Intention

Discussion of meditation in the Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions.
dude
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Re: Intention

Post by dude »

Yoga have been the most inspiration, because I found them most easily available. If one, then playing pool has taught me the most, since you won´t push beyond a certain level if you cannot get your feelings or thoughts handled. Therefore you have to observe them. And you can either decide to do that or not. I´ve also, on the side, read a lot. But not memorized. But I´ve basically understood that part of what was written which I already perceived on my own. It changed from cryptic to obvious after the corresponding observation. It helped sorting things."

That has been the process in my own experience as well. I think you're doing fine.
muni
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Re: Intention

Post by muni »

When I am hungry, I read a cooking book.

:meditate:
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Kaccāni
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Re: Intention

Post by Kaccāni »

Thanks for all the answers.

@Sherab Dorje: I cannot conclude from your words on your motivation, your actions or your interest. Why do you suggest you can do this with mine?
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Grigoris
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Re: Intention

Post by Grigoris »

Gwenn Dana wrote:Thanks for all the answers.

@Sherab Dorje: I cannot conclude from your words on your motivation, your actions or your interest. Why do you suggest you can do this with mine?
Super powers?
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I made an effort to show you that your interpretations of my statements were mistaken, so please feel free to prove me wrong too.
"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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Kaccāni
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Re: Intention

Post by Kaccāni »

I guess that´s just the way it is.
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garudha
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Re: Intention

Post by garudha »

You are what your deep, driving desire is.
As your desire is, so is your will.
As your will is, so is your deed.
As your deed is, so is your destiny.


Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV 4.5

Now that's what I call wisdom!
Adi
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Re: Intention

Post by Adi »

Gwenn Dana wrote:...I´ve been a generalist freestyle practitioner most of my life….
If you spend all your time developing your own sense of self, your own self's language and your own way of things it is not reasonable to expect anyone else will understand you unless you do a lot of explaining and contextualizing.

The intention of most Buddhists is to liberate themselves from the chains of self and suffering, not reinforce the experience by making a bigger and better self.

And yes, in Mahayana intention and motivation are absolutely crucial.

Adi
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Re: Intention

Post by Adi »

garudha wrote:You are what your deep, driving desire is.
As your desire is, so is your will.
As your will is, so is your deed.
As your deed is, so is your destiny.


Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV 4.5

Now that's what I call wisdom!
That's in in a nutshell, or better put, the core of a Bodhi seed.

Adi
hop.pala
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Re: Intention

Post by hop.pala »

Thus I go practice my art that teaches me what words can not.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zPkWVqdJXI
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later please write something about meditation.
moron
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Re: Intention

Post by moron »

Hi there,I like very much this topik And I have some questions about intention from the biddhist perspective.
I am also not native english speaker.
So,is intention a wish?Or may be not the wish it self but the motivation behind it?Can this alter the relative world we live in?
How this can be interpreted from a budhist pespective:
Lets say that I had doubt that I am suitable for practicing in a specific tradition. So , what I did is that I expressed verbally the wish (and this was supported by doing the Vajra guru mantra), that I want to have a sign in my dream and if this tradition is open for me as a student and if it is suitable to practice there and under the guidance of the Guru there,or not.So same night I had this sign in my dream.
Is it how the intention is working?
So,is it common in a budhist practice to use once wish with the motivation to change reality?I mean,If I say this prayer:
May I have the right circumstances and right teachers around me,
so I can progress one the path for my sake and then for the benefit of all.
I take this prayer as a magical formula containing my intention witch is going to change the reality.I have same understanding about mantra as well.Am I totally delusional here?
So how it is from the Dzogchen perspective as well,I mean same questions and touts I had expressed?
thank you all and best wishes
m :namaste:
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Wayfarer
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Re: Intention

Post by Wayfarer »

Welcome to the Forum, Moron.

As you say you are not a native English speaker, you might consider looking up the user name you have chosen before making a lot more posts.

It might convey a negative impression.
'Only practice with no gaining idea' ~ Suzuki Roshi
dude
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Re: Intention

Post by dude »

No, you're not delusional.
It really does work that way.
Intention formed in the mind and expressed in words affects all the environment.
moron
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Re: Intention

Post by moron »

jeeprs wrote:Welcome to the Forum, Moron.

As you say you are not a native English speaker, you might consider looking up the user name you have chosen before making a lot more posts.

It might convey a negative impression.
ok tank you.I will change it, although I like the sound you are right..it may coses harm
moron
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Re: Intention

Post by moron »

dude wrote:No, you're not delusional.
It really does work that way.
Intention formed in the mind and expressed in words affects all the environment.
Can the intention affect deeply other creatures mind,I mean changing their reality(perceptions),curing diseases
eradicating obstacles and so on?
If one have powerful intention,can he attain Buddhadhood just because he has this wish in a proper way?Is this the aim of all different practices,to make once intention so powerful that he or she can realize he Buddha nature just by wish?
moron
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Re: Intention

Post by moron »

Adi wrote:
Gwenn Dana wrote:...I´ve been a generalist freestyle practitioner most of my life….
If you spend all your time developing your own sense of self, your own self's language and your own way of things it is not reasonable to expect anyone else will understand you unless you do a lot of explaining and contextualizing.

