dawg

Allinone, Meditate more, and read less… you can’t really understand what the books say unless you have experienced it for yourself… imagine that you wanted to learn to snow ski… you could read about skiing for a year and still not know how to ski… but if you went to a ski slope, put on a pair of skis, and tried to ski for even one day… you would know more about skiing, than reading about it for a year… ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is what I was taught by my teacher… it is what Theravada Buddhism teaches.. What is a “BUDDHA”…? What is “AWAKENED”… ? What is the meaning of the word “Buddha”…? Buddha is often misunderstood as the name of a historical figure from India… but this is not the case… his name was “Siddhartha Gautama”, the word Buddha means “awake”… when Siddhartha Gautama was asked by a man, “are you a god…?” Gautama, the person who became the Buddha replied, “No ! ” ... “then what are you?” the man asked again…Gautama answered, “I am awake”… the word “Buddha” is derived from a Sanskrit word that means “awake” …that is why he is called “Buddha”… all awakened people are Buddhas (awake), but out of respect the title “Buddha” is reserved for Siddhartha Gautama… What is a “BODHISATTA”…? The Buddha referred to his past lives before he became the Buddha as “when I was a bodhisattva”… meaning that a Bodhisattva is not yet awake, but will reaching awakening in seven reincarnations or less …Bodisattas are not yet “awake”, they still have delusion… they will die and be reborn in the physical world unless they have reached the attainment of “Anagami”, the last attainment before wakening… then if they are an “Anagami”, they will be reborn in one of the “pure abodes” which are the highest heavens… and reach awakening there, and never be born anywhere else again… or if they are a “Sakadagami” (“once returner”), they will be reborn in the physical world one more time, and reach “Anagami” and go to the “pure abodes”; or reach awakening… A Bodhisatta is a “Sotapanna, a ” stream enterer who has abandoned the first three fetters that bind the citta to the cycle of birth and death, and has entered the path to awakening… he will be reborn no more than seven times, before he reaches awakening… and because his own eventual awakening is assured, he chooses to spend this life, and as much of his future lives as he can, in helping others to reach awakening… What is a “ARAHAT”…? The Ten Fetters to Awakening… There are 10 fetters or bonds that tie us to this deluded world of existence. To become awakened, we need to overcome or cut these fetters… 1 - False belief in Self. 2 - Skeptical Doubt about the Dhamma. 3 - Attachment to Rites and Rituals, including norms, beliefs, concepts, names. 4 - Sense Desires. 5 - Ill Will. 6 - Attachment for existence in the Fine Material Planes. 7 - Attachment for existence in the Fine Immaterial Planes. 8 – Conceit. 9 – Restlessness. 10 – Ignorance. The 4 levels of attainment on the path to awakening A Sotapana or “Path Enterer” has eradicated the first 3 fetters of a false belief in Self, skeptical doubt and attachment to Rites and Rituals. He will have at most 7 more lifetimes before achieving enlightenment. Having eradicated the first 3 fetters, he will not fall back into the lower realms (he will never be reborn in hell, or as an animal again). A Sakadagami or Once-Returner has further weaken but not totally eradicated Sense Desires and Ill Will. He will have no more than one rebirth before attaining nirvana... An Anagami or Non-Returner has eradicated the first 5 fetters. He will be reborn in the Pure Abodes and from there attain Nirvana... An Arahant has eradicated all the 10 fetters. He has attained awakening (enlightenment) in this life. What is ENLIGHTENMENT ? Though 19th century translators of Buddhist texts sometimes used the word "enlightenment" to refer to Gautama's moment of spiritual awakening on seeing the morning star… the first time a large number of general English readers saw the word used as a spiritual term was with the publication of “Essays on Zen Buddhism First Series D.T. Suzuki” in the 1930s’’... Before that time the word referred to the 18th century rationalist movement in Europe that strove to understand the world using logic and reason. ..The word “enlightenment” is just the English language word used in translation to describe the Buddha’s awakening, it is not a different type of awakening… A Buddha..., someone who is Awakened..., an Arahat..., and someone who is Enlightened, have all reached the same level of attainment… they are all the same… spiritually they have all permanently destroyed their delusion and purified their Citta … and have reached nirvana… their personalities my be different, their talents may be different, there may be other differences... but once they die, they will never be born or die again, they are free... Dawg

Taichistudent, The reason I started this forum was to pay back the wisdom my teacher taught me… all I do is answer questions, or give opinions… since you have no questions, I will give you an opinion… You try to use “anger" to control people… a person who uses anger (your righteous indignation is just another form of anger) to control people, is a person with low self esteem… why do you have low self esteem…? It is because your father used righteous indignation (anger) to control you, and conditioned you that way when you were a child… he indignantly criticized every little thing you did wrong, but never praised you for the things you did right… he was always “right” and you were always “wrong”… so all of your conditioning is negative, which is why you have low self esteem, and a negative attitude… then to cover up your low self esteem, you built up a superiority complex, which is your bloated ego… now you have turned into your father… and you indignantly (angrily) criticize other people, to prove to yourself that you are superior… that is why you waste your time being an internet troll, trying to bait people, then trying to flame them… all trolls are the same… they are a psychological type