Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Malcolm
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Malcolm »

PadmaVonSamba wrote: Since at this early point, there are no objects of attachment, with only consciousness functioning, what possible action of the mind can take place which would generate karma?
When the previous universe is destroyed, it is destroyed only up to the level of the third form realm. All remaining sentient beings exist in the upper highest form realm (those who are not in the formless realm, that is). Eventually, as their merit is exhausted, the winds created by their traces of karma generate an air mandala which begins the formation of a new container universe. As sentient beings have karma to be reborn in this and that place, this or that place appears to receive them.

M
pensum
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by pensum »

Malcolm wrote:In fact, space arises from consciousness, and the four elements arise from space. This is a universal explanation of the arising of matter in Dharm texts.
dzogchungpa wrote:Did the historical Buddha teach this?
Malcolm wrote:Indeed.
dzogchungpa wrote:Well, do you have a reference?
Bump.
Malcolm
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Malcolm »

pensum wrote:
Malcolm wrote:In fact, space arises from consciousness, and the four elements arise from space. This is a universal explanation of the arising of matter in Dharm texts.
dzogchungpa wrote:Did the historical Buddha teach this?
Malcolm wrote:Indeed.
dzogchungpa wrote:Well, do you have a reference?
Bump.

You will have to wait until I get home.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Malcolm wrote: When the previous universe is destroyed, it is destroyed only up to the level of the third form realm. All remaining sentient beings exist in the upper highest form realm (those who are not in the formless realm, that is). Eventually, as their merit is exhausted, the winds created by their traces of karma generate an air mandala which begins the formation of a new container universe. As sentient beings have karma to be reborn in this and that place, this or that place appears to receive them.
Of course! How positively silly of me not to notice!
I stand corrected.
Except that I am sitting.
. . .
EMPTIFUL.
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Kaccāni
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Kaccāni »

Actually that system appears to me as consistent in itself, even across emergences of universe, from the perspective of consciousness, which vaguely resembles our observer view.

It's not that you have to assign any truth value to it. But if it is in itself consistent and it describes known phenomena correctly within itself, then one can work with it for its purpose. That's all you need to do with a model. Science won't do more for you either.

Best wishes
Gwenn
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dzogchungpa
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by dzogchungpa »

Malcolm wrote:
pensum wrote:
Malcolm wrote:In fact, space arises from consciousness, and the four elements arise from space. This is a universal explanation of the arising of matter in Dharm texts.
dzogchungpa wrote:Did the historical Buddha teach this?
Malcolm wrote:Indeed.
dzogchungpa wrote:Well, do you have a reference?
Bump.
You will have to wait until I get home.
What am I, chopped liver?
There is not only nothingness because there is always, and always can manifest. - Thinley Norbu Rinpoche
Andrew108
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Andrew108 »

Malcolm wrote:
PadmaVonSamba wrote: Since at this early point, there are no objects of attachment, with only consciousness functioning, what possible action of the mind can take place which would generate karma?
When the previous universe is destroyed, it is destroyed only up to the level of the third form realm. All remaining sentient beings exist in the upper highest form realm (those who are not in the formless realm, that is). Eventually, as their merit is exhausted, the winds created by their traces of karma generate an air mandala which begins the formation of a new container universe. As sentient beings have karma to be reborn in this and that place, this or that place appears to receive them.

M
This has to be proven. Otherwise it is a fairy tale.
The Blessed One said:

"What is the All? Simply the eye & forms, ear & sounds, nose & aromas, tongue & flavors, body & tactile sensations, intellect & ideas. This, monks, is called the All. Anyone who would say, 'Repudiating this All, I will describe another,' if questioned on what exactly might be the grounds for his statement, would be unable to explain, and furthermore, would be put to grief. Why? Because it lies beyond range." Sabba Sutta.
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Schrödinger’s Yidam »

This has to be proven. Otherwise it is a fairy tale.
Anything scenario pre-Big Bang is speculation, and plenty of scenarios are being offered by the scientific community. My supposition is that this type of idea comes from an enlightened perspective of "what is" and extrapolating out from that, the macroscopic being an extension of the observable. But obviously I'm in no position to know that.

