dawg Posted January 29, 2015 CLASSIC!! Someone believes eh attained enlightenment and has to go talk in a forum all about it and then gets slightly agitated when someone gives him a little shit. Even better: people actually believing him and asking him questions like he is some God. Hilarious taichistudent, yawn ! dawg 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
taichistudent Posted January 29, 2015 taichistudent, yawn ! dawg Exactly my point. Still engaged in reaction Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted January 29, 2015 (edited) two vechiles. 1. Disciple(arhant), Paccekabuddha 2.Bodhisatva Bodhisatva path is different to disciple way and leads to Buddhahood. Arhant is not Buddhahood. Edited January 29, 2015 by allinone Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted January 29, 2015 (edited) There is voice with tongue and voice without tongue and there is duality(center with both(eyes for an example)). In front of the head its mouth, forehead and eyes. when you realise your voice it will open up other centers, one of them is in hands and there you change your body and with this your overall state will change and you start all over again, there is many centers wher eyou go through first to reach areas where you know where you are, but there is areas in legs where we experience confusion and all bad states of mind.. just gave an example that there are many more things to purify what contribute to the overall thing, they are all tied, you will walk from one place to other(witout going outside the body or into a spiritual world). Body itself will be purified and changed little by little. "voice"- its you. Edited January 29, 2015 by allinone Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted January 29, 2015 (edited) i have read that bodhisatvas are waking up arhants from their very long sleeps. For now here are plenty of bodhisatvas. Even ordinary beings are going through meantal states and fruits, but they don't see them. All living things have buddhanature.. Edited January 29, 2015 by allinone Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dawg Posted January 29, 2015 Exactly my point. Still engaged in reaction taichistudent, yawn ! dawg Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted January 30, 2015 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… Master Dawg, I have to give respect for your steadfast striving and accomplishment. There are others in this thread who blatently disrespect a being who claims attainment (which the Supremely Enlightened One has described as a "peaceful abode/liberation". It is tradition in india not to address a person such as you or Dominicus, simply by their name. (That is why even Brahmins or other ascetics or lay people addressed (even before they accepted him as Buddha) Gotama as Venerable or Teacher or Ascetic or Master etc, never simply as Gotama). So, to those who disrespect, i say this : Just as how you would pick out a stone from choice fragrant freshly cooked rice, throw it away, and eat the rest of the delightful rice, take the parts of Master Dawg's words which are condusive to your well-being and growth. Throw away the parts that you consider to be un-consumable. I have gained much from this thread and this forum. So, i want to give back what i have understood so far. I wish Venerable Dominicus would post in this thread or elsewhere about his own experiences, in the simple and lucid way that you have written them in your original post . 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… The Supremely Enlightened One has spoken of the 4 higher liberations (#4 - 7) as the peaceful abodes. These are also referred elsewhere in Suttas as higher awakenings. So, we understand that there are levels of awakenings/liberations, as Venerable Dominicus has pointed out in prior post. I am so glad that you have reached an awakening and live in a peaceful abode. I made the request to gain more insight into the lower abodes (like #1-3) which is relevant to my current practice. Our Tathagatha has discussed these liberations/abodes/awakenings in many Suttas, and hence i needed clarity from someone with direct knowledge.......not in terms of their relation to heavenly realms, but in relation to the state of mind during a meditation or sleep or meditation+sleep together. 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… This is what i am trying to understand. How can anything take place "outside of my subconcious mind, in the spirit world" as you mention ? Since all my delusion/perception/formation/cognition(awareness) takes place within my 5 khandhas, my original question above is resurrected again. 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… Yes, i am delusional (i have no doubt in our Tathagatha's words) and i am mentally disturbed (according to average humans around me, because i do not follow the right path/actions in life). But now, i am here seeking to progress myself in the path shown by the Supremely Enlightened One. Since you have contributed so much here for the benefit of me and others, i want to put forth the words of Venerable Ananda, from what i read in Majjhimha Nikaya (Sandaka Sutta): "Sandaka, when a bhikkhu is an arahant with taints destroyed ...and is completely liberated through final knowledge, he is incapable of transgression in five cases. A bhikkhu whose taints are destroyed is incapable of deliberately depriving a living being of life; he is incapable of taking what is not given, that is, of stealing; he is incapable of indulging in sexual intercourse; he is incapable of knowingly speaking falsehood; he is incapable of enjoying sensual pleasures by storing them up as he did formerly in lay life". 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 There comes a stage of life, for most beings on earth, where sex is not important anymore - neither to the male nor to the female in the relationship. They advance to more important tasks of life - nature has its own way of evolution (for spirit). There are numerous teachers/masters/liberated/awakened ones in india who preach the same doctrine as above - the most famous of them being "Rajneesh (of Osho)" who advocated a more open attitude towards sex and owned numerous Rolls Royce cars in USA. And many westerners followed Rajneesh - i wonder how many of them got Arhantship. These are fruitful discussions, for the benefit of many. Metta to you. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dormantBuddha Posted January 30, 2015 seekingBuddha, You seem inclined towards studying scriptures and gaining an intellectual understanding side by side with any other practice you might be doing. I don't know if this is appropriate or would be to your interest but if I'm guessing correctly that you like a scholastic approach to Dharma, I'd recommend some things for you to read. They are not sutras nor are they words of the Buddha. However, they are foundational texts still widely read, discussed, and admired. First is the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā by Nagarjuna, what laid the foundation for the Mahayana--the full pdf of Jay Garfield's translation is available online if you search enough. Second, the Shobogenzo by Dogen, the father of Japanese Soto Zen. Both took their meditative experiences and combined it with natural intellectual and philosophical talent to bridge the gap between the conventional, conceptual world of normal everyday thinking and the enlightened state. These works were written post-realization and would serve as a very good guide. If you haven't already read them, it might help you a great deal to get to them when you can. Though reading will never be a proper substitute for actual practice, these texts will surely aid in ripening your mind by way of influencing your everyday thoughts. If you can really absorb and interpret your life experiences through the words of these masters then it'd be a one up from the usual random, noise-making machine the day to day mind is. Best wishes from a fellow seeker, dormantBuddha Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dawg Posted January 31, 2015 (edited) CLASSIC!! Someone believes eh attained enlightenment and has to go talk in a forum all about it and then gets slightly agitated when someone gives him a little shit. Even better: people actually believing him and asking him questions like he is some God. Hilarious 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 Edited January 31, 2015 by dawg Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
taichistudent Posted January 31, 2015 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 So far from the truth. I guess that's the problem with people these days. Someone gets a little bit of experience and wants to teach / tell the whole world about it. Keep pouring it out, there are enough who will drink it here. I'm out Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted January 31, 2015 DormantBuddha, Thank you for the pointers. Joining this forum has been of great help to me, due to helpful words in this thread. I am old enough to ignore the the negativity that typically dominates youthful stage of life (myself included). Yes, you are right about my scholastic approaches. Currently my practice combines meditation with plenty of reading, and i have found these two supplement each other nicely. In the beginning years of my practice, i was only trying to sit with the limited knowledge that was taught to me by my teacher - of course, he taught only what was necessary for a beginner, even though he was far advanced. Then came a stage where i started reading and found Buddha's direct words before his pariNibbana.....some words to the effect that "Do not think that you do not have a teacher anymore. Let my dhamma be your teacher and follow it as if you will follow me". So, i found great progression in my practice, once i started reading the Suttas and contemplating the direct words of the Teacher of Teachers. As per your suggestion, i will check into those references for my next reading material, once i finish with my current book. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dawg Posted February 3, 2015 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 4 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Kubba Posted February 3, 2015 (edited) ..... Edited September 9, 2019 by Kubba Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted February 4, 2015 (edited) Master Dawg, I have been studying and contemplating Dhamma from different angles, during my primitive meditation practice. It would help me, if you could expound on Dependent Origination. Some of the words found in english translations of the Pali Suttas carry multilple meanings as common english words, and could potentially be misconstrued. In case you have contemplated on Dependent Origination, it would be nice to hear your words because the words you use are simple, easy to understand words, and have good explanations. While one part (the ending or the beginning) of Dependent Origination is easy to see and understand, the other end of it gets tricky. While most in this forum have seen/read these words of buddha in english, and interpreted it in their own ways, i would love to hear an exposition, directly from a liberated one. Edited February 5, 2015 by seekingbuddha Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bearded Dragon Posted February 5, 2015 Master Dawg, I have been studying and contemplating Dhamma from different angles, during my primitive meditation practice. It would help me, if you could expound on Dependent Origination. Some of the words found in english translations of the Pali Suttas carry multilple meanings as common english words, and could potentially be misconstrued. In case you have contemplated on Dependent Origination, it would be nice to hear your words because the words you use are simple, easy to understand words, and have good explanations. While one part (the ending or the beginning) of Dependent Origination is easy to see and understand, the other end of it gets tricky. While most in this forum have seen/read these words of buddha in english, and interpreted it in their own ways, i would love to hear an exposition, directly from a liberated one. Give it up . There is nothing to be found in words other than obtaining a basic direction. Wanting to know intellectual facts is the human inability to accept things as they are. