Freedom

The driving force that has compelled all cultures, at all times, is the desire for freedom. How are we to understand this desire that defines us all? Read histories from any culture, and you’ll find this force at work. Wars to subjugate others, for being set free and independent, to the shaping of religions (e.g., The Exodus)—It’s all there and continues to this day.

But one stem on this branch of freedom addresses the motherlode of all bondage: Bondage of the mind—The firm conviction that we are in bondage and slaves to desire. No other compulsion is more endemic and pernicious than this one. And until we awaken to our inherent freedom, we will never be free, regardless of phenomenal conditions (that always change). Beneath the apparent trap lies freedom, and the two— phenomenal and noumenal—can never be pulled apart.

So strong is the desire to escape the tyranny of consciousness and the restrictive boundaries of perception—to unlock the prisons of thought, in which we chain ourselves, lies the hope to reveal a better version of who we are. It is a never-ending desire that when all other forms of phenomenal freedom are achieved, we remain unsatisfied and feel the compulsion to move through a door of awakening to the bedrock nature of who and what we are.

Dreams of safety and a reality of folly.

Ignorance based fear.

A while ago I came across a greeting card, intended as encouragement, that said, “Don’t let reality get in the way of your dreams.” The implied message was that we should not be discouraged by events that can bring us down. 

There was something that troubled me about the message and started me thinking of ostriches with their heads buried in the sand having dreams that ignore what surrounds them.

In 2018 I reposted a title, The high price of choice: winning battles, losing wars (originally written four years earlier) and in that post, I spoke about our normal way of discerning reality, delusion, and how these relate to dreams. The conclusion of the post was—according to the Buddhist way of understanding reality—the vast majority of humanity imagines a reality in a distorted way that leads us to remain completely unaware of what is the ultimate reality. Consequently, we walk around in a dream state, all the while thinking our perceived world is reality.

Persuading anyone of this view is most difficult. Instead, we prefer fantasy to reality, and this dream state is very often based on fear with a consequence of adopting an attitude of denial, pretense, and unrealistic hopefulness. Our attitudes about COVID-19 is a perfect example. The viral pandemic has gone on far beyond our capacity for tolerance, and consequently many have adopted attitudes of wishful thinking, of the firm persuasion that the risk has passed and we can carry on without concern.

In the Nipata Sutra, there’s a conversation that occurred with the Buddha that said: 

“What is it that smothers the world? What makes the world so hard to see? What would you say pollutes the world and threatens it the most? The Buddha replied: It is ignorance which smothers and it is heedlessness and greed which make the world invisible. The hunger of desire pollutes the world, and the great source of fear is the pain of suffering.” 

Twenty-five hundred years later there remain clear examples of this dilemma.

• It is far easier to ignore advancing devastation of global warming and our contributions that exacerbate the growing threat. It is fear of suffering and losing one’s livelihood, or alienating those attached to vested interests with whom we align ourselves. It is likewise a hunger of desire that produces the willingness to toss caution to the wind and refuse to do our part to flatten the curve of viral spread. The desire for shortsighted greed in maintaining a destructive status quo traps us all in states of fear. 

• It is easier to ignore many aspects of family discord that corrupt one’s spirit and fills us with fear of suffering the loss of expected love that could come from a family, based on openness and acceptance. 

• It is easier to ignore our civic obligation to vote as an expression of our moral convictions than it is to risk having others discover our true values that conflict with theirs, and thus suffer the loss of facile relationships, which we reason are better than none at all. 

• It is easier to maintain a duplicitous relationship of pretense where we risk standing nakedly exposed than it is to risk being discovered and suffer loss from being ourselves.

Dreams built on the sands of ignorance are doomed and ensure our ultimate suffering in many ways, none of which we hope for. The very first of the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths is that we all suffer—none can escape. And the second of these truths is the cause of suffering is attachment (e.g., craving) to the blowing sands of change. If there were only two noble truths then despair is the only possible result. However, The Buddha didn’t stop at two. The third is there’s a solution and the fourth directs us to the Eight Fold Path that leads to experiencing ultimate reality and the discovery of our always loved, and always loving true nature. When we arrive at that place of enlightenment we find that we were living, not just in a dream, but in a horrible nightmare that was, and is, based purely on an expected fear of suffering.

Castles in the sky of mind.

Our castle in the sky.

Imagine a house floating in space. In every direction outside the house, the same void exists. Our lives, as far as we know, exist solely within that house with no awareness that anything exists outside, nor are we aware that our house is suspended in space.

Days turn into weeks, weeks into months, months into years, and as our lives continue, our experiences are shaped by what we can perceive only. As life rolls on, we either grow accustomed to our limited familiarity, enclosed within our house, or we become dissatisfied. And, of course, eventually, the house (as all things do) wears out. 

