The spiritual journey leads nowhere, and that's absolutely fine

My last post was a digression of sorts, as I explained in the opening paragraphs. 

Today I was planning to write a post about a central theme in a book I've been blogging about recently, Joan Tollifson's Nothing to Grasp. I was struck by how Tollifson has come around to viewing reality in simple terms, "as it is." Leaves falling. Birds flying. Pain happening. Dishes being washed.

She came to this outlook after a lengthy period of seeking the Truth of It All via meditation, Zen Buddhism, nondual teachings, therapy, and other means. I wanted to write about how weird and wonderful it is to have sought reality in esoteric teachings, then realize that, hey, it's been Here/Now all that time.

But that intention brought a long-forgotten term to mind: naive realism. I remembered that I'd written a paper on this subject in college. That led me to poke through a stack of folders in a rarely opened cabinet where I keep stuff that I'd written way back when. Amazingly I found it.

A paper I'd written at San Jose State College on December 20, 1968 for Phil. 111 ,a class about epistemology, the theory of knowledge. I titled it, "Psychology, Zen, and the Naive Realist." Reading it, I found that the 20 year old me who wrote that paper sounded quite a bit like the 75 year old me I am today.

I'll take off from that last sentence in an attempt to recapture what was on my mind a couple of days ago before I digressed from it. Though really, the fact that I could see my current self in what I wrote 55 years before points to what I'd intended to say originally.

Which is, basically: the whole idea of a spiritual journey now makes no sense to me, even though I've embraced that notion for most of my life.

I say this for a couple of reasons.

One is that the chance of such a journey leading to a supernatural realm of reality is exceedingly slim, given the lack of demonstrable evidence that anything supernatural exists. Thus anyone who believes that all their meditating, praying, good works, and such is going to lead to God, heaven, angels, or anything else other-worldly almost certainly isn't going to have that belief come true.

Simply put, you can't take a journey to a place that doesn't exist. Sure, you can imagine going to such a place. You can hope you'll go to such a place. But almost certainly the actual journey is a fantasy.

However, this leaves what may be the most common conception of a spiritual journey -- a trip that isn't geographical but psychological. Meaning, the spiritual journey'er sets out to modify their state of mind, their consciousness, their way of looking upon the world, with the goal of leading a more fulfilling life.

It's more difficult for me to find fault with this aspiration, for it seems doable. However, I've come to feel that while we can obviously make discrete concrete changes in our psychology, our fundamental personality usually doesn't change much once we enter our 20s, or thereabouts.

Reading the paper I wrote when I was 20 reminded me of this. Much of it, most of it, really, seemed like something I'd write today at the age of 75. So where have I journeyed to after more than half a century of avid spiritual seeking? Pretty much the same place where I started.

And that's totally fine with me, as it should be for anyone else who finds that whoever they were when they began their spiritual journey is essentially the same person they are now.

This is what I was getting at in my 1968 college paper, where I noted the Zen adage about "first there is a mountain, then there isn't, then there is," as I recall Donavan paraphrasing it. When I was a child, I never had the slightest idea that mountains weren't simply mountains.

(I grew up in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, in a picturesque small California town, Three Rivers, at the gateway of Sequoia National Park, so I had a lot of direct