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted February 6, 2015 Give it up . There is nothing to be found in words other than obtaining a basic direction. Wanting to know intellectual facts is the human inability to accept things as they are. Agreed on your wisdom that "words provide only basic direction", because practice makes big impact. But, Beg to disagree on the last part, based on following thoughts: Buddha's words are not merely intellectual facts. They lead us further into the practice; provide support and basis for the right way to practice; these words illuminated my practice, whereas before i was stumbling along. Human inability to accept things as they are is an issue. So, the words of Supremely enlightened One lead us to reality, to the revelation of things as they are - not as we deludedly see them to be, because of our conditioning. Our inability to accept things as they are, is continuously lessened by furthering our understanding of wisdom words. I have experienced big impact on my practice, after i started reading my Teacher's words; whereas, before i met His words, i was a bigger fool, stumbling along in darkness, although i had made progress in practice to some degree. In practical life, to deal with suffering of my householder life, our Tathagata's words have given me strength to accept things as they are, in a progressive manner. Buddha advices NOT to give it up, but says Strive On tirelessly in the PATH. These are simply steps i must take, in the eternal path of suffering and delusion. I don't underestimate the abilities, attainments or words of Master Dawg. This is a rare thing to come across. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted February 12, 2015 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 You should read more. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted February 12, 2015 Dawg, you can hit the nail xxx times, you get stuck at somepoint sooner or later. Since you brought out the example of skiing then i assume you have no clue what is impermanence. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Brian Posted February 12, 2015 I think Dawg's skiing analogy is a rather apt one as it is an excellent illustration of the inherent limits of intellectualizing a kinesthetic experience, which maps fairly nicely to an energetic parallel. Additionally, the act of actually skiing demonstrates the value of relaxing into an experience -- trying to muscle one's way through a complex terrain is very different than carving one's way through it. I've got two brothers with whom I have skied many, many times over the years. One is a powerlifter and the other is an adrenaline junkie -- our styles are very different but I ski circles around both of them and they can never figure out why I don't get as tired as they do... 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
phore Posted February 13, 2015 Hey Dawg, It sounds like you've had an authentic Kundalini Awakening. Since your initial experience, has the Kundalini rising experience (complete with mystical experience) occurred multiple times or only the time you have mentioned. Have the Kundalini sensations intensified? I recognize of course that once you have your initial experience of the Kundalini, the second time or hundredth time is not as surprising. I am merely asking if the Kundalini experiences have continued. Love and Light Tony 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted March 15, 2015 It is a loss for us, since we seem to have lost Master Dawg in this thread, due to some bad elements posting useless replies to him. We all have much to learn from accomplished people like Master Dawg - that is the whole purpose of this forum, isn't it ? As far as the kundalini question goes, i think you will get the answer if you read his original posts carefully. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
allinone Posted March 15, 2015 It is a loss for us, since we seem to have lost Master Dawg in this thread, due to some bad elements posting useless replies to him. We all have much to learn from accomplished people like Master Dawg - that is the whole purpose of this forum, isn't it ? As far as the kundalini question goes, i think you will get the answer if you read his original posts carefully. why you think he is a master? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
seekingbuddha Posted March 17, 2015 why you think he is a master? Consider why we trust/like/value anyone's words in this forum, in any thread ? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
taoguy Posted February 3, 2017 (edited) I hope you will see this Dawg, but could you expound on Dependent Origination, which was one of the earliest sermons given by the Buddha? According to Bhante Vimalaramsi, Dependent Origination can be directly observed, where individual thoughts arise and pass away very quickly. So how does one observe it, and how can we use it to purify our subconscious minds? Secondly, you claimed in a reply that jhanas are not recommended and are simply forms of higher concentration. However, the Buddha said the ending of cessation is the Noble Eightfold Path, and it can only be a Eightfold Path if there is jhana in it - otherwise, it is a Sevenfold Path. Other teachers like Ajahn Brahm or Ajahn Chah also teach jhanas. In the Dhammapada, it says: "Insight and jhana are yoked together." Would love to understand why you do not recommend jhanas when the Buddha praises jhanas for an entire section in the Pali Canon, and shows how people gain liberation directly after fourth jhana, along with arising of the five siddhis. Thirdly, you did not give a method for how to quell away the habitual tendencies of the subconscious mind, simply a method for concentration on the breath with 'bud-dho', then on to the body contemplation of its various parts. Would like to know more. Fourth, Nan-Huai Chin, an enlightened Chan master, says that subconscious and conscious mind lie within the domain of the 6th consciousness. There is the 7th consciousness, which is the Egoic sense, as well as the 8th consciousness of the Alaya-vijnana (collective consciousness), from which karma seeds arise from. You've described theravadan enlightenment until the 6th, so I was wondering if you knew of the methods involving the 7th and 8th as well, as well as development of the Buddha's body (nirmanakaya), which is that of Mahayana enlightenment. Hoping that you can see this and reply when you're back. Thank you for the thread! Edited February 3, 2017 by taoguy Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
thelerner Posted March 11, 2020 (edited) On 6/26/2013 at 5:23 AM, dawg said: I am posting this in hopes that it might be useful to someone who is actively trying to reach awakening … it is essentially a road map describing my own journey down the last section of the path to enlightenment… From the very beginning, my meditation was focused on one thing only… silencing the voice of my mind (delusion)… then destroying that voice completely… all of my meditation practice was insight meditation, and because I made steady progress from beginning to end, I never tried anything else… my insight meditation consisted of fixing my awareness on my nose, and passively observing my breath as it went in and out of my nose…while repeating “Buddho – Buddho – Buddho”… then when I became proficient in Samadhi (concentration), I started doing investigation of my mind… I first spent a few weeks at a Theravada Forest Monastery in the north of Thailand… I did this several times, but just when I started to get results, it would be time to leave… so I decided that the next time I would stay for as long as I got results… and I ended up staying for a full year, during which time I got rid of my anger and greed and reached equanimity… then I did solitary meditation at a house in the mountains (here in Thailand) for a year… then spent another year at the monastery primarily doing “body investigation”… then again I returned to a house in the mountains to do solitary meditation … after doing “body meditation” at the monastery I had reached a high level of attainment, but was unsure of what to do next…so I decided that I would attempt to reach awakening, or to at least scout out the territory… but I realized that I didn’t really have a clue where to start… so I decided that since the process of meditation and awakening takes place in the mind, knowledge of how the mind works would be extremely useful… so I surfed the internet looking for research and other information to update my knowledge about how the mind worked… after I digested it all, I wrote a short summary of it for my own use (conscious & subconscious mind… see below) which also includes my own observations and insights… with this information I could see how to proceed, and why… so I then wrote a step by step “road map for awakening” for myself that took me to awakening… see below)… then after my awakening, I wrote a description of what I experienced when I awakened… (awakening … see below)… later I wrote an epilogue describing how I felt 6 months after awakening… see below… Dawg CONSCIOUS MIND & SUBCONCIOUS MIND (Summary of my research and insights) The left hemisphere of your brain was generated from your father’s DNA, and contains your conscious mind, which is the male mind (Yang), and seventh chakra… the right hemisphere of your brain was generated from your mothers DNA, and contains your subconscious mind, which is the female mind (Yin), and sixth chakra (third eye)… the conscious mind is “father sky”, the subconscious mind is “mother earth”… …………………………………. THE CONSCIOUS MIND THE CONSCIOUS MIND IS A SERIAL PROCESSOR (with only one image or thought at a time, in a lineal sequence). The conscious mind can process 40 bits (nerve impulses) per second… the conscious mind understands “words” and “logic”, it is very “rational”… THE CONSCIOUS MIND IS THE MIND OF OUR PHYSICAL BODY AND ITS SENSES… “Consciousness” is usually defined as being aware of the physical senses… if a person cannot see, hear, smell, taste, or touch, they are said to be “unconscious”… NOTE... The “conscious mind” is used to survive in the physical world (world of the body’s senses)… The conscious mind is concerned with our personality and the survival of our body… when a person reincarnates, their past personality and conscious mind becomes a part of their subconscious mind, and a new conscious mind and personality is created… When a baby is born, it is taught (conditioned) how to survive in the physical world (physical survival), and how to survive within the context of the culture that it is born into (personality)… The conscious mind is just a temporary superficial interface that allows our spirit to reincarnate in a physical body, and experience the physical world… while our subconscious mind is the eternal spirit that we are, that is connected to, and is a part of the spirit universe …………………………………. THE SUBCONSCIOUS MIND THE SUBCONSCIOUS MIND IS A PARALLEL PROCESSOR (with many images and thoughts arranged in many different complex patterns and structures simultaneously). The subconscious mind can process 40,000,000 bits (nerve impulses) per second, so it is 1,000,000 times more powerful, complex, bigger, or faster than the conscious mind… and can think hundreds or thousands of different thoughts simultaneously… the subconscious mind understands “visual images”, “emotions” and “feelings”; and is totally “irrational”… the subconscious mind controls our body… it keeps our heart beating, our lungs breathing, our stomach digesting our food, etc… it repairs and replaces the cells of our body… it creates our health or sickness… this is why the Buddha said that “every man is the author of his own sickness or health”… the subconscious mind is extremely powerful, but we seldom use more than a tiny fraction of its power, because we are unaware of it… If you see someone that you know; your subconscious mind “recognizes them” (visual image), and your conscious mind “remembers their name” (word)… this is how they work together… The conscious mind cannot cope with the simultaneous "multiple images and thoughts” in the subconscious mind, which is the reason why the subconscious mind is subconscious to the conscious mind. The conscious mind is simply unable to process and "be conscious" of the complexity of the "subconscious mind”… NOTE... If a “normal” mundane person were to unwittingly make their subconscious mind conscious, they would “think” (a logical lineal sequence of thoughts in their conscious mind) that they must be going “crazy”; because of the flood of conditioned multiple interacting reflex thoughts that would flood through their mind. Clinical insanity is when the subconscious mind of a mundane person becomes conscious, when he has tapped directly into his “spirit”, and neither the mundane person, nor the mundane world around him, understands what is happening… but this is also why some cultures consider “crazy people” to be “holy”, and why some “holy men” appear to be crazy… likewise a meditator who unwittingly