Ego is not a dirty word.

[swilow]

^I was going to say some thing quite similar. Buddhism does have a belief system, yet its portrayed as more a philosphy then metaphysical dogma.

Detachment from ego is a very buddhist concept; most religions praise external, faith based teachings, wherein that faith arises in the mind and latches onto the ego....Buddhism claims not to do that. But it has noble truths, etc. which are rules requiring a degree of faith. It is also not a particularly honest religion/philosophy; terrible things have been done in the name of buddhism.

Let me preface this by saying that I think everyone should be treated with respect and fairness.

Now, in the world, there are certain people that are simply better than most of the rest at some things. It's only natural that these people deserve to feel superior and thus have what I would define as an ego.

In itself, I see no issue with that so long as they are willing to share and help others with their particular gift.

Well, you have an ego whether you believe yourself superior or not; the ego can make us equally sad and filled with self-loathing, or (as you said) superior to others.

I don't really care if people think they are better then others at, say, shuffling cards- I just know that feelings of superiority are as futile as feelings of self-loathing.

And, agreed about the gifted ones helping the world; as long as they realise the world can also help them.

 

[being]

I guess this is going a bit offtopic, but I would strongly argue against Buddhism needing faith to be learned in a sense that a 'regular' religion would.
All these Noble Truths are NOT to be blindly believed in. They aren't rules, but rather guidelines. You are not supposed to believe in them, before you have figured out, if they are for the benefit of one an all and what is their true meaning.
I suggest you re-read the quote by Buddha I pasted in my previous post.

Of course there are always different people, who practice different kinds of practices. There's nothing the teaching can do about it, if it's twisted and followed for some unwholesome egotistical reasons. There are many people, who identify themselves as a Buddhist, but really have no clue of what Buddhism means. It's bound to happen. I guess one could compare it to many US Christians, who have less clue about Christianity than many atheists.

 

[bronson]

"Well, you have an ego whether you believe yourself superior or not; the ego can make us equally sad and filled with self-loathing, or (as you said) superior to others.

I don't really care if people think they are better then others at, say, shuffling cards- I just know that feelings of superiority are as futile as feelings of self-loathing.

And, agreed about the gifted ones helping the world; as long as they realise the world can also help them."

Very valid. I think the egotistical often feel they are above the rest of the world. In fact, those people often lack a lot in the areas of common sense and social skills.

It's important for them to know that they could probably learn more from the rest of the world, than the world could ever learn from them.

 

[Changed]

Just wanted to reiterate that the 4NT's have nothing to do with faith. Anyone that thinks about them logically can see that they are true and practical; probably more so now than when Siddhartha was alive.

 

[Jabberwocky]

^ Many religions have tenets that are practical and realistic. The elevation of those tenets as important above all other tenets or propositions involves a belief like process. Scientology talks about the reactive mind vs the objective mind which I find perfectly reasonable. Its super elevated importance though moves it into a domain that isn't of casual observations.

The Buddhists I've known have badly wanted to convince me that Buddhism does not involve belief but have not convinced me- but I regard belief as involved in being a democrat, a Jungian, a sociobiologist, a teacher, on and on. Tenets may be verifiable true or common sense but if they become ingrained and important they have a huge belief component at lest some of the time. Lawyers believe in the law, Doctor's believe in medicine, I say that without calling either law or medicine a fairy tale.

I find it bizarre that some Buddhists are so concerned with convincing people Buddhism is unique. I know Buddhism is unique just like every other religion.

 

[swilow]

^Another excellent post Enki

Just wanted to reiterate that the 4NT's have nothing to do with faith. Anyone that thinks about them logically can see that they are true and practical; probably more so now than when Siddhartha was alive.

I still think they require faith. I can look at them logically and posit arguments that they are both true and false. They also contradict themselves in ways that are basically semantic.

To accept these things as FACT would be to have them proven time and time again; and they would also be eternally undeniable. Yet they are.

