Attended a Buddhist lecture/meditation session

Prime Junta

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I attended a whole-day Buddhist lecture/meditation session yesterday. New Kadampa Tradition to be precise; it's a Tibetan (Mahayana) Gelugpa tradition that's doing well in the West. (Apparently it's embroiled in some kind of doctrinal dispute with the Dalai Lama about someone/something called Dorje Shugden, who, apparently, one bunch believes is a Protector of the Dharma and another bunch figures is some kind of demon. But we didn't enter into that yesterday.)

There were three hour-and-a-half sessions, where we sat quietly listening to an Englishman named John explain stuff about Affectionate Love, Wishing Love, and Cherishing Love, with some tangents here and there, mixed in with meditation on the same topics, with John quietly going over the main points. It started and finished with a prayer to Shakyamuni Buddha set to a sort of New Age-y music; there was also an altar set up with a little brass Buddha, a photo of Kelsang Gyatso, the founder of this particular tradition, seven bowls of water, a candle, and a bunch of sweets left as offerings.

There were sixteen people attending, including one bhikkuni (nun). Most of them were women; there were only two men apart from me, and both were regulars.

It was an interesting and somewhat unusual experience. I felt a bit embarrassed about the New Age-y stuff; the altar and offerings struck me as corny/terribly out of place, and the prayers were just... weird. I also didn't much care for the veneration given to Kelsang Gyatso -- his photo with the lighted candle, John singing his praises and citing his books in-between teaching; that struck me as cultlike in not a good way.

On the other hand, I liked listening to the teaching, and I enjoyed the meditation. (I have meditated before; I did a few years of ki no kenkyukai aikido in my late teens and early twenties, and there were a quite a lot of meditation exercises involved there.) I have read a quite a bit about Buddhism, so there wasn't all that much in the lecture that I hadn't encountered before; however, the way it was presented was new to me, and quite interesting.

On the face of it, John was just talking, stream-of-consciousness style, but I'm pretty sure there was a great deal more to it. He repeated, revisited, and reiterated core ideas many times through the day; his cadence and tone were rhythmic and soothing, and he repeated the main points during the meditation; his gestures and expressions also appeared "trained" -- I've seen film clips of the Dalai Lama making very similar gestures when talking. That can't be accidental, and the effect was different than just reading about the ideas, or talking informally about them. I do feel a good deal more relaxed and calmer than before the session; it gave my mood and feeling of general well-being a lift.

The bottom line for me? This tradition at least isn't for me. My overall impression was of something that's solid at the core -- the main gist of what John was saying, how he was saying it, and the meditation itself --, but has a lot of fluff around, some of which has just a bit of a nasty taste.

However, it did get me even more interested about Buddhist practice than I've been before. There's a small Zen community in Helsinki; they have a basic course in zazen meditation in August. I might be going to check them out next.
 
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Huh. That's pretty interesting. I've always wondered about 'spirituality' - its a concept that I've never understood and that has never quite gelled with me. I've always wondered if that's because it's so closely married to superstition throughout most of the world, or if I'm just wired not to accept/need/desire any sort of spiritual experience.

The more religious-y candles and offerings etc etc would definitely not be my cup of tea, but maybe there is something in meditation, spiritual training, etc that I should consider examining and looking into. God knows I'm stressed beyond belief pretty much all the time.

Thanks for the intro and food for thought, PJ!
 
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All religions have something in their core, else they wouldn't have lasted that long. But once you discovered it you have no use of the other garbage.
 
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The more religious-y candles and offerings etc etc would definitely not be my cup of tea....
The candles, incense, bells and food offerings are all nods to the notion that Buddhism has to do with life and living it at its highest potential. So they're all actually pretty mundane gestures, even though they seem "religious-y".
 
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Sounds like an interesting experience, Prime J. I'm far from an expert, but I think Tibetan Buddhism is a fascinating 'religion', and it communicates a lot in symbols like mandalas, prayer flags and beads, etc; all of which have always seemed innately very spiritual to me--in that it is a method using a silent reinforcement that people use to focus their own thoughts. I also think the core message is, for want of a better word, much purer, more mystical and less focused on this world, more on transcending it, than most Western religions, and some Eastern ones. But my knowledge mostly comes from reading a few of the Dalai Lama's books and general osmosis.

