Attachments

Setsu SG

This is not meant to be an insulting or trolling post, so please don't view it that way.

In Buddhism, you renounce your worldly pleasures and attachments. For the layman, how minimalist does this get?

To see a doctor when you are sick, to eat daily, are these attachments to life?

To make friends, is this an attachment to fellow humans and an attachment to your desire for companionship?

To view yourself as interconnected with the world, is this also attachment? Volunteerism seems like attachment to others too. How do you sever these attachments without killing yourself or treating your world as irrelevant?

To get on the bandwagon of self development and pursue knowledge, art, music, self expression etc., is this an attachment to self?

Can devout adherence to Buddhism itself be called an attachment to Buddhism too?

I have difficulty reconciling the idea of "attachments", since it seems to tell you to strip away everything you could hold dear - friends, family, even yourself. I don't want to become a shell of myself who values nothing.

An Eternal Now SG

This is not meant to be an insulting or trolling post, so please don't view it that way.

1) In Buddhism, you renounce your worldly pleasures and attachments. For the layman, how minimalist does this get?

2) To see a doctor when you are sick, to eat daily, are these attachments to life?

3) To make friends, is this an attachment to fellow humans and an attachment to your desire for companionship?

4) To view yourself as interconnected with the world, is this also attachment? Volunteerism seems like attachment to others too. How do you sever these attachments without killing yourself or treating your world as irrelevant?

5) To get on the bandwagon of self development and pursue knowledge, art, music, self expression etc., is this an attachment to self?

6) Can devout adherence to Buddhism itself be called an attachment to Buddhism too?

I have difficulty reconciling the idea of "attachments", since it seems to tell you to strip away everything you could hold dear - friends, family, even yourself. I don't want to become a shell of myself who values nothing.

1) You can have worldly possessions or pleasures but not be attached to it.

2) No this is not an attachment, it is just doing what needs to be done.

3) Not necessarily, Buddha teaches us that 'spiritual friendship is the whole of spiritual life'. He values friends, and teaches us to find friends with noble qualities.

4) This is not an attachment, it is a truth that we are interconnected, as elucidated by the teachings of Buddha on "Dependent Origination".

A Bodhisattva (e.g. Guan Yin Pu Sa, and countless others) is also actively involved in the world, saving sentient beings from sufferings. However, having given rise to the realisation of the two emptinesses (emptiness of self and emptiness of dharma), they no longer have the notion of a truly existing 'self' and a 'sentient being' to be saved. His actions becomes spontaneous and arises due to his wisdom and compassion but he does not grasp. He does not grasp of notion of himself as the savior or someone who is saved. He just do what needs to be done. Practitioners of the Mahayana Buddhism practice to become Bodhisattvas ourselves.

A Bodhisattva's action does not arise out of attached thinking (someone saving and something to be saved) but spontaneous wisdom, that naturally gives rise to wise and compassionate action according to each situation without divisive notions:

http://www.jenchen.org.sg/vol9no3b.htm

From the Editor

Non-thinking

(Excerpt from URL)

...Often people ask, "How is it possible to not think? I've got work to do!"

The untrained mind is always thinking, so much so that it is difficult to imagine what the state of not thinking is like! Once thinking begins, it is like throwing a pebble into a completely still pool; ripples after ripples ensue and the pool is no longer still. Thus, Buddhism advocates that when we have work to do, do it. It serves no purpose to lament (think) about the whys, the ifs and the buts. Just do it. Many wise teachers liken a pure mind to a smoothly polished mirror - unmoving, clear and bright. When a red apple is placed before it, it just reflects the exact red apple. It is not concerned with its colour, sweetness, shape or size. The mirror 'just does its job'.

Some years ago, my company held its annual Dinner & Dance by the poolside of a hotel. During the party, a little boy of about 3 or 4 years of age walked straight into the pool. Almost instantaneously, a colleague who was about 3 tables away plunged into the pool fully clothed and pulled the little boy out. There was work to done and so he just did it. It was spontaneous; there was no further thinking. I never forgot that incident because it was an excellent example of an action not adulterated by thinking. It was selfless. The notion of 'self' or 'I' was not involved at all.

Can we not be like this in the course of our life? It is possible. Bodhisattvas do this all the time purely out of selfless loving kindness and compassion for sentient beings. Thus we see why Venerable Master Shen Kai constantly emphasized the need to revere Bodhisattvas, respect Bodhisattvas, learn from Bodhisattvas and be a Bodhisattva. When the 'thinking' ceases in this way, the inner beings are purified and we realize Bodhi. Thereafter, in whatever we do, we are actually practising the Bodhisattva Way....

5 & 6) Not necessarily. It's just your interests. It does not have to become an attachment. Just do what you do with awareness and non-attachment.

Metta.in.Mindfulness SG

This is not meant to be an insulting or trolling post, so please don't view it that way.

To see a doctor when you are sick, to eat daily, are these attachments to life?

When you are hungry you eat. When you tired, you sleep. This is not attachment to life. This is natural process of life.

To make friends, is this an attachment to fellow humans and an attachment to your desire for companionship?

Making friends with noble qualities foster and encourage positive qualities to grow in one another. In fact, Buddha said spiritual friendship consists the entire of our spiritual lfie.

To view yourself as interconnected with the world, is this also attachment? Volunteerism seems like attachment to others too. How do you sever these attachments without killing yourself or treating your world as irrelevant?

Volunteerism - is a form of giving, a giving of effort, time and money. We learn to develop compassionate during our process of interacting with the less-fortunate and grown happy when we improve the quality of life for others. In the process of giving, one lessen her grips of the self-centreness A giving heart generally is more generous in love.

