A Monster Question: Is attachment a problem and should it be seen as one?
Buddhism views attachment as something to be overcome. Christians speak of how it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than to get into the kingdom of God, which may be related to the Buddhist one because the two ideas suggest that we should not grasp for the material world and its riches.
If we go beyond spiritual philosophy, attachment to the material world is an aspect of life, although perhaps consumer culture may be collapsing, and this may have some impact. However, there is still the attachment to other human beings, as stressed in the attachment theory of John Bowlby.The whole level of attachments and bonds is complex.
Attachments exists in all aspects of our life. I would say that apart from attachment to our familiar level of daily life, on some level we can even become attached to our own suffering.
Buddhism, and, perhaps Christianity, suggested that we should try to overcome attachment. However, the question arises independently from any particular belief system, and is relevant for all human beings to consider.
Should we seek to overcome attachment, to what extent, and can it be achieved ? Whether or not one adopts these worldviews, we can ask whether attachment is a problem and, should we seek to overcome our attachments at all?
25. 12. 20
Please note that the day after I creating this thread I have edited the title,. This was in reflection with upon someone's comment, but you will have to read on, to find where the hidden monster comes into the picture and consider whether the creature should be annihilated.
If we go beyond spiritual philosophy, attachment to the material world is an aspect of life, although perhaps consumer culture may be collapsing, and this may have some impact. However, there is still the attachment to other human beings, as stressed in the attachment theory of John Bowlby.The whole level of attachments and bonds is complex.
Attachments exists in all aspects of our life. I would say that apart from attachment to our familiar level of daily life, on some level we can even become attached to our own suffering.
Buddhism, and, perhaps Christianity, suggested that we should try to overcome attachment. However, the question arises independently from any particular belief system, and is relevant for all human beings to consider.
Should we seek to overcome attachment, to what extent, and can it be achieved ? Whether or not one adopts these worldviews, we can ask whether attachment is a problem and, should we seek to overcome our attachments at all?
25. 12. 20
Please note that the day after I creating this thread I have edited the title,. This was in reflection with upon someone's comment, but you will have to read on, to find where the hidden monster comes into the picture and consider whether the creature should be annihilated.
Comments (151)
Emotional attachment to things is obviously normal and, I think, desirable. As the English writer Orage (one of Gurdjieff's students) said, referring to being in love: "Hold on tightly and let go lightly". Would you want to live a life where you lacked love for particular things, places, people and animals, and felt only indifference or a generalized Buddhistic compassion?
I do agree that emotional attachment seems a natural aspect of life as a human being, and perhaps without it would be more like machines. However, I was dwelling on it this morning, and do see it as a philosophical problem.
However, I do believe that enjoyment is important and hope that all the members of the forum have a good Christmas, without too much worry and philosophical angst.
Happy Christmas and let us hope that 2021 is a positive year for us all,
Jack x
With literally no attachment to anything, I doubt you would live very long. Our attachment to pleasure is what spurs us to eat when we’re hungry, or drink when we’re thirsty, etc. If I’m indifferent to life itself, what could ever cause me to act in any way whatsoever? Why would I do anything? But of course, as Geddy Lee would say, “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.” So my inaction would ultimately lead to my demise sooner or later. I think the issue with attachment is it’s propensity to cause things like addiction, confuse our priorities, and let the end (whatever it is we’re attached to) justify the means. So the trick is to only be attached to things that are good.
Emotionally giving up on the pursuit of good things and just living through life indifferently until it at some point it stops of its own accord is effectively the psychological condition of depression, which is widely regarded as a bad thing by those who suffer through it.
Also while in traditional Buddhism attachment is seen as something to overcome, in its offshoots (Zen, etc) it is not. You have no "obligation" to overcome attachment in those systems in the same way that you have to be good in christianity. The point of them is to see the uselessness of attachments. Whether or not you sever them later is up to you (though I don't see why you wouldn't)
You guys seem to be equating attachment with desire. They are very different things. As you say, if the Buddha hadn't desired anything, he wouldn't have got out of bed to eat. But he did. So that suggests that they're not the same thing.
I would agree that one of the problems arising attachment is addiction. You say that that the best solution is to be 'only attached to things that are good,' If only it was that simple.
I am sure that when the person who goes on to develop an alcoholic first experiments with alcohol it appears so good, and only years later after 1000s of drinks and many years later sees that what began as a good turned into an evil. I have met people in this predicament. I think that this applies to most addictive forms of pleasure, including those which are more obviously not so good, such as drugs, to the more simple pleasures which can turn into excesses.
So, the question is how do we prioritise? Even if we steer clear of attachments to material possessions and focus on people, we can still stumble and fall. Relationships can become toxic and the people we love may reject us and die, leading us into potential misery and despair. When we form attachments how can we know the direction these will take us?
I do agree that part of the issue is about the whole
disparity between fulfilled desires. Sometimes it is not just that we are trying to overcome desires but
meet obstacles in trying to fulfill them and, as you say, this can lead to depression, including the extremes of clinical depression.
Personally, I find that I am functioning at my best when I am able to fulfill my desires rather than when I cannot. I would say that I am a better person to be around than when I am miserable, and that is why I would challenge any philosophy which is world rejecting.
But, I would say that life comes with so many ups and downs that it is sometimes inevitable that we have the suffering of unfulfilled desires. Some might say that the underlying problem is the desires themselves, but I would feel that to give up trying would be contrary to the life drives and instincts.
I think that attachment is linked to desire, and the whole issue of Buddha getting out of bed is a critical example. Here, he went to both extremes and this is illustrated by the contrast between the thin and fat Buddha illustrates this.
I would say that it is extremely difficult not to form attachments. Even in the case of people who fail on the autistic spectrum, they may fail to form the early childhood attachments to others, including their primary caregivers. However, that does not mean that they do not interact with the objects within the physical world.
The relationship between attachments to objects and other human beings is complex, as illustrated by the child development theory of Winnicott. He spoke of the role of transitional objects, giving the example of the teddy bear, as a way in which objects enable connections between the child and adults. Of course, there are many other factors going on, including some which are detrimental to the formation of initial and later relationships.
However, I would argue that it is supremely difficult, for better or worse, to live without attachments and desires. I am not sure that, as living human beings, we are able to achieve it. If we simply stayed in bed most of the time rather than pursue grander desires, it would still involve an attachment to the comfort of being in bed.
It is. But the key distinction is that they are qualitatively different. Not quantitatively. You can want something really really badly and still not be attatched to it. How attatched you are to something is answered by asking yourself "How big of a problem would it be if I didn't have this/this didn't happen?" The answer to that is usually different from what we desire. There is supposedly a sort of mental "Sweet spot" where you want things but at the same time are not distraught at failing to get them. However usually, attachment follows desire. You start by wanting something, then that want turns into a need. That thing becomes a necessity.
Quoting Jack Cummins
Probably.
Quoting Jack Cummins
I don't think so. Not necessarily at least.
Lets assume you reach some sort of Nirvana state if you manage to sever all forms of attachment - is that something most of us would even want? It would mean abandoning family, love, friendships. It would just be you, and, I guess, the universe.
Here's the thing: We're situated whether we like it or not (i.e. we have a family, a community, sexual/romantic bonds or desires, etc.). However, we can't let that situated-ness dominate our every action. As humans we're split between a universalism and this "situated-ness" and its up to us to make a healthy balance. It's not easy, I get it. Go too far in any one direction and it's not good. The human mind naturally drifts towards certainty or extremes and we need to be careful with that. We like things black and white - good and bad, it makes the world more intuitive.
As far as I'm concerned a life without love or music isn't one with living, nirvana or not. In life you're naturally intimately connected with a network of people or a community and we should be extremely careful about throwing that all away to pursue absolute perfection. I don't believe in perfection in this world.
No I think that is quite right, because what separates living for non-living things, is that living things have purposes. Purpose meaning here to desire or want certain things to happen, which is another way of saying that living things have (emotion) attachments to certain things or outcomes. So in a very literal sense, the only way to entirely overcome attachments is to become a non-living thing... to die.
So I think the interesting question here is not whether we can overcome all attachments, but rather what should we be attached to and what not, and to what degree etc?
In the world of poker, or other sports too for that matter, you will often hear something like, results-oriented thinking should be avoided at all cost, or you shouldn't care about any particular outcome of a game because that makes you preform worse. The reasoning behind this is that, as it is in part a game of chance, you only have limited control over the results... and so you will be disappointed a lot if you care about the results, and that hampers your ability to make good decisions.
Of course this poses a bit of a conundrum in that what motivates you to play in the first place is probably winning games. And if you do away with that motivation, why bother at all right? The way around this particular motivation-conundrum is being invested in the process instead of the results. You focus on playing every game as good as you can, and try to care only insofar you played well or not.
I think Buddhism and a lot of other wisdom or virtue-traditions point in this same general direction of trying to shift your attachment from concrete results or things to caring about certain processes, i.e. right speech, right action... the eightfold path. And yes I think psychologically this kind of mindset would give you a more even, persistent and resilient motivation throughout your life, because you have more agency and control over it and also because these are goals that don't expire.
I don't think those two things are the same at all. Attachment is different from desire.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
This would mean that you would be put down by a bad performance. But athletes are pushed to to not care even about that. Take volleyball for example, it often happens that a player single handedly loses a game or a set for his team because of the nature of the game making it very clear who messed up (fast paced, highly structured and a single mistake by a player puts down the whole team). But top players shrug off mistakes without losing performance, worse players are put down by bad performances leading to even worse performances. Does that mean that top players have a weaker desire to win? I think they want it just as badly, but they're not attached.
Meh, I don't think they are things at all... just two symbols pointing at different degrees of what is essential one psychological process. It seems a matter of degree rather than discrete things. If I don't get what I want, I'm disappointed. If I don't get what I'm attached to, I'm very disappointed…
Quoting khaled
No I don't think this is correct, almost every top player cares very much about their performance ... Maybe they can shrug it off more easily, I could buy that. Also note that giving a bad pass for instance, isn't necessarily 'a mistake' from the perspective of the process of trying to play as good as you can. It's the intention and training that counts, not necessarily a particular execution.
That is exactly what I'm saying does not seem like the case for me. They seem qualitatively different.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
If desiring to win and failing to do so is disappointing, then those who desire to win the most should be devastated the most. We can agree that top athletes probably do desire to win the most. However they are not devastated the most (ideally, they are not affected by a bad performance at all). Suggesting that maybe there is something extra that is the actual cause of disappointment, something other than desire to win.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
I can think of many instances when I didn't get what I wanted but wasn't disappointed. You could probably do so too.
Also I find there is a world of difference between getting the thing I'm attached to vs the thing I want. When I get something I want I'm happy, when I get something I am attached to I don't feel anything. And sometimes I'm attached to things I don't even want (bad habits).
If you are talking about addictions I would agree, but do you think that is what is meant with attachments here? Maybe, I'd need to think about it some more.
Quoting khaled
Yes but my first guess wouldn't be that that something extra is attachments. It's sort of a psychological downward spiral that compounds the mistakes that other non-top players get stuck in. How do you see the relation to attachments here? I'd say this is more a question of a lack of confidence.
