Beyond - To transcendate the duality of "inside" and "outside"?

[Guest guest]

>Hi Magne,

>

>Your quote:

>> "Everything exists in our mind;

>> there isn't anything out there"

>> (Yogachara Buddhism)

>

>You remember that I find such a statement symptomatic of some kind of

>mental pathology. Now I definitely do not want to put Sri Ramana

>Maharshi, the Buddha, or Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva in the same

>category as other Advaitins, Buddhist or Hindi yogic approaches that

> to the above statement. But after a lot of deep thinking and

>based on some intense experiences I think my viewpoint warrants

>consideration.

>

>http://aurasphere.dhs.org/Kundalini%20Posts/PathologyOfIllusion

>

 

The famous words of Buddha in Dhammapada is sometimes translated as:

 

- "What we are is a result of what we think" (1.1.)

 

in essence the quite opposite of our materialistic culture, where for

example the behaviourist Skinner turned the causality the other way in a

fatalistic view, stating that everything we are is a result from the

environment. Other translations (due to different versions of the original

text itself) of the two first verses sounds:

 

1. Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all

mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts suffering

follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox.

2. Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all

mind-wrought. If with a pure mind a person speaks or acts happiness follows

him like his never-departing shadow

 

1. Mind precedes its objects. They are mind-governed and mind-made. To speak

or act with a defiled mind is to draw pain after oneself, like a wheel

behind the feet of the animal drawing it.

2. Mind precedes its objects. They are mind-governed and mind-made. To speak

or act with a peaceful mind, is to draw happiness after oneself, like an

inseparable shadow.

 

Without preaching "Buddhism" - or any "ism", isn't these words 2600 years

ago a clear indications of the fact that everything we experience "out

there" is a mirror from our own mind?

 

When I practiced 60 to 70 to 100 rotations of Kundalini during Kriya Yoga, i

told the person who introduced me to the technique that "I have seen my

little village for the first time in my life". An intensive ecstasy of the

inherent *suchness* in everything, without putting labels on anything. A

very pure experience, like a child seeing the world for the first time.

 

Do You know what he answered me? He said that what I experienced was refered

to as "a rendevouze with reality". However, my next lesson was to "realize

that there doesn't exist any reality!"

 

"Out there" or "within my mind"? The relative recent movie "The

Matrix"

touched these point of dualism.

[Guest guest]

Dear Magne:

 

Of course, what you write about, the teachings, I went through all that

as well... Wanted to agree with it at some point and I thought I did.

Thought I really did... Mind, mind you. Then something new started to

come through which I have tried to describe since, and I found that the

original teachings of the Buddha do not disagree, in fact not at all.

If you happen to read what I mean, please do not put it into a Skinner

bag.

Also if you read what I write, what you *understood* is not necessarily

what I *meant*.

 

:-) So unless you agree with what I wrote you have not understood it :-)

:-) Or, if you understand what I wrote, you will agree with it. :-)

(hehehehehe)

Those two lines are meant in profound jest, they clearly show though the

dilemma of understanding each other.

 

You wrote:

> The famous words of Buddha in Dhammapada

> is sometimes translated as:

> "What we are is a result of what we think" (1.1.)

 

That by the way says nothing about 'WHAT EXISTS'. It clearly starts with

"WHAT WE ARE", it does not say, "What exists is a result of what we

think."

 

You wrote or quoted:

> 1. Mind precedes all mental states.

> Mind is their chief; they are all

> mind-wrought. If with an impure mind

> a person speaks or acts suffering

> follows him like the wheel that follows

> the foot of the ox.

> 2. Mind precedes all mental states.

> Mind is their chief; they are all

> mind-wrought. If with a pure mind a person

> speaks or acts happiness follows

> him like his never-departing shadow

 

Mind indeed precedes all mental states, that is exactly right...

But...have you ever surrendered to reality... That is no mental state...

 

The Prajna Paramita Hridaya Sutra is all about "Form is

Emptiness-Emptiness is Form." and the skandas (senses), it is one of the

most profound sutras and also one of the most wrongly understood...

 

I will copy some material I have written before, 11 minutes until next

millennium... (I want to get this in before the end .............of this

one, hehehehe.)

 

"We may use our mental abilities to imaginatively conceive. This will

influence our limited use of our senses and finer perceptions and

diminish our sole reliance on them so that at some point in time (ha!)

we may get the void/form conundrum sorted out as it is so well clarified

by Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara in the Prajna Paramita Hridaya sutra.

