There is something magical about those moments when, no matter how many people I might consult, no answer is given. We see a lot of stories about this in Chan Buddhist interactions between the Master and student. I would like to quote Master Sheng Yen's example in Tea Words Volume II (2013) at some length:
A story from the Tang dynasty tells of a disciple who
asked his master, “How can I calm my mind?” The master
said, “I’m too busy right now, why not consult your first
Dharma brother?” The disciple did as he was told. The first
Dharma brother said, “I have a headache, I can’t talk now.
Why not talk to second Dharma brother?” But the second
Dharma brother said, “I have a stomach ache, why don’t you
talk to Master?” So the disciple went back to his master and
complained, “Nobody told me how to calm my mind;
nobody told me anything.” The master said, “You really are
a stupid fool. Everybody has been telling you how to calm
your mind.” Upon hearing this, the disciple realized
enlightenment. (p.16)
What resonates with me about this passage is not the part about "enlightenment", but more so the part about not having anyone to tell the answer to how to calm one's mind. This story reminds me that ultimately, people are not guided to their own mind by way of words or explanations. In fact, sometimes the opposite might be the case, wherein too many concepts cloud the mind, creating a confused sense that we have already accomplished something that we have not actually experienced directly. More so, it tends to reinforce a kind of craving mindset, where we wander from one idea or book to the next in search of an idea that will provide us with bliss. In fact, this seeking after explanations only upholds a mind that is agitated and filled with desires. It doesn't help a person see the clarity that is beneath the thoughts.
The other aspect of this story that appeals to me is how this disciple eventually realizes that his teachers refusals are actually revealing his own mind. When I have exhausted this desire to know through others, I am no longer clinging to them for answers, and then I am able to see that it's letting go of this appeal that leads one to the true mind. As I suggested in another blog entry, sometimes the simple mundane life, with all its thrown-ness (to borrow from Heidegger) can help disillusion people of the idea that they can find themselves in the explanations provided by others, be it authorities, books, "experts" or other respected peers.
Sheng Yen (2013) Tea Words Volume II Elmhurst NY: Dharma Drum Publications
Friday, August 31, 2018
Thursday, August 30, 2018
Change as the only constant
Change is the only constant, or so the cliche goes. I have been writing this blog since 2015, when I was consistently applying myself almost daily. I would like to believe that part of my rationale in doing this is that quite simply I am in my 40s, and I want to be able to chronicle the entire life of the 40 something person: his philosophy, his goals, and his ideas. I don't know how long I will sustain such a journey, but this chronicle should also reveal something about my trajectory of thought.
Is there any idea that one ultimately "arrives" at that tells the entire truth? This is perhaps what I dreamed would happen when I was engaged in philosophy studies. I don't think that this is the way things go. I am inclined to suspect that the journey at my age is to consolidate what I know and understand that this too is in a state of continual flux. There is no "security" in knowing, only a letting go of the fear of disapproval by others.
Is there any idea that one ultimately "arrives" at that tells the entire truth? This is perhaps what I dreamed would happen when I was engaged in philosophy studies. I don't think that this is the way things go. I am inclined to suspect that the journey at my age is to consolidate what I know and understand that this too is in a state of continual flux. There is no "security" in knowing, only a letting go of the fear of disapproval by others.
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
Role of Reason in Spiritual Practice
In Tea Words Volume II, Master Sheng Yen continues to explore the idea that Chan cannot be communicated through words alone. Sometimes as Master Sheng Yen notes, a practitioner with a question will be given an "indirect" answer such as a shout, in order to get the student to move beyond words and reason in arriving at an awareness of true mind. As Master Sheng Yen notes: "These methods are
designed to help students to drop the habit of reasoning
themselves to true mind. Reasoning will not free you from
mind, thought, or consciousness." (p.15)
I believe that life itself is always pointing to the mind, and it does this by always defying the supposed rules of reason. Often, reason boxes people in: it gives thinkers the impression that the world can be predicted by thought alone, and this gives an illusion of a fixed essence that can be controlled. People even seek fortune tellers under the implicit belief that consulting a seer will allow them to trace the exact path of their life. Why is this so compelling? Again, I think it's because people want to be able to read their life in a predictable manner, when in fact what life points to is something that cannot be seen or reasoned.