I will stick with Greek philosophy and the good of being the very best we can be. I think it is wrong to not enjoy the game of life for as long as we can. Sure it hurts when we loose something we value but so what, we can grieve and move on. Perhaps if we live in a very poor country it makes sense be happy with nothing but in a country with plenty it doesn't make as much sense. If we learn to enjoy life, there is a good chance we will enjoy the next one, if our attachments do cause us to reincarnate, and really what is so bad with that?
I live as though reincarnation is a possibility and like the idea that this might pay off in the future. But having life and not using it? Really isn't that a bit pointless?
I do agree that there is a difference between attachments and desires, but I am not sure that it can be divided simply into a quantitative or qualitative one, but a mixture of the two.
This is because some aspects of life we wish for are easier to achieve than others and this varies so much between individuals. For example, some people find that they can get a job as soon as they begin looking, and you can ask how important this is? The reason it would not be simply about how important it is because the matter itself could be divided into smaller goals, such as the need for money and the need for purpose and social identity. The person would likely need some means of financial support and whether they could cope would be according to sources of money for basic needs. Also, the questions about purpose and identity would also be dependent on other social aspects of life and meaning.
One critical factor, I believe, is the way in which frustrated desire fuels and drives the desires. For example, supposing that a person is desperately wishing for a romantic relationship, the very absence of it over a period of time is likely to make the desire increase. It might also involve how that desire has been satisfied in the past. For example, the person who has not had a relationship at all may have a more intense desire than one who has done in the past.
Perhaps a certain level of satisfaction of desires also leads to some indifference. Perhaps this is what happens in relationships which go wrong. Maybe the satisfied desire results in boredom, and we might, in a similar way, become bored by certain taken for granted aspects of our life, because we do not have to stop and revision the cravings on a regular basis. It could be that we do not realise the depths of our attachments until we face losses which hit upon us.
As far as lying in bed goes, I know that if I am going through a rough patch in life I love to crawl into bed, to lie there wallowing, play music and escape into sleep. I am also aware that there are many people in the world who do not have a soft bed, and have no choice but to sleep on the hard earth. So, I am always grateful for having a bed. And, when I am happy, as well as low and downcast, I still adore, and hold onto my attachment to my bed.
I don't have any major addictions but sometimes I notice that I feel the need to get something I don't even really want. If you've been on a losing streak in a videogame you'd know what I mean. You just keep playing in a rage, you're not even having fun, and you're hardly trying to win, but for some reason you feel you need to.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
It's also a common trait of mediocre athletes to be OVERconfident, not lacking confidence.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
Attachments are "How big of an issue is it if I don't get X?" I find this has surprisingly little to do with how much you want to get X. And sometimes not having X is a huge issue even though you don't even really want X.
Quoting khaled
I know what you mean, but I not sure if that's a qualitative difference, or just two conflicting desires with differing intensities... i.e. a shortterm desire to really want to win, and a more general desire to just stop playing the game and do something else constructive.
Quoting khaled
I think they are two sides of the same coin. When you are overconfident, a little thing can tilt you to loose all your confidence precisely because it was inflated and it's hard to maintain the illusion in the face of evidence to the contrary.
But yes I think I sort of get what you're trying to get at with linking it to attachment. The downward spiral then is presumably the result of an attachment to an overinflated idea of yourself.
I do believe in the importance of enjoying ourselves and being one's best. I don't believe that life is meant to be miserable.
Hope you are have a good Christmas. I am busy reading and writing but having an enjoyable time. I am also being DJ with my mum, giving her an assortment of music.
Let's hope that 2021 brings more enjoyable times for everyone!
I do agree that a life without music or love is indeed questionable, but I won't go as far as saying not worth living because I am aware of some people being deaf, but hopefully the majority of these will not live a loveless life as well.
In terms of these basics, I think that it great suffering to live without these pleasures, although I think being blind is my worst imaginable fear, although I would probably be in a better position than those who have never known sight. But, of course, I am attached to visual perceptions whereas a blind person has not formed this attachment.
I don't really believe that the supreme state of Nirvana would, from my point of view, the utmost. What would be the point of attaining such bliss without sharing it? Even in Hindu philosophy there is some debate as to whether nirvana is an ultimate end state of development of the soul, or whether, at some point the soul would be reborn once again.
As you say, as long as we are alive it is hard to be free of all attachments. This is likely to involve a mixture of aspects of fulfilled and unfulfilled yearnings. A central part is the attachment to life itself, which most people hold onto. Even many who make suicide attempts and survive are often glad that they did not die afterwards.
You are right to say that many traditions, such as Buddhism, shift the focus from attachment to the Buddhism Path, and the importance of right action. This probably brings balance and stops us being trapped in the cycle of personal gratification, with all its highs and lows.
I would be happier at the moment if we were celebrating the winter solstice that pagans everywhere once celebrated. Calling the winter solstice "Christmas" is like pouring lemon juice into a wound, as it screams a terrible history of extermination that continues to plague us as a terrible prejudice against "those people" and denies the value of other human beings or that they even existed.
Hard times? In the past people starved to death, especially in the winter and a God didn't send birds to feed them. I live in a country where few children starve to death because of what science has done for us. whoops, I am ranting aren't I. What a topic "Is attachment a problem and should it be seen as one"? lf I knew how to use social media I would use it to call a demonstration at our public broadcasting station demanding they use a warning when broadcasting a biased religious program, announcing it is prejudice and may be offensive. The God of Abraham religions are an attachment I wish we would give up. I celebrate with the pagan tree and the pagan understanding of the solstice and so thankful our children are not starving and dying in winter as they once did when the church was the only source of knowledge.
Yes, what kind of thread have I created? Your post is very interesting. Perhaps it is my 'monster,' and it arose from my subconscious on Christmas eve, and was unleashed on the forum for everyone to consider. I think it probably stems from the conflicts which I have going around in my subconscious, encompassing Catholic guilt and disillusionment.
I am really interested in paganism and I would imagine that that it is certainly about celebrating of pleasure rather than repression. I have read a bit but not much but know that the early albums by The Waterboys, who are one of my favourite artists embrace it in their music.
But I would imagine that the pagan solstice celebrations are extremely different from the ones in Christian based consumer culture. When I was at school and in my original church background I always found a clash between the supposed Christian basis of it in the birth of Christ and the commercial celebration. I do believe Chistmas was originally a pagan custom, which the Christians redesigned to fit into their perspective and system of rituals.
It will be interesting to see if others respond to your thinking and I would ask simply do you think that attachment should not be seen as a problem? But, of course, remember that in my questioning I am not simply asking whether we should avoid attachment as a spiritual goal, but also as a problem of frustrated goals and desires in an unequal, upside down world.
You will see that I have edited and added 'A Monster Question' to the title of the thread based on reflecting upon the post I have created after your comment. I have done so, because I think in doing so, I will encourage readers to think outside of the box of traditions, but I am unsure how this will see what impact this will have on the debate, but I am in favour of experimental thinking, and looking at arguments in the rawest, forms.
OK, your kid's getting treatment for childhood leukemia. You want your kid to live.
Where's the sweet spot?
This may seem snotty picking such an extreme example, but at the same time it really highlights, to me, that there is, at root, a division in Buddhism. Accept what it outside you, but try to dampen certain things inside you.
Seeing something as desirable and desiring something are not necessarily the same. So, I might see discipline as desirable because it is the path to an end that I have come to think of as the highest, for example.
According to Buddhist thinking it is fine to be attached ("find refuge") in the Sangha (the community of the faithful), the Four Noble Truths and the Dharma ("Way") because they are believed to lead away from attachment to transient, earthly things and lead towards the changeless.
In Hinduism and Buddhism the Sages are portrayed as having the same unwavering compassion for all. Does this mean a Sage will not feel love towards "special" friends or family that he or she does not feel towards everyone? Not being a Sage myself, I can't answer that. Or maybe it depends on the Sage? What does seem to be the case is that the Sage should not manifest favouritism to any individual unless to do so would serve the Dharma.
That might look like "attachment" but it is really a problem of perspective.
Quite a few people became addicted quickly after their first encounter with alcohol, meth, cocaine, weed, heroin, or something else. They didn't so much desire these substances as their brains were so constituted to be a trap ready to close once the substance came along. Some people are biochemically prone to addiction. For some more complicated psychological reason, some people are prone to become overly attached to other people.
Granted, people can get addicted by patient effort; I liked the idea of smoking enough to keep at it until I was addicted. Stupid, but advertising and peer influence works. I haven't smoked for 25 years, but I still have the urge sometimes.
Then there is GREED--one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Some people desire more (gold; bitcoins; real estate; pounds or dollars or Euros or whatever measure o wealth is handy). Let's call greed an attachment to things of recognized value. That's a problem with real moral consequences which is (presumably) NOT a problem of brain chemistry (alcoholism), inability to decide what to throw out (old age), psychological dependency disorders or OCD, etc. People who collect bits of string and add it to their big ball are not sinning, even if they are greedy for more bits of string. They are just weird.
Many attachments are normal, desirable, necessary, and good, as long as they doesn't become a neurosis (like parents who are attached to the desire for a child to be a violin prodigy who isn't). We should be attached to our homeland, family, faith, alma mater (send a donation), local community, and so on--in reasonable proportion. People who are overly attached to the Green Bay Packers or Miami Dolphins are just tedious, not a moral problem.
Oh, and Merry Christmas.
Buddhism was originally a renunciate spiritual movement, so attachment is precisely what was to be overcome. The rationale for renunciation is that ultimately all of the things to which you’re attached, and the body itself, is subject to decay. ‘Not getting what you want, getting what you don’t want, old age, sickness and death’ is fate of all beings. The eightfold path is said to yield a kind of happiness which is greater and more secure than that obtainable by any worldly means.
However, among the Buddhist texts are admonitions and advice to householders for living a prosperous and happy life (e.g. here.) The Buddha is presented as being fully cognisant of the importance of married life, ethical investments and sound business decisions.
In early Buddhism there was a distinct duality of renunciation and worldly life, but as Buddhism developed the duality between the two became less pronounced. Renunciation came to be seen more as a interior state rather than an external act. There is a Mah?y?na Buddhist scripture called the Vimalakirti Nirdesa, the central character and namesake of which is a married silk merchant whose grasp of the Mah?y?na principle of ??nyat? is such that the Buddha’s direct disciplines are scared to debate him.
Perhaps the deeper meaning of attachment is craving, habituation and dependency. Detachment in that sense is inner liberation from these factors - not identifying with them, letting them go. Easier said than done, in my experience.
At not caring if your kid dies. Similar to some stoics. Then again, Buddhism is not about finding the sweet spot in everything, it is the observation that such a sweet spot exists. You are not instructed to go get it in the same way you are instructed to becomes a good Christian. Buddhists do not spread their religion actively for example. If you want to be attached go right ahead, just know what it will hurt and will have no practical advantages (at least none that I can think of)
Really? When was this said. I don’t read much about Buddhism in particular but more about Zen and other offshoots. I doubt the words used were “attached” though.
Eternity, by William Blake
You mean: Revulsion with the idea that the sweet spot should be sought after in every circumstance. That it exists was all I was trying to establish, not that it should be sought out. Though I think it should.
Quoting Coben
I’m skeptical when people say “anti human”. Is it not a part of the brain that is judging this other apart as a problem? Whether or not you judge it as a problem or not then still seems pretty “human” to me. In other words, it's only anti-human because you decided it was, it could be easily argued to be natural to want to eliminate suffering.
