Written by Mathew Naismith
It was said to me recently in a discussion
on the western and eastern mind that the western mind is controlling or maybe
even of no mind. Considering that the yang and yin are within each other so is
the eastern and western mind, one is never not of the other to one extent or
another, it is therefore unlikely that the western mind is of total control
and/or mindless. The following replies I gave to other people on this subject
will explain this further.
The western mind, being of the greater ego,
will of course judge someone like me stating that the western mind is mindless
is judgmentally egotistic, however, the eastern mind observes this as simply
pointing our an obvious weakness within the western mind itself. In saying
this, as the western mind has it's weaknesses, so does the eastern mind. The
difference is in that the eastern mind will acknowledge and deal with it's
weaknesses, this is different to the western mind that primarily focuses on it's
strengths while ignoring it's weaknesses.
_______________________________
Interesting
Chinwhisker, this is probably why I relate Christianity and Hinduism, in the
raw form, to be of both western and eastern mind, yin and yang, however, I only
equate Buddhism to yin, the feminine, the eastern mind.
To
me: Eastern mind = yin + feminine + of lesser ego
Western mind = yang + masculine +
of greater ego
A
balance brings peace, God's kingdom, where an imbalance brings chaos, man's
kingdom.
_______________________________
I also wrote the following reply on
questioning the bible and the mindlessness of the western mind. It was
interestingly mentioned that the western mind is of control or of no mind.
_______________________________
+Chinwhisker It's all to do with how one is conditioned to
read the bible, however, as I have found out,
prayers have been changed over time to reflect a different stance, is
the bible the same?
If
one is all ego, can we equate this to no mind? By destroying the very thing one
relies on for it's existence to feed it's ego, I would say this is of no
mind.
_______________________________
Primarily focusing on, for example,
positive thinking or love and light, is focusing on our strengths while
noticeably ignoring the weaknesses. A good example of this is of children being
abused in every way, this is ignored by positive and love and light people
because it's too negative or toxic to address. It's a weakness that is plainly
ignored. If half the people in the world spoke against this kind of abuse, a
lot of children would be saved from abuse, instead, the western mind focuses on
itself and it's own strengths, not it's own weaknesses. By ignoring these
weaknesses because they are not of love and light or positive, allows these
weaknesses to flourish, in actuality that is exactly what is presently
occurring.
I should mention here that stating Buddhism
is equated to the feminine (yin) and not also the masculine (yang) is in
reference to it's philosophies. I believe that Buddhism came about for a need
of a philosophy and an awareness to balance out life as a whole that was and
still is primarily of the masculine. Even though Buddhism is of a religion as
well as of philosophy, Buddhism wasn't meant to be followed or used in the same
way as most ideologies. I believe Buddhism should be used in conjunction with other
ideologies, not in opposition, a lot of western people following Buddhist
philosophies, in my mind, are using Buddhism in opposition to other ideologies,
not in conjunction.
It's funny to think it's the eastern part
of the western mind that observes these weaknesses as the western mind is
unable to. Consider this; can a man (yang) give birth? It's the same as the
western mind being unable to address it's weaknesses, it needs the eastern mind
to do this. Void of the eastern mind, the western mind can indeed be too
controlling and mindless by primarily focusing on the ego, the outer world
instead of the inner world or self.
_______________________________
Supplement:
I suppose the way we are looking at past lives is more
western than eastern.
At times translation between western and eastern is easy, at other times virtually impossible. I don't think everything eastern can be successfully translated into western and probably visa-versa. Language is one barrier but so is the substance or meaning. Considering that the eastern and western mind looks at things in quite a different way a lot of the times, this figures.
I was talking to a bloke fromIndia about the
bhagavad gita, he simply said it's virtually impossible to convert the bhagavad
gita to English, you lose too much of it's truer meaning. I don't think western
language has as much inner depth and meaning as eastern languages. In saying
this, I think the old English language has more depth than today's English; I'm
not sure on this though.
At times translation between western and eastern is easy, at other times virtually impossible. I don't think everything eastern can be successfully translated into western and probably visa-versa. Language is one barrier but so is the substance or meaning. Considering that the eastern and western mind looks at things in quite a different way a lot of the times, this figures.
I was talking to a bloke from
No comments:
Post a Comment