One of the compelling ideas that comes to mind while reading this passage is that Chan indeed has to take us out of our heads, to know that there is no separation between what is "up here" and "out there". Is it possible that life, when engaged openly, can do what Chan masters set out to do as well, only in a more gradual way that twists and turns? I leave it to the reader to contemplate to what extent their lives are their "teachers" who open them to their true mind.
Sheng Yen (2013), Tea Words Volume II. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.
I believe that life itself is always pointing to the mind, and it does this by always defying the supposed rules of reason. Often, reason boxes people in: it gives thinkers the impression that the world can be predicted by thought alone, and this gives an illusion of a fixed essence that can be controlled. People even seek fortune tellers under the implicit belief that consulting a seer will allow them to trace the exact path of their life. Why is this so compelling? Again, I think it's because people want to be able to read their life in a predictable manner, when in fact what life points to is something that cannot be seen or reasoned.
One of the compelling ideas that comes to mind while reading this passage is that Chan indeed has to take us out of our heads, to know that there is no separation between what is "up here" and "out there". Is it possible that life, when engaged openly, can do what Chan masters set out to do as well, only in a more gradual way that twists and turns? I leave it to the reader to contemplate to what extent their lives are their "teachers" who open them to their true mind.
Sheng Yen (2013), Tea Words Volume II. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications.
Tuesday, August 28, 2018
"Carried Away" by Thoughts or "Choosing" Thoughts?
During my lunch break today, I had a reflection about to what extent I believe that I am a "prisoner" to my thoughts. I think that one of my weaknesses in life is that I get carried away in negative thoughts, such as "I can't manage all these responsibilities", and these thoughts have a tendency to bring my energy down or lead me to stop reflecting altogether. It's as though my mind has already bought into a view that I am not able to go beyond a certain capacity...when in fact this too is nothing more than a thought! The inertia that people sometimes feel when they have many responsibilities at work may itself just be another creation of the mind. In telling myself that I have a lot to take care of, I give myself the false impression of a limitation, when in fact, I am not really that limited in what I can imagine myself doing or in setting goals for myself.
I think one of the most important skills that one can acquire is not being emotionally involved in stress: that is, to "keep one's head" and to be present when one feels burdened by thoughts and heavy emotions in the body, particularly tightness and tension. It's helpful to recognize that everything is just a thought, and nothing more. On my way to work this morning, for example, I had a worrisome thought about whether or not I would have enough experience to tackle the work related project testing. Am I enough? the thought seemed to say to me. But then I paused to consider whether there is ever a point where a person simply says, "well, that's it, I have nothing new to learn here...I might as well go home and curl up in a ball". Sometimes this is what a person might want to do in certain circumstances, but does it happen all that much in real life? The point is that sometimes what appears to be a logical response to an uncertain situation might actually be an unlikely scenario. This is one of the problems that comes with "overthinking"; the tendency to imagine extreme scenarios, similar to the donkey who can decide whether to eat or drink because it is partway between food on one side and water on the other in a desert. What if there are times when I know what I am doing, and in another second I simply don't? Am I able to be both knowing and unknowing in the same situation, and be able to bear those in one moment?
This comes to the topic of my entry: is it possible that thoughts control us, or are we actively choosing our thoughts at every moment? While I tend to agree that thoughts are a choice, I also believe that changing thought habit patterns is not easy. There is a certain inertia there, similar to when a person chooses a path that is already trodden in the snow rather than creating one's own path. It's simply easier to do what one has been doing all along; and it's equally easy to settle for a glib view that I can change my mind simply by adopting a new sentence in my mind. This is hardly convincing because changing one's mind is a project: it's something that requires a lot of passion and curiosity to explore what works and doesn't work. It's not likely to discover that one's mind is programmable like a computer, but it seems possible to treat thinking as a kind of adventure in beholding new possibilities.
