JustARandomPanda

I'm beginning to think I should follow Taoist Marblehead's example - especially at Taobums.

:lol:

I'm so tired I like Buddhism as it tends to be very "science-y" in it's method of discovering things about one's self and the world around you. Except for one thing. I'm sooo F'n tired of that damn RIGHT VIEW. My God...You don't have Right View and you're Realizations are utterly SATURATED with the TAINT of subtle Eternalism or Nihilism. And heaven help you - Without that RIGHT VIEW you're gonna Reify too. I really have loved the tiny handful of Buddhist sutras that I've read. But then I come to Taobums and the enjoyment just withers on the vine as I'm reminded over and over in thread after thread of how damn TAINTED people's views are since they aren't RIGHT. Makes me seriously consider going back to Taoism. Much less stressful.

Hah! I just discovered apparently mods can't put peeps on ignore lists! Ah! good thing for me right?! I will still get to see brilliant Sinfest posts. I'm outa here peeps. I'm gonna go get rain on my face, wind in my hair, pet a neighbor's dog and play my guitar. Have lots o fun in the Buddhist forum! Make this forum fun! That's the only advice I have to give.

Sure thing! You're now on my permanent Ignore list. *waves*

....

Then EXPLAIN that this is something that can be DISCOVERED for themselves! This is where you and I part ways in going about trying to get people to begin inquiring about their senses. I would show them the Buddha's sutras on Right View and explain that if what the Buddha said is TRUE then it will also be VERIFIABLE one day in their VERY OWN PRACTICE. That the FRUIT will show itself from the EXPERIMENT of testing the RIGHT VIEW VARIABLE. Capiche? It is telling them to TEST BUDDHA's claim that RIGHT VIEW is necessary for a breakthrough to occur in their meditative practices (and thus an effect on their ordinary, everyday, run-o-the-mill life experiences as well). THAT'S how I would get away from the inevitable baggage of people being instantly suspicious of being "indoctrinated" into Right VIEW. It is reassuring people that what the Buddha taught is something they can test out. If RIght View is necessary as he claims then the Fruit will manifest with it and without it it will NOT manifest. If other spiritual traditions manifest this Same Fruit it means they had Right View too in their teachings even if they used those horrid words TRUE SELF to describe everything (Ways to Truth (dharma) are Infinite but I vow to master them ALL. ) I think this is what Seth Ananda was getting at. Christ had a pretty good maximum I like to refer to still: "By their Fruit shall ye know them." Frame it in terms of a scientific experiment. Which is what the Buddha was teaching anyway. Nobody needs to be indoctrinated into Right View and the way a lot of Buddhists teach it runs damn suspiciously close to precisely that. Search for a different angle of explaining the same thing.

Here's someone who teaches No Self in a way I can understand. Notice he also uses those Horrid words True Self too. He even says you can use the word Bubba (note: I think I'm gonna go investigate my original Bubba Nature ROFL)! :lol: Notice how he emphasizes this is something someone can actually PERSONALLY TEST and VERIFY for one's self and that anything else doesn't amount to a hill of beans at the end of the day. Daniel Ingram:

