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  • hardie karges 11:02 am on September 4, 2022 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , , , , , , , sarmatha, self-control, ,   

    Buddhism 499: Self-control and the Benefits of Meditation 

    Self-control should not be an affront to your Western freedoms. It should be the foundation of your Eastern practices. But this is a tough pill for many Westerners to swallow, because it invokes the dreaded ‘C’ word, control, mattering not to many that self-control is a totally different activity than controlling others, which for me is a hideous affair, usually. Self-control, on the other hand, is the cause and effect of some of my life’s finest moments, not the least of which are simple meditative moments, the practical foundation of Buddhism.

    And all Asian monks know this, and can attest to it fully, while Westerners resist and desist, and their meditative practices often show it, twitching and flinching while struggling to finish a half-hour of meditation, while I’ve seen even Asian laypeople sit motionless for hours. But was it sarmatha or was it vipassana or was it mindfulness meditation or was it that new style that somebody was doing on TV? And there’s TM, the one that the Beatles made famous, with their Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and which has gone on to be bliss of choice for Hindu-style practice, complete with secret password.

    But all Buddhist practices derive from some version of anapanasati, awareness of breath, and to there they all return—eventually. And to be aware is very much within the practice of control. Because you don’t really have to do much of anything to meditate properly. But there are some things that you should definitely NOT do, and distractions are at the top of that list. Life itself can be extrapolated from this practice, also, giving meditation a central place and practice in your life. It’s simply a good approach to life, calm and collected, and likely to produce a ripple effect that radiates outward. Don’t you wish everybody would participate?

    So, if you’re looking for something like ayahuasca, then Buddhism is the wrong place to look. Because there is nothing here, really, to get excited about, and just the opposite, in fact. There is much here to get calm about—life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but without all the weeping wailing and gnashing of teeth. We Westerners are emotion junkies, though that doesn’t mean that we are ‘evil,’ as certain pro-Putin pushers suggest outright. What the West loves was perfect for a world growing up and reproducing itself. What Buddhism offers is perfect for a world finding itself. The future is at stake.

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  • hardie karges 9:38 am on July 25, 2021 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , Bedouin, , , , , self-control,   

    Buddhism and the Principle of Ahimsa—Non-Violence… 

    If violence is the answer, then we’re asking the wrong questions. That should be the simplest lesson of all to learn in life, for any human with the capabilities of reason—but it’s not. This is a lesson that we must learn continuously, over and over and over, not to resort to violence when confronted with a confrontational attitude, and not to ‘take the bait’ when offered, because it will surely lead to no good end. ‘Taking the bait,’ of course, is a response to a form of provocation which pretends to be harmless, but which is designed specifically to evoke a response, often negative.

    So violence is more than an act. It’s an attitude, and it often has nothing to do with physical violence, but still it’s violence—mental violence? Spiritual? Psychological? Yes, all that and more. Because once it infects your mental state, then the harm is already done. That’s the trauma. Any physical distress is almost superfluous unless it’s lasting. But physical pain is only real when you are in it, and so is difficult to describe. Death is the ultimate act of violence, of course, and the highest sin in any and all religions—Buddhism included. If you can’t resolve your differences with someone without killing them, then we are indeed a sorry species—at best.

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  • hardie karges 6:10 am on September 15, 2019 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , self-control   

    The Simplest Pleasures are Better than the Wildest Bliss… 

    Sometimes the worst of circumstances can yield the best results and the phoenix can rise from the ashes I hope. But this is the relativity of circumstance, again, and the inability to see far when the usual rewards are for immediate consumption. So it’s hard to articulate long-term goals when we can’t even see them. And this is the curse of our fate, I suppose, to be under the social and psychological pressure to ‘go for it’ when we don’t even know what ‘it’ is, much less the route to ‘it’s fulfillment. Thus we are perpetually stuck in the middle, between our desires and reality, by dint of our lack of our view to the future, and the lack of ego-fulfillment for something whose results will only be seen in a far distant world. And the self-proclaimed cognoscenti double down on this dumb-down, logic for the luckless, reduced to ‘this present moment’ for the lack of anything better. But there is something better, whether it’s known or it’s not, and this is the beauty of emptiness and simple foreplay, enjoying the ride when we know not where it goes, only that the ride itself is sublime but not indifferent, and the slower we go the more fulfilling it is. And this is the secret, of course, that contrary to the crush of speed and the big gulp of quick-fix contentment, long-fix containment is really a better option, without even knowing where it all leads, only knowing that the path itself is more proper and fitting. Thus we are handsomely rewarded for our control, more than our wild and crazy lack of it. Self-control is the best of all human qualities, more than passion, more than precision, and the Fifth Noble Truth of Buddhism…

     

  • hardie karges 7:23 am on February 3, 2019 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , liberation, self-control   

    The one who can control himself can control the world–his world. And that’s the essence of Buddhism, in a nutshell, the power of inaction, like the title of the meditation book a decade or two ago: “Don’t just do something, sit there!” That says a lot. But sometimes you can say even more with silence. Words don’t always have happy endings. The good news is that you really shouldn’t need it, not if you’ve done your Buddhist homework. Because Buddhism is not an emotional religion, not like Christianity, where rapture is the holy grail. In Buddhism liberation is the holy grail, release from the sufferings of the world, on your own terms. The first step is to control your body, your mind, and your emotions…

     

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