Topic: Detachment

[Endless~Knot]

Detachment does not automatically mean wisdom, but it is nonetheless, an advantage because it allows the warrior to pause momentarily to reassess situations, to reconsider positions. In order to use that extra moment consistently and correctly, however, a warrior has to struggle unyieldingly for a lifetime.
     
A warrior is someone who seeks freedom. Sadness is not freedom. We must snap out of it. Having a sense of detachment entails having a moment's pause to reassess situations.

~The Eagles Gift.

[Endless~Knot]

Of course we are going to have some attachments. I think this has to do with the unnecessary. Like I need my job, my car, my home. So i'm a little attached to those things. However trying to be detached in realizing "I own nothing in the end" is really necessary because of the nature of impermanence, and we cannot keep anything forever.

I posted an article in here from Shantideva, some of his writings, and he had a lot of disgust for the human body, maybe too much lol, but the method was to try to teach detachment to people. When we love something, we attach. But even if we hate something, we attach. So trying to have a healthy emotion regarding either people or objects is necessary, so we are not so attached to such things.

Realizing we are beings who are going to die, and we cannot take it all with us is critical. Even the Pharoahs, with all their power, could not take their riches with them, though they tried. I am not going to be able to take even my body with me when I die! So understanding we dont really own anything is critical. In the end Spirit owns it all, and we are just borrowing what we have.

[Michael]

It's good to try, and good to identify attachments, and a worthwhile aspiration. Unfortunately, we are connected to our attachments on a very deep level - too deep for our mind to have much influence over. The real task is to reach down below the surface of consciousness, and de-link on the sea-bed. This, like much else in the behaviour change agenda, is a task that needs to be set up strategically, in order to reorder our arrangement deep beneath the surface layers.

[CherryArc]

I just had a discussion today with someone about thier connections to friends and personal history, and he asked me if on the warriors path does he have to remove them. I told him if he needs the energy or wants to be free of them he can remove them, but a warrior can choose to indulge and keep a connection if he likes for whatever reason. He then went on to say that he believed that part of the reasons he has the ability to understand this was because of his connections, which I saw as a rationalisation. I called him out and told him he did not have to justify, he may keep or remove any connection he likes for whatever reason, but that the ultimate goal is to place no importance on anything more then the other, because they are all valueless, that would leave him free to have an even more intense connection. I also said if he values a connection, He should keep it, don't just destroy it for the sake of it.

[Michael]

Seems reasonable CherryArc.

[Michael]

I just had a discussion today with someone about thier connections to friends and personal history, and he asked me if on the warriors path does he have to remove them. I told him if he needs the energy or wants to be free of them he can remove them, but a warrior can choose to indulge and keep a connection if he likes for whatever reason. He then went on to say that he believed that part of the reasons he has the ability to understand this was because of his connections, which I saw as a rationalisation. I called him out and told him he did not have to justify, he may keep or remove any connection he likes for whatever reason, but that the ultimate goal is to place no importance on anything more then the other, because they are all valueless, that would leave him free to have an even more intense connection. I also said if he values a connection, He should keep it, don't just destroy it for the sake of it.

I had a few thoughts about this. You are quite right on the energy aspect, and it is also true a person dedicated to the path continues to retain certain attachments that they deem worthwhile, or just plain enjoyable. But it's not quite that way.

You see, what we take as our reference point, is death. Death means detachment from everything. Let's leave aside questions of what we may be attracted to after death, because that's a different matter. Essentially, the true path runs through the Portal of Death. This means we have to give up every attachment - there are no maybe's. It is only after the Portal of Death that detachment and the moment's pause really comes to us.

Your friend is mad to think his attachments allow him to comprehend the warrior's path. There is no way out - we have to let everything go. The question then becomes, after giving everything up, what do we want to reconnect to? That is a warrior's choice, but that choice is totally different to the connection state we are in prior to the Portal of Death. This is the sequence: first we release everything, then we reconnect from a different position. And it is that different position that makes all difference.

What we connect to after the Portal of Death is a most interesting affair. Some things simply come back to us, due to a deep underlying link. Other things we select for practical reasons, and some because that's just what we like. But these new connected items in our life have a severance at the core of our link, and they know it. This becomes a relationship of freedom.

[CherryArc]

Yeah I don't know why he said that but i told him it was unreasonable. Yes what you said makes more sense through the gate of death. break all the connections first and then reconnect the ones you value from the position of freedom. Now i just wonder if i have been through the gate of death yet. i know there have been times where i have had no connections with anything even the earth. but being at the lions gate seems more reasonable because i did recollect a dream about a gate and lions, they came out of the forest while i was in some sort of complex i then exited through a gate. When I re entered i was in a lions sort of den something you would see in a zoo. I was cautious of them many came up to me and i fed them something.

[Michael]

Dreaming of lions tends to mean you have contacted that aspect of your being - it can evolve, and it can differ considerably for everyone, and some never dream of them. But the important thing is to not seek to avoid the Portal of Death. Whether you think you have been through it or not is not significant, because it's in the cards and will come. How it comes is different for everyone - could be highly dramatic or simply a sense of complete surrender. But come it will for those who pursue truth.

Of course you can set out to look for it if you're game. But that's a different matter.