Reality Isn’t What You Think

• An Eternal Now

  10 Dec 08, 04:15

  http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3111&Itemid=0

  Reality Isn’t What You Think By Andy Karr Unlike most religions, Buddhism says our big problem is not sin but ignorance—our fundamental misunderstanding of reality. Contemplative practice, says Andy Karr, is a good way to analyze whether things are as solid, separate, and lasting as we habitually think they are. Do things really exist the way we see them? Do they exist as the separate, independent entities we usually take them to be? “I” and “mine” certainly seem to exist. This world with its mountains, rivers, oceans, and cities seems solid and reliable. Past, present, and future seem to be three different things. That’s how things seem to most everybody most of the time. But it turns out that if these things were ultimately real, we would be completely stuck, because liberation from the painful confines of this reality—the main promise of Buddhism—would be impossible. If things existed the way we see them, all our fears would be well-founded and all our hopes would be worth struggling for. The inexorable cycle of birth, old age, sickness, and death would be the final truth. The Buddha would be wrong about ego because it would truly exist and egolessness would be impossible. Buddhism would be a delusion. There seems to be a contradiction between the reality we expect and experience on a daily basis and the reality described by the Buddha. This is because the way things appear to us is not the way things truly are. There are two ways of seeing everything. Whereas we see a world that is limited, confining, and solid, buddhas experience the world as open, spacious, and relaxed. What we experience as suffering, buddhas experience as great bliss. How could that be? Investigating the difference between the way the world appears to us and the reality proclaimed by the Buddha is a key practice in many Buddhist traditions. This practice of “contemplation” involves using our everyday thought process to help us discover how things are, and how they are not. This process gives direction to meditation practice and is also supported by it. Once you get the hang of it, contemplation not only leads to insight but also is enjoyable. It inspires us to go forward on the Buddhist path. Contemplation invites us to question what we experience. The Buddhist tradition tells us that what we ordinary beings see are our own confused projections. Our seeing is obscured by basic ignorance and the delusion arising from that ignorance. This is what is called apparent reality. It is not the way things really are; it is only the way they appear to us. It is like the delusion that takes objects in dreams to be real when we don’t realize we are dreaming. Buddhas and bodhisattvas who have overcome ignorance and delusion see ultimate reality. These realized beings see emptiness—the true nature of things. This is like recognizing a dream to be a dream. How can we transform seeing apparent reality into seeing the ultimate? The answer is found within us. It can be unlocked through careful contemplation. Contemplation can be done alone; it can also be done in a group and with the aid of a teacher. In any case, we need material to contemplate, and the Buddhist tradition provides ample choices. In this essay, we will take a step-by-step approach to contemplating emptiness. While contemplation takes effort and is sometimes frustrating, it is much more rewarding than just speculating about what emptiness is, which often just generates more concepts that obscure what the buddhas see. Cultivating Insight The contemplative process of transformation depends on cultivating insight. To do this, we need to look closely at our experience. Normally, when things appear to us, in the second moment we project concepts onto them and think the appearances are what we conceive them to be. For example, we see these black lines on the page and think they are letters and words. It is only because we are deeply habituated to reacting to these shapes in this way that sounds and meanings arise in our minds. We can’t see letters and words. We can only see shapes and colors. The process of projection happens so quickly that we don't even notice it. We constantly project our version of reality, this seemingly solid world. These projections are handy when we want to ask for some cinnamon on our cappuccino, but to realize ultimate reality we need to distinguish appearances from our own projections. Here are some simple contemplations that illustrate this. They are meant to be experiential rather than intellectual. Please try to approach them in as childlike a way as you can. Think about this planet. No doubt it seems like you are on the top, but what about people 10,000 miles away from you? They feel equally that they are on the top of the world. If people in each location point “up” at the same time, they will be pointing in completely different directions. Up and down don’t truly exist either. Next think about two people: one you like and one you find difficult. Think about a third person who doesn’t get on well with the person you like but gets on well with the one you find difficult. If you contemplate this state of affairs for a little while, you will understand that pleasant and unpleasant don’t truly exist either. If the first person was truly pleasant, everyone would see them that way, and if the second person was truly unpleasant, everyone would see them that way. All qualities are like these: large and small, up and down, pleasant and disagreeable, beautiful and ugly, hot and cold, good and bad, light and dark, old and new, mine and yours. No one can deny appearances, but whatever appears is empty of whatever we conceive it to be. Ultimate reality, the true nature, is free from all conceptual fabrications. This is the meaning of emptiness, or shunyata, as it is called in Sanskrit. Seeing Mirages Basic ignorance is not recognizing the emptiness that is ultimate reality. It is the root cause of delusion and the bondage and suffering that come from it. It’s as easy as one-two-three. First, we don’t recognize the nature of what appears to our minds. Next, we generate desire, anger, or stupidity toward our projections, as if they were external objects. Finally, we make decisions, act, and react to what we have merely imagined. To return to the dream example, when we don’t know we are dreaming, we might dream of being attacked by a snake, experience great fear, and try to escape from his fangs and writhing body—all without realizing that the snake was only made of dream stuff. If we can realize we are dreaming, fearsome images have no more power over us than a painting of a snake in a museum. It is like the experiences and emotions we have while watching a movie. Even though we know we are sitting in a theater or watching TV, we still believe we see real people in real situations on the screen. We sit there thinking, “He’s going to fall in love with her.” “Don’t go in there!” “They’re all going to die.” It is nothing but colored light coming from a screen, but the illusion of a well-made movie is completely compelling. Dreams and movies are good examples of what happens when we don’t recognize the true nature of appearances, and what happens when we do. In our daily life, when we think about someone we like, we don’t recognize the nature of what is appearing to our minds and think about that person with attachment, failing to see that we are thinking about our projection of a person rather than an actual human being. If someone we don’t like comes to mind, anger arises. It’s the same with jealousy, pride, and stupidity. All confused emotions arise in relation to our projections. In turn these emotions give rise to confused actions. When a person happens to be right in front of us, we see or hear them, and in an instant project a concept on to what is merely a sight or a sound. Next, emotions arise toward the projection, and confused actions arise in response to that. This happens so quickly that we don’t even notice we are doing it. Our actions then give rise to new appearances, which give rise to new projections, emotions, and further actions. These chain reactions go on constantly. As the great Tibetan yogi Milarepa said, “Mind has even more projections than there are dust-motes in the sun.” When we begin to recognize the nature of our projections, it is like waking up from a dream, or recollecting that we are merely watching a movie. Gradually, as we do this more and more, we start to experience freedom from our claustrophobic imagination and begin to experience the spaciousness and relaxation of emptiness. What Emptiness Is Sometimes when students of Buddhism first learn about emptiness, shunyata, they get frightened or angry, as though emptiness was something that would suck all the warmth from life, the way a black hole sucks in light. Emptiness sounds a lot like nothingness, which is clearly not what ultimate reality is. Shantideva, the great Indian practitioner and teacher who lived in the eighth century, made it clear in his classic The Way of the Bodhisattva that nothingness is not the meaning of emptiness nor the intention of teaching it: It’s not indeed our object to disprove Experiences of sight or sound or knowing. Our aim is here to undermine the cause of sorrow: The thought that such phenomena have true existence. Sometimes people think that emptiness is a Buddhist philosophical concept, but the Buddha did not create emptiness; even if the Buddha had never appeared in this world, the nature of phenomena would still be emptiness. We teach emptiness to remove the suffering that comes from clinging to fabrications. It is not presented to destroy appearances. What the teachings on emptiness destroy is delusion, and the suffering that arises from it. Shantideva goes on to say: Whatever is a source of pain and suffering, Let that be the object of our fear. But voidness will allay our every sorrow; How could it be for us a thing of dread? What we really need to be afraid of is ignorance and delusion. These are the causes of suffering. Recognizing emptiness is the antidote for suffering. It is what we need to embrace. Emptiness is not easy to realize, because it is not an object for the conceptual mind. What does recognizes emptiness is prajna (Skt.), which translates literally as “highest knowing.” It is usually rendered as “wisdom,” “insight,” or “knowledge.” Prajna is basic to our makeup, but it is covered over by veils of concept and emotion. We need cultivation to bring it out. There are three ways to cultivate prajna: listening to the teachings, contemplating their meaning, and meditating. These three form a natural sequence. Listening is straightforward. It includes both hearing teachings and studying them. We study such topics as suffering and its cause, the cessation of suffering, the nature of apparent reality, the nature of ultimate reality, and the general workings of samsara and nirvana. The prajna that arises from listening removes our coarsest misunderstandings about reality. Contemplation takes the