Tag Archives: Christianity

The Problem with Emotions

Posted on by
Reply

A better title for this post would perhaps be “My Problem with Emotions” as I certainly don’t want make the mistake of projecting my own problems, world-view and so on onto others. Everyone is unique of course, but there are some things we all have in common and one of those things is emotion (with the exception of sociopaths, but even they have emotion, it’s just different). It is not the purpose of this post to claim that all emotions are bad. Rather, it is an introspective look and analysis of my own experiences with emotions and how they affect me for bad or good. I could blame it all on my O.C.D. But I don’t even buy that excuse and I fully realize that I am responsible for my own emotions and how I allow them to affect me. I am, unfortunately, a highly emotionally person even though I seem to come across to some as very aloof or even “cold”. But inside it is a seemingly ongoing battle between me and my emotions. For example, when I get angry (not simply mad, but seriously angry) I can stay that way for years. The same with sad. So sadness and anger are my “problem” areas. It has only been recently that I have been able to let go of the raging anger over something that happened to me as a child and actually forgive those involved. But it was a huge relief. Almost as if a mountain had fallen off my back that I had been carrying around almost all my life. Now I do my best to stay emotionally detached from situations that may make me angry or sad. The situations themselves are unavoidable, that’s just life. But being able to stay emotionally detached from them is a skill that I’m still developing but has been a real life saver.

There is a difference in the emotional detachment I have learned and the psychological problem of depersonalization disorder. One is healthy while the other is not. I look at it sort of like the difference between choosing the foods you put into your body and starvation. Emotional detachment is sort of like choosing the foods you will eat. Some foods you know are bad for you, perhaps even toxic, and therefore obviously best avoided, while others are good and needed. Anger and sadness are toxic for me while empathy and compassion are good for both me and those around me. Both Christianity and Buddhism teach about self control and compassion, but for me anyway, Buddhism teaches me how by providing actual methods to achieve it. It’s up to me to actually put it into practice. Sometimes I do well and practice as I should and other times not so much. I can definitely tell the difference in my life when I am practicing as I should and when I am not. I think it would be the same for Christians as well. When they are keeping a close relationship with God, via prayer, reading the Bible and living in faith they are more at ease and can more easily cope with the sometimes overwhelming things life can throw at a person. I’m sure this is true of any faith, not just Christianity or Buddhism.

All one has to do to see the negative effects of emotions out of control is turn on the television, read a newspaper or check their favorite news site on the Internet. And I’m not just referring to war, but to personal relationships and the way strangers treat strangers. Or, we can just take a look inside ourselves and sometimes see the turmoil right there within us. Someone made us angry today, someone was rude or did or said something that made us sad, mad or whatever. All of that is emotional. For myself, I have to make sure what measure of importance I am going to give to a certain situation and perhaps completely detach myself from the emotions of others simply to avoid becoming emotional as well and lashing out or finding myself ruminating over the event again and again in my mind.

Something I have learned that is useful for me is to be aware of not only my thoughts, but also sensations. For example, we all know what it feels like to be startled. That sudden rush of adrenaline and the feeling in our gut. That is easily noticed. But there are sensations happening quite often that are not so obvious unless one is looking out for them. The sensation of tensing up when feeling angry or feeling overwhelmed. The sensation in the chest and/or gut when sad. All of these are really good clues to what is going on with us at any particular time and can give us a heads-up that we need to detach. Personally, when I find myself experiencing these things, I look at what is causing them and tell myself it’s only a sensation and I’m not going to attach any importance to it whatsoever. That can fend off a cascade of negativity for me. Something I really have to watch out for. I also take it a step further and remind myself that whatever emotion I’m experiencing that is causing the physical sensation, I’m not going to attach any importance to that either.

