Lost cursed Buddhist temple, Cambodia

(PraveenMohan) The cursed temple that saw our end | Praveen Mohan

• Hindu deity (avatar) Kalki
• Who is Manu?
• Manu (Hinduism): the progenitor of humankind

Journey Into Buddhism w/ Sharon Stone

Journey Into Buddhism - Prajna Earth | full documentary

Dennis Schwartz Reviews

(PBS America) From PBS, PRAJNA EARTH explores the lost civilization of Angkor in Cambodia, the magnificent Angkor Wat temple, and Bali, Indonesia’s sacred landscapes.

Narrated by Sharon Stone, the trilogy's second film also shares trance dancers in the jungles of Java and the gigantic seven level mandala mountain of Borobudur (the largest excavated Buddhist temple in the world) and is described as “inducing an inner journey” by Asia Society, New York.

14th Dalai Lama endorsed film

Called “eye-opening and essential if you have an interest in Eastern spirituality” by the Boston Globe and an “illuminating meditation” by Variety, these visually stunning documentaries are cinematic pilgrimages to legendary places in Buddhist Southeast Asia and Tibet, including the spiritual wonders of Buddhist Laos, Thailand, Burma (Myanmar), Bali, Cambodia, Java, and Central Tibet (China).

Welcome to PBS America, a channel curated for an international audience from America's Public Broadcasting Service, PBS. This is a factual focused channel including award-winning American history, current affairs, and science.

Sign up to UK broadcast channel weekly highlights at pbsamerica.co.uk. Follow on X @PBSAmerica. Like on Facebook.com/pbsamerica. #buddhism #documentary #asia #religion

• Journey Into Buddhism - Prajna Earth (2006) documentary; Ashley Wells, CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Buddhism's "Atlantis" in the Jungle (BBC)

Jungle Atlantis | BBC Select

(BBC Select) Aug. 6, 2024: In June 2013, an international team of archaeologists uncovered a lost urban landscape deep inside the Buddhist Cambodia's jungle, close to the magnificent 12th-century temple complex of Angkor Wat.

Filmed with unique access, this fascinating history documentary follows the team as they travel deep into the jungle to uncover more about this forgotten city – once the capital of the mighty Khmer Empire and home to a million people – and its eventual decline.

• Watch the full series on BBC Select

ABOUT: BBC Select is the home of documentaries. Available in the U.S. and Canada. Find out more and start free trial: bit.ly/3kwM3bU. Follow on social media 📲💻 Facebook: bit.ly/37UXpBn Twitter: bit.ly/3dSUqxc Instagram: bit.ly/3uEVieL

Clone princesses Taylor Swift, Nicki Minaj

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Is Nicki Minaj a clone of Cambodian Buddhist Princess Neaky Moneang?

• This Cambodian Buddhist Princess Norodom Buppha Devi?

Nicki Minaj Cambodian Princess Neaky Moneag?

Covertly lesbian-leaning bisexual rapper and pop idol Nicki Mina (who's married to beard Kenneth Petty) is an oddly Asiatic Black woman said to be from an island in the Americas.

She has a demonic entity or spirit who possesses her, a sexually vulgar and aggressive male alter ego she refers to as "Roman," which may explain her sexuality. Could she be the product of the DNA transfer (cloning) of Cambodian Buddhist Princess Neak Moneang (1943-2019)?

Poor Nazi Barbie Clone! Her hit release, The Tortured Poets Society, was knocked off the No. 1 spot by fellow clone blondie Eminem and his return with The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce) reborn, it seems, as Marshall B. Mathers or is Slim Shady reborn as someone else, like the new interloper singer (M&M)?

Taylor Swift clone of Satanist Zeena [LaVey]?

Anton LaVey's daughter was a pop singer, too.

It would not surprise us to find that such a program exists, just as other possessed oddball performers like Doja Cat, Cardi B, Katy Perry, Beyonce, SZA, and the super successful Taylor Swift might be channeled entities, "walk ins," invited to possess a singer and present (dancing, speaking, behaving as a diva rather than human would).

We look nothing alike. I'm a TN Christian.

In the case of Taylor "Nazi Barbie" Swift, the connection to Satanist Anton LaVey's blonde daughter Zeena is striking, and joke conspiracy theory is made out of that striking resemblance, as if Taylor were Zeena.

It is more likely that Taylor is a clone offspring of an older Zeena, a transition (of spirit and or DNA) taking place in or around 1989). Was Taylor born (birthed) for this role in corporate rock, pop, and country music?

