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Emotion
Feb 26, 2011 0:10:34 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 26, 2011 0:10:34 GMT -5
Normally I'm one of those people that doesn't usually get bothered by many things. A bit apathetic, maybe. Anyway, today some things got the anger level rising, and it surprised the hell out of me. Not because there was an idea that apathy makes a person impervious to feeling, but because of how instantly things snapped into the now. I got so P.O.'d that I didn't want to think a single thought! The mind tried to go off on all sorts of internal dialogues and acting scenes where I got to play some self righteous hero or whatever, but it wasn't happening.
I guess getting upset got the blood boiling to the point where the sensation absolutely could not be ignored and I just said screw it. Maybe it's time to get angry more often, hahaha. If any of you get upset anytime soon, see what I mean. It's nifty in a weird kind of way.
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Emotion
Feb 26, 2011 1:14:24 GMT -5
Post by enigma on Feb 26, 2011 1:14:24 GMT -5
I noticed that as identification with the mind/body is released, control over emotional reaction is also released. IOW, that filter that says 'I should't show my anger' was part of the identification and is gone, and so now and then anger arises and is expressed without anybody asking 'my' permission. Hehe. It's usually pretty amusing. Why does it happen? Maybe Frank has an answer.
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Emotion
Feb 26, 2011 1:24:58 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 26, 2011 1:24:58 GMT -5
That's probably what was happening, but I'm still pretty attached to this bugger. "I just said screw it" is a prime example. I did nothing of the sort--it happened and a thought was put on top. It was pretty nuts though... I haven't been angry in quite a while so it hit home pretty much immediately.
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 12:20:56 GMT -5
Post by therealfake on Feb 27, 2011 12:20:56 GMT -5
Emotion, they say is a 'thought' in 'motion', kind of like energy in motion. Like 'thoughts', it's sometimes difficult to pinpoint the catalyst for the movement of energy through the body. If I'm aware, I can usually see the frustrating thoughts, preceding the crescendo of anger that takes the stage. Sometimes, I can intervene, other times I can't. When I can't, I always feel stupid and say 'what was that all about'? I've learned that the attention gets caught and once it has, to keep it there and to bring as much awareness to the situation as possible. Not trying to stop or change or think about it, just be aware of how it 'feels' in my body. Anger is not right or wrong, it just happens and I'm finding out, it isn't happening to a separate self, even though the thoughts inherently uphold that falsity. Until recently, I thought the sense of self was a reality. What I have discovered is that there is a tidal wave of thought upholding that false belief. Not only that, there seems to be some force within that wave, that doesn't want me to find out this truth. "Smacks himself..."
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 13:13:50 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 27, 2011 13:13:50 GMT -5
The force in the wave is another thought. Anger is not right or wrong, it just happens and I'm finding out, it isn't happening to a separate self, even though the thoughts inherently uphold that falsity. If it isn't happening to a separate self, how could there be a force in the wave of thought trying to keep YOU from the truth? Somehow I doubt that there's a monster hiding behind a 'wave of thought' trying to keep you away from the truth. That's just a fancy way of saying, "There is me, there is you, and there is thought," yet you keep claiming that there is no separateness. If you really think there's a force trying to keep you out, try jumping out and screaming 'Gotcha!' I bet you won't find anything. Actually, you probably will since you're looking for it, but if you look at it for what it is instead of what you think it is, it'll probably be different than what you think.
