Thanks, you've pretty well expressed what's on my mind.
The fellow I wrote about has some personal issues
which I'm pretty sure explain his behaviour,
and I guess I'm struck with the fact that the practice,
whatever its benefits, doesn't help with them.
As to the ex you aptly described:
I was at the gym this morning and somebody there
was obnoxious to me. I responded skillfully
but coming home I sat for awhile and
watched anger, fear, arising, thoughts of the
snide thing I could have said that would have
really put down that individual, anger, fear...
It's still going on.
Suzuki Roshi said that meditation
consists in seeing everything as it is and letting
it go as it goes. So there it is, the whole unpleasant
fight or flight thing, unpleasant visceral sensations causing thoughts/fantasies causing more visceral
sensations.
The idea is to have lots of inner space, to see this
stuff without identifying with it, but gee
I do wish I didn't have a baboon brain-stem!
Metta meditation
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anniemcu
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In my own experience...mutepointe wrote:now you know how christians feel when our fellow christians act like monkeys' behinds. doing the right thing is always hard, no matter what your faith. i don't know much about being a buddhist but i do know about being a person. if this bothered me and i thought there was hope, i would ask him about this.
Buddhism is, simplistically, at least, about keeping one's own doorstep clean and welcoming, and one's windows on the world clear and open. You observe all without getting caught up in it, live an honest and open life, and earn your living in a manner that does not take advantage of another.
It is not about pointing out anything about another's doorstep or windows. You may invite others to stand in your doorway or look out your windows ... to enjoy what you enjoy. You work for a betterment of the world as a whole. Your living is both a prayer and an example, but by its 'doing', not by its 'showing'.
It is an exceptionally personal practice that can be felt even by those outside it as a calm, aware, loving, protective - yet open handed, feeling/attitude... it's not 'not valuing', but 'not possessing'...
Oh-oh... I have fallen... Whoa is me!
It is also a practice of working for that same calm and understanding for others.
One of my favorite lessons was the practice of focused prayer for others, in which we were directed to ask for 5 benefits for ourselves - safety, health, sustenance, inspiration and fulfillment, and then to ask for the same things for the person we most love, then someone we know and like, then someone we don't know well, and then, especially, for the person we have the most difficulties dealing with. ... The premise being that anyone who genuinely feels safe, is not struggling with health issues, does not fear at all for their continued survival, who has genuine inspiration, and finds their efforts in pursuit of that inspiration fulfilling ... is going to be someone happy in their own life, and therefore, a much more pleasant person to deal with all the way around.
... kind of a "win-win" attitude toward life.
It is almost palpable... if you happen to be in the presence of a person, or especially several people, practicing their meditation, you can feel the calm, almost a glow. It's pretty amazing, really.
Of course, there are many who only put on the trappings, and some who try but do not achieve, as in any other cross-section of humanity. For something so genuinely simple, it is not easy.
I claim no expertise, and certainly do not practice as I should.
Last edited by anniemcu on Thu Sep 06, 2007 10:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
anniemcu
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
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"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
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"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
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http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
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Cynth
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It doesn't seem reasonable to me to conclude that because this Buddhist approach did not seem to be helping this particular man at the time of the behavior, it cannot help those in the American condition who make whatever committment is required to practice this meditation. How can we know for certain what sort of people the Buddha was talking to? They must have been feeling some sort of spiritual emptiness or a need for something more in their lives. Their lives were different, sure, but I don't think they were probably any saner or sweeter than humankind in general. I imagine many of the people the Buddha talked to fell by the wayside or failed in their goal and had to try again or else gave up. I understand your shock (I read the entire post earlier), but I think that you should just judge the meditation by what help it has given you in living the sort of life you wish to live. And maybe you could look at it more as something that has the potential to help people reach a better life and but better might not be perfect and it might be a slow process. Maybe that meditation has helped this man---perhaps he would have punched you out before he started meditating! Maybe those who can just totally and instantly let go of things have gone through a long process of gradually decreasing the magnitude of their responses to things.
Diligentia maximum etiam mediocris ingeni subsidium. ~ Diligence is a very great help even to a mediocre intelligence.----Seneca
There are Buddhist communities that have been divided
geographically from one another for a thousand years or more,
sometimes. The Tibetan practice is removed from
the Japanese, and the Southern School in Sri Lanka,
Burma, Thailand, Cambodia was entirely out of
touch with these others for the longest time.
