Effect and cause 2

If we accept that the external reality is a projection from mind...

-- it might be hard to accept, but it is the reality --

we can deduce that the content in the mind of individuals varies from the extremely good to the extremely bad.

If we compare this objective perspective with a subjective perspective we see a mixed picture.

Some of the social bad is experienced as individually good, some of the social good is experienced as individually bad, Some of the social bad is experienced as individually bad, and some of the social good is experienced as individually good. 

So there is no complete union between society and individual. Nevertheless, there could be an exchange of ideas between society and individual. But is it possible?

Mind projections have a tendency to support themselves. If we see the world as hostile, the signs of hostility will show that we are right. If we see the world as friendly, we will find this attitude supported by observation and facts.

One theory is that if society acts with sternness, the individuals will see that there is no alternative than to adjust. 

But from mind point of view, sternness would be counter productive. Sternness would support the negative tendencies already existing in mind, and thus make negativity stronger.

Society is a meeting place for projections of all kinds, from the good to the bad, so there is a lot of spontaneous negativity around.

Goodness in content is better than sternness in form as attitude of society. This is also the general principle. Most citizens are socialized by doing what they want - in study, work and family life. 

Form and content 2

Form is emptiness and emptiness is form. So it says in the Heart sutra. What does it mean?
Form is empty of form, but not of content. To be empty of form means that the form is not absolute. One particular content can have different forms.
Emptiness is form means that emptiness must be emptiness of something - of something that can have form. There is emptiness of emptiness, but not emptiness of nothing.
"Nothing" - the not existing - has no form and no emptiness.
To be aware that form is emptiness is to be aware that form can deceive. This person looking poor can be rich, an this one looking rich can be poor.
But if this person acts in an evil way, that is evil. That is no deception. So if we think that this person acting evil might be good, we are wrong. This person looking bad might be good, however.
In this world there are bad actions and bad forms. If we fight bad form by bad action, we do the wrong. Sometimes good form needs effort. That is not wrong if the individual has made a choice and accepted it. But it is wrong if the individual is just forced to do something, even if the result is good form. Form is emptiness, and thus a particular form is not very much to strive for.
The good is in itself formless, but it expresses itself in form, for example as a nice home. We can try to get the good by manifesting its form, for example a nice home. It might succeed, but it might also fail. The form of the good without the content of goodness is just a cold lifeless mask.
Form is important, but content is more important. In the society it is not that obvious, as form is the most important for certain individuals and in certain contexts. If society was more distinct in pointing out the good content, the individuals would be more happy and the form would be nicer also.

Label power 2

Labels are the framework within which we think and feel, so we need nice labels. Like love and trust. Will we always be deceived and fooled if we have nice labels? 

In the analysis of how mind works, labels are a third category. The first category is feelings and the second is thoughts.

Compared to feelings and thoughts labels might seem to be insignificant and almost invisible. Feelings can be grand, thoughts can occupy our mind days and nights. But labels just flash by.

But in the beginning was the word.

And the law system for example is concerned with finding the right label. When someone dies, which label is appropriate: suicide, accident, murder or something else? And the people around, which label is appropriate: innocent, witness, murderer? 

Everything must be sorted under a label or else it is impossible to understand. 

Reality is in constant change so if we have static labels they will become obsolete automatically. 

Good labels have a very strong power, as every teacher knows. The student relating to a good label can achieve great things. The one burdened by a bad label has an internal resistance.

There is a tension between realism and good will. To manifest anything is difficult, and we can not always do it even if we want to.

 

Walking 2

What is the difference between a walk and a pilgrimage? 

Is it what we reach or what we are?

A traditional pilgrimage is to a holy place of some sort. These places are special. You do not find them on your ordinary itinerary. 

Why are these places special? They might be a certain quality there, a certain atmosphere.

If we see external reality as a projection, the visit to a holy place is a projection of the holy in the person. It is an important projection of something quite rare. The holiness is maybe not prominent in all of us.

If we know it is a projection, we can project it on anything. Also on the trivial things in our ordinary life.

When it comes to material things it is obvious we have to get then from the material reality. So we might assume we have to get spiritual things from the outside as well. 

And the spiritual environment we live in is very important. It is invading us so we have to deal with it. On the holy place we might feel we are among friends.

Normally we can not choose projections just after will. The persons we meet "are" attractive or frightening. That means that they are activating different projections, positive or negative. It is a fact that these projections take place. For us as individuals it is annoying that this happens out of our own control. We might fall in love with the wrong person and start to hate our benefactor.

While waking our mind processes the knowledge and experiences it has. It is partly an automatic process and partly aware. If we supervise the processes in mind we can see which are based on knowledge, which are based on good will and which are based on bad will.

