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  • #3560

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Hi Alex,

    As I understand it, the anatta doctrine is not quite the bald assertion that there is no real self (atman) at the basis of our consciousness. The point is that there is no Self, or basic reality which may be grasped, either by direct experience or by concepts. Apparently the Buddha felt that the doctrine of the atman in the Upanishads (which were widely available and studied during his lifetime), lent itself too easily to a fatal minsinterpretation. It became an object of belief, a goal to be reached, something to which mind could cling to as its final abode of safety in the flux of life. The Buddha’s view was that a Self so grasped was no longer the true Self, but only one more of the innumerable forms of maya (illusion). Thus annata may be expressed in the form, “The true Self is non-Self” since any attempt to conceive of the Self, believe in the Self, or seek for the Self immediately thrusts it away.

    The Upanishads distiguish between atman, the true, supra-individual Self, and the jivatman, or individual soul, and the Buddha’s anatman doctrine agrees with them in denying the reality of the latter. It is fundamental to every school of Buddhism that there is no ego, no enduring entity which is the constant subject of our changing experiences. For the ego exists in an abstract sense alone, being an abstraction from memory, like the illusory circle of fire made by a whirling torch. We can, for example, imagine the path of a bird through the sky as a distinct line which it has taken. But this line is as abstract as a line of latitude. In concrete reality, the bird left no line, and, similarly, the past from which our ego is abstracted has entirely disappeared. Thus any attempt to cling to the ego or make it an effective source of action is doomed to frustration.

    Then the second noble truth relates to the cause of frustration which is trishna, clinging or grasping, and the third truth is concerned with the ending of self-frustration, or grasping, and the whole viciously circular pattern of karma which generates the Round. The ending is called nirvana. Nirvana, according to its Sanskrit roots is related to the cessation (nir) of turnings (vritti) of the mind. These turnings are the thoughts by which the mind tries to grasp the world and itself. Nirvana is the way of life which ensues when clutching at life has come to an end. In so far as all definition is clutching, nirvana is necessarily undefinable. It is the natural “un-self-grasped” state of mind, and here of course, the mind has no specific meaning, for what is not grasped is not known in the conventional sense of knowledge. So, to attain nirvana, or awakening is not attainment in any ordinary sense, because no acquisition and no motivation are involved. It is impossible to desire nirvana, or to intend to reach it, for anything conceivable as an object of action is, by definition, not nirvana. Nirvana can only arise unintentionally, sponataneously, when the impossibiity of self-grasping has been thoroughly percieved. A Buddha is someone who has transcended all dualities, whatsoever.

    The non-duality of the mind, in which it is no longer divided against itself is samadhi, and because of the dispappearance of that fruitless threshing around of the mind to grasp itself, samadhi is a state of profound peace… it should be noted that this is not the stillness of total inactivity, for once the mind returns to its natural state, samadhi persists at all times, in “walking, standing, sitting and lying”.

    Hope that helps…peace…Arthur

    • This reply was modified 5 years ago by  bluelotus9.
    • This reply was modified 5 years ago by  bluelotus9.
    • This reply was modified 5 years ago by  bluelotus9.
    #3302

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Thank you all, for your responses. Its not that I personally don’t feel compassion, I do!, but whether it was dependent on being self-aware. I can agree with what Meshe said – “insight informs behaviour- that is what we call compassion. We become unable to act with aggression or seduction towards beings and objects, and this begins to look like love and care as the fetters fall away”. So probably just a matter of definitions – i.e. it looks like compassion, and it is, but a very different origin to what a non-Buddhist would call compassion perhaps.

    It is interesting that my pet dog, Ella, knows when I am feeling low or hurt in someway and will try to give me a lick and a bit of dog tlc..lol. But dogs aren’t supposed to have self-awareness, at least according to wikipedia they fail the ‘mirror test’. I think so far its only been proven for great apes (including humans), a single Asiatic elephant, dolphins, orcas, the Eurasian magpie, and ants by self-recognition when holding a mirror up to them (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_test).

    So assuming this is indeed dog-compassion, and since they are apparently not self-aware, perhaps self-awareness is not necessary for compassion after all!! However, Ella is not so compassionate when she meets some other dogs though..growl…

    • This reply was modified 5 years, 7 months ago by  bluelotus9.
    • This reply was modified 5 years, 7 months ago by  bluelotus9.
    #2577

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Hi,

    As the previous replies suggest, it might be that ‘willpower’ is impairing peripheral awareness. In my experience, the antidote is that the attention should be more awareness on the actual sensations of breathing (wherever that might occur e.g tip of nose etc), rather than rigidly blocking off anything else that may arise (peripheral awareness). As I progress through the meditation, it almost always becomes easier for the attention to maintain on the sensation of breathing (unless dullness intervenes) – the initial effort required for maintaining awareness of the sensation of breathing becomes relatively less effort. The peripheral awareness is a consequence of expansion of consciousness and all sorts of things will arise in awareness – if one maintains breath sensation these slowly subside until you can be aware of them without ‘going to them’ – you can just observe them as passing mind moments, and by golly, there are lots of them. But insights arise here, such as how uncontrolled the mind is, the plethora of things occurring ‘under the surface’ of the mind, the impermanence of the mind moments etc. Eventually as the meditation session progresses, there is a natural quietening of the mind, and ones awareness comes to the forefront in a clearer, more pristine form. This can and will then carry over into life, affecting your behaviour patterns and modifying your life path towards greater insights into yourself.