When we fall in love, losing ourselves in surrender, all conceptuality

goes the way of the libi-dodo bird. ;-)

 

The following is snipped from what I wrote to jb on 12 07 00:

 

"The brain is not a sense organ, it only stores data from the senses,

keeps

count of them and tracks linkages. The brain is an subservient organ,

it does not direct or coordinate, it only keeps track of occurrences,

directions and coordinates, it is not at all like a gland, the brain

does not

*do* a thing.

 

The mind at best is a trustworthy director of the brain, is has however

no direct connection to the senses. To the mind nothing makes sense,

it cannot because it senses not. (I know I differ here from some

Buddhist

psychology, but I stand by it.)

The mind is not an organ of sense, it is not even an organ.

 

The mind actually has no physical powers. It can only 'label'

perceptions

with qualifiers that also are fed to it from the outside through the

senses.

Those qualifiers are usually not too subtle, often very black and white

indeed. In this, our current society of limited and controlled sensory

input the mind cannot seem to 'do' anything more than labelling under

two

main headings: stimulus and passivity.

Human physical dynamics and functionalities are controlled or ordered

that way in our consumer society.

 

At worst, the mind thinks - meaning that it assumes that its labelling

has

a systematic, analytical, controlling and steering effect (cybernetics,

the

art of steering, informatics).

When it overly labels for excitement and stimulus - typical for this

society -

a seemingly overwhelming mentality can engulf the body, often at the

cost

of the body... but not really... this is what the mind thinks.

When the mind overly labels for passivity, the result of a too accepting

consumer attitude - also typical for our society - a seemingly apathetic

and stifling mentality can take hold of the body, this also at the cost

of

the body... but again, so it seems... that is what the mind thinks.

It is not what happens in physical reality, when that is about to happen

the body generates all kinds of messages to the brain to stop the

mental trickery... this then leads to mental depression. A good thing.

The body depresses the mind so as to force the human to integrate

itself again.

 

I sometimes consider the brain a tumour, some overgrowth

that gains in self importance by identifying with its symbolic

contents while putting itself ahead of the senses that collect

the data, while putting itself ahead of the data collected by the

senses, while putting itself ahead of that what is being sensed.

Thinking that it actually is the creator of its own contents.

 

The labels are moral and cultural agreements, 'per se' labels are

nothing. Labels are not the contents of the box, data in the folder.

Data are not even what they are a symbolic copy of.

 

When the mind has turned into the censor, judging perceptions and

storing

them under labelled categories, allowing some, not allowing others, it

has

overstepped its illusory bounds.

The mind then thinks it can actually direct the senses. If it thinks it

rejects,

which it can not, it can only store certain data into a box of

"rejects".

Once the mind has put data in the reject box it thinks it has gotten rid

of

them... no it has only labelled them... The mind creates the illusion

that

it can decide what is and what is not real... what exists and what not.

 

Reality can not be influenced by the mind. The mind tells you that it

can and you may or may not believe it. The mind even tells you that you

are free to believe what you want. The mind even allows for such

'wishy-washyness'. As in, "Everybody has their own truth."

Reality, you don't have to believe in, you sense it with your senses,

it is directly tangible. Illusion always wants you to believe.

Reality dispenses with belief.

.............end of post to jb.

 

"Whatever is" is way more complex than the mind can conceive of, as it

only uses perceptions seconf handedly

 

Love,

Wim

 

http://www.aurasphere.dhs.org

 

"Indirect knowledge gathered from books or teachers can never set a

human free until its truth is investigated, applied, experimented with

and experienced. Only direct, factual and actual realization does that.

Realize your whole self, reintegrate your mind and body." - Tripura

Rahasya, 18: 89-90

[Guest guest]

>Dear Magne:

>

>Of course, what you write about, the teachings, I went through all that

>as well... Wanted to agree with it at some point and I thought I did.

>Thought I really did... Mind, mind you. Then something new started to

>come through which I have tried to describe since, and I found that the

>original teachings of the Buddha do not disagree, in fact not at all.

>If you happen to read what I mean, please do not put it into a Skinner

>bag.

>Also if you read what I write, what you *understood* is not necessarily

>what I *meant*.

