ASD and non-sectarian Buddhism

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Hello,

Here are instructions for our own approach.


"Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it.

Do not believe in traditions because they have been
handed down for many generaions.

Do not believe in anything because it is spoken
and rumored by many.

Do not believe in anything simply because it is
found written in your religious books.

Do not believe in anything merely on the
authority of your teachers and elders.

But after observation and analysis, when you find
that anything agrees with reason, and is
conductive to the good and benefit of one and all,
then accept it and live up to it."

- The Radiant Buddha -

Hello,

Here is a quote of clear intent from the Tibetan tradition.

We live in illusion
And the appearance of things.
There is a reality.
We are that reality.

When you understand this,
You see that you are nothing.
And being nothing,
You are everything,
That is all.

- Kalu Rinpoche -


Have a wonderful day!

Hello Artsung
It seems I am continuing to have difficulties following this thread due to not receiving email updates. Tell me my friend, what is your greatest challenge? What oftens threatens to come between you and your practice? Cravings, attachments?

Wishing you, and everyone on this thread well from London.

Hello.....Quaker,

Sorry for not getting back to you sooner.

A quick answer to your question, would be that I attempt to use all the experiences of my mind as the practice. My greatest challenge would be my my lack of pure vision, and the limitations of my projections.
But I think we come to know what is to be accepted and what is to be rejected.
I do not drink, I do not smoke, but I am in love with food.
I once drank, I once smoked, and I have always liked food. So there is some improvement. There is also room for more advancement.

I will try to explain.

If we live in modern society there will be many things that pop up. And if we live with ASD then there will be things that pop up and stay often too long.......

Under such conditions I think it is important to be compassionate to ourselves and loosen our ideas about maintaining what we think is, "Traditional", practice.

We can say mantra, or a positive affirmation over in our mind in our day. We can contemplate a teaching. It is said in the Buddhadharma that even to remember two sentences of the words of the Buddha, there we will find the teachings. If we are not Buddhists, per se, there's no problem, we could contemplate the meaning of loving kindness or compassion, etc. we can be creative and still practice.

One Buddhist teacher I know suggests choosing a piece of classical music that reminds you of your teachers qualities and just find a comfortable place to sit and listen, and just listen to the pure sound and its majesty, the pure nature of the sound.

When distractions arise just replace the mind on the object of the sound of music.

In practice we rewrite the relationship we have with our thoughts, emotions and sensations. Thats where we start but later we can use other methods.

In the so-called post meditiation instructions we approach our mental content with a growing sense of comfort and ease, learning to be more gentle.

As we are householders, we will live most of our lives in the post-meditation experience. Even great meditators would find it quite difficult to not spend time in the post-meditation experience. So we take both the night and day as our path, as all is an expession of our mental experience. This is not to say that mind is the creator of external phenomena. Rather it is the creator of internal phenomena, and how we experience our world.

Accordingly we should not feel that our practice is limited to sitting practice alone. Even in our dream state we can practice virtue. We just need to recognise!

We just recognise our mind and know in our heart that its present expression is momentary. In a state of constant flux. We do not need to hold on to things, with the tight grip of grasping to things, this includes ourselves and other people. In this way we can practice with confidence.
Sitting practice is good but it is not the only way to place the mind, its just a good one.

Its nice to hear from you!

Will look out for your reply!

All the very best!

Thank you art- sung.

My greatest attachment in recent years. has been to my identity as a person in the autistic spectrum.

In recent times I have seen how this was so important for me after my diagnosis, but now I feel able to let this attachment go more and mo
I now see my autism as something I have rather than something I am. I also am starting to see how diminishing it is to see my neurology as something that makes me fundamentaly different from my my non-autistic brothers and sisters.

My greatest craving (post diagnosis) had been accumulating information on Autism.........this too is waining. However, the motor of desire always tics over within me, seeking an object to clasp and devour.

When does a special intetest become an attachment?

I have found Mindfulness practice v helpful in acknowledging and accepting that which causes me to suffer as well cultivating that witch brings me joy.

Hello Quaker,

You mention an important point for us, our respective identification.

Since everything is in a state of flux, so is our identification.

I think Asperger's is the unique grouping of certain Autistic traits.

Do we have these traits before diagnosis, yes.
Do we have the same set of traits after diagnosis, yes.

We have Autism! We also have the full measure of humanity, as does everyone on the spectrum!

