Lucky7Strikes

Or that no one is actually behind the mask...masks on masks... like.. those Scooby Doo villains. .

It's not that I dismiss it. If there is an omnipotent God, and I've stated this several times in threads on Hinduism, I'd gladly vow out of his omniscience (if that makes sense that is...). Choice and intent is what we ultimately are, and it guides our experiences through incredible complexities, like being here on Earth and sharing in its energy and dense physical reality. It leads us to encounter one another and shape our own "lands" which is Awareness itself, your immediate reality. Without the intent that carries our existence through, we'd be non-existent. The only "God" outside of myself that I can acknowledge is the infinitude of the un-manifested possibilities, which is really "non-being," something that still cannot exist without my own "being" to actualize and explore it. How can you separate the physical and the spiritual? Both definitions are quite, ahem, meaningless , like saying that the left side of a table is "the left table" and the right side of the table is "the right table." Sorry that's a bad analogy, but...hope you understand what I'm getting at. If our life really had a definitive meaning and purpose to it, it would truly be a limited and a caged existence. Freedom would never be possible. We are not here to do anything beyond what we impose on ourselves. You don't have to be reading this forum. You don't have to be responsible. You don't have to be moral. All is based on your own choices and structures, and the void lets whatever be, well, be. It has no will of its own, like an infinitely endless canvas which lets you paint whatever you wish. . But of course, you're not the only artist here. . It's great that you can cultivate effectively through 12 hour nightshifts! _/\_

There is no omnipotent God. You are not bound to this world. You have chosen to be here. You cannot "join" the light. That is an illusion. There is no true distinction between the physical and spiritual. It seems like you have given meaning to what you deem spiritual or light. It wasn't what I meant in my original post. .

Sorry, I need to stop mentally masturbating. .

Hi CowTao, I meant the realization that anything we hold to be absolute, something of a "TRUE" experience, are actually never so. It's very tricky to say these things in words, because at one point some one will inevitably go, "oh isn't that a truth itself?" . And yes, that person would be right. Detachment, seeing emptiness or any wisdom are all imposed realities of the mind. Are they better or freer? Yes, but ONLY comparatively. There is no "true" experience of reality. Reality is what we choose to experience, and it is absolutely subjective and without real meaning behind it. There's nothing "wrong" with attachments or desires. And really there is nothing wrong with giving them value just as the Buddha gives value to compassion, or the Taoist gives to immortality. The unmanifest void is truly infinite, and its potentials are limitless. It is your choice to take it wherever you wish. Bon Voyage! .

IMHO, there is no infinity to unite with. You are just giving infinity its property of being infinite. It is as delusional and meaningless, it has no true objective value. If you mean infinity to mean the unmanifest potential of experience, which truly is infinite, to united with it would mean to have realized Buddhahood. It is actually a liberating statement to those who lead everyday values or are trying to detach themselves from delusional habits in thought. Even if it leads to a state of abject loss, what comes out of it is much more freer and fluid than a structured system of values. When it is realized that really, every experience has no true value or meaning but one that your awareness takes hold of, it is very very humbling. You see clearly that there is no such thing as illusionary experience or an awakened experience. Actually, I will hope that the thread ends here, because I just realized that what I wrote was just a reiteration of emptiness. .

You shouldn't think too much about what you eat. If you are forcing yourself to become vegetarian, that is not a good practice. The transition should come rather naturally. I used to love eating beef when I was younger, but now the sight of it is rather..eh...unpleasant. This is somewhat unrelated, but I went out to buy a leather jacket one day and realized how disgusting it is to wear the skin of another animal. But be careful if it is your mind coaxing you to eat chocolate! . Sweet things are hard to say no to (not only food that is ).

Haha! I'll enjoy my bits of paper, I like my money! And I like pretending money has value! . The knowing is in meaninglessness.

HAHAHA You're absolutely RIGHT! I didn't call it magic, but it's this moment that strikes where you go... NOW...WHAT????

Groundless is exactly that: groundless. There is no white sheet of paper to speak of, but only the relative relationship of the action and the reaction. The contents of this relationship is completely subjective because there is no inherent "ground" to it. But simile wise, I think the white paper it makes a sense of it's own in a way. When we say that there is no Truth, I mean to say that there is no "what" that is the truth as in becoming a Buddha, worshipping a God, etc. There is no Truth to experience. There is a Truth to "how" all this exactly works however, and that is experience's meaninglessness and hence unlimited creativity. I mean to say that this is something a practitioner should fully realize before believing that they strive to attain a state that i somehow more REAL or BETTER than the current state they are in.

It's giving meaning to meaninglessness, clinging to non-clinging, habitualizing non-habit. But this isn't the important part. The important part is the part where you go, NOW WHAT? WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH IT? WHAT WORLD DO YOU WANT TO CREATE?

