Labeling thoughts.

[Andrea1974]

Thank you all for your comments and to Jundo and Taigu for clarifying some of the important points about practice. I took a look at the recommended "Nurturing Seeds" Practice link and found it very inspiring in its simplicity. I do not have many problems handling (or not handling) my thoughts during Zazen...they are here...I am here too...that's it. However, "off the cushion" it is a different story and, from time to time, I am still bothered by the apparent contradiction between the actual thought and the "I" that recognizes that thought. I believe that other people not necessarily associated with Zen Buddhism (e.g. Ekart Tolle?) proposed a distinction between thought/thinking and and "observer" of that though/thinking, where the "observer" is much closer to the actual "me". In my opinion this seems to be a decent example, a good pointer to what actually is and cannot be expressed by words.

Any thoughts? eheheh

Gassho, A

[Taigu]

The observer...no. Not even close. There is nobody left. Nobody to see or know. Tolle caught the tail of the ox and turned it into a sceptre. Not even good enough to get rid of flies. Good to make money. But that s not shinjin , body and mind dropped away.

As Trungpa puts it, and I said this already, the ego wants to see its own funeral. But it cannot. No witness in Buddha land, no Buddha to see or being seen. Eyes cannot see themselves. Once realized, no traces of Buddha, no whiff of awakening.

The stench of : now I see is but a toy in ignorant hands.

Throw everything away.

Gassho


Taigu

[Andrea1974]

Taigu,

I have not understood a word you have said...yet, it makes so much sense!
Can the observer I was referring to in my previous post more appropriately be replaced by the word "awareness"?
Now wonder Zen masters point their finger to the moon. It is so difficult to talk (write) about "IT".

Gassho, A

[Taigu]

The moon reality is unbroken, it could be called I-eye-finger-moon. So , nothing is pointing. Or we could say it is self-pointing-pointed-moonlight.

Anyway, awareness is closer.

Gassho


Taigu

[Daitetsu]

Many thanks, Taigu!


Reminds me again of the first verse of the Tao te ching:
"The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things."

Gassho,

Timo

[Jundo]

I believe that other people not necessarily associated with Zen Buddhism (e.g. Ekart Tolle?) proposed a distinction between thought/thinking and and "observer" of that though/thinking, where the "observer" is much closer to the actual "me".

Yes, as Taigu re-Minds us, Master Dogen's take was endlessly richer than so. Let me try to explain in my own feeble way.

I usually say that the delusion of life is sometimes to be caught up in the comedy and tragedy of a film (this life) without realizing it is so. We see all kinds of scenes play out, our drama, other characters who are apart from (and often in conflict with) "me", and take it as something which is (sometimes happily, sometimes horribly) real. That is "ignorance".

Now, some folks (in various schools of Eastern Philosophy, even of Zen) seem to say that the point of this enterprise is to strip everything down to the "watcher" of the fake film because what is being watched is a fiction, and they call that "the real you" or some such name. It is very much like turning off the projector, and turning on the theater lights, leaving just a blank empty screen.

In Master Dogen's view, doing so kills the show!

Rather, Dogen's view was more a wondrous view of the Totality of viewer-story-screen-characters-truthfiction-beginning-end-light-drama-comedy-tears-seats-popcorn as One Bright Pearl, the whole Real-Unreal-Real Again performance ... a dream within a dream so dreamy that we best dream on! ... a reality transcending "real" or "fiction" and thus As Real As Real Can Be.

Perhaps one of the most poetic descriptions of this by Dogen was his vision of how the Moon (usually taken as a symbol of "Enlightenment" in Buddhism) actually is found and given life in all the big and small pieces of this world, here all the tiny droplets or vast pools where reflected (Genjo Koan) ...

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.
Enlightenment does not divide you, just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment, just as a drop of water does not hinder the moon in the sky. The depth of the drop is the height of the moon. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky.

Or Mujo Seppo (On a Dream Within A Dream)

Because this wheel of Dharma is the ten directions and eight aspects themselves, the great ocean, Sumeru, national lands, and all dharmas are realized here and now. This [realization] is the “preaching of the dream-state in the dream-state” that is prior to all dreams. The pervasive disclosure of the entire universe is the dream-state. This dream-state is just “the clear-clear hundred things” [all things] —and it is the very moment in which we doubt that it is so; it is the very moment of confusion. At this moment, it is to dream things, it is to be in things, it is to preach things, and so on. When we learn this in practice, roots and stalks, twigs and leaves, flowers and fruit, and light and color [everything] are all the great dreamstate, which is not to be confused with dreaminess. Yet people who prefer not to learn the Buddha’s truth, when they encounter this “preaching a dream in a dream,” idly suppose that it might mean creating insubstantial dreamy things which do not exist at all; they suppose it might be like adding to delusion in delusion. [But] it is not so. Even when we are adding to delusion in delusion, we should endeavor just then to learn in practice the path of clarity of expression on which the words “delusion upon delusion” are naturally spoken. “Preaching the dream-state in the dream-state” is the buddhas, and the buddhas are wind, rain, water, and fire.
...
The dream state and the waking state are each real form; they are beyond greater and smaller and beyond superior and inferior. ... The dream state and the waking state originally are oneness, and are real form. The Buddha-Dharma may be a metaphor and at the same time real form.