Quoting Coben
Fair. Again, I wasn’t saying that this sweet spot should be sought out, only that it exists. Though I think it should be sought out, but I can see the arguments against that (not that I agree with them)
The first order of business then is to understand the cause of suffering for if we can discover the cause, we have something to work on towards reducing/eliminating the unwanted effect, to wit, suffering. To get to that I'd like to first draw your attention to a point of view that has its origins in logic and perhaps even philosophy itself, the view that every person has an emotional and a rational side to them and this is germane to the question of attachment because first, attachment and suffering are both, at their core, emotions and second. the entire project of alleviating/eliminating suffering is a rational one.
While I'm not completely certain that all suffering is attachment-related, I concede that attachment does figure prominently in the list of causes for suffering. Well, if I had to justify that all suffering is attachment-based I would say something to the effect that suffering arises when that which we value is damaged/destroyed and that which we value is what we get attached to; attachment then is that intimate connection between us and the things we hold dear that's vulnerable to attack, injury and destruction, this then manifests as suffering.
So far so good.
Returning to the dual nature of all humans, the emotional and rational aspects of the human psyche, what transpires is this: our rational side, after studying the nature of the universe, arrives at the conclusion that, well, nothing lasts forever which, in Buddhist circles, is known as the doctrine of impermanence and ergo, our rational half concludes, there really is no point in getting attached to the point of being completely unable to, as @Wayfarer put it, "...let go..." Remember this is precisely what causes suffering - being unable to "...let go..." What's supposed to happen next is our rational side informing our emotional side that attachment doesn't make sense because impermanence is part of the very fabric of the universe and to have attachments, a facet of which is the inability to "...let go..." [suffering], would be asking for the impossible and expecting/waiting for an outcome whose probability of happening is zero is irrational. It's like expecting a 7 from a roll of a 6-sided die.
Perhaps, if the inherent duality of the human mind (emotion and reason) can't be reconciled, it would be best to give both free reign - let our emotional sides suffer, excruciatingly even, and let our rational sides maintain its equipoise through all that.
I do believe that addiction is extremely complex, and beyond the psychological dimensions, chemical dependence is central, so I see where you are coming from. I get really annoyed when people become judgemental about people with addictions. I did a 12 week placement in a drug addiction unit as part of a psychiatric nursing course and I would say it was one of the most interesting areas I have ever worked in. I would consider working in addiction services in the future.
I think that I do have an addictive personality, so I have to be careful to avoid excesses. Perhaps, the best way is to have several addictions rather than one to get balance: coffee, books, writing, music, art, wine and a few secret ones. etc. What I am saying is that it is better to have several options for enjoyment or coping rather than just one, because it stops any one getting out of control.
My own biggest addiction is probably caffeine because I have to begin everyday with 2 cups of coffee, and this goes back to having used Pro Plus caffeine tablets as a student. I used to take them so often for essay writing and as a form of 'speed', and sometimes in more than the recommended dose. They gave me bad insomnia and I used to feel awful the next day, worse than a hangover, and I used to sometimes reach for the packet to take a tablet to feel better.But I did stop, but people often remark that I drink a lot of coffee.
I can also relate to the problem of accumulating clutter. I had to move in the summer and had a really horrible time. I do not consider myself as materialist because I have never been drawn to conventional possessions, such as a buying a car. But books and music are my disease and what to keep, donate to charity shops, or throw away was a nightmare. I can understand why some people end up with hoarding problems, especially if they live in one place for a long time.
But, I do think that attachment to material possessions is not simply about how much one accumulates but to the nature of the attachment. Some people may have only a few possessions but be attached to them greatly.
So, yes I would agree that addiction are big issues and I would not dismiss them, but frame them in the context of the larger picture of human suffering.
I appreciate your contribution and I think that it captures some extremely important points, especially the Buddhist perspective. I would not consider myself as a Buddhist as such, but do think that suffering and impermanence are the central aspects of human experiences.
I used to have a big problem with impermanence, especially as teenager. Now, I think that the constant process of change is to be celebrated as well deplored because it does mean that all the bad aspects of life will pass, not just the pleasant ones.
I think that you are right to emphasise the two strands, emotion and rationality. The use of reason is useful for considering our attachment, rather than just being driven by it blindly.
I appreciate your contribution and do believe that the Buddhist perspective has a lot to contribute, as I have just said in my reply to the Madfool.In particular, this discussion focused upon the problem of suffering and impermanence. Emotionality and rationality are two competing aspects in life, and reason offers a way for us to consider our attachments rather than being overwhelmed by them.
However, I am struggling a bit with what you are saying about the ideas of detachment. I am not sure to what extent detachment is desirable. Is it different from indifference?
I am also not convinced that renunciation is a helpful idea. However, I will say that I am viewing the idea through the lens of my Christian upbringing. Here, I am speaking of the whole view that we should not seek pleasure. This led to all sorts of problems, such as the whole shadow side of the Catholic church. Sexuality was repressed on one hand, with gay men turning to the priesthood. The whole issue of priests abusing young boys has come to light, and throws into question the whole issue of renunciation as practiced within Catholicism.
Aside from this, perhaps pleasure is to be celebrated rather than eliminated. For this reason, Athena replied, querying the whole question of the post. She was objecting to the whole way in which many spiritual teachers have tried to encourage the suppression and repression of pleasure. She points to the the pagan tradition as an important one to the argument. Perhaps we can think of the way in which Dionysus points to the importance of pleasure and, this could lead us to consider the whole idea of renunciation as a problem in itself.
All attachments (including attraction and lust) fade away with time according to the natural order of things. Attachment to material things, even short-term, is almost non-existent - until we add psychological components (emotional, mental, etc) and then it extends for as long as we maintain those relations. (Natural attachment to material things is more along the order of curiosities and enjoyments and they have very clearly defined limits.)
Money, sex, social interactions, education, employment, etc, matter too much because we've created psychological relations which define them beyond their actual boundaries especially in our appreciations (significance/validation) of the connections to other people.
If the exercise of one's free will without the intentional harming of others causes disharmony in one's situations and relations, then it is proof of attachments that must be gotten rid off.
:grin: From time to time your childhood brainwashing seems to come to your consciousness as unquestioned truth but in general you have done a heroic job of getting past that problem. :clap:
I would not give too much honor to pagans either. But I have a love for our mother earth. That of course is an emotional thing, not exactly a thinking thing, but it can include knowing we can destroy environments, and when we do that can damage our own survival, but we can also create healthy environments. A lack of technology is not the answer. Low tech people are very destructive and deforesting their area is a huge problem. So is polluting the available water a huge problem! Often people had to move because their way of life was not sustainable, so after consuming resources in one area they moved to the next. When only a few people do this, there is a chance of the environment recovering. When there is a large population, we have to make better decisions.
With technology, we have done amazing things! A huge area in China has been restored after it had been destroyed hundreds of years ago. Everyone had just assumed the destroyed area was always like that, but science discovered it was fertile and had once been abundant with life, and with that knowledge they restored this Garden of Eden. We have brought rivers and areas of the ocean back to life. We have good reason for being hopeful of making most of our planet a Garden of Eden, but to do this we need to get past the notion that a god controls things. We need to spread technology not religion!
Do you know of the Peace Core? It was created during past President Kenndy's administration and is about sending US volunteers around the world to teach better farming and better sanitation and better health. Better birth control must go with this because we must be real about living on a finite planet. Just feeding people without population control, makes the problems much worse, leading to the wars and refugees we have today. We need secular thinking for peace because it is wrong to feed people and give them religion and think a god will take care of them. God did not build Noah's ark nor does He save people from terrible things. A moral is a matter of cause and effect. What happens is a consequence of what we do and we need truth to do the right thing.
Back to your question, I love our mother earth, and I love our technology, and I love education for liberty and democracy and while Buddism has wisdom I could not be one because I want to be part of life and I want to be part of making life better for everyone in a very pragmatic way. The Peace Core is a pragmatic way to make life better.
In saying that attachments causing 'disharmony in one's situations and relations in one's situations and relations...is proof of attachments that must be gotten rid of' I am left wondering how do you think that they should be got rid of?
This is because the attachments have deep roots. Meditation is one possibility, but even meditation is not easy. Psychological interventions range from the behavioural to the cognitive, or a blending of the two.
Really, I am saying that eliminating attachments is a problem in itself, so I am wondering if we should we even seek to get rid of them at all.?Perhaps we would be better addressing the disharmony or conflict which we experienced rather than the actual attachment itself. This may be about acceptance of certain aspects of ourselves which we would wish to deny, and probably be about acknowledging our attachments and living with them, at least.
What Janus said makes perfect sense to me. It is also very Christian to be devoted to God and heaven and renounce this mortal world. If we cling to a heavenly fantasy we are saved and immortal. I am pagan. I love life in this three-dimensional reality. However, I have to admit this is easier now that I am adjusted to being divorced and my children are grown, and I don't need to work for a living. That is I am past many worldly concerns and live in peace in my own imagined reality of mother earth and what humans can do to make life better.
So, do you think that the idea of renunciation is not about following a set pathway, but more of a mindset, in which one feels free from the binding of the concerns of day to day existence?
I don't know what I think until I participate in one of your threads. This time I mentioned being happy now that I am past my years as wife and mother and having to work for a living. Had I never been a mother and never held a job, would my life have been more joyful? I think that is highly possible. My marriage was terrible and a lot of heartache has come out of that. I am not sure I would repeat it.
There are wonderful benefits to working, but I found low-income employment miserable because with autocratic industry the conditions of jobs can be intolerable! My life could have had been better had I been better prepared and made better decisions. That is not equal to renunciation. It is knowing what we want and how to get it. I knew what I wanted but not how to get it and made bad choices, the failures of my marriage are now impacting my great-grandchildren and I have deep regrets. To be happy I avoid thinking about my family and engaging with most of them. I guess I would do it all over again, but I would do it differently. Today women have more opportunities, and I hope we work through some human problems and that everyone will do better.
It just dawned on me that we're, as some have accused me of, self-delusional. As Agent Smith in The Matrix rightly pointed out, "there's no escaping reason". Notice an important detail that's missing from my analysis - the "reason" behind our emotions. We get emotional - we become attached, we suffer for it - for "reasons", right? I remember the many times I've felt sad, deeply so, and the sadness didn't just happen for no reason. If, perchance, this were true, we should be witnessing random laughter and tears but this, for better or for worse, isn't true. There's always a reason for suffering. It must be then that our rational side is shifting, or trying to shift, the blame - tilting at windmills as the English are fond of saying -creating an imaginary foe just so that it can let itself off the hook. So, at the end of the day, we're not two beings (emotional and rational) locked in a battle with each other but one being struggling under the burden of its own delusions.
The subject of whether we delude ourselves or not is a big one. Having worked in psychiatric care, the subject of delusions was always around.People were proclaim as delusional on a day to day basis and I think all of us probably adopt some delusions, but I am not sure that it is simply about the division between emotions and reason.
You say that there is always a reason why we suffer and I am not sure that it is that simple. It could be that we suffer because we don't understand our emotions enough and the real nature of our emotions, but even then, sometimes suffering comes out of nowhere. A day can be going well and then a sense of low mood comes from nowhere. It could be chemically related.
