Common Sense & the Excitement of Life

(symbol representing the Eightfold Path)

I am acquainted with the Eightfold Path from a perspective of using it for a time to re-make my life after alcoholism nearly ended it. From that viewpoint, the Eightfold Path is simply common sense. I can find no fault in the Path except one: where's the excitement of life?

What sense is it to become corporeal, and suffer in this material existence if not to experience the thrills, the joys, the agonies of life? Humans are all about exploring limits, not walking the middle way. The middle way is for herd animals. The extremes are for humans, for explorers, for wanderers.

Imagine a see-saw. The middle point where the board rocks upon the fulcrum is a boring ride, indeed. But out on the ends of the board -- well, that's another matter entirely! Out on the end, staring over the precipice, a moment away from free-fall -- that's where humans belong. And the Eightfold Path can go there also. It helps make sure the excitement doesn't turn into hysteria, disaster and death. Right Intention, y'know.

If one ponders a moment on the subject, one can see that the Eightfold Path weaves in through every aspect of human life -- even out on the edge. It has to, else it would not be a true wisdom.

Life is to be lived. Life is to be enjoyed. Life is transient. If one looks closely one can see it in the Eightfold Path. There is a time and place for excitement, as well as for serenity.

(see-saw animation from CurriculumAnimation)

The Noble Eightfold Path

The Noble Eightfold Path is the way to end suffering.

It is the path that, if followed correctly, will lead to peace.

It is broken down into 3 different categories: Wisdom, Ethical Conduct and Mental Development.

Under Wisdom falls Right View and Right Intention. To have "Right View" is to realize that suffering does, in fact, exist and everyone has to go through some form of suffering to reach peace. Once you have Right View, you will have right thoughts and actions. With Right View, you will "see and understand things as they truly are".

Right Intention is a "commitment to ethical and mental self-improvement". There are 3 types of right intentions: resisting your desires, resisting anger and developing compassion, not hate.

Under Ethical Conduct falls Speech, Action and Livelihood. Right Speech is knowing when to speak and what to speak. Don't lie, don't blackmail, don't use hurtful words and refrain from conversations that don't have a purpose. An example of this would be John's experience where you couldn't speak unless you first thought about what you were saying and if it was necessary.

Right Action is acting in a kind, respectful way that will not hurt anyone. Right Livelihood is living with good morals and gaining wealth "legally and peacefully". Right Livelihood is living in a way that does not violate Right Speech and Right Action.

Right Effort, Right Mindfullness and Right Concentration all fall under the Mental Development category. Right Effort is essential in the Eightfold Path because without it, you wouldn't have the drive to get you where you need to be. Once you acheive the right state of mind and see things as they really are (Right Mindfullness), you will be on your way to peace. Right Concentration also contributes to this category. Find a way to focus all of your mind's energy on one thing, whether it be through meditation or any other kind of spiritual or non-spiritual discipline.

Following these steps will eventually lead you in the direction of peace.

pic: wordpress.com

The Eight Fold Path: A Thread within the Great Tapestry Known as Religion

The Eight-fold Path, as with a lot of religious guidelines is purported as being the right doctrine on how one should live in order to be good and pure. I had similar problems with this, as well as the Four Noble Truths.

The problem really started before I even read the words. In class, the idea of what is "right" and what is "wrong". This was the main problem I had with it. The path deals in absolutes and those who deal in them, tend to be stiff and unyielding. The version of the Tao Te Ching that I have states that "…whoever is stiff and inflexible is a disciple of death. Whoever is soft and yielding is a disciple of life." This came from tidbit #76.

The eight fold path consists of:

1. Right View (Wisdom)

2. Right Intention (Wisdom)

3. Right Speech (Ethical Conduct)

4. Right Action (Ethical Conduct)

5. Right Livelihood (Ethical Conduct)

6. Right Effort (Mental Development)

7. Right Mindfulness (Mental Development)

8. Right Concentration (Mental Development)

The first two are the only ones I really, truly agree with. However, with analysis they become just a psychological analysis of the human thought process and how to fix it.

It went down hill from there, because as the philosophy turned slowly into religious guidance and absolutes.

Number 3 basically means don't be deceitful, slanderous, or make idle speech.

Number 4 means be nice and good to people

Number 5 means live for and work towards or during a life of kindness.

Finally I just gave up. If I was going to be told how to live, act, think, I would just follow the hard way. And all I have to do for that is jump off a cliff and "sample .

The Four Noble Truths

To me this chapter spoke a great deal about the worth of our materialistic lifestyles. Suffering is everything, it is all around us, and it is only natural for people to try and feel better. In our culture, people use things they can buy at the store or from a website catalog, and some of it really does makes us feel better (we've all had a meal that really hit the spot). The trouble is that because in our world everything does decay and change and fall apart, there is no way to find an eternal happiness from concrete things. I think this chapter highlights the idea that there is no way to find eternal happiness in the items we find here on earth, regardless of the temporary relief, and that in order to find fulfillment we must think above ourselves.

The Eightfold Path

So i am just going to dive into it.
This writing on the four Noble Truths I actually did not like I thought this translation was just there..repeditive..noble but just there. Though in this case I don't think it to be of that much importance if the author did a good job or not on translating the idea into three pages. Looking past that with an idea from past readings I see what is being said, the idea, the humble path of suffering and I can digg it..I do appriciate it.

The reading deals a lot with the belief that "life is suffering" from beginning to the point where one reaches enlightenment. Those who are often blind to the truth is suffering. I think we all reach a time where the truth is blinding, most likely on more than one occasion. Though I do not think this aspect to be suffering, I think it is a form of superficial suffering which essentially is material suffering. when one blocks or lacks the ability to see the truth I think it is a unconscious to conscience defense. Granted some aspects such as religion are a lot harder to cut through the bullshit and know the truth, but with simple life situations I think it is more a defense we use. One could say that this is averting to only seeing the pleasurable.
The dust over one eye is i think a metaphor of dust being the blind. I think what was being said there is that we must wipe our eyes of the dust, that the experience of suffering is a path one must walk and endure to learn from themselves and others. I guess one should not be afraid to suffer its a part of life that naturally happen.
"Yet those whose eyes are only a little covered with dust: they will understand the truth."

I would agree with the middle path of the "perfect one" between two extremes, one being to give oneself us to indulgence in sensual pleasure, or to give oneself up to self-mortification. At times I think its calming to deal with the suffering, by dealing with it, with nurture and flow...things will happen that one must deal with, correct, or involve... I see it as an experience a way to evolve oneself...as it is said in the text. I just think that it can be a lot more bearable then actually being infected with pain and suffering.

Ae they the four noble truths?

I am not sure what to think about this chapter or Eastern Philosophy as of yet. So far all I have seen is that is all about removing yourself from the thing that make you happy and give you pleasure. Why would I give up my present life which I am happy and satisfied with in order to pursue a happiness in which there will be much struggle getting to? I can see some of the points this reading is trying to make, but I do not feel connected to them in a way others might. I enjoy using my senses they all work together in a great harmony in order to create pleasure. Why would I have these senses if I as not supposed to use them? It does not make senses to me. I will keep trying to read with an open mind and looking though a different looking glass.

The Four Noble Truths

From this passaged I noticed a lot more things the more I thought about what it said. The thing that really got my attention was on page 41 when it says
"the Peaceful One, freed from rage, from sorrow, and from longing, has passed beyond birth and decay. This I call neither arising, nor passing away, neither standing still, nor being born, nor dying. There is neither foothold, nor developement, nor any basis. This is the end suffering."

