The best spiritual practice could be...nothing

Here's some thoughts about the value of basing your spiritual practice on... drumroll please... absolutely nothing. But I'll introduce this topic by sharing an anecdote.

Yesterday I took our dog for a walk around the community lake near our rural property. A house is for sale that overlooks the lake. A woman and two children were walking down from the house toward the lake, seemingly because the family was looking into buying the house.

A young boy came up to the fence that our dog and me were on the other side of. He pointed and said, "nice lake." Then he crawled through the fence with no problem.

His mother, I assume it was, came over to him. "Look," she said, "there's some barbed wire on this fence. You could have gotten caught on it. There's a gate over there. I'll show you the proper way to get through the fence." 

The gate, with a kayak peeking from the side

I said, looking at the boy, "Proper? That's no fun." As dog and I continued on our walk, I thought about my own boyhood days growing up in a rural area in the foothills of California's Sierra Nevada mountains. 

Barbed wire was used in all the fences on the land where my friends and I played and cattle roamed. Rarely were there gates. Early on I learned various tricks to get through a barbed wire fence.

If the wire was tight, stand on the strands next to a post and hop over the fence. If the wire was loose, put your foot on the bottom strand and crawl through the fence. Or have a friend pull up on a strand while you step on the bottom strand while you crawl through.

Telling the boy that only a gate is the proper way to cross a barbed wire fence not only isn't true, it prevents the boy from learning other ways. The mother could have said, "Let's think of some ways to get through the fence safely without using a gate."

I was right when I said Proper is no fun. Often we have to act properly to fulfill a societal expectation. But I've found that improper behavior tends to be more enjoyable, because it flows from our natural inclination, not someone else's view of how life should be lived.

Anyway, back to the best spiritual practice being nothing. I can relate this to what I wrote above with just a little cramming of the fence/gate metaphor into the subject at hand. 

Religions are fond of gates. They like to control who passes through their gate that supposedly leads to God, heaven, enlightenment, or some other elevated state. So there are requirements to approach the gate.

For example, the Eastern religion I was a member of for 35 years, Radha Soami Satsang Beas, required initiates to be vegetarian, meditate 2 1/2 hours a day, not use alcohol or recreational drugs, abstain from having sex outside of marriage, and follow a vaguely stated pure and moral life.

Members of other religions follow other sorts of rules. The underlying rationale is that the spiritual seeker is different from what is sought. So the gap between seeker and sought has to be bridged by a gate that leads between what a person is now and what they hope to be.

Thus almost all religions have a dualistic philosophy. Humans are on one side of a cosmic fence -- the worldly, physical, limited, time-bound side where suffering is commonplace. Religions promise a way to get through that fence into a very different supernatural, spiritual, expansive, eternal side of the cosmos.

But what if that side doesn't exist? After all, there's no proof that it does. Then we're left with two basic approaches to spirituality, one that isn't based in reality, and one that is.

(1) There's much to do and become (non-reality based)
(2) There's nothing to do and become (reality based)

Yet here's why (2) still exists in the form of Zen Buddhism, Taoism, Advaita, and similar non-dual approaches to spirituality. Religions who preach (1) are so ubiquitous, and have been so for thousands of years, currently billions of people are lined up in front of gates that don't lead anywhere.

So they need to be told, "Hey, guys, wanted to point out that there's no need for those gates that you wrongly believe lead to divinity. Actually, you can just walk right around them, since there's no fence either."

Meaning, reality isn't divided into a natural world and supernatural world. There's just one world, and it isn't supernatural. It's right here, right now.

Thus nothing needs to be done to be "spiritual," viewed as being in touch with how you and the world really is, other than giving up the erroneous belief that you're separate from reality.

This is akin to someone being afflicted by a psychosis of sorts where they imagine being judged by an outside power, told by that power that they lack something without which they can't live a meaningful life, and instructed how to search for it under the guidance of people in tune with that power. 

What that person needs is the ability to recognize that what they imagine to be true, actually is false. They don't need to do anything. They need to stop believing in a fantasy.

Sam Harris likes to say in the guided meditations on his Waking Up app, "Rest in the condition in which everything is appearing." That condition is awareness, or if you like, consciousness. Without awareness/consciousness, there is no reality capable of being known.

So in that non-dual sense, the observer isn't separate from what's observed; the thinker isn't separate from what is thought; the hearer isn't separate from what is being heard. Alan Watts speaks of this when  he says, "We don't come into the world; we come out of the world."

In other words, we aren't separate from the world.

I'm reading Stephen Bodian's book, "Wake Up Now: A Guide to the Journey of Spiritual Awakening." There's many places in the parts of the book I've read so far that echo the notion that the best spiritual practice is nothing.

Here's an example:

From a direct intuition of the imminent availability of the truth of your being, you've been lured into the spiritual marketplace, where well-intentioned vendors hawk their wares, promising enlightenment somewhere in the distant future as the result of years of effort if you're willing to buy their product, take their course, join their community, and invest thousands of hours of your time.

The innocent initial impulse to orient, listen, and move toward truth the way a child naturally returns to its mother or a bird to its nesting ground has been co-opted by an established tradition and turned into a circuitous path to spiritual realization. Welcome to the progressive approach!

Progressive paths are extraordinarily appealing because they've been so carefully elaborated, often over many centuries. Bearing the imprimatur of an established tradition, they suggest that if you just follow the instructions wholeheartedly, the results will take care of themselves. 

If you listen to enough teachings, spend enough hours in meditation, attend enough retreats, cultivate enough of the right attitudes and qualities, you'll one day discover the truth of who you really are. As inspiration, the progressive scriptures are filled with exhortatory tales of masters who began as seekers just like you and me and eventually achieved enlightenment through prolonged and concerted effort.

