Search found 237 matches

by Shardrol
Sat Jul 05, 2014 4:10 am
Forum: Worldly Matters
Topic: Science news to briefly consider
Replies: 17
Views: 30543

Many prefer an electric shock to thinking

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jul/03/electric-shock-preferable-to-thinking-says-study The link is to an article about an experiment in which people were asked to sit alone in a room for 6-15 minutes with nothing to occupy them but the contents of their own mind. Apparently a fair number, w...
by Shardrol
Wed Aug 07, 2013 9:55 am
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: If you were about to die....
Replies: 64
Views: 33728

Re: If you were about to die....

Dan Rowden wrote:Hey Shardrol,

Long time no see. How goes it?
Hi Dan, good to see you.

Nothing too radical here. I'm still in New York but plotting my escape.
I think most people are taking my questions far too literally. Never mind.
Oops. Well I can stop any time. How would you answer?


Shardröl
by Shardrol
Tue Aug 06, 2013 3:11 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: If you were about to die....
Replies: 64
Views: 33728

Re: If you were about to die....

I don't think I want to say or write anything to explain myself or list my accomplishments. That is for others to do - or not. It's not explainable anyway. Twice I've been asked to deliver eulogies at funerals & both times it was just a kind of finger-painting. Things I remembered, things I like...
by Shardrol
Fri Sep 03, 2010 2:44 am
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

It's not attachment to men a woman can renounce: that very attachment to a man, the offspring or the group is what defines deep down her feminine aspects. She never stands alone as woman. Therefore, by abandoning those attachments she abandons "womanhood" in all meaningful ways. Some migh...
by Shardrol
Fri Sep 03, 2010 1:06 am
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

With Vajrayana, the story becomes rather more convoluted. Since nirvana is samsara in the ultimate sense, with samsara being the wheel (a feminine symbol of eternal recurrence, of creation and death, of things and matter, ignorance and suffering), one could only in this sense say things like "...
by Shardrol
Thu Sep 02, 2010 11:58 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

It's interesting to read how Victor & Victoria Trimondi summarized the feminine principle in Buddhism: 1. The “sacrifice of the feminine principle” is from the outset a fundamental event in the teachings of Buddha . It corresponds to the Buddhist rejection of life, nature and the soul. In this ...
by Shardrol
Thu Sep 02, 2010 10:51 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Kelly Shardrol : I have met several women whom I see as Buddhas. Although I wouldn't describe them as 'stuck', all of them are involved in the tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, so they're probably not what you're looking for. Kelly Jones : A Buddha is a perfectly enlightened being, the wisest of the wi...
by Shardrol
Thu Sep 02, 2010 12:02 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

The baby in the womb is symbolised as male, not female. Why do you think that is? I think you're taking the pregnancy metaphor too literally. I see 'pregnant' as a poetic way of getting at the idea that emptiness isn't actually empty but full of potential form. S : Male/female is a more basic polar...
by Shardrol
Wed Sep 01, 2010 12:09 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Thanks for replying, Shardrol. You’re welcome. Shardrol : Since form arises out of emptiness, viewing form as male & emptiness as female is an easily-understood metaphor of pregnancy & birth. (Emptiness or space is sometimes poetically described as ‘the womb of potentiality’.) Kelly Jones :...
by Shardrol
Wed Sep 01, 2010 2:28 am
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Shardrol, Do you think that wisdom (formlessness) is more accurately expressed in symbolic form using feminine rather than masculine traits? And would you conclude by this that women themselves are intrinsically wiser than men - or have more potential for wisdom? Actually, it would be clearer, prob...
by Shardrol
Tue Aug 31, 2010 2:06 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

In Tibetan Buddhism, wisdom is viewed as female & compassion is viewed as male. Symbolically, that is. Wisdom relates to emptiness; compassion (actually compassionate activity, not sitting around feeling sorry for everybody) relates to form. The images of female & male figures together in TB...
by Shardrol
Fri Jul 23, 2010 2:56 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

RobertGreenSky: as you were
by Shardrol
Fri Jul 23, 2010 2:07 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

In Tibetan one of the words for the enlightened state is 'rigpa', which literally means knowledge. - Shardrol Nope. Rigpa (Tibetan; Sanskrit vidya) is the primordial, nondual awareness advocated by the Dzogchen and Mahamudra teachings. - Wikipedia, Rigpa, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigpa Awarenes...
by Shardrol
Thu Jul 22, 2010 10:47 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

