I DON'T love you! (video)

Amber Larson, Dhr. Seven, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly

One of the funniest British cult classic movies ever made on religion -- Bedazzled -- with a tip of the hat to Zen Master Lee Kwai Quach (Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Raquel Welch)

I'm not in love. I won't be sunk, attached, hopelessly clinging. And yet, somehow, I'm still not free.

Where is my liberation, my enlightenment, my experience of nirvana?

Isn't detachment the key? Isn't indifference, callousness, withdrawal, and aloofness the key?

No, if craving (thirst, grasping for, and clinging) is the problem, simply turning our backs is not at all the solution.

• I'm in love! (love addiction)
• The Affection Sutra
• VIDEO: I'm in love! ("West Coast") 

The reason one withdraws is to draw out the thorn in one's heart. Physical seclusion is not the Way, not the answer, not the solution. At best it is a vital aid to the real thing -- mental withdrawal. But the mind/heart needs something to draw into, to be absorbed by. That's why the meditative absorptions (Pali jhanas, Sanskirt dhyanas, Japanese zens, Chinese chans) are so important.

But I thought shaving my head and not looking at or talking to anybody -- or being looked at or talked to by anybody -- was the Way!

Superficial stays superficial. A saffron robe does not a Buddhist monastic make.

Well, then, what? Shave the eyebrows, too? Get a mantra tattoo? Call my significant other "Boo"?

That and more will never do! The problem is not without; the problem is within. The question is sometimes asked, Do beautiful objects -- alluring, pleasing, attractive, and charming -- cause attachment, or is it the beholder?

Himalayan Theravada monastic experience (sayalaysusila.net)

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Himalayan Ladakh (SylvainBrajeul/flickr)

The answer is obvious if one thinks for a moment. Although it feels like objects (people, songs, entities, foods, flavors, scents, art, etc.) get a hold on us, it cannot be the objects because fully-enlightened beings utterly freed by insight of all clinginess and attachment perceive and experience beautiful objects just like we do. Sayalay Susila (sayalaysusila.net) points out that if object actually had the power they seem to have over us, there would be no release. But because it is us -- our dependently arisen attraction, aversion, and delusion -- then it is possible to become completely free. We are not at the mercy of the Sensual Sphere (Kama Loka), not even the Subtle Sphere (Rupa Loka) or the Immaterial Sphere (Arupa Loka).

It is our job, if we wish to undertake it, to make an end of suffering. Suffering will never end by itself. It may take a break or be delayed, but it is coming back. It is the nature of things that certain action produce painful results. It cannot be otherwise. Until we free ourselves of this karmic round of endless rebirth and disappointment, we can be sure disappointment (dukkha) is on its way.

Rooftop of the World: Puebloan Peoples, Spituk Monastery, Himalayas (Skaman306/flickr)

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(Sylvain Claire/sc-pictures/flickr.com)

We say, "Okay, we'll bare it. It's worth it to experience more pleasure. But this is exactly the trap. We gain no satisfaction. We keep wandering on and on and on trying to break even, like hopeless gamblers, always meeting with disaster, never remembering that we consciously made this bargain.
 
"It is because of not seeing this truth -- the dependently originated nature of things -- that not only us but the Bodhisattva (Buddha-to-be) wandered endlessly for aeons in plane after plane of existence," miserable and exalted, obscure and famous, weeping and laughing, sunk in ignorance and delusion, chasing after pleasant experience, running from misery, ensnared by lust, bitten by hate and frustration, utterly confused and defeated by ignorance, which is the greatest ill of all. And now that we have time to meditate, time to study, time to and talent enough to ask questions and understand, what do we do instead? Search for love, fulfillment by personal relationships, as if we had NOTHING HIGHER TO LIVE FOR.

What are we waiting for? For reality to change? For a better teacher -- like Marshall or Maitreya -- to come along offering us everything, our defilements and enlightenment at the same time? Mahayana already does that. Hey, have sex. But have tantric sex, and enlightenment's included. Hey, have wealth. But have humility, and enlightenment's included. You're already enlightened, so relax! Blah blah blah, meanwhile the wheel of suffering grinds on in very subtle and very overt ways. Liberation is available right now. It won't happen by itself. It would've if it could've. Buddhas are guides:

"By ourselves is harm done.

By ourselves is harm left undone.

Benefit and harm depend on us."

"No one saves us but ourselves,

No one can and no one may;

We ourselves must tread the Path;

Buddhas only point the Way!"

• QUESTION: "We aren't supposed to want love? Should I live alone for the rest of my life? I am new to this blog. Please forgive me if you have answered this question."

This is a great question. The conundrum arises from assumptions. What do we mean by "love"? Universal altruism, loving-kindness (metta), compassion (karuna), unselfish joy (mudita), and impartiality (upekkha)? These are five expressions of love that ancient Indians (Pali/Sanskrit) and Greeks (agape, "unconditional love," etc.) had a better grasp of than we do...

