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 deff
just love everyone
Registered: 05/01/04
Posts: 9,428
Loc: clarity
Last seen: 3 hours, 21 minutes
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 Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened?  [Re: Strumpling]
#3413502 - 11/26/04 06:50 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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^  
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 Diploid
Cuban
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: Strumpling]
#3413638 - 11/26/04 07:35 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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The englightened one is never convinced of their own enlightenment.
Is there an echo in here? 
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Republican Values:
1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.
4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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kaiowas
lest we baguette
Registered: 07/14/03
Posts: 5,501
Loc: oz
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: Phluck]
#3413665 - 11/26/04 07:49 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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I don't know if enlightenment is a state of mind (as a means to an end) or if it is the actual journey or path taken.
when I see enlighten, what I mainly see is "lighten"
don't take your opinions and the world so seriously and you will "lighten" up a bit
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Annnnnnd I had a light saber and my friend was there and I said "you look like an indian" and he said "you look like satan" and he found a stick and a rock and he named the rock ooga booga and he named the stick Stick and we both thought that was pretty funny. We got eaten alive by mosquitos but didn't notice til the next day. I stepped on some glass while wading in the swamp and cut my foot open, didn't bother me til the next day either....yeah it was a good time, ended the night by buying some liquor for minors and drinking nips and going to he diner and eating chicken fingers, and then I went home and went to bed.
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zahudulallah
Sexual Heretic
Registered: 10/20/04
Posts: 10,579
Loc: Tokyo, Japan
Last seen: 18 years, 10 months
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: kaiowas]
#3413672 - 11/26/04 07:53 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Enlightenment is a state of being. Realizing one's own being is Enlightenment/gnosis...
The mind is flesh.. it eventually becomes worm food.. but Being cannot be assimilated into the earth. 
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gettinjiggywithit
jiggy
Registered: 07/20/04
Posts: 7,469
Loc: Heart of Laughter
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3413761 - 11/26/04 08:24 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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I liked what is realistic about what markos said. I don't even bu into the word enlightenment itself AT ALL! I could come up with I bet a million questions Budha or Jesus could not answer any better then saying "It is what it is, or It has always been" Phooey!
realistically, from the top down and back, not one conscious entity, incarnate or discarnate knows everything about the whole of existance.
At best, light is shed on one dark area at a time and the same area many times over going deeper and higher and broader rightside in and inside out and directions we havn't concieved of yet.
There is the infinite and eternal void/dakrness/nothing always ready to become something and have light shed on it-the unrealised potential yet to be.
Define enlightenment? If you can, you are not talking about enlightenment. I don't even know how or why the word exist. Because it can't be defined, you have no way of knowing it in full. Just think about that.
People can continue to lighten up dark places but to have the whole of existance down to every subatomic nook and cranny lit up all in one moment in one conscious mind?
Just my thoughts and feelings on that useless word.
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Ahuwale ka nane huna.
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Strumpling
Neuronaut
Registered: 10/11/02
Posts: 7,571
Loc: Hyperspace
Last seen: 12 years, 10 months
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: Diploid]
#3413767 - 11/26/04 08:25 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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oh heh looks like there IS..
Sorry about that - I am guilty of not reading this whole thread.. :-|
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Insert an "I think" mentally in front of eveything I say that seems sketchy, because I certainly don't KNOW much. Also; feel free to yell at me.
In addition: SHPONGLE
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kaiowas
lest we baguette
Registered: 07/14/03
Posts: 5,501
Loc: oz
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3413781 - 11/26/04 08:28 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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"Just my thoughts and feelings on that useless word."
your opinion of course... 
if its so useless why is there a good debate going on?
even when things seems useless something cool can come out of it
then again "cool" is defined by the ego...so there you go 
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Annnnnnd I had a light saber and my friend was there and I said "you look like an indian" and he said "you look like satan" and he found a stick and a rock and he named the rock ooga booga and he named the stick Stick and we both thought that was pretty funny. We got eaten alive by mosquitos but didn't notice til the next day. I stepped on some glass while wading in the swamp and cut my foot open, didn't bother me til the next day either....yeah it was a good time, ended the night by buying some liquor for minors and drinking nips and going to he diner and eating chicken fingers, and then I went home and went to bed.
