The critical nature of genuine self awakening.

When contemplating the myriad problems of today’s world you might come up with a list such as the following:

• The COVID-19 pandemic

• The Middle East debacle

• Unchecked global climate change (warming)

• A growing gap between the ultra-wealthy and everyone else

• Spreading violence

• Hatred and intolerance

• Political gridlock

• Toxic pollution of the environment

• Loss of genuine liberties

• (add your own)

While all of these are problems of enormous concern, there is a core root that underlies and drives them all: a misidentification of who we are individually and collectively. So long as our answer to identity boils down to a vacillating self-image (ego) the natural result is fear, greed, possessiveness, selfishness, isolation, irresponsibility, despair, and a victim mentality that leaves us all heading for a cave of seeming security.

Recently Avram Noam Chomsky observed that “As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to consumerism, or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they please and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.” While a grim statement that shocks us into states of denial and disbelief, his observations are true.

The question is, what must we all do in order to escape from this inevitable outcome? The answer is not the ostrich method of avoidance, denial, and ignorance. On the contrary what we must all do is transform our self-understanding, from an isolated individual to a connected member of the human race, which was (and remains) the solution to suffering offered by The Buddha more than 2,500 years ago. The solution does not change because the nature of being human does not change. 

At the central core of all of us is an indefinable state of unconditional consciousness that is the same for everyone. The problem is that while this state is the source of all aspects of awareness, itself is not detectable and we are all prone to consider real only things with conditions that can be detected. This is a case of the eye not being aware of the eye. However, in this case, it is the inner eye (URNA) instead of the detectable eye, and as the father of Zen wrote, it is in this state of mind that all discrimination ceases to exist. Out of this indiscriminate state arises sentient discrimination that leads us to the mistaken notion that each of is a dependent ego at odds with every other human, vacillating and contingent on an uncertain world and that “ego idea” then produces the undesirable qualities listed above.

In the recent past, a form of meditation (MBSR) has become prominent in helping many to cease attachment to waves of thinking, many of which are destructive to self and others. While very helpful, it only one of two dimensions outlined by The Buddha in his Eight Fold Path. MBSR rests upon one of these two: right mindfulness (Sanskrit: samyak-smṛti/sammā-sati) and is the essential path to a genuine awakening of our true, indiscriminate nature (who we truly are). The other dimension of mind (right concentration (Sanskrit: samyak-samādhi/sammā-samādhi) is not widely known, but by any other name is Zen/Dhyāna, with a history going back into an unrecorded time, long before The Buddha. 

The two disciplines were intended to be practiced as a combined pair but in today’s world, they have been split apart. MBSR has become quite useful in stilling the mind and helping practitioners to stay present instead of lost in speculation. However, the issue of identity remains an esoteric matter leaving those who practice MBSR only, still holding fast to a perceptible and insecure self-understanding. Importantly it is Zen that produces the desired result of a sense of SELF that is unconditional, whole, perfect, and unshaken. This quality alone delivers the awareness that we are all unified, none better; none diminished in any way. 

As awful as the laundry list of contemporary problems may be, those and unknown others will flourish unless we can experience this state of indiscriminate, undiscovered unity, inherent in us all. 

Life, taxes and death.

According to Ben Franklin, nothing is more certain than death and taxes. I would add to that list one more: Life. And while it may seem that life and death are not directly related, hopefully, by the time you finish reading this post, that opinion will fall flat.

Have you ever considered what would occur if we didn’t pass from mortality into immortality? All mortal things are conditional. As such they are born, grow, eventually die, and are conditioned by the very nature of being objective entities, whether humans, any sentient being or for that matter; anything (e,g., plants, insects, other animals, etc.) In psychological terms, two factors determine how a human life turns out: Nature (what everyone is born with) and nurture (e.g., circumstances or conditions to which we are all exposed). 

All mortal things go through the same process of birth, growth, and death. If this were not so (e.g., never die, mortally), not only would we humans be standing on each other’s head, with the ancient on the bottom and the babies on top, but there would be no regeneration of anything. 

Mortality is fleeting, and by design is conditional. In The Diamond Sutra, The Buddha taught: “All conditioned dharmas (e.g., phenomena) are like dreams, illusions, bubbles, or shadows; Like drops of dew, or flashes of lightning; Thusly should they be contemplated.” Likewise, Bodhidharma (the father of Zen) taught: “As mortals, we’re ruled by conditions, not by ourselves.”