What can diagnosis offer us? Well possibly if offers confirmation of our traits as something that is natural to the condition. Rather than being something possibly- not natural, or belonging to another condition.

With education of the condition and its scope we come to understand ourselves and also to appreciate other people on the spectrum, for their diversity.

If look at an apple and measure it against an orange we will see difference.
If we look at the apple and measure it against an orange, according to the qualities of an orange, the apple will never measure up. Apples have their own unique qualities. Both are equally fruit.

If we measure ourselves according to a stereotype we have in our mind we will not measure up perfectly with that stereotype. But neither will other people who do not share our diagnosis. Stereotypes are just that, impressions created and thus projected, often by our unstatisfied emotional content.

If we measure the apple according to its own qualities, we find that it is inherently OK, as it is!
Its all a part of what it is!

Oranges are OK too!

Am I OK? This may arise in our personal questioning, possibly, over and over again. I know it has in mine. Actually why wouldn't it arise, given that our difference is often apparent, and this difference has, at times, been noted in our social communication with Oranges, and with other Apples.

I hope this is not too.... fruity!

With both, ease and compassion, for ourselves and others- we progress in our practice, in our experience. Gentleness flows from self-knowledge.

Any how just a few thoughts from my side.

Have a wonderful day dear friend!

And thank you for reading my post!

is any one taslking to me how can i find out

Hello Pudgy2010,

Warm welcome to the thread.

Hope to hear from you soon!

Here is a famous quote from the Indian Master Shantideva, whose name means, "Angel of Peace".

All the happiness there is in this world comes from thinking of others,
and all the suffering comes from preoccupation with ones self.

Have a nice day!

If you are reading this thread I encourage you to post!

Hope to hear from you soon!

Thank you art.sung......you are so true. By being of service to others I water my own seeds of happiness. It is for this reason I give my time to others and commit myself to peace.

Your words of wisdom are well needed here, as so many of our brothers and sisters in the spectrum suffer with depression and anxiety, because their condition can so easily become all consuming and self obsessed.

Peace to you Art.sung and peace to everyone here

Hello Quaker,

Thank you for your kind words.

We can help each other, we can all help each other.

We can remind each other that we can be positive.

Sometimes we can have social anxiety, to the point where we feel our family and friends are no longer supporting us. We could be so stuck in our stuff, that we can not leave our home or our room.

We can communicate with each other and share this communication with people who know how it feels to be on the spectrum.

We all have a voice which can be heard...........

Gandhi said something like, "Be the change you wish to seen in the world".

We can be that change.

An inspired mind is easier to work with, than an uninspired mind.

Often our special interests inspire us. We can add more related imformation to our special interests so that they start to become more well-rounded. In this way we use our ability for detail to grow into a wider perspective.

We can communicate our mind in various ways like, writting, art, music, film, photography, multimedia, etc.......

We can find amazing ways to be more inclusive.

Thank you again!

And thank you to all the people reading this post.

The weather is getting warmer now in Australia. Spring is here and the flowers are out. We have a little family of native finches which are coming to visit in the morning. One tried to fly through the window the other morning.

It must be getting colder in the UK and north America.

I have never seen snow in my life. I have often wondered what it must feel like. I can only come up with cold, but I believe the Inuit in Canada and Alaska have approx. 20 words for different types of snow.

Everyone have a wonderful day!

Hello folks,

I pray all is well with you.

In Buddhism, in general, there are two types of meditation, one is Shamtha or Calm Abiding, the other Vipashyana or Special Insight.

Calm Abiding is to rest the mind on an object or subject and stay, and to be still and rest in that stillness, that Calm.
It is both peaceful and restful. When the mind is distracted by thoughts, emotions, sensation etc. We just simply replace the mind on our object of choice or subject. Its very simple, and offers a very simple experience.

Further to Shamatha we also practice Vipashyana, or Special Insight. This insight is the knowledge of the nature of all things. "Interdepndence" or "Dependant Origination".

The most important point of any practice is to extablish a new positive relationship with our internal dialogue. The Buddhist approach is to edit the textualisation of our perception. To get beyond the construction business of the conceptual mind.
To do just this, is to do it all.

So logically we ask ourselves in our practice, what is beyond conceptual mind, what is the substratum of mind itself.

I will borrow from a high teaching of the Mahayana, in this regard.

When we, as sentient beings, see something, hear something, taste something, smell something or touch something, anything, we have a first generation experience, and then a second generation experience of our mind.