I am partly coming up with this idea because I thought that the post createdp earlier today was going to explore this when it contained testosterone in the title. But it lacked this and this was disappointing because I do think that our biology affects our emotions and reason, which you speak of as being in conflict.
So, getting back to the subject of attachment, I am asking whether an underlying source of our attachments is derived from biology. To what extent are we limited by the biology of our being?
I am glad if you are able to clarify your thoughts through discussions on threads because that should be the purpose of philosophy. It may involve hard questions. Attachment is a monster and I am sure that there are even some dragons to come yet.
Having read what I wrote a short while ago, I realise that I am also doing the shifting of blame, placing the blame on biology. It is just that it is hard to pin reason or emotions onto any exact peg. Maybe the whole problem lies, on some level, at the quantum level. Perhaps in the energy dynamics, reason and emotions can be divided , but that distinction is complex, as are attachments which have developed and are embedded within our systems.
Assuredly. There was a comment made above that detachment means 'you don't care if your child dies'. Couldn't be further from the truth. I have long read the sermons of Meister Eckhardt. The way he puts it is that the birth of Christ in the soul brings a peace so great that even tremendous vicissitudes cannot shake it. Detachment is more about the abandonment of egotism than being callous or indifferent. That is why members of religious orders are often associated with care for the sick. I myself witnessed that when I was sent to work in the casuality ward of a Catholic teaching hospital in my youth.
Quoting Jack Cummins
We live in a sensate, materialist culture, where only what can be seen and measured scientifically is considered to be real. Our hedonistic culture places huge emphasis on pleasure and acquisition. From this perspective renunciation of any kind doesn't make any sense at all.
The problem with the pursuit of pleasure is that it always comes with a cost, there's always a reaction. Pleasure and pain are inextricably connected, the pursuit of pleasure invites suffering. But repression is not the way, I think it's more a matter of seeing through it and going beyond it. Not that this is at all an easy balance to acheive, I certainly haven't made a lot of headway with it.
Freudianism, as you mentioned in another post, plays a huge role in modern culture, even if Freud has been mostly forgotten. It was Freud who introduced the idea that libido was the main driving force in life, and that repression of it was impossible, and lead to neuroses. Sexuality and sexual expression then become seen as a fundamental human right, and anything that suggests foregoing it or curtailing it is seen as repressive. Don't want to derail your thread, as these comments tend to do, but it's a major factor in my opinion.
Quoting Janus
In one of the other recent thread on Buddhism we were discussing the parable of the raft, where the Buddha says that Buddhism itself is like a raft, used for 'crossing over' the river of suffering, but to be let go of once it's served its purpose. 'Dhammas should be abandoned, to say nothing of adhammas'. That is specifically about not becoming attached to Buddhism. Of course, the way it plays in culture is such that it becomes a tremendous source of attachment, hope, longing. But at least in the original exposition, this reality was recognised and warned against.
I think it depends on the importance to which we assign the need/want of overcoming the attachments. In analogy, I would say it's like any other problem - if you really want to overcome it then you put up the fight. For me, the biggest obstacle which I see as preventing most people from overcoming attachments is the need to bargain - which is a sign, to me, that those people are not really committed. For example, I know people who realise that alcohol isn't good for them but they don't/can't stop because they've not yet decided to stop the party kind of lifestyle. So they end up looking for half-measures which don't really solve anything and the problem gets drawn out for a really long time.
Meditation/yoga works for those who integrate them into their lifestyle. Most people don't and it doesn't work, then they accuse meditation/yoga of being mumbo jumbo. Meditative/yoga sessions can only give moments (an hour or two) of harmony, a meditative lifestyle allows for harmony all the time. The same with therapy - one can see a therapist for a few moments or they can have a therapeutic lifestyle.
Anyway, there are so many types and degrees of attachments as well as the methods of overcoming them. But the bottom-line is the same - a person has to do it or go through it the whole nine yards.
I have steps which I follow when I want to rid or distance myself from something/someone/situations. In short:
The list is just an outline of how I've tried to overcome some of my attachments.
Also, until one recognizes or realises their individuality (self or 'I'), life will remain a series of attachments. The only true path in life is self-realisation (study of oneself). Any appropriate method will do.
I agree that is the ideal, but I think it is an ideal never realized. The sages are typically portrayed as being and feeling the same towards all. For me that is not a desirable state for a human; at least I would not want to live my life like that.
I have never met anyone I found to be "free of ego", and I find it hard to believe the sages are not emotionally attached to their roles as gurus. Humans, all humans, are imperfect creatures in my view.
Quoting BrianW
~ Dogen, founder of S?t? school of Zen.
I was asking for a source on where it was said that you should “find refuge” in the eight fold path. I’m interested in the exact wording. I thought I had read the exact opposite of that and wayfarer pointed it out:
Quoting Wayfarer
Quoting Janus
I think it’s a bit more nuanced than that. I rely on my keyboard but I wouldn’t be distraught if I lost it. I care about my grades but doing badly on a test doesn’t affect me nearly as much as it used to.
There is a difference between being indifferent about something or someone, and not caring if you lose it or them. I don’t buy the idea that desire is a “two way street”, where if you want something then you’re necessarily distraught at not having it. I think it could be two separate streets. Sometimes you really want things but are not too distraught at not having them (certain Christmas presents), other times you are really distraught at not having something you don’t really want (smoking, addictions)
You don't rely on it for your emotional, indeed existential, well-being as someone who relies on their religious faith does.
Quoting Wayfarer
It's not a cynical, but a skeptical, attitude. Despite what the scriptures, or anyone, might say I don't see any reason to believe that any human has every achieved perfection, whether moral or otherwise. You have a right to believe that some people have achieved perfection, of course, but I can't see any either empirical or purely rational warrant for such a belief. What remains to motivate belief in the perfection of some humans is desire to believe in that or groundless faith. If there is an alternative perhaps you'd be able to explain it?
Quoting Wayfarer
Of course those attitudes expressed by Brian W and Dogen are possible attitudes to hold. However even if you felt absolutely convinced that you knew such things, that would still not be any guarantee that you could not be mistaken. I acknowledge that if I felt such certainty, I may not be skeptical about it; indeed I could not hold such certainty unless I was not skeptical.
The point is that no matter how much I might feel that I could not be wrong; there could still never be any real guarantee that I was not mistaken; neither my own conviction nor any institutional judgement based on tradition could ever suffice to give rational grounds for absolute certainty about anything.
Lol, yes. Good luck!
Quoting Jack Cummins
To me, this is the basic question of morality. My answer is that our priorities should reflect our needs. I don’t think everyone can be happy living an ascetic lifestyle, obviously some can. So not everyone should prioritize the renunciation of material possessions, but others should. Discovering which type of person you are requires some self-awareness and self-reflection, but I’d posit that one’s general emotional state is a good indicator as to whether or not a change needs to be made. Mental illness is an obvious exception to this, however. We can’t know for sure how things will go in the end, and suffering is inevitable, but if something/someone causes you more suffering than happiness it’s usually best to move on. And yes, there is often suffering involved in fighting addiction or ending a relationship, but (hopefully) it is relatively short-term.
Then they misunderstand.
Quoting Wayfarer
Quoting Janus
"In Zen you don't find answers, you lose questions" -Saying
Zen isn't about finding "The One Mindset/Worldview to Rule Them All" as much as it is advertised that way. It's about getting rid of the need for such a thing and being able to live with the uncertainty you outlined.
I see attachment as something that lies underneath desire, that causes desire. Desire is more specific, or narrowly focused on specific things (money, sex, objects, etc.), whereas attachment is more abstract (life, pleasure, etc.). So we desire whatever it is we desire because it fulfills/sustains (temporarily, of course) an attachment. Starting with the most general, our attachment to life causes our attachment to pleasure, which causes our desire for things that give us pleasure. Pleasure acts as a sort of rule-of-thumb for whatever is beneficial for life, but due to the slow speed of evolution, it isn’t perfect. It operates under the premise that our ancestral environment hasn’t changed.
Regarding the second part of your quote, it could suggest many things; that the Buddha didn’t literally mean what he said, that he was imperfect, that he lied, etc.
I don't see it that way at all. The way you defined it I don't see a hard line between what counts as a "desire" and what counts as an "attachment", they both just seem to be talking abou the same thing to me. "Why are you participating in the tournament?" "Because I want to win" is that attachment or desire? How about "Because I want to be happy?" The way I use the term "attachment" is radically different from what you just outlined.
Quoting Pinprick
Sure but we're gonna have to assume that the guy coining the term "Attachment" knew what he was talking about and was not a scam artist if we are going to discuss the term in any meaningful way. It is either that you or I don't understand what he meant by attachment OR we do understand what he meant by attachment, and the Buddha was lying. I find the first much more likely considering how many people seem to find sense in what he says.
I think the Buddhist answer is that it’s our faith in the security and permanency of our day to day lives which is groundless.
It’s as hard as the line between cause and effect. Attachment causes desires.
Quoting khaled
Well, it depends on two things; whether or not wanting to win caused you to participate in the tournament, and how general/specific an answer the questioner accepts. If the questioner is looking for a sort of “first cause” the questioning would continue with “why do you want to win?” But this issue arises when determining cause and effect as well. If someone shoots me, what is my cause of death? The bullet entering my brain? The person who pulled the trigger? Me for pissing off the person that pulled the trigger? It can go on and on, but an effect is always preceded by a cause.
Quoting khaled
So how do you define it?
Quoting khaled
This is just an aside for me, but there are still plenty of other options. Translation issues, the meaning of the term could have changed in 2000 years, perhaps he didn’t fully understand what he meant. Perhaps people find sense in what he said because it is vague enough to allow people to project or insert their own concepts into it? I don’t know, and I don’t have a strong opinion one way or the other, but your conviction looks a bit more like faith than fact to me. Almost as if you consider ancient secondhand accounts of the Buddha’s teachings to be infallible or divinely inspired.
Wouldn’t permanency be a part of human perfection? If someone is only perfect for a moment, are they truly perfect?
However, I was going to say that I agree with this:
Quoting Pinprick
If believing our day to day lives are permanent is a groundless belief, then how can a sage be said to be perfect unless he is able to continuously (permanently) demonstrate his perfection? IOW’s believing someone’s state of perfection is permanent would be just as groundless a belief as the previously mentioned one. And if you try claiming that their state of perfection isn’t permanent, then I would argue they aren’t actually perfect.
Then it's a very blurry line. When ball A hits ball B did ball A cause ball B to move or did ball B cause ball A to move? Which was the cause and which was the effect? My point is that you can keep asking someone "Why do you want X" and they can keep giving answers. Are you saying the last answer in that sequence is the "attachment" and the others are the "desire"? What happens when the sequence is circular? etc. I don't see the point in making such a vague distinction. Like how does this definition help me do anything?
Quoting Pinprick
No disagreement there. Causes are iffy.
Quoting Pinprick
How big of a problem it is not to have the thing. Which I find to often be different from how much you want the thing. Sometimes you want things that you would not be distressed at not having, such as a new car or a particular christmas present (Desire without Attachment). Other times, it seems like a huge problem to not have something even though you don't really want that thing, like with smoking and gambling (Attachment without Desire).
