Hrvoje Butkovic

I have recently started experimenting with panentheism in the sense that I’ve made a concerted effort to see everyone that I came into contact with as another aspect of myself. Even though my attempts thus far have been far from perfect, I have found that they have nevertheless begun to fundamentally alter my approach to relationships. For example, when I remember to apply this principle, conflict becomes nonsensical and reactive seeking of retaliation is replaced with a desire to understand and heal the other person(s).

I wanted to check whether anyone here has done something similar and what kind of results they’ve had with this.

David B

You might be lucky or you might get walked all over, in my experience.

Which I've begun to understand, I think, rather better in recent years.

You might well not think this link is a pointer, but I think it is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tit_for_tat

David B

EnHiding

I take it from more of a Buddhist perspective that once I become less concerned with a conceptual "self" the easier it is to see people as other "non-selfs" and it creates a sort of equanimity that I find reduces conflict and encourages togetherness.

So far I'm still just starting, but through meditation and awareness I'm able to apply these things and I'm becoming better acquainted with the physical (experienced world) rather than the abstract that is filtered through my sense of self.

So I guess it's closer to "one with the world" rather than "the world being one with me."

Good luck in your search.

EH

premjan

I don't know whether it is all that hard to see others as being essentially like yourself. The problem comes from the spoilers - the ones who are determined to exploit others.

adren@line

from my understanding, "oneness" is something experienced through meditation and is esoteric. After that, it can be applied to every-day life.

David B

That's sort of in tune with my experience. But...I've sort of found another way to it, that I can use in time of need.

Yeah, that's what my guru said.

Looking back, though, that side of it didn't really work

It was more like being spaced out, with a bunch of other equally (at least) spaced out people, who have all pretty much lost their critical faculties, and aren't particularly in touch with everyday life, as most people would understand the term.

David B (once again links to http://www.suggestibility.org/index.htm)

Leonard

Interesting point. I´ve thought about it and come to the conclusion that oneness is a fact, and it has to be understood intellectually.

Meditation on the other hand, I see as a way to experience that oneness. Not meditation as such, but the state which is sometimes referred to as Jhana or Samadhi (which I see as the reason to meditate in the first place).

David B

I agree, when looking at the life the universe and everything at the bottom end of reduction, oneness can be understood intellectually. To that degree, it is a fact.

But if you have one apple, and another apple, you have two apples.

I don't meditate much any more. But then, I don't see why getting a Oneness experience, in meditation, pleasant though it is, is necessarily in touch with reality.

Lot's of people tell me that the meditation I did isn't (in effect - the words used differ) that the sort of meditation I did was crap. Hmm. It was sufficiently powerful for lots of people to be impressed enough with it to devote themselves to celibacy and work, without pay, for it.

Meditation can be (but doesn't have to be) a harsh mistress.

David B

EnHiding

I'm just starting to meditate, and I do my study alone (not a lot of Buddhist temples here in east Tennessee), so I don't get the zoned out feeling or "the hippie effect". If anything meditation gets me out of my head (so to speak) and more in touch with the physical world. It may be the style I choose or my perspective on the Buddhist philosophy.

But there are a lot of kinds of meditation, and awareness is just one. I find it reduces my stress and helps me experience my body in a way other than just in my head.

But I don't imagine little gardens and look for spirit guides when I meditate. I'm trying to get closer to the ground, not God. The Buddha said that any teaching that discusses suffering and how to end it is a teaching that could be called Buddhist (horrid oversimplified paraphrase). But to each their own as they seek freedom from the cycle.

May you happy, healthy, and at peace.

EH

David B

What cycle might that be?

The only context in which I understand what you say is an implicit assertion that there is some sort of soul, apart from the brain, that gets reincarnated in some other body until it somehow escapes by not having a body any more.

Which is bollocks!

But perhaps you man it in some other sense, which has escaped me.

Please explain.

David B