style… Whether you practice Tai Chi as a martial art or mild form of exercise, your anger and low self esteem (negative attitude) will poison your efforts… You are a spiritual cripple… your low self esteem prevents you from being able to “love” yourself… and if you cannot love yourself, you cannot love anyone else… and if you cannot love anyone else, they cannot love you… The first step in breaking out of your negative attitude, is to accept yourself just the way you are, and know that you are no better or worse than anyone else… love yourself and accept yourself… you are not inferior, you are not superior… once you can do that, you can destroy both your low self esteem and superiority complex… and until you can do that, you are wasting your time, if you are meditating… you need a positive attitude if you expect to make any positive progress… a negative attitude poisons your mind and blocks any positive attainment… only you can make that choice… if you flip your attitude from negative to positive, everything else will fall into place… if you don’t flip your negative attitude, your negative emotions will poison your life and be the source of more problems… you create your fate with your thoughts and actions… Dawg

taichistudent, yawn ! dawg

taichistudent, yawn ! dawg

seekingBuddha, Please edit your post, and delete “Venerable Dawg”, and change it to simply “Dawg’… then I will delete this request from my post… I am not offended, it just made me smile at the absurdity of it… I am not a “holy man” preaching religion… I am just an ordinary guy who wanted to know the “truth” of our existence… so I followed the path of the Buddha, and found it… 1… Terminology Terminology....Words such as liberation, arhantship, enlightenment are often interchangably used, these days. So, i request all who are posting in this thread to clarify their level of liberation using the terminology of the Buddha, the Supremely Enlightened One whose is the teacher of teachers. The Buddha used the Pali language which was the language of the common people in his day, so that everyone could easily understand what he said… but today, no one speaks the Pali language, and glossaries of Pali words frequently contradict one another and give you different translations… so that you are still unsure of the meaning… now that I have reached awakening and realized the simple meaning of the Pali words, I use simple English language words in their place, so that anyone who speaks English can easily understand what I write… 2… 'There are, Ananda, these eight liberations. What are they? (I) Possessing form, one sees forms. That is the first liberation. (2) Not perceiving material forms in oneself, one sees them outside. That is the second liberation. (3) Thinking: "It is beautiful", one becomes intent on it. That is the third. (4) By completely transcending all perception of matter, by the vanishing of the perception of sense-reactions and by nonattention to the perception of variety, thinking: "Space is infinite", one enters and abides in the Sphere of Infinite Space. That is the fourth. (5) By transcending the Sphere of Infinite Space, thinking: "Consciousness is infinite", one enters and abides in the Sphere of Infinite Consciousness. That is the fifth. (6) By transcending the Sphere of Infinite Consciousness, thinking: "There is no thing", one enters and abides in the Sphere of No-Thingness. That is the sixth. (7) By transcending the Sphere of No-Thingness, one reaches and abides in the Sphere of Neither-Perception-Nor-Non-Perception. That is the seventh. (8) By transcending the Sphere of Neither-Perception-Nor-Non-Perception one enters and abides in the Cessation of Perception and Feeling. That is the eighth liberation. 'Ananda, when once a monk attains these eight liberations in forward order, in reverse order, and in forward-and-reverse order, entering them and emerging from them, as and when, and for as long as he wishes, and has gained by his own super-knowledge here and now, both the destruction of the corruptions, and the uncorrupted liberation of heart and liberation by wisdom, that monk is called "both-ways-liberated, and Ananda, there is no other way of "both-ways- liberation" that is more excellent or perfect than this.' ....................(Mahanidana Sutta) Since it would be nice to hear from someone who speaks from direct experience, could you expound on the experience of reaching each one of these liberation stations ? The eight liberations… These are not “liberation stations” on the path to awakening… they are a super sure test to see if you are awakened… Ananda did not reach awakening until after the Buddha’s death… The Buddha is talking to his cousin Ananda, who in spite of high attainment had been unable to reach awakening… and Ananda wanted to know how he could test himself and know beyond any doubt that he was awakened… the Buddha is explaining to him how he would know for sure that he had awakened… Ananda reached awakening after the Buddha died… The eight liberations are the rejection of the physical world and the seven types of higher and higher heavenly worlds… the Buddha is saying to Ananda that if he can visit these 8 types of realms without wanting to stay in any of them, he is enlightened… bear in mind that the inhabitants of all of the heavenly realms, even the highest, suffer from delusion (karma), and when they die will reincarnate again in the physical realm… but if he does not choose any of them, he will rise above the heavenly realms and not reincarnate because he has no delusion (karma)… he is free… There is not just one path, there are many… the Buddha mentioned that there are tens of thousands of possible paths, but I don’t remember the exact number he said… 3… You have expounded on your experiences of visiting other worlds. Some in this thread have mentioned numerous worlds that exist beyond earth. So, why is it that Digha Nikaya mentions only 31 abodes (worlds), including the fine-material Bramha/Deva worlds ? (I don't think is this of much use to me, as i focus more on my development, here and now. But, my