I noticed that there were a lot of complimentary things mentioned. Such as arising-passing away, born-dying, rage-sorrow-longing, etc but there was none for standing still. This got me thinking. Does this mean that we keep moving and experiencing life in the now? Like in meditation were thoughts flicker in and then are gone or the reflection of a cloud on the lake of how you see it but when its gone there is no trace of it ever being there. So to go with the theory that we are not real but our experiences are real in the fact that we can only experience the now. Does this mean that for that split second what we experience is real and then turns into nothing like us? That the now arising is the future and the passig is the past and if we get rid of those by not thinking about or dwelling about them and live in the now then we can truly have no suffering. Same goes for longing and sorrow. You only long for something you want that is in the future and you only get sorrow on those things that you dwell upon in the past. So if you give up those then you can reach the Peaceful One and therefore have neither death nor birth for everything is a cycle and you can only experince the now and since the now has no past nor future then death and birth can't exist like us. Plus if you only experince the now and do not long for something you can't be dissapointed and therfore there will be no more suffering. You must expose yourself to the now in order to experience it and be rid of suffering. For if you long for something you create layers and if you dwell in the past you create layers but if you live in the now and only the now you will have no layers. You may experience death for a second in the now but then it is no more it was just an acknowledgement.

Do not fear death, and do not be afraid to Suffer

In order to live we must suffer. Suffering is a part of life. For wanting things and longing for things we suffer. However, those things that we want for we may not need and those things that we think we need, we probably do not; and yet still we suffer longing. Without craving we are at peace at a state of Nirvana, but to be able to want for nothing... does that truly create a contented man, or is it merely an illusion? Human's want, they crave, what they do not have. In order to achieve Nirvana these feelings must be cast aside, but in doing so are we casting aside a part of ourselves; a part of our beings? This also brings up the question of what is self? How do you know that you are truly yourself?
There is no self. This is a concept that the ways of Taoism try to teach us. If we can free ourselves from attachment, and desire then we will truly be pure and free. This kind of freedom will not bring happiness to all though. There must also be acceptance. Acceptance of death is a big one. There is no cure for death. In the Four Noble Truth's, the woman, Gotami, found this out as she went around trying to find medicine for her dead son. There is no medicine for the dead but he was driven so mad with grief that she tried to seek some out. She soon learned that death comes to everyone eventually and she learned to accept that. No one can escape death. It just comes to you when your time is up, the important thing is not to fear it, though. Because in acceptance of something that is beyond your control you will be free.

No Self and No suffering: does one lead to the other?

So after reading these two writings I got the feeling they were related. No-Self pretty much lays it down in clear words, there is no self in your material body or material world. If we grasp this it "conduces to his welfare and happiness" So by giving up our idea of self we can avoid suffering. The Four Noble truths also address suffering, lableing what it is, where is comes from, how it can stopped and the path to get there. Basically when we give up the phsyical sensations of the body that we have cravings for we can escape the suffering. I beleive this relates to no self because if we are not actively expirienceing ups and downs of life, Like the Middle Path to Extinction of Suffering, we can be more whole. Now do I beleive this? absolutely not. But I see where the Teachings of the Buddha are pointing and what followers of this train of thought subsribe to.

Noble Truth of Suffering

The thing that caught my eye was the short paragraph in the beginning of the chapter. It explained that almost everything, if not everything, as composed of suffering. For the most part I agree with this but I don't believe that everything is composed of suffering. If that were the case then there wouldn't be a point in living. You care for people, and when they die you suffer because of that connection you had with them. This is what I think of the paragraph: everything that is good will eventually come back and bite you in the ass. But its the good part that is worth the suffering in the end. Having friends, a significant other and sharing the good times with them, to me, are worth the pain that you feel in the end.
I may be on the wrong track with this but that's who I perceived this part.

Suffering

I won't lie, when I first started reading "4 Noble Truths", I had no idea what was going on. I went back and read it again, trying to really understand and grasp the ideas.

The 4 noble truths all relate to each other: the noble truth of suffering, the noble truth of the origin of suffering, the noble truth of the extinction of suffering, and the noble truth of the path that leads to the extinction of suffering.

The noble truth of suffering pretty much means anything that makes us miserable... not getting what we want, feeling pain & sorrow.. etc.

The noble truth of the origin of suffering explains how suffering, in one way or another, is caused by attachment. We all want these "delightful & pleasurable things", but what we don't know is that we're really setting our selves up for suffering. These things can be smells, tastes, sights, sounds or visual things.

The noble truth of the extinction of suffering is finding a way to detach ourselves from what we want and desire. It is an "extinction" of the craving to want these things. The book states that once there is no more greed or hate, we will find Nirvana, or peace.

The noble truth of the path that leads to the extinction of suffering is simply "The Middle Path". The Middle Path is a road between 2 extremes, which eventually leads to Nirvana. This road "makes one both see and know, which leads to peace".

The Noble Eightfold path is "The Middle Path". If you follow the Noble Eightfold path, you will end suffering.

Pic-my own. central park, nyc

The Four Noble Truths

I found this chapter to be very humbling I guess is how I would put it. The part that has really stuck out in my mind is about death and how it is unavoidable to anyone and that it does not just effect one person. Even though this is true we humans are always trying to find ways to keep ourselves alive as long as we possibly can to delay the inevitable. When I was younger I used to fear death and it scared me to think that I could die at anytime and wondered if anyone would have cared. I soon realized that death was nothing to fear and that it was just a natural part of life and people do mourn death, and I guess it took longer for me to come to an actually understanding of death was not until the end of my senior year of high school when a friend of mine died in a car accident that I truly saw that death is not just an end but a beginning as well. And that suffering is a part of healing and to truly accept the passing of someone you must mourn them in your own way and go through the suffering for that is what makes you stronger.

I also like how this chapter talks about having to give up our worldly possessions and that its not what we own that makes us great it's what inside that really counts. In today's world you see so many people that just want want want and are never happy with what they have and are never content. And then there are the people who have nothing and want nothing and are the most content and sincere people on the planet. I think it just goes to show that in our society most people view your worth by the things you own and not what is in your heart and to me that is what is most important.

I think that maybe if more people could read the four noble truths and actually take what it says to heart that they would be more understanding of their fellow man and that the world might be a more pleasant place and we all might get along better and love one another and be a better nation for it.

The understanding I extract from 'The Four Noble Truths'

The Four Noble Truths made me do alot of thinking. As a reader, this passage made a lot of sense to me, but although I understand I am not easily able to explain my thoughts. But I will try my best to convey what I took to heart.

This passage dealt alot with suffering, and I understood this to be the pain of real life. I know that I find simple pleasures in things, but I never forget that life can hold pain. Those who avert themselves from the truth in things by only seeing the pleasure in life blind themselves to the whole truth. Life is not all pleasure, and by ignoring the sister of pleasure, which is pain, you encase yourself in blinders. This was emphasized to me by, " Eyes are only a little covered with dust". The message I take from this is ' Do not be blinded by your aversion to pain, accept it all in order to see the truth in things'.

The second resonating idea of this passage to me dealt with the extinction of suffering. It was a little more difficult to comprehend because in order to rid yourself of suffering, you must give up overheated petty human emotions and attatchments. Being recklessly emotional human beings, it is hard to imagine ridding ourselves of things like jealousy, or material attatchment to unimportant things. Though I see the sense in this thinking. Escaping the suffering in life begins with going beyond futile human emotions that fog our minds and control our actions. By releasing ourselves from needs beyond basic needs, and useless emotions beyond those necessary for basic human expression we can free ourselves from suffering. This is beginning of the path to freedom, and leads the way on the quest to nirvana.

My version of the hard way

Hard way reminded me of a philosophy that I have. My philosophy is that what does not kill you will only make you stronger. In my thought it is that when you live through an experience that is extremely hard for you to do, it raises the bar on how tough you are. This applies to not only physical but mental too, along with other things as well. When you accomplish a feat that you thought previously as unbeatable you are exposed to a new world. You are now able to attempt thing that you never would have tried before. You can hear others whining about what they are doing and you can say to yourself that you have been through a similar stage like that and they may enlighten like you in the future. The only way to get to that place is by doing it “The Hard Way”.

The Four Noble Truths: Buddhist Self-Help?

