hi there and welcome to this friendly board   we do have a resident zen Buddhist I believe, he should be along some time to say hello perhaps. this Buddhist has non/physical helpers/friends himself.

I think u are drifting towards not taking the vows and it's such a personal decision that I don't think any of us here, other than the Buddhist I mentioned, would be able to say much about it, whether it is necessary for you.
just conjecturing that the taking of vows is necessary for some, to remain one pointed, focused on spiritual priorities of getting off the wheel of incarnation perhaps, or I like as you say, staying until all are able to wink out or wake up. then I would assume taking vows are not necessary either for some, who have no trouble and are not distracted by the material aspects of living here, they can achieve it with their personal helpers and guides and life will present those opportunities where we can do our part.
so it seems like 6 of one, 1/2 dozen of the other in your case, just so long as they would not be engendering a fearful aspect to do this thing, as the best possible approach to any situation I feel is "you will know them by their love." or I should say my creed is that we are here to conquer every fear, or realize fear is False Evidence Appearing as Real.

this affirmation alone if realized might go a very long way in one's spiritual growth plan as to be love realized is to be god realized, and the opposite of fear is love, so listen to your heart, where you can hear it's sound.

Hello Vajra:

I used to be involved with Eastern teachings including Buddhism. I've found that it isn't necessary to have a guru of some sort. It is better to rely on your higher self. I've experienced much more growth by praying to God and making contact with my higher self, than I did when I hung around a guru. I've also received guidance from Christ.

Regarding discipline, here's an experience I had that relates. I was meditating one day and suddenly I found myself at the back of a church.  A young lady was trying to decide whether she should get married. She decided to do so and I found myself at the front of the church but still inside. I was standing in front of two big wooden doors. One was partly opened. I could see white light behind it. I heard a voice ask, "Do you want to make the change?" I answered: "yes."  The voice asked very firmly: "Are you sure?" I answered yes.

I've found that the demands of such a committment can be quite challenging at times.  You have to be willing to question everything and deal with whatever issues might be troubling you.  If you make the choice to be guided by a light being, you have to be willing to do whatever is necessary, otherwise you completely waste your time and the time of the being or beings who help you.  You have to be willing to let go of all that binds you with both hands.

I'm not suggesting that spiritual growth and guidance has to be an all or nothing thing. However, if you're considering taking vows, it makes me think you're really serious about growing spiritually.

Hi Vajra-
Welcome to the forum. Hope that you stick around with us.

If I might, I suggest on stepping back a bit to review what is actually bothering you from a little different angle.

Vows were initially intended to quiet unruly people who needed restraints before they could become serious. Obviously, if you make a vow and break it, you will suffer whatever you feel is necessary or appropriate. Conversely, if you are already on the path, then vows intended to help you get there are superfluous. Recall Marpa who was a criminal and murderer and was enlightened almost at the moment of death. (At least I think it was Marpa, name might be wrong.)

There is another purpose to vows - making money for the monks who administer them. It's just as good to donate the money. Probably better for the monk too.

The only really important vow that Buddhism suggests is the Bodhisattvic Vow. It runs roughly like, "So long as time and space remain, I shall not accept the highest nirvana, but I shall return to help reduce the suffering of others."  As the Dalai Lama said, this is not necessarily taken in a formal manner, nor does it need a properly ordained teacher to administer it - it is a vow you make in your heart, to yourself and to all sentient beings over all time.

The Bodhisattivic Vow looks scary because it says that you are willing to abandon yourself to the welfare of others - an attitude called bodhicitta. As Jesus put it, "No man hath greater love than to lay down his life for his friend." Sounds really holy, irrevocable and eternally binding. And it is. And it is intended to be that way.

BUT - look at the top end of the creation sequence and you'll notice that there is only one reality there, often called "Mind", the initial impulse of existence within beginningless time. (I usually use the term "God" instead of "Mind", much to the distress of formal Buddhist friends who miss the point of the Anatta Doctrine.) Ultimately, your nature arose out of that initial Thingamajig. It is your own personal nature. Sri Ramana Maharshi called it "the True Self". In ultimate fact, everything is actually everything else, and eah of us is everyone else as well. So when you accept the Bodhisattvic Vow it does two things - (1) it means that you will return to help yourself get through samsara with less suffering - although parts of you might be in other bodies. Until this is done you have no access to the "ultimate nirvana" so acceptance or rejection of i is actually moot. (2 When you die you will be without a roadmap unless you have built one into your life. The Bodhisattvic Vow guarantees that you will have a predestination to a life infused with bodhichitta, and oriented toward enlightenment. That way you keep on moving in the proper direction, and have the best possible start. (There's more, but this is to the point of your question.)