In any case my confidence in Dharma does not come from its cosmology.
1.The problem isn’t ‘ignorance’. The problem is the mind you have right now. (H.H. Karmapa XVII @NYC 2/4/18)
2. I support Mingyur R and HHDL in their positions against lama abuse.
3. Student: Lama, I thought I might die but then I realized that the 3 Jewels would protect me.
Lama: Even If you had died the 3 Jewels would still have protected you. (DW post by Fortyeightvows)
Andrew108
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Andrew108 »

smcj wrote:In any case my confidence in Dharma does not come from its cosmology.
Me neither. Glad you pointed that out.
The Blessed One said:

"What is the All? Simply the eye & forms, ear & sounds, nose & aromas, tongue & flavors, body & tactile sensations, intellect & ideas. This, monks, is called the All. Anyone who would say, 'Repudiating this All, I will describe another,' if questioned on what exactly might be the grounds for his statement, would be unable to explain, and furthermore, would be put to grief. Why? Because it lies beyond range." Sabba Sutta.
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Sönam
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Sönam »

Andrew108 wrote:
smcj wrote:In any case my confidence in Dharma does not come from its cosmology.
Me neither. Glad you pointed that out.
In a relative conception of the univers, why should a view be superior to another? ... perhaps the "another" view has a better focal? Would not the best view be the one the more accurate for the realization of Buddha Dharma, eradication of suffering?

Sönam
By understanding everything you perceive from the perspective of the view, you are freed from the constraints of philosophical beliefs.
By understanding that any and all mental activity is meditation, you are freed from arbitrary divisions between formal sessions and postmeditation activity.
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Kaccāni
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Kaccāni »

I suppose when you speak in terms of Dharma as a form of realization then that does not need a cosmology. It needs a model of perception. However, if you got that model of perception down, it will automatically end in some form of cosmology when it completes itself. That will become obvious when the model of perception is understood and experienced.

Now if you got such a basis laid out, you can draft up dependent systems. Like those of tibetan medicine, ayurveda, those for interacting with other people, and the like. Not to see them as rules, but honoring certain predictions you can make from that model. The problem is, you will not understand those predictions if you don't have the underlying model down. That's what it's for. Not more, not less. Those dependent models will still have to prove themselves experimentally. They just structure themselves accordingly. That structuring seems appropriate, since it is easier to remember things when they attach to some basic core that has already been laid out. Otherwise you have a pile of jigsaw puzzle pieces that don't give a big picture in which you can sort stuff. Makes remembering a ton more difficult. Let alone conclusions when you need to interpolate.

Now ask a doctor of tibetan medicine about buddhist cosmology, and you get as an answer: what the buddhist cosmology within its perception model looks like (the cosmology appears to me as an extension of the perception model which makes it complete). What other answer do you expect? Something that contradicts it? That may appease your temper, it will maybe even attach to your current understanding better, but it won't make you for example understand all those procedures that have been based on it. And it's not only medicine, it's also the Dharma itself. The practices which have been described.

How can a question whether something is selfish or not be answered without a corresponding reference frame? It's a relative question. A yogi who dwells "as pure observer" may be seen as selfish: "You only do that for yourself". The yogi dwelling in it may tell you: "If you would experience this, you would know that there is no room for selfishness left, since I cannot find my self." There are then two possibilities: Either you make the experience, which probably will take time. Or you try to get an explanation. That again needs a reference fram which describes the phenomena involved.

Transporting them into a capitalist (or communist, or libertarian, or whatever) framework for example will not deliver an appropriate explanation. It may give you one which appeases your temper. But it doesn't give you one to make the experiences which are described in the methods. I constantly try to come up with "newer" ways of explaining things, so people may be pointed to that which I found I could experience so far. And it's not easy. Most of the stuff I have experienced came along with developping a similar view upon the world, although not as complete. And even that resulted in a ton of misunderstandings as I tried to communicate with people here. Since it was my reframing. Partly yogic, partly scientific, but difficult to interpret for people who do not have a model with the same terminology, when it comes to a level of detail that is required to describe phenomena. Then I can only talk about what I have experienced so far. And there's a huge chance that people will think what I say is wrong, that I apparently haven't made the experience, because what I say for them seems to contain too many mistakes.

