Vajrahridaya

RR, This is a board of words. If you wish me to speak in non-words... Come to Florida... lets have some tea! Take care. P.s. Krishnamurti didn't understand process or progress, he came from the ultimate perspective all the time when talking like a giddy teenager, completely misunderstanding the relative. Thus, he suffered... I don't apologize for seeing right through him. I had to write this quote... "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water, after enlightenment, chop wood carry water." Zen proverb. That should not be an excuse for limited perception. You go ahead and speak on Buddhism in your way... I'll do it my way and because it's not your way, doesn't make the realization of Buddhahood any less rare. Show me a Buddha, and you've shown me a very rare being on planet Earth. Not your typical grocery chopper. .

You don't see how conditioned your interpretation is. These experiences happen through unbecoming. Through the way that your experience of samsara is compounded is the way in which it is uncompounded. Dependent origination is the reason you suffer, it's emptiness is the way to unsuffer. Instead of answering you just judge me, very clever. But... alas. No, that's just conditioned.. apprehended as truth because it's the limit of your experience. I'm sorry, you just come across as a normal mortal trying to make excuses for his/her limitations. How does that nature work? Keep trying... subverting the path before entering it shows a lack of exploration. You sound like a Krishnamurti follower. Sadly.

I'd also like to say that understanding that the universe is much like a hologram and experiencing it is very different. The first doesn't grant true and total peace, the second does, as well as secret mystical powers, which arise naturally, like seeing through walls and such.

No, it's liberation from anyone rightly interpreting while rightly interpreting. Ah!

Those are very good points I'll grant. I would - like most - conclude it is a sign of clinging. But if I examine HOW or WHY I arrived at that conclusion I end up with the conundrum I talked about in my prior post. It doesn't mean I'm right (or anyone else is for that matter either - yet). It just means I'm confused and am hoping someone can clarify. Ralis doesn't understand that the Buddha said the same thing. Read the Pali suttas and he talks about how superior this teaching is, left and right. The Buddha also preached dependent origination in many ways for 40 years. It's actually quite interesting that I go from Hinduism to Buddhism. Because the Buddha did the same thing. Went from Hinduism to Buddhism. He also found there was no further to go. It's very clear. Because a rooftop is never posited in Buddhism, unlike Hinduism, God is the rooftop, not the concept, but the essence merged with. It's not the same realization. That's all I'm saying. Take it or leave it... if you don't like what I say... don't engage.

It's very simple... I don't crave these experiences, they just happen naturally during the process of progress. Not that one doesn't always hold the view that transcends both process and progress, that is emptiness. I care not for your projections. Sorry... I don't have much to say here because you are not really talking to me. You have merely set up a projection of a false me which you deem a reality and throw darts at it. Yes, but that means forever! So, that means that one is not ignorant of what it personally means to be forever on an experiential level. That means, omniscience, which includes many various powers of perception. Naturally. Not have to, but it's a faster path. As in eon's faster. The Buddha had Guru's, both in his life as Gotama and lives previous. Yes, and how does it happen? Sorry, I think your taking up the idea of Truth as some essence, some ideal, that you deem definitely is. Sounds like a subtle form of clinging and not seeing emptiness directly. 99.9% do. Why be proud? It's just a faster path to real humility and surrender, not to some separate person, as you very clearly think a Guru is. But to one's own potential manifest both internally through the transmission and externally through the clear mirror that is the enlightened lineage. I don't expect you to understand, but it's clear that you have not yet experienced how exceedingly wonderful it is to have a precious teacher. Uh oh... I detect clinging to an essence. Due to my many glimpses of dharmakaya, I see that you are off the mark. You project clinging, where I see none. There are two features, dependent origination and emptiness. That's it, all other features are delusions attached to, that arise due to this fact. Dependent origination/emptiness is actually explaining the relative truth of delusion. I'm not... you guys are. I'm just repeating what the Buddha said, not as a parrot, but as an experiencer. No, I'm not a Buddha. So, I haven 't eradicated suffering completely and I don't have full and total presence and omniscience. But, you guys all preach leaving the path before you've even really started on it. I don't buy the fools gold that's heavy.

