Summary and the Truth of Repetition -- Listening, DIYacupuncture and AlanWatts

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Date Posted: 14:46:48 06/13/14 Fri
Author: robinchi
Subject: Summary and the Truth of Repetition

Date Posted: 16:27:04 11/08/12 Thu
Author: robin
Subject: Summary and the Truth of Repetition

Part Two
Pleasure leads to preferences and these pre-references influence the process of feeling and relating to life.

a) The different forms of wanting
b) The Process of Feeling and Preferences
c) Summary and the Truth of Repetition

2c) Summary and the Truth of Repetition

So, the 2nd and 3rd Truth (the origination and dissolution of dukkha), explain that the process of relating to life is not running smoothly, because wherever there are pleasurable things, personal preferences can arise.

and preferences can arise for objects, feelings, ideas, and self-identity. (i.e. to repeat feelings, and by repetition to confirm, identity and ideas etc.)

A preference is infact a pre-reference - we are talking about preconditions, preconceptions and expectations because these influence our sensing, perception and understanding.

For the process of listening to work well, we need to listen free of any personal wishes about what we will hear ...

Infact the slightest preference or inclination for or against what we hear, will influence how we hear the sound and how we understand it.

To see well and reliably, we also need to be free of all personal preferences.

Buddhism recognises 6 senses : the first 5 which we all know, and in buddhism, the 6th is the mind sensing thoughts ... there are many reasons for this, but one of the ways we can use the idea, is we can learn from hearing and seeing well, how to think well ... and so it follows and i believe most people would also agree that thinking really works clearly (and creatively), when one is free of all preferences, preconceptions and preconditions about the outcome ...

And actually today, this seems nothing very mystical or metaphysical. It is an idea which to the modern mind seems easily understandable as a mixture of perceptive or cognitive psychology and scientific objectivity ; but 2,500 years ago it would have been revolutionary.

But Buddha went a bit further than that, his point was that:

Dukkha (things not running smoothly), starts or stops dependant on these preferences and pre-references.

The text says "it is that craving which gives rise to fresh rebirth"(5) and while this maybe so; what we can witness every day is how all our little preferences, our pre-references, cause experiences and all our attitudes and responses to keep repeating.

Pre-references refer to previous experiences and they colour every present event and thus lead to recurrence and repeats, but even more than that, we ouselves want to repeat pleasure, and avoid pain, and to be safe in what we already know.

In addition i would suggest "that craving which ... finds ever fresh delight, now here, now there"(5) is a reference to how our personal preferences lead us to always want to be somewhere else - never contented - never here now.

Simply, preferences pre-set us to boring repetitions and recurrances.

... and after considering my own suprise,... id like to ask others : could this really be one sense of what Buddha was talking about in the 4 Noble Truths? …

But questioning our personal preferences leads to a problem, because what could be more sensible than being guided by our own feelings of pleasure and pain? … and then logically avoiding the pain and seeking the pleasure?

Maybe the only rational objection to the safety of repetition, is that this means we would also be led by our anxieties. But buddha did not say this. He continued from a completely different angle

So far we are only talking about the origination and dissolution of dukkha and so far we are not asked to do anything about it except maybe exercise our understanding concerning this 2nd and 3rd Truth.

The way to end dukkha is the 4th Truth, which is the eightfold path.

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