Excerpted from article here.
SEED QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION: What does "dropping out like the Buddha" mean to you? Can you share a personal experience of a time you dropped out of extremes to find your peace? What helps you cultivate balance?
I totally agree with author opinion about this subje ct
I've been reading "The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, " by Cynthia Bourgeault. From this book's perspective Mary was crucial to Jesus' development, insight, blossoming. This perspective resonates with me in a deep way, as yet another truth forgotten (concealed?) by those who write our histories. Thank you so much for pointing out the crucial role of the 'milk maiden' in the Buddha's journey. Neither Mary nor Buddha's unnamed 'nurse,' are given proper credit.
The most dangerous man is the one with no self doubt. WIth a little bit of material prosperity in one hand, and enough of a feel of dharma in the other, such a man declares that which he doesn't understand to be either irrelevant, non-existent, or colored wholly with the shade of his own wrong view. The result is to re-injure the world in the ways one is broken because of the inability to confront the blind spot that self-doubt points toward. How to wake up such a man before his actions drive past the point of oblivion? This kind of man is a metaphor for a slightly awakened western civilization as well, possessing prosperity and a little bit of understanding of the subtle, while unconsciously destroying everying it does not understand.
Hi - wonderful sharing, thank you. "Dropping out" could remind us to not immediately/mindlessly react to what we perceive as real, that could be a person we think we know, an emotion we are experiencing, a static view. An impulse we feel very strongly about and want to act on can be unwise action. "Dropping back" I think is more the middle path - to 'drop out' seems to imply completley - to withdraw all the way when we know that this is delusional - interconnectiveness/interbeing includes us and we are needed and need to be connected but connected to wisdom. Droppingout like the Buddha means going deeper - afterall he shared and so is present with us today, 2500plus years later.
The only Way to save the world is from the inside out. Start by saving your self (for most of us that in itself is a life's time of work), then work your Way outwards toward your family, then your friends, relatives, neighbors, co-workers...
Matthew 6:24 tells me that I cannot serve two Masters. From this, Isaiah hits the homerun for peace and balance. (Isaiah 40 says it all!) To make straight my personal highway to God (Who is Peace) I try to keep Him the center of my attention. Going from extremely Catholic to extremely Christian ... cultivated the peace I have in the balance of the two.
When my husband and I were were in the dating phase of our relationship. My focus was on him. When my husband and I married 34 years ago, my focus was on him. As a lover of God, my focus is on Him. Any distractions are meant to be cut away. In God, the pressure is taken off of me "to perform", In Him I can go anywhere and do anything as HE leads me. I have GREAT balance when I keep my focus on HIM.