Is it wrong to be self-centered?

truth
I can see, Twyvel, how your non-dualist insights into the unobservable observer may be the product of "contemplation." But I would suggest that when you are contemplating deeply notice that you are probably also meditating. When I meditate and there seems to be no mental activity, I do not consider that to be a better quality of practice than when thoughts are passing through the mind. In fact at those times of passing thoughts there is usually also an undercurrent of passive yet intense observation of the thoughts like clouds passing through, i.e., there is little or no attachment to the thoughts because there is noone to be attached.
It's also possible (I don't want to insist) that the self is suddenly dropped not only as a result of insight, but that insight occurs as a result of the dropping (or forgetting) of self.

As I vaguely remember, there are two schools of Zen that practice opposite techniques. One emphasizes meditation while the other one practices the "immediate" technique. This latter one uses koans and other more relentless methods to trick the acolyte past his ego.

Wasn't it the Sixth Patriarch, Hui Neng, who heard a pebble or something hit a stone, and he was immediately enlightened? While in the mediatation room and all the other monks were meditating, Hui Neng would just be looking up and not paying attention at all. The Master had all the monks write a poem so he could pick his successor. Hui Neng's cut right through the illusion of ego, and of course he won.

I've probably bungled this up, but it been a while since I read it.

When I cited Alan Watts' "out of my mind and into my senses," it was from a poem he wrote. I think it was called "Birdle Burgle" or something close. It goes:

I went out of my mind
and into my senses
by meeting a magpie
who mixed up his tenses,
who muddled distinctions
of nouns and verbs
and insisted that logic
was bad for the birds.

The stars in their courses
have no destinations;
the train of events
will arrive at no station.
The inner and ultimate self
of us all is dancing on nothing
and having a ball.

etc. etc.

That's all I can remember, but it's the major part.

Watts may have been a drunk, but back in the sixties he was one of the few mystics around.

truth
Yes, he was something. I used to take "seminars" with him in Los Angeles. He was not a rinzai zennist as far as I could tell. He seemed much more of a Taoist, yet the magpie sounds both like a zen master and Taoist sage.

The end of the Alan Watts poem...
You got almost all of it. In full it was:

I went out of my mind and into my senses
by meeting a Magpie who mixed up his tenses
Who muddled distinctions of nouns and of verbs
and insisted that logic is bad for the birds

With a poo-whee-cluck and a chit chit chit
grammar and meaning don't matter a bit

the stars in their courses have no destination
the train of events arrives at no station
The inner and ultimate self of us all
is dancing on nothing and having a ball

so with chit for chat
and tat for tit
this will be that
and that will be it.



The man's wit and wisdom is still the deepest most timeless of at least the 20th century. His brand of Zen eliminated anxiety and depression, as I have personally found out.

Weightless Albatross

Regarding: "A single word is sufficient to reveal the truth."
Shen Hui

Yes, Twyvel, I think that for the single word to have its effect, one must be primed, and that is the function of meditation. That's probably why zen teachers prefer to guide aspirants in the monastic setting rather than in the classroom. Let me presume to suggest that the enlightenment of insight may not be the only thing involved here. I do believe that there are intellectually simple people who lack insight but who have become relatively whole or spiritually fulfilled by a life of meditation and a spiritually nourishing mode of life. When you ask such people a question about the ulitmate nature of things, they have no answer. That may be simply because they see the "answer" to the question as ineffable, or that the question is meaningless, or that their spiritual fulfillment does not translate into ideas. Or all three.

Byron Katie

Yes, Tywvel, I agree with all that. I read the intereview with Byron Katie. Very interesting. Her description of her "shift" is convincing, even though far more sensational or exotic than the shifts of most people. A bit of bi-polarism is suggested in the early years of her transcendence. But who says that the empirical boundary between what we "normally" consider enlightenment and insanity is that firm?
I like her comment about the nature of reincarnation. I've always understand that to be the "buddhist" version (the continual rebirth of the ego delusion), as opposed to the Hindu movement of energy from one human person to another. She said in response to the interviewer's question ("Many seekers are aspiring toward having a sustained transcendent experience. Can an STE be prepared for?"):
"If I say...'I want to be enlightened…' it implies a future. And there isn't any. And then we attach to…one by one, by one, by one… I call it 'they get married and have babies.' It's reincarnation. You start with the…the I arises, and if you don't notice, then it has a baby and a baby and a baby and it splits, it's a cellular… [laughs] thing."
Much of what she says resembles the talk of J. Krishnamurti, but they refer to a different Krishnamurti whom I do not know.
Her description of the sudden nature of enlightenment follows the lineage ,in Zen, of the Rinzai tradition from Hui Neng. I acknowledge (how could I not?) that possibility, but personally prefer the Soto tradition of Dogen, viz., the gradual (and less dangerous, if I may say) process of coming to a state of transcendence. One in which we eventually grow out of the problem of hardening of the categories. I do think that, while I cannot claim to be enlightened, my years of meditation have made my mind, i.e., my perception of the world, much softer. My existential problems have largely dissipated. If I ever experience "enlightenment" (suddenly or gradually) that will be great, but if not, that would be great as well.
But I don't want to be terrorized again by the hard categories of self and other, of (absolute) good and bad or true and false, etc. That is to say the curse of living in a virtual reality of mentally coercive abstractions.