makes his subconscious mind conscious, might “think” that meditating has made him crazy, and so be afraid to meditate any more… but if you recognize it as simply the natural state of the subconscious mind and are not afraid, it is no problem… it is fear of it that is the problem… if you ever fall into fear, simply start repeating “Buddho… Buddho… Buddho…” again and again until you feel safe… it will anchor you to something good, and protect you from fear… NOTE… When our subconscious mind becomes conscious, we have the potential to instantly and spontaneously “know” (with certainty) even the deepest and most complex universal knowledge and truths… NOTE… The subconscious mind simply collects information. It takes in every bit of input whether it is positive or negative. It does not make judgments about the information that it collects since that is the responsibility of the conscious mind. Every sight, sound, taste, smell, or anything we've experienced since the day that we were born (and what is carried over from past lives...karma) is stored in our subconscious mind for future retrieval…. Our subconscious mind is similar to a six-year-old child. It is innocent, naive, and wants to help us in any way it can, but has no idea how to help us. The subconscious mind wants to do the “right thing”, but it can only respond with what it has been conditioned to believe is the right thing (“mundane reality”, usually “ignorance”), so that it does not always make the best of choices… NOTE... The subconscious mind is “telepathic” and can hear the thoughts of other people, and communicate with the subconscious minds of other people, without our conscious mind being aware of it… this is what is called “intuition”… NOTE... Psychologists or behavioral change experts speak about writing goals or affirmations. Affirmations are positive, goal-directed phrases that are worded as if we have already achieved these goals… experts suggest we review our goals or repeat affirmations just before bed or just as we wake up… The reason is at these times our brainwaves are naturally in the correct state (the alpha frequency) for communicating with our subconscious mind. In alpha, the conscious mind is in abeyance, and we can speak directly to the subconscious mind… let's say you wrote the affirmation, "I love to exercise and have a compulsion to leap out of bed and exercise for 30 minutes every morning"… If you were in the alpha state, this message would go directly into the subconscious mind, unchallenged. But if you forgot to repeat affirmations just before bedtime, and repeated them while in the beta frequency (normal awake conscious mind) instead? Do you really think you could say this phrase without, at least, rolling your eyes? And most likely, that little voice in your conscious mind would be saying, "yeah, right"… …………………………………. Our subconscious mind is running our life! We have two separate minds that create our conscious mind’s controlling voice. There is the conscious mind that can think freely and create new ideas “outside of the box of our conditioning”. Then there is the subconscious mind, which is basically a super computer loaded with a database of programmed behaviors, that we carried with us from a past life (karma), or that we acquired before we reached the age of six or seven (when we were most gullible and impressionable) and were taught (programmed to believe) what the adults called “reality” (how to think and act)... The subconscious mind cannot move outside of its fixed programs… It automatically (reflex) reacts to situations with its previously “conditioned” behavior responses; it works without the knowledge or control of the conscious mind. We are usually not even aware that most of our actions are subconscious conditioned reflex responses. Studies from as far back as the 1970’s, show that our subconscious mind begins to prepare for action just over a third of a second before we consciously decide to act. In other words, even when we ‘think’ that we are consciously deciding to act, it is our subconscious mind that is actually making the decision for us...the subconscious mind is controlling us 95% of the time! Neuroscientists have shown that the conscious mind of a normal person provides 5% or less of their cognitive (conscious) activity during the day, and 5% they say is for the more aware people, many people operate at just 1% consciousness. It is the subconscious mind which shapes how we live our life… Note that the reason that an enlightened person is said to be “awake”, is because they are no longer in the “hypnotic trance” of conditioned behavior and sleepwalking through their life… they have awakened. Most of our decisions, actions, emotions and behavior depend on the 95% of brain activity that is usually beyond our conscious awareness, which means that at least 95% of our life is conditioned behavior that comes from our subconscious mind. Our life reflects our subconscious conditioning, because the job of the subconscious mind is to create a “reality” out of our subconscious conditioning. If our subconscious conditioning is negative (caused by negative experiences), our subconscious mind will recreate those negative experiences in our life, again and again. The voice of our thoughts, is not our voice… it is the voice of all the people who have conditioned us… our thoughts are all the “value judgments” and “control trips” that our family and our culture have programmed us with, to control our behavior… our awareness is clean and pure… the defilements in our mind are these conditioned “value judgment” and “control trip” thoughts that other people have filled our mind with. Whatever thoughts that our mind keeps returning to, are unresolved issues… If we have unresolved issues, it is usually because we have been conditioned with contradictory behavior… that is to say that we have been conditioned to do something (because it’s “good”), and also conditioned to not do the same thing (because it’s “bad”)… unresolved issues are usually a result of this situation… this situation produces conflict in our mind, so that we like to do something, but we feel guilty about it, and consider ourselves a bad person because we do it… it is a conflict of two conditioned value judgments… to resolve the issue we must make a choice of one or the other… either we don’t do “it”, or we do “it” and let go of our guilt about doing “”it” (assuming that we are not hurting anyone, including ourselves). “Guilt” is nothing but a control trip that someone has put in our mind to control us… we should not be deceived into thinking that it is a “natural response” to the “badness” of our actions. If we have negative conditioning (caused by negative experiences) in our subconscious mind, 95% of the time we will recreate those negative experiences in our life. Most of the conditioning in our subconscious mind is control trips based on negativity and fear that were put there to control and shape our behavior… we have been conditioned by our parents and other family members, school teachers, religious teachers, friends, enemies, books, newspapers, magazines, radio, television, movies, the internet, the government, etc… For example : if we are repeatedly told that we are “bad”, we are “stupid”, we are “worthless”, we are “incompetent”, we are a “failure”, or we fear what other people are thinking about us, or fear that we will not be accepted loved and respected as we are, fear that we are inferior to other people in some way, etc… these thoughts will keep popping into our mind, and this will cause us to have low self esteem, and a negative opinion of ourselves, and to believe that we are worthless. We then hate ourselves so are unable to accept and love ourselves as we are, and as a result we are unable to love others... Our subconscious mind is conditioned by a form of hypnosis that we call “education”… we are conditioned (hypnotized) when we voluntarily agree to believe what “respected authority” (parents & family, school teachers, religious teachers, government, media, friends, etc.) “suggest” to us… they suggest to us what things are good or bad, true or false… how we should behave, how we should think, what is “normal”… what is “reality”… so that the 95% of the time that we are controlled by our subconscious mind, we are in a hypnotic trance… simply reacting to stimulus with conditioned reflex behavior… our conscious mind’s “ego” thinks that it is making all of our decisions, that it is in control of our fate, but in reality it is just a puppet of the subconscious mind… We are taught to be greedy, and to want as much money as we can get… we are taught to chase pleasure and sex… we are taught to get angry when certain things happen to us… we are taught that what we believe is right… and anyone who disagrees with us is wrong… and so on. And as time passes we forget that we have learned these behaviors from other people, because they become automatic responses, so that we think that they are our natural and spontaneous reactions… and so that we become locked into a mundane hypnotic trance state that we consider to be “REALITY”… we are like “zombies”… THIS CONDITIONED MUNDANE REALITY IS THE IGNORANCE AND DELUSION THAT IS CALLED “AVIJJA”… this MUNDANE REALITY is the “DELUSION” that we must see through to liberate our mind… then it is as if we “awaken” from a long sleep, and see the true nature of our existence. But be warned that Avijja (mundane reality) has one last trick… it will try to convince you that you will “go crazy” if you let go of mundane reality… don’t believe it, you will “go sane”, and you will be free… forever and ever… MY ROAD MAP FOR AWAKENING (My strategy for attaining awakening) …………………………………. MY ANALYSIS (1) ………………MEDITATION……………… Meditation… The whole object of meditation from start to finish, is gaining control of, and silencing the voice of the mind… so that we can investigate the mind and purify it… then permanently destroy the voice of the mind by destroying “Avijja”, the delusion that is the source of that voice… when we have destroyed “Avijja”, all delusion falls away and we become awakened… and we clearly see the truth of our existence… (it does not matter what method we use to purify the mind, and destroy Avijja, that is of no importance… all that is important is that the method works)… Breathing during meditation… When meditating and observing our breath, we should not control our breath with our conscious mind, but instead let our subconscious mind do our (automatic) breathing for us, then we should be aware that by observing our (automatic) breath that we are observing our subconscious mind, and get in sync with it, and then simply let go, and let it “lead the way”… this helps to set up “investigation”, or set up “communication”, and/or “interaction” with the subconscious mind… Meditation in solitude…To reach awakening, it is very helpful (maybe necessary) to have days or weeks of uninterrupted and undisturbed meditation in solitude… away from the sights, sounds, and constant interruptions of the mundane world, away from all other people… to develop and sustain the necessary intensity of “concentration” and “determination”… the sights, sounds, smells, and feel of desolate unspoiled nature is the most ideal environment for meditating in solitude… (2) ……………NECESSARY SKILLS…………… It It is necessary to have concentration… The action or power of focusing one's attention or mental effort… dealing with one particular thing above all others… It is necessary to be deft… moving or acting in a quick, smooth, and skillful way; clever, showing good sense and skill in ... It is necessary to be cool… in a composed and unconcerned manner… It is necessary to be efficient… expending the least effort for maximum result… It is necessary to have determination… unshakable “intent”… (3) ………………STRATEGY……………… TO DESTROY “AVIJJA” (delusion) WE MUST UNDERSTAND : 1)… “WHERE IT IS” 2)… “WHAT IT IS” 3)… “WHAT IS ITS WEAKNESS” 4)… “HOW IT CAN BE DESTROYED” RESULTS OF MY ANALYSIS 1)… “where it is”… the first major insight on my path to “awakening”, was when I suddenly realized that my subconscious mind was my “Citta”… and since I knew that Avijja (delusion) and the Kelisas (defilements) were in my Citta, that meant they were in my subconscious mind… 2)… “what it is”… the second major insight was that a single conditioned reflex response in our subconscious mind is a “Kelisa”… and that the self reinforcing structure of interconnected conditioned reflex responses in our subconscious mind that we call “mundane reality”, is “Avijja”… 3)… “what is its weakness”… so how do we “fight” Avijja” (DELUSION) and destroy it… we can’t punch, kick, bite, stab, or shoot Avijja, nor beat it to death with a big stick… Avijja is