Occasionally, very seldom I suspect, we yearn to know if anything lies beyond the limits of the walls, and when that happens, two doorways appear in the walls. A way out, and beyond, is suddenly available and we feel we must choose the right door, thinking one leads to a better place, and the other to a worse place. Either door leads to the unknown, and we fear to open the wrong door, and with a roll of the dice and great trepidation, we choose to open one but not the other. 

And as we fall into an infinite void, we find out it is neither good nor bad. It is just a void that enclosed our house and all houses. We can see the outside of our house and notice an innumerable number of other houses, all floating in space. What we could never know, is what would happen, for sure, had we chosen the other door. But now being on the outside, we realize that any and all doors lead to the same space—an unconditional realm of peace, harmony, unity, and muses singing songs love. 

All doors lead to the same space, and it doesn’t matter which door we choose. That house is your body and exists in the sky of mind—that which we know of as cosmic consciousness. So long as the house exists, you (the real you) live imprisoned, never realizing that you are in bondage with freedom a hair’s breadth away. 

Freedom is casting off the chains of the house and soaring in the infinite void of our collective, all-inclusive consciousness. Only then do we become aware of our bondage, and only then do we realize what freedom is truly. And eventually, we get another castle in the sky and forget the freedom we once had and will have yet again.

Deluded Mind

In the commentary on The Diamond Sutra, Huineng said, “A bodhisattva doesn’t practice charity for his own happiness but to break through miserliness within and to benefit other beings without. But the Tathagata says that the perceptions of self and other are ultimately subject to destruction and not truly real. Hence, all beings are fictions. If one can get free of the deluded mind, there are no beings to save.”

I’ve read and puzzled over that statement for a long time, and then I decided to just pay attention to that last part, “If one can get free of the deluded mind, there are no beings to save.” The question is, what’s the difference between a mind that is deluded and one that isn’t? Apparently, a deluded mind imagines something that doesn’t exist, like seeing heat waves on the highway and concluding rippling water. In this case, Huineng says that we likewise believe entities called self and others, which we mistake as being real. In other words, what we take to be real is actually fictitious.

The teaching of “no-self” is deeply embedded in Buddhism. It’s a fundamental tenet. In our deluded state of mind, we imagine a separate and independent being that is the same thing as a body. It looks real, and it seems separate from every other body. How can it not be real and mutually discrete? Yet Huineng says this perception is not real. It only seems that way, and this conclusion is apparently emanating from a deluded mind.

How can this be understood? To answer that puzzler, we have to take a step backward and consider how Huineng and The Buddha understood the difference between what’s real and what isn’t. The what isn’t part is that things exist independently. Instead, everything is arising dependently, based on something else. The extended thought is that everything is thus empty, meaning that a self is not an isolated matter. By itself, it is empty (non-existent). Only when joined with something else does it exist.

It is somewhat easier to grasp this distinction with a simple example. Up and down are obviously discriminately different, yet the two dimensions don’t exist independently. These two define each other. Neither up nor down could exist independently, yet both exist in relationship to each other. That is essentially the Middle Way: Not up. Not down. Neither not, not up. Neither not, not down. Both are true together. Neither are true apart. That relationship is known as dependent origination, and the implications of that principle are far-reaching. Of course, we embrace independence (which is foundational to our nation) and fail to see the connection.

How then does this understanding inform this matter of self and other? If we apply this criterion to a person, the question is, what is the connective tissue? If I’m not independent, what is the other side of me? Or of you? Obviously, we have a bodily form, which we are looking at, and that part certainly looks real and independent. Yet the Huineng said no. It is neither real nor independent. By itself, a body is no more real than up apart from down.

To answer this question, we need to switch over to another Sutra—The Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra, which says form=emptiness. We know what our own form is. It’s our body. But this sutra says that this bodily form is empty (e.g., not real; not independent); instead, it is mutually dependent on this thing called emptiness. Neither of these is real by itself, and both are real together. So how can we define and understand the empty part? The truth is you can’t identify or conceptually understand emptiness. It can only be experienced because emptiness is your primordial mind, which can’t define itself.

The father of Zen (Bodhidharma) said this, “To say that the real Dharmakāya of the Buddha resembles the Void is another way of saying that the Dharmakāya is the Void and that the Void is the Dharmakāya...they are one and the same thing...When all forms are abandoned, there is The Buddha...the void is not really void, but the realm of the real Dharma. This spiritually enlightening nature is without beginning...this great Nirvanic nature is Mind; Mind is The Buddha, and The Buddha is the Dharma.”

The other side of us all is this spiritually enlightened mind. It can’t be seen or understood by our thinking mind, but without that, we (the bodily part of us) couldn’t exist. Without that part, we would be nothing more than fiction. This mind is what produces, not only our bodies but everything else. This mind is spiritually integrated with everything.

