Becoming understanding of spirituality

[The_Winner]

The reason I am writing this, is that I want to share my own experience, so that maybe some of the readers could progress on their paths towards understanding the reality/nature of existence. I see a lot of people in the threads here, who seem to be struggling with what I used to be struggling some years ago. Not saying I have it all figured out, tho.
And maybe someone else will find ways to explain, what I am trying to explain, even better.
Any questions, comments and objections are welcome.

I started searching for the 'meaning of life' or 'understanding the existence' about 10 years ago.
I looked at all different kinds of knowledge - psychology, science, philosophy, drugs etc. Until a good friend of mine introduced me to a book by Eckhart Tolle, "The Power of Now" and at about the same time I had also discovered meditation.

Before that I used to be quite skeptical about anything, that involved spirituality and I guess that's the reason why it took me so long to understand the meaning behind spiritual teachings. I used to associate spirituality with religion (blind beliefs, believing in god as some entity etc). And I was and am to this day against believing in anything I have no proof of.
If I only knew, that Buddhism's goal is to teach you to see reality as it is - for 'your' and 'others' good.

At first I was quite ecstatic about my new discoveries.
The book made so much sense to me (it's about living in the present moment and has nothing to do with any religion or belief). Meditation and practicing mindfulness as much as I could brought me peace and joy. But with some minor setbacks I slowly gave up on my practice (as it takes effort) and fell back into my old mind-patterns, which caused me misery.
Realizing this after some time I slowly started to practice again. Especially when I broke up with my gf and had a lot of time being totally alone. I also quit smoking cannabis (I wasn't an everyday stoner, but would occasionally light it up), as I became to understand, that it really affects me more negatively, than positively in the long run.
It didn't arise out of a need to follow some rules or to prove someone something, but out of pure understanding. Which is the most powerful, if you really mean to do something.

The pinnacle of my experience so far has been the 10-day Vipassana meditation retreat I went to this July. The day I arrived back from there, was the day I felt most 'alive' for a long time, even tho I was exhausted and felt like falling asleep when driving back from there.
As I arrived back to my home-town, I slightly felt as if I am visiting some new place I haven't been to before. But it was actually my perception and state of mind, that was changed, not the place itself. I felt so much more positive and free than before, I would be just smiling to anything/anyone, I saw.
But again slowly the state of mind started changing back to the more negative "usual me" day by day, since I wasn't practicing that much any more and made some poor choices (contacting my ex-gf, not being aware it would revive some old hopes and expectations, which would only bring me misery).

Another reason I find it hard to practice, is that I am currently kind of forced to live with my parents, who live quite unmindful lives and it seems to affect me negatively a lot. I become very unmotivated to do anything at all and let my desires rule me much more.

I now am thinking of becoming a Buddhist monk. Actually I have been thinking about it for a long time, but I think I've become closer to actually doing it. The main reason I went to the 10-day retreat was to help me decide, what I want to do next.

I have become to understand, that no mere intellectual understanding will ever let one feel true peace. The good old taste of an apple example: you could read a book on the taste of an apple, but if you never tasted it, you would still not understand the taste.

The true peace is already there inside ourselves, but it's covered with a heavy blanket of our mind (our thoughts/our ego).
To reach that state of peace, pure joy of being and understanding one has to practice diligently.
The practice is about letting go of that blanket - letting go of our thoughts, our reactions to anything that happens (desire and aversion) and simply being aware and accepting of what is, without the noise of the thoughts.
edit:
There's a theory, that desire and aversion are our subconscious reactions to whatever we are experiencing. So we have to practice in order to 'reprogram' our subconscious mind, which also means gaining real conscious control of our minds. Eventually we would be able to react to anything consciously with much more thought than just our subconscious reactions 'this is bad, I don't want it' or 'this is good, I want more of it'. Or not react at all, if not needed, which is the case most of the time.

I'm not sure, if this theory is totally true and it's not really that important, but it sounds very reasonable to me.
/edit

One will start experiencing glimpses of that peace with even very little practice, but to reach the final state of understanding, it takes quite a lot of diligent effort.


May you all find real peace and real joy on your paths.

 

[anonymous1419]

Very interesting, thanks for sharing that. It sounds like I am in the same situation you described as yourself being in ten years ago, associating spirituality with religion, and wanting no part of any of it.

I've found myself in hard times over the past couple of years, a few deaths of people in my life, a seemingly never-ending opiate addiction, drama with friends/parents, etc. I think my number one goal in life has always been and always will be to find inner peace. Even if only for a second, I want to experience bliss, nirvana, peace, whatever you want to call it, I crave it.

I've heard of this Eckhart Tolle book. I received mixed reviews about it. Some said it was great and they changed much for the better from it, others said he's a nutjob. I guess I'll have to check it out and see for myself.

Thanks again for posting, for some reason this really resonated with me.