...Eventually, after giving up the effort and the formal practice of meditation, I met a teacher who told me, "The seeker is the sought, the looker is what he or she is looking for." My mind couldn't wrap itself around these words, but one day soon after, in a moment out of time, the seeker and the sought collapsed into one another, and I knew who I was once and for all.

The one who had been looking so hard for true nature was the very true nature I had been looking for. Truth had been playing hide and seek with itself. As long as I continued focusing so much on searching, I couldn't possibly stumble backward into the silent presence that was the source of all searching.

...In fact, the prolonged practice of a particular technique may have the opposite effect, deadening and habituating the mind, rather than making it more open and accessible to truth. If you want to know how a progressive path might affect you, spend some time at one of the tradition's residential meditation centers or ashrams.

Do the longtime practitioners appear happier, freer, more peaceful, more enlightened? Or do they seem rigid in their adherence to structures and rules, lacking in spontaneity, proud of their spiritual progress or stature, addicted to control?

Every center, tradition, and practitioner is different, of course, but many of the ashrams and monasteries I've visited lack the joy and aliveness one would expect to find there; instead, they exude a quality of emotional repression and subservience to form.

Which is why I started off this post by saying, Proper is no fun.

 

Comments

[Vinny]

Most of the so called Americans can become fodder of false language çreated by British Mafia. Jesus would fail to save them from British Mafia.

[Ron]

Stephen Bodian: - "The seeker is the sought, the looker is what he or she is looking for." And: - “The one who had been looking so hard for true nature was the very true nature I had been looking for. Truth had been playing hide and seek with itself. As long as I continued focusing so much on searching, I couldn't possibly stumble backward into the silent presence that was the source of all searching.”
Or as Brian puts it: - 'There's nothing to do and become (reality based).'

In the past I’ve read some of Tony Parson’s books – which are transcripts of his meetings, and recently I bought his book ‘this freedom’, an interesting though often exasperating read. Similar to Bodian, Parson’s talks about how the human brain developed to assume the myth that there is ‘me’ and a separate subject-object world out there as observed by the constructed ‘self’, the ‘me’. “The ‘me’ believes that by doing something it can gain enlightenment, but that is a complete myth. There is no such thing as an enlightened person. There is no person to become enlightened.”

Apparently, the ‘me’ is always searching for something, usually some formular that will give the ‘me’ what it thinks it wants. “One of the motivations for self-inquiry is for knowing and awareness. If there is a knowing there is a knower – the ‘me’ again.

Parson’s frequently refers to ‘nothing being everything’ which reminds me of one of the theories popularised by Prof. Brian Cox on the origins of the universe which he coined the "science creation story". He said: "In the beginning there was an ocean of energy that drove a rapid expansion of space known as inflation. There were ripples in the ocean. As inflation ended, the ocean of energy was converted into matter by the Big Bang.”

And as we know, energy can neither be created nor destroyed. It can only be converted from one form or the other. Which reminds me of the Zen Buddhist’s ‘Form is emptiness and emptiness is form’. Emptiness is the cause of form and the various aspects of form arise from it. Without Emptiness there would be no form. In this way, the Emptiness of form is essentially not distinct from form. And form also is not essentially distinct from Emptiness.

[um]

The BBC reporter asks himself why not live a normal life with some fun instead of depriving myself of it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXqJc9Qlujw

[TENDZIN]

You need to define "spiritual," otherwise there's no point to such essays, which seem based on the notion that being spiritual is achieved by saying "f- it, don't harsh my vibe."

"Spiritual" in Eastern religion isn't about feeling at one with all that is, or like. It's about the existential problem of birth, death, and suffering, and the way out of this existential dilemma. This is the basis of Sant mat, of Zen, of all of them.

This is why RSSB laid down a path of meditation and ethics. The Eastern religion paths are not about feelings, they're about karma. Whether we believe in the karma concept or not, it should be known that the problem of karma is the core of what Eastern religion is about.

Is the problem of karma best dealt with by saying F it? Perhaps, but then again, the barbed wire fences of the world may be there to protect us, or to protect our property. If we don't believe in property rights for others, then fine.

[Brian Hines]

Tendzin, you're wrong. The basis of Zen Buddhism isn't about karma. If you believe that, you don't know much about Zen. Also, the basis of Taoism isn't about karma. You really should learn about a subject before you share false information in a comment.

Do you really believe Sant Mat is similar to Zen? They're much different. Zen embraces this world, the physical here and now. Sant Mat imagines a supernatural realm and an immaterial soul. Zen isn't supernatural, nor does it believe in soul.

It's a pleasure to set you straight. Differences of opinion are great to discuss. But when someone like you shares obviously false information, I feel a duty to speak the truth. I realize you're dedicated to religious belief, but you need to recognize that reality isn't religion. It is what it is, reality.

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian Ji
Reality is also a mystery. Not a fixed quantity of nicely categorized objective laws in a book that was completed long ago by scientists with nothing new to discover.

Nope, the book has 10 pages of formulas and laws and 100 more empty pages, each awaiting new discoveries.

And many of those are within, hidden.

It's a magic, living book, and a little irksome. Every new page of nicely detailed, peer-reviewed facts, once written, causes ten more empty pages to be added. The closer we think we are getting to the WHOLE TRUTH" the more dammed empty pages suddenly appear!

Irksome to all completionists!

So yes answers are within and no we don't know the whole story.

Zen is not a path of seeing nothing new.

It is a path of dispassionate observation. Both within and without.

This dichotomy of inner vs outer is really arbitrary. And therefore the notion that inner realities aren't real is an arbitrary and false claim.

Where is our attention? And can we withdraw that attention to a single point?

What is the truth? We are creatures on a journey to see and understand more, to raise our consciousness. So then, tomorrow we will see things differently, and more of them.

Brown Ji you didn't get rid of eight crates of books. You added ten thousand empty pages to the encyclopedia De Hines!