Our imaginary and real self—understanding both

The tides of transformation.

Before getting too far into my topic, first, let me speak about how we all perceive the physical world within which we live, and our self-understanding that grows from that complex of perceptual dimensions. And I emphasize the word “complex” since, unless we are lacking one or more perceptual capacities—such as Helen Keller, who was lacking both the capacity to see and the capacity to hear, the standard interrelated complex—the Gestalt, depends upon five sensory capabilities, e.g., sight, sound, smelling, feeling, tasting and thinking. And yes, thinking, because it is an internal aspect that emerges from the co-mingling of the other four. 

We perceive, for example, a perfectly ripe peach through sight, smell, feeling, and tasting, and we form an image in our mind of that co-mingled combination and label the Gestalt with a chosen word “peach,” at least in English. In French, it would be “pêche,” or in German “Pfirsich.” The human experience of a sensorily perceived “peach” is universally the same regardless of the word used to describe it. Changing the term does not change the experience. Shakespeare used this premise when he had Juliet utter to her lover Romeo: “Tis but thy name that is my enemy; Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What’s Montague? It is not hand, nor foot, nor arm, nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet;…” Romeo held the idea that, because their names were different, they could not be united.
 

An analogy of how a computer works is a helpful metaphor in understanding. A computer has three, interrelated functions: Input (the data entered to be processed), data processing, and output (something it reports or does). In line with this construction is the idiomatic term “GIGO”—Garbage in, garbage out. In other words, a computer will be limited by what goes in to be processed. And the output will never be any better than the input, thus “GIGO.” That is easy to comprehend in the case of a machine. 

But how about our self-understanding? The same involvements apply. If the mental construction of ourselves (fabricated from our perceived experiences) is garbage, then the thoughts about ourselves will likewise be garbage, and nobody wishes to think of themselves as garbage. All of us have a deeply held desire to be better than garbage—so we construct an imaginary self-image; an ego if you will, which in ancient languages across the entire world meant, and still means, “I.” And when anyone imagines themselves, they further imagine they are separate and apart from other “I’s.” We naturally perceive differences, only. Why? Because everything that can be perceived is different and seemingly incomplete. Nobody can perceive what is non-different (e.g., united and complete).
 

And for the most part, that imaginary construction of our selves is far less than who we are truly. But we are limited (just as a computer is) to our input. It is utterly accurate to say that what is imagined (in any way; self or otherwise) falls short of the truth of ourselves, which can never be perceived, in an ordinary way.
The difference between the imagined and the real is completely opposite in nature, and neither what is imagined nor real can possibly exist separate and apart from the other. 

Just as “up” is opposite from “down,” so too is the imagined opposite from the real. The imagined is constructed, by, and dependent upon, the capacities and limitations of our conditional/ perceptual tools. The real, being opposite in nature, is thus unconditional and can’t be perceived at all. And this is so because the conditional and the unconditional arise (and cease) together; they are in a sense, inseparable “Siamese-twins.” And the problem, universally, is hardly anyone has been blessed by experiencing the unconditional, always-perfect aspect of who they are, genuinely. And out of that, mismatch grows every evil known to mankind.
 

The world population does not have an identity crisis. Instead, we are having a non-identity crisis. And by that, I mean, hardly anyone has ever been blessed with experiencing the other, real side of themselves—the non-imagined, true aspect of our beingness. 

That is the crisis that all of us are presently having, and it is killing us, both figuratively and literally. The perceptual world all around us is changing at light-speed, and we are collectively going through a shedding process. 

What used to work for us, does no longer. We are being forced, by circumstances beyond our individual control, to adapt and change. We are lost and in a state of universal crisis. This is nothing new. It has been advancing upon us for a long time and is now reaching a crescendo. If we are to survive this, we must all learn how to “flatten the imaginary curve,” or we will over-tax the system, and it will crush us, suddenly and destructively.
 

Thus far, I have written a number of books on this tsunamic crisis which I will gladly send to you in PDF format, for no charge. The selections are The Other Side of Midnight—The Fundamental Principle of Polarity, The Non-Identity Crisis—The crisis that endangers our world, Impostor: Living in a world of Alternate-Facts, and More Over—Finding Your Worth Beneath Excess. All you need do is send me an email, with “Request for book” in the subject line and requesting a copy of your choice in the body, and in short order, I will respond with a PDF file copy. My email address is john.joh40@gmail.com.

Connecting the dots.

The talent of connecting relevant dots (not all dots are relevant) is a critical one. In a good many cases, what seems as disconnected and independent is instead the opposite (e.g., connected and interdependent). We can quickly lose the sense of the whole tree when our noses are pressed against the bark. Throughout history, there have been those who could stand back and see the big picture of lots and lots of dots. But to then see the emerging pattern, when the dots are connected, is an even more rare talent.

