Seeker of Wisdom

Yeah, anatta really confuses people. It's difficult to understand because it completely opposes the average person's view of their identity, which the average person considers the blatantly obvious fact of things. So a person is a bunch of mental and physical processes, none of which is permanent or owns and controls the others. Instead of 'me thinking' just 'thoughts occur', instead of 'me doing' just 'actions'. Every bundle of these processes is a unique set, but to call any of it 'self' is to say that there is something permanent which owns and controls the rest, which is set apart from other things. There isn't, it's all impermanent things which influence each other. There isn't some central hub 'me' which is a changeless observer unaffected by what it observes. To say 'I am the observer' or 'the one choosing this' is like saying 'I am the itch above this body's left eyebrow' - these are all just processes. In a house, which brick is the true essence of the house? Can you have the house without the bricks? Are any of the bricks 'house'? Reincarnation in Vedic traditions is the same water being poured into a new cup. Rebirth in Buddhism is like an ember from a burnt out fire being used to start a new fire. That ember will soon become ash, so between the new fire and the old everything is new. But there is a causal continuity, you can see how the new fire is a continuation of the old. Even while alive - mental processes arise and vanish at an incredible rate, every cell changes. So how could I be the exact same 'me' as I was even five minutes ago?! What escapes rebirth? The question itself assumes a view of 'self', there isn't a self which escapes. Rather, the ember of the last fire isn't used to start a new one, and goes cool. What exactly does this mean, what is nirvana? Good question, but one even the Buddha was fairly vague about. You may find this helpful, there are some posts on anatta and other stuff, which you could compare to Taoism to understand the similarities and differences better.

I never said that any concept itself is the truth. What I'm saying is that practice results in the nonconceptual realisation that the concept was pointing towards (which other concepts may not point towards), which undermines both other concepts and that concept. I agree that realisation is always available, all it takes is a real honest look at experience. But a person cannot just skip the practice and realisation, going straight to the undermining. There is a big difference between using a koan to actually get satori, and telling yourself that all concepts are to be abandoned (which is itself another concept, thus a catch-22). N, the 'moment of despair' which got you to 'stop riding the raft' happened as a result of practice! Anyway, I'm just repeating myself now, so adios for now.

Skilful views shortcut themselves. You're trapped in a mind game you're playing with yourself,N. Do you not see how you yourself are setting up a dichotomy in which you are right and I am wrong? You're grasping onto the concept that all concepts are equally valid and to be dropped. This is what I mean by the 'drop the raft prematurely' approach not actually being able to shortcut itself. The underlying views are not truly released. You're throwing out the baby with the bathwater, before it's even got wet. If you want to truly drop all the views and graspings, you need to stay on the raft until it reaches the other side. This means taking skilful view/practice (the suttas refer to 'right view' and 'one fortunate attachment' for a reason) to the point where it undermines the unskilful, and then shortcuts itself. This shortcutting of views happens automatically once you've stayed on the raft until the end, not by a choice you've made - a choice based, ironically, on concepts you hold. Would you say that you are both a human and a chipmunk, and that both perspectives are valid from different angles? If not, why is an approach to views that is insane in every area except cultivation appropriate in cultivation? And if you would say with a straight face 'I am a chipmunk', this level of cognitive dissonance is extremely unhealthy and I hope you manage to break out of this trap you've locked yourself in.

Either there is a self of some kind or there isn't - one of these must be true, one must be false. At some point grasping to the concept must be dropped for the full realisation, but this doesn't mean both teachings are equally true. One accurately points to the realisation (but is not itself it), the other doesn't (and is not itself it). The only way to get around this dichotomy is to reinterpret what the word 'self' means to the point where it bears no relation to what anyone else means by it. As language is meant as a way to communicate, IMO this isn't worth doing. Strange that the Buddha explicitly taught it as the way to get awakened, then... how do you think people become awakened? If it's completely random, why bother with any of this anyway? I find it much more useful, empowering and pragmatic to take the common-sense perspective that cultivation actually has results, up to and including awakening, and put effort in. Skilful fabrication shortcuts itself.