Quoting Pinprick
Possible. But I'm not really concerned with what the Buddha said, I'm more concerned with interpreting it in a useful manner. I don't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater by declaring "Buddha was just a scam artist and all these people are dealing in mumbo jumbo". Though it is possible that that is the case, I find it unlikely.
Quoting Pinprick
I think it's reasonable to assume that there is some genuine wisdom in a tradition as old as Buddhism. If you don't that's fine, but that seems highly unlikely to me. If you don't have a strong opinion either way that's fine, neither do I. I thought you were saying that the Buddha was a scam artist, as a matter of fact, and I was challenging that idea.
Quoting Pinprick
I assure you I don't. Heck, most second hand accounts (that I read) stress NOT taking what the guy says too seriously and to instead try to figure things out yourself.
"If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him" -Famous saying
Quoting BitconnectCarlos
From a Buddhist point of view my understanding of attachment is in the sense that “ in our everyday life our thinking is ninety-nine percent self-centred. ‘Why do I have suffering? Why do I have trouble?” Shunryu Suzuki
No matter what you believe in, if you become become attached to it, “your belief will be based more or less on a self-centred idea.”
So the attachment is to the egotistical idea of the self. You won’t lose anything by non-attachment, you won’t be unable to love, to have a family or friends. It’s more than likely you’ll have more because you are open to more.
Misunderstand what?
Who has faith "in the security and permanency of our day to day lives"? No one with half a brain I'll warrant!
What the Buddha was saying. You're not supposed to become attached to the eight fold path, or the community.
:ok:
Not suffering when losing things doesn't mean you don't care about the things (or people).
Emotions, ergo, suffering, has (a) reason(s) as I outlined in my previous post. This squares quite well, in my opinion, with the fact that emotions are essentialy reactions to what I'll term as stimuli (people/events/places/time even/etc.). However, between the stimuli and the reaction, there's some processing (of the stimulus) involved and this is nothing other than rational analysis of the stimuli.
Say, for example, that you call me a liar. The word "liar" is the stimulus. The next stage of what's going to be an unpleasant experience is me taking this as an insult - you're casting aspersions on my integrity - and only after this does the emotion of sadness well up inside me and I suffer. A similar story holds for all emotions. The form of the logical argument apt for the occasion is:
1. X thinks/says/acts in a certain way about/towards me
2. If X thinks/says/acts in a certain way about/towards me then I feel sad, I suffer
Ergo,
3. I feel sad, I suffer
It must be clear to you by now that rationality is the main protagonist in this tale of human suffering but as you'll find out below this particular brand of reasoning is imperfectly rational.
However, if we're to be perfectly rational i.e. go after truths, and having acquired them, live by them then, according to the Buddha, suffering is pointless because it (suffering) has as its foundation a pernicious lie - that change doesn't occur, that what we cherish the most is immune to damage, death and decay.
I am slowly catching up in this thread post-Christmas, but I wanted to quickly comment here...
I don’t think that Buddhism advocates dampening certain things inside of you - it’s more about recognising that, as much as a parent would want their kid to live, what they want isn’t a factor in how their kid responds to treatment for childhood leukaemia. We all want our child to live, but at some point that living stops, regardless of what we want. That doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t want, but that we shouldn’t have expectations about getting what we want, as if the world owes us something for existing. Life is a negotiated collaboration with the world, not a well-worn path through a shopping aisle. Loss, lack, pain and humility are all part of the process, and we have more capacity to adjust than we think.
:up:
I would add that in Buddhist doctrine, it's not so much that we "adjust" to suffering it's more like we get rid of maladjustments. Our expectations that the world will go as we predict are tools that allow us to act but that come with a risk. For example, I expect my interenet to work flawlessly at all times, this allows me to take it as a "given", which then removes any barriers to me say, streaming a movie or playing a videogame. If I thought there was a 50% chance my internet would disconnect randomly within the next hour I would not start either of those things.
This expectation allows me to do things I otherwise wouldn't, but it comes with the cost that I suffer when the reality doesn't match the prediction. Expectations simplify tasks to allow us to act more easily, most are a maladjustment to reality. How badly they are maladjustments depends on how accurate they are and how attached we are to them. Paranoia is attachment to predictions that are completely out of whack for example.
Interesting. I can’t say that I expect my internet to work flawlessly at ALL times - I think the probability is sufficiently high, such that I would act as if I relied on it, but I’m also prepared for it to possibly NOT work on the rare occasion, for reasons beyond my understanding or capacity to prevent.
How you determine a ‘maladjustment’ is based on subjective/culturally influenced perception of value/potentiality. Complaining to the service provider when you live in a region where everyone suffers from patchy internet service could be considered a maladjustment.
Then you're not attached. That's the difference. For me I NEED it to work, it is a PROBLEM if it doesn't work. I act as if it is guaranteed to work despite rationally knowing that it is not. Ironically, I just threw a hissy fit because of internet lag right after writing that reply.
Quoting Possibility
Well, technically ALL expectations are maladjustments. My expectation that the internet will always work is a maladjustment (because I know, rationally, that there is a chance it doesn't, yet I become emotionally attached to it always working), but not the worst one in the world because my internet usually works. If I had a prepetual expectation that I am going to win in the next blackjack table however, that's a much worse maladjustment.
From what I read, Buddhism doesn't instruct you to get rid of all maladjustments/expectations. I have the expectation that my family is not going to die tomorrow. If they were to, I would be devastated (to put it lightly). Furthermore, it is possible for me to get rid of this maladjustment while still caring for them (because the two are unrelated, supposedly, I'm not 100% convinced of that but I can't put my finger on why).
And that's all they wrote. There is suffering, it is caused by maladjustments/expectations, there is a way to get rid of the suffering, and it is to get rid of the maladjustments expectations (eight fold path, among many other ways). Interestingly, there is no actual instruction to go out and get rid of your maladjustments. Maybe that's not worth it for you. I don't think I need to get rid of my expectation that my family will be alive tomorrow, not worth it where I live. Had I been in a war torn country however, maybe I should consider it. It is difficult to get rid of attachments and (supposedly) there is no downside to doing so, but maybe the difficulty is not worth it, if the expectation isn't likely to be broken, or isn't very strong.
I should probably get rid of my maladjustment in expecting my internet to work all the time though :confused:
I'm more interested in whether or not getting rid of these expectations has a downside though. The Buddhist claim is that there isn't (from what I read) or that it is always worth it or heck, that it is better to get rid of them, I'm not so sure about that. What do you think? Can someone who is prepared at any moment to see their child die love them as much as someone who would be devastated by the loss? Can an athlete who wouldn't be affected by a loss compete with the same desire to win as one who would be completely devastated if he loses a game? Etc. I think so, but it's weird to me why we would ever form these attachments in the first place then. What's the point of them? They seem to be all negatives, so I'm not so sure, sounds too good to be true.
Even if we follow the path of self realisation and self-analysis, I think that attachments are still likely to play a large part. I do believe that we can work on particular areas which we can work on, but not all the areas at once. Meditation has an a central role but do not necessarily have to aim to become sages. Of course, if becoming one occurs in the process it may be the best possibility, but if we were to seek that goal it might become a hollow attachment ideal in itself.
The Bible speaks of the beast and we can turn to Roman history and US history to understand that beast as reliance on military might to acquire essential economic resources and markets. The economy depends on the military and the military consumes more and more of the economy, forcing everyone to labor for the beast.
Rather than think in terms of this or that, we might want to think of terms of this and that. We are not logic and emotion but logic and emotion are two parts of the same thing. Life consumes and that is the reality of the beast. The beast is just much large when it is the size of Rome or the US or China. When we kill an animal it is natural to feel bad about killing, so primitive man gave thanks to the animal for giving its life so the hunter and the village may live. It is all yin and yang, a give and take, it is life.
Suppose we lived in space capsule where all our needs to sustain our body were met. How long would a person want to live in that situation knowing it would never change? Do we really want life without attachments?
That is a good question, although it is as if we are living in space capsules during this year of social isolation, with need or unmet needs. My imagined fantasy of a space capsule with all my needs met would be the chance for freedom to pursue the writing and artistic life. But I would probably still want to meet others. Nevertheless, I would prefer the space bubble to a really stressful social situation.
I would have no desire to live with no chance of experiencing life on this planet and the humanity that goes with it and you are making me ponder this as I have not done before. As I think on it, I want to run without caution into life and experience life as it is as totally and completely as I can. But also before this moment and my contrary thinking, I would chose isolation to think and write. Relating the space capsule to how we are living now, makes me so aware of how much I desire to mingle with people. I love my isolation to think and write, but it has no meaning without other people and life itself. I just have no motivation without life and people stimulating me to think and do.
Not attachments, just connections. Attachments are limitations while connections are channels for expression of our life-energies. We can connect without being attached.
The conflict between time spent alone and with others is as 'a paradox' as the Madfool would say.I grew up as an only child and often spent a lot of time by myself and was often longing to meet others. But, I have never lived alone and often crave just a bit of private space and time and have even struggled to find this even in this time of social distancing.
Probably our experiences affect our cravings. I am fed up that I cannot meet with friends or go to social events, but at the same time, as I live in overcrowded, shared accommodation I am constantly negotiating private space, even just to read and write on this site, free from intrusions from others. But, of course communication on this site is connection anyway.
The difference between attachments and connections is that in attachments, the objects and subjects we are attached to are given greater priority than (or as much as) our selves. However, in connections, we are the priority, followed by the expression we are communicating. The objects and subjects involved in the expression are just tools to facilitate the process.
*Thought I should explain myself a little.
I would say that we have to connect with others before the attachments occur. Attachments don't arise out of nowhere. They have to have some basis from which to form in the first place. It is not possible to be attached to someone without a meaningful connection.
Why go from meaningful connection to attachment? Why not maintain at meaningful connection?
What can be particularly painful is rejection, but I am not saying that we cannot rise above the surface of the suffering However, in doing so, we might form attachments which are built on the original source of pain, making the glue of these new attachments more fixed, and less flexible. Of course, in some cases the rejection may make some fearful of connections and even solitude is a form of attachment, as well as a detachment, in a strange way.
What I get from that is a failure in communication. When the appropriate meaning is not expressed then we cannot receive the proper response. This is usually the cause of the imbalance/confusion in our connections (communications/relations). Friendships, romances, family ties, etc, etc, are not more or less meaningful than other connections - they just have different meanings. There is no need for a hierarchy of meaning. Can you imagine words in the dictionary having a hierarchy of meaning? Ridiculous, right?
Each connection has its own value/significance. There is no need for comparisons and competitions.
A friendship allows us certain expressions, a romance - other expressions, family - other kinds of expressions, even acquaintances allow their respective modes and degrees of expressions. None of which need to infringe on others even when there are similarities.
The amount of time and energy we apply to any connection is dependent upon our choices and predispositions. And, instead of instigating conflicts they should reveal to us our situations (which can be altered if need be).
At the same time, I also understand that this is a complicated discussion because we've already developed systems that are biased/polarised in one way or another and galvanised them with values and significance which we are compelled to uphold (fight for). It's why we must consider the positives of attachments even when, in essence, by definition, it is the antithesis to the meaning of freedom.