Sigh... I said I would not participate again but here I am since Twinner's PM about my posts here got me curious again as to how it was turning out. I had not planned to ever read this thread again nor post. That's how wearying it was. Xabir... It's the WAY you go about teaching. Not necessarily WHAT you teach. I repeat it is the WAY YOU DO IT. This in fact was the thing about Vajrahidaya that pissed so many people off too (well that and his insistence on the absolute superiority of Buddhism to anything else human kind has ever had in the way of spiritual wisdom but I won't go down that road right now). Let me put it this way. To me Right View is not necessarily something to harangue others about but rather something to be Discovered and Explored (that's where those Sutras come in as another possible aid.) Does that make sense? Your constant insistence that someone has to get RIGHT VIEW FIRST is the same technique CULT LEADERS use to indoctrinate their believers. It's used by Propogandists and Agitators. Most people know that these days if they've been paying any attention at all for the past 50-70 years. That's why suspicion immediately leaps to the mind whenever anyone - no matter how nobly their intent - keeps harping that you gotta get that Right VIEW FIRST (read to the modern student: Indoctrinated). And then proceeds immediately to tell you exactly what you need to believe FIRST just so you'll correctly interpret the meditative exercises? Now...is it skillful means to be telling potential seekers they gotta leave their discernment parked outside in the parking lot before they can get anywhere with the exercises? Do you see how that opens potential students up to heavy doubts about whether they're genuinely noticing their "focusing" and "awareness" and "one-pointedness" exercises is being pre-conditioned by what they were taught first? Yes, some sort of starting framework is used by everyone. I think Science has sufficiently debunked the Blank Slate theory of the brain. And Yes, I know the Buddha taught Right View. He was teaching a people that were heavily enculturated with a certain way of interpreting both their everyday sensory input as well as their spiritual ones that was putting a halt to them investigating everyday life even further when he knew it was possible to go further. But right along side with his Exposition of "Right View" he was telling his students to TEST what he was saying. He kept saying something to the effect of: I can not give you my experiences or Realizations. All I'm doing is showing you How I did it. You must do the actual exercises yourself. Otherwise you will always be stuck at either Belief (blind adherence) or Skepticism when neither needs to be the case. Here is the Map he said. I'm showing you there IS further to explore and discover. But you must walk the territory for yourself. I don't know about YOU but one of my Bodhisattva vows I recite nightly (yes, I say them every night) is: Ways to the Truth (dharma) are Infinite but I vow to master them all. In otherwords...if I F up the interpretation of those experiences of this mindstream with a wrong view...then the REALIZATION of that F-up needs to come from me as well. The teachings are only an aid in helping me see where I might have F'd up. But being harangued about how o so wrong I am makes me NOT inclined to discover where I may have F'd up but rather WEARY of the Guy/Gal pointing their finger at me at what a colossal F up I was in understanding. That doesn't inspire dedication to go back and re-examine. It only inspires someone to get pissed off. And eventually turn away from the teachings since Finger Pointers seem to be heavily represented in said spiritual tradition. *shrug* This truth is true for all spiritual traditions, not just Buddhism - the need for everyone to discover for themselves both where they are right and where they are wrong. If it turns out the Hindus or Taoists are wrong as you and Vh say they are they will have to discover it for themselves during their practices and researching not just their own Dharma (truth/Tao) but all others as well.

Here's a review on Amazon of exactly the kind of unacknowledged framework of mind that the author of Being Different discusses and the unspoken assumptions of Cultural, Spiritual, Religious and Scientific Superiority to all other ways of relating and understanding things: Letters to a Buddhist Jew Additional comments by the above writer: and and

Well Dwai... I'm reading the book and I must say I like it. I find this guy's arguments well done. In fact I suspect something like what he discusses has long been acknowledged in the West across many disciplines, not just religious ones but economic and political ones as well. Ever heard of anyone making a comment that "so-and-so has gone Native"? Yeah. Just like that. The "Native" guy/gal is the one who tossed over most or all their Culture's unspoken frameworks and lives the new one just fine. So what the author is talking about has kind of been intuited to some degree by people of non-dharma/non-shamanic-societies aplenty. They just don't go into examining it in detail. I do think he has a good exposition on the entire branch of Abrahamaic religions. And it's interesting to see that sort of veneration of "objective truth" in the New Atheism/Agnosticism too. I'm still very early in the book but I like it so far. It's interesting to think how different U.S. society might be now if it'd had its roots be dharmic or shamanic vs Abrahamaic or Philosophy-based.

From reading BK Frantzis books I discerned his Opening the Energy Gates is a form of Zhan Zhuang. Hence his meticulous pointers on getting the posture absolutely right. It's harder than it seems at first. And probably takes a full length mirror as well as someone who already knows what the correct posture is like to help one adjust correctly.

I've long believed this! In fact...I thought ALL branches of Buddhism taught these very things as I was under the impression this is a basic tenet! Uh... If all branches of Buddhism do *not* believe the above then what the heck is it they believe?!

