Enlightenment Orgasm

[Masked Dude]

A few thoughts...
First, I want DB's Burger guru. Damn.

Next, for the Dudely Lama, I respect you but got no problem calling bullshit.   To be honest I don't think any of us do. I didn't hitch my rope to this wagon because I thought I'd get enlightenment or free nookie. Not saying I would avoid either. I'm not stupid!

To me Dudeism and the CLD isn't so much of a religion as it is a place for like-minded people to share thoughts. I've been involved in various religious & philosophical groups, even had a Rajneesh book, been a Kabbalist, even had a vision. The one thing I learned from all of that is that the more we learn the more we bullshit. When I was a little kid I told a teacher that learning things makes us learn more. I told her the more I learn the less I know. She was surprised and I didn't know why until years later.

Most dudes here know there's not much "right" and "wrong" but a lot of gray areas. That's why I hang around.

[Hominid]

Hey BD - that "Burger Guru" - Is she looking for help to conceive???  I'm free this weekend.

[DigitalBuddha]

Hey BD - that "Burger Guru" - Is she looking for help to conceive???  I'm free this weekend.

Vagina? 

[DigitalBuddha]

Years ago i used to suffer from eczema, I once scratched myself so hard i nearly came, does that count?

Well dude, we just don't know.

[Hominid]

Um, OK... (Hominid fills his lungs...)


VAGINA!!!!!!!!!!!

[DigitalBuddha]

Um, OK... (Hominid fills his lungs...)


VAGINA!!!!!!!!!!!

Far out, man!

[milnie]

That one is so big it goes off the page of my browser ;)

[Hominid]

That one is so big it goes off the page of my browser

Size DOES matter!

[forumdude]

A few thoughts...
First, I want DB's Burger guru. Damn.

Next, for the Dudely Lama, I respect you but got no problem calling bullshit.   To be honest I don't think any of us do. I didn't hitch my rope to this wagon because I thought I'd get enlightenment or free nookie. Not saying I would avoid either. I'm not stupid!

To me Dudeism and the CLD isn't so much of a religion as it is a place for like-minded people to share thoughts. I've been involved in various religious & philosophical groups, even had a Rajneesh book, been a Kabbalist, even had a vision. The one thing I learned from all of that is that the more we learn the more we bullshit. When I was a little kid I told a teacher that learning things makes us learn more. I told her the more I learn the less I know. She was surprised and I didn't know why until years later.

Most dudes here know there's not much "right" and "wrong" but a lot of gray areas. That's why I hang around.

I should hope none of you have a problem calling any of us on their bullshit! Good on ya for that.

But you have to define your terms. What are you calling bullshit on?

I disagree that the more we learn the more we bullshit. Some people, yes. But then, they probably aren't learning for learning's sake, but to win at pub quizzes, trivial arguments at parties, and of course, the occasional Internet forum.

The Tao Te Ching does touch on this idea often - that the more we learn, the less we know, but I think that's more than a warning than a principle. I like to think of Picasso, who learned everything there was to know about painting and then never drew a normal picture again.

There's a salient quote from Alvin Toffler: "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."

Maybe the problem is a semantic one. Or an epistemological one: what does it mean to "know" something? I like to think of the scientific method as one of the most profound spiritual methods in existence: namely, that we don't know anything for sure, but we have provisional tools which are useful only so long as they seem to provide more tools, and so on. Socrates alluded to this long before science technically existed. He "knew" nothing. But of course, this was false humility. He knew much more than the average idiot, so much so that he was one of the few who realized that he knew nothing for certain. But that didn't preclude him from gathering a broad range of knowledge (or tools, in the parlance of this post).

Another problem: the overspecialization of knowledge. Too many academics have spent their whole lives studying one little piece of experience. The thing I like about Dudeism is that it seems to cast its net quite widely - doesn't delve too deeply and officiously into anything, but rather tries to take a jazzy and reverent look at the whole enchilada.

