Where can one stand?

Where is my dwelling place?

2012-02-07T08:45:00.000-08:00

Where I can never stand.

--- Angelus Silesius

"You"

2012-01-12T07:49:00.000-08:00

are not living "your life."

"Living" is all there IS.

The "Knowing" which IS,

2011-12-11T08:08:00.000-08:00

Which you ARE,

Is the one "thing"

That is beyond

Knowing or not-knowing.

not-two

2011-11-19T07:41:00.000-08:00

There ARE

no separate things

to be 'different'

or the 'same.'

The 'Totality of Isness' cannot be an object.

2011-10-22T10:13:00.000-07:00

Whose object could it be?

The Ultimate

2011-09-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

The ultimate is that 'Enlightenment' means

NEITHER 'enlightenment' NOR ''non-enlightenment'---

which is ABSENCE OF AN ENTITY TO CONCEIVE EITHER.

--- Wei Wu Wei

no more worry

2011-09-03T10:14:00.000-07:00

One in All, All in One -

If only this is realized,

No more worry about your not being perfect!

--- from the Hsin Hsin Ming

God alone is

2011-08-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

Q: How to see God who is all-pervasive?

A: To see God is to be God. There is no all apart from God for him to pervade. He alone is.

--- Ramana Maharshi

"Experience (ing)"

2011-08-20T15:30:00.001-07:00

Is that which cannot be described or defined

Because there is simply no place outside of it

From which we could do the describing.

--- J. Jennifer Matthews

everything

2011-08-11T07:56:00.000-07:00

When nothing is,

you still are.

What is that you?

--- Nisargadatta Maharaj

seamless

2011-08-01T07:17:00.000-07:00

The whole, being love,

there is nothing for you to set it against

and judge it by.

[Doing] so, you are driven to fancies.

--- George MacDonald

not a thing is -- Hui-neng

2011-07-22T07:37:00.000-07:00

At the level of non-duality,

there is "nothing to do"

simply because

there IS no thing.

where?

2011-07-10T09:31:00.000-07:00

When you are cognizing something as an individual,

where do you place yourself?

Consciousness is

that which is cognizing,

the cognition,

and that which is being cognized.

--- Nisargadatta Maharaj

being=awareness

2011-07-08T13:08:00.000-07:00

Q: How can I stay stable in awareness?

A: You know you are. That is awareness. If you think you have to be aware, then it becomes an experiential state. You want to experience something.

--- Nisargadatta Maharaj

a total unity

2011-07-01T07:11:00.000-07:00

Reality is infinite, thus unseizable.

We cannot take hold of it.

We can only allow ourselves to be seized.

--- Jean Klein

everything - always

2011-06-21T12:38:00.000-07:00

What we truly long for is intimately here, always...

It is not something, some of the time-

It is everything, all of the time.

--- Jeff Foster

All IS

2011-06-19T07:31:00.000-07:00

Jean Klein: When the senses are accepted totally, welcomed, they open and there's a deep relaxation. In this deep relaxation, they are integrated into our being.

Q: Would you say, then, that the practical essence of enlightenment is integration?

Jean Klein: Yes; there is nothing to refuse and no one to refuse. All is consciousness perceived by consciousness in consciousness.

apperceiving

2011-06-18T08:36:00.000-07:00

Welcoming is [undivided] presence and in this presence you are absent as a perceiver.

There is only perceiving with no perceiver and nothing perceived.

--- Jean Klein

the objectivity of a thing

2011-06-16T19:30:00.000-07:00

The objectivity of a thing is maintained only

by the divided mind functioning in a subject-object relationship.

When the subject becomes pure, becomes innocent, free from all striving,

then it disappears - and with it, its object.

What remains is only openness, being.

--- Jean Klein

just this

2011-06-14T07:29:00.000-07:00

When the subject is fixed on the object,

the body[mind] is in a state of tension.

In the [natural] unfolding of the object,

the body[mind] comes to a great letting go.

It is only in deep relaxation

that the object can dissolve in the subject.

