tom moylan:
howdy mark,
i think your post covers a lot of territory and makes a couple of "false" comparisons.
brahma vihara practices are fab. so is mindfulness. each person will most probably benefit from each one more or less at different times in their career. bramha vihara practices speak directly to the reactivity that you mention so imo are the perfect practice to help us rise above our undisciplined tendencies.
the end of suffering...that's the goal all right, whether you're a theravadan or a vajrayana or secular practitioner. til the end is reached though, there will be suffering. how you deal with it, or how you react to it will most likely change as a direct result of your practice though. by the way, most traditions don't loudly advertise the fine print about the "path" to enlightenment NOT being a linear one.
whatever tradition you follow, from yoga, to advaita you will go through peaks and valleys. in this forum, most speak openly about the valleys and the peaks and the best routes to both.
the decision which tradition or method to use is a personal one. using myself as an example i started in a glamour vajrayana tradition. while interesting and exotic and full of large promises, the tradition was too full of mystery and cultural overlay baggage that strayed to far from my rationally bent mind. some people love it though and feel they are making progress.
i like the cut and dried, 'try the experiment on yourself' approach here and for me this place has the most bang for the buck.
if you have not read daniel's book yet, you should. it might be right for you, maybe not.
in any case, good luck and enjoy yourself.
tom
Hi Tom,
I need to revise my understanding of bramha vihara because I don't see them reducing reactivity - for example I'd expect to react in a more compassionate way (not be less reactive). Maybe you are adding negative connotations to "reactive" or I've misunderstood bramha vihara.
Reading Daniel's book was a little of an electroshock

Before reading his book I was thinking along the lines you mention - that the goal is the end of suffering. But I get the impression from Daniel's book that enlightenment is much more about having a non-dual understanding of the world. It seemed to me that a big motivation for Daniel was to help peole who have passed an
A&P experience, they are on a treadmill and there is no getting off i.e to help reduce their suffering.
It seems immoral behavior is going to cause suffering and I wouldn't be surprised if it causes more suffering to someone who is enlightened than someone who is not. Daniel seems to make it clear that morality still needs to be worked on after enlightenment. That is as clear as an indication as we are going to get that suffering is not ended with enlightenment.
Daniel wrote about how we (approx. quote) "wake up to the life we have, so make it a good one". I think that is advice those who have not crossed an A&P could really take to heart.
This leads me to the conclusion (for now) that it would be wise to build concentration and mindfulness with the primary objective of improving morality - not having an A&P. Which in turn led to this post.
You are correct that the decision of which tradition to use is a personal one, but it would be wise to gather information about the various traditions so as to make a decision rather than roll a dice. I hoped this thread might point out some practices that people found particularly beneficial for morality (I use the term as used by Daniel in his book). I really appreciate the "hard core" style of the forum and if I'm lucky some will have some "hard core" morality practises to share!
Enjoy yourself is an interesting remark - Daniel's book makes it pretty clear that is not what it is about

It does seem to involve a lot of luck - thanks for the kind wishes.
Thanks for jumping in the ring!
Mark