What does /r9k/ think of Buddhism/Buddhists?

Theyre really good at mamanufacturing electronics

one question i've always wanted to aks buddhists is how does meditation improve one morally? I get it helps with insight and concentration

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>>26219302
I don't like it. The self exists, maybe some of their arguments of the mind being controlled by the structures of society is right, but in general I disagree.

>>26219349
>self reflection
to be able to journey within your own mind, to unravel the stresses that plague you. To objectively see things from all perspectives.

Maybe you are angry about something, this anger is consuming you. You meditate, you self reflect, you ask yourself why is this making me so angry? You argue with yourself from a differing point of view, you start to learn, become wiser, accept things. These things can be applied to morally plaguing issues.

>>26219349
I'm not a Buddhist, but I've read a fair bit about it.

There is no purpose to meditation. It's a misconception that you're meant to meditate over a thought or problem. You meditate to slow yourself down, to let go and connect with what you are and the rest of the world. Meditation is letting the mind relax.

And I don't think there's morals in Buddhism, just karma. It's similar to morals in a sense since it's practically mirrored but the reason of karma is to lessen the misery/pain in the world, it's not about not doing something because it's 'bad', you just don't do certain things because it will cause suffering for you, for someone else, or for someone down the line.

There's the whole concept of realizing your state and that everything is one of the same and it's why everything is connected and holds the same value.

>>26219376
I dislike it because it tries to disconnect man from nature, but it also, for the lack of a better word ,claims to disconnect you more with the world/universe/nature through the Buddhist mindset. Controlling one's ego or letting it go has its merits, but I thin that's where it should stop, after that you may develop naturally as an animal, do what you are meant to do according to the rules of the game. Attempting to reach nirvana is ultimately tied to your ego as well for you are trying to get somewhere mentally. Yes, they do say that once you stop seeking it that's when you achieve it but when one does they practically have the mindset at the point of ego death, just more disciplined.

Think Taoism/Daoism has it more 'right'. that after you achieve enlightenment you simply dip back into the world and live your life with this mindset. Reaching nirvana and being passive for the rest of your life is fruitless and void of anything. Life is dualistic, you don't want misery? Well you won't have happiness either. Don't want pain? You won't know pleasure. Buddhism lets go of everything that makes us human, so in the end it's sort of hypocritical for they learn to value everything in the universe to the same extent, but they don't apply it to themselves, as if they overlook that they're part of it, and that they're alive. Perhaps not alive with a purpose, but that doe not take away from ones experience in life.

>>26219502
claims to connect*

Fuck this shit let me delete posts sooner.

>>26219502
I'm not saying I don't agree with your point about taoism. I'd like to note though that it is almost like a polar shift of objectives. On cursory allegation only, Taoism seems to me to be a choice made to give yourself advantage in this current life without consideration to continuity where as Buddhism would be the abandonment of attachment to most of the things we consider "necessary" during this life.

In a sense, there's nothing essentially wrong with either philosophy thought it would be rare to find anyone who has adhered in any consistency or duration.

Same could be said about many things.

Part of the human condition I guess.

Every """""Buddhist""""" I've ever met was just some wannabe neo-hippie who just didn't want to say they were an atheist and not be a special snowflake so they'd adopt the most superficial aspects of Buddhism and Hinduism without understanding any of the beliefs.

>>26219611

That doesn't discount the philosophy though. More discipline is needed by practitioners.

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>>26219302
pretty fucking nice

watched a zen master get kicked in the nuts like five times and his face was serene

>>26219502
>i don't know what a bodhisattva is

pleasure is pointless, happiness is a chemical high. animals in nature can be fucking horrific.

>>26219302
a load of horseshit. health benefits of meditation aside, i don't see why someone has to follow some kind of ideology just to accomplish being a nice person. i don't take buddhism seriously and never have. i'm an atheist and i guess my line of thinking here is that if nothing matters, then what's the point of bothering with something like this? just live out life and try not to be sad. all there really is. fuck god.

>>26219677
it's not just about being a nice person. there are plenty of anecdotes of zen masters and monasteries being violent, there are buddhist revolts throughout history.

but hey if you want to be inert while your family guzzles corn syrup poison, eats antibiotic and hormone ridden meats that destroy the environment, and sit there like a fucking cuck while they watch multiple traumatic brain injury: the sport, because that's the, "nice," thing to do, then go right ahead.

>>26219592
> Buddhism would be the abandonment of attachment to most of the things we consider "necessary" during this life.