The passage about the four noble truths seemed to be all about suffering. What I got out of it is that all of life is suffering, and, to get rid of suffering, is to reach enlightenment. I think you need to suffer through life, though. I think you learn the best/most as you suffer.

The four noble truths seem to me like some sort of medical treatment plan. You have an illness (how you are suffering), a cause (why you are suffering), a cure (the fact you can abandon this suffering), and a medicine (how you are going to reach the cure--the Eightfold Path). It seems like the Buddhists are saying that you hold the cause and the cure of your own suffering; you create it, and you can escape it. It kind of sounds like an ancient self-help book.

Let's take death as an example. Let's say that your mother died last week. You are sad, maybe angry. You can't get through daily struggles because of all this sadness. You are suffering.

The Illness: Your suffering is your sadness over your mother's untimely death. You can't move on. Everyone lives and dies. According to the Buddhists, you can't hold onto people/things forever because every thing passes on.

The Cause: Your suffering is coming from your attachment to your mother. Yes, she is/was dear to you, but the Buddhist say to let go. Only with this detachment, can your suffering end, but it's not an easy task.

The Cure: Detatch from your mother.

The Medicine: The Eightfold Path. (Which kind of remind me of the 10 Commandments)

1. Right Understanding-->Understand that things are as they are. Understand that people die. Understand that life is imperfect, and that you can't cling to things all the time.

2. Right Thought-->Not to be angry at your mother for dying or to blame anyone. To think only of what she taught you, and what you can take from that, but you need to let go.

3. Right Speech-->Tell the truth and speak kindly.

4. Right Action-->Refrain from wrong and destructive actions.

5. Right Livelihood-->Do things in a righteous way.

6. Right Effort-->Nothing can be achieved without effort, but it shouldn't be misguided. Have effort in good things (i.e. kindness, love, family) and not bad (i.e. murder, stealing, anger).

7. Right Mindfulness-->Control your thoughts to good.

8. Right Concentration-->Concentrate all thoughts and actions on good.



Apparently, if you follow these steps, you can get over any sort of suffering imaginable.
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On a side-note, I found this speech by the Dalai Lama to be relevant and interesting:

The 4 Noble Truths

It sounds like the point of this teaching is to deny your senses. That's my first reaction. Craving is said to be the key to suffering. And this craving comes from the use of our senses-which can result in pleasure. A desire to be satisfied through pleasure is craving. So how do we overcome such cravings? By choosing to deny them? By realizing that they are traps? But then balance is mentioned. So are we not truly overcoming those desires, but instead merely learning to not make them our number 1 focus?
I think I agree that if someone can become completely devoid of desires such as the longing to please the self and others, then that person won't be shaken very easily by anything threatening or other that they across in life. The problem I see with this method is that we are still relying on ourselves as the ones to perform the change...and I'm not sure that it is possible for us to completely overcome all of our desires on our own.

On page 41+42 "To give oneself up to indulgence in sensual pleasure, the base, common, vulgar, unholy, unprofitable; or to give oneself up to self-mortification the painful, unholy, unprofitable: both these two extremes, the Perfect One has avoided, and has found out the middle path, which makes one both see and know, which leads to peace, to discernment, to Nirvana." What is the distinction between the two paths here? I thought that he was describing a giving in to our physical and emotional desires through the use of our senses as being a "craving trap"... And if that was an extreme then I would assume that the other extreme would be to completely deny your senses, and give no response to anyone or thing, to have no desire to live. But the two options that he points out seem to be similar. Am I missing something?

An Experiment in Turning A Simple Thing Into Many Difficult Things

I am without the book, but since the teachings of the Buddha are free to everyone, and easily accessible . . . I'll wing it.

(photo "The Four Noble Truths" from: The Friends of the Western Buddhist Order )

The Four Noble Truths. It's a shame there is not, and has not been, a universal human language, for even in the translation of these four simple sentences there are vast chasms of murkiness about which words to use. But then, the situation of not having a universal language highlights just how pervasive a truth the first Noble Truth is.

I am not going to use this translation from 4Truths.com:

1) THE EXISTENCE OF IMPERMANENCE "Dukkha"
2) THE ARISING OF SUFFERING BECAUSE OF CRAVING "Samudaya"
3) THE CESSATION OF SUFFERING "Nirodha"
4) THE MIDDLE WAY, or THE NOBLE EIGHTFOLD PATH "Magga"

I am going to use this translation from BuddhaWeb:

Four Noble Truths
1. Suffering exists
2. Suffering arises from attachment to desires
3. Suffering ceases when attachment to desire ceases
4. Freedom from suffering is possible by practicing the Eightfold Path

Simple and to the point. It correctly highlights the one part of life every living thing would like to do without: suffering. The first truth is noble because it is honest. The second truth is noble because it is insightful. The third truth is noble because it is a promise. The fourth truth is noble because it is the answer.

What is the Eightfold Path? According to BuddhaWeb, which is basically the same translation I am familiar with, the path to freedom from suffering is: right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right contemplation.

Ah, but what is right? This second part, though simple, is not easy. Not easy at all. Not even easy to define. What is right? Well, things get murky at this point:

Three Characteristics of Existence

1. Transiency (anicca)
2. Sorrow (dukkha)
3. Selflessness (anatta)

Five Hindrances

1. Sensuous lust
2. Aversion and ill will
3. Sloth and torpor
4. Restlessness and worry
5. Skeptical doubt

Seven Factors of Enlightenment

1. Mindfulness
2. Investigation
3. Energy
4. Rapture
5. Tranquility
6. Concentration
7. Equanimity

. . . and then there's the Four Reliances . . . and it keeps on going like the energizer bunny to the Four Immeasurable Prayers, the Six Perfections, the Eight Auspicious Symbols, . . . and more. Hmm . . . talk about your ten thousand things . . .

The Middle Path

(Photo: My own, taken in Patan, Kathmandu. This is the Temple of One Thousand Buddhas. How's that for the thousand things?)

Before I read the section on the Four Noble Truths, I took a second to think about what those truths might be; I figured they would be along the lines of compassion, truthfulness, unattachment, etc; therefore, I was a little startled to see that each of the Noble Truths pertained directly to suffering. I think this perception I had hearkens back to our conversation last class, where John was talking about how damned cute Buddhist Monks typically are. It's easy to get caught up in the warm, happy, golden-lit side of Buddhism and forget about the negative things Buddhism addresses. Buddhists are, after all, human--since suffering is a huge part of the human condition, I shouldn't have been surprised to see it addressed so directly.

I've had the opportunity to work with a monk named Lama Tenzin a couple times, and one of the things he said that has stuck with me most strongly was this:

"If a butterfly lands in your hand and you try to hold onto it, you will crush and kill it; if you turn your hand upwards, however, the butterfly may linger. Learn to enjoy things while they last and allow them to pass in their time; if you spend all your time and will on making a good thing stay, you will distroy it. Allow things to happen naturally."

Not being gifted with eidetic memory, I'm paraphrasing here, but you get the gist. In Buddhist philosophy, as I understand it, all suffering is derived from desire. In our reading, this was called "craving" in the second Noble Truth; the want of "visual objects, sounds, smells, tastes, bodily impressions, and mind objects" that are "delightful and pleasurable" (page 39). But how is it possible to not want anything? To not want food, water, mental stimulation? It's a natural function of living, isn't it? That's why we have a class for Exibit Enrichment and Design here, because animals need stimulation to maintain mental health. So if it's so important, why does the Buddha teach against these desires?

This, I think, is the Middle Path that is mentioned a little later in the reading. If you poke around a bit more in this book, you'll find more mentions of the Middle Path. The overwhelming desire of input (be it food, objects, or other forms of stimulation) is never a good thing. We find this principle in Christianity as well--Thou shalt not covet, thou shalt not indulge in gluttony, etc). While the complete nondesire of anything may be ideal, it is probably impossible to attain; Somewhere between these two extremes lies the Middle Path. A lot of what we've talked about in class ties into this...remember John's class that did the no-talking trips, and how they discovered how little really needs to be said? Complete silence wasn't dictated, but language wasn't superfluous either. That was perhaps a Middle Road.

