arbitrary

Meanwhile, US economic power continues to wane globally

And US munitions with no quick way to ramp up production capacity.

Any recommendations?

You're welcome.

if i were to explore buddhism more fully, it would definitely be on my own, rather than in association with any particular sect or practicing group

That seems reasonable to me. Keep in mind my experience may not be representative. I will also say my experience as a lay temple member vs. the priesthood training were almost opposite and I was caught very off guard. From what I remember, Tendai is dying off in Japan. CIA-pedia says 2.8 million practitioners in Japan, 5.3 million for Zen, vs 22 million for Pure Land and 10 million for Nichiren. My point being that although Tendai is a significant sect that incorporates practices from the others, it's one small slice of Buddhist traditions. I know basically nothing about Theravada or Tibetan Buddhism.

Comrade, this and your other reply to me are good comments, thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. You've caused me to re-examine some of the core teachings of Buddhism on my own terms. For example, I did not remember that Buddha specifically spoke against self-mortification as a practice. One of my strong memories from trying to enter the priesthood was the temple head (my teacher) speaking reverently of some long dead monk who cut a piece of her own skin off as a devotional practice. I think I might spend some time re-examining core texts and precepts without the colorings of a specific sect. Materially I am still skeptical of Enlightenment, especially given the historical context during which Buddha lived and the other competing groups seeking the same, but I think I'll give it another critical examination.

I understand. I think there is value in some of the practices like mindfulness meditation, and some of the teachings. It's just for me those on their own aren't Buddhism anymore. For example, breath awareness meditation was the most basic meditation to develop the attention required to sustain the more advanced meditations in Tendai. But maybe other people have different experiences - I know Tendai incorporates a lot of esoteric practices, which were the main thing I struggled with accepting, and I am honestly not sure the extent those are prevalent in other traditions even within Mahayana. I know many of them are still part of Zen practice for the priesthood/monks but 90% of my experience and study was Tendai. I have no experience with Theravada traditions and only some with Tibetan, which I know is very esoteric.

On paper there are some philosophical similarities but I ended up having a negative experience and impression of Buddhism after being a serious practitioner for almost 4 years and started training to be a priest. Imo it's ultimately very idealistic and I personally wouldn't be able to reconcile the two without discarding enough of the practice that it didn't resemble Buddhism much anymore.

But my experience with it was as an authentic imported organized religion. As part of training to be a priest I was taught secret mudras, mantras, and visualizations that I'm supposed to keep secret because they're considered dangerous for people who aren't ready, for example.

I also witnessed all of the non first year attendees perform a devotional practice of doing 1,000 full body prostrations a day (in a row with basically no breaks) for three days in a row. People's knees were bleeding through their robes. There was a lot of stuff like that which ultimately really turned me off from Buddhism. This was all Tendai Buddhism by the way.

The training was very much like boot camp and designed to break you down and mold you differently. Sometimes when I'm drunk I still feel like I need to return to it and will start reciting sutras and wanting to reach out to the temple, even though it was 14 years ago, then wonder wtf I was thinking the next morning. Luckily that almost never happens now.

I guess I'm writing this because most people's experiences with Buddhism in Western countries was very different than mine. Many people see it as a secular practice but that was not at all my experience.

About 12-15, depends on how close to 8 hours of sleep I get.

What's JDPON? Searching brings up Maoism Third Worldism which I'm familiar with but I can't figure out what the actual acronym here is.

Gotcha, agreed there for sure.

Definitely, not arguing against the outcome either way

Do they actually care if they lose, is it really a punishment? Feels like they'll just continue Republican policies whenever they're next in power and keep willingly being dragged to the right.