--- Jean Klein

total being is always present

2011-06-13T10:38:00.000-07:00

Q: What is this insight you speak of?

A: It is an instantaneous apperception that your total being is always present, always in the "now."

--- Jean Klein

"Self"

2011-06-09T18:07:00.000-07:00

What we call the Self

is not a soul-like thing, a state;

it is the uninterrupted flow of life.

--- Jean Klein

"a liberating relationship"

2011-06-08T08:58:00.000-07:00

Rather than a remote transcendent state, nirvana is a liberating relationship with all things. For Nagarjuna, it is simply "the letting go of what rises and passes" and, as such, is neither something nor nothing. It suggests a freedom that cannot be pinned down in either time or space, prompting Nagarjuna to ask:

What do you think

Of a freedom that never happened?

What do you make

Of a life that won't go away?

---"Verses from the Center" by Stephen Batchelor

What do you mean by "the perceived leads to the perceiving?"

2011-06-06T11:39:00.000-07:00

It is the shortest way to consciousness.

The moment the object gives up its representation,

we live in silent perceiving

where there is nothing seen and nobody seeing.

It is non-dual.

--- Jean Klein

When we consider the knower independently of the known,

2011-05-27T07:56:00.000-07:00

he reveals himself to be pure witness.

When knowledge and knower are one,

there is no longer a place for a witness.

--- Jean Klein

People generally believe

2011-05-26T08:03:00.000-07:00

that everything is moved by the laws of nature.

Everything.

Except for us.

We think we move our lives.

--- Darryl Bailey

we attempt to impose form where no form exists

2011-05-24T08:06:00.000-07:00

Here we find the basic agony of life.

We believe there are stable forms

when, in fact,

there is merely unstoppable,

unpredictable,

motion.

--- from"dismantling the fantasy" by Darryl Bailey

All troubles are conceptual

2011-05-19T08:02:00.000-07:00

and are rooted in the assumed reality of the separate self

(that is, that 'I' stand apart from reality).

But the notion is patently false.

In fact, no separate self has ever been present,

except as concept.

--- John Wheeler

who has what?

2011-05-13T13:55:00.000-07:00

There is no "one" separate from what are called the "preferences" of the organism to then be attached to them or not.

who cares....

2011-05-08T14:44:00.000-07:00

about what?

Perceiving is happening,

2011-05-06T18:36:00.000-07:00

but when you give it a point

and say I'M PERCEIVING,

you've created a pseudo subject.

--- Sailor Bob

there's no THING to choose

2011-05-02T12:38:00.000-07:00

WHAT is good or bad for WHOM?

Awareness is what we are.

2011-04-27T18:34:00.000-07:00

But we block it with self-centered thinking, with dreaming, with fantasizing, with whatever it is we want to do.

Trying to be aware is just ordinary thinking, not awareness.
All we have to do is to be aware of our self-centered thoughts.

Finally they drift away, and we're just here.

--- from "Nothing Special" by Charlotte Joko Beck

There's "just what's happening"

2011-04-25T07:49:00.000-07:00

With no one (separate)
To know "it".

no one to suffer any thing

2011-04-22T09:19:00.000-07:00

In direct perceiving, there is no separation.

No perceiver, no perceived,

Only perceiv-ING.

You ARE the Aware-ing which IS

2011-04-17T07:44:00.000-07:00

Your real being is the 'I'-less, timeless, ever-present radiance of non-conceptual being-awareness---completely evident and inescapable.

--- John Wheeler

Your true nature is to be acknowledged non-conceptually, without reference to thought or anything else.

2011-04-16T18:48:00.000-07:00

Q: Aren't I supposed to always know the truth of my being?

A: You are present and aware. This is undeniable. It is not to be known or sought as if it is some special object or state. It is the ever-present basis of all experiences. How many thoughts can you have without the presence of awareness? It is so evident that it does not even need to be known, really. It is pointed out and simply acknowledged. Without thinking, seeking, or finding, you are that.