curiosity is curious). There is an endless multitude of inhabited planets, and their spirit realms in the universe… plus there are spirit realms for animals and all other life… but humans will go to one of the 31 realms mentioned in the Digha Nikaya … so the Buddha only mentioned the realms that concerned us… 4… While i spent many months at the meditation center, i encountered several visitors who would engage me in spiritual talk. And some of these people spoke about their use of psychedelic drugs to attain to the experience of reaching other realms and beings. I still remember one guy who said he had attained Nibbana Some of these people were very happy, healthy, highly educated and successful. So, i neither credited nor dis-credited them, while speaking. But, i started wondering if the use of drugs plays tricks with brain chemistry and if it is easier for drug users (past or present), to reach advances in liberation. If this is possible, I wonder how many in this thread are using (OR have used) drugs to reach their attainments. The ancient Indo-Europeans who swept down off the Eurasian Steppe, conquered India, and founded Hinduism… they built sweat lodges filled with marijuana smoke to purify themselves…and then they drank “Soma” (a psychedelic drug they called the “drink of the of the gods”) which allowed them to see and communicate with the gods… psychedelic drugs were used in almost every tribal religion in the world… it is a tradition that goes back thousands of years… psychedelic drugs strip away “mundane reality” which is “Avijja” or “delusion”… which allows a person to temporarily see and know that mundane reality is not real, that it is an illusion, a deception, a delusion… that there is a higher reality… the effect of the psychedelic drug is temporary, but the memory of it permanently alters a person’s perception of “reality” …but it does not do the work of purifying the mind, a person still has to meditate to destroy mundane reality, but now they know what and why… 5… The power of subconcious could be the influence for the "visions" people get during dreams ? While you have talked about the distinction between visions and ordinary dreams, i wonder how one can be sure that thevisions are not the projections of the subconcious (during deep sleep). Your subconscious mind is your spirit… so it is always in, and connected telepathically to the spirit world… and it communicates with spirits and the subconscious minds of other people, without you being aware of it… your subconscious mind creates “visions”, “normal dreams”, and “lucid dreams… all three are created by your subconscious mind…“visions” are called “Nimitta” and happen when you are wide awake and meditating… normal dreams occur in your subconscious mind while you are sleeping… “lucid dreams” take place outside of your subconscious mind in the spirit world, and are usually generated by one or more spirits (your spirit guides) trying to teach or test you… 6.. Morality: While discussing the numerous reasons why other people praise him, Buddha says "Abandoning unchastity, the ascetic Gotama lives far from it, aloof from the village-practice of sex"....... "Abandoning harsh speech, he refrains from it. He speaks whatever is blameless, pleasing to the ear, agreeable, reaching the heart, urbane, pleasing and attractive to the multitude." I can not question your decisions, but i wonder why you chose a different path, post liberation/arhantship ? Buddha has spoken about how liberated beings lose the strength of their mindfulness and equanimity, due to indulgence… The Buddha is talking about the awakened monks, who have taken a vow of chastity… so he is not warning them about sex… but because I am awakened, you think I should take a vow of chastity… because you think sex is “dirty”… your delusion is showing… Indulgence is anything that you do in excess… you can eat in excess, that is indulgence … but that does not mean that eating food is bad and that you should not eat… there is nothing wrong with eating food… you can spend all your money buying trendy clothes, that is indulgence… but that does not mean you should not buy clothes… you can spend fourteen hours a day reading books, that is indulgence… but that does not mean you should not read books… you can have two hundred pet dogs, that is indulgence… but that does not mean you should not have a pet dog… you can have sex with dozens of women, that is indulgence… but that does not mean you should not have sex with one woman… You said … “Buddha has spoken about how liberated beings lose the strength of their mindfulness and equanimity, due to indulgence”… the Buddha was cautioning about any form of excess, he is not prohibiting sex… Once you reach awakening, you have finished, it is permanent… now if you are not a monk, you can continue the life you had before you started to meditate, and now it is effortless and full of joy… I am not a monk… nor have I ever taken a vow of chastity… and you forget that you reach awakening by accepting the Buddha’s middle path as your new reality… sex is neither good or bad, it is neutral of itself… it just is… only intention can make it good or bad… if you are neutral, and neither seek it, or reject it… there is no attachment or karma… if you are married, it is a duty you owe your wife… Dawg