understanding that arises from listening and starts to mix it with our personal experience. There are many ways to contemplate. The simplest way is to reflect on what you have studied and ask yourself how it applies to you. Is all your experience tinged with suffering, for example, or not? What does emptiness mean? Is it something you vaguely understand, or is it clear to you that all phenomena are empty? Another way to contemplate is to use questions that arise from your studies to investigate your experience, such as asking yourself, What is the nature of the enemy I’m thinking about? Is it really my friend arising in my mind, or is it a projection? A third way to contemplate is to use logical analysis to clarify your understanding. You can ask yourself such questions as, Is this body one thing or many things? It must be one or the other, or else it does not truly exist. When you see the body is made of parts, you understand it is not one thing. And since the parts can also be broken down endlessly, at that point you can realize that its nature is emptiness. Sometimes practitioners have doubts about the validity of contemplation. Since many teachings on meditation emphasize non-conceptuality, they feel it isn’t kosher to practice with concepts. This is an overly simplistic understanding about how to work with conceptual mind. Genuine freedom from fabrications comes from seeing through the delusion of concepts, not from suppressing them. If we don’t use concepts to develop prajna, we will have no way to develop it. Contemplation plays an essential role in transforming dharma from mere theory into personal experience. Through repeated contemplation, we develop confidence in the meaning of the profound teachings and confidence in our understanding. Gradually, we develop certainty about the meaning of prajna and shunyata. Meditating transforms the intellectual understanding developed by contemplating into realization, or direct experience. Intellectual understanding only approximates ultimate reality. The genuine ultimate reality is beyond the intellect. It is inconceivable and inexpressible. We say that ultimate reality is emptiness, for example, but the genuine ultimate is even empty of anything called “emptiness.” Nagarjuna, the great second-century master whose teachings refuted all extreme views of existence and nonexistence, described the characteristics of the ultimate (calling it the precise nature) in the Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way: Unknowable by analogy; peace; Not of the fabric of fabrications; Nonconceptual; free of distinctions— These are the characteristics of the precise nature. Because it is beyond the reach of the intellect, ultimate reality can only be realized through meditation. There are two main aspects to meditation: resting and looking. These are sometimes called cultivating peace and cultivating insight. In the beginning, resting is emphasized, because first we need to pacify mind’s wildness. There is not much point trying to look around inside a whirlwind. As mind begins to settle, the emphasis shifts to investigating the nature of experience. At this point we alternate resting with investigating. This is the way to develop prajna through meditating. It is worth mentioning that some people feel they need to practice resting meditation until their minds are completely still before they can move on to developing insight, and others feel that if they settle their minds enough, they will be freed from suffering and disturbances by that alone. Both of these approaches overestimate the role of resting meditation. It is insight that liberates, because it is insight that sees through ignorance and delusion. Starting to Investigate In apparent reality, such things as outer objects and inner mind; past, present, and future; me and mine; self and other; all seem to truly exist. In ultimate reality, there are no such distinctions. To understand, experience, and finally realize ultimate reality, we need to investigate apparent reality thoroughly so we can see that whatever we cling to is empty. Prajna doesn’t have just one thing to accomplish; it must accomplish many things. There are countless ways to investigate. To give you a feeling for the process, here is a series of investigations that proceeds from what we discussed before, the emptiness of outer objects. The outer environment seems solid and dependable because we always carry our projections with us the way a snail carries its shell. As the 1980s cult-film sage Buckaroo Banzai said, “Wherever you go—there you are.” While we are deeply habituated and cling tightly to our projections, they’re relatively easy to see through. We can begin by investigating what we think of as “home.” Home appears to be as reliable as the earth, but when we look closely at our experience of home, all we find are glimpses of our front door, cooking smells, the sounds of people’s voices and flushing toilets, the feeling of snuggling into bed, the sight of the TV and perhaps pictures on the wall, and so on. We never find “home,” because home is merely a conception. This is something we should contemplate. To do this, ask yourself, “Where precisely is this thing called ‘home’? Is it in the walls, floors, and ceilings?” If you think that is where it is, investigate each of them in turn to see whether they are anything other then collections of glimpses and tactile sensations held together by concepts. Investigate gradually. Look at all the experiences that seem to make up your home. By investigating in this way, you will find that home is in fact emptiness! The experiences conceived of as home do appear, but they are empty appearances. They have no base or support, no fixed, durable foundation. Investigate “this planet” in the same way. You might feel that you know where various geographical reference points are located—Asia, Canada, Kansas, San Francisco. With your mind’s eye, see if you can find them. Are they in the east, west, north, or south? Did you take into consideration the curvature of the earth? How far away are they? Look at your experience of each reference point in turn. Is “Asia” anything more than the memory of a shape on a map? Can you ever find a whole city, or is San Francisco made up of lots of different glimpses the way home is? By contemplating in this way, you will understand that the planet and its geography are also projections. All outer objects can be investigated in this way, and you will find that all are emptiness. Outer objects still appear, but they have no essence. Next, moving into more intimate territory, we should investigate the object of our self-clinging. The only thing we cling to more tenaciously than the external world is ego, the self. The self is our most precious possession, yet we really have no idea what it actually is. We think “I” and “mine” all the time, but what exactly are we referring to? If pressed, most people would say that it is their body and mind, although some would say it is something separate and more abstract, like a spirit or soul. We need to deconstruct the actual experiences that seem to be “the self.” We see glimpses of hands and feet, clothing and reflections. We experience feelings, emotions, and other perceptions. We see reflections in mirrors, feel pleasant and painful sensations, get headaches and stub our toes. We think a lot, get sleepy, and sometimes feel uncomfortable. None of these is the self, and when we investigate we can’t find anything else that holds all of these experiences together. You may protest, But all these things are part of “me”! If so, then ask yourself, What is it that experiences all these things? Is it something separate from the experiences, like a soul or spirit? Can you find such an entity? Are thoughts the experiencer? If you think that thoughts experience things, then investigate what produces the thoughts. Can you find “a thinker” as well as a thought? Perhaps the experiences experience themselves. Is that how it is? Look for the doer in the same way you looked for the experiencer. When you think, “I am going to walk the dog,” will the thought do the walking or the one who thinks? If it is the latter, then they must be two separate things and you should be able to identify both of them. For whatever action you experience, try to find the actor. Is the doer anything more than an assumption? This is a difficult contemplation to do, so don’t rush or push too hard. We have a tremendous investment in the existence of ego, and there is incredible resistance to exposing this illusion. It is easy to dismiss such investigation simply as mind games or word play: it’s all semantics. But the Buddhist tradition of investigation is not based on playing games. The proof of the power of investigation has always been the result: loosening the grip of ego. Sensing this possibility, ego is amazingly resourceful at fending off investigation. All sorts of emotions, distractions, and confusion will come up to ward it off. Investigate repeatedly and you will gradually see that the self is also emptiness. It too has no base or root. At some point you might conclude that there is no self, but there must be a consciousness that is the experiencer of all and the doer of all. If you arrive there, this is what you need to investigate next. The subjective aspect of experience is undeniable, but does this prove that a thing truly exists that is the experiencer? There are many types of consciousness—visual consciousness, auditory consciousness, smell consciousness, taste consciousness, tactile consciousness, mental consciousness, and self-awareness, to name the main ones. Is there a basis or unifying entity for all of these? Each of these consciousnesses is always conscious of something. Can you find mind or consciousness that is not connected with some specific experience? Can you find the root of mind? Investigating the root of mind is an extremely subtle investigation. You might reflect on it from time to time to see if it illuminates itself. You could also refresh yourself by studying more, receiving teachings, and meditating. This gives contemplation more power to work on you. Because there are two ways of seeing everything and we are deeply habituated to only seeing apparent reality, for realization of ultimate reality to develop, everything must be seen anew. Popular literature holds out the hope that this transformation can occur like a flash of lightning, but I am afraid this is wishful thinking. Understanding, experience, and realization develop gradually through lots of listening, contemplating, and meditating. Meeting ultimate reality is more like exploring a new continent than a cosmic revelation, but the good news is that the journey of exploration itself is invigorating and endlessly rewarding. Andy Karr is a senior teacher in the Tibetan Buddhist traditions of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Khenpo Tsültrim Gyamtso Rinpoche. His new book is Contemplating Reality: A Practitioner’s Guide to the View in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism.  Reality Isn't What You Think, Andy Karr, Shambhala Sun, July 2007.

