Laughing My Ass Off

The joke goes like this:

What Western Religions seek to achieve, the Eastern Religions seek to cast off: Immortality.

The "wise" Western Christians convert to Buddhism thinking reincarnation = immortality.

LOL LOL LOL

Epicurus had it right all along.

But what do I know.
I am only a temporary mortal heathen.

a reply to: FullHeathen

Lolololol!!!!

a reply to: FullHeathen

I am of a Western religion, or at least was indoctrinated into one, and I do not really believe in reincarnation, but I do believe in an afterlife. What that afterlife is or can be is yet unknown.

a reply to: FullHeathen

What Western Religions seek to achieve, the Eastern Religions seek to cast off: Immortality.

But eternity is such a long time to be, without an identity and stuff!

a reply to: midicon

without an identity and stuff there is no time.

Good point. Time is something "spent".

a reply to: Sookiechacha

Thanks for repeating that. I messed up editing it.

a reply to: quintessentone

What that afterlife is or can be is yet unknown.

It has been written:

I have seen the living die, yet I live.
That is the afterlife.

After I have died, others will still live.
That is the afterlife.

a reply to: JJproductions

I didn't know if anyone would get it.

This is how death was described to me and has given me comfort. The person said that we've all already been dead. It's where we were before we were born. And then they asked me, "And did it hurt?"

I would like to believe that this isn't all for nothing. That somehow when we die, that all of that life experience and the suffering that happens, isn't wasted. That we live in some way after passing to wherever.

I'd also like to think that those who were miserable human beings would be told so and then they would simply be sent away as if they never existed. Gone. Really dead. Knowing the rest will live forever. That really would be a punishment. But as always, there seems to be a lot of arguing about what constitutes a "good" life as opposed to a "bad" one.

I'm also comforted by the fact that so many have already died, and I don't hear them complaining.

Am I the only one who hopes in the end there is nothing? I'm getting tired of this thing called life and I really do not want to repeat it or start something new...

originally posted by: Sookiechacha

But eternity is such a long time to be, without an identity and stuff!

Eternal anything sounds like hell.

originally posted by: Xtrozero
Am I the only one who hopes in the end there is nothing? I'm getting tired of this thing called life and I really do not want to repeat it or start something new...

A saying comes to mind: "Life is what you make it."

a reply to: Xtrozero

Immortality is hell.

originally posted by: quintessentone

A saying comes to mind: "Life is what you make it."

I have a good life, just do not want to repeat it over and over, and immortality puts up a lot of warning flags unless it's just our energy in some collective. When I die I'll be ready...

a reply to: Xtrozero

Am I the only one who hopes in the end there is nothing?

That is the actual goal of Buddhism.
You have to earn it though.
Through life after life after life, never remembering the lessons learned. It's freaking hopeless. And even in two hundred million years, after the Earth is swallowed by the Sun, it will just keep going somewhere else.

Or, we can just call it one and done.

originally posted by: Xtrozero

originally posted by: quintessentone

A saying comes to mind: "Life is what you make it."

I have a good life, just do not want to repeat it over and over, and immortality puts up a lot of warning flags unless it's just our energy in some collective. When I die I'll be ready...

I don't mind repeating it over and over again if I need to learn something perhaps for ascension or just because I am a lifelong (make that forever lifelong) learner. But, I don't believe in reincarnation so I'm SOL.

a reply to: FullHeathen

"Ha, ha, ha, thump-thump"?



Actually, Buddhism seeks to escape the cycle of pain and suffering that eternal rebirth ensures.

Christianity's immortality in a state of heaven has no pain or suffering.

a reply to: chr0naut

argumentum ad lapidem?

Christianity's immortality does just that.

For Christians; but only if true.

originally posted by: FullHeathen
a reply to: chr0naut

argumentum ad lapidem?

Christianity's immortality does just that.

For Christians; but only if true.

If false, non-existence is also absent of pain and suffering. Christians call that the second death, although they do account for the third option where existence continues, but so does pain and suffering - they call that hell.