With no loss, there is no love. |
Birds and thoughts fly through the sky of mind. When they are gone we’re left with the sky of wisdom and compassion.
Showing posts with label anguish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anguish. Show all posts
Sunday, November 29, 2020
On Grief and grieving.
Labels:
anguish,
Bodhidharma,
loss,
love,
Suffering
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Danger in paradise.
The fusion of two worlds |
Sixteenth-century Spanish mystic Saint John of the Cross wrote a poem that narrates the journey of the soul from it’s bodily home to its union with God.
He called the journey “The
Dark Night of the Soul,” because darkness represents the hardships and
difficulties the soul meets in detachment from the world and reaching the light
of union with God. The main idea of the poem can be seen as the painful
experience that people endure as they seek to grow in spiritual maturity and
fusion with God. The Christian experience assumes a soul separated
from God that seeks reunion whereas the Buddhist perspective recognizes no
separation. Instead, unification takes place when the conceptual image of a
false self is replaced by the actual experience of selfhood.
However, it must be said, that the key Christian scriptural passage that speaks to this matter comes from the 12th chapter in the Book of John verses 24-25 which says, “Very truly I tell you unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.”
This is the English
translation of the Greek, which camouflages the actual meaning of true human life
due to translation limitations, and this inaccuracy has lead to widespread misunderstandings. In the Greek, the first two uses of the word life meant soul—a conceptual equivalent
of the self, and the latter meant the real self. The Greek word for soul/life
was ψυχή better known as psyche, one of two manifestations of the source of life ζωή/zōē,
the last Greek term used in this scripture.
How to understand this?
When the soul dies the presence of God shines forth. Another word for soul is ego, thus death of the ego unveils the
source, which is eternal (no birth/no death and unconditional). That being the
case, ζωή is ever-present but something without conditions: thus unseen. ζωή can never be perceived, only experienced. On the other hand, the ego is an unreal image—an illusion of the self, which is clearly evident. Nevertheless illusions have a hard way of immediately subsiding; the memory
passes slowly at the same time that the light begins to dawn. The seed grows
slowly and remains separate as an idea but when it dies, unity with all things emerges.
Roughly a century following the death of The Buddha, his teachings had moved out of India, along the Silk Road and into the Middle East, arriving during the era of the Greek philosophers. Evidence of his understanding, regarding illusion, can be found in the writings of Plato in an allegory called Plato’s Cave. In this allegory Plato describes a tenable argument involving this fundamental illusion and the resulting consequences on those so deluded. He also addresses the duty and price to be paid by philosophers who attempt to shine the light on truth. In essence, Plato says that coming out of darkness and into the light involves both courage and pain.
Eckhart Tolle speaks to
this process as follows: “It (dark night of the soul) is a term used to
describe what one could call a collapse of a perceived meaning in life…an
eruption into your life of a deep sense of meaninglessness. The inner state in some cases is very
close to what is conventionally called depression. Nothing makes sense anymore, there’s no purpose to
anything.”
Before, normal was egocentric and afterwards the center, begins to
fade into a depressive, immature darkness. This is a stage of jeopardy and
disorientation when we yearn for retention of our awakening yet can’t seem to
grasp and hold onto what is our hearts desire.
The Buddha properly
pointed out that to desire anything, even a lusting for enlightenment, is a
sure prescription for suffering, and when we think about it, this makes immanent
sense. Once true love is awakened, then only do we know for sure what it is. Up to that point, true love remains a product of our imagination; a wishful
fantasy. But once we know, then we have a dilemma: what was previously a less
than satisfying but acceptable idea, by comparison, now becomes a colorless and
shallow experience that lives on as a not yet forgotten memory.
There’s a story is told in
the Platform Sutra of a conversation held between Daman Hongren (fifth
Chinese Chan patriarch) and Dajian Huineng (sixth Chinese Chan patriarch).
Huineng was an illiterate, unschooled commoner who upon hearing the Diamond Cutter Sutra recited, realized enlightenment and subsequently sought out
Hongren. When Huineng met the patriarch he was assigned the lowly job of
rice-pounder, where he remained for many months before proving his worth to
Hongren.
The conversation between
the two was thus: Hongren—“A seeker
of the path risks his life for the dharma. Should he not do so?” Then he asked,
“Is the rice ready?” Huineng— “Ready long ago, only waiting
for the sieve.” Two questions, a single short answer which reveals the nature
of enlightenment—both sudden and gradual. Sudden since the awakening happened
quickly but fullness required the sifting of life’s sieve. The rice was ready
but the lingering, residual chaff must be blown away by the winds of life.
In the words of the famous
psychiatrist Carl Jung, “There is no coming to consciousness without pain.’
Sometimes when we awaken, we realize that how we have lived and behaved has
simply been out of line and nonproductive. It is a painful experience to
observe ourselves from a space of neutral honesty and watch as we often go out
of integrity to appeal to mental images we have created, and hurt people we
love in the process. This observation of the false ‘self’ we have created in
our minds is one of the first steps of becoming ‘enlightened’ if you will, and
in this observation there is no gaining taking place. There is only the
crumbling away of what you are not.’”
