Jetsun
-
Content count
4,228 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
9
Everything posted by Jetsun
-
What is the force that keeps us unconscious ?
Jetsun replied to Jetsun's topic in General Discussion
Interesting, do you have any sense of what the purpose of this web of denser energies is for? seeing the effect it can have it is hard not to view it as malevolent at the moment. It was most illuminated to me during a silent retreat I went on, any time I sat near the master I would become really uncomfortable to the point of anxiety and could only gain relief by sitting quite far away. Something the master said about the Bible seemed to hit a chord somehow with what I was experiencing, he made the point how the demons in the Bible would flee from Jesus whenever in his presence yet in the whole story it was only the demons who immediately knew who Jesus was, everyone else including his main disciples took time or never knew at all, yet the demons knew immediately who he was. I'm not sure exactly why this has come to mind but I feel it may be relevant somehow. edit: I see you answered my question RV thanks -
They speak very clearly and eloquently about the subject, especially John Kabat Zin The science will help bring such practises into the mainstream and who knows what will result out of that in the future. Twenty years ago doing Yoga was laughed at and considered weird but now it is mainstream, now meditation and mindfulness is becoming mainstream, who knows what will happen if people take this questioning of what they thought was their reality to its full conclusion, the whole ball could unravel.
-
Power corrupts - Even spiritual leaders & enthusiasts
Jetsun replied to z00se's topic in General Discussion
He doesn't go into specifics but basically he trained his powers of concentration to an incredibly high level. But the crucial gist of this particular passage is that in his own path of development Gurdjieff realised that such powers don't help at all in the higher more important aims of his life of self realisation and self rememberance, so as such that realisation represented a great failure for him and went on to make an oath not to use those powers again. Osho clarifies it in this way that there are two paths to take in spirituality, those in which we narrow and focus the attention which creates great power in the ability to focus the life force into a concentrated point, and the second which is the religious to widen the attention until it has no limits or barriers. The first brings power, the second brings peace and unity. The first can corrupt a person more easily as a person can deludedly claim ownership of the power they are focusing. -
What is the difference between Dzogchen, Zen and Anapanasati?
Jetsun replied to taoguy's topic in Buddhist Discussion
Dzogchen arises out of Tibetan lineages which are fundamentally based upon Guru Yoga http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajrayana#Guru_yoga , which means you need a teacher or Guru to practice in the traditional way. I would advise reading about the different turns of the wheel of dharma and what they mean to get a clearer overall picture http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Turnings_of_the_Wheel_of_Dharma Do you need Dzogchen to progress to the highest levels and gain enlightenment? no you don't. The Dalai Lama who is empowered to teach at the highest level of Dzogchen says it is one of many paths to enlightenment in Buddhism and by no means puts it on a pedestal higher than others like you often see westerners or those on internet message boards do, his emphasis is far more on the Bodhisattva approach. But many people seem to get fixated on Dzogchen because it has a unique manifestation at death called the Rainbow Body, but just because other lineages don't go rainbow it doesn't mean they don't get to be enlightened it just means they don't produce that particular manifestation so it is hard to quantify or prove their effectiveness on an observable physical level. If you don't like the Guru Yoga approach then Zen might be more suitable. It is a fact that the modern psyche for the most part isn't really suitable for Guru Yoga because we have been taught our whole lives to be individualist and to think for ourselves, which is fine it just means that it may be more suitable for us to find a different way than the Tibetans used -
Why does reincarnation contradict a belief in Christ? Many of these masters may have a higher understanding of what is really meant by Christ than the regular average Church goer, whose comprehension rarely extends beyond a literal interpretation and who only usually love their neighbour in word or ambition rather than in reality.
-
There is Stylianos Atteshlis, aka the Magus of Strovolos. John Chang, aka the Magus of Java. Both Christian energy masters. Adyashanti carries a powerful energetic Christian transmission these day although I wouldn't describe it as qigong. There are stories of the monks of Mount Athos doing powerful spiritual things but again I wouldn't call it qigong.
-
At some point in the cycles someone has to put the weapons down
-
It only creates a schizm if you believe the name is the thing rather than a conventional label which helps things get done.
-
To try to find a way out reinforces the sense of being trapped. To seek out happiness causes the misery we try to escape from. How easily I forget these truths and do the exact things which cause the problems I try to find the solution to, its almost as if I want to be caged, to be unhappy and have problems.
