Achieving nirvana/enlightenment while keeping my personality?

[alanford]

I like to take teachings from multiple religions and belief systems, mostly esoteric buddhism, taoism, luciferianism and paganism. I love the idea of karma, rebirth until reaching nirvana, peace etc...But at the same time I love my freedom, my uniqueness and believe in balancing the ego rather then dissolving it. What are your opinons on this, and do you think certain gods would mind me finding my personal gnosis or working with gods from another pantheon? I considered to work by myself(and my higher self of course) but I would really like to have a daily buddhist mantra to Bodhisattva/s like Ārya Tārā and I like working with certain demons like lord Lucifer or lord Asmodeus. Is my practice more common then I think or am I a bit crazy lol?

 

[Anziel_Merkaba]

The internet shitlord in me says you have to have a personality in the first place, but the actual occultist part of me says that you need to do more theurgy and ritualistically invoke yourself-as-god every day until you internalize the truth that there is no separation between you and your highest self.

Self-created practices will always be more effective than external practices when it comes to these sorts of things, because dealing with yourself-as-god is a deeply personal experience and as such finding some mantra or rite that someone else made is not the way, in my opinion.

You are the end of your path, and reaching it means you must face yourself and know yourself.

 

[whome]

The word personality comes from the Latin persona. A persona is a mask held up in front of the face of an actor while s/he plays a role.

Perhaps enlightenment requires growing out of the need for a mask

 

[HoldAll]

You don't get to keep your personality upon reaching Nirvana in Buddhism, period. Early Western authors learning about Buddhism hated that idea because their notion of paradise was living happy ever after with their family and loved ones (presumably with their pets as well), and dissolving into nothingness like a drop in the ocean was just too frightening. Likewise, Victorian theosophist roundly rejected the idea of the Hindu/Buddhist Six Realms of Existence (hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human, titan, demigod) because they found it preposterous to be reborn as anything other that human (according to the motto "A gentleman does not turn into a dog!"). And every incarnation must be better than the next was the unspoken assumption, always being re-born into privilege and not as a pauper, of course, an eternal cycle of entitlement, so to speak, and you can still find the same point of view in modern NewAge thinking.

You’ll really have to be highly eclectic in your reading to find anything valuable about the preservation of your uniqueness and your personality in religions originating in India – it disqualifies you automatically from practising Buddhism and Hinduism (as opposed to merely reading about it). In Buddhism, identification with one‘s individuality and remaining overly attached to your personality keeps you from realising your Buddha nature, after all, and the next trap NewAgers typically fall into is identifying the Buddha nature with a supposed ‚real/higher me‘ or even one’s soul (= no such animal in Buddhism), and from then on their so-called ‚spirituality‘ becomes only snowflakey narcissism and ‚meditating‘ to mystical ambient music while lolling on their couches and feeling ‚holier‘ and superior to their ‚unenlightened‘ fellow men.

I’d give the Buddhist idea of a total dissolution of the self a whirl if I were you, it’s liberating. However, try to keep it apart from LHP-style self-glorification and self-deification, the two are simply not compatible. Some paradigms simply don't mix.

 

[LadyBoi]

You don't get to keep your personality upon reaching Nirvana in Buddhism, period. Early Western authors learning about Buddhism hated that idea because their notion of paradise was living happy ever after with their family and loved ones (presumably with their pets as well), and dissolving into nothingness like a drop in the ocean was just too frightening. Likewise, Victorian theosophist roundly rejected the idea of the Hindu/Buddhist Six Realms of Existence (hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human, titan, demigod) because they found it preposterous to be reborn as anything other that human (according to the motto "A gentleman does not turn into a dog!"). And every incarnation must be better than the next was the unspoken assumption, always being re-born into privilege and not as a pauper, of course, an eternal cycle of entitlement, so to speak, and you can still find the same point of view in modern NewAge thinking.

