Do we require guidance to reach enlightenment?

[Pero]

It has become practically meaningless to use word "enlightenment" in public discussions since everyone seems to have their own idea of it and yet at the same they/you all think enlightenment means the same thing to everyone. Ridiculous. In any case, to achieve Buddhahood (which is what enlightenment means to me and every Mahayana Buddhist) you certainly need guidance.

[Aaron]

It has become practically meaningless to use word "enlightenment" in public discussions since everyone seems to have their own idea of it and yet at the same they/you all think enlightenment means the same thing to everyone. Ridiculous. In any case, to achieve Buddhahood (which is what enlightenment means to me and every Mahayana Buddhist) you certainly need guidance.

 

Yes... I think that's perhaps why I have doubts about it. If one cannot achieve it without guidance, then is it actually something that can be achieved naturally? In my opinion true enlightenment is not something that requires teaching or guidance, but it merely requires one to awaken to the true nature of reality. That is done simply by sitting and stilling the mind. Where is the teaching in that?

 

Here I can teach you! Go to your room, sit comfortably and stop thinking so much! What do you mean you can't stop thinking? Something must be wrong with you! This is a very simple thing to accomplish. Mojo Bob did it in twenty minutes! Yes, you definitely need help. Well we will have to smack you with the big stick now, but this is for your own good. Don't give me that look. Now you quit squirming and get back over here! You want to be enlightened after all! Do you expect to be enlightened without guidance?

 

Aaron

[Aaron]

Thanks Aaron!

I don't think I can do reality checks for anyone really. I can only tell them the way I see it.

 

Well then, make sure when their reality contradicts your own, that you ask them to check their reality.

 

Aaron

[Birch]

Well then, make sure when their reality contradicts your own, that you ask them to check their reality.

 

Aaron

Now why would i do that???

If it really is their reality. Why would i go over there and tell them to check it?

I guess if i didn't like it i might. But who cares what i like and what i don't? Not the things i like, anyway:-)

[Aaron]

Now why would i do that???

If it really is their reality. Why would i go over there and tell them to check it?

I guess if i didn't like it i might. But who cares what i like and what i don't? Not the things i like, anyway:-)

 

Well that is a good way to view it. More people should care less.

 

Aaron

[Birch]

Hell, not to say I don't care about people. Of course if someone is having difficulties with their reality then I'll do my best to help.

[Aaron]

Hell, not to say I don't care about people. Of course if someone is having difficulties with their reality then I'll do my best to help.

 

Trust me, more people should care less. If people cared less, then there wouldn't be as many problems in the world. You care less and that's a good thing.

 

Aaron

[Pero]

Yes... I think that's perhaps why I have doubts about it. If one cannot achieve it without guidance, then is it actually something that can be achieved naturally? In my opinion true enlightenment is not something that requires teaching or guidance, but it merely requires one to awaken to the true nature of reality. That is done simply by sitting and stilling the mind. Where is the teaching in that?

 

Told you the word "enlightenment" is meaningless, so whatever you say about how to achieve it will be meaningless as well. But anyway, achieving Buddhahood is not natural and as far as I know, by just stilling the mind one will not achieve it. Although I just remembered there is a Buddhabum subforum now and we're not it, so perhaps I shouldn't have revealed my Buddhism colored thoughts haha. Sorry.

[xabir2005]

Thank you for your response. No hurry, feel free to wait for a keyboard. Very impressive on a phone.

 

I would be happy to share (or answer any questions). I believe we are in agreement on our definitions. Your definition of insight=my understanding. Your realization = my knowing. For me, to "know" is permanent realization. I just seem to have an in between stage where I "feel" it. "Feeling" includes some level of "experience".

 

Also, if it would be easier, feel free to email.

 

Thanks.

Haha the reason why I had to use phone is because I'm stuck in my camp now and my phone is my only source of internet on weekdays (I only get to go home on weekends), and I have one more year to go. All Singaporean males must serve a mandatory two year military service.

