Two Truths Doctrine

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MagnetSoulSP
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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PadmaVonSamba wrote: Sun Jan 01, 2023 12:41 am
Ardha wrote: Sat Dec 31, 2022 10:05 pm
But what I am trying to say is that in that quote she mentioned there is no reason to feel a way about anything, according to what she said. In other words when someone dies there is no reason to be sad or when you get a gift there is no reason to feel happy, etc because this is all stuff that just happens. There is no reason to feel anything about anything.
so, why do you need a reason?
I think you are adding more to what she is saying than what is there. I'm trying to say that your explanation isn't what she means.
You originally stated:
“I don't understand if there is ultimate reality then how can you just go back to living the day to day as if things matter, aren't you pretending at that point? I also didn't understand loss being false at ultimate reality (in regards to someone dying), heck I don't even understand ultimate reality.”
…so, I’m addressing that.
I also explained that in the movie the thing falls apart once you recognize it as just a movie.

Right. I can enjoy a car wreck in a movie precisely because I know it’s not real. Likewise, knowing the true nature of things does not mean you have no emotional experiences. Why do you keep arguing this point?
But to recap she is saying that the one with "true understanding" knows that there is no reason to feeling anything about anything, it's not what you seem to be getting at.
I think my reply is what she is getting at, and I say this because she really isn’t saying anything new that hasn’t been said before or that isn’t basically the crux of the buddhist teachings. She just said it in a way that’s got you confused.

One who has ‘true understanding’ (and I can only interpret that phrase to mean a direct perception of emptiness) doesn’t experience happiness and sadness in the same way that one who is easily swept away by the constantly shifting winds of samsara experiences happiness and sadness.

That doesn’t mean they are emotional zombies. You seem to be making that claim but you have no basis for doing so other than “I don’t think so” .
But, as been suggested, maybe if you do more research into the Buddhist teachings, and don’t just fixate on what that one person has written, you might get a different perspective.
Emotional zombies might be close to the truth. Upon realizing that there is no reason to feel anything about any sort of occurrence you just sort of stop and abide in a state free of joy or sadness. I mean if happiness and sadness are essentially caused by you and your reactions to things then you just sort of "hop out" of that stream of emotions and experience all things equally. At least that's what I've read in some books at my library, and my conversations with monks, and what she is saying (and I have asked her personally and she can confirm, she's also studied it in college and spoken to scholars and monks as well about it).

When people are happy or sad you are just "playing along" with them seeing no real reason to feel happy or sad over what's happening but you act as such so that you can relate to others all the while inside you have moved past that. You even move past things you like or enjoy one you realize that at the core of it all there is no reason for liking or enjoying such things so it stops. It's the same thing that happens when you realize a movie is fake. You don't enjoy the car crash.

That's what I meant about entertainment, so much money, effort, and time goes into making people forget it's not real which is the point. Otherwise you're just watching lights on a screen instead of an epic (or some other tale) that's going on. It makes it more than what is, otherwise comics are lines on paper. None of that would go anywhere if people saw it wasn't real, it wouldn't move or inspire what it does today with fandoms, cosplay, movies, and all that.

It's part of why I'm hesitate to look further into this, because I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am Emotional zombies might be close to the truth. Upon realizing that there is no reason to feel anything about any sort of occurrence you just sort of stop and abide in a state free of joy or sadness.
Why do you keep insisting on this “no reason to feel anything” nonsense? Please show me where this is taught in Buddhist teachings.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am It's part of why I'm hesitate to look further into this, because I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
So, who’s telling you to?
And if your mind is truly decided, what point are you trying to make by posting the same thing over and over again?

If you are you hoping that some Buddhists here will convince you that the Dharma isn’t about being a zombie, that’s not ever going to happen, because that’s what every reply has been an effort to do. And it hasn’t happened.

