Wisdom Quarterly: American Buddhist Journal: repulsive

Showing posts with label repulsive. Show all posts

Saturday, October 31, 2026

FREE Haunted House ('death meditation')

Sexy slut Halloween and Day of the Dead Catarina costumes welcome, but please keep it PG-13.

Dressing up as sexy objects (Kristen Schaal)

Catrina dressed as Santa Muerte ("Saint Death") for Day of the Dead (stayhappening.com)

Two haunted house meditations

How can I release the grip of lust right now?

We will conclude with two haunting meditations called "contemplation of the repulsive" and "mindfulness of death."

Paṭikkūla-manasikāra [1] in the historical Buddha's language (Pāli/Magadhi) is translated as "reflections on repulsiveness," "wise [attention to] reflection on the repulsive aspects of phenomena," "contemplating the foul."

It is a traditional Buddhist meditation internally reviewing the 31 parts of the body, which are contemplated in a variety of ways to gain liberating-insight into their true nature.

I'm grateful to be able to practice for liberation

In addition to developing sati ("mindfulness") and samādhi ("stillness," "whole brain coherence," "concentration"), this meditation is considered conducive to overcoming lust (craving), addictive obsession, and overbearing sensual desire.

Along with the "cemetery contemplations" monastics may practice -- such as the contemplation of the nine stages of decaying corpses -- this type of cultivation dispassion (letting go, freedom from obsession, non-clinging) is one of the two meditations on "the foul" or "unattractive" (Pāli asubha) [2].

Meditation on death? I can't go out. *Cough* I'm sick.

Translation

This sounds crazy. Surely, we should do the opposite, right? What if we lose all of our lust?

The Pāli term paṭikkūla literally means "against" (paṭi) "the slope" or "incline" or "embankment" (kūla) and has been translated adjectivally as "averse, objectionable, contrary, disagreeable" and, as a noun, "foulness, loathsomeness, impurity" [3].

The human body can be so beautiful

Hate your body? Plastic surgeons are just a phone call away in LA!

The Pāli manasikāra ("wise attention") is derived from manasi (locative of mana, "mind," thus, loosely, to bear "in mind" or "in thought") and karoti ("to make" or "to bring into") and has been translated as "attention," "pondering," "contemplation," or "fixed thought" [4].

In contemporary translations, the compound term paṭikkūla-manasikāra is generally translated as "reflections on repulsiveness" or, adding contextual clarity to literal accuracy, "reflections on [or recollection of the] repulsiveness of the [nature of the] body" [5].

Alternate translations include "attention directed to repulsive" aspects of bodies [6] and direct "realization of the impurity of the body" [7].

Benefits

But I don't want to look at ugly stuff!

While it may sound "fun" to practice in a group around Obon, Halloween, Samhain, or the Day of the Dead, this type of Buddhist meditation is traditionally mentioned as a strong "antidote" to sensual passion [8].

This is also one of the "four protective meditations," along with Buddha-anussati ("recollection of the Buddha"), mettā (universal, illimitable "loving kindness," "friendliness," "agape," "benevolence") practice and "recollection or mindfulness of death" (maraṇa-sati) [9].

In individual sutras, this type of contemplation is identified as a contributor to many mundane and transcendental goals.

Who wants to see the truth?

For instance, in the Girimananda Sutta (AN 10.60), Ven. Ananda's recites this and other contemplations immediately cures an ailing Buddhist monastic [10].

In the Sampasadaniya Sutta (DN 28), Ven. Sariputta declares that meditating on (recollecting, contemplating, reviewing, examining, analyzing) these 31 body parts leads to "the attainment of vision in four ways" and briefly outlines how this method can be used as a springboard by which one "comes to know the unbroken stream of human consciousness that is not established either in this world or in the next" [11].

Sexy witch Halloween costume

In addition, in the Iddhipāda-samyutta's Vibhanga Sutta (SN 51.20), this meditation subject is used to develop the Four Bases of Power (iddhi-pāda) (one of the seven sets in the 37 Requisites of Enlightenment) by which one is able to achieve awakening, enlightenment, and complete liberation from all suffering [12].

The Pali canon invariably includes this form of contemplation in its various lists of mindfulness meditation techniques [13].

Moreover, the 5th century Buddhist compendium known as The Path of [Mental] Purification (Visuddhi-magga) identifies this type of contemplation (along with anapanasati or "mindfulness of breathing") as one of the few body-directed meditations particularly suited to the development of "right stillness, "super-consciousness," or "right concentration" (samma-samādhi) (Vism. VIII, 43) [14]. More

NOTE: This Wiki entry on patikulamanasikara has been severely edited by Wisdom Quarterly to enhance and bring out deeper facets of the practice as undertaken at Dharma Buddhist Meditation sits.

Free walk through the Haunted House

Calmly looking at repulsiveness and death? Can we just go through the house and get scared?

Who would purposely want to look scary or like some crazy axe murderer in public?

