This is an illusion, why stay in it?

[Jakuden]

Thank you Jundo, after all these years, I think I am starting to finally experience the true vastness of Dogen's wisdom and why he was so ahead of his time! Although that too is a dream!

Gassho,
Jakuden
SatToday

[Rich]

For me I think this is a question of compassion. If you saw someone walking around really confused and deluded in their own little world would you think 'Oh I better put that person out of their misery'? Or would you feel compassion for them and try to treat them with kindness and help them? Surely it's the same with ourselves isn't it? It's a good question - thank you.

Gassho
Lucy
Sat today

Right, it's just natural to do this. To not be compassionate is delusion.

Sat today

Sent from my LG-LS720 using Tapatalk

[Jishin]

As the title might suggest, why should we not just die?

The topic of life and death cames up several times per day in my line of work and most often in the contemplation suicide. Why not just die I am asked?

I sometimes say this:

The real issue is pain and pain does not go away when you die. It simply gets transferred to others.

I use an example that sometimes goes like this:

You are sad and you die an unnecessary death. The people around you then get sad. The trip to Disney World gets cancelled and the worker at Disney World gets her work hours cut and she does not get to buy the electronic gadget made in Japan. The worker in Japan loses her job and does not get to buy the shirt made in Taiwan with the cotton from somewhere else and so forth.

I then say if you don't die and resolve the pain that is within you, the pain turns into joy and 2 trips to Disney World are made and we have a better world for it.

It has to be very concrete to be of much value when a person is hurting a lot and not able to reason very well. My example sometimes is too abstract but I think it helps a lot of people and it is based upon Buddhist teachings. Because this exists, that exists. Because this arises, that arises.

You don't just die without consequences.

Hope this helps.

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Rich]

Thanks jishin, that's a great way to explain it.

Sat today

Sent from my LG-LS720 using Tapatalk

[Jishin]

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jundo]

SPOILER ALERT

From Matrix ....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8eKxVCFoUk

However, watched Matrix Part II last night. No amount of dreaming can make that good.

Somebody wrote to ask me if I thought (!) that there is really nothing "out there", and that it is all ideas in our mind. Well, philosophers (Buddhist and Western) have been debating how to prove or disprove that for millenia! We finally can't really know, can we, whether it is all a dream and we are heads in a bottle in some lab? However, the world does seem to have so much regularity and predictability, unlike the instability and fluidity of dreams and imagination, that I am pretty sure that there is something "out there" which my body and brain are interacting with (when I hit the light switch, the lights come on ... and not purple cats raining from the sky one day, genies on flying carpets the next). I seem to wake up each morning in the same room, with the same family I love. So, it is pretty solid and consistent most of the time, and I can be pretty sure about it (and I am unlikely to see a genie today except on the Disney Channel). Thus, I am pretty sure there is something "out there" (or, at least, the dream is so predictable and consistent, it does not really matter).

However, folks also do not realize how much of experience is "mind created": our judgments, categorizations, aversions and attractions, dreams of a possible imagined future, faulty memories of the past, emotions such as fear and longing imposed on events etc etc etc. The universe may string together some atoms in a certain pattern of cloth and have photons bouncing off in certain wave amplitudes which strikes our retina ... but how much do we need to add to it in order to see and call the thing "American Flag" with all the meaning and emotions and judgments and political opinions that go with that? A certain group of cells forming organs and fur becomes my "dear pet", triggering emotions of love and caring within us. Same, much more than we realize, for all the things, events and people in our lives. Yes, even the "chair" you are sitting on would not seem as a "chair" to an ant crawling over it (maybe just another obstacle on the way back to the hill). and maybe our human experiences and categorizations are primarily what allow us to see and call molecules forming wood in a certain shape as "chair" just by convention ... nonetheless, a pretty useful convention!

Don't get me wrong: I am not calling your husband or wife just a "group of cells with organs and fur" taking up space in your imagined house (although he or she may seem to you like that sometimes! ). Rather, for there to be the wondrous relationship of caring and love and intimacy and history and communication between you, and to make your house (and the atoms which give it walls) into truly a "home", the brains of the two of you have to add so much to "flesh out" the relationship. So much of what we think of as the "situation out there" is our mind writing an inner story we call the "situation out there."

Buddhism provides us tools to change the story in some radical ways. As but two examples, even the hard divisions between "self" and "the rest of the world besides you" can soften or drop away (talk about intimacy!). We find that judgments such as "birth and death" are also more fluid or subjective than we realize, only one way to look at things. Anger can be turned to love, resistance to acceptance, sadness to joy etc. etc.

It is even wilder than Hollywood can come up with in some ways.

