How Is Detachment Compatible With Passion?

[Gabor Bornemissza]

It must be a rather common newbie question, but if I learn to disidentify with my mind and not let the negative aspects of it have a hold over me, how do I then not fade or obstruct the intensity of positive feelings also?

[Prabhaker]

@Gabor Bornemissza

The negative ideas of your mind have to be released, not repressed by positive ideas. You have to create a consciousness which is neither positive nor negative. That will be the pure consciousness.

In that pure consciousness you will live the most natural and blissful life.  You will be surprised that if you don’t choose, if you remain in a choiceless awareness, your life will start expressing something which is beyond both positive and negative, which is higher than both. So you are not going to be a loser. It is not going to be negative, it is not going to be positive, it is going to be existential.

 

[Prabhaker]

39 minutes ago, Gabor Bornemissza said:

How Is Detachment Compatible With Passion?

It is not compatible with passion. What is passion? Passion is a sort of fever, a sort of trembling of your being, a sort of inner wavering. Passions means you are not content as you are. You would like something else, you would like something more, you would like a different pattern of life, a different style. Then you think you will be happy and contented.

A mind full of passion is a mind full of discontent with the present. A mind with passion desires, hopes, but never lives; it postpones. It says tomorrow, always tomorrow. It is never here and now. A mind full of passion always goes on missing the present - and the present is the only reality there is. So a mind full of passion goes on missing reality. It cannot reflect that which is, it cannot reflect the truth, it cannot reflect the dhamma, the way. It cannot reflect the real that surrounds you, because you are never here.

Consciousness has to become without content. That is the meaning of being passionless. When you are, simply you are, I call it primal innocence. You are not hankering, desiring for anything. You are just in this moment, absolutely here and now. A great content arises into your being, a tremendous satisfaction arises into your being. You feel blessed.

In fact that is what you are seeking. In all your desires you are seeking a state of contentment. But desires cannot bring it. Even in your desires, in your greed, in your sexuality, in your ambition, that's exactly what you are seeking - but you are seeking in a wrong direction. It cannot happen that way. It has never happened that way. Meditation is the way. That way is right now-here available to you.

[aurum]

Detachment means you don't rely on it for your happiness. You're acting out of INSPIRATION instead NEEDINESS.

Imagine you were going to sing a song you love with someone you know.

And then as you started singing, this person looks at you and says "wait a minute! Don't you realize we could be singing FASTER? After all, we're singing with the intention of reaching the end of the song. Therefore, I conclude that the best way to sing must be to go as fast as possible. And I will NOT BE SATISFIED in till we reach the end of the song."

You would think this person insane. After all, the purpose of singing a song is not to get to the end of the song. You sing because in each moment, you just enjoy it. When it's over, maybe you'd do it again.

That's how I think of life. People act as if the goal of life is to "get somewhere" or to reach the end. But here's a new flash: the end result of life is death.

If you're just running through life as if it's a mission to get from one goal to the next, you're missing the point.

Of course this doesn't mean don't do ANYTHING. Notice even in the above song, you're still singing. But you're acting now because you're INSPIRED to do so, not out of fear and misery.

 

[Telepresent]

@Gabor Bornemissza Hello!  I'm not enlightened, so take what I say as assumptions from someone who's been playing in this creek at little longer.

What I've noticed so far is that identification and negative-identification change.  So I may lose the potential payoff from something that might be the cause of great anticipation, but I'm saved from feeling like shit if it all goes wrong.

In exchange, I have a MUCH MUCH greater appreciation for what is happening right now.  I can't begin to explain to you how much of what actually IS right here and right now I have sqandered by worrying, remembering, projecting and remorse-ing. 

I still get hit by the positive, and by the negative: the difference is that I can experience the negative and recognise it as a feeling, and a meaning, without then dwelling on it for the rest of the night.  That seems a decent trade-off for not getting excited over things I'm going to anyway.