 

Personally I use the term insight and realization interchangeably, insight not being of inferred or conceptual understanding but a direct realization of something.

 

Yes, there is a difference between feeling/experience, and a permanent realization. Be it I AM, non dual, anatta, etc. Usually one has glimpses of experience or feeling, then through one's contemplation, a permanent realization arises. Realization will inevitably result in certain forms of experience that corresponds to that particular insight, whereas experience alone does not necessarily entail a realization. Hence realization is more important and has vaster implications and transformation in life, as it is a permanent quantum shift of perception in view, not just as a passing state.

 

Regarding timelessness: timelessness is experienced even at stage one, but the timelessness of stage one is experienced when abiding as the self, the background source. It is seen that there is a timelesss unchanging source beyond all transient phenomena.

 

In stage five however, timelessness is experienced in and as all transient phenomena. Without a self that links, each phenomena is complete, whole, and disjoint as it is. Means if I walk from A to Z, there is no self at the center that links the process, that actually walked from A to Z. Rather, A is simply A, complete and whole as it is, B is B, C is C, Z is Z. If each transient manifestation is experienced as complete and whole as it is, without establishing an unchanging self in which movement in relation to that unchanging self could be established, transience is experienced as without movement, without coming from or going to.

 

Even after nondual there could still initially be a sense of "an eternal now" as if all there is is Here/Now, but even this is an illusion and this is seen clearly for me only at the beginning this year. There is no self, and there is no Here/Now either. There are simply manifestation that dependently originates, that is disjoint, whole and complete as it is.

 

Seeing through all these notions of self, here or now etc, there is nothing at all to cling to. Everything self-manifests according to dependent origination, and self-releases upon inception. This is a deeper freedom and liberation than the previous phases of insights and experience.

 

Here is something relevant from thusness in another forum:

 

http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/107490;jsessionid=7240B143BE5063F91914E49C921E255A

 

Author: ByPasser

 

I think realization and development will eventually reach the same destination.

 

A practitioner that experience the “Self” will initially treat

1.The “Source as the Light of Everything”.

then

2. He/she will eventually move to the experience that the “Light is really the Everything”.

 

In the first case, the Light will appear to be still and the transience appears to be moving. Collapsing of space and time will only be experienced when one resides in Self. However if the mind continues to see the 'Light' as separated from the 'Everything' , then realization will appear to be apart from development.

 

In the second case when we experience the “Light is really the Everything”, then Everything will be experienced as manifesting yet not moving. This is the experience of wholeness and completeness in an instantaneous moment or Eternity in a moment. When this experience becomes clear in practice, then witness is seen as the transience. Space and time will also collapse when we experience the completeness and wholeness of transience. An instantaneous moment of manifestation that is complete and whole in its own also does not involve movement and change (No changing thing, only change). Practicing being 'bare' in attention yet at the same time noticing the 3 characteristics will eventually bring us to this point.

 

However what has a yogi overcome when moving from case 1 to 2 and what exactly is the cause of separation in the first place? I think realizing this cause is of utmost importance for solving the paradox of realization and development.

Edited September 14, 2011 by xabir2005

[xabir2005]

Xabir2005,

 

Thank you for your posts and the description of the Thusness stages. The information was new to me. Some of my experiences have been similar and If you don't mind, I have some questions...

 

In the Thusness descriptions, level 5 is the full shift to non-dual perspective. Have you experienced it? At this point, in your understanding, is there only the present moment (no sense of time)?

yes as explained. Yes I do speak from direct realization of it.

Also, did you experience level 2 and level 3 to actually be two different states. Or, is it really just two sides of the same coin? I am "everything" or I am "nothing" seem to be more about the perspective that you are viewing from.

stage 3 is an absorption into nothingness where even sense perception is shut. Actually this is the only stage I haven't experienced mainly because I don't have that much time to practice samadhi. So I can only speak from what thusness said. But stage 3 and 2 is definitely not the same (I have direct experience and insight into stage 2 before), being that stage 2 is the experience of impersonality, where the construct of personality is removed so it appears that everything shares the same source, all animate and inanimate things come from this source of source, some universal essence or god which we see to be our more fundamental underlying essence. In this phase we experience ourselves as a divine expression of one life as if we are being lived by a higher power, there is no personal controller or doership.