To get on the bandwagon of self development and pursue knowledge, art, music, self expression etc., is this an attachment to self?

There is a conceptual self but there is no self that is non-changing. Every thought, feelings, bodily sensation changes. Every ideas and dreams, they comes and goes in your mind. The person you was 3 years ago is not the same person as you are now.

I have difficulty reconciling the idea of "attachments", since it seems to tell you to strip away everything you could hold dear - friends, family, even yourself. I don't want to become a shell of myself who values nothing.

Value yourself, friends and family with wisdom that will result in happiness. We hold onto our kins but understand that when it is the time to let go, we have to let go. For example, a mother has to learn to let go of her children when they have grown old. If not, how can the children learn to be independent and take care of themselves when the mother is not around anymore? We let go our attachment to our own view and learn to understand other people's point of view. In this way, we are not dogmatic and see things in a clear way.

Hi, just some cents of thought

Stomp661 SG

I agree with Setsu.Attachments come from complaints and criticisms.If we do not complain and criticise, we may not die so soon.

Worcer SG

Attachments are just words.Things u have to do isnt really there if u dun 'know' about it.

A person can have many desires,attachments,pleasures or possessions.At the same time,he can renounce them.

It is the the 'WAY'.Doin something intensively and not knowing oneself of doing it.

Before anyone can figure this out,please do not start giving on lifes little pleasure.

marcteng SG

attachment is like seeing a pretty and sexy girl without thought of possessing the girl and say, I want to be her bf.

An Eternal Now SG

Attachments are just words.Things u have to do isnt really there if u dun 'know' about it.

A person can have many desires,attachments,pleasures or possessions.At the same time,he can renounce them.

It is the the 'WAY'.Doin something intensively and not knowing oneself of doing it.

Before anyone can figure this out,please do not start giving on lifes little pleasure.

Are you a Taoist or a Zen Buddhist?

An Eternal Now SG

An advise to the TS:

Rather than being attached to a goal, which will result in this moment of action being reduced to just a means to an end, a practitioner lives mindfully in just this moment. And don't daydream while doing your things.

When walking, just walk. When sitting, just sit. When volunteering, volunteer. No attachment to a goal, no separative notion of "me the doer" and the "deed being done". You 'become' the doing itself such that the doing is not really a doing but mere spontaneous happening. No attachment involved. But no distancing from action and world, either... in this moment of action or manifestation it is completely non-dual without division of subject (self) and object.

"Cultivation is of no use for the attainment of Tao. The only thing that one can do is to be free from defilement. When one's mind is stained with thought of life and death, or deliberate action, that is defilement. The grasping of Truth is the function of everyday-mindedness. Everyday-mindedness is free from intentional action, free from concepts of right and wrong, taking and giving, finite and infinite... All our daily activities -- walking, standing, sitting, lying down -- all response to situations, our dealing with circumstances as they arise: all this is Tao." (Zen Master Ma-tsu)

Zen teacher Dr. David Loy:

The Prajñāpāramitā Heart Sūtra states that one who has realized the emptiness of all things acts freely because he is "without hindrance in the mind." Clearly this is one way in which mental events interfere with nondual action, by sometimes keeping one's physical actions from occurring naturally and spontaneously according to the situation. The nondual "psychic body," which knows how to react perfectly well by itself, suffers a kind of paralysis due to psychological "hindrances." Asian martial arts usually include some meditation in their training in order to avoid this, so students can react spontaneously to attack without being paralyzed by fear and without needing to deliberate first. According to some Zen masters, the first aim of zazen (Zen meditation) is to develop such a "power of concentration" (joriki).

"Joriki... is the power of strength which arises arises when the mind has been unified and brought to one-pointedness through concentration. This is more than the ability to concentrate in the usual sense of the word. It is a dynamic power, which, once mobilized, enables us even in the midst of sudden and unexpected situations to act instantly, without pausing to collect our wits, and in a manner wholly appropriate to the circumstances. (Zen Master Yasutani)"

Ordinary mind is the Tao [37] because, when they are free from intentional action, daily activities are realized to be nondual. This gives insight into how the "mindfulness of body" described in the Satipaṭṭhāna Sūtra, and Theravāda vipassana practice in general, might function: In the slow "walking meditation" of vipassana, for example, one "lets go" of all intentions by concentrating on the act of walking itself. This also explains why those Zen koans which ask "Why...?" never receive a straight answer. "Unmon said, 'The world is vast and wide like this. Why do we put on our seven-panel robe at the sound of the bell?'" [38] From a contemporary Zen master's commentary on this case:

... Some of you are familiar with the last line of the mealtime sutra, "We and this food and our eating are equally empty." If you can acknowledge this fact, you will realize that when you put on your robe, there is no reason or "why" in it... There is no reason for the "why" in anything! When we stand up, there is no reason "why". We just stand up! When we eat, we just eat without any reason "why". When we put on the kesa (seven-panel robe), we just put it on. Our life is a continuous just... just... just. [39]

This passage clarifies what "intentionless activity" means. From the usual perspective, it seems impossible to avoid intentions. We eat to satisfy our hunger, for example, and even taking a walk can be seen to have a purpose such as to relax. But the claim just presented is that even now actions of ours like dressing and eating are not purposive. "Intentionless activity" does not mean merely random and spontaneous action, but involves realizing the distinction between thought (the intention) and the action. The thought (for example, "time to eat") is whole and complete in itself; the act (eating) is also whole and complete in itself. It is when the two are not experienced wholly and discretely but only in relation to each other, the first as if "superimposed" upon the second, that action seems intentional and therefore dualistic, and there is the sense of an agent/mind that uses the act/body for the sake of something...