It also doesn't make me understand a description of a meditation method that has been described in buddhist terminology. I have to map my experiences into that buddhist reference frame first to get that understanding, and then see what other pieces are there to explore. Therefore I have to look up the definiton of terms that are specific to the model. That does not mean that I was wrong. I just needed an add on to my "translator module". Then I can see which of my experiences are covered where, and what's been described in addition to that. And maybe even where the two seem to contradict. That still doesn't mean I have to accept patriarch organization systems. But once I can argue within the system, things may become easier ;-)

The main mistake one makes is the illusion of "isness". Talking in a different reference model does not mean things "are" different. It does not mean "you become different". It does not mean your sensing becomes different. You only speak different about them in a particular context. That doesn't make you unscientific, that's a mere issue of communication. Even if you do science that's just a different way of speaking about what appears to be, what is experienced, with a different purpose. And maybe, with these additional thoughts, you can draw conclusions or understand texts which you weren't able to before.

The simple fact is: When you continue to talk in scientific terms, that will not point you towards the phenomena that are there to realize on the path, which is completely described "from the perspective awareness" (forgive this trivialization). Well, maybe if you read people in the cybernetics/sociology/biology corner, like Humberto Maturana, Heinz von Förster, maybe even Benoit Mandelbrot, concepts about autopoiesis, Nassi Taleb's black swans, it may happen that your thinking drifts towards an inversion from the paradigma of dimensionality to a paradigma of dependent arising. They're really close to it. Maybe it helps dwelling 20 years over an interpretation of the first three pages of the Tao Te King to get your thinking set up this way.

But to take laws which are based on dimensionality and telling they don't work in dependent arising, therefore dependent arising is wrong, is just mixing up things. There's nothing new to be won by doing that. And not knowledge either.

Of course, you can do the Zen way, sit down, and wait until realization comes spontaneously. You can do the yoga way, merge self into the observer and forget about it, but that still won't make you understand what's written in buddhist texts. Even to grasp ayurveda you won't get around the terminology of the Baghavad Gita (and if you understand that, you will probably grasp the "good"/"bad", halal, kosher-Principle of quite some religions). Starting from there you can probably even make modern adjustments to it, that don't violate the rest of the system.

You don't need to do that. It's not needed for practice. But that's what many people here apparently want to do: talk about it.

Best wishes
Gwenn
Shush! I'm doing nose-picking practice!
Simon E.
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Simon E. »

What ARE you on about ?

Get thee to a ( Buddhadharma ) teacher.
“You don’t know it. You just know about it. That is not the same thing.”

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche to me.
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Sönam »

I'm since long surprized by peoples still trying to hammer a nail with a screwdriver ... Mind (Sems) is a tool originated in ma-rigpa, it is powerful to describe samsara and (from a relative pov) nirvana. It has never answered to question like the beginning or the infinite (except if postuling God or inanimate matter originating energy/spirit). Mind can only comprehend completed systems, those with a beginning and a (potential) end. It cannot comprehend larger system, therefore all attempt to apprehend or explain the Buddha Dharma with the mind (Sems) tool will be at best approximative and most probably ineffective.
This is the reason why, if you considere that matter originate energy, or that there is an having-created-all entity, or that life begin at birth and end at (clinical) death, that there is no continuum and rebirthing process, you cannot pretend to follow (and discuss) the Dharma of Buddha Shakyamuni.