You’ll really have to be highly eclectic in your reading to find anything valuable about the preservation of your uniqueness and your personality in religions originating in India – it disqualifies you automatically from practising Buddhism and Hinduism (as opposed to merely reading about it). In Buddhism, identification with one‘s individuality and remaining overly attached to your personality keeps you from realising your Buddha nature, after all, and the next trap NewAgers typically fall into is identifying the Buddha nature with a supposed ‚real/higher me‘ or even one’s soul (= no such animal in Buddhism), and from then on their so-called ‚spirituality‘ becomes only snowflakey narcissism and ‚meditating‘ to mystical ambient music while lolling on their couches and feeling ‚holier‘ and superior to their ‚unenlightened‘ fellow men.

I’d give the Buddhist idea of a total dissolution of the self a whirl if I were you, it’s liberating. However, try to keep it apart from LHP-style self-glorification and self-deification, the two are simply not compatible. Some paradigms simply don't mix.

Do you think it would be possible to attain a true kind of permanently existing self through vampirism and then branch off into realizing buddha nature so instead of deifying the self the traditional way, one attains immortality then dissolves the self into buddha nature so that one can continue experiencing that state of bliss eternally without the problem of impermanence? I've heard that clear light is akin to realizing buddha nature or something very close to it and I question whether or not the attainment of clear light would make the path of a magician significantly easier or more bearable in the face of the obstacles one expects to encounter along the way. Also, might it not make the loneliness of the path no longer painful? I'd like to hear your take on the matter.

 

[HoldAll]

Do you think it would be possible to attain a true kind of permanently existing self through vampirism and then branch off into realizing buddha nature so instead of deifying the self the traditional way, one attains immortality then dissolves the self into buddha nature so that one can continue experiencing that state of bliss eternally without the problem of impermanence? I've heard that clear light is akin to realizing buddha nature or something very close to it and I question whether or not the attainment of clear light would make the path of a magician significantly easier or more bearable in the face of the obstacles one expects to encounter along the way. Also, might it not make the loneliness of the path no longer painful? I'd like to hear your take on the matter.

No idea what vampirism is capable of or if in fact works. Reaching Nirvana in the Buddhist paradigm doesn't mean eternal bliss (although you might reach blissfulness in advanced stages of meditation after years and decades of practice) because there is no longer any individuality, no you to experience that blissfulness - the individual dissolves like a drop in the ocean and becomes liberated from the endless cycle of birth and rebirth which for Buddhists is the most ambitious goal imaginable.

However, I've also heard that Taoists shoot for immortality to have more time to become enlightened at their disposal but I'm afraid that's a subject I don't know very much about.

 

[LadyBoi]

No idea what vampirism is capable of or if in fact works. Reaching Nirvana in the Buddhist paradigm doesn't mean eternal bliss (although you might reach blissfulness in advanced stages of meditation after years and decades of practice) because there is no longer any individuality, no you to experience that blissfulness - the individual dissolves like a drop in the ocean and becomes liberated from the endless cycle of birth and rebirth which for Buddhists is the most ambitious goal imaginable.

However, I've also heard that Taoists shoot for immortality to have more time to become enlightened at their disposal but I'm afraid that's a subject I don't know very much about.

You know, I've heard what you're saying about there being no you to experience the bliss but how is it that figures like Padmasabhava and the like seem to still have an individuated consciousness besides having directly realized being a part of all things? Is there not someone there within that energetic field which makes him, him? Also, there are buddhists who have attained clear light through dream yoga and the like but they're clearly not gone or entirely dissolved because they are still alive and with us today. If the experiencer is gone and there is no bliss to be experienced, isn't this somewhat of a contradiction to the existence of a bodhisattva who is said to have realized buddha nature and abides in bliss yet has not exited the wheel of samsara because not all beings have been liberated? I don't think Nirvana is an appropriate goal for me but there are vampiric sorcerers like Alexander W. Dray or people from the temple of set who claim to be able to fend off the astral decay and attain an immortal state beyond which there is no return and no possibility of death. Maybe this convo has branched off a little too much and deserves it's own thread but I'm struggling with this idea that one can become immortal and realize buddha nature (since there is no governing authority on how unethical or twisted you can become until you realize buddha nature) and clear light is a state of realization that can't be defiled or altered by anything so it must be a kind of permanent state of bliss. I'm going to make a thread for this now so I can as others and hear what they have to say but thank you for your reply.