3Dominicus3, you asked me for my opinion... and I gave it to you... you can accept it, or reject it... it does not matter to me... I will not respond to your post point by point, because you are not serious... instead I will give you my opinion again... When you said that you were playing the devil’s advocate, you were admitting that you were not telling the truth of what you believe, but were trying to bait me… in short, you were lying, and by lying you destroyed the credibility of everything else that you said… What you say and imply about your level of attainment, also shows you were lying about that too… it is all “book knowledge that you don’t understand properly, so that you cannot describe it properly, it is not your personal experience… but you think you understand it… I will not describe the things that give you away, because I don’t want to help you make your lies more credible… A person who tells lies, is a person with low self esteem… why do you have low self esteem…? It is usually because your father conditioned you that way… he criticized every little thing you did wrong, but never praised you for the things you did right… so all of your conditioning is negative, which is why you have low self esteem, and a negative attitude… then to cover up your low self esteem, you built up a superiority complex, which is your bloated ego… now you have turned into your father… and you criticize everybody else, to prove to yourself that you are superior… that is why you waste your time being an internet troll, trying to bait people, then criticizing them… Your low self esteem prevents you from being able to “love” yourself… and if you cannot love yourself, you cannot love anyone else… and if you cannot love anyone else, they cannot love you… The first step in breaking out of your negative attitude, is to accept yourself just the way you are, and know that you are no better or worse than anyone else… love yourself and accept yourself… once you can do that, you can destroy both your low self esteem and superiority complex… until you can do that, you are wasting your time, if you are meditating… you need a positive attitude if you expect to make any positive progress… a negative attitude poisons your mind and blocks any positive attainment… only you can make that choice… if you flip your attitude from negative to positive, everything else will fall into place… if you don’t flip your negative attitude, your negative emotions will poison your life and be the source of more problems… you create your fate with your thoughts and actions… Dawg

Allinone, Yes, what you described above is “Avijja”… when we are little children we learn how to act like the adults around us by watching them, and doing what they do… we also watch children older than us and learn from them… we want to act like adults so we mimic their actions… even when we “play”, we play by pretending we are acting like adults…if adults get angry, we learn to get angry… if adults lie to each other, we learn lie to each other… if adults hit each other, we learn to hit each other… whatever we see and experience around us, we consider to be normal behavior… and our actions and reactions, and the emotions that they generate become automatic… our actions and reactions, and emotions that they generate are no longer controlled by our conscious mind, they are now controlled by the subconscious mind (our Citta)…we then forget that we learned these actions and reactions, and think that they are our “gut reaction” to the world around us…we no longer control what we have learned, it controls us… we have been brainwashed, and don’t even know it… this is what Avijja (delusion) is, and how it controls our conscious mind…this is why we need to purify the Citta (subconscious mind)… before we can reach “awakening”, and why enlightenment is called “awakening”… it is like awakening from a dream…that seemed so real that it deluded us… Dawg

Allinone, Buddhist terminology uses the Pali language, which was the language of the common people at the time of the Buddha… Pali is a corrupted version of the Sanskrit language which was brought to India by the indo-europeans who swept down from the north about 1800 years before the time of the Buddha and conquered India… who then set themselves up as the ruling class, and founded Hinduism… the Buddha was an indo-european… The subconscious mind is in what is called “the Citta” (pronounced as Chitta)… which is usually translated as “mind” or “heart”… “mind” is the conscious mind, “heart” is the subconscious mind… the subconscious mind is called the “heart” because it feels and controls our emotions… the purified Chitta is radiant and bright, and is a state of “knowingness”… a Citta that is not purified is under the power of “Avijja” (delusion)… as long as there is “Avijja”, there is “intention”… “intention” creates “Kamma” (Karma) that attaches itself to the Citta… everything that we think or do, originates in the Citta (conscious mind and subconscious mind)… Dawg

Hey Dawg, Hey Kubba, From your perspective - is it true that arahants do not have sexual life or are impotents? They say in Buddhism it is like that after full enlightenment. Ajahn Brahm said so, but some gurus and teachers have wifes so I don't understand this part… Buddhist monks have taken a vow of chastity… and unless they quit being monks (disrobe), it is forbidden for them to have sex… so they abstain from sex, because they rather stay as a monk… they may or may not be impotent, that depends on their age and heath… Ajahn Brahm abstained from sex for most of his adult life, so he didn’t miss it… __________________________________________ Quote from my reply above, “I never ordained as a monk… but now that I am awakened, I am totally neutral and indifferent all the time… and open and honest… and I never try to pick up a woman… but women try to pick me up… and if I have sex, it is the best sex I ever had… because there is no voice in my mind to distract me, and I am totally in the present moment… but I don’t miss sex, or go looking for it… it is just a “spontaneous unplanned event”… bear in mind that sex is neither “good” nor “evil”, that it just “is”… if you don’t cling to it (consider it “good” or “evil”), there is no karma… I am now experiencing what it was like back in the mythical “Garden of Eden” of Adam & Eve… before they ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of “good” and “evil”, and became deluded… delusion is the “original sin” of Christianity… I laughed my ass off (at the absurdity and simplicity of it) when I first realized this, after I awakened… it is so blatantly obvious to me now, that I can’t imagine how I could not have seen it before I awakened… but that is how powerful delusion is, we can’t see what is right in front of our faces… but when we destroy delusion, we regain our innocence, purity, and peace… and