After reading Toni Packer’s The Silent Question again, I am reminded why I don’t readily adopt labels and that proclaiming that I’m Buddhist could put me in a box that I don’t want to be in and that doesn’t reflect reality. The fact is I currently have a lot of saddha (faith or confidence) and I have to in order to meditate all of my waking hours. I am immersed in a Buddhist culture, am living with monastics and have dedicated my life solely to practice right now. We’ll see if things change upon leaving Burma, getting back to the States, etc., but what’s important is that this practice is about daily life, and about making meditation a way of living, so that’s why for the first time I feel a need to identify with the religion…but really, it’s the self-inquiry and the questioning that matters (which can be entirely independent of anything faith-based). And the learning. The direct experiential learning. My teacher said the other day that wisdom (paññā) is what makes life meaningful. Wisdom being a synonym here for knowledge, insight, skillful practice, all in terms of the understanding of ultimate reality (anicca, dukkha, annatā).

What this kind of meditative work comes down to (yes, if only it were so simple!), at least from a Theravadan perspective, is understanding the teaching of anicca or impermanence, dukkha, which is translated most often as suffering but also as unsatisfactoriness or stress, and anattā or “no-self”. Anattā is referred to more as emptiness in the Mahayana schools and across the board is probably the most important single element of the Buddha’s teaching even though he supposedly said: “I teach only dukkha and the ending of dukkha”. Of the three, the first two concepts are a little easier to grasp than the last one. The Four Noble Truths state that there is suffering; not that everything is suffering but rather that there is the experience of suffering. It’s a fact. It’s not something we have to believe in, just like we don’t have to believe in the sun and that it will come up tomorrow. Similarly, we intuitively understand impermanence through the loss and death we experience in our lives, and more simply in things like cut flowers or sunsets. And meditation allows us to explore these truths much more deeply. But at the core of it all is the attachment to self, to the identification of all that we experience as “me” or “mine”. So then the work requires that we investigate the concept of self and really understand what it is. So we ask questions like, “who is aware of this moment?”, “what is experiencing this pain?”, “what is hearing this sound?”, “who is it that knows this experience?”. Toni Packer describes this type of investigation, this effort to move outside of conceptual thought in order to gain some understanding of anattā, in the following passage:

“I remember going through all this many years ago, racking my brain about this ‘I’ and ‘me’, trying to get to the root of it while driving to Rochester on the interstate. And if you, too, are interested in finding this out, go quietly into it any time it comes up for you. It is amazing to experience this quandary, this wondering, and investigating into not-knowing, because it really seems to exercise the brain and allow it to move outside its accustomed pathways of talking and thinking. Questioning can shake it up. Loosen its stuckness. Like we’ve said before, ‘cracking the cement of language’.”

Everything we relate to, we do so in terms of our self; it’s the only way we know how. But we’ve also probably all had the kind of bare awareness where the ego just falls completely away (imagine being alone in a forest hearing the wind rustling the leaves, or the moment of inspiration when something creative just comes oozing out of your fingers). It doesn’t happen often, and usually we’re not trying for it, but it’s pretty powerful to tap into this awareness that’s always there but unfortunately hidden by our normal ways of thinking about the world.

Sayadaw U Tejaniya teaches the practice of moment to moment awareness and the development of wisdom. He begs us to see and know ourselves that pain, happiness, whatever object the mind relates to, that it is all just nature, heaps of mental (nāma) and physical (rūpa) process happening over and over. Arising and passing away relentlessly. There’s nothing to hold onto. The “I” and all the adjectives we use to describe it are a concept and only that. So any label or word that I use on here is just a convention, a means of communication. It is a pointing to, a representation of something factual, but it in and of itself is not. (See next post for more on this topic.) So, Buddhist or not doesn’t really matter. Questioning, investigation, meditative inquiry, and realizing wisdom – we can all do that.

I’ll end this post with a few quotes (that I’m retiring from elsewhere on the Inernet) from two important influences, both adamantly “non-religious” though deeply “religious” people…

“But being a religious person, I would like to question the validity of everything for myself. That is the essence of religion, which is humility. Not to accept anything unless you understand the meaning there of, personally in your life. If you accept without understanding, you will be imposing upon the mind. And then you are neither true to the mind, nor true to the meaning. The essence of religion, which is humility, lies in uncovering the meaning of life, uncovering the meaning of every moment, learning the meaning for ourselves.”
- Vimala Thakar

“In the space which thought creates around itself there is no love. This space divides man from man, and in it is all the becoming, the battle of life, the agony and fear. Meditation is the ending of this space, the ending of the me.”
- J. Krishnamurti

Als der Buddhismus in Deutschland Ende des 19. Jhs.  besonders  im Bildungsbürgertum bekannt wurde, war das vor allem Arthur Schopenhauer zu verdanken.  So kamen  z. B. Karl Eugen Neumann, der  berühmte Übersetzer  der Lehrreden des Buddha, und Georg Grimm,  Gründer der Altbuddhistischen Gemeinde und einer der wichtigsten Interpreten des alten Buddhismus, über Schopenhauer zum Buddhismus.