I’ve got a goal I’m working toward that I think will help me and everyone around me, be it family or strangers. That goal is to eventually be so completely aware of my emotions as to be able to instantly recognize them as toxic or healthy (to use the food analogy) and therefore control them immediately and not allow them any control whatsoever over me. I have met a few people that seem to have achieved this, and they are really an inspiration to me. In fact, I am just about in awe of them because it seems that no matter what was happening, they never “lost it” or even showed any sign that they were even affected by it. And in a couple of those cases it actually helped to save someone who was seriously injured when everyone else was either frozen in place where they stood or running in the other direction. (On the off chance that these individuals are reading this, yes, I remember and am still impressed!)

This post may not have made much sense to anyone but me, because I was basically just writing down my thoughts on the subject as they came and decided to post it anyway. To me, since I’m trying to adopt a healthier diet, the food and emotion analogy really works. Some things are just bad and others are good. I’m trying to be more careful about bringing more good. I wish I had realized this and started it when I was much younger… it would have saved me from experiencing a lot of trouble and needless misery!

Always a Catch Involved?

Posted on by
7

When it comes to expressing one’s views, there aren’t many subjects that can be so potentially volatile than the subjects of religion and politics. The disagreement can be to such a degree as to even cause rifts between close friends and even family. This is a shame, but true. With that said, I’d like to pose a question that has always been on my mind regarding religion. The question has been there since I began serious study of religion years ago. The question is simple, but I believe it is also very important. It is this, “Is there a “catch” in all religions?”. Please let me elaborate, I’ll try to keep it as short as possible and still get my point across in a cohesive manner. Also, please keep in mind this is not meant to offend anyone but rather to simply pose the question.

Simply for example (and also because they are the religions involved in my own family) I will pose the question to two faiths, Christianity and Buddhism. The ultimate end-goal of Christianity is to spend eternity with God/Jesus (and by process avoid hell). In order to achieve this, one must have faith in Jesus. I understand that there is more involved, and depending on which denomination, the “more” can vary, but all the denominations agree that faith in Jesus is essential. There is the “catch” in Christianity. The Bible states that Jesus died for mankind’s sins (1st Corinthians 15:3 among others), so is that for all mankind? Not a stupid question. A valid one. Phrased differently, did Jesus dying on the cross, the sacrifice, apply to everyone throughout time, before Jesus, during his life, as well as to the present? Did it transcend time to go forward and backward? (Western/Christian thought on time is linear… as in started at point A will end at point B) To pose it another way, if Jesus dying on the cross was the ultimate sacrifice, putting an end to the need for animal sacrifices under the “Old Law” (to use the Christian term for the Jewish law in the Tanakh) and offering salvation to both Jew and Gentile, then why is anything else required? Why is even believing required? If it is God’s will that all be saved (2nd Peter 3:9) then why is anything at all required? I do notice in the verse just referenced that just after saying that God wishes none to perish, it says that rather God desires all to come to repentance. Repentance of what? Being human? Human nature? Please understand I am not trying to be contrary, I simply don’t understand, or cannot reconcile that if Jesus died for all sins, then why is anything else required of fallible humans?

The Bible says that with God all things are possible (Matthew 19:26). However, this is not so with humanity. We cannot even pool our resources to end hunger and homelessness in our own country (America), much less the world. We can spend over 200 million dollars per day on war, but not to feed people. We cannot even stop a cold, the flu or other bugs, nor can we stop mental illness or even completely understand criminology. If you think about it, there are a lot of things we humans can’t do. The media and scientific journals hail and praise what we can do, but little is said about what we cannot do or control. So why leave something, even a fraction, up to humans when it comes to something so enormously important as eternity? And why have so much chance involved? Jesus said he is the only way (John 14:6), so what about people who are born in Muslim countries to devout Muslim families? Or how about Buddhist countries? Or perhaps even into a nomadic tribe in Africa or elsewhere? The chances of any of these people born into and indoctrinated into their culture’s/tribe’s beliefs ending up being Christian is nominal to say the least. Or, to take it even further, what about “Doubting Thomas” who declared that he would not believe that Jesus had risen unless he saw him with his own eyes? If Thomas got his proof, then why are people two thousand years later damned for doubting?