I think one of the most important skills that one can acquire is not being emotionally involved in stress: that is, to "keep one's head" and to be present when one feels burdened by thoughts and heavy emotions in the body, particularly tightness and tension. It's helpful to recognize that everything is just a thought, and nothing more. On my way to work this morning, for example, I had a worrisome thought about whether or not I would have enough experience to tackle the work related project testing. Am I enough? the thought seemed to say to me. But then I paused to consider whether there is ever a point where a person simply says, "well, that's it, I have nothing new to learn here...I might as well go home and curl up in a ball". Sometimes this is what a person might want to do in certain circumstances, but does it happen all that much in real life? The point is that sometimes what appears to be a logical response to an uncertain situation might actually be an unlikely scenario. This is one of the problems that comes with "overthinking"; the tendency to imagine extreme scenarios, similar to the donkey who can decide whether to eat or drink because it is partway between food on one side and water on the other in a desert. What if there are times when I know what I am doing, and in another second I simply don't? Am I able to be both knowing and unknowing in the same situation, and be able to bear those in one moment?
This comes to the topic of my entry: is it possible that thoughts control us, or are we actively choosing our thoughts at every moment? While I tend to agree that thoughts are a choice, I also believe that changing thought habit patterns is not easy. There is a certain inertia there, similar to when a person chooses a path that is already trodden in the snow rather than creating one's own path. It's simply easier to do what one has been doing all along; and it's equally easy to settle for a glib view that I can change my mind simply by adopting a new sentence in my mind. This is hardly convincing because changing one's mind is a project: it's something that requires a lot of passion and curiosity to explore what works and doesn't work. It's not likely to discover that one's mind is programmable like a computer, but it seems possible to treat thinking as a kind of adventure in beholding new possibilities.
Monday, August 27, 2018
Refraining from Words and Speech
In Tea Words Volume II, Master Sheng Yen remarks, "Whichever Chan method you use please refrain from
relying on words or speech. Words represent ideas, concepts,
and images, and only by leaving these things behind can you
begin to understand true mind" (p.15). Typically, Chan emphasizes a direct pointing to the mind, rather than clinging to concepts, ideas or images. Why is this so? Part of the problem is that clinging to anything quickly becomes a source of suffering and vexation. I have observed in myself that whenever I like a particular idea I have, that same idea will lose its flavor over time, because the conditions have changed. Have you ever had situations in your life where you come up with a "brilliant" idea at 11 in the evening, only to find that it doesn't hold much appeal at 6 in the morning, when you wake up? I am sure that many psychologists have different explanations for this phenomenon (such as the "right brain" adding a different element during sleep or dreaming), but one reason is that thoughts are conditioned. What seems a good idea in some circumstance or condition is likely to change with new sets of information or even bodily conditions. It's sometimes troubling to recognize how delusive thoughts can be when they make us believe that we have "got it!" only to yield to a questioning of what exactly we "got" in the first place. This is perhaps one of the reasons why Master Sheng Yen remarks that whatever we think or say is always going to be "off the mark" (ibid). Thoughts and expressions only speak to the current conditions of mind, and they can never capture the essence of mind.
While Chan practice is not said to rely on words or concepts, there is certainly a lot of explanation in Chan Buddhist philosophy. Why so? Master Sheng Yen poignantly reflects, "But the point of what we talk or write about is to convey that whatever you think or say is erroneous." (ibid) That is, I think the point of attending Dharma talks is not to get caught up in words or explanations but, rather, to recognize that such explanations always fall short of the proverbial mark. They never can point to the true mind.
Sometimes getting too involved in thinking can have a similar effect of having us spinning in our own thoughts. I find it's helpful to remind myself that thoughts can never be solutions to life's problems in themselves, and that sometimes the only way we can approach a situation is to be with it, no matter how unpredictable it is. When I try to "think ahead" to predict how a situation will unfold, I am often subconsciously trying to exert control over whatever it is that happens to be arising. What would it be like to be vulnerable to the way life itself is simply not subject to easy labeling or categorization? How would I feel to recognize that there is no way to even know what kinds of situations we will encounter in the course of life? It's helpful to make a space for anxiety and vulnerability, because this is where the rawness and tenderness of sentience meets the present moment and its conditions. It's not always helpful to come into anything with any presumption of knowing.