These processes have an immediate effect and along term effect.

The immediate effect is our present experience. Are we fine or sad?

The long term effect is a result of learning. While our thoughts run around as it seems on their own, we are learning the things they are occupied with. If we think about anger or negative actions, we are learning this negativity. It will return later in a stronger form. We will that feel these reactions are caused by external factors, bur in reality they are the content in our own mind surfacing and being projected.

The difference 2

The legendary Tibetan poet and yogi Milarepa had a very dramatic life. He was trained as black magician and destroyed his home village before he started to study the compassion and wisdom of Buddhism. After many years of extreme hardship he reached clarity of mind. 

So he himself had experienced the two ways to understand reality, the conventional and the absolute.

The conventional way of understanding reality does not necessarily lead to black magic, but it certainly leads to suffering. The reality will never fit into the categories we believe in and expect to be fulfilled.

Long ago life was quite static for most people - living in one village all the life - so understanding reality as static was almost right.

In the modern world however, all of us are in constant contact with change. Even the remote mountains have satellite television, GPS, Google, blogging and DVD movies. Climate change, swine flu and financial crisis are global.

In this modern world formed by decisions made by humans it gets more and more appropriate to see the absolute aspect of reality and not only the relative.

Milarepa was an example of the lotus principle: purity growing from dirt. From the dirt of black magic, the purity of the saintly poet emerged. 

Dream 2

When studying mind television programs of the type Idol are a new way to get knowledge.
In these programs different artists show their best performances, and the audience can see the differences.
The qualities displayed might be analysed in terms of music, presence, choreography and the like, but all of these aspects are mind. The show is a meeting between the performance and the ideas in the minds of the viewers and judges.
The winner often has a quality we can feel and experience, but which might be difficult to describe in words.
This quality is the difference between dream and reality. We can all dream about how to win Idol, but most of us do not.
But if we knew mind we would all be winners. If we sort out and take away everything that disturbs our understanding, and work very hard to manifest our idea, we will win.

Cool

Cool
Originally uploaded by KurtQ

The clear light reflected in this dahlia is it the exception or the rule?

Stiff 2

Mind is openness. It is so open that it can be trained not to be open. The opposite to openness is being stiff. Mind can be stiff and react in one particular way to a certain stimulus. This happens in basic military training. The idea is that soldiers should use their weapons automatically in war situations.

War has this technical aspect of handling weapons. It also has the humane aspect of relating to other individuals.

It is easier to avoid this issue if the mind is stiff. It the others are understood as just enemy, evil, threatening and not as nice people longing for love and kindness, it is easier to kill them.

Is this good or bad?

A person with a very stiff mind can treat others very bad and still feel that he is doing the right and good thing.

To relate to others is difficult, in particular in the meeting between different cultures. Here we need the openness of mind. We need new solutions or at least a new understanding.

Truth 2

How to avoid disappointments? When we get new ideas we also get now hopes. If they fail, we are disappointed.

Is it possible to compare our ideas with truth itself and thus find the factors that reinforce the idea and avoid all mistakes?

When we meet a new person - the one we have been looking for so long, or when we start a new project, career, movie, investment we start making plans. 

These plans have a positive side - we imagine all the nice things we could do. We also feel the joy of accomplishment. We will be famous, probably.

But there is also a neutral and a negative side. The neutral side is the work involved. Whatever the idea is - protecting the environment, finding the murderer, getting a baby, building a house - a tremendous lot of work is needed. This is not bad, but it is a fact.

The negative side is the things we have to abstain from in order to fulfill our idea.

But the main problem is in the realism of the idea. Will this person share the future with me? Is he really the murderer? Are we ready for a child? Can we manage everything needed to get a house of our own?

Well, we have a brain process here. If we have a good idea, we normally start to create a positive emotional charge. We need this emotional power in order to do anything, so it is positive so far.

The problem is that we can create emotional attraction even for the most unrealistic of ideas. Sometimes we feel that the strength of our feelings is proof of their justification. The stronger attraction, the safer relation. The stronger the hate, the more certain that he is a villain.

This is not true, of course. We can be extremely attracted even to the most destructive, and our hate can be totally unjustified even if it blinding us totally.

On the other side we have truth itself. It is very discrete and subtle. Compared to the emotional charge, truth is very bleak.

In order to be able to hear the faint voice of truth, we have to shatter the emotional charge. Kill your darlings, is the expression.

We can do that, as the darlings will return if they stand the test of truth. 