Ich hatte  mich viele Jahre  mit dem alten Buddhismus, wie er im Pali-Kanon überliefert ist, ziemlich intensiv beschäftigt.  In diesem Zusammenhang  arbeitete ich viele Jahre im Buddhistischen Haus in Berlin-Frohnau mit und war auch einige Zeit Vorstandsmitglied der Buddhistischen Gesellschaft Berlin. Dabei hielt ich Vorträge z. B. in Volkshochschulen und im Radio, schrieb Artikel in buddhistischen Zeitschriften und Beiträge zu Büchern, um so interessierten Menschen die Lehre des Buddha nahe zu bringen. 

Je intensiver ich mich aber mit dieser sehr anspruchsvollen Lehre auseinandersetzte, desto größer wurden die Schwierigkeiten.  So fiel mir auf, dass buddhistische Lehrer bestimmte Kernaussagen des Buddha , die mir widersprüchlich erschienen, nicht erklären konnten. Dazu gehört vor allem die Anatta – Lehre, also Aussagen des Buddha darüber, was das “Ich” sei,  ja ob überhaupt ein “Ich” existiere.  Wenn es, wie viele dieser Lehrer erklärten, kein “Ich” gäbe, wie soll dann eine Wiedergeburt möglich sein?  Bei den Meditationen, die im Mittelpunkt der buddhistischen Praxis stehen, stellte sich für mich die Frage:   Wer meditiert da überhaupt?  Die Meditationslehrer gingen solchen Fragen zumeist aus dem Wege und beschränkten sich darauf,  die Bedeutung der Meditation und den mit ihr verbundenen Achtsamkeitsübungen für den Alltag hervorzuheben. 

Ein Schlüsselbegriff, nicht nur im Buddhismus, sondern aller altindischen Lehren, ist Karma. Hierunter wird zumeist ein universelles Gesetz von Ursache und Wirkung verstanden. Stark vereinfacht erklärt, bedeutet es, böse Taten  führen zu schlechtem Schicksal bzw. ungünstiger  Widergeburt und gute Taten zu einem entsprechend besserem Schicksal.  Hierbei ist nicht die Tat als solche entscheidend, sondern die Tatabsicht, also der die Tat bewirkende Wille, welcher gut oder böse, genauer: heilsam oder unheilsam sein kann.  Wenn unser Schicksal, ja wenn wir selbst die Folge von Karma sind, ist dann nicht auch unser Wille das Ergebnis von Karma?  Nyanatiloka erklärt dazu  (Buddhistisches Wörterbuch, 2. rev. Aufl., 1976, S.173) :

Falsch ist die Annahme, dass sämtliche geistigen Phänomene und Vorgänge die Wirkungen früherer Taten (Karma) seien. Niemals z. B. sind karmisch heilsame und unheilsame Willenszustände die Wirkung früherer Taten, da sie selber Karma sind.

Obige Einschränkung ist notwendig, denn andernfalls würde der Mensch lediglich ein Produkt seines Karmas sein. Willensfreiheit gäbe es dann nicht, und dementsprechend wären die Menschen völlig ihrem Schicksal ausgeliefert.  Auf die Konsequenzen weist auch Nyanatiloka  ( a.a.O., zu ”Titthayatana”, S. 223) hin:

Die drei ´Glaubensstandpunkte `, die (in einer buddhistischen Lehrrede) als zur Untätigkeit führend erklärt werden, sind:
1. die Lehre , dass alles Wohl und Wehe durch früheres Karma gewirkt sei,
2. dass alles ursachlos sei,
3. dass es durch Gottes Schöpfung bedingt sei. -
… Nach obigen drei Lehren ist also der Mensch nicht für seine Werke verantwortlich und jedes Streben sei daher zwecklos.

Mich kann diese Erkärung nicht ganz überzeugen, denn sie erinnert mich an die Begründung, dass nicht sein kann, was im Hinblick auf die Konsequenzen nicht sein darf. 

Ein weiteres Problem ergibt sich bei einem der wichtigsten und ältesten Teile des alten Buddhismus, nämlich der Lehre von der bedingten Entstehung aller psychischen und physischen Phänomen (paticcasamuppada). Sie erklärt auch den kausalen Zusammenhang zwischen den durch Wiedergeburten verknüpften individuellen Existenzen.  Sie wird oft  als Kreislauf dargestellt: … Ursache -Wirkung-Ursache-Wirkung …   So gesehen, ergibt sich ein endloser Kreislauf  von Wiedergeburten. Wie sollte da eine Erlösung aus diesem Kreislauf möglich sein?

Vor allem durch die oben erwähnten Fragen kam ich zu Schopenhauers Philosophie. In ihr fand ich Antworten, die mir weiter halfen und  immer noch helfen. Das bedeutete keine Abkehr vom Buddhismus, denn Schopenhauer selbst bekannte sich zum Buddhismus und nannte sich und seine Anhänger “Buddhaisten”. 