It’s pretty obvious that you don’t really want to be convinced of that. Once a person thoroughly believes something (whether it is true or not) no explanation will ever change their thinking. There is no way for you to find out for yourself except to do what this Buddha suggested: try it out and see what happens.

And the whole thing is absurd anyway, because it is not as though if you mediate (which is why I asked about that) or chant or whatever, that some weird change will occur and you won’t ever feel any more emotions.
Booze is good for that.

And it’s not like taking LSD, where twenty minutes later you start seeing paisley patterns everywhere for the next ten hours, and you don’t have any control over your mind.

So, forgive me for being blunt, but the whole premise of “if I get into Buddhism and see into the insubstantial nature of things, I will lose all of my emotions” is ridiculous. This is something that you have made up. It’s how you have interpreted the things that you have read or been told. The fact that over 500 million Buddhists around the world are in fact not zombies should give you a clue that you are simply clinging to ideas that are not valid.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
This is the other thing I find problematic in your reasoning:

It’s okay for you to be “living a lie” (as you put it) but at the same time, it’s not okay for someone else to (supposedly) pretend to be happy or sad when they aren’t?

How do you square that one?

This really comes back to a misunderstanding of the two truths doctrine.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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PadmaVonSamba wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 6:38 am
Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
This is the other thing I find problematic in your reasoning:

It’s okay for you to be “living a lie” (as you put it) but at the same time, it’s not okay for someone else to (supposedly) pretend to be happy or sad when they aren’t?

How do you square that one?

This really comes back to a misunderstanding of the two truths doctrine.
What I am talking about is what someone I used to know told me from the people she spoke to about Buddhism, that being scholars and monks. She didn't really mention specific teachings and I didn't really ask as I was too concerned about the words.

I'm still not sure about the zombie thing either since I have read different things from different places in my 15 years reading on this and they all seem to conflict. So it's not like I want to think it makes you a zombie but every now and then I read something that seems to suggest it. I would prefer to just leave it all behind and forget but I can't seem to, as it would just feel like living a lie.

But to get back to what she told me so you can get a better idea:
You spend enough time in meditation, you will realize that you never genuinely feel feelings in the first place
it is all just cause and effect response
and a lot of the time the specificity of that response is ascribed to how societal expectations dictate one should be effected by a particular cause
loss-->sadness
gain-->joy

The part about loss being false, is cold -- that is why the wise thing to do is to help people grieve rather than tell them about it
there are more appropriate times and places to discuss the ultimate nature of reality,
and telling someone "death doesn't matter" while they are vulnerable and grieving over death
will often hurt them in an emotional sense more than it will help guide them to an ultimate understanding

it has to be balanced out with a proper understanding of compassion
but all the monks I've met over the course of my life have been comfortable in their way of life
while my own had for years been disordered and confusing
To me that just sounds like you never really feel happy or sad about something, that you're just brainwashed by society and that the default is just some flat state.

The rest was just strange:
Suffering is change; change is chaos; at the ultimate level suffering is the only real thing, but it is only suffering through the lens of those who suffer
the bunny cries, the bird cheers, nature goes on
Which pretty much sounds like what I read about stuff not being real like love, sadness, etc, which just ties knots in me (and no they didn't elaborate further it was just that point full stop).
duality is okay
non-duality is getting somewhere
but one must come to comprehend the non-duality of duality and non-duality
This I can only guess must mean about marrying conventional and ultimate reality as neither it's not either one, neither, or both, but something complex.

The only real good thing I can say I got was meditating which does help to quite things as I focus on breathing, which is nice. But outside of it the words I heard from past teachers just torment me each day.

I want to believe you that it doesn't make you a zombie, but so much I read is conflicting I don't know who is right. So much I don't understand and for some reason I can't just drop it and move on.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Well you could always go and study and practice with an actual teacher, instead of making a prison with your own thoughts and willingly living there.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Sun Jan 08, 2023 2:52 am The only real good thing I can say I got was meditating which does help to quite things as I focus on breathing, which is nice. But outside of it the words I heard from past teachers just torment me each day.