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 16:24:38 GMT -5
Post by therealfake on Feb 27, 2011 16:24:38 GMT -5
The force in the wave is another thought. Anger is not right or wrong, it just happens and I'm finding out, it isn't happening to a separate self, even though the thoughts inherently uphold that falsity. If it isn't happening to a separate self, how could there be a force in the wave of thought trying to keep YOU from the truth? Somehow I doubt that there's a monster hiding behind a 'wave of thought' trying to keep you away from the truth. That's just a fancy way of saying, "There is me, there is you, and there is thought," yet you keep claiming that there is no separateness. If you really think there's a force trying to keep you out, try jumping out and screaming 'Gotcha!' I bet you won't find anything. Actually, you probably will since you're looking for it, but if you look at it for what it is instead of what you think it is, it'll probably be different than what you think. I'm looking at your post, but I've got nothing... Yes, the force behind the wave 'is' a thought...LOL I think you're seeing, that anything that get's typed here is a 'thought' about the falsity of a separate person, including this idea. But can you see that the 'seeing' is also a thought? The seeing also pulls the attention of the consciousness/awareness from this moment... And the seeing that see's that seeing, gets seen and then that seeing gets seen... "Smacks himself"
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 17:25:18 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 27, 2011 17:25:18 GMT -5
Based on this, I have no idea what you mean by 'seeing'. Seeing is seeing, thinking is thinking. Everything may supposedly collapse into oneness or whatever, but seeing isn't a thought until you think about seeing. Until then, it's just seeing. I don't 'see' a thought, I notice that a thought is a thought when it's thought (or shortly thereafter). And what you said before seems to be implying the presence of a separate person rather than the lack of one, but that's just how it seems to me.
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frustratedwanter
Full Member
Apparently I posted something in 2020. I don't think that's what I'm looking for but what ta hey?
Posts: 150
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 19:31:11 GMT -5
Post by frustratedwanter on Feb 27, 2011 19:31:11 GMT -5
Can't follow much of the above. Slow brain. Thinkin'.... anger is the real, "Don't be angry" is a "self", a conditioning, a thought. And going over and over and over the event is just a "self" trying to survive. Poor thing! Everything wants to survive, like a stunted tree growing out of a windswept rock near timberline. Thinkin'.... that obnoxious little butthead I call my self isn't really keeping me from realizing anything. When it's not there I don't see anything so I have to bring it back! I don't know what to do with any of that. Don't know why I identify with my little "Don't! Don't! Don't!" whiner and not something cool like a universe. Wish I didn't though. My whiner's a drunk. (insert smiley face)
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Emotion
Feb 27, 2011 21:49:58 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 27, 2011 21:49:58 GMT -5
Anger usually bugs me because I'm not used to feeling that way. I move from normal or happy to angry. This is interpreted as bad. It isn't a 'good' feeling, so it must be a 'bad' feeling. I want to move from 'bad' to 'good', but at the time the only thing I can feel is what's happening, which is 'bad' feeling. Enter suffering.
But now that attention is shifting a bit, there's less and less of an effort being made to feel good when I feel bad. There are less thoughts jumping around saying, 'this is a bad feeling, it must be fixed!' In this particular case, the physical sensation of anger overpowered the desire to fix it, and so focus was mainly directed toward the actual. I was just noting how interesting it was that it happened without a 'me' actually trying to focus on the actual. Focus was just put there.
