Burning Electrons

The General Tendency of Ego,http://www.tricycle.com/blog/?p=1266,

The General Tendency of Ego

Posted by Shane Michael Manieri in : Books, General, Retreats , 4 comments

As a student of Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, I recently attended his yearly sangha retreat at Nalanda West in Seattle, WA. Yearly retreats usually focus on a particular topic. This year’s topic was Mahamudra (Great Seal or Great Symbol), which is an advanced meditation practice and one that I am just embarking upon.

However, I left the retreat thinking more of a basic Buddhist doctrine, the teaching on anatman, “no self,” and the related idea of the skandhas, or aggregates, and how clinging to them cause suffering. Why? I don’t know. Perhaps it’s because I was paying too much attention to my own ego, trying to establish my wants and needs. And I thought I was being intelligent about it too—an intellectual. But I wasn’t completely content; I was constantly worried about what others thought of my establishment, wondering if they noticed my egomania. In short, I was suffering.

Looking back, I see that those afflictions arose from clinging to an identity, to the parts of myself that wanted things to be a certain way. Retreats do have a way of shedding light on areas—both in practice and study—that need attention. Along these lines, I came across an insightful chapter called “Intellect” in, The Sanity We Are Born With by Chögyam Trungpa, which helped me put my thoughts into words:

Looking at the general picture of psychology as we get involved with more and more complex patterns of the skandhas, it becomes clear that it is a pattern of duality developing stronger and stronger. The general tendency of ego is uncertain at the beginning how to establish its link with the world, its identity, its individuality. As it gradually develops more certainty, it finds new ways of evolving; it becomes more and more brave and daring in stepping out and exploring new areas of possible territory or new ways of interpreting and appropriating the world available around it. So it is a pattern of a kind of stubborn bravery making itself more complicated patterns. The fourth skandha, samskara, is a continuation of this pattern. It could be called “intellect.” Samskara is intellect in the sense of being the intelligence, which enables the ego to gather further territory, further substance, more things.

Daily Dharma, June 24th, 2009 – No Way Out,http://www.tricycle.com/blog/?p=1250,
Life is endless. We are all in the very middle of it. We alone are responsible. There is no way out except through it.
–Ajahn Sumano Bhikkhu with Emily Popp, from Meeting the Monkey Halfway (Weiser)
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I got one of my helmets set up with bluetooth communications between nt Zumo GPS and my Iphone, and the built in fm radio, and my MP3 player with 30 gb of mp3s.  I figure I won’t have to just listen to my motor and the wind anymore.

First thing I had to do, though, was to pick which helmet I wanted to set up.  For a guy who never liked helmets I’ve got a bunch of them… I’ve got about 7 helmets.

You would think that someone with that many helmets would wear one of them.  Well, in Wyoming they don’t require a helmet, so of course I had my helmet on the back of my bike, not on my head, when I laid it down going into a corner too hot.  I landed on my face and then my bike landed on me.

I remember trying to get off behind my bike after I layed it down (really quickly), but then I got flipped over the bike and landed in front of it, on my face.  I remember my face hitting the pavement.  It didn’t really hurt, or, it didn’t hurt as much as the bike landing on me hurt.

After that  I didn’t feel a thing.  I don’t remember anything until I woke up with some guy holding my neck in a vice grip so I couldn’t move it.  Of course, I was bleeding into my eyes, so I couldn’t see anything until the EMTs showed up.  It didn’t seem to take too long, but I am not sure at what rate time was moving right then.  It didn’t seem too long.

I got out of the hospital the next day.  I guess my face looked pretty bad  based on the look people gave me when they saw me.  It did ring  my bell, though.  I now know how you can get stupid from having a bike crash.

But I was lucky… again.  It only took a couple of months to shake off the stupid state.  This crash convinced me that wearing a helmet is a good idea.  I still think that helmet laws suck, the choice ought to be the riders, but I am going to wear a helmet from now on, and I will actually wear a real dot approved helmet, not one of those fake things, and if anyone asks, I will tell them that helmets are a good thing.  Everybody ought to wear one.

Practicing Buddhism whether you’re a Buddhist or not,http://www.tricycle.com/blog/?p=1243,
“The greatest gift you can give someone,” says B. Alan Wallace, “is your attention.” I’ve just given him nearly 15 minutes of mine and it was worth it, and I’ll listen to more tomorrow (thank you for the tip, William Harryman!). Here’s the opening talk of a two-day retreat hosted by the Jefferson Tibetan Society [...],
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Monks escape China in the long wake of last year’s protests,http://www.tricycle.com/blog/?p=1242,
Last year, carefully laid plans to demonstrate to Western and Chinese journalists that Tibetans were faring well under Chinese rule were subverted by a brave act of defiance on the part of 15 Tibetan monks at a monastery in Xiahe, in northwestern China. When the journalists arrived with their Chinese escorts, the monks unfurled banners [...],
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Daily Dharma, June 19th 2009,http://www.tricycle.com/blog/?p=1239,
A Remedy for Evil Thoughts
When the petty ego appears, do not be concerned with it. Simply
ignore it. When a negative thought strikes you, acknowledge it, then
drop it.
The Zen saying goes, “The occurrence of an evil thought is an affliction; not to continue it is the remedy.”
–Katsuki Sekida, from A Guide to Zen (New World Library)
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Hello all,
As I mentioned a while back in the podcast, my real-life job has grown to insane proportions in the past couple of weeks. I had planned to keep the site going on an every-other day basis, but obviously, I haven’t been doing that. I do apologize for the interruption. That being said, the site [...]

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Update

Issue #2, June 2009, 46 Pages, $5.00

Contents:
You And Your Property … 3
Can Karma Be Shared … 6
Koan: Publishing the Sutras … 9
Starting Out … 10
Creation and Origin of the Universe … 12
Sign Language and buddhism (ASL) … 15
Dealing With Hatred … 16
Koan: Sleeping In The Daytime … 26
Koan: Joshu’s Zen … 26
Is Buddhism A Lonely [...]

Post from: Daily Buddhism, by Brian Schell

Monthly Buddhism Issue 2 (June 2009)

Podcast Episode 59: Paradoxes and Being in the Present
Announcements:
The all-new Monthly Buddhism PDF Magazine for the month of June will go on sale tomorrow, and future issues will be available regularly on the first Sunday of each month.  The June issue has Just under 50 pages of great material suitable for reading onscreen or printing. [...]

Post from: Daily Buddhism, by Brian Schell

Podcast Episode 59: Paradoxes and Being in the Present

Question:
I was listening to one of the many comments that you were reading on your podcast regarding attachment to enlightenment, and I had a delightful series of thoughts that I felt compelled to share with the Daily Buddhism sangha. I was listening to your commentary on the issue and realized that it may not be [...]

Post from: Daily Buddhism, by Brian Schell

Paradoxes