One of the more profound dot connections was an East Asian Sūtra known as the Avataṃsaka Sūtra. Upon thorough investigation, this sūtra reveals that it was constructed over a long period and is actually a sūtra of other sūtras, a sort of supreme dot connection. What the sūtra says is that the entirety of the cosmos, from top to bottom, is an interconnected web known as “Indra’s net.”

In our time, a branch of mathematics has arisen called “Chaos theory” that showed these interconnections, to the smallest of detail, within the apparent randomness of complex, chaotic systems, contain underlying patterns, feedback loops, repetitions, self-similarities, fractals, self-organizations, and reliance on programming at the initiating point, are sensitive to dependencies of initial conditions. The butterfly effect describes how a small change in one state of a deterministic, nonlinear system can result in substantial differences in a later state, e.g., a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil can cause a hurricane in Texas.

On a less ambitious plane (which some see as less complex but instead more practical) are those who see dots in our world of economics, migration patterns, immigration, climate change, etc. And among this branch are the likes of Todd Miller, journalist, and author of his latest book, Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration, and Homeland Security. What Todd has to say, could not be more timely and essential to the understanding of the interconnected variables driving our modern world. His book may be found by clicking here. It is highly worth the time it will take to read, grasp, and enlighten your understanding.

A spoonful of honey.

The two books of life.

The idea of balancing sweetness with sorrow is particularly relevant in today’s world. In case you don’t know, A Spoonful of Sugar is a song from Walt Disney’s 1964 film about Mary Poppins—the nanny and teacher of two children in Edwardian London. 

She tells the children though tasks may be daunting, with a good attitude, they can still be done with joy. To those living in 1910 London, the notion of daunting (just preceding WWI; the war to end all wars and the era of the Spanish Flu) may have been drastically different from those of us living today. They never saw that war or the pandemic coming. Nor do we have a crystal ball that portends our future. We can only deal with what appears on our doorstep moment by moment. Nobody can see the future with clarity but the attitude part, regardless of time and place, is critical for keeping us from fighting to our mutual destruction. While in the midst of any catastrophe we can get lost in despair and opposition without a perspective of this balance between the sweet and the sorrow. Not only is this a good attitude perspective, but it is also a reflection of reality since nothing comes along cleansed of the opposite.

This observation has become a part of our colloquial quiver of expressions but has also been a part of human traditions going all the way back to one of the oldest known sacred texts in ancient India—The Vedas, written sometime between 1700–1100 BCE. The now-dead language of that time/place was Sanskrit and the two-part principle of balance was known as Pratītyasamutpāda (dependent origination or dependent arising)—a key principle of Buddhism.

Pratītyasamutpāda makes the eyes blur, but in simple terms, it means this sweet and sorrow balance—one thing arising with the opposite. Deeply understood, dependent origination is a very useful perspective because it brings us back from the brink of my way or the highway thinking. All too often in today’s world, we forget that “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” It all depends on where we stand; our heritage, our traditions, the fish with whom we swim; all of it. 

And without this perspective of unity, we can get lost in talking at people (sometimes with fits of rage) to persuade them of our right points of view, rather than with people to gain understanding and empathy. The expression “United we stand, divided we fall” comes from ancient Greece and is found in the Bible (Matthew 12:25—“Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.”) And of course Abraham Lincoln borrowed the expression to make a point during the Civil War.

Over the eons (when not locked into right opposed to wrong) the perspective of balance has been embraced by many cultures and ethnic groups, in both simplistic and profound terms, such as the American Indian Proverb, “Never criticize a man until you’ve walked a mile in his moccasins,” or one of my favorites from the Islamic mystic Rumi in his poem, The Guest House:

“This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.”

Any aspect of human wisdom that spans that range of time and space, across all spiritual boundaries, should tell us all something very important regarding the centrality of what binds us together and conversely, what drives us apart into camps of my way or the highway tribes of opposition. Sweet with sorrow rise and fall together as the two indivisible aspects of life. However, sage advice is only sage when it is incorporated into everyday life. Otherwise, wisdom is not wise, but instead remains mere words in dust-covered books with no practical value.

Staying Present and non-discrimination.

The past is dead, the future is yet to come.

I know I made a formal, online pledge to begin speaking my own words and begin to cease speaking other people’s words. 

That remains my goal but the path of mortal life moves forward full of flaws. The keyword of my committed vector toward immortality is “begin.”

That said, I have feasted on the wisdom of spiritual giants, and from time to time I am drawn to their words for a simple reason: They are considered giants because of their wisdom and means of expression. 