In the heart of Zen is Sant Mat. In the heart of Sant Mat is Zen.

The gate is there, Brian Ji. If you want to play on the fields beyond, it may just be the fastest way. But you just have to go anywhere near the fence and a gate will appear wherever you happen to be. Could be an automatic gate, could be a ladder ten stories tall. Could be a mountain covered in barbed wire. Whatever appeals to you, that's the gate you get.
You always make your own gate. Because it is inside you.

[Brian Hines]

Spence, you view everything through your religious lens, and that prevents you from seeing clearly. Zen isn't about one-pointed attention. Just the opposite. Zen isn't the same as Sant Mat. Quite the opposite. It's amazing that while you've intelligent, you're unable to perceive how you look at every subject through a single viewpoint.

[Dungeness]

@ Brian [ Religions promise a way to get through that fence into a very different supernatural, spiritual, expansive, eternal side of the cosmos.... But what if that
side doesn't exist? After all, there's no proof that it does. ]

In the case of mysticism, the promise is you're already "through the
fence" and just don't realize it. The fences are mental roadblocks
you've blinkered yourself with. Those are the ones "Moms" and
traditional religious figures tell you to get through by first finding a
"proper gate". Living by their rules, joining the one true church
or temple, doing charitable works, or less traditionally: adopting
atheism, asceticism, fad practices/lifestyles/sects for instance...
they've all been touted as valid gateways to truth.

Actually, there's an important difference though. Mystics say the
gateway is within and truth must be sought there through a
discipline of mindfulness and transformative devotion. That's
because in the end you'll never quite be convinced of the truth
unless you experience yourself.

[Dungeness]

@ Dungeness [ you'll never quite be convinced of the truth
unless you experience yourself. ]

That should be: "you'll never quite be convinced of the truth
unless you experience it [truth] yourself.

[Brian Hines]

So we must accept that those who experience Jesus as God have found truth? And those who experience Allah’s hatred of infidels have found truth? Is truth a personal experience? If so, I reject your view of truth.

[um]

A child knows of the dangers of fire after burning its fingers., it is a personal truth.
All are free to reject that truth.

[Dungeness]

Brian [ So we must accept that those who experience Jesus as God have found truth? And those who experience Allah’s hatred of infidels have found truth? Is truth a personal experience? If so, I reject your view of truth ]

I couldn't presume to know what it means to "experience Jesus
as God". It's a personal experience for the experiencer. Who
can deny its validity. Same for Allah's "hatred of infidels". How
could anyone purport to know what the experiencer saw, felt, or
interpreted.

Yes, I believe truth is a personal experience. Mystics claim to
see God. Yet their descriptions differ. Maybe an allegory best
captures a transcendent inner vision or their backgrounds
account for the disparity. It can't be discounted so easily if
you really intend to pursue truth inside as well as outside.

[Uchit]

If you go hunting for a spiritual practice, you move away from your own power and you put that power in someone else and who describes a path - rather like some RSSB agents that infiltrate this site. You normally go hunting for answers when lifes throws you at rock bottom and you are desperate for help. This is when the fake gurus come in and offer you a false hope, with a very shaky foundation, and false after life promises. This in return for your mind, body, and soul, and your entire family will follow in your blue print.
The greatest fake guru right now is Gurinder Singh Dhillon, and the so called science of the soul , RSSB path is the greatest web of lies to a so called enlightenment. GSD, the spider, has fooled millions of people from doctors, professors, and many professionals. It attracts 2 types of people, those that are genuine lost souls, and then there are those that hunger for power and position and status in society. It is a cesspit where the narsassits take advantage of the weaker blinded sheep. The charlatan fake ass guru of beas has said many times in his satsangs, that misery loves company which is why the mafia boss/guru, attracts the rich and powerful and the influencers. Gurinder Singh Dhillon, your days are numbered. In your own admissions, you have said that you are the biggest crook on the planet. Sweet Karma will soon be served to you.

[Brian Hines]

um, burning fingers in fire isn't a personal truth, because anyone can have the same experience with fire. And everyone can see fire and the nerves in our body that cause pain. By contrast, spiritual/mystical experiences can't be experienced by anyone else, being completely personal. Plus, there's no evidence of any supernatural realm, so a person who claims to have a supernatural experience can't show that they've actually contacted an unknown part of reality. This is why it's hugely easier to believe someone who says "I burned myself" than someone who says "I saw God."

[Howdo Joey Biden Here - fart]

I see Pastor Tepper is still a preachin from the pulpit. The only good news is he ain’t no longer so firmly stuck up the buttcheeks of guru Hinesey it seems.

There is most definitely another world which we are not aware of, forces that operate well beyond our senses, laws of the universe that we don’t have a clue about and civilizations and rings that fit all intents and purposes would probably seem like gods to us. Do I know any of this for certain, not really it’s just logical really given the magnitude of the universe and our own undoubted ignorance.

Is there life beyond this one ?

yes I believe so, tho perhaps consciousness is a better word than life. How do I know it, I don’t I just believe it more and more each day. I think if you’ve ever encountered a truly loving human being (someone close to saintly) and you too are a sensitive person capable of such love - you cannot be a non-believer ultimately.

I simply cannot believe that such a good soul is only existence for such a brief period for no reason whatsoever - which is what the material approach to the universe would have you believe. I don’t particularly even mind the material approach, it’s just I simply no longer can believe it.

[TENDZIN]

@ Brian Hines

"Tendzin, you're wrong. The basis of Zen Buddhism isn't about karma. If you believe that, you don't know much about Zen. Also, the basis of Taoism isn't about karma. You really should learn about a subject before you share false information in a comment."

Dōgen argued in his Shobogenzo that karmic latencies are emphatically not empty, going so far as to claim that belief in the emptiness of karma should be characterized as "non-Buddhist," although he also states that the "law of karma has no concrete existence.