Gassho, J

[shikantazen]

Here is a link from my previous tradition (not Zen) where the teacher answers a similar question about Witness state

http://www.aypsite.org/122.html

[Kokuu]

Now, some folks (in various schools of Eastern Philosophy, even of Zen) seem to say that the point of this enterprise is to strip everything down to the "watcher" of the fake film who is watching while realizing that all being watched is a fiction, and they call that "the real you" or some such name. It is very much like turning off the projector, and turning on the theater lights, leaving just a blank empty screen.

In Master Dogen's view, doing so kills the show!

I have in the past read instruction on focussing on the witness and found it to be unhelpful as there is still very much the feeling of self and other. Sometimes, in fact, more so than in normal experience. In contrast, just sitting with (or in) experience allows the witness to fall away and it feels like a much more expansive state without a point of reference.

Is it as simple as being focussed on experience rather than the experiencer?

[Jundo]

Here is a link from my previous tradition (not Zen) where the teacher answers a similar question about Witness state

http://www.aypsite.org/122.html

Yes, that is a Yogic Practice seeking after some unusual state, a "Pure Bliss Consciousness". If you would like to have a "Pure Bliss Consciousness", you should perhaps listen to that Teacher. To me, it is a kind of Opium.

Our way is the "Pure This Consciousness" ... the Bliss of that which is sometimes purely blissful and sometimes purely not. A Happy So Happy, that it not does need even to be "happy" all the time, and is Happy to be sometimes broken hearted and sometimes tickled pink.

Gassho, J

[Daitetsu]

My grandmother died 2 weeks ago and it didn't bother me at all. I must have been the only one in the funeral smiling or trying not to smile most of the time. My cat whom is everything to me.. my best friend.. my companion.. my love.. I think is going to die or is dieing slowly and I am just not bothered by this.

That sounds a lot like the so-called "Zen Sickness" to me to be honest.
IMHO there is a difference between not being attached and being totally detached.
But I may be wrong...

Gassho,

Timo

[Andrea1974]

Thank you Jundo and Taigu for your clarification. I am truly happy to have found this Sangha!

The moon reality is unbroken, it could be called I-eye-finger-moon. So, nothing is pointing. Or we could say it is self-pointing-pointed-moonlight. Anyway, awareness is closer.

So…if the "I" that recognizes that thought is closer to “awareness”, what happens to that “me” when I am asleep? Just to give you an idea of how my mind takes me on rides that have no end. I am not bothered by these questions as much as I used to…but still sometimes I wonder.

Gassho, A

[Jundo]

Thanks you Jundo and Taigu for your clarification. I am truly happy to have found this Sangha!

So…if the "I" that recognizes that thought is closer to “awareness”, what happens to that “me” when I am asleep? Just to give you an idea of how my mind takes me on rides that have no end. I am not bothered by these questions as much as I used to…but still sometimes I wonder.

Gassho, A

Amswer:


ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz


Gassho, Jundo

[shikantazen]

Thanks you Jundo and Taigu for your clarification. I am truly happy to have found this Sangha!

So…if the "I" that recognizes that thought is closer to “awareness”, what happens to that “me” when I am asleep? Just to give you an idea of how my mind takes me on rides that have no end. I am not bothered by these questions as much as I used to…but still sometimes I wonder.

Gassho, A

The awareness is still there even when you are asleep. It doesn't get noticed thats all. Lucid dreaming is one proof that we can be aware even when asleep

[Jundo]

Amswer:


ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz


Gassho, Jundo

Let me explain this a little more clearly for you and Sam.

Sometimes in Zen Practice, we drop certain questions because the very asking makes the problem. It is rather like asking "how many angels can rest on the head of a pin?" or "how many flying blue horses can fit in a barn?" or "will the red dress or the blue dress make me happy?"

Sometimes in Zen Practice, we drop certain questions because, though perhaps a question with an answer, it is irrelevant to Zen Practice. An example would be "which team won the 1949 World Series?" or "what is the right way to brush your teeth?". There may be an answer, but it does not pertain to our enterprise here and merely distracts.

Sometimes in Zen Practice, we drop certain questions because nobody can know for sure (and anyway, it is always still irrelevant to our Practice).

The Buddha sometimes gave examples in the old Suttas such as whether the cosmos is eternal or not eternal, finite or infinite, both or neither?" and whether 'the soul & the body are the same?" or "after death does a Tathagata exist or not exist?". He said ...

"It's just as if a man were wounded with an arrow thickly smeared with poison. His friends ... provide him with a surgeon, and the man would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know whether the man who wounded me was a noble warrior, a brahman, a merchant, or a worker.' He would say, 'I won't have this arrow removed until I know the given name & clan name of the man who wounded me... until I know whether he was tall, medium, or short... until I know whether he was dark, ruddy-brown, or golden-colored... until I know his home village, town, or city... until I know whether the bow with which I was wounded was a long bow or a crossbow... until I know whether the bowstring with which I was wounded was fiber, bamboo threads, sinew, hemp, or bark... until I know whether the shaft with which I was wounded was wild or cultivated... until I know whether the feathers of the shaft with which I was wounded were those of a vulture, a stork, a hawk, a peacock, or another bird... ... The man would die and those things would still remain unknown to him. ...

"So, Malunkyaputta, remember what is undeclared by me as undeclared, and what is declared by me as declared. ... And why are they undeclared by me? Because they are not connected with the goal, are not fundamental to the holy life. They do not lead to disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, calming, direct knowledge, self-awakening, Unbinding. That's why they are undeclared by me.

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.063.than.html

.

I am not sure which your question is (I might go with the first kind), but we put the question to sleep, give the question a rest.

Gassho, J

[shikantazen]

That makes sense Jundo. I have seen Zen teachers skip some of my questions and never understood why