• Isis

  10 Dec 08, 14:16

  Very nice.

  Thank you

• Isis

  24 Dec 08, 18:54

  How to Rid Ourselves of Attachment: Training the Mind, Verse Eight The Doctrine of Emptiness - Meditation Class

  >

  For a full listing of all articles written by Laurie Conrad, please type her name in Buzzle's search engine. Thursday, November 8: This week we continued our studies of the Eight Verses on Training the Mind written by Langri Thangpa (1054-93), the final verse:
  
  Verse Eight:
  
  By ensuring that all this remains undefiled
  From the stains of the eight mundane concerns,
  And by understanding all things as illusions,
  I will train myself to be free of the bondage of clinging.
  
  This verse in a way includes all the other seven vows: if we can free ourselves of all attachments to all forms, the previous seven vows are not difficult to achieve. This is why in his lecture, His Holiness the Dalai Lama called the last two verses the "short path".
  
  By ensuring For me, this phrase, By ensuring is similar in nature to the phrase I will train myself , which is found in all eight verses or vows: i.e. it is our own responsibility to put these vows into practice, to live them. No one can take these vows for us, nor practice them for us.
  
  all this  We decided that all this referred to the previous seven verses.
  
  remains undefiled From the stains of the eight mundane concerns I asked the class what the eight mundane concerns were. After some thought, Trudy answered: "We don’t know what they are." Which is true, we did not know. However: it is not necessary to know specifically what those eight mundane concerns are. The point is that they are mundane , and therefore connected to the ego - and that to entertain them defiles and stains the Mind of Clear Light and our lives, as all the aggregates, or ego thoughts, do.
  
  And by understanding all things as illusions This is the key to this very valuable verse. First, I asked the class for a definition of The Doctrine of Emptiness : this Tibetan Buddhist Doctrine is often misunderstood in the West. Westerners tend to think of it as a doctrine that supports nihilism, that nothing exists - which is not true. In fact, in past lectures I have attended, the Dalai Lama has warned us against falling into nihilism. His Holiness has suggested that if we feel that we are falling into nihilism that we apply the antidote, i.e. remind ourselves that mundane, conventional, physical reality has its own conventional reality.
  
  The Doctrine of Emptiness , for the Tibetan Middle Way Buddhists, means that all forms are empty of independent, inherent existence.
  
  This includes the ego, or "I thought". Chris took notes at His Holiness’ lecture on The Eight Verses of Training the Mind and she gave them to me after class. Chris had written: "The ego, the personality, the small self is also devoid of inherent existence. ‘Self’ and sense of ‘I am’ are constructs based on physical and mental elements, derived from factors that cannot stand on their own. Therefore, the self is empty of inherent existence. The self only exists in dependent relation with physical and mental elements or aggregates. The physical and mental elements also have no true Reality (and here the Dalai lama mentioned Quantum physics.). Grasping at the sense of ‘I am’ is at the root of our afflictions. For instance, holding onto a notion of self leads to attachment and clinging."
  
  In other words, if we examine who we are: we are more than our thoughts and emotions, more than our personalities and physical bodies. If we examine our personality or ego: it is only comprised of thoughts that come and go. Therefore, those thoughts cannot have inherent existence; they arise within the mind and physical brain, a physical brain which is dependent upon our physical body. Our physical body is dependent upon our parents for its very existence, and the food we eat and the water we drink for its continued existence. Therefore, we must be something more than the ego or personality and physical body. If this is so, then our ego or smaller self - does not independently, inherently exist. Our ego self is devoid of true Reality.
  
