doc benway

I don't mean to speak for CT but I welcome any and all sincere commentary about these wonderful teachings, even questions and criticism. I think that's how we benefit the most - by questioning, challenging, trying to digest. While I agree that it's nice to keep this thread from getting derailed by argument or distractions, that really has not been a problem here.

Is it possible that while your heart told you to get a movie, it was your brain that made the selection?

Bindi - I think that's an astute observation and I share it. Here's how I would try to explain it - The one who tries and exerts effort is the one who keeps us asleep. That very effort is the obstacle as it reinforces the illusion of the one who is exerting effort. When we are able to let go of that effort we can simply rest in a state which is uncontrived (thank you Rigdzin Trinley for that word). That state is the most conducive to awakening. My teacher says it very succinctly - "effort is the exit"

The Bön and Tibetan Buddhists certainly cultivate ming. There are multiple examples - tummo, tsa lung trul khor, 9 Breathings, and multiple tantric methods. These methods seem to predate Buddhism in Tibet. Perhaps they were adopted by the Buddhists from the Bön in Tibet. That may explain why they are not seen elsewhere in Buddhist practice (if indeed that's the case).

I have some experience with both Daoist methods (not specifically Damo Mitchell, I'm not sure what lineage his teachings come from) and mindfulness. I find them to be completely complimentary. Daoist neigong practices, by and large, are methods of concentration. One use the attention or intention to observe and/or guide energetic awareness within and through the body and beyond. Mindfulness practices are wonderful ways to cultivate concentration and attention and will, therefore, augment and compliment anything that relies on concentration and attention. Mindfulness allows us to prolong the duration and stability of attention and concentration. If one finds mindfulness to be passive, they have probably been taught incorrectly (at least in the early stages). To be mindful is to remain fully engaged and connected and that's a very active (and challenging) process in the beginning. I will say that at advanced levels, one is able to gradually relax the degree of effort without losing the connection. At that point perhaps the word passive could be used but if the connection is lost, the mindfulness is lost. I think the word effortless would be more accurate than passive, perhaps.

I'm not sure I buy this argument. What is claimed that Daoists cultivate that Buddhists do not, specifically?

I think that sometimes we really try too hard. To do what actually? It really doesn't matter what - we try to be spiritual, we try to be normal, we try to help, we try to get ahead. Try, try, try - effort, effort, effort! It's exhausting. For me, a lot of spiritual practice has become to learn how to rest. How to let all the effort simply relax into this moment, here and now. It is good to do that on the cushion and it's good to do it in our everyday activity. Rest doesn't mean to do nothing, it means to simply let the body relax, let the thoughts settle, and let the heart and mind be open - let things come and go. Just be present. So many things will effortlessly take care of themselves if we simply allow it to happen. I wonder if Yueya's recent post here would be at all helpful. He references a discussion of the right and left hemispheres of the brain and how we embody two very different ways of experiencing life. Neither is better but an integration of both I think can help us achieve equilibrium.

I would also recommend starting with the very basic posture - hands around the level of the lower dan tian. If you do not have experience with zhan zhuang, the more physically challenging postures will shorten the duration of practice you can endure, lead to muscular tension, and be a distraction from a more holistic experience of the mind/body connection. i was once taught that if one stands long enough in the most basic posture, all of the more physically complex postures will naturally arise when they are ready.

Your entire post was very valuable but this deserves emphasis. Thank you

I'd like to emphasize the value of this concept in terms of how we relate to the psychological states and emotions we experience. There is a tendency to identify the very nature of our being with our transient states of mind and feeling. Phrases such as: I am angry - No, you are not angry. Angry is the label for a transient emotional state. Who you are is something altogether different. Anger is present currently in your experience. At some point it will no longer be there. I am depressed, I am happy, I am hungry ... You are wrong - No, perhaps you are ill-informed or incorrect regarding a particular topic but the "you" cannot be reduced to the simple descriptor "wrong" with any credibility. There are so many other areas in which you are "right" and those must be equally qualified. It may seem mundane or trivial but I assure you that it can be liberating to free oneself of such over-identification. We create our reality through the stories our internal narrators are endlessly reciting. While misuse of language in this way is done out of convenience and efficiency, it can be damaging through reinforcing an unhealthy over-identification with a transient mood or experience. PS - Yueya, Blood Meridian is one of my favorite novels and, IMO, McCarthy's best.