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SkorpivoMusterion
Livin in theTwilight Zone...
Registered: 01/30/03
Posts: 9,954
Loc: You can't spell fungus wi...
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3413810 - 11/26/04 08:38 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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It is not uncommon for people to complicate the meaning of enlightenment to the point of the word losing it's essence; it's meaning. Similar to how the word God has become empty through thousands of years of misuse, giving rise to egoic delusions and so forth.
The Buddha defined enlightenment as: The end of suffering.
Keep it simple, because ultimately, enlightenment is simple. It is nothing fancy, nothing extravagant. It doesn't indicate superiority. In fact, many people who are in their mind-identified state would often find it 'too boring', like water. Water and enlightenment have alot in common. They are both neutral, clear and simple. They are both within each and every one of us, always - and within all life forms subject to birth and death. I could go on and on about the similarities between the two.
I could come up with I bet a million questions Budha or Jesus could not answer any better then saying "It is what it is, or It has always been" Phooey!
It seems you may be confusing knowledge, with enlightenment. Simply knowing the answer to a million things doesn't equate inter-connectedness with Being. Knowledge and Wisdom are two seperate things.
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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
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kaiowas
lest we baguette
Registered: 07/14/03
Posts: 5,501
Loc: oz
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
#3413828 - 11/26/04 08:41 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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"lighten" up skorpivo 
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Annnnnnd I had a light saber and my friend was there and I said "you look like an indian" and he said "you look like satan" and he found a stick and a rock and he named the rock ooga booga and he named the stick Stick and we both thought that was pretty funny. We got eaten alive by mosquitos but didn't notice til the next day. I stepped on some glass while wading in the swamp and cut my foot open, didn't bother me til the next day either....yeah it was a good time, ended the night by buying some liquor for minors and drinking nips and going to he diner and eating chicken fingers, and then I went home and went to bed.
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SkorpivoMusterion
Livin in theTwilight Zone...
Registered: 01/30/03
Posts: 9,954
Loc: You can't spell fungus wi...
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: kaiowas]
#3413919 - 11/26/04 09:03 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Well it was a big Thanksgiving dinner after all..
-steps off weight scale-
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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
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kaiowas
lest we baguette
Registered: 07/14/03
Posts: 5,501
Loc: oz
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
#3413980 - 11/26/04 09:19 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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*farts*
am I more enlightened than I was before?
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Annnnnnd I had a light saber and my friend was there and I said "you look like an indian" and he said "you look like satan" and he found a stick and a rock and he named the rock ooga booga and he named the stick Stick and we both thought that was pretty funny. We got eaten alive by mosquitos but didn't notice til the next day. I stepped on some glass while wading in the swamp and cut my foot open, didn't bother me til the next day either....yeah it was a good time, ended the night by buying some liquor for minors and drinking nips and going to he diner and eating chicken fingers, and then I went home and went to bed.
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AnotherDimension
Wanderer in the Land of the Lost
Registered: 06/14/04
Posts: 533
Loc: USA
Last seen: 15 years, 2 months
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: kaiowas]
#3414076 - 11/26/04 09:38 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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If you convince yourself you are enlightened, no one else believes it.
If you are enlightened, most everyone realizes it.
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Another Dimension
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"Come, and trip it as ye go,
On the light fantastick toe."
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gettinjiggywithit
jiggy
Registered: 07/20/04
Posts: 7,469
Loc: Heart of Laughter
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
#3414200 - 11/26/04 10:06 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Soooooooo Buddha invented the word and gave it the meaning of the end of suffering?
Is that the official websters meaning of the word???????? News to me. I always knew the word to mean "the state of being in the light" and something enlightening to mean something that brings light to something. In the context of that meaning, what I said about the word enlightenment stands.
In the context of the end of suffering meaning, well, typically suffering relates to ignorance, being in the dark, yada yada and being in the light eases fear and confusion and brings peace. So, in a way his meaning and my understanding of the word sorta relate.