Trotz vieler  Übereinstimmungen – wie z. B. in der Mitleidsethik, welche auch die Tiere einbezieht – gibt es zwischen der Philosophie Schopenhauers und dem älteren Buddhismus einige wesentliche  Unterschiede.  Im Gegensatz zu Schopenhauer wurde vom Buddha die Willensfreiheit des einzelnen Menschen bejaht. Diese Voraussetzung für den buddhistischen Übungssweg kann ich jedoch kaum mit der oben erwähnten buddhistischen Anatta – Lehre vereinbaren. Daher habe ich mich über den Buddhismus hinaus auch der Philosophie Schopenhauers  und den von Schopenhauer hochgeschätzten Upanishaden zugewandt. Sie sind für mich kein Ersatz, sondern eine wesentliche Ergänzung zum Buddhismus und verhelfen mir, wie ich hoffe, zu einem besseren Verständnis der altindischen Weiheitslehren.
hb

Herbert Becker im Buddhistischen Haus

Übersicht (alphabet. in Stichwörten) zu den Themen der Arthur Schopenhauer Blogs > hier

Zu Arthur Schopenhauer und seiner Philosophie
> www.arthur-schopenhauer-studienkreis.de
sowie zum Buddhismus
> www.schopenhauer-buddhismus.de

The very popular S.N. Goenka style Vipassana retreats are taught around the world by video dhamma talk, and are a consistent 10-days of silence, starting with three and a half days of anapanasati (breath awareness) instruction and the remaining days introducing the body-sweeping technique as originally taught by U Ba Khin. Actually, my first long retreat and longest retreat to this day (about to change!) was also in this style. I have since explored other teachers because I found the technique as taught by Goenka quite rigid and because it’s very important to me to have a teacher that is teaching in an individual way, to exactly where I am now. That’s hard to do by video.

My friend Z has been on three Goenka retreats over the years, and he and his girlfriend have said their friends and family call it “silent selfish camp”. Today, the Tricycle Editor’s blog referred to an article that ran in The Vancouver Sun about meditation’s ill effects – in particular narcissism or an inflated sense of self-importance; and just last week this video showed up all over the Buddhist blogosphere, criticizing spiritual materialists. While there may be some truth to these critiques, is it possible that with right intention and a good teacher those who pursue the spiritual path may actually be contributing to society in a truly altruistic way, even if they separate themselves from society for a time?

Dōgen said, “to study the self is to forget the self”. For some reason, this has always made sense to me theoretically, at least since the first time I read the Shobogenzo Genjokoan as a 20 year-old. Practically speaking, it’s much more difficult to arrive at true understanding of this statement. Perhaps even harder is trying to explain this to someone else in any sort of conventional way. When I talk about anattā, no-self, as such a fundamental component of Buddhist philosophy, it really doesn’t compute for those people in my life who don’t have a meditation or spiritual practice of their own. Even just describing what meditation is has been excruciatingly difficult at times, although I’ve recently amassed a small collection of wonderful quotes on what it is, which may help.

If meditation is being aware of just this, exactly what is, then identifications with “I”, “me”, “mine” do tend to fall away. If someone says something that can be perceived as a criticism, but we don’t take it personally, then it’s just a factual statement and nothing more. There is no ego to get in the way and react. As Vimala Thakar says, meditation is then a way of life. It’s not something we go do by ourselves and then leave on the mat. It’s how we relate to everyone and everything in our lives, it’s how we eat, sleep, work, drive, interact, etc., if everything is done with heightened awareness. The point of this? Acceptance of things as they are, but also, more importantly less “me” to get in the way of honest relationship.

Toni Packer puts it this way:

“When the deeply habitual self-referencing–the comparing whatever is perceived in others to ‘my’ performance, ‘my’ idea, ‘my’ accomplishments–begins to slow down and clear the space for simple awareness, a new way of seeing and hearing unfolds. Everything seems to have changed, yet nothing has really changed, except that all of oneself is open, receptive, present and truly loving. This cannot be practiced–it springs into life as whole and complete being.”

So can I explain to my seven year-old nephew that I’m going away, not because I don’t care about him or don’t want very much to be a part of his life, but because I know that this practice helps me move away from these conditioned ways of thinking that cause me and all those I come into contact with to suffer? No, not really. Can I explain this to my parents? No, not really. Can I explain it to you? I don’t know. Can anyone understand any of this other than through direct experience? Probably not. Do I believe that radical transformation is possible through this practice? Yes, quite definitely. Is it for everyone? No, but at least this is one more person with the faith and commitment to move towards self-lessness, liberation, transformation.

For more on radical transformation, one individual at a time: See Krishnamurti piece on The Mirror of Relationship and Bhikkhu Bodhi’s article on Laying Down the Rod.

