Meaningful meaningless meditation

More and more, I'm trying to make my meditation time as meaningless as possible. That's a change.

I've been meditating, daily, for more than thirty-seven years. After being initiated in 1971 by an Indian guru, Charan Singh, I dutifully followed the meditative practice enjoined by Radha Soami Satsang Beas.

While this supposedly was aimed at emptying the mind so divine sound and light, plus the guru's grace, could flow in, actually there's an awful lot of meaningful content in the meditative method I followed for so long.

A mantra composed of "five holy names," each of which points to a defined metaphysical level of reality. Envisioning the guru's face, principally the eyes and forehead, as this was supposed to contribute to spiritual uplift. Paying attention to certain mystical phenomena to the exclusion of others.

It's difficult to have an empty, open, receptive consciousness when it's filled with so much preconceived content.

So now I'm attracted to a meditation philosophy that fits with the Boundless Existence schema expressed in my previous post. Meaningfulness is all on this side of Boundless Existence, or ultimate reality. It involves relations between existents—particular things, people, objects, ideas, concepts, phenomena, whatever.

Boundless Existence, on the other hand (and it is really other), has no connection with anything. It is nothing, emptiness, inasmuch as nothing whatsoever can be predicated or said about it.

It provokes the most profound sensation of Ahhhhhh. And only that. Intuitive awareness of its presence is as close as we can come to knowing it. That it exists is within the bounds of human comprehension; What it is—that's the Mystery which shall ever remain.

I picture Boundless Existence as sort of a featureless backdrop to all of my other meaningful pursuits. This is how Milton K. Munitz views the relation between bounded and boundless existence in his book, "Does Life Have a Meaning?"

He says that a deep appreciation of the utter and complete Mystery of Boundless Existence delivers us from misleading assumptions, or projections. One is that it's possible to make generalizations about the nature of the universe or reality "as a whole."

As I argued, Munitz-like, in my previous post, no matter how meaningful an existent may be—up to and including the possibility of God—there's a beyond: Boundless Existence. Within that emptiness (assuming "within" has any meaning in this context) all meaning vanishes.

So the quest for a unitary "meaning of life" is fruitless. The foundation of the cosmos, Boundless Existence, bears no relation to all of our human intentions and dreams. Munitz says:

The misleading result of such projections is to withdraw attention from the only possible source of genuine, though limited, control—that by human beings themselves. The realization that since Boundless Existence has no properties of its own that work either for good or ill with respect to human life obliges us to focus on ourselves, both individually and collectively, as agents for both understanding and exercising limited areas of control over the character of our own interactive meanings.

Hey, Munitz is a philosopher. His rather murky language reflects his academic leanings. But his basic point is simple and clear: we make our own meanings in life.

Meaning isn't handed down from on high, like the Ten Commandments. It comes from our never-ending (until we die) interactions with everyone and everything we encounter daily, hourly, minutely, momently.

Thus a backdrop of meaninglessness brings a sharper resolution to whatever produces meaningfulness in life. The letters I'm typing on my laptop's screen stand out because they appear on a featureless white background.

If everything in life is meaningful, nothing is, really. I need the awareness of Boundless Existence's empty, uncaring, cosmic meaninglessness to create a sharp contrast with the meanings, large and small, produced by my interactions with other existents every waking moment of my life.

Silence. That's the key. Munitz says:

To see why an intensified awareness of Boundless Existence, in its own distinctive way, makes the question of the meaning of life vanish, I shall focus on the way in which that awareness is experienced by the cultivation of a special type of silence.

…Since it is not propositional or conceptual, the awareness of Boundless Existence is, to this extent, experienced in silence. If one breaks this silence, it can only be to engage in metaphor, negative statements ("not this, not that…"), or exclamations and expressions of feeling evoked by the experience.

Yesterday a delivery truck driver came to our house. One of the first things he said was "Wow. It sure is quiet out here. I'm used to the city. There's always some sounds where I live."

We've lived in the country for sixteen years. Naturally I'm aware of the silence, but usually it doesn't have a lot of meaning for me. I've come to take it for granted—except when the wind, or cold winter air, brings us the constant thrumming noise of a distant freeway.

The delivery man rejoiced in the quiet. He reminded me of what it makes possible. Hearing birds singing…owls hooting…frogs croaking…geese honking…coyotes howling.

My wife and I love each of those sounds. Which rest on silence—nothing.

As outside, so inside. Meditation, for me, is cultivating awareness of meaningless emptiness. Out of that mental silence, meaning emerges.

There! That! Ah…

Comments

[sew3aszkjhgy98324t9f]

I don't look for mystical states during meditation. I only have a limited amount of time and what I want from meditation is equanimity: relaxation and a calm mind. This is practical and useful in this life and if you believe in the afterlife, equnamity in this life make you fit for the higher realms there too.

I look at meditation as a time to let the mind calm down. Like a wild horse put in a pen, at first the mind runs around and around but after a time it calms down.

