Ms. HRP and I had a discussion about the soul and spirit yesterday. This is a point at which I depart from typical Buddhist teaching. I don't believe in a soul in any traditional sense, nor do I believe in reincarnation. This is why my previous post about being a formless cloud was just wishful thinking. I don't believe there is anything in a human being, be it psyche, ego, soul, intellect, spirit or whatever that can or does exist outside the physical body.
Our basic state, as I've written before, is that of elements, chemicals and minerals deposited in the earth. A bizarre biochemical process which we call 'conception, gestation and birth' assembles us into a walking, talking, itching, farting, fucking, french fry-eating organism that rolls along for a number of years before finally shutting down and slowly returning to the state of individual elements, chemicals and compounds.
This is what the overwhelming majority of the evidence suggests, yet most people persist in believing something else. They find themselves and their lives to be so special that it simply couldn't be possible that it is all just going to end, finally and permanently, or they find their mortal existences to be so painful and miserable that they keep holding out hope for something better on 'the other side.'
My own belief is that there is no 'other side.' What I have right now is what I have, and it's enough.
6 comments:
i've heard of others who believe as you... however...there are many... who have experienced that which you have not... so...is it that your beliefs...are true...and their experiences are make believe...or is it...in fact...you have only thought...which you subscribe to as belief...without evidence of experience...
of course...the science of it all makes it logical... this brings me back to the tao...again... there is nothing to believe in...if nothing exists at all...
Let's see, you believe this life is an illusion and that there is a reality outside this illusion which can be accessed through a magical process of enlightenment but you are too skeptical to ever believe in a soul or afterlife.
does that fairly state your position?
blogblah
The self's an illusion,
This I know,
Because the Buddha
Told me so.
Seriously... I think the notion of a self that stands apart from the rest of the universe is an illusion.
I don't think enlightenment is any more magical than understanding how to ride a bicycle.
As for people who believe they experienced past lives, I think they sincerely believe they remember past lives. Tibetan tulkus (I think that's the word) often claim, even as children, to remember specific details and people from their previous lives.
While I believe they're sincere, I also believe they're mistaken. A lot of people seem to remember past lives as Italian Renaissance poets or knights of the Crusades. No one remembers selling life insurance in Ames, Iowa in the 1940's, or working for the city water department in Birmingham, Alabama in the 1950's. I just can't take the handful of people who claim to remember past lives as evidence of reincarnation.
So, to summarize: while you are in this world, you're part of a much, much larger universe which supplied the basic building blocks of your physical self. When you die, you check your physical self back in, and it goes back to its original job of being inanimate matter. But I don't believe some part of you lingers on.
Your self thinks it doesn't exist and therefore it doesn't? Rene Descartes salutes you.
blogblah
When Decartes says "I think," he's made an assumption. How does he know it's him doing the thinking?
sorry, guys when you are talking ALL I hear is
blah, blah, blah...
I also zone out about football when Z tries to explain why whatever something happened!!
Post a Comment