The intention of most Buddhists is to liberate themselves from the chains of self and suffering, not reinforce the experience by making a bigger and better self.

And yes, in Mahayana intention and motivation are absolutely crucial.

Adi
Can you explain the differences between intention and motivation.
For me the sentences: ,,I have intention to benefit all,,and ,,I have motivation to do it,,somehow sound quite similar.
:namaste:
dude
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Re: Intention

Post by dude »

Can the intention affect deeply other creatures mind,I mean changing their reality(perceptions),curing diseases
eradicating obstacles and so on?
If one have powerful intention,can he attain Buddhadhood just because he has this wish in a proper way?Is this the aim of all different practices,to make once intention so powerful that he or she can realize he Buddha nature just by wish?[/quote]


Of course. The Buddha's moon loving meditation cured King Ajatashatru's illness overnight.

The desire to attain enlightenment is the fundamental cause for it. Reaching it requires practice (cause) with body and mouth as well as mind.
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Kaccāni
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Re: Intention

Post by Kaccāni »

My view:
Motivation needs an external motive, a purpose. Whatever you do, is not done for just doing it all by itself so that it just happens, but it depends on achieving something that serves as purpose for that motive. It needs fruit of action. Thus it is born out from attachment. It comes with frustration when that which is the motive is not being achieved, and with that frustration comes suffering.

Intention only sets forth actions, creates a chance that things happen. It does not need a purpose other than doing itself. There does not need to be fruit from doing, it is optional, there's no attachment to it. You completely make out within yourself. Keep inside yourself. It is not born from attachment. It can thus result in endless trial out of mere joy of being, not shutting off any arising options because of thoughts or judgement according to some purpose. If something happens, it happens. If it happens not, it happens not. That does not mean that there is no action or no trial. There is. There is also learning. There is learning of skill. There is experience. There's just no clinging to the fruit.

In the above example you were giving intention a motive, thus turning it into motivation. Which is one huge trap, that even "do it for the benefit of all beings" does not completely resolve. That still is based on motive, even if that motive is considered beneficial.

To make an example:

When I practice pool, I can play a certain drill to acquire some skill. Then whenever I do that drill, when I do not yet have acquired it I will create suffering and a feeling of inferiority. Frustration because things are not progressing fast enough. Or superstition because I progressed faster than I thought. Bad karma, in both cases.

When I simply do those drills for a certain period of time, not caring abot the skill, but just doing the drill, after a while there will suddenly be realization that the skill is there. Because it comes from simply doing those many executions. Yet there was no clinging. Now that it is there, it opens new options for things that can be done.

When I go to a competition with the motive to win it, and I finish second or third, there will be frustration.
If I simply play tournaments with no motive other than the intention of playing, some day I will probably also win, if the conditions are met (my skill, the opponents, the environment, ...)
Even that can become a motive. When my health breaks and I can no longer play tournaments I will experience whether playing tournaments was a motive and I have to deal with attachment or not.

Whenever there's a motive, there is suffering.


Best wishes
Gwenn
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Grigoris
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Re: Intention

Post by Grigoris »

So you believe that motivation and intention are seperate? How can you have intention without motivation and vice versa? Somehow it does not seem possible to me. Realistically though, to me the two terms are synonyms.
"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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Kaccāni
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Re: Intention

Post by Kaccāni »

In my experience there can be intention without motive, because motive needs thought. Some may call that "right intention", because then no suffering can arise from it. It does not neccesarily imply desire. (The common definition for intention still implies a "purpose". At some point in my personal practice I found it useful to limit that to executing the action itself and make this distinction. An In-tension that simply supports itself. It just comes. You still need an intention for actions to arise or you sag and rot.) So in this sense, intention is that ground on which penomena emerge that can be observed as my actions.

Then there can not be motivation without intention (at least the intention to hold that motive). Although there can be motivation without ever doing anything else than holding the motive. That's utterly useless, but probably gives rise to all our status thinking of "being some thing". If you'd hold the intention to "act that thing" you'd notice how impossible it is. Motivation is something based in external things. In conditioning. In learned values, so whatever is praised as motive is judged "worthy" to keep. Motivation arises when there is attachment to that.

Best wishes
Gwenn

Edit: Would probably make a nice koan: "Do that cherry!"
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Grigoris
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Re: Intention

Post by Grigoris »

Intention and motive are synonymous, they are used interchangeably. I think that you are making distinctions where none actually exist and really I cannot see why you wish to make the distinction.
"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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