I'm sure the ritual/candles-and-light-show aspect is helpful for some, but that would be a turn off for me also--but then I tend to part company with religion when it crosses the line at philosophy and becomes faith.

Thanks for sharing your experience. How did your wife feel about it, in terms of her Roman Catholic point of view?
 
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Thanks for sharing your experience. How did your wife feel about it, in terms of her Roman Catholic point of view?

Actually, this was mostly her idea. She also invited her mother along, and she's keen to check out the zazen "course" as well. That one's going to be my treat.

Her reactions were rather similar to mine, except that she found more points in common with the ritualistic parts of the session. For example, when I was rolling my eyes at the chocolates brought to the statue of the Buddha, she pointed out that it's really no different than lighting a taper for St. Francis.

She also noted that several of the "suggestions" in the teaching were pretty much identical to the core ethical teachings attributed to the Christ; for example, "love your neighbor as you would love yourself" <-> "the source of all suffering is the delusion that you are more important than anyone else; to abolish suffering, you must realize that every living being is equally important, and cherish all of them as much as you cherish yourself."

There was also a short shared discussion after the teaching; since she was sitting next to the bhikkuni, she chatted mostly with her. I don't know what, exactly, she told her, but the bhikkuni seemed impressed; she said that "your wife has a really deep understanding of the teaching!"

I don't think the Pope would approve, but then she *is* a highly heterodox Roman Catholic. I've pointed out that back in the day they would've burned her as a heretic several times over, bless her heart.
 
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She also noted that several of the "suggestions" in the teaching were pretty much identical to the core ethical teachings attributed to the Christ; for example, "love your neighbor as you would love yourself" <-> "the source of all suffering is the delusion that you are more important than anyone else; to abolish suffering, you must realize that every living being is equally important, and cherish all of them as much as you cherish yourself."

I saw some speculation a while back that Jesus had spent time in India and incorporated a number of buddhist messages. A quick goodle turns up a pile of sites but I haven't evaluated them.
 
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Well, on the face of it, Christianity sounds a lot like what would happen if a Buddhist teacher showed up in the Middle East and gathered some disciples who subsequently completely mangled what he was saying, like the Chinese whispers thing.

"To get rid of suffering, love every living being as you love yourself; to achieve this, it is helpful to believe that every living being is your kind mother" becomes "Love everyone else or you'll suffer; to be able to do this, you have to renounce your family and believe that everyone is your mother," which becomes "Love everyone else or you'll burn in Hell; to do this, you have to believe what the Master says even if it doesn't make much sense" which becomes "Ah fuck it, just believe what we tell you or you'll burn in Hell all eternity, and have nasty creatures poke you with forks to see if you're done, and then burn you AGAIN!"

Makes sense to me. ;)
 
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Re the Jesus/India connection, it's obviously totally speculative; there's way too little to go on.

India and the Roman Empire did have contacts; there were even colonies of Indians living within Roman borders -- archaeological remains have been discovered on the Egyptian Red Sea coast, in what may have been the port of either Leukos Limen or Myos Hormos. Roman historians record an Indian ascetic self-immolating to impress the Roman emperor; apparently it worked because he got a quite a fancy tomb for himself. So Yeshua bar-Yusef wouldn't have had to go all the way to India to encounter Buddhist ideas; they were around a lot closer.

However, IMO we don't really need to go all that far; most of the teachings attributed to Jesus are also found among contemporary and preceding Jewish thinkers (and, conversely, the one body of teaching that has no such antecedents -- the Kingdom Parables -- has no easy parallels in Buddhist or Indian philosophy either). Rabbi Hillel is famously said to have answered "Love your neighbor; the rest is commentary" when some Roman roughs told him to recite the Torah while standing on one foot, for example.

Whether Jews arrived at these ideas independently or they arrived in the Roman Empire from India through diffusion, or brought by Indians who lived or traded there, we'll never know for certain. However, I'm inclined to consider the story of Jesus traveling to India to study at an ashram as a nice tale told by people who want to reconcile their identity as Christians with their practice of non-Christian religious or philosophico-religious traditions.
 
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With a little luck, ffbj will swing by. He could probably add a great deal to the discussion.

I suppose the commonalities between religions are going to stem from a couple options: either they've "got it right" at their beginning but have diverged from the foundation over the centuries, or they all hinge on the same basic principles of population control.
 