the whole world is a Garden of Eden… and our conscious and subconscious minds integrate themselves into this Eden, so that we are plugged into whatever we need… and life becomes fearless, painless, and effortless…” ______________________________________________ Arahants essentially all go through the same process of purifying their subconscious mind, so they are the same in that they have all destroyed the delusion in their subconscious mind… but as a random group of people, they are as different as any other random group of people… their skills and powers vary depending on what they were interested in and cultivated… But I don’t think it is possible for gurus and teachers who have wives, to be enlightened in the sense of being a Buddhist arahant… a married arahant would be like saying… “he has one of his feet nailed to the floor (he is attached to his wife), but he can go anywhere he wants to go with the other foot”… you cannot be tied down, and free at the same time… but the Hindu tradition considers raising the Kundalini using any method, as reaching enlightenment… in Buddhism raising the Kundalini is called a “Brahmin Awakening”, because it temporarily pushes aside your delusion and gives you a taste of awakening, but then the delusion reasserts itself, and returns and the awakening fades away… and you are right back where you started… but with the Buddhist awakening, you destroy the delusion, so it is permanently gone… Dawg

Hey Dawg, Just wanted to reply to a few points: Hey Dominicus3 Sorry to be so long in replying, I was off line… Quote Karma is just the spiritual equivalent of Sir Issac Newton’s “third law of motion” describing one of the laws of the physical universe which states that…”for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction”… the universe is indifferent… what you sow, you reap… If you stick your hand in a fire, your hand gets burned… why can’t you un-burn our hand… ? The thing is, the laws of this physical universe has loopholes. You can cover your hand with a special fire-proof gel before putting it in a fire, and not get burned. Also, their is a high probability that there are other universes/dimensions that do not hold to the same rules that are in this one. If you put gel on your hand, you are not sticking your hand in a fire, you are sticking your gel in the fire… You are bound by the laws of this physical universe and spiritual universe… you can’t escape them… Everything you have ever thought or done (all your karma… including your past lives) is recorded in the “Akashic Records” (which is not in your subconscious mind, but your subconscious mind can access it)… I have seen the akashic record myself when I awakened, so I know they are real… the record of your karma cannot be changed, it can only be added to… google “akashic records”, and check out several sites… There are some teachings out there that describe the place within the body where karmic seeds rest (your karma is your conditioning and it is in your subconscious mind… It is also called your delusion), and it is said that an awakened one who has taken Buddhas vows (there is no such thing as Buddha’s vows…! Unless you mean the vows of a Buddhist monk) , can go in and pluck all the karmic seeds out, and is no longer accumulating any (after you awaken, you no longer make any new karma, but your existing karma lasts until the death of your body..). So my question is, what if you haven't gotten or seen this within yourself yet? Cause it may be this way, but if one doesn't know, then they would just say that there is no way to transcend karma. (I know because I am awakened, and now have “knowing”)… “you pluck out the karmic seeds” to reach awakening, not after you reach awakening Quote If it exists as described, normal humans would be unable to experience it, because they still have delusion… raising the kundalini might give you a taste of it for a short time, but it would quickly fade… There are Taoist, Buddhist, Sufi, Mystical branches of thought that say that Absolute Beingness Experience doesn't require kundalini. Others say if consciousness merges absolute, then subconscious is transcended, because it is entirely seen as "Not I" therefore there is nowhere for consciousness to "stick." This makes no sense at all… either what you are reading is bullshit, or you don’t understand what you are reading… So from what I read of your path, via through the Subconscious , some say this is the front door to Enlightenment, and that the back door is just to no longer identify with it, while merging conscious with Unity Consciousness permanently in heart, and then merging Unity with Absolute in the LDT, and this backdoor way will also purify and trasncend the subconscious resulting in it becoming very quiet… You cannot transcend or deceive your subconscious mind… at best you can make it “quiet” temporarily… "Not I"… is only one of the many steps on the path to awakening… you also have to get rid of your hate, anger, greed, etc, etc, etc… and even then after attaining all the steps, you have to have the necessary strength of focus, to hold the focus long enough to break through and shatter your delusion (active karma)… Your subconscious mind IS your eternal spirit which you are trying to purify… it controls your conscious mind and your body… it is impossible to deceive it… it is what is deceiving you now… and there is no back door… I know a Taoist master in India (also claims Enlightenment) who teaches that only by avoiding and no longer identifying with Subconscious, will the central channel and access to unity and absolute open, and that going through subconscious is something you can get stick in for lifetimes with no guarantee, and that it is the hardest path… I repeat… your subconscious mind IS your eternal spirit which you are trying to purify… it controls everything else… there is no back door… it is the main event, you can’t avoid it or deceive it… but it deceives your conscious mind 24 hours a day… which is why you are deluded and cannot tell the difference between truth and fiction… you obviously don’t