• Perkyy (video) with segment on Nicki Minaj via Wisdom Quarterly

Buddhist "Atlantis" found in jungle (BBC)

Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly; Prof. Damian Evans; BBC.co.uk

Scattered around the well known monuments of Angkor Wat are hidden cities (wiki)

The psychic enlightened Buddhist master Ajahn Jumnien told us, after the discovery of Siem Reap, that there were many more discoveries to be made. BBC Radio announced it Sunday night, June 12, 2016 (bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03xdkrs). It's like finding "Atlantis."

(MappointAsia Video) Angkor Wat LiDAR Presentation by Prof. Damian Evans at Siam Society, February 4, 2016, Part 1.

• VIDEO: Trying to explain how Angkor Wat was made

The discovery of "whole host of ancient hidden cities underground" by Australian archeologist Damian Evans, according to the BBC (bbc.in/21heUQb, June 12, 2016), hits the Sunday news but is eclipsed by news from Orlando.
 

Towers of Bayon, Angkor Thom (AZ)

(WQ) LiDAR is a form of penetrating radar that can see through the jungle thicket to ancient structures underneath. Wooden artifacts have been under our feet for centuries, even as spiritual tourists have been flocking to the central Buddhist and Hindu temple of Angkor Wat, of the Khmer Empire. But Angkor was once a city of 1,000,000 -- the largest in the ancient world -- due to its mastery of water and an ingenious system through the jungle. The gateway to Angkor is Siem Reap, Cambodia. 

Death of Angkor Wat's Megacity, Buddhist Khmer Cambodia (BBC TWO/bbc.co.uk)

Satellite/aerial view next to location of Angkor Temple (Wat) in relation to other Angkor City archeological sites such as Angkor Thom (NASA/Manfred Werner/PIA00505).

Trying to explain Angkor Wat (video)

Ashley Wells, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly; FZone; Unexplained Structures (Ep. 2)

Inexplicable ancient ruins around the world have stood the test of time for academics and laypeople to ponder and study. Many of the methods used to create these ancient stone cities, temples, and monuments remain rather mysterious.

The Archive’s "Unexplained Structures" Series endeavors to acquaint viewers with these locations and present some alternative explanations for their existence.

The ancient Buddhist city-state of Angkor Wat is a miniature replica of the world-system in stone and represents an earthly model of the cosmic world. This is true for all Buddhist stupas and pagodas, which are mandalas in the shape of the 10,000-fold world systems that spread out in all directions, all of them inhabited by other beings.

• The Buddha taught that there are many world systems
• (Wiki) Angkor Wat (Khmer អង្គរវត្ត) was a Hindu then a Buddhist temple complex. It is the largest religious monument in the world. The temple was built by the Khmer King Suryavarman II in the early 12th century in Yaśodharapura (យសោធរបុរៈ, present-day Angkor, Cambodia), the capital of the Khmer Empire, as his state temple and eventual mausoleum. Breaking from the Shaivite tradition of previous kings, Angkor Wat was instead dedicated to Vishnu, whom Hindus relate to the Buddha. As the best-preserved temple at the site, it is the only one to have remained a significant religious center since its foundation. It is the country's prime tourist attraction.
• The modern name Angkor Wat means "Temple City" or "City of Temples" in Khmer: Angkor means "city" or "capital city," is a vernacular form of the word nokor (នគរ), which comes from the Sanskrit word nagara (नगर), like the Buddhist-Pali vihara (monastery/nunnery, temple complex).[3] Wat is the Khmer word for "temple grounds" (Sanskrit: वाट vāṭa ""enclosure"). It was formerly known as Preah Pisnulok (Sanskrit Vara Vishnu-loka), after the posthumous title of its founder.

The central tower rises from the center of the monument symbolizing the mythical mountain, Mt. Sumeru (Meru, Sineru), situated at the center of the system.

Its five towers correspond to the peaks of Sumeru. The outer wall corresponds to the mountains at the edge of the world, and the surrounding moat the oceans beyond.

Angkor Wat or Angkor Temple is the largest monument of the Angkor group and the best preserved. It is a world-class architectural masterpiece, but it is not the biggest Buddhist temple complex. That distinction goes to Borobudur, Indonesia and the yet to be excavated Mes Aynak, Afghanistan.