However, this dream ... and your lovely wife, kids, dog and house ... are yours. A gift of having awoken sentient and aware in this human form. Dream them well: You truly have more power than you realize to turn this dream into a dreamy dream, and not an ugly nightmare of your own creation.

And I might not be able to give you the power to walk through walls or fly like superman just by a thought (sorry, only in the movies). However, I can give you the power to transcend space and time, life and death just be a thought (or its absence). And that is a pretty super power!

(Brad Warner, in his new book, mentions this scene from a quirky movie of a few years back) ...

Gassho, J

SatToday

[Doshin]

Jishin

Well said

Gassho
Doshin
Sattoday

[Doshin]

Nothing to add to such a sobering subject but,

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

I think, therefore I am, I think

Doshin
Sattoday

ps..the Matrix is cool

[Mp]

Nothing to add to such a sobering subject but,

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

I think, therefore I am, I think

Doshin
Sattoday

ps..the Matrix is cool

Plus the illusions of life has such a better view from a boat! =)

Gassho
Shingen

#sattoday

[jacaranda tree]

I love this thread and every comment in it. I actually signed in just to say that.
Thank you. That is all.

(SatToday)

[Byokan]

Hi Scaryw,

Hm, I’m not qualified to answer this in any way. But here are 13 Good Reasons Not To Die Today:

1. Laziness. You’re already alive so life is now the default. Take the easy way: relax, do nothing, and stay alive.

2. Hanging around Death’s door is unnecessary. Don’t worry, Death will come find you when the time and conditions are optimal for your death. On this you can rely.

3. The aforementioned effects on others. Very well said by Jishin.

4. You might as well see how the story plays out. Aren’t you curious?

5. There’s lots of time to be dead later, but only a few decades to be alive here and now and in this form.

6. Actually, death is as much of an illusion as this life is, so you won’t actually be getting “out” of anything by dying. Haha, too bad!

7. If you realize the walls of the building are unstable, do you just leave quietly out the back way without telling anyone else? Thanks pal! Maybe you could share that information, help a few folks get out, and even help build a better building.

8. Dying’s not always as much fun as it looks. Suicide, especially, is a real buzzkill.

9. Ending your own life just because “it’s all illusion” is no more valid than blowing up the whole world for the same reason. Should we just put everyone out of their misery? Maybe violence is good!?

10. Feeling revulsion toward the illusion is kind of just the flipside of attachment to the illusion, isn’t it? Choosing your actions based on desire or aversion may not be the best strategy.

11. You will not be able to keep up with the Kardashians if you’re dead.

12. By what logic is dying the proper response to waking up? When you wake up... it’s time to get up and do stuff, isn’t it?

13. Why not stay in it? There’s a ton of good stuff here, even more so after you catch on to the illusion. Now you have a chance at real happiness, real contentment, real fulfillment, real usefulness, real love. Awesome.

Bottom line is, I think, that we can release the illusion without rejecting all of life itself. Letting go of illusion can be unsettling, but it's a good thing. We can open the hands, let go, and move forward, lighter, free, with joy.

Scary, I hope you are asking a philosophical question, and not thinking of ending it all?

Gassho
Byōkan
sat today

[Kotei]

I think, therefore I am, I think

Doshin, I thought about Descartes, too.
Maybe it is all a dream, but if we can think that we're dreaming, then the true fact is, that we're thinking. May the dream be 'real', or not.
If we cast doubts about everything, we cannot be in doubt that we doubt.

Isn't it wonderful, that the universe's causes and effects result in dreaming this dream?
That the universe itself is pondering about itself like this?
Why wasting this rare opportunity?

Gassho,
Kotei sattoday.

[Doshin]

Scary,

I too assumed this was a philosophical question. However Byokan's concern and a deeper sit with the words of Jishins are like a glass of cold water in the face this morning. With that said life is not an illusion it is real, I doubt it not. It is the result of billions of years of evolution of this thing...we call the Universe. It is unique and it is precious. Of all the Chants I have heard or said the one that has most meaning to me and often repeated amongst our Sangha members here in this forum, (which to me is like sitting on the side of a mountain discussing with friends what it all means, the perpetual question of our species)

Evening Gata

Let me respectfully remind you
Life and death are of supreme importance
Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost
Each of us should strive to awaken….
Awaken….
Take heed.
This night your days are diminished by one.
Do not squander your life.

To that, I often think, embrace life the best we can since it is now and the one thing I am sure of, how I interpret it at times is the illuison that this path helps me with.

Gassho
Doshin
Sattoday

[Kaishin]

Nice one, Jishin. I will remember that.

[Jika]

Jishin and Byokan, great reasoning!

I like the mixture of ease and compassion.

Only this:

11. You will not be able to keep up with the Kardashians if you’re dead.

I thought it was the "Cardassians". Well, probably true for both.

Gassho
Jika
#sattoday