Confusion in Practice

[Tom0206]

Thank you for your response Jundo.
With direct experience, I should have added that what I was meant, that which is experienced without likes/dislike, mental fabrication etc.
Your explanation of the borders dissolving between I and the outside world resonates.
Gassho

[Shinshou]

Hi Tom,

I rather doubt that a brain can have a truly "direct experience," since we are always experiencing a mental interpretation of the data entering the senses, categorized and judged by the mind. In other words, you do not truly see that "beautiful green tree" you think you see outside, but likely only an image in the mind (seemingly from photons which came from something outside) which appears in the brain as an image and experience we package and interpret and might then call "beautiful green tree." Even if you strip away much of the interpretation and categorizing, all you will still be experiencing is a brain image of the electro-chemical signals from the senses.


SatTodayLAH

As Eknath Easwaran, the Hindu writer, likes to note: we cannot experience the world, only our own nervous system.

Daniel (Shoshu)

Sat Today