 

[Voidking]

Nirvana is the end of the illusiory self. Your sense of self, your memories, your aversions, your fears, your past knowledge, all, are not really you, you are simply attached to your likes and dislikes, to your fears and desires, as fears and desires are one, your fear something and you desire escaping from it, you desire something and you fear losing it etc... Nirvana is the end of identification and attachment, you won't be attached to your personality any more, but you'll still have one, but not attached to it, you play the mask, you play the game, but you are the game, your karma will carry on, but you are not identified with it anymore, the body-mind does it thing, and you are there, both participating and witnessing, as consciousness dancing and as emptiness-awareness witnessing.

Post automatically merged: Today at 12:57 PM

Sorry for the double posting, I cannot edit my last post.

There is no dissolving of ego, there is a realisation of the ego as a movement of thought and its illusory nature.
You are already free and unique, you just have to remove the dirt, you do not need to acquire more, but to remove and therefore you'll find absolute freedom.

We have so many wrong assumptions guiding our life, like the belief of being separate, being a soul in a body in a universe etc... this is all an imagination, the negative path focuses on removing these false assumptions and investigating oneself, why do I believe I am separate?

After all the hermetic magician disconstructs the world and re-ensoul it with his own meaning, and the earth become a Goddess!

 

[IllusiveOwl]

There are a lot of takes on ego, individuality, and how they are related to one another. In short, you achieve more uniqueness and individuality once you shed the tight cocoon of the RNG-ego and the mob-mind of your culture's collective-identity. If you dissolve the chains, you become completely free and can then create any kind of self you wish to be while incarnate. It is like breaking free and as a formless cloud, constructing a new vehicle entirely according to your design, then hopping behind the wheel.

The you that was born here has a story, just from the fact that it has been in a certain place in space-time for as long as you can remember and has collided with other selves and with the ongoing flow of nature. This you has a backstory, it has bias based on opinion and experience, it has a view of the infinite formed by teaching and its limited gnosis. All of this makes up your "identity", your ego, but almost all of it is reactionary and magnetic: you like this, so you draw it in, you don't like this, so you repel it, and that is you. Do you really want to be defined by that...?

Ego dissolution is the realization of this and a very intensive investigation of the entity that makes all of this possible in the first place. It is closing your eyes, stilling the mind, and recognizing that there is an unflickering brilliance that sustains you, that is you. The blackness behind your eyelids is actually vibrant, like blackness projected onto a movie screen via a radiating projector.

Completely free, you can do and worship what you believe to be appropriate, much as a God would. I personslly work with dieties as embodiments of certain energies/archetypes. I worship both Baphomet and Ganesha as the Left & Right hands of the Buddha, who is above them both.

 

[sherab]

It’s like asking if I keep the knot when I untie the bow, in my opinion.

 

[HoldAll]

You know, I've heard what you're saying about there being no you to experience the bliss but how is it that figures like Padmasabhava and the like seem to still have an individuated consciousness besides having directly realized being a part of all things? Is there not someone there within that energetic field which makes him, him? Also, there are buddhists who have attained clear light through dream yoga and the like but they're clearly not gone or entirely dissolved because they are still alive and with us today. If the experiencer is gone and there is no bliss to be experienced, isn't this somewhat of a contradiction to the existence of a bodhisattva who is said to have realized buddha nature and abides in bliss yet has not exited the wheel of samsara because not all beings have been liberated? I don't think Nirvana is an appropriate goal for me but there are vampiric sorcerers like Alexander W. Dray or people from the temple of set who claim to be able to fend off the astral decay and attain an immortal state beyond which there is no return and no possibility of death. Maybe this convo has branched off a little too much and deserves it's own thread but I'm struggling with this idea that one can become immortal and realize buddha nature (since there is no governing authority on how unethical or twisted you can become until you realize buddha nature) and clear light is a state of realization that can't be defiled or altered by anything so it must be a kind of permanent state of bliss. I'm going to make a thread for this now so I can as others and hear what they have to say but thank you for your reply.

As far as bodhisattvas are concerned, I imagine them making a conscious decision not to enter Nirvana, like a demi-god postponing the acquisition of full divinity, sort of hovering above the Wheel of Life without being subject to the cycle of birth and rebirth. I've never really thought about it, it seems to be such an improbable state of existence, after all.