I know a few people who are, just ask them!

life short but merry my stature defines me not my roots, they run deep

From the perspective of Daoist sensibility, I would say we probably could go farther than that if you felt like bringing labels like wu wei and de into the discussion. Would you say those concepts are related to roger's point? They certainly seem to be apt for me.

I agree with you roger. The "Universal" as you call it (as good a label as any) occasionally wakens within us. It becomes self-aware in us, like we wake up and open our eyes and see our Self in everything "out there" - yes? It can be a big and obvious event or it can be a subtle hint, a whisper, almost like you're in a dream and you thought you heard someone call your name and you're not sure so you start looking to see if someone is there, hiding. Or it can simply be a feeling of dissatisfaction with the way things are, like something is missing. I think this is the most subtle. I think this latter form can be highly motivating (the Buddhists make very good use of it in the ngondro practices) but can also be destructive, like when people are wealthy and fortunate enough to be able to acquire everything and anything they could possible want, but even all of that doesn't make them happy. Then they get depressed and frustrated and turn to addictions (sex, drugs, food, alcohol) to numb the empty feeling. I went through all of that to simply say that, yes, the spiritual exercises give the Universal a focused activity to try and break through into our lives. I think they are particularly useful because they have a few things in common - 1. quieting of the inner narrator and thought train that we ride around on most of our lives 2. connection between mind and body - this has a powerful ground and stabilizing effect and also brings us into this very moment 3. taking the focus off of the "me" that has problems, preferences, the one that judges everything - some traditions do this through focusing on others, some focus primarily on mind-body connection, some get us into nature, some by dismantling or trying to locate that "me", but I think this dis-identification is basically important. - this isn't meant to be an exhaustive or authoritative list, just a few casual observences Once we open enough to feel that in a bit more tangible and stable way, it is something that can and should take root in every aspect of our waking, sleeping, and dreaming lives - total integration. That's a lot more challenging but ultimately very fulfilling and somewhat self-sustaining. I say somewhat because, at least in my experience, this connection and motivation waxes and wanes considerably over time, especially as we try to continue to live in the "real world."

I find it so easy to neutralize this problem. It simply requires that when we proclaim something to be a certain way, the best way, or the only way, we add two words - "for me." Even then, convincing ourselves that something is the best or only way, even "for me", is limiting and equates to self-programming. An open mind is a beautiful thing.

I suspect you will someday... Thanks for the clear answers, that helps a lot.

Wonderful introduction, RT. Can I ask for 2 small clarifications, please? 1. Are you using ekayana as synonymous with Mahayana or are you more referring to Mipham's desire for a single coherent view that is consistent with the 2nd and 3rd turnings? Or something else altogether? 2. "it means for him that either nagarjuna or maitreya got it wrong, and that can't possibly be the case" - please clarify, forgive my ignorance

Excellent point which circles back to the Madhyamika - Yogacara dispute.

Yes, there is a great deal of agreement. It is simply that if you follow the reduction reasoning of Madhyamika to its natural conclusion, the Brahman is seen to be free of discrete, independent "is-ness." I am not educated enough to walk you through that but what it denies is exactly that which you propose to be a thing. The same paradox is inherent in Daoism which describes Wuji, Taiji, and the 10,000 things. For me this is equivalent to the Buddhist concept of emptiness. I would say dependent connotes related or connected as opposed to unfree. When you say free, what do you mean by something that is free? I think you are pointing to something that is independent. Something established from its own side. The Absolute, as you refer to it, is a phenomenon. It does not appear as separate from the "you" that apprehends it. It is dependent on the "you" or the "I". From my perspective it is you, literally and figuratively, who are treating the Absolute as a thing - other than you. If it is not other than you, then it is I and the point is that I cannot be established as existing independently. Not sure if I'm being clear, or even correct. Take everything I say with a grain of salt. The four negations - it cannot be said to exist, to not exist, to both exist and not exist, to neither exist nor not exist. Each of these assertions leads to error. Yes, it is confusing! Although if you have a solid foundation in Madhyamika logic, it comes about as a natural conclusion. Yes, different strokes for different folks. While these other traditions don't have a strong potential for nihilistic misinterpretation, from the perspective of a skillful Madhyamika they suffer from eternalistic misinterpretations. Pick your poison, perhaps. Rigdzin Trinley is walking through arguments from Mipham Rinpoche's Beacon of Certainty - arguably a pinnacle of Madhyamika reasoning from the Dzogchen perspective. He is much more educated than I am and I invite you to follow that thread if you're so inclined.

