Ñāṇa wrote:socoguy78 wrote:This is the cessation of everything, including the mind. This is the place where consciousness no longer manifests, where earth, water, fire and air find no footing, where name-and-form are wholly destroyed, (DN 11,85). Emptiness. Cessation. Nibbana, The "jewel" in the heart of the lotus.
The cessation of perception and feeling is not the same as nibbāna.
I was trying to quote one of "pegembara's" post. It didn't get quoted right and now it looks like I wrote it. If you look a couple posts above the post you quoted me from you will notice pegembara writing what you quoted myself saying. I never wrote that. I AGREE the cessation of perception and feeling is NOT the same as nibbana. I believe Nibbana ocures after the cessation of perception and feeling when we see dependent origination both forwards and backwards... a 12 link cognition chain of events that happens super fast all the time in our minds. When we see dependent origination happening our bonds are released from seeing with wisdoms eye and that is Nibanna. No Fire... No more craving. The dependent origination link of craving is forever cut off stopping all links after craving from arrising in the mind. I believe that is Nibanna.
"Majjhima Nikaya- 131 Maha Kaccana and the One Single Excellent Night.
[The Maha Baccana Bhaddekaratta Sutta ]
( A lesson about the Past, Present and Future )
To begin with, the elder Maha Kaccana was teaching like this:
“Dependent on the eye, eye-forms and eye-consciousness; the meeting of the three is contact. With contact as condition, there is feeling. What one feels, one perceives. What one perceives, one craves. What one craves, one becomes mentally involved with and expands upon. With what one has mentally expanded upon as the source, habitual tendencies tinged with mental involvement beset a person with respect to the past, future and present forms cognizable ……
AND then this same pattern is repeated for each of the sense organs.
The elder then expanded and linked this with the teaching of the Process of Dependent Origination and explained to the monks how everything is conditionally dependent on the preceding condition and ceases with the cessation of that preceding condition. In respect to this, it is also true of the Past, Present, and Future.
The Maha Kaccana Bhaddekarattan Sutta from the Majjhima Nikaya is also another illustration of Venerable Maha Kaccana’s gift for explaining this pattern of cognition. Look at this little adventure the monks had.
Once, a Bhikkhu named Samiddhi approached the Buddha and requested Him to dispense the Dhaddakaratta Sutta which is in general known to all the monks. The Buddha responded by memory to all the monks.
The Buddha responded by saying:
“Let not a person revive the past
Or on the future build his hopes.
For the past has been left behind
And the future has not been reached.
Instead with insight let him see clearly
Each presently arisen state;
Let him know that and be sure of it,
Invincibly, unshakably.
Today the effort must be made;
Tomorrow death may come, who knows?
No bargain with Mortality can
Keep him and his hordes away.”
But one who dwells thus ardently
Relentlessly by day and night---
It is he (or she) the Peaceful Sage has said,
Who has one fortunate attachment.”
“One who revives the past when one recollects the eye and the forms seen in the past, dwelling upon them with desire and lust. One builds up hope on the future when one sets one’s heart to experiencing future sense objects that one has not as yet encountered. One who does not bind himself to desire and lust resulting from past memories of sensory experiences is one who does not revive the past or build up hope on the future. Similarly, one whose mind is shackled by lust to the present sense faculties and their objects is one vanquished in regard to presently arisen states, while one who is not bound by lust to the present sense faculties is called one invincible in regard to presently arisen states.”
The elder then repeated the above explanation slowly using each of the other sense bases.
So this is just to let you see that the Buddha had a real position on this.
By practicing the 4 steps of Right Effort you can begin to re-train mind through a purification process.
1. Recognize when any unwholesome mind-state arises in mind…. By the change in tension and tightness that arises as it is coming up.( At first I was really slow with this and was int othe suffering before I could stop it. But then, I began to watch more closely with good observation HOW the thoughts were arising…. And I began to see the changing tension and tightness each time it happened. So I Recognized earlier and earlier, you see, and then I let go and relaxed and smiled;
2. Release the thought, let it fall away and just be there without any attention on it, and then Relax all left over tension and tightness in mind and body… and then;
3. Bring up a wholesome mind-state; the most wholesome mind-state is to RE- SMILE and RETURN to the most wholesome mind-state there is; to your object of meditation OR, if in daily life, this means “to lovingly come back to the task at hand with a smile and putting loving kindness into it..”;
4. Then keep this wholesome state going and REPEAT this cycle as needed to repeatedly retrain mind until one day it simply lets go by itself and you LAUGH!
What’s that you say? Oh. Certainl, I almost forgot!
The PRESENT. Well, Truth be known here, there is only one thing you need to learn about the present to help guide you in this game as you retrain your mind.
“What you frequently think about, that will become the inclination of your mind!”
MN-19:6
So you see now that everything is changing all the time and you too can change. You are not trapped by this, truly you are not. As you practice this game to purify mind, not only in meditation classes, but all the time in life, you will come to see how Impermanence, Suffering, and the Impersonal nature of everything actually work.
Each time you practice Right Effort, you are building Knowledge and Vision, which actually means, ‘ knowing by seeing’. You witness how Anicca, Dukkha, and Anatta actually are for real. This was the way that the Buddha always taught. He guided you to investigate and see the true nature of everything.
I hope you will find this helpful and you will come to see that you are not helpless in this matter. You only needed some more knowledge about how to handle the retraining of mind, which, is actually perfecting the steps of RIGHT EFFORT!" What is in parentheses was written by Sister Khema, I just coppied and pasted.
Much metta! I will look for the whole 12 link dependent origination and input it in here or a different thread.
zach