Watch for dead lady in the dark on roadside holding sign

Cats and Bats Haunted House
(@catsandbatshaunt) • Instagram
3000 E. Chevy Chase (on the right)
Glendale (Los Angeles), California
FREE (lots of free street parking)
MORE: SoCal Haunt List of "spooky houses"
SoCal Haunt List (@socalhauntlist) • Instagram
Located a few blocks up the hill from Paramahamsa Yogananda's Self-Realization Fellowship Glendale Temple

FINAL WEEKEND (Friday and Saturday) RSVP:

FREE Cats and Bats Haunted House (Glendale, LA County), FRIDAY, Oct 30, 2026, 7:00 PM | Meetup

(Nature Center) FREE Cats and Bats Haunted House experience (Glendale, LA), Sat, Oct 31, 2026, 7:00 PM | Meetup

FIRST WEEKEND FREE TO RSVP:

October 23, 24, 30, and 31, 2026, 7:00 pm to 10:00 pm (@catsandbatshaunt)

Oct. 23, 24, 30, 31, 2026, 7:00 pm-10:00 pm (@catsandbatshaunt) - socalhauntlist.com

WARNING: Jump scares, terror, bloodcurdling screams, yells, creepiness. Enter at own risk.

The final chamber is the scariest because a lady dressed in Victorian Era clothes starts hitting on you and wants you to sit on a Ziggy Freudian psychotherapy couch -- but she's a... (Aaahhh!!!)

OUTDOOR GALLERY

These are the views outside the House

How scary is it?

Haunted House? It’s just Corporate America

Cats and Bats Haunt (socalhauntlist.com), Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Dhr. Seven, Jen B., Ashley Wells, Pat Macpherson, Wisdom Quarterly

Sunday, November 2, 2025

How much PAIN would you rather? (sutra)

Ven. Sujato (trans.) Salla Sutta (SuttaCentral.net) edited by Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly

“Mendicants, an unlearned ordinary person feels pleasant, painful, and neutral feelings. A learned noble disciple [one anywhere along the four stages of enlightenment] also feels pleasant, painful, and neutral feelings. What, then, is the difference between a learned noble disciple and an ordinary unlearned person?”

“Our teachings are rooted in the Buddha. …”

“When an unlearned ordinary person experiences painful physical feelings, she or he sorrows and wails and laments, beating the breast and falling into confusion. One experiences two feelings, physical and mental.

One is bad enough. Why make it worse?

“It is like a person who is struck by an arrow only to be struck with a second arrow. That person experiences the feeling of two arrows.

“In the same way, when an unlearned ordinary person experiences painful physical feelings, one sorrows and wails and laments, beating one’s breast and falling into confusion. One experiences two feelings, physical and mental.

“When one is touched by painful feeling, one resists it. The underlying tendency for revulsion [aversion, resistance, hate, dosa] towards painful feeling underlies that.

“When touched by painful feeling, one looks forward to enjoying sensual pleasures. Why is that? It is because an unlearned ordinary person does not understand any other escape from painful feeling apart from [the temporary and unfulfilling distraction of] sensual pleasures.

“Since one looks forward to enjoying sensual pleasures, the underlying tendency to greed [lust, craving, grasping, clinging, lobha] for pleasant feeling underlies that.

“One does not truly understand feelings’ origin, disappearance, gratification, drawback, and escape. The underlying tendency to ignorance [delusion, confusion, wrong view, moha] about neutral feeling underlies that.

“If one feels a pleasant feeling, one feels it attached. If one feels a painful feeling, one feels it attached. If one feels a neutral feeling, one feels it attached.

“One is called an unlearned ordinary person who is attached [clinging] to rebirth, old age, and death, to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress, one who is attached to suffering [disappointment, unsatisfactoriness], I say.

Noble disciples

“When a learned noble disciple experiences painful physical feelings, one does not sorrow nor wail nor lament, beating one’s breast and falling into confusion. One experiences one feeling: physical, not mental.

“It is like a person who is struck by an arrow but not struck by a second arrow. That person would only experience the feeling of one arrow.

“In the same way, when a learned noble disciple experiences painful physical feelings, one does not sorrow nor wail nor lament, beating the breast and falling into confusion. One experiences one feeling, physical, not mental.

“When one is touched by painful feeling, one does not resist it. There is no underlying tendency for revulsion towards painful feeling underlying that.

“When touched by painful feeling, one does not look forward to enjoying sensual pleasures. Why is that? It is because a learned noble disciple understands an escape from painful feeling apart from sensual pleasures.

“Since one does not look forward to enjoying sensual pleasures, there is no underlying tendency to greed for pleasant feeling underlying that.

“One truly understands feelings’ origin, disappearance, gratification, drawback, and escape. There is no underlying tendency to ignorance about neutral feeling underlying that.

“If one feels a pleasant feeling, one feels it detached. If one feels a painful feeling, one feels it detached. If one feels a neutral feeling, one feels it detached.

“One is called a learned noble disciple who is detached from rebirth, old age, and death, from sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress, one who is detached from suffering, I say.

“This is the difference between a learned noble disciple and an unlearned ordinary person.

Summary in verse

“A wise and learned disciple is unmoved

by feelings of pleasure and pain.

This is the great difference in skill

between the wise and the ordinary.

A learned disciple who has appraised the Teaching

discerns this world and the next.

Desirable things do not disturb the mind

nor is one repelled by the repulsive.

Both favoring and opposing

are cleared and ended and are no more.