Its perfection in composition, balance, proportions, bas reliefs, and sculptures make it one of the finest monuments in the world. When the lost world was discovered, explorers could not believe the legends were true. Yet, the monuments exceeded they myths surrounding their existence.

HIGHLIGHTS

• 00:35 History and Mythology
• 12:48 3D Reconstruction and Cosmological Alignment
• 18:00 Visual Tour of Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom 
• Angkor Wat LiDAR Presentation by Prof. Evans Part 2

Laos' "Temple Mountain" (Wat Phou)

A. Nguyen, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Pint Maws (via Pinterest Mania, Ben/flickr), Wiki edit

(VideoVoyage.TV) Wat Phu is a ruined Khmer temple complex in southern Laos located at the base of Mt. Phu Kao, which later became a Theravada Buddhist center as it remains today.

UNESCO World Heritage Site Vat Phou, Laos hidden in jungle rediscovered in 1914 (PM).

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Shiva Nataraja (Kristine Krol)

Vat Phou or Wat Phu (Lao ວັດພູ, "temple-mountain") is a ruined Khmer Hindu temple complex in Buddhist southern Laos.
 
It is located at the base of Mount Phu Kao, 4 miles (6 km) from the Mekong river in Champasak province.

There was a temple on the site as early as the 5th century, but the surviving structures date from the 11th to 13th centuries.

(Secrets of Nature) LAOS, Southeast Asia: 85% of the country is pristine nature, widespread forests, jungle wilderness, steep mountains, and wide river valleys, with cool high plateaus and savannahs. The primeval forests support fauna like something out of a fairytale, with elephants, tigers, leopards, and some of the rarest animal species on the planet. Unknown species discovered by science at regular intervals. In recent decades, the few large mammals to be described for the first time were all found in Indochina (between India and China), and experts assume that most of them are at home in Laos: wild oxen such as the saola and kuprey or the truong son munjak. No outsider has ever seen a living specimen of the latter. Its existence is only known indirectly, through skeletons, horns, and bag that are occasionally found in remote villages. Here is the Mekong, one of the last untamed rivers on Earth. Fed by hundreds of tributaries, it is one of the richest freshwater systems on the planet, comparable to the Amazon or Congo, where the Mekong catfish lives -- 9 feet (3 m) long, 661 lbs (300 kg), possibly the largest freshwater fish (naga) on Earth.
 

Bangkok linga shrine (alinavitenberg/flickr)

The temple has a unique structure, in which the elements lead to a shrine where a linga (phallic structure) dedicated to Lord Shiva was bathed in water from a mountain spring. The site later became a center of Theravada Buddhist worship, which it remains today.

View from Vat Phou or Wat Phu near the sanctuary on the upper level, looking back towards the Mekong River (Mattun0211/wiki).

  

The mountain has a natural linga on its peak.

Wat Phou was initially associated with the city of Shrestapura, which lay on the bank of the Mekong river directly east of mount Lingaparvata, now called Phu Kao (pamphlet Projet de Recherches en Archaeologie Lao. Vat Phu: "The Ancient City, The Sanctuary, The Spring").

By the latter part of the 5th century the city was already the capital of a kingdom, which texts and inscriptions connect with both Chenla and Champa. And the first structure on the mountain was constructed around this time (Freeman, A Guide to Khmer Temples in Thailand and Laos p. 200-201).

The mountain gained spiritual importance from the linga-shaped protuberance on its summit. The mountain itself was therefore considered the home of Shiva, with the river representing the ocean or India's holiest river, the Ganges (COMOS report p. 71). 

 

The temple was naturally dedicated to Shiva, while the water from the spring that emerges directly behind the temple was considered sacred.

Vat Phou or Wat Phu from left to right: the south palace, the tiers leading to the central sanctuary, mountain peak shrouded in mist, and the north palace (wiki).

 

Famous Angkor Wat (samcambodiatours)

Wat Phou was a part of the Buddhist-Hindu Khmer empire, centered on Angkor (with the massive Buddhist-Hindu temple Angkor Wat) to the southwest, at least as early as the reign of Yashovarman I in the early 10th century.

Shrestapura was superseded by a new city in the Angkorian period, located directly south of the temple (Ibid., p. 72). In the later period, the original buildings were replaced, reusing some of the stone blocks. The temple now seen was built primarily during the Koh Ker and Baphuon periods of the 11th century.