 

[alanford]

Nirvana is the end of the illusiory self. Your sense of self, your memories, your aversions, your fears, your past knowledge, all, are not really you, you are simply attached to your likes and dislikes, to your fears and desires, as fears and desires are one, your fear something and you desire escaping from it, you desire something and you fear losing it etc... Nirvana is the end of identification and attachment, you won't be attached to your personality any more, but you'll still have one, but not attached to it, you play the mask, you play the game, but you are the game, your karma will carry on, but you are not identified with it anymore, the body-mind does it thing, and you are there, both participating and witnessing, as consciousness dancing and as emptiness-awareness witnessing.

Post automatically merged: Today at 12:57 PM

Sorry for the double posting, I cannot edit my last post.

There is no dissolving of ego, there is a realisation of the ego as a movement of thought and its illusory nature.
You are already free and unique, you just have to remove the dirt, you do not need to acquire more, but to remove and therefore you'll find absolute freedom.

We have so many wrong assumptions guiding our life, like the belief of being separate, being a soul in a body in a universe etc... this is all an imagination, the negative path focuses on removing these false assumptions and investigating oneself, why do I believe I am separate?

After all the hermetic magician disconstructs the world and re-ensoul it with his own meaning, and the earth become a Goddess!

You don't get to keep your personality upon reaching Nirvana in Buddhism, period. Early Western authors learning about Buddhism hated that idea because their notion of paradise was living happy ever after with their family and loved ones (presumably with their pets as well), and dissolving into nothingness like a drop in the ocean was just too frightening. Likewise, Victorian theosophist roundly rejected the idea of the Hindu/Buddhist Six Realms of Existence (hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human, titan, demigod) because they found it preposterous to be reborn as anything other that human (according to the motto "A gentleman does not turn into a dog!"). And every incarnation must be better than the next was the unspoken assumption, always being re-born into privilege and not as a pauper, of course, an eternal cycle of entitlement, so to speak, and you can still find the same point of view in modern NewAge thinking.

You’ll really have to be highly eclectic in your reading to find anything valuable about the preservation of your uniqueness and your personality in religions originating in India – it disqualifies you automatically from practising Buddhism and Hinduism (as opposed to merely reading about it). In Buddhism, identification with one‘s individuality and remaining overly attached to your personality keeps you from realising your Buddha nature, after all, and the next trap NewAgers typically fall into is identifying the Buddha nature with a supposed ‚real/higher me‘ or even one’s soul (= no such animal in Buddhism), and from then on their so-called ‚spirituality‘ becomes only snowflakey narcissism and ‚meditating‘ to mystical ambient music while lolling on their couches and feeling ‚holier‘ and superior to their ‚unenlightened‘ fellow men.

I’d give the Buddhist idea of a total dissolution of the self a whirl if I were you, it’s liberating. However, try to keep it apart from LHP-style self-glorification and self-deification, the two are simply not compatible. Some paradigms simply don't mix.

Wait, so do I stop being attached to my personality or do I lose my personality completely then? I like to think that we are all already a united part of an "ocean" of energy, and each one of us is a unique droplet in it. Doesnt a human being already at birth regardless of what they might think of themselves in the future and regardless of what others will think of them and regardless of how society will shape them already has certain qualities and attributes that are and will be unique only to them. Cats, dogs, lions etc have different personalities too or maybe personality is not the correct term Im using? Sure life is filled with suffering, but what about love? My love for my friends, family, art, all the joy and laughter I experienced regardless of all the childhood trauma and suffering I went trough, isnt there beauty in all that and wouldnt that be some sort of "balance" and "harmony" in the universe if there is any? Why avoid it altogether simply to stop suffering? Why would I want to become one with the entire universe when universe also includes pedophiles, mass murderers etc... Im curious about your opinions, Im not a native english speaker so I dont want to sound like Im arguing or disagreeing, I just want to learn.

