Re: Thoughts and Suffering
Posted: Mon May 21, 2018 4:37 am
We can't live without Vitakka and Vicara.Only temporarily.
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We can't live without Vitakka and Vicara.Only temporarily.
If you say thoughts contribute, then it means that thoughts are defiled already. Like when swastika is equated with nazies.one_awakening wrote: ↑Sat May 19, 2018 12:06 pm In my own practice, I have found that thoughts seem to contribute the most to suffering than any of the other five sense objects. Would this be a fair statement?
Maybe because the sound triggers your thoughts about dogs, neighbours, and our assumed right to hear only what we want to hear. Sounds can actually hurt, but they need to be very loud and on the point where it tips over into the sense door of physical feeling. Sound is an interesting one, because there is (unlike sight) little that we can do to blank it out of consciousness. But my guess is that if the "yappy dog" sound were part of background noise in a jungle or some other completely natural environment, we would soon stop paying attention; like we do with frogs, birds, crickets, and water sounds.
the irritation is through the minddoor which arises after the sensedoor...
I was thinking of DO, where craving ( and by implication, aversion ) arise in dependence upon feeling, and feeling arises in dependence upon contact via one of the sense-bases ( including mind ). So here there is aversion arising in dependence upon a mildly unpleasant feeling arising "at" the mind-base?
That sounds right to me. If you heard the same sound coming from a rescue dog while you were buried in an avalanche or somesuch, the experience would be different. The feeling arising at the mind-base would be pleasant, and probably give rise to the strongest possible craving.Dinsdale wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:16 am I was thinking of DO, where craving ( and by implication, aversion ) arise in dependence upon feeling, and feeling arises in dependence upon contact via one of the sense-bases ( including mind ). So here there is aversion arising in dependence upon a mildly unpleasant feeling arising "at" the mind-base?
That makes sense, but now I'm wondering about the distinction between physical and mental vedana. For example, isn't the first arrow in the Arrow Sutta unpleasant ( physical ) vedana?Sam Vara wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:27 amThat sounds right to me. If you heard the same sound coming from a rescue dog while you were buried in an avalanche or somesuch, the experience would be different. The feeling arising at the mind-base would be pleasant, and probably give rise to the strongest possible craving.Dinsdale wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:16 am I was thinking of DO, where craving ( and by implication, aversion ) arise in dependence upon feeling, and feeling arises in dependence upon contact via one of the sense-bases ( including mind ). So here there is aversion arising in dependence upon a mildly unpleasant feeling arising "at" the mind-base?
It is, but note robertk's point above about thoughts contributing most to suffering,Dinsdale wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:32 amThat makes sense, but now I'm wondering about the distinction between physical and mental vedana. For example, isn't the first arrow in the Arrow Sutta unpleasant ( physical ) vedana?Sam Vara wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:27 amThat sounds right to me. If you heard the same sound coming from a rescue dog while you were buried in an avalanche or somesuch, the experience would be different. The feeling arising at the mind-base would be pleasant, and probably give rise to the strongest possible craving.Dinsdale wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 8:16 am I was thinking of DO, where craving ( and by implication, aversion ) arise in dependence upon feeling, and feeling arises in dependence upon contact via one of the sense-bases ( including mind ). So here there is aversion arising in dependence upon a mildly unpleasant feeling arising "at" the mind-base?
Yappy dogs are in this vital respect different from arrows, double-handled saws, etc. The latter would appear to be far more intractable than the former.apart from moments of intense pain at the body door. The other sense doors have only neutral feeling.
Tangled in Thought
When concepts and thoughts are entertained without wisdom, the world becomes fragmented and filled with complexity. The Buddha called this tendency papanca, or “conceptual proliferation.” A simple thought like “me” gives rise to a “you.” A “this” necessitates a “that.” As conditions change, the notion of time is created. The actual flow of sense experience is ever-changing and ungraspable, but the nature of language imparts apparent solidity and “thingness” to the world. When thought and concept are thus conjoined with ignorance, it leads to grasping, proliferation, increasing complexity, and the suffering of endless “birth and death.”
The ending of papanca—nippapanca—reveals the true, undivided nature of the reality we inhabit. When the proliferating tendency of the mind ceases, even for a moment, the everpeaceful radiant heart is recognized. Papanca means “to spread out,” and the word conveys the dynamic web of thoughts and concepts that create our sense of reality. Rather than illuminating reality, papanca actually eclipses the direct seeing of what is really true. Papanca endlessly separates, and nippapanca means the cessation of that. It is a profound practice, to see through thinking and its activity of concretizing the self and the world.
https://tricycle.org/magazine/tangled-thought/
another aspect: although the feeling that arises at the ear door when sound is contacted ( vedana associated with sota vinnana) is always neutral, it ( the hearing consciousness) is still classified as vipaka (result) due to either kusala or akusala kamma. the hearing of a barking dog would be due to akusala kamma from the past - and this is inherently undesirable..
I think it depends how intrusive the sound is, though I don't have a problem at all with natural sounds like waves breaking, or wind in the trees. With the yappy dog next door, my irritation is mostly with the neighbours for not doing anything about it. The dog is quite neurotic, they tried some "doggy counselling" but they didn't see it through.