meditate, you just read about meditating… and unless you meditate, you are wasting your time reading about it… I'm bringing this up, no offense to you, (don’t worry about me, even if you tried to insult me, I would not take offense… ) but to just show that everybody, who (you think) is enlightened, is teaching only what they know themselves through direct experience, and there were only a few teachers (Osho) Osho was certainly not awakened, all of his teachings were run of the mill hindu “feel good meditations” presented by him with the flair of a good performer… who told people what they wanted to hear… you are too gullible (wishful thinking)… don’t believe anything you hear or read until you try it out (take it for a spin around the block) and prove it to yourself, that it is true… who spoke of a myriad of ways to get there, or at least 2 (front door/back door)… All ways lead to the subconscious mind, called the “citta” in the Pali language… Quote Think of “Metta” as having a good attitude, so that you are happy, and wish other people happiness… because without a good attitude, you have poisoned your awareness… and blocked spiritual attainment… so in that sense “Metta” is vital… Don't some of these spirit realm gods feed off metta though? which would mean its better not to feed them with it? “Metta” has nothing to do with the gods… it is simply having compassion and good feeling towards all other sentient beings… so that you don’t poison your own mind with any negative thoughts… Quote Anything that PERMANENTLY destroys all delusion in your subconscious mind will make you awakened… but just temporarily detaching yourself from the delusion is just simple Samadhi (concentration)… it makes your mind temporarily peaceful ; but when your concentration ends you are right back where you started… it is not permanent… Ramana Maharshi taught that to find the source of thought, or the thought 'I', would uproot the main taproot of the entire conscious/subconscious mind, and leave you in complete thoughtlessness permanently along with full awakening, subconscious purged, enlightenment, and so forth. So in that case, it would qualify as your: "Anything that PERMANENTLY destroys all delusion in your subconscious mind will make you awakened." You already know that the source of ‘thought”, and the thought “I” is in the subconscious mind… so are you awakened now…??? Also, obviously it took years to get to this point, so would you agree entering a monastery full time would be the only legitimate choice to achieve this? Considering a monastic life is majority spent on practice without access to family, friends, tv, media, and other worldly distractions, it just sounds like your way there is impossible in the modern day world… what you are saying here is that you don’t want to give up your delusion because you like it, and cling to it… that your delusion is more important to you, than spiritual development… that you are looking for a way to reach awakening, without having to let go of your delusion… I never ordained, I was what is called a “Dharma Guest”… I lived in a monk’s hut when I was at the monastery… ate food collected by the monks on their alms round (had one meal a day)… our group of Dharma guests (2 to 6 people)…were given Dharma talks 2 or 3 times a week, and our Dharma teacher would answer questions… we were supposed to spend most of our time meditating… I also had a house where I lived when I was not at the monastery… when I started meditating, I had the attitude that I would give it a try, to see if I made any progress, I came to Thailand and found the best monastery and teacher that I could find… and from the beginning I made steady progress… so I persevered and the path opened up before me… Also 2 other questions I forgot to ask: 1. What's your take on Lust? It's connected also to the body/subconscious network yes? But there also stories of lust continuing in the spirit realms and some say lust is only part of the body, so I'm trying to figure out the whole Lust complex. Is it also transcended in your case or is there still some partaking in it? The only place in the spirit world where there is physical sex similar to the physical realm are in the lower heavenly realms… the very lowest heavenly realms are here on earth… the inhabitants are the nymphs and satyrs of Greek mythology, so it can get wild… the feeling you get from just being in a realm gets better and better the higher you go… in the upper heavenly realms, just being there is far far better than physical sex… people there are usually married, and live together… sex there is staid, but when the two bodies meet, ZAP, you have a smile on your face for weeks… “I never ordained as a monk… but now that I am awakened, I am totally neutral and indifferent all the time… and open and honest… and I never try to pick up a woman… but women try to pick me up… and if I have sex, it is the best sex I ever had… because there is no voice in my mind to distract me, and I am totally in the present moment… but I don’t miss sex, or go looking for it… it is just a “spontaneous unplanned event”… bear in mind that sex is neither “good” nor “evil”, that it just “is”… if you don’t cling to it (consider it “good” or “evil”), there is no karma… I am now experiencing what it was like back in the mythicall “Garden of Eden” of Adam & Eve… before they ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of “good” and “evil”, and became deluded… delusion is the “original sin” of Christianity… I laughed my ass off (at the absurdity and simplicity of it) when I first realized this, after I awakened… it is so blatantly obvious to me now, that I can’t imagine how I could not have seen it before I awakened… but that is how powerful delusion is, we can’t see what is right in front of our faces… but when we destroy delusion, we regain our innocence, purity, and peace… and the whole world is a Garden of Eden… and our conscious and subconscious minds integrate themselves into this Eden, so that we are plugged into whatever we need… and life becomes fearless, painless, and effortless…” 2. Would someone meditating next to you gain any benefits from your own aura or state of Being? There are a lot of stories of monks gaining benefits from the auras of teachers who were enlightened It would depend on how receptive the person was… if their subconscious mind communicated with my subconscious mind, they could “intuitively” understand things that they did not know before… @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ SUMMARY… you want to reach awakening, but keep your delusion because you cling to it… you can’t scam or cheat your way into awakening… it has got to be an honest and sincere effort… and if you succeed, your delusion will be permanently swept away… but you will not miss it… Dawg

