[Reference: The First Noble Truth – Dukkha]
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An unwanted condition is Dukkha per the first noble truth of Buddha. It results from ‘imperfection’, ‘impermanence’, ‘emptiness’, and ‘insubstantiality’.
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The physical and mental forces and energies in this universe are always changing. That is their inherent nature.
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What brings about unwanted condition is the desire to bring these physical and mental forces and energies into enduring forms that is enjoyable, pleasing and satisfying.
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None of the desirable forms created in this universe can endure forever. What then persists is the desire to make these forms endure.
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This desire exists in the physical and mental forces and energies themselves, out of which these forms are created.
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The center of these physical and mental forces or energies is what we know as the perception point.
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As the perception point becomes fixed with the desire for the pleasing forms, it gradually develops into a “self.”
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A tightly knotted set of desires and considerations may appear as an “identity” with a certain purpose.
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As “self” winds up into complex configuration of desires and considerations, unwanted conditions start to set in. These conditions are patterns fixed in space.
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There seems to be no way out of this condition.
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Plato started out by considering the Ethical problem. That led to the Political problem; which, in turn, led to the Psychological problem.
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Plato then came up with a solution to this Psychological problem in terms of setting up internal controls.
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These controls involved the indoctrination of people into believing in a personal God who can judge, reward or punish them.
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Plato’s solution provided the groundwork for later religions, such as, Christianity, which provides a system of faith designed to set up internal controls to make people behave properly.
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Here we see an attempt to resolve ethical, political and psychological problems by fixing desires and considerations into acceptable configurations.
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It is the fixedness of these desires and considerations that creates the unwanted condition. It doesn’t matter whether that fixedness is acceptable or not.
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Fixedness comes about when arbitrary decisions are taken during confusion. When such patterns become part of the identity they are difficult to spot.
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As part of the identity one uses fixed patterns to look at everything. The identity as a fixed pattern then becomes part of the unwanted condition.
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Resolution of unwanted condition then involves a resolution of fixed identity.
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Attempts to fix the patterns of physical and mental forces and energies into some acceptable configuration shall never lead to a resolution, because that very effort to fix them generates unwanted conditions.
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Comments
An unwanted condition could be the identity as a cult member.
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The person entered the cult to handle some confusion. The ideology of the cult helped handle that confusion by instilling a fixed pattern.
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Vin: The person entered the cult to handle some confusion. The ideology of the cult helped handle that confusion by instilling a fixed pattern.
Chris: Yes, which we call a “frame of reference.” The more completely this frame of reference is defined, the more “truth” the cult can be perceived to possess. All frames of reference are constructed mentally. All frames of reference are self-fulfilling.
. . . or entered the cult to gain some desirable quality.
Then “lack of a desirable quality” is being viewed as an unwanted condition.
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Exactly and so desired and undesired should be lumped together as a dichotomy of one type of consideration?
That seems to be correct.
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A religious ideology could generate the identity such as that of a terrorist. This would be an unwanted condition.
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. . . or generate the valence of a pious priest — equally unwanted condition. But the terrorist valence is unwanted by whom?
It is not a question of “whom”. It is a question of “consistency”. There seems to be lot of inconsistencies associated with both the “pious priest” and the “terrorist.”
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An unwanted condition seems to be associated with a fixed identity that a person has assumed to handle some confusion.
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ah, thus the sense of “going out of valence.”
We have to confront the idea that these spins and charges appear and disappear. Looking has the purpose of equalizing unequal charges to put it one way; or possibly to make adjustments to wave patterns in order to bring about unity, as in unity of power factor. One definition of unity could be harmony.
Our looking seems to bring about personal harmony, but does this harmony extend to the environment in a way that others can perceive? Is a desire for the results of this perception the reason for a trip to the “examiner” after an auditing session?
ABSOLUTE REALITY = There is nothing absolute
BASIC REALITY = Everything is in a flux.
BASIC DESIRE = To bring order
SEXUAL DESIRE = To bring order at genetic level
BASIC INCONSISTENCY = Inability to tolerate random motion.
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Good confronting.
That tells me that underlying the “fear of death” is the “fear of unknown”, and underlying that is the “inability to tolerate random motion.”
This body and the awareness through the body provides an arbitrary “stable datum”. Contemplating over the the loss of it leads to great fear with all the attendant effects on the body.
Mental figure-figure is akin to vomiting and chewing upon the same food again and again. No new nutrition or realization is being supplied.
The solution to this seems to be Buddha’s exercise #2 as described here:
MINDFULNESS IN BODILY ACTIVITIES
What may help is physical exercise as simple as walking, and being fully aware of bodies activities while doing so. In addition, taking nutritious food.
What will resolve the unwanted condition is what one inputs to mind and body. It should be new nutrition and new stimulation.
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The thought came to my mind that the above conjecture may be tested by examining the effects of sexual stimulation.
For example, it may easily be inspected what kind of neural impulses are sent to the brain with, for example, the rubbing of the tits (nipples on mammary glands), not just in humans but also in animals. One may then examine what kind of commands are sent from the brain to rest of the body as a response. One may then look for the confusion it creates at the genetic level. Probably, the parts that are most sensitive to this confusion are the sexual organs.
One needs to define the parameters by which to measure confusion at genetic level.
I think this is a very doable experiment.
No wonder many people are usually obsessed with the question, “Who am I?”
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haha, yes I can relate.
A cult member, a terrorist, or a religious fanatic may not consider their identity to be the root of their unwanted condition because it is so much stable compared to their original confusion.
But they would not be totally at ease and they would be looking for targets to blame.
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Vin: A cult member, a terrorist, or a religious fanatic may not consider their identity to be the root of their unwanted condition because it is so much stable compared to their original confusion. But they would not be totally at ease and they would be looking for targets to blame.
Chris: Yes, I have noticed this and often remarked that I have a personality type which, were I raised without hope of betterment in one of these off-the-grid locations, that I could be susceptible to recruitment for terrorist activities such as suicide missions, etc.,.
Maybe looking starts equally well with desire for a wanted condition. Wanted and unwanted seem equally motivating; seem to come from the same place but simply with opposite spin or charge from one another.
“Desire” and “wanted condition” appear to be the same thing.
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Yup.