Mortal death is essential to continuing immortal life. Yet it is among the last things we want to talk about. Consequently, when the unavoidable inevitability occurs, the living are left with a mess to sort out. That’s the nature of mortality—in the end, a conditional mess (and often before the end). 

That part is beyond dispute. It is easy to understand and doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with spirituality because mortality is something tangibly perceptible, and we are all mortals. But some question anything imperceptible; that can’t be measured because they regard themselves as logical and scientific.

The nature of immortality is another matter. It isn’t born, it never grows and never dies. Immortality is not perceptible, it isn’t measurable, is eternal and is the unconditional, authentic nature of you and me. This delineation between what passes away and what doesn’t is not limited to Buddhism. It is a spiritual principle in Christianity as well. Several passages in the Bible address this. But here is just one:

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly, we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”—2 Corinthians 4:16

But there is a difference. A fundamental teaching of Buddhism (that doesn’t appear in Christianity) is dependent origination, and this principle is likewise easy to grasp. It, too, is beyond dispute. Consider an easy example: “up” and “down.” These are two ends of the same stick. They come into existence as opposite pairs, and they disappear together. Neither can exist separate and apart from the other. And this fundamental is true of all things. Everything has an opposite that enables existence and defines another thing. That’s an easy matter to understand. 

What seems hard to understand is the extension of the same principle, such as conditional/unconditional or mortal life/immortal life. These also enable mortal existence and mortal non-existence (otherwise known as immortality). So if this is so, (and it is), why do we concern ourselves with just the tangible/conditional (which we know passes away) but pay little attention, if any attention, to what does not pass away? It’s a logical contradiction, but one most people live with, along with taxes.

Who are we? A view from linguistics.

Who Dat?

Our sense of who and what we are determines how we relate to the world. In a prior post, I stuck a little toe into the great sea of language to illustrate a point of significance regarding the matter of identity. Today I want to further the discussion by beginning with Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (26 November 1857—22 February 1913). He is known as the founding father of semiotics—the study of signs and symbols as elements of communication behavior. 

His concept of the related chain of sign/signifier/signified/referent forms the core of this field of study. In brief, Saussure noted that something signified (an objective thing) is represented with a sign (a coded language form) by a signifier (a person) in terms of references to the thing. For example, the color black (a thing) must have a reference or contrast to something different from black (perhaps the color white) to be signified or detected. Once signified in a differentiated way from the referent, the signifier can then create a sign (the word “black”) to represent what has been signified.

If there is nothing signified, the entire language chain collapses since a sign can’t be established. We can’t create a language form other than to sign what is missing. For example, if there is nothing to be signified the best we can do is to create a sign called no-thing or nothing, to signify the lack of a thing. Since nothing is signified, the validity of a signifier is brought into question. Then we would have a no-signifier. In essence, the principle of signifier and signified must come and go together in matching cases. Nothing signified, no signifier. Something signified, signifier. That awareness is the beginning of language and communications and broadly acknowledged throughout the realm of linguistics.

This chain is quite similar to the Zen chain of causation in the following way: thing, thought, thinker; No-thing, no thought, no thinker. To remove any one of these, causes the chain to collapse. For example, a thinker only has meaning in reference to what a thinker does: thinks. If there is no thinking then the meaning of thinker is meaningless. Remove a thing and there is nothing (no-thing) and thus no thought. The central Zen question concerns the identity of “thinker.” Is a thinker who we imagine our self to be? The ordinary presumption is yes: we are a thinker who thinks thoughts. Rene Descarte established this seeming fact with his now famous, “I think therefore I am.” But this is an impossibility since when we stop thinking we don’t disappear even though the thinker does, thus the real us and a coming-and-going thinker must be two different entities.

What Saussure brought to the realm of language formation, Zen brings to the realm of identity formation. And the conclusion of Zen is that we—the true you and me are independent of a vacillating signifier/sign we call ego. Our true identity is solid and doesn’t move, because while things change, the referent is no change since we are not an objective thing. Instead, we are a subjective non-thing. And how is this awareness established? Through the Zen practice of not thinking which reveals the true, never-leaving you and me. 