Yes, I think that attachments are complicated and each person's own set of them are unique. We probably have to negotiate the right balance in all areas of life.
and caring is worth more than the pitfalls of attachment by itself. It's worthwhile to manage the intricacies of attachment instead, most important is to make sure what you're being attached to is worth your emotional investment. Next is to overcome any attachments which control you, basically, be confident in yourself and prioritise things intelligently. Best to work backwards, rather than fearing and assuming an attachment is a problem, be comfortable to see attachments as a cause of an existing problem. That's more pragmatic and efficient.
You are supposed to attach yourself to the eightfold path and the community, and given the fact that people mostly always become emotionally attached to what matters to them, the attachment is obviously going to be more than merely one of physical proximity, even if that is not the ideal (an ideal which is rarely, if ever, achieved).
So, the upshot is that Buddhism becomes, in practice of not in theory, just another of the myriad forms of attachment that people attempt to find solace and security in.
Anyway, the OP question is whether attachment is desirable or not, and my answer to that would be that people cannot live happily without caring about, that is becoming attached to, one thing, person, activity or institution or set of things, people, activities or institutions.
Is the far distant ideal state of non-attachment (vanishingly rarely if ever actually achieved) even desirable? Is it really a life of bliss, and even if it is, what value would such a live have to the human community if the blissed out sage is not politically active, but is living the life of a (wider, at least) world-renouncing guru, which most of them apparently do?
If the value is only measured in terms of the life or lives to come (after death) and if one does not accept the idea of any form of afterlife, or even if they accept the possibility, do not count it as important as the present life, what then?
I would agree that there is a problem in viewing this life from the standpoint of future lives. Even if a person believes in future ones, surely this one should be the focus, because it is the life being lived rather than imaginary ones.
Yes, that is a good point that we should not work upon attachments unless they are a problem. Personally, I have felt guilty about attachments and I have found it hard to hold onto the things to which I would like to. But, yes, if there is not a problem, why create one?
So, the focus in Buddhism and in the very idea behind non-attachment is the greater importance given to future lives where one can be further along the path if one does the right things in this life.
Yes, but the answers in between could overlap, just like some effects are also causes. I think it would be unlikely, or inaccurate, to say that someone is attached to their new car, or really any physical object or person. Attachment has more to do with the feelings that objects/people give you (joy, power, pleasure, etc.). So that might be a better way of distinguishing between them. The issue is that people often confuse the two, and will equate object X with feeling Y, when in reality there are many X’s that correspond with feeling Y. Whereas if the attachment to feeling Y were somehow eliminated, the value of all the X’s that corresponded to that feeling would greatly diminish. So the value of the various means through which one can achieve orgasm is very different for a 20 year old and an 80 year old, because one’s attachment to sex decreases, or so I’m told.
Quoting khaled
Doesn’t seem any less vague than my definition. How big enough of a problem does it take to qualify as attachment? Or what about how big a problem it is when you get something you don’t want? I was disappointed my burger had onions on it, does that mean I’m attached to onion-free burgers? On the other hand, I’m never disappointed if I get Coke, even though I prefer Pepsi; but if I’m dying of thirst, not having either is a very big problem. Does that mean I’m only attached to Coke/Pepsi sometimes, but not others?
Do you think that suffering is a 'pernicious lie' and that 'which we cherish the most is immune to damage, death and decay', because surely this contradicts the idea of impermanence.
However, I do like the idea of reason personified as 'a protagonist', although some might object to me saying 'like' because I am not sure if we are meant to be swayed by our likes, and I am perhaps following the path of attachments here, in the realm of ideas, and ignoring Reason's governing power.
I'd be wary of slipping easily between Platonic and Buddhist. Interestingly, they both have chariot analogies, but they're totally different. They also have different conceptions of the nature of reason. In Plato, 'reason' is the 'higher' faculty that it bridles the drives and the appetites - hence reason as 'the charioteer' or the highest faculty.
In the Buddhist texts, the reason given for suffering in all its forms is the reality of dependent origination, which ultimately originates with t????, 'craving' or 'thirst'. This is stated in practically every text. But in Buddhism, 'craving' has a cosmic dimension, as it's the factor driving all of existence. So the faculty which is key in Buddhism is prajna or Jñ?na, which is insight into the fact of dependent origination as it conditions each moment of existence. The goal of 'mindfulness' or meditation is to become directly aware of those processes which normally run on automatic pilot, as it were. So instead of acting out your automic and conditioned drives, you're acting from jñ?na, from wisdom, unshackled from craving.
Then how do you explain this?
Quoting Wayfarer
Where do you get the idea that you're supposed to become attached to the eightfold path and the community? You keep asserting it.
Quoting Janus
Agreed. But I thought we were talking about the theory.
Quoting Janus
I think that's wrong. Is it not possible to care about things without becoming attached? I think how much of a problem it is not to have something (attachment) is a separate thing from how much you want the thing. They just happen to coincide often.
Quoting Janus
Considering Buddhism became popularized in Japan at the same time as the samurai, I don't think the ideal of Buddhism is passivity (it depends on the school). From what I read, that's a baseless Western cliche. It comes from conflating attachment with desire, but I think they're separate things. It is possible to become attached to something you don't desire and vice versa. Detachment =/= No desire (passivity).
Quoting Janus
Many schools of Buddhism don't admit to reincarnation literally but metaphorically.
Any size at all. It's not a binary thing like "You're attached" or "You're not" it's a spectrum. I'm way more attached to my family (would be troubled at their loss) than my laptop for example.
Quoting Pinprick
More like you're attached to getting your order as expected.
Quoting Pinprick
No it means you're attached to having enough liquids to live. A reasonable expectation in the moden age.
Is it not possible to care about something without being attached to it (without it being a problem to lose it)?
Otherwise agreed.
The word “care” is a bit of a problem for me. I’m not sure what exactly it means.
Does "Want" work better? I'm basically asking: "Is it not possible to want something without it being a problem not to have it?"
Want is easier if that’s what you mean? I think it is possible to want something without it being a problem not to have it. But there’s also a difference between having something then losing it and wanting something but never getting it.
According to Plato, the human predicament, our greatest challenge, stems from our split personality so to speak - one one side we have the rational & positive passions (the noble horse) and on the other we have the irrational & negative passions (the savage horse). Plato then compares us to the charioteer of the chariot driven by these two horses; quite naturally the chariot will behave erratically because of the savage horse. This difficulty we face, our susceptibility to irrationality & negative passions, defines what I referred to as the human predicament.
The Buddha, although he makes no such analogy, epitomizes people who pay heed to the noble horse [in Plato's chariot allegory] - the rational half of Plato's dualistic take on the human psyche. The Buddha's modus operandi is to find a solid foundation for his view on life in the form of undeniable truths and then see what their logical implications are. This tactic - to build a worldview based on truths and sound reasoning - is the hallmark of rationality; it's the noble horse at peak performance.
To tell you the truth, Plato's chariot allegory can be thought of as incipient Buddhism because of how negative passions were bundled together with irrationality. All that the Buddha does is reiterate what's presupposed by Plato viz. that poor reasoning is to be blamed for negative passions. If one reasons well and reasons from truths, negative passions become something of an impossibility (to experience) for they're, as Plato thinks and the Buddha concurs, irrational (the logic is flawed or the premises are false or both).
Furthermore, our irrational & negative passions have the unwanted effect of sometimes hindering and other times overwhelming our rational & positive passions - the savage horse, sometimes for a few and all the time for most, gains the upper hand over the noble horse.
What all this boils down to is the noble horse (the rational & positive passions) lodge two complaints against the savage horse (the irrational & negative passions) viz. 1) the savage horse is an encumbrance and 2) the savage horse doesn't make sense
Quoting Wayfarer
:up: What you say here is relevant to what I said above in the post preceding this quote. I'll restate them here verbatim for clarity.
[1. What all this boils down to is the noble horse (the rational & positive passions) lodge two complaints against the savage horse (the irrational & negative passions) viz. 1) the savage horse is an encumbrance and 2) the savage horse doesn't make sense]
[2. All that the Buddha does is reiterate what's presupposed by Plato viz. that poor reasoning is to be blamed for negative passions. If one reasons well and reasons from truths, negative passions become something of an impossibility (to experience) for they're, as Plato thinks and the Buddha concurs, irrational (the logic is flawed or the premises are false or both).]
Please read my reply to JackCummins below.
Quoting Jack Cummins
Suffering is real but the Buddha's point is that we suffer when what we love is damaged, dies, and decays but that means those who suffer either didn't expect or don't want such things from happening. If we didn't expect damage, death, and decay then it means we're ignorant of a fundamental truth about the universe, impermanence; if we don't want damage, death, and decay, we're asking/demanding the impossible. In both cases, we're being irrational. This state of not wanting what we cherish to be subjected to damage, death, and decay, this entreaty for the impossible, is what's known as attachment or, as Wayfarer likes to put it, t????, 'craving' or 'thirst'
Quoting khaled
I think It's possible but only in certain contexts, the more you care, the more impossible this is.
I would say that the main point of Zen, Buddhism and gang is that it is very possible and that how much you want something doesn't have much to do with attachment. I agree with them. I can think of extremes such as smoking, where not doing it is a problem and doing it isn't even rewarding (attachment without desire). And vice versa.
I think it's really hard to evaluate to what extent it's possible. I only disagree that it's achievable in just any context, I don't think an extreme example like smoking is fair, PTSD seems more appropriate.
I really have no confidence that someone practising non-attachment even for decades really exhibits the desired trait. Not only is it hard to prove but it's not like success in these areas is required to call yourself a Buddhist. My main concern is that much like with PTSD, our control over how we think can be really quite limited in certain cases. Claiming to be able to overcome that sounds a lot like wishful thinking to me. Truly being able to overcome attachment in any context would mean overcoming a lot of what makes us human. Just being able to be okay with small things not going your way would be commendable.
I think that the biggest problem is when any group of people think that they are in a position to dictate how we should live our lives.
For better or worse, we have certain attachments and who has the right to stand as judge? Perhaps we need more people with compassionate understanding of attachments rather than philosophies which simply proclaim detachment as an end.
Agreed. I'm nowhere close to a point where I could start to consider severing all attachments so I'll answer if that's possible when I get there. If I get there. The real question (and the one in the OP) is does approaching that point have downsides? Whether or not it's possible is another matter.
Quoting Judaka
If you want to consider mourning and grief "part of what makes us human" then sure. I don't think it's significant. I don't think people who are at peace with their parents passing away are any "less human" than people who are devastated by it for example.
Buddhism doesn't proclaim detachment as a goal. The four noble truths: There is suffering, there is a cause of the suffering (attachment), there is a way to get rid of the suffering, and it is the eightfold path (roughly). Nowhere is there the instruction to follow it. If you wanna keep your attachments and your suffering go right ahead.
I am sure that Buddhism does not actually suggest detachment. I think that the problem is people interpreting in a shallow way. I think that it is unfortunate that the shallow interpretations are upheld by many, and I would intend that in my post that such misconceptions can be explored and clarified, because they are complex.
Your comment makes me think of things someone I love gave me versus something I bought for myself. If it came from someone I love, and it is damaged, broken, or stolen that is far more disturbing to me than if I bought that thing for myself. The value of the thing is the value of my relationship, and if it came from my dead mother or father, it has greater value because she will be giving me any more things.