  The Doctrine of Emptiness is closely connected to The Doctrine of Dependent-arising. The Dalai Lama would say that nothing in form inherently exists, i.e. nothing in form has Ultimate or True Reality or Existence. Everything in form - all physical and mental things and objects, including our own physical bodies - depend on something else for their very existence. Therefore, they do not independently, inherently exist. For instance, if we take the example of a wooden cart: if we take the cart apart, take its wheels off, disassemble the sides and bottom: where is the cart? The cart is dependent on the tree’s wood, the wood cutters, the workmen that cut the wood and those who then assembled the cart. The cart does not exist on its own, is does not independently or inherently exist. The tree is dependent on other factors for its physical existence as well: the seed that began it, the rain and sun that supported its growth. For the Tibetan Buddhist, all forms are empty of independent, inherent existence. Any thing in form is dependent on something else for its very existence; therefore nothing in form can be Ultimately Real.
  
  In this sense: the world is illusion.
  
  And by understanding all things as illusions,
  I will train myself to be free of the bondage of clinging.
  
  In other words, if we understand the Doctrines of Emptiness and Dependent-arising : we can then train ourselves to be free of clinging , or attachment.
  
  I asked the class why attachment put us into bondage, why we need to rid ourselves of this clinging . Diana said: fear of loss leads to anger which leads to hatred which then leads to jealousy and greed: in other words, attachment leads to pain and suffering. Trudy said that attachment to things or people blocks us from the Higher; attachment replaces the Higher in our lives, i.e. we get stuck in material forms. I asked the class to define "forms" and they said forms included material things, ideas and emotions, as well as people, animals and flowers and all other beings.
  
  I added that these illusions also include the notions of time and space, and the notions of duality and separation. If we think we are merely the physical body, and that others are merely their physical bodies - then we will feel separation from others. The erroneous notion of duality tells me that I am here, sitting on the couch - and Pam is there, across the room - i.e. that we are two separate entities separated by space. To know that space does not ultimately exist as we know it, we need only to examine the bilocation skills of the saints of many religions; to disprove that time ultimately exists, we need only to examine the clairvoyance of the saints of many religions. Separation, as we experience it, either of time or space, does not Ultimately exist. Only our human perceptions convince us that separation exists. If we realize that separation does not truly exist, then we will not cling to anything in form, there is no need to cling.
  
  Then I asked the class how the Doctrine of Emptiness could help us overcome the bondage of clinging, or attachment. M. said: "What are you clinging to, if it does not ultimately exist?".

  http://www.buzzle.com/articles/how-to-rid-ourselves-of-attachment-training-the-mind-verse-eight-the-doctrine-of-emptiness-meditation-class.html
• xXIron_fistXx

  27 Dec 08, 12:02

  Breaking concepts with concepts , some may feel I tot buddhism say not to work with concepts but if u dun use concept to break concept , what can u use ?

• An Eternal Now

  27 Dec 08, 13:53

  Originally posted by xXIron_fistXx:

  Breaking concepts with concepts , some may feel I tot buddhism say not to work with concepts but if u dun use concept to break concept , what can u use ?

  Whether you use concepts or not are completely irrelevant to your true nature.

  You don't need concepts to know you are alive and you are breathing.

  Whether or not thoughts are arising, your true nature is presently aware of these thoughts and presently aware when no thoughts are arising.

  The more you try to figure out using thoughts, the more you are looking at the wrong direction and missing out the directness and simplicity of this.

  Even when you think you figured things out, your true nature is that which is aware of the thought arising. And when you think you are confused, your true nature is that which is aware of the thought arising. Look into what is it that is aware.

  But once there is a direct realisation and conviction in your true nature, then doubts no longer arise.

• xXIron_fistXx

  27 Dec 08, 21:28

  Sorry , cyberlogy I am a novice .

  Haha

   

• An Eternal Now

  27 Dec 08, 23:44

  Don't worry, your buddha nature is not in any way lacking as a novice nor will your buddha nature increase in any way after Buddhahood.

  It just takes some looking to clarify your true nature.

• annoy-you-must

  3 Jan 09, 22:20

  To some extent, I guess my intellect understands this, but not my emotion? It's kind of hard to explain.

  Let's use a cup as an example.

  I understand that that it is empty of inherant nature. That while we perceive it to be a nice cup, it's true nature is not that of a nice cup. It is materials (molecules together) in the form of a cup. It is there because somebody gathered the material and mold it, put it on the shop shelve and someone else bought it. Throughout the moments in which I own the cup, it changed, it degenerates. I perceive it as nice because of it's shape, colors and design. But it is not truly so.

  Still, when the cup drop onto the ground and shatter into pieces, my heart still pain, abeit knowing full well that the cup was not the same cup through and couldn't possibly exist forever anyway.

• An Eternal Now

  3 Jan 09, 22:53

  Originally posted by annoy-you-must:

  To some extent, I guess my intellect understands this, but not my emotion? It's kind of hard to explain.

  Let's use a cup as an example.

  I understand that that it is empty of inherant nature. That while we perceive it to be a nice cup, it's true nature is not that of a nice cup. It is materials (molecules together) in the form of a cup. It is there because somebody gathered the material and mold it, put it on the shop shelve and someone else bought it. Throughout the moments in which I own the cup, it changed, it degenerates. I perceive it as nice because of it's shape, colors and design. But it is not truly so.

  Still, when the cup drop onto the ground and shatter into pieces, my heart still pain, abeit knowing full well that the cup was not the same cup through and couldn't possibly exist forever anyway.

  Yes. Intellectual understanding is not the same as truly realising it deeply and seeing emptiness in everything. The deeply held bond, the attachments to form, is still present in our subconscious. Our usual way of seeing things dualistically and 'inherently' still functions because the bond is too strong and is affecting almost every moment of our lives with the exception of deep sleep and deep meditative absorption.

  Only through a quantum shift of perception, a true insight into the nature of reality, these bonds are 'burnt' away. Furthermore, an initial glimpse or insight into non-duality, no-self, emptiness, etc... will not be sufficient to clear all these bonds. It requires years of maturation, deepening and cycles of insight that it can totally penetrate the subconscious and clear all remaining bonds and afflictions. That is why there are 4 stages to Arhatship and 10 stages (bhumis) of a Bodhisattva... and at each stage certain obscure and subtle layers of bonds are cleared.

  So to truly clear all of these attachments, all bonds, we still have to continue practicing hard to develope the prajna wisdom that sees the emptiness of self and the emptiness of all phenomena.

  When we practice subjectless and objectless awareness, when seeing a cup, there is just the sight -- when there is sound of airplane or birds it's just sound -- not an airplane or a bird. There is also no sense of a separate seer or hearer, only sights and sounds. There is no discriminations, and thus no grasping nor rejecting of what appears in our sensory awareness.

  What we call 'bird' or an 'airplane' is just a luminous and empty Appearance, a manifestation of consciousness. It has in fact empty of an objective reality and it is not 'out there' in contrast to 'me in here'. It is due to the bond at seeing things dualistically and inherently, the deep conditioning within us, that makes us constantly experience things as external objects in contrast to an inner experiencer.

