Wow I just realized! "Desire" itself doesn't make people suffer, it's actually...

I'd be really careful not to let all kinds of things end up "defining" who you are as a person. Like your stuff, your titles, your money, the people around you etc etc. That stuff can end up defining who you are when really you're none of it. You're just a life force in a human body. You're not your material positions, but if you end up identifying with them so closely that they define you, it's not good cuz you're just living out of the ego.

reply to post by darkbake

darkbake
reply to post by arpgme

 

So, tell me what you think about this, I don't actually care about material things - but I really like interacting with stuff, and this includes ideas

When you think about it, everything is an idea/abstract/concept. Even this thread. Even "nothingness" is a concept - the idea that there is something opposite to all ideas and physicality that we see. Before there is a "physical" book, there is a concept of a book.

It is all connected.

reply to post by Drala

Drala
Don't forget to read the part in my post about prana and darma...

Everything is dual...desire and contentment are inseparable in many ways, I was mainly just pointing out there can be life-force without desire and therefore desire is not life-force...I am not here to debate if duality is actually and illusion of one...

Yea, I won't go into whether or not duality is an illusion or not. I will just stick on the topic of desire (this thread).

This is the thing I'm pointing out though. I'm not sure why you are seeing "desire" and "contentment" as something "dual" from each other.

Dualism says "there IS (Presence)" and "there IS-NOT (Absence)"...

The dualistic nature of "contentment" should be "NON-contentment (not feeling satisfied)".

'Not feeling satisfied' is not necessarily "desire". If you enjoy the desire itself, then you ARE satisfied. Therefore, desire is not necessarily the opposite of "contentment".

reply to post by NthOther

NthOther
That's the problem with desire. It is driven by an errant way of perceiving the world as a collection of separate and distinct objects that can be commodified and "owned".

Desire is not just about "objects". People can desire, "happiness", "love", and even... detachment...

Most people desire to have, without actually liking the desire itself. They want to have a million dollars, but they don't like the way the "desire" feels of it. They just want to HAVE it.

"having" and "wanting" are not necessarily the same thing. Sure, most people "want in order to have", but you can also "want for the sake of wanting - for the pure enjoyment of wanting".

reply to post by IandEye

IandEye
reply to

 

You like what I did there calling all those other religious figures "wrong" like you so blantantly did to the Buddha?

I really don't care, how "blatant" or "bold" you were. I only pointed it out because you seemed to have a problem when I did it.

Another case of "do what I say, don't do what I do"

IandEye
reply to [url= by arpgme

 

you are obviously a spiritual materialist- someone who seeks spirituality to make themselves feel better and to try and and control,

When did I promote controlling anything in this thread? If you care about "Truth", maybe, you should read what is written instead of what your mind wants to believe.

IandEye
reply to [url= by arpgme[/url]

 

as opposed to a seeker of Truth which involves the death of the Self and selfish desire.

Truth = Death of Self

I guess "The Living Self" is a lie then, an is not to be preferred. Interesting perspective.

reply to post by arpgme


Bob Marley sang, "Every man thinketh his burden is the heaviest. Who feels it knows it Lord."

Some suffer because of "want" and "desire" it's very self. Some suffer because of materialistic attachments "to have". Some suffer from "lack of".

Often times suffering is relative and subjective.

reply to post by spartacus699

spartacus699
I'd be really careful not to let all kinds of things end up "defining" who you are as a person. Like your stuff, your titles, your money, the people around you etc etc. That stuff can end up defining who you are when really you're none of it. You're just a life force in a human body. You're not your material positions, but if you end up identifying with them so closely that they define you, it's not good cuz you're just living out of the ego.

Defining yourself can make you feel unfree and even cause disappointments when you can't "fit" those roles. I wasn't encouraging this idea of "taking on definitions" at all. This was random.

arpgme
reply to post by darkbake

 

Desire is not just about "objects". People can desire, "happiness", "love", and even... detachment...

Most people desire to have, without actually liking the desire itself. They want to have a million dollars, but they don't like the way the "desire" feels of it. They just want to HAVE it.

"having" and "wanting" are not necessarily the same thing. Sure, most people "want in order to have", but you can also "want for the sake of wanting - for the pure enjoyment of wanting".

I understand what you're trying to say. Often times just the way in which the language works and how words are defined becomes a problem.

I think one problem here is the word "Want". Defined as being the state of Lacking Something. This is where "Wanting" regardless of how you use it, implies the state of being in "Loss". This is what others are trying to point out.

To "Want" or "Desire" happiness or love, then implies the state of being which you are without love or happiness. If you are Happy, you don't have to Want it. You are it.

reply to post by mOjOm


If what you "want" is the desire, then there is no lack.