The image of us (an objective sign) is meaningless without something signified (an objective thought), thus there is no signifier, which is a central premise of Zen: no-self (at least in an objective sign form). Our true non-sign self arises when there is no thought. We are the one signifying the lack of thought as well as the presence of thought. We see either the presence or the absence of thought and it takes both signified thought in reference to no thought for either to have meaning and this is true of all things, which must have a referent of difference to be signified. In physics, that principle is called relativity, and in Buddhism, it’s called dependent origination.

In the end, the self/no self-referent reveals the interconnected fabric of us. The sign (objective self-image/ego) can be seen to move and gyrate and the real us (no-self) never moves, and this, in turn, reveals a fabricated and discriminate mind (thoughts and emotions) and a real not-to-be-found indiscriminate true mind. The first is based on changing objective conditions/things (and is thus not substantial) and the second is based on the lack of objective things, which is unconditional and therefore substantial. 

Consequently, we are both real unconditionally and not real (based on objective conditions) at the same time. One part is born, grows big (unfortunately too big some times), decays and dies. The other part (the real us) is never born, doesn’t decay and lives forever. Unfortunately, the common-coin self-understanding is just the objective sign/symbol, which we label ego and unless we go to extraordinary means we rarely discover the real person that we are.

The Producer

“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.”—William Shakespeare.

Once there lived a person of enormous wealth in the land of everywhere: a producer with great ideas for making movies. But he knew that making movies was an involved process, and he would need talented people with different functions to turn his ideas into a film. Since he was very wise, he knew he would need to hire the best talent for each function, give them all clear and adequate direction, equip them with the right tools, empower them with responsibility, and then not micro-manage the filmmaking process. He understood that to micro-manage the production would be futile and could clearly see that he’d need to pay big bucks to hire the best talent. He also knew that making movies was quite an involved process and didn’t want to manage just producing movies since he had many other demanding projects for which to care. He thought about this challenge and decided he first needed to hire a top-flight general manager.

Having given some thought to finding such a person, he realized that what he wanted most in that position was someone cast in his own image. If he could locate the right person, then his life would be much more comfortable because such a manager would be able to anticipate his needs without looking over his shoulder every few minutes. After some trial and error, interviewing various candidates, he found the person he was convinced was just right. Of course, the person didn’t come cheap, but in the long run, he reasoned it would be better to pay the price than to hire the wrong person, fire him when he didn’t work out, lose time and money and then need to start again from scratch.

After extensive contract negotiations, he hired the ideal General Manager. Now the two sat down and talked about the producer’s ideas and the need to find the rest of the crew. He told his new GM that money was no object; hire the best talent and get moving. The GM was excited, and off he went to scout and hire the crew. Let’s see, there was a need for someone to write the screenplay, and that person must have a vivid imagination and wordsmithing skills. An art director to work with the writer would also be needed, a camera crew, an editor, someone to write a musical score, arrange and orchestrate the music, a customer, someone to scout locations, another person to find and cast the actors, a director, and of course someone to put together the work of all those people. Oh, and one more pressing matter—a theater would be needed where the film would be projected onto a screen. Better yet, he wanted a theater enabled by a virtual reality where the viewers could watch, smell, and feel the production.

After what seemed a long time, everyone needed was found, hired, equipped, and given direction by the GM, and finally, the shooting began. From time to time, the wealthy producer would check in and review where the project stood. He watched the dailies and talked with the GM about appropriate adjustments, but this was a delicate matter. People with the skill and expertise of the GM were not terribly comfortable with heavy-handed direction, and they were generally somewhat of a prima donna. So he needed finely crafted people skills to get what he envisioned without alienating the GM.

All went well for a while, but slowly and surely, the GM started to resent the wealthy producer. Of course, he thought the producer was not aware of this developing attitude because the GM was a crafty fellow. The GM had decided to plan a coup d'état, intended to steal the entire production and take all of the glory for himself. He reasoned: Why should I have a boss? I am the one doing the work, so I should make all of the money. Being a wily person, he pulled off the coup. But he didn’t know that the producer knew this all along and intended for the GM to carry off the coup. Why would he allow such a thing? Because he knew that an arrogant GM was like a wild stallion and needed to be broken to be of much long-term usefulness. 