My perception and understanding differs from yours, Kongming, and I'll point out those differences below... ... not reality but our perception and reification of appearances... which we mistakenly take for reality ... it is not so much that there "is nothing" which transcends the skandhas but rather, the foundation upon which the skandhas rest is empty (meaning without an independent, self-subsisting entity, as Old River so eloquently put it). It is not nothing - that is a wrong view. "It" is described in terms of the characteristics of space, clarity, and warmth. The characteristics of space are things like unchanging, indestructible, unborn, unformed, unceasing, unbounded, without center, and so forth. The characteristics of clarity are things such as presence, awareness, now-ness, knowing, and light. The characteristics or descriptions of warmth include bliss, loving-kindness, oneness, non-dual, allowing, openness, spacious, and connected. All of this transcends the skandhas and yet none of this can be shown to have inherent independence when subjected to Madhyamika reasoning, which is a tool, not ultimate reality (and empty in and of itself). This is where you go astray. It is not "nothing at all." Both samsara and nirvana are ultimately seen as being of one taste, one nature. That nature is empty of inherent independence, however, and is of the nature of space with characteristics of presence and warmth as described above. Nirvana and samsara are not independent and are not other than this very moment. They are also dependently originated. Yes, even this is considered to be empty, thus dependently originated. Here we do get into a sticky wicket and it requires quite a bit of Buddhist education and sophistication to see that even that which is eternal, unborn, and unchanging is empty. This is a characteristic of space which is not equivalent to nothingness as it is inseparable with clarity and warmth - the lively presence of this very moment that has the infinite potential to manifest all things. From the perspective of the Madhyamika view (well, I should probably say from my understanding - I'm certainly no authority), those who deny the characteristics of transcendence, timelessness, and changeless are mistaken. They lapse into the error of nihilism. These are simply characteristics of space. Conversely, those who conclude that these characteristics imply a self-subsisting entity are equally mistaken. They lapse into the error of eternalism. They gratuitously posit an independent "something" that possesses those characteristics. These are just my unscholarly and unsophisticated attempts to show my understanding of the middle view. One easy way to avoid this nihilistic misunderstanding is to do the following. Any time one thinks of the word empty in the context of Buddhism, don't think of nothingness. Think of empty referring to space and that space being alive with presence and the warmth that can give rise to the infinite manifestations we experience here and now in this very moment. I'll take the liberty of borrowing CT's beautiful post from Hui Neng: Do not sit with a mind fixed on emptiness. If you do, you will fall into a dead kind of emptiness. Emptiness includes the sun, moon, stars and planets, The great earth, mountains and rivers, All trees and grasses, Bad people and good people, Bad things and good things, Heaven and hell; They are all in the midst of emptiness. ~ Hui Neng ~ This is exactly the purpose of Madhyamika, however, that method of reasoning must also be applied to the "timeless and eternal Absolute" and can easily be done so through evoking the characteristics of space and the inseparable nature of space, clarity, and warmth. If we apply Madhyamika reasoning to everything BUT the very foundation of everything itself, then we are selectively applying the rules and that's never a good idea.

I know that he would be very pleased to hear you say that, as am I. Thank you for that. _/\_

one size fits us all provided we dress ourselves in garments of light

Here's a variation that came from the sick mind of an overworked surgical resident a few decades ago. Working in a big city ER, one is inundated with people coming in with swollen, painful hands in the middle of the night. About half the time they were injured in a fight and the other half were infected from IV drug abuse. We came up the idea of the hammer test then - Patient comes in with a painful swollen hand --> put hand on table --> hit it hard with a hammer --> if it's infected pus will come out, if no pus comes out it's broken... We never actually did this mind you, but it did lighten the mood at 4 am...

calms and enlivens? paradox and poetry are good bedfellows!

Or can of words... I admire your courage and fortitude to do so! Looking forward to it