>

>:-) So unless you agree with what I wrote you have not understood it :-)

>:-) Or, if you understand what I wrote, you will agree with it. :-)

>(hehehehehe)

>Those two lines are meant in profound jest, they clearly show though the

>dilemma of understanding each other.

>

 

First of all - thanks for your LOVELY CONCERNS! *mind,mind you!*.

 

When looking at the two above statements about understanding, I have my own

version:

 

:-) No statement is so truth, that it isn't untruth under certain

circumstances :-)

 

Just look at physicians ! Isaac Newton stated in his *second Law* that Mass

= Energy x Movement-energy. This formula is used by bridge-constructors to

avoid oscillations during heavy storms etc., but then came Einstein.....

telling us that this Law doesn't hold when objects comes very close to the

speed of light.....................

 

Likewise, Aristotle told that a stone would fall faster than the feather...

Gallilei told us the opposite; however the latter was refering to an

artificial space without oxygen and ...... it's my humble opinion that none

of the above gentlemens were *wrong* in their statements, it is just that -

 

:-) No statement is so truth, that it isn't untruth under certain

circumstances :-)

 

>You wrote:

>> The famous words of Buddha in Dhammapada

>> is sometimes translated as:

>> "What we are is a result of what we think" (1.1.)

>

>That by the way says nothing about 'WHAT EXISTS'. It clearly starts with

>"WHAT WE ARE", it does not say, "What exists is a result of what we

>think."

>

>You wrote or quoted:

>> 1. Mind precedes all mental states.

>> Mind is their chief; they are all

>> mind-wrought. If with an impure mind

>> a person speaks or acts suffering

>> follows him like the wheel that follows

>> the foot of the ox.

>> 2. Mind precedes all mental states.

>> Mind is their chief; they are all

>> mind-wrought. If with a pure mind a person

>> speaks or acts happiness follows

>> him like his never-departing shadow

>

>Mind indeed precedes all mental states, that is exactly right...

>But...have you ever surrendered to reality... That is no mental state...

>

 

*SMILE AND THE WHOLE WORLD SMILES BACK TO YOU!*, it's said.

 

Is it not so that what we think and feel, influence our environment, even

our body? *Ask for, and you will receive*. However, whatever the original

Christians must have meant with that statement, or how it's interpreted

today, something must be added.

Whenever we think about something, we are actually giving an *order* for

things to be performed. If I want $5,000,000, maybe I get it, but....... at

the very moment I allow doubts about these possibility to enter my mind

(perhaps due to previous disappointments), I'm giving *contra-orders* -

*Well, I have changed my mind. Do not give it to me !*

What Christians and other calls *prayers*, some mystics refers to as

*turbo-thoughts* - it's impossible to gain magic power in our environment

when some thoughts and feelings go one way, other follows another

direction.... They need to be cohesive, syncronized like a laser beam.

*Reality* is not so fixed that many believe. It's in an eternal flux, and

we CAN influence it.

>The Prajna Paramita Hridaya Sutra is all about "Form is

>Emptiness-Emptiness is Form." and the skandas (senses), it is one of the

>most profound sutras and also one of the most wrongly understood...

>

<...>

>

 

Yes! I agree with you that it's one of the most profound sutras. It's short,

but concise. In the Chinese Buddhist Canon *Taishoo* there are no less than

six different translations of it into Chinese (T250-255,T257), together with

several translations in Tibet, Korea and Japan, reflecting it's popularity.

In fact - where I sleep (and slept this night before writing these piece), I

have decorated my wall with two painted cooling fans from Thailand and the

heart sutra in the middle with Chinese letters.

 

How do I understand these sutra? It's one of the best descriptions - as far

as descriptions is possible, of the state of consciousness we enter when

beeing able to have Beta- and Delta-brainwaves simultaniously. In these

state, there is no *ego*, no subjective feelings and emotions; it's the

state of consciousness of the mineral kingdom. During these state there is -

I repeat NO *ego*, no contrasts between *here* and *there*, no contrasts

between *out there* and *within here*. My best way to describe it, is a

state of *pureness* - a pure, undescribeable IS:

 

OM ! Homage to the Caring, the great Prajnaparamita !

 

The Holy Avalokitashvara and Bodhisattva, practiced the deep dicipline of

the Wisdom which has penetrated beyond. He saw down from the high, and he

saw onfly five congregations (skandhas), and he saw that in their own beeing

(svabhava) they were empty.

