ajasatya

@mandyjw Adyashanti

@mandyjw In the Zen tradition, there's a huge distance from Kensho to Samadhi. One can have Kenshos very early but still be vulnerable to emotional/conceptual drawbacks. And this also happens in this community. Samadhi is when you master Kensho as well as a lot of other things (emotional mastery included). For this more advanced stuff I'd recommend listening to more experienced practitioners. By more experienced I mean people with 40+ years of experience.

I'm sorry to say this but you're already failing by building up expectation. "I'm afraid this is going to be another failed attempt". BEEEEEMP. And you're still resisting it by postponing it. There is no future meditation. You will never meditate tomorrow. You can only meditate now. I'm done for now. Good luck.

@aklacor727 Here's a clue for you: the mind will always come up with reasons not to meditate, regardless of your context. Why is that? Because meditation scares the mind. Deep meditation is the cessation of the mental turbulence. And you, as someone still highly attached to the mental activities, will be tempted to skip it every time. Believe me... even if you lived in an isolated place with the perfect conditions to practice meditation, you'd still find your way out to avoid practicing it. This is why you gotta make a counter-intuitive move. Just sit in meditation right now. Even if it's for 5 minutes. It doesn't need to be on the ground. Or hell, just close your eyes and do one cycle of mindful breathing. Breathe in and breathe out slowly as you feel your muscles stretch. Why the ceremony?

@Mikael89 Pardon. Hell, just as you described, exists because our society is not ready to raise new human beings in a healthy way yet. Maybe in 200~250 years from now emotional openness will be something we will be teaching our kids since very young ages so they won't grow as wounded or emotionally blocked adults. And just to pinpoint it, your chances of reaching Truth are virtually zero as long as your heart is so rigid and your're stuck in the mind. I was where you are and I guarantee you that the best approach is to own your struggle and to cleanse all that hatred and violent way of thinking.

@aklacor727 What would stop you from sitting in meditation for 10 minutes right now?

@Alex bliss Hell is: craving, attachment, violence, neediness, distractions etc. It might be a lot closer than you think. Or maybe you're already living in it?

@Andre_3 I understand that you want to join the army. But aren't you limiting your perspective of your entire Life too much? I mean, you're a human being, alive, at 22. There is so much you can do in a lifetime. Why suffer so much with a narrow perspective?

@aklacor727 Beware. If you practice meditation with expectations it might get worse. You don't practice meditation craving for a future result. You just sit in silence. Shikantaza. I highly recommend that you find a Sangha to practice with.

@Bryanbrax IMO, waste of time and also unnecessary baggage. Also, this practice sponsors deforestation. Beware. The human mind has a tendency to collect information and store it somewhere as an attempt to "have it covered". This is why lots of people buy several books that they won't ever read. What an useless pile of paper. Also IMO, any kind of hobby to collect stuff is a bad addiction that triggers unhealthy emotional attachments. I'd rather be completely free 1000 times.

Jeez, this is the damnedest thing.

Hi. I'm the most girlish hetero guy I've ever seen. Nice to meet you. This is just the beginning. It's a matter of time. You won't recognize yourself in 3~4 years or so.

"I am enlightened and everyone else is deluded". Such an old story, bro. You either live an amazing life or you don't. You either have a light heart or you don't. In the end, the quality of your everyday experience is what matters. If you're struggling to sound wise on this forum but you're unable to make your dreams come true, too bad for you. I'm raising this hypothesis because it's a possibility that everyone should watch out for. I hope you're not fooling yourself with all this. Peace.

@Aakash Oh, the neediness. It hurts, doesn't it? The human psyche is indeed very fragile. We're all the son of Man and the son of God. Human and divine. What are you trying to do? What are you avoiding? What are you scared of?

Truth can't be thought, written, spoken, taught or read.

@Voladores Being silent is very different from actually listening. One can have a shut mouth and a monkey mind.

@Voladores Shut your mind and listen to people. Make eye contact and relax your body. You don't even need to say anything. Just be a listener and you'll do more good to people than 99.9% of the human population. Everyone wants to be a speaker. There are thousands of courses for that. Coaching and all that s***. But who wants to be a listener? Listeners are the rare ones.

@LoveandPurpose If you're too young to make solid plans for the future with your partner, there will be always another prettier girl that would be worth more regardless of how pretty your current partner is. It's an endless struggle as long as you're not mature enough. It gets even worse because society is sick and we have extremely scarce instances of happy/stable couples and families. Youngsters have virtually nobody to inspire them in this field of intimate relationships. And many times, their own parents screw up due to lack of wisdom, which adds up some unnecessary difficulties.

@CreamCat Who are you?

@Mondsee It will be unexciting until you free yourself from rationalism. You can have all questions and answers you want and it will be nothing compared to the state of no questions and no answers.

@Truth Addict If your critique is highly biased, it's healthy to express it in your words: "in my experience, ...". Here's an example: in my experience, Zen didn't provide me a rich mindset to come back to society.

@Truth Addict I wouldn't call it arguing I'm trying not to let your statements demotivate Zazen beginners. People are insecure enough. There is a Zen saying that goes like this: don't jump off the boat too early.

There is no zen_practioners_history.csv... I've been very close to many Zen communities. The numbers may be greater than you think. Human perspective is cruelly biased. Yours and mine.

@Truth Addict I'm not defending Zen because there's nothing to defend about it, really. What I said is that you can't say that Zen is not hardcore. Also, hardcore seeking is something that Zen transcends. It's very noticeable how the teachings of Zen kinda kick you out of Zen after you reach a certain level. Wrapping it up, Zen goes full circle and comes back to a mundane life. From suffering to domain/release to Truth and back to being a regular dude.

"Not so many" people are suitable for Zen to begin with. And "not so many" people achieve full embodiment of Truth regardless of the path. It's not about the method. It's about you, alive here and now, finding what works for you. But if you want to grasp a solid view of anything, live it. Guessing won't take you very far.