Talent seemed to come along with a big ego, and he knew the project would flop under the exclusive reign of the arrogant GM. And when it did, it would be abundantly clear to everyone (most importantly to the GM) that it flopped because the wealthy producer was no longer running matters behind the scenes. The producer didn’t care if the project failed since his wealth was vast, and he had a whole lineup of better film ideas awaiting production if a trustworthy and proven GM could take charge. 

So the producer allowed the coup to unfold with no resistance. And what was predicted happened: The show flopped, and with anger in his heart and hat in hand, the GM had no choice but to see that he needed the producer after all. Before it wasn’t clear, the GM had a big head and imagined his independent greatness; he had to learn the hard way, by failure. Now the real show could begin. Now the pompous, self-righteous GM had been broken like a wild stallion, and Now the two could make some really great films together. 

Are you wondering why I’ve spun this allegorical tale? The reason is that this story is what happens in our minds. All of us need to know that we are people of great wealth already, tell stories, and make movies. Real wealth is what we think we would buy one day once we have earned enough. So we spend our entire lives working to obtain that distant goal. We chase the rabbit for more, only to discover that there is never enough, and the harder we run, the faster the goal moves away. Then one day, if we’re extraordinarily fortunate, we stop to catch our breath long enough to realize an invaluable truth: the prize is already closer to us than our own breath.

Real wealth is not on the horizon for several reasons. First, there will never be a distant goal. That’s an illusion that shimmers like heat dancing on the pavement as we race across the desert toward the mirage of an imaginary oasis. It only looks real. There is no tomorrow and, thus, no distant goal. There will never be anything other than now. That’s the first reason. The second reason is that we need to think more clearly about the nature of what we seek. What we all desire is to love and be loved, health, emotional and spiritual abundance, a sense of joy and amazement, happiness that arises like effervescent bubbles from our depth, quality relationships, having our basic needs provided, a lack of stress and fear, and a bone-deep knowledge that we are beautiful just as we are. These qualities constitute genuine wealth; they can’t be purchased at any price and will always be here and now because they exist within us all. They are the worth beneath our mistaken notions that more of the stuff that passes away moment-by-moment will ever be enough.

We are all geese who lay golden eggs. Only we don’t know because we get into such a rush chasing that rabbit that we never pause long enough to find our roots. When we stop, we can see this never-eroding treasure buried beneath the race to oblivion by our arrogant egos. We were, and always have been, home, living in a castle of enormous wealth: our mind. That is our true nature, our only true life. Everything else is an illusion, a dance of insanity. Nothing is lacking, and the race to obtain what is already ours is sheer madness.

But then there are those who will read this and say, He just doesn’t get it. If he only knew what I have gone through, he wouldn’t be such a Pollyanna. Indeed, I don’t see what you have gone through, but I do know what I’ve gone through. We all bear the rigors. We all suffer. Everyone experiences terrible tragedies. None of us can escape the consequences of karmic adversity or simple living. 

I’ve had my own tragedies and suffered much to the point of utter despair. I stood at the edge of death several times. First, in war, and later when I saw no reason for hope, I was ready to take my own life, but I was spared. I stepped away, found that producer, and discovered my own treasure within, buried deep down beneath my own corruption. So don’t delude yourself with this idea; this victim excuse that mine is terrible, and others aren’t. Suffering goes with the territory of mortal living. Nobody escapes, and everyone is already wealthy beyond the boundaries of our rational imaginations. That is why the true Self is known as being transcendent. Conceptual vision is not our friend. It is a prison of our rational mind. And the not-to-be-found mind moves us away from fantasy and back to reality. 

The wealthy producer in the story is behind the scenes running the show, but nobody knows he’s there except the GM. The GM is our ego, a self-image—self-righteous, talented, with a big head and of very little worth without being broken. And how does an ego get crushed? By trial and error. Give it enough rope, and it’ll hang itself. Try to force its hand, and it’ll resist. It’s a crafty creature and up to no good until it learns how inadequate it is by itself. We are the real power behind our own throne—the wizard of the Oz we create, and our ego has to learn the hard way that the producer and our ego are an inseparable team. Until that lesson is learned, there is only chaos.