-Existence is sufferring. Hmm- why? I don't feel that way, at all. In fact I think existence is a beautiful and very strange thing. Suffering is defintely very relevant; but its actually not always a negative thing. In fact, to the buddhist perspective, sufferring is desirable, as it leads to the rest of the truths and the idea of emancipation from sufferring. I would say that sufferring also helps one to see the simple goodness of existence in a clearer light; a duality, but one that can be broken by accepting that joy and pain are linked, forever.

-Sufferring is casued by attachment. I would agree there, to an extent; but I would also say that attachement can cause great happiness; as an example I would mention the beautiful relationships I have with Miss Willow; the love I feel for my dog-friend; the beauty of the world, that I desperately want to maintain.

-The cessation of sufferring is possible. Well, yes- it is. But for this to occur, don't you have to be attached to this concept of cessation? Why not just accept that, yes, I will feel pain, and yes, I will feel joy- in life you rarely get a dose of just one of them.

-Then we have the 8-fold path, which I won't go into, but its the most accurate of the lot, because it suggest that a middle ground is what is neccesary. Not simply light; light AND dark.


The idea that these things are "Truths" (noble, at that!) does require faith. If examined, they are not flawless, logical arguments. They are assumptions about the human condition; assumptions made by humans, and we know that humans are prone to focusing not too far beyond the tip of their nose.

We can use the concept of attachement as a function of the ego; so discussing buddhism here is valid, I think.

I do find buddhism interesting, but I don't hold it in any higher regard then I do any mystical system. I am more interested in changing my own world, a sort of solipsism that is as true as external events seem to be.

 

[being]

Reading your descriptions of the 4NT's implies to me, that you have some own distorted perspective of them, which does not really go together with their real meaning.
As I find it almost totally futile to start quoting what you said and argue against it, I just suggest you read this url and try your best to comprehend what is written.

And if somehow you might be interested, there's an awesome even more in-depth description of the 4NTs here.

 

[Jabberwocky]

I agree with willow11 entirely. 4NTs are mostly a matter of belief, especially when held up as universal laws as they usually are. Just as a tangential point, I think being eaten by a tiger would generate suffering quite apart from my attachment or non-attachment.

Anyway universalized rules or observations end up being matters of belief even if entirely factual.

 

[Changed]

be·lief [bih-leef]
-noun
1.
something believed; an opinion or conviction: a belief that the earth is flat.
2.
confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof: a statement unworthy of belief.
3.
confidence; faith; trust: a child's belief in his parents.

---

I still don't see how you can call the 4NT's a belief system.

 

[Jabberwocky]

be·lieve
verb \bə-ˈlēv\
be·lievedbe·liev·ing
Definition of BELIEVE
intransitive verb
1
a : to have a firm religious faith b : to accept as true, genuine, or real <ideals we believe in> <believes in ghosts>
2
: to have a firm conviction as to the goodness, efficacy, or ability of something <believe in exercise>
3
: to hold an opinion : think <I believe so>

 

[swilow]

Reading your descriptions of the 4NT's implies to me, that you have some own distorted perspective of them, which does not really go together with their real meaning.
As I find it almost totally futile to start quoting what you said and argue against it, I just suggest you read this url and try your best to comprehend what is written.

And if somehow you might be interested, there's an awesome even more in-depth description of the 4NTs here.

Ah, so thats the game. I don't see how these truths are true; therefore I have a distorted perspective.

And- you know what- you're right. I've done everything in my power to distort my perspective on basically everything. I refuse to be blinded or preached to, though I will happily preach to others I don't mean this in a vicious way; compassion is more important to me then any other trait of humanity- but my own self- its all I'll ever truly know, or at least, know to an extent. I am still a mystery to myself And I won't reject any aspect of myself simply because it is seen as pointless to most. My ego is intrinsic to me; there is no doubt- we need not use the term ego even; my sense of self, which is constructed from billions of ephemeral "qualities", fleeting and basically non-existent.

