DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - Breaking free from Rebirth... Why would you want to?

**evennyNiz** · 03-07-2011, 03:57 PM

Since we are not-self

Good question.

I'm possibly the only Buddhist who would say that it's better to proceed with the assumption that self exists. In doing so we allow ourselves the opportunity of honestly investigating what is there.

If we proceed from the point of view that we are not-self, then we run the risk of it becoming a philosophical stance without any experiential element.

This matters because theory (even if correct) is no match for the power of self in all it's glory. If we can discover what is at work behind the process, we can discover what the opposite of this process is - ie unbinding.

Without at least glimpsing this, how can anybody answer these questions for themselves in a convincing way?:
Would breaking free from rebirth not just mean that we cease to exist? Is living a suffering life still not better than not living at all? Namaste
kris

03-07-2011, 03:57 PM	#12
evennyNiz Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 548 Senior Member	Since we are not-self Good question. I'm possibly the only Buddhist who would say that it's better to proceed with the assumption that self exists. In doing so we allow ourselves the opportunity of honestly investigating what is there. If we proceed from the point of view that we are not-self, then we run the risk of it becoming a philosophical stance without any experiential element. This matters because theory (even if correct) is no match for the power of self in all it's glory. If we can discover what is at work behind the process, we can discover what the opposite of this process is - ie unbinding. Without at least glimpsing this, how can anybody answer these questions for themselves in a convincing way?: Would breaking free from rebirth not just mean that we cease to exist? Is living a suffering life still not better than not living at all? Namaste kris
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