[xabir2005]

 

Do you perceive level 6 & 7 as ongoing levels or observations of perceived non-duality?

actually I prefer to call stage four the insight into non duality, being the nonduality of subject and object, while stage five is more about the emptiness of self, and stage six is the dependent origination and emptiness of objects

 

From stage four onwards, nondual experience becomes your predominant mode of perception and gets effortless especially after stage five.

 

But the bond of inherency (seeing an inherent self, awareness or objects) does not go just by an insight into nondual. The bond of duality and the bond of inherency are therefore distinct, tho the former can be said to be a subset of the latter.

Do you still experience Anger? Did it drop at a perceived level?

hardly. As I said some months back:

 

"after the initial realisation, while i cannot at this point claim complete enlightenment (of which there are many subtle levels where layers of emotional and knowledge obscurations are progressively removed), i can report a gradual transformation such that situations that once called for fear, nervousness, irritation, anger, etc now only manifest as some bodily sensations that self liberates upon inception. for example if a loud explosion is heard there can be a surge of adrenaline just for a moment but no psychological fear surfaces."

 

I'm curious as to what your insights or experiences have been.

Edited September 14, 2011 by xabir2005

[xabir2005]

Told you the word "enlightenment" is meaningless, so whatever you say about how to achieve it will be meaningless as well. But anyway, achieving Buddhahood is not natural and as far as I know, by just stilling the mind one will not achieve it. Although I just remembered there is a Buddhabum subforum now and we're not it, so perhaps I shouldn't have revealed my Buddhism colored thoughts haha. Sorry.

Indeed. Stillness can just be stagnant and a person can practice stillness all his life but not realize anything.

 

For there to be realization one has to engage some form of contemplative investigation or insight practice.

[xabir2005]

I still havnt seen anyone enlightened on here with enough practical knowledge to understand and apply this.

 

We have seen people who claimed things then did other things that were not in line with their understanding.

 

Non-Dual understanding should not be misunderstood for experience and non-experience when learning. If someone is fully non-dual one is englightened and relies upon instant knowing, instant feeling, instant... No one here has that so conversation is digressed to the mundane.

actually, simple jack clearly has some pretty deep insights/realization and imo might be close to fully penetrating the seven stages, and among others who clearly realize nondual: thuscomeone, lucky7strikes, etc, there might be more.

 

Not that I'm saying they are fully enlightened buddhas or whatever, but in terms of nondual realization they are clearly there.

Edited September 14, 2011 by xabir2005

[Aaron]

Indeed. Stillness can just be stagnant and a person can practice stillness all his life but not realize anything.

 

For there to be realization one has to engage some form of contemplative investigation or insight practice.

 

This is how I know you don't know what you're talking about. This comment would not come from someone who has experienced stillness. Stick to topics you've read up on, or your ignorance on others will show.

 

Also keep in mind that all Buddhist experiences are described in the same language, in fact you've been programmed by your teachings to experience what you experience. You don't experience the actual phenomena of awareness, but go through an intellectual process of learning about awareness and then mistake that for the actual experience. This isn't meant to insult you, but I know now that you are still a young man and that you still see this very much as an intellectual experience, which it absolutely is not. This is why I am adamant that it is a constructed experience, rather than a natural experience that can be achieved by all people without instruction.

 

Aaron

Edited September 14, 2011 by Twinner

[Birch]

Well I don't know if Xabir has or has not experienced what he's talking about but i do agree on the conditioned mind trap.

I guess it just feels safer (to me) to have a container. But it would be wrong of me to attempt to push my container onto anyone else, especially where liberation is concerned.

But you can IMO/IME give people vehicles to drive. But until they get that they're doing the driving...

