Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Chasen Banks, modified 1 Year ago at 11/7/22 9:04 PM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/7/22 9:04 PM

Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Post: 1 Join Date: 11/6/22 Recent Posts
Has anyone ever had trouble with attachments to ontological viewpoints. 

I think I have been smuggling in a form of attachment to the "everything is emtpiness view".  I consisder this to be an ontological truth.  I dont attempt to be someone high and mighty but isnt this the case for reality? All things in a sense merge into one another to the point of emptiness. I know this is a very abstract way of talking and I'm reaching out into the void in hopes that someone knows what I am saying.

Yet I have also humbly learned that this is a viewpoint to let go of.  I am stuck because how can I let go of the truth? Taking off this ontological hat feels like abandoning everything I've worked towards.  

Maybe I am having trouble expressing myself so I apologize, hopefully I am making sense LOL.
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Chris M, modified 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 7:55 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 7:55 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 5104 Join Date: 1/26/13 Recent Posts
Mediators and other spiritual practitioners can get "stuck" on emptiness and thus believe everything is empty. This is a partial view of our experience, but it can be very enticing, and even mildly addicting. Unfortunately, being stuck there leads to interrupted spiritual experience and/or progress. Our human experience is richer and more varied than just that one view. It contains multiple "truths" and we can, and actually do experience them all.

Are you worried about this? If you are, try to focus on something you have always believed to be "real" - a loved one, a pet, an experience of love or joy.
Adi Vader, modified 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 9:05 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 9:05 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 268 Join Date: 6/29/20 Recent Posts
One way to look at emptiness is to state it as: everything we experience is constructed/assembled

This construction happens according to discernible patterns. These patterns or operating principles are called 'dhammas' small case d, plural.

As human beings living a human life we will always be subject to the construction process, patterns, dhammas.

As yogis we try to understand experientially these dhammas and live in accordance with them. Thereby reducing cognitive friction in our minds.

1. All constructs are unreliable
2. All constructs contain the potential for suffering
3. All patterns of construction/dhammas are not-self. They dont define us, we dont own them

So instead of nihilism, we enter a state of an understanding of the dhammas and we learn to be copacetic with them.
shargrol, modified 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 9:22 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 9:21 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 2326 Join Date: 2/8/16 Recent Posts
Chasen Banks
Has anyone ever had trouble with attachments to ontological viewpoints. 

I think I have been smuggling in a form of attachment to the "everything is emtpiness view". 


I think you would really like this website: Why meaningness? | Meaningness

Excerpt:
"Eternalism
 and nihilism are the simplest, and most extreme, stances toward meaningness.
  • Eternalism says that everything has a definite, true meaning.
  • Nihilism says that nothing really means anything.
Both these stances are wrong, factually. They are also unworkable, in their implications for living.However, almost everyone falls into them at times, triggered by particular contexts. Each stance is based on genuine insights, and a powerful, emotionally appealing pattern of thinking. They also can seem to be the only possible alternatives, so we are forced into one by the repulsive qualities of the other..."
George S, modified 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 2:52 PM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/8/22 2:52 PM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 2722 Join Date: 2/26/19 Recent Posts
Emptiness is as empty as any other view. It only comes up when you are thinking about it ...
Ben Sulsky, modified 1 Year ago at 11/9/22 11:57 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/9/22 11:57 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 169 Join Date: 11/5/19 Recent Posts
I find that as practice deepens, I've tended to soften around ontological commitments and generally take things less rigidly.
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:46 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:42 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
Emptiness cures all wrong views,
but those who hold the view of emptiness are incurable-
bless me to allow even the antidote to self-liberate
.


Forgive me if you are one of those people who frain upon poetry as a way to get answers, but words are very unprecise, and sometimes peotry is the closest you can get to portraying something which you have very tangibly experienced.


​​​​​​​
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:51 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:51 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
I recently lost a treasured friend over this. His attachment to emptiness was so strong that he couldn't hold back his contempt when I tried to point to something else. It hurts when someone values reified emptiness over friendship.
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:56 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 2:56 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
Chris M:

Mediators and other spiritual practitioners can get "stuck" on emptiness and thus believe everything is empty. This is a partial view of our experience, but it can be very enticing, and even mildly addicting. Unfortunately, being stuck there leads to interrupted spiritual experience and/or progress. Our human experience is richer and more varied than just that one view. It contains multiple "truths" and we can, and actually do experience them all.



This! Thanks for putting it into words!
George S, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 8:58 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 8:57 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 2722 Join Date: 2/26/19 Recent Posts
Reminds me of Nagarjuna:

The victorious ones have said
That emptiness is the relinquishing of all views.
For whomever emptiness is a view,
That one will accomplish nothing.
...
By a misperception of emptiness
A person of little intelligence is destroyed.
Like a snake incorrectly seized
Or like a spell incorrectly cast.
...
For him to whom emptiness is clear,
Everything be comes clear.
For him to whom emptiness is not clear,
Nothing becomes clear.

And Foyan on "Zen Sickness":

In my school, there are only two kinds of sickness. One is to go looking for a donkey riding on the donkey. The other is to be unwilling to dismount once having mounted the donkey.
You say it is certainly a tremendous sickness to mount a donkey and then go looking for the donkey. I tell you that one need not find a spiritually sharp person to recognize this right away and get rid of the sickness of seeking, so the mad mind stops.
Once you have recognized the donkey, to mount it and be unwilling to dismount is the sickness that is most difficult to treat. I tell you that you need not mount the donkey; you are the donkey! The whole world is the donkey; how can you mount it? If you mount it, you can be sure the sickness will not leave!
If you don’t mount it, the whole universe is wide open! When the two sicknesses are gone, and there is nothing on your mind, then you are called a wayfarer. What else is there? This is why when Zhaozhou asked Nanquan, “What is the path?” Nanquan replied, “The normal mind is the path.” Now Zhaozhou suddenly stopped his hasty search, recognized the sickness of “ Zen Masters” and the sickness of “Buddhas,” and passed through it all. After that, he traveled all over, and had no peer anywhere, because of his recognition of sicknesses.

​​​​​​​Emptiness is medicine for a dead horse!
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 10:18 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 10:18 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
Thanks! I hadn't seen those. 
Ben Sulsky, modified 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 12:37 PM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/10/22 12:37 PM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 169 Join Date: 11/5/19 Recent Posts
That nagarjuna character is a smart cookie
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Oatmilk, modified 1 Year ago at 11/11/22 7:16 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/11/22 7:16 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 141 Join Date: 7/30/20 Recent Posts
You could experiment with some sort of schema therapy visualization approach if you want to change that. Otherwise I think it's kind of natural for this view to progress and unfold into something else naturally. You could start by beoming mindful of how this view manifests by bringing up a memory of a situation in which this view was rather destructive. Next you could start to imagine an alternative scene/qualities of a view which is rich and balanced, meaningful and yet lucid. 
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 1 Year ago at 11/11/22 8:37 AM
Created 1 Year ago at 11/11/22 8:20 AM

RE: Attachments to Ontological Viewpoints

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
How is it going? Does any of this make any sense to you? 

Regardless, do yourself a favor and don't be an ass to people who care about you and who try to point you to what matters in the world. The feelings you might hurt are just as real as they are empty. 

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