Soul mate
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Do buddists believe in soulmate or the right one for you? I have always wondered if there is a soul mate for everyone. I used to think that everything in nature exists in pairs to make it complete. Male and female. New life will only be created when male and female merge as one. Light and darkness. Light will only exist when there is shadows or darkness. Good and evil. Good will only exist if there is bad to show a contrast. Happy and sad. One will not know what happiness is when one has not experienced sadness. Yin and yang. And the list goes on.... Will someone be kind enough to enlighten me?
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My master answered a similar question before which I read some years ago, but I just can't find it at the moment.Originally posted by snowstar:Do buddists believe in soulmate or the right one for you? I have always wondered if there is a soul mate for everyone. I used to think that everything in nature exists in pairs to make it complete. Male and female. New life will only be created when male and female merge as one. Light and darkness. Light will only exist when there is shadows or darkness. Good and evil. Good will only exist if there is bad to show a contrast. Happy and sad. One will not know what happiness is when one has not experienced sadness. Yin and yang. And the list goes on.... Will someone be kind enough to enlighten me?
We should also see dualities as mutually inclusive, and without yin there is no yang, no yang without yin, they cannot be separated from each other but are simply relative truths -- they exist in relation but ultimately is one whole.
False-imagination teaches that such things as light and shade, long and short, black and white are different and are to be discriminated; but they are not independent of each other; they are only different aspects of the same thing, they are terms of relation and not of reality. Conditions of existence are not of a mutually exclusive character; in essence things are not two but one.
Shakyamuni Buddha
> The Lankavatara Sutra
Thusness said,
Yes Earthing82,
Polarity certainly isnÂ’t opposites; these extremities are themselves a single whole. Although the power to abstract has brought us to the advancement of science today, it also prevent us from experiencing reality directly, separating the inseparable and dividing wholeness into opposites. Let us be undefined so that we can penetrate into the profundity of Tao.
To speak in Taoist terms, the Pristine Awareness is the great Unmanifest Infinity. It manifests itself as phenomenon existence but conceals itself; this is its great reserve. Momentarily it creates and recreate, this is called the Change. Before yin and yang, this is called the Original. That Presence that can be felt but cannot be defined, this is called the Spirit. Movement without core and center, this is called Emptiness. To see what is as it is, this is called Wisdom. The Tao in its Self-So, this is called Thus.
Actually you don't have to pair up to be complete. Yin does not have to pair up with yang, male with female, light with darkness, and so on. Such separation is ultimately illusory. It is only the dualistic, egotistic mind that separates them, and therefore sees incompleteness, and desires to fulfill himself. There is no need to. As a matter of fact, it is because of the constant seeking that is causing much mental sufferings. It is the seeking and attachment to others that is causing our suffering... always seeking to fulfill a more complete sense of self. This is the core movement of the ego. The identification/attachment to the dualistic Yin and Yang view is what causes us to undergo endless samsaric sufferings.
Monks do not have partners, but they also do not have much sufferings, they are also happy. You do not necessarily need to have a partner to be happy. I am not denouncing having a relationship, but I am telling you not to be attached/addicted to self-centered feelings and egoic attachments. That is -- go beyond the obsession and addiction to the feelings and emotions by dissolving its root cause -- the egoic identification, due to one identifying with something or someone as one's possessions, or fulfilling one's false sense of self, and therefore undergoes much sufferings and pain when that is lost, as well as suffering anxiety and fear of losing something/someone.
Also one's obsession with someone can be 'expanded'... to become the unconditional love and compassion encompass everyone, like a bodhisattva..
Beyond happiness and sadness, good and bad, life and death, there is peace and bliss that surpasseth understanding.Addiction And The Search For Wholeness
~ The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle
Why should we become addicted to another person?
The reason why the romantic love relationship is such an intense and universally sought-after experience is that it seems to offer liberation from a deep-seated state of fear, need, lack, and incompleteness that is part of the human condition in its unredeemed and unenlightened state. There is a physical as well as a psychological dimension to this state.
On the physical level, you are obviously not whole, nor will you ever be: You are either a man or a woman, which is to say, one-half of the whole. On this level, the longing for wholeness - the return to oneness - manifests as male-female attraction, man's need for a woman, woman's need for a man. It is an almost irresistible urge for union with the opposite energy polarity. The root of this physical urge is a spiritual one: the longing for an end to duality, a return to the state of wholeness. Sexual union is the closest you can get to this state on the physical level. This is why it is the most deeply satisfying experience the physical realm can offer. But sexual union is no more than a fleeting glimpse of wholeness, an instant of bliss. As long as it is unconsciously sought as a means of salvation, you are seeking the end of duality on the level of form, where it cannot be found. You are given a tantalizing glimpse of heaven, but you are not allowed to dwell there, and find yourself again in a separate body.