The rest of the crew are our various functions that collaborate to produce what appears to be a seamless rendition of reality. When the film is in the can, and the audience is assembled, the film is projected, but the screen is not out there―it is being projected in the theater of the mind. It is such a stunning movie that it is almost like being in the film. We don’t realize that we are actually in the film we produce. We will never be outside of the movie since the movie is us, only we don’t call it a movie. We call it our relative and the conditional world, which, we imagine, is not us. We are the movie, the crew who produced it, the audience who watches, the GM, and the producer. It is all produced within a virtual realm, which we imagine is the real world. Everything produced is a virtual reality—all conditional and based on causes and effects. Even the unconditional producer is a virtual being. The entire assemblage is an illusion—a story we tell ourselves. This is our mind at work, which can’t be found. 

As the movie (movement) unfolds, our mind comes into being. When the video stops, our mind likewise ceases to exist. Our minds and movies are one and the same thing. The only function of the mind is movement. When the mind moves, the world appears. When the mind stops, the world disappears. Zen masters and sages, even before The Buddha, said this is an accurate rendition, and now the science of neurology confirms it.

Is this just a fantastic allegory? Perhaps an interesting story, but no more? Granted, creative liberties have been taken, but fundamentally the story is an accurate portrayal of the way it is. This is the Dharma of real life. This is what The Buddha saw when he woke up. It may seem strange, incredible, and fantastic, but it is accurate.

So how must we understand this? Awakening can be confirmed only through personal experience.  We—our only substantial and pure nature—are the unchanging and already complete producer who lacks nothing but can’t be seen. Nothing can be added to, nor subtracted from, a perfect mind since the mind is everything (yet nothing). To try to do either (add to or subtract from) is an exercise in utter futility. Nothing is lacking. Everything is already present. Clinging to anything adds nothing to who we truly are. Our true identity is no identity, yet it is secure, and the rush to add to something that is already complete is a fool’s journey. The vector of wholeness does not come through addition. It comes through subtraction, and that is what we must do when we meditate: allow the virtual to vanish into the void, and when it dissolves, we find we’re home, right where we’ve always been. We are Buddhas, waiting to wake up from a virtual dream.

“The mind is the root from which all things grow. If you can understand the mind, everything else is included. It’s like a tree. All of its fruit and flowers, its branches and leaves, depend on its root. If you nourish its root, a tree multiplies. If you cut its root, it dies. Those who understand the mind reach enlightenment with minimal effort. Those who don’t understand the mind practice in vain. Everything, good and bad, comes from your own mind. To find something beyond the mind is impossible.”—Bodhidharma; The Breakthrough Sermon

“Vision without execution is hallucination.”—Thomas Edison

Forwards or backward?

Two related issues: Vision and execution. One assumes vision comes first with execution following. There is, however, the opposite notion: First execution then the vision. This is clearly the difference between engineering and reverse engineering. The common coin presumption is that engineering depends on vision, and without that nothing can be created.

What would the other way around look like? It happens all of the time. Someone finds something and wonders, “How was this thing made?” Then begins a disassembly process, piece by piece, until the investigator finds out how the thing was made in the first place. But, you might say, “Yes but someone had to engineer the thing in the first place in order for reverse engineering to take place.” 

True enough, but the one doing the engineering doesn’t necessarily need to be another human being. If that was the case there would be no such thing as the science of physics, biology, or any other area of scientific investigation. Nature is full to overflowing with marvelous things being made, but not by humans.

So why am I pointing out this relationship? And what does this have to do with spirituality (which is the central focus of my writing)? The short and simple answer is because nothing is more concrete than a transforming, spiritual experience whether or not it can be explained, which it can’t. Everything I have been writing about for the past 20+ years is an attempt to do the impossible: To explain an ineffable spiritual experience that utterly transformed my life. An accurate explanation can’t be done, but I try nevertheless. It is akin to dancing around a fire without being consumed.

It took me nearly 30 years of concentrated study beyond that life-changing experience to reverse engineer it, and the best I have ever been able to do is like pointing to the light of the moon. The moon is real, not a hallucination, but it is not my finger either.

Praise and blame: the perception of differences.

Happiness or madness? Once we’ve considered thinking, let’s take a look at not thinking. And the very first issue that needs to be explored is a question: What difference does it make, this matter of thinking or not? 

So what, we should ask? As established in the post Thinking, The Buddha considered thinking so crucial that he said: “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.” On the other hand, the father of Zen (Bodhidharma) defined Zen as Not thinking. How do we put these two apparently contradictory statements together? And, so what?