Hörande: vågors svall
Smakande: färskbryggt kaffe
Kännande: trötthet

Starkast -  identifikationen med trötthet.

[I wrote the following article as a submission to the Guest Writings section of the Kenneth Folk Dharma site. Kenneth teaches a model of meditation practice which he calls The Three Speed Transmission, and this article was written to fit that model (hence the references to various “Gears”).]

The Three Characteristics: A Practical Introduction

“Monks, [all phenomena are] impermanent. What is impermanent is suffering. What is suffering is nonself. What is nonself should be seen as it really is with correct wisdom: ‘This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.’ When one sees this thus as it really is with correct wisdom, the mind becomes dispassionate and is liberated from the taints by nonclinging.” ~The Buddha, from the Pali Canon*

The purpose of the Vipassana (Insight) side of the 1^st Gear of the Three Speed Transmission is to directly apprehend the Three Characteristics of phenomena via one’s direct moment-to-moment experience. The Three Characteristics are Impermanence (Pali: anicca), Suffering (dukkha), and Nonself (anatta). It is easy to contemplate these characteristics in an intellectual way, but experiencing them directly is another thing entirely. The direct apprehension of these characteristics is what leads to swift progress along the path of insight.

What follows are some basic ways in which one may directly apprehend each of the Three Characteristics through the practice of Vipassana meditation:

Impermanence: When one looks at a candle flame, it appears as though it is a separate thing. In actuality, it is constantly burning itself away. There is not one flame that exists from moment to moment. The same is true of the sensations that make up the totality one’s phenomenal experience.

If we pay attention to the activity of breathing, we notice that one moment the belly is rising, and the next it is falling. If we pay close attention to our hands and feet, we notice the quick rise and fall of each tingling sensation (i.e. vibrations). Each pulse, flicker, itch, and subtle movement will be seen to arise and vanish completely many times during each second of observation. Thoughts and mental images suddenly appear, and then vanish as quickly as they came. Everything that can be observed will be seen to arise and then vanish. This is perhaps the simplest way to observe any of the Three Characteristics, so it’s a good place to start.

Suffering: Tere are two simple ways to observe the Suffering characteristic. First, Suffering is said to be concealed by changing in to different postures. For example, if one decides to sit for a long period, they will eventually have to use the bathroom. The discomfort of a full bladder causes one to get up. When we examine our experience we see that we are always changing position to relieve discomfort of some kind. Realizing this, we realize the Suffering Characteristic.

The second way the Suffering Characteristic is observed is to notice how nothing can be held on to. A pleasant mind state arises, and we think, “Yes, this is it! I could stay like this forever.” But the state changes, even if we don’t want it to. In each moment one is either visited by unpleasant circumstances or watching the pleasant circumstances fall away. As painful and frustrating this is to experience, directly apprehending the Suffering Characteristic in this way brings insight.

Nonself: There are two basic ways to observe the characteristic of Nonself. First, as one observes the characteristics of Impermanence and Suffering, the meditator will understand that there is no one in control of what occurs. Thoughts just come and go. Pains and discomforts just happen, without any prior authorization from an “I.” Even the recognition of these processes seems to arise naturally without any prompting. With the realization that no one is running the show, we observe the Nonself Characteristic.

The second way to observe the characteristic of Nonself is through the practice of self-inquiry** (one of my all-time favorite practices). After noticing that no observable phenomena seem to be controlled by a separate observer, the meditator may ask, “Then who/what am I?” By asking, “Who am I?” the meditator begins the active search for a self essence. But s/he will quickly discover that anything that can be observed is by definition NOT an observer. When the sensations of experience that lie previously hidden are revealed, the meditator will continue to apprehend thus: “This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.” The Nonself Characteristic is perhaps the most of important of all three. In the words of the Burmese meditation teacher Sayadaw U Silananda, “No realization of Truth can occur without the knowledge of the anatta (no-soul) nature of things.”***

Conclusion: Working with the Three Characteristics involves more than just thinking about them. Rather, it is by direct apprehending these characteristics that one begins to gain insight into the Ultimate truth of things. In so doing, the meditator working on the 1^st Gear of the Three Speed Transmission will make their way through the stages of the Progress of Insight**** which leads to the attainment of stream entry (sotapanna): the first stage of enlightenment in the Theravada tradition.

* (SN 22:45; III 44-45)

** Self-inquiry is also the practice of the 2^nd Gear (Dwell as the “Witness.”).

*** Sayadaw U Silanadna, No Inner Core: An Introduction to the Doctrine of ANATTA (full PDF download).

**** For more information, see Kenneth’s pages on the Progress of Insight (Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five).

This morning I read a short book by Sayadaw U Silananda called No Inner Core: An Introduction to the Doctrine of ANATTA (available for free in PDF format here). Anatta (e.g. no-self or no-soul) is a teaching of the Buddha that is often misunderstood, and U Silananda does a spectacular job clearing up some common misconceptions. The book is a quick read, and I highly recommend it.