If you want "something" and don't take time to enjoy the feeling of the "wanting", then you will feel lack.

Correct me if I am wrong but the way I see it is if you want something and make it a goal to to gain that item, the process of making it a goal and something to look forward to can be fulfilling in itself. The waiting and working towards it is part to the fulfillment.

My experience in wanting something is that after i have worked and patiently waited for it, not long after the initial excitement I find my self saying "now what?" I then need to find a new "want." Something else to look forward too.

Fulfillment doesn't come from the item itself, unless it is something needed to survive like food or shelter.

arpgme
reply to post by mOjOm

 

If what you "want" is the desire, then there is no lack.

If you want "something" and don't take time to enjoy the feeling of the "wanting", then you will feel lack.

No, I get what you're saying. I'm just not sure the idea you're trying to express is being communicated correctly using the words you're using or in the way they are being used.

What is it to "Desire" "Wanting"?? They are both a Verb and Noun and if used as only a verb it has no context. You don't "Sing Singing" (verb verb) you "Sing a Song" (verb noun). If you "Want Wanting" what is it that you are "Wanting"?? Want and Wanting are both actions without a subject.

When using "Wanting" as the noun however "The Wanting" as a noun is just the "lack of something". That something being defined by whatever "The Wanting" (noun) is "Wanting" (verb).

Like I said before. I'm not saying you're idea is invalid. I just think you're explanation needs some work.

arpgme
reply to post by mOjOm

 

If what you "want" is the desire, then there is no lack.

If you want "something" and don't take time to enjoy the feeling of the "wanting", then you will feel lack.

Just to make it more clear. Use your own example:

"If what you 'want' is the desire, then there is no lack."

Notice how you used "want" as a verb but your noun isn't "desire" but "the desire". "The Desire" is a specific Desire a specified "Want" of some kind which is defined even though exactly what "It" is isn't being explained, just identified as "The Desire".

Does that help??

reply to post by arpgme


I don't know what most people feel. I do hear often the axiom that desire is the source of suffering, which I don't relate to.

I sometimes think boredom is the more likely culprit?
Unless I choose to focus on some sort of goal to motivate me, indifference and apathy make the world a grey blank for me.... I can easily fall into something that I think might be depression, though it doesn't have the quality of "sadness" or pain- it is like my physical body starts to just run down. I get tired, sick, forget to eat...

I used to not care if this happened, but then I had kids and a husband, and when I would start to waste away like that, it would upset them and they would try to shake me up.


I put forth goals, intents, motivations for myself now, and not necessarily to have them, but to motivate myself to move forward- to have a direction, a curiosity, an appetite for moving onto the next moment.

Sometimes I choose goals that I secretly know I cannot achieve, just to relish the process or trip of heading towards it. It happens sometimes that I suddenly have the opportunity to have those goals confronting me and that is always a choice of either accepting it (then having to create a whole other imaginary carrot) or make some excuse to hold it off and "miss" that train.


In general, my goals don't have much to do with possessions- possessions make me feel very insecure. The more crap you have, the more you have to weigh on you and get in the way. Like body surfing is great, but once there is a surfboard involved, you run the risk of getting your bones broken or your head knocked out by it in a wave. Life is like that to me. I prefer body surfing.

But I do set goals like to master a certain skill (why I like the ones that never have a "ending" like horsemanship) , to see a certain place, experience a certain activity.

The desire suddenly makes forms, colors, and contrasts come out of the grey, and I start to feel a momentum in a certain direction. I have no idea why people consider that "suffering".
It is like riding a motorcycle through a beautiful winding mountain road and complaining about the trip and the need to arrive at your destination and get off!!

reply to post by Bluesma


A thousand stars if I could. That is exactly what I was trying to say only you did it so much more eloquently.
I couldn't agree more.

graceunderpressure
True, and another way of saying it is that it's the journey, not the destination.

I also think that our human impulses, emotions and desires are not bad in and of themselves. It's what we do with them, through our free will that makes us monsters or angels.

Namaste

Feelings are not true or false so they can't be bad or good, one way or the other. It is how we attach things to them that causes us to either react or act.

And to act on our thoughts instead of reacting to our feelings does come from being aware of your internal world, right now.

That can be bad or good. But it's not then an impulse.

reply to post by arpgme

Awesome thread! Really interesting . I totally agree that desire for something can be a good thing depending on what it is and the intention thereof.

Some people with "depression," actually have spiritual desire but they can't put their finger on it or don't know how to develop their spiritual being, which we all are; spiritual beings. We are spiritual beings attached temporarily to a physical shell. An alarming number of people in the West are spiritually infants and the television helps maintain this tragedy for some.

To desire communion with The Source can have amazing effects on people's lives.

