From Buddha to Jesus (the journey of Susan Lim)

[Aila]

Well, well, well … Here I would have to agree with Victor.

To add another sketch into the mix … which according to the artist embodies unity, interconnectedness & spiritual enlightenment....

Attempting to express Nonduality, I would paint the triangle with the (Central) Sun in the middle point (to illustrate the dawning of the ‘inner’ light/vision - but the All-Seeing-Eye works just as well.

Here the Cross is depicted at the centrepoint – where (when Christ enters into our awareness) - we get “checkmated” by that Trinity – so to speak:
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...l1e1Q&usqp=CAU

[Aila]

Haven’t seen a Buddhist go into psychosis like that, but I did have a workmate, who wanting to have a union with God started to feverously read the Bible 24/7 and thus stopped sleeping.

Went to visit her in the mental care facility, where she had painted her face into a grotesque mask and where she also wore very bright colors to ‘keep the demons away” …

[Loki]

Well, well, well … Here I would have to agree with Victor.

To add another sketch into the mix … which according to the artist embodies unity, interconnectedness & spiritual enlightenment....

Attempting to express Nonduality, I would paint the triangle with the (Central) Sun in the middle point (to illustrate the dawning of the ‘inner’ light/vision - but the All-Seeing-Eye works just as well.

Here the Cross is depicted at the centrepoint – where (when Christ enters into our awareness) - we get “checkmated” by that Trinity – so to speak:
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...l1e1Q&usqp=CAU

You believe in Jesus, then? You believe in his Gospel?

[Loki]

Haven’t seen a Buddhist go into psychosis like that, but I did have a workmate, who wanting to have a union with God started to feverously read the Bible 24/7 and thus stopped sleeping.

Went to visit her in the mental care facility, where she had painted her face into a grotesque mask and where she also wore very bright colors to ‘keep the demons away” …

Well it's easy to make up a story like that. It doesn't bring anything to the debate.

[catgeorge]

Then he told me, “Do not seal up the words of prophecy in this book, because the time is near. 11Let the unrighteous continue to be unrighteous, and the vile continue to be vile; let the righteous continue to practice righteousness, and the holy continue to be holy.”

12“Behold, I am coming soon, and My reward is with Me, to give to each one according to what he has done. 13I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”

14Blessed are those who wash their robes,c so that they may have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by its gates. 15But outside are the dogs, the sorcerers, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

[Aila]

Well it's easy to make up a story like that. It doesn't bring anything to the debate.

No. That was not a made-up story Loki.
I did become concerned, when she – at work, during the lunch break told me that she had not slept all night (a few nights?), because she had been reading the Bible, seeking union with God.
That she was reading the Bible didn’t worry me, only her obsessive-compulsive mental fixation …

It is so many years ago now, I can’t remember what I told her exactly, but I told her something like now that she had made the intent, prayed/wished for the communion, it is time to SURRENDER, LET GO and LET GOD.
She couldn’t do it but ….

Since I only worked there casually – the next time I went to work, others told me that she had been taken to the mental hospital, where I then visited her.
Apparently, it was not the first time she had had a psychotic episode.

*

Another person like that was doing TM-meditation and then had a mental freakout, imagining the flames of hell after him.
A kind of sun gazer psychosis.
One can, in good will throw in an image of the Sun that shines on everyone and everything equally – it is a good metaphor ….. but for an unbalanced mind anything can become a trigger really …

Maybe it is bi-polar, I don’t know … the mind just gets stuck …

*

Buddhism talks about enlightenment and studies the mind. Mind as a function however is mechanical and can only think in dualities.
The idea is not to make the mind enlightened, but to go ‘beyond the mind’, which is simple awareness really ….