But the people are doing, with some variation, the same
meditative practice, and for those who do, it
tends to produce the same sort of personality:
a bland, uncharismatic individual who is kind, compassionate,
and has very little to no ego. The Dalai Lama is
a good example. So good practitioners
in most every Buddhist tradition tend to resemble
one another. You could easily mistake the abbot of
the Chinese buddhist monastery in Augusta MO
for the gardener. He wouldn't mind.
He's now doing a two-year meditation retreat,
living in a trailer behind the meditation hall.
But I think you've really got to have very few
serious personal problems. Asians seldom have them, and if you
do, these are probably more effectively addressed
by other means. Meditation isn't a panacea.
Also you have to practice so much
that it transforms you--as it's labor intensive, that
means it's a major commitment.
The standard advice I've received from Theravada
teachers is an hour and a half to two hours meditation a day,
and a long retreat in the summer. That's for lay people.
geographically from one another for a thousand years or more,
sometimes. The Tibetan practice is removed from
the Japanese, and the Southern School in Sri Lanka,
Burma, Thailand, Cambodia was entirely out of
touch with these others for the longest time.
But the people are doing, with some variation, the same
meditative practice, and for those who do, it
tends to produce the same sort of personality:
a bland, uncharismatic individual who is kind, compassionate,
and has very little to no ego. The Dalai Lama is
a good example. So good practitioners
in most every Buddhist tradition tend to resemble
one another. You could easily mistake the abbot of
the Chinese buddhist monastery in Augusta MO
for the gardener. He wouldn't mind.
He's now doing a two-year meditation retreat,
living in a trailer behind the meditation hall.
But I think you've really got to have very few
serious personal problems. Asians seldom have them, and if you
do, these are probably more effectively addressed
by other means. Meditation isn't a panacea.
Also you have to practice so much
that it transforms you--as it's labor intensive, that
means it's a major commitment.
The standard advice I've received from Theravada
teachers is an hour and a half to two hours meditation a day,
and a long retreat in the summer. That's for lay people.
We know this fellow well.Denny wrote:so ya couldn't just ask him "what's the matter?"
I believe, as does my wife who was
there through it all, that this wouldn't be a good idea.
Wouldn't help and/or would make things worse.
Sometimes (not always) it's best to let people work things out for themselves. Intervening does for them what they need to do themselves.
Also he quite definitely wants nothing to do with us.
We're not uncomfortable with the way things are.
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djm
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What a tremendous load of codswallop. Areyou referring to Asians' suicide rate? If you really believe half of what you have said in this particular posting it is small wonder you come into the pub mewling about your failures at meditation camp.jim stone wrote:But I think you've really got to have very few
serious personal problems. Asians seldom have them, and if you
do, these are probably more effectively addressed
by other means.
djm
I'd rather be atop the foothills than beneath them.
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anniemcu
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Again, just my own experience and opinion...Denny wrote:so ya couldn't just ask him "what's the matter?"
If it is quite obvious that something is 'going on' with him, and you are willing to shoulder a little of the weight to help him, you can ask, but you have to be careful that you don't either take on the burden yourself nor assume you have the answer to give him.... self disciplines that are difficult to maintain.
It is easy to get caught up in the whirlpool of doubt in such cases... 'do I poke my nose in? "Will he become even more offended?", "should I just let him work it out on his own?", etc. ... all very valid concerns, but can tend to get us to not make the one offer that might help... friendship.
It is hard to offer friendship to someone we don't always particularly like... (partly due to the fact that 'friendship' has been so misused in both definition and practice). There are degrees of friendship, of course. But I think it's mostly that, having been acquainted with a person for a long time, we have not found that we can trust them... or rather, have found that we cannot predict what they will do with any accuracy... the old term " like walking on eggshells" is very apt ... are they going to be in good mood or a touchy one? It's hard to remain friends with people you cannot count on... but it is important to, which is where the 'don't become attached' thing can get murky... you can be involved without attachment, but it is tricky, especially in current US society. And it's damned hard to want to. You can only do so much, and it is far more pleasant to do things for people who actually appreciate it. Sometimes, though, we have to do things because they may help, even if they are not appreciated at the time.. or even ever.
A good rule for life, of course, is "Never give anyone anything with the requirement that they be grateful." Otherwise, it is not really a gift.