Zen's most famous koan about karma is called Baizhang's Wild Fox (百丈野狐). The story of the koan is about an ancient Zen teacher whose answer to a question presents a wrong view about karma by saying that the person who has a foundation in cultivating the great practice "does not fall into cause and effect." Because of his unskillful answer, the teacher reaps the result of living 500 lives as a wild fox. He is then able to appear as a human and ask the same question to Zen teacher Baizhang, who answers, "He is not in the dark about cause and effect." Hearing this answer the old teacher is freed from the life of a wild fox. The Zen perspective avoids the duality of asserting that an enlightened person is either subject to or free from the law of karma and that the key is not being ignorant about karma. And so, the full picture is quite different from the statement that "Zen isn't about karma." Karma and rebirth are the foundation of all schools of Buddhism, even Zen.

"Do you really believe Sant Mat is similar to Zen? They're much different. Zen embraces this world, the physical here and now. Sant Mat imagines a supernatural realm and an immaterial soul. Zen isn't supernatural, nor does it believe in soul."

Sant mat is indeed similar to Zen Buddhism in that both of these religions are based on the concept of karma and rebirth and the problem of existence. And rebirth implies another world, as well as implying there's something that survives physical death and whose destiny is in relationship to our thoughts and actions. The Zen Masters of old endured years of ascetic practice to find the answer; does anything think they did this out of idle curiosity and a truly atheist, nihilistic outlook? No, they deeply believed that existence presented a problem (karma and rebirth) that required a solution, hence their heroic efforts to find that solution. None of them would equate the solution to life's existential problem to what you present here.

Now, for all I know, your pov that traditional spiritual practice is a waste of time may be correct. But then it would have been better if you wrote your essay with the theme that traditional spiritual practice is a complete waste of time because it's your personal opinion that there is no afterlife, and thus no karma or rebirth. But that's not what the Zen Masters believed or taught, and so by invoking them here you're comparing oranges to apples.

"It's a pleasure to set you straight. Differences of opinion are great to discuss. But when someone like you shares obviously false information, I feel a duty to speak the truth. I realize you're dedicated to religious belief, but you need to recognize that reality isn't religion. It is what it is, reality."

If that's how you feel about religion it's OK with me. My point though is that the proponents of Eastern religion (including Zen) do not share your view that reality is limited to this life and this world. And even if they felt that life was so limited, it's hard to envision that telling us that they'd abandon the value of ethics.

[um]

@ Brian.

I understand. The problem lies in the content vs medium.

We all dream, nobody dreams your dreams and vise versa.

People report personal experiences for which we have an conceptual names.

Beside dreams, there are ND experiences, OBD experiences, experiences brought about by plant material like ayahuasca.

Those people that make use of these practises now how to handle them.

The Kogi indiandians, know exactly what they are doing and what effect they are looking for when the prepare newborn children for a periode of years in a dark cave to make them visionaries.

What meaning would any manipulation of the body/mind have if it would not have a desired result?! Nobody will sit for hours, years etc if there was not something to be had.?!

What is to be had is a conceptual medium [ by lack of another wordt] and the more or les unique content in that medium and later the description thereof and the understanding by those that doe not have these types of experiences.

Giving birth does happen but women among themself can talk about it understandably but they can not share what it was for themselves as unique experience, Men are neither able to understand both, the form and the content.

And yes .. there are people that smoke weed wiyhout any reaction at all.
Yes there are people that even after 40 years of meditation have had no experience at all

[TENDZIN]

" Also, the basis of Taoism isn't about karma. You really should learn about a subject before you share false information in a comment"

The concept of karma and rebirth are in fact integral to Taoism. Taoism teaches that if immortality isn't attained during life, the Tao will continue to evolve and manifest in different forms, in accordance with the entity's general conduct during a state of existence. This applies to all sentient and insentient beings.

Karma is an important concept in Taoism. Every deed is tracked by deities and spirits. Appropriate rewards or retribution follow karma, just like a shadow follows a person.

The karma doctrine of Taoism developed in three stages. In the first stage, causality between actions and consequences was adopted, with supernatural beings keeping track of everyone's karma and assigning fate (ming). In the second phase, transferability of karma ideas from Chinese Buddhism was expanded, and a transfer or inheritance of karmic fate from ancestors to one's current life was introduced. In the third stage of karma doctrine development, ideas of rebirth based on karma were added. One could be reborn either as another human being or another animal, according to this belief. In the third stage, additional ideas were introduced; for example, rituals, repentance, and offerings at Taoist temples were encouraged as it could alleviate the karmic burden.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma#Taoism

Just another example that points to why I believe Alan Watts isn't a reliable source for info on Eastern religion.

[TENDZIN]

Well, this is awkward. My posted reply to Brian Hines is now missing from the forum.

Brian, did you delete my post?

[um]

@ Brian
https://www.lionsroar.com/the-sound-of-silence/

There they speak of the same inner sound phenomena but in total other way as in RSSB context.

So what is the truth here?
The fact that humans can and do hear it or the way they use it or give meaning to it.

It would not surprise me at all if in the end, the different ways of using that sound creates the same effect

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Brian Ji
You wrote
"Zen isn't about one-pointed attention. Just the opposite."
Hmm...
All forms of mindfulness (attending to or focusing on one thing), and every form of contemplation are about being aware of some thing, focusing on one thing to the point of stilling the mind altogether. That isn't just focusing down to one point. That is focusing down to that one point so completely that all thought stills, and only then, understanding and the whole are perceived. Mindfulness goes beyond even that point to no point. To stop the mind to a singe point is in fact focus.

