Time

[Alphamale1821]

It all depends some guys are just more "natural" then others. I was once a the guy who missed several oppurtunities in high school. But it was due to simple ignorance. When i was in school i found my friends before i found myself. The funny thing is people pointed out all my great traits(leadership, sense of humor) just to name a few. However the fact that i was skinny held me back it wasn't until i realized that it didnt matter. Once i found out about confidence over night i had finally become the person i was suppose to be and the inner guy people had been telling me for years.

I was different then the other fools who had no chance. I hung out with popular kids because you are best suited with people you are like. Yet i never found myself until senior year then i realized all the miss oppurtuities and chicks i could have ****ed. Of course high school is over and i've made up for it and it's a motivation for me today. I will never be that same guy who wasted time and didn't realize his potential.

 

[NickBe]

So going by these taoist beliefs is the person who realizes he is a blank slate better off than the masses?

What I see on earth day to day is people that are depressed, sure some people are happy from time to time but for the most part all I see is people who are depressed. However they walk around every day telling themselves that everything is ok because one day they will find love. So they go through their lives depressed searching for this false idealistic notion of love. When they find it they are on top of the world but it doesn't last, they always fall back down. So the question is do I want that? the answer is no because I have seen what it does to people. I do not want to be normal, part of the masses.

My life is not bad, I do not just eat, **** and masturbate. I do have desires to do things and when I do them I feel what I can only describe as contentment. To give up a life of doing anything I desire without fear, without worry, without care. To give up a life of freedom that most men would kill for it is not logical. To give it all up for a life of depression it is definitely not logical. So even if I could I wouldn't.

 

[jtrain 289]

lol thanx charm

 

[Charm]

So going by these taoist beliefs is the person who realizes he is a blank slate better off than the masses?

A taoist would realize that since everyone is a blank slate, some just don't realize it, he is neither better or worse than anyone else, simply more aware. Better or worse are judgements made by people from their vantage point of what they consider better or worse to mean. Is it better or worse to go to germany rather than spain? Based on your pre-conceived notions of those places, you make up your mind. A taoist realizes that all notions are illusions created by the mind, even the notion that all notions are illusions. (A paradox)

 

[NickBe]

I will pose the question to you in a different way, are these people seen as equals in society or as higher status? Being that they are more aware have they fulfilled some time of goal that Taoist society sees as attainable only by a select few?

Like a Buddhist reaching the state of nirvana?

 

[Charm]

In short the answer is yes. The goal they have reached is the ability to control their emotional attachments. Buddhism for example attempts to nullify
desire, taoism however realizes that desire in itself is not the cause of suffering but rather the emotional attachment one has to the desire. This allows them to experience emotions but not create internal suffering as a consequence of their emotions. Their awareness is essentially a complete realization and actualization that beyond physical suffering, the emotional burdens in life are a result of their emotional attachments.

At the fulfilled goal that you mentioned, they realize that all of their reality is perceived through their senses as a result of their mind, and their internal and external worlds are not seperate but actually one in the same. A person who is depressed may see the world as if everyone else is depressed or is not aware of the happiness of others because they are not aware of happiness at all due to their depressive state.

In short, in order to experience emotions, one must be willing to experience all of them (this is a matter of pure willpower, not desire). It is possible to numb yourself to emotion and to will your mind to stop experiencing them. It is also possible to activate the emotional region of the mind to a greater extent but the cost is clear: If you want to experience love, pleasure, joy, etc, you'll have to open yourself up to experiencing negative emotions as well. Because negative emotions are associated with suffering, many people choose to experience nothing in fear of suffering. However they are not aware that the internal suffering is due to the attachments they have.

The taoists however realize that whether you are experiencing positive or negative emotions, it is not the emotions themselves that cause suffering but the attachment to those emotions. If a person experiences joy, and becomes attached to it, when they are no longer joyous they will become depressed because of the attachment to that joyous state. If you can control your attachments, you can experience emotions and not create undue suffering as a result of those emotions.

That is the fulfilled goal and it is attainable only by a select few. The reason being is that a large majority of the population is not even aware that such ability of mental control is possible and of the group that is aware, few are willing to do what it takes to achieve that state.

However there is one caveat to this and that is that there is an even greater paradox looming in the distance. That paradox is: Once you have fulfilled the goal of reaching the state of being able to let go of any attachment, you must be able to let go of the attachment to that state as well. The problem people see here is that they end up where they started, a return to the beginning, you go through all that work and end up with nothing, a blank slate.

 

[rakishness]

In short the answer is yes. The goal they have reached is the ability to control their emotional attachments. Buddhism for example attempts to nullify
desire, taoism however realizes that desire in itself is not the cause of suffering but rather the emotional attachment one has to the desire. This allows them to experience emotions but not create internal suffering as a consequence of their emotions. Their awareness is essentially a complete realization and actualization that beyond physical suffering, the emotional burdens in life are a result of their emotional attachments.

At the fulfilled goal that you mentioned, they realize that all of their reality is perceived through their senses as a result of their mind, and their internal and external worlds are not seperate but actually one in the same. A person who is depressed may see the world as if everyone else is depressed or is not aware of the happiness of others because they are not aware of happiness at all due to their depressive state.

In short, in order to experience emotions, one must be willing to experience all of them (this is a matter of pure willpower, not desire). It is possible to numb yourself to emotion and to will your mind to stop experiencing them. It is also possible to activate the emotional region of the mind to a greater extent but the cost is clear: If you want to experience love, pleasure, joy, etc, you'll have to open yourself up to experiencing negative emotions as well. Because negative emotions are associated with suffering, many people choose to experience nothing in fear of suffering. However they are not aware that the internal suffering is due to the attachments they have.

The taoists however realize that whether you are experiencing positive or negative emotions, it is not the emotions themselves that cause suffering but the attachment to those emotions. If a person experiences joy, and becomes attached to it, when they are no longer joyous they will become depressed because of the attachment to that joyous state. If you can control your attachments, you can experience emotions and not create undue suffering as a result of those emotions.

That is the fulfilled goal and it is attainable only by a select few. The reason being is that a large majority of the population is not even aware that such ability of mental control is possible and of the group that is aware, few are willing to do what it takes to achieve that state.

However there is one caveat to this and that is that there is an even greater paradox looming in the distance. That paradox is: Once you have fulfilled the goal of reaching the state of being able to let go of any attachment, you must be able to let go of the attachment to that state as well. The problem people see here is that they end up where they started, a return to the beginning, you go through all that work and end up with nothing, a blank slate.

Charm,

Those words really speak to me. I have read a little about this philosophy as well as the Wu Wei . It is very interesting to me. But it is hard to achieve such a mental state. To live a life without attachments. That is very difficult. Please, if you have any more thoughts about the taoist philosophy please share. Or you can PM me if you want. Thanks