 

Sorry, blah de blah:-)

[xabir2005]

This is how I know you don't know what you're talking about. This comment would not come from someone who has experienced stillness. Stick to topics you've read up on, or your ignorance on others will show.

 

Also keep in mind that all Buddhist experiences are described in the same language, in fact you've been programmed by your teachings to experience what you experience. You don't experience the actual phenomena of awareness, but go through an intellectual process of learning about awareness and then mistake that for the actual experience. This isn't meant to insult you, but I know now that you are still a young man and that you still see this very much as an intellectual experience, which it absolutely is not. This is why I am adamant that it is a constructed experience, rather than a natural experience that can be achieved by all people without instruction.

 

Aaron

calmness is one of the requisites for insight, but not the only condition. That is why shamatha alone doesn't lead to realisation.

 

My insights and realizations are not derived from intellectual understandings or inference. I had such understandings for years, until it is directly realized in experience, which is a whole different thing.

 

I can talk about anatta many years back, but realizing it is a whole different thing, for example. Now I no longer have a sense of an inner observer, everything reveals itself self-felt as self-luminosity, without the view and sense of an observer and observed dichotomy, or an agent behind the processes. In seeing just the seen, in hearing just the heard, so everything is experienced intimately at 0 distance. So it is in fact the most experiential thing in the world - can't get any more experiential or direct.

 

My insights are not constructed, but discovered in a very experiential way through contemplative investigation, all of which are detailed out in my ebook. Why don't you actually go and download and read my journal entries - the first one marked on 10th feb 10 being my first realization into the I AM... And on and on, journal entries about my discoveries and experiences, none which are derived intellectually. Afterall its a journal about my experience (experiential insights), not a notebook for some philosophical thoughts.

 

One of the interesting thing this insight reveals is that the way we view ourself, in terms of subject-object dichotomy, in terms of inherent self and world, is what is being learnt and constructed. It isn't real. It is just a view, a worldview, a belief we cling tightly due to lack of investigation, like a hypnotic and magical spell that affects the way we view and cling to ourselves and things. And it is this magical spell that prevents us from seeing and directly experiencing what awareness actually is. When this spell is lifted, we see the world in a much more wondrous and liberating way. There are many levels of veils - the veil of conceptual thoughts when lifted reveals the self-luminous presence as pure thoughtless beingness (aka I AM), the veil of seperate self when removed reveals nondual luminosity, and so on...

 

Age doesn't matter - there are people who got enlightened at 7 (a few such cases are recorded in scriptures), doesn't make sense to say it can't happen at my age.

 

Ramana maharshi had an awakening at 16, this dude got it at 20: http://the-wanderling.com/cyber-sangha.html , zen master seung sahn got it at 21: http://www.buddhimudra.com/wisdom/zen/51-the-story-of-zen-master-seung-sahn

 

Last check, thuscomeone, lucky7strikes are 20, simple jack is 22. All of them had direct experiential realizations.

 

Thusness had his first awakening at 17.

 

My initial awakening was on 09 feb 10 when I was 19, after almost two years of engaging in the contemplative investigation of self-inquiry (ala ramana maharshi style)

 

Now to be honest, thusness never guided me in my self inquiry (my approach is different - I would at least give more detailed pointers, advice or instructions to those interested in self inquiring, as what was shown in my ebook, base on my past experience with self inquiry). Thusness (who himself had his initial awakening through selfinquiry) was adamant it can't be guided - but he assured me that there is actually no "wrong way" to self inquire as long as I am actually honest and seriously self inquiring (and not doing something else like intellectualizing) and rejecting whatever experiences and answers I had until the direct realization occurred. Other than that he never guided me.

 

So I believe, as ramana maharshi, eckhart tolle etc have shown, self inquiry can lead to self realization without being guided.

 

But if I had not had the strong incalcation of right view from the beginning, I would have been satisfied and not investigated further. It is right view that spurred me further to deeper realizations rather quickly - and that is why right view is important and often right guidance. Not that right view alone is all it takes, as a direct experiential form of contemplation is necessary for realization to occur.

