Icedude

A course fee? I'm not looking to attend any class courses, and I don't have any income, so I can't afford that. Sorry.

1. b 2. a 3. b 4. a (I'm not looking to be a monk. I hear monks don't get to have internet connections.) Thank you for testing me.

Yes, and they're christian. I don't think they possess the knowledge to be able to test me for a completely different religion. ...but thanks anyway. I've already solved my problem: I'll just go to a nearby buddhistic temple and ask them. I'll just wait a couple of years for them to build the temple first, no problems. It's just that I heard they tested a guy for "Buddha energies" and that got me all excited, imagining some sort of buddhistic Ghostbusters with PKE meters: "Oh, the midichlorian count on *this* one is through the roof! I think we might have an enlightened entity here - at least a class five arhat!" I can test if you qualify as a great man, by comparing you to the Buddha. Let's see here... "Hands reaching below the knees"? Check. "Lion-shaped body"? Check. "Four canine teeth pure white"? Check. "Jaw like a lion"? Check. "Tongue long and broad"? Check. Well, 5 out of 32 characteristics, isn't bad. You're not a lion by any chance? That would make you score even higher.

See? *Now* where getting somewhere! Can you provide me with an email to said relevant authorities, that'd be great. (I don't recognize chinese governmental authorities, btw.)

Yes, but it's not just in the diploma itself. I need to be able to earn it somehow, through a test of my current state. It needs to stand for something - not just for being an annoying beggar at an internet forum. I only see the need for one, as to my knowledge, there is really only one scale from dukkha to buddhahood.

Just people in general. Ignorant people who like diplomas.

I know plenty of atheists that would be more impressed by a glowing, singing cert, than by Gods invisible, mute presence. There's no point in God revealing himself to you, when you already see him. You guys are completely useless. For six pages now, half of what I've been hearing is "You don't need a diploma. A diploma is completely useless. You wouldn't be able to back up a diploma. You're just after money, sex and glory.". All of these are just complete excuses. You'd *like to think* that I don't need a diploma. You'd *like to think* that a diploma is completely useless. You'd *like to think* that nobody is more enlightened than you. You'd *like to think* that nobody could be more genuine than you. The truth is that you don't know. You don't know what enlightenment is about, how to measure it, how to test for it, or how to cert it. ...but you'd like to play these stupid mind games, based on your selfish assertions, because if you can just drag me down to your level and beat me, then at least I'm not better than you. You tell me that you don't need diplomas or certs for anthing, so I'm guessing that you just went and got a prestigious job by showing up on time and finding an empty desk. Your boss fully believed that you were capable of handling things, because there's really no need for grades or tests or recommendations. ...but then you got fired one day when you didn't show up to work fast enough, only to find that two monkeys had taken your place. ...because they showed up first, and found your empty desk. ...but you *sound* pretty cool when you say that you're above diplomas. That makes you sound like The Man. Maybe you even *have* said diplomas. What you don't have is a clue.

Well God would draw one up, of course. However Jesus wouldn't be able to draw one up, because he's dependent of God to draw one for him. This is why we had transmissions and lineages, at least back in the day, that was supposed to lead all the way back to Buddha. Buddha "drew" his own certificate, and then the guys who found him bought into it for some reason. ...and people apparently got pretty pissed when Buddha just selected one guy to transmit to. *slowly begins transforming into John Cleese.* Today we have lots of people claiming to be buddhas and bodhisattwas, and there are different faiths having different requirements, and nobody seems to know exactly who is who in this giant mess that people still manage to take seriously somehow. If there's no way to test for enlightenment, then what's all the hubbub about? A guy sat down under a tree, and people got interested, and things kind of snowballed, and maybe something really cool was said, but we don't know that. We don't really know, because in steps the first council, who has no clue about what the buddha meant, so they draw up all these ridiculous rules that they define as buddhism, and after that Asoka just chops off their heads off. We can't be the least bit sure that there's anything left. Not unless there is a test of some kind that we can use to verify wisdom and titles with. This is an ex parrot!

So no certificate in the world could convince you that anybody was Jesus, not even if God came down from the heavens, danced the macarena in front of you, singing: "Oh, glory to my son, who is my son, and he's just over there, embarrassed over his father making an ass of himself, but he is my son, and here's a glowing, singing cert, that makes flowers blossom and birds ejaculate, that is actually a portal back to this moment in space and time, where I always will be to prove that my son is my son." Okay.

Ah, but if I could produce a cert that I was a bodhisattwa, then you wouldn't think or say these things. If I had some kind of glowing stamped cert by God, that I was Jesus, then you wouldn't doubt that I was Jesus.