Such is the case today and my sharing comes from maybe the greatest of all was Huangbo Xiyun (or simply Huang Po)—the teacher of Chan (Zen) Master Rinzai Gigen; the founder of one of two remaining strands of Zen. And the strand I studied, began, continued with and within that strand found my inner truth, which saved my life.

Huángbò’s most significant contribution, to the treasure chest of human wisdom, was his teaching centered on the concept of “mind.” If it were possible, to sum up (a profound dis-service) his teaching it would be, “It is as it is. It was as it was. It will be what it will be.”—with nothing added (perfection personified). Closely aligned with “things as they are” is what in technical terms equates with Suchness (or thusness). 

To adequately unpack that summary would be an entire dissertation. So I will leave that aside and get to the core, which is that our thoughts are the engine of karma-producing actions, for the good; the bad or the in-between. Huángbò’s, and my, grasp of how this works in ordinary life is when we think, anything at all, we leave reality behind and substitute for it an abstraction, tempting the demons (metaphorically) toward judgments, biases and dogmatic, dug-in life. 

When we do that we get caught up in the whirlwind of attachments, not realizing that we already have the treasure we seek. And when that happens we are lost in the hurricane of samsara, (living hell) we move further and further away from the greatest of all treasures: The source of never-ending fulfillment, which is always with us, never leaves us, and becomes hidden beneath the soil of ever-deepening bad stuff, with some really nasty behavior and feedback.

Aha, you might say, but The Buddha said, “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”  True enough but what if we just saw life “as it is truly?” A central question is, to which world was he referencing? Or the flip side—which world was he not referencing? For sure he was not referring to the unconditional/ultimate realm since that realm has no defining properties and can’t be defined or thought of, so it must have been this conditional world that is made with our thoughts, for the good or the bad. 

I hesitate to say more since more words on top of other words leads us further and further away down the primrose path. However, I will justify my addition be employing another fundamental principle—that of Nāgārjuna’s Two Truth Doctrine, which in essence says we must use the vehicle of the artificial to expose the genuine article. One of these truths is our ordinary, conventional one, which we take to be the ultimate, but in fact is the exact opposite. Conventionally our perception is conditional where everything is contingent upon other conditional matters, which are also in constant motion. Without awareness, we are engaged in a never-ending tennis match of delusion. Ultimate truth, however, never changes, is always present, and is dependent upon nothing. And these two truths are inseparably bonded together.

So I can only point to the mind with words, but never find it since it is impossible to use the mind to find the mind. All things arise from the ground of all being (e.g., mind); stable as the rock lying hidden beneath the sands of the shore which are swept away by the surf. The notion here is quite similar to the parable told by Jesus in Luke 6:48-49—building our house upon the bedrock instead of the moving sands.

But alas I drift from the initial matter of “things as they are,” sans the addition of thinking (the abstraction of the real). I’ve said enough of my own words and will thus end with two quotes of Huangbo Xiyun: “Here it is—right now. Start thinking about it and you miss it.” and “The foolish reject what they see, not what they think; the wise reject what they think, not what they see.” Think about that. Better yet don’t think, then you too will accept “things as they are,” and remain in the ever-present moment with no discrimination.

Traveling theatre

The masks we wear.

When I was much younger there was no television, only radio and it was referred to as a “theatre of the mind.” Unlike television, where we see visual performances on screens across the room, we saw performances in the imaginary theatre of the mind. 

In some ways, the imagination was more vivid and pictorial than watching images on a TV screen. Ours was an internal screen (actually our screen was the primary visual cortex located at the back of our brain). What none of us realized then with radio, or now with television, was that the ultimate screen remained, located in our brains rather than across the room.

We all look out upon our moving, conditional, changing world and see what we all take to be real. In fact what we are seeing remain images being projected upon that internal screen—our primary visual cortex. Images are all just shadows of what’s real. And out of that projection, we form an idea of who we are; one self-image built upon other images and none of it real. 

Nevertheless, we take it (our egos/self-images) as real and become persuaded, guarded and protective of that fabricated image, feeling insulted and inflamed when the role requires a different sort of performance. Some are fabricated out of harsh experiences and formed into negative self-images (hateful and hated) while others fabricate theirs out of more genteel material and fabricate loving self-images, with every step in between. 

Regardless of harshness, genteel, or anywhere in between, all of the end results are unreal simply because the material is unreal. The base material determines the end result. As the saying goes, “You can’t make filet mignon out of hamburger.” The fundamental point here is that we all take our ideas of whom and what we are far too seriously, never realizing how conditionally unreal we are actually. 

How much better, for everyone if we all recognized this fact and lightened our emotional/mental load and became what we truly are—performers, acting out changing roles. And as performers, we adapt to changing circumstances with changing roles and play the part as circumstances dictate.