 

[Legerity]

It sounds like have found your path. I've read Eckhart Tolle's books and have spent a lot of time reading about Buddhism as well. I've often been tricked into believing that by understanding something intellectually I was actually putting it into practice, but this has not been the case. I'm starting to understand that, as you said, it is not about intellect. We each need to find and live according to what works for us...

 

[malakaix]

I have become to understand, that no mere intellectual understanding will ever let one feel true peace. The good old taste of an apple example: you could read a book on the taste of an apple, but if you never tasted it, you would still not understand the taste.

The true peace is already there inside ourselves, but it's covered with a heavy blanket of our mind (our thoughts/our ego).
To reach that state of peace, pure joy of being and understanding one has to practice diligently.
The practice is about letting go of that blanket - letting go of our thoughts, our reactions to anything that happens (desire for more/less) and simply being aware and accepting of what is, without the noise of the thoughts.

It's a hard gap to bridge, but once you do.. the peaceful awareness of 'just being' is overwhelmingly blissful.

I came to this understanding a little over 10 months ago, when i became heavily involved in awakening Kundalini through deep meditation and focusing on a state of 'being'. I too was living with 'undesirable' people at this point in time, and eventually did move out with a friend of mine who has been on the spiritual path for the last 5 years.. it's really helpful to be around someone who's already been through what your experiencing.

 

[Changed]

Sounds like we've traveled some of the same paths... (of course we're all one, so this is no shock).

I've been contemplating the Buddhist monk life for a couple years now. At first I was ignorant and simply wanted to jump head first. Then, I started to lose any interest in Buddhism. Finally I abandoned psychedelic drugs and started to realize the reality of our situation.

I think I'm going to finish grad school in a year, abandon all payments, and enter into a monastery for good.

Once you've realized those very simple truths of the universe, no earthly matters seem to... matter. What a great feeling.

 

[DocLucid]

Even if only for a second, I want to experience bliss, nirvana, peace, whatever you want to call it, I crave it.

you can experience it for 3 to 4 hours.. all you have to do is take lsd and wait four hours and then take ecstasy. its called candy flipping and its the most sacred, uplifting and humbling experience a human being can have. it puts you into a state of total clarity and complete god realization. it changed my life literally over night.

 

[Changed]

Even if only for a second, I want to experience bliss, nirvana, peace, whatever you want to call it, I crave it.

there's your problem.

 

[DocLucid]

^ you gotta start somewhere though..


and i think its safe to say that's where we all started

 

[Changed]

^ you gotta start somewhere though..


and i think its safe to say that's where we all started

sure... then when you stop craving it, it appears.

 

[vegan]

you can experience it for 3 to 4 hours.. all you have to do is take lsd and wait four hours and then take ecstasy. its called candy flipping and its the most sacred, uplifting and humbling experience a human being can have

er. i don't want to play at "my drug is better than yours"
and it's certain that very high doses of lsd can bring you to wonderful places

but i can't help but mention that if you take a slap of 5-MeO-DMT or DMT on the soul you're sure to reevaluate your top 5 of humbling experiences

i mention those 2 because they are the ones which brought me to nirvana (i'm not using the word lightly)

but salvia and ketamine are equaly more humbling than lsd+mdma
(if you're talking about very high doses of lsd, then the mdma's effects are overwhelmed by those of lsd anyway)

 

[DocLucid]

yea ive done dmt and i know what you mean..

but for me its the pure love i feel from the flip that i find has the most real and practical value in my life. the mdma has the ability to put me at ease with whatever it is that comes to me when i close my eyes, even if its something that i would normally find disturbing or try to block out. it lets me face things inside myself without judgment or denial.

and i also find the musical experience of the flip much more enjoyable.

 

[Pans-Advocate]

Eckhart Tolle is probably good for most people to read but I found him pretty insufferably simplistic. I prefer Alan Watts.

 

[DocLucid]

Eckhart Tolle is probably good for most people to read but I found him pretty insufferably simplistic. I prefer Alan Watts.

please elaborate on this statement.

eckhart tolle is god realized and he comes as close as you possibly can to explaining the nature of consciousness in words.

if you found him too simplistic then you've clearly missed the entire point because enlightenment is the simplest thing ever, in fact, its too simple for words. so the simpler you can explain it to others, using the tool of language, the better.

also why is it good for most people but to simple for you? i dunno dude, your comment just comes off as annoying to me lol.

 

[malakaix]

I havnt read too much by either, but i've watched a lot of Ken Wilber video's and talks which i've found very interesting.

 

[Changed]

I wonder how much Tolle makes in a year off his jumble of pre-existing philosophies?