I want to believe you that it doesn't make you a zombie, but so much I read is conflicting I don't know who is right. So much I don't understand and for some reason I can't just drop it and move on.
I think the only thing to do is to just keep meditating and see for yourself what happens.

This is problem that often occurs. It is really very common. People hear or read about some unusual Buddhist concepts without having developed the necessary context for understanding what is being said. It’s like seeing a crucifix for the very first time and thinking that Christians nail people to crosses, eat their flesh and drink their blood.

As a matter of fact, when British missionaries first went to Tibet to make converts, the word they used for Christ’s resurrection from the dead was the Tibetan word for zombie. Tibetans laughed and said, “why would anyone follow a religion started by a zombie?” Christianity in Tibet never got very far.

With regards to what you cited previously, that “you never genuinely feel feelings in the first place”, the thing is, if one examines the rising and falling of emotions, one sees that ultimately they have no substance. They don’t “exist” anywhere. That’s all I can imagine this person was trying to say.

Otherwise, this doesn’t sound very authentic. Even the phrase “genuinely feel” is not how Buddhist thinking frames things, as far as I’ve ever heard or read. It might be said that feelings have no genuine substance, but it wouldn’t be said that the experience of feelings isn’t a genuine experience.

Feelings and emotions are objects of awareness. Everything we see, or hear, or smell, or think, is an object of our awareness.

Now, on some extreme, ultimate scale of things, one might say that “the duality of awareness and objects of awareness is an illusion” and that there’s ultimately nobody experiencing anything, or something like that. But that really has to be understood within a much broader context. You can’t just pick it out of nowhere. It has no practical application to day to day life. As been said on this DW Forum many times, this is why having a really qualified teacher is important. You’ve said that you’ve talked with many teachers. If that’s the case, then there is a disconnect somewhere. Either they are talking nonsense, or you are not hearing it right, or something. Perhaps you could share some of your source references?

Emotions are valid experiences, even if they have no substance and even if there is no “me” experiencing then. Just as there is nothing in wind that itself is “wind” it doesn’t mean that wind can’t blow leaves or whatever. Likewise, emotions do occur. They have energy.

The practice of seeing rising and falling emotions as having no substance is to help one to not become attached to them, or more importantly, controlled by them. Not to deny them.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Johnny Dangerous wrote: Sun Jan 08, 2023 5:48 am Well you could always go and study and practice with an actual teacher, instead of making a prison with your own thoughts and willingly living there.
It might be too late for that. As she had said in the quote the emotions we feel are the result of what society expects us to feel so none of our emotions are our own. That means I don't really feel happy over something I'm just "brainwashed by society.
You spend enough time in meditation, you will realize that you never genuinely feel feelings in the first place
it is all just cause and effect response
and a lot of the time the specificity of that response is ascribed to how societal expectations dictate one should be effected by a particular cause
loss-->sadness
gain-->joy
Even going further to say that our loss is false and there isn't a reason to feel sad about it. I know you're trying to guess what she might be saying but I can assure you it's not what she's saying. What you see is what it is and nothing else. It's why I don't know what's what with Buddhism or even whats true anymore.

I meditate regularly but as I mentioned before it doesn't stop the thoughts, they don't stop. Even when I don't engage with them they keep coming. Once I get out of meditation it's back to the torment.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Do you have OCD Ardha?

Serious question, I do, and your ruminations look familiar.