U Silananda teaches the Burmese Theravada style of Buddhism, so his views differ from some of the more well known forms of Buddhism in American (i.e. Zen/Ch’an, Tibetan). He in no way attempts to refute or belittle any other Buddhist traditions, so I think this book is accessible for the general Buddhist community, not just those of the Theravada tradition.

Enjoy!

Inconsistency is quite costly if you are working as a constructer; of a building, of a theory, of a life, of anything. The most feasible option is usually to keep up with the chosen(if you can) and deny the inconsistency when any ideological defence is asked. So this conversation might be over in pragmatic sense but it is hard to keep some contra-theorists quite. They are really good at reasoning and obviously they are looking for more than a mere construction; something more absolute, I shall say.

The above may sound biased (and) against the following quotations , but it was just designed to serve for the premise of the blog: “to inquire and debate”. I just wanted bring fairness & democracy to this post, because following people are really wise. Reading them alone could cause destruction without creation especially for teen minds.

And here they are:

“[...]But setting aside some metaphysicians of this kind, I may venture to affirm of the rest of mankind, that they are nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement. Our eyes cannot turn in their sockets without varying our perceptions. Our thought is still more variable than our sight; and all our other senses and faculties contribute to this change: nor is there any single power of the soul, which remains unalterably the same, perhaps for one moment.”

David Hume, from A Treatise of Human Nature

***

Well, days passed, this post was still unfinished. Time was in flux and kept loyalty only for herself. I was gonna quote from Heraclitus, Feyerabend and maybe some others. Check these two notions of Buddhism: Anatta & Annicca. You must have got the idea if there is any.

***

Ok wise ones, I will be honest with you, this last story is a setup to strengthen my point of view.

A setup.

I just added a new poem to the Poems section, an illustration of No Self and how awareness of it sets us apart from others.

‘Of human life the time is a point, and the substance is in a flux, and the perception dull, and the composition of the whole body subject to putrefaction, and the soul a whirl, and fortune hard to divine, and fame a thing devoid of judgment. And, to say all in a word, everything which belongs to the body is a stream, and what belongs to the soul is a dream and vapour, and life is a warfare and a stranger’s sojourn, and after-fame is oblivion. What then is that which is able to conduct a man? One thing and only one, philosophy. But this consists in keeping the daemon within a man free from violence and unharmed, superior to pains and pleasures, doing nothing without purpose, nor yet falsely and with hypocrisy, not feeling the need of another man’s doing or not doing anything…’ — Meditations Book II, by Marcus Aurelius

Of what I’ve read of the Meditations so far – which is the first two books – I find myself in agreement with Marcus Aurelius on most things, except that his repeated references to nature are a bit alien to me. I think he was trying to give words to his intuitions, which are probably the same as mine and those of other spiritual people, and he did so by using a ‘nature frame’. My view of nature is not nearly as reverential, but I think on an intuitive level Marcus Aurelius and I are in the same boat.

I would add, to the above quote, that what is constant and governs a person is not merely philosophy, but philosophy and spirituality. Philosophy alone cannot provide us with an understanding of those things that cannot be comprehended by the intellect or the senses. Acting according to reason is not enough, but one must also act from the heart. I’m open to the suggestion that the more one’s heart is developed and ‘emerged’, the more one can abandon acting from reason altogether. I have not experienced this, but I do not doubt it.

In the beginning of Book II of the Meditations, Marcus Aurelius states that one should tolerate and love other human beings, even those with vices. He says:

‘Begin the morning by saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busy-body, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial. All these things happen to them by reason of their ignorance of what is good and evil. But I who have seen the nature of the good that it is beautiful, and of the bad that it is ugly, and the nature of him who does wrong, that it is akin to me, not only of the same blood or seed, but that it participates in the same intelligence and the same portion of the divinity, I can neither be injured by any of them, for no one can fix on me what is ugly, nor can I be angry with my kinsman, nor hate him…’

I arrived at the same conclusion, but through different reasoning. First, I considered the free will issue. I stopped believing in free will when I thought about the principle of sufficient reason properly, but then I started questioning that position with the assumption that there is an immaterial soul. I considered the way one would know about the immaterial soul, which is through introspection. Can introspection answer the question of whether or not we have free will? What have I learned through introspection, anyway? For one thing, I have learned that anything I do feels like the most reasonable and appropriate thing to do at the time. My body has a mind of its own, and it just flows, sometimes with a proper consciousness of it developing only after the action has been executed. I also learned that the ego is an illusion; it is merely an ephemeral collection of mental and bodily events that something in us (the witness consciousness perhaps, or the soul) identifies with, leading to suffering. Thus, there is no ‘actor’, except a corporeal thing touched (just barely) by some sort of spiritual breath, that follows its own laws and has a life of its own.