"The five main types of meditation in the Dhyāna sutras are ānāpānasmṛti (mindfulness of breathing); paṭikūlamanasikāra meditation (mindfulness of the impurities of the body); maitrī meditation (loving-kindness); the contemplation on the twelve links of pratītyasamutpāda; and contemplation on the Buddha.[22] According to the modern Chan master Sheng Yen, these practices are termed the "five methods for stilling or pacifying the mind" and serve to focus and purify the mind, and support the development of the stages of dhyana.[23] Chan also shares the practice of the four foundations of mindfulness and the Three Gates of Liberation (emptyness or śūnyatā, signlessness or animitta, and wishlessness or apraṇihita) with early Buddhism and classic Mahayana.[24]"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen

Emptiness, Brian Ji. That is zero thought. The empty cup that recieves.

Not religion at all. Religions like Atheism and classic contemporary organized religion are distinguished by their distinctions from one another.

But Zen, and Sant Mat are all about transcending those little distinctions, for the Presence and experience of the One. Which as I mentioned earlier is the empty hub of the wheel, the empty space within the vase that gives it purpose and function.

That soul or power can never be found with a microscope, not in the smallest thing, yet it pervades everywhere. It is the nameless Name.

"If thou would’st hear the Nameless, and wilt dive
Into the Temple-cave of thine own self,
There, brooding by the central altar, thou
May’st haply learn the Nameless hath a voice,
By which thou wilt abide, if thou be wise,
As if thou knewest, tho’ thou canst not know;
For Knowledge is the swallow on the lake
That sees and stirs the surface-shadow there
But never yet hath dipt into the abysm,
The Abysm of all Abysms, beneath, within
The blue of sky and sea, the green of earth,
And in the million-millionth of a grain
Which cleft and cleft again for evermore,
And ever vanishing, never vanishes,
To me, my son, more mystic than myself,
Or even than the Nameless is to me.
And when thou sendest thy free soul thro’ heaven,
Nor understandest bound nor boundlessness,
Thou seest the Nameless of the hundred names.
And if the Nameless should withdraw from all
Thy frailty counts most real, all thy world
Might vanish like thy shadow in the dark.

“And since—from when this earth began—
The Nameless never came
Among us, never spake with man,
And never named the Name”—

Thou canst not prove the Nameless, O my son,
Nor canst thou prove the world thou movest in,
Thou canst not prove that thou art body alone,
Nor canst thou prove that thou art spirit alone,
Nor canst thou prove that thou art both in one:
Thou canst not prove thou art immortal, no
Nor yet that thou art mortal—nay my son,
Thou canst not prove that I, who speak with thee,
Am not thyself in converse with thyself,
For nothing worthy proving can be proven,
Nor yet disproven: wherefore thou be wise,
Cleave ever to the sunnier side of doubt,
And cling to Faith beyond the forms of Faith!
She reels not in the storm of warring words,
She brightens at the clash of ‘Yes’ and ‘No,’
She sees the Best that glimmers thro’ the Worst,
She feels the Sun is hid but for a night,
She spies the summer thro’ the winter bud,
She tastes the fruit before the blossom falls,
She hears the lark within the songless egg,
She finds the fountain where they wail’d ‘Mirage’!

“What Power? aught akin to Mind,
The mind in me and you?
Or power as of the Gods gone blind
Who see not what they do?”
From The Ancient Sage by Lord Alfred Tennyson

https://www.telelib.com/authors/T/TennysonAlfred/verse/tiresias/ancientsage.html

[Appreciative Reader]

Is this doing-nothing spirituality any different, then, from simply doing nothing?

That is, is someone who sees true spirituality as doing nothing, and therefore does nothing, any different than someone who does nothing simply because he doesn’t care, or for that matter someone who may not even have heard of any of this and simply does nothing because that’s all he knows and understands?

That Chinese parable you’d presented in an earlier thread, how does that work? The one about the up-and-coming mandarin and his two layabout brothers? Those two brothers being genuine layabouts without any inkling of spirituality one way or the other, would that have been any different, in spiritual terms (whatever that might mean, in this context), in terms of outcome, to their being enlightened masters who’d studied and practiced for years and then come to the conclusion that true spirituality lies in doing nothing?

[umami]

This post has a lot of barbed comments.

[Appreciative Reader]

Brian's? Mine? (I ask because you've commented right after I did, so that's kind of ambiguous. Mine doesn't, I assure you. Straight simple question, about something I wasn't clear about, is all, zero subtext.)

[umami]

AR,

It was only a pun. Not directed at anyone at all. "Barbed comment" flashed in my brain at random, and I rushed to the keypad!

You're all my friends. It was a sweet nothing to everyone.

[umami]

And "post." Double pun!

[umami]

"Fence around the crop." Waka! Waka!

[Ron E.]

[“...Eventually, after giving up the effort and the formal practice of meditation, I met a teacher who told me, "The seeker is the sought, the looker is what he or she is looking for." My mind couldn't wrap itself around these words, but one day soon after, in a moment out of time, the seeker and the sought collapsed into one another, and I knew who I was once and for all.

The one who had been looking so hard for true nature was the very true nature I had been looking for. Truth had been playing hide and seek with itself. As long as I continued focusing so much on searching, I couldn't possibly stumble backward into the silent presence that was the source of all searching.”]

There’s probably a lot of truth expressed here. Many who describe a realisation use phrases such as: - ‘Just this’, ‘This is it’, ‘What is’, ‘Nothing special’ and so on. It’s saying the seeker is looking for something that he/she already is and the only thing that prevents seeing this is ‘me’ - the seeker.

All that Buddhism offers for example is a way to understand suffering (also translated as ‘being out of kilter, unbalanced) and its cessation for the seeker to realise who he/she is.

It has been explained often in this manner: - An infant learns separation when he/she identifies itself with the other. Originally the infant knows only oneness, then it sees that there is mother and there is not mother - ‘me’. From then on, the search is on to rediscover that state of oneness. The organism already lives in such a state, it is only the mind, the mental accumulation of knowledge that has produced a separate ‘me’, that feels it must find something in order to be complete – not knowing he is already complete, only separated by a ‘me’, a ‘me’ that instinctively fears it may be dethroned if what is sought is found.