On the psychological level, the sense of lack and incompleteness is, if anything, even greater than on the physical level. As long as you are identified with the mind, you have an externally derived sense of self. That is to say, you get your sense of who you are from things that ultimately have nothing to do with who you are: your social role, possessions, external appearance, successes and failures, belief systems, and so on. This false, mind-made self, the ego, feels vulnerable, insecure, and is always seeking new things to identify with to give it a feeling that it exists. But nothing is ever enough to give it lasting fulfillment. Its fear remains; its sense of lack and neediness remains.
But then that special relationship comes along. It seems to he the answer to all the ego's problems and to meet all its needs. At least this is how it appears at first. All the other things that you derived your sense of self from before, now become relatively insignificant. You now have a single focal point that replaces them all, gives meaning to your life, and through which you define your identity. the person you are "in love" with. You are no longer a disconnected fragment in an uncaring universe, or so it seems. Your world now has a center: the loved one. The fact that the center is outside you and that, therefore, you still have an externally derived sense of self does not seem to matter at first. What matters is that the underlying feelings of incom-pleteness, of fear, lack and unfulfillment so characteristic of the egoic state are no longer there - or are they? Have they dissolved, or do they continue to exist underneath the happy surface reality?
If in your relationships you experience both "love" and the opposite of love - attack, emotional violence, and so on - then it is likely that you are confusing ego attachment and addictive clinging with love. You cannot love your partner one moment and attack him or her the next. -
(continued)
CHAOS AND HIGHER ORDER
~ A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle
When you know yourself only through content, you will also think you
know what is good or bad for you. You differentiate between events that are
“good for me” and those that are “bad.” This is a fragmented perception of
the wholeness of life in which everything is interconnected, in which every
event has its necessary place and function within the totality. The totality,
whoever, is more than the surface appearance of things, more than the sum
total of its parts, more than whatever your life or the world contains.
Behind the sometimes seemingly random or even chaotic succession
of events in our lives as well as in the world lies concealed the unfolding of a
higher order and purpose. This is beautifully expressed in the Zen saying
“The snow falls, each flake in its appropriate place.” We can never
understand this higher order through thinking about it because whatever we
think about is content; whereas, the higher order emanates from the formless
realm of consciousness, from universal intelligence. But we can glimpse it,
and more than that, align ourselves with it, which means be conscious
participants in the unfolding of that higher purpose.
When we go into a forest that has not been interfered with by man, our
thinking mind will see only disorder and chaos all around us. It won't even
be able to differentiate between life (good) and death (bad) anymore since
everywhere new life grows out of rotting and decaying matter. Only if we are
still enough inside and the noise of thinking subsides can we become aware
that there is a hidden harmony here, a sacredness, a higher order in which
everything has its perfect place and could not be other than what it is and the
way it is.
The mind is comfortable in a landscaped park because it has been
planned through thought; it has not grown organically. There is an order here
that the mind can understand. In the forest, there is an incomprehensible
order that to the mind looks like chaos. It is beyond the mental categories of
god and bad. You cannot understand it through thought, but you can sense it
when you let go of thought, become still and alert, and don't try to
understand or explain. Only then can you be aware of he sacredness of the
forest. As soon as you sense that hidden harmony, that sacredness, you
realize you are not separate from it, and when you realize that, you become a conscious participant in it. In this way, nature can help you become realigned with the wholeness of life.
GOOD AND BAD
At some point in their lives, most people become aware that there is
not only birth, growth, success, good health, pleasure, and winning, but also
loss, failure, sickness, old age, decay, pain and death. Conventionally these
are labeled “good” and “bad,” order and disorder. The “meaning” of people's
lives is usually associated with what they term the “good,” but the good is
continually threatened by collapse, breakdown, disorder; threatened by
meaninglessness and the “bad,” when explanations fail and life ceases to
make sense. Sooner or later, disorder will irrupt into everyone's life no
matter how many insurance policies he or she has. It may come in the form
of loss or accident, sickness, disability, old age, death. However, the
irruption of disorder into a person's life, and the resultant collapse of a
mentally defined meaning, can become the opening into a higher order.