 

Here, O Sariputra, form is emptiness and the very emptiness is form;

emptiness is not different from form, form is not different from emptiness;

everything which is form is emptiness, everything which is emptiness has

form, the same applies to (the four skandhas) feelings, perseptions,

impulses and consciousness.

 

Here, O Sariputra, all existing phenomenas (dharmas) are characterized as

emptiness; they are neither born nor anihilated, dirty nor clean,

non-perfect nor perfect.

 

Therefore, O Sariputra, in emptiness there is no form, no feelings, no

mental images, no impulses, no conscioussness; no eye, ear, nose, tongue,

body nor mind; no forms, sound, smell, taste, feeling or objects in mind; no

visual element, and so forth, until we come to no conscious cognitive

element; no ignorance, no cease of ignorance, and so forth, until we comes

to: no degeneration or death, no abscense of degeneration or death. There's

no suffering, no death, no birth, no cease, no way. There's no (higher)

realization, no attainment (of Nirvâna) and no non-attainment.

 

Therefore, O Sariputra, it is because of his non-attainment (of Nirvâna)

that a Bodhisattva, by having faith on the Perfect Wisdom (prajna-paramita),

that he dwells undisturbed in mental fridom. In abscense of mental

blockages, he is without fear, he has conquered all perversions, and at the

end he attain the non-attainable (bliss) Nirvâna.

 

All those appearing as Buddha’s in the three periods of time (past, present,

future) is fully awakened to the ultimate, right and perfect Enlightment

(samyak-sambodhi), since they trusted the uncomparable prajnaparamita.

 

Therefore, one should accept prajnaparamita as the great mantra, the mantra

of great wisdom, the ultimate mantra, the uncomparable mantra, the

eliminator of all pain, which is truth through it's non-falseness. From

prajnaparamita has these mantra been delivered. It sounds: Gone, gone, gone

beyond, gone totally beyond (to the other side), O Enlighted in its very

beeing ! (gate gate para gate parasam gate bodhi svaha) – This ends the

Hearth of prajnaparamita.

 

By the way, observe that the eight mantras corresponds to the SECOND hearth

chakra with 8 blades, called *hridaya* in Tantra!

>"We may use our mental abilities to imaginatively conceive. This will

>influence our limited use of our senses and finer perceptions and

>diminish our sole reliance on them so that at some point in time (ha!)

>we may get the void/form conundrum sorted out as it is so well clarified

>by Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara in the Prajna Paramita Hridaya sutra.

>When we fall in love, losing ourselves in surrender, all conceptuality

>goes the way of the libi-dodo bird. ;-)

>

>The following is snipped from what I wrote to jb on 12 07 00:

>

>"The brain is not a sense organ, it only stores data from the senses,

>keeps count of them and tracks linkages. The brain is an subservient

>organ, it does not direct or coordinate, it only keeps track of

>occurrences, directions and coordinates, it is not at all like a gland,

>the brain does not *do* a thing..........

>

>The mind actually has no physical powers. It can only 'label'

>perceptions with qualifiers that also are fed to it from the outside

>through the senses..... In this, our current society of limited and

>controlled sensory input the mind cannot seem to 'do' anything more than

>labelling under two main headings: stimulus and passivity....

>

>At worst, the mind thinks - meaning that it assumes that its labelling

>has a systematic, analytical, controlling and steering effect

>(cybernetics, the art of steering, informatics).....

>When the mind overly labels for passivity, the result of a too accepting

>consumer attitude - also typical for our society - a seemingly apathetic

>and stifling mentality can take hold of the body, this also at the cost

>of the body... but again, so it seems... that is what the mind thinks.

>It is not what happens in physical reality, when that is about to happen

>the body generates all kinds of messages to the brain to stop the

>mental trickery... this then leads to mental depression. A good thing.

>The body depresses the mind so as to force the human to integrate

>itself again.

>

>I sometimes consider the brain a tumour, some overgrowth

>that gains in self importance by identifying with its symbolic

>contents while putting itself ahead of the senses that collect

>the data, while putting itself ahead of the data collected by the

>senses, while putting itself ahead of that what is being sensed.

>Thinking that it actually is the creator of its own contents.

>

>The labels are moral and cultural agreements, 'per se' labels are

>nothing. Labels are not the contents of the box, data in the folder.