However, light to me equates with information. Information brings you into the light about something you were once in the dark about.
The difference between knowledge and wisdom to me is that wisdom comes from experience and knowledge comes from being informed. Like the difference between street smarts and book smarts.
ALL the more Buddhas definition of enlightenment leading to wisdom doesn't cut it with me then, because to gain wisdom, one needs to experience all sorts of never ending non sense and come through it all the wiser. Wisdom is aquired by jumping into the unknown and coming out with it known because you experienced it as such.
Correct me if I am wrong, but Buddha didn't impress me as being someone who advocated gaining experience. Without that, all he could have is knowledge, not wisdom.
If enlightment is as simple as putting an end to suffering, that's easy and let me tell you death doesn't get ya there either as I have found a handful in the after life suffering in the guilt and denial of their passing brought on with them. Those stories and that subject is a whole nother topic.
It would be as easy to end suffering as to simply not care about a thing. Thats all it would take is the ability to say "So What! I don't care! to everything. How that equates with compassion is beyond me. Yet that makes being compassionate really easy.
"ooooooh you have a knife in your back and lost your job and your child was raped? I don't care because if I did, I would have to feel and acknoledge your suffering and I ended that as I am now enlightened and compasionate. Have a nice day!"
I'm just throwing out a different loot at it and some food for thought and I think its clear the term means different things to different people.
I don't bother with the word or any meaning of it. I do like to transform darkness into light though and gain experiential wisdom, event by event.
Thats why I go black hole jumping!!!!!!!To each his own at the end of the day! 
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Ahuwale ka nane huna.
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the_phoenix
Stranger
Registered: 07/07/04
Posts: 541
Loc: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Last seen: 17 years, 3 months
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3414234 - 11/26/04 10:15 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Convincing yourself that you're enlightened will not successfully create enlightenment in you. This can be measured by its effect, versus that of true enlightenment, on the state of your being/existence.
           
Edited by the_phoenix (11/26/04 10:22 PM)
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gettinjiggywithit
jiggy
Registered: 07/20/04
Posts: 7,469
Loc: Heart of Laughter
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: the_phoenix]
#3414255 - 11/26/04 10:22 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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I'm assuming you hit quick reply. I do want to ask you, "what is true enlightenment?"
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Ahuwale ka nane huna.
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the_phoenix
Stranger
Registered: 07/07/04
Posts: 541
Loc: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Last seen: 17 years, 3 months
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3414266 - 11/26/04 10:24 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
gettinjiggywithit said:
I'm assuming you hit quick reply. I do want to ask you, "what is true enlightenment?"
The point is that pretending to be something, or acting as something, can never equal the actual state of truly being it, regardless of what "it" is.
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Nothing is sacred!
Life is tough--thick-skinned--impenetrable--so that it can function--work--create--dance--live!
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SkorpivoMusterion
Livin in theTwilight Zone...
Registered: 01/30/03
Posts: 9,954
Loc: You can't spell fungus wi...
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3414282 - 11/26/04 10:28 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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The end suffering does not mean not ever experiencing any challenging times, trials and tribulations of life...
It's simply about changing the perspective and attitude in which you live Life, so that you don't create suffering for yourself and others. If this isn't compassionate, I don't know what is.
If experiencing suffering objectively leads to wisdom and enlightenment, then millions of people would be Buddhas today. Which brings me to this statement:
The difference between knowledge and wisdom to me is that wisdom comes from experience and knowledge comes from being informed.
Experience alone does not guarantee wisdom. Wisdom comes from the ability to be still. The longer the length, or rather, depth of experience of life... the more likely the this ability will be recovered/learned. Certainly we all have met many people who are very old and experienced, who contrast greatly in magnitudes of wisdom to others who are very young compared to them.
I agree that it is a generally observable fact that it does take suffering for many people to spiritually 'wake-up' and actualize their spiritual evolution. However, whether suffering is ultimately, truly needed, is another question.