Now to Buddhism. Just like Christianity, Buddhism has it’s “denominations” (though they are generally called “schools” or “sects”). Most Westerners have heard of Zen and Tibetan Buddhism because they have received the most attention here. But there is also Hosso (or consciousness-only), Pure Land (with “traditional”Chinese, Japanese Jodo Shu and Jodo Shinshu) and others. Then there are “Western Buddhists” who I really don’t understand why they call themselves Buddhists at all because they dismiss some key elements of Buddhism, and therefore would be better referred to as “humanist”. But let’s take Jodo Shinshu, a school of Japanese Pure Land Buddhism that is “faith based”. It teaches total reliance upon Amida Buddha in order to reach the “Pure Land” and become a Buddha and return to work for the benefit of all sentient beings. The nembutsu (chanting the Buddha’s name) is central to not only Jodo Shinshu, but also to Jodo Shu and Chinese “traditional” (read ‘more conservative’, as in placing an emphasis on good works alongside faith in Amida, or Amitabha in Chinese). But, back to Jodo Shinshu which may be better known to some as simply “Shin Buddhism”. Some claim one must have faith in Amida to escape samsara and reach Buddhahood. Well, that begs the question, “What about those who have never heard of Amida?”. A valid point. Buddhism does teach that it is rare to be able to hear of the Buddha’s teachings and therefore one should not waste this human life. Contrary to popular belief here in America, Buddhism does not teach reincarnation (with the possible exception of Tibetan Buddhism). There is nothing to reincarnate. Buddhism does, however, teach “rebirth”. Even this does not mean literal rebirth as in if Sam or Sally died then they would be “reborn” as Sam or Sally. One could say one is reborn every day, as one’s thoughts, attitudes and perceptions change daily depending upon circumstances and the condition of the mind and body. For example, the phrase “to be reborn into one of the hell realms” applies just as much to anger, jealousy or any other negative state as it could to any metaphysical state. You can look at it as a continual unfolding with no beginning and no end. Each moment unfolds into the next whether one is living or dying. I could even compare it to the Christian notion of going “to be with Jesus” after death, it implies that some part of them continues after death of the physical body and in Buddhist terms would be “reborn” in the place Jesus is. But enough with the semantics.

Why, in Shin Buddhism, does one have to have faith just as in Christianity? I have read of some Shin Buddhist scholars and ministers who say one does not have to because of the Primal Vow and the saving grace of Amida Buddha. Hozen Seki wrote,

“If I believed that there were any condition in Amida’s embrace, I would abandon this ministry”

and also,

“I believe that all beings, when they die, are embraced by the Amida Buddha—cats, dogs, humans, whatever they may be. Nor does it matter if they have never heard of Amida’s teachings or recited the nembustu”.

This makes infinitely more sense to me, for if there is a being that is capable of saving other beings, whether in the Christian or Buddhist sense of the word “saving”, then that being would be compassionate enough to do so without requiring something on our part. An example of this is a parent and a child. If the child is hungry and in need of food, there is no requirement on the child’s part for the parent to provide food because the parent has such love and compassion for the child. To make it more extreme simply for emphasis, if the child were in serious danger, the parent would not exclaim, “I will save you, but ONLY if you believe I will!”. That would be utter nonsense and not at all acceptable. The parent would rightly so be imprisoned for child endangerment or neglect. Yet another example is the way a mother cat moves her kittens out of danger. She picks them up and moves them, “saves” them, with no “effort” whatsoever required of the kitten. Same with a dog.

So, back to the original question. If dogs, cats and humans provide for their children without attaching any requirement, why can’t a superior being? It makes no sense to me whatsoever. To me, the arguments of “free will” and others of the like are completely moot. Just like a parent, if a being has the ability to save all beings from harm but yet fails to do so without some sort of prerequisite, then something is amiss.

I invite any and all ideas on the subject (so long as they are civil). :-)