--- title and dialogue from "clear in your heart" by John Wheeler

all there is

2011-04-14T00:12:00.000-07:00

Awareness cannot be known objectively

because it is not an object,

but neither can it be unknown---

for the same reason.

--- John Wheeler

We try to grasp something in a story that cannot be found in a story.

2011-04-11T09:31:00.000-07:00

I look for the form of awareness---the thought, perception, sensation, etc.---that will liberate me,

but liberation is FROM attachment to any particular form, so that no form that is grasped can provide what I seek from it:

a non-dwelling awareness that does not grasp [cling].

--- from "the world is made of stories" by David R. Loy

no thing has any self-being of its own

2011-04-03T09:47:00.000-07:00

The most important matter in Zen practice

is to come to a clear and unmistakable EXPERIENCE

of the fact that all things of the phenomenal world,

myself included,

are totally void....

This is Satori.

--- Koun Yamada (David R. Loy's late Zen teacher)

Truth is not a mosaic, but a spring -- Sokei-an

2011-03-31T19:08:00.000-07:00

... the sense of self is actually a manifestation of something that cannot be grasped or understood and therefore can only be experienced as a NOTHING.

Our consciousness is a spring bubbling up from an unfathomable source.

Awakening happens when the bottom of the bucket drops out,
to use the Zen metaphor.

--- David R. Loy

For the sage, there has never yet begun to be things. --- Chuang-tzu

2011-03-31T08:22:00.000-07:00

In contrast to the everyday world of differentiated objects,

the Tao is not an otherworldly denial of things nor their transcendence,

but their no-thingness,

which enables their interpenetration and incessant transformation into one another.

--- David R. Loy

we understand ourselves as special instances of self-existing things that are nonetheless subject to the ravages of time and change

2011-03-29T19:52:00.000-07:00

If I self-exist, how can I change?

How could I die?

For that matter, how could I have been born?

This is the simple contradiction that Nagarjuna uses to deconstruct self-being. That all phenomena appear and disappear according to conditions means that our usual way of perceiving the world as a collection of separately existing things is a delusion.

--- from "Awareness Bound and Unbound" by David R. Loy

no thing to get

2011-03-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

We want

to meet God face-to face,

or gain enlightenment,

but the fact that everything is SHUNYA

means

that we can never attain that.

--- David R. Loy

where can you stand?

2011-03-25T08:59:00.000-07:00

[You] cannot stand aside as an independent observer of this world,

because you, the observer, are what you're observing.

You're inseparable from it [and vice-versa].

--- Alan Watts

there IS nothing ELSE

2011-03-22T10:56:00.001-07:00

When I say that, "[something] is okay," it's like saying, "Well that's it, too."

It's this constant "flowing with" --- only to discover that you ARE the stream.

And therefore there is no problem about flowing with it [or not].

You can't do anything else.

---from "Out of the Trap" by Alan Watts

there is nowhere else to be

2011-03-22T10:36:00.000-07:00

If you insist that you're trapped by the present, by the existing flow of thought, or the existing flow of experience, then of course you will resent it.

When you discover that you ARE it, and the reason that you can't get away from it is that it IS you---this is a very different state of affairs.

There is no trap. It's not happening TO you. It IS you. You are the process.

So then, instead of asking,"How shall I get out of it," the question simply disappears.

---from "Out of the Trap" by Alan Watts

fixation

2011-03-20T09:25:00.000-07:00

If getting stuck is the basic issue,

neither desires nor concepts are problematical

in themselves.

--- from "Awareness Bound and Unbound" by David R. Loy

Let your mind come forth without fixing it anywhere! -- the Diamond Sutra

2011-03-20T09:13:00.000-07:00

According to the Platform Sutra of Hui-neng,

this verse precipitated his great awakening.

--- David R. Loy

One thing I teach, and one thing only...

2011-03-18T10:02:00.000-07:00

Dukkha and how to end it.

--- the Buddha

Is a wave trapped by the Ocean?

2011-03-18T09:57:00.000-07:00

If there isn't any difference between you and the trap,

then you are not trapped.