I think its impossible to say that I am mistaking the meaning of these "truths"- you are assuming, a priori, that they are indeed true. Why do you think that? Maybe you can explain them to me? And- I don't care if we're arguing, but I take your refusal as a real slap in the face to human dignity. If you believe something, stand by it. Or don't.

I will read the links- the thing is, I will always think for myself; I feel sad that humanity often gives away its greatest gift in the name of faith/religion. My own spirituality is based on experience; and it revolves more closely around taoism, various occult currents and flat out drug derangement. I have seen, therefore I believe; and moreso, I have BEEN, so I believe. Sometimes, though, I don't believe. Keep initiating chaos or a form thereof, and the world of humans- a senseless weird thing of splendour and disgust- actually makes some sort of sense, in its senselessness.

Do you know what Tibetan buddhists have done to people? They have initiated sufferring on grand, world-consuming scales, and continue to. They have slaves, and will torture them in ways that are extraordinairily creative for a people that places a huge emphasis on the cessation of sufferring. But the same charge can be levelled at all blind religions.

I see truth as completely subjective; everything is changing into something else- so why hold onto any particular construct simply because someone insists you do?

I just don't understand why people are afraid of themselves; their ego, their freedom, their thoughts- why?

 

[.Lucid.]

I see truth as completely subjective; everything is changing into something else- so why hold onto any particular construct simply because someone insists you do?

you dont realize that there is an absolute truth behind the subjective truth you experience through the filter of your ego?

thats the whole problem with the ego, it implies perspective and perspective implies limitation. the ego isnt necessarily "bad" but identification with it is the source of all human ignorance and suffering.. and thats clearly why the word ego often carries a negative connotation.

I just don't understand why people are afraid of themselves; their ego, their freedom, their thoughts- why?

you dont see that there are things in life that are too painful for some people to face.. ? you dont see that the ego creates defenses from what it precieves as psychologically painful? taking responsibility for all of these things can be an enormous emotional and psychological burden.. especially to those confronted with an inordinate ammount of pain in life.


so maybe im just not getting what your trying to say.. i dont really see where youre going with this.. ?

 

[Jabberwocky]

I'll posit one model by which rejection of the ego or a powering down of the ego is not necessarily positive. [[ for this post: necrophillic=death oriented biophilic=life oriented.]]

I could call the ego the life force or the libido and call the forces that want to suppress the ego thanatos or destrudo. Erich Fromm made a dichotomy between biophiles and necrophiles in one of his works. He used Hitler as a archetypal necrophile and Jesus Christ as an archetypal biophile. I would have chosen different examples.

Anyways, necrophiles want order, authority, and hierarchy. Bibliophiles are in the moment, spontaneous, sloppy, and impulsive. An organized , methodical, process to eliminate the ego seems necrophillic by the Fromm model to me. Living with one's ego to spite its vicissitudes seems biophillic to me.

My Fromm stuff is from something I read twenty years ago so I may be distorting quite a bit. Its never been defined to me what you are left with upon elimination of the ego. I like Buddhists and seekers of liberation. For the moment though I embrace life with all its chaos and unpredictability. I agree with Fromm that the search for ordered and predictable existence is akin to seeking death. Fromm thought ideally everyone should be in a moderate position between biophillia and necrophillia.

Attachment is not so much suffering as involvement in life which almost always is a roller coaster of highs and lows. Detachment is siting it out, for good or bad its a non-investment in life. Buddhists talk a lot about compassion and I don't doubt that they generally have good will, but their position tends to be "resign because living sucks". My position is go on and play because it might not.

Thanatos/destrudo does honestly seem to be a bigger component of monastic traditions within every tradition I'm aware of. Possible wandering, adventuring religious orders might be be more biophillic and less destrudo. Many things are posited about what the ego is and how it arises. Order and predictability seem preferred by the anti-ego folks. Life seems seems to reject deliberate ordering or marshaling of the troops even though eventually a secondary order appears. Embracing life and living it up seems more in tune with nature.