Thanks, JL. I've been saying that about the rebirth of ego illusion being reincarnation for a long time, but nobody has ever corroborated it until you just did. I was starting to think maybe I was just full of it. At least now there's at least two of us full of it.

Tell me if you agree with this: I've never read a statement explaining what the Zen Buddhists meant by "emptyness." I understand it, but Joseph Campbell said, "The ultimate mystery of being is beyond all categories of thought. " An acceptance of this is what I believe is meant by "emptyness." Most people would misunderstand this as a negative statement, but it's just the opposite.

Thanks, Coluber, if I am full of it, it is a less unpleasant place to be if you are there with me.
Regarding "emptiness" or sunyata (sanscrit) . Scholars have been fretting over that imponderable for a long time. Linguistically it is related to the meaning, swollen on the outside but hollow within (like the Maya zero is symbolized by an empty conch shell). Others say it refers to the non-self. Buddhist art often depicts an empty circle, but as Edward Conze warns, we should not interpret this as mere nothingness or a blank. I see it, following my understanding of Nagarjuna as an absence of absolute meaning: an idea takes its meaning from its opposite, and, as such, is relative rather than absolute. Moreover no thing can stand alone in reality. Everything is in flux, having no fixed nature, interdependent, conditional and contextual, having no "own-being", no self-sufficiency or in-itselfness. This is all because of the essential unity or oneness of everything. When one sees this emptiness in everything, one realizes the unity of Reality and the ephemeral and contingent nature of everything. I better stop before I repeat this principle again.
That's how I understand, for what it's worth.

JL: I just wanted to share the Campbell qoute. About twenty years ago or so, I stopped chasing the ultimate truth and accepted that it can be experienced but not understood intellectually.

Then I started reading Campbell who puts things as succinctly as a Zen master but less enigmatically when talking about myths. He said, "It has been said that mythology is the penultimate truth—penultimate because the ultimate cannot be put into words."

We visited the Yuen Yuen Institute in the New Territories of Hong Kong on my recent visit to Asia. Their religion is a combination of Taoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. I think most ofyou who believe in meditative religions would really appreciate the Yuen Yuen Institute. It probably entails all of what you seek.

Very interesting, C.I., thanks. I'll look it up.

Coluber, your statement--"I stopped chasing the ultimate truth and accepted that it can be experienced but not understood intellectually"--is wise. But it is fun to talk around it, to try to get some intellectual glimpse of what it may be or what it is not. As long as we don't take our utterances and speculations seriously. Yes, we can experience (our portion of) ultimate reality (I don't like "truth"); indeed we cannot avoid doing so even when we don't recognize it for what it is and cannot understand it intellectually. The intellectual process is the pursuit of answers to questions. We cannot even find questions when it comes to ultimate matters, hence there is no such thing as intellectual mysticism.

C.I., one of the first things I got on Google was a Taoist school, which trains students in techological skills. Hmmm, the modernization of Taoism. But I have to look further. Right now it's too late. Yawn.

JLN, Here's some excerpts from a brochure from the institute. "Founded in 1950 and occupying hectares of land around Sam Dip Tam, Tsuen Wan, the institute is a place for worshipping the dieties of the three religions: Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism. --- The first three Chinese characters of the institute's name denote the essence of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism respectively, demonstrating its advocacy for the integration and realization of the teachings of the three religions."

Un-enlightenment or maya also cannot be put into words. Though words are maya, and maya is one with > That<.

But words/ideas, can trigger mental images, perceptions, insights and in-seeing. (satori is often triggered by a percept.)

Spontaneous, direct perception, or as Wei Wu Wei says, referring to the words of Zen masterswe were looking.

imho

Twyvel, I agree that ripeness is all. I wonder if the zen word, gesture or truthful thought ever liberates one. It seems the reverse (although I cannot swear to it) that when one is liberated, one comes to realize it by meangs of a word, idea, falling leaf, or virtually any experience.

Interesting JLNobody………..




Where there is liberation there is bondage.

Yes, where there is the idea, or feeling of liberation, there is bondage to that idea or feeling. True liberation is non-liberation, the taste of tea--or wine when one is only, and effortlessly, appreciative of the tea--or wine (when one is tea--or wine).

Watts' Poem in its entirety
I went out of my mind
and came to my senses
by meeting a magpie
who mixed up his tenses

who muddled distinctions
of nouns and of verbs
and insisted that logic
is bad for the birds

with a poo, wee, cluck
and a chit, chit, chit
the grammer and meaning
don't matter a bit

the stars in their courses
have no destination
the train of events
will arrive at no station

the inmost and ultimate
Self of us all
is dancing on nothing
and having a ball

so, with chat for chit
and tat for tit
this will be that
and that will be it

So, that's that!