--- from "Out of the Trap" by Alan Watts

If by eternity we mean timelessness,

2011-03-14T08:24:00.000-07:00

then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.

--- Ludwig Wittgenstein

the NOW that I AM

2011-03-13T19:58:00.000-07:00

The NOW that I HAVE immediately fades away into the past,
moment by moment,

but the NOW that I AM never falls away to become the past,
and is therefore the same as eternity.

--- from "money sex war karma" by David R. Loy

on 'being-time'

2011-03-13T08:19:00.000-07:00

Time is not something I have; it's what I am...

(lack of) time was never the problem, but rather the false sense
of a distinction between ME and "MY" TIME...

My being and my time are not distinguishable...Instead of me being IN space and time,
it's more accurate to say that I am what space and time are doing, right here and now.

from "money sex war karma" by David R. Loy

undivided knowing is existence itself

2011-03-07T08:27:00.000-08:00

Remember that the separate self can never discover the Truth.

In the end, the Truth just awakens to itself through you.

--- Stephan Bodian

direct apperception of being itself

2011-03-05T17:27:00.000-08:00

...in spiritual illumination,

the apparent separation between knower and known

dissolves into pure, undivided knowing,

which is simply existence itself.

--- Stephan Bodian

buddha nature

2011-03-05T17:23:00.000-08:00

Only come to know the nature of your own mind,

in which there is no self and no other,

and you will in fact be a Buddha.

--- Huang Po

witnessing without a witness

2011-03-03T19:08:00.000-08:00

All are endowed with the wisdom and virtue of the Tathagata,

yet simply because of delusions and preoccupations,

cannot bear witness to their endowment.

--- attributed to the Buddha

what else is there ?

2011-03-03T18:58:00.000-08:00

You say, "I am ignorant of my true nature,"

but how can this be? What else is there besides

this infinite, eternal, non-dual field of

Consciousness-and-form which is already present,

right here and now...and now...and now...

--- Joel Morwood

nothing (no one) separate

2011-02-26T08:14:00.000-08:00

If anything appears to be other than yourself,

you absolutely cannot have peace of mind.

--- Yasutani Roshi

the dropping away of body and mind

2011-02-22T16:16:00.000-08:00

Dogen absolutely did not return home as an unenlightened being,

but rather,

having completely dropped away the skin -- of ideas, concepts, perceptions, and beliefs,

and

having "become" nothing but the one reality.

--- Yasutani Roshi

the "Great Self"

2011-02-22T16:10:00.000-08:00

What the Buddha means by the self

is precisely the whole universe.

Thus,

whether one is aware of it or not,

there is no universe that is not the self.

--- Dogen

when attention "returns"

2011-02-20T10:05:00.000-08:00

When attention returns to its Source in Consciousness Itself,

there is an opportunity to realize that

"Oh, of course,

THIS IS IT!

THIS IS WHO I AM!

THIS IS WHAT EVERYTHING IS!"

--- Joel Morwood

The Impersonal Awareness of Being is the ONLY Truth. -- Ramesh Balsekar

2011-02-20T09:51:00.000-08:00

Impersonal Awareness, or What IS

transcends and includes

all the apparent movements of attention,

and

its conditioned by-products

of perception, conception, and identification.

direct, non-volitional apperceiving

2011-02-19T08:31:00.000-08:00

What does Atma darsana, 'direct perception of That' mean?

Seer-seeing-seen: these three are realized

as modifications created by the mind,

superimposed on the one all-pervading Consciousness.

--- Anandamayi Ma

It is as it is -- Ramana

2011-02-17T08:10:00.000-08:00

What seekers have so long been searching for

Turns out to be

PRECISELY What IS,

Just as it is.

where nothing is, there is everything -- Anandamayi Ma

2011-02-16T08:31:00.000-08:00

Awareness becomes consciousness when it has an object.

The object changes all the time.

In consciousness there is movement [subject-object];

Awareness by itself is motionless and timeless, here and now.