Ok... I'm rambling... I'll go do something more constructive now.
anniemcu
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
'How can we know for certain what sort of people the Buddha was talking to? They must have been feeling some sort of spiritual emptiness or a need for something more in their lives. Their lives were different, sure, but I don't think they were probably any saner or sweeter than humankind in general.'
I lived in India for three years. The standard family is extended.
That is, you have a lot of families in one house. So there's
grandma and grandad, then a son with his wife and kids,
another son with his wife and kids, a daughter who decided
she didn't want to get married, Uncle Louis, who never
amounted to anything, living on the roof, and so on.
Often there is a central court yard with children running
around in it. Childcare is shared by multiple adults.
Children are doted upon.
People in this situation tend to fit together like a jig-saw
puzzle. They're not individuals like we are; they are complete
only as part of the whole.
This pretty routinely produces sweet, sane individuals.
It compensates extraordinarily well for deficiencies
in parenting. Suppose your mother or your father is a deficient parent.
Then your aunt or your uncle or your other aunt or your
other uncle, or grandma and grandpa, or... do the parenting.
Often particular parenting jobs, like teaching the kid about
sex, is delegated to an aunt or uncle. As the collective does
the parenting and child care, weak links make little difference.
(another advantage, in passing, is that women who choose
not to marry (as Indian women occasionally do choose)
have lives full of close and loving relations with children.)
Children in nuclear families are a lot more vulnerable.
If mom or dad are deficient in parenting, often
there's nobody there to fill in and the kid suffers
the consequences. One of the consequences of
American individualism is that large numbers of
Americans are dealing with the bad consequences
of defective parenting. I expect there are
other causes too.
Another sanity-making feature of Indian families
is that parents, not children, decide who the children
will marry. Generally an Indian mother knows very
well the sort of person who will make happy her
son or daughter. People fall in love a couple of years
into a marriage. Expectations within marriage are
low, so marriages tend to be a lot more stable
and happy than here (with our 50 percent divorce
rate and the consequences for children).
Extended families were surely the norm in 'India'
in 500 BC, and there's no reason to think they worked
differently then. The main features of Indian society
then are there today (e.g. extended families, arranged
marriages, the caste system). Life was, if anything,
simpler and less confusing. So it's a very good bet
that Indians then were a good deal more like Indians
today than they are like us. Sane, sweet people
who aren't suffering the consequences of defective
parenting.
These are the people the Buddha preached to,
they are the ones whose needs Buddhism was meant
to answer. Because sane, sweet people suffer,
it's part of the human condition, their children
die, they fall ill, they grow old, they grieve,
they are afraid, they are parted from what they
want, they get what they don't want....
Buddhist practice was meant for them.
It responds to the suffering that comes
with being human, no matter how sane you are.
When Buddhism comes here many of the people
who join up are dealing with the consequences
of defective parenting. What many of them
want is to solve such personal problems.
There has been a good deal of pressure
on buddhism, therefore, to apply the meditative
practice to these needs.
It's conceivable that meditation
might solve these very different problems,
but I've been watching for decades the
effort to bend it to that purpose,
and I'm very doubtful that it does.
That doesn't mean it's useless, of course.
I think it does what the Buddha meant it
to do. But it isn't a panacea.
I lived in India for three years. The standard family is extended.
That is, you have a lot of families in one house. So there's
grandma and grandad, then a son with his wife and kids,
another son with his wife and kids, a daughter who decided
she didn't want to get married, Uncle Louis, who never
amounted to anything, living on the roof, and so on.
Often there is a central court yard with children running
around in it. Childcare is shared by multiple adults.
Children are doted upon.
People in this situation tend to fit together like a jig-saw
puzzle. They're not individuals like we are; they are complete
only as part of the whole.
This pretty routinely produces sweet, sane individuals.
It compensates extraordinarily well for deficiencies
in parenting. Suppose your mother or your father is a deficient parent.
Then your aunt or your uncle or your other aunt or your
other uncle, or grandma and grandpa, or... do the parenting.
Often particular parenting jobs, like teaching the kid about
sex, is delegated to an aunt or uncle. As the collective does
the parenting and child care, weak links make little difference.
(another advantage, in passing, is that women who choose
not to marry (as Indian women occasionally do choose)
have lives full of close and loving relations with children.)
Children in nuclear families are a lot more vulnerable.