  Similarly when emotions arise we should just feel the emotions without grasping on it 'solidly' -- it's just a pure feeling, don't interprete, judge, chase, or grasp the emotion. They are also impermanent, ungraspable.

  When we observe anything -- say a red flower, though they vividly manifest due to conditions, it's in fact insubstantial and empty. It's just an appearance. A dog sees a black flower, and if we observe its quantum characteristics it's mostly void. So there is no inherent 'red' 'flower' with inherent characteristics, colours and shapes. There is just an insubstantial, empty yet luminous appearance.

  When we truly observe everything and contemplate on its emptiness, insights may eventually dawn for us. But this is not something that can be done over one day's time, it requires a period of practice.

• An Eternal Now

  3 Jan 09, 23:37

  There's something very important that Thusness just wrote in the other thread

   

  He said:  ...To conciousness, it is always insights that liberates.  Spontaneous perfection is not about the path we adopt, it is that ultimate and thorough insight that allows us to willingly, fearlessly and unreservedly open to whatever that arises; for whatever arises is always to liberate itself when experienced as non-dual and empty awareness....

   

  And how to allow insight to arise?

  As Thusness so clearly stated: The syncing of the Right View (1st of Eightfold Path) and Right Path/Practices (2nd to 8th of Eightfold Path) allows Fruition (insight/enlightenment) to arise.

  Have a thorough understanding of the Buddhist teachings of Anatta (No-Self), Emptiness/Dependent Origination, the 5 skhandas and 18 dhatus etc, and practice to experience the truths for oneself.

  When insight arise, one will automatically let go of all our attachments. Prior to that, the attachments will still surface intermittently when the conditions for them to arise surfaces. We should not supress them but to continue dropping, and observing. Only until one day when insight arise and self-liberation is experienced at all moments, then all bonds and karmic propensities (deep conditionings) that affects the way we perceive things dualistically and inherently and thus attach to them, are cleared.

  As Thusness wrote years ago:

  
  "...When one is unable to see the truth of our nature, all letting go is nothing more than another from of holding in disguise. Therefore without the 'insight', there is no releasing.... it is a gradual process of deeper seeing. when it is seen, the letting go is natural. You cannot force urself into giving up the self... purification to me is always these insights... non-dual and emptiness nature...."
  
  ~ Thusness

• An Eternal Now

  4 Jan 09, 22:39

  Originally posted by An Eternal Now:

  Whether you use concepts or not are completely irrelevant to your true nature.

  You don't need concepts to know you are alive and you are breathing.

  Whether or not thoughts are arising, your true nature is presently aware of these thoughts and presently aware when no thoughts are arising.

  The more you try to figure out using thoughts, the more you are looking at the wrong direction and missing out the directness and simplicity of this.

  Even when you think you figured things out, your true nature is that which is aware of the thought arising. And when you think you are confused, your true nature is that which is aware of the thought arising. Look into what is it that is aware.

  But once there is a direct realisation and conviction in your true nature, then doubts no longer arise.

  What I said here, is not really correct. Thought is, but no thinker. Sound is, but no hearer. Awareness cannot be separated from thoughts and manifestation.

• Thusness

  5 Jan 09, 09:32

  Originally posted by An Eternal Now:

  What I said here, is not really correct. Thought is, but no thinker. Sound is, but no hearer. Awareness cannot be separated from thoughts and manifestation.

  Yes but what said can still have the following senario:

  1. There is an Awareness reflecting thoughts and manifestaion.

  2. Thoughts and manifestaion are required for the mirror to see itself.

  3. Thoughts and manifestaion have always been the mirror

  In 3 not even a quantum line can be drawn from whatever arises;  whatever that appears to come and goe is the Awareness itself.  There is no Awareness other than that.  We should use the teachings of anatta, DO and Emptiness to see the 'forms' of awareness.

   Just a casual comment on the articles posted:

   

  Although it is important to know that "reality is not what we think it is", the articles posted should not stop at 'Form is Emptiness'.  It can be dangerous leading one to an utter state of confusion.  It is better to explore anatta and emptiness by relating it to our daily experiences.  I think there are 2 articles from Toni Packer and Ajahn Amaro that are posted by you that explain anatta and emptiness very well.  They are written from deep experiential insights.  You may want to revisit them. :)

   

• An Eternal Now

  5 Jan 09, 13:06

  I see... thanks for the explanation.

  By the way is this 'Form is Emptiness' (especially the highlighted parts):

  http://itisnotreal.com/subpage22.html

  Awareness of the Void

  At some point, either before or after the initial enlightenment experience—at least in my tradition—you must become absolutely certain that you are not your body.

  All that you know is consciousness. Think about it. Everything you experience, your body, the world, thinking, memories, science, history, dreams, other people--all happen in your consciousness. If something happens outside of your consciousness, such as a storm while you slept, or Lincoln’s assassination, you only know about it if someone, or something within your consciousness tells you. That learning occurs now, within your present consciousness. Of course, you can also infer something happened by after effects, such as wet ground implies there was rain. Yet, even that inference is a thinking, a speculation, and it occurs in your present consciousness. All memory about the past and thinking about the future, occurs in your now consciousness. Thus, all knowing and experience occurs now. It is then obvious that you need to experience and understand now-consciousness.

  If all that you know or experience is consciousness, then you too, at least for argument’s sake, are consciousness. Your consciousness is not limited by body, mind, world, time or space; all these occur within your consciousness as objects of that consciousness.

  Even the intangible, the invisible, and the hidden, such as an atom, or gravity, are known only by inference from present experience in your now consciousness. The inference to the unobserved, such as the existence of an atom, or a gravity wave, is a mental process occurring within your present consciousness too. Atomic physics, cosmology, and all of science becomes a set of inferences about hidden and non-hidden objects and forces, derived from simple acts of perception conjoined with a set of mental functions we call inference or logic, which are also happenings in now consciousness.

  So what is this now-consciousness? Intellectually understood it is called mind. Others would call it imagination. It is all mental stuff. This, of course doesn’t help understanding one whit except that it is a pointer that helps you get before the concept that the body it real, and by real, I mean as having its own, autonomous self-existence. Its existence is imaginary, mindstuff.

  I must admit my own evolution appears idiosyncratic. That is, for many years before awakening, I was conscious of an almost palatable emptiness or Void. When I described it to someone else, he ascribed it to seeing God.

  The only persistent mention I see of it is in Mahayana, where the Void’s meaning is explained according to differing schools, and Vajrayana Buddhism, such as the Tibetan Kargya school. It is only in the latter that I see much description of the experience of the Void (as opposed to the theory of the Void), or the mention that the essential quality of mind, mental space, is that of clear light.