So is Cynicism, but I don't see it being praised as much as Buddhism. Buddhism aims to get rid of misery, waiting for the universe to reach the ultimate state, to stop reincarnation by removing misery from existence. And I am talking about the concept of reincarnation that Buddhists follow, not that Western adaptation of it. To me it puts us in too high of a position, as we're above some imaginary line that we have an impact on things. Yes, it's selfless and connected for they let go of desires, fears, everything pretty much and hope to spread the teaching so to lessen the overall suffering, that's a good aspect of it all, it's just going about it in a way that makes existence pointless when there's wonders to it. Humans basically become walking corpses waiting for death.

>pleasure is pointless, happiness is a chemical high. animals in nature can be fucking horrific.
Everything is pointless, m8. Happiness being a chemical high does not negate happiness or make it not real, for we do not function on a level beyond chemicals. The chemical happiness is us. As I've said, I agree with the notion of lessening misery, experiencing ego death, but that's to such an extreme it goes over the line of pointless. As in they strip one of everything so they are only born to die. They shut off what it means to be human by examining it to such an extent.

>>26219734
>but hey if you want to be inert while your family guzzles corn syrup poison, eats antibiotic and hormone ridden meats that destroy the environment, and sit there like a fucking cuck while they watch multiple traumatic brain injury: the sport, because that's the, "nice," thing to do, then go right ahead.

you say this stuff like i'm supposed to inherently dislike consumerism/consumerist culture/etc just because it's hip to do so. what exactly is wrong with it? it works and it brings me pleasurable things, so i see nothing wrong. also i don't give a single fuck about the environment. i don't care about starting a family, so i don't give a fuck what happens to the earth after i die.

you can call me blind/etc but i really don't care. i'd rather be blind.

>>26219302
They will never reach Nirvana.

>>26219742
The second reply was meant for >>26219661

I'm not buddhist myself but I have a "theory" that Im wondering sounds like it could jive with buddhism.

What if there is just one consciousness/awareness which is what we really are, cycling through the infinite number of possible life experiences eternally. We are really that awareness, and any conscious experience we can imagine (and even ones we can't) will one day be experienced by us, the "awareness". So in some life we will be hitler, in others we will be Anne Frank, so it behooves us to be as good as possible to others since we will all experience the same shit. Also, this means someday we will be Ash Ketchem.

shit-tier "religion" to be honest
anyone who thinks he can overcome his own ego is fooling himself outright

>>26221485
>I can't lose weight
>I've tried everything but diet and exercise
>Nothing works
Its always the ones who've never applied themselves who are the proclaimed experts on everything

>>26221789
lose weight? what are you even talking about?

>>26221805
it was an example, of how people who never put in effort are always the first to say something doesn't work, when the reality is they haven't applied themselves or even bothered trying

>>26221821
am i to infer from this that you've abandoned the trappings of this world and achieved enlightenment?
please tell me more

>>26221848
>you've abandoned the trappings of this world
to some extent, i'm still rather young but have been practising for some years now. I only get better with practice and perseverance. Making mistakes and learning from them. Not giving up etc.
>achieved enlightenment
Not yet but that's the aim, I assume I have 70-80 years to try.

>>26221879
well that's just dandy, but how about you wait until you reach endgame to make grand pronouncements about whether enlightenment is a matter of "applying oneself," hmm?

>>26221917
maybe I should not bother trying and make grand statements of how it doesn't work? What I can say is its working for me so far, can you say the same? Or can you only sit there and admit you've never tried and you won't bother with this "pointless" crusade.

>>26221968
if it were working for you as well as you say it is, or indeed at all, then it's odd that a contrary viewpoint would get under your skin like this.
it's also odd that you're so attached to the notion that i've never tried. what if i told you that i had actually tried pretty damn hard, and that my criticism came from a place of experience?

>>26219302
The main problem I have with Bhuddism is that people say it isn't a religion and that nobody idolizes Bhudda but then I see huge temples and statues devoted to him and groups of people that sit in those temples chanting all day and think "how tf does this not count as idolizing?." Basically it's religion for Atheists and wannabe philosophers.

>>26222040
Then I would respond to that accordingly. But you didn't say that. You made some sweeping statement of how it doesn't work and I called you out on your lacklustre.

Just as you are accusing me right now of having anything under my skin and being attached to any such notions, to which I would respond that's not true at all, but rather its just your interpretation on the matter.

For argument's sake lets say you did try pretty hard. I've tried pretty hard too. I've fallen over multiple times. Guess the difference would be between us is that one has abandoned his endeavours, and one has not.

I only wanted to see why you claim it doesn't work, and I've gotten my answer.

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>>26219742
Please someone respond. I want to be educated.

being free from desire seems like a good thing, but I'm not sure you can actually acheive it

>>26222045
Can't people say Christmas isn't about presents yet we could argue Christmas is about presents.