And a part of this traveling theatre is the recognition that we are also real observers. So we play the roles, with a chuckle in our hearts, knowing full well that we can perform as the role dictates and at the end of the day leave the roles behind and go home to ourselves. It is important to us all to see conditional life as just a show. We are the players; all different. Conditional life is the stage, and the real us—all the same, are the observers: as different and distinct as snowflakes yet fundamentally just indiscriminate snow. Distinctive snowflakes melt into indistinct snow and that becomes the water of unity.

The Man in the moon

I have a habit each evening of sitting on our deck after dinner, feeling the gentle evening air and watching the phases of the moon. 

Once every month, the moon reaches fullness, and every time it comes, we can see the man in the moon. Oh, I know: there really isn’t a man in the moon, and you likewise know there isn’t. We’re sophisticated people and live in a sophisticated time. Scientific tools and methods have been with us all of our life. So we know what people who lived long ago didn’t know, and chuckle when we think how deluded they were.

Did you know that many “sophisticated people” in earlier times were convinced that there really was a man in the moon? Some people said that the man was banished to the moon for some crime. Christian lore commonly held that he was the man caught gathering sticks on the Sabbath and sentenced by God to death by stoning in the book of Numbers. Some Germanic cultures thought he was a man caught stealing from a neighbor’s hedgerow to repair his own. There is even a Roman legend that he was a sheep thief.

We laugh at such silliness, but are we able to laugh at our own absurdity? Now we say things like “Those people who see things differently from us are not authentic (fill in the blank.)” You could use the label of Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu, atheist or any other birds of a feather. The question isn’t how we label ourselves. The meaningful question is how we don’t label ourselves, but we do love our labels. We wear them like badges of superiority, distinguishing ourselves from others. The famous Christian mystic, Meister Eckhart, said: “Humanity in the poorest and most despised human being is just as complete as in the Pope or the Emperor.” And we know what sort of clothing the Emperor wore—none.

We need to consider the moon, not if there is a man in it. Nobody was born with a label. Nobody will die with a brand. But in between birth and death, we become inordinately concerned with labels and forget about our own authentic human nature. Fundamentally the moon is the moon. Fundamentally a human is a human. If you want to stick a man in the moon, then we can all have a good laugh. We don’t laugh, however when we stick a label on us. Too bad, because that also is a good joke.

Becoming Self Aware.

All of us eventually become creatures of habit and after the passage of time are lulled asleep into a state of blindness based on an assumption that what we think we know is true. 

Mark Twain said it best: “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” Someone who never knows the truth believes they do nevertheless.

Faith, by design, is a precarious state of being that asks us to accept particular aspects of the inaccessible, the imperceptible, the ineffable, and the immeasurable without challenge. And being given over to easy persuasion by those we trust, as being more astute and capable than ourselves, we come to a state of confidence in their esteemed judgments, and at long last embrace and take to be our very own, the ideas expressed by “the experts.”

What breaks this chain of presumption? Ought it not be success or failure? The measure of life as what works or doesn’t for one and all? Unfortunately this is rarely the case. What we believe, is held in higher regard than such concrete measures and we shape our lives, not so much by the good of all than we do by what supports our fanciful wishes: The hope for things being different than they truly are. 

Try, try again is the mantra. If at first we don’t succeed then try harder to shape what is not so into illusions of what we prefer. Be more perseverant, more tenacious, and resilient. And after such relentless assaults, even with the experience of not reaching the goal of the common good, we are remiss to let go and try a different path. Instead we hold fast to dogmas and reject the obvious, clinging forever to standards set by those in whom we have placed our trust. In psychological terms, this strange behavior is known as “confirmation bias,” a state of ignorance wherein we reject the truth and favor what confirms our preconceived beliefs. To do otherwise, we reason, will cause a loss of face and force us to admit error, neither of which our egos desire.

It is an exceedingly sad aspect of being human that leads us all into those habitual states of continuing ignorance, and it is not an aspect adopted only by the common man. Surrendering from our cherished ideas, valued though they are, seems risky work. Yet to reach the depths of our souls where the light of truth prevails, requires letting go of little to get all. Meister Eckhart, one of the greatest mystics of all time put the highest release like this:

“I will put into plain words what St. Paul means by wishing to depart from God. Man’s last and highest leave-taking is leaving god for God. St. Paul left god for God: he left everything he could give or take of God, every concept of God. In leaving these, he left god for God since God remained to him in his essential self, not as a concept of himself, or as an acquired thing, but God in his essential actuality.”

Even those who adopt open minds and are moving toward enlightenment fall prey to the trap, sometimes to the edge of death. The Buddha came to the final point of surrender before letting go of the greatest natural fear of all: The fear of death. When he reached the edge of the abyss, his choice was clear: Let go or die. Only then did he awaken to the essence of his True Self. Only then did he become genuinely Self Aware. 