Are you quite sure about that? You're not just taking a huge dump on me now for no reason? Think it over, because there will be a test. >I'm not "enlightened" but can still help my community, friends and family live in peace as best as I can. Yes, "as best as you can". ...but sometimes "as best as you can" might require a certificate. In the case of the user who needed a cert to do acupucture: He can help with grocery shopping too, but he has greater skills than that, which he needs to get validated to be able to use officially.

People consider him to be a manifestation of a bodhisattva, which is why whe's such a role model and a celebrity. You're free to not believe in that, but you cannot convince me that he lacks a title. ...and if people can get tested for titles, just like he was, then I want one too. I'm good for at least being a bodhisattwa. Pieces of paper "makes the world go round". Well, it used to. Now little electrons in computer systems "make the world go round". Maybe a piece of paper doesn't mean anything to you, but it does to people stuck in dukkha. It does to students. That's why the Dalai Lama sits surrounded by gold, preaching that gold is cursed: It's a connection with people. There needs to be a bridge somehow, between Nirvana and Dukkha. I'm looking to build that bridge out of paper, just like the zen masters before me did.

I concur with ChiDragon: I'd really like to know where this "somewhere" is. Is there a compressed "somewhere" that you've found, that is more "somewhere" than here?

I bet that either one of us could use a paper to wave around right now, because this distrust is exactly what I mean. Then why doesn't the Dalai Lama wipe his ass with his robe? Thank you. I'll go and ask him. I was replying to somebody complaing about how I'm acting in a conflicting way. At this very moment where *all* letting kittens starve in Africa. What is that saying about us? ...and if we're over in Africa nursing kittens, we're certainly not working for world peace in the UN at the same time. Wouldn't world peace save a lot of kittens? We're all hypocritical bastards by our very limited nature. Everything we do is stupid and full of conflict, whether we want it to be or not. Pointing that out is hardly a feat. You can turn every action on its head, but all you're doing then, is just saying ”F***ing Icedude, man... He thinks he's all that, but he's clearly not.”. You later say that I'm ”juggling too many things”. According to who? According to you. To you there's an amount of things, or certain things, that is ”too much” for you to ”juggle”. If you were in my seat you wouldn't be able to handle it, so you can't imagine how that amount could be ”healthy”. You say that it's a bummer to have nothing to do, so that continuing to do nothing instead of defining a role for yourself, would be stupid. I'm part buddhist, so I happen to think buddhahood and Nirvana is fine too. Your definition of ”illusion”, where you think that the experience of other people living is an illusion, seems based on ”a brain in a vat”, and that anything that we cannot prove, is an illusion. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_in_a_vat ) That's not how ”illusion” is defined in taoism or buddhism. Rather it is the *value* of existing things, that is an illusion. Pain is a nerve impulse. You feel pain when you exercise too, and life is full of discomfort, but pain isn't always a sign of something bad. Sometimes pain isn't important. That's why you see monks living in asceticism instead of being high on morphine and worldly pleasures: Because while these things (very likely) exist, they're not important. Yes, conflict is an illusion. That's why I toss it around like confetti. Yes, even doing nothing could be seen as a conflict. Complaining over there being conflicts, is like complaining over there being space and time everywhere. Still, you can't ignore the fact. There's also peace everywhere, if you wish to see it that way. Yes, I'm considering printing a diploma myself, but that wouldn't fill the need to be validated.

It's not sarcasm. Once you're aware that all your motivations for acting is based on your own illusions, there's really no point to acting, so when you act anyway, you know that it will create a conflict somehow. Just living and breathing will create ripples in existence. That's what life does: It sputters around fueled by its own illusions. I don't know what specific motivational conflict you were referring to, but everything I do, I do, not *because* there's a conflict, but *despite* there being a conflict. I see people suffering and I motivate myself to care about them. Why? Why not? I don't have anything better to do, so I might as well. It's what life is supposed to do: Something. My frontal lobe is intact, so I might as well follow it and let it take me on an adventure, and I have all this fantastical wisdom that would be a waste otherwise. ...but then again, is it really caring? Just like you're saying, many people don't want help, because it makes them feel dumb and embarrassed. There's a conflict, in that the response is pretty much random. Maybe them getting helped all the time will just spoil them weak. There's a conflict, and once again I don't care about it, because there's conflict no matter what I do. There's even conflict in sitting at home and doing absolutely nothing. People can judge everything and find me guilty if they want. I will always be a fiend in *some* light. I'm not planning on "waving around" the piece of paper - I'm not looking for an achievement. I know of a yoga teacher, and he's always so content that it looks like he's high on drugs all the freaking time, and underneath it there's seems to be this nasty level of smugness too, despite him refusing to talk about it. I don't know him personally, but I suspect that his smiling muscles must get tired if he's around people for too long. I'm not like that. I didn't ask for this weird way of seeing things. I didn't ask to see people suffering around me, and knowing exactly why, and them not caring about anything I have to say on the matter. It's frustrating. It's just that I get everything, and I read that there's all these high and mighty descriptions of people who get what I get, so now I'm interested in if there's anything left to learn (and I'm not talking about learning common yoga techniques here), and also if a title could help me to get through to people. Do I have faith in people who has diplomas in enlightenment? Yes, I do. I have faith enough to consider their words very carefully. Fake diplomas or genuine diplomas, these people cared enough to make themselves seem enlightened, and that makes it worth discussing deep things with them. Genuine or fake, it shows some level of spiritual dedication. ...but yes, of course I wouldn't just believe everything they told me, based on their diploma. If there's a "Mall" sign hanging over a building, that sign is there to indicate the strong possibility of a mall. ...so you go and check out the building, and there's a good change that you'll find at least an *attempt* of a mall, which is cool too. In the case of buddhism and taoism, you can find all sorts of weird malls, which are nothing like the other malls. ...and as for me, I'm looking to see at what level I'm at. There is something "really wrong" with me, and I'd like to figure out what name this "existential syndrome" has. I'm also generally looking for some kind of substance in these faiths, because it's a complete jungle of conflicting definitions, where the goal seems to lack a clear definition.