If mom or dad are deficient in parenting, often
there's nobody there to fill in and the kid suffers
the consequences. One of the consequences of
American individualism is that large numbers of
Americans are dealing with the bad consequences
of defective parenting. I expect there are
other causes too.
Another sanity-making feature of Indian families
is that parents, not children, decide who the children
will marry. Generally an Indian mother knows very
well the sort of person who will make happy her
son or daughter. People fall in love a couple of years
into a marriage. Expectations within marriage are
low, so marriages tend to be a lot more stable
and happy than here (with our 50 percent divorce
rate and the consequences for children).
Extended families were surely the norm in 'India'
in 500 BC, and there's no reason to think they worked
differently then. The main features of Indian society
then are there today (e.g. extended families, arranged
marriages, the caste system). Life was, if anything,
simpler and less confusing. So it's a very good bet
that Indians then were a good deal more like Indians
today than they are like us. Sane, sweet people
who aren't suffering the consequences of defective
parenting.
These are the people the Buddha preached to,
they are the ones whose needs Buddhism was meant
to answer. Because sane, sweet people suffer,
it's part of the human condition, their children
die, they fall ill, they grow old, they grieve,
they are afraid, they are parted from what they
want, they get what they don't want....
Buddhist practice was meant for them.
It responds to the suffering that comes
with being human, no matter how sane you are.
When Buddhism comes here many of the people
who join up are dealing with the consequences
of defective parenting. What many of them
want is to solve such personal problems.
There has been a good deal of pressure
on buddhism, therefore, to apply the meditative
practice to these needs.
It's conceivable that meditation
might solve these very different problems,
but I've been watching for decades the
effort to bend it to that purpose,
and I'm very doubtful that it does.
That doesn't mean it's useless, of course.
I think it does what the Buddha meant it
to do. But it isn't a panacea.
It must be done from a calm center,anniemcu wrote:Again, just my own experience and opinion...Denny wrote:so ya couldn't just ask him "what's the matter?"
If it is quite obvious that something is 'going on' with him, and you are willing to shoulder a little of the weight to help him, you can ask, but you have to be careful that you don't either take on the burden yourself nor assume you have the answer to give him.... self disciplines that are difficult to maintain.
that their behavior has not disturbed.
It acknowledges that you have become aware of their condition and are willing to listen.
There is no shouldering of the burden, other than listening.
No answers given.
You must stay centered and detached from the storm.
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anniemcu
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That was quite an assumption, and a rude one at that.djm wrote:What a tremendous load of codswallop. Areyou referring to Asians' suicide rate? If you really believe half of what you have said in this particular posting it is small wonder you come into the pub mewling about your failures at meditation camp.jim stone wrote:But I think you've really got to have very few
serious personal problems. Asians seldom have them, and if you
do, these are probably more effectively addressed
by other means.
djm
I didn't clearly understand what Jim said in that section of the post either, but I didn't see it as representative of his being either full of dung or false in his beliefs. Nor did his coming to friends for some input and the ability to vent a little and talk a little, resemble 'mewling'.
Last edited by anniemcu on Thu Sep 06, 2007 11:09 am, edited 1 time in total.
anniemcu
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
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anniemcu
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Yes, that is it.Denny wrote:It must be done from a calm center,anniemcu wrote:Again, just my own experience and opinion...Denny wrote:so ya couldn't just ask him "what's the matter?"
If it is quite obvious that something is 'going on' with him, and you are willing to shoulder a little of the weight to help him, you can ask, but you have to be careful that you don't either take on the burden yourself nor assume you have the answer to give him.... self disciplines that are difficult to maintain.
that their behavior has not disturbed.
It acknowledges that you have become aware of their condition and are willing to listen.
There is no shouldering of the burden, other than listening.
No answers given.
You must stay centered and detached from the storm.
anniemcu
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
---
"You are what you do, not what you claim to believe." -Gene A. Statler
---
"Olé to you, none-the-less!" - Elizabeth Gilbert
---
http://www.sassafrassgrove.com
-
djm
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I disagree.anniemcu wrote:That was quite an assumption, and a rude one at that.
I didn't clearly understand what Jim said in that post either, but I didn't see it as representative of his being either full of dung or false in his beliefs. Nor did his coming to friends for some input and the ability to vent a little and talk a little, resemble 'mewling'.
djm
I'd rather be atop the foothills than beneath them.
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KatieBell
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I find this really interesting.