The ironic thing is that if your nihilist friend is right, all your rumination about emotions has the same status as your emotions themselves. The difference being that while you maybe feel distant from emotion, your ruminations about their unreality seem to always near by. Why do you think that is?
Ardha wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 4:42 am
Johnny Dangerous wrote: Sun Jan 08, 2023 5:48 am Well you could always go and study and practice with an actual teacher, instead of making a prison with your own thoughts and willingly living there.
It might be too late for that. As she had said in the quote the emotions we feel are the result of what society expects us to feel so none of our emotions are our own. That means I don't really feel happy over something I'm just "brainwashed by society.
Ffs no it’s not too late, you are just caught up in rumination. Stop listening to people who don’t know what they’re talking about wrt to Buddhism and try to move on, accepting that you don’t have the answers and want simply learn more. Dharma is really subtle, it’s important to listen to people who have at least put in the basic study, preferably people who are actual authorities when it’s a question this deep. Have you ever even read an acknowledged Buddhist book on emptiness?
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Meditate upon Bodhicitta when sad

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when suffering occurs

Meditate upon Bodhicitta when you are scared

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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 4:42 am she had said in the quote the emotions we feel are the result of what society expects us to feel so none of our emotions are our own. That means I don't really feel happy over something I'm just "brainwashed by society.
that, right there, what she said, is not what Buddhism teaches.
You spend enough time in meditation, you will realize that you never genuinely feel feelings in the first place
Did you read my reply (above) to that statement, regarding the idea of ‘genuinely feeling’?
it is all just cause and effect response
and a lot of the time the specificity of that response is ascribed to how societal expectations dictate one should be effected by a particular cause
loss-->sadness
gain-->joy
If that were really true, then dogs and cats and other animals, who are not bound by our societal expectations, would not feel either happy or sad. They wouldn’t feel pain. But since they do, then obviously what she said was false (or you misunderstood what she said). Furthermore, Buddhism teaches that all beings wish to be free of suffering. If the feeling of sadness and joy wasn’t actually occurring, beings wouldn’t desire to be free of pain. This is logical. You can figure this out for yourself!
Even going further to say that our loss is false and there isn't a reason to feel sad about it. I know you're trying to guess what she might be saying but I can assure you it's not what she's saying. What you see is what it is and nothing else. It's why I don't know what's what with Buddhism or even whats true anymore.
people here are only replying to what you have said.

If she said that “loss is false and there isn't a reason to feel sad about it” she may simply be practicing denial, not Buddhism. I have read accounts of this sort of thing (‘it’s not real so don’t suffer from it’) taught by a certain discredited group whose initials are NKT. If that’s where she came from, then this would explain a lot.
I meditate regularly but as I mentioned before it doesn't stop the thoughts, they don't stop. Even when I don't engage with them they keep coming. Once I get out of meditation it's back to the torment.
what? I missed the part where there is torment involved.
Have you had formal Buddhist meditation instruction? I ask, because thoughts naturally arise during meditation. That’s normal. You don’t need to engage them or suppress them. Just return to watching the breath. As long as you keep returning, eventually the mind will relax and calm down by itself.

As J.D. suggested, you really need to forget the nonsense that you were told. No wonder you feel confused.

Metaphor: You were sold a bag of rocks and told they were eggs. Don’t just keep coming back with “but she said they were eggs” over and over again when people here are explaining to you that they are rocks. That’s the curious thing here: whenever people try to correct the thing that’s confusing you and explain what Buddhism actually teaches, you keep pushing back. What’s that about?
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Johnny Dangerous wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 7:31 am Do you have OCD Ardha?

Serious question, I do, and your ruminations look familiar.

The ironic thing is that if your nihilist friend is right, all your rumination about emotions has the same status as your emotions themselves. The difference being that while you maybe feel distant from emotion, your ruminations about their unreality seem to always near by. Why do you think that is?
Ardha wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 4:42 am
Johnny Dangerous wrote: Sun Jan 08, 2023 5:48 am Well you could always go and study and practice with an actual teacher, instead of making a prison with your own thoughts and willingly living there.
It might be too late for that. As she had said in the quote the emotions we feel are the result of what society expects us to feel so none of our emotions are our own. That means I don't really feel happy over something I'm just "brainwashed by society.
Ffs no it’s not too late, you are just caught up in rumination. Stop listening to people who don’t know what they’re talking about wrt to Buddhism and try to move on, accepting that you don’t have the answers and want simply learn more. Dharma is really subtle, it’s important to listen to people who have at least put in the basic study, preferably people who are actual authorities when it’s a question this deep. Have you ever even read an acknowledged Buddhist book on emptiness?
She's not a nihilist, she explained it to me like some kinda of Hindu/tantric school. I forgot.