Yes, I understand, I used to believe the same way. But Samsara comes so natural and one can be so deep within it. One must have both the realization of non-duality beyond subject and object, but without the subtle clinging to a universal essence. One must interpret correctly as well, on an intuitive level. Buddhas are most definitely liberated, so not bound. This is not a concept, it's quite clearly understood as clarity and method, or wisdom and method. Most paths think that if you just meditate, you'll attain liberation, but Buddhism just doesn't agree. You have to have right view. In Buddhism, liberation is the condition of right cognition. Because there is no essence that one can rely on, it is different from the mysticism that most religions share. Take care.

No, neither both, nor neither. Not both or neither. Unless that's what you meant. Exactly. Actually, no. Because dependent origination is the only analysis of reality that comes to this conclusion. It's the only way to apply it consciously to the sub-conscious and un-conscious way that things work and mind works. Because you are saying that your fear arises dependent upon mis-cognition of reality. So, right there you are positing dependent origination but don't even know it. You are saying that your fear of death arises dependent upon identity and thus your lack of fear arises dependent upon a lack of identity. But the only way to truly come to the actual experience of emptiness is real analysis of the process, which itself is dependent origination. Why yes, it is. No, it's a fact... your thoughts originate dependently as well. I think your not aware of how much you just posited dependent origination. While saying that it's not. To make sense of something and to directly experience this subtle truth are two different things. The signs of progress on the path are listed as the stages of jhana, stages of vipassana reflection, seeing directly your past lives. Having various types of visions... all relative post marks, but definite signs of progress. Deep devotion, tearful compassion, incredible bliss, various energy experiences, chakra recognition, etc. How many of these direct experiences have you had RR? It's saying what it was made for. Though one can take the same thing and not know it's a tooth brush like a kid in a third world country and think of it as a rock smoother or something, LOL! But, the inner experience is basically usefulness, beneficial or not beneficial. The term dependent origination merely denotes how things happen, both internally and externally. That's why I can say... dependent-co-arising, inter-dependent-co-generation, mutual-co-origination, etc. It's still all pratityasamutpada. There is also the fact of emptiness, because you see a process, doesn't mean you see emptiness directly. There are stages to recognizing emptiness as well. Intellectually, experientially as a glimpse, then as an integrated intuitive level of living conduct. Then of course liberation from any form of clinging whatsoever. If you can get there without having a teacher, this generally takes much, much longer, as we are so wrapped up in our subjectivity that it's hard to see unless we get an opinion from an objective person who is free themselves from craving to point the way both from within and without. The closer you get to the Guru, the closer you get to liberation because the closer you get to the Guru you more you realize that your Guru is just that presence that is the realization of the true nature of all things, which is merely all pervasive emptiness, which again is not a thing, but merely the quality of how things process, and originate dependently.

Ah, but liberation is all about how one inwardly and intuitively interprets reality. So, liberation is about right cognition.

Wow! That's an incredible trip there. I'm jealous... in the good way. I mean... I wish I could afford a trip to like Dharamsala or something of that nature. You are very blessed!! Have a wonderful, and auspicious trip!