Nikolai, I feel you're throwing the baby out with the bath water when it comes to the intellect. What if two things actually are dualistically opposed? There cannot be a self and simultaneously not be a self, any more than you could be a bankrupt millionaire. The following posts explain anatta and Buddha-nature: http://thedaobums.com/topic/35341-lessons-in-buddhism/page-2#entry573689, http://thedaobums.com/topic/35341-lessons-in-buddhism/page-2#entry578123 and http://thedaobums.com/topic/35341-lessons-in-buddhism/page-2#entry622578

As a dedicated practitioner of it, I think Buddhism has been damaged by an excess of ideals of perfect saintliness. The texts imply a rigid correlation between levels of awakening and incredibly saintly shifts in behaviour and emotion which, judging by people who actually do vipashyana and get the results (cough, Ingram, cough) doesn't apply. Some of what the texts say on this (e.g. arhats will die in a few days unless they ordain) is clearly nonsense, but how much of it is naive, how much is superstitious, and how much actually happens... I think we'll only really know from achieving these things ourselves. Unfortunately most people think you have to be a really saintly person to achieve even stream-entry, that this doesn't really happen anymore, and if you want jhanas say hello to fifty years on retreat. Virtue is one axis of development, samadhi is another, and the insight into the fundamental nature of experience which results in awakening is another. These axes are related, to a certain extent they support each other and rely on each other. This is part of the reason virtue is one of the three trainings. But it's naive to say an arhat will never ever be upset, or that they will die if they don't ordain very soon. As for Buddhas, *shrug*. Kenneth Folk makes good points on this here.

You may have to redefine your expectations of 'high level'. All axes of development are connected, but this is not so linear that an awakened person will automatically be a saintlike charismatic figure with perfect advice for any situation.

If you want to hear/read people's experiences and awakenings (an awesome experience isn't necessarily awakening, and can be misleading), three sources come to mind. *Buddha at the gas pump. *Liberation Unleashed - particularly their free eBook, 'Gateless Gatecrashers'. *Daniel Ingram, the Dharma Overground, and the hardcore/pragmatic dharma scene in general. Daniel Ingram's 'Mastering the core teachings of the Buddha' (free online PDF) is extremely illuminating, experiential, practice-oriented and a good read.

You can't choose to drop everything - you have to cultivate to know on a deep gnosis level that nothing is worth holding, so then dropping will occur by itself. This gnosis can be found through koan, self-inquiry, vipashyana, etc. Sounds to me like you accidentally used koan practice. Just my theoretical understanding...

A lot of what's being said about Therevada here applies to being a monk - which the OP doesn't seem to be intending anyway - and to the ossified cultural traditions and dogmas rather than the core theory and practice itself. In any tradition whatsoever, an intelligent practitioner will try to separate the actual essence from the nonsense that people, time and cultures have burdened it with. If you want to see this done in Theravada (to an extent Buddhism in general, but particularly Therevada), look to people like Daniel Ingram.

I'm trying to do vipashyana/noting continuously. It's difficult, I regularly get distracted by stuff, but it's damn good. From my perspective, mindfulness (objective present moment awareness) is itself so very useful for giving breathing room from the neurotic running commentary. But it's even better combined with other things to make different practices which refine the mind at a deeper level, and produce liberating insights. Combine with one-pointed focus on one thing, such as the breath, sitting still with no other activities, and you get shamatha. Combine with close looking at experience to see how it consists entirely of rapidly arising and passing processes which are not 'you' or 'yours', and you get vipashyana. And so on.

Buddhism explicitly disagrees with holding the view of a cosmic Self, just as much as an individual self. Maha-nidana sutta: But what about Buddha-nature? Well, this is also not a self. It is merely the principle that the mind has the capacity to become fully awakened. Maha-parinirvana sutra: Lankavatara sutra:

I suspect my taste in music is rather different from Lao Tzu's. .

Only one way to find out!

In walking, many mental processes are going on so that you see where you're going, intend to go there, move with balance, etc. This isn't a lot of mental activity by the standards of normal activities, but it is a lot of bustle compared to jhana. IMHO (just theory here, a novice myself) jhana and walking are incompatible. While standing could be possible, but not while moving. If you want to do walking meditation, vipashyana is a good idea. Observe the rapid (as in, literally fraction of a second) arising and passing of the mental and physical processes involved - impermanence. Observe their dukkha - dukkha. See how they are just phenomena, not a self or owned or controlled by a self - no-self.

A transgender person's brain didn't set the right 'I am this gender' setting while developing. So they may be physically male but see themselves as female, or vice versa. Their brain literally expects their body to be the other gender and is constantly saying, 'hey, that bit isn't right...' - imagine waking up the other gender, that's what it's like for them. It's neurological.