Paradoxically, there is no-one seeking, only an imagined ‘me’. And also paradoxically, there is nothing to be found – as what is seeking is already 'it'.

[umami]

"Waka! Waka!" as in Fozzie Bear.
https://youtu.be/lcElGfR9wpc

[Todd]

“He who instructs an ardent seeker to do this or that is not a true master. The seeker is already afflicted by his activities and wants peace and rest. In other words he wants cessation of his activities. If a teacher tells him to do something to do in addition to or in place of, his other activities, can that be a help to the seeker? Activity is creation. Activity is the destruction of one's inherent happiness. If activity is advocated the advisor is not a master but a killer. In such circumstances either the Creator (Brahma) or the Death (Yama) may be said to have come in guise of a master. Such a person cannot liberate the Aspirant, he can only strengthen his fetters.“ — Ramana Maharishi

[Spence Tepper]

Hi Todd!

"The real feet of Bhagavan exist only in the heart of the devotee. To hold onto these feet incessantly is true happiness. You will be disappointed if you hold onto my physical feet because one day this physical body will disappear. The greatest worship is worshipping the Guru's feet that are within oneself."
Ramana Maharishi
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramana_Maharshi

[Manoj]

The best spiritual practice could be...nothing

Sounds about right sometimes...

Its just the likes of Gurinder Singh Dhillion and his Radha Soami Cult which is so bent on trying to intice people with they're Golden Gates to Sach Khand story and a Golden ticket to sell you the perfect loser of a lie.

Kaals 5 name simran with long sitting in this meditation is a road well paved straight to hell

With the introductions of self limiting beliefs and forced doctrines implemented on the disciples

And a fear based religious out of dated dry cult which has no compassion towards humanity but selfish gains n morals of they're expansion worldwide, can never be a good thing for humanity

This is the way of the immoral person in the self profiteering world we live in and Gurinder Singh Dhillion shows us the way to do it in his own bent baba of a style.

This Fake Ass Gurinder has to be the number one fake and fraud baba of our time just like the Coronvirus we all wish it never came and it would now go away forever n ever

Lets hope we find a vaccine for this Infectionous parasitecal Gurinder Singh Dhillion as its so detrimental to the world we live in.

If nothing we should at least see straight threw the bull and cut to the dry and give ourselves the power and right to live in the now with our own standards and beliefs.

There's nowhere to go and nothing to go and see

We have it all just feel it inside stop looking at these so called now it alls

And give yourself that permission, to live your life your way

[Spence Tepper]

"According to the tradition, Buddha was gazing upon a flower when he began to laugh. Because Mahakasypa was the only disciple who understood this "discourse", the Buddha entrusted him with the teachings that could not be spoken. Meditation, or dhyana, was central to this tradition, and when it became Ch'an, silence and paradox were the tools Bodhidharma and other masters used to propagate it. The message they conveyed was that truth eludes the mind's ability to grasp it, a theme very much in tune with Taoism."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen

Go beyond mind.

[Appreciative Reader]

Rather than "Go beyond mind", a better piece of advice, in my view, would be: "Stop spouting nonsensical words and pretending that those make any sense." To reword that more gently, and without withdrawing the benefit of the doubt, I suppose that can be rephrased like this: "Please explain in clear words what exactly you were trying to say."

I'm not referring specifically to you here, Spence, but harking back to that famous no-words-spoken Sutra of the Buddha, that you quote here. What exactly, in your view, was the Buddha trying to convey there? Let's try to be very clear, for once, about what is said. Let's not pretend that looking cross-eyed at a flower, and having some sycophant smile back knowingly at us, is somehow wise. I mean, if one is to conclude random things from unconnected random words and actions, then you might, if you tried hard enough, be able to detect, in this very comment of mine, all of the wisdom that has ever been spoken by mystics everywhere, including in the Upanishads and in the aphorisms of Zen and in the accounts of the Christian mystics and in the poetry of the Sufi mystics.

Go on, then. Spell it out, since you seem to know what was said there well enough to, in turn, offer that same advice to others:
(a) What exactly does that Sutra of the Buddha refer to?
(b) What does it mean, exactly, to "go beyond the mind"?
(c) Why exactly would anyone want to do that, "go beyond the mind"? For what reason?

----------

Sorry, don't mean to pick on you personally, Spence, but I find myself running out of patience with this kind of faux wisdom. I mean, if there's any actual wisdom underneath those mysterious-sounding riddles, then spell it out, and I'll be the first to acknowledge and appreciate their depth and their, well, wisdom. But otherwise, spare us the hints and innuendo, that promise much without actually committing to anything.

----------

I'm going to repeat what I'd asked in an earlier comment in this thread, something that touches on the core of this thread, and that I am genuinely puzzled about:

What, if any, is the difference between, on one hand, "doing nothing" because one finally comes to realize that real spirituality lies in going beyond these practices, and on the other hand "doing nothing" because one has no inkling or no interest in spirituality in the first place. To hark back to that Chinese parable in an earlier thread, where some Zen master or Daoist master tells the mandarin that his two layabout brothers are enlightened, is there any difference at all between those two brothers being actually and literally idle layabouts who've never given a thought to spirituality and therefore leading lives of unabashed hedonism, and their being deep enlightened masters who've realized the emptiness of spiritual endeavor?

In other words, when we say "doing nothing is the deepest spirituality", are we in fact saying what might be more clearly rephrased as "There is no spirit, and therefore no spirituality, and therefore no spiritual endeavor; and we'd all be well advised to stop wasting our time with such"? Or do we mean something different than that?