 

Simple jack didn't have a teacher, but at least because he had been exposed to many good buddhist teachings, I believe it had helped. Thusness didn't have a personal teacher too. But he said he was indebted to buddha as without the buddha's teachings on fundamental things like anatta and dependent origination, he too would not have gone so far and would have been stuck at the earlier phases of insight.

Edited September 14, 2011 by xabir2005

[Simple_Jack]

This was posted in another thread and I felt that it didn't really go along with that thread's purpose, so I chose to create a new thread for those who might wish to discuss this topic.

 

Recently I have had a few experiences that have shaken my understanding of the world, the "void", heartmind, and enlightenment. For that matter it has shaken my understanding of compassion and other things as well, however this thread isn't so much about that, but rather I use this as an example of how it might be useful to shake off old beliefs to gain a greater awareness of what is and isn't.

 

The common consensus of most people is that in order to gain an awareness of the "truth" one must be taught or guided. (Please keep in mind that I use the word truth only so that we can understand the premise of my comments within a certain context.) I do not agree with this entirely, but in all honesty I cannot discount that certain ideas led me to a greater experience, but I also must say with honesty that only after I gave up those beliefs was I able to achieve an even greater degree of awareness, one that called into question and discounted many of the "truths" I held.

 

From my experience what I can say without doubt is that every man and woman, regardless of who they are or where they come from, has the ability to achieve this awareness, that it requires no guidance, but in some instances may require prompting, simply because many of us are led to believe that something other than, or more, doesn't exist, and rather what is true and real is what we've been taught to believe is true and real.

 

I also have come to understand that religions, regardless of the religion, are intricately linked to morality and in most cases a selfish desire for enlightenment in order to gain something that one believes will grant them some escape from death or suffering in this life. I can say from my own experience that neither of these is true in the context that people wish to believe it to be, but rather there is more to it than simply that. Part of my greater understanding stems from understanding the true nature of me as I've been taught to view me, and also what I was before I was born and still am. When one sees who they were from the beginning then the desire to continue to be the person they are fades away, because they understand the transient nature of this being they have become.

 

Anyone who sets forth and simply meditates, not on themselves, or truth, but simply sits and stills the mind will come to this revelation. I have no doubts of this. The problem is that we are tricked into believing that things require purpose, when in fact, in this case, purpose is the greatest hindrance. One can only achieve a greater degree of awareness when they understand that there is no purpose for it, that this state is already within them and exists, they only need to be made aware of it.

 

With that said, I know of nothing else to say, so I will leave it at that. I hope that this discussion will bear fruit. Be kind to others or bare your fangs, it doesn't matter, nor will it change what is, so please feel free to discuss this as you choose to.

 

Aaron

 

P.S. I will only say I'm enlightened if you say I'm not. <insert smiley face>

 

"Recently I have had a few experiences that have shaken my understanding of the world, the "void", heartmind, and enlightenment. For that matter it has shaken my understanding of compassion and other things as well, however this thread isn't so much about that, but rather I use this as an example of how it might be useful to shake off old beliefs to gain a greater awareness of what is and isn't."

 

What about those individuals who have proven the teachings for themselves, through direct experience? Is it brainwashing? Psychosis?

 

"The common consensus of most people is that in order to gain an awareness of the "truth" one must be taught or guided. (Please keep in mind that I use the word truth only so that we can understand the premise of my comments within a certain context.) I do not agree with this entirely, but in all honesty I cannot discount that certain ideas led me to a greater experience, but I also must say with honesty that only after I gave up those beliefs was I able to achieve an even greater degree of awareness, one that called into question and discounted many of the "truths" I held."