“The wisdom of this world is folly with God,” says the Bible.3 What is
the wisdom of this world? The movement of thought, and meaning that is
defined exclusively by thought.
Thinking isolates a situation or event and calls it good or bad, as if it
had a separate existence. Through excessive reliance on thinking, reality
becomes fragmented. This fragmentation is an illusion, but it seems very real
while you are trapped in it. And yet the universe is an indivisible whole in
which all things are interconnected, in which nothing exists in isolation.
The deeper interconnectedness of all things and events implies that the
mental labels of “good” and bad” are ultimately illusory. They always imply
a limited perspective and so are true only relatively and temporarily. This is
illustrated in the story of a wise man who won an expensive car in a lottery.
His family and friends were very happy for him and came to celebrate. “Isn't
it great!” they said. “You are so lucky.” The man smiled and said “Maybe.”
For a few weeks he enjoyed driving the car. Then one day a drunken driver
crashed into his new car at an intersection and he ended up in the hospital,
with multiple injuries. His family and friends came to see him and said,
“That was really unfortunate. “ Again the man smiled and said, “Maybe.”
While he was still in the hospital, one night there was a landslide and his
house fell into the sea. Again his friends came the next day and said,
“Weren't you lucky to have been here in hospital.” Again he said, “Maybe.”
The wise man's “maybe” signifies a refusal to judge anything that
happens. Instead of judging what is, he accepts it and so enters into
conscious alignment with the higher order. He knows that often it is
impossible for the mind to understand what place or purpose a seemingly
random event has in the tapestry of the whole. But there are no random
events, nor are there events or things that exist by and for themselves, in
isolation. The atoms that make up your body were once forged inside stars,
and the causes of even the smallest event are virtually infinite and connected
with the whole in incomprehensible ways. If you wanted to trace back the
cause of any event, you would have to go back all the way to the beginning
of creation. The cosmos is not chaotic. The very word cosmos means order.
But this is not an order the human mind can ever comprehend, although it
can sometimes glimpse it. -
~ Fa Yin Xuan Liu (3), Ven Shen Kai -
BTW, nothing in the world is fated.
If one meets someone he/she love, it is by causes and conditions, and karmic affinity, which is also causes and conditions. Nothing is determined nor fated, karma is not about fate or destiny.
It does not mean that there will be someone who you are fated to meet and marry. -
Thanks for the enlightenment An Eternal Now!Originally posted by An Eternal Now:BTW, nothing in the world is fated.
If one meets someone he/she love, it is by causes and conditions, and karmic affinity, which is also causes and conditions. Nothing is determined nor fated, karma is not about fate or destiny.
It does not mean that there will be someone who you are fated to meet and marry.
It is a very clear detailed explanation, U must have spent hours typing that 
makes me understand the whole picture much better. May all benefit from it!!! -
Male and female, not one, not two...Originally posted by snowstar:Do buddists believe in soulmate or the right one for you? I have always wondered if there is a soul mate for everyone. I used to think that everything in nature exists in pairs to make it complete. Male and female. New life will only be created when male and female merge as one. Light and darkness. Light will only exist when there is shadows or darkness. Good and evil. Good will only exist if there is bad to show a contrast. Happy and sad. One will not know what happiness is when one has not experienced sadness. Yin and yang. And the list goes on.... Will someone be kind enough to enlighten me?
Good and evil, not one, not two...
Yin and yang, not one, not two...
Happy and sad, not one, not two...
shadows or darkness, not one, not two...
this is essential Buddhist teaching.... -
Not really. Some parts are copy and pastedOriginally posted by snowstar:Thanks for the enlightenment An Eternal Now! It is a very clear detailed explanation, U must have spent hours typing that makes me understand the whole picture much better. May all benefit from it!!! -
wtfOriginally posted by An Eternal Now:Not really. Some parts are copy and pasted 
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ok lah, only the italics and quoted parts are copy and pasted...Originally posted by gigabyte14:wtf
which is most of it... -
Since all things are one yet each is separate, Eternal Now are u m/f?
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i also kena fooledOriginally posted by An Eternal Now:ok lah, only the italics and quoted parts are copy and pasted...
which is most of it... -
17/mOriginally posted by snowstar:Since all things are one yet each is separate, Eternal Now are u m/f? Originally posted by gigabyte14:i also kena fooled -
Wah so young! are u taking your A'levels or poly exams now?
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No exams nowOriginally posted by snowstar:Wah so young! are u taking your A'levels or poly exams now? -
THis guy speaks with wisdom...far more than most adults older than him! Wow!