Many spiritual traditions are enamored of death. I don't think I've even scratched the surface on exploring rejection of the ego. I do think analysis of ego rejection as rejection of life or an embracing of death is a very legitimate topic.

 

[being]

It has been stated many times, that it's not about rejecting the ego (at least not in the Buddhist path), but giving up the identification with it - being mindful of the ego/accepting it, but not indulging in it's twisted ways, which always seek to satisfy itself, which is never possible.
Yes, you can accomplish this and that for your ego, but right after you have reached the goal, you will need a new one, never feeling real contentment, which is already there inside of us all.
If there's no identification with your mind (ego), you don't have to be its slave, always trying to reach the unreachable.

Why do we do this? Because we humans like to feel good. But we are ignorant (just a tiny fluctuation in human evolution) to the fact, that we can't reach that through our egos.
But when raising our levels of awareness we can clearly see through all this ignorance and stay detached of this false identification. That's what pretty much every religions core teachings have been about. Not about random beliefs in some deities or such...

Imho even the reason we have so many religions, which are more destructive, than helping, is this same ignorance - the ego translating religion into this ego-language. "I will live by these rules and I will get that!" or "I won't do that, else I will burn in hell."

 

[swilow]

you dont realize that there is an absolute truth behind the subjective truth you experience through the filter of your ego?

No. I don't really believe in absolutes (but I'm not absolutely certain of that). I think, for example, scientific knowledge provides an absolute of sorts, but it is unable to adress the deeper mysteries, and therefore isn't absolute in a definite sense. To me, an absolute truth implies a notion of a God/deity/higher power, which I simply don't believe in. I believe that the higher power we call "God" is embedded into every single action, thought, flower, animal, plant, molecule that has existed and ever will exist- on this planet and others.

For someone to say that there is a fundamental truth behind all others is impossible; we are all humans, and everything therefore must be filtered through our human minds.

thats the whole problem with the ego, it implies perspective and perspective implies limitation. the ego isnt necessarily "bad" but identification with it is the source of all human ignorance and suffering.. and thats clearly why the word ego often carries a negative connotation.

I would agree that identifying solely with the ego causes sufferring, but I am not suggesting that anyone do that. For starters, saying that the ego causes all sufferring is, once again, an absolute premise. As Enki has said, sufferring arises in many, many forms, completely outside the human mind-structure.

I also think rejecting the ego creates as much suffering as embracing it. Instead, seek a balance or unity of mental states.

you dont see that there are things in life that are too painful for some people to face.. ? you dont see that the ego creates defenses from what it precieves as psychologically painful? taking responsibility for all of these things can be an enormous emotional and psychological burden.. especially to those confronted with an inordinate ammount of pain in life.

Well, I hate to mention such things, but I've actually experienced immense pain in life; from sexual abuse/incest, poverty, violence, mental illness to more self-inflicted pains; namely, drug addiction. From that, I have had dissociative experiences, PTSD, nightmares and blah blah. And, sadly enough, thats merely the tip of the iceberg- as much as I will mention, at any rate. Either way, rejecting my self never helped; nor has deluding myself. Life is hard, but it is equally beautiful- like subtracting zero from zero, its all relative and in proportion.

I am a bit confused, because you appear to be supporting egoic-defense systems; similar to what I am actually saying. I don't support delusions though; mainly, the modern delusion (and one could say, a delusion built into society by such cults as Christianity and Buddhism) that human beings are evil. My own mental repressions have only caused pain; though, only when the levee broke, so to speak. Prior to that, I was simply confused- after it, I was disgusted and yet free.

so maybe im just not getting what your trying to say.. i dont really see where youre going with this

Its pretty simple. Accept yourself, in all its multiple derivations. There is no need to fear either the external world, or its creator, the internal world.

I've just gotten weary with the western need for flagellation. Sure, the world is a sorry place, but its also beautiful; but the more we hate ourselves, the less chance we have of saving any of this.

ps. Eckhart Tolle: A New Earth. That opened my eyes; I understood, in part at least. He talks about the ego as an enemy, and yet, I see it as a friend. You cannot fight something thats sole purpose is to defend. You may as well accept it all, and go openly into life without worrying about anything, for nothing has any concrete basis in reality, or outside it.