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Perhaps both. Religious organizations are organizations too, and subject to Parkinson's Law and the Peter Principle just like the rest of them. You start with some guy having a brilliant insight about how we can be happy and all live together in harmony, and before you know it you've got a bunch of ranking monks arguing over each other's credentials and excommunicating each other over the Buddha-nature (or lack thereof) of Dorje Shugden, because of what it means for the cause of Tibetan nationalism.

(Substitute any instance of religious idiocy for the latter -- I find it highly amusing that not even everybody's favorite spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, manages to steer clear of this kind of stupidity.)
 
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(Substitute any instance of religious idiocy for the latter -- I find it highly amusing that not even everybody's favorite spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, manages to steer clear of this kind of stupidity.)

Actually, I've long held the belief that every good and original idea, particularly in the realm of helping others, is always taken over and derailed by it's later adherents. Civil rights becomes exaggerated political correctness, laws intended to promote fairness instead promote totally frivolous and counter-productive lawsuits, or are used to justify principles and actions that are completely the opposite of the intention, etc.

RE: your wife--yes, sounds like she would have either have been a mystic anchorite or burned at the stake. :) Hope you enjoy the zazen. My first husband was a devotee and attended many a session at Philip Kapleau's zendo in Rochester New York. Due to the many conflicts in our marriage and his nature, at the time the whole thing failed to impress me, though the Three Pillars of Zen is a good read. I think it's very easy for Westerners to miss the point.
 
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Well that's pretty cool. I don't know a lot about Tibetan Buddhism just the basics. The tradition I became involved with was Soto Japanese Buddhism. The basic meditation is sometimes called serene reflection, as opposed to the Rinzai which usually uses Koans. Intellectually unsolvable problems like, the most famous:
Joshu's Wu. Here is one I like:

Monk: What is the meaning of the patriarchs coming from the West?
(In essence what is the meaning of Buddhism)?
Master: The cypress tree in the courtyard.
Monk: Do not try to express it it terms of an objective reality.
Master: I do not.

Many times a monk would be enlightened on a point after these interchanges, which can really not be expressed directly, but can be intimated if the person is ripe for the teaching. One aspect of Tibetan Buddhism, is that it is much more magical. Certain Mudra's or hand positions are sometimes used. One I know is the Buddha's fear not. Here is an explanation of some of them:
http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/mudra-japan.shtml

I have attended half a dozen or so sesshins over the years, intensive meditation retreats, and they can really give you a wake up call. In essence we are all asleep at various levels, light sleep, deep sleep, dreaming, and our true nature still remains hidden. We can get glimpses or speculate about it but we can't really enter it, since the ego itself is antithetical to our true nature. In that one is illusion, the ego, and the other is real, our true nature.

Cool. Phillip Kapleau book The Three Pillars was the first book I read on Buddhism.
Lately I am reading and re-reading the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment.
Well I guess I have blathered on long enough.
 
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I love it - would love to take my kids to something like that ... they are incurably curious and skeptical, but love all of that mystery.
 
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That sounds a bit more up my alley, ffbj. The Helsinki Zen group follows the line founded by Sogaku Harada Roshi, which, apparently, combines Soto and Rinzai techniques. Can't say the distinction means much to me at this point, but I can't help liking the epitaph he chose for himself:

'For forty years I have sold water by the riverbank
'Ho ho, my work is completely without merit.'

Incidentally, I just discovered that I have, in fact, practiced zazen without knowing what it was. I found a PDF explaining how it's done, and it's exactly how I was taught it in my aikido days; the sensei just never bothered mentioning that it had anything to do with Zen. Only the basic "counting meditation," and later the "just sitting" meditation, mind, but still. :)
 
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Yes, Harada Roshi is one of the most well known and respected teachers. His combination of Rinzai and Soto techniques makes him a bit of a rebel, but in Zen that is not a bad thing. My teacher Shohaku Okamura came from this lineage and was a monk at Antaiji. I have my lineage papers but they are in Japanese so I can't read the names.
http://www.antaiji.dogen-zen.de/eng/sawaki-uchiyama.shtml

Zen is the quality of doing nothing really well.

http://global.sotozen-net.or.jp/eng/how_to_do_zazen.html
 
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Playing resurrectionist here to write a small update.