I do not see anything Taoist about this quote at all. Not in the least. Insanity to me is specifically a disease of the brain. A very specific condition. "groups, parties, nations" won't have insanity unless the majority of it's members also actually have that disease. In fact..Nietzsche sounds illogical here. Pretty strange quote for someone whom I understood to have personally suffered from a diseased brain himself that led to mental breakdown and death.

So... Every now and then I see someone post about this Robert Anton Wilson dude. Can anyone explain to me what was so remarkable about him and his Trilogy (or any of his other writings for that matter)?

Interesting. To me that's another take on Buddhist (and Quantum Physics) emptiness teachings. I would except my library doesn't have a copy.

Ah Kunlun and the Kunlun Wars that raged at TB. Those were the (not-so) Good Ol' Days. You know... I actually own both Max Kunlun books (the 2nd one in color). Maybe I should bust the color one out and give it a shot and see what happens. Except Max says not to mix Kunlun with anything else. I do rather like my 6 Healing Sounds, Mantra and (occasional) White Skeleton and Lower Dantien practices but it might do me good to do some sort of actual Nei-Gong again. And as for Confucius. It's my understanding he was teaching in an era of Chinese history when Society was experiencing breakdown of societal norms as well as less than helpful "governing" by elites. He was trying to steer Chinese Society in a more beneficial direction. Hence his prescription - Awareness (aka Mindfulness practice) as applied to virtue cultivation by every individual or group in Society. Master Nan Huai-Chin discusses Confucius and how beneficial he was and still is to this day for the Chinese (and the rest of the world too for that matter). Master Nan says you can always tell what a Culture's People are lacking in by what their Sages call particular attention to. Jesus called for Loving Others as One's self (meaning his listeners didn't). Mohammed called for Submission to Allah (meaning the people had excessive amounts of Pride). Lao Tzu called for living in harmony with the Tao (meaning the Chinese weren't - and Master Nan says they still don't), etc.

This thread is exhausting. I will not post in it again. Too bad Thusness refuses to post at Taobums. I'll just say a few things that pertain solely to the mindstream making this post. 1. There is this mindstream believing the Buddha in that there is such a thing as Right View. 2. There is further this mindstream believing that it can be "scientifically discovered" for one's self with practice. 3. There is this mindstream thinking the way "Right View" is taught at Taobums is...well not the way this mindstream would do it but whatever. It's all fungible. There is no I. There is no Others. *shrug* Someday this mindstream will get to realize it, not just Parrot the Buddha's teachings. This mindstream is a Parrot dreaming it's a Human Being. I just hope there's also this mindstream remembering the Buddha taught skillfully. And that he didn't go around making Sentient Beings exhausted and weary of the Noble 8 Fold Path. *sinks into the depths of lurkdom*

Will trying to stand relaxed for 1-2 minutes even if it's not true Zhan Zhuang help open up chi flows?

Sigh. Yeah... That's what I've long suspected too. Too bad I can't afford a teacher. I would love to be able to do Zhan Zhuang correctly someday (assuming my feet ever quit hurting). That + holding my breath to open the tiniest chi channels + shining Awareness practice upon everything... Man...if I could do all of those I'd be set to go for a LONG time.

I don't think the Seth Ananda mindstream is disputing the Teachings in Buddhism that clinging goes on by Sentient Beings and leads to the results posited above. I think all the Seth Ananda mindstream is disputing is the Xabir mindstream's 'I know it when I see it' realization of Nisgardatta writings. *shrug* I keep wanting to ask HOW the Xabir mindstream arrived at that Awareness that the Nisgardatta mindstream (and students) are taking Nothingness as a Source (3rd stage instead of 7th) but I guess I won't get anything I'll be able to understand right now. Sigh.... I keep wanting to ask the method used to come to the above Realization that there's "no realization of anatta being taught by them"...those mindstreams just *Think* they are but they're really not and (somehow) the Xabir mindstream detects it automatically. But...I guess I won't understand it until I get there. Anyhoo... Cheers!