I like the Buddha! . And I don't think what I've written actually contradicts anything Buddhism says. Well, at least my understanding of it. It's like realizing that you are not the character in the play, and that you can actually BE anyone in the play or be in any play. But you have to know that there are only characters and no real actor. Fully coming to this realization, as in, breaking the habits you have built believing you are this "character" takes effort. Right, when beliefs are conceptualized and adhered to, you at once create a view or a path you think is so set and objective you become chained to it. If you do this, suddenly there is this dual approach to life where there are activities you consider "practice" and activities you consider "non-practice." This is a limiting way of cultivation. One has to fully realize that all of this has no REAL value or meaning. This of course applies to all those Buddhists who are stuck in the methodology or think that one HAS to attain Buddhahood to be perfectly happy oR what not. Buddhahood is just as much a contrived state of being as with any state, even that of a sewer rat. Fully knowing this, and having the ability to become it or unbecome it is true freedom.

If you say so... Life is neither important or not important. It ceaselessly continues on for eternity taking different shapes and forms according to what direction it tries to reach. But there is no destination. If you make a destination, yes, you will think you have arrived somewhere. But then you must go on. On and on. You have no choice but to keep making choices. .

Drugs suck. But if you really need to do them, you should do them. I have friends who are heavy drug users, but I don't really look down on them that much. They are going their own paths, and they respect my "New Age" hullaboo just as well. A part of me thinks that drug users who are doing it for the purpose of discovery, not self-hatred (although both are bound to be related), and some sense of hippie "freedom" or what not, are actually more respectable than conditioned lab rats (that's a metaphor) who rot in timidity and fear. I know I posted before that drugs are absolutely unnecessary and hindering to spiritual progress, and I still hold that view for those cultivating Taoist and Buddhist methods. But for those conditioned by society, drugs can be a useful tool for breaking through. They would, of course, need to realize in the end that drug use is never something good to become attached to. Yes, the epiphany is that serotonin/dopamine release has nothing to do with happiness. .

The Tao is symbolized through the Tai Chi symbol. It depends on the relativity of action and reaction. Of identity and its reflection. The yang is the manifest and the yin is potential. But really, I'm mentally masturbating here (as I always do! ). I think you are getting the sense that some Buddhist live in silly denial of self, will, and life's desires and manifestations. I agree that this is the wrong approach where the method is confused with the truth. For example, I believe the practice of celibacy is exactly that. Practice. It's not that you are limited to being a celibate once you have liberated yourself from illusions, that wouldn't be liberation. So I imagine the state of liberation as mastering manifestation of phenomena. To experience anything under a conscious will through relationship with others. To suffer, to sin, be joyful, be compassionate, or whatever. Like a painter who has mastered his craft, and knows that the canvas will always be renewable and infinitely creative. Haha, the SHOW MUST GO ON! .

There is a pattern here. The self is. It isn't anything. It is. Isness. Thusness? . The parts make the car. But the parts are also of more parts. And those parts are also of more parts. So it is wrong to view the car as made of parts. It's an infinite mind tease. It is a misconstruction of the mind to designate "parts" and "whole." There are no parts that make a whole. It is an illusory distinction. But distinction nonetheless, and it is the act of distinction that is significant. It really doesn't matter whether there are actual parts that make the car.

The whole "in order to know itself" bothers me personally. Why does it have to know itself? Create all this fuss to know itself. Bleh. The Cosmic Mind is not the source of my dreams. My dreams are manifestation of deeper imprints within my consciousness. But I like the last paragraph! .

A person? Thank you, Max. .

Hmm, does this mean that enlightened beings are aware of their state, remember their past lives, can enter various depths of samadhi since birth? I imagined that when a Bodhisattva decides to reincarnate in a human form, he is subject to the rules that bound a...baby . He must cultivate as a human form again? no?

I don't know. Call it solipsism, I don't know much about it. . Existence cannot be without awareness. This is a very obvious fact, since for something to know it exists, it must be aware. For something to be aware, it needs an objective reflection. Kind of like how you need a mirror to see your own face. So all kinds of creation is drempt of. The reality you see and experience is a web of creations co created by others within that frequency/level of perception. Well, that's just my idea anyway! .

Sentience = Awareness. Without you there is no earth. There is no past, present, or future. Your Awareness is unborn, unceasing, and will never die. Only its contents and experiences will change and cycle due to habitual actions and views i.e. Karma. All phenomena is creates from a beginningless dream wherein in you see flowers in the sky arising out of nothing and seeing it as a distinct form of itself, one adheres to "this," and "that" creating objects to this relationship of causes and conditions. There is no object of dependence. Only the relationship exists.

This is partially right in my view. Your awareness's existence is not dependent, as in it will never cease to exist. Its contents and its experiences however can only be continued through reflection of others that creates an illusionary subject/object relationship.

I can't reify what I am. . Always transforming, always changing, all without a center. There is no center, the center is complemented through reflections. Vaj, if you continue to insist that you are the product of causes and conditions, why can't you see that causes and conditions are themselves illusionary distinctions?

But it is and is not! .