I think part of what leads to these disagreements (thought is good v thought is bad) is that in English we only have this one word 'thought' to mean several different things. There is the compulsive discursive mental blathering that sifts & categorizes experience as a method of bolstering the eg...
by Shardrol
Tue Jul 20, 2010 1:20 am
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy
Replies: 574
Views: 128724

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

I've been reading the debate about A=A & how some people want to describe it as a theorem that must be proved or a belief that is irrationally held in the absence of this proof. It is neither. It is a fundamental truth because it cannot be otherwise. A=B is an incoherent idea because the basis o...
by Shardrol
Tue Feb 10, 2009 3:40 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: How can women be sexually appealing...
Replies: 162
Views: 27629

Re: How can women be sexually appealing...

Norman . . . Norman, is that you? Norman Bates, you come here right now! Your mother needs her cup of tea.
by Shardrol
Tue Jan 15, 2008 2:16 pm
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Leg hair debate
Replies: 83
Views: 20260

Re: Leg hair debate

Shahrazad I didn't mean to imply that all people went along with all aspects of fashion all the time. But most of us don't step so far out of line that we cause ourselves to become objects of too much negative attention. As Elizabeth mentioned, one generally doesn't want to appear repulsive - except...
by Shardrol
Tue Jan 15, 2008 3:50 am
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Leg hair debate
Replies: 83
Views: 20260

Re: Leg hair debate

It's interesting how far people will go in attempting to rationalize their feelings about something as seemingly trivial as body hair. We don't want to believe our preferences are actually in a large part programmed by the world of entertainment & advertising, we want to think we made them up ou...
by Shardrol
Mon Jan 14, 2008 3:40 pm
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Leg hair debate
Replies: 83
Views: 20260

Re: Leg hair debate

Shahrazad

So why was it exactly that you said all women should shave their legs? So that their legs will feel smooth as silk to them?
by Shardrol
Fri Dec 21, 2007 3:05 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: David's compassion
Replies: 135
Views: 15521

Re: David's compassion

Oh thanks. I'd forgotten about that. I'm actually old enough to have seen it back when it was made & it was just as ridiculous then as it is now.
by Shardrol
Fri Dec 21, 2007 1:59 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: David's compassion
Replies: 135
Views: 15521

Re: David's compassion

True compassion cannot be separated from wisdom. One needs to have the wisdom to know what is needed in a given situation, but it's not a question of figuring it out or developing expertise or anything like that. True compassionate activity is automatically elicited from a Buddha by the existence of...
by Shardrol
Thu Dec 20, 2007 12:37 pm
Forum: GENIUS FORUM
Topic: Forget about Enlightenment
Replies: 238
Views: 36405

Re: Forget about Enlightenment

[to Mikiel] I think it's great that you're here. I find it ironic and amusing that on a forum devoted to enlightenment, you go unrecognized. Maybe that shouldn't be surprising. In any case, I hope you continue to stop by and share your rare and valuable perspective. People who believe themselves to...
by Shardrol
Wed Dec 19, 2007 6:30 pm
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Is this how it seems to you?
Replies: 7
Views: 4865

Re: Is this how it seems to you?

I didn't read much into it, but then I don't really bother trying to interpret stuff that could be interpreted in a zillion ways. That is very interesting to me, & also the fact that no one commented on the story (except Dan, to say he didn't finish it) till I posted the narrative in words. Y'a...
by Shardrol
Wed Dec 19, 2007 6:23 pm
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Is this how it seems to you?
Replies: 7
Views: 4865

Re: Is this how it seems to you?

So you're saying that women aren't really oppressed like they want everyone to think? I'm not really saying anything about women's oppression or lack of it, I'm giving my interpretation of a comic written by someone else. What interests me in art is individual awareness & experience, not sociol...
by Shardrol
Wed Dec 19, 2007 1:13 pm
Forum: Help Desk
Topic: Is this how it seems to you?
Replies: 7
Views: 4865

Re: Is this how it seems to you?

This is how I saw it: a depiction of male-female relationship in the way that some people on this forum talk about it. As soon as the boy & girl start getting interested in each other, tentacles begin to appear in the landscape, eventually pushing their way into the train & even through the ...