But I haven't been officially diagnosed with it but I am on the spectrum so it's a strong possibility and it would match. I get stuck on one thing and no matter how much logic or reason I throw at it it never moves unless the PERSON who said it takes it back or "releases me from it".
Metaphor: You were sold a bag of rocks and told they were eggs. Don’t just keep coming back with “but she said they were eggs” over and over again when people here are explaining to you that they are rocks. That’s the curious thing here: whenever people try to correct the thing that’s confusing you and explain what Buddhism actually teaches, you keep pushing back. What’s that about?
In my mind since she talked to monks and scholars that makes her right, to explain what goes on in my head. That and I feel like only the person who said the thing can release me by saying they were wrong.

The part about society and feeling I did think about how dogs and cats and animals in nature feel happy and sad over stuff and it's not based on our society. But the counter point is that it could also be based on their own social structures. But then I thought about where that social structure would get it from. Society just doesn't innately have this stuff, which means that it comes from us. So to be happy over gain and sad over loss is to be human. But then my brain just tells me I'm avoiding the painful truth and grasping what makes me feel better.

To me trying to logic out of this is just telling myself a story to stop the pain, that I'm just trying to get out of the uncomfortable truth about things.

Lots of people have told me otherwise and I've tried to implement their solutions but the thought just cannot break, it gets reinforced every time I catch myself feeling similarly or sharing in a sentiment among other people. To me that's proof shes right and that I'm just acting according to what society wants and that what I feels isn't how I truly feel, that I don't truly feel anything about anything, not even what I like...
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 2:40 am I get stuck on one thing and no matter how much logic or reason I throw at it it never moves unless the PERSON who said it takes it back or "releases me from it".
You should probably get some kind of professional therapy.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 2:40 am
Johnny Dangerous wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 7:31 am Do you have OCD Ardha?

Serious question, I do, and your ruminations look familiar.

The ironic thing is that if your nihilist friend is right, all your rumination about emotions has the same status as your emotions themselves. The difference being that while you maybe feel distant from emotion, your ruminations about their unreality seem to always near by. Why do you think that is?
Ardha wrote: Tue Jan 10, 2023 4:42 am

It might be too late for that. As she had said in the quote the emotions we feel are the result of what society expects us to feel so none of our emotions are our own. That means I don't really feel happy over something I'm just "brainwashed by society.
Ffs no it’s not too late, you are just caught up in rumination. Stop listening to people who don’t know what they’re talking about wrt to Buddhism and try to move on, accepting that you don’t have the answers and want simply learn more. Dharma is really subtle, it’s important to listen to people who have at least put in the basic study, preferably people who are actual authorities when it’s a question this deep. Have you ever even read an acknowledged Buddhist book on emptiness?
She's not a nihilist, she explained it to me like some kinda of Hindu/tantric school. I forgot.

But I haven't been officially diagnosed with it but I am on the spectrum so it's a strong possibility and it would match. I get stuck on one thing and no matter how much logic or reason I throw at it it never moves unless the PERSON who said it takes it back or "releases me from it".
She’s a nihilist because of what she says, don’t care what her professed beliefs are.

Anyway, obviously I can’t diagnose you but this stuff is very OCD sounding, some people’s obsessions are around religious/spiritual ideas. Get therapy if you can, if you don’t or can’t, look into self-help on intrusive thought and obsession. I can recommend specific books.
In my mind since she talked to monks and scholars that makes her right, to explain what goes on in my head. That and I feel like only the person who said the thing can release me by saying they were wrong.
I’ve spent a decent amount of time with some “monks and scholars” and I think she has very likely greatly misinterpreted some of the things she’s been taught.

