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carl
Revolutionary
Registered: 04/26/05
Posts: 374
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looking for a guide
#5368232 - 03/05/06 06:34 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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I believe i am on the beginning of my own spiritual awakening. I have looked into buddhism to begin my journey. I feel however that I cannot direct myself properly into this awakening. Is it recommended i find someone skilled in the philosophy to help me along the way? Just looking for some answers. THanks for your time.
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Quoiyaien
><<<<0>>>><


Registered: 06/08/04
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5368376 - 03/05/06 07:24 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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My advice to get started is to learn how to sit Zazen, because it is just sitting there without any dogmatic interpretation. I do recomend at least getting some basic instruction in meditation and then decide if you want to continue. After you know how to meditate, psychedelics make wonderful teachers, and can teach you a lot. Personally, I have a teacher and I dont know where I'd be without him. It really helps clear up misunderstandings. Just my 2 cents.
Peace
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lysergicide
Aurora Borealis


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Re: looking for a guide [Re: Quoiyaien]
#5368476 - 03/05/06 07:55 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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the perfect teacher you can have is yourself. i recommend reading books. philosophy, psychology, religion maybe. i was indirectly influenced by my hobbies (music, reading) and people i looked up to (dalai lama, mohatma gandhi).
just spend time with yourself and the truth will unveil.
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Dmonikal
Bareback up inthis neden


Registered: 09/06/04
Posts: 474
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: lysergicide]
#5368665 - 03/05/06 09:17 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Go stand outside in your boxers in the rain for 1 hour listening to the same gay song over and over. Chi gung ain't fun but it's a start.
-------------------- Give your money or your life Take 'em both for all I care Dump your bullets right here
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder


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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5368726 - 03/05/06 09:33 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Start from exactly where you are. What tradition were you born into? What land were you born in? Ther answer to 'where should I begin?' is given by the 'isness' of your present situation. Were you born to Christian parents? Does their understanding of their faith make little or no sense to you? It may not be a matter of changing traditions, it may be a matter of cracking the outer shell of that faith and going to the kernal from the outer husk (where most people get stuck).
No one can tell YOU where to begin. You must begin with Reality - where you actually are (not where you fancy yourself to be). Such are the 'givens' of your current lifetime. Acknowledge Reality and work with that which has been 'given' to you, or ignore Reality and descend even deeper into wishful thinking, fantasy and illusion.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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Silversoul
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5368751 - 03/05/06 09:41 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Psychedelics were my guide. Obviously they are not enough in and of themselves, but they give you a great boost, which can then be supplemented through meditation and reading the wisdom of others.
I find it's great to take a significant dose(but one you feel comfortable with), get in the right set and setting, and say "Show me!"
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carl
Revolutionary
Registered: 04/26/05
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Last seen: 16 years, 9 months
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Quote:
MarkostheGnostic said: Start from exactly where you are. What tradition were you born into? What land were you born in? Ther answer to 'where should I begin?' is given by the 'isness' of your present situation. Were you born to Christian parents? Does their understanding of their faith make little or no sense to you? It may not be a matter of changing traditions, it may be a matter of cracking the outer shell of that faith and going to the kernal from the outer husk (where most people get stuck)
I was born as a mutt in every sense. My mothers family is jewish but my mother does not practice while my fathers family is christian. I have never had a religion pushed upon me and grew up happy with reality. It was psychedelics that pushed me into a realm of thinking i had never visited. I was born and currently still live in the united states to an average family in an average town. My problem when i was younger as im sure many have been through it was the drive to be accepted. I learnt a lot about myself and others through psychedelics which in turn has lead me down this path. That is just a basic outline of me. I have shed many past beliefs which have helped me clear a lot of things up but i feel like i need to go deeper. THanks again.
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psyka
Praetorian


Registered: 06/09/03
Posts: 1,652
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5370684 - 03/06/06 12:13 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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When you stop looking for a guide, you will finally be able to live an uninhibited life. No one can guide, because we don't know jack shit. We're only animals... only human. You can only form a philosophy, and live your life according to that. No religious dogma, will help you. It will only say, "When you die, you will be happy because you'll be in paradise... forget your Earthly troubles," and so it will only support laziness and apathetic comfort.
-------------------- As the life of a candle, my wick will burn out. But, the fire of my mind shall beam into infinite.