The risks of studying Mahayana involve all the usual risks of psychic development, which mostly are that you get to work off all your accumulated karma. Once you dedicate yourself, there is a "bucket of sh!t effect" in which all the stuff that's been on hold suddenly dumps on you. That's also because now you're ready for it. So keep at it, and have faith, the bucket does not refill - unless you mess up, in which case you know what happens. There are also the pitfalls of siddhis - seductive side trips into psychic powers, which are ultimately useless.

I recall the story of two monks who studied together, and then parted. Many years later they again met, and one asked the other what he was up to. "Oh, I've had a wonderful practice. It took years to master the ability, but now I can walk on water."  The other monk smiled. "That's nice, but it only took me a few minutes to learn that if I give the boatman a coin, he'll ferry me across."

Most of the dangers lie in learning to "walk on water", a material situation that does no spiritual good, but it binds you to the everyday world. Stick to reducing the suffering of others and you'll go farther and faster.

You might find it useful to look into the Prajnaparamita Sutra - The Dalai Lama presented it in San Jose some years back, and there might still be copies of the presentation available. Try
www.medicinebuddha.org.  The reason is that this focusses direcly on the idea of "Mind" and what it is - and it will give you something on which to meditate for a few months.

dave

A wonderful Nyingma lama offers the inner-most teachings to anyone who walks in the door, without asking for anything in return.  He feels they should be available and given freely to anyone.

He said to me: " All spiritual practice is about Bodhicitta (awakened heart). It is the path underneath your feet and at the same time it is the goal. Underneath all the words and images, there it is. There is nothing more important"

The vow of vows is non-verbal. It is an open heart.

Take your stand there.

(And then look around. I'll be standing next to you, along with many other friends)



Hey Vajra,

welcome!

Love,
        Tim F.

Hi all. Pardon my delay coming back, and thank you very much for your generous and considered replies. It's good to find a group in a similar this space.

There's nobody saying 'do it'. (on the vows that is)

Which is fine. Seems on reflection like it's clear that vows are one of those things to be parked unless at some time itcomes to feel very right and clearly the thing to do. So it becomes a case of seeing how things play out. It's on reflection a kind of a non-issue anyway  - until you have developed enough trust in a potential teacher to seriously consider doing it  acting would be delusional. Would be driven by a mind made concept, or grasping or whatever.

My own path has (in as much as this is only an appearance) been self determined so far, with a strong resistance (possibly for reasons to do with my own past) to committing to traditions and belief systems.

What got me going was the bind the idea of vows produced. The sense that Vajrayana seems as it says to be 'the  diamond vehicle'. But that to avail of it requires signing away all egotistical self determination in a teacher student relationship. ('Dangerous Friend by Rigdzin Dorje from Shambhala Books gives an insight into the realities of this)

I'd not rule out by the way that that's not one of the reasons why it's set up that way - it forces a crisis and you either drop or don't drop the credibility you give to ego.

You caught the link  that led to my feeling that Vajrayana is important in the last post Tim. Tantric Buddhist practices and TMI do seem to lead to the same place. Our opening accelerates if we can start to connect with our wisdom/compassion/higher selves/I there/past lives/Yidam/whatever and use this to help us to move towards a broader emptiness/God/higher mind/Rigpa consciousness. As in the Heart/Prajnaparamita Sutra....

Opening can bring a lot of pain and trouble too as Dave said. The 'bucket of fecal' effect has in my own case been very evident - it seems to have brought illness, angst, the lot. I've pasted in some of my own verses (for personal use - not sure how they read) in this vibe below.

Vajrayana is maybe for this reason reckoned to be quite dangerous  - they talk of the individual student as a snake in a bamboo tube. The options are to go either rapidly upwards, or rapidly downwards with no in between. Point being I guess that with greater opening and capability there arises all sorts of potential for getting badly off the rails. Perhaps for karmic disasters that go far beyond simple angst or whatever.

They say the teacher student relationship must extend through successive lives until realisation, that stepping away is not really an option.

It's hard to know where it all ends up, but I can't help feeling that in the end it's maybe all a circuitous argument.

Vows (be they to a teacher or the bodhisattva variety to be reborn until all others achieve enlightenment) maybe  only matter if you are not capable of acting correctly, are likely to be driven by ego. Yet if you you have gotten to the right place you do the right thing naturally.

There's for sure a hard question around requiring vows in a tradition that emphasises faith only through personal experience, and ultimately the dumping of the belief system.

Yet there's a conventional logic around having a teacher of greater wisdom and compassion than yourself around in a very close relationship to advise you too when for sure you can't see the forest for the trees.

But there's also a possibility that it's just a self serving monastic tradition trying to corner Vajrayana for it's own ends since it was it seems originally primarily a path followed by individual yogis or practitioners.