 

What if someone were to progress , through realization of a particular set of teachings, to a point where they start to realize that people are fundamentally not seperated from trancendent wisdom awareness and the innate freedom from afflictions and mental suffering experienced in one's life? That because they attach to "false thoughts" that they perpetuate thier experience of mental suffering/afflictive states and continue to create bad karma by continually following habitual tendencies that are deepely ingrained in the consciousness of an individual.

 

"From my experience what I can say without doubt is that every man and woman, regardless of who they are or where they come from, has the ability to achieve this awareness, that it requires no guidance, but in some instances may require prompting, simply because many of us are led to believe that something other than, or more, doesn't exist, and rather what is true and real is what we've been taught to believe is true and real."

 

I agree that we all have the innate potential to realize self-nature, but there is so much obscurations and karmic habit energy and clinging that the possibility of going astray or getting attached to a mental realm or phenomenal appearence; most poeple don't have enough inborn wisdom to guide themselves out.

 

What I meant was getting guidence from someone who is more experienced in meditation. As for the other thing I was talking about there are many texts from different traditions on how to apply different meditations in order to reach "higher" meditative states i.e.: Learning from the worlds different texts on how to apply whatever meditation technique, the transformations in mind/body that start to happen as someone apply's meditation, the meditative absorptions that one can reach through applied meditation, and the succesive steps one can take to proceed further towards realization.

 

Though I have to ask: What's wrong with studying the world's traditions? Even Shakyamuni Buddha went all over India, studying under different teachers; though he eventually found out that they didn't lead to what he was seeking and eventually left those teachers.

Edited September 14, 2011 by Simple_Jack

[Informer]

I agree Twinner. Over-intellectualization is a great hinderance. By not accepting what others have told you about the phenomena you can then find your own words to describe it. Otherwise you are simply regurgitating what you have been told or read. Then these will become the truth of the matter, even if it isn't the total truth, it will seem like it because it is like what was explained.

 

Really no explanation will suffice, and no explanation is really what it is. As it is before the explanation.

[Aaron]

calmness is one of the requisites for insight, but not the only condition. That is why shamatha alone doesn't lead to realisation.

 

My insights and realizations are not derived from intellectual understandings or inference. I had such understandings for years, until it is directly realized in experience, which is a whole different thing.

 

I can talk about anatta many years back, but realizing it is a whole different thing, for example. Now I no longer have a sense of an inner observer, everything reveals itself self-felt as self-luminosity, without the view and sense of an observer and observed dichotomy, or an agent behind the processes. In seeing just the seen, in hearing just the heard, so everything is experienced intimately at 0 distance. So it is in fact the most experiential thing in the world - can't get any more experiential or direct.

 

My insights are not constructed, but discovered in a very experiential way through contemplative investigation, all of which are detailed out in my ebook. Why don't you actually go and download and read my journal entries - the first one marked on 10th feb 10 being my first realization into the I AM... And on and on, journal entries about my discoveries and experiences, none which are derived intellectually. Afterall its a journal about my experience (experiential insights), not a notebook for some philosophical thoughts.

 

One of the interesting thing this insight reveals is that the way we view ourself, in terms of subject-object dichotomy, in terms of inherent self and world, is what is being learnt and constructed. It isn't real. It is just a view, a worldview, a belief we cling tightly due to lack of investigation, like a hypnotic and magical spell that affects the way we view and cling to ourselves and things. And it is this magical spell that prevents us from seeing and directly experiencing what awareness actually is. When this spell is lifted, we see the world in a much more wondrous and liberating way. There are many levels of spell - the veil of conceptual thoughts when lifted reveals the self-luminous presence as pure thoughtless beingness (aka I AM), the veil of seperate self when removed reveals nondual luminosity, and so on...

 

Age doesn't matter - there are people who got enlightened at 7 (a few such cases are recorded in scriptures), doesn't make sense to say it can't happen at my age.

 

Ramana maharshi had an awakening at 16, this dude got it at 20: http://the-wanderling.com/cyber-sangha.html , zen master seung sahn got it at 21: http://www.buddhimudra.com/wisdom/zen/51-the-story-of-zen-master-seung-sahn

 

Last check, thuscomeone, lucky7strikes are 20, simple jack is 22. All of them had direct experiential realizations.