I think the trick is to learn how to truly appreciate a good thing when it happens to you, without missing it when it's gone. If we could really love what we have, we wouldn't spend so much time looking for what we don't. It's hard; taking the bad with the good and not missing what's past is about the hardest lesson to learn as far as I can tell. But as I said before: In all things, balance.

The Four Noble Truths

Despite that many have claimed their separations, East and West have common threads both in philosophical and religious circumstances. The Four Noble Truths follows the same guideline format that other religions use such as the Ten Commandments or the Five Pillars of Islam. Other themes I found within that particular piece were other religious themes such as deliverance, purity, The Peaceful One, and the Holy life.

Within my personal experience, such ideas such as purity, one true being, the true path etc. are simply unnecessary and distracting. The hard way stated that following one or another organization's form of the way/the proper way to live/the simple way to live isn't the "Hard way". The Hard Way is life itself. The Hard Way is the crevasse beside the cliff and the cliff represents those organizations or ways of thinking that can, and often do prevent us from fully experiencing life as it occurs. We are afraid to sample the edge, sample the great vastness that occurs within our universe, our worlds, our thoughts. It is that fear that keeps us from revealing our true selves and our true intentions.

In summary, I feel that this piece represents the ideas of religion and religious philosophy and provides a guideline as to the proper way one should live their lives and the distractions that will keep them from this path. I also feel that the methods and the message Trungpa's "The Hard Way"suggest can apply better to our own lives and understand how to live in a way that is true and positive to one's outlook upon life.

The Hard Way

When I first read this passage I was really confused. It took me a couple times of reading it before I actually started to understand some of it. The questions and answers that were at the end also helped me a lot in this reading. The first question I wanted to address was on page 252.
Q. If the truly hard way is to expose myself, then should I allow myself to be exposed to what I judge to be evil, knowing I might get hurt?

I agree with the answer to this question. That if we go out of our way looking for “evil” then we are merely doing it for something in return like boosting our ego or to claim a title of hero. Which is not the true way of the hard way because the true way is when you face your “evil” but expect nothing in return and you have no fear of what could happen to yourself or your ego. You face it because you have to because it is a way of life not because you choose to. Plus once you get rid of your self preservation or ego you can truly be yourself you wont let anything bother you and when a problem or “evil” crosses your path and your forced to face it, since you are no longer afraid of protecting your ego (what people think of you) then you can see what would truly be the right way to face this problem.
This ties into the second question I’m going to address on page 252 and 253.
Q. When you feel angry, should you just express that anger in order to open?

Again I would have to agree with this answer that if you were to physically express your anger by hitting someone then you are following the false hard way by defending your ego and therefore can not truly see the right way to deal with your anger. In fact if you think about it. It actually takes more discipline and is harder to control your anger then it does to express it openly by throwing or hitting stuff. If you approach it in a calmer manner and are no longer worrying about your ego then you can take the more skillful and creative action road than the clumsy and unskilled road of hitting someone. It’s kind of like what my mom told me when I was younger. If someone insults you, no matter how horrible it is, they are looking for a reaction/retaliation back so instead of giving them what they want by getting angry/aggressive and being defensive just simply say thank you or give them a complement and be on your way. You will leave them speechless because A. they never expected it and B. you didn‘t give in to what they wanted you to do. You remained true to yourself and didn’t let others influence/get the best of you. This also can tie into other emotions as well because if you let them overwhelm you, you won’t see the whole entire picture but if you keep them in check and under control then you can decide which decision is best. Another case is if you have two friends and they ask you who is right instead of taking one side it is best to try and find a compromise for both of them in the middle. Same goes for yourself if you get into an argument or situation that seems like its going one way or another instead of getting worked up and sticking to just your side you can try to compromise instead and possibly have a better out come in the long run.

Open your mind and your heart

'If you open your mind, if you are willing to meet, the the teacher opens his mind as well. It is not a question of magic, the condition of openness is a mutual creation'. Openness is a common theme throughout this chapter, referring to the openness of your thoughts, and the openness of yourself. Being open and allowing the you that is wholly you, and the beauty of self to shine through, without interference from other ideas or people.
Spiritual understanding is not about assuming someone is going to take care of you, nor is it found by putting stock in something because you believe if you put your belief or faith in it, the organization or, whatever your belief, is going to lead and take care of you. In order to reach an understanding, you must make your way there. To be a wisdom keeper, to reach a path that leads you to what could be considered enlightenment, requires a sacrifice on your part. This reading emphasizes that this enlightenment is not just a following of one way, or placing stock in one particular group of ideas, it is understanding and accepting oneself in order to reach understanding and acceptance of greater ideas and truths prevalent to life. The chapter explains to me at least, that there is no magic way, no particular set path for each person to take in order to gain enlightenment. It is not instantaneous, or easily set upon. It is a path set by a person learned through teachings and applied in a personal way. Being true to oneself, and allowing oneself to be open allows for the understanding of these teachings in a way that forcing yourself to understanding or enlightenment does not allow for. This enlightenment just is, and by accepting it just as it comes, and not raising it beyond what it truly is, one comes to true enlightenment and spiritual understanding/liberation. Personal sacrifice in order to understand and perceive is necessary but in doing so there is not some great goal to be reached by letting go of our preconceived notions. What we 'receive' in the end, enlightenment or not,whatever you may call this experience, it just is. This sacrifice is learning to go beyond oneself on the path to understanding, and finally seeing oneself for who and what we truly are. This is a deep and sometimes emotional change because our society deems it necessary to veil who we truly are in order to fit stigmas or ideas. Being true to oneself is the greatest, and most difficult thing one can do, and it is necessary to do in order to examine beliefs and make it to enlightenment and understanding. Naked inside and out, bare to the world and this makes us uncomfortable. With things to hide behind we are easily able to follow ideas put forth by others, and try not to fall into the uncomfortable realm of self actualization. Though this self actualization is the way to a greater spiritual understanding and a step on the road to enlightenment.
This is how I perceived this chapter, and the way that I took it to heart.

It's really HARD to do things this way

In order to walk an enlightened path you must go the "Hard Way." But what are they really asking you to do. It seems that in order to walk a spiritual path one must first expose themselves completely and for many peopel this is a very difficult thing to do. In modern Western Society people have learned t obottle there emotions and keep many of their feelings to themselves. Some people find this unhealthy, while others find it normal. The truth of the matter is that it takes a lot of trust to open yourself up to someone. It takes infinetely more courage to expose yourself to someone that you have just met. This is becasue it puts us in a feeling of vulnerability, that you must let someone see every fault and every flaw that you have and leave it out there exposed.
It is a very difficult thing to do, but it is necessary to see the spiritual path. This is why most people do not follow the path of the tao, however once you start following the path you are comitted to seeing it through to completion. Everyone wants an easy way out, everyone wants a list of what to do, but that is not how you can achieve spirituality. You must be able to make your own way instead of blindly following the instructions of others. It takes a lot more thought and time than most people are willing to give, but in order to achieve enlightenment you must be able to stand on your own two feet.

The Path Less Traveled

It can sometimes become very difficult to understand things when you read them. With this reading I found myself enjoying it and getting the gist of what was being said, however then I began to become confused and even disagree with what I thought was being presented.

I came to realize that this section "the hard way" was more a metaphor and disclaimer than it was anyhing else. It says basically "Nothing is Ever Easy"(TG) , and that sometimes the most difficult thing to do is be accepting of the way things are, whether its a truth about yourself, the fact that someone you know has just died or even that you in all your imperfect perfection at your very core and being could be just like everyone else. There is a saying that states you can not dislike or like something about yourself without liking or disliking those same qualities about yourself. This relates to the stripping yourself down to the core and being vulnerable, because perhaps you didn't realize the things you dislike most in others were things that whether you meant to or metaphorically have and show. This section seemed to be saying that this way is not for the faint of heart, its not all happy and spoon fed, and that the only way to follow this path is to have someone impartial and unbiased to help you get to that place of "nakedness" to the universe.