At the end of the day Buddhism isn't about Temples and Chanting and yet we see temples and hear chants. Some people are traditional and cling onto rituals. Not everyone needs to go to a church to believe in God. How others worship really shouldn't affect your own personal spirituality.

>>26219302
>What does /r9k/ think of Buddhism/Buddhists?
Do you even need to ask? /r9k/ hates everything.

>>26222143
What is your question exactly?
>>26222151
If you want to move a mountain you have to slowly chip away at it piece by piece

>>26222184
Just looking for arguments for Buddhism as it seem incomplete to me.

>>26219302
**Happiness**

The process is thus : we want to be happy, we notice that we are not, we wonder why, we notice that it is because mundane hedonism [=taking seriously our desires/ideas/self/what we feel] is poorly effective to be happy [we must work hard to get riches, then we must keep our riches, then we get a bit of pleasures from them, then they disappears (since we spend them), so we work hard anew to get new riches. Even worse, there is, sooner or later, a lassitude towards the fruits of our hard work (everybody in relationship knows this). Why do we get bored from all the entertainment we buy thanks to we hard work ??], we notice that everybody around us does the same and are not really happy. this mundane life is full of woes....
Plus we have faith that we will die, because we look around and see hundreds of people being miserable perishable pricks like us. people are us and we are people.
=> we abdicate before the lack of results from hedonism, we want to leave this lack of relevance forever (and we know how to).
we know thus that it is not worth it to go into the same hedonistic quest day after day, week after week, up to year after year; that we are not different, nor better than others in our misery.

It clicks. we understand that there is no point to continue to envy; once we understand this, we want to do the contrary of what we have done so far in our pathetic existence : do the contrary of being agitated.
we want to be still, even though we are not so still (otherwise we would be happy), yet we have no doubt about this new perspective on life [we clearly see that other hedonists are sad just as we were before, and we know why].

>>26222260
**Stillness**

What happens when you do not move, when there is nothing to do, when boredom happens ?
First we try to do not move, physically, but we notice that we fail. as soon as we try to stop moving, we dwell in the fantasies of our mind, we move physically, as if we despise being still. This hate of being still is interesting...
Why do we hate being still, to the point of doing the opposite most of the day, that is to say, exciting things all day long and when facing the sterility of excitations, we try to justify our behavior thanks to the manufacture of a faith in rationalization-objectification, so that ''we gain knowledge when things are excited '' ?

We try anew to be still. We try to keep our consciousness [=the thing which knows] [not mind!] on the object whereof we are conscious, as still as possible : we no longer dwell in the speculations of our mind, we try to be still towards our 5 other senses.
We stop moving physically: we sit and do not move, we lay down and do not move, we stand-up and do not move. Our body does not move.
when our body no longer moves, the sense of touch disappears, just like when we ''smell nothing'', when there is a neutral odor, just like when ''we hear nothing'', when there is less noise than regularly. Our body disappears, to better leave our consciousness (and the object whereof we are conscious).
[as an aside, consciousness alone does not exists, feelings does not exists, reality alone does not exist: you have these three things always tied with one another, and if you suppress one, you suppress the other two]

>>26222198
If you want to escape from suffering of the endless cycle of life and rebirth follow the eight paths:

1. Have the right understanding/view/knowledge
2. Have the right train of thought and resolve
3. Conduct yourself with right speech
4. Conduct yourself with the right actions and behaviours
5. Live in a righteous way
6. Put in effort
7. Have the right state of mind
8. Have the right concentration and contemplation

Ask away

>>26222270
**breath**

Then we notice that the breath keeps moving. but at least the movement repeats itself: the breath moves in cycles; the small cycles in which we can decompose the breath is in-breath, out-breath.
The new question becomes: how can we be still towards the breath, since the breath moves in cycles? Well, to be still towards an do object which moves, we must move with the object. we will thus be still with respect to this object, no matter what movement of this object.

to be still towards the breath means that :
-when we breath out, we know that we breath out, WHEN we breath out [not an instant before, not an instant after]
-when we breath in, we know that we breath in, WHEN we breath in [not an instant before, not an instant after]

[there can be other things moving in cycle, typically the heart beat, but it is faint and far to speedy for most people to be conscious when heart beats happen. the breath is what is in the foreground, therefore, the breath is what matters]

there it is: we are still towards the breath, we are still towards the other senses which disappears, since THINGS DISAPPEARS when we keep being conscious of them and nothing happens.
Once your senses disappear, we are conscious of ''our consciousness'', and things happen: the jahnas arrive !
The method to study the consciousness, by the consciousness itself, is to get rid of as many displeasure as possible. this is what the buddhists do in their meditation. **the point is that there is no longer a distinction between epistemology, ontology, ethics and happiness.**

>>26222280
The jhanas are hedonism of the consciousness, while ordinary hedonism is materialistic, of the body; but even the jhanas are hard to get and their effects disappear, once we are no longer in them, sooner or later ! just like with mundane hedonism ! another deception... which leads you to know that, sooner or later, you will get rid of those jhanic fruits...