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Yeah, I got a shock too when I first learn of AEN's age..... I had a hard time believing that a 17 year-old can demonstrate this level of maturity and wisdom.
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no lah! i know a little nia.. and i don have much wisdom to speak of.Originally posted by snowstar:THis guy speaks with wisdom...far more than most adults older than him! Wow! -
for a 17 years old... who is hardworking in learning dharma..
make me feel so ashamed.. -
me utterly speechless when i found out abt his age .Originally posted by Isis:for a 17 years old... who is hardworking in learning dharma..
make me feel so ashamed.. -
unless ur gf also buddhist , u also or same religion .Originally posted by snowstar:Do buddists believe in soulmate or the right one for you? I have always wondered if there is a soul mate for everyone. I used to think that everything in nature exists in pairs to make it complete. Male and female. New life will only be created when male and female merge as one. Light and darkness. Light will only exist when there is shadows or darkness. Good and evil. Good will only exist if there is bad to show a contrast. Happy and sad. One will not know what happiness is when one has not experienced sadness. Yin and yang. And the list goes on.... Will someone be kind enough to enlighten me?
maybe possible .
my gf all christians . -
Hello Goldevil, I'm not a guy. Me is mei meiOriginally posted by goldevil:unless ur gf also buddhist , u also or same religion .
maybe possible .
my gf all christians .
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Dear All, Please take a look at this interesting Buddhist website www.jenchen.org.sg May all benefit from it! Metta to all!
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I thought you're a guy also.. until I see your friendsterOriginally posted by snowstar:Hello Goldevil, I'm not a guy. Me is mei mei -
Since there is some discussions of Taoist concepts here.. just wanna share some stuff... since just now goldevil asked me in MSN if I believed that before Tai Chi there is 'Wu Chi' and later giving rise to "Yin and Yang"... I did a little search on internet and come across this article explaining what is 'Wu Chi':
http://www.ichingwisdom.com/IChingWisdom/intro.html
"This whole field of spontaneous creativity and returning to zero was thoroughly explored for millennia by Chinese thinkers. In Chinese, pure awareness is called Wu Chi. It is the infinite, formless place just before all meaning and form. The place from which all creativity springs. When you are connected with Wu Chi you are in the Tao. When you are in the Tao creativity naturally happens. WU CHI, emptiness, is symbolized by the empty circle, and TAI CHI, plenitude, is symbolized by the ancient Chinese yin/yang fractal:
"
Practise is to return to the original, eliminate till zero... drop all bonds. And then act in spontaneity.
Also from previous posts:
looking for the Tao article postOriginally posted by earthling82:fundamental Taoism deriving from the Yi Jing has similarities with mainstream Buddhism. But because of vast commercialization and varying interpretations, the underlying teachings to life is secluded from most people
For example, the Ba Gua (Early and Later heaven) are representation of a core buddhist teaching. Firstly the first verse, "The unmanifested infinity gives rise to the manifested finite" -- Meaning all forms abide in space. Subsequently the Yin and Yang represents the dualism views of Samsara e.g.
- Gain / Loss
- Health / Sickness
- Wealth / poverty
- Fellowship / lonliness etc etc
The dots within the Tai Chi represents the seed of the opposite polarity and an infinite no. of Tai Chi within each Tai Chi. Denoting infinite beginning and end.
The turning of the Tai Chi reveals that when 1 extreme moves, it has to give up certain space in order to progress -- denoting change. This is in accord with Buddhism whereby change or impermanence is always in constant motion.
The full and broken stroke outside the Tai Chi denotes time esp for the Later Heaven Tai Chi.
On the whole it represents the spiritual realm of the universe in which we abide.Originally posted by Thusness:Yes Earthing82,
Polarity certainly isnÂ’t opposites; these extremities are themselves a single whole. Although the power to abstract has brought us to the advancement of science today, it also prevent us from experiencing reality directly, separating the inseparable and dividing wholeness into opposites. Let us be undefined so that we can penetrate into the profundity of Tao.
To speak in Taoist terms, the Pristine Awareness is the great Unmanifest Infinity. It manifests itself as phenomenon existence but conceals itself; this is its great reserve. Momentarily it creates and recreate, this is called the Change. Before yin and yang, this is called the Original. That Presence that can be felt but cannot be defined, this is called the Spirit. Movement without core and center, this is called Emptiness. To see what is as it is, this is called Wisdom. The Tao in its Self-So, this is called Thus.
(www.humanbliss.com.sg)