Tough stuff.

http://www.sixthman.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/dm1810one-tough-cookie-posters.jpg

Hard way

Ive got mixed feeling about this reading. I agree with his depection of expirienceing the hard way is going to be painful and hard, but that is definelty life. Things never go easy for you and in Trunpas words "it is an extremely narrow path with no escape, a painful path" I dont know if Im just in a pessimistic mood today but as I was reading that I had to agree that to think life is going to be otherwise is foolish hope. If we are going to get to the end of it we are going to be embarresed,shot down and dejected, but no one promised it was going to be easy. But what I noticed in the writing was that there didnt seem to be much enjoyment or even satsifaction in the hard way. That is where I differ from Trungpa,now I might be interpreting him wrong, but I think that despite all the hardships in life there can be some fullfll in life by oversoming the hardships that are thrown our way

Trungpas alright with me

This was definetly my favorite piece we have had to read so far becasue it really corresponds to my own beleifs. I understood and fully agreed with his argument in the beginning about westerners thinking they have to give up their worldly possessions and become strict followers and perhaps move to Nepal just to look the part of "enlightened". "we think our path is spiritual because it is literally against the flow of what we used to be, but this is merely the way of false heriosm" I couldnt help but think about all the Birkenstock clad yuppies sitting in coffee houses in Burlington just eating up all types of Buddhist writing thinking to themselves of how clever they are that they gave up their selfish western ways and are now examples of how enlightened one can be. The hard way to them is this change of culture that they are now undertaking but that is really not the Hard Way at all. I did have a tough time figuring out the part about the strange doctor, slowly operating with no anaesthetic. I beleive it was about how difficult the hard way is but it sounded pretty extreme.

The Hard Way

We think we know dedication we think we know how to discipline our selves and we think we know what giving is but do we really know? Can we really say that when we give and do not expect anything in return that we really don't want anything in return?

I would say no because even if you given and receive nothing in return once you tell someone about what you did they might praise you which is what the mind might be seeking the praise and approval. So needless to say if you really want to give and not have to receive then you do so and not go about telling others what you did.

I think that it is called the hard way because we as humans are always seeking approval and rewards for anything and everything that we do even if we think we don't want that subconsciously we do everyone does it's our nature. So to be able to over come our natural impulses is a hard and difficult thing to do so you could say doing so is the hard way and that the path is filled with twists and turns that are there to lead us off of it.

Spiritual Friendship: The Hard Way

I'm going to write this slightly different today...kind of in a stream of consciousness.

Reading The Hard Way definitely got me thinking. It was something I read at the right time in my life for it to leave an impact, mostly about the importance of friendship and human connection. The Hard Way is described, by Chogyam Trungpa, as simply the open meeting of two minds. I realized that, yes, this is probably one of the hardest things to do.

In general, people don't like to be vulnerable. To be vulnerable means you are capable of being hurt physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Most people don't wake up and say, "Today, I think I'm going to go out and see how much hurt I can collect!" (Well, perhaps, that's the voice of a masochist, but they're an exception.) Living in a safe, comfortable bubble is all well and good, but you don't really learn anything of value.

"The process of dismantling, undoing, opening, giving up, is the real learning process."

The best way to become vulnerable is to open yourself up to another person. You are sacrificing your security, and reaching out a trusting hand. Now, that person can either respond by also opening up to you, or they can take advantage of you and cause you pain. Sometimes, this pain happens immediately, while, others, a friend, whom you have known for a long time will, ultimately, end up hurting you the most. I think this hurt provides the most learning, but you cannot receive this learning until you take a risk and give up something of yourself.

"You have to have a spiritual friend in order to completely open yourself."

I like this idea of a spiritual friend, but I don't think you have just one. You have many throughout different stages of your life. Perhaps, you have a few at one time. Perhaps, you are alone (which we all must do from time to time). A spiritual friend can help "expose ourselves to ourselves" which causes greater learning and understanding. A spiritual friend makes this learning more real to you. You can bounce ideas and comments off of them to gain a better understanding. We are social creatures for a reason. Perhaps, that's the answer to everything. Maybe we're here for human connection, and all the answers lie in that.

"The only way to get to the heart of the matter is to experience it for yourself..."

You could sit in a circle and talk about the theory of roller skating, love, marriage, friendship, religion, or under water basket weaving all you want, but you'll never gain any understanding of it, if you don't experience it yourself or with your spiritual friend. There are so many things hidden in the doing that cannot be attained by just talking about doing it. If you just talk about doing everything, then you get nothing done, you don't learn anything, and your life was just a waste. People need to experience pain in order to understand it. People need to experience joy to fully grasp it. People need to lose something or someone in order to glean any insight. We're emotional beings, believe it or not and everyone experiences things differently, so we'll never know what these things are really like, unless we experience them.

Spiritual friends can help you experience things. You can really only experience passionate love with people, laughter with people, anger with people, and, of course, you can feel the most pain from people.

Really makes you think about how useless schooling actually is, doesn't it?



Image from: http://abkm.info/About_Us.html

A way of the Hard Way

Q: You speak of the necessity to experience excruciating pain. Can an understanding of the unmasking process make it unnecessary to go through the pain?

I agree with the answer that was given. "Understanding does not mean that you actually do it; you just understand it." Just because you know the process of something doesn't mean you know exactly what it is. Experience is what life is. You have to experience things first hand rather than out of a book. Knowing something is different then experiencing it. As an RA I grew to learn that you should never say "I know what you mean." or " I know exactly how you feel." Because in reality you have no idea. You didn't experience the event that the person did you can only assume you understand it.

Experiencing somethings is the Hard Way. Many things are pleasurable and are hard to bare. But experiencing something is, in my opinion, the only way to become enlightened in a way. You can read thousands of books and listen to hundreds of stories, but if you don't experience anything, what's the point?

Finding a Path, the Hard Way

This reading was an interesting read. It made me think of the American culture. Our lazy tendencies and easy fixes, wanting the answers before asking the question. I do not mean to sound harsh or pompous I am just stating the Americans are offered so much with little doing, it conditions the general public to expect and accept.

He speaks of heroism and the general public view of what most tend to think behind the meaning of the word. "Heroism is based upon the assumption that we are bad, impure, we are not worthy, nor ready for spiritual understanding." I do not necessarily agree with this statement, its a large generalization he is making. Chogyam Trungpa then speaks against a change in lifestyle as a next step to add change in ones life, such as the Zen Buddhist path, giving a kind of "high" for a period of time, which eventually returns to normal, setting aside the past ambitions and passion.

"Some kind of real gift or sacrifice is needed to open ourselves completly." Essentially allowing oneself to become vulnerable, which is scary and a tough position to be in. Being vulnerable allows pain in, discomfort, an unknown ending. Receiving the gift Chogyam states that for the gift to be meaningful one must "give up the hope of gaining something in return" that actually giving up the hope is the big part of the Hard Way. I never really thought about this aspect on this scale before, but it is a reality. We are constantly looking for gratification....even giving a gift to another, we seek appreciation at least from the receiver as gaining something back in return.

Entering the hard way's path is a painful, naked, and open spiritual path. He states that one needs a spiritual physical friend to help and provoke the accomplishment of walking the path. I agree that if someone is needed at all to open oneself and commit to a unknown path that a physical person is needed to completely open ones self to.

Q: Do you think it is possible to begin to see what is, to see yourself as you without a teacher?