not physical, nor is it even “alive”… so how do we fight something that is not physical or even alive… Avijja (delusion) has no awareness of its own, it is just a system of programmed reflex reactions stored in the subconscious mind that we call “mundane reality”… when we realize this, we have understood how the magician (Avijja) does its trick, (how we are deluded) so we are no longer fooled by it… we have discovered both the strength and the weakness of Avijja… and because we now understand its trick, we have already greatly diminished its strength (its ability to control and deceive us)… 4)… “how it can be destroyed”… It is not possible to “delete” anything from the subconscious mind, it remembers and records everything permanently… But we created Avijja (“mundane reality”) in our subconscious mind by accepting and believing mundane information and ideas, that we were taught were “true” (real, reality)... We were taught how we should respond to every possible situation, what we should like and dislike, etc… so that, 95% of our cognitive thoughts and actions are really just “programmed reflex reactions” dictated by our subconscious mind… this is “Avijja”, the “mundane reality” or “delusion” that we want to destroy… But consider that if we created Avijja (“mundane reality”) in our subconscious mind by accepting and believing mundane information and ideas, that we were taught were “true” (real, reality)... it is possible to reprogram our subconscious mind with a stronger new “awakened reality” based on the “truth of our existence”, that supersedes mundane reality, replacing it as the new default reality… This I now realize, is why the monk who taught me, had me do body investigation… body investigation is just a way to reprogram the subconscious mind to see the truth of our body… the truth of our existence… So it is possible for me to use whatever knowledge and skills that I have, and my understanding of the conscious and subconscious mind to reprogram a new awakened default reality… so starting now, the “middle path” of the Buddha IS my new default reality… I will do this by using “concentration”, “deftness”, “coolness”, “efficiency”, and “determination”… by continuously reaffirming to my subconscious mind that “reality” is the “truth of the middle path”… and by “intently” believing ( having my mind and will focused on this one specific purpose) and acting as if it already was the new default reality” (this is important), and I will even “intently” thank my subconscious mind for making it so (this is important too, remember that our subconscious mind is not only aware, but it has more awareness than our conscious mind)… and by continuously reinforcing the truth of the middle path as the existing new awakened default reality, while continuously reinforcing the idea that mundane reality was just childish ignorance… I can make the new “awakened reality” stronger and stronger, as I make the “mundane reality of delusion” weaker and weaker… then when the new “awakened reality” becomes stronger than the “childish ignorance” of mundane reality (Avijja)”, delusion will break up and be permanently destroyed… that will be the moment of “awakening”… AWAKENING (Written days after I awakened) I had been doing intense solitary meditation for many weeks trying many different strategies to get into and reprogram my subconscious mind, and/or trying to establish better communication with my subconscious mind, without any noticeable results… then one day without warning, and when I least expected it, I awakened… One minute I was listening to a bird chirping, and the wind rustling the leaves on the trees, the next minute I was inside my subconscious mind and could visually see Avijja (mundane reality) like it was a huge dam breaking up, making deep rumbling loud sounds, and also “zinging” high pitched sounds, that seemed oddly musical… It was like a musical earthquake… This was accompanied by blinding flashes of light, like flash bulbs on a camera going off in my face… And then the sea of information and thoughts (my subconscious mind) that had been held back by the dam (of mundane reality) swept out over me, carrying me away... I could hear the devas (heavenly beings, my spirit guides) excitedly cheering me on, laughing and clapping like fans at a football match… So I felt very reassured that I was “safe”, and that whatever was happening was a very positive development, so I had no fear… Instead of trying to get out of this sea of thoughts which was my subconscious mind (remember I had just spent weeks trying to get into my subconscious mind), I kept pushing deeper and deeper into it… I was like a scuba diver systematically descending into the depths of the ocean... I would go deeper into this sea of thoughts (exploring), and then pause for a while observing what was going on and acclimate myself to the intensity, then go deeper exploring again and pausing to observe and acclimate myself again so that my awareness always remained clear and lucid… I did this for about a day and a half, until I reached “the bottom”... I then spent more than a week, day and night, submersed in this sea of thoughts, feelings, and images exploring and observing, and all the while I was in a state of extreme bliss... I laughed a lot, not because anything was humorous (although many things were), but because a zillion volts of pure joy was shooting up my spine (kundalini ?)… Both my conscious mind and my subconscious mind were conscious to me, and I was in both the physical world and the spirit world at the same time. My third eye was wide open… My two minds (two lobes of my brain) talked to one another as if they were two different people, while I was both of them. At one point I could see multiple copies of myself everywhere doing different things, and each of them could see all the other copies, and I could see all the other copies they were seeing, etc… it was like being in a hall of mirrors… My subconscious mind seemed to have no limitations... It could fragment into a multitude of many minds, all thinking different things, and I could keep up with all of them… the subconscious mind “thinks” with moving images (eyeball movies) like the dreams we have when asleep, or drug hallucinations, both of which occur in the subconscious mind… and with words, feelings, and emotions… It is impossible to describe with words, the many different things that I saw and experienced… There are no words to describe it, and even if there were, no one would understand the words, unless they had personally experienced what the words described… It seemed that the whole universe was available, but most of it didn’t interest me any more… I saw the “Akashic Record”, but things like “’past lives” seemed totally irrelevant and uninteresting, and the only thing that interested me was what my subconscious mind was doing NOW in this moment, in this life… I don’t remember sleeping, but one or both of my minds could have gone in and out of one pointedness (total concentration) without me having any awareness of time passing, without me even noticing… or I could have been “asleep” & “awake” at the same time (asleep in the physical world and awake in the spirit world, or asleep in the spirit world and awake in the physical world), a state that I have experienced many times before... My only awareness that time was passing, was that the sun kept coming up and going down, I was always in the “now” (and still am)… I fasted most of the time, not because I decided to fast, but because I never got hungry and my body didn’t seem to mind, but I drank a lot of water... The devas stayed with me the whole time, which made me feel very safe and protected… It took me two full days to come completely out of my subconscious mind, and totally back into my conscious mind again exploring and observing, pausing and acclimating as I did so… The weirdest and most unexpected part of it all, is that with the destruction of delusion, my subconscious mind which now contained my new “awakened reality”, fused with my conscious mind, and now it is a “soul mate” (??? union of yin and yang ???)…whereas before I never thought much about my subconscious mind, I now love my subconscious mind, and I can feel its love for me… in any case it is my spiritual partner and best friend, who will help me in any way that it can… at first my conscious mind felt that it was really very very very strange having this “other person” (other conscious mind) in my body with it (“what now ? who the hell is this ?”)… until it realized that it was the same subconscious mind... (“is that you Dawg ? I didn’t recognize you”)… “Dawg” is the name of my subconscious mind… my subconscious mind adopted the name “Dawg” several years ago, so that it would “know” for sure when I was talking directly to it… I can say “hey Dawg ! listen up, I want to talk to you”… and Dawg listens… Dawg dictates to me what to write, then edits it after I type it… my conscious mind is just the typist)… my new awakened subconscious mind now makes me feel “whole” and “complete”, so that I love everybody now… (even if I don’t even like them !!!)… “you must love yourself, before you can love anyone else”, comes to mind… although my communication with my subconscious mind (Dawg) is now very much improved, it can still be difficult sometimes because the subconscious mind is so unlike the conscious mind… I have to use the right key words, mental images, and keep it simple… for all of its power and complexity; my subconscious mind (Dawg) is like a small child in some ways... or like a very gentle and brilliant simple minded giant with magic powers who knows absolutely everything… and because Dawg is now enlightened, whatever Dwag tells me is totally trustworthy… the absurdity of it all, still makes me laugh with joy whenever I think about it… Every meditation method that I tried in the weeks before I awakened produced results, not only did I awaken, but I raised the Kundalini and opened my third eye, and also unified the yin and the yang… a grand slam… it was awesome… the smile on my face is still five miles wide… EPILOGUE (Written months later) I can say without any doubt that “I am awake”… because if you are awake there is absolutely no way you could not know that you are awake… even if you were dead, you would still know that you were awake… it is impossible not to “KNOW”… if you wonder “IF” you are awake, you are not awake’’… The extreme out pouring of bliss and love has subsided… I feel so different since I have awakened, but in the best possible way… and so many unnecessary things have dropped away that I feel as if my life before awakening is a “past life”… “I feel as if I have been reborn”… The change is permanent… and it seems that there is no longer any “need” to meditate, because my mind is totally empty, and because there is nothing in it to investigate or meditate about… but I can still call up a thought, observe it, and instantly gain insights, then let it go… although my mind is usually totally “empty”, I see and hear everything, it is just that my mind does not respond to anything…nothing arises in my mind unless I make an effort to cause it to arise, and it disappears as soon as I cease making the effort … I’m never bored, or aware of the time passing, it is always “now”… the normal state of my mind is for it to be filled with silence, which I now realize is “the sound of one hand clapping”… My awareness lives in the present moment, the NOW !... my personality and my body are not “me”, they are just masks that I can put on and take off (as and when necessary)… the only thing remaining that I could call “me”, is pure awareness that is simply aware of being aware… and even that is just a part of a larger universal awareness… but I have never in my life felt so totally “normal”… this is obviously the way physical human existence is supposed to be… When I was a small child I saw the world as a very “magical place” where everything that I saw or heard was “real” and “existed”… George Washington, Mickey Mouse, Dinosaurs, Spiderman, Grandpa and Grandma, Uncle Sam, Santa Claus, angels and devils, bed time stories, movies, etc, etc… were all equally real… when I learned what the adults called (mundane) “reality”, bit by bit the world lost all of its “magic”… but now that I am “awakened” I find myself once again living in a “magical” world where the “magic” is not only real, it is reality… It is the subconscious mind that experiences awakening (a new reality), not the conscious mind… upon awakening, the conscious mind becomes empty with no mundane thoughts to distract it, so it lives in the NOW (present moment), the only place in the physical world that is real… which is the world of the body’s senses (sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch)… NOTE… As a child you believed that santa claus was a reality who brought you Christmas presents… then one day you realized he was not real (you awakened) and realized that your presents were put there by your parents… so you no longer believed in the reality of santa claus … but you still remembered who he was… you can’t just delete him from your memory… the memory remains, but you no longer believe he is a realityl… in the same way you can destroy avijja as a reality, but the memory of it remains… when you destroy the reality of Avijja (delusion), you no longer create any new karma… but your past karma is the memory of avijja, so it remains active until you die (even if you are enlightened)… then it drops away because you go to the highest heavenly realm, and no longer reincarnate… NOTE… You have spirit guides that want to help and protect you, but they can’t help or protect you unless you ask them to help you and protect you, because they would be interfering… talk to them as friends and allies, and ask them to help you, and tell them “how” if you can (they can lead things to you, and you to things, without you even realizing that they are involved)… and don’t forget to thank them… NOTE… Anyone dear to you who has died (parents, siblings, children, grandparents, spouses, friends) can hear you if you talk to them, most of them can come to you in an instant… call them to come… tell them that you love them and miss them, and pour out your heart to them… they are not “dead” (it is impossible to die, even if you wanted to), they are just someplace else… NOTE… Learn to talk to your subconscious mind, ask it to help you… remember that it is more conscious than your conscious mind… and if you let it, it will love you unconditionally, just the way you are… tell it your dreams and aspirations… it can help you in ways that you cannot even imagine… it has complete control of your body…24 hours a day, it keeps your heart beating, your lungs breathing, etc, etc… your subconscious mind is always aware, it never sleeps, it is always taking care of you, every second of your life… and it is always listening to the thoughts in your conscious mind, and those thoughts create your health or disease… On 7/1/2013 at 12:38 PM, dmattwads said: This has to be with out a doubt the best post ever written on this forum! Though I do have a few questions and difficulties that I would like some help with. 1. Meditation. I've noticed that my meditation life seems to go through cycles. For a while meditating for a long period of time seems easier than at others. During the difficult times I seem to feel very distracted and no matter how long I sit there breathing saying "Buddho" to myself its very hard to get my mind to quiet down. Other times I'll meditate for a while and feel very peaceful and still afterwards, but then there were be times that I'll meditate and then for a while after I will feel a lot of intense unpleasant emotions. Sometimes I can sit for a long period of time no problem, and other times I will feel very tired or sore, or feel that I want to be doing anything else but sitting in meditation. On a positive note I can say that for the past year (after a nasty break up) I've been trying to meditate as often as I can with my free time and not try to find another relationship. What I have noticed from that is that the inclinations of my subconscious that in the past would lead me into trouble (bad relationships mostly) is still there, but if I'm sitting and observing it as opposed to acting on it then at least it can't get me in trouble anymore lol. AND I'm becoming more aware that these non-beneficial thought patterns are there in the first place (awareness). 2. A question I have about your second to last note about communicating with deceased loved ones (as this is something I've been confused about for a while). My question is, I can understand being able to speak to them while they are in the ghost world, but after they reincarnate would you be unable to communicate with them anymore? 3. "Side-effects". Are there side effects from meditation? What I mean is that I'll noticed that sometimes I'll meditate and for a certain span of time (a few days or a week usually) I'll feel one certain way after meditating. Lately its been feeling very tired. Other times I'll meditate and feel all sorts of latent emotions come up. Other times it feels like my perspective on everything changes and everything feels "weird". *So to finish I'll sum up with the one point that I most want help with and that is what to do when its hard to meditate? Either feeling ill will about doing it in the first place, or having a hard time quieting the mind even after meditating for a while, or feeling "off" after meditating? On 7/5/2013 at 12:18 PM, dawg said: Dmattwads, I tried to cover everything… but if this does not answer all of your question, ask me again and try to be as specific as possible… ………………………………………… THE CONSCIOUS MIND IS A SERIAL PROCESSOR (with only one image or thought at a time, in a lineal sequence). The conscious mind can process 40 bits (nerve impulses) per second… the conscious mind understands “words” and “logic”, it is very “rational”… the conscious mind is the mind of our body’s senses… “Consciousness” is usually defined as being aware of the physical senses… if a person cannot see, hear, smell, taste, or touch, they are said to be “unconscious”… THE SUBCONSCIOUS MIND IS A PARALLEL PROCESSOR (with many images and thoughts arranged in many different complex patterns and structures simultaneously). The subconscious mind can process 40,000,000 bits (nerve impulses) per second, so it is 1,000,000 times more powerful, complex, bigger, or faster than the conscious mind… and can think hundreds or thousands of different thoughts simultaneously… the subconscious mind understands “visual images”, “emotions” and “feelings”; and is totally “irrational”… the subconscious mind controls our body… The subconscious mind can process 40,000,000 bits (nerve impulses) per second, so it is 1,000,000 times more powerful, complex, bigger, or faster than the conscious mind… and can think hundreds or thousands of different thoughts simultaneously… the subconscious mind understands “visual images”, “emotions” and “feelings”; and is totally “irrational”… the subconscious mind controls every aspect of our body… it never sleeps… it has been taking care of you every second of your life, day and night… ………………………………………… your subconscious mind is controlling your life! You have two separate minds that create your conscious mind’s controlling voice. There is the conscious mind that can think freely and create new ideas “outside of the box of your conditioning”. Then there is the subconscious mind, which is basically a super computer loaded with a database of programmed behaviors, some that you carried with you from a past life (karma), and some that you acquired before you reached the age of six or seven (when you were most gullible and impressionable) and were taught (programmed to believe) what the adults called “reality” (how you should think and act)... you have been programmed with a conditioned response for every possible situation… THESE CONDITIONED RESPONSES OF MUNDANE REALITY… (1)… ARE THAT OBNOXIOUS VOICE IN YOUR MIND… (2)… ARE NOT YOU, BUT WERE PUT THERE BY OTHER PEOPLE… (3)… ARE YOUR KARMA… (4)… ARE THE DELUSION THAT YOU WANT TO DESTROY… The subconscious mind cannot move outside of its fixed programs… It automatically (reflex) reacts to situations with its previously “conditioned” behavior responses; it works without the knowledge or control of the conscious mind. We are usually not even aware that most of our actions are subconscious conditioned reflex responses. Studies from as far back as the 1970’s, show that our subconscious mind begins to prepare for action just over a third of a second before we consciously decide to act. In other words, even when we ‘think’ that we are consciously deciding to act, it is our subconscious mind that is actually making the decision for us...the subconscious mind is controlling us 95% of the time! Neuroscientists have shown that the conscious mind of a normal person provides 5% or less of their cognitive (conscious) activity during the day, and 5% they say is for the more aware people, many people operate at just 1% consciousness. It is the subconscious mind which shapes how we live our life… Note that the reason that an enlightened person is said to be “awake”, is because they are no longer in the “hypnotic trance” of conditioned behavior and sleepwalking through their life… they have awakened. Most of our decisions, actions, emotions and behavior depend on the 95% of brain activity that is usually beyond our conscious awareness, which means that at least 95% of our life is conditioned behavior that comes from our subconscious mind. Our life reflects our subconscious conditioning, because the job of the subconscious mind is to create a “reality” out of our subconscious conditioning. If our subconscious conditioning is negative (caused by negative programming and experiences), our subconscious mind will recreate those negative experiences in our life, again and again. The voice of our thoughts, is not our voice… it is the voice of all the people who have conditioned us… our thoughts are all the “value judgments” and “control trips” that our family and our culture have programmed us with, to control our behavior… our awareness is clean and pure… the defilements in our mind that we want to purge our mind of are these conditioned “value judgment” and “control trip” thoughts, that other people have filled our mind with. Our subconscious mind is conditioned by a form of ‘hypnosis” that we call “education”… we are conditioned (hypnotized) when we voluntarily agree to believe what “respected authority” (parents & family, school teachers, religious teachers, government, media, friends, etc.) “suggest” to us… they suggest to us what things are good or bad, true or false… how we should behave, how we should think, what is “normal”… what is “reality”… so that the 95% of the time that we are controlled by our subconscious mind, we are in a hypnotic trance… simply reacting to stimulus with conditioned reflex behavior… our conscious mind’s “ego” thinks that it is making all of our decisions, that it is in control of our fate, but in reality it is just a puppet of the subconscious mind… We are taught to be greedy, and to want as much money as we can get… we are taught to chase pleasure and sex… we are taught to get angry when certain things happen to us… we are taught that what we believe is right… and anyone who disagrees with us is wrong… and so on. And as time passes we forget that we have learned these behaviors from other people, because they become automatic responses, so that we think that they are our natural and spontaneous reactions… so that we become locked into a mundane hypnotic trance state that we consider to be “REALITY”… we are like “zombies”… THIS CONDITIONED ‘MUNDANE REALITY” IS THE IGNORANCE AND DELUSION THAT IS CALLED “AVIJJA”… that we must see through to liberate our mind… then it is as if we “awaken” from a long sleep, and see the true nature of our existence. ………………………………………… Meditation… The whole object of meditation from start to finish, is gaining control of, and silencing the voice of the mind… so that we can investigate the mind and purify it… then permanently destroy the voice of the mind by destroying “Avijja”, the delusion (mundane reality) that is the source of that voice… when we have destroyed “Avijja”, all delusion falls away and we become awakened… and we clearly see the truth of our existence… don’t get in a rut and do the same meditation all the time… try all kinds of different things to keep it fresh… try everything you can think of… do whatever works for you… there is no right or wrong way to meditate… (it does not matter what method we use to purify the mind, and destroy Avijja (delusion), that is of no importance… all that is important is that the method works)… Breathing during meditation… When meditating and observing our breath, we should not control our breath with our conscious mind, but instead we should let our subconscious mind do our (automatic) breathing for us (like when we sleep)… then we should be aware that by observing our (automatic) breath which is controlled by our subconscious mind, that we are also observing our subconscious mind, and get in sync with it… then we should simply let go, and let it “lead the way”… this helps to set up “investigation”, or set up “communication”, and/or “interaction” with the subconscious mind… Meditation and the “five senses… when we meditate we are trying get in touch