The man hits a bump in the road and responds angrily to a miscommunication between you (he apparently didn't realize you thought it was first come/first serve since you were typically second and on the other corner), so you assume the meditative practice isn't helping him through this.
In my religion, there is a great focus on theosis. It is the journey of our life to God. As we grow closer to the Lord, we live lives more in accordance with His will instead of our own. There is a great focus placed on monastic principles, even for the laity. The same focus of detachment from the worldly, etc is there. So I see us both as coming from the same premise in this instance. So I find it interesting that your assumption is so different than mine would be about where things should be going.
I would assume that he was in more need of the meditative process, not less. And I would wonder how bad off he might have been without it. I would assume he recognizes its transformative power as well since he isn't ready to change and therefore skipped the meditation wishing health to his enemies. I would assume there were some much greater things going on in his life that he hadn't shared with me, or possibly with anyone, to lead him to have so much uncharacteristic anger. I would worry about him and what was affecting him so much so as to affect his faith. I would spend quite some time in prayer for this man that he would have the grace and strength to confront and overcome whatever was affecting him so deeply. I would pray for insight and guidance so that I might help him in any way possible. I would let him know that I was sorry we had apparently had a miscommunication, but when he was ready that I would like to try to set it straight with him. I would ask him for his forgiveness for whatever I had done to hurt him. I would also spend more time in prayer myself trying to battle my own flaws which helped lead to such pain in another.
You have said this is very uncharacteristic of him. You said he has been dedicated and a pious adherent of his faith. You have said you and he have gotten along well in the past and he has manifested the tenants of the faith you both practice. Then you said he became angry with you over an apparent miscommunication, greatly disproportionate to the unintended offense, so much so that he would stop practicing regular devotions and even stop talking to you. So you complain about him on a message board and say how crazy he is and write off your own shared practice as less than what he needs (because what he really needs is psychological counseling). It seems to be a cold and callous response to a man you respected and considered a friend.
I would agree with the others that you could respect him and his need for space to work through this while also offering to lend him any support he needs, most especially a way to gracefully work through it and move on and preserve your friendship and your meditative practice together. And that you could take the time to work on your own flaws and to grow in your own faith.
The man hits a bump in the road and responds angrily to a miscommunication between you (he apparently didn't realize you thought it was first come/first serve since you were typically second and on the other corner), so you assume the meditative practice isn't helping him through this.
In my religion, there is a great focus on theosis. It is the journey of our life to God. As we grow closer to the Lord, we live lives more in accordance with His will instead of our own. There is a great focus placed on monastic principles, even for the laity. The same focus of detachment from the worldly, etc is there. So I see us both as coming from the same premise in this instance. So I find it interesting that your assumption is so different than mine would be about where things should be going.
I would assume that he was in more need of the meditative process, not less. And I would wonder how bad off he might have been without it. I would assume he recognizes its transformative power as well since he isn't ready to change and therefore skipped the meditation wishing health to his enemies. I would assume there were some much greater things going on in his life that he hadn't shared with me, or possibly with anyone, to lead him to have so much uncharacteristic anger. I would worry about him and what was affecting him so much so as to affect his faith. I would spend quite some time in prayer for this man that he would have the grace and strength to confront and overcome whatever was affecting him so deeply. I would pray for insight and guidance so that I might help him in any way possible. I would let him know that I was sorry we had apparently had a miscommunication, but when he was ready that I would like to try to set it straight with him. I would ask him for his forgiveness for whatever I had done to hurt him. I would also spend more time in prayer myself trying to battle my own flaws which helped lead to such pain in another.
You have said this is very uncharacteristic of him. You said he has been dedicated and a pious adherent of his faith. You have said you and he have gotten along well in the past and he has manifested the tenants of the faith you both practice. Then you said he became angry with you over an apparent miscommunication, greatly disproportionate to the unintended offense, so much so that he would stop practicing regular devotions and even stop talking to you. So you complain about him on a message board and say how crazy he is and write off your own shared practice as less than what he needs (because what he really needs is psychological counseling). It seems to be a cold and callous response to a man you respected and considered a friend.
I would agree with the others that you could respect him and his need for space to work through this while also offering to lend him any support he needs, most especially a way to gracefully work through it and move on and preserve your friendship and your meditative practice together. And that you could take the time to work on your own flaws and to grow in your own faith.
To be on a quest is nothing more or less than to become an asker of questions. -Keen