To all,

The main purpose of Buddhism is to rid oneself of all sufferings.I see it as mental and physical.
I do not like repeating my physical story,ex athlete,5 heart operations , 8 tares in the knees and one in my left foreharm.

After my 5 th hearth operation the doctor told me I was good for another 20 years.Waited 2 weeks ,joined a gym,and pushed myself ,to the point of my body hurting.I can run ,could not walk 100 feet,that's great but the hurting is there.

Why do I do it? Spoke with my gym sensei,and his answer contained nothing spiritual!


I rarely ask for advise,what would you do if you were me ?

loong

LOL. First of all, everything is spiritual. Even answers that don't seem spiritual.

Second, your thread title holds clues: "Why do I suffer deliberately?" You then admit you are intentionally bringing on the suffering?

One might think that we do not bring on our own physical suffering, but upon deeper reflection, we find that often we do. In your case, you waited only two weeks after a heart surgery to "push" yourself to the point of "hurting." Why?

I sense that you have inner heartache and it is manifesting through your physical heart. You seem to be deliberately inflicting pain upon yourself. Do you have feelings of guilt, low self-worth? Do you feel you deserve punishment?

Why do you think you do it? We usually know, deep down...

loong, First of all you are totally NOT alone in suffering. You brought none of this upon yourself. Some might disagree with me as I do not profess Buddhism as a belief system yet I do know some things about the Great Buddha. We evolve down our path by circumstances that make up our being. Yes we do have choices in their direction but did any of us ask to suffer? I don't think that you or I did anywhere along the line. Lets take today and change what we can. Yesterday is gone and tomorrow is not there as of yet. We don't have to allow anybody else to help us but I believe that we are here to do just that when needed. If you will allow some of us to send you healing energy we will do so. You have been a healing force for some of us! dave

Loong, as a qualified and experienced counsellor you come across to me as someone who might benefit from this form of therapy. Not the just talking one though as you seem to have been through this style and had all the use out of it you are going to get.

I feel that the styles of counselling that could help you are Gestalt, Ericksonian, and NLP-based. All of these are more experiential and less talking which I feel you would respond to well- remember how 'mind blowing' you found the different perspectives of the human and insect on wooden furniture? Those are the sort of approaches that are in tune with the spiritual system you follow, and may enhance its' practice.

Hope this helps

To all

Unhappy chidhood, mother mentally sick,self thaught in everything, Tennis, drag racing ,built my own car,semi pro goalie
in hockey.As for the heart thing ,all,but all of my family from my father's side died at 60 of a heredity problen. I am the only survivor. Once someone asked me to show my fuzzie side well you are seeing it.Self thaught in Buddhism ,computor.This shell that
we might call loong/normand has gone through alot.The real sense of my question was why do I push myself somuch.Iwas called very often a survivor,Oh Norm you'll get through it ,you're a survivor.
Like one of you friends mentionned is maybe lack of self esteem.
I have succeeded almost everything in my life.How by discipline, total honesty.
I thank you for giving me advise,and I hope to receive some more.

With thankfullness
_/\_
loong

To all,

Please do not hesitate ,if you have other advise, what I miss in this group is the exchanges ,like I have always had in other groups.
Please do not hesitate.
With love

loong

Hi looong, thanks for sharing so much of yourself. As you know, this kind of self-inquiry work is the heart of the Buddhist path (and I would say all spiritual paths really.) We can practice mindfulness, and positive thinking, and all sorts of other methods for 'improving' our minds, but this is really like chopping the same weeds down over and over. Until we dig up the roots, the weeds will keep growing back. So looking in to our deepest patterns and seeking to understand and release them is the 'real' work, as far as I am concerned.

I do energy work and counseling myself with my students, and I support all the different methods people have mentioned above - I think it's very individual what will work for someone, we are each different. And of course there are many other methods besides those mentioned above for working with yourself in this way, including many Buddhist ones (and many Buddhist psychologists too, as we discussed in another thread, this is one of the ways East and West have worked together. If you want book suggestions along those lines, I can provide you with some.)

Personally, I don't like to do too much analyzing in a thread like this - it can get a little 'pop psychology', and really you have to come to your own insights. But in a way, you're already doing the work yourself, in the information you have provided for us on your life. You have had to work hard your whole life just to survive. That was conditioned into you with the type of childhood you had. Survival is our most ingrained instinct, and you've been conditioned that in order to survive you must push yourself, you must work hard. So it makes perfect sense that after a major health scare, after something in which you no doubt felt your mortality keenly, a part of you is going to want to push yourself.

As for poor self-esteem, or a sense of unworthiness, that makes so much sense too with your childhood. And as you achieved things in life, you no doubt felt some sense of esteem from that, and so you are also conditioned to believe you have to keep achieving, keep pushing to have any worth. Although philosophically you know from your Buddhist studies that your worth is inherent, you may not feel that deep down.

I'm not saying this is the case, I am just offering things for you to look at since you asked. And again I respect you doing so, as this is the real work, I think (and I could write pages on my own work, believe me!)

From a Buddhist practice perspective, you can work with these feelings in terms of mindfulness, just as you do other emotions and thoughts that arise. It just may take a little more 'digging' to find these emotions within yourself - a sense of unworthiness, or a deep fear of mortality and drive to survive. But you can locate them in your inquiry practice, and begin to 'unroot' them. Which doesn't mean you shouldn't try other methods mentioned above if you like, but you already have a strong Buddhist practice foundation, so it makes sense to work with these impulses within that context too.

Loong, sometimes we must stop amidst all the stress and confusion and listen to the voice of our soul. Your answers lie within.

To all my friends,

I have found my answer, thanks to your help.

One thing I can say is I cut my gym in a less demanding way.Remembering that Buddhism is NO SUFFERING .

Thank you all
_/\_
loong