Monday 23 February 2015

Right View and Humility: The Middle Path Mind

Never trust the mind. It isn't your mind, yet it will do anything to make you think that it is. Unless the mind is unraveling itself with wisdom, it is not putting itself to proper use. Right View is the view which serves to eliminate all notion of any viewer truly viewing, while also being the source of infinite compassion for all beings stuck in self-view. 

It is easy to judge the monsters outside our "self" but hard to see the origins of similar monsters within our "self." Although I and others have always considered my "self" a loving and compassionate being, I have nearly been a serial killer, a thief, a rapist, a psycho, all kinds of things that looking back I can see I was on the verge of becoming due to various urges, thoughts, and justifications. Even now I am seen by many as an arrogant asshole, and by others as almost a saint. I have learned that we must always be on guard against self deception, and especially when we start to feel important. This mind can never fully trust itself. Remember that a truly insane person will never think they are insane.

Even Shakyamuni Buddha himself was often filled with useless pompous thoughts, such as "I am so wise, I should go back and take my rightful place as king." Or, just after becoming enlightened, when someone asked who he was, The Buddha told the wanderling that he was "the Victor and Conqueror of the World, superior to gods and men, an All-Enlightened One beholden to no teacher." The Buddha later realized that his answer only served to alienate the wanderling, who perceived the Buddha as merely another arrogant fool.
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(This post is in relation to a previous post on the question of how can anything be known.)

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