 

Minor changes were made during the following two centuries before the temple, like most in the empire, was converted to Theravada Buddhist use. This continued after the area came under control of the Lao. A festival is held on the site each February. Little restoration work has been done, other than restoring boundary posts along the path. Wat Phou was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001.

The site

 

Like most Khmer temples, Wat Phou is oriented toward the east. The axis actually faces eight degrees south of due east, being determined primarily by the orientation of the mountain and river. Including the barays it stretches 1.4 km east from the source of the spring, at the base of a cliff 100 meters up the hill. Six km east of the temple, on the west bank of the Mekong river, lay the city, while a road south from the temple itself led to other temples and ultimately to the city of Angkor. More 

• How far is the Moon from Earth? (space.com)

Angelina Jolie in Buddhist Cambodia (video)

Amber Larson, Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Nat Geo; U.N. Ambassador Angelina Jolie

Angelina Jolie meditates, contemplates, and waxes philosophical in Cambodia.

(KJ09) 3-D animation of the central temple in the massive city and suburbs of Angkor, Cambodia. Angelina Jolie appears at Min. 4:50 and talks of her son, the U.S. wars on Vietnam and Cambodia and how it now taught in American schools.

Jolie's adopted son is Cambodian, and she is the United Nation's "Goodwill Ambassador," and even a dual citizen of the U.S. and Cambodia. Her interest and/or karma brought her to the Theravada Buddhist nation when she was working on the "Tomb Raider" franchise as the character Lara Croft, which sealed her worldwide fame as a stunningly beautiful and eccentric celebrity.

 
But what's the real story of Angkor, Angkor Wat, and the ancient Khmer Buddhist and Hindu empire of modern Cambodia?
 
Some power took Buddhism and Hinduism from Afghanistan deep into the jungles of Southeast Asia and across the sea to Indonesia in the south, leaving some of the largest and most magnificent Buddhist temple complexes in the world. The largest is at Borobudur, Indonesia, but the extent of Angkor, Siem Reap, and other lost temples in Cambodia are massive beyond belief using more stone than was used for the pyramids of Egypt.

Angkor Wat (National Geographic)

Jolie's Cambodian tats

(National Geographic) Where Lara Croft raided tombs in fantasy, there really are magnificent Buddhist and Hindu temples sunk in jungle thickets once hidden to the world. Now some are exposed, as others remain lost in the jungles of Southeast Asia and the former Khmer empire that extended east of India to Vietnam.

America's Amazing "Buddha Girl"

Mother Asokha with Dhr. Seven, Ashley Wells, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly

The amazing "Buddha Girl" -- Ratanayani -- at nuns' full-ordination ceremony for three Western Theravada Buddhists, Dharma Vijaya Temple, L.A. supported by Bhikkhu Bodhi, Wisdom Quarterly, Ruth Denison, Ven. Karunananda Theri, family, friends, Nov. 2012 (WQ)

Bible Belt South: Georgia borders North and South Carolina (aussiefitzy.com)

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Bright Buddha banner (Georgie_girl/flickr)

DHARMA VIJAYA TEMPLE, Los Angeles - Wisdom Quarterly loves and supports "Buddha Boy," Nepal's Ram Bahadur Bomjon (aka Ven. Dharmasangha, formerly Ven. Palden Dorje).

Apsaras (Andreadaddi/flickr)

And late in 2012 we met an equally amazing American "Buddha Girl," the samaneri Ratanayani. She is a Cambodian-American (Theravada Buddhist) child in the U.S. who felt so strongly about ordaining as a nun and making known the Buddha's liberating teaching (Dharma) that she swayed her Georgia town to make accommodations and swayed her reluctant brother (photographed above in Buddhist robes next to her as he holds his breath with arms crossed) to come along with her on this monastic journey.
 
She is a samaneri (a female novice, "little ascetic," probationary "Buddhist nun-in-training"). She intends to become a bhikkhuni (fully ordained Theravada nun) in America's Bible Belt.

Angkor Thom (Ramsch_ursel/flickr)

We spoke to her mother, who told us the details and have been hit and miss about publishing the story without an extended sit down interview with the family.

Buddha Boy, a bodhisattva intent on training in the Ten Perfections to eventually become a supremely enlightened teaching buddha (samma-sam-buddha).

The venerable novice Ratanayani ("Jewel Vehicle") is a Cambodian-American Buddhist, the first "little nun" (samaneri) from Clayton County, Georgia, Southern United States of America.