Does this answer the free will issue? Not quite. If free will is defined as having the ability to have done otherwise than one did, then this cannot be answered through introspection alone. Introspection can only tell you what did happen, not what could have. It cannot be answered metaphysically either, until we have solved the mind-body problem. However, the insights gained through introspection very seriously and thoroughly (and rather interestingly, you must admit) demolishes the idea of agency, at least in one of its interpretations. I suppose you could define agency as what the ego has room to do, in which case the idea of agency has not been abolished by the above insights. But if you define it as a cohesive and permanent ‘I’ controlling one’s body like a machine, then the idea of agency is abolished.

So where does this leave me on the issue of whether or not to have compassion with others? The insight that people act in an automatic way, and with the feeling that their action is the best thing to do at the time does lead me to have compassion with them, and should lead others to do so as well (especially with me, as I don’t know how else people will tolerate my aspie-ness ). It is easier to have compassion when you’ve practice Vipassana, and so realized the impermanent nature of things, and begun dismantling your ego. In this relatively refined state, one does not expect much from others (expecting things from others is a function of the ego), and so one does not blame others. One becomes, even if one did not intend to, significantly more compassionate.

However, I would go further than Marcus Aurelius to suggest that one should not judge others as being busy-bodies, unsocial or ungrateful to begin with. Compassion without such judgment is better than compassion with those who one thinks of as inferior. In the instance that somebody is undoubtedly vice-ful, one should judge them carefully and without damning and totalizing labels; except in extreme situations where there is a complete loss of humanity, as with the Taliban.

PS – Aspie-ness refers to my autistic tendencies.

In response to Desi Skeptic’s comments, I want to write another post elaborating on why I left Buddhism, as well as on what Buddhism has to offer.

Besides setting out to treat suffering, Buddhism does something else rather important: it casts light on the nature of the self. ‘Anatta’, an important Buddhist principle, means not-self, specifically that a permenant or enduring self is an illusion. People often define identity as that which in their experience of themselves endures over time. One component of that is your perspective, which in its thinnest conception (as merely a witnessing consciousness) may be considered permanent in normal sentient beings. However, when people refer to their identity they always include the sense of having a personality, dispositions or agency. This self-concept exists only as a hypothesis being created on a moment-to-moment basis by our brains; in other words, the self is an illusion. The Buddha pointed this out before the Metzinger, Demasio, Hume and James did, and without their technological resources.

Attachment comes from trying to make permenant what is not permenant, and the ego/self has the tendency to do that. Since the material and phenomenal world is in a constant state of flux, any one thing – however pleasurable or even noble – is not going to last; but an illusory, impermanent self tries to make it last. I do not know exactly why the self has this tendency, but I suspect that inherent in it is a desire to control things.

Logically, then, in order to become detached you have to ‘dismantle’ your self, which you can do by simply watching it: the practice of mindfulness. I have a description of this practice in my post ‘Atheistic Spiritual Practices’, under the heading ‘vipassana meditation’. Vipassana and mindfulness are the same thing.

Trying to control when you’re detached and when you aren’t is simply repeating the problematic behaviour that started your suffering to begin with. You’re trying to control things, as an agent, as an ego. What to do about this problem will become clearer to you as you decide what you want and learn more about the various approaches to suffering and desire.

Anyway, this brings me to my problem with Buddhism, as I mentioned in the original post. As you get into the ‘dismantled self’ state, your witnessing consciousness (the bare minimum perspective mentioned above) remains intact but the dynamic part of you seems to almost disappear. That dynamic will is in fact bound up in the inherent pathologicalness of the ego (and also in your embodiment), so you do suffer significantly less (or not at all) in this non-willing state. I was convinced, by my experience of this, that Buddhism was the right path. But then it was exam period, and I needed to do things. I needed to study, to write, to research. And even when I didn’t, I needed to eat, poop and have conversations. Whenever these actions begin to ‘form’, your ego becomes temporarily recreated and that feeling is an uncomfortable one. The more you become involved with worldly life, the more the dismantling gets reversed. Thus, it is confirmed, that suffering is inherent in samsara, because suffering is inherent in the personal self or ego, and the personal self is a natural accompaniment to the moving, sentient body.

If you’re thoroughly immersed in this conception of the self and samsara, it would be strange if you did not want Nirvana. After all, it is the only state in which you can be entirely ‘de-selfed’. In the very least, if you haven’t reached Nirvana yet, you’d want to live a monastic life. It is the least worldly life you can live, and one that will not disturb you with its constant calls to action.

I think the problem with the Buddhist story is that the Buddha has only one dynamic will in his equation, and that is the personal, egoistic will. The Integral Yoga does not suffer from this problem, but I will not describe how just yet. I have not immersed myself enough in the discourse of the IY, and my own practice has been so pathetic so far that it feels presumptuous to talk about it. Suffice it to note that Buddhist practices are still useful in the IY, since by dismantling your ego you make room for your true Self.

According to my understanding of the original ideas of the Buddha, all movement belongs to samsara. Samsara is the world of becoming, i.e. of process. The goal of the Buddhist path appears to be Nirvana, the world of being, a world where there is no process. These worlds are not physical spaces, but states; when a person has achieved Nirvana, they are out of samsara.

