12 upvotes, 2 direct replies (showing 2)
View submission: Experience of duality and self during meditation
This is an experience of delusion based on inexperience and lack of wisdom. The five skandhas are body, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. These things you perceive as a self willing these things to happen are also conditioned and subject to arising and ceasing and inherently have no self.
This self you felt that you experienced is based on your experiences throughout your life and is completely different from one moment to the next. It is easy to see that there is no "core self". The conditions in this life that have led to the conventional self you currently experience are also due to past karma, as this is what led you to be born into the life you have now.
When it is said that you experience things yourself, it is meant that if one has a proper understanding of the Dharma, the things that are taught are always replicable and can be experientially verified. If one has received wrong teachings, it is very easy to have an experience based on delusion that appears to be something it is not.
You mention Sam Harris which leads me to believe that you are following western non-buddhist grifters. If you want to make even a millimeter of progress, you must have a willingness to follow authentic monastic teachers who live the Right Dharma and attain the fruition of the path.
The only way to make any progress at all in Buddhism is to leave all preconceived notions at the door, be open to listening to legitimate monastic teachers, and to leave pride and ego at the door.
The first point of the Noble Eightfold Path is Right View. Without Right View, refuge in Buddha Dharma and Sangha, which is belief in what the Buddha taught, the only thing you will achieve from meditation is delusion.
Following the Right Buddhadharma leads to the attainment of buddhahood. Following the dharma of maras leads to nothing but the hells.
Comment by htgrower at 18/02/2025 at 06:36 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Honestly Sam Harris isn’t a bad entry point for Buddhism, in his book waking up he mainly talks about his experience with dzogchen and why he prefers that school. OP says his experience was specifically anti-Sam Harris, as Sam Harris is consistent in his views on the illusory nature of the self. Sam Harris is not a Buddhist, of course, but his insight into meditation is largely inspired by and in agreement with the Buddhist outlook. Agree with him or not, he’s a legit neuroscientist and public intellectual, not a grifter. And I’m not a fan of his, though I did enjoy his book and know multiple people who came to Buddhism through it.
Comment by DivineConnection at 17/02/2025 at 09:34 UTC
-1 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I dont think he has to follow "monastic teachers" there are plenty of lay teachers who are very wise, I think your biases are coming through in telling him that.