Everybody may end up in sexual assault lawsuits. It's like the flu. However, it takes a certain speed (desire) to end up responsible for one, and I see no point in building up speed. I'm satisfied with having enough conflicts to keep me sitting here typing. Yes, but how do I even get the intent to understand? That's what this thread is about. You have a horrible attitude. I disagree with almost everything you typed. First of all, you've fallen into a spiritual trap. It's easy to just say "Give up wanting. Give up typing. Don't post. Shut up." in every situation, because that means you don't have to think about problems, and can always provide a copy-paste solution, but in this case that means a will from *your* end for any would be future students of mine to suffer. By stopping me, you're not stopping ten other people. Your copy-paste solution doesn't apply here. It's not impossible for me to give up wanting to teach, but that's up to me. You say that it's impossible to enlighten someone, because you want me to give up. Still you admit that progress can be made if teacher and student is aligned. I want to align myself, and I want to use a material means to do so. Just thinking that everything is up to chance and fate, sounds very naïve to me. We can arrange the material world, to align material students into leaving the material world. Again and again I hear this cynical "You're only doing this to be praised, get rich, and get status.", as if everybody coming here is just faking a spiritual call. I'm not from India. My only status will probably just be "That weird hippie guy.". ...so you have a horrible "holier than thou" cop-out, that you can get away with most of the time, but not right now. Edit: Please don't be hurt by my post. I mean the above in a firm but a most respectful manner.

Are conventions that foolish? What has conventions ever done to Robert Adams? Why? That's kind of what you do when you're enlightened: You don't resolve your conflicts. Instead you just sit down amongst your conflicts and you toss them up in the air and go "Whee! ".

Is wanting to be listened to not part of the tao? I thought that was part of most of tao. However, I doubt that I act in accordance with the tao. A tao master out looking to enlight people, doesn't act in accordance with the tao. He chooses his own direction and speed, and he's out to stop people. I doubt that such an act of tao terrorism, is a natural flow of the tao.

Hello. First of all, I'm sorry. I tried to register as "Iceman", but wrote "hotmail" as my email address, so that whole account should be disregarded. "Icedude" is fine. Well, all names are bad at describing people, really, yet people fall for them every time. You can't win. You can be "HappyDude" and then people will expect you to be happy all the time. I'm a taoist. ...I think. I also think I'm a rinzai zen buddhist. I don't read that much, so I don't really know. I also have these delusions of being horribly enlightened. I don't know which is worse: Me being a delusional madman, or me being a complete waste of ultimate wisdom. What if Jesus just sat at home in front of a computer all day and did nothing but fap? Would he still be Jesus? I'm also not a bot. At least I'm certain about that bit.