Sheng Yen (2013) Tea Words Volume II. Elmhurst: Dharma Drum Publications
While Chan practice is not said to rely on words or concepts, there is certainly a lot of explanation in Chan Buddhist philosophy. Why so? Master Sheng Yen poignantly reflects, "But the point of what we talk or write about is to convey that whatever you think or say is erroneous." (ibid) That is, I think the point of attending Dharma talks is not to get caught up in words or explanations but, rather, to recognize that such explanations always fall short of the proverbial mark. They never can point to the true mind.
Sometimes getting too involved in thinking can have a similar effect of having us spinning in our own thoughts. I find it's helpful to remind myself that thoughts can never be solutions to life's problems in themselves, and that sometimes the only way we can approach a situation is to be with it, no matter how unpredictable it is. When I try to "think ahead" to predict how a situation will unfold, I am often subconsciously trying to exert control over whatever it is that happens to be arising. What would it be like to be vulnerable to the way life itself is simply not subject to easy labeling or categorization? How would I feel to recognize that there is no way to even know what kinds of situations we will encounter in the course of life? It's helpful to make a space for anxiety and vulnerability, because this is where the rawness and tenderness of sentience meets the present moment and its conditions. It's not always helpful to come into anything with any presumption of knowing.
Sheng Yen (2013) Tea Words Volume II. Elmhurst: Dharma Drum Publications
Saturday, August 25, 2018
Responsibility and Karma
In her book Good Karma, Tibetan nun Thubten Chodron talks about the idea that karma is not "a ticket to punishment. Rather, it meant I could no longer blame my misery on others." (p.2). Thubten Chodron had an experience back in 1976 when she contracted Hepatitis A after eating vegetables that had not been fully cleaned by the kitchen staff. Feeling very weak and angry, she was given a book called The Wheel of Sharp Weapons, where she achieved the insight that her illness is the result of causes and conditions she created in prior lifetimes. Rather than blaming people around her for her illness, she learned to take a kind of total responsibility for everything that has happened to her up to this point in time.
How is it possible to develop the capacity to take total responsibility for one's current state of body and mind? What is the starting point for this kind of practice? I am reflecting that even the notion of "self" responsibility might be a bit misleading, since even the self is conditioned by all sorts of things, and it is not a permanent state of being. I think self-responsibility needs to begin with a clear awareness that suffering is coming from the mind. It is not something I attribute to something outside of me, but it's related to where I am at right now in terms of my motivations and attitudes. If I am not checking and aware of these motivations and attitudes, then I am unable to really appreciate the mind sufficiently to take responsibility.
Quite simply, unless one is aware that they are not identified with this body, they will not feel the gravity or the depth of the responsibility that Thubten Chodron talks about. If I am only thinking for this body and taking care of the appetites, I might have a sense of responsibility for the beings who provide for me and take care of this body, but beyond that, what can responsibility include? If I don't have the basic insight that the mind is not limited to this body (and even goes beyond all bodies) then my responsibility will be defined by this narrow sense of identity: my clothes, my job, my food, my preferences, and so on.
I think that the most important thing is to see that one is not one's body: to see that even this body is a kind of dream, and that the mind is never limited to this body in this life. It would be a pity if one's life were only focused on making this body feel relaxed and comfortable, when in fact the body is impermanent and is subject to all sorts of discomforts. What is it that is witnessing all that discomfort? Is that witness subject to discomfort? This is a kind of practice that goes beyond even the notion of responsibility.
Chodron, Thubten, (2016). Good Karma: How to Create the Causes of Happiness and Avoid the Causes of Suffering.
How is it possible to develop the capacity to take total responsibility for one's current state of body and mind? What is the starting point for this kind of practice? I am reflecting that even the notion of "self" responsibility might be a bit misleading, since even the self is conditioned by all sorts of things, and it is not a permanent state of being. I think self-responsibility needs to begin with a clear awareness that suffering is coming from the mind. It is not something I attribute to something outside of me, but it's related to where I am at right now in terms of my motivations and attitudes. If I am not checking and aware of these motivations and attitudes, then I am unable to really appreciate the mind sufficiently to take responsibility.