  The clear light experience is found when the mind is quiet, and the light of consciousness, which is always there, rather than a background awareness, becomes the foreground awareness. That is, the light becomes a more compelling experience than any object within mind. The screen, so to speak, becomes more important than the play of images that make a movie.

  How to get to this place is explained further on another page on this site, but it is so important that it is worth repetition.

  When at first we look within, rather than at an object in the world, we only find darkness. However, as our ‘inner eye’ ‘adjusts’ to the darkness of the mental space within, the darkness gradually gives way to an inner light. It is like entering a darkened movie theater. The eyes have to acclimatize before they see the reflected light from the movie. That inner light illuminates a mental world of emptiness, or void. Many years of looking leads the inner emptiness to expand, and the light to illuminate it ever more brightly.

  Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhists call this clear, self-illumined Void our true nature. Our true nature is nothingness, this nothingness-emptiness, which is absolutely clear, is illumined by its own light.

  At first, this light appears different from physical light. It is less clear, less intense and less ‘grabbing’ of attention. However, over the years, its intensity grows and its manifested forms change. Color patterns and shadows dance and fill its radiance. An inner movie of insubstantial forms plays to its one audience. Eventually the meditator discovers that the inner light and outer physical light are the same. They arise out of the basic functioning of vision consciousness itself. Of course there is sound consciousness and that is described in many other sources.

  Knowing this inner Void of light and peace leads to dramatic changes in one’s belief systems. For example, no matter how hard you look, no matter how long you look within, and that within becomes a clear, light, Void, you cannot find an I.

  With your eyes open, operating and functioning in the world, you may act like a me, and even feel like a me if you turn your attention to yourself. However, if you stop and look within, eyes open or closed, trying to pursue the I, whether it is a thought or a feeling, you cannot find it. Even if you turn even further inward to look for the one who is looking, you will find the same self-illumined emptiness only. That’s it. That’s all you’ll ever find looking within.

  Looking within and abiding within, means getting to the non-experiential state lying beneath (or before) thoughts, feelings or sensations.

  All that you find is nothingness, a lighted void. While this experience may not change you radically, you do begin to wonder who is it that exists, and what is the nature of that existence.

  One day the realization comes that within the entire fabric of your being there is no I at all. There never has been an I. There is no coordinator. There is no thinker.

  You discover there are thoughts, but no thinker. There are actions, but no actor. There are decisions, but no decision maker. There is movement, but no mover. There is life, but no one who lives. There are trees, but no perceiver.

  Everything takes place without a perceiver or organizer. Thoughts come and go, but they are like drops of rain, not something you create and implement. Everything happens without a central point of I-ness.

  When this absence of I is clearly understood, your world is turned upside down. Without an I, there is no other opposed to it. I and other become one. I am no longer different from my percept, because there is no longer a me. There is percept, and I am that. There is only one field of perception, undivided by categories of me and thee, I and Thou, inner and outer, and I am all that.

  With the disappearance of the I-idea, there is the temporary replacement by the Oneness-idea. You go around saying there is only One, only One! However, even this Oneness-idea is eventually overturned because we realize it too, is only an idea. With the disappearance of the I-idea, all ideas begin to vanish too. Atom is an idea. Quantum is an idea. Communism and capitalism are ideas, as is central bank, gross domestic product, integrity, dishonesty, brain, pancreas, and even Oneness and consciousness. They all disappear and with them, the existence of that which they purportedly denoted. The world is not other than mind and mind is no other than thoughts.

  Soon our apparent brains begin to close out random thoughts and we begin to really look at our direct experience without the intervention of thought or the guidance of theory and memories of how things ought to be. The world revealed is vastly different from the world we thought we lived in.

  We eventually discover we are not human beings at all, trapped in a body doomed to death, but we are everything we experience. We are the totality of consciousness. Without the I to limit us, without an I to direct our lives in routines of please and pain avoidance, we are allowed to expand and take ownership of the totality of real existence. We leave behind the world of thought existence.

  The inner world and the outer world come together. The inner world of vast, inner, self-illumined space merges with the outer world of objects and sense impressions. When you look within you see the inner light, and when you look without, everything you see is illumined by physical light. When you walk into a dark room, you leave the physical light behind, and you see only the inner light. One day you realize that inner light is always there, even in the external world of sunlight. One day you realize there is only light. Sometimes you may call it sunlight, or lamplight, and sometimes you may call it inner light. However, there always is light, and that light illumines all, whether an inner fantasy or an outer tree.

  When we are quiet and still, sometimes the inner vastness opens completely, and we, as discrete sentient objects, as subjects, disappear completely, to be replaced by our totality of experience of the world. The boundary between the trees and us disappears, and we become the trees. We become the sound of the tree blowing in a breeze. We become the jet plane overhead. Body and mind disappear completely, and we become the totality of experience, including portions of body experience mixed in.

  We experience we are not the body. We are the totality of experience. We are the totality of consciousness, which includes the experience of the body as a part of a larger totality.

  Now comes a most important step. We begin to investigate the body as an object of consciousness, and therefore, like all objects in consciousness, it too is consciousness. We explore the body as consciousness, just as we explored the vast, inner emptiness.

  Since the vast, inner, self-illumined emptiness is now always present, eyes open or closed, it is not surprising to see that the body too has this quality. The body is experienced in many ways. We can touch it, and be touched by it. We can hear the sounds it makes. We can taste its skin, and we taste our mouths. We can see portions of it with our eyes open. We can feel its muscles moving. We can feel our lungs pulling in air. We can feel a headache or muscle strain. We can look within, using our inner vision and find the lighted void that permeates all sensations of touch, taste, smell, sight, and inner feelings.

  We begin to see the body is essentially empty and light, as is everything else within consciousness, as well as it should be, because the body too is only another object within consciousness, and thus is consciousness itself.

  Whether there is something that reincarnates into a new body is a moot point. Speculating about it does not help you know yourself first hand. Someone who has recognized there is no I can see there is nothing to reincarnate, except the vast, self-illumined Void. But, this is everyone’s void, everyone’s true and original nature. Who can say that this part of the Void is me, and that will reincarnate?

  The same self-illumined speck of void is in everyone and permeates everyone’s every experience. The void is everyone and contains everyone. The void is One. As the Prajna Paramita Hridaya Sutra so succinctly states: Form is no other than Emptiness, Emptiness no other than form. Feeling, thought, sensation, and consciousness are also like this. All forms arise out of the Void, and return to the Void, just as clouds materialize from a clear sky, and after an hour or a week, dissipate back into the clear sky.

  Perceiving the body and its experience from the inside, with the understanding that it too is consciousness, changes the body’s experience. Things no longer happen to it as a passive subject. Rather, the body and environment are inseparable. One cannot experience one without the other. In fact, the body is the One world, and the One world is the body.

  Sensations become less substantial. They are all permeated by emptiness. They feel less cluttered, more discrete and clear, but at the same time, less substantial, and in a sense, less "real." We often use the term ‘real’ synonymously with hard, tangible, or especially impactful sensations. However, all sensations now occur within a simultaneously perceived vast emptiness, which is as real as the sensations.

