What Are The Problems With Buddhism?

[Guest username]

Hello, I am interested in spiritual enlightenment and have watched Leo's videos. I do not follow Buddhism, but it seems that it is difficult to learn about enlightenment outside the Buddhist context. Should I follow Buddhism to get a better understanding of what is being taught? Is this path distinct from Buddhist teachings? What are some of the problems with Buddhist teachings?

Tangent: I believe I have had my first awakening today. Perhaps I am mistaken,but I believe I have caught a glimpse of a few hairs of the Ox's tail; it was not quite as powerful and sudden as Leo's realization ( I assume, if what he says on his personal experience video is true), but I have a markedly less potent identification with the body and mind and feel less distinct from reality itself.

Edited April 8, 2016 by Anthony Gosal

[Cuzzo]

I think learning the story of the Buddha and his journey is very valuable. I am not a Buddhist because I am not 100% on the dogmatic parts of the religion (reincarnation being a big one). Any religion assumes that it knows more than it actually knows in my eyes.  

[Guest username]

@Cuzzo Thanks for your reply. I think to facilitate the enlightenment journey, I may follow Buddhism, dismissing the mystical/ supernatural aspects and following more on the aspects more pertinent to true spiritual development. I'm not quite sure how they manage to reconcile the ideas of no self and the void with karma and reincarnation. Also, I'm not quite familiar with their take on morality, as I would suspect that they would ultimately see morals as fictitious, perhaps abiding by a particular code only to facilitate self-realization, not due to some intrinsically proper ideal.

 

[nbolt]

If you look into buddhism at all, I'd recommend looking into zen buddhism in particular. I might even call it more academic in nature than religious, almost all the mysticism found in other schools isn't really present.

[Guest username]

@Neill Bolton Thanks for the tip; I might start there.

[askdfjnak]

@Anthony Gosal I read Buddhism for Dummies 2e by  Jonathan Landaw a few months ago and it gave me a really solid introduction with key terms, concepts, beliefs, practices and mythology. It also described the major branches of Buddhism and how they differ from one another. It is written by Buddhist practitioners, not just academics. I highly recommend it.

Tangent: What is a problem?

 

[Guivs]

I think the good thing about buddhism is that you are supposed to challenge, critique and make an idea for yourself of what is being taught A respectable buddhist teacher shall not make you adopt his views, I see more buddhism as "training of mind" at its core, like the yogic traditions

[Progress]

@Cuzzo I believe Buddha said not to even believe him so that kind of shoud rule that out

[Emerald]

On April 8, 2016 at 8:33 PM, Anthony Gosal said:

Hello, I am interested in spiritual enlightenment and have watched Leo's videos. I do not follow Buddhism, but it seems that it is difficult to learn about enlightenment outside the Buddhist context. Should I follow Buddhism to get a better understanding of what is being taught? Is this path distinct from Buddhist teachings? What are some of the problems with Buddhist teachings?

Tangent: I believe I have had my first awakening today. Perhaps I am mistaken,but I believe I have caught a glimpse of a few hairs of the Ox's tail; it was not quite as powerful and sudden as Leo's realization ( I assume, if what he says on his personal experience video is true), but I have a markedly less potent identification with the body and mind and feel less distinct from reality itself.

I would say that the limitations are from Buddha's perspective being one of extremes. First he was extremely rich and powerful. Then he was an Ascetic. So, he referred to his enlightenment as the middle path. This gives the impression that living modestly is what Buddhism is about, but this will not produce enlightenment in itself. So, this would be a limitation that would make it difficult for an average, modern, and/or Western person to relate to unless they dived deeply into Buddhism

[30secs]

@Anthony Gosal yes you can men, skies the limit.

[ZenMonkey]

On 8.4.2016 at 6:03 AM, Anthony Gosal said:

but it seems that it is difficult to learn about enlightenment outside the Buddhist context.

Buddhism is one way but there are many more.

Advaita is also very popular with Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj as the big sages.

Then there is for example sufism which is a tradition from the middle east.

And nowadays there are great spiritual teachers in the west (like Eckhart Tolle) that might be easier to understand for people from the west.

[Azrael]

On 8.4.2016 at 2:33 AM, Anthony Gosal said:

Is this path distinct from Buddhist teachings? What are some of the problems with Buddhist teachings?

For the first 10 months on my own path I was really against looking deeper into Buddhism and study its principles because I just didn't want do become a religious person. I was really scared of that. I'm learning to become a scientist and my whole life I laughed about religious people so I had this limiting belief all set.

Then, after enough pealing away the layers of bullshit belief I learned a lot about Zen. First from Alan Watts' lectures and books and then researching it on my own. What I like about Zen is that even Zen masters wouldn't probably call themselves Zen masters, not even Zen students. Probably they would call them self ordinary people. They don't belief in anything and don't want you to believe in something.

Even if you look into reincarnation, they don't believe that you have a soul that is reincarnated. They just watched for hundreds of hours and came to the realization that as one center of consciousness fades away another wakes up. So as long as this goes on, there always will be creatures who "know themselves". And as you are everything you the self will manifest in one of these centers of consciousness having the experience of being limited. That's basically it. Just an observation.

So, now I tend to look very deeply into Zen Buddhism because they have such sharp knifes to cut bullshit belief and don't want you to belief anything. The basic idea of the Soto school - if I got it right - is just to sit down erectly and see all of this for yourself. The only books they have like Shobogenzo basically give you pointers in which direction to look.

That's why I really fell in love w/ Zen and had to get rid of my limiting belief. Do you have to do the same? Fuck no. You can chose whatever framework you like for you own journey. Or you don't pick any framework and just do any practice. For me personally I try to look into a lot of things and then get the methods and ideas that make me realize the most and I go crazy on them.

Cheers,

Edited April 11, 2016 by Arik

[Khin]

@Anthony Gosal It is very wise to choose Buddha's teachings to become enlightened. But remember, you have to find the right teacher.

[Khin]

7 hours ago, Socrates said:

Buddha was not enlightened.  For his time yes, but because relative manifestation is always evolving, then so is definition of enlightenment.  He only realized nirvana.  Zen was offshoot of mahayana and enlightenment evolved to realizing nirvana and samsara are one.  Then Vajrayana is integrative enlightenment which includes gross, subtle and causal bodies.  There is no one definition of enlightenment according to Buddhism.  Practitioner need to start with Theravada school and work his/her way up.

Well... I'm Theravada. I think of Nirvana as Enlightenment. Maybe my translation is a little off. After reach, I kind of thought Nirvana and Enlightenment are a little different in some people mind. When they say Enlightenment, it's more like realization of truth. Ya know... realizing the real nature. For Nirvana, one must pass through the state of realization and being one with the nature which is nothingness. Not many talk about Nirvana in this western country though.

But......... I don't think that is a problem. Once one knows the true nature, one sure will accept the teachings of Buddha automatically because they are exactly what you see in your enlightenment experiences. In Theravada, every words of Buddha was kept and learned. All about Hell, heaven, reincarnation things are not the same as what most people believe. They are actually very different. Soooooooooo different.  The annoying part maybe tons of rules. Don't worry, you won't go to hell if you don't follow all those rules.  

I don't even think of Buddhism as religion because it's not believing. All Buddha taught was reality. You believe it or not doesn't matter. Whatever happening around you will still be happening whether you notice it or agree with it or like it or not. That is why life is suffering because we are pitiful. We are pitiful because we think we have control over many things but ............... We actually don't.