>Data are not even what they are a symbolic copy of.

>

>When the mind has turned into the censor, judging perceptions and

>storing them under labelled categories, allowing some, not allowing

>others, it has overstepped its illusory bounds.

>The mind then thinks it can actually direct the senses. If it thinks it

>rejects, which it can not, it can only store certain data into a box of

>"rejects". Once the mind has put data in the reject box it thinks it has

>gotten rid of them... no it has only labelled them... The mind creates

>the illusion that it can decide what is and what is not real... what exists

and what not.

>

 

Yes, dear Wim. I agree with you that our brain is filled with PINK

ELEPHANTS. And just as ordinary gray elephants, they have a tendency *to

never forget*. Moreover, they are even walking in huge processions, claiming

the same social rights as grey elephants!

 

In an infinite complex reality (just look at fractal geomtry), it's

impossible to grasp the outside with our linear way of thinking. Therefore,

our brain sort things out in order to make them *explainable* according to a

previously defined classification system. And these classification is in

itself PINK. *maya* means excactly to classify, that is, to measure

according to the viewpoints of our *ego*. *maya* is *relative measurement*.

 

And - our concepts about anything *out there* is constructed from these PINK

building blocks within our mind.

 

However, when you say -

>Reality can not be influenced by the mind. The mind tells you that it

>can and you may or may not believe it. The mind even tells you that you

>are free to believe what you want. The mind even allows for such

>'wishy-washyness'. As in, "Everybody has their own truth."

>Reality, you don't have to believe in, you sense it with your senses,

>it is directly tangible. Illusion always wants you to believe.

>Reality dispenses with belief.

 

- i must disagree with you, since *reality* can be influenced by the

positive affirmations.

 

So, with the *inner smile* in the previous posting, the world smiles back to

you, just as I went to bed after celebrating the new year, and entered a

nice sleep - with a soft smile on my face.

 

By the way, the madhyamikas (*middle way*) and the yogachara (*mind only*)

movements within Buddhism, which have argued with each others and caused

many controversies, is possibly another example of the statement that

nothing is so truth that it isn't untruth under certain circumstances.

 

The Tibetan mystic Je Rinpoche, who wrote a commentary to Nagarjunas work

Mulamadhyamika Karika entitled "rTsa she tik chen rigs pa’i rgya mtsho",

translated with the title "An Ocean of Reason - A Great Exposition of the

Root Text", claimed that he managed to unite the two schools.

 

Maybe the two schools reflect another koan of seemingly contradictory

doctrines? On a web-page, I picked up the following information about him:

 

*The yogi Tsong-Kha-Pa, popularly known as Je Rinpoche, was born in the

province of Amdo, East Tibet, in the year 1357, fulfilling the prophesies of

both Buddha Shakyamuni and Padmasambhava. The auspicious omens surrounding

his birth indicated the appearance of a truly exceptional being.

At a very early age, he was given to the greatest living Master of the

Yamantaka Tantra Method, the yogi Dondrub Rinchen, who raised and educated

him. When Je Rinpoche reached the age of 16, Dondrub Rinchen sent him to

Central Tibet to continue his training, for it was Central Tibet that was

the repository of every lineage coming from Buddha. Studying under some 45

gurus of all the different Buddhist sects, Je Rinpoche gained proficiency

and experience in the theories and practices, Hinayana, Mahayana and

Tantrayana, that had come to Tibet from the Pandits and Mahasiddhas of

ancient India. First he studied the various teachings, then he deeply

contemplated them; finally he took up intensive meditational practice by

entering into a four year retreat during which he ate nothing but a single

seed from a nearby tree each day. Applying himself in this manner, it was

not long before he attained realisation. In his later life, thousands of

disciples came to him, yet his humility was always apparent.

In his sixty-third year Je Rinpoche told his disciples that he would soon

pass away. On the twenty-fifth day of the tenth lunar month he gave a short

discourse on Bodhicitta, sat in meditation and stopped breathing. Before the

eyes of his many disciples, his body transformed from that of an old man to

that of a sixteen-year-old boy. It was encased in a golden stupa in Ganden

Monastery, where it sat until the Chinese invaders broke it open in 1959. A

number of witnesses to this sacrilege report that the invaders were somewhat

shaken to find the holy body of Je Rinpoche not only in perfect condition,

but warm, with hair and nails still growing.*

 

Blessings from Norway.