Dunno about you but whenever I see people describing the taste of an apple it is also always via referencing commonly held cultural concepts to explain experiences between me and the other apple taster that we picked up in childhood and was sustained throughout or lives by ourselves and those around us. Can't be divorced from it. And I think a Taoist would point that out too. How do you know that your Apple (anatta) is not the same Apple as Nisgardatta's? Because you peg Nisgardatta at Thussness Stage 3? I presume Thussness teaches that Nisgardatta is Stage 3 and shows how Nisgardatta still had Wrong View and thus clinging going on? And all that's ever revolved back to when a beginner like me keeps asking to please CLARIFY the METHOD is: AKA: "I know that I know and there's nothing else to say about it except that it's because I've Realized Right View which can not be unseen once seen and therefore can detect (detection method used is never explained) when Right View is absent in someone else's writings". The above explanation tells me everything and yet tells me nothing all at the same time. It was for this very reason the Buddha advised to start practicing what he taught (Scientific Method as applied to one's mindstream and body) to see how deep the causes and conditioning go. I get that what once one has seen can not be unseen. That's not what I'm talking about. How do you know that Thusness (and Xabir) 'realized correctly the flawed understanding' of Nisgardatta mindstream's View? Even Thusness had to go off what Nisgardatta *wrote* (just as deluded me still has to go off of what you *write* - which starts accessing all that stuff in the brain that was learned as a tiny tot), not what the Nisgardatta mindstream may or may not have actually Realized. Maybe Nisgardatta just uber-sucked at explaining Anatta so that it seems like he's 'taking Nothing as a Source'? Maybe his actual Realization was way less clingy than his sucky ability at explaining? Or maybe Nisgardatta just explained things in a way that triggers your 'that's a Wrong View' realization since it's not in language you are used to in any shape, form or fashion but someone else may actually realize 'anatta' Rightly via Nisgardatta. Or maybe he had to describe things the way he did to Skillfully Teach the clingy students who were his disciples in a language they could understand so as to aid their realization of Anatta Rightly (which I take is Seth Ananda's take on Nisgardatta writings vs Thusness' take on Nisgardatta writings). Again...how would you separate Nisgardatta student A (realized Anatta Rightly via Nisgardatta teachings) vs. student B (did not realize Anatta Rightly via Nisgardatta teachings). You still have to rely on the written word - as you yourself claim you did. And which I submit is far more problematic than the assertion that it is not. Else why did the Buddha teach the need to cultivate?* The above quote is saying a similar thing to the Supreme Court's ruling on what's pornography. "I just know it when I see it." See...I would pose this question to Thusness himself but I'm not a Thusness student although maybe Thusness will swing by (maybe Xabir will invite him?) and explain it personally in this thread - especially since Thusness has a Taobums account. I'm left scratching my nose, twisting in the wind with such replies. I guess there's really nothing else left to say. Except it's pretty dang cool being so accurate in one's assessments. On a totally separate note: Why do we almost never see Buddhists at Taobums swapping their Inner Alchemy, Awareness or Metta practices so that they don't cling to the body nor the mindstream anymore either? Why at other Buddhist forums but NOT Here? * I get that what's right in your face is "just thus". That's what the 6th Zen Patriarch's sutra is about (though it's still important to practice and I've got a *very* long way to go - philosophical understanding does not replace or substitute for practice). BTW - a lot of Taoists are not as clever as they think in thinking Buddhists don't realize the 'just thusness' of the Tao every bit as much as Taoists do.

Can anyone list for me what the benefits of doing the Esoteric Lakshmi Mantra (1 set for 432 repetitions - ie. forward and backward on a mala) for every single day without fail for 10 years brings? 25 years? Does anyone know what Vows were made by Lakshmi and Ganesha in regards to other sentient beings?

Hmm... Well I got it from that book I referenced. And the author got it from his Guru. *shrug* I guess I erred in thinking this was common knowledge to all Indian spiritual traditions. ***** On a separate note I finally found out what So Ha is. It's the Chinese word/pronunciation for Swaha.

Thank you!