Lots of people have told me otherwise and I've tried to implement their solutions but the thought just cannot break, it gets reinforced every time I catch myself feeling similarly or sharing in a sentiment among other people. To me that's proof shes right and that I'm just acting according to what society wants and that what I feels isn't how I truly feel, that I don't truly feel anything about anything, not even what I like...
Obsessive and anxious thinking makes people think they are working out some logical conclusion, but they aren’t, they are just creating a narrative to fit their already existing obsessions. They *already* believe their obsessions and either 1) everything they do confirms it or 2) they spend lots of time creating all these counter arguments or looking for reassurance (like you are here) that their obsessions are wrong.… the result is the same because fighting our own mind doesn’t work, you have to use other strategies to feel better.

Actual analysis of these things requires equanimity, and presently you have none of that because you are being completely guided by the obsessive thinking.

I really think you would be happier with help. As you can see, what you are doing now is just leading over the same old loop.
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Meditate upon Bodhicitta when suffering occurs

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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am It's part of why I'm hesitate to look further into this, because I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
Realized people only experience positive emotions.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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Malcolm wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 3:37 pm
Ardha wrote: Thu Jan 05, 2023 1:44 am It's part of why I'm hesitate to look further into this, because I don't want to give up my emotions or the things I like to do, even if it would mean I'm living a lie.
Realized people only experience positive emotions.
That's not to say that anything worthwhile is lost, though, correct? That is to say, it's not like there are these things called 'positive emotions', and then there are these things called 'negative emotions', and both truly exist, and a realized individual only experiences the former but not the latter, but rather that the 'negative states' are realized in their true nature to be dharmata and therefore no 'negative emotions' can be found in truth, correct?

Put another way, it's kind of like the whole rope/snake thing - a realized being realizes that the rope was never a snake at all. It's not that there is 'a rope' and then there is 'a snake', and a realized being just focuses on the rope and sets aside the snake, but it's more that the true nature of the snake was always the rope, and with proper insight, there is no longer any snake that can be found. Similarly, what was previously 'negative emotion' is no longer found in truth.
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

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PadmaVonSamba wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 5:00 am
Ardha wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 2:40 am I get stuck on one thing and no matter how much logic or reason I throw at it it never moves unless the PERSON who said it takes it back or "releases me from it".
You should probably get some kind of professional therapy.
I have tried but it doesn't lead anywhere because they can never seem to answer the questions and I just seem to find more evidence that she is right and nothing to the contrary.
Obsessive and anxious thinking makes people think they are working out some logical conclusion, but they aren’t, they are just creating a narrative to fit their already existing obsessions. They *already* believe their obsessions and either 1) everything they do confirms it or 2) they spend lots of time creating all these counter arguments or looking for reassurance (like you are here) that their obsessions are wrong.… the result is the same because fighting our own mind doesn’t work, you have to use other strategies to feel better.
But it just seems like all her words are right. That my feelings are pretty much dictated by what society says I ought to feel in regards to things. I don't know how to prove it wrong and it keeps happening.

I just don't know what to do, some days I wonder if this will be my life...torment. Meditation only offers some relief from the thoughts but it just looks like I find it everywhere. I've been to therapy but they weren't any help beyond just telling me "it's not true" but nothing more. I just want peace of mind and to live my life as I wish.

Instead this stabs me by telling me my thoughts aren't mine, my desires aren't really mine. That I don't really feel happy or sad about stuff and I'm just a puppet of society, it's a bleak existence and everything seems flat. That all my hopes and dreams are false...

How can she call that BUddhism?
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Kim O'Hara
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

Post by Kim O'Hara »

Ardha wrote: Wed Jan 18, 2023 6:31 am ...