I feel like pretty much all of you here at this a here forum are in more agreement on most of the issues raised here than you even might realize. Though sometimes there are some kerfuffles, they're largely over semantic issues, not principles or attitudes. I dig your style, Dudes. Thanks for contributing.

Oh also, regarding the boarding pass quip (too lazy to look up who said that) - you're right. No one should have to travel to India or Nepal to pursue spiritual stuff. I wasn't looking for it at all. Just thought I'd do the "when in Rome" thing as I was traveling around the world and was pleasantly surprised to have had such an experience.

[DigitalBuddha]

So I'm wondering what an "Un-Enlightening Orgasm" would be?

[Hominid]

You're right FD, I believe most of us do have in common a core set of beliefs/values that are mostly unspoken. That's why I keep hanging around here... I have this strong sense that many (like you and me) have this "re-learning" gene in our brains that has guided us throughout our lives to experience this and that, commit to this and that, though never really fully drink the cool aid. Although I do have to say that the more I experience, the more I become a lone wolf. Like they say, twice burned, thrice shy. Yet here, we all seem to be cut from the same cloth. I don't know dude, you really have started something unique.

I just woke up, have a hangover, so maybe I'm just blathering, but it seems the more I learn about the inner workings of people's lives in this forum, the more similar we all seem to be....

[Boston Rockbury]

........ it seems the more I learn about the inner workings of people's lives in this forum, the more similar we all seem to be....

I dig that point dude. Maybe we are reserved about saying too much about ourselves because we don't want to be self-indulgent and bore other people but actually it's often the most interesting part of a post when someone let's slip a bit about who they are and how they got to be where they are.

[RighteousDude]

Oh also, regarding the boarding pass quip (too lazy to look up who said that) - you're right. No one should have to travel to India or Nepal to pursue spiritual stuff. I wasn't looking for it at all. Just thought I'd do the "when in Rome" thing as I was traveling around the world and was pleasantly surprised to have had such an experience.

Having reread what I wrote, I see that I didn't express myself clearly. I meant "you" as the anonymous collective who are never as smart as anyone present  and not you, personally, and I was expressing disdain for the spiritual tourism industry itself.

I have no trouble with vaguely unfulfilled rich bitches flying off to get blissed out for four grand a week, and if that's their gig then so be it. I figure that the spiritual tourist who doesn't appreciate the great irony of a greedy Buddhist probably needs the experience anyway. But I get bummed out when people I know, people of more meager means, drop their life savings into it and then come home to balky furnaces, tired old cars that cannot be depended upon to make the daily commute to the job that puts food on the table, and the inability to recreate the blissful state they ostensibly went all that way to learn how to achieve.

[A Stoned Buddha]

"A fool who persists in his folly will become wise." some dude wiser than me once said. Most people don't feel worthy of spiritual wisdom. They need a "mountain to climb" a "hardship to endure" and then they will feel they've earned it. So they make a "mountain" in their mind and climb. We are standing in our own way. Guru's, prophets, monks or clowns are only others we see as being closer to "it" than we are and we are desperate to skip over the mountain that we make ourselves! Round and round we go, when it stops nobody knows. Keep'er easy dudes.

[Masked Dude]

Nah, forumdude, we have no reason to call you on anything. I was just saying that if you ever lost your mind and said something really out of line, we wouldn't have a cult mind and let it slide. So far you've been a good guy.

Yeah, the bullshit wasn't quite how I should've stated it. My point was that the more we learn, the more we're able to BS people. So yeah some do, most don't unless they're Cliff from "Cheers."

What I probably didn't explain well was that learning skills and facts open your world to new things. You learn notes on a guitar, then you learn chords, then you learns riffs, etc. When I taught college, I loved the students that always felt like one bit of knowledge could open theirs minds up to more.

I guess that's a sort of Nirvana for me. I love knowing I can never learn everything.