/end rant :D

 

[.Lucid.]

Attachment is not so much suffering as involvement in life which almost always is a roller coaster of highs and lows. Detachment is siting it out, for good or bad its a non-investment in life. Buddhists talk a lot about compassion and I don't doubt that they generally have good will, but their position tends to be "resign because living sucks". My position is go on and play because it might not.

this is a total misinterpretation of the idea of detachment.. detachment does not mean that you do not participate in life and have no attachments. attachments are still there and still a part of life except a realized being sees them for what they are and no longer clings to and identifies with them the way an unrealized being does.

buddhism is not about sitting out of life at all, buddhism is not about being special.. the core of buddhism is about living a normal human life, feeling normal human feelings, and doing normal human things. "go and play because it might not [suck]" is exactly what the idea of detachment is trying to convey..

I would agree that identifying solely with the ego causes sufferring, but I am not suggesting that anyone do that. For starters, saying that the ego causes all sufferring is, once again, an absolute premise. As Enki has said, sufferring arises in many, many forms, completely outside the human mind-structure.

suffering does not exist outside of the human mind.. pain certainly exists outside of the mind, but suffering arises as one mentally resists pain. pain and suffering are different and the two should not be confused.

Its pretty simple. Accept yourself, in all its multiple derivations. There is no need to fear either the external world, or its creator, the internal world.

i dont think anyone is disagreeing with this at all.. and i think you have largely misunderstood the nature of the ego and the role it plays in human life and society..

theres a huge difference between "rejecting" the ego and disidentifying from it. if you thought A New Earth was about the rejection of, and not the disidentification with, the ego then i would suggest reading it again.

so i dont know. i still dont think we're on the same page with this, and im still not really sure what youre going for here. but thats ok. you seem to have your own position (although im still unsure of what it is) and you just dont really seem opened to what other people are saying..

and if you really dont believe there is an absolute reality, that which your subjective reality is a part of, then there is really no point in having this discussion at all.

 

[Changed]

Do you know what Tibetan buddhists have done to people? They have initiated sufferring on grand, world-consuming scales, and continue to. They have slaves, and will torture them in ways that are extraordinairily creative for a people that places a huge emphasis on the cessation of sufferring. But the same charge can be levelled at all blind religions.

I like how you sort of slipped this in here... Because some Tibetans have committed crimes against humanity, Buddhism as a whole is implicated as the culprit! Buddhism as a "blind religion" is a farce-- people, on the other hand, can almost always be counted on to be blind.

...so why hold onto any particular construct simply because someone insists you do?

What specifically are you referring to here?

 

[Changed]

this is a total misinterpretation of the idea of detachment.. detachment does not mean that you do not participate in life and have no attachments. attachments are still there and still a part of life except a realized being sees them for what they are and no longer clings to and identifies with them the way an unrealized being does.

buddhism is not about sitting out of life at all, buddhism is not about being special.. the core of buddhism is about living a normal human life, feeling normal human feelings, and doing normal human things. "go and play because it might not [suck]" is exactly what the idea of detachment is trying to convey..

exactly! /thread

 

[Changed]

And reading a little book, today I stumble across this paragraph:

The great Asian ways that I am speaking of do not, strictly speaking, have any creeds. They do not involve belief. That is to say, they do not involve committing oneself to a certain positive opinions about life. Almost to the contrary, they abandon ideas and opinions because what they are concerned with is not ideas, not theories, but experience; experience in the sense almost of sensuousness, for instance, as they say, you drink water and know for yourself that it is cold. So, it is knowledge rather than faith that we are concerned with.

 

[ninjadanslarbretabar]

imo
the ego is good, but not being able to distance yourself from it is bad, not the ego itself
i see ego as the system that cares for you to survive
no ego means you wont care to eat and just let yourself die cuz you dont associate whats happening to yourself