Thinking about thought and Buddhism
I'm reading the Dalai Lama's book "Kindness, Clarity, and Insight" off and on - I'm about 1/5th of the way in. It's a collection of his lectures and speeches explaining the outlines of Buddhism and how to understand the concepts within it. I have a lot of respect for the Dalai Lama. There are very few people in the world who have had such an impact, just through inherent personal charisma and power. Oddly enough, pope John Paul also had a similar impact. I wonder if they ever spent any time together? Anyways, back on topic, I've never heard of anyone else able to discuss deep philosphical matters, religious matters, public management and governance matters, _and_ attend seminars on things like quantum physics and ask questions of the experts that gave them a run for their money. I don't know how people do these things. Where do they get the time, the insight, the sheer memory power to retain the concepts and vocabulary?
One thing I'm coming to realize as I read this book is that I don't necessarily agree with a lot of the tenets of Buddhism. "If afflictive emotions, such as hatred, were in the nature of the mind, then from its inception the mind would always have to be hateful...Hence the foundation of the mind of hatred is not valid" - what is valid are things that bring a good foundation such as good attitudes and good motivations, which bring happiness and pleasure to yourself. Now, if I take this, I can't say that the mind is either hateful or happy, because the mind is not always happy either.
He states later that one can not feel love and hate at the same time, they are mutually exclusive feelings (this is part of the "only one can be a valid foundation for the mind" point. The idea is if you focus on one path, the other tendency becomes weaker and weaker.) He connects anger with hate as a source or affliction of the mind. I disagree. There are plenty of times where I am incredibly angry and yet I'm still perfectly aware of the love I feel for the object of my anger. Ever felt so strongly both love and anger that the conflict makes you burst into tears? It happens. I don't know that I've ever actually felt hate, true hate. Would I feel the same way if I had? Wow, I don't even know how to speculate on that one.
The thing is, if hatred and love are the two main pushing/pulling forces which informs our lives, and if those things don't come from the mind, then where? The heart? What is the heart if not a set of feelings within the mind? The soul? Is this a way that the soul interacts with the body? If the mind isn't feeling strongly in either of those directions, does that mean it is only loosely tied to the soul, that you're only loosely tied to yourself/only loosely know yourself? Does the mind actively engage the soul to help determine the path to take?
Another portion of his lectures deal with karma, and how it impacts your life. If you murder someone in one life, your next life may be short because you cut short the life of another. This example got me thinking about how so many people are living longer and longer lives. Does this mean that as a species or even just as a global community that we're doing more good towards one another than we ever have before? We keep thinking about all the problems societies deal upon one another, and how much death and suffering is in the world. But millions and millions are living longer and longer lives, unprecedented ages in unprecedented numbers (at least if you view the old testament Bible with a grain of salt.) Does this show that there has been an aggregate improvement despite the news we are bombarded with on a daily basis? A lot of religions and occult/alternative practices continually state that humanity is coming to a crossroads. Maybe that crossroad isn't whether we're going to destroy ourselves as whether we're going to reach some kind of "critical mass" with working to improve our species lives through our group actions or if we will instead back off from those improvements. Suddenly, the world doesn't seem so dark, does it?
One thing I'm coming to realize as I read this book is that I don't necessarily agree with a lot of the tenets of Buddhism. "If afflictive emotions, such as hatred, were in the nature of the mind, then from its inception the mind would always have to be hateful...Hence the foundation of the mind of hatred is not valid" - what is valid are things that bring a good foundation such as good attitudes and good motivations, which bring happiness and pleasure to yourself. Now, if I take this, I can't say that the mind is either hateful or happy, because the mind is not always happy either.
He states later that one can not feel love and hate at the same time, they are mutually exclusive feelings (this is part of the "only one can be a valid foundation for the mind" point. The idea is if you focus on one path, the other tendency becomes weaker and weaker.) He connects anger with hate as a source or affliction of the mind. I disagree. There are plenty of times where I am incredibly angry and yet I'm still perfectly aware of the love I feel for the object of my anger. Ever felt so strongly both love and anger that the conflict makes you burst into tears? It happens. I don't know that I've ever actually felt hate, true hate. Would I feel the same way if I had? Wow, I don't even know how to speculate on that one.
The thing is, if hatred and love are the two main pushing/pulling forces which informs our lives, and if those things don't come from the mind, then where? The heart? What is the heart if not a set of feelings within the mind? The soul? Is this a way that the soul interacts with the body? If the mind isn't feeling strongly in either of those directions, does that mean it is only loosely tied to the soul, that you're only loosely tied to yourself/only loosely know yourself? Does the mind actively engage the soul to help determine the path to take?
Another portion of his lectures deal with karma, and how it impacts your life. If you murder someone in one life, your next life may be short because you cut short the life of another. This example got me thinking about how so many people are living longer and longer lives. Does this mean that as a species or even just as a global community that we're doing more good towards one another than we ever have before? We keep thinking about all the problems societies deal upon one another, and how much death and suffering is in the world. But millions and millions are living longer and longer lives, unprecedented ages in unprecedented numbers (at least if you view the old testament Bible with a grain of salt.) Does this show that there has been an aggregate improvement despite the news we are bombarded with on a daily basis? A lot of religions and occult/alternative practices continually state that humanity is coming to a crossroads. Maybe that crossroad isn't whether we're going to destroy ourselves as whether we're going to reach some kind of "critical mass" with working to improve our species lives through our group actions or if we will instead back off from those improvements. Suddenly, the world doesn't seem so dark, does it?