Instead this stabs me by telling me my thoughts aren't mine, my desires aren't really mine. That I don't really feel happy or sad about stuff and I'm just a puppet of society, it's a bleak existence and everything seems flat. That all my hopes and dreams are false...

How can she call that BUddhism?
This reminded me of a fairly common misinterpretation of Buddhism which turns acceptance and equanimity into their 'near enemies', to use the terms of this article: indifference, apathy, nihilism.
The near enemies are dangerous to us precisely because they can be mistaken for the real thing but will block us from the real thing.

https://www.dhammawiki.com/index.php?ti ... ma_Viharas

:namaste:
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muni
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

Post by muni »

Instead this stabs me by telling me my thoughts aren't mine, my desires aren't really mine. That I don't really feel happy or sad about stuff and I'm just a puppet of society, it's a bleak existence and everything seems flat. That all my hopes and dreams are false...


Thoughts, feelings are not the problem but our habitual holding/grasping to them. When we don't, they have not that power. At least sad or upset or dissatisfied always changing thoughts... why/how keep them, why call them "mine"?

When we see a gap between two thoughts, this offers a break of grasping to unnecessary thoughts.

If this is too difficult, there are other methods offering help.
Find help my dear and then follow a meditation master.

All the best.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

Ardha wrote: Wed Jan 18, 2023 6:31 am
PadmaVonSamba wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 5:00 am
Ardha wrote: Sun Jan 15, 2023 2:40 am I get stuck on one thing and no matter how much logic or reason I throw at it it never moves unless the PERSON who said it takes it back or "releases me from it".
You should probably get some kind of professional therapy.
I have tried but it doesn't lead anywhere because they can never seem to answer the questions and I just seem to find more evidence that she is right and nothing to the contrary.
so far you haven’t presented any evidence whatsoever.
I just don't know what to do, some days I wonder if this will be my life...torment.

Yep, it sounds like you are doomed forever. That’s because you are clinging your own insistence thst what is the not true is true.

It reminds me of a film I saw once about a puppy who accidentally knocked down a broom and it made a loud when it hit the floor and scared the puppy. For the rest of its life, it was terrified whenever it saw a broom.

You don’t say what questions the therapy can’t answer.

You need to learn how to take some more responsibility for yourself. The mere fact that you just keep bringing this up over and over again with no purpose (you reject any alternative view to the one you have, even though the view you have is failing you) really suggests to me that you are just looking for attention.

Perhaps it would be better to focus on the doomed state of existence that you find yourself in. What are your plans for coping with that?
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
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PadmaVonSamba
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Re: Two Truths Doctrine

Post by PadmaVonSamba »

PadmaVonSamba wrote: Wed Jan 18, 2023 2:10 pm
I just don't know what to do, some days I wonder if this will be my life...torment.

Yep, it sounds like you are doomed forever. That’s because you are clinging your own insistence thst what is the not true is true.

The mere fact that you just keep bringing this up over and over again with no purpose (you reject any alternative view to the one you have, even though the view you have is failing you) really suggests to me that you are just looking for attention.

Perhaps it would be better to focus on the doomed state of existence that you find yourself in.
I don’t mean to be so blunt, but it seems you already have your mind made up. You have everything decided already. So in that case, you have no choice but to live with that decision that you have made for yourself.
What I mean is, it seems as though you are just looking for validation. I find that people generally hear what they want to hear. That can even include things they think that they don’t want to hear.
It sounds like there’s a part of you that actually wants to cling to this gloom-and-doom outlook. Self-grasping often works that way.
By presenting the same problem over and over again, and having it refuted, and clinging to “but I still think she’s right” you are practicing a process of self/validation, even though it has a negative structure.
You aren’t actually doomed to that. You can change things. But you’d really need to work on it.
EMPTIFUL.
An inward outlook produces outward insight.
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