Why I am not a Buddhist

One of the things which tends to make me rage hard in relation to Western Buddhists in general, is the idea that you can get stoned and do meditation that has any value whatsoever. You can't, it really is that black and white.

Rather than going off on one of my usual judgemental fundamentalist rants, which are purely based on my own limited intellectual understanding of Dharma, rather than wisdom born in meditation, I'm taking the above issue of contradictory attachment and applying it to myself.

My main obstacle to practice is, and has always been women. Yet I convince myself that it's possible to combine some sort of relationship with genuine practice. In my case, I think this level of self-deceit is pretty astronomical. I could of course try to explain that desire, be it for emotional or physical intimacy is simply a manifestation of mind and thus empty of inherent existence and so on. This however would be an act of stupidity on par with the "monk" I met in a Thamel nightclub who said experiencing what he was there was helping him overcome dualistic attachment, or some other moronic statement based on something read in a book on Dzogchen or similar.

Facts. I gave up being a monk and retreat to enter into a relationship which was more negative than positive. It helped fuel my own clinging and attachments as well as encourage them in others. Nothing positive came from it apart from two women eventually taking refuge in a probably superficial way. In hindsight, there was no other reason for disrobing and leaving retreat than attachment to concepts.

Similarly, when I lived in Dharamsala, lots of practice opportunities were wasted because of my attachment to a woman. At this point there was no negativity generated by disrobing or similar, but there was the usual furthering of delusion and possibly some samaya issues, but those are a permanent fixture.

In summary, when I am in retreat, on vows or otherwise not overwhelmed (over dramatic much?), my practice is steady and some revulsion with samsara arises.

So avoiding women seems like the sensible thing to do?

When I asked Gyalwa Karmapa about taking proper ordination, he said think about it after four years retreat. Think about it, not do it.

When I asked another Lama, whom I consider my main teacher, whether or not I should give up women he said no.

Then more recently various Nyingma Lamas have been similarly unhelpful, in one case trolling me by suggesting I'd achieve rainbow body in this life.

The issue isn't really anything to do with whether or not I put my cock inside someone or not, or whether I wear funny clothes and shave my head. It's about how much I allow myself to become attached to the ideas themselves.

The whole essence of the BuddhaDharma is to watch ones mind, and root out attachments, both coarse and subtle. This is something I entirely fail to do, thus I am not a Buddhist in anything other than name. Names and titles mean nothing other than an extension of ego.