 

[alanford]

You don't get to keep your personality upon reaching Nirvana in Buddhism, period. Early Western authors learning about Buddhism hated that idea because their notion of paradise was living happy ever after with their family and loved ones (presumably with their pets as well), and dissolving into nothingness like a drop in the ocean was just too frightening. Likewise, Victorian theosophist roundly rejected the idea of the Hindu/Buddhist Six Realms of Existence (hell being, hungry ghost, animal, human, titan, demigod) because they found it preposterous to be reborn as anything other that human (according to the motto "A gentleman does not turn into a dog!"). And every incarnation must be better than the next was the unspoken assumption, always being re-born into privilege and not as a pauper, of course, an eternal cycle of entitlement, so to speak, and you can still find the same point of view in modern NewAge thinking.

You’ll really have to be highly eclectic in your reading to find anything valuable about the preservation of your uniqueness and your personality in religions originating in India – it disqualifies you automatically from practising Buddhism and Hinduism (as opposed to merely reading about it). In Buddhism, identification with one‘s individuality and remaining overly attached to your personality keeps you from realising your Buddha nature, after all, and the next trap NewAgers typically fall into is identifying the Buddha nature with a supposed ‚real/higher me‘ or even one’s soul (= no such animal in Buddhism), and from then on their so-called ‚spirituality‘ becomes only snowflakey narcissism and ‚meditating‘ to mystical ambient music while lolling on their couches and feeling ‚holier‘ and superior to their ‚unenlightened‘ fellow men.

I’d give the Buddhist idea of a total dissolution of the self a whirl if I were you, it’s liberating. However, try to keep it apart from LHP-style self-glorification and self-deification, the two are simply not compatible. Some paradigms simply don't mix.

Btw what is LHP-style stuff exactly? I always keep myself away from any elitism or thinking Im better then non practitioners of occultism, I know you didnt specify me personally but Im not trying to glorify myself in any way. I just recently obtained healthier self esteem, and now recently these new eastern teachings tell me there is nothing to self esteem about in the first place because there was never a "me" in the first place. Dont you think there should be a balance of ego, rather then complete dissolution?

Post automatically merged: Today at 9:07 PM

Btw what is LHP-style stuff exactly? I always keep myself away from any elitism or thinking Im better then non practitioners of occultism, I know you didnt specify me personally but Im not trying to glorify myself in any way. I just recently obtained healthier self esteem, and now recently these new eastern teachings tell me there is nothing to self esteem about in the first place because there was never a "me" in the first place. Dont you think there should be a balance of ego, rather then complete dissolution?

ohhh lhp is left hand path, I googled it. That is more for my pursuit of freedom rather then self glorification or power (except the power to protect my freedom of course).

Post automatically merged: Today at 9:20 PM

Btw what is LHP-style stuff exactly? I always keep myself away from any elitism or thinking Im better then non practitioners of occultism, I know you didnt specify me personally but Im not trying to glorify myself in any way. I just recently obtained healthier self esteem, and now recently these new eastern teachings tell me there is nothing to self esteem about in the first place because there was never a "me" in the first place. Dont you think there should be a balance of ego, rather then complete dissolution?

Post automatically merged: Today at 9:07 PM

ohhh lhp is left hand path, I googled it. That is more for my pursuit of freedom rather then self glorification or power (except the power to protect my freedom of course).

I now understand what you said, the 2 simply do not mix. I cant see the option to delete or edit my previous reply anymore tough

 

[HoldAll]

One very important thing to avoid here is religious universalism or perennialism, the notion that all religions are not so very different from each other and have basically the same goal. They don't. Not at all, and their differences are nothing short of staggering, just look at the different ideas concerning an afterlife or the soul (or the absence of it).

"Life is suffering" is not outweighed by all the joys human existence brings, rather it's the proposition that all joy is transient and craving love, happiness, possessions, whatever (or desparately trying to hold on to them) is ultimately but another source of misery as well since all these things are impermanent as well. If you were raised in an Abrahamic faith (e.g. me as a Catholic) and don't educate yourself sufficiently in a religion you investigate, you're likely to look for do's and don'ts first which is pointless here because life is not suffering because of any (original) sin or some profound human transgression, suffering simply is, i.e. a mere statement of fact. Having a personality and being attached to it isn't "sinful", it's just the way things are, and you won't be 'punished' for refusing to let go of it - it will certainly hold you back if you decide to walk the path of the Buddha but that's your own decision to make. It's not a hegemonizing religion like the Abrahamic faiths with their claim that you must either exclusively believe in their god or go to hell. Buddhism is more like a philosophy than a religion (although it may look like one to outsiders watching common folk living their spirituality in Tibet, Sri Lanka, or Myanmar), all it requires you to put your trust in its teachings after thoroughly thinking it through - no (enforced) blind faith required.