Her family has many accomplishments to announce. For example, on November 5, 2013 the novice and her brother, Jadetha Samanera, were set to receive the first proclamation from Commissioner Jeff Turner of Clayton County, Georgia. This award was the first ever issued by a commissioner to any Buddhist monastic in Georgia's history.

The award was presented in the town center with reporters from local papers in attendance. We will offer more "Buddha Girl" coverage but first, What is a Buddhist "novice"?

• Going Forth: A Call to Buddhist [Monasticism]
• The 10 Training Precepts of a Buddhist Novice
• Novice Chants (excerpt from The Khuddakapatha)

10 Questions of a Novice

Samanera Pañha, "The Novice's Questions" (Ven. Piyadassi, edited by Wisdom Quarterly)

1. What is one? All beings subsist on nutriment [Footnote 1].
2. What is two? Name and form [2].
3. What is three? The three types of
   feeling (sensations) [3].
4. What is four? The Four Noble Truths [4].
5. What is five? The Five Aggregates of Clinging [5].
6. What is six? The six internal sense bases [6].
7. What is seven? The Seven Factors of Enlightenment [7].
8. What is eight? The Noble Eightfold Path.[8].
9. What is nine? The nine abodes for beings [9].
10. What is ten? Endowed with ten qualities, one is called an arhat (a fully enlightened person) [10].

FAME: depressed, drunk, sickly Selena (W)

FOOTNOTES: 1. "There are these four nutriments for the establishing of beings who have taken rebirth or for the support of those in search of a plane to be reborn. What are the four? Physical food, gross or subtle; contact as the second, intention [a representative mental formation] the third, and consciousness the fourth" (SN 12.64).

2. Mental and physical phenomena.

3. Pleasant, painful, and neutral (neither pleasant nor painful).

4. Disappointment (suffering), the origination of disappointment, the cessation of disappointment, the path of practice leading to the cessation of disappointment.

5. Form, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness.

6. Eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind.

7. Mindfulness, keen investigation of mental phenomena (dhammas), energy (persistence), rapture (joy), serenity (calm), concentration (collectedness), equanimity (non-bias).

8. Right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

9. Seven stations of consciousness and two spheres. There are beings with diversity of diverse form (body) and diverse perceptions, such as human beings, some devas, and some beings in the lower realms; this is the first station of consciousness. There are beings of diverse form and singular perceptions, such as the devas of Brahma's Retinue generated by the first meditative absorption (jhana); this is the second station of consciousness. There are beings of singularity (not undiversified) form yet diverse perceptions, such as the Radiant Devas; this is the third station of consciousness. There are beings with singular form and singular perceptions, such as the Effulgent Streaming Devas; this is the fourth station of consciousness. There are beings who, with the complete transcending of perceptions of [physical] form, with the disappearance of perceptions of resistance, and not attending to perceptions of diversity, [perceiving] 'Space is boundless' arrive at the base of consciousness of Boundless Space; this is the fifth station of consciousness. There are beings who, with the complete transcending of the base of Boundless Space, [perceiving] 'Consciousness is boundless' arrive at the base Boundless Consciousness; this is the sixth station of consciousness. There are beings who, with the complete transcending of the base Boundless Consciousness [perceiving,] 'There is nothing [or no-thing],' arrive at the base of Nothingness (the Void); this is the seventh station of consciousness. The base of non-percipient beings and, second, the base of Neither-perception-nor non-perception; these are the two spheres (Maha-nidana Suttanta, DN 15).

10. "The right view of one beyond training (asekha), the right intention (non greed, non harming, non wrath) of one beyond training, the right speech of one beyond training, the right action of one beyond training, the right livelihood of one beyond training, the right effort of one beyond training, the right mindfulness of one beyond training, the right concentration of one beyond training, the right wisdom of one beyond training, the right release (liberation) of one beyond training" (AN 10.112). 

All Civilizations (and Self) Must Fall (video)

Dhr. Seven and Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly

(B1) The seafaring Aegean civilization (a general term for the Bronze Age civilizations of Greece around the Aegean Sea, the Minoan, Mycenaean or Crete, the Cyclades, and the Greek mainland) destroyed ancient Egypt. Crete is associated with the Minoan civilization from the Early Bronze Age around 1200 BCE.

One facet of the universe, along with being ultimately impersonal and disappointing, is that it is impermanent. This radical flux, or constant state of change, leads to a wearing away of larger structures, such as entire human civilizations. They may last thousands of years, but that is of course only in the sense of continuity. They, in fact, do not last two consecutive days. This is the ever present change or flux the Buddha refers to as anicca. 