The first generation experience is the purity of awareness itself. The second generation experience then arises as a conceptual process which then qualifies this expereience.

If we were to live more in our first generation experience we would experience more of the basic purity of our minds nature, which is transparent awareness. This transparent awareness is an expanding field in our practice, our life.

Accordingly, this first generation experience, primal awareness itself, is beyond thought.

I like this view of experience as it provides a clear approach to experience itself. I have found it very helpful, personally.

Have a wonderful day! [A first and second generation experience]

All my very best to you all!

Thank you artsung.

It is generally only with my breath that I am able to anchor myself amidst the storm of restless thoughts.

I take great comfort that my thoughts do not define me, but it is my faithfulness in the practice of contemplation that is the deeper measure.

Wishing you well my friend.

Hello Quaker,

The storm of restless thoughts. I actually had a bit of a problem with them, in my practice, and in life. Then I was given teachings about the nature of thoughts themselves as being just the creative play/display of mind, and that we do not need to stop them, or slow them down, but rather enjoy the display without attaching an 'I', to the thoughts. To see the wonder of their nature even when stormy.

In this sense, "thoughts without a thinker",[ its become a bit of a catch phrase in contemporary circles ].

I believe with this information we can all go deeper. Everything is in a state of flux, especially this present state of mind. If we go to the coast and watch the pounding waves of a storm the nature of the waves still have the esstential nature of the calm water, on another day, or another time in the same day.

The deep stillness of the ocean is not changed by the current manifestation on its surface. It is still water which is fluid and blends with itself. Similarly the current thoughts of our storm are fluid-light, and blends with itself as it shares the one nature.

If we take the, 'one-nature', as our meditation we transform the present storm from within. Just like watching a storm at sea, we just watch. If we own a boat in that sea, we will feel a personal. emotional attachmnet to the storms furry. I we just offer up our attachment, then we just watch the storm for what it is.

Also as we can be distracted we can use this skillfully. When the storm is powerful, we can turn to an inspiring quote or text and keep repeating it until the storm is once again at ease.
Because everything is in a state of flux we can have confidence that it is only a matter of time, before it changes again, and again.

In the Tibetan tradition is a wonderful understanding, it comes from the original Indian tradition.

It says; "There is no difference to be found in the nature of the arisal for both ordinary beings and those who have awaken. Rather the difference is to be found in the nature of their method of liberation".

This points quite directly that we are not different in the way thoughts, etc, arise in our mind. But some sentient beings differ as to the method that they use to liberate themselves from their minds content.

So here we are talking about a method of liberation of our thoughts. This is easier to do if we see our thoughts through new eyes. Just fluid-light in nature, and when attached then associated directly with emotions as per, our socialisation and present condition.

As a further example if someone offered us honey, and our mouth is already full of it, we may not have any attachment to their offer. On another day we may wish and wish for some honey but none is to be found, then we will feel all the associated emotions that come with this.
But better still is to not have attachment to honey, nor aversion, so that if honey is offered we can have or have not, it doesn't matter anymore, its just honey, money, relationship, career, success, fame and gain. Its just what it is, nothing more and nothing less, it just is.

The play of Fluid-light. It can work for us, or work against us.

We have the power to change our mind, by changing the atmosphere of the mind. When in a storm just reach for a teaching which is a calm harbour. It is easier for us to practice and grow in our practice in safe waters, so that we give ourselves a chance to become a better swimmer, under the correct supportive conditions.

Later on, with this approach you can even swim in stormy seas. Life Savers can swim in stormy seas, Yogis can rest in their mind, so can we. Its all a matter of our approach, and its method.

Anyhow, you have reminded me of something very important, thank you!

And thank you for reading my post and writing something back.

It is raining here now and the beach is just around the corner, I can already see the waves in my mind. Because I know what they look like, I also know how they taste. I have local knowledge, similarly we can develop local knowledge of our own mind stream. We've seen the storm before, we know how it tastes. All we need to do is offer it all up and let go, and let be.

All my best to you!

Is non-sectarian Buddhism like lay Buddhism, or believing in Buddhism but not being a Buddhist, or neither?

I find Buddhism very comforting indeed. I love to meditate and feel at peace with myself, and apply wisdom and comfort to myself with quotes on Buddhism, and with meditation. I find Spirituality interesting.
I am not a Buddhist, but I do find Spirituality and Buddhist belief very comforting.