3Dominicus3, So what's your take on Intuition? It is also connected to Subconscious, but cannot be wrong? I've seen people on the path argue about who was right when they were both going by intuition, but choosing different. TELEPATHY… your subconscious mind is telepathic, and can communicate with all other subconscious minds… (this is the “collective subconscious” of the psychologist Carl Yung)… your subconscious mind can pick up ideas and information from other peoples subconscious minds… this is what your intuition is… and your spirit guides are with you 24 hours a day… they are telepathic… they work by planting thoughts, ideas, and actions in your mind that you think are your thoughts… this is what your “intuition” is… EQUANIMITY… there is no right or wrong, everything just is… everything is neutral… when two people argue about which one of them is right or wrong, they are both “wrong”… if they both agreed that the other was entitled to believe whatever they wanted to believe… both would be “right”… Why can't karma be transcended? The seeds completely uprooted and just transcend the whole karmic system so as to not play out what's left? It seems unfair that stuff done in ignorance, and because of it, then has to be tallied up after ignorance is snuffed out. Karma is just the spiritual equivalent of Sir Issac Newton’s “third law of motion” describing one of the laws of the physical universe which states that…”for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction”… the universe is indifferent… what you sow, you reap… If you stick your hand in a fire, your hand gets burned… why can’t you un-burn our hand… ? 3. Can one navigate the spirit realms to get to the Highest heaven by whatever modes, stealth, love, thought-less awareness with intention, or even some mystics say you have to keep repeating that "you are from the first and highest pre-existent realm," and that it acts as a one way ticket, then Enlightenment can be gotten at that highest realm. No…, the highest you can get in the spirit realm by stealth is the ghost realm… and that is beneath the lowest heavenly realm… anyone who says otherwise is conning you… The longest continuous time you can spend in the spirit realms is seven or eight days, or your physical body will die… Many shamans extend their life as long as they can… (with rapidly declining quality of life) then go to the ghost realm leaving their physical body to die… they do this rather than die in their physical body… they do this to avoid going to a hell realm… (and the ghost realm is visually very much like the physical world)… but they are stuck in the ghost realm forever, unless they go to a hell realm and get rid of their bad karma… then they are reborn in the physical realm… 4. Can you speak on Absolute Beingness, it is the state on which Unity seems to rest on, yet is prior to it, unborn, unmanifest, and seems to be linked to the Lower Dan Tian as a doorway to it. The only context in which I have ever heard the term “Absolute Beingness” used, was in a religious context, to describe a god, or gods… it implies that the mind knows and contains everything… including the unborn and unmanifest… (but everyone in the spirit world still has delusion, even the gods… so only enlightened beings would be able to experience it)… Absolute Beingness is a unity, it is complete, it does not rest on anything... IF it exists as described, normal humans would be unable to experience it, because they still have delusion… raising the kundalini might give you a taste of it for a short time, but it would quickly fade… The lower Dan Tian is a door to many things… if it is a door to “Absolute Beingness, it is a metaphor to imply that using the Dan Tian to raise the Kundalini, will allow you to experience a taste of Absolute Beingness… but it will not be permanent… 5. Which brings up next question. 3 Dan Tian System, or Chakra system, or are they united? They are interconnected, but not the same… both are invisible body systems… that western medicine is not aware of… they are both controlled by the subconscious mind… 6. Also what about radiating Metta to all beings? Is this vital, as it is in a number of Buddhist branches? Think of “Metta” as having a good attitude, so that you are happy, and wish other people happiness… because without a good attitude, you have poisoned your awareness… and blocked spiritual attainment… so in that sense “Metta” is vital… 7. Also, it seems Adviata Vedanta can do the same as a mantra, by constantly detaching from and no longer identify with any thoughts/thinker/body, access to the source of Thought manifests, and in that source, there is no thought. So are there other legit Paths to manifest Enlightenment in the manner of what you have reached? All the gods including Brahman, were born and will die… and they suffer from delusion… the hindu path to awakening is based on raising the Kundalini… when you raise the Kundalini, it cleans out the six lower chakras, which includes the third eye (subconscious mind…) but it does not destroy the “delusion” in the subconscious mind, it just suppresses it… this is called a “Brahman Awakening”… but a Brahman Awakening is not permanent, it slowly fades, and the delusion takes over your subconscious mind again… and replaces all the blockages in your chakras that the kundalini removed… you are back where you started… you