He answers that without a physical person by your side it is communicating with the imaginary. That having any type of teaching from a god of any religion is self interpretation. Religion is teaching based on interpretations then interpreted again, offered to the population and interpreted yet again. this is not to say that the interpretations are wrong at all, but for the "path" that the author speaks of I do not think that to use teachings of a religion to become naked and open to ones self works, one could just interpret oneself as an enlightened being.

o jeez I apologize for the un-organization of this entry it sounds scattered with half thoughts, though it is all I can offer right now...

Hmmm, heroism edition

It was at first difficult for me to get by the style in which "The Hard Way" was written...fragmented sparsity can suit certain compositions, of course, but here I found it initially distracting. Once I managed to get past my writing-oriented discomfort, I did find quite a bit of worth in this piece.
The part that struck me most true was the section concerning false conceptions of heroism. I believe that I mentioned in my last post my issues with the concepts of self-deprivation and ascetic martyrdom. That to me is not a spiritual pursuit, and I was glad to see it articulated in another person's slant of thinking. The layers we pile upon ourselves in our quest for clarity only serve to enhance the haze of scattered identity. That's a convoluted way of saying that we mask ourselves in the guise of ideals and vague notions far too often. Indeed, as stated in the piece, you do not need to go against your grain to discover your own truth.
I did take issue with the emphasis on deliberate exposure, although I did not completely disagree. My divergence with that way of thinking is that I believe every raw edge needs to be tempered with comfort now and again, or you will be worn hollow by the constant baring of your self. It is good to push yourself, or acknowledge that you are being pushed- bare your skin to the elements and do not shrink from the pain of it. But suffering will occur often throughout your life, and it is not necessary to seek it. I know that is rather too broad an interpretation of this particular text, but I wish to address that pesky asceticism thing again, I guess. It seems to keep working its way back.
I could never live by a doctrine, tenet, and I could never let another's thought define me. But I can draw what can help me sustain my spiritual equilibrium from the thoughts of so many who have thought for years beyond my own. From this text I draw the personally resonant notion of the dishonorable default to false heroism.
Heroism is rarely deliberate. Unless you rise to meet what assails you unexpectedly, you are just preparing lines for a scene you know to expect. Heroism is an active concept. You cannot contemplate being heroic. I don't think you can even classify yourself as such. Heroism is a quality assigned by those who have observed how you carry yourself in this world. Therefore, you cannot want to be heroic and ever hope to attain it. The flow, the basic foundation of Tao will not permit any thought on the matter.

The Hard Way?

On the comparison and contrast of this form of Buddhism and western philosophies, mainly Chrsitianity:

Trungpa Rinpoche says to the reader that from his time spent in the west he has seen a weakness to our common religions. (This is what I gathered from his teachings on pages 244-254.)On page 245 he insinuates that westerners generally believe that if we accept the religion placed before us then "...we do not have to do anything on our own..." I disagree with this thinking. I can only offer what I've known and seen of Christianity. All humans are not called to be babies and let someone else take care of their every need, nor are we asked to forget our problems and let someone else handle them. We are called to accept the free offer of help and redemption from God through his son Jesus. In doing this we choose to draw near to God. At some point we discover that God wants us to surrender ourselves to him. This requires a tremendous act of faith, trust, and self sacrifice. Yes, there is an amazing reward; that of abundant life on earth and eternal life after death, and as Trungpa says that accepting the Hard Way means giving up our ambition to get something in return for our gift I offer this question: If we are truly concerned mostly about a reward for our actions then why bother with religion? Does it not take a significant amount of self sacrifice and to offer up your entire life to someone else who you can't even see? And if a person is truly devoted to God, then they will act in ways that they know is pleasing to God, not themselves...


Simply "facing the facts of life" definitely sounds like a hard path to choose to walk on....
But
Accepting that we are imperfect and faulty and being willing to hand over your life to someone who you may barely know but you trust for some reason, is also a hard thing to do.


What do you think?


P.S. John, please let me know if you think I'm straying too much into religion.
-sleepy

The Hard Way? Ayup.

Reading this chapter of "The Buddhist Bible" was entertaining and enlightening for me. Much of the chapter, indeed, almost every word, reads like an Alcoholics Anonymous Step Meeting! In fact, the description of the 'hard way' path to enlightenment is exactly what old-timers tell newcomers in A.A. meetings about getting off the "pink cloud" and getting on with the rest of life. I am fond of remarking that the life of a drunk is the hard way to enlightenment, but you get there just the same. Just substitute a couple stock A.A. phases for Buddhist terminology. Perhaps if people realized this, then they would look at enlightenment the same way a person in A.A. views recovery: as the final desperate attempt to 'get right' with the world, to find peace and an end of suffering; to find love and serenity; to find the meaning of life. The key words there are "final desperate attempt."

Nobody stays sober without a lot of extremely simple yet extraordinarily difficult work on themselves, exactly as Trungpa warns: "It takes tremendous effort to work one's way through the difficulties of the path and actually get into the situations of life thoroughly and properly."

Look at this quote from an Alcoholics Anonymous Daily Reflections blog: "When my own house is in order, I find the different parts of my life are more manageable. Stripped from the guilt and remorse that clocked my drinking years, I am free to assume my proper role in the universe, but this condition requires maintenance."

And this A.A. slogan: "It's easy to talk the talk, but you have to walk the walk."

And for the rest of Trungpa's chapter I can only post one more thing: an edited version A.A.'s 12 Steps. Tell me if this is not completely compatible with what Trungpa says:

1. We admitted we were powerless.

2. Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the pursuit of the Tao as we understood it.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted within the Tao, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to remove all these defects of character under the guidance of the Tao.

7. Humbly sought through the Tao to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through meditation to improve our conscious contact with the Tao as we understood it, praying only for knowledge of the next step for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to others and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

In my own foray into the universe of A.A. I found myself attracted to Buddhism in my early recovery. I also found out that such a thing was not uncommon in A.A., simply because of the vast similarities. Also not uncommon, that after a while the alcoholic in recovery leaves Buddhism behind for the same reason Trungpa explains about the teachings of Christ: it "is an imaginary situation."


And just so there's no questions on the spirit of the 12 Steps being violated, here are the official 12 Steps of A.A.. If anyone would like to explore the connections between A.A., the 12 Steps and this chapter, a good place to start is the A.A. Grapevine and 12 Step.org.

Surrender

This was a very interesting read to say the least.

In the first paragraph, "The Hard Way" is described as "a simple meeting of 2 minds". Trungpa states that if you "open your mind then the teacher will open his as well". This means that both you and the teacher need to be willing and open to learn.

"the idea that we do not have to do anything on our own is extremely wishful thinking"

The above quote means that people generally believe that someone or something else will take care of them. All they have to do is "make a commitment to the organization, pay the initiation fee, sign the register and then follow the instructions given". This paragraph is saying that this is not how things really are in the real world.

"One must be willing to stand alone, which is difficult"

You need to be an individual and find who you are. You don't need to be a "hero" to do so either. Being "heroic" in today's society is "false heroism". Trungpa states that "the only one who is heroic in this way is ego".

"We cannot escape what we are, we carry it with us all the time"

All the "magical potions" that we use in order to help cure us in some way are inevitably a waste of time and money. To truly understand ourselves completely and to truly know "the hard way" is to give up everything, and not expect anything in return. According to Trungpa, "We must really surrender, give something, give something up in a very painful way".

"It is an extremely narrow path with no escape, a painful path"

photo credit: wordpress.com

The Hard Way

I can see why he calls it the hard way. Interesting read and it exposed many different ideas, fears and thoughts for me. The beginning was slightly confusing for me because it required me to think outside of what my mind normally thinks of in this instance. A few lines interested me in this piece. First was the following:

"We must give up our ambition to get something in return for our gift. That is really the hard way."

This idea really stands in the face of Western ideology because it says that the world doesn't operate in a way that favors the individual and therefore the individual shouldn't take pride in their strengths or weaknesses because it leads to expectations and desires that can corrupt the spirit. Another point that it brought up was the questioning of experience. Trungpa makes the point that "We must really surrender, give something up, really give something up in a very painful way." That pain, that uncomfortableness will allow one to be more open not only to themselves, but also to the universe itself.