I would stop thinking in terms of 'good', 'bad', how to live and what to avoid if I were you. And one of these days I'm going to investigate why Freud's concept of the German 'Ich' (eng. simply 'I' or 'Me') was rendered as the Latin word 'Ego' in English translations of his work, how all kinds of gurus like Ramana Maharshi (currently reading a book about this 'knowledge transfer') suddenly latched on to this term in the 1930ies, made the Ego the repository of all that's bad and unspiritual in a person and played it back to the West. Amazing, really.

The way I understand it (and I'm still reading books about it), the Left Hand Path only originated with the foundation of LaVey's Church of Satan and Aquino's Temple of Set, with Michael Aquino being the superior theorist, in my opinion. The idea seems to be radical individualism as opposed to surrender to the divine, indulgence instead of abstention, antinomism (= going against the grain) instead of meekly complying with societal norms, as well as self-deification instead of eventually merging with the godhead.

If you're looking for an answer from me as to what's more 'spiritual' (or gods forbid, The Truth!), trying to overcome your ego, revel in it, or think or behave in any specific way, I can't help you. We generally don't have RHP vs. LHP fights here, nobody wants to root out 'black magic', people work with demons, use psalms and Christian prayers in their workings, vampyres also get their say, and chaos magicians do and use whatever they want anyway. It's all pretty ecumenical here.

 

[Mars]

Your personality so far seems to be Firmware Version 2.87.230 North America. A lot of people have that version (personality)

Yeah Asmodeus, Lucifer and Crowley, pop culture satanism certainly has a pull on you.

And if you would take your studies into hinduism or buddhism actually serious, it will quickly drive this out of you. This is what your ego is afraid. Or your hylic state. Because then you cant reference this to others and feel part of Maya.

I recommend you to read the Bhagavad-Gita. It is very clearly instructed how to reach Moksha. Both as a living person or as a dead one.

Post automatically merged: Today at 10:04 PM

One very important thing to avoid here is religious universalism or perennialism, the notion that all religions are not so very different from each other

They are literally the same. All have the same Atlantean source. Which is in turn an Hyperborean source. Which in turn came from the Sun and Mars.

Some non human patterns sprinkled in between for good measure and a lot of fantasy and confused vision like whatever the jews did with christianity, the warlord imagined for islam and the Igigi intended for the jews.

You don't need to kiss my ring or get your ass fucked by an ascended one like the freemasons require you to. I say it because it has to be said, it is my favour upon you.

 

[alanford]

F

Your personality so far seems to be Firmware Version 2.87.230 North America. A lot of people have that version (personality)

Yeah Asmodeus, Lucifer and Crowley, pop culture satanism certainly has a pull on you.

And if you would take your studies into hinduism or buddhism actually serious, it will quickly drive this out of you. This is what your ego is afraid. Or your hylic state. Because then you cant reference this to others and feel part of Maya.

I recommend you to read the Bhagavad-Gita. It is very clearly instructed how to reach Moksha. Both as a living person or as a dead one.

Post automatically merged: Today at 10:04 PM

They are literally the same. All have the same Atlantean source. Which is in turn an Hyperborean source. Which in turn came from the Sun and Mars.

Some non human patterns sprinkled in between for good measure and a lot of fantasy and confused vision like whatever the jews did with christianity, the warlord imagined for islam and the Igigi intended for the jews.

You don't need to kiss my ring or get your ass fucked by an ascended one like the freemasons require you to. I say it because it has to be said, it is my favour upon you.

Im from the Balkans and what could you possibly know about my personality trough this forum and my writing alone besides that I clearly like reading Alan Ford comics lol