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Sinbad
Living TheMoment


Registered: 12/23/04
Posts: 2,571
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5370839 - 03/06/06 01:06 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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If you have an affinity with Buddhism, and are looking for an authentic teacher on your path, be patient, and in time you will find your teacher. But tread carefully as there are lots of charlatans and unauthentic lineages sprouting up here in the west that can and do take advantage of fresh minds. Research thoroughly and investigate the sources of whatever teachings and teachers you come across.
Check out the Buddhist Esangha forum, there are many evolved minds there that could help you find your way.
http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/
Also check out this website, it has lots of useful info.
http://buddhism.kalachakranet.org/spiritual_teacher_guru.html
Good luck to you on your path.
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Edited by Sinbad (03/06/06 01:12 PM)
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InnerStillness
<3 U

Registered: 03/06/06
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: Sinbad]
#5370856 - 03/06/06 01:13 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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If your looking for material to read. I think a good start would be The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, it was my first book on the subject and it was infinitly helpfull. Buy you are your own guide in a sense, learning to meditate would be a powerful step. Peace on your journey.
PS. Sinbad, thank you for that Duddhism forum ill be checking that out!
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder


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Re: looking for a guide [Re: carl]
#5371547 - 03/06/06 04:38 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Technically, you are Jewish from a rabbinical point of view, since your mother is Jewish. If you believe in any of the Christian myths you are Christian from a Chistian perspective. If you recognize something of both, you are either a Jewish Christian or a Messianic Jew, depending upon how much emphasis you put upon your Christianity (Jewish Christian) or upon your Jewishness (Messianic Jew). If you accept Christian myth at all, the rabbis would consider you to be an 'apostate' Jew, whereas Christians would simply consider you to be a Jewish Christian of some sort, minimizing your Jewishness, unless you were truly observant of ritual and dietary laws (then you might be considered to be a rare Ebionite Christian).
Wherever you find yourself amidst these possibilities, you are Free to explore the different strands of mystical Jewish (Kabbalistic) or mystical Christian (Gnostic) thought and practices. Of course, I am just sharing my own trip with you. I originally rejected Judaism and made a mental trip to Greece and India, but later embraced Christianity through Eastern Orthodox mystical practices which were similar to the Indian Yoga that I had discovered and practiced in conjunction with psychedelics. Many years later - recently in fact - I have made my way back to something of a Jewish identity, but unrecognizable to Jews whom I meet. They say, 'Hey, you have a Jewish surname...how come sometimes you wear a cross around your neck?' (today I wore a Kabbalistic Tree of Life glyph). I say, "I want to be the kind of Jew that Jesus was." That is true, whether Jesus is myth or history, and I have yet to meet a Jew who was ever told anything like this.
If you archive my posts, you'll see Yogic stuff in my old posts but lots of Kabbalistic stuff and of late, Gnostic posts. I am learning tons of stuff from both traditions. It's like I'm back in college discovering LSD and all these mystical systems that describe my tripping states (while all my peers are struggling to finish their degrees in accounting, ot biology or whatever). I'm still excited, and I finished college in 1975!!! The Masters and Doctoral programs were periods that were a whole lot less joyful in terms of self-discovery, and then I had to enter the working world. Thirty years have gone by very, very quickly, and so I am really spending a lot of time studying these things again because it seem like I'll be 100 years old any minute and on my death-bed. There really is no time to piss away.
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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dblaney
Human Being