Energy 2

Breakfast with bread, apricot jam, cheese and newspaper. Obama in Asia. Very good. What about Tibet?
Green Chinese tea in the usual mug. Time for the meaning of life. Start the laptop.
Life is an energy process. The meaning is in the content.
Energy is squeezed in between meaning and manifestation.
Manifestation? What should be manifested? It depends on the role we have, the vehicle we drive. Naturally. Obama drives the big vehicle called USA. In Afghanistan his compatriots drive military vehicles. The purpose is different! Great surprise!
Normally we know what vehicle we have, where we have influence, which our resources in knowledge, connections and economy are. At least we have a rough estimate.
The tea is very good. Outside it is raining a little. People have umbrellas. It is a dark November day. No snow.
Do we have to be president of the USA to manifest something worthwhile? No.
It is a question of frequency. On the low frequency level we have specifics. This mug of tea is specific. It is this mug of tea, nothing more. Nice tea, but nothing more.
On the highest frequencies there are no specifics, and not even general concepts. We are above concepts, in the space above language!
The only thing that can be manifested here is ideas, or rather just one idea: will well.
The value of this idea is without limit.
From this everything else falls out. On the ethical scale: no killing, no stealing, no lying.
Can we ever do good by doing bad? As in Afghanistan? The intellectual confusion in this world and the acceptance of this confusion is rather big. If we build on this confusion we build on bad ground. As in Afghanistan. To build on corruption or to build on temporary military power is not safe.

Afflictions 2

The reality is complex and always changing - it is impossible to follow with our clumsy brain. So we simplify and look for rules of thumb.

Historically we used to live a static life - one village, one work, one group of other people. We could learn a lot about this small world, but as we had to live together in order to survive we also had to accept a lot of ignorance and even ill will.

These days we can move around more and we can get more information about the world at large. So a lot of the old ignorance is removed. We can not uphold prejudice in face of truth.

When we were rooted in one economical situation and in one world view we are like sitting ducks - vulnerable to whatever happened around us.

If we have a clear mind we can undermine all afflictions. The afflictions are related to mind, not to any external reality. We can remove all afflictions and live under very different circumstances - rich or poor, traditional or modern, in the wilderness or in the city.

If there is a problem, it depends on new attacks of ignorance. Sometimes ignorance is attacking with weapons, sometimes it is attacking with limiting rules and even laws.

From reality to memory 2

The slowness of the brain which makes us live in memory rather than in reality creates constant dysfunction, according to Buddhist psychology. There are three standard, basic faults.

The first is that we see a solidity which has no factual existence. The memory might be solid and static, but the really behind is never solid or static.

The second fault is that we exaggerate the positive in the positive we encounter. 

The third fault is that we exaggerate the negative in the negative we encounter.

Flow is a situation where we live in the dynamic reality, without having to solidify reality and without having to exaggerate anything.

To Be Is Not To Be 2

We all know that the reality we see is not the true reality. We see static things on the surface, but reality is a dynamic process. The computer looks like a box of metal and nothing more. Madame Bovary looks like the young wife of a country doctor and nothing more.

So the surface - that which seems to be - is deceptive. The nice can hide something bad. The bad can cover something nice.

But the difference between the high energy state and the low energy state is something different. The low energy state - that which seems to be - is like the ashes after the fire. It has almost none of the qualities of the fire.

On mind level we can reverse the process and transform ashes into fire, or surface into reality.

That is the dimension of freedom - to return to the high frequencies.

Mind control 2

Why mind control? What is it useful for, is it engaging?

The problem is that we can not understand or experience the effects of mind control before we have it. So the argument for mind control is primarily negative: we want to avoid something bad we certainly have. The bad is suffering, aging, illness and death.

Should we make the study of mind a central issue in our life? 

Well, mind is the decisive factor in everything we do. Mind is behind everything. If we ignore mind we accept living in unawareness.

Not long ago we had no other choice. The knowledge of mind was very difficult to get. But now it is quite different. The number of books in English is so high that no single individual can read them all. On Internet there is teachings which only few individuals could get earlier.

We study mind not to get theoretical knowledge but to use mind and control mind.  

When we run into problems we might seek the cause in the external world and even put a blame on others. 

Instead we could inquire about the workings of our mind. The more individuals who do so, the easier it will be to erase suffering.

Deactivation 2

If our self is under attack, we defend it by reflex. The stronger the attack, the stronger the defense.

But we have no self. It is an artificial construct. 

If our self is not under attack, we can see that it has no existence. We can joke about it and about ourselves.

The self is an idea of ourselves be build in order to do things. We need preservation and self confidence in order to do anything in this world. Everything we do meet friction and opposition.

So we create this hypothetical identity. It has no reality. So it is extremely vulnerable. It will break at any challenge. 

When it breaks there is normally strong feelings. But if we knew from the beginning that the self was just a construct, we would not be sad when it breaks.