Further, when we say things like "No real master will ask you to do more things", are we hinting that there might actually be real masters who might somehow be of use to us in a spiritual sense? Or are we in fact saying that there is no spirit, and therefore no spirituality, and therefore everyone who claims to be a master pointing at things spiritual is either misguided or a charlatan, and that the thing to realize is that there is no question of there being a "master" about things spiritual at all, since such a thing does not exist at all?

Clearly spelling out what we mean helps, in as much as it leads to, well, clarity. Hints and innuendo only lead to obfuscation and confusion and pretend-wisdom.

[um]

@AR

Spence, but I find myself running out of patience with this kind of faux wisdom

Hahahaha .... if you are allergic to pollen in the air, the best remedy is to go through a process of de-sensitization. The pollen will be there, there is no remedy for their occurrence.

Or go through Rumi's entire mathnavy.

If after reading it your allergy is not over, try better tea.

[Appreciative Reader]

Hey, um.

The problem is, I've not quite given up on finding actual seeds in the midst of all of that dust floating around, seeds from which might sprout life. Far from it, I still devote a large --- and perhaps inordinate --- portion of my day in exactly such practices, and also in reading and thinking over them. I mean, had I given up on them entirely, then I'd simply walk away, and wouldn't care any more what nonsensical thing people are saying, right? But because I still haven't given up, because I'm still exploring --- although increasingly running out of patience, and increasingly being drawn to the conclusion that it's all a fool's errand and that there's nothing to explore at all --- well, that is why the impatience.

Yep, I've read Rumi. Don't remember all, or even most, of it; and in any case I hadn't understood much of it. But yes, I'd found it beautiful, I do recall that.

Your bringing up Rumi is very apposite. Rumi's of a piece of that particular Sutra of the Buddha's. (The Buddha's otherwise so piercingly clear in what he says, at least in his original teachings, that that particular Sutra kind of stands out in its obscureness and lack of clarity.)

It's not that I've got anything against things being expressed with beauty and in poetry and using metaphor. But they must admit of a clear explanation, is my point. Simply gazing back at someone spouting --- or, in the case of this Sutra, miming --- wise-sounding things, with a wise-looking shit-eating smile, implying all sorts of things without actually saying anything of real substance, that is kind of thing that, increasingly I've found, gets to me.

[umami]

I can help clarify.

"Daibai asked Baso: `What is Buddha?’ Baso said: ‘This mind is Buddha.’"

[Spence Tepper]

Hi AR
You asked
""Please explain in clear words what exactly you were trying to say."
Thank you for the clarity of your question.

Beyond mind meaning beyond your own conventional thinking.

From your perspective, all human experience is biologically based. If you start with that gooey bag called the brain and the intricate and delicate biochemical network of trees within it, and the active network of billions of interacting signals, you can reduce the brain to two levels of functioning, maybe three.
1. The brain itself as described above.
2.the programming / conditioning of the brain.
3.it's operating system programming

The view of consciousness can be viewed from this perspective.
Normally we are only conscious of item 2, and even then only a portion of that. .We therefore think there is nothing beyond it. We identify with it, personalize our experiences and identify purely with our programming.

Mystics claim that you can learn to withdraw from the senses and mind and look within and watch item 2. above functioning from a distance, as an observer.

From a purely biological view, this isn't out of body. But it is real and a regular part of advanced meditation practice. Moving consciousness inward and upward through practice: Beyond mind. Beyond 2.

That means seeing from a different vantage point, which I suggest is 3, the operating system. From that perspective we are entirely free of emotional drives, reactive conditioning. We are liberated from those and can watch them from that vantage point. That provides us with a new perspective, like the Space Telescope.

That perspective offers completely different views and observations, and of course increases our objectivity. We see that we aren't our thinking, nor our emotions. We aren't even this body, because we can view these inaction from a separate point. One that is reached through practice, such as those advocated by Buddha and his more advanced followers.

[um]

@ AR

You answer brought a smile an the fase as made me think, rember and smile of my own interactions with what others bring on the table.

Probably fortunate, not to be equipped with mental talents as you and others are and having had for decades a good friend to walk through life and thought me to calm down, to look at my own sensitivities and not at the outward agents.

Again and again, for years he whould say to me in a soft tone after yet another fit of anger, ...Yes, yes, Um, you are right but why do you get upset by it?

It has been a long path and not so easy to let go of these mental attachments but these days I can say ""Dear friend you were right, I should have heed your words the very first time", you are right ...meaning ....do not get emotionally involved in worldly ties nor the persons involved

An d yes ... it puzzles me why these great writers use such difficult language to explain simple truths?

So yes, I see what you are pointing at and in some way do agree with you too, and yes I wonder sometimes why people write in the way they do ... but ... It does not affect me as they are what they are, it is their problem, not mine anymore and I do not need, nor are able and willing to correct them

[Appreciative Reader]

Spence, thanks for that clarification. I may or may not agree with you, I may or may not believe you, I may or may not insist on evidence to back all of that up, and I may or may not, myself, put in the effort necessary in trying to arrive at subjective evidence for myself --- and all of that's on me, not you --- but, fair's fair, you have indeed put into crystal clear words what you meant, as opposed to the vagueness I was complaining against.

[Appreciative Reader]

Spence, thanks for that clarification. I may or may not agree with you, I may or may not believe you, I may or may not insist on evidence to back all of that up, and I may or may not, myself, put in the effort necessary in trying to arrive at subjective evidence for myself --- and all of that's on me, not you --- but, fair's fair, you have indeed put into crystal clear words what you meant, as opposed to the vagueness I was complaining against.

[Appreciative Reader]

" ... It does not affect me as they are what they are, it is their problem, not mine anymore and I do not need, nor are able and willing to correct them"

Which indicates that you've now walked away from all of that, um. Or at least, walked away from such of "that" as is external to yourself at this time, and that others allude to. Like I said, I haven't, yet.

