dharmacorps wrote: ↑Sat Mar 03, 2018 8:14 pmSelf-imposed public humiliation doesn't seem especially skillful.
And it's an
anonymous self-imposed public humiliation at that. Which is lightyears away from a confession that actually matters.
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perkele wrote: ↑Sun Mar 04, 2018 5:32 pmWhy should it be good for monks to confess their mistakes and moral lapses but not for laypeople?
Of course it makes sense to confess: when and to whom it matters.
As the passage you provide says:
MN 61 wrote:"Having done a bodily action, you should reflect on it: 'This bodily action I have done — did it lead to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both? Was it an unskillful bodily action, with painful consequences, painful results?' If, on reflection, you know that it led to self-affliction, to the affliction of others, or to both; it was an unskillful bodily action with painful consequences, painful results, then you should
confess it, reveal it, lay it open to the Teacher or to a knowledgeable companion in the holy life. Having confessed it... you should exercise restraint in the future. But if on reflection you know that it did not lead to affliction... it was a skillful bodily action with pleasant consequences, pleasant results, then you should stay mentally refreshed & joyful, training day & night in skillful mental qualities.
The passage says to confess
to the Teacher or to a knowledgeable companion in the holy life. It doesn't say to confess to strangers.
binocular wrote: ↑Sat Mar 03, 2018 6:47 pmNwad wrote: ↑Sat Mar 03, 2018 6:02 amWhat do you think ?
That this is a form of attention-seeking. Bragging with one's less than virtuous behavior so as to come across as virtuous. As if to say, "See, I did some shitty thing, but now that I'm telling ya'll about it, that makes me such a good person!"
Honi soit qui mal y pense. Why suspect the worst possible motives from the outset of people who might use such a forum?
When there already exists a history of a particular type of behavior, it's not mere bad-faithed speculation anymore to view particular things with suspicion or disapproval.
binocular wrote: ↑Sat Mar 03, 2018 6:47 pmNot everyone needs to know about the less than noble things one has done. There is a place and time for confession, and it's with people one considers admirable friends. Not a bunch of mostly strangers on the internet, many of whom could unnecessarily have their doubts proliferated after reading such confessions.
I agree with your first sentence here, half agree with the second. But the last half-sentence does not make any sense to me. How and why do you think that people could have "their doubts proliferated" by reading about someone admitting to having done something wrong and opening a topic to talk about it here? Maybe I could understand it if you would clarfiy what you are imagining here.
Simply that reading about other people's transgressions can lead some people to have more doubts about the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Sangha then they had before.
From
another thread:
binocular wrote: ↑Wed Feb 21, 2018 10:46 amYou don't have to deal with them. The slower ones naturally get left behind by the faster ones.
In other words, as per my interpretation and applied to this topic: Those who would use such a forum for senseless self-flaggelation and attention-seeking would eventually learn to let it be and not get much out of it anyway. So why care?
No, that's not what I meant by what you quoted from me. I meant that those who actually are capable of walking faster don't feel bothered by those who are slower. In that conversation where this is from, the other poster was complaining about all those less than advanced people and how burdensome they are to the more advanced. To which I commented that the truly advanced aren't bothered by the less advanced, because they simply leave them far behind.
But why not accommodate for the possibility? I think that for enough people this forum here would be a natural place to go to when looking for "a knowledgeable companion in the holy life" (and even lay life), as per the advice in MN 61, even if that is only "a bunch of mostly strangers on the internet".
I think one has to make that accomodation oneself, by actually establishing some kind of relationship with particular other people, one where the friendship in "admirable friendship" isn't just a formality.
+1 for "confessions and seeking advice" or "sensitive issues" Sila sub-forum.
There already is something similar in place here anyway, it's part of the culture of this forum that people frequently post confessions and ask for advice.
Anyway, this opposition is looking more intense than it actually is, simply because stances get artificially polarized in a debate. By all means, confess, even more than already, let's see what happens!