Things like whether you are Buddhist by birth or by conviction, whether you live in a Buddhist majority or minority society. ā¦ Some of us feel drawn to teach the Dhamma and others of us donāt. Some know or are learning Pali. We all have different ways of giving service and bringing the Dhamma into our lives.
If you have time, and would like to share, that would be wonderful.
Thanks for greetings. I am from Poland and started meditate and practice Buddism 3 years ago after S.N.Goenka Vipassana course. I did read also his book as a first book you mention. Then turn into monastics from Theravada like a Ajahn Brahm, Ajahn Sona and lay teachers who study Early Buddism and Theravada. Also read their books and watch on yt Dhamma Talks. Also trying to start read Sutta, thatās why i am here.
I would say Iām not entirely new to the forum. I have been reading topics here and there for several years. But as Iāve started to read the suttas more systematically and begun to learn some Pali (shout out to the Open Buddhist University), I thought it would be good to have an account so that I could ask questions and better track relevant topics that were ongoing.
Iām in the US; born in the Appalachian Mountains and raised in the South. Iām trans (nonbinary) and queer; I live with my queer platonic partner who is a trans woman and also a Buddhist. The area weāre in can be a challenge as one might imagine.
I was raised in fundamentalist Christianity and converted to Paganism as a teenager (in secret). I was taught the basics of meditation by a school counselor around age 11 as a way to cope with otherwise untreated OCD. I practiced it diligently. My first introduction to Buddhism was in a comparative religion course I took while still in high school. I had such a visceral reaction to hearing the Four Noble Truths that I couldnāt get them out of my head and kept going back to Buddhist resources when I needed comfort. I started sitting with a Korean Zen group around age 19. I became chronically ill and too disabled to work around 24 which sparked a steady deepening of my practice and study of EBT specifically.
There is admittedly a part of me that feels drawn to monasticism but with my medical conditions I require a fair bit of care and can contribute little which isnāt something Iād want to put on a community. I lived for a time on a commune and know the difficulty it can cause. So Iām moving toward living in the 8 precepts for more of the time so I can deepen my practice to the ability that I can as a lay person. Iāve found them quite supportive.
As such Iām incredibly grateful for all the resources many have made available for lay people who want to study deeply. SuttaCentral, ReadingFaithfully, Open Buddhist University, and countless others have been a light and a joy for me.
Iām excited to continue reading and hopefully participating some as Iām able. Wishing all well!
ETA: The first Buddhist book I read was probably You Are Here by Thich Nhat Hanh. I still take comfort in it and reread it often.
Hi all! Iāve been lurking here for some time but just recently made an account. Iāve been practicing for about 2 years now. I think my primary focus as of late has been trying to find a good balance between study and meditation. I have a habit of procrastinating meditation and reading more than I can process. Overall Iām just trying to be more compassionate, calm, and helpful to those around me. This community seems really wonderful and full of kindhearted folks!
Itās so lovely to see so many new people who are keen to learn and discuss the suttas.
Thanks to those who introduced themselves. I hope you find this a fun, nerdy inclusive corner of the internets. Try not to be too scared by how smart some of the conversations seem. I know this scared me off for some time. Some of the best conversations are the ones where we dig into the practical application of the suttas in our lives.
Hello, I am happy to be apart of this online Sangha! I come from Chicagoland where I currently am an upÄsaka living with a wife and two children with a big backyard surrounded by a narrow strip of woods. I have been meditating for over half my life (Iām 32), but did not make real progress until I started meditating and studying with Bhante Ukkam Sa and a Burmese Sangha. In the Burmese way, I was introduced to serious study of Buddhism through the Abhidhamma. As I progressed to the Visuddhimagga, I wondered why I was delving into such analytical and structured reading when I had not read more than a few suttas. Since then, Iāve compiled a database of all suttas and have added filters to sort them by various means to determine what in an EBT, core doctrine, and likelihood of being taught by the Buddha. I am trying to discern what the Buddha taught from later Theravada additions and doctrine. I also enjoy playing guitar, piano, tending to the yard, and growing vegetables.
Hello my name is Jay, I have been practicing the Dhamma for about 2 year now, however due to moving to a city without a active Sanga, I have been trying to find a community online. I am very interested in early Buddhist texts, and have recently started the practice of reading the Majjhima Nikaya sequentially. One of my ālife projectsā is the synthetization of Buddhist and Nietzschean metaphysics, which is what motivates my study of EBTs. My formal academic background is in psychology (social and health psychology, specifically), but I am also interested philosophy of mind and science on a more armature level.
Hello everyone,
My name is Jesse and I practice Buddhism for about twenty years now. I live in the Netherlands. I started in the tradtion of Mahasi Sayadaw, and then went on in the Thai Forest Tradition. Currently Iām in contact with the Samatha Trust in the UK.
I have studied Latin and Greek, learned Sanskrit and Pali, so I love reading and interpreting ancient textās. Beside my meditation practice I study the Pali suttaās, and thatās how I came to Sutta Central.
I would think a Buddhist commentary on Nietzschean metaphysics, on where it falls short etc, would be more to the right view. To attempt an equal mix of them, is to risk bending the right view in Buddhism to wrong view. Anyway, may your faith increase to the point where you see it as I see it, that Buddhist metaphysics is superior to other philosophies.
With all due respect, I find the comment āBuddhist metaphysics is superior to other philosophiesā to be unnecessarily disrespectful to non-Buddhist traditions. Philosophical traditions are not sports players that can āsuperiorā in a simplistic matter. Rather, they paint different pictures of reality, based on different perspectives, focusing on different aspect of reality. What would you think if I were to say āThe Budhha thought is clearly inferior to Leibniz, because the Buddha did not invent calculusā? I would speculate, that you would think me a fool! The Buddha was no mathematician, and never claimed to be one, so itās not wise to judge him on the standards of one. The same goes for non-Buddhist, it is reductive and dogmatic to just lump all of them into āwrong viewā.
Another point, what āBuddhist metaphysicsā are the superior to other philosophies? Many schools of Buddhism have radically differing metaphysical views, I would even claim, some share more with Nietzsche than they do with other Buddhist schools!
I hope your practice leads you to more intellectual flexibility.
Welcome Jay @Nietzschean_Buddhist and @Jesse! Hope you find some interesting discussions to join here, it sounds like you both have rich experiences to contribute from