Another concept that stuck out was the idea that we horde thoughts, ideas, beliefs, objects etc. in order to prove our worth to a particular aspect of the ten thousand things, or even just to show off. However, if we are told to let go, we refuse because we are afraid to lose ourselves. We are afraid to loose the distinctions and statuses that allow one to completely connect with counter realities.

The way that psychologists examine and treat their patients is probably the best example of the entire piece. Trungpa states that "…there are many kinds of psychotherapy and many psychotherapists involved with trying to prove themselves and their own theories rather than working with what is. In fact, they find it very frightening to work with what is."

A very interesting piece which makes you stop to think about one's own actions only to be reminded that it is the incorrect thing to do. Stay within the now and all will be well.

Simple 71

Knowing ignorance is strength
Ignoring knowledge is sickness

If one is sick of sickness, then one is not sick.
The sage is not sick because he is sick of sickness
Therefore he is not sick.

Well this reading jumped out to me becasue it was short, to the point and easy to understand. I liked it alot becasue I didnt have to pull it apart piece by piece to figure out what Lao Tsu was teaching. I think the sickness is not just physical sickness, but anything debilitating or unhealthy going on in the world or ourselves. I took the most important line to be " The sage is not sick becasue he is sick of sickness" but Im not sure how to express the message easily. Obviously the sage is not sick becasue he is aware of the sickness and is sick of it. But he is not sick in the sense of sickness, but sick of the presecene of sickness. Therefore he is not sick.

Twenty-Four

He who stands on tiptoe is not steady.

He who strides cannot maintain the pace.

He who makes a show is not enlightened.

He who is self-righteous is not respected.

He who boasts achieves nothing.

He who brags will not endure.

According to the followers of the Tao, "These are extra food

and unnecessary luggage."

They do not bring happiness.

Therefore followers of the Tao avoid them.

This is one of the more straightforward chapters I've read from the Tao Te Ching so far, written with simple imagery that makes sense on the first read through and concepts that I have encountered regularly in my own life (something I can't say about all the other passages). This chapter stood out because although it takes a tone that I can identify from a Western perspective, it's message is distinctly eastern and takes a stance that is directly opposed to many of the notions that I find typical of modern western culture: boasting, self-righteousness, elitism, greed, they're commonly considered normal, sometimes even desirable. Even the concrete subjects like extra food and unnecessary luggage that Lao Tsu describes as obviously undesirable are things many members of our society want.

I feel that the value of modesty is underappreciated in our culture.

Tao Chapter 46

This passage was interesting because I think it plays to what we can understand and identify with in these modern times. The passage goes as follows:

"When a country is in harmony with the Tao, the factories make trucks and tractors. When a country goes counter to the Tao, warheads are stockpiled outside the cities.

There is no greater illusion than fear, no greater wrong than preparing to defend yourself, no greater misfortune than having an enemy.

Whoever can see through all fear will always be safe."

The first part sets up for the last two passages statement. The last two passages speak the most to me, because it seems to be more of a guide to how an individual should approach a situation. Personally, after applying certain aspects of the Tao to my own life, I feel more confident and relaxed than I did before. However other parts befuddled me, primarily because they either go against how I see the world or because they simply don't make sense to me.

This passage lays out the idea that fear can get in the way of what people would like to do with their lives. Since we've all felt fear at some point, we can all understand how powerful it is. It can be simple disgust and ignorance, all the way up to paranoia and phobias. What the Tao tells us is to let go of what we feel frightens us, we can achieve anything we put our minds to.

In all things, balance.

"Know the strength of a man, but keep a woman's care! Be the stream of the universe! Being the stream of the universe, ever true and unswerving, become as a little child once more. Know the white, but keep the black! Be an example to the world!...know honor, yet keep humility...ever true and resourceful, return to the state of the uncarved block..."

-from Twenty-eight

I'd like to preface this, and all my subsequent posts, with the strong iteration that I do not wish to offend or "attack" any person, or their beliefs and ideas. I will always try my best to present my opinions and ideas in a respectful manner, and I apologize in advance for any offense I may ever cause, as this will certainly not be my intention.

My games of magic book keep leading me to different chapters with the same general theme: Balance. Perhaps this is because there's just a lot of passages about Balance in the Tao; perhaps this is truly guided by something higher than chance. I like to believe the latter. Balance is something I've struggled with a lot in my life, and I'm faced with reminders to be aware of balance and perspective almost daily. I also keep finding passages with the theme of water; movement and fluidity, adaptability, and the general "go with the flow" motif.

I think a big part of the endurance of eastern philosophies and beliefs is their applicability to different cultures and experiences. A lot of the contention between western religions, I think, stems from disagreements over the "facts" of a belief. Is the Holy Trinity a single entity in three persons, or three separate entities? Was there a virgin birth or not? These are some of the disagreements that have led to the fracturing of Christianity (which is the only major branch of religion I know enough about to compare).

All my experiences with various eastern beliefs, however, has been that they are less specific and more general than western beliefs, leaving more room for interpretation and are therefore more accepting.

I'm a very spiritual person, and I'd like to think that I'm being guided to the passages that are most relevant to my own life and struggles right now. To argue objectively, however, the very abstract nature of the Tao is why I am able to find guidance in many of the passages; like much of eastern philosophy, the Tao is open for interpretation. By being vague, the Tao is able to reach a wider audience.

I think maybe it boils down to this: Am I finding personal relevance in the Tao because it is inherently there, or because I am looking for it?

That's about all I've got for now; these comments are mostly musings. I hope this might help open up discussion, or at least provoke thought. Thanks for reading.

(Photo credit: My own. Taken in Pharping, Kathmandu, Nepal.)

To take over the universe...

Maybe its just my...creative way of thinking that led me to 29.

Do you think you can take over the universe and improve it?
I do not believe it can be done.

The universe is sacred.
You cannot improve it.
If you try to change it, you will ruin it.
If you try to hold it, you will lose it.

So sometimes things are ahead and sometimes they are behind;
Sometimes breathing is hard, sometimes it comes easily;
Sometimes there is strength and sometimes weakness;
Sometimes one is up and sometimes down.

Therefore the sage avoids extremes, excesses, and complacency.

I agree, no one can take over or understand the universe. There is too much to it and not nearly enough time in our lives to understand anything but a small part of it. Even then I believe that some people understand less or more than others but whos to say what we believe is real or just parts of our imaginations?
The universe has a balance, and if someone were to "take over" it would disrupt that balance and everything would be thrown into chaos (even though I love that word, there's just something about it...). Therefore there is a sacredness to the universe, something so pure that no one can understand its purpose. If you change it, you ruin it and if you try to understand it you lose the true purpose. With everything good there has to be bad to balance it out. Strength and weakness; hard tasks and easy ones. If you seek out the balance then you wont reach one or the other extreme. Seek out simplicity and balance.
Taking over the universe would be a task in itself, most likely an unreachable one. But no one ever said anything about taking over the world...now thats a completly different matter.

Difficulties

Chapter Sixty-Three

Practice non-action.
Work without doing.
Taste the tasteless.
Magnify the small, increase the few.
Reward bitterness with care.

See simplicity in the complicated.
Achieve greatness in little things.

In the universe the difficult things are done
as if they are easy.
In the universe great acts are made up of small deeds.
The sage does not attempt anything very big,
And thus achieves greatness.

Easy promises make for little trust.
Taking things lightly results in great difficulty.
Because the sage always confronts difficulties,
He never experiences them.

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I felt i could relate to a few verses in this chapter and I also feel that it is a good guideline for when you are stressing. The first paragraph stood out to me, i feel it was just trying to say slow down, and just focus on one thing at a time. The two lines that really stood out to me were "See simplicity in the complicated." I really liked this line because this is basically how I live my life. I never take anything that seriously and i just lay back and do what needs to be done. The other line that I really liked was "In the universe great acts are made up of small deeds." I really liked this because I feel if everyone tried this, the world would be a better place. I know from experience that a small deed can go a long way,

Thoughts?