--- Nisargadatta Maharaj

just this

2011-02-11T09:01:00.000-08:00

"Intimacy" and "realization" are synonymous in traditional Zen Buddhist texts.

--- Robert Aitken

terms

2011-02-11T08:36:00.000-08:00

"Satori", now an English word, thanks to its introduction by D.T. Suzuki, has come to imply omniscient wisdom.

I much prefer the term KENSHO, which holds the more modest meaning of "seeing into (essential) nature."

"Shunyata", the void, expresses deepest experience ---

but I find that all too readily it becomes something abstract called "nothing."

--- From "Original Dwelling Place" by Robert Aitken

all

2011-02-10T08:35:00.000-08:00

Someone asked master Yun-men,

"What is the eye of the genuine teaching?"

The master said,

"It's everywhere!"

the Tathagata's inexpressible radiance

2011-02-10T07:30:00.000-08:00

There is nothing at all from the very beginning.

Purity of the mind is "not a single thing."

When all forms are abandoned, there is the Buddha,

but even the Buddha can in no way be identified.

If the mind depends on anything, it has no sure haven.

--- from "Original Dwelling Place" by Robert Aitken

not even "nothing"

2011-02-09T09:34:00.000-08:00

It is better to have nothing

than something good.

--- Yun-men

overcome everything

2011-02-08T09:51:00.000-08:00

"Is the green fog, like the guardian, something that one has to overcome in order to SEE?" I asked Don Juan.

"Yes. One must overcome everything," he said.

"How can I overcome the green fog?"

"The same way you should have overcome the guardian, by letting it turn into nothing."

"What should I do?"

"Nothing. For you, the green fog is something much easier than the guardian...You never really SAW the guardian."

"Maybe that was because I didn't like it."

"No, you still don't understand. It doesn't matter whether you like or dislike the guardian. As long as you have a feeling toward it, the guardian will remain the same: monstrous, beautiful, or whatever. If, on the other hand, you have no feeling toward it, the guardian will become nothing and will still be there in front of you."

I insisted on asking him what he meant by that.

"You thought the guardian was something you knew; that's what I mean."

"But I didn't think it was something I knew."

"You thought: it was ugly; its size was awesome; it was a monster. You know what all those things are. So the guardian was always something you knew, and as long as it was something you knew you did not SEE it. I have told you already, the guardian had to become nothing and yet it had to stand in front of you. It had to be there and it had, at the same time, to be nothing."

nothing is known

2011-02-05T08:58:00.000-08:00

When a man learns to SEE, not a single thing he knows prevails - not a single one...not a single thing is any longer the same. Once we SEE, nothing is known - nothing remains as we used to know it when we didn't SEE.

--- Don Juan speaking, in "A Separate Reality" by Carlos Castaneda

THIS existence

2011-01-31T07:53:00.000-08:00

To experience Bodhidharma's zen, there is no need to destroy THIS existence---YOU ARE FACING EVERYTHING....you suddenly realize that THIS existence, "I and that," are your original nature and that you cannot say a word about it, cannot divide THIS existence into two pieces (mind and matter). Of course in that moment, all color, all sound, everything together, disappears [as such]. This is what is known as sudden enlightenment, Bodhidharma's zen.

---from "The Zen Eye" by Sokei-an

'Ocean' and 'wave'

2011-01-22T08:36:00.000-08:00

Nonduality does not mean 'not-duality'---that would be completely dualistic! In reality, nonduality includes (the appearance of) duality because it is everything. It is nothing (no-thing) and it is everything.

Ultimately, nonduality appears as duality. They are one and the same. Then you can't even speak of 'nonduality.'

In other words, the appearance of the wave is not a problem for the Ocean. The appearance of your life story is itself a perfect expression of Being. In this unconditional love, nothing is denied.

--- Jeff Foster

Adaptability

2011-01-19T09:13:00.000-08:00

Day by day, moment by moment, intrinsic adaptability in accordance with circumstances reveals itself.