Then there are the old books I continually refer to. Loosing some of them would a tragedy to me, but loosing books that can be replaced is just an annoyance. My life is really built around those old books and spreading that past, they are part of identity unlike the books that can be replaced. I think there is a bit of crazy in there?
Quoting Jack Cummins
About the paradox of wanting to be alone and wanting to be with others. I think it would be much harder for me to be in a situation like yours, than getting through this pandemic alone because I must, absolutely must, have that alone time to be on the forum. If I do live with others, it is tolerable if I am the head of the house, and intolerable if I am not. I have slept in places for the homeless and 3 days is my limit. By the 3rd day, I have to get away because the feeling to get away is so strong! But if it is my home, I can share it with many people as long as I have private space. I can cook and clean for everyone if it is my home that I am sharing. :roll: Now that is crazy. There is something about the position I am in, concerning the relationship to others, that is going on here?
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I am sorry that you have been homeless. In terms of attachments, having somewhere to live is about the most basic. Homeless and blindness are my worst fears.
But I would say that cooking and cleaning are skills. On a funny side, I will admit how bad I am at them and how when I try to mop I seem to make the floor dirtier than it was in the first place. Somebody told me that I use too much water. Also, I tried to run a couple of cooking groups at work and got in a terrible mess. I got cake mix on the door and the group I was leading ending up making chocolate brownies which looked more like brownie lumps, and I don't know if they were ever eaten at all.
But on a serious level, I think that the need for others, and to be alone, are both important and are real basic needs, and not just attachments. I think there is a danger of certain basic needs just being seen as attachments rather than as essential needs.
Ok, and this is a clear example of why eliminating all attachment would lead to death, right? Or do you think I could desire to drink, even if I’m not attached to being hydrated, etc.?
But all basic needs are also attachments, right? Supposing it’s possible to discard attachment altogether, these basic needs would still remain, but without any attachment you would never act on trying to fill those needs. Why would you? By eliminating attachment, you’ve also eliminated your will. You’ll get hungry for sure, but you have no reason to eat other than being attached to sustaining your life.
I have been reflecting on what you have said about suffering and impermanence and how it bears upon the whole question of attachment. What I have been thinking is that we should all realise that, in some senses, what we love will decay and die. Some of the people we love will die, as we will at some point and we will age and face inevitable loss. However, it does seem that some people have more than their fair share of loss and suffering, and I am wondering if this level of suffering goes beyond the matter of attachments.
What I am left wondering is about the extent of suffering and how far can people be pushed in the plight against attachment. Of course this is not simply a matter for philosophy as the reality is one faced in real life rather than just in writing philosophy discussions.
Personally, I think that the most ultimate forms of suffering I could be confronted with would be blindness or homelessness, as I said to Athena in response to her post.Of course, having pointed to my worst fears, I realise that it is hard to consider losses without them really happening. For all I know, I might cope with homeless and blindness, but hopefully not together, and fall apart on account of some lesser loss which I had never thought about at all.
However, thinking about attachment and life, including essentials like having a place to live, good health, sight and hearing, food, need for others and private space, I am left wondering how much can be seen as basic need and how much is about our attachment?
Being stripped back to deprivation of basic needs, such as fluids, does seem questionable indeed, but, all human beings, including those on the precipice of death, and are clinging to the basic attachment to life itself.
I have been talking about the practice, which is all that matters from a pragmatic perspective. The point is that Buddhism is as much a form of attachment as any other pursuit.
Quoting khaled
Obviously the degree of attachment is a major variable in human life. I don't see any reason to think that caring about anything would not involve some degree of attachment. Some people can let go of things easier than others. As I pointed out earlier with the quote from Orage:
Quoting Janus
Quoting khaled
Buddhism is, in principle, an entirely pacifistic religion. From the fact that some people, who lived in a country where Buddhism (along with Shinto) was a predominant religion, practiced violence, it does not follow that Buddhism advocates violence. Buddhism sees all desire as craving (Ta?h?), and craving is understood to lead to attachment (Up?d?na). The ideal in Buddhism and many other religions is to free oneself from desire entirely:
Detachment as release from desire and consequently from suffering is an important principle, or even ideal, in the Bahá?í Faith, Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Stoicism, and Taoism.
In Buddhist and Hindu religious texts the opposite concept is expressed as up?d?na, translated as "attachment". Attachment, that is the inability to practice or embrace detachment, is viewed as the main obstacle towards a serene and fulfilled life. Many other spiritual traditions identify the lack of detachment with the continuous worries and restlessness produced by desire and personal ambitions. *
* from here
On the other hand this paints a far more attractive picture of detachment. However the ideal here is that I should care for all beings no more and no less than I do for my mother, father, spouse, sibling, child or friend. For me that is not a possible, or even a desirable, ideal.
There's a sense in which modern Western culture sets out to make the world 'a safe space for ignorance'. It's a harsh saying, but I suspect it's true. We're an individualist culture - liberalism is based on the atomic individual who is the ultimate arbiter of what is 'right for me'. There are good things about that - I mean, I think I'm far better off living in Australia, than in a theocratic autocracy like Tehran. But modern culture tends to loose sight of anything beyond material goods, political freedom, and ever-increasing rates of consumption. 'What's right for me' is no longer moored to any larger purpose or cosmic sense, it's anchored mainly by screen-time.
There's actually a strong politico-economic rationale for advocating a less consumer-oriented way of life. Planet Earth is living well beyond its means. Every year, the date on which we have consumed 'one earth-year's' worth of resources moves forward (see Earth Overshoot Day). Plus all the developed economies are building up massive amounts of debt. We're facing huge environmental problems, and borrowing from future generations. But meanwhile the emerging middle-classes of India, China, and Africa are all demanding entrance into Western consumer culture.
The upshot is, the Earth simply cannot afford to maintain consumer-based liberal individualism. There's far too many people and not enough resources. I think the realisation of the meaning of that is going to forced upon us real soon now. (I recall John Michael Greer published a book on this topic called Collapse Now and Avoid the Rush.)
So - if renunciation is learning to let go of attachments, I think we're all going to be obliged to do a lot of it in the very near future. Meaning that understanding a philosophy or way of life within which this a virtue, and not mere privation, may become very important.
I think that we have a lot of work to do. The whole social questions, including problems like homelessness should not be about trying to enable the homeless person to think about being attached to basic needs. Ultimately, we are interconnected and the needs of everyone need to be addressed collectively. Perhaps it will need a shift in consciousness, and the underlying wisdom of impermanence could be a basis for this in order to address the problem of consumer based materialism.
The problem with this is that there is no "larger purpose or cosmic sense". Even if there were, it would not be obvious to everyone, and hence could not be something everyone would ever agree on.
As to people cooperating in the face of climate change and diminishing resources and social problems like poverty and homelessness etc., etc., people first would need to understand the issues, and then be prepared to cooperate with others and make the necessary sacrifices for the pragmatic purpose (nothing to do with "higher cosmic purposes) of bettering the general human condition.
Even this more modest pragmatic goal is not easy to achieve given the general skepticism of science and the spinelessness of authorities when it comes to making the hard truths known to the populace.
Edit: I didn't mean that science is skeptical, I meant that many people are skeptical of science.
Says the Secular Thought Police. :razz:
Quoting Janus
‘Beasts are driven to the pasture by blows’ ~ Heraclitus. Harsh, but true.
The problem is developing a coherent alternative to capitalism, which is not communism. I’ve been fleetingly involved in green left politics in the past but I thought it was entirely hopeless; went to a Greens Party branch meeting once, the kinds of things there were arguing about were completely unreal in my view. Nevertheless I think we’re going to be obliged to adopt a kind of ‘small is beautiful’ approach to the economy, where we all consume a lot less power and meat, and we learn cultural forms that are sustaining and sustainable. Yes, a lot of work, none of which I myself am doing at this time. :sad:
I think attachments are simply a part of life. We're attached to our families and loved ones, we're attached to our jobs (somewhat), we're attached to the things which give us comfort etc etc...Even ascetic monks are attached to their beliefs.
I don't think attachment itself is "bad," it's when the attachment turns into disruptive obsession that it negatively affects our health and well-being as well as the well-being of those around us.
I actually don't consider even Siddhartha Gautama to be 100% perfect. I mean, he did become obsessed enough in his belief that he completely abandoned his family and responsibilities. And in his journey, he tried to be nearly 100% ascetic, having just a grain of rice per day or some other ridiculous thing and he ultimately ended up with the "middle way" which allowed him to have at least some comforts.
That's a silly comment. As I said even if there were a "cosmic purpose' it could never be demonstrable. People cannot universally agree even on what is demonstrable, so a "cosmic purpose" is effectively irrelevant to the problem.
Quoting Wayfarer
If you are advocating any kind of authoritarian or theocratic regime, then you've lost my support.
Exactly. I think the two are unrelated. How much you want something and how big of a problem it is not to have are different things.
No. It becomes so for most people. That is not to say it is inherently supposed to be so or that you cannot do it properly.
Quoting Janus
Have you never wanted something yet at the same time had it not be an issue not to have that thing? I have.
Quoting Janus
I didn’t say it did.
Quoting Janus
It was a bit more than that. Some of the most famous samurai were buddhists and Taoists. And what about the whole “warrior monk” thing?
Quoting Janus
Note how it’s not translated as “desire”. Again, assuming the Buddha wasn’t failing to do the thing he was asking everyone else to do, how come he got out of bed to eat without any desire? Makes me think that maybe desire and attachment aren’t the same thing. Moreover that they’re qualitatively, not quantitatively different.
Nowhere in your quote or in the Wikipedia article is attachment and desire used interchangeably. And for good reason.
Quoting khaled
Quoting khaled
I wanted to revisit the word “care”. To “want” something is different than to “care” about something. So I’m going back to the idea of “caring” for something.
We seem to form attachments without much thought. We all do it in different ways, we find different things to be important or valuable. So attachments seem to be part of human nature, even though different cultures might have different attachments, though there are consistent attachments across all cultures, like the care for children or family.
Attachments are behind our caring, as in concerns. We develop an attachment to someone and find their care to be important to us. We buy a house for our family and care about its condition, we have children and then care about their well-being in education or developmental interests. So these attachments contribute towards a healthy strong community. Without these attachments why would we care? We might care about a famine in Africa but it’s at a very abstract level. Our level of caring seems to get weaker as it spreads out from us, because the further the subject is from us the less attachment we feel. That also seems perfectly natural. One can cope with only so much attachment otherwise each attachment would get watered down in an effort to manage all you take on.
It's not crazy, it's just a way (an attempt) to preserve certain kinds of value. If we had perfect recall (memory of thoughts, emotions, things, situations, everything about any moment) we may not feel compelled to hold on to 'things' as much as we often do. That would be because we could recreate the life-energies we value and re-experience them whenever we choose to. We would have special moments with our loved ones that never fade and always inspire. We would relive experiences, reread books, revisit places, etc, etc. However, how much forward progress would we make?
If someone only read books their whole life, what have they made of that life? If they only travelled, conducted business, interacted with people, everywhere on earth, how much of life would they have made? How much value would they be to themselves? And how much value would they be to others if they have not realised the value of their selves?
