Defining Purpose

The viral video of the Dalai Lama telling a boy to suck his tongue is food for discussion. I appreciate many of the tenets of Buddhism and find that they have been helpful on my journey away from Christianity and self-discovery. Given that America is predominantly Christian, it seems, however, that this situation is useful to analyze and demonstrate what it means to hold somebody too highly in reverence. Throughout Christendom, there has been scandal on top of scandal, from Catholicism to the SBC. Notice how the deep followers’ cognitive dissonance causes them to explain things away or suggest that God forgives such and such. Their reverence is just way too attached. And, here, we have a situation wherein people come to believe that a high religious leader is the reincarnation of the Buddha of Compassion.  The path to self-fulfillment and self-realization is a precarious one comparing say a pastor to the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama was sought out when he was still a boy. A Protestant pa

There are charlatans, self-proclaimed gurus, and demagogues somewhere out there, today. They have been around before, and yet, for every rationalist out there in grave attempts to set records straight, they show no signs of disappearing. It’s been said that  “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on”. Why? Are people just gullible? What are some of the tools one needs in order to put a spell on you?  Ignorance is bliss, as they say. But, it seems that just about anybody can be fooled - at least, by someone . Ignorance can be played up perhaps because the audience has never experienced some far away place. It can be played up through an undeveloped grasp of history. It can be played up through many condescendingly daunting scientific words. Or, maybe, it can be played up through the audience simply being unaware of themselves. Imagine living in a time with no airplanes and you were perhaps some peasant who had not quite the means to travel t

Nihilism, in essence, doesn’t have to be an end goal - rejecting life and self. No, that isn’t the latent use value hidden there. Nihilism need not be feared either. Nothingness, the void, is most supreme in separating a thing from a thing even from that very thing which it is. At the moment, I am most concerned with how nihilism separates me from the Other and Self from animal. Solipsistically, how can I know, whether another human being is a gregarious malleable animal primed, conditioned, and capable of being directed by the whims of puppet masters and manipulators or a conscious being capable of free thought? When one sees advertisers, politicians, and religious leaders holding sway over the masses, it’s difficult to think that the said masses could ever be fully conscious. How do they not see the deceptions and narratives appealing to their sensory inputs? There’s nothing that leaves a bad taste in the mouth more than knowing you’ve been misled. But, isn’t it strange just how ofte

       The struggle of existence plays out both in the physical antagonisms of life and in finding reasons to exist.  From the beginning of one’s life, meaning of one’s existence is determined on culture & family.  Through the years, in-group struggles and unanswered - or unsatisfactory - questions about the world might induce one to go out into the “unknown” world on a quest in an effort to satisfy such curiosities (that is, if they are free enough to take on such a task).  But, what if, in this quest, they discover that so much of what they were taught was based off of much fabrication, mental manipulation, or paranoia; and, at this juncture, choose to cast off those past paradigms?      This person is left in fragments.  How can he know what is real save for the skin on his bones and the earth beneath his feet?  How can he trust anybody without reading into them some sort of manipulative agenda?  Better to be stoic and not let anybody too close.  Better not to show anybody his

     Funny how a thing isn’t a thing until it is a thing to the observer.  If I don’t give it a name or make a mental connection with a thing, it may be there yet refrain from presenting itself to my faculties - to my focus.  And, a thing holds no meaning unless it invokes fear, desire, or curiosity.  Reason is a “thing” – or more precisely a no-thing – compartmentalized throughout the history of curiosity in the psychological realm.  Reason is set as opposed to imagination – the fabulous, the fantastic.  I can see a thing and imagine it to be what it is to me without obtaining a right view of it.  But, if I want to have better control over that thing, I need to know what it is. How can I do that if I do not, at first, detach the inferences I am making of that thing?      Reason is that attempt to set myself apart from a thing that has presented itself to me which  I would like to better manipulate or understand.  Reason is that necessary component of detecting how much of me I am

  What is meant by “One becomes more conscious through suffering”?       Suffering comes in all shapes and sizes.  Suffering is not necessarily desirable.  We can try to look away from it, try to suppress it, or try to put it on the shoulders of another being (divine or not).  Curiosity drives us forward to new innovations but suffering has the potential to make us more aware of ourselves and our capabilities.   But, if one speaks of suffering, it could seem like they are being dismissive of the horrible sufferings people might endure that may actually be counterproductive to awareness - sufferings possibly caused by others.  How do we navigate this?      Suffering can induce greater consciousness in that we have the ability to look at suffering, understand that it is of human nature  - if not all nature - to endure some state of suffering.  Suffering can induce greater consciousness when we are experiencing suffering and are investigating our suffering to work our way through it.  How