Thanks CowTao, but I have thousands of posts here, and most all of them get mis-represented, because frankly, I'm not in a Buddhist room where people even really study Buddhism to begin with. The only people that seem to understand my posts are Buddhist already, or really open minded people who are just starting to wake up to something deeper and are really open about where to place their feet as a path. Of which there have been quite a few... well a handful, but that's enough! My words have effected people to look more deeply into Buddhism. Not these guys who argue with me incessantly and refuse to make space for understanding a word I say directly. See, people who have already decided what their path is and have traveled it for quite some time, will find it hard to understand Buddhist logic, or expression in any sense. Especially anti-religious types. They measure everything under the stick of "anti-my-birth or home" religion. I myself was on an Advaitin Shaivite path my entire life, with many years of practice and experience all aimed at reifying the subtle "I" behind everything, the 1 true existence of Shiva, the source of all beings! It was extremely painful to start realizing directly the truths of Buddhism through 3 years of arguing with Lappon Namdrol. We argued and argued and argued, my realist Shaivite logic verses his neither real nor unreal logic of Buddhism. I decided after some time, that he was actually starting to make some sense, even though every time I meditated, I would get visited by Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva on an energetic level and I would also experience all sorts of wonders and go to the different realms spoken about in the scriptures, experience immense bliss, joy, wisdom, a wonderful sense of freedom! But, I didn't realize that it was a freedom that would only last to the end of the cosmic eon, where it say's in the scriptures Shiva re-absorbs everything back into the primal balance during pralaya, into a non-manifest state of formless bliss. I realized that this was not liberation from Samsara after all. Through Buddhist reasoning and contemplation, I started having memories of even prier to this universe, I started remembering all sorts of things. Though even as a devote Hindu I remembered past lives, but not nearly as many coming in rapid succession and not nearly as far back as the concept of dependent origination takes one's mind much further in contemplation as it never posits a supreme source a beginner that never began itself. It see's the big bang as a result of the end of the last universe, not as a primal uncaused causer of everything. Dependent origination see's through everything, and de-mystifies everything. No more excuses for ignorance. Anyway... people might understand this and people might not. I express... that's it... the crumbs land where they may. Xabir's posts are quite clear, yet people don't seem to understand him either. I think Mikael is very clear, but people don't understand what he's getting at as well. So... I try... but... ultimately, I am quite detached, though relatively of course attached to absolutely everything and everyone. Anyway... Que sera, sera!

What it seems that most people aren't getting here is that, all paths that I know of, posit a true existence, that everything is because of the existence of one, mysterious agent behind everything, a beyond concept, true source of all existence. That all things are because of... "God", "Tao", "Light of consciousness", "The great spirit", "The one", "Brahman", "True Being", "I", "I AM", "That", "whatever"... Dependent origination is the only formula even merely on a logical level that transcends the duality of existence and non-existence, not merely as concepts as when you stop thinking for instance in a deep formless samadhi, but come out and say, "That's God"... or, "That's Tao"... Dependent Origination is the only way to look at things if one want's to transcend the duality of "I exist" as one with "That" or, "I do not exist" because only, "That" exists. Buddhism is the on only path that logically posits, neither existence, nor non-existence, neither both, nor neither. Buddhahood never makes experiential, intellectual, or emotional excuses for ignorance. Agree with it or not, think that this is... totally impossible or not. Think it utterly delusional even. Buddhism makes this grandiose statement and stands by it thick and thin, through philosophy and method, it has people that realize this "omniscient omnipresence" of the truth of dependent origination and emptiness. Take it or leave it, but that's Buddhism which means "awake-ism" and I'm a Buddhist.

For the sake of readers, I'll answer this. The profound truth of the Buddhas statement, that dependent origination/emptiness is the only path to complete liberation, no matter what the religion might be called, is a logical inference, and not an emotional one.

The main cause is ignorance of the true dependently originated and thus empty nature of every experience, thought, action, and choice. The experience of rigpa is beyond thinking about any of this stuff, as the realization is intuitive, but uncompounded. You can feel the Buddha presence in every particle, not because the Buddha is everything, but rather all the Buddhas have attained complete and total presence and have omnipresence as their awareness permeates every aspect of everything during all the 3 times as they have firmly realized emptiness. The result of dependent origination is the realization of emptiness. The realization of emptiness means the intuitive realization of dependent origination beyond formulaic thinking. But, one should still express the formula as expression is the formula in action anyway. My poems come across very differently from my scholarly blurps. But, you are welcome to your opinion. Take care.