Only when any of us faces the grim reaper and accepts what seems like our ultimate demise will we be ready to cast off the chains of illusion and meet, at long last, our true nature and know that, as Eckhart said: “God expects but one thing of you, and that is that you should come out of yourself in so far as you are a created being made and let God be God in you.” 

And on the way to this exalted place of pure awareness, where do we place our faith? In the orthodoxy? Holy Scriptures? The experts? What shall we consider the anchor that binds us firmly to eternal life?

• “Do not believe anything on mere hearsay.

• Do not believe in traditions merely because they are old and have been handed down for many generations and in many places.

• Do not believe anything on account of rumors or because people talk a great deal about it.

• Do not believe anything because you are shown the written testimony of some ancient sage.

• Do not believe in what you have fancied, thinking that, because it is extraordinary, it must have been inspired by a god or other wonderful being.

• Do not believe anything merely because the presumption is in its favor, or because the custom of many years inclines you to take it as true.

• Do not believe anything merely on the authority of your teachers and priests.

• But, whatever, after thorough investigation and reflection, you find to agree with reason and experience, as conducive to the good and benefit of one and all and of the world at large, accept only that as true, and shape your life in accordance with it.

The same text, said the Buddha, must be applied to his own teachings.

• Do not accept any doctrine from reverence, but first, try it as gold is tried by fire.”⎯The Buddha: The Kalama Sutra

It is the fires by trial in life that burn away ignorance, but only when we are open to letting go of the unreal and ready for the real. And when once we meet our Self for the first time we are still left with a residue of the old, that lingers like unwanted dust and was previously considered to be gold, when all the while it was fools gold. Then we must learn a new way, no longer clinging to chains of the past but rather accepting wings of The Spirit, just as any baby learns to crawl before walking. And until our spiritual legs grow strong, we will wobble and fall again and again, until at last, we rest in the assurance that the core of our being is firm and immovable. Along the way to maturity we will be unaccustomed to the new way and think for a time as Lao Tzu:

“I alone seem listless and still, my desires having as yet given no indication of their presence. I am like an infant which has not yet smiled.”

The Ladder—Form

It has occurred to me that the relationship (as expressed by Nāgārjuna) between the two truths—One being dual; this vs. that (two opposites such as right and wrong), and the other being united—emptiness, resembles a metaphorical arrangement between a ladder and a wall.

A ladder connects the two sides with rungs. If there were neither sides nor rungs, a ladder could not exist. Furthermore, a ladder must lean upon (e.g., depends upon) something, or it would fall. In my metaphor, that something is a wall (the equivalent of essential emptiness).  Together these two—a ladder and a wall—make a whole, complete; they are interdependent.

For essential emptiness (transcendence) to transform, otherness would have to exit. And if otherness were introduced into this realm seen through the imagination, emptiness would transform from nothing/everything into something. 

Once emptiness transforms into form, it would then no longer be wholly essence. It would then take on definable form—an extension of essence yet imbued with essence. Otherness provides dimension. Otherness is creative expression. Otherness means contingent: one thing depending on another thing at the primordial level and beyond. Otherness is interdependent and moves away from absolute essence into the realm of form and non-stagnation. Otherness is life itself and death itself and both life and death, and neither. Otherness provides infused separation, a condition necessary to be imagined. It is “being” with a “ground” for being.

“Being” and “ground of essence” define and support one another. The two are interdependent and integral to one another. One is not more important than the other just as a mother is not more important than a daughter, who will one day be a mother with a child, and neither can exist without the seed of essence, which is transmitted eternally through a form. 

All arise and exist together. The existence of entities depends upon infused otherness. They are mutually supportive. Ground-of-being and Being are essential partners for the creative expression to exist. Ground (form) without Ground-of-being (emptiness) remains unborn potential. Being without a foundation is not possible. Being without sentient beings is pointless. Source and sourced go together. Essence apart from otherness, meaning ceases to exist at least in any way which can be comprehended. Being is the sentient eye through which essence is intuited.

The Key to Fulfillment

What you’re about the read now is the result of having lived through extreme adversity, finding victory, and then looking back to find a rational explanation. 

What I write about here is that rational, rearview perspective. I never saw this view from the other side, which is to say while in the midst of anxiety. The vision presented here is a retrospective.

If you study Yoga or Buddhism you’ll learn a lot about a unique perspective about why people suffer and you can sum up the entirety of this perspective in one statement: “We suffer because we don’t have a proper grasp of what genuine reality is.” 