I use the Buddha's definition of enlightenment, because it is simple, straight to the point, and free of clutter and egoic-complications.
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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
Edited by SkorpivoMusterion (11/26/04 10:36 PM)
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gettinjiggywithit
jiggy
Registered: 07/20/04
Posts: 7,469
Loc: Heart of Laughter
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: the_phoenix]
#3414302 - 11/26/04 10:31 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Thanks for clarifying you were making a point and what it was.
If I am the acting Mayor of the town, am I not the Mayor? Pretending is not truly being, but acting as "is"
Here's what the dictionary said;
enlightenment
n 1: education that results in understanding and the spread of knowledge [ant: unenlightenment] 2: (Hinduism and Buddhism) the beatitude that transcends the cycle of reincarnation; characterized by the extinction of desire and suffering and individual consciousness [syn: Nirvana] 3: a movement in the 18th century that advocated the use of reason in the reappraisal of accepted ideas and social institutions [syn: Enlightenment, Age of Reason]
See, it said knowledge NOT wisdom. Here's what it said on the meaning of enlighten;
en?light?en ( P ) Pronunciation Key (n-ltn)
tr.v. en?light?ened, en?light?en?ing, en?light?ens
To give spiritual or intellectual insight to: ?Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppression of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day? (Thomas Jefferson).
To give information to; inform or instruct.
Thats what I said, "to become informed" back to knowledge only.
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Ahuwale ka nane huna.
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gettinjiggywithit
jiggy
Registered: 07/20/04
Posts: 7,469
Loc: Heart of Laughter
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: SkorpivoMusterion]
#3414376 - 11/26/04 10:46 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Adding clutter to it is the only way to give meaning to it.
If you told an 8 year old that to become enlightened which is ideal is to end suffering, what would that mean to them?
What good is simple if it has no useful applicable meaning to anyone?
To be honest, if I start to notice I am feeling "suffering of sorts" I do choose to just stop caring about it" and up and out of suffering I go.
If you havn't noticed, I'm sorta playing devils advocate here just to push discussion around and stretch the subject so we all can stretch with it.
I also found this which was interesting;
Knowledge and wisdom, far from being one, Have ofttimes no connection. Knowledge dwells In heads replete with thoughts of other men; Wisdom, in minds attentive to their own. Knowledge, a rude, unprofitable mass, The mere materials with which wisdom builds, Till smoothed, and squared, and fitted to its place, Does but encumber whom it seems to enrich. Knowledge is proud that he has learned so much; Wisdom is humble that he knows no more. --Cowper.
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Ahuwale ka nane huna.
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SkorpivoMusterion
Livin in theTwilight Zone...
Registered: 01/30/03
Posts: 9,954
Loc: You can't spell fungus wi...
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Re: What's the difference between enlightenment, and convincing yourself you're enlightened? [Re: gettinjiggywithit]
#3414431 - 11/26/04 11:04 PM (19 years, 4 months ago) |
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Adding clutter to it is the only way to give meaning to it.
Clutter doesn't add meaning. Clutter deteriorates, muddies, and clouds meaning.
If you told an 8 year old that to become enlightened which is ideal is to end suffering, what would that mean to them?
The combination of words: "The end of suffering" is by no means the entire philosophy/spirituality in and of itself, it is merely the epitome of such.
That is why there are entire religions, i.e. Buddhism, with basic principles and practices that revolves around that basic epitome - because simply saying "end suffering" isn't going to get everybody very far.
To be honest, if I start to notice I am feeling "suffering of sorts" I do choose to just stop caring about it" and up and out of suffering I go.
In order to end the suffering, you have to essentially care about it.. This care gives motivation to learn the mechanics of the cause and effect that led to such suffering, and adapt principles to prevent further suffering, and so forth - which makes room for true compassion, love for Life and higher consciousness to flower.
If you havn't noticed, I'm sorta playing devils advocate here just to push discussion around and stretch the subject so we all can stretch with it.
Why, you devil, you.. .
I appreciate the increased flexibility and stronger elasticity that will evolve from such challenges of your Satanic advocation.
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Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
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