with our subconscious mind so that we can observe and investigate it… so we must turn off the conscious mind, which blocks our access to our subconscious mind… to do this you : SIGHT… Close your eyes so that you are not distracted by what you see… SOUND… You mentally repeat and focus your hearing on “Buddho – Buddho – Buddho”, so that you are not distracted by some other sound, and focus on it instead… SMELL… You should meditate in a place where the air is fresh and odorless… you should not smell anything distracting (especially food)… burning incense can be used to provide a “special positive atmosphere”… TASTE… Your mouth should feel clean and neutral, rinse it out with cool water if necessary… if you get thirsty when you meditate, keep a glass of cool water within reach… TOUCH… You focus your awareness of touch on feeling your breath going in and out of your nose… remember that your breath is controlled by our subconscious mind, so that when you feel your breath going in and out, you are feeling the “touch” of your subconscious mind… ………………………………………… Answer to question…1)… listen up, this one is extremely important… When you go to sleep at night… you get into the bed, turn the light off, get comfortable… and “let go”… so that you drift off to sleep… but if you put effort into “trying to go to sleep”, you will never drift off to sleep… meditation is the same… when you meditate, just sit down, close your eyes, and let go… don’t “try to meditate”… pretend you are going to sleep, just let go… and you will go into Samadhi (concentration)… sleep itself is just nature’s way of forcing people to go into one-pointedness (total concentration) Samadhi … just let go no matter what you experience, because your subconscious mind will take care of you just as it does when you go to sleep… just as it has done for you all your life… if you can’t hear your breathing, just relax, you are in no danger, you are just going into deep concentration, a sought after mile stone on the path… that will put you on a permanent plateau of peace and serenity… it means that you are attaining a higher level of consciousness… Just relax and indifferently observe your thoughts…see through the illusion of “mundane reality” and just be aware that your thoughts are not coming from you, that they are just conditioned reflex reactions that were put there by other people to control you… don’t respond to the voice in any way, because if you do, you are giving the voice some of your energy, and energizing it… if you feel “weird”, be aware that the “weirdness” is just delusion (mundane reality) trying to control you… everything that you feel as a result of your meditation, is a programmed response put into your mind by “mundane reality” to control you… to make you conform… (no, no, not me… I’m not weird, I’m normal… watch me, I’m going to go down to Mac Donald’s and get a supersized Big Mac, a double order of fries, and a jumbo Dr Pepper to wash it all down… see, I’m not weird… I’m normal !!!)… Regarding relationships, I would advise you to avoid women who go drinking with their friends in clubs every Saturday night, and women who go to church every Sunday morning… actively try to find women who meditate, then go for one with some spirituality… there must be some kind of meditation organizations that give lectures or sponsor social events, near where you live… If she meditates, you could talk about meditation for hours, and form an instant bond… A sane woman in your life, who understands why you meditate, could bring you much joy, and in no way hinder your meditation… she could put a big smile on your face… if you let her… so let her… Answer to question…2)… all the people who you knew, who have died, should still be somewhere in the spirit world… so you should be able to talk to them… everyone goes to the ghost realm first… then their thoughts (karma) sends most of them on, to a heavenly realm or a hell realm… the ones who don’t have enough good or bad karma to go to a heavenly realm or hell realm… remain in the ghost realm… they look and act exactly the same as they did when they were alive in the physical world, even the same clothes… you may well have seen ghosts walking about on the streets, before they went to the ghost realm, without realizing it, because they look just like everyone else… the ghost realm is a strange place that is very bland and ordinary, without the beauty and powers of the heavenly realms… where ghosts, for lack of knowing what else to do, try to live a life like they lived before they died… they live in “ghost cities”, have houses and possessions and live with other family members, have jobs, and even have restaurants and clubs… (I was once offered a job in a ghost city… because I was walking around talking to the street people, asking them a lot of questions… so they thought that I was dead, and had just arrived… they were very friendly)… they can see and hear, but cannot smell, taste or touch, which makes them yearn to reincarnate in a physical body again so that they can experience “physical pleasure” again… some of the people who are about to reincarnate, are in the ghost realm preparing for their next life… The other consideration is the relative speed of time… from my own experience, it seems that time in the spirit world can move faster or slower than time in the physical world… but I have not been able to see any consistent pattern to it… nor have I heard anyone else give a reasonable description of time in the spirit world, compared to time in the physical world… Answer to question…3)… if you find it hard to motivate yourself to meditate... don’t set a time or time limit… just start doing it, without “thinking about doing it’… you can stop any time you want… you can start any time you want… don’t make a big deal about it, just sit down and observe your thoughts flowing by, you don’t have to “do” anything… and don’t be suckered into believing one word of your thoughts (especially negative thoughts), they are just what other people wanted you to believe, so programmed you to believe it… you are just observing to see what is in your subconscious mind… just consider meditation as a “quiet time” when you can “let go”, and take a rest from all of the bullshit of the world… a place where you don’t have to put out any effort… a place where you do not have to “ suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune”… ………………………………………… Dawg On 7/8/2013 at 3:38 AM, dawg said: Hello Tibetan Ice, I have three questions, if you don't mind. . .………………………..I will do my best to answer them… but bear in mind that I know nothing about your chosen path or practice… or how far along you are in your practice (level of attainment)… roughly speaking, are you doing Buddhist “samadhi practice” or Taoist “energy practice”…? If you are mixing them, each will interfere with the other…………………………..1)… I have gone through meditative states where I see thousands of images/thoughts/visions go whizzing by. It is like being caught in a tornado of colors and lights, all very clear and crisp, moving rapidly, appearing and dissolving like lightning. So many of them it is bewildering and I wonder what this is. Am I getting close? you were in your subconscious mind... I don't know what kind of meditation that you were doing, but you are definitely seeing your subconscious mind… (it is possible that you got there by opening your third eye, but you don't mention anything about how you transitioned into your subconscious mind)... you can now understand why your conscious mind is unable to cope with it, so considers it “subconscious”… do a google search on “how to communicate with the subconscious mind”… there are some good sites that are informative… surf around and follow links… you might also google ‘hypnosis” as well, since the "delusion" of "mundane reality" is essentially a "hypnotic trance state", that is a result of our cultural conditioning which is located in our subconscious mind… ………………………..2)… Lately, during my breath meditations, explosions are occuring in my head. Twice, in separate sessions, there was an explosion around the third eye and my arms starting doing a rapid dog-paddle, like I was trying to pull myself out of a tunnel, or maybe I was just so shocked that that was the reflex? Did you experience anything like that? What is happening there?My meditation is “Samadhi mediation”, that involves deeper and deeper states of concentration… so I have not experienced anything exactly like it, but when I awakened I heard loud rumbling sounds and flashing lights, then the kundalini shot up my spine and my third eye opened… plunging me into my subconscious mind which was like your description in question one… body motions like the ‘rapid dog paddle’ are usually caused by the kundalini… so you might have been opening individual chakras, or even aborting the rise of the kundalini “by pulling yourself out of a tunnel”… I can’t say for sure………………………..3)… You said: "or like a very gentle and brilliant simple minded giant with magic powers who knows absolutely everything…"I was describing my interaction with my subconscious mind… and how the subconscious mind of every person has access to all the knowledge and powers of the universe..……………………….. Do you now have any siddhis? For example, can you tell me what I look like, how old I am and what my past lives that I can remember are?The Buddhist monk who was my teacher, warned me away from siddhis… saying that, “if you want siddhis, you have already been seduced by them… if you want them, it is only because you want to use them… and what could you use them for, other than to build up your ego”…He said that siddhis are a by-product of concentration... that siddhis have nothing to do with self-realization and awakening. A practitioner may manifest Siddhis due to strong passions and intense desires, and if that is the case, he will never attain awakening... that Siddhis are a great hindrance to spiritual progress, and so long as one remains within the realm of Siddhis, there is not the least hope of enlightenment. So I have never been into attaining or exhibiting siddhis…But, this does not mean that a person manifesting Siddhis is not awakened… Siddhis may appear spontaneously before or after awakening, without any effort on the part of the practitioner… but they should never be used to show off…When I began meditating seriously with the goal of enlightenment, I began to spontaneously find myself in the spirit world… if I sat down to meditate and closed my eyes, or got in bed to sleep and closed my eyes, I would find myself in the spirit world… if I opened my eyes I was back in the physical world… if I closed my eyes again, I was back in the spirit world again… so I would close my eyes and sit down in the spirit world to meditate, or lay down in the spirit world and go to sleep… in the morning I would wake up in the spirit world… then I would open my eyes and I was in my bed… then if I closed my eyes again, I was back in the spirit world again…one of my spirit guides used to take me around the spirit world and show me different spirit realms… frequently I roamed around on my own… I have been to the spirit world more times than I can count… I have seen everything from heavenly realms, ghost realm, and the hell realm…I bumped into a dead friend while I was walking around talking to “street people in a ghost city in a ghost realm, he was the same old friend, and he looked great, just like he did when he was alive… he was with a group of about ten other people preparing to reincarnate, on their way to do something, so we only spoke in passing because he had to keep up with the group… then another time, one of the monks in the monastery where I was meditating, came and found me in the spirit world where I was meditating, because he wanted to ask me about something, then after I gave him the information he wanted, he just walked off in the spirit world… I have also met the extremely beautiful woman in one of the high heavenly realms who was my wife in my last reincarnation which was it that heavenly realm (she has elaborately arranged blond hair hanging down to her waist)… (on a scale of one to ten, she is a five hundred)… she asked me if “I wanted to marry her again, like before ?”