Over the summer, I've been meditating regularly; to start with a couple of times a week, lately every day. I've also been doing some yoga-related exercises, mostly to limber up, but partly for the mental effects.

It's been quite interesting. I've had a variety of experiences I attribute (perhaps wrongly) to this meditation practice.

Almost from day one, I noticed a better sense of body awareness and posture. I sit and walk in a better position; I fidget less; I get less tension in my shoulders; I also naturally stop eating when I'm no longer hungry, and have virtually no craving for food unless I am actually hungry.

My stress level also dropped quickly; for example, I'm usually very nervous when traveling with our dog (since he travels in the hold), but not this time.

After a while, I noticed that sitting cures the blues. I have a tendency to bad moods -- depressive, irritated, and so on. I still do, but if I sit a half-hour when I notice one of those moods, it's greatly mitigated, suppressed, or even completely dissipated when I come out of it.

I've also had a few experiences that were pretty much completely unexpected and rather weird.

The first one happened when I was shaving. I was suddenly intensely conscious of the feeling of the shaver against my face, and of the act of shaving. The feeling is very hard to describe, but I think it's related to what those kung-fu masters mean when they tell the student to "be the sword." Shame that it wasn't related to anything more exciting than shaving, though, and I'm not even sure the shave was a particularly close one.

The second one happened when I was walking back from the market in a small town in Provence. I had been reading some Buddhist philosophy, and had been thinking of the concept of anatta -- the idea of "not-self" that's inherent in Buddhist teaching. Suddenly I somehow *experienced* this idea, in a very concrete, immediate, and personal way. Again, something that's impossible to describe (I've tried three or four times in this message and can't). The experience faded in a few minutes, but left a mark; again, what that mark was, I can't describe despite trying.

The third slightly weird experience isn't really an experience; more like a discovery of something I didn't expect I'd be able to do. We went to a spa with my wife and my in-laws over the weekend. They have a cold pool there. I usually grit my teeth, dunk myself in, then scramble back out. This time, when I lowered myself into the water, I was counting my breathing; at breath ten or so, the shock of the cold had passed, and I suddenly felt that I can stay in the cold water without much discomfort. I counted sixty slow breaths (or thirty inhalation/exhalation cycles) while in the water. At that point, my feet were starting to feel cold, so I thought it best to climb out.

I tried it again the next day, and it was even easier.

And finally, this morning, while I was meditating, I shifted into a different mental and physical state. Previously, I had become conscious of all the little movements my body is involuntarily making as I'm sitting, as well as the thoughts that chase each other around in my mind. This time, they quieted down, until I was almost completely still. My breathing became very shallow, but I could feel my pulse. At the same time, a visual illusion appeared on the wall I was facing. First, I saw cloud-like shadows drifting slowly across the wall. Then, they arranged themselves into a pattern that was bright in the center, with a darker, shadowy, rotating ring on the outside; the ring had some kind of pattern to it; a bit like a Greek ornament, or perhaps like little people or animals chasing each other. The bright center had a pattern of flowing, sharp-edged triangles in it. Very vivid, and uncannily like some designs in Tibetan thangkas I've seen. If this one was cut out of paper and had a light on it, what I saw could be a shadow cast by it, except this one has a square rather than a triangular pattern in it:

B-58%20Mandala%20Thangka01.JPG


And when the egg-timer rang after a half-hour and I came out of it, I was feeling exceptionally good.

This is way cool, and I'm most definitely pursuing this thing further. I'll have a formal zazen course in another four weeks; I'm really looking forward to that.
 
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Just be careful PJ, it is very good to feel relaxed, but you risk being too relaxed, and detached from reaility.
 
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Well, on the face of it, Christianity sounds a lot like what would happen if a Buddhist teacher showed up in the Middle East and gathered some disciples who subsequently completely mangled what he was saying, like the Chinese whispers thing.

Modern liberal Christianity or the bible? The biblical Jesus sounds as if someone without any military power were successful in starting a cult, using nothing but master suppression techniques and strong rhetoric to keep going. A Buddhist might not have demanded complete submission combined with threats of death and destruction for those who do not.

Some of the Buddhist ideas (such as it's response to suffering) are today used in cognitive psychology simply because it's true and actually work even in secular therapy.
 
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