  The experience is a little like seeing the old pirate hologram at Disneyland’s Pirate Cove. There is a discrete image of light with the form of a man, but you can see through the image, as if it were a ghost. It has an intangible, empty feel about it. So too become the body’s sensations. They seem less substantial, and less real, which is good if you are dying a painful death, but bad if you are having enjoyable sex.

  Another result of the constant presence of the Void is that no experience is more important than any other portion of the totality of the experience. The body is no more important than the tree. With increasing freedom from the demands of the world, we can begin to explore our experience of our bodies more closely. One day we make the remarkable discovery: we have no bodies!

  We realize that the body, like our sense of I, is only a concept. There is no central experiencer of the body that coordinates the body’s many sensations and perceptions. If you look closely at the body, examine each sensation moment by moment, you will understand completely, there is no such thing as the inner experience of the body as a totality. The sense of body totality is a concept only. Try it, you’ll see this is true. You must become convinced that you have no body by this direct experience before you can become free. In fact, this appears to be the essence of Ramana Maharshi’s experience. He discovered he was not his body. He did not find realization through self enquiry as he taught everyone else to do, but through a process where he realized he was not his body. I call this sort of self-investigation Microanalysis, and it is a great adjunct to the "Who Am I?" sort of self-enquiry.

  If we look at our experience of our bodies from the inside, in a careful, thorough manner, we discover all sorts of things. At any one time we only experience portions of our bodies’ feelings. Sometimes we feel a muscle tightness in the neck or back. Sometimes just the pressure of the chair against the buttocks. Sometimes we experience the taste in or mouths. Sometimes a tingling sensation on the feet. Sometimes we feel our heart beating, and sometimes we hear it.

  Though many sensations may vie for our attention, and reside on the edges of direct awareness, we actually can only attend to one sensation of the whole at a time. It is like trying to hold onto two thoughts at a time-impossible. Just as you cannot think two thoughts at the same time, you cannot attend to two sensations simultaneously.

  While we can examine one sensation after another, either randomly, or in a linear fashion, we cannot experience them all at once. Nor can we experience the body as a whole, as one complete form. If you think you do, please examine that wholeness feeling. You will discover that the experience of the body as a whole, is in fact, an "enduring" image, a fantasy, not an actual experience of the body as a whole. We have a body image, imagination, so to speak, derived from many years of body experience, and this image acts as an inner cognitive reference map that gives all the random sensations a meaning within the context of that map, i.e., a banged toe, hot mashed potatoes in the mouth.

  It also becomes clear that the external world has its own reference map, but that map is still within our imagination. It then comes as no surprise that they are the same: reference maps of various dreams.

  For example, I will have a sudden slight burning ‘pain’ somewhere. I search through my memories of similar sensations, until there is a match. I can then declare it a foot pain or a back pain based on past experience. Back sensations are different from foot sensations. The body image then gives me a map, and I place that pain in my body image’s foot. I can then reach down and rub my foot.

  Isolating the spatial location of any body sensation from the inside is impossible without this body image map. The map is not itself a sensation or perception of the body. It is an image, born of experience, and supported by our ideas about our body. In fact, for most people, the body image grabs more attention than the sensations, which means we do not experience our experience, but we experience our ideas about ourselves.

  This all leads up to my initial statement and final conclusion, the requisite knowledge of awakening: You have no body. The body is only a concept. There are only scattered sensations and perceptions that the brain puts together with a body image. There is only One experience, one field of consciousness, and you are that, the totality of all that is.

  Robert used to say, "You are nobody, No Body at all." The body idea is very limiting. You are much more than the body and its many sensations. These all come and go, but who you are essentially, stays the same: Emptiness, without form, vast like space, lighted by its own light. But even this emptiness is not you. It is added to you. Form dissolves into emptiness and both into you.

  You are not your body. In effect, you have no body, nor is there a you to have one. No body, no you. Even consciousness is just a concept. The vast, self-lighted Void too, is just a concept, a knowing added onto your emptiness nature. These concepts are both stepping stones and hindrances to discovering who you are, without words, images or concepts. About This, nothing can be said, because that which can be said has nothing to do with you.

  Next: Our Mission  (http://itisnotreal.com/subpage23.html)

• An Eternal Now

  5 Jan 09, 13:13

  Originally posted by Thusness:

  Yes but what said can still have the following senario:

  1. There is an Awareness reflecting thoughts and manifestaion.

  2. Thoughts and manifestaion are required for the mirror to see itself.

  3. Thoughts and manifestaion have always been the mirror

  In 3 not even a quantum line can be drawn from whatever arises;  whatever that appears to come and goe is the Awareness itself.  There is no Awareness other than that.  We should use the teachings of anatta, DO and Emptiness to see the 'forms' of awareness.

   Just a casual comment on the articles posted:

   

  Although it is important to know that "reality is not what we think it is", the articles posted should not stop at 'Form is Emptiness'.  It can be dangerous leading one to an utter state of confusion.  It is better to explore anatta and emptiness by relating it to our daily experiences.  I think there are 2 articles from Toni Packer and Ajahn Amaro that are posted by you that explain anatta and emptiness very well.  They are written from deep experiential insights.  You may want to revisit them. :)

   

  btw, for those who want to read the 2 articles:

  Toni Packer's article

  • What Is The "Me"?

  And Ajahn Amaro's article

  http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2008/01/ajahn-amaro-on-non-duality-and.html

• Thusness

  6 Jan 09, 08:21

  Originally posted by An Eternal Now:

  I see... thanks for the explanation.

  By the way is this 'Form is Emptiness' (especially the highlighted parts):

  http://itisnotreal.com/subpage22.html

  
  Hi AEN,

  You must first know that “Emptiness” cannot be understood by second hand knowledge except by prajna wisdom.  Prajna is a form of intuitive insight of ‘emptiness’; a kind of direct knowing.  You must be deeply aware of this “direct without intermediary” sort of perception -- too direct to have subject-object gap, too short to have time, too simple to have thoughts.

  I will not comment on the article but just want you to be clearly aware of this immediate sort of seeing.  An experience of the Eternal Witness is not a form of knowledge that is derived from relating, associating, deducing or inducing anything.  It is not about thinking, there are no thoughts.  It is a whole and complete sense of ‘I’; a pure sense of existence free from all artificialities.  Unlike relative knowledge that always requires an element of faith to bridge the gap as there is no certainty of knowledge, the experience of Eternal Witness is completely free from doubts.  A practitioner is fully convinced, unshakeable and unmovable; not even Buddha can shake his insight. 

  It is this sort of insight that must arise when it comes to spirituality.  It is the ‘wisdom eye’ that can see the whole of ‘sound’ by being ‘sound’.  It is the same ‘eye’ that sees ‘anatta’ and ‘emptiness’.  After the maturing of insight, one will naturally understands that ‘Eternal Witness’ is no more “purer” than the arising and passing sound, the empty phenomena.  It is just the awakening of this non-dual eye.