Quite simply, unless one is aware that they are not identified with this body, they will not feel the gravity or the depth of the responsibility that Thubten Chodron talks about. If I am only thinking for this body and taking care of the appetites, I might have a sense of responsibility for the beings who provide for me and take care of this body, but beyond that, what can responsibility include? If I don't have the basic insight that the mind is not limited to this body (and even goes beyond all bodies) then my responsibility will be defined by this narrow sense of identity: my clothes, my job, my food, my preferences, and so on.
I think that the most important thing is to see that one is not one's body: to see that even this body is a kind of dream, and that the mind is never limited to this body in this life. It would be a pity if one's life were only focused on making this body feel relaxed and comfortable, when in fact the body is impermanent and is subject to all sorts of discomforts. What is it that is witnessing all that discomfort? Is that witness subject to discomfort? This is a kind of practice that goes beyond even the notion of responsibility.
Chodron, Thubten, (2016). Good Karma: How to Create the Causes of Happiness and Avoid the Causes of Suffering.
Friday, August 24, 2018
Transcending Thoughts
The second method that Master Sheng Yen describes in dealing with adversity is a method he calls "transcending thoughts" (2013, p.15). What does it mean to transcend thoughts, and how is it different from "contemplating mind"? Master Sheng Yen defines transcending thoughts as "having the attitude of non-attachment to yourself or others" (ibid), which means that there is no particular anchoring to a method, an object or a particular point of reference. This doesn't necessarily mean that one is completely void of thoughts, but rather that one is simply not being lead by thoughts. And note also how Master Sheng Yen describes this approach more as an attitude than a method. When I read it in this way, I have more of a way of seeing things that is not caught up in methods themselves, but is more interested in the spirit of being non-attached. When my attitude is not to get lost in methods themselves (or attach to them), I am able to take a similar non-attached approach to other thoughts and methods as well.
I don't think that these two methods (contemplating mind and transcending thoughts) are by nature mutually exclusive. For example, having an object of contemplation can be a way of stabilizing the mind and allowing an honest reflection of the mind state. On the other hand, too strong a grip on the method can lead to a controlling or forceful mindset. Yesterday during the meditation group sharing, a participant raised the point that when she is being too focused on the method of watching the breath, she feels a desire to force the breath to arise. This naturally seems to happen when the mindset is to suppress all other thoughts when concentrating on the method. But with the method of transcending thoughts, the opposite approach is emphasized, where one is openly aware without attaching to thoughts. In this way, the mind can recognize the thoughts in a way that sees them in the context of a totality, rather than being absorbed or attached in one thing or another.
Seeing things clearly, one needs an anchor-- a sense of joy in being present that comes from having a method to practice. But it also requires a sense of leniency to know when one is subconsciously judging themselves while engaging in this sort of practice.
Sheng Yen (2013). Tea Words, Volume II. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications
I don't think that these two methods (contemplating mind and transcending thoughts) are by nature mutually exclusive. For example, having an object of contemplation can be a way of stabilizing the mind and allowing an honest reflection of the mind state. On the other hand, too strong a grip on the method can lead to a controlling or forceful mindset. Yesterday during the meditation group sharing, a participant raised the point that when she is being too focused on the method of watching the breath, she feels a desire to force the breath to arise. This naturally seems to happen when the mindset is to suppress all other thoughts when concentrating on the method. But with the method of transcending thoughts, the opposite approach is emphasized, where one is openly aware without attaching to thoughts. In this way, the mind can recognize the thoughts in a way that sees them in the context of a totality, rather than being absorbed or attached in one thing or another.
Seeing things clearly, one needs an anchor-- a sense of joy in being present that comes from having a method to practice. But it also requires a sense of leniency to know when one is subconsciously judging themselves while engaging in this sort of practice.
Sheng Yen (2013). Tea Words, Volume II. Elmhurst, NY: Dharma Drum Publications
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