It takes many years of continuing adversity before our dawning matures. Once the seed of awakening is planted, the world changes forever, there is no turning back to old ways, yet maturity takes a long time. But, like Huineng, chaff of the old familiar way remains. It is natural once we awaken into the dawn of truth to retain the whisper of what is now dead yet lingers on in memory. And during this time we are in jeopardy, trapped between two worlds: one dead and gone, the other fresh and naïve, like an infant not yet able to stand alone with the indwelling spirit of eternity beating in our heart.
Labels:
anguish,
attachment,
awaken,
baggage,
bliss,
Buddha,
Christian,
danger,
death,
delusions,
Diamond Sutra,
ego-centric,
enlightenment,
false self,
freedom,
imaginary self,
transformation
Monday, September 5, 2016
Bitterness and Betterness
A friend sent me the meme to the right. I thought about the message and then, in honest reflection, realized something of worth: To move to Betterness without going through Bitterness is not only disingenuous but more than likely impossible.
We are, after all, humans and rarely react to adversity gladly. That reaction takes some pretty advanced transformation and few indeed are able to get to that place without having first experienced disappointment, anguish, and suffering. Nobody I have ever known (including myself) has ever leaped over these preliminary emotions of sadness as though moving from “A” to “Z” by jumping over “B” through “Y.”
In point of fact, it is precisely the process of anguish that compels transformation. This is a point we often overlook because we think suffering is something we can avoid if we stand on the sidelines while the suffering train leaves the station. No, there is great wisdom inherent in suffering because of this:
“Every suffering is a seed because suffering impels us to seek wisdom.”⎯Bodhidharma
Betterness is the residue of bitterness and we can’t get to betterness by avoiding the bitter pill of suffering. And even once we arrive at a better way, the memory of what led to bitterness remains a compelling force, unless of course, we enjoy suffering.
Monday, July 1, 2013
Truth, half-truths and the power of delusion.
“You can’t handle the truth.” |
Over the years, due to personal experience, I have learned quite a bit about truth-telling and delusion. I knew it first hand, beginning as a child, and in adult life working as an advertising executive on Madison Avenue. The lessons I learned have been an essential education about the motive of driving these matters. It’s a good thing that people employed in the advertising business are not required to answer in the positive the oath required in every court of law in our nation: “Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” If advertising people were so required, we’d need to build many more prisons to house those who knowingly perjure themselves daily.
The reason I say this with certainty is that the advertising business is designed to deceive others by telling half-truths. The positive is singled out, and the downside is always left out. After working for many years in the business, I reached the point when I could no longer persuade myself that it was okay to deceive people, all for earning a very good living. By then, I had learned that for reasons justified by my parents, I had been lied to as a child. The result was holding some very bad beliefs about myself.
Since that moment of truth (pun intended), I have noticed that people tell lies and half-truths routinely, justified on several flawed notions. One of these notions concerns a lack of confidence in those hearing the truth. The inherent belief is that if they hear the truth, somehow, they will be destroyed or think harshly of the person choosing to withhold the truth. In the movie A Few Good Men, the commanding officer of the Marine Corps base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba (Colonel Jessep) is being questioned in court by Navy lawyer Lieutenant Kaffee, concerning the death of one of the men under the Colonel’s charge. Jessep is lying because he doesn’t think anyone can handle the truth. The dialogue goes:
“Col. Jessep: You want answers?
Kaffee: I think I’m entitled to them.
Col. Jessep: You want answers?
Kaffee: I want the truth!
Col. Jessep: You can’t handle the truth!”
In the end, Jessep is arrested and charged with perjury. This movie is, of course, a fictional portrait of behavior that happens, with seeming justification, on a vast basis, but this is not a limited fiction.
I am personally aware of a situation where an entire family participated in a fraud, feeding the family head with half-truths. All concerned knew that the head chose to live with the fantasy that the family was perfect and without flaw. None of the family members ever told the truth to the head but instead affirmed the fantasy in order to preserve the desires of the matriarch, and thus receive her blessing. Consequently, the family head refused to listen to anything that undermined her wishes, and other family members chose to endure lives of shame, guilt, and feelings of inadequacy to support her desires.
Often times the motive of feeding another half-truths or lies appears to be well intentioned: to either preserve a belief that isn’t considered to be beneficial (to either the teller or the hearer), but what is the result? The one being protected or lied to is not made stronger but instead made weaker by not being challenged to deal with adversity. And the one telling distortions is forced to try to remember the details of the lie, to tell other supporting lies (or be exposed) and thus endure self-condemnation and shame.
Knowing whom to trust has always been a dilemma. As far back in recorded history as the time of the Buddha, people have been perplexed by this conundrum. In one particular sutra the people of Kesariya, India asked the Buddha how to ascertain the truth. His famous answer was:
“Now, Kalamas (a clan in Kesariya), don’t go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, ‘This contemplative is our teacher.’ When you know for yourselves that, ‘These qualities are skillful; these qualities are blameless; these qualities are praised by the wise; these qualities, when adopted and carried out, lead to welfare and to happiness’—then you should enter and remain in them.”
That’s a tall order in a world dominated by deceit and misdirection. We find ourselves in a predicament of degrading confidence, falling trust and loss of regard for just about everyone, from those close to us as well as public officials of all sorts. However, perhaps this loss might be a good thing since for far too long we have placed our trust in others and lost trust in ourselves.
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