I was a Buddhist for about two months. But for two weeks of that time, I was intensely conflicted about whether to want Nirvana. Non-movement does not seem like a worthwhile enough goal for me to devote my life to. And while I have a body and am moving, what guides my actions? It appears to be just pragmatic concerns or folk ethics, which explains why Buddhist ethics are usually stated as: don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t take intoxicants, don’t engage in elicit sexual behaviour, don’t lie etc.

Not only is there no proper guide to action, but the worldview is not sufficiently life-affirming. While I’m acting, I don’t want to feel like it’s a compromise. I want to put my heart into it. For these reasons I gave up Buddhism.

Meu amigo Vitor Hugo Adami já fez vários cursos de dez dias de Vipassana. Ele me deu um folheto direcionado às pessoas que ainda não se inscreveram em nenhum curso. Eu sei que esse folheto é difícil de encontrar, então transcrevo aqui pros iniciantes:

“Por favor leia com cuidado antes de inscrever-se num curso: Vipassana é uma das técnicas de meditação mais antigas da India. Esteve perdida durante séculos para a humanidade e foi redescoberta por Gautama o Buda há mais de 2500 anos. Vipassana significa ver as coisas tal como são na realidade. É um processo de auto-purificação mediante a auto-observação. Começa-se observando a respiração natural para concentrar a mente e depois, com a consciência afiada, começa-se a observação da natureza mutante do corpo e da mente, e se experimentam as verdades universais da impermanência, do sofrimento e da ausência de ego. Esse é o processo de purificação: o conhecimento da verdade através  da experiência direta. Todo o caminho (Dhamma) é um remédio universal para problemas universais e não tem nada a ver com nenhuma religião organizada nem com nenhuma seita. Por isso, todo o mundo pode praticá-lo livremente em qualquer momento e lugar, sem que se produzam conflitos por motivos de raça, comunidade ou religião aos quais se pertença; é igualmente benéfico para todos os que o praticarem.”

Observações pessoais: É importante a preocupação que a Fundação tem de informar os futuros alunos neste folheto. Por incrível que pareça, é muito comum encontrar pessoas que não tem a menor idéia do que seja meditação fazendo estes retiros. A desinformação gera muitas situações desagradáveis, porque não é nada fácil ficar dez dias sem falar, sentado imóvel 11 horas por dia e sujeito aos horários, regras e alimentação do centro. Os desinformados são pegos de surpresa e acabam prejudicando seu aprendizado e às vezes o aprendizado dos colegas.

Neste folheto fala-se em purificação. Eu acho esse termo ultrapassado, melhor aplicado na India antiga. O ego e os pensamentos não são impuros. São ferramentas úteis para a vida. Basta usá-las, em vez de ser usado por elas. Numa visão mais ampla, nada é impuro. Essa dicotomia prejudica meu entendimento da equanimidade. Também acho que não pode existir um “processo de purificação”, porque não existe um início, um meio e um fim na auto-observação. Nós observamos e ponto. Sem uma meta de limpeza pro futuro. Não posso afirmar que hoje estou melhor do que ontem, por mais meditação que eu pratique. A mente não pára, nem o tempo, nem o mundo. Essa purificação não existe, na minha opinião.

As três verdades universais citadas no folheto (impermanência, sofrimento e ausência de ego) podem ser profundamente assimiladas em dez dias:

A impermanência (anicca em pali) fica evidente no fluxo de pensamentos, sensações e emoções mutantes observados na mesma posição, no mesmo lugar e num curto período. Mas anicca também se pode constatar pela simples observação do mundo externo: as transformações são constantes. Nada no universo é estático. Quanto mais profundamente assimilarmos essa verdade, melhor surfaremos pela vida, sem resistências. Com sofrimento sim, mas sem apego a ele.

O sofrimento (dukkha em pali) é a característica da existência mais polêmica no ocidente. À primeira vista dá a sensação de que as filosofias orientais são pessimistas. Mas não existe nada mais realista do que afirmar que o sofrimento é parte integrante da vida, de todos, sem excessão. A insatisfação humana é constante. Só muda de intensidade, mas está sempre lá.

A ausência de identidade (anatta em pali), está intimamente ligada à idéia de anicca. Se “tudo muda, o tempo todo, no mundo”, então nós também mudamos. Dizem que trocamos todos os átomos do nosso corpo em um ano. Podemos mudar de profissão, de estado civil, de país, de religião, alterar profundamente nossos corpos, mudar radicalmente de opinião,  ideais e até de nome. O que fica no final? Apenas uma força observadora desprovida de rótulos. Assustador, mas real.