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 0:06:42 GMT -5
Post by therealfake on Feb 28, 2011 0:06:42 GMT -5
Based on this, I have no idea what you mean by 'seeing'. Seeing is seeing, thinking is thinking. Everything may supposedly collapse into oneness or whatever, but seeing isn't a thought until you think about seeing. Until then, it's just seeing. I don't 'see' a thought, I notice that a thought is a thought when it's thought (or shortly thereafter). And what you said before seems to be implying the presence of a separate person rather than the lack of one, but that's just how it seems to me. LOL... It seems like the more I keep pointing to the 'thought' of no self, the more I keep reinforcing the presence of a self, 'thinking' that thought... If there is no self or thinker of thoughts, wouldn't thoughts have to be independent? Even though the previous statement is a thought, it carries within it a 'seeing' or understanding of the relationship between a thought and no one thinking the thought... But then again, what is 'seeing' or understanding? In my opinion, isn't it simply a higher 'form' of thought? "Double Smack"
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 5:27:05 GMT -5
Post by sharon on Feb 28, 2011 5:27:05 GMT -5
~ The Useless Tree ~
Hui Tzu said to Chuang, "I have a big tree, the kind they call a "stinktree." The trunk is so distorted, so full of knots, no one can get a straight plank out of it. The branches are so crooked you cannot cut them up in any way that makes sense." "There it stands beside the road. No carpenter will even look at it. Such is your teaching - big and useless." Chuang Tzu replied, "Have you ever watched the wildcat crouching, watching his prey. The prey leaps this way, and that way, high and low, and at last lands in the trap. And have you seen the Yak? Great as a thundercloud, he stands in his might. Big? Sure, but he can't catch mice!" Now you have this big tree and you're distressed because it's useless. Why don't you plant it in Not-Even-Anything Village, or the field of Broad-and-Boundless, relax and do nothing by its side, or lie down for a free and easy sleep under it? Axes will never shorten its life, nothing can ever harm it. If there's no use for it, how can it come to grief or pain?" Adapted from : Translations by Burton Watson and Thomas Merton
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 12:14:06 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 28, 2011 12:14:06 GMT -5
Thoughts aren't independent just because they're not thought by a self. What are they supposedly independent from? How can anything be independent? If thought were truly independent, it would transcend everything because there would be nothing that could affect it whatsoever. It would be independent, unchangeable by outside forces. I don't know about you, but thoughts seem pretty intricately woven around experience over here. That's why it's so hard to tell when something is a thought sometimes.
Edit: Now that I think about it, the only thing that really seems like it could be independent is awareness/consciousness. At what point do 'I' decide that there is a lack of awareness? At what point do 'I' increase the level of awareness? I don't cause it, and I don't affect it. I just think I do because it happens in relation to the experience of Mamza. It's really awareness becoming aware of the lack of awareness, and that awareness of the lack thereof is in itself an increase in awareness. I can't really affect it at all. It's just doing its own thing at its own pace in exactly the way that it needs to. LOL! I can't even say, "High five, teamwork!" because it's just awareness that caused all this in the first place! LOL!
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 12:55:42 GMT -5
Post by enigma on Feb 28, 2011 12:55:42 GMT -5
"I can't even say, "High five, teamwork!" because it's just awareness that caused all this in the first place! LOL!"
Right, and you must be that cause, right.?
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 13:38:31 GMT -5
Post by mamza on Feb 28, 2011 13:38:31 GMT -5
I'm not sure. The cause of what? Awareness becoming aware of the lack of awareness?
I don't see how that would be the case unless I am consciousness, and while that may be the case it's not something I understand/see/feel/whatever yet.
I guess when I watch my breathing there's a sense of sameness or whatever... the 'me' that hasn't changed at all regardless of anything that could happen. And if it hasn't changed, that would mean whatever it is I am transcends blah blah like consciousness so it could be drawn that I am consciousness. Maybe? I dunno..that's just conjecture.
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Emotion
Feb 28, 2011 14:35:06 GMT -5
Post by therealfake on Feb 28, 2011 14:35:06 GMT -5
Thoughts aren't independent just because they're not thought by a self. What are they supposedly independent from? How can anything be independent? If thought were truly independent, it would transcend everything because there would be nothing that could affect it whatsoever. It would be independent, unchangeable by outside forces. I don't know about you, but thoughts seem pretty intricately woven around experience over here. That's why it's so hard to tell when something is a thought sometimes. Edit: Now that I think about it, the only thing that really seems like it could be independent is awareness/consciousness. At what point do 'I' decide that there is a lack of awareness? At what point do 'I' increase the level of awareness? I don't cause it, and I don't affect it. I just think I do because it happens in relation to the experience of Mamza. It's really awareness becoming aware of the lack of awareness, and that awareness of the lack thereof is in itself an increase in awareness. I can't really affect it at all. It's just doing its own thing at its own pace in exactly the way that it needs to. LOL! I can't even say, "High five, teamwork!" because it's just awareness that caused all this in the first place! LOL! ROFL.... "Smacks Mamza an extra one"
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