 

[DocLucid]

^ wow what an ignorant, passive aggressive statement/question(?) how are we even suppose to respond to that lol? i think you should seriously ask yourself what purpose that post even serves. cause it feels like your just looking for some attention or something..

does somebody need a hug?? 8)

 

[The_Winner]

Please don't make this into a fight about Eckhart Tolle. It's sad to see, that people got so caught up about the only name I mentioned in the op. It's really not that important, who passes you the teaching. There are very many good teachers and I think Eckhart Tolle is one of them.
The reason I mentioned only him, was that his book was the first one I read about spiritualism. And I believe it's a good book for someone, who is very skeptical towards spiritualism or religion, since he doesn't put any emphasis on beliefs in his teachings.
The book may seem quite repetitive, but that's only cause he actually is trying to explain you the same simple teaching from very many different perspectives.
Imho the only shortcoming of his teachings is that he doesn't really teach you much, how to put the teaching in to practice and that's where Buddhism/meditation comes in.
I believe the reason he doesn't put that much emphasis on the practice, is that he himself reached enlightenment in quite a weird and 'effortless' way. He describes it in the book.

In this world it is natural to have doubts, if he is doing this for money. I had those too. But those doubts aren't really important at all, if you don't let them get in the way of understanding, what he is trying to teach you. From my own experience I can say, that after having seen quite many talks by Eckhart, I'm sure of his sincerity.

Another book I have read and would suggest to anyone, is "Minfulness in Plain English" by Henepola Gunaratana.
Also Stumbling Toward Enlightenment by Geri Larkin was quite insightful.
And then there's many talks by different Buddhist monks on youtube. A recent one I watched and really liked, was this. There's many more good ones in this same channel.

 

[Changed]

^ wow what an ignorant, passive aggressive statement/question(?) how are we even suppose to respond to that lol? i think you should seriously ask yourself what purpose that post even serves. cause it feels like your just looking for some attention or something..

does somebody need a hug?? 8)

It's ignorant because I questioned the motivations of a religious figure? I guess we should just buy what he says because he says is so elegantly, right?

 

[Raw Evil]

eckhart tolle is god realized

Whoa there. At the end of the day, he's just a person who's figured something out, and is explaining it to other people - and while that's a commendable action, I certainly don't think it comes anywhere near grounds for worship.

and he comes as close as you possibly can to explaining the nature of consciousness in words.

I've read some good descriptions of the nature of consciousness. While I'm sure Tolle has written some very useful advice, I find it hard to believe that any one viewpoint is going to be definitively "close" to an accurate description.

if you found him too simplistic then you've clearly missed the entire point because enlightenment is the simplest thing ever, in fact, its too simple for words. so the simpler you can explain it to others, using the tool of language, the better.

also why is it good for most people but to simple for you? i dunno dude, your comment just comes off as annoying to me lol.

Some people crave complexity or depth. I'm one of these people, and this is the reason I chose my current position in society (that of a computer programmer). I'm never satisfied with knowing how to do something, unless I understand why it must be done in that way. If I understand the why, I can evaluate the how and optimise it based on my existing knowledge; make it easier for myself. I guess I'm not really one for anything pre-packaged, which is a theme that seems to reoccur in my life time and time again, not least seen in my rejection of organised religion.

 

[Pans-Advocate]

please elaborate on this statement.

eckhart tolle is god realized and he comes as close as you possibly can to explaining the nature of consciousness in words.

if you found him too simplistic then you've clearly missed the entire point because enlightenment is the simplest thing ever, in fact, its too simple for words. so the simpler you can explain it to others, using the tool of language, the better.

also why is it good for most people but to simple for you? i dunno dude, your comment just comes off as annoying to me lol.

I think when you say that "eckhart tolle ... comes as close as you possibly can to explaining the nature of consciousness in words," and you look at that harder, you'll find that it's literally impossible that this statement could be true. There is no perfect linguistic description of consciousness. And to claim that nobody has ever or will ever describe it more "closely" is very obviously silly.

That said, I understand the simplicity of what he's trying to say. I just happen to have encountered Tolle's writing AFTER having encountered a variety of other writing on the concepts of liberation, unity, etc., and I found other writers' presentations of the various concepts to be more compelling and easier to understand. Specifically, Alan Watts, Aldous Huxley, and Ram Dass (along with a variety of translations from mystics throughout history, like Meister Eckhart, Nagarjuna, Ibn al-Arabi, and a few others) ... basically, I got some formal education in liberation theology when I was in college, and Tolle's vocabulary is tuned for an audience that did not, so I see his approach as being a bit simplified compared to the others I've read, and I appreciate the extra depth that you can find when you delve into denser texts. If I had started with Tolle, I'd no doubt have an extremely different view on him, and I'd probably like his work a great deal more. As it stands, I started with Alan Watts, and so far nobody I've read has held up to the same gold standard of clarity and precision. I highly recommend that you read Watts' "The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing who you Really Are" if you enjoy Tolle's work. I have a PDF copy I can send you if you'd like.

I'm not trying to put Tolle down. He's an extraordinary writer and thinker and the world is far better because he is in it. I find him simplistic because I'm used to writers who take a more academic approach to the topic.