-
Mother Meera does everything for free and it is difficult to even give donations, although some of her devotees have set up a small shop and a few people have written books about her that they sell. With Amma also everything is completely free, but she does generate a huge amount of money through donations to her charitable causes so there is an element of subtle pressure to donate , yet most do it very willingly. Edit: I guess neither of which qualify as they both have shops, but it depends on how you look at it
-
Some people have more success with the enquiry "what am I?"
-
Whenever I come up with one life never agrees with me
-
Don't waste your money, I have seen many healers over the years and there is absolutely to correlation between how good they are and how much they charge. If anyone promises one session can remove your issues for good they will be a fraudster, any legit healer wont promise anything of the sort, so where is the morality in charging such a large amount as it is likely to involve multiple sessions? those sorts of people are usually preying on the desperate.
-
Well it is me paraphrasing things I have heard Adyashanti has said, without a direct quote it is probably bit unfair to put those words to him as he is far more precise and clear about these things than I am. But it is hardly rare for non dualists to say that at some point it takes grace, that is a very common theme from many teachers that at one point there is nothing you can do that efforts are useless because efforts reinforce dualism, what then takes over apart from grace? Many hundreds of thousands of people have done self inquiry and sat in Zazen etc, yet only a handful have awakened from it, so what is the factor which moves some people that bit further? Everyone qualifies for and receives grace in many forms but as I explained it is only likely to result in awakening if you put yourself in certain situations first, if you bring yourself to the door. Committing suicide is the ego trying to get away from something usually suffering, so in other words it is the ego trying to control the situation, therefore it is completely different from ego death which is about accepting the truth and the situation, suicide is egotistical (not that I blame people as trying to get away from suffering is a normal pursuit). I actually think what he is saying is very useful, that at certain points your own efforts and dedication to practice and the truth are useful as they bring you to the edge, which is far more empowering than those teachers who say everything you do for awakening is useless, but at some point all things including effort, including the meditator or the one doing enquiry have to be let go. I don't see how this in inconsistent from Zen or Vedanta or many of the other wisdom traditions, he just uses some different terms and mixes in a bit of Christianity.
-
What Adyashanti says is that all the direct techniques whether it is to sit in silence like they do in Zen, self enquiry of Ramana or dwell in the 'I Am' like Nisrigatta Maharaj prescribes are all effort techniques, which are very direct pure techniques leaving you nowhere else to go but they don't take you all the way, what they do is take you to the cliff edge then to move into what they call 'awakening' means falling over the edge of the cliff, but there is absolutely nothing you can do to fall over the edge as by definition the ego wont commit suicide, all you can do is wait for what he called a 'strong wind' to blow you over or get moved over by grace. So the more time you spend at the cliff edge the greater chance of being blown over the edge by grace, which is why up to a certain point efforts can be helpful but after that its up to God or will of the Tao.
-
Archbishop of Canterbury 'doubts God exists'
Jetsun replied to Nikolai1's topic in General Discussion
Where you are born and your culture which is largely dictated to by religion basically provides the blueprint for your psychology, so for me even though I hardly ever go to Church and have read far more Buddhism and received more Buddhist teachings than Christian ones I know that psychologically I am Christian, which basically means that I have somehow assimilated deeply embedded beliefs about being sinful or original sin, which then leads to the drive for redemption or to prove that I am worthy. As a child these are the models of what it means to be human that we adopt if we grow up in this culture, they are imprinted in us with the force of survival energy, so if 20 odd years later I then put on a robe and do a few hours meditation a day and call myself a Buddhist it isn't going to shift these deeply embedded patterns very easily, it can just be a way of trying to avoid facing up to the reality of them. It is more ideal to find solutions to our spiritual issues from our own culture, which is why I would prefer the Priests and Bishops to have embodied experiences of what they talk about, because I know it is available to them. -
Archbishop of Canterbury 'doubts God exists'
Jetsun replied to Nikolai1's topic in General Discussion
