I was reading Brad Warner's latest book, Don't Be a Jerk this evening, and I came across a section that resonated with me. He was discussing the Genjo Koan, specifically this part:
To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly. When you first seek dharma, you imagine you are far away from its environs. At the moment when dharma is correctly transmitted, you are immediately your original self.
Brad says:
You see that what you call “self” is the manifestation of everything. You reflect and refract the universe around you in a unique way, and that unique way is commonly called “self.” But it does not belong to anyone — certainly not to you!
When you understand this, your mind and body drop away, as do the mind and body of everything else. You stop conceiving of things in terms of mind and body, or spirit and matter. You see that nothing in the universe is purely mind/spirit and nothing is purely body/matter.
When I read this, it made sense. Not in a logical way, as in X = Y, but in that way when things just make sense. The part about "reflect and refract the universe around you" in particular reminds me of the half dozen or so kensho moments I've experienced in my life, when, for a brief time, I felt that my "self" was indeed expansive. When my mind and body dropped away, and what was left was, well, everything...
A few hours earlier, my partner's mother died. She was in a nursing home, after breaking her hip in September, then being put into care just before Christmas. The poor woman had dementia, and had every possible problem one can have after the broken hip. My partner said, "She had a good death," in the sense that she wasn't hooked up to tubes and machines, and two of her four children were by her side. I had only met the woman a couple of times, and wasn't able to converse with her very much, but she was still my partner's mother, and I have sadness for her, for my partner, and for the other children. But it was a good death. It was one whose time had come.
This woman - Eileen - her self has passed on, things will go on as before, and her echo will remain. My self that isn't a self will continue to reflect and refract the universe for a while longer.
Unless I'm wrong about everything.
Chop water, carry wood.
Gassho,
Kirk
SatToday
To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly. When you first seek dharma, you imagine you are far away from its environs. At the moment when dharma is correctly transmitted, you are immediately your original self.
Brad says:
You see that what you call “self” is the manifestation of everything. You reflect and refract the universe around you in a unique way, and that unique way is commonly called “self.” But it does not belong to anyone — certainly not to you!
When you understand this, your mind and body drop away, as do the mind and body of everything else. You stop conceiving of things in terms of mind and body, or spirit and matter. You see that nothing in the universe is purely mind/spirit and nothing is purely body/matter.
When I read this, it made sense. Not in a logical way, as in X = Y, but in that way when things just make sense. The part about "reflect and refract the universe around you" in particular reminds me of the half dozen or so kensho moments I've experienced in my life, when, for a brief time, I felt that my "self" was indeed expansive. When my mind and body dropped away, and what was left was, well, everything...
A few hours earlier, my partner's mother died. She was in a nursing home, after breaking her hip in September, then being put into care just before Christmas. The poor woman had dementia, and had every possible problem one can have after the broken hip. My partner said, "She had a good death," in the sense that she wasn't hooked up to tubes and machines, and two of her four children were by her side. I had only met the woman a couple of times, and wasn't able to converse with her very much, but she was still my partner's mother, and I have sadness for her, for my partner, and for the other children. But it was a good death. It was one whose time had come.
This woman - Eileen - her self has passed on, things will go on as before, and her echo will remain. My self that isn't a self will continue to reflect and refract the universe for a while longer.
Unless I'm wrong about everything.
Chop water, carry wood.
Gassho,
Kirk
SatToday
Kirk, sending metta to you and yours tonight.
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