What do we know about Zen and how it influenced The Buddha? Zen was the means employed by The Buddha to realize his enlightenment. Having experience enlightenment, he understood the root of all thinking and not thinking was his true, indiscriminate mind, where all is united⎯the wellspring of both nothing and everything. At this level of consciousness, there is neither this nor that (thinking or not thinking). You would be right to say such things as, I must deal with everyday craziness; I have a job to which I must attend and am surrounded by disagreeable people; I’m a practical person, the world seems to be going to Hell, and I don’t have time or patience for esoteric, useless nonsense. 

In the Breakthrough Sermon, Bodhidharma said, “The mind is the root from which all things grow. If you can understand the mind, everything else is included. It’s like a tree. All of its fruit and flowers, its branches and leaves, depend on its root. If you nourish its root, a tree multiplies. If you cut its root, it dies. Those who understand the mind reach enlightenment with minimal effort. Those who don’t understand the mind practice in vain. Everything good and bad comes from your own mind. To find something beyond the mind is impossible.”

So how then is the mind to be understood? To begin to fathom the mind, we must first consider which mind is up for consideration. I addressed that issue in a previous post⎯ True You and Me. Then we need to acknowledge the difference between a source and a manifestation. What we ordinarily consider our mind are manifestations (ideas, images, emotions: fleeting psychic phenomena, in other words, thoughts, and what results from thoughts). When such views are rooted in fantasy, and the image of self, they are always theoretical reflections that are self-centered. These thoughts emanate from the wrong root, the root of ego, and that emanation is self-centered lousy fruit. The world created from this root is expressive of the nature of the root.

In the seventh chapter of Matthew, Jesus is on record of having said, “By their fruit, you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.”  

The point is that the world we create with our thoughts is always a reflection of the root. The parallel here is that dreams can grow into very different kinds of manifestations. The critical key is the nature of the root. If the root is the ego, there is only one kind of fruit⎯bad. To grow better fruit, it is necessary to dig deeper, down to the source of all thought or non-thoughts: our pure mind.

From the same Breakthrough Sermon Bodhidharma said: “If you use your mind (your rational, conceptual-producing mind) to study reality, you won’t understand either your mind (your true mind) or reality. If you study reality without using your mind (your rational mind), you’ll understand both.”

It becomes clear after reading Bodhidharma that he acknowledged both the pure mind (where there is no discrimination) and the “everyday, quotidian (e.g., ordinary) rational mind” of discrimination. These two are present in us all. One is virtual and based on being able to discriminate one thing from another thing (and becomes the source of all conflict), and the pure mind: the source of everything, where there is no discrimination and no friction. For a conflict to exist, the perception of difference has to exist. If there is no perception of difference, there is no conflict.

So how is this understanding supposed to help us in everyday life? It helps us to recognize that we are all the same (conflicted at one level of consciousness that is virtual) and not conflicted or different at a deeper level of consciousness that is real. It puts everything into the proper alignment and perspective. When we find ourselves embroiled in conflict and adversity, we need to notice which mind is the cause of the conflict. It can’t be the pure mind since for conflict to arise, the perception of discriminate differences must exist. 

In the Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra, it says, when referring to the true mind, “In this world whose nature is like a dream, there is a place for praise and blame, but in the ultimate Reality of Dharmakaya (the true mind) which is far beyond the senses and the discriminating mind, what is there to praise?”

Little Bear and Lily Pads

The kingdom of magic.

Many years ago I had an experience, which irrevocably changed my life. When it happened I knew it was transforming but I had no idea to what extent, nor did I have any contextual framework into which to fit the occurrence. 

It took many years more before I fully comprehended what had taken place, and the impact on my life. It is hard to speak of the experience in terms, which can be understood, but I’ll give it my best shot since I know how important it is to share what happened⎯not for my benefit but for those who may read this. 

In metaphorical terms, the floor of my bucket collapsed and I fell through Alice’s rabbit hole into a vast and unknown realm. I had lived 40 years by then with no clue that my sense of reality was questionable. It wasn’t what I hoped for but I never thought there was any other possibility. I was living just like everyone else, based on the notion that I knew who I was. I had a name, a career, relationships, and a long history. I functioned in all of the ordinary ways—in short, I had a well-defined identity and I was miserable even though by any conventional measure it appeared as if I were successful. 