About Buddhist meditation and panic attacks:

[Loki]

No. That was not a made-up story Loki.
I did become concerned, when she – at work, during the lunch break told me that she had not slept all night (a few nights?), because she had been reading the Bible, seeking union with God.
That she was reading the Bible didn’t worry me, only her obsessive-compulsive mental fixation …

It is so many years ago now, I can’t remember what I told her exactly, but I told her something like now that she had made the intent, prayed/wished for the communion, it is time to SURRENDER, LET GO and LET GOD.
She couldn’t do it but ….

Since I only worked there casually – the next time I went to work, others told me that she had been taken to the mental hospital, where I then visited her.
Apparently, it was not the first time she had had a psychotic episode.

I don't believe you, you're making this up. It's a weak attempt at slandering the Word of God, that could save your soul. Your story doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I don't have hard evidence of it, of course, but I think you are lying in order to promote the failing reputation of your Buddhist false religion.

[Aila]

I don't believe you, you're making this up. It's a weak attempt at slandering the Word of God, that could save your soul. Your story doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I don't have hard evidence of it, of course, but I think you are lying in order to promote the failing reputation of your Buddhist false religion.

I don’t believe in beliefs Loki.

Obsessive-compulsive mental fixation is not about the Word of God, Buddhism or whatever …. it is the mind trying to become it or possess it (or whatever it is, I am not a mental health expert) – but mind cannot, because mind is just an interpreter of reality – not Reality itself.

(Although I think (not sure though) that in Theravāda Buddhism the word “mind” is also used to mean “awareness”.
I would separate the 2 words however for clarification, because there is an awake quality, awareness in us that can observe the mind and its workings objectively).

The Buddhist teacher I followed said something like … that … there is no such thing as “Buddhism”. Ultimately Buddhism doesn’t exist, because Reality doesn’t have any subtle concepts in it. Reality is straight up, if it rains, it rains, rain is not a belief or any kind of “ism”.

*

Children play the ‘don’t step in the lava’ game, but it seems in OCD this mind game is played still in adulthood.


It is not that the Bible, Buddhism or Yoga are dangerous, it is the mind-games we can develop or create from our beliefs.

The more we focus on being securely saved from demons, the more strength or weight we give to the demons of and in our minds.
That is how the dual mind works, functions.

To surrender our minds. Trusting in letting go and letting God sort the whole thing out for us is important:

[Loki]

I don’t believe in beliefs Loki.

Obsessive-compulsive mental fixation is not about the Word of God, Buddhism or whatever …. it is the mind trying to become it or possess it (or whatever it is, I am not a mental health expert) – but mind cannot, because mind is just an interpreter of reality – not Reality itself.

(Although I think (not sure though) that in Theravāda Buddhism the word “mind” is also used to mean “awareness”.
I would separate the 2 words however for clarification, because there is an awake quality, awareness in us that can observe the mind and its workings objectively).

The Buddhist teacher I followed said something like … that … there is no such thing as “Buddhism”. Ultimately Buddhism doesn’t exist, because Reality doesn’t have any subtle concepts in it. Reality is straight up, if it rains, it rains, rain is not a belief or any kind of “ism”.

*

Children play the ‘don’t step in the lava’ game, but it seems in OCD this mind game is played still in adulthood.


It is not that the Bible, Buddhism or Yoga are dangerous, it is the mind-games we can develop or create from our beliefs.

The more we focus on being securely saved from demons, the more strength or weight we give to the demons of and in our minds.
That is how the dual mind works, functions.

To surrender our minds. Trusting in letting go and letting God sort the whole thing out for us is important:

Yeah, your mind tricks are not going to be very useful on that day when you will stand before Jesus Christ.

[Aila]

Through participation in this thread, I discovered another favorite priest.

It becomes rather obvious, he has studied Buddhism and done Buddhist meditational practices when you listen to him. In other words, he has used mindfulness, contemplation as a tool to observe his own mind and its patterns.

He said something like that your True Self is a prayer, when you live in conscious union with God.
Staying present to Presence.
There is no Presence if we do not learn to be present.

My own note here is that if we indeed stay present to the Presence the mind chatter naturally starts to quiet down into stillness the more we let go into that Presence.