    At least thats my take on the issue – metta, Bluelotus9

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 1 month ago by  bluelotus9.
    • This reply was modified 6 years, 1 month ago by  bluelotus9.
    #2576

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Hi,

    In my experience, moments of dullness always arise as a result of lapses of attentional awareness on the sensation of the breath – for me this usually occurs due to physical or mental tiredness. It is much easier to avoid dullness if the mind and body is ‘fresh’ i.e. for me, first thing in the morning (or in the book, Culadasa provides several techniques graded in severity for addressing such dullness). The dullness manifests as nonsensical short dream sequences and visual imagery – these are the moments of dullness which occur when I let go of the effort required to maintain attention on the breath, and I consider these to be unconscious moments – sometimes I can recall the visual imagery and sometimes not, but they are always due to a lack of attention (i.e unconsciousness). One might say that these moments of unconsciousness or dullness are still consciousness, and that is true, but here the major point of the meditation is to train the attention on the breathing sensation, and this requires energy, which in Therevada buddhism is one of the seven factors of enlightenment. At least that is my take on the matter – hope it helps…

    Metta, Bluelotus9

    #2041

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Hi,

    Yes, maybe they are not piti or directly related to meditation; having said that, I wondered whether there was any reference to lucid dreaming or OOBE’s by the Buddha or in any sutta’s. I looked online and there are references to a dream body in the Samaññaphala Sutta:-

    “With his mind thus concentrated, purified, and bright, unblemished, free from defects, pliant, malleable, steady, and attained to imperturbability, he directs and inclines it to creating a mind-made body. From this body he creates another body, endowed with form, made of the mind, complete in all its parts, not inferior in its faculties. Just as if a man were to draw a reed from its sheath. The thought would occur to him: ‘This is the sheath, this is the reed. The sheath is one thing, the reed another, but the reed has been drawn out from the sheath.’ Or as if a man were to draw a sword from its scabbard. The thought would occur to him: ‘This is the sword, this is the scabbard. The sword is one thing, the scabbard another, but the sword has been drawn out from the scabbard.’ Or as if a man were to pull a snake out from its slough. The thought would occur to him: ‘This is the snake, this is the slough. The snake is one thing, the slough another, but the snake has been pulled out from the slough.’ In the same way — with his mind thus concentrated, purified, and bright, unblemished, free from defects, pliant, malleable, steady, and attained to imperturbability, the monk directs and inclines it to creating a mind-made body. From this body he creates another body, endowed with form, made of the mind, complete in all its parts, not inferior in its faculties.This, too, great king, is a fruit of the contemplative life, visible here and now, more excellent than the previous ones and more sublime.

    This is described alongside other ‘fruits of the contemplative life’ such as recall of past lifes etc in the above sutta and can be found at http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/dn/dn.02.0.than.html. The final section of the sutta refers to the ending of mental formations or ‘fermentations’, so the dream body could perhaps be seen as one of these and the formation of a dream body considered as one of the ‘flowers along the way’, and one should not become distracted by such phenomena, and remain on the path.

    #2016

    bluelotus9
    Member

    Hello, I have also had numerous lucid dreams and so-called OOBE’s. I am in my 50’s and began inducing OOBE’s when I was a teenager in the 70’s after reading Rampa’s books – this was before I ‘got into’ proper Buddhism, I was only living in a small town in Yorkshire, so at the time access to Buddhist literature and groups was virtually non-existent. I also read Robert Monroe’s books such as Journeys Out of the Body & later got into hemi-sync. Since then I have had too many lucids & OOBE’s to count. I have experienced the so called ‘vibrations’ that precede the experience on many occasions. After starting a Samatha practice, many years ago now, I mentioned the vibes & lucid dreams to my teacher at the time, and he said, just lie there and experience the vibrations, and don’t go OOBE, (or shift the focus of consciousness if you prefer). When I did that, I just lay there in a deep state and eventually the vibrations subsided and I woke up – my teacher considered it to be piti. My feeling towards lucids now is that they are much the same as ‘reality’, with a consciousness experiencing them. Of course you can perform physics-defying feats and gratify any old desire, but I came to realise that really, apart from being able to perform such feats, the consciousness is more or less experiencing the dream in the same way it experiences the waking state. However, having said that, on very rare occasions, I have asked to be shown the true nature of reality, and a very bright light appears in the distance, or just in front of me. On one occasion, after helping someone get out of a fight in a lucid dream, and explaining to them that it was just a dream and they were ok, I was given a backbone or chain made of metal by what I took to be a Dakini, then she took me and we flew across valleys and fields and woods and then I found myself ‘flying’ through a living, vibrant blue sky with an opera playing around me which changed depending on how I moved my dream body and I arrived at the verge of a spiral galaxy of intense bright light. Emanating from the central light was the most incredibly powerful feeling of love and kindness or compassion I have literally ever experienced and my understanding was that I would pass into this ‘post-mortem’. My teachers take on these experiences was that they were basically jhanic experiences, however, I do think about that experience a lot, but it has never been repeated since then. I now think that sticking with meditating and working in the physical waking state is the way to go though, as the dreaming states are too unstable and unreliable, at least for me…

    • This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by  bluelotus9.
    • This reply was modified 6 years, 9 months ago by  bluelotus9.
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