I'm reading more and more about it - mainly anything written or recommended by the magnificent Sam Harris - and am tempted to give it a bash.
I have learnt that there's a fully operational monastery inhabited by actual Buddhist monks in the unlikely setting of Hemel Hempstead.
Yeah, but I'm not happy with how readily you're embracing your effete, middle-class jew identity.
Have you not considered just getting fired into substances? You can do it. In fact you'd love it. And it would be so much less demeaning than poncing around with some bald, middle class drop-out who takes 50 notes an hour off you while discussing your chakras.
Last edited by Burney; 04-13-2017 at 11:36 PM.
'Seems that I was busy doing something close to nothing
But different than the day before'
'Met a dwarf that was no good, dressed like Little Red Riding Hood'
'Now you're unemployed, all non-void
Walkin' round like you're Pretty Boy Floyd'
Monty. If you want, I'll take time out over the next few days to write you a detailed reply and pm you. But if not, please say, cos I don't want to waste the time needlessly.
I was a total atheist growing up, but got into LSD. But on my first trip to India, I saw the Dalai Lama stop the monsoon. Really. Yes, I wouldn't believe that if someone else had said it, even my best mate, but I saw it and it happened. And the other dozen of us who were only there cos the tourist bus from Leh to Menali had been stopped by a landslide killing 2-3 people saw it too. And we all looked at each other - we'd never met before we got on the bus - going WTF while the 10k Buddhist monks being initiated into the priesthood all just smiled and laughed.
Been to India over 40 times since. Spoken to uni-educated Sadhus (the chillum smoking dreadlocked meditating upper/high caste/class Brahmins) in the Kulu and Parvati valleys.
Discussed Marx with one chap - have the interview on DV tape somewhere - though some Graun reading **** on CiF told me I must be lying cos no believer in God could ever discuss philosophy.
If you want me to give you a considered reply, tell me. And I'll pm you within a week. GLW off to India for a wedding tomorrow and I'm off to Paris on Mon, but I'll do it just after if you want. If not, no probs, but just tell me so I don't waste my time.
I have no idea who this Sam Harris is but your comment to Berni - acid for fluffy Yids - is pretty much accurate. {Though it's also LSD for fluffy Buddhists like HH Dalai Lama and for hardcore, non-fluffy Hindu sadhus as well. That's its beauty. If you want I can also talk about Abrahamic meditation - why the early Catholic church hit down on mystical Christianity and why late C18th Islam onwards hit down on Sufiism. Though I know next to nothing about mystical Judaism. Prob cos I always assumed that if any Yids were in tune with the Divine, He'd have told them not to support Sperz. }
Last edited by Ganpati's Goonerz--AFC's Aboriginal Fertility Cult; 04-14-2017 at 02:22 AM.
Other than a lost weekend on hash cakes, I missed the boat on substances. Now got responsibilities, innit. Although micro-dosing could be an alternative, I suppose - a method that I believe is growing in popularity in this country.
Many of the monastery's exist exclusively through donations (money and food) so you don't have to pay them a penny, if you don't want to.
Meditation is not something I've given much thought to.