When you hear the Buddha's teaching , it is the voice of the soul whispering. You call it "conscience." It does not always work by itself; we may have to dig it out to use it. Sometimes we listen; but it is very hard to take its orders---"Don't eat any more sausage!" But you have already decided---"Just a little more."

It is the sorrow of the human being that we know the "law" but cannot obey it. "Well," some old monk says laughingly, "perhaps that IS adaptability." I think I agree. After all, adaptability is not always as cold as ice.

When you understand adaptability in accordance with circumstances, you will understand the unity of all existence---the unity between this and that, you and me, the entire world. All is just one soul working by the same law of adaptability. We understand the law of society, of the human being, and of nature, the law of everything. The same law works in the human heart, in the tree, and in the weeds. When I was studying painting, I understood this very clearly. Now it works in Sokei-an in New York. Giving lectures in this terrible language is the position he must accept. We accept everything.

From the "Zen Eye" by Sokei-an

ch.32 The Disappearance of Subject

2011-01-17T08:18:00.000-08:00

The reason why ignorance and knowledge are identical is because all concepts are objectivisations; enlightenment and ignorance are also identical, for both are objective concepts.

He who has lost his objective self thereby loses his subjective self, and has found his non-objectivity---which is the absence of subject and object.

Objects are neither 'empty' nor 'non-empty', not because they are or are not this or that, but because, of themselves, they are no 'thing' whatever BUT THEIR SOURCE ONLY.

The reason for comprehending the emptiness of objects is the abolition thereby of their subject, an abolition which remains impossible as long as the objects are perceived as real (since the one is the counterpart of the other, they have no independent identity). Phenomenally, therefore, they are one concept that has a dual aspect, and noumenon is its source.

Since subject can never be abolished directly via itself, the recognition of its objects as appearance only, results in the dis-appearance of itself as a supposed object functioning as their subject.

from "Open Secret" by Wei Wu Wei

I am Not, but the Universe is my Self --- Shih T'ou, A.D. 700-790

2011-01-16T09:15:00.000-08:00

In other words,

I am not any thing, but the apparent universe is my self.

Interpenetration of Self and Other

2011-01-15T09:14:00.001-08:00

Towards the end of his book "In Over Our Heads," Robert Kegan mentions some features of what he describes as the post
"self-authoring" order of consciousness, two of which I found particularly interesting.

1) the sense of our relationships and connections
as prior to and constitutive of the individual self

2) an identification with the transformative process of our being
rather than the formative products of our becoming

structures of knowing

2011-01-14T08:31:00.000-08:00

One pattern is forever repeated in the evolution of our structures of knowing, whether we are looking at mental development in infancy or the highly elaborated order of consciousness that underlies postmodernism. That pattern can be described like this: DIFFERENTIATION ALWAYS PRECEDES INTEGRATION. How could it be otherwise? Before we can reconnect to, internalize, or integrate something with which we were originally fused, we must first distinguish ourselves from it.

--- Robert Kegan

Organisms organize, and human organisms organize meaning.--- William Perry

2011-01-11T09:07:00.000-08:00

[My notion] that a given individual may over time come to organize her experience according to a higher order principle suggests that what we take as subject and what we take as object are not necessarily fixed for us. They are not permanent. They can change.

In fact, transforming our epistemologies, liberating ourselves from that in which we are embedded, making what was subject into object so that we can "have it" rather than "be had" by it---this is the most powerful way I know to conceptualize the growth of the mind.

It is a way of conceptualizing the growth of the mind that is as faithful to the self-psychology of the West as it is to the "wisdom literature" of the East. The roshis and lamas speak to the growth of the mind in terms of our developing ability to relate to what we were formerly attached to.

---from "In Over Our Heads, The Mental Demands of Modern Life" by Robert Kegan

a bit more on faith

2011-01-06T21:26:00.000-08:00

Only knowing is believing,

and such believing is being;

such "being" is another kind of faith,

the kind to cherish.