I guess there's one of three ways to not care anymore about all of this: (a) One buys into the BS and plays along with it; and (b) One actually arrives at, well, something, and that something finally answers all one's questions (loud Hallelujahs chorusing in the background!); and (c) One finally walks away from it all and stops bothering about it all. Let's see how this all turns out, finally.

[um]

@ AR

c) One finally walks away from it all and stops bothering about it all. Let's see how this all turns out, finally.

Well yes and no .... The touchstone has become what things mean for me.

So whether something put on the table by others is BS or not doesnt matter. There have been teachers and teachings to which I am not attracted at all. That doesn't mean that my appriciation is a qualification of these teachers and teachers. It is not an cannot be. To judge properly I have to be at the others level and if that is not possible for me to find out ... what is most of the times with so called spiritual matters, i have to lean on my own feelings and understandings.

So the fact I have been drawn to certain teachers and teachings, does not say that they are indeed great teachers and teachings and that my understanding of them is in accordance with what they have in mind.

I am not alive to find out whether what others have to say and do is correct....If there is something they say that I can use, I will use it and be gratefull otherwise we all have to live our own life, the way we deem fit. Being alive is a gift it is up to me how to use that gift ... and to nobody else. Unfortunately it took me so many years to understand that.

We are all alone. unique variations of the same and better not to waste one's time in looking whole day what others are doing.

If somebody is convinced that the earth is flat so be it

[um]

@ Ar

If I had finished this "project" completely i think I would no longer read and write here .. so still some miles to cover and some obstacles in side myself to be cleared out of the way.

If I am allowed to tive that long ... hahahaha

[Appreciative Reader]

"... I am not alive to find out whether what others have to say and do is correct....If there is something they say that I can use, I will use it and be gratefull otherwise we all have to live our own life, the way we deem fit. Being alive is a gift it is up to me how to use that gift ... and to nobody else... "

That's wisdom, right here. Amen.

[um]

@ AR

Hahaha ... I do realize that others should not follow my example, or apply what I say to their live, ...... otherwise the next burning down of the library of Alexandria will take place and the mental asylums get overcrowded, and the waiting lists for psychotherapy will be longer than one year.

It is like prostitution, it should not be there but if it is not there the misery that follows sexual suppression is huge.

It takes time to build mental pressure, it takes time to release that pressure due to cultural conditioning

[Spence Tepper]

HI AR
You wrote
"I may or may not insist on evidence to back all of that up, and I may or may not, myself, put in the effort necessary in trying to arrive at subjective evidence for myself."

To get you started, here is a scale by Kruse to help objectify different levels of conscious awareness.

Note that deep meditative states are a deeper version of "Metaconscious", where we become aware of and can monitor our own cognitive functioning.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altered_level_of_consciousness

That these are common observed states reflects the very real, if mundane, observation that in a given day we move through different levels of conscious awareness. Things invisible at one level become visible realities at another.

Are there practices that can expand these levels a bit further? That would be any thing that can raise consciousness, by definition.

Our consciousness rises and falls all the time naturally. Are there other levels to be reached through practice?

Can we improve upon the basis of experience that we use to judge and decide?

I believe so.

[um]

@ AR

Probably you have read the "cloud of unknowing" if not it should not be a problem to find it online.

At the outset of the book, the writer almost begs the reader NOT to spread the content of the book and NOT to continue reading its content if, he is not convinced of his own calling.

Why do bring it up?
Well, most of the literature that is around should be dealt with in this way. should be "secret" knowledge, because most of the available is potential harmfull to the reader and society as a whole.

Everybody agrees that whatever we put into the body should not be poisonous, and becoming to the body etc.

But what to say of the mental food, whatever is put on our plates intellectual and emotional?

We also agree that we should train a newborn human to digest little by little other stuff than milk. etc etc

We cannot consume books without their consequences.

[Spence Tepper]

"Zen Buddhism is a mixture of Indian Mahayana Buddhism and Taoism. It began in China, spread to Korea and Japan, and became very popular in the West from the mid 20th century.

" The essence of Zen is attempting to understand the meaning of life directly, without being misled by logical thought or language.

" Zen techniques are compatible with other faiths and are often used, for example, by Christians seeking a mystical understanding of their faith.

" Zen often seems paradoxical - it requires an intense discipline which, when practised properly, results in total spontaneity and ultimate freedom. This natural spontaneity should not be confused with impulsiveness.

" Zen - the word
"'Zen' is the way the Chinese word Ch'an is pronounced in Japan. 'Ch'an' is the Chinese pronunciation of the Sanskrit word Dhyana, which means (more or less) meditation.

"Zen - the essence and the difficulty
Christmas Humphreys, one of the leading pioneers in the history of Buddhism in Britain, wrote that "Zen is a subject extremely easy to misunderstand." He was right.

"Zen is something a person does. It's not a concept that can be described in words. Despite that, words on this site will help you get some idea of what Zen is about. But remember, Zen does not depend on words - it has to be experienced in order to 'understand'.

"Enlightenment is inside
" The essence of Zen Buddhism is that all human beings are Buddha, and that all they have to do is to discover that truth for themselves.

"All beings by nature are Buddhas,
as ice by nature is water.
Apart from water there is no ice;
apart from beings, no Buddhas.

" Hakuin Ekaku

"Zen sends us looking inside us for enlightenment. There's no need to search outside ourselves for the answers; we can find the answers in the same place that we found the questions.

" Human beings can't learn this truth by philosophising or rational thought, nor by studying scriptures, taking part in worship rites and rituals or many of the other things that people think religious people do.

" The first step is to control our minds through meditation and other techniques that involve mind and body; to give up logical thinking and avoid getting trapped in a spider's web of words."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/buddhism/subdivisions/zen_1.shtml

Practice true Zen. Go beyond mind.