 

Thusness had his first awakening at 17.

 

My initial awakening was on 09 feb 10 when I was 19, after almost two years of engaging in the contemplative investigation of self-inquiry (ala ramana maharshi style)

 

Hello Xabir,

 

I am sticking to the topic of stillness, which has nothing to do with "I am", but rather "I am not". When you can explain to me what stillness is, then I can accept that you have experienced it, but so far you are off the mark.

 

Aaron

[Informer]

I suggest we might need "unguidance" but since it's just something we've decided to do, doesn't matter really.

So, given you're enlightened, what would you say to me who doesn't want to be enlightened but doesn't quite know why exactly but does know it doesn't matter if i am or i'm not (enlightened).

With my thanks for the insight (given you're plugged in:-))

 

 

I'd say that is a good start, because I don't think that "You" as an individual being can ever be enlightened.

[Aaron]

"Recently I have had a few experiences that have shaken my understanding of the world, the "void", heartmind, and enlightenment. For that matter it has shaken my understanding of compassion and other things as well, however this thread isn't so much about that, but rather I use this as an example of how it might be useful to shake off old beliefs to gain a greater awareness of what is and isn't."

 

What about those individuals who have proven the teachings for themselves, through direct experience? Is it brainwashing? Psychosis?

 

"The common consensus of most people is that in order to gain an awareness of the "truth" one must be taught or guided. (Please keep in mind that I use the word truth only so that we can understand the premise of my comments within a certain context.) I do not agree with this entirely, but in all honesty I cannot discount that certain ideas led me to a greater experience, but I also must say with honesty that only after I gave up those beliefs was I able to achieve an even greater degree of awareness, one that called into question and discounted many of the "truths" I held.

 

What if someone were to progress , through realization of a particular set of teachings, to a point where they start to realize that people are fundamentally not seperated from trancendent wisdom awareness and the innate freedom from afflictions and mental suffering experienced in one's life?

 

From my experience what I can say without doubt is that every man and woman, regardless of who they are or where they come from, has the ability to achieve this awareness, that it requires no guidance, but in some instances may require prompting, simply because many of us are led to believe that something other than, or more, doesn't exist, and rather what is true and real is what we've been taught to believe is true and real."

 

I agree that we all have the innate potential to realize self-nature, but there is so much obscurations and karmic habit energy and clinging that the possibility of going astray or getting attached to a mental realm or phenomenal appearence; most poeple don't have enough inborn wisdom to guide themselves out.

 

What I meant was getting guidence from someone who is more experienced in meditation. As for the other thing I was talking about there are many texts from different traditions on how to apply different meditations in order to reach "higher" meditative states i.e.: Learning from the worlds different texts on how to apply whatever meditation technique, the transformations in mind/body that start to happen as someone apply's meditation, the meditative absorptions that one can reach through applied meditation, and the succesive steps one can take to proceed further towards realization.

 

Though I have to ask: What's wrong with studying the world's traditions? Even Shakyamuni Buddha went all over India, studying under different teachers; though he eventually found out that they didn't lead to what he was seeking and eventually left those teachers.

 

Hello Jack,

 

I do not think there is anything wrong or right with following a tradition, just as there is nothing wrong or right with giving up those traditions, rather my point is that they are not needed in order to attain insight and awareness. If one seeks within they will find it, if they practice the three virtues of clarity of mind, dedication, and meditation. Dedication should not be confused with attachment, but rather a knowledge of there being something more and the practice of acquiring awareness.

 

So again, I will not say Buddhism is bad, or any other religion, because bad and good do not exist, but rather that one should not follow something blindly, nor view the destination as being reached by only one path, but rather we should remember that if the destination is really there, then no matter how we get there, we will know when we arrive.