This does not mean we have the right to break the self of others. We have no right to hurt the body of others and no right to hurt the self of others.

 

Dependency 2

Form can never exist on its own. It must always be supported by other factors. There is a necessary dependency. 

The most important other factors are mind.

In earlier times, the mind aspects were quite simple and direct: food, sex, money, power.

These days reality is more complex. The mind factors which support some form and counteract other forms can be very difficult to describe and control.

In music and fashion, for example, the difference between the good and the bad can be quite obvious but still impossible to describe. What makes that melody so fine?

In music and fashion we are free to follow our impulses. But in relation to other people and society in general, we are taking part in a network. Most of us know that, but there is a constant debate about appropriate and non appropriate actions.

It is a weakness of a society if this debate is very big. The normal situation should be that all human activity take place withing the limits and borders. It is an ideal.

Symbols 2

Normal human life is an exchange of symbols. We say a few words and pay a symbolic sum of money, and we get the object or the service we want.

Even not normal human life is an exchange of symbols. Like in the south of Afghanistan where a war is going on. The weapons used have an effect by themselves. Persons are hurt and even killed. But the main importance is on the level of meaning. 

The foreign soldiers can probably not win the war militarily. If all Taliban were killed it would be genocide.

So the use of weapons is symbolic, as way to convince the Taliban to be nice people, peaceful and democratic.

So far the strategy has not worked. The Taliban continue to fight, and in the areas they control they impose very strict Islamic rules.

Which strategy could work?

The future Afghanistan must be founded on the traditional roots. They are quite destroyed after decades of war. But they are Afghan and they are mainly Muslim. So the western ideas are alien.

If the global community wants to support Afghanistan, it should be done mainly by Muslim countries. It should be a meeting between friends.

The Taliban is a militant movement. To convince them to use peaceful means is difficult as the issue includes both power over land and religious ideas.

It is obvious that without the immediate threat of weapons, the people in Afghanistan prefer a non-radical Islam. 

So the chain of symbols that would make Afghanistan peaceful would be: Muslim soldiers instead of western, a peaceful, prosperous society as alternative to continuous war and the coexistence of different Muslim traditions.

Pakistan could be the practical example.

The necessary condition 2

Lack of compassion is a mental illness which is a bit more devastating than most physical illnesses. The present most recent illness - the swine flue - has caused some 6 000 deaths so far globally. The lack of compassion has caused millions and millions of deaths in wars and conflicts.

The problem with lack of compassion is that it starts anew with every new generation. It can not be erased once and for all. But the situation is better now than it used to be only one hundred years ago. It can be much better.

Low level lack of compassion is tolerated in most cultures. Hostility, negativity and envy is often considered good as social control and a way for keeping the population alert. 

To live in this acid environment is not nice or fruitful, however.
Lack of compassion causes frictions and conflicts, and in order to stop these effects more friction and violence is used - by military, police or private gangs.

The better way would be to stop the mental illness as a mental illness. It is a question of awareness. No medicines are necessary.

Slow 2

There is a movie about the object - subject process called "The Devil Wears Prada". The subject is a young woman called Andy and the object is management within the fashion industry. 

For the young woman fashion is a typical object: alien, unknown, something to be independent of and even spiteful and hostile towards.

But as Andy starts her new job she has to learn about fashion and she also learns the logic of the business. And as she is a good learner, the object is about to become subject. 

After half a year she has got a new side in her personality, a side which is totally alien to her old friends including her boyfriend.

Andy herself is in doubt about the ruthlessness in the fashion industry, so there is a conflict. 

The cool attitude Andy used to have about fashion and work is threatened by her new knowledge. The drastic manners of her boss becomes her own. Attitudes she initially saw with aversion becomes part of her own personality.

The mind process of object becoming subject is stronger than her intellectual ambition of remaining cool.

And this is the way mind works. Our learning creates our personality, and if we want a nice personality we should learn nice things in a nice way.

Ideal 2

In Buddhist philosophy there is not one ideal but three. One is for the physical body, the second is for the energy system of the organism and the third is mind. 

All of these three - physical body, energy and mind - are called body. The Sanskrit word for body is kaya. 

The ideal physical body is thus called nirmanakaya. The perfected energy level is called sambhogakaya. The perfected mind level is called dharmakaya.

The normal ideal for the physical body is that it be strong and healthy. But nirmanakaya is not particularly strong. Indeed, it has almost no physical quality at all. Instead it is a visual manifestation. It looks like body but behind the surface there are no intestines and organs.

The ideal is to be able to manifest in different ways according to circumstances and need.

The most important body is the body of knowledge, dharmakaya. This makes Buddhism a bit particular.