... she thought I was dead, and had just returned… I told her that I didn’t know, since I was still alive and trying to reach enlightenment… (and I have since reached enlightenment, so will not be in that heavenly realm)… if I had said yes, I would have had to abandon my physical body to die, back in the physical realm, and abandon my attempt to reach enlightenment… the spirit world is an incredibly amazing place… the beauty and spotless perfection of the heavenly realms is awesome… it is beyond physical imagination… and the way heavenly women (and men) look, move, speak, and laugh makes physical women (and men) seem like baboons by comparison…everything in the spirit realms is created by thought, so you can imagine how strange and weird that can get… the language of the spirit world is telepathy… everyone can hear your thoughts, so you need to have an “empty mind”, except when you want to communicate… you can talk to anyone no matter what language they speak, because you hear them in your own language, and they hear you in their language… even if they are a different species than you…I have seen snow covered mountains, sailing ships on a sparkling sea, gardens full of flowers, fruit, and trees, castles floating in the sky, buildings that change like kaleidoscopes as you walk through them, a fireplace with fire… and I have been driven around in what looks like a Mercedes through what looks like leafy suburbs of Los Angeles… the spirit world is as solid as the physical world… I am a shameless tourist, and like to fly around and look at everything… I like flying around and using telescopic vision to zoom in on whatever looks interesting… All the gods exist, but none of them made or control the universe, and they were all born and will die… (consider that “god the father” is a male god, which means he must have a penis and balls to be considered “male”… (remember that he made adam in his own image and likeness) and why would he have a penis and balls unless there was a “goddess” with a vagina… which means that he was born of a goddess)… they have no control over the spirit world… they are just powerful entities that live in a high heavenly realm… they want you to worship them because that sends them the energy that keeps them alive (otherwise they would have to die and might find themselves in hell or some other very unpleasant reincarnation)…no religion “owns” the spirit world… and in the same way that “science” is just man’s attempt to explain the physical universe which “just is”… “religion” is man’s attempt to describe the spirit universe which “just is”… at least science can “see” the physical universe, so it is not totally out to lunch… but how many religious leaders have or can “see” the spirit universe ??? ZERO… organized religion is blindfolded, deaf, and lost in the woods…What is it like being dead ?… if you were crossing a street, and a car came speeding down the street, and hit you, killing you … you would get up, brush yourself off, then notice that your body was still laying on the street… you would think and act just the same as when you were alive… but nobody would see you or hear you, and would walk right through you… your spirit body would look the same as your body… you would still have your conscious and subconscious mind… you might loiter around for a while in the physical world, and even go to your funeral… but you would soon proceed to the “ghost realm”, which is the “grand central station” of arrivals (deaths) and departures (reincarnations) of the spirit world… you would still have your conscious and subconscious mind until you reincarnate, then your conscious and subconscious mind would become your new subconscious mind (why people can remember past lives), and you would be born with a blank new conscious mind…nobody judges you when you die... it is all just simple “cause and effect”… it is not a contradiction to say that atheists can go to heaven… if you are good, you go to a good place… if you are bad, you go to a bad place… imagine that you have a television set, and all of the television channels are the many spirit realms… what you, watching the television set will see when you die, is the channel that your mind is set on… in other words, the voice (thoughts) in your mind (which is your karma talking) determines where you go, and sends you there… then when you use up your good and/or bad karma (accumulated “credit” or “debit”) you reincarnate…but I do not consider my ability to see the spirit world to be a siddhi, it is a normal power of the human subconscious mind… I also frequently experience telepathy while I am in the physical world… sometimes it is the thoughts of people who are alive and sometimes people who are dead, and sometimes it is my spirit guides… one time when I stepped out of my body and squatted down so that I could take a close look at my 4th chakra turning around (I even put my eye up to hole and looked in the hole)… I suddenly became so telepathic I could hear the thoughts of everyone in the city (millions of people… it was an obscene roar of humanity, it made me understand why “holy men” live as far away from human habitation as they can get… all I know about my past lives is what has appeared spontaneously… when I awakened I saw the akashic records, and could have looked up all my past lives, but past lives don’t interest me… to me looking at my past lives would be as interesting as looking at my dirty laundry from the past umpteen years… all that interests me is the present… the moving point in time called now…so can I tell you what you look like, how old you are and what your past lives that you can remember are? I am not into that sort of thing…dawg On 7/12/2013 at 6:21 AM, dawg said: Tibetan Ice, You said, Your statement about siddhis is kind of disturbing to me. I'm never happy to hear about gurus who caution about siddhis and then don't demonstrate any. It always seems like a cop-out to me, like they are hiding the fact that they don't have the ability, are not realized, or at least, don't know the proper technique… I also find it strange that you can say "I was describing my interaction with my subconscious mind… and how the subconscious mind of every person has access to all the knowledge and powers of the universe..' and yet cannot demonstrate what that statement actually means. Or perhaps you don't want to demonstrate? If I could walk through walls or fly, I would never tell anyone because I would become a target.. Some things are best kept secret. …………………………………………… I am glad you understand that although I am a dawg, I am not a performing dawg that does tricks on demand… Don’t be disturbed by what I say below… read it carefully and understand it… don't judge it… if you are ripe and ready for it, you will see the truth of it… if you are not ripe for it now, it will lay dormant in your mind and perhaps be useful to you later… I assume you aspire to awakening… and from what you describe of your practice, you have attained much… your efforts have not been in vain… but you need to be more systematic and cover all bases, if you ignore some things, they will become your weaknesses… and if you aspire to awakening, not once did you mention the most important thing of all… THE DESTRUCTION OF DELUSION, WHICH “IS” AWAKENING… delusion (mundane reality) is located in the subconscious mind, the 6th chakra. but only the conscious mind, the 7th chakra can destroy delusion… if you destroy delusion you would attain awakening, and all your attainments would come together, giving you everything you desire… you can develop as many siddhis as you want, and still not be awake (enlightened), or any closer to awakening… you need to purify the conscious mind (7th chakra), and use it to destroy delusion (purify the 6th chakra) the subconscious mind, to be awakened… and unless you are awakened, delusion controls 100% of your subconscious mind (the 6th chakra), and 95% of your conscious mind (7th chakra)… so if delusion controls your conscious mind 95% of the time… the siddhis, which are powers of the subconscious mind, would be under the control of delusion for at least 95% of the time… and you would be unaware of it… Because your deluded subconscious mind with powers would subconsciously control you… At present, your mind is filled with thoughts (the voice of your mind, delusion), and you react to them… in other words, you “think and react”… but if you were awakened, your mind would always be empty of thoughts, and you would “know and act” instead… until you can purify your mind of thoughts (mundane reality, the conditioned reflex reactions (thoughts) that other people have filled your subconscious mind with), you would be unable to control any powers that you may attain… In short, you now have no control of your subconscious mind… zero… and you cannot control your conscious mind 95% of the time… to control the powers that the subconscious mind is capable of… you need to control your conscious mind and your subconscious mind 100 % of the time… …………………………………………… Norbu says that he remains in a deep dream-like state during his waking hours. I think part of the formula is to be asleep while you are awake, so that everyday existence becomes the dream that it really is. Once you realize this, that's when you really wake up. So, the method would be to dig as deep as you can while maintaining a connection to normal consciousness, so you can fuse the two together. …………………………………………… The dream is the world of delusion, the “mundane reality”, the hypnotic trance that you now live in… and yes, you are asleep… not just you, but everybody who has not awakened… you can intellectually realize that you are in a hypnotic dream, but you are still totally asleep… only when you destroy delusion, do you wake up from the dream… and it literally is like waking up from a dream… which is why people call it “awakening”… …………………………………………… NOTE… THE VOICE OF YOUR KARMA The conditioned reflex responses in your deluded subconscious mind are your karma… the voice of your subconscious mind that is always talking to your conscious mind, is the “voice of your karma’… this is how your karma controls your life… the voice is always telling you to act in ways that lead you to, and produces results that “are your karma”… for example, if it is your karma to be rich, the voice of your subconscious mind will lead you to riches, because that is how it is programmed… if it is your karma to be poor, the voice will lead you to poverty, again because that is how it is programmed… if it is your karma to commit suicide, the voice will drive you to suicide… if it is your karma to develop a fatal disease, the voice will act on the subconscious mind to produce it… if it is your karma to have a beautiful body and face, the voice will act on the subconscious mind to make your body and face beautiful… unless you are awakened, your karma controls the powers of your subconscious mind… When you destroy delusion and awaken, you are destroying your karma… so that you are destroying the voice of your karma... your conscious mind is totally and permanently transformed… it is now blissfully empty, and serenely peaceful… you don’t “think”, you “know”… you don’t “react”, you “act”… it is always “now”… you feel more “normal” than you have ever felt before, and you realize that this is obviously the way physical human existence is supposed to be… Dawg On 7/14/2013 at 10:30 AM, dawg said: Hello Matthew, You said… 1. About feeling "weird". I guess I should have explained what I meant by feeling "weird" better. I don't feel weird in relation to society (I live in Austin, its hard to feel weird here haha). What I meant was that sometimes after meditating for a while I'll feel weird to myself as in "different" .... its very difficult to put into words. I guess the best way to put it is that I'll just feel a little "off". This is good because it indicates that the meditation is having an effect, and that your meditation is working… you could say that the whole point of your meditation is to feel different… for the better… 2. In regards to finding a woman, this is something that I have been confused about for a while now. I know the monks do not get involved with women since they are seeking enlightenment. If I wanted to reach enlightenment would a woman be a distraction from that? On the other hand I must admit I do have that desire, and its not just for the sex, but for the companionship aspect of it (which really isn't much of a shocker since most people want that type of thing). So I find myself in the quandary of trying to figure out if I should keep staying single and meditate enough to eliminate that desire or to meditate in order to better understand exactly what kind of woman I really would want. .. Now a story about enlightenment... in the time of the Buddha, a poor ignorant worthless old man who had been thrown out of his house by his family because he could no longer do any useful labor, came to the Buddha’s monastery and wanted to become a monk… but the monks at the monastery ridiculed him, and chased them away… so he decided to kill himself by throwing himself off a nearby cliff… the Budda who was returning to the monastery became aware of the old man, and put himself in the old man’s