Member
after reading briefly on zen,, it got me thinking. suppsedly, u do fight better with an empty mind. though, how does this apply to a real confrontation? could zen help us expunge the infamous tunnel vison? or lower the addrenaline?
hell, i have no idea since i'm no practioner of zen, yet..
keeping calm is pretty obvious in a fight though, or u could go with the sluggin aggresive attitude. hehe.
what'd u think?
“Start by doing what’s necessary, then what’s possible and suddenly, you are doing the impossible”
St. Francis of Assisi
Loud City
It keeps you from being distracted while fighting, or gardening, or shaving your head for that matter.
He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher. -- Walt Whitman
Originally Posted by David Jamieson
I crush things.
Never cough while shaving.
Different situations... Sometimes I guess it would be good to keep your cool, and it certainly makes you look like a bad mofo... But sometimes you would lose without taking the "Sh!t, you think you're crazy? You aren't sh!t" attitude, but I guess said attitude could be taken while still maintaining a fairly calm mind... More or less learning to direct the adrenaline dump would be a good thing.
Junior Member
i have ideas (like im not entirely sure you really have a choice in the matter - if someone slaps your kid sister across the face how calm you gonna be) but i tend to just listen to the guys who have been in more fights than me.
Porcorossa
I've read elsewhere that the samurai of japan took up zen becoz they were impressed with the chan monks' ability to die "well".
Maybe it appeals more to some cultures or something.
As for empty mind, thats not necessarily just a zen thing.
-Thos. Zinn
"Children, never fuss or fret
Nor let unreason'd tempers rise
Your little hands were never meant
To pluck out one anothers eyes"
-McGuffey's Reader
“We are at a crossroads. One path leads to despair and the other to total extinction. I pray I have the wisdom to choose wisely.”
ستّة أيّام يا كلب
If "autobiographical self" "drops out" and you are operating from core conciousness, this would be the best way to fight.
You wouldn't have your "self" getting in the way all the time.
Animals operate under core conciousness. They have no concept of "self" that is thinking. They are not sentient. There is no knower that knows, they simply know.
Autobiographical self is really an illusion created by core conciousness to monitor the state of the animal brain. If you can see through that illusion then you are half way there.
People talk about "going w/ the flow." It is when they are no longer monitoring their own thought processes and are completely absorbed in the activity they are doing.
This is the part of Zen that is applicable to fighting.
The other part of Zen is to temporarily eliminate core conciousness. But you would not want to fight in that state because you would have no awareness.
Junior Member
one thing i have always wondered though, if we have developed a sense of self through evolution why would it be in your best interest to tear it down?
i can claim no advanced understanding of no mind, but i have meditated here and there, and experienced some of its more trivial benifits, but still that question remains.
Porcorossa
who says it was to our collective advantage?one thing i have always wondered though, if we have developed a sense of self through evolution why would it be in your best interest to tear it down?
-Thos. Zinn
"Children, never fuss or fret
Nor let unreason'd tempers rise
Your little hands were never meant
To pluck out one anothers eyes"
-McGuffey's Reader
“We are at a crossroads. One path leads to despair and the other to total extinction. I pray I have the wisdom to choose wisely.”
ستّة أيّام يا كلب
As good as I get
"Animals operate under core conciousness. They have no concept of "self" that is thinking. They are not sentient. There is no knower that knows, they simply know.
"
To state a fun fact,we are animals.
How can anyone say that other animals than us (the last surviving species of ****) do not have any concept of self?
The sunset´s setting down.Lay me on the forest floor.
______________________________
I do not necessarily stand behind all of the statements I have made in the past, in this forum. Some of the statements may have appeared to support a biased view of reality, and may have been offensive. If you are a moral person and were hurt by comments that I made, you can PM me about it and I will apologize if I find your cause reasonable.
-FC, summer of 2006-
Registered User
"Animals operate under core conciousness. They have no concept of "self" that is thinking. They are not sentient. There is no knower that knows, they simply know."-Fu-Pow
Theoretically they fight as they do to preservr the self. themselves.
They might not have a sense of Self, But it seems standard that they act out of a sense of at least self-preservation.
Not all peoples accept the Science Database to think of cellular structure to determine if you are an animal or plant or both.
Let us not pick at the term animal. I say this relevant to the varied ways it might be used. Let us more address the intent of use when it was used.-ish perhaps
There are four lights...¼ impulse...all donations can be sent at PayPal.com to qumpreyndweth@juno.com; vurecords.com
Registered User
There are different brain circuits involved with inter- vs intra- species aggression. The latter is associated with wide-spread excitation (as in aggression for social or sexual dominance), the former is associated with wide-spread inhibition/relaxation (as in aggression for food or survival; predatory/prey reactions). Perhaps what people are talking about is cultivating the "use" of the "inter/relaxation" circuit within an intra-species self-defense context.
We can try to do this with experiments to assess things like theory of mind or identification of mirror images; or by comparitive neuroanatomy.Originally posted by former castleva
How can anyone say that other animals than us do not have any concept of self?
As good as I get
"We can try to do this with experiments to assess things like theory of mind or identification of mirror images; or by comparitive neuroanatomy."
Yes.While such experiments tend to be a bit biased IMHO.Considering that it is far too easy to presuppose a single type of conciousness.I have support for comparative neuroanatomy in this case.At least certain predictions can be made.I could name at least 4 species that pass mirror tests,as far as that goes then.
The sunset´s setting down.Lay me on the forest floor.
______________________________
I do not necessarily stand behind all of the statements I have made in the past, in this forum. Some of the statements may have appeared to support a biased view of reality, and may have been offensive. If you are a moral person and were hurt by comments that I made, you can PM me about it and I will apologize if I find your cause reasonable.
-FC, summer of 2006-
Registered User
Yeah, I've very dubious about all of these sorts of experiments that I've read. Just to say that we can try to find answers in these areas...
As good as I get
Yeah.Why not.I´m not against it.
(Surprising choise,as far as avatar/caption goes)
The sunset´s setting down.Lay me on the forest floor.
______________________________
I do not necessarily stand behind all of the statements I have made in the past, in this forum. Some of the statements may have appeared to support a biased view of reality, and may have been offensive. If you are a moral person and were hurt by comments that I made, you can PM me about it and I will apologize if I find your cause reasonable.
-FC, summer of 2006-
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Vajra
[B]one thing i have always wondered though, if we have developed a sense of self through evolution why would it be in your best interest to tear it down?
***We developed a sense of self outside of the self as a sort of homeostasis mechanism. If we feel badly then we need to have self to protect our self and remember to move us away from what is making us feel badly. Its a self-protection mechanism.
Howeewr, if you are engaged in some activity and instead of just doing it you are constantly monitoring your internal state (ie self- conciousness) while you are doing it then you slow yourself down.
For example, when you are fighting and you only have half a second to respond. You want your "whole" self involved in the action not the self that is doing and the self that is knowing.
In terms of "enlightenment" or the dissolution of the self. It is not a "tearing down" but rather a deep realization of the impermanence of the "self" even on a core level.
What's the point of it all? The buddhist's would say, to loosen the egos grip on an impernanent world and reduce suffering.
There are some really good books I'd recommend on this subject.
James Austin "Zen and the Brain"
Antonio Demasio "The feeling of what happens"
"Zen Mind, Begginners Mind" Can't remember the author
"Taoist Meditation" Thomas Cleary
"The Eight Gates of Zen" John Daido Loori
"Scholar Warrior" (Philosophy section at the back) Author?
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