Here is something very special about desire from John Lake. He wasn't Buddhist but that's okay. Most Buddhist schools say that it is better to work hard on one system of cultivation then to get nowhere with a bunch of different schools; & some of them believe that no one school is necessarily better to cultivate. The level attained is not about the system it's about the person's actual persistence to cultivate within one school along with their inborn virtue. This video is about a very special man who helped make Spokane Washington be the healthiest city in America at the time.



...And this video is from Curry who learned a lot from John G Lake's life it's only 11 minutes long.

IandEye
reply to [url= by Drala[/url]

 

lol....that WAS gentle muchacho. The OP said the Buddha was wrong in the title (which has since been changed). Jesus was wrong. mMoses was wrong. Mohammed was wrong. But not the Buddha.
plus this guy is on a Satanist-Pagan-Pantheist trip (the OPPOSITE of Buddhism) and that aint my path "brother".

edit on 17-9-2013 by IandEye because: (no reason given)

Such struggling from someone who claims to be otherwise influenced.

I guess unless you can instruct others, it means nothing?

reply to post by mOjOm


When someone sings it's called a "song".

Singing the singing of someone else is called "singing a song".



When someone wants to want it's called a "desire".

Wanting to want is called "wanting desire".

This is just syntax. Whether it is a "noun" or a "verb", the essence is the same.

"wanting the desire" - means exactly that. When you feel the desire within, instead of fighting against it, feeling "bad" you don't have something, be happy that you want more for yourself, enjoy that feeling.

reply to post by arpgme


Once again, I understand what you're getting at so there is no need to try and explain it more. But thank you. Remember, I'm not disagreeing with you either, I'm just saying for others to grasp what it is you're saying, I think a different use of language might help.

Let's try a different approach.

You say "Wanting to want is called "wanting desire"." correct. How does one "Want" the feeling of Wanting?? You can't because the moment you begin to Want it you've got it. You see that???

The same moment you Want or Desire and that desire is for itself you have it right then, which at that point satisfies that want of wanting.

If you want something and that something is the feeling of wanting, it then satisfies itself.

All of which is just another way of saying what you're saying for the most part isn't it??? If one Want's to Want there is no Lacking anything!!! Right?!?!?

Not saying you're wrong, just saying it is confusing when trying to put it into words.

reply to post by mOjOm

mOjOm
All of which is just another way of saying what you're saying for the most part isn't it??? If one Want's to Want there is no Lacking anything!!! Right?!?!?

Yes. That's why I'm saying. Someone else in this thread said it's like saying "the joy is in the journey rather than the destination". I guess that is another good way to put it.


"wanting for the sake of wanting, rather than wanting just to have something"

If you want to have something and you get it, that attainment is just extra because but focusing in this way, you would have already been happy from the feeling of want alone.

arpgme

If you want to have something and you get it, that attainment is just extra because but focusing in this way, you would have already been happy from the feeling of want alone.

Kinda sounds like taking a journey to where you already are.

Why bother confusing it??

Satisfying the Want with Wanting I don't see as a needed step in the equation. It just cancels itself out leaving you with Happiness in your method when you could just leave that out and realize the Happiness was always there and there was no need to look for it in the first place. Just drop the solving for "Want" with itself and you're left with Happiness.

When you no longer want for anything, you will have everything.

IandEye
reply to [url= by arpgme[/url]

 

that's a pretty bold title- to call the Buddha and therefore millions of followers over thousands of years "wrong". Sorry to say, but it's your limited understanding which is wrong.
here are the 4 noble truths and there is no mention of desire:
1. Existence is suffering.
2. Suffering is caused by ignorance of the true nature of Self.

The second noble truth is (and I don't speak sanskrit) the origin of suffering / unease ...

The Three Poisons are the origin of suffering which are ignorance, attachment, and aversion. Tanha (thirst roughly) is strongly connected with the second noble truth, which is strongly connected to desire. Suffering and desire are often seen as two ends of the same line in Buddhism.

Ignorance of the true nature of the self is a wide topic and does encompass desire associated with belief in illusions and nonsensical belief such as believing you have an identity beyond the present moment and trying to cling to that identity, or that you own parts of the universe such as your car stereo. It's a delusion. A delusion shared by millions, but still not actually that important.

Not trying to mega lecture, and by all means correct me if you think I'm wrong, but in my understanding of Buddhism desire is incredibly important in the understanding of the four noble truths.

Edit: sorry for not addressing you OP I want to, but don't have much time. Is good to think about these things always, and the Dalai Lama himself would urge you to be skeptical and query all teachers, even the Buddha.

reply to post by arpgme

Desire is life.

I agree. And I see the state of enlightenment, not as a state free of desire, but as a state of pure desire, i.e desire without an object. Objectless desire.

Is that what you were describing?