Maybe in the end it doesn't matter. That as Richard Rose said 'the cows all get to the barn just the same'. That we all eventually wake up.

That Grace, our natural wisdom and compassion or whatever lead us to awaken. But that beyond that all choices made while in the grip of ego simply cause a circling in the goldfish bowl. As in the first poem below.

The question may only be what if any is the best route to jump start our 'progress'. If jump starting is possible, it often seems like we can only go places when we are ready to do so. And if progress is what it is - in the big view where we are now is only problematical because of how our egotistical so-called self relates to it.......


Life unfolds
As time rolls out
While certain we decide the script
We circle endlessly in ego’s grip

The dream
Leads ever deeper into pain
Self reinforced but made from fear
Sees only what it deigns to see

And yet
Though blind resisting every step
Bathed in light all but ignored
Our path somehow revealed unfolds

Until
At last in retrospect
We dimly can discern the sign
That through life’s detritus spirit’s called

***

Yearning
We walk
Deluded and alone
Yet drawn by spirit
Self burns in light’s clear flame
Towards emptiness
Impending doom
An end
And yet
Awakening

***

The light
Creeps in
This multicoloured dawn
Brings joy
With pain

***

Care worn,
Love lorn,
Lost,
Yet not.

All wise,
Big heart,
Awake,
Not yet.

Still caught,
‘Tween views,
Torn,
Raw heart.

***

This path
Brings light
Makes space to see
Mind’s chatter eased
The view makes clear

This path
Brings calm
Relieves the angst
Wakes love that knows
And sight renewed

But sight
Brings pain
When all that’s seen
Seems wrong to mind
Brings only fear

But sight
Brings light
Shows beauty too
Makes all so right
So very clear

So life
Goes on
Midst fear and joy
Whilst day by day
The onion’s peeled

© ian

Hi, Vajra and Dave seem to say the same thing: Vajra said: Maybe in the end it doesn't matter. That as Richard Rose said 'the cows all get to the barn just the same'. That we all eventually wake up.
____

this may sound crazy but I claim to be of all faiths and paths in my soul, so I strongly relate to the above that Richard Rose said. I used to do faith healing of laying on of hands which now is basically obsolete practice unless they are doing it somewhere where I'm not. so my path has been to always be looking at what a miracle is. especially as concerns JC, those kinds of miracles, not walking on water or levitation, but healing of the body mainly, and "your faith has made you whole" idea.
Thinking about what a miracle is, is valid without interacting with a group or church.  you're always waiting because you know the miracle will show.  During the laying on of hands, this was the requirement (of self) to draw the healing energy into the recipient, that you simply "wait." Also a certain merge into their field and the drop off of ego, or mind chatter and the glad acceptance that you could do this if they would let you.

I learned through A Course in Miracles 50 principles of miracles, one of which relates to what Richard was quoted to say above.  ACIM is a self study course btw, and to make a church out of it, would possibly ruin the intentions of it being a self study course, which is why I understand if you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him. although there are many groups of ACIM teachers/students. the premise is: All of us are teachers, teaching others who we are, and all of us are students at the same time, which includes the teacher, as illustrated by this principle of what a miracle is and explains that all cows will make it to the barn: (also miracle workers hold the vision for this)

#8 Miracles are performed by those who temporarily have more for those who temporarily have less. (we live outside of linear time)

#1 There is no order of difficulty in miracles. One is not "harder" or "bigger" than another. They are all the same. All expressions of love are maximal.

#18 ..In performing miracles you recognize your own and your neighbors worth simultaneously. (this is important)

35. Miracles are expressions of love but they may not always have observable effects. (what they may receive is none of your business, their gifts are held for them until they can receive what was given)

21. Miracles are natural signs of forgiveness. through miracles u accept gods forgiveness by extending it to others.

42. a major contribution of miracles is their strength in releasing you from our false sense of isolation, deprivation and lack.
43. Miracles arise from a miraculous state of mind or a state of miracle-readiness.

basically, we all deserve a miracle or as many miracles as it takes to find our way home like the other cows that already found the barn. so I discovered with the laying on of hands, the healing would occur if I saw the other person as being the same as me, we were one, and then I emptied out the ego.

however, as I go thru life I find ego cannot be snuffed out. it has it's usefulness to teach us we are godlings and all are One sharing the barn. The ego can taught to self correct through the observance of the miracles it places itself to perform.

we are all still in the heart of god as we never truly left but now we dream of exile from our home. we will all get there in the twinkling of an eye sometimes.


then the course goes on to say miracles are a mere tool. we will all transcend the need for miracles and enter direct revelation, where we hear only the voice for god at all times.
whatever path you take, Buddhist or Christian or whatever, we will all be on focus 27 or higher. and we can still have a beer.
love, alysia

....Oops. On their 'doing their nuts'. They of course don't judge.