Distractions during meditation practice

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Mr Green

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post09 Jan 2017

I feel I could still do it, no idea what it is though
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ex-l

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post10 Jan 2017

Pink Panther wrote:And for me, as I also stated, there was an ever growing gap between the experience and the "truth” surrounding it, an increasing gap with plausibility and relevance.

And that's it. I agree with that.

The more aware and "enlightened" you become, the more you see the gap between the experience and what you are told it is and the untruth surrounding it until at some point it becomes unbearable and you have to move on.

It's just sad it interferes with actual meditation practises and, I think, sad that many ex-BKs carry it on with them ... remaining "open channels", to be used as "serviceable" by the BK leadership or their gods, whatever they might be. Open to having their strings pulled.

Like the proverbial monk crossing the river and carrying the boat on with him after he's on the other side.

Maui

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post12 Sep 2017

I've had experiences like Mr. Green; many ... some in Madhuban ... that were profound, and many back home in the USA at the centers.

Since I am feeling more and more apart from BK life, I seem to have more and more trouble with meditating ... which has never been before. Perhaps it is what has been said before ... using all BK terms and thinking, it's quite confusing and unsettling now to meditate.
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Pink Panther

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post12 Sep 2017

using all BK terms and thinking, it's quite confusing and unsettling now to meditate.

Meditating is a verb, just like running, for example. OK we know running can be good for you but where do you run, how do you run? Run to the wrong place and you may get mugged or shot at. Run in a big city and you may strengthen muscles but end up damaging your lungs from pollution or damaging your knee and ankle joints from impacting hard pavements continually.

If you run to have a brief respite from the dramas of a volatile domestic situation, how is that different to someone who meditates to escape the unpleasant dynamics of their own mind or life situation? Sure, its better to have that respite, but wouldn't it be better to practically change the unpleasant dynamics?

ex-l likes to use the analogy of nutrition, that BK spirituality is a ”fast-food" type of meditation, cheap (they teach it for free!) and easily accessible (there’s a branch near you!) and has that "smells good, tastes good" aspect that the fast food industry have adopted from the food technology industry’s refining of artificial flavours and aromas (BKs use all manner of superficial slogans, additives and philosophies from anywhere and everywhere without any depth - all artificial). You fill up and feel good for the moment - and the lack of real nourishment leaves you wanting more. Great business model.

If the BKs were really about others and not themselves, they would, like a good doctor or teacher, help people to get better and not come back, to graduate so as to live their lives in a fuller freer way. But no, that's not what they are really about.

Maui

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post12 Oct 2017

Your analogies are quite succinct, Pink ... never thought of it that way.

To practically change the dynamics is the answer I think, as you said. I am starting to feel I can live that fuller life; then sink back without even realizing it.

I guess if they believe this is really God, then they think, as I did, that they are bringing others to God. Yes, to help people and not come back defeats the purpose as well as the hooking into all ... ALL ... of it.

When you say, "the lack of real nourishment leaves you wanting more" ... it depicts addiction in another form. I have to start pulling away from all of it ... Your use of a verb is great ... it requires an action ... as you say, "practically change the unpleasant dynamics".
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Pink Panther

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post12 Oct 2017

Maui wrote: Your use of a verb is great ... it requires an action ... as you say, "practically change the unpleasant dynamics".

You may know John Lennon’s song ”Across The Universe” written when he had become aware of how meditation had expanded his view of 'the universe' but had also realised the agenda of the Maharishi and the effect the whole TM/Indian spirituality trip was having on him and others? (There were others songs around that theme too, e.g. the song "Sexy Sadie" is specifically about Maharishi Mahesh Yogi).

In ”Across the Universe”, after the poetic solipsistic imagery, he then sings the chorus ambiguously, almost as a lament - ”Nothings gonna change my world, nothings gonna change my world”. After this period, his songs got harder edged, many of them, and his activities, became more political.

Maui

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post14 Oct 2017

As a previous Beatles fan, I did not know any of that! So you think he "woke up" in a way that we have to, although I cannot believe how long awareness takes hold but denial, or change, or whatever doesn't seem to precipitate a quick exit.

Does one need to "replace" something indeed prior to creating that change?

But then, is that not another crutch so to speak ... or, could not the determination, anger, feeling used and abused, be enough to just say I've had enough?

The reality of knowing something is false, or wrong, yet still staying for what one may think is true, or may be true, also takes time. Yet that is, as I know now, another hypocrisy ... and if one must be "to thine own self be true", one must forge to stay on a determined course.
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Pink Panther

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Re: Distractions during meditation practice

Post18 Oct 2017

Maui wrote:The reality of knowing something is false, or wrong, yet still staying for what one may think is true, or may be true, also takes time

We are (hopefully) always waking up to something as we live and learn. The question of "staying for what one may think is true” is a tricky one but I think the awakening involved here is realising that 'what is true' is not found only in the current group or place one first sees some truth, not is it proprietary, patented at any time or place.

As I understand it, to think there is some quite specific insight to be had that will grant THE revelation or THE enlightenment is to trap oneself as a follower, either of the cult or guru who you believe will lead you there, or if you go on your own way with that same idea, trapped as a follower of one's preconceptions which dangle like a carrot before the donkey.

I think when the Buddha defined his path as being about reducing and eliminating suffering, that appears quite a humble ambition relative to the salvation, "divination” or apotheosis that most religions promise.

But, if you think about it, whatever is designated by any belief system to be their goal or attainment, what they have in common in all the various attainments and promises they describe is an absence of suffering. So, in a way, that is a good sign of where any person is at vis a viz spiritual attainment, regardless of their position in society or occupation. How much are they, in their situation, feeling suffering, and how much are they affirming life as it is, doing the best they can in the circumstances not merely stoically, but even cheerfully?

If you know anyone like that, my guess is you will find them quite self-sufficient and uninterested in pontificating or having followers. They will be better teachers or role models because of it.

“One of the open secrets of life on earth is that the answer to life’s burning question has been inscribed in one’s soul all along. The soul is a kind of ancient vessel that holds the exact knowledge we seek and need to find our way in life. Each life is a pilgrimage intended to arrive at the center of the pilgrim’s soul. From that vantage point, the issue is not whether we managed to choose the right god or the only way to live righteously; such notions fail to recognize the inborn intimacy each soul already has with the divine.”
-
Michael Meade, Fate and Destiny, The Two Agreements of the Soul


[my footnote: many people use the word ”soul” in ways which has nothing to do with individual existence beyond death but as a way to name intangible functions of ourselves, like conscience, morality, empathy etc. It’s good to break the nexus between vedanta/BK conditioned definitions and our ability to understand others’ communications. Abnother example is ”body consciousness”. Is there anything worse than not being conscious of the state of your body or what's happening within?]
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