 

Aaron

[Simple_Jack]

[Aaron]

[Simple_Jack]

Hello Jack,

 

I do not think there is anything wrong or right with following a tradition, just as there is nothing wrong or right with giving up those traditions, rather my point is that they are not needed in order to attain insight and awareness. If one seeks within they will find it, if they practice the three virtues of clarity of mind, dedication, and meditation. Dedication should not be confused with attachment, but rather a knowledge of there being something more and the practice of acquiring awareness.

 

So again, I will not say Buddhism is bad, or any other religion, because bad and good do not exist, but rather that one should not follow something blindly, nor view the destination as being reached by only one path, but rather we should remember that if the destination is really there, then no matter how we get there, we will know when we arrive.

 

Aaron

"I do not think there is anything wrong or right with following a tradition, just as there is nothing wrong or right with giving up those traditions, rather my point is that they are not needed in order to attain insight and awareness. If one seeks within they will find it, if they practice the three virtues of clarity of mind, dedication, and meditation. Dedication should not be confused with attachment, but rather a knowledge of there being something more and the practice of acquiring awareness.

 

Then how come you aren't applyng the teachings yourself in order to really see if they are bullshit or not, instead of totally dismissing them?

 

"So again, I will not say Buddhism is bad, or any other religion, because bad and good do not exist, but rather that one should not follow something blindly, nor view the destination as being reached by only one path, but rather we should remember that if the destination is really there, then no matter how we get there, we will know when we arrive."

 

Then why are you always going around accusing everyone who has proven the teachings for themselves that they are brainwashed? Why go around telling people on this board that being "free" from one's afflictive states, attachments, and obscurations is not possible and cannot be attained?

 

This is why in that spat between us in that one thread I said to get rid of all your current held beliefs, to drop them, and to really dedicate with mind and body to find out if these things that the different religions around the world are talking about are true. To really go beyond your current outlook based on conceptual constructs and rendered beliefs based on emotional opinions; to really go beyond and prove this stuff for yourself. To get as far as you can in this lifetime in determining once and for all the question of life and death.

Edited September 14, 2011 by Simple_Jack

[Jeff]

 

I'm curious as to what your insights or experiences have been.

 

Xabir2005,

 

Thank you for your detailed description. Your words to describe it are different, but very consistent and resonate with what others who have had non-dual realization have told me. As an example, your explanation of the difference between level 5 and 7, others have described as the difference between "oneness" and "wholeness". The trick is translating perspective.

 

It is difficult to describe a direct correlation to the steps. Unlike most here, I did not start out on "conscious" path, so there was no "defined beginning". Everything is always just "normal", even when things happen. I am just a guy, who was just trying to be a good father & husband, when my head started vibrating. My "path" has been sort of just "feel the flow" and go with/surrender to it. All the problems start, when I try to "improve" what is happening. More insight comes to me from reading the "Dhammapada" or "Tao Te Ching" then just energy practices.

 

My feeling anger question was relevant (sorry, I missed your earlier post, only been a member for two weeks), because I have found that when Buddha said "drop anger & desires", they really do go away. Gone (as in does not compute ). Energy experience vary (and may be mind games), but experiencing steps of peace, joy, loss of anger & desire directly impact your existence (and give you the energy stuff for free ).

 

To me, level 2 and 3 are the same thing. Your description of level 3 is just an "experience" to help with the understanding. I have found that everything and nothing are just two sides of the same coin. From my discussion with others, it seems to be that either can come first as a perspective, dependent on your perceived point of view. I have experienced "oneness" in life for a few minutes a couple times, but it is not stable and I am not sure that it the same as others describe. Hard to define and agree on what is "oneness"...

 

In general, I don't worry about it at all. No "desire" for enlightenment. More an intellectual curiosity where the flow is drifting...

 

Overall, it is quiet and pretty much just smiles... Still stuff to clean out, but the peace & joy grow. Lost anger somewhere along the way and probably would not have noticed other than it drives my wife crazy...

 

If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask. Also, if you experience energy/chakras, I would be interested in asking a few followup questions relative to the stages.