Yeti: Hunt for the Buddhist Wildman (video)

Pfc. Sandoval, Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly; National Geographic; Bhutanese guides; Nepalese Sherpas; Telegraph.co.uk; Arthur C. Clarke; Sasquatch Central

(National Geographic) "Yeti: Hunt for the Wildman"

  

The Yeti or Migoi (BhutanCanada.org)

In our search for apemen, other species of humans, human-hybrids, and cryptoids, Western researchers get more than they bargained for -- the preserved body of a Yeti [Migoi, pronounced meh-goor, a Yakṣī (यक्षी)] in Buddhist Bhutan. What is a Yeti to the Bhutanese, inhabitants of the world's last Himalayan Buddhist kingdom? A Nat Geo team of investigators went looking for concrete evidence "like DNA," says Oxford's Dr. Bryan Sykes. Strange tissue so far recovered turned out to be a subspecies of brown bear never before seen. Of course, that sample does not explain the five-toed, clawless footprints and the many eyewitness accounts of something that is much more than a bear. Bhutanese Vajrayana Buddhists call them "demons" (rakshasas) and consider Yetis killers. As a result more than one has been killed, and their remains are kept as cautionary relics, 100% proof for locals who fear them alive.

Nat Geo goes to Buddhist Bhutan

Mark Evans with cast of Bigfoot print (NG)

But wait. Nat Geo now believes in the firm scientific basis for Yeti? Yes, but to please the powers that be, the question has been shifted to, Is it a type of officially extinct bear? To find out for sure, Nat Geo sent Mark Evans and a team to the spectacular Himalayas. They went in search of the legend and discovered that Yeti creatures are deeply embedded in local legend. Meanwhile, Oxford Professor Bryan Sykes had some extraordinary samples to test: hairs from a Nazi Yeti killed in Tibet in the 1930's, samples from a Tengmo (the Yeti of Ladakh, in Buddhist India) shot in the early 1970's, and a mystery hair collected in Bhutan in 2001. When Prof. Sykes reveals the results, they are surprising, and could potentially identify the biological identity behind the Yeti legend. More
 
The World's Missing Apemen

(MW) "Hunt for the World's Missing Apemen" with Arthur C. Clarke from Buddhist Sri Lanka

  

Bigfoot corpse (Rick Dyer)

This classic episode of Mysterious World is a lively documentary investigating evidence for the Himalayan Buddhists'  Yeti and the North American "Bigfoot" (Sasquatch). Lester Davies talks about finding Yeti footprints that lead from snow, across water, to snow on the other bank. Davies estimates the Yeti to be 840 lbs. (60 stone) and 8 feet tall, for it crossed the waterway by simply stepping out onto two legs after having been in frigid water in which Davies sank down to his armpits. Dr. Grover Krantz, an anthropologist at Oregon State University, tracks Sasquatch. The academic is attempting to kill a single specimen for science after carefully studying footprint evidence and sightings by reputable witnesses.
  

In 2013 Oxford scientist Dr. Bryan Sykes reported on his DNA analysis of samples.

  
"Yeti lives"! Abominable Snowman still roams the Himalayas
Telegraph.co.uk

Some Yetis are brute cannibals (yakshis)

Research by an University of Oxford scientist has found a genetic match between an ancient polar bear and samples said to come from the Yeti -- suggesting the creature known as the "Abominable Snowman" is definitely still living in the Himalayas. More


 

Man-bears are humans not bears (wired.com)

But the word for "bear" is widely used for black bears in lower altitudes, brown bears in higher altitudes, the Wildman (Migoi) or "man-bear," and also the Mitchim. This use of the general word "bear" does not limit it to our Western nomenclature or classification system. There are human creatures that are not bears, ogres who are much bigger with human features, conical heads, chimp noses and otherwise bare human faces, with bodies covered in hair. They have their own language and calls, which ordinary humans are incapable of making.

Woman found who lives with Yeti

This woman lived with a giant Yeti (NatGeo)

Moreover, Sarah Seymour of the Nat Geo Team found a woman who for six years periodically lived with a Migoi or "Abominable Snowman." Villagers searched for her but could not find her because the creature hid her in a cave. She would go missing for days at a time in the wilderness, where she was unable to fend for herself, yet she would return in perfect condition each time. She claims the creature she stayed with would bring and give her whatever she wanted. (This is exactly like the Buddhist sutra where the Buddha interacted with the Yakkha Alavaka, a Yeti, who had language, preternatural strength and powers, as well as human wives and was called a "cannibal" because of its penchant for eating humans). It is no bear, and she would gladly return to it now to sleep with it in its cave, but the villagers would worry and search for her if she did. It did not harm her and may even, one imagines, have mated with her.

What is the human creature the locals see?

There is a school in Buddhist Sri Lanka named Visakha Vidyalaya. Its motto comes from the Alavaka Sutra. When this creature first confronted the Buddha, he threatened to kill him. The ogre said he would utterly destroy him unless the Buddha correctly answered its questions. One of the questions was, "How is one cleansed?" (Kathansu Parisujjhati?) to which the Buddha replied, "By wisdom is one cleansed" (Paññaya parisujjhati).

• PHOTO: American shares photo of Bigfoot killed a year ago after luring it with pork; DNA tests performed (Daily Mail)