way… when the man approached, the Buddha hailed him asking, “where are you going old man…?” the old man did not realize he was talking to the Buddha, he thought he was just talking to another ordinary monk… so the old man told Buddha what had just happened when he went to the monastery, and since he could not become a monk, he was on his way to throw himself off a cliff so he could start his next reincarnation… the Buddha told the old man that if he followed him back to the monastery, he would get someone to ordain him… the old man was estatic saying, “really ?... do you know someone important there, can you really get me ordained …? So the Buddha took him back to the monastery and had him ordained… a week later, the old man had attained enlightenment… the other monks were amazed, and came to the Buddha asking him how the old man had reached enlightenment so quickly… the Buddha replied, “he had already thrown away his body”… (when he decided it was worthless and was going to throw it off a cliff to get rid of it… so that he could move on to his next life)… 3. Also I've been trying to implement your advice about meditation but I still find my mind wondering often. You are repeating “Buddho” and observing the breath, as a way to block your thoughts… but if that doesn’t block your thoughts… try to analyze why… what is the problem… (3a)… is it because you have been over stimulated by the mundane world, and are “hyper” as a result… if so, meditate to sounds that will relax your mind and put it into a meditative state (alpha brain waves)… surf “youtube music videos” and you can find an endless supply of good sounds to download… just focus your attention on the breath going in and out, and just let the music wash over you… use the music in place of the “buddho” to block your thoughts… the idea is to replace the voice in your mind with peaceful sounds… Goggle and download these, and give them a try… Om Mani Padme Hum - Original Extended Version.wmv Sound Therapy - Whales Singing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWPVJlyJkbg 75 minutes of thunder and rain - relaxing noise for your ears Peaceful Aum namah Shivaya Mantra Complete Tibetan Chant - Heart Sutra Relaxation music -Chinese Bamboo Flute Yoga –Meditation - Natural sounds (3b)… is it because you are having “negative thoughts”… if so, realize that those thoughts are not you… that those thoughts were put in your head (subconscious mind) sometime in the past by someone else, to control you… forgive that anonymous person (or persons) for putting those thoughts in your head, and send them some “love”, whoever they are, and wherever they may be (they probably need some love)… then forgive yourself for accepting the thoughts, and feel some love for yourself, for all the good things you are… hug yourself, and say to yourself, “I love the goodness of the spirit within me”… then let go of it all, and breathe deeply and freely… (3c)… is it because you have a problem… and you are distracted by it and can’t concentrate on your meditation…? Try to think of your problem as an opportunity to change things for the better… don’t think (obsess) about the problem and feel helpless (depressed)… rally the troops instead… get in an alpha state, and ask your subconscious mind to help you find a solution… and ask your spirit guides to help you find a solution… while you work your way through the problem… (3d)… is it because you have a really really big problem… like is it because your whole family was killed at a family reunion, by a falling meteor, which you missed because on your way to it, your Mercedes ran over a giant armadillo and flipped over totaling it, throwing you into a thicket of prickly pear cactus and mesquite… then when you held a wake for them at your ranch, the candles around the coffins, caught the curtains on fire, burning down your ranch house... and sparks from the house set the barn on fire, killing all your prized horses that were locked in their stalls, and burning up your new Maserati Gran Turismo which you had parked in the barn so it would be “safe”… and while you were reading the “dear john letter’ from your girl friend who had just run off with your best friend… you received the news that your faithful beloved hound dog "meatball", had died because he ate too much charred horse meat… and then when you tried to telephone your insurance agent (Billy Bob Smith who was your fraternity brother at University of Texas), the insurance company told you that they had no record of you having any insurance policies with them, and that Mr. William Robert Smith is wanted by the feds for insurance fraud, and is believed to be hiding somewhere in South America… If your problem is this big, I can only suggest that you be a selfless saint in at least your next ten reincarnations to cancel some of your bad karma… : ) Dawg On 3/1/2014 at 8:04 AM, dawg said: A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE PATH TO AWAKENING “DELUSION” is the toxic voice of your thoughts in your conscious mind… many people believe that their thoughts are somehow useful to them… and believe that the inner voice of their thoughts is there to help guide them to make better choices so that they will create a happy, joyful, comfortable, fulfilling and successful life for themselves… If this were true then they would find themselves feeling satisfied, happy, confident, relaxed, at ease, peaceful, positive, optimistic, good about themselves, successful, fulfilled and worthy… But if we consider what it really feels like to have that critical inner voice living inside our conscious mind, we will invariably notice that it makes us feel inadequate, weak willed, lacking confidence, unmotivated, risk averse, overly cautious, fearful of making mistakes, paralyzed, anxious, confused, unable to make clear and focused decisions, incompetent, sad, stuck, pessimistic about the future, unworthy and so on… which prevents us from being able to create a successful and fulfilling life… it is this voice, that creates all of our dissatisfaction and suffering…it is the voice of delusion… but don’t dislike or hate it, that is clinging to it… instead just think of it as the “voice of childish ignorance” and dismiss it as having no credibility… simply be indifferent to it...Meditation… The whole object of meditation from start to finish, is gaining control of, and permanently silencing that voice in the conscious mind… the voice that is coming directly from the subconscious mind… that voice which is the voice of your “conditioning”… that voice is not your voice, it is the voice of “mundane reality”, it is the voice of all the other people who have taught you what you should believe is “real”… that voice is how the mundane world controls your thoughts and actions… that voice is the voice of your karma, it is how your karma (conditioning) controls your life…that voice is the voice of your delusion…that voice is the source of all your dissatisfaction and suffering… when you destroy that voice permanently, your subconscious mind becomes enlightened, and “awakens” as if from a dream, and you “know” and understand “the truth of your existence”… and once you “know”, it is impossible not to “know”…and because now the voice is gone, the conscious mind becomes “empty” and “serenely peaceful”…Note…you get rid of the “voice” by systematically purifying your mind of the mundane conditioning that is creating the voice… it does not matter what method you use to purify the mind, and destroy delusion, that is of no importance… all that is important is that the method works for you…Breathing during meditation… When meditating and observing our breath, we should not control our breath with our conscious mind, but instead let our subconscious mind do our (automatic) breathing for us, then we should be aware that by observing our breath now, that we are observing our subconscious mind taking care of us, and get in sync with it, and then simply let go, and let it “lead the way”… this helps to set up “investigation”, or set up “communication”, and/or “interaction” with the subconscious mind…FIVE STEPS ON THE PATH TO AWAKENINGStep (1)… Concentration (samahdi)…this is developing the ability to temporarily stop the voice in your conscious mind, so that your mind is quiet and peaceful… this is the first step in regaining control of your conscious mind…Step (2)… Getting rid of “anger” (dislike) and “greed” (like)… anger and greed are the two sides of the same coin… understanding that when someone makes you angry or greedy, that they are not only controlling you, but they are also stealing your energy…and then learning how to remain indifferent, so that you no longer respond with anger or greed…You will not be punished for your anger; you will be punished by your anger… (Buddha) Step (3)… Reaching equanimity (“live” and “let live”)… Realizing and accepting that other people have different opinions and beliefs than you, and that their opinions and beliefs are just as valid as yours… a person with equanimity is never sucked into arguments with others, about who is right, and who is wrong…nor do they become upset if they are beset by the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune”…equanimity is a state of psychological stability and composure which is undisturbed by experience of, or exposure to emotions, pain, or other phenomena that may cause others to lose the balance of their mind…Step (4)… Body investigation… understand that you are not a body and personality with a spirit; understand that you are an ancient spirit with a new body and personality…understand that you are not your “body” or your “personality”… understand that you are an ancient immortal “spirit” with a temporary “body” and “personality”, and that you have had an uncountable number of bodies and personalities in the past… understand that the spirit that is you could not “die” even if you wanted it to, and that when your body dies, your spirit is alive in the spirit world, and if you have not attained enlightenment, your spirit reincarnates in another physical body and personality…Step (5)…”The middle path”… the “truth of our existence” is that there is no “reality… everything just “is”, nothing is good or bad… good and bad are just value judgments of mundane reality… and mundane reality is just a survival strategy created by humans to ensure the survival of the species… “the truth of our existence” is that we live in a universe of “cause” and “effect”… consider that in the physical world that if you stick your hand in a fire (the cause), the effect is that your hand will get burned… does that mean that the fire is “bad”, No!... it is just the truth of our existence... in the spiritual world, “intention” is the “cause”, and “karma” is the “effect”… if you intentionally harm another person (cause), you will create “karma”, karma that harms you (effect)… this is the truth of our existence... this is the reason why it is necessary for you to make everything (and everything means everything) “neutral” (middle path, neither good nor bad ) to reach “awakening”… consider a “screwdriver”.., is it good or bad..? No… it is neutral… it is just a useful tool if you want to drive a screw…this is being indifferent, treat everything with this kind of indifference…you must be able to hold this attitude of indifference, long enough for mundane reality to collapse and vanish permanently, to reach awakening… once you reach awakening it is permanent…when you reach awakening, you will “know”… it is impossible not to “know”… ********************************** You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection… (Buddha) Forgive yourself for not being perfect…realize that you are no better or worse than anybody else… be totally honest with yourself, and love yourself… otherwise you will be unable to be honest with others, or love others… accept and forgive yourself just the way you are… if you are unable to calm your mind when you sit down to meditate, forgive yourself for not being perfect and at peace, this takes the stress out of the situation so it is easier to be at peace…offer no resistance to “the way things are”, or you will set up inner conflict… whatever happens “just is”, it is not “good” or “bad”, it is neutral…”be indifferent”, don’t make “value judgments”, just let everything flow past you…you are always “here”, and the time is always “now”… Dawg his last post on the Bums- Report post Posted February 3, 2015 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 bump. Interesting stuff. Apparently I read it 7 years ago, but don't remember it or Dawg. Thought I'd bump it up to give it a more thorough read. Sift it for any gems. Edited March 11, 2020 by thelerner 1 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