Spotless would probably be a good person to talk to about stuff like this. Welcome to TDB!

Therevada doesn't shun the body... rather, attachment to it. Anyway, I think you could draw on both of them. But you would have to choose one as your fundamental reference for what the path is about and how you proceed, and only use practices from the other that don't contradict. For example, taking the four noble truths and eightfold path as your base, using qigong as an extra method to help calm the mind, deal with emotional crud and maintain health, could work well. You can practice vipassana during qigong and recognise that the flow of qi is impermanent, dukkha and anatta. You could use The Attention Revolution by Alan Wallace (ignoring his crazy high standards), MCTB by Daniel Ingram and Daoist Nei Gong by Damo Mitchell as your practice guides for that.

According to Ingram, once you cross A&P then you will cycle between A&P and re-observation, until you practice your way up out of the dark night to the stage of equanimity. Once there if you stop practice because it's so nice there you'll slip back down into the dark night, but if you just keep practicing you'll reach awakening. I'm just repeating theory here - I haven't yet reached A&P myself, and I may be wrong about this being your situation anyway. But I do think that perhaps you're in the situation of dark night yogi - in that cycle, not knowing that past re-observation you can get up and out to equanimity and awakening, it's easy to be stuck in the dark night and see it as a phase of life, when really it's a phase in the development of insight. Before your first dip into the dark night, do you remember anything that could be considered A&P? Energy phenomena, experiencing things as rapidly flickering, unitive experiences, hypersexuality, heightened philosophizing, general awesomeness, weird shaking, really lovely practice? Because it's the experience of so many people that A&P->dark night like sunrise->day. Also, are there stages you're moving between in your dark night, times when it's more fear based, then more misery, then more 'oh I'm sick of existence', then more 'how do I escape everything?', or something similar? If that sounds relevant to your situation, I'd advise asking people on the Dharma Overground how to proceed, because those guys have actually done this stuff and I haven't yet, they could help you see much more precisely what's going on and what to do about it. Actually I hope my conjecture here is right, because it means the solution for you is so simple and you aren't too far from a real payoff. Vipassana, just going at it any way that helps you objectify phenomena ('shitty feeling arising', rather than 'I feel so shit') until you strike up past re-observation into equanimity, saying to yourself 'well, this is great, but mustn't stop here', carrying on practice with an emphasis on subtle background stuff like time, space, the sense of a watcher, etc, until... 'pop'. In any case, best of luck.

If I were Daniel Ingram, I might say you're shifting between something nice like equanimity or arising & passing, and the dark night. Now I'm not that far myself and I don't know anything about the route your path has gone through, so I hesitate to state anything about what's going on for you. But that's a possibility for you to consider...

Anything that rocks are naturally adept at isn't a sign of enlightenment in my opinion. Equanimity doesn't mean neutrality...

No worries man, I knew that's what you meant.

Interview extract from here. I haven't read, watched or attended Adyashanti, so I won't comment on how awakened he is our isn't. But based on ^^^ it seems like his method is fairly standard sudden-path zazen + inquiry. So long as he isn't making the drop the raft prematurely mistake, which seems not to be the case from the OP saying... ...I see no real issue.

I've seen horse stance mentioned as a powerful exercise; so I'd like to hear more, and will be trying it for a while. I tried it for the first time today, and now have a warmth in my lower spine, perhaps kundalini stirring a tad - though that could be from my other practices. What exactly does horse stance do, and any other comments on it?

There's no such thing as chemtrails. Spraying chemicals from high altitude would be much less efficient than just spraying from factories (spray from 36000ft and it will just disperse to nothing over hundreds of miles) and take much more covering up (how many people would have to be bribed to hide chemicals being put on passenger aircraft on a mass scale?). What does exist is contrails, which are simply water vapour. An open minded person looks at arguments for chemtrails, then at arguments against chemtrails, before reaching their opinion. Few conspiracy theorists seems to be this open minded - they just look at evidence for the theory, then they assume that any opposing arguments are lies for the sheeple. Now, as for the Hopi prophecy. Perhaps it could refer to contrails. But they hardly make the entire planet's atmosphere seem cobwebbed, do they? And jet planes have existed for decades, which stretches the meaning of 'near' just a bit. Tl;dr: what soaring crane said.