Open, open Magic book where will I be lead today? Flip, flip, flip the pages go by… number eight is where I was lead today. The highest good is like water because you take it for granted when it is around and when it is gone you miss it deeply and cannot survive without it.

When you do something you should always put your whole heart in to it and focus solely at what’s going on. When this happens you reach a whole new level of concentration and it will be like doing that activity for the first time. New and enlightening your experience will be. Always be aware of your surrounding do not go through life with blinders on. If you do this you will miss out on the greater meaning and it will be like seeing thing only surface deep. Missing out on the larger picture is like seeing no picture at all!

The Mystic Fire

The Sage has no mind of his own

He is aware of the needs of others.

I am good to people who are good.

I am also good to people who are not good.

Because virtue is goodness.

I have faith in people who are faithful.

I also have faith in people who are not faithful.

Because Virtue is faithfulness

The sage is shy and humble - to the world he seems confusing

Men look to him and listen.

He behaves like a little child.

Writings of how a good and humble sage should be like.

As my eyes first examined this passage 'o number 49 I thought, hmmmmmmmm, simple, rewarding path, the virtue of the holy sage, faith in human nature, in human actions.

"The sage is shy and humble - to the world he seems confusing"

Many hold the kind notions and characteristics of a person that others value as a listener, or as one who actually cares of what someone of any kind of nature is projecting, feeling, roots of discomfort. The excerpt to me is describing a path for a sage of unrelenting kindness or care for ALL. I believe we are all one, we are all connected on a spiritual and biological ground. At times I forget that there are those of whom are lost in who they are, caught up in a material net, selfish in manner and kind because its required. This is ok, they deserve no complaints or ridicule...they deserve the knowledge of a different path, a kind ear, and open eyes. I believe that we are born of good nature, evil is developed and used as one grows and requests/invites the belief. I think its a different level when one describes themselves with a label...to be is to just be, (what a refreshing thought and feeling...the flow of being mmmm) :). ......what was I saying....OK yes...I think I've finished this thought.

Connecting to our childlike tendencies as it is said "He behaves like a little child."

Some say that we are all born inherently selfish, mine, mine, mine is what the baby thinks, want, want, need, is what the baby asks. This may be true, a raw notion to survive, we all have it, but as a child is it magnified unconsciously...true or false this may be irrelevant.

As a child we are learning and seeing things for the first time. I would loove to have that excitement back of JUST meeting the world! Anyways as children we accept all people, we look to all with wide eyes, love, and kindness. Innocence and natural senses is illuminated.
I think what is being said here is that the 'sage' is innocently and knowledgeably confused, greeting all with raw love, excitement, and knowledge.

Hmmmmm part 1

22

Bend and you will be whole.
Curl and you will be straight.
Keep empty and you will be filled.
Grow old and you will be renewed.

Have little and you will gain.
Have much and you will be confused.

That is only a fragment of the 22nd chapter of the Tao Te Ching, but as in any piece of writing one facet can and should have the power to strike you with its own stark significance. This snippet illustrates to me the shade of Eastern philosophy that I find most appealing- it is sparse, simple, quiet, but lacks the bitter taint I detect in most ascetic doctrines. There is awareness and self-effacing humility, but no latent resentment threading through the text. Simplicity is an appealing concept that has manifested in many different human behaviors over the years- the back-to-the-land movement, for example, or abstinence from many aspects of physical life. The latter is often associated with purity of intent, in terms of how a life is conducted, so to speak. However, I admire the Tao because although it acknowledges the value of clean, quiet living, it does not actively strive for an ideal state of being. Indeed, it does not actively strive for anything. But implicit in the nuances of text is the hope of realizing that kind of still fulfillment, and in the meantime, a contented awareness of the way things are. One of my primary dilemmas with many religious tenets and philosophical principles is the emphasis on denial. Denial of the relevance of other thought and expression has been a common theme in faith and thought the world over. Values splinter into near countless interpretations, and the essential nature of those values is often lost in the adrenaline rush of bared teeth and raised hackles (metaphorically, of course. Unless you're talking about some sort of anthropomorphic affiliation. I suppose anything's possible). Faith and belief diverge very clearly in my mind- faith is trust in a power beyond your own abilities and even comprehension. Belief is the trust in your power to grasp and interpret your own personal revelations. I am more comfortable with belief, and that is derived from the multifold influences of my personal history and ideals. However, the two are not mutually exclusive. I appreciate that Taoism is quite clearly a belief, but it does not seek to exclude the merit of faith. To me this speaks to the endurance of this slant of thought- it is surely rooted in acceptance. Acceptance of what is, what might be, what is not- it does not approach religion and offer the hand of friendship because it has no cause to doubt that compatibility all along.

Our western culture and government is rife with regulations and reminders to do no harm. But in the quiet of Tao there is not even the drifting inclination to do harm.

Have little and you will gain. Have much and you will be confused.

The Tao eloquently presents that message which often carries the taste of idealism- just be. However, in just being, idealism is abandoned, as is hostility, bitterness, martyrdom, exclusion. The clutter of defensive thinking is an impediment to contentment.

Bend and you will be whole.

Acknowledge the contours and canyons on the path you tread, and you will be able to navigate them with the clarity of comprehension. Acknowledge the roads that others pursue and you will not have any need to perceive your own as superior in any way. Acknowledge the shifting nature of the life you inhabit and you will be comforted in its constancy.

Wow, that was digressive.

Fear of Death

#74

If men are not afraid to die,
It is of no avail to threaten them with death.

If men live in constant fear of dying,
And if breaking the law means that a man will be killed,
Who will dare break the law?

There is always an official executioner.
If you try to take his place,
it is like trying to be a master carpenter and cutting wood.
If you try to cut wood like a master carpenter,
you will only hurt your hand.

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To not be afraid to die is a rarity in this world today. Yet, we are long acquainted with this notion in western thought -- since the days of Epicurus (341-270 BCE). "Death is nothing to us," said Epicurus. "I was not; I have been; I am not; I do not mind", is written on many ancient tombstones -- followers of the Epicurean philosophy. What happened to bring about in us such a fear of death? Oh yes, the notion of eternal heaven and eternal hell. As a more recent philosopher sung: "Imagine there's no Heaven, it's easy if you try, no hell below us, above us only sky, imagine all the people, living for today." That was John Lennon, of course. We know the words, but how many know the feeling . . . and live it?

To be afraid to die is a terrible existence. One cannot live if one fears the experience -- and death is part of the experience. It did not hurt before we were born, and it will not hurt after we die. It only hurts while we are alive. Fearing death is actually fearing life -- it's one of those paradoxes that are, above all, True.

When one is afraid to die one will suffer any abomination, including letting evil people lead them. When one is afraid to die one will suffer atrocious laws, including putting innocent people to death. When one is afraid to die one will suffer any ignorance, including letting the world die around them. Governments control by fear. It wasn't supposed to be like that in these United States, but the Grand Experiment has failed. The country called America is simply another culture doomed to rot from the inside, like so many others, because the people fear the government. Why fear the government? Because the government can execute you for breaking one of its laws . . . and you never know what's going to be against the law tomorrow. So, if you fear death, you fear the executioner, and thus you fear the government who controls the executioner. If you do not fear death . . . the government has no hold on you, and the government is afraid of you. Hmm . . . could be why few people outside chefs have been taught of Epicurus. And it could be an Epicurean Underground that made the movie: "Who's Killing All The Great Chefs of Europe" (j/k)

The "official executioner" is Death, The Grim Reaper. So the last part is a warning to those governments which will try to control their people through fear of death -- they will only hurt their hand . . . rot from the inside and die. The death penalty is a symptom of a sick society.