--- Wei Wu Wei

unfettered

2011-01-06T09:20:00.000-08:00

[To] "let your mind take its rise without fixing it anywhere"

means to be perfect master of oneself,

[not] dependent on anything,

perfectly free.

--- D. T. Suzuki

a bit more on Prajna

2011-01-02T18:15:00.000-08:00

Prajna, in many cases, can safely be [translated as] 'faith': not a belief in revealed truths, but a sort of immediate knowledge gained by intuitive intelligence. [Moreover] Prajna corresponds in some respects to 'wisdom': meaning the foundation of all reasonings and experiences.

--- from "Outlines of Mahayana Buddhism" by D. T. Suzuki

Give me a place to stand, and I will move the Earth. --- Archimedes

2010-12-26T17:47:00.000-08:00

Ordinarily, unnoticed in our perceiving and thinking is the assumption that "we" are truly standing "somewhere" apart from the "objects" of this perceiving and conceiving.

Assuming this supposed point of view has been called
'the dream[ing] of an objective universe.'

"Awakeness" is "actual immediacy."

this dualistic world

2010-12-21T18:31:00.000-08:00

There is nothing perfectly simple in this world.

Everything is doomed to final decomposition.

It seems to exist as a unit, to be itself, but there is nothing there
that cannot be reduced to its component parts.

It is sure to be dispersed.

--- D. T. Suzuki

Mind is never truly divided

2010-12-18T08:24:00.000-08:00

Only let not your insight be interrupted
through all the periods of time,

and you will be at peace with whatever situation you come into.

--- Lin-chi

the One Mind

2010-12-15T07:23:00.000-08:00

Friends,

Mind has no form
and penetrates every corner of the universe.

In the eye it sees,

in the ear it hears,

in the nose it smells,

in the mouth it talks,

in the hand it seizes,

in the leg it runs.

That which is most unmistakably perceivable
right before your eyes,
though without form, yet absolutely identifiable---

this is what understands the discourse and listens to it.

--- Lin-chi

"pure subjectivity" is "pure objectivity"

2010-12-13T19:43:00.000-08:00

"To escape" or "to be disengaged" or any[thing] implying the idea of keeping oneself away from a world of becoming, is altogether inadequate to express the Zen way of achieving "salvation." Even "salvation" is a poor term, because Zen recognizes nothing from which we are to be saved. We are from the first already "saved" in all reality, and it is due to our ignorance that we talk about being saved, or freed. Zen knows no traps or complexities from which we are to escape. The traps or complexities are our own creation.

Zen, therefore, does not try to disengage us from the world, to make us mere spectators of the hurly-burly we see around us. Zen is right in the midst of the ocean of becoming. It shows no desire to escape from its tossing waves. It does not treat Nature as if it were an enemy to be conquered, nor does it stand away from Nature. Indeed it is Nature itself. For "pure subjectivity" is no other than "pure objectivity." Our inner life is complete when it merges into Nature and becomes one with it.

--- D. T. Suzuki

delicious

2010-12-13T10:30:00.000-08:00

An officer once visited Gensha and asked, "They speak of our not knowing it while using it all the time. What is this 'it'?"

Gensha looked as if he were not paying attention to the questioner, for he innocently picked up a piece of cake and offered it to the officer to eat.

The latter finished it and repeated the question.

The master said, "There you are ! It is daily made use of and yet you know it not."

--- D. T. Suzuki

Prajna is the law of identity

2010-12-13T08:55:00.000-08:00

The eye cannot see itself; to do this a mirror is needed, but what it sees is not itself, only its reflection. Vijnana may devise some means to recognize itself, but the recognition turns out to be conceptual, as something postulated.

Prajna, however, is the eye that can turn itself within and see itself, because it is the law of identity itself. It is due to Prajna that subject and object become identifiable, and this is done without mediation of any kind.

Vijnana always needs mediation as it moves on from one concept to another---this is in the very nature of Vijnana. But Prajna, being the law of identity itself, demands no transferring from subject to object.

--- D. T. Suzuki

"pure" seeing

2010-12-12T08:08:00.000-08:00

Juten, the master, once asked a monk, "Where do you come from?