It seems pretty obvious from all that is said and written about by most of these priests and bishops that most of them have little experience of being at one with god as a intimate lived experience. It is not meant as a condemnation of his character, he seems very sincere and truthful and for him to have doubts is probably very healthy, yet for the head of an entire Church to be in that situation is a poor reflection of the lineage of that Church to provide the sort of spiritual growth many people are looking for. What would be the implication of a head of a Buddhist lineage to come out and say he had no experience or confidence in 'Buddha nature'? you would probably say it is good to be truthful but he shouldn't really be in charge of guiding others. Yet the problem with that Church of England is that there probably isn't anyone better because there isn't a great deal of contemplative or meditative methods contained within its structure. If you remove such methods all that usually happens is that all the spiritual knowledge gets turned into intellectual concepts and beliefs while also serving to reinforce and cement social conditioning, so the religion creates the barriers to the religious experience rather than facilitating it. Not that I am down on Christianity as a whole, there is a history of mystics who are unrivalled in their poetic descriptions of life and God and if you examine places like Mount Athos you have a whole succession of Christians having continual religious experiences and union with God. There are others like the spiritual exercises of Ignatius of Loyola which provide ways to help grow out of conditioning and limitations. But the point of the larger churches the main reason why the Roman empire took it under its wing is to control people, to control their sexual energy and condition them, not to empower them or show them their full potential. Even though the Bible continually repeats that God and the Kingdom of Heaven are within and already exist right now, the main Churches continually promote the idea that it is outside of ourselves and we have to earn it or beg for it. -
Archbishop of Canterbury 'doubts God exists'
Jetsun replied to Nikolai1's topic in General Discussion
As Carl Jung says religion is a defence against having religious experiences, so it is no surprise that these high priests and ministers have no perceptible direct experience of God. -
William Wallace looking remarkably like Mel Gibson kept in a protective cage... says a lot.
-
Its not really independence, if they leave the UK they will join the EU and Euro leaving them with less independence than they have now, being ruled by politicians and having their economics dictated to by Brussels. As the recent crisis showed if there was any future economic crisis in Scotland they would then have to take their orders from Angela Merkel in Germany. Then even if they kept the pound their economy would be dictated to by London but they would have less say and influence on those decisions than they do now. Strange sounding independence to me.
-
I don't disagree with you, yet even to investigate the 'I' could be considered a technique just as much as lying down and pretending you are dying.
-
I know books can have transmission or lung and so it is best to receive them at an appropriate time, but even if that is so what is the worst that would happen if you continued on reading? there is no Dharma God who is going to punish you or strike you down if you did and such transmissions don't have the power to unbalance your psyche in any serious way, most likely what would happen is that your mind would create concepts out of it creating temporary barriers to full embracing of the teaching and barriers to that particular transmission, what worse could happen than that?
-
I guess it is related but not necessarily the same thing, it is more like their presence emits this kind of silence which feels palpable when you are around them and then it is easier for you to fall into silence too being there. Yes I know what you mean, usually internet scholars who have read a few books about right view believe that they get it and Ramana (who is generally considered one of the greatest Sages who ever lived by all who met him in person) is somehow missing the mark or locked in an eternalist viewpoint. In reality Ramana explained how the eternalist and nihilist views are actually two sides of the same coin when trying to communicate about reality using language which is always dualistic, which is why silence is the more direct and powerful teacher. I try to ignore those guys these days, in my perspective they tend to value their intellectual position on these matters as more valuable than actually realising and embodying these things. One thing about Ramana which I didn't understand is that he had his awakening through doing a death meditation and pretending he was already dead, yet he never instructed others to do similar meditations, rather to investigate what the I or self is. .
-
Who ever said he was a joke? as far as I am aware just about everybody who met him in person regarded him as a highly realised master. You do have to be a bit careful with what you read about him though and what he taught, as apparently most of what is written about him in the English language comes from just a few sources looking through their own skewed lense of interpretation and translation, so i'm not confident what is available to us about him gives a very full picture of what he was really about. Yet I like and agree with what you write here about silence, I have met some masters who also transmit waves of silence like that.
-
I don't believe all the scare stories about how if you read a text too advanced for you it will create barriers for life in your practice, that just sounds like a load of BS to me. It is possible that if you read advanced texts you may start to create mind made concepts around what you read and start intellectualising about things before you have realised them in an embodied way, but that is pretty much what we all do all the time anyway, just continuing down the path should sweep these away in the end, sure it is better not to have such self created barriers in the way but there is no need to fear that somehow you are completely destroying your progress down the line through doing so.