Usually the response to that summation is MEGO (My eyes glaze over). Everyone who has ever lived, or will ever live, begins with the unchallenged assumption that they know precisely what reality is. They can’t explain it. They just know in some unexplained way. If pressed we can come up with a few dimensions to frame our understanding. Such dimensions as tangibility, mutual discretion and measurement are ordinarily candidates for a definition. In other words if we can perceive stuff, that measured stuff is real. But hardly anyone thoroughly examines the relationship between that understanding and suffering. We measure stuff and people suffer—two observations, and these appear to have nothing to do with each other.

There was a man who devoted his life to a thorough examination of this matter and the world has never been the same since, at least for those who take the time to consider what he discovered. The man lived a long time ago (more than 2,500 years ago) and his name was Siddhartha, who became Gautama Buddha. What he discovered changed my life and the lives of millions since he lived. His understanding is contained in the first of eight steps which he identified to enable anyone to find a way to solve their own suffering problem, and that first step revolves around the interrelated matters of emptiness and dependent origination—my topics for this post.

To the ordinary eye, these two matters are obscure and foreign, but when looked at carefully the way forward becomes clear. The first of these—emptiness—challenges the premise of mutual discretion: that things are different and independent from other things. For example, we regard “up” as different from “down” and are persuaded that these two are independent matters. The same goes for in/out, forwards/backwards, or anything else, which have two opposing dimensions (everything does). 

To the ordinary eye these are always separate and opposite, just as Republicans and Democrats are—separate and opposed to one another. Emptiness says simply that this observation is both true and not true at the same time. It is not true that any pair can be divided. Instead these exist only as pairs. Without up, there could be no down. Without an “in” where would “out” be located? Each half of these pairs is not real by themselves but real only as pairs. To acknowledge the validity of one half you must accept the validity of the other half, otherwise neither is valid. Here the rule of discrimination governs all. It’s an either/or world of compromised choices with clear winners and clear losers. In a nutshell that’s emptiness. It goes much deeper than the nut but for the moment just stay with that.

Then we come to a kissing cousin of emptiness—dependent origination. This principle says that everything is linked together (just as the pairs are) and one thing causes another, which then cascades onto other things. The water cycle is a perfect example. Every aspect of this cycle is created by what came before and then creates the next step in the cycle, in a circular feedback that never ends. So long as we remain in the sphere of relative and conditional life none of these feedback cycles can ever be avoided because everything is in constant motion. When one dimension comes into existence what follows also comes into existence. Rising, heated water vapor ultimately cools and turns into rain. Birth ultimately turns into death. These cycles repeat endlessly without a beginning and without an ending. In a nutshell that’s dependent origination.

In our physical and conditional world, these two matters—emptiness and dependent origination point to why we suffer. We do so because we try to retain the good parts of these changing cycles and avoid the bad parts, but this is impossible to orchestrate. What brings us joy in one moment brings us sadness in the next. Nobody can stop the tides of anything, thus the conclusion that “life sucks.” And if that were the end of the matter then that conclusion would be correct. Fortunately that is not the end of the matter because emptiness and dependent origination are deeper matters.

The law of these two principles, if valid, would have to apply to everything including conditional life. Just as up can only exist with the partner of down, conditional life can only exist with the partner of unconditional life. Conditional life is empty by itself and real only with a partner. We can perceive anything and everything of conditional life because of the perceptible nature of objects, and these objects are always in opposition and in motion. The first and preliminary part of solving the suffering problem is thus to not cling but rather to savor each passing moment with the awareness that soon the savor will turn into the sour. Be here now is a familiar code for one form of Zen, but frankly, that premise sucks. Who truly looks forward to eventual sadness? It helps but it is insufficient.

Ultimate victory comes by moving beyond the conditional and into the unconditional where discrimination and sadness cease to exist. What brought me enduring grief was this cycle of destruction. I was trapped in one cycle after another and could find no relief. I never realized until I reached the end there was an alternative. Only when I ran out of gas did I say to myself, “To hell with this,” if I can’t find a better way I don’t want to live. 

Then I just sat down and refused to get up until I found the key. Only when I let go, completely, of the bargain of hope did I find the other side—the unconditional side, which I never knew existed. When it happened I was dumb-founded and wholly disoriented, but I was also in a state of mind without suffering! I had no idea what had transpired but I loved it. Before it happened I was full of despair. Afterwards I was whole and pure. But since I had experienced nothing but the cycles for my entire life, I kept waiting and expecting that blissful experience to pass away. It never passed and has remained a constant presence. It’s now been more than 40 years and it is still here.

Having said that, it is important to say that I’m still just as much affected by the swings as before. But no longer do the swings affect my stability. My true sense of being is now rock solid. Nothing causes it to waver. And this is what dependent origination means at the deeper level. Both sides are true together and neither side is true separately. And at a deeper level yet, is the ultimate value of Gautama’s understanding—his first step (Right View): while all of us are different, we are also the same, and neither of these truths is real separately. Conditionally we are apart. Unconditionally we are united.