The ancient Greek and Egyptian civilizations fused at Thonis-Heracleion (Hilti)

 

Insight into this is liberating when it leads to dispassion and letting go, accompanied by the realization that it is in a sense unreal as well. All formations (compounded things, composites, constructions, fabrications) are unreal. What is true for the micro is true for the macro. The Buddha focused on psychological phenomena, on what we regard as "self," those things we feel closest to and identify with. On a grander scale and much more obvious to our investigations is the fact that large things fall apart, dissolve, crumble away. If we cannot accept that this happens to the greatest of humans, the most glorious "gods" (brahmas and devas in space), the loftiest of plans, it will be very hard to accept the fact that -- and this is verifiable through vipassana -- it is true of I, me, and mine.

Monuments in Egypt are far older than ancient Egypt. They actually go back 10,000+ years, but to say so and show the evidence is to step into the realm of "forbidden" archeology.

 

(AW) "The True Story of Troy" documentary: It's the site of history's most legendary war and the Western world's oldest "adventure" story. According to myth it began with a rigged beauty contest and ended with a giant wooden Trojan horse unleashing utter destruction. Now archaeologists and literary detectives and military analysts are uncovering evidence suggesting the war was really waged. From archaeological trenches at ancient Troy and the citadel fortress of King Agamemnon from Homer to Hollywood, we search for Troy.

 

Khmer King Yayavarmann VII, Bayon temple, Angkor Wat, Cambodia (platonkohphoto/flickr)

  

End of Khmer Rouge (Hanumann/flickr)

When Buddhism ultimately says there is "no soul" (anatta) it is not aligning with materialistic science and its annihilationist view of the afterlife -- that we all die and it ends here in a pile of ashes. 

When Buddhism conventionally says there is a "soul" (atta), it is not aligning with Abrahamic religions and their eternalist view of the afterlife -- that we all die and it continues from here because an imperishable part of us goes on to one more rebirth in heaven or hell.

Who am I? Five Aggregates

Ultimately, that amalgamation of heaps of (1) form (the four primary material elements) and the four primary components of mentality), (2) feeling, (3) perception, (4) mental formations, and (5) consciousness we call body and mind, the "soul" or "self" is ultimately not what it seems.

 

Some of the treasures recovered from the Greco-Egyptian civilization (Franck Goddio)

  

These are opposite views, so how could the Buddha not side with either? That's a logical fallacy surely? It may seem like a paradox or sophistry. But we can rest assured that it is neither. When we realize for ourselves the reality we, too, can get to sounding like mystic or Zen koan writer. It really is not this way, and it really is not the other way either. Indeed, there is no self (ultimately speaking), and there are countless rebirths. We do not die at death...except that we are dying at every single moment, and physical death is one of those moments, too. There is continuity. But what "continues" or seems to continue is not the exact same thing, is not some imperishable "soul" as Hindus, Jains, and the Abrahamic faiths maintain. 

Khmer (Cambodian) Empire may have come to Olmec Mesoamerica

Buddha, Ladakh, Likir Gompa (Ifphotos/flickr)

Buddhism is unique in this assertion -- that there is no ego, no personality, nothing to cling to. Letting go is NOT possible by an act of will. Only liberating-insight can bring it about. Fortunately, it is also possible to gain an intellectual grasp of the Teaching, the Dharma, but a mere intellectual grasp will never do to reach enlightenment. 

We must know-and-see, that is, directly experience the truth. And the truth will set us free from the illusion we currently feel so utterly trapped by. Only insight into the truth can do it, and for mindfulness of body, sensations, mind, and phenomena to produce liberating-insight, we need a great deal of calm, serenity, tranquility.

If we are motivated by disappointment (dukkha), suffering, a strong desire to escape, this craving may do more to ultimately obstruct us just as it helped get us very far along the Path. We need not "want" the truth to be true. The truth is true regardless. And if the heart/mind is calm, absorbed, purified by concentration and applies these four kinds of intensive mindfulness, it will produce insight. One of the most amazing things the Buddha ever said occurs in the discourse on the Four Foundations of Mindfulness. It ends with the Buddha guaranteeing that whosoever practices correctly according to these instructions for seven years...not even seven years but just seven days will surely break through to the truth, will surely gain at least one of the stages of enlightenment and thereby make an end to all suffering.