have to continuously raise the kundalini to maintain the awakening… even then you will not reach nirvana when you die, you will go to a Brahman Realm (a group of high heavenly realms) for a long time… then to a hell realm to burn up your bad karma, then be reborn again… Anything that PERMANENTLY destroys all delusion in your subconscious mind will make you awakened… but just temporarily detaching yourself from the delusion is just simple Samadhi (concentration)… it makes your mind temporarily peaceful ; but when your concentration ends you are right back where you started… it is not permanent… 8. What is left for you now? Any more cultivation of any additional aspects? Once you reach awakening, it is permanent… delusion is gone forever, you have finished the work… you are free to do whatever you want… life is effortless… nothing bothers you… you are never bored… your heart is at peace… you are permanently happy … you continue to have deep insights on whatever you focus your awareness on… so you can know whatever you need to know… your spirit guide protects you from harm, warns you of any danger, and helps you find whatever you need… Dawg

Tibetan Ice I follow the tradition of Ajahn Mun… (but I translate the Pali language words into English)… the abbot of the monastery where I meditated was a student of Ajahn Mun… both were enlightened… I followed the meditation instructions of the abbot, who followed the meditation instructions of his abbot … Ajahn Mun died around 1950… the abbot where I meditated died in 2011, age almost 98 years…he appeared to me shortly before I awakened… and smiled at me… the first time he ever smiled at me… he knew…! I know what jhanas are but was strongly discouraged from doing jhanas… and the few mediators that passed through the monastery where I was , who did do jhanas did not seem to have much attainment… they still had all the defilements in their subconscious mind that would prevent them from reaching awakening… the whole point of the meditation I was doing, was to get rid of the defilements in my “Citta” (subconscious mind) step by step by sitting in Samahdi” (concentration)… so I could reach awakening… I see the jhanas as high states of concentration that are useless unless you have already reached awakening… and even then useless if you are living in the mundane world… Dawg

Infinity, When you awaken all of your active conditioning in your subconscious mind is destroyed and drops away, and you make no more karma…both your subconscious mind and your conscious mind are squeaky clean, all defilements are gone… but there is a record of your present life and all of your past lives in the Akashic Record (which is a permanent record of everything in the universe… so you still owe karmic debts… (if you are not familiar with the Akashic Record, Google it and read up on it… I think you will find it interesting)… using hypnosis, it is possible for a hypnotist to regress you to past lives, and to see your past lives… access to the Acashic Record is from your subconscious mind… your conscious mind goes into your subconscious mind …which is always in the spirit world… normal dreams take place in your subconscious mind… lucid dreams take place when your conscious mind leaves the subconscious mind and goes out into the spirit world… that is to say that “lucid dreams” are you experiencing the spirit world, in your sleep… that is why you can fly in lucid dreams… the goal of breath meditation is “ to stop all thoughts… when you stop all thoughts it is called “concentration” ( “samahdi”)…(samidhi is said to be a taste of nirvana…) when you are in samahdi you frequently see visions that are called “nimita”… you might hear music, or singing, or see beautiful different colored patterns of colors, or bright lights, feelings, ecstasy, etc… Once your awareness was focused on the nimitas, your concentration was destroyed… if you had ignored the nimita your concentrate would have continued… No...I am completely unified now… but I don’t see my personality and conscious mind as being “me”… my subconscious mind is “me, the spirit that I am… ”my conscious mind is unified with my subconscious mind… and the physical world is unified with spirit world… sometime when I get in my bed to go to sleep, and close my eyes, I find myself in the spirit world… so I lay myself down in the spirit world and go to sleep… sometimes I (my spirit body) wakes up in the spirit world… and I have to open my physical eyes to see the physical world… don’t forget that your subconscious mind is your spirit body… You should experiment with it… record several tapes to hypnotize yourself… then try them out and fine tune them…and since hypnosis is aimed at the subconscious mind and what it believes to be true… it could be a very effective tool… you could go to another hypnotist, and have him do a past life regression… if you do it, let me know how it turns out.. Each person is unique… some people could meditate all their lives, and never reach any attainment… other people meditate and reach attainments quickly and easily… it is possible that you are such a person… if you meditated seriously, you might progress quickly... Dawg

ALL KARMA IS NEUTRAL TO THINK THAT THERE IS “GOOD KARMA” AND “BAD KARMA” IS DELUSION Karma is Karma… there is no such thing as “good Karma” or “bad Karma”, there is only “Karma”... “Karma” is neutral, neither “good” nor “bad”… Karma is neutral “cause” and “effect”… our intention is the “cause”, Karma is the “effect”… we call some Karma “good, because we like it, and want it… we call some Karma “bad” because we don’t like it, and don’t want it… but all Karma is neutral… it just is…! It is “delusion” to call Karma “good” or “bad”… if you cling to “good Karma”, you are also clinging to “bad Karma”… they are the two sides of the same coin… you cannot have one without the other… if you cling to good Karma, you will not reach awakening… the highest level you can attain is a high heaven called a “Brahmin Realm”… it is not good Karma that gets you to awakening… it is destroying delusion that gets you to awakening… Dawg