Hi from the UK

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Void65
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Hi from the UK

Post by Void65 »

Hi,

I have been interested in Buddhism for a couple of decades but am inconsistent in my practice. In the last couple of years I have been almost torched by what I assume is karma ripening. At times it has been agonising and I have had several breakdowns.
The experiences have changed me at a deep level but I am vividly aware of the need to practice and learn the Dhamma. I have lots of opportunity to do so - books, time, internet, local sanghas - so I am continuing the journey.

I know that this is perhaps not the right kind of motivation, but I have genuinely had enough of suffering and want to commit to leaving samsara. I am aware of how little material things matter, how temporary everything is and that ‘I’ do not matter anymore than ‘you’. I still have many, many delusions though (in the Buddhist sense ;) I have also created so much negative karma that I know I need to ‘do’ things differently.

My username comes from the fact that I used to have a terror of ‘the void’ but now embrace it.

I am looking forward to learning from you all.
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Queequeg
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Queequeg »

Hi and Welcome.

One of the first steps in Buddhist practice is often disenchantment with samsara. What you describe feeling is called samvega. Its what the Buddha felt after seeing the old person, sick person and corpse.
There is no suffering to be severed. Ignorance and klesas are indivisible from bodhi. There is no cause of suffering to be abandoned. Since extremes and the false are the Middle and genuine, there is no path to be practiced. Samsara is nirvana. No severance achieved. No suffering nor its cause. No path, no end. There is no transcendent realm; there is only the one true aspect. There is nothing separate from the true aspect.
-Guanding, Perfect and Sudden Contemplation,
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Grigoris
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Grigoris »

Greetings "void", welcome to Dharma Wheel.

What is this "void" you are referring to? Is it like what is described by Nietzsche?
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Void65
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Void65 »

Queequeg, Thank you for naming the motivation for me. The term samvega is new to me.

Grigoris, Thank you for your question. The void is emptiness/nothingness - but it is incomplete because I still exist to experience it. That was the horrifying aspect of it for me - the absence of other - particularly life forms.

I’m not sure what Nieztsche meant when he talked about the abyss, although I have an impression that it is to do with evil and monstrous acts. Horrifying in its own way, but not in the sense that I mean.
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DNS
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by DNS »

Welcome to DW!

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Grigoris
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Grigoris »

Void65 wrote: Sun Jul 21, 2019 10:08 pmGrigoris, Thank you for your question. The void is emptiness/nothingness - but it is incomplete because I still exist to experience it. That was the horrifying aspect of it for me - the absence of other - particularly life forms.
Emptiness is not voidness. Emptiness means that phenomena arise based on causes and conditions, that they lack inherent qualities. Like, for example, a tree needs water, soil, sunlight and a seed to exist. It does not (cannot) exist as tree without the presence of these factors.

How is that terrifying?
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Void65
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Void65 »

Thank you.

The Buddhist concept of emptiness differs from the everyday delusion of emptiness. It is helpful to develop this understanding of emptiness. My original terror, as I posted, was of an experience of absence of sensory experience - the nothingness which I mentioned. The nearest that I can describe it as is the naive depiction of space - a vast, empty, unresponsive and (almost) infinite absence.

I have a basic understanding of the scientific concept of cause and effect and how this is the Buddhist concept of emptiness.
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Grigoris
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Grigoris »

Void65 wrote: Mon Jul 22, 2019 9:58 pm Thank you.

The Buddhist concept of emptiness differs from the everyday delusion of emptiness. It is helpful to develop this understanding of emptiness. My original terror, as I posted, was of an experience of absence of sensory experience - the nothingness which I mentioned. The nearest that I can describe it as is the naive depiction of space - a vast, empty, unresponsive and (almost) infinite absence.
What practice were you doing to experience this?
I have a basic understanding of the scientific concept of cause and effect and how this is the Buddhist concept of emptiness.
Buddhist cause-and-effect is a moral/ethical teaching, it's not physics.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
Void65
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Joined: Sat Jul 20, 2019 8:48 pm

Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Void65 »

Grigoris wrote: Mon Jul 22, 2019 10:34 pm What practice were you doing to experience this?
It wasn’t during practice. It started with thinking along those lines in childhood - when I realised that there was nothing between the top of my head and the furthest reaches of space.
Grigoris wrote: Mon Jul 22, 2019 10:34 pm ]Buddhist cause-and-effect is a moral/ethical teaching, it's not physics.
My understanding was that it is both. I have read in The Buddha’s Ancient Path by Piyadassi that Buddhist teachings refer to psychophysical forces that form the five aggregates. One of these aggregates is matter. I have mainly read Theravadan literature however and am here to learn :smile:
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Grigoris
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Grigoris »

Void65 wrote: Tue Jul 23, 2019 1:58 pmMy understanding was that it is both. I have read in The Buddha’s Ancient Path by Piyadassi that Buddhist teachings refer to psychophysical forces that form the five aggregates. One of these aggregates is matter. I have mainly read Theravadan literature however and am here to learn :smile:
Rupa is a reference to the physical human form, within the context of the Skandha.

Rupa does not describe atomic theory, for example, nor is it particularly related to physics in the Western sense.
"My religion is not deceiving myself."
Jetsun Milarepa 1052-1135 CE

"Butchers, prostitutes, those guilty of the five most heinous crimes, outcasts, the underprivileged: all are utterly the substance of existence and nothing other than total bliss."
The Supreme Source - The Kunjed Gyalpo
The Fundamental Tantra of Dzogchen Semde
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WesleyP
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by WesleyP »

Hello citizen from the U.K. <wave>
Void65
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Re: Hi from the UK

Post by Void65 »

Hi Wesley! Waves back.
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