Sönam
By understanding everything you perceive from the perspective of the view, you are freed from the constraints of philosophical beliefs.
By understanding that any and all mental activity is meditation, you are freed from arbitrary divisions between formal sessions and postmeditation activity.
- Longchen Rabjam -
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conebeckham
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by conebeckham »

Sönam wrote:I'm since long surprized by peoples still trying to hammer a nail with a screwdriver ... Mind (Sems) is a tool originated in ma-rigpa, it is powerful to describe samsara and (from a relative pov) nirvana. It has never answered to question like the beginning or the infinite (except if postuling God or inanimate matter originating energy/spirit). Mind can only comprehend completed systems, those with a beginning and a (potential) end. It cannot comprehend larger system, therefore all attempt to apprehend or explain the Buddha Dharma with the mind (Sems) tool will be at best approximative and most probably ineffective.
This is the reason why, if you considere that matter originate energy, or that there is an having-created-all entity, or that life begin at birth and end at (clinical) death, that there is no continuum and rebirthing process, you cannot pretend to follow (and discuss) the Dharma of Buddha Shakyamuni.

Sönam
I'm in agreement. I've been pondering this thread, and I think Science, and all other systems based on "mind," are useful and powerful, but the truth of Mahamudra concerns "nature of mind," which is really not an object of analysis, scientific or otherwise. Furthermore, as we can clearly see in this thread, locating "mind" in the brain is not the point of Mahamudra, nor is building a model of "life," the "sentient being," or a "cosmology." I'm going to call it a "category error" to equate the materials of successful Mahamudra practice with materialist representations or ideas. Thoughts may have a relation to electrochemical processes in the brainpan, but that is completely beside the point, for a Mahamudra practitioner. It is the thought itself, and not the material manifestation or process, that is paramount.
དམ་པའི་དོན་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ཆེ་བ་དང་།
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དེ་ནི་ཤེས་རབ་ལ་ནི་ལོ་རྟོག་སེལ།།


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It is realized through the blessing grace of the Guru and fortunate Karmic potential.
Like this, mistaken ideas of discriminating wisdom are clarified."
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Simon E.
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Simon E. »

:good:
“You don’t know it. You just know about it. That is not the same thing.”

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche to me.
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Kaccāni »

@SimonE: You talking to me?
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Malcolm
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Malcolm »

Andrew108 wrote:
Malcolm wrote:
PadmaVonSamba wrote: Since at this early point, there are no objects of attachment, with only consciousness functioning, what possible action of the mind can take place which would generate karma?
When the previous universe is destroyed, it is destroyed only up to the level of the third form realm. All remaining sentient beings exist in the upper highest form realm (those who are not in the formless realm, that is). Eventually, as their merit is exhausted, the winds created by their traces of karma generate an air mandala which begins the formation of a new container universe. As sentient beings have karma to be reborn in this and that place, this or that place appears to receive them.

M
This has to be proven. Otherwise it is a fairy tale.
You can prove it for yourself by developing the devacakṣu, the divine eye. You will never be able to prove it to anyone else.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Malcolm, are you saying that all realms share the same universe,
or that each realm creates its own universe?

If you say that all realms share the same universe,
then the universe cannot be said to be created by the consciousness of beings in a particular realm.

If you say the realms exist in separate universes,
then humans and animals could not share the same sense of reality.

Which is it?
. . .
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
Malcolm
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by Malcolm »

PadmaVonSamba wrote:Malcolm, are you saying that all realms share the same universe,
or that each realm creates its own universe?

If you say that all realms share the same universe,
then the universe cannot be said to be created by the consciousness of beings in a particular realm.

If you say the realms exist in separate universes,
then humans and animals could not share the same sense of reality.

Which is it?
. . .
It is like a house with separate floors. Not all inhabitants can know whether the others are home.

We all inhabit the same universe, the universe comes about because of our collective actions. It is as if we all build one house, but then we live on separate floors, using separate entrances.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Mahamudra meditation problem: locating the mind

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Malcolm wrote: We all inhabit the same universe, the universe comes about because of our collective actions. It is as if we all build one house, but then we live on separate floors, using separate entrances.
If all beings inhabit the same universe,
Yet experience different 'realities' of different realms,
some pleasant, some torturous, and so on,
then what they experience cannot be the result of any sort of combined consciousness
but rather, due to their own karma,
each being experiences the same basic properties of an already existing physical universe in their own way
which is why, for example,
it is said that (something to the effect that)
even if you offer a hungry ghost (preta) cool water
it will perceive that water as vile pus.
. . .
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
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