John Locke's blank slate
I've done a little bit of reading on Buddhism and the path to enlightenment, not a lot, but a little, and I've often wondered how those who are "enlightened" identify with the rest of mankind. Do they really feel completely at ease and at peace with the world? Do they feel as though they are on the balcony in an auditorium as a witness to pain, drama, and passion, but are completely and utterly detached from it in all of its forms? Do they simply exist to observe, to live vicariously through the pain of others with the knowledge that emotions are trite and hackneyed? I've met people who have claimed to be Buddhist or have claimed to have reached an internal equilibrium, and they carry themselves with an air of haughty self-possession; that self-possession, in turn, makes them seem judgemental and on a line paralleled to humanity. On separate paths, never meeting, never crossing, never converging. This path of "happiness", or "zen"- of alienation- is terrifying to me. Of course, I have never met a "true" Buddhist, so this thought is just a platform. Brain-fodder.
Maybe we all need to constantly challenge our own self-image.
Sometimes I think people get trapped within their own perceptions and their own desires to possess something that is uniquely "theirs." This is perhaps how they identify with other people- a so-called social crutch- and I think that without this crutch people are at a loss for self-description in a way that makes them feel uninteresting and aloof. Without their faults, their pain, their struggles,their passions, people simply do not feel interesting.
Could it be that all of my personal truths are falsities? Could it really be that I cling to my self-definitions, even ones that are truly hindering my evolution, out of fear and insecurity?
Could it be that nobody truly wants happiness, they simply crave acceptance in either a conventional or abstract form? Is acceptance synonymous to happiness in the grand scheme of things? It seems to me that most people want to feel strange and identifiable with a group of people to support their strange and identifiable thoughts. They want something of their own, but they want something of their own that's shared.
I feel the need to shatter my own perceptions. I feel the need to shed my name, my convictions, my plight, and my past, like several layers of clothing impeding movement, and ask myself: What do I really want? Is any of this real?
Maybe we all need to constantly challenge our own self-image.
Sometimes I think people get trapped within their own perceptions and their own desires to possess something that is uniquely "theirs." This is perhaps how they identify with other people- a so-called social crutch- and I think that without this crutch people are at a loss for self-description in a way that makes them feel uninteresting and aloof. Without their faults, their pain, their struggles,their passions, people simply do not feel interesting.
Could it be that all of my personal truths are falsities? Could it really be that I cling to my self-definitions, even ones that are truly hindering my evolution, out of fear and insecurity?
Could it be that nobody truly wants happiness, they simply crave acceptance in either a conventional or abstract form? Is acceptance synonymous to happiness in the grand scheme of things? It seems to me that most people want to feel strange and identifiable with a group of people to support their strange and identifiable thoughts. They want something of their own, but they want something of their own that's shared.
I feel the need to shatter my own perceptions. I feel the need to shed my name, my convictions, my plight, and my past, like several layers of clothing impeding movement, and ask myself: What do I really want? Is any of this real?