Yes it does! As you well know... "emptiness" also means the lack of a fixated view. Because identifying everything with a.. "all encompassing thing that is everything" would be a fixated view. Which is why the Buddha denied any substantialist non-duality, such as Monism as described in the Vedas and by Vedanta and called it an extreme view of Eternalism and not in alignment with true and total liberation from Samsara. He called the goal of Monism, or "one-ism" as a very high level delusion leading merely to a formless bliss realm where all levels of manifest karma is merely repressed through an intense level of focus on a one encompassing infinite concept... deemed non-conceptual by Monist paths, but the Buddha said that this is just a concept that is bigger than the normal range, thus he transcended the jhanas/samadhi's as giving any real way to enlightenment other than a way of cultivating and integrating "right view" if you are a Buddhist with one's sub-conscious energies and unconscious formless mind realms. Nagarjuna said this as well, that "paths that don't see dependent origination/emptiness 'right view', merely get to the edge of Samsara", but don't fully empty out all future possibilities of re-experiencing of Sasmsara because they maintain a backbone that is true, and ultimately real in and of itself that all things manifest from and through. This is clinging to a fixated view and is ultimately the cause of re-experiencing Samsara as an aspect of it after the pralaya (big crunch) of this universe and then the next "big bang", because a person who believes in this "one thing" that is all things, is actually re-absorbed by that fixed view and recycled. Thus, no true liberation from Samsara for Monists. This is why the heavens of Monists that are considered "Eternal" by them, actually are not. The Buddha saw that everything is relative and non-inherent, even the experience of Nirvana is relative and non-inherent. Though in language one can go the opposite direction, but it's very clear what that means in Buddhism to say that the only inherent is relativity, non-inherency, or impermanence is actually permanent. So you see? But, Nagarjuna as the king of logic showed that because dependent origination reveals that nothing really arises, because not one thing is inherently established, one cannot say that anything is there to be emptied as well. So here he is showing that logic and study does have it's limits and to truly experience the meaning of emptiness as prescribed by the Buddha, is a state of non-dual, non-conceptual fullness and bliss... total liberation from any form of clinging, either form, or formless. Yet, the Buddhas non-conceptual bliss is not due to identifying with a single substratum concept that all things are based on, it's by emptying completely, even the, "I AM" camp, or "All is Tao", unless Tao is defined as the flow of impermanence and not considered an actual existent or fundamental source of all things, because that type of non-conceptual substantialist non-dual experience would still be based on a subtle clinging to a backbone, a truly existent "mysterious" something that one rely's on. Thus... is reabsorbed into at the end of a cosmic eon during the pralaya. Wiki on Prayala... pretty deep. This is what makes the Buddhist teaching of emptiness extremely subtle and clearly a different realization of how things work than other spiritual traditions. The Buddha said so himself, "This teaching is not taught on Earth at this time that I now teach it." He said that even some solitary realizers prier to him, pratyekabuddhas, realize the truth experientially, but didn't have the conceptual ability to describe how they got there. So, he was the first during this period on Earth to teach this extremely subtle teaching known as the Dharma. Wiki on the meaning of the term, "Dharma" You wil not find it in the Vedas, or the I-ching, or the Bible. Though there is great wisdom in these books, they in and of themselves do not lead to total exhaustion of the re-production of a Samsaric experience for an individual. I myself use the I-Ching with great delight, but integrate the information with "right view". As not to loose grounding in the dharma. People say..."this is dogma" and get all concerned, but no... that's just dependent origination. Your experience is pre-determined by view either conscious or unconscious, and if the view is not correct as in, "right view" of the first of the 8 fold path, which is "dependent origination" a deceptively profound view. Then it's not the view that ends proliferation of Samsaric re-experiencing during the next universal cycle, because you would have just re-absorbed back into your substratum you call, "true nature". Of course it gets subtler than this, because after one has realized emptiness as a first stage Bodhisattva, one works on reversing the personal dependent origination cycle through the accumulations which can happen as fast as an instant, or take many eons. So, enlightenment in Buddhism is not "non-existence" as many Westerners fear. It's actually a revelation that Samsara is Nirvana when rightly realized and in fact you get to keep on existing, just as a liberated being here to bring the goodies of one's ultimate realization of the non-inherency of everything. This is also why I find the English language tedious. I find Sanskrit to be the most potent spiritual language because it has words that are very uniquely adept at describing spiritual experience through, when the meaning is understood contextually. Because even the term "yoga" can be used to talk about putting two pieces of clay together, which has nothing to do with spirituality unless you want to think metaphorically. You have money?? You lucky dog!! Ok, ok... it's just... well my post above explains why "fullness" needs to be contextualized with "emptiness" for a Buddhist in order to remain on the path of the Dharma. Take care! You are funny. I can tell nicely steeped in practice as well. Very sweet comment. Thank you for sharing your joy.

