they had was "become one with the Dao" etc and after it became "Buddha says, you are suffering because you are not yet one with the Dao yet".
 

Gyakuto

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Yeah... years ago when I came upon all this stuff I was on cloud 9, thinking I've found the solution and no more suffering to be had. Then the last 5 years have been an unstoppable avalanche...

Brought me to not fun places of such despair and doubt... but perhaps that's the point... it's breaking down all my "certainties" about life, the things I hid behind, to tell me that no... even that is not "it"...
The ‘great doubt’ is an important part of the Zen process, but what you describe doesn’t sound…healthy or at all pleasant. We do live in an increasingly uncertain world but it’s not worth despairing over things we have little control.

I’m pretty certain my dying thoughts as I float in my interstellar transport pod (😐) will be, “Was that it? Life was quite dull and boring”, but I’m fine with that and I’m sure there are many in Ukraine and Iran etc who would love those to be their last thoughts.
 

Gyakuto

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Just go back and take the blue pill.

But seriously, I believe enlightenment is a neurological rewire. ( bringing back the op) the brain has plasticity so it can go back to the common state.
When I was a kid, I had a Sega Megadrive with the Space Invaders game. It was challenging and a bit frustrating. By some weird fluke, I discovered that flicking the on/off switch a couple of times I could glitch the game allowing my ‘artillery space laser cannon’ to fire two rounds in quick succession - no waiting for the fired shell to hit a previous target! I DESTROYED those aliens and reached unimaginable scores and was the envy of all my friends (whom I didn’t tell or noticed).

Thus, I increasingly agree with Hoshi and think meditation is a ‘hack’ that allows ‘awakening‘ caused by the wiring of some people’s brain’s. The whole ‘robes/sutras/church/synagogue/Gurudwara’ thing is just human superstition, our love of ritual and a fearful desire for a benevolent father-figure to watch over us.
 

Gyakuto

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Yeah and it's funny that certain traditions (like Chan) are basically a mashup of Daoist return to nature meditations and Chinese breathing/body/mind techniques combined with Mahayana concept of enlightenment (and Indian breathing/body/mind techniques).

Before Buddhism came to China, the best they had was "become one with the Dao" etc and after it became "Buddha says, you are suffering because you are not yet one with the Dao yet".
It’s all man-mad. I’m reading about Neo-Confucianis and this mash-up so obvious!
 

Gyakuto

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I think there are some enlightened people who post on this forum…and some, like me, who just like shiny swords and a well-tailored hakama 🤓🥳 Oooo I loves a sword…🥰😍
 

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