I eventually reached a point when I took a serious look at the life I had fashioned and asked myself a hard question: Did I want to spend the rest of my days doing more of the same, and getting the same result? I decided that I didn’t, but by then I had a lot invested in a bad game with no idea what the alternatives might be. In spite of this dilemma I saw that if I was ever going to find the answer, I had better consider again, from the beginning, with the time I had left. So with that realization, I cut loose from my moorings and plunged into foreign waters.

Through a convoluted set of circumstances, I soon found myself living in a Zen monastery, which I first thought of like a halfway house to give me time to solve my mystery and chart a new life path. Little did I know that this choice would open the door to a wholly different realm, which would radically transform how I looked at the world and myself. When I say, “the floor of my bucket collapsed” what I mean is that my floor—the foundation of my life up to that point: my imagined identity; ego—was blocking discovery of my real, true nature. It was like wearing a coat that obscured my naked and real self. 

I had not been at the monastery very long and can’t explain why the collapse happened so soon. I have since read many stories about Zen monks spending years in dedicated practice before experiencing this metamorphous. I don’t know why it happened to me as it did. All I know is that when it happened it felt like I was being flushed down a toilet and when it was over “I” no longer existed. The “me”—identity, which was my floor, died there. And I was transformed from an isolated individual into an integrated sojourner and I joined the world for the first time, spiritually fresh, clean, naked, and raw.

As I look back over what I’ve just written it looks unbelievable and strange. I know that, but I also know—after having lived many years beyond that magical moment—that it is worth the risk of possible scorn to share it. If even a single person believes this story, they will know that it is possible for them to be transformed also. And if that means they will take a similar risk to cast aside what they think is real and discover the same reality that I did, then a good outcome will have resulted. You might be tempted to think this experience made me special. It had the opposite effect. I realized that we are all the same; none any more special than anyone else. In fact, I now realize that this whole wish to be special is a major obstacle to waking up to who we really are.

I am not a Zen master. I did not spend years of dedicated practice to achieve this transformation. There is no reason whatsoever that it should have come when it did, but it did. And if it happened for me it can happen for anyone. What I have learned since that moment of transformation is this new and unknown realm is neither new nor unknown. It is like a story I used to read to my daughter when she was very young—the story of Little Bear, who discovered that he didn’t need to wear a coat since he already had one. We too don’t need the extraneous cloak of an ego. We already have a true nature, which is always there beneath the cloak. I can only tell you that my deepest nature is infinitely finer than the extraneous one.

If you take the time to read Zen literature you’ll find this underlying, true nature called many names—Buddha-Nature, the One Mind, pure consciousness, True man without rank—the names don’t matter. Call it what you choose. Maybe the best name is Lily—the flower of life. The water lily grows on a pad floating on water, rooted in the muck, which is hidden in the deep. In many icons, the Buddha is shown sitting on that pad. What we all would be wise to not do is to gild our lilies, or put coats on bears who already have one.

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.

Living in a world of “alternate-facts.”

“Lies, damned lies, and statistics.”—Mark Twain

In prior times deception was the exception (or so it seemed). Now it appears to have become the norm, and more than ever we need to be able to discern truth from lies, but since liars lie it is not so easy. And when statistics get involved, there are many ways to spin the truth. It is the nature of a liar to lie. There are many reasons liars fabricate and distort the truth. But the most important reason of all is, liars think they are something they are not—an ego. 

According to the dictionary, an impostor is one who assumes a false identity, or title, for the purpose of deception. It is somewhat irrelevant if a liar knows they are an impostor. So long as liars lie, they are impostors. Until such time as we truly know, who and what we are, we are subject to deception, and I will be the first to admit, I have deceived and been deceived many times in my mortal lifetime, never realizing I too was an impostor. I thought I knew who I was, but I didn’t. Only when I knew I wasn’t what I thought—an ego, did I discover my true immortal self. Until then I suffered greatly, and like an impostor, inflicted suffering upon others. 

In the West, much of the wisdom of the world has been lost to us, as it was to me until I began to study and practice Eastern Wisdom from some of the world’s greatest sages. I have thus been exposed to many of, what must be considered from a Western perspective, outlier treasure conveyors from the East, a few of whom I wish to share in this post so that you too might begin to find your hidden, immortal selves, cease being a mortal impostor and begin to discern the truth.