  Therefore after some pointers, to progress further and truly know, reflecting relatively will not help; you should start to let go completely and learnt the art of feeling directly and wholly.  Buddha taught mindfulness that practices bare attention at the same time experience the impermanent nature of all arising and passing phenomena.  We should not take this lightly.  We can start from there to awake the intuitive insight of anatta and emptiness. :)

• An Eternal Now

  6 Jan 09, 11:49

  I see... thanks :)

• Thusness

  6 Jan 09, 12:18

  Originally posted by An Eternal Now:

  I see... thanks :)

  
  We cannot just understand non-abiding as not resting the mind anywere, u must also be able to that whereever it is, it's home.

  Similarly after Form is Emptiness, you must see the fabric and texture of Emptiness.

  :)

• An Eternal Now

  6 Jan 09, 12:48

  I see... thanks again.. :)

• Thusness

  6 Jan 09, 12:57

  Originally posted by An Eternal Now:

   

  "u must also be able to that whereever it is, it's home."

  You mean 'see'?

  Yes typo. :P

  It means u must also be able to see it from the angle of "whereever we are, it's home."
  

   

• djhampa

  26 Jan 09, 23:03

  If one looks at the context of "form is emptiness"  the author of the heart sutra was talking of the 4 skandhas of sense objects, feelings, perceptions and volition. Form referred to the sense objects that came through the sense organs. These then followed on to feelings which triggered our perception and these created our emotions and follow on actions which is karma.

  ONENESS as described in the article posted by The Eternal Now occurs at 2 levels. The first level is when we have an awareness of the illusion of whatever that that flow pass our consciousness. There is a realisation that all that we are conscious of is within our mindstream and not outside. We are this delusion and this delusion is us. We are inseparable. The sudden conceptual void created by our detachment from the 4 skandhas can be very unnerving.   Our entire mind created reality that we have known all our lives had disappeared in an instance.

  When peace and equanimity returns insights start to arise and the mind created reality that had used to stop us from connecting with what was beyond our mind-created reality is no longer a barrier. Our awareness became freed from the burden and a direct connection can be made with objects outside of us.  A sense of connection with everything became the second level of ONENESS - a connection without any interfering projections. 

  Penetrating insights into life and reality can now occur unobstructed.

  Does the tree still exist outside ?

  ----

  On the light been seen in meditation those light seen is not clear light. Light seen in meditation is called kasina and in tantra buddhism this occurs when bliss starts to arise and the wind managed to penetrate the chakras. Light in clear light is clarity and not physical light.

   

   

   

• An Eternal Now

  27 Jan 09, 18:30

  Originally posted by djhampa:

  If one looks at the context of "form is emptiness"  the author of the heart sutra was talking of the 4 skandhas of sense objects, feelings, perceptions and volition. Form referred to the sense objects that came through the sense organs. These then followed on to feelings which triggered our perception and these created our emotions and follow on actions which is karma.

  ONENESS as described in the article posted by The Eternal Now occurs at 2 levels. The first level is when we have an awareness of the illusion of whatever that that flow pass our consciousness. There is a realisation that all that we are conscious of is within our mindstream and not outside. We are this delusion and this delusion is us. We are inseparable. The sudden conceptual void created by our detachment from the 4 skandhas can be very unnerving.   Our entire mind created reality that we have known all our lives had disappeared in an instance.

  When peace and equanimity returns insights start to arise and the mind created reality that had used to stop us from connecting with what was beyond our mind-created reality is no longer a barrier. Our awareness became freed from the burden and a direct connection can be made with objects outside of us.  A sense of connection with everything became the second level of ONENESS - a connection without any interfering projections. 

  Penetrating insights into life and reality can now occur unobstructed.

  Does the tree still exist outside ?

  ----

  On the light been seen in meditation those light seen is not clear light. Light seen in meditation is called kasina and in tantra buddhism this occurs when bliss starts to arise and the wind managed to penetrate the chakras. Light in clear light is clarity and not physical light.

   

   

   

  I agree with you about the understanding of 'clear light'... 'clear light' is without any features, or colours, but is the subtle luminosity that pervades and allows every experience. I also have had experiences of lights in kasina in meditation and 'clear light' is not refering to Kasinas.

  About the experience of "Oneness"... I wouldn't agree that "Oneness" is "a direct connection can be made with objects outside of us". Speaking from my experience, in non-dual experience there is no one to make a connection with objects.... Awareness is not 'in here' taking in/observing things, it is that thing being seen in itself, without a seer.

  In non-dual seeing... there is no 'you' seeing the objects or have a relationship with the object or 'connect with' the object... you ARE that seeing/seen. When seeing the tree you are the tree, there is no 'you' in here perceiving the tree... no self at all... just the self-shimmering tree.

  That said I did not experience a permanent shift to non-dual awareness... that requires deep insight into the 'Always So' nature of non-duality, that the nature of reality has always been non-dual at all moments... Thusness and Longchen can talk more about this from experience.

• Thusness

  28 Jan 09, 09:24

  To me "Oneness" is a sense of 'totality'.  It doesn't matter how clumsy outward appearances may be, as long as there is a deep sense of totality in action or activity or experience or sensation, there will be this sense of "Oneness".   

  Regardless of the forms of practices we engaged, be it chanting or breathing or bare attention of not imputing concepts and labels on objects or naked awareness on whatever arises, the experience of "Oneness" appears to have 2 distinct characteristics; one is the dissolving of subject/object or agent/activity division and the other, the sense that the phenomena taking place "is on its own".  When these 2 characteristics are there, there will be the experience of "Oneness".

  Just a sharing.

  Happy Chinese New Year to All!

   

• Thusness

  28 Jan 09, 09:24

  Double posts! :P

• JonLS

  28 Jan 09, 11:40

  Yes, reality isn't what I think,

   

  That's why the mind has given up

   

  There's nothing that needs to be known,

   

  There's nothing that can be known,

   

  LaoTse said, "Everyone else has an aim and purpose in life, but I alone am confused and wander aimlessly like a child with no home".

• Thusness

  29 Jan 09, 07:56

  Originally posted by JonLS:

  Yes, reality isn't what I think,

   

  That's why the mind has given up

   

  There's nothing that needs to be known,

   

  There's nothing that can be known,

   

  LaoTse said, "Everyone else has an aim and purpose in life, but I alone am confused and wander aimlessly like a child with no home".

  Happy Chinese New Year to You, JonLS!

  The mind does not know how to liberate itself.
  

  By going beyond its own limits it experiences unwinding.
  

  From deep confusion it drops knowing.
  

  From intense suffering comes releasing.
  

  From complete exhaustion comes resting.
  

  All these go in cycle perpetually repeating,

  Till one realises everything is indeed already liberated,
  

  As spontaneous happening from before beginning.