I'm not looking to be "heard of", but I am looking to be understood and listened to. I know this girl who thought I would beat her up if we met, this after a year of speaking with her. People formulate their own ideas of other people, sometimes completely independent of reality. When not even your fiancé can understand who you are, or what you're saying, because she's so caught up in her own world, then you need external help. Magic, qigong and martial arts, can be demonstrated pretty much in an undeniable way. Spirituality less so. Yes, going to a temple and asking a decent level practitioner, seems like a good plan. I just hope they know what they're doing. Again, I'm not looking to be reknowned even in my local area. I'm just looking for a certificate in case people are doubting me. I'm not looking for "acolytes", but yes, the certificate are there for "naïve" people who trust material things. We seem to have different definitions of who is worthy of being taught. To me it's a waste to teach people who are already on their way to enlightenment, compared to people who suffer the most from lack of understanding and who are fixated with material things. Why people would even *want* to pay me for something I can't seem to offer for free, is a strange thought. However, once I didn't give away $60 to somebody as a lesson. I don't have a need for money. I have a bed, food, clothes, and an internet connection. I don't get what else you would need in life. I'm already spoiled. I think I'd rather pay people to listen. I want to teach for the same reason that any bodhisattwa would want to teach, and most school teachers would want to teach: For people to learn. Still, I wouldn't like being followed. Even being respected feels uncomfortable to me, but I still seem to need some amount of respect to be understood, which I currently lack. I don't think I have an air other than the air that people make up about me. Some people think that I must surely stalk the streets at night, peeking into the bedrooms of women. Other people think other things. Rumours are not air. ...but I reckon I have an uncanny *lack* of air, which sometimes drives people crazy. It comes from my lack of identity - my lack of self. It is the people who are impressed with things like diplomas that I want to reach. They're the ones who are worth my time. >One thing I have found is that the people who have told me they are enlightened were the least enlightened of folks I have met Well, that's why I'm looking to get tested. I've known for many years that I don't think like other people, and there's something off when I eat koans like a bag of chips and just understand everything. Imagine that you're about to begin a big marathon, and at the start of the gun, everybody finds it really hard to move, like they're stuck to the ground. Everybody but you, who can move freely. You ask them what's wrong, and they tell you that they're unable to move for probably eons and eons, and that they're certainly not going to finish the marathon in *this* lifetime, and probably not the next one either. That sort of fills me with eerie dread, especially when they give me that look that I shouldn't be breaking the laws of physics by not having any problems. Being special means feeling alone and disgraceful. The Dalai Lama considers himself to be a Bodhisattwa. All power to him, but I can't learn anything from him. The people I learn most from, are just normal people. Especially people who wakes emotion in me, are awesome teachers. (DarkSydePhil on YouTube: Excellent Dukkha artist. Always whines and complains. I can listen to him for hours. He's my meditation.) Not thinking all the time, is fairly easy. Manifesting stuff? Physical things out of thin air? Never done it. Not be 100% physical all the time? Depends on what you mean. If is means your body physically turning untouchable, I've never done it. Thank you for reading through all of this. I'll probably go to sleep soon.

I heard that some group of people came to determine whether or not Dharma Sangha was a buddha or not, and they concluded that he didn't have the same "Buddha energies". Also, when people go out to look for the next incarnation of the Dalai Lama, they are apparently testing lots of children in different households. ...so somewhere there is a test that strangers can undertake, that doesn't require years of studies under a teacher. When you say "Instead we look for how the person leads their life, how they act, the sense of energy and peace around them, the feeling of a sort of power, as well as word of mouth from others who have trained with said person." then that sounds exactly like what I'm looking to have tested. Hopefully you can test enough over the internet, because I guess we're not exactly neighbors. >Also keep in mind that the whole striving for recognition from others only distracts us from our path. To be honest, the only thing certificates are good for is if you are performing healing on others, or you are trying to make money from the path. I already explained why I want recognition: So that people will actually listen to me. There are people so caught up in Dukkha, that they can only see material things. ...so I need a material thing as a means of communication. It's great that you know people who say good things about you. Unfortunately, if you become enlightened enough, you tend to drift away from "the common tounge", and end up being pretty strange when people get to know you. It sort of hinders "hanging out" with people in a social way, at least outside of India. I guess I can start writing articles on the net. Still, I'm not sure whether I'd want to attract a whole following of people that come to my house, and peek in through my windows when I'm naked. Yes, there are probably a lot of fake certificates, but I'm not looking for a fake certificate. Sure, it would be something to show, but I wouldn't be able to fully know that I earned it. "The State of China in The United States of America"

So it seems that I need to actually go to a temple and find a teacher. It feels like a waste of time, but if that's what I must do, then that's what I must do.

Exactly: I don't get the real meaning of the definition for Nirvana. Sure, it's described, but people expect big things to happen when you reach Nirvana, and I don't see myself glowing like a 20 foot lightbulb like the Mahayanas think I should be. (Okay, one person actually did, but I'm certain she's schizophrenic. She was going to kill me with a knife, saw my light, and apparently she converted to buddhism soon after, and became a temple nun. Yes, seriously. ...but this was before I was fully enlightened, so we didn't talk anything about buddhism or such things.) The thought of going around glowing with holy light, would be pretty creepy, and the mutant tiger thing would probably be even creepier. Thank you so much! If only it was genuine too.

Yes, I'm actually serious. Think is something I've been thinking about for a few months. Sure, there is "Dharma transmissions", but those seem to be from teacher to student. I guess I'm out of luck. Didn't my example show that a sage *does* need recognition? If nobody listens, then sure he's a sage, but he's no use to anyone. What sort of a bodhisattva would even the Dalai Lama be, if nobody listened to him and everybody thought he was just a loon?

Exactly. > How about a lightly trolling forums diploma? I bet if I had a diploma, you wouldn't think me a troll.