Since I’ve been blessed with the study of wisdom from the East, I’ve become familiar with some Buddhist vocabulary, and corresponding, underlying meanings, which are also foreign to the West. Foremost among this Eastern Vocabulary is the word “Dharma” and Dharmakāya—Sanskrit, which means “truth body” or “reality body.” The Dharmakāya is the wellspring of all truth and discernment of what is real. It is neither eastern nor western.

Shantideva, an 8th-century Indian Buddhist scholar and an adherent of the Madhyamaka philosophy of Nāgārjuna said, “All the suffering in the world comes from seeking pleasure for oneself. All the happiness in the world comes from seeking pleasure for others.” And the driving force that produces this suffering is the ego: the idea we hold of our selves.

In similar fashion, Zen Master Hakuin Ekakuin in his Song of Zazen wrote, “How near the truth, yet how far we seek. Like one in water crying, ‘I thirst!’ Like the son of a rich man wandering poor on this earth we endlessly circle the six worlds. The cause of our sorrow is ego delusion.” 

When mediated through the illusion of an ego, morality becomes simplistic, inflexible, abstract and unjust, in spite of mortal intentions. In that case, the criteria are “what’s in it for me?” And from that vantage point, there is only a single sense of justice: Mine. 

In the Sutra of Complete Enlightenment, Chán Master Sheng-yen illustrates the relationship between the fabrication of our egos and our true nature by saying, “We practice (meaning meditation—zazen) until the self (ego) is gone. When the self disappears, all obstructions will be gone too. There cannot be a self (ego) that is free from all obstructions. If there is a sense of self, then there are also obstructions. There cannot be obstructions without a self to create and experience them, because the self (ego) is an obstruction. This is nondiscrimination of the highest order.” 

Our egos are an illusion, it tells us the half-truth that we are incomplete, not whole and imperfect and this, in turn, initiates desire: a greed response. What may (or may not) be known is that slowly, but surely, Eastern Wisdom is becoming human wisdom, lacking boundaries of either east or west. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, captured the essential point when he said, “We are not human beings having spiritual experiences. We are spiritual beings having human experiences.” Some may say, I am not spiritually inclined but instead rely upon facts. 

Now facts are alternate, but the truth remains the truth, with no alternatives. Our mortal egos desire. Our immortal selves are already full and desire nothing. Truth has no boundaries. It is always whole, complete and perfect.“Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.”—The Buddha

Spooky reality.

It’s quite amazing how physics is catching up to, and blurring the lines, between the age-old enemies of science and philosophy. Three articles have recently been published in respected scientific papers. One titled, “Quantum chicken-or-egg experiment blurs the distinction between before and after,”  the second reported on the “Nobel Prize Awarded to Two Quantum Physicists,” and the third “The Quantum Theory That Peels Away the Mystery of Measurement” occurred just three days ago.

All three make note of the growing consensus within the physics community that what Einstein referred to as “spooky” can be explained by a principle known as quantum entanglement that allows quanta, perhaps many thousands of miles apart, to reflect a mystical connection that defies rational logic, where before and after are not sequential but rather simultaneously connected.

This chicken and egg, logical, conundrum was postulated, under a different name, nearly four millennia ago in India with the principle of “dependent origination”—Pratītyasamutpāda in Sanskrit.  It is a very simple principle to understand philosophically but, until now, made no logical sense. But then neither did the chicken and egg puzzle. 

At the simplest of philosophical levels, consider “up” and “down,” neither of which can exist without the other. When up arises, down arises simultaneously. When one disappears, the other disappears simultaneously. So too a mother and a child (e.g., chicken and egg). A mother can’t possibly be a mother until the instance of birth since that is how we understand the difference between a mother and a non-mother woman. Before that point of creation, a woman was not yet a mother.

The philosophy takes this a step further (as physics may one day) by pointing out that the nature of one thing is conjoined with another of a completely opposite nature; thus conditional and unconditional. Conditions (the realm of physics) are constantly in motion, even at the quantum level, whereas the unconditional (the realm of metaphysic) never changes, and just like chickens and eggs, one can’t exist without the other. Before the big bang, there was nothing, yet out of Singularity came everything—total opposites.

There are broad and meaningful implications to the latter philosophical observation, concerning the survival of the human race. And these implications takes us into human self-understanding that could save our collective behinds, but only by opening the door and embracing this new/old notion of universal connectivity: We are all different, yet exactly the same, simultaneously. Spooky! Yet not.