OT: Unsatisfied with goals acheived - Page 4

PrayingMantis · #31 10-17-2005, 12:32 PM

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While I'm not particularly well-versed in other methods, I've never heard any other religion or school or whatever articulate the absurdity of thought clearly.

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First, you are wrong if you believe that Buddhism as a whole (Buddhism in fact is many many different things) articulates the absurdity of thought (certainly not thought _in particular_), for instance there's a great tradition of Buddhistic logic and philosophical reasoning. but I don't think we're in the right place to discuss it.

Second, there are many other schools or "religions", most of them "born" in India of course, that are actually much more radical than Buddhism with regard to what I think you mean when you write "absurdity of thought". But again, that's not the time or the place.

#32 10-17-2005, 12:36 PM

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While I'm not particularly well-versed in other methods, I've never heard any other religion or school or whatever articulate the absurdity of thought clearly.

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First, you are wrong if you believe that Buddhism as a whole (Buddhism in fact is many many different things) articulates the absurdity of thought (certainly not thought _in particular_), for instance there's a great tradition of Buddhistic logic and philosophical reasoning. but I don't think we're in the right place to discuss it.

Second, there are many other schools or "religions", most of them "born" in India of course, that are actually much more radical than Buddhism with regard to what I think you mean when you write "absurdity of thought". But again, that's not the time or the place.

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Fair enough. I'll play the ignorance card. I left out the word "Zen" before Buddhism just about everywhere.

PrayingMantis · #33 10-17-2005, 12:40 PM

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Fair enough. I'll play the ignorance card. I left out the word "Zen" before Buddhism just about everywhere.

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I thought you meant zen more than anything else. Now let's stop with this hijack... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

#34 10-17-2005, 12:40 PM

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Become a Buddhist. All this wanting's no good for you; just do stuff and enjoy it for no particular reason.

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Agreed, except that you don't need to become a Buddhist or anything else. Becoming things is part of the problem.

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I was really shocked to see someone give an answer similar to mine.

Desiring anything is bad. Desiring to end all desire is good. Ending all desire requires the eightfold path. The best way to acheive the eightfold path is to try for a while, fail, and then give up.

I love Buddhism and seriously think it's the absolute solution to sadness and frustration.

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w00t! Didn't expect this on this forum! [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

Although I haven't really studied Buddhism or anything like that, I do like it. I read the book 'I am that' (most of it), because on amazon I saw ONLY positive reviews, and I got curious. It's a book that consists only of questions by people, and answers by this 'realized' guy. I'm still a little skeptical, because of some of the things he says (he basically says nothing is real, everything is created by the mind, forget about your body and mind and... well read reviews on amazon.) but, well.. I like it.

"Stop making use of your mind and see what happens. Do this one thing thoroughly. That is all."

[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] and now we stop the hijack.

PrayingMantis · #35 10-17-2005, 12:47 PM

Yes, Nisargadatta Maharaj is amazing. These are 500 pages of absolute delight (BTW he isn't buddhist at all, he "belongs" to a small hinduistic ancient school, called "Navanath Sampradaya".)

citanul · #36 10-17-2005, 01:01 PM

don't set a $ goal would be my first advice.

maybe set a goal of how many hours you want to spend playing poker or working on poker, and set goals about things like "i want to learn to play stud 8 at a competant to high level." things like that.

if you set yourself a goal at the beginning of the year in terms of hours, and you met that goal, you shouldn't feel lazy, you should feel like maybe your goal wasn't high enough, or something. or maybe you should be looking at why you set that number originally. is poker time now eating in to other stuff time? do you just have more free time than you expected? etc.

long term goals i think shouldn't even really exist in the form of 'play x hours, work x hours' unless this is your income source, and you find it hard to play the hours (in which case my goal would be something like "find a better type of employment"). if you love the game and want to make a stronger time commitment to it, do so, but don't set a monetary goal. maybe set a number at which you'll buy yourself a particular toy/present/vacation, or something like that. something to have out there, but not think about constantly.

anyways, at work, can't really do much more right now.

good luck,

c

#37 10-17-2005, 01:03 PM

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Yes, Nisargadatta Maharaj is amazing. These are 500 pages of absolute delight (BTW he isn't buddhist at all, he "belongs" to a small hinduistic ancient school, called "Navanath Sampradaya".)

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Yes I didn't think he was a buddhist (he doesn't say so at least), but it's about what he says anyway.

AleoMagus · #38 10-18-2005, 07:45 AM

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Also, you set a goal to make pooh-bah, and you're not even close. You have 2 1/2 months, get busy posting porn links, "NH"s, and quoting what others have already said, and you should make it easily.

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Oh my goodness, you are right. I did resolve to make pooh-bah by the end of the year and I am way behind. Perhaps this is the real subconcious root of my troubles!!!!
[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] How on earth did you remeber that?

Oh well, there's always next year, or OOT...

Regards
Brad S

AleoMagus · #39 10-18-2005, 07:56 AM

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I think maybe you'd be better served by looking for goals that are outside poker that are going to be more satisfying for you.

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Well, this is almost certainly true, and became obvious to me as I read over last night's post.

Really, I suppose I'd have a greater chance of getting a PhD in the next 5 years than of making a WPT final table, and come to think of it, when I was a little kid I always wanted a PhD, but never even knew what poker was.

Put another way, I don't actually even want a PhD, but simply still love philosophy and logic. More than Poker. But I set no goals to continue my education this year yet had a clear plan for my poker progress. Really strange, now that I think about it.

That said, I still think I need to seriously change my attitude about poker and the kinds of things that I want from poker.

Regards
Brad S

AleoMagus · #40 10-18-2005, 08:16 AM

There are a lot of other people in this thread and who PM'ed me that I should thank for some good responses.

In particular, I am actually surprised and comforted that so many people let me know that they understood how I feel. I don't seem to be alone in feeling a bit dissatisfied with my (good!) results, and from the looks of things, it's fairly common.

As Irie said, it is hard to look at online poker and really feel like we are getting the most from it, because there is SOOOO much money out there and it's probably never going to be this easy again. As Irie also implied though, that doesn't automatically mean playing 12+ hrs a day is the answer.

I'd also like to share a little bit of a PM that lori sent me that I really liked

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almost anyone who is lazy enough in life to want to make a living from poker is lazy enough not to do it properly.

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Frighteningly true, but somehow made me smile at the same time.

Finally, I agree with all those that suggested I can simply solve this problem by looking at the big picture and making longer term goals and plans to get whatever I think I want. I'm already working on it.

buddhism-schmooddissm [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

Regards
Brad S