Registered: 10/03/04
Posts: 7,894
Loc: Here & Now
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There really is no time
Indeed!
-------------------- "What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?" "Belief is a beautiful armor But makes for the heaviest sword" - John Mayer Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin. "This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln
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dorkus
don't look back
Registered: 04/12/04
Posts: 1,511
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Is it really necessary to define our identies? The joker falls freely without foundation. Isn't it all about letting go and unlearn?
There really is no time
Isn't that exactly why there is no rush?
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dblaney
Human Being

Registered: 10/03/04
Posts: 7,894
Loc: Here & Now
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: dorkus]
#5371904 - 03/06/06 06:25 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Indeed and indeed.
-------------------- "What is in us that turns a deaf ear to the cries of human suffering?" "Belief is a beautiful armor But makes for the heaviest sword" - John Mayer Making the noise "penicillin" is no substitute for actually taking penicillin. "This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -Abraham Lincoln
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carl
Revolutionary
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: dblaney]
#5372293 - 03/06/06 08:41 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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My religious past i guess you could call non existant. While my parents might have come from those religions i have never set foot in any holy building. I was never taught either/or by my parents and they never practiced while i was alive. I have no religious background whatsoever.
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MarkostheGnostic
Elder


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Re: looking for a guide [Re: dorkus]
#5372587 - 03/06/06 10:03 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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I am not ready to withdraw from the world and vanish into the Infinite. Therefore, I must bring Infinity into the finite. Such an interface creates a certain type of identity. It is an Illumined identity - the conditioned being informed by the Unconditioned. It is the seed syllable 'HUM' in the Great Mantra 'OM MANI PADMA HUM' - The Absolute is a Jewel in the Lotus of the Heart. OM is the timeless realm of the Infinite and Eternal. It, paradoxically, can be found to 'tabernacle' upon the Center of Human finitude - the Heart. Infinity consciously present in finitude means Ultimate Identity - "I AM."
-------------------- γνῶθι σαὐτόν - Gnothi Seauton - Know Thyself
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Sinbad
Living TheMoment


Registered: 12/23/04
Posts: 2,571
Loc: Under The Bodhi Tree
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Markos, your statements seems to suggest that you are taking the extreme POV of eternalism. Examine this notion of "I" carefully, and you may discover something very interesting.
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fireworks_god
Sexy.Butt.McDanger


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Re: looking for a guide [Re: psyka]
#5373726 - 03/07/06 10:22 AM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Quote:
psyka said: When you stop looking for a guide, you will finally be able to live an uninhibited life. No one can guide, because we don't know jack shit. We're only animals... only human.
In terms of this thread, "guide" is of the same as "teach".
Are there no teachers?
No concepts that can assist others, that can be communicated?
Ultimately, of course, we are entirely responsible for our own self and no one can make our decisions for us. We are similar beings and we have similar paths. We form our perspectives and it is possible, through our interactions with each other, to share with each other and to develop each other.
There are no guides? Highly doubtful. It seems to be more concerning one's attitude towards being helped and how/if one recognizes and utilizes the guidance that is available to be reaped, rather than there not being any guides at all. 
 Peace.
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If I should die this very moment I wouldn't fear For I've never known completeness Like being here Wrapped in the warmth of you Loving every breath of you
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psyka
Praetorian


Registered: 06/09/03
Posts: 1,652
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There are no answers outside of your own mind.
In asking for a guide, one must first realize he is asking for varying aspects of himself. Looking for something outside of your own mind is akin to surrendering your reality to another's.
-------------------- As the life of a candle, my wick will burn out. But, the fire of my mind shall beam into infinite.

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carl
Revolutionary
Registered: 04/26/05
Posts: 374
Last seen: 16 years, 9 months
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Re: looking for a guide [Re: psyka]
#5375217 - 03/07/06 05:43 PM (17 years, 10 months ago) |
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Quote:
psyka said: There are no answers outside of your own mind.
In asking for a guide, one must first realize he is asking for varying aspects of himself. Looking for something outside of your own mind is akin to surrendering your reality to another's.
That is the one thing said that has helped me the most so far i believe. I always am questioning myself and my surroundings, but i need to find the answers within myself.
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