Thanks to the jhanas you study the consciousness itself and see before your eyes what you knew since the day it clicked: that your consciousness is not as permanent, nor as personal as you expected before leaving your pathetic hedonism, just as you understand that the body, the mind, the emotions, the tastes, the ideas are not you and and that the attachment to them prevent you from being happy.

Why this method leads to result worthy of being called ''knowledge'' ? because the results:
-transform us
-transform us without reversibility [you cannot go back to a previous state, the good news is that these states make us happier than before] (and this is the whole point of the endeavor : to escape the impermanence which is the weakness of induction)


Happiness is thus the destruction of the avidity towards pleasures, the destruction of the aversion towards pains, the destruction of the ignorance of the sterility of hedonism of the body and hedonism of the consciousness.

What replaces the things destroyed ? equanimity, benevolence, charity, certainty that you are no longer an hedonist, certainty that you are happy and that nothing remains to be done in this life.
The results which are the certainty in this perspective of being still, is called ''stream-entry'' by the buddhists.

keep going buddhanon

>>26222277
how can i vanquish my ego if, in my unenlightened state, even my decision to do so is a product of my ego?
if the ego can decide to overcome itself, is it really an ego, and does it truly need to be overcome?

>>26222358
You are asking questions like where does the bridge beyond the fog lead. No one knows because that bridge is in your mind, that bridge is you. Only you can cross it, only you can discover what's beyond it.

Matters of the self is complex and no simple answer would satisfy you. If you want to see where the rabbit hole leads then take the journey for yourself.

Buddhism is the journey of the mind. You don't have to go to Church every Sunday. Do it at your own leisure.

For me personally it wasn't easy. I struggled with letting go of my self. It was scary. And I certainly didn't do it on the first go. Questions like would I really be me anymore if I travelled down this path? Do I even want to stop being me? But I persevered and it wasn't as scary as I thought, the fears were self inflicted but once I got over that hump I'm still me, I just have a different view on life now. Its no different from you being traumatized and changing from it but in this case the trauma is actually tranquillity. Fear will always hold you back. Live the righteous path, would include living with courage to face the unknown.

>>26222403
i'm asking questions that a proper religion should have answers to. no, no simple answer would satisfy me. i'm in the market for very complicated answers. ones i can really sink my teeth into.
that's my beef with buddhism. it's 1% descriptive, 99% prescriptive. it would be hard for me to follow to the eightfold path when the only explanation offered as to why things are the way they are amounts to noncommittal throat-clearing.

>>26222473
You have your answer. Its a religion of the mind and soul, you want to unravel it you'll have to do the work. Maybe your ideas of ego and what you think you know about it are all false. So really I can't be answering questions based on what you think you know. The question you asked me in >>26222358 are all based on what you think you know about the ego.

>>26222473
>>i'm asking questions that a proper religion should have answers to.
my questions make sense, because I say so, even though I never thought one time in my life.

>>26222508
well that's why i'm asking questions.
if you have absolutely no answers or insights that could help me be rid of "what i think i know" about the ego and move closer to the truth, then i have no reason to believe that buddhism has really taught you anything, or that it will bring me any closer to enlightenment than sitting here twiddling my thumbs would.

>>26222574
that's fine, one should strive to seek answers on his own instead of having everything spoon feed to them anyways. Good luck on your journey.

>>26222603
i do seek answers! and a big part of that for me is talking with other people of faith and workshopping the nature of existence, just like we're doing now. i hope i don't come across as expecting to be "spoonfed." i just like talking.
good luck to you too :)

>>26219302
It's a genius scam. When people say enlightenment makes you "become the Buddha" they mean that literally. Buddhism is an ancient scheme for immortality by memetic engineering. By extensive meditation you lose all aspects of your individuality and even perception of time. You are reduced to nothing but "cognito ergo sum". One such minimal consciousness is identical to another, and because the original Buddha did this too, everything that defines you as a person is literally the same thing as the Buddha, and the Buddha the same thing as you. He made it, he'll never die until Buddhism dies. While this is a totally awesome hack, I don't recommend falling for it yourself. Buddha is effectively an ancient brain parasite.

>>26222656
Thanks, its just maybe you don't even have to vanquish your ego. I don't feel as if I've vanquished. I'm trying the path of enlightenment and its working for me. You might try it and its not for you, but I do hope you try wholeheartedly. Who knows you might pick it up when you are 50 or 60 years old. Or not at all. From my experience its an extremely hard life to live but as rewarding as it is difficult.