The monk answered, "I come from a monastery on the western side of the river where Kwannon is enshrined."

The master said, "Did you see Kwannon?"

"Yes I did."

"Did you see it on the right side or the left side?"

The monk replied, "When seeing there is neither right nor left."

In a mondo like this, one can readily see that the question at issue is not Kwannon, which is used merely as a symbol for ultimate reality; and the seeing of it means Prajna-intuition. There is no differentiation in it of right and left; it is complete in itself; it is a unity in itself; it is "pure" seeing.

This monk apparently understood what Prajna-intuition was, and this form of question on the part of the master is known as a "trial" question.

---from "Studies in Zen" by D.T. Suzuki

Prajna is the fundamental noetic principle whereby an apprehension of the whole becomes possible.

2010-12-11T08:46:00.000-08:00

Prajna is a unifying principle. It does this not by going over each individual unit as belonging to an integrated whole, but by apprehending the latter at one glance, as it were. While the whole is thus apprehended, the parts do not escape from entering into this vision by Prajna. [Even the smallest] parts are united in the whole to become significant, and this unification is the doing of Prajna-intuition.

--- D.T. Suzuki

immediacy

2010-12-10T09:49:00.000-08:00

...the idea of an all-permeating God in the world of plurality is the work of postulation. Prajna-intuition precludes this. No distinction is allowed here between the one and the many, the whole and the parts. When a blade of grass is lifted the whole universe is revealed there; in every pore of the skin there pulsates the life of the triple world, and this is intuited by Prajna, not by way of reasoning but "immediately." The characteristic of Prajna is this immediacy.

--- from "Studies in Zen" by D.T. Suzuki

the I is Reality

2010-12-08T07:31:00.000-08:00

The eye that sees, the ear that hears, the tongue that tastes
are only apparatus,

but the I that sees, hears, and tastes is Reality.

--- Wei Wu Wei

all (nothing) at once

2010-12-08T07:19:00.000-08:00

We have two eyes to see two sides of things,

but there must be a third eye which will see

everything at the same time and yet not see anything.

--- D.T. Suzuki

totality and viability

2010-12-02T20:10:00.000-08:00

It need not be specially mentioned that the Unborn is brought into actuality by means of the instinctive or unconscious reaction to sense-stimuli and their psychological complications; but the main point is that all these conscious and unconscious activities on the part of each individual are gathered up by the basic notion of "I am" or "I exist."

Descartes' dictum, "I think, therefore I am," will be, according to Bankei, "I feel (or perceive), therefore I am," and when this "am" is apprehended in its deepest sense we have the Unborn.

Descartes' "am" is epistemological and therefore dualistic and has not yet touched the rock-bed of existence, the source of all things.

The "I am" must preserve its totality and viability if we are to come to the idea of the Unborn.

---D. T. Suzuki

the Unborn for Bankei was not a static concept

2010-12-02T19:52:00.000-08:00

The Unborn was the content of Bankei's satori which sprang up from his whole being, and enveloped it, so that he felt as if he were living in and with the Unborn all the time. The Unborn with him, therefore, was not a static conception. He did not intuit it spatially but temporally; he lived it, and while living he knew he was it---which is satori.

---from "Living by Zen" by D.T. Suzuki

the Unborn

2010-12-02T19:29:00.000-08:00

What every one of you has got from your parents in no other than the Buddha-mind, and this mind has never been born and is full of wisdom and illumination. As it is never born, it never dies...and by this unborn Buddha-mind all things are perfectly well managed.

When you were coming this way to hear my sermon, or as you are actually listening to it, suppose you hear a bell or a crow. You at once recognize that the bell is ringing or the crow is crying, and you do not make any mistake. It is the same with your seeing: you pay no attention to a certain thing, but when you see it you at once know what it is.

It is the Unborn in you that is performing all these miracles, and as long as you are all like that, you cannot deny the Unborn, which is the Buddha-mind, bright and illuminating.

--- Bankei