There's an analogy which can be used to show the difference between real value and illusory value. Ever thought of those guys who work at financial institutions, at which, one of their job descriptions entails counting loads of money? Perhaps this was so mostly in the past, I'm not sure now with electronic banking and such. Anyway the premise still holds. So, think of someone (long retired now) who must have handled millions maybe billions of money in such kinds of employments. In the end, that money does not appreciate his/her value financially. In that same period, it is possible for millionaires and billionaires using the services of such enterprises to never have had such money in their literal grasp. They own the money but don't need to see it to use. Others see it and handle it, but can never use it.
So, that's the fundamental difference between the ideal of a monk/yogi and that of a normal guy. One interacts with people in their everyday occupations - they think/are thought about, follow/are followed, develop feelings and opinions, etc, etc, and at the end of all that, they have done nothing to raise the value of a human (even themselves) beyond its mediocrity. Then comes a yogi who teaches that the power of the self is such that we can achieve self-control over our thoughts, emotions, bodies, actions, interactions, perceptions, imaginations, etc, etc. They teach that we can refuse to do bad to others even if they do bad to us. They teach about how materiality is not a dimension that we ought to exemplify. And so many other teachings which, if we were to learn only by experience, then a new generation of apes and monkeys would evolve to humans before we achieve anything significant.
It's like the average guy is dealing with so much thoughts, emotions, things, etc, while the monk/yogi is dealing solely with the value. And not just casually or carelessly, but as their value. Value they understand, develop, put to action.
My point is, we can philosophically delineate how attachments are important or necessary to our values but, bottom line is, we have no such values. They are values we think about, have developed emotions/feelings for, talk about, etc, etc, but we don't have them. We are the guys counting money while they're the millionaires and billionaires who own them.
If they who know the true value of a life, TEACH (not just say) that it's not worth the attachments, why argue with that?
Sure. But the question isn’t whether or not it’s possible or whether or not it’s desirable (at least that’s not what I’m interested in). The question is: does it have downsides? Is it theoretically possible to want things just as much without being affected at losing them. Buddhists would say yes, I’m not so sure.
Yea I think it's a source of a lot of confusion. People are using words that I define sharply differently interchangeably so I keep getting confused.
"Caring" seems to encompass both attachment and wanting. If I want something I "care about it" and if I see it as a problem that I don't have the thing that's also "caring about it". For example, we sometimes think of people who don't mourn the death of someone close to them as "not caring" but I don't think that's fair.
Quoting Brett
Agreed.
Quoting Brett
Until here. Sure we often form attachments to our children and family but I don't think those are necessary for us to love them. If someone's dad passes away at 80 years old peacefully in his bed and the person in question is at peace with the fact (doesn't mourn or cry) does that mean he didn't care about his dad? I don't think that's fair.
Quoting Brett
Yes, and also towards all our suffeirng. The question that I'm interested in that I keep asking everyone: Can you still keep the advantages (strong healthy community, interpersonal relationships, etc) without attachments?
Some Buddhists would say yes. Some would say no, but it's always worth it to sever the attachment anyway. I'm not so sure. I think I agree most with "yes".
Quoting khaled
Well from my point of view the attachments are behind the caring, i.e. the concern for others or community.
When Notre-Dame in Paris caught fire there was an outpouring of grief from Christians. Their attachment was probably more than just the material structure of the cathedral. But those sort of attachments to community structures or institutions are what hold a community together. In the past they took responsibility for them and maintained them. As opposed to contemporary communities that have less attachment to their community institutions and in which we see an atomising of communities.
So I don’t think we can expect healthy communities and interpersonal relationships without attachments.
Quoting khaled
From my understanding when a child is born that connection between the mother and newborn, the meeting of the eyes, is the beginning of bonding. Those woman who can’t bond for some reason find it difficult to experience the attachment that leads to care under all conditions. So, to me, attachment is the beginning of caring and one cannot happen without the other.
I’m not sure what your point is about the dying man. But attachments will probably end in some grief. Some attachments are superficial and in terms of this OP largely irrelevant. The loss of something can go from irritation to inconsolable grief.
The whole Buddhist thing, and my interest is in Zen more than anything, makes sense theoretically. One can be philosophical about losing someone, if you chose. Otherwise it’s heartbreaking. Remember the message of the Queen of England about the deaths on 9/11: “Grief is the price we pay for love.” I may be paraphrasing there.
I think you can.
Quoting Brett
Quoting Brett
So therefore if someone doesn't grieve does that mean they didn't love the person who just died? I don't think so. That's why I don't think attachments are necessary. Same with the Notre-Dame. If you are not devastated by the news of it burning down are you "less of a christian" than someone who is?
I have just read what you have written about grief, and that is a very interesting about what grief says about the attachments one has? Is it the case that those who grieve, or appear to grieve for someone who has died means that they loved them more than someone who does not?
One interesting exploration of this is the protagonist in Albert Camus in The Outsider, who goes out and has sex following the death of his mother.
I think that grief is an extremely complex subject, as it is experienced differently and expressed differently from one person to person, and in various cultures. Some people have complicated grief reactions. Grief is a big topic, but it does offer an interesting view for thinking about attachments to other human beings.
Quoting khaled
I would agree with you there. But I don’t think that means there was no attachment.
A person who has lost something may think about what they had, or what they were given, and know that nothing’s forever. They could have had an intense attachment to a person on a day to day basis and understood that what you’re given can be taken away. In that sense I go along with the idea that you should “be here now”. From my singular experience which I mentioned in a post I can see that one might be accepting of, let’s say, the grace of reality. Depending on what you think you might feel that person has gone to a better place, or is out of pain, or even that they may be standing behind you.
And no, if you are not devastated by the burning of Notre-Dame then you are not a lesser Christian, because, of course, it’s God’s work.
Edit: I don’t think attachments are necessary, I think they come with being human.
I have read 'Small is Beautiful' by Schumacher and was very impressed by it. I would love to see it put into practice but it is hard to know how this would be done in practice, but consumer materialist society is crumbling. This was happening prior to the pandemic and it is escalating and it is hard to know what will happen next, because a year ago we would have never expected the situation we are in now.
The possible harsh lessons which many of us will face is painful to think about, but let us just hope that it will bring some positive balance as well as the more grim ones. It just seems hard to predict at the moment.
I do not think attachments are the source of the problem, I think instead it's interpretation. You can be attached to something worth your emotional investment and that may or may not cause you suffering based on how you react to, essentially, change or things not going your way. If we think of a professional athlete who is accustomed to giving a good performance, gets frustrated after poor play, it's more about how to handle that frustration. If being frustrated means throwing a tempter tantrum, behaving disgracefully and lashing out at people then that's clearly going to be damaging for that person. If instead that frustration is converted into motivation and determination to give a better performance next time, then I'd say that might be even better than having an attitude of acceptance. We need to evaluate the intricacies of the emotions being evoked.
As for "what makes us human", we could change that to "what makes you, you" if it's easier. I just mean that we're not in total control of what kind of person we are and we're forced to live with what we have no ability to change. Just like it'd be easy to get over PTSD if a person could just decide to forget about that trauma but the whole issue is that they can't. Our ability to manipulate our psychology is limited and sometimes it can be exhausting to even try. That's why I believe in only trying to fix problems rather than trying to practice total non-attachment.
It is interesting that you raise the question whether the Buddha was perfect, and this raises the inevitable underlying one which is what would be the perfect human being? Would it be the ascetic way, or would it be more about caring for others? Would it involve attachments, or be free of them?
I am inclined to think that there is no perfect human being. The teachers like the Buddha and Christ are the closest possible examples. There is so much mystery around the life of Christ, including the question of whether Mary Magdalene was his partner. When you speak of the Buddha leaving his family you are suggesting that this could be seen as a fault and I am not certain of this, because I am not sure that we are obliged morally to remain with the family into which we are born.
I realise that you come from a different background from me, and the society you come from is very family orientated. I come from one in which it is common to leave the family home in early adulthood. Also, I come from a very small family. Of course, I do see it as problematic if people are abandoned in old age, but some do not have any family, especially if they had no children.
On the subject of perfection, I would point to the way in which Jung suggested that Christianity emphasised the idea of perfection and he thought that the principle of wholeness was a better ideal. He was indicating that the ascetic life could give rise to lack of balance. An integrated personality was the goal.
If it isn't possible then it wouldn't seem to matter whether it has "downsides". If it isn't desirable that would be because it has downsides. Of course it's theoretically (as in logically) possible to want things without being affected by losing, or not getting them. But I, for one, don't believe it is a real possibility. If Buddhists say yes, that is because it is an article of their faith.
It's quite common to leave your primary family (parents and siblings) here too.
What's less common is when a husband/father leaves his wife and child. I'm sure this happens as well but it isn't normal and usually we don't consider this a good thing.
Quoting Jack Cummins
I don't think it's possible to attain a perfect state since nothing is static. The environment changes and we must constantly adapt to those changes.
Kind of like how bears gorge themselves, get fat, then hibernate over the winter and emerge at an emaciated state.
Because the environment changes, being attached to any single state of being might not be a good thing.
Asceticism though might be more practical since you're getting yourself used to the bare minimum but again, if you've locked yourself into this state, you would inevitably forgo all the things that life has to offer - including relationships which are vital to us humans. You could do it of course, stay in some far off cabin/cave/street corner and watch life pass by as you stay still - like a cactus, I guess.
So, there must be a balance between our real needs (biological, social, intellectual, creative etc...), our capabilities as well as what the environment can sustain.
We must be adaptable in the face of the ever changing environment. We can't do this if we were attached to static/unsustainable states and ideals.
But on the other hand you have evidence to show it isn’t possible? Even though we know it can be approached. What is that evidence?
Quoting Janus
And you say it isn’t desirable. So what are the downsides?
The evidence for me is that I have never met anyone I could say was free of attachment. The accounts of the lives of so-called gurus I have read attest to the same conclusion. So, I think freedom from all attachment is more likely a fantasized ideal; particularly when you consider how psychology is underpinned bu neurological processes which no one can be aware of as they happen. Sure we can learn to, within limits, let things go, become less attached to things which obviously don't matter anyway, and so on.
Quoting khaled
The downside is that nothing would be more important to a person without any attachment than anything else. She would not care more about her own children than she would about any stranger, or even serial killer or pedophile. For me that would not be a desirable state; would not be something worth aspiring to.
I though we were past the point of using desire and attachment interchangeably. The way you use “care” makes it sound like if you are not saddened by the loss of the thing you don’t care about it. I don’t think that’s fair. Things are made important by how much we want them AND how much we see it as a problem not to have them or to lose them. Either works for making one thing more important than another.
Quoting Janus
Reasonable.
I don't say they are interchangeable, just that they are interdependent; you can't have one without the other.
Quoting Janus
Which is it? And I’m sure you can think of examples where you wanted things without not having them being a problem and vice versa.
It's not a matter of "which is it". Logically they could be independent, but I believe that psychologically they are interdependent. I can't prove that obviously just as no empirical theory can be proved; but that is what seems to be the case to me based on my experience.
One possible distinction which I can see between attachments and desires are that attachments may refer to the nature of our experiences of meeting desires. Loss of objects of desire may also be incurred, of course. However, that is perhaps another experience, separate from desire which may be about the fire for unquenched desires. They are connected but there are some subtle differences.