A lecture by Thomas Metzinger that I am a little in love with:

“Now that Samurai bow and arrow, Sumi brush, teacup
and Emperor’s fan are balanced in the hand
-what about a glass of water?
Holding my cock to pee, the Atlantic gushes out.
Sitting to eat, the Sun and Moon fill my plate.”
(Homage Vajracarya)

If we are to speak of the self in philosophic terms, it would make sense that we may speak of it as anybody’s self. That is to say, a unique container of identity possessed by everyone and yet still different. A common analogy: almost everybody possesses a cell phone. Although the intent of the device and our reasons for having them is largely the same, the infinitude of accessories, features, services and related miasma that the telecommunications industry spends millions in advertising to customize is microcosmically analogous to the various modalities that the human animal has created to customize it’s self as it were. We speak of the domains of religion, education, beauty, fashion, culture, science, banking, medicine, and the arts. If this understanding is applied to the notion of the self, perhaps the most interesting approach to deciphering and interpreting selfhood is through art and poetry. It is because poetry lacks, by definition, the rigidity of more established or ornamentalized forms of written expression that it would be well-suited to express the self, or glimpses at what that may or not be. In trying to approach the task of filtering the philosophic perspectives on the self through poetry, I felt it necessary to understand the context of both the poem and it’s poet. In doing so, I settled on trying to wrap my head around both Allen Ginsberg the man, and Allen Ginsberg’s poetry, and what both have to say about the self. If his booming, thunderous voice is any indication, it was upon the back of his widespread and oft controversial explorations into what it means to feel, to be human that the confidence in his writing exposes deeper philosophic views. I based my initial understanding of the man upon the late Mr. Ginsberg’s personal assistant and biographer Bill Morgan’s book I Celebrate Myself (the title a reference to Whitman). This method proved insightful as I was able to reread and connect much of Ginsberg’s work alongside events in his life (much of it letters and journals) in this prolific biography. Having read many of his more familiar poems many times (Howl, Kaddish etc) I became increasingly struck by what some of the lesser-known poems had in view of the self. Written on a train between Kyoto and Tokyo Japan in 1963, the physically, emotionally, and spiritually beleaguered poet penned one of the most lucid poetic depictions of himself, and of the nature of selfhood.

“Allen Ginsberg says this: I am a mass of sores and worms and baldness and belly and smell I am false
Name the prey of Yamantaka Devourer of strange dreams, the prey of Radiation and Police Hells of
Law […]
I am that I am I am the man and the Adam of hair in my loins. This is my spirit and physical
shape I inhabit this Universe Oh weeping against what is my own nature for now. […]
In this dream I am the Dreamer and the Dreamed. I am that I am Ah but I have always known.
In my train seat I renounce my power, so that I do live I will die. […]
Till my turn comes and I enter that maw and change to a blind rock covered with misty ferns that I
am not all now But a universe of skin and breath and changing thought and burning hand and
softened heart in the old bed of my skin from this single birth reborn that I am to be so-
My own identity now nameless neither man nor dragon nor God But the dreaming Me full of physical
rays’ tender red moons in my belly and Stars in my eyes circling And the Sun the Sun the Sun my
visible father making my body visible thru my eyes!”
(from The Change: Kyoto-Tokyo Expres)

_________________________________________
1Ginsberg, Allen. Selected Poems 1947-1995. New York: HarperCollins, 1996.

In the various schools of Buddhist thought there exists a concept that is called anatta in the Pāḷi language. This term roughly translates into “non-self”. The belief is that your inner consciousness, your self, does not last forever, but is transient and always changing. You will not be the same person you were in twenty years, nor are you the same person you were twenty years ago according to this idea. Your very self, the core of your being, is ephemeral.

Or so they claim. I take issue with this claim, however. If I’m constantly changing, is it possible for my self at one point to be good and warrant going to heaven while a later self is bad and is damned to hell? Now, I can only really base my judgment of this concept on personal experience, and it seems to me that the idea is lacking. I am exactly the same person I was all my life. To prove this, I submit to you an excerpt from a book report I wrote while in first grade entitled Green Eggs and Ham — a Literalist Approach:

When Theodor Geisel first wrote these immortal words:

You do not like [green eggs and ham]./So you say./Try them! Try them!/And you may./Try them and you may, I say.

which are now enshrined in his magnum opus, Green Eggs and Ham, he, quite simply, intended us to take them at face value. Through the words of Sam-I-Am, Seuss is directly stating to the reader that, despite the fact that we find the prospect of eating green eggs and ham revolting, we may, in fact, enjoy them. It is not as the Seussian apologists of the playground state: that we should try things before passing judgment on them. No, this is simply false dogma.

What they close their eyes to is the fact that these were actual events transcribed by Geisel. The unnamed, hatted protagonist was not some character created for a child’s amusement, but an actual flesh and blood person. And, with this account of his encounter with Sam-I-Am, Seuss reveals to us a universal truth: we may like green eggs and ham.

It is very much like this one fable I wrote [...]

As you can see from this passage, I have not changed one iota in terms of expressing my thoughts in the written word. Now, the Buddhists can go on believing their nonsense about the “non-self”. Perhaps, due to their fickle, ephemeral nature, they will eventually come around to the truth.