Question on Attachment

[Scarlett Wampus]

Originally Posted by Sunstone

So far as I know, the effects of these mechanisms do not go away with any meditative practice or enlightenment.

They can go away to a significant extent, if you did little else but meditate all the time. Prolonged meditation does unusual things to the working of the mind effectively resulting in an ultra-detached state like descriptions of Nibbana attest to. The mechanisms of attachment gradually (actually, usually quite quickly) return when meditation ceases but the more experienced in meditation someone is the more easily & quickly they can enter into quintessence again. There's more to it than just meditation though. The progressive changes in the psyche that come from following a Buddhist path successfully can prolong the detached state that results from meditation.

I first experienced Kensho over a decade ago and have had similar experiences several times since. Did that mean I had a much better intuitive grasp of impermanence? Hell no. It took philosophical meandering, psychoanalytic work and entheogens to help me really shift in that area. The result was that afterwards I found detachment that little bit easier as well as meditation. Its all progressive.

[zenzero]

Friend ben d,

My understanding is that attachment is a result of not realizing the Oneness of one's own inherent nature.

Yes, but as you say

True understanding is not just understanding understanding, it is also understanding not understanding - Bodhidharma

The doer is required to close the gap between the two by that realisation / understanding.
Love & rgds

[ben d]

Originally Posted by zenzero

Friend ben d,

Yes, but as you say

The doer is required to close the gap between the two by that realisation / understanding.
Love & rgds

Yes sir!

[michaelm]

To accept everything is impermanant, therefore subject to loss and change, so we have to not cling to a concept of how things should be.

For me, suffering occurs when someone or something behaves in a way I wasnt wanting. The problem is not theri behaviour (even if its bad), its my expectation.

There will always be people doing wrong (including myself). I must learn to accept that fact, therefore not be disappointed when it occurs. This is not the fatalisitic view that i will do nothing about it. If someone does wrong and I can prevent it, or correct it appropriately then i should, but without geting upset, angry etc.

Always with a cool mind

[Mjolnir]

Attachment (or at least how I interpret it) is when you are walking down the street and you see a tree. An attached person would start making connections with that, or go on another train of thought. You have to see that the tree is the tree. Nothing more, nothing less. A tree. Beautiful, ugly, tall, short, does not matter. A tree. It is like this with everything. It is the essence of the here and now that is, not the what if or has happened.

[UltraViolet]

Thank you all for this thread.

It is a good and timely reminder for me.

[3.14]

the world does not care about attachments so the more you get attached the more you drift away from being in harmony with the world

[Mr Cheese]

Originally Posted by Halcyon

The most basic teaching of the Buddha is that the ending of attachment leads to the ending of suffering.

But what, to you, does attachment mean?

And yet my friends will become nothing
And others will also become nothing.
Even I shall become nothing;
Likewise, everything will become nothing.

–The Guide to the Bodhisattva’s way of Life (Shantideva)



with this in mind, all things that are impermanent are "attachements"



the 10,000 things...

[Mr Cheese]

Originally Posted by Scarlett Wampus

They can go away to a significant extent, if you did little else but meditate all the time. Prolonged meditation does unusual things to the working of the mind effectively resulting in an ultra-detached state like descriptions of Nibbana attest to. The mechanisms of attachment gradually (actually, usually quite quickly) return when meditation ceases but the more experienced in meditation someone is the more easily & quickly they can enter into quintessence again. There's more to it than just meditation though. The progressive changes in the psyche that come from following a Buddhist path successfully can prolong the detached state that results from meditation.

I first experienced Kensho over a decade ago and have had similar experiences several times since. Did that mean I had a much better intuitive grasp of impermanence? Hell no. It took philosophical meandering, psychoanalytic work and entheogens to help me really shift in that area. The result was that afterwards I found detachment that little bit easier as well as meditation. Its all progressive.

indeed, the more "coffee you drink"..the more "awake you become"

the more you paint, the more you can paint...

[koan]

wanting not to want, is still wanting