The reason the Buddha used emptiness, which is Shunya in Sanskrit or Shunyata in Pali, was to negate clinging to experiences and ideas as ultimate. Nagarjuna, considered a second Buddha even states, that one should even consider emptiness empty. As in, not to use emptiness itself as merely a conceptual view and to negate negation as well... in the end. Negating any sort of clinging, naturally leads to the experience of free flow fullness. What emptiness first and foremost means is, dependent origination, so... it should always be contextualized first as the result of seeing dependent origination, which is saying that all arisings arise due to causes and conditions which are themselves arisings from causes and conditions add infinitum, since beginningless time. Thus, all arisings, even consciousness is empty of inherent existence as in, there is no self existence to be found anywhere. So, emptiness is the appropriate word to use, because when examining anything in contemplative meditation, you don't find anything substantially there. Everything is like a hologram, including yourself. So... it's quite well defined for Buddhists. I've tried to help here, but not many actually read my posts, they just react. Those that do read my posts have found them helpful, while plenty of others just find themselves feeling threatened? Anyway... thanks for asking. The experience of what the Buddha means as shunyata, is fullness.

Yes, I never try either. Not my thing... it's enough dealing with the spontaneous arisings and letting them talk to me, then trying to make them happen and try to force them to clue me in.

Yes, at first I got scared and I told my Mom. She took me to a doctor, because though she's been a kundalini yogini my entire life, she doesn't have this, "talent". She was a little scared too, so just to be sure she took me to a doctor. They recommended anti-psychotics. So, I took them, for like a couple of months. I got soooo depressed that I slept 12 hours a day and though lost the "talent", I lost all sense of reason for living life as well. So, I quit them and re-realized my natural tendancy towards joy and exuberance! Never again will I take anti-psychotics!

Actually the experience of emptiness is fullness. Marble emptiness in Buddhism doesn't mean empty like in a jar, it means mailable, non-inherent and luminous. I've explained this to you before, I think more than once. It always dumbfounds me when people prefer to take things personally rather than learn something new. Is that exercising free will? Or... pre-conditioned reaction?

Thanks! Breath in... space.... out.... release.... in.... space...AH! ;-)

Looove Sienfield!!

This is why D.O. is not just cause and effect and is subtler because its revealing emptiness, the non-inharency of everything, so the more you see emptiness the freer your will. Otherwise look at the choices you make. Notice how they rely on conditioning too, even spontaneous ones are conditioned subconsciously and unconsciously. So I think most people don't exercise free will. Even this post of yours is an opinion conditioned by a pre-conception that thinks D.O is merely cause and effect. But it's not. So your opinion is conditioned incorrectly, thereby negated. Sorry to use this as an example but, it's better you see the truth. Not that your entire post is wrong but as you do make beautiful points as well.

The Buddha had teachings that were figurative and those that were literal. Pratityasamutpada is one of the literal teachings of exactly how things work and how one can de-condition one's workings.

Yes, I did, because I was heavily conditioned, first by society, then by incredibly powerful deity worship and seeing a "one" in everything. If you don't know what's in front of your face and who's looking from within you, and how the looking is happening, then you better get some Buddha medicine. If you think it's all not dependently originated, then you got another thing coming. All is because dependent origination is how all does it's is'ness. You are free to disagree with me, but I think it's just an opinion that originates dependent upon a whole lot of pre-conceptions, based upon interpretations of experiences based on experiences and interpretations.