In this view, meditation is not a technique where you keep the mind still, it is a technique where the mind is given circumstances in which it naturally calms down.

http://www.geocities.com/chs4o8pt/habit_of_being_relaxed.html

http://www.geocities.com/chs4o8pt/meditation.html

[Bryan]

In your earlier post on Boundless Existence, I mistakenly believed you were describing something that closely resembles the emptiness that forms the heart of the Buddhist meditation practice I've followed since 1973. But I see now that you've created your own definition, and although it is interesting, it clearly does not match my own experience of the formless.

Far from being the "yang" against which meaningful "yin" emerges, I find the realm of formlessness to be where genuine meaning is found. The foreground world of phenomena proves itself time and again to be illusory and empty of meaning, although often seductive.

I do, however, fully agree that these states are inextricably linked to one another. As we say, "Form is emptiness; emptiness, form."

It is an interesting perspective, though; thanks for offering it.

[Brian]

Bryan, I wouldn't say the definition (or lack thereof) of "emptiness" in my post is my own.

For one, I was echoing Munitz' ideas. For another, Munitz echoes the core tenet of a host (if not most) of deeply mystical philosophies.

Namely, that beyond everything human consciousness can know is More. Wonder. Boundless Existence. Mystery. We can know much about the "whats" of existence, but "that" existence exists...Wow! is the only possible relation to it.

I agree that this seems to be different from the Buddhist conception of "emptiness." But because that is a conception, in my opinion it shouldn't be considered as a benchmark of truth.

Munitz is very Buddhist-like in his emphasis on relationship in the realm of existents. Nothing stands alone, so in that sense is "empty."

However, you're right. He goes further and points to an emptiness that isn't form. This, I'd say, is a weakness of Buddhist thought. It's pretty dogmatic on the "form is emptiness, emptiness is form" front.

Who knows if that is true? Who knows if it isn't also possible to have an intuitive, direct, experiential understanding that "emptiness is emptiness, and form is form."

(I believe Buddhism also says that, but isn't it true that the higher realization is supposed to be "emptiness is form, and form is emptiness? This mashes all of the cosmos together, whereas Munitz posits two realms--that of existence or that of existents.)

[Tucson Bob]

There is a subtle trap being fallen into here in that this "boundless existence" is being made an object that exists somewhere but is not our current experience. I think we are fully immersed now AS this boundless existence. Awareness (existence) and phenomena are the same thing. The hang up is that we perceive objects and then say, "I perceive that". We go 'round and 'round as this "I" perceiving objects. This "I" is just another object floating around in the sky of boundless existence which we already really are. We make this reference point of "I" the center rather than seeing it as an appearance or concept which crops up now and then. Once the "I" is seen through as a conceptual phantom, then there is just the perceiving awareness unbounded, one and the same with what is perceived. There is just perceiving and no perceiver. At this point, according to traditions, one might say "I am That". But even this is incorrect. More accurately, one might say, "That", or better yet, "This". Best of all... one would say nothing.

[JP]

(I believe Buddhism also says that, but isn't it true that the higher realization is supposed to be "emptiness is form, and form is emptiness? This mashes all of the cosmos together, whereas Munitz posits two realms--that of existence or that of existents.)

Hi Brian,

You can read this article by a Zen teacher who is not afraid to philosophize a little bit

http://www.zenmontreal.ca/en/teacher/consciousnessandevolution.pdf

Footnote 33 says
"This is a fairly difficult point to explain. It is, however, the basis of the Prajnaparamita tradition. In the Prajnaparamita Hridaya, for example, it is said, “Form is only emptiness, emptiness only form.” Nevertheless form is form and emptiness is
emptiness."

JP

[Bryan]

Brian:

Still, your primary tenant is that this "void" is meaninglessness, which just has not been my experience at all. The void is not some matrix out of which existants emerges to form meaning—it is the very thing that creates meaning.

Secondly, I don't really buy into the segregation of "existence" and "existants." This is a very western prejudice, and seems quite contrary to the Hindu and Buddhist ideas that influence other aspects of your philosophy.

To say "form is emptiness; emptiness, form" is ultimately to acknowledge there is no division, that non-duality is truth.

Sorry, but I think I'll have to take issue with Munitz and you on this one.

[Ashwin]

The entire subject, being as murky as it is, without words to define what isn't (or what should not be defined), confuses me.

"Form is emptiness; emptiness, form."

Could anyone please offer a bit of elaboration?

Thanks in advance.

[tao]

Ashwin,

Yes... Go study the Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra:

http://www.empty-universe.com/prajnaparamita/heartsutra.htm

http://www.buddhistinformation.com/heartsutra.htm

http://kr.buddhism.org/zen/sutras/conze.htm

[tao]

Ashwin,

... Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra continued:

http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/world/asia/as-heart.htm

http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/heartsutra.html

http://www.lamrim.com/hhdl/heartsutra.html

[Edward]

Ashwin, the source for study is truly where tao points.

Did you see tao point? Ah, no finger.

So, look out the window, which is the rectangular thing that is not wall. It is a thing, but it is a lack.

This stuff is closer than your own heartbeat.

[Ashwin]

Edward -

You couldn't confuse me more if you tried. Well, you probably could.

[Edward]

Oh, sorry.

It's like this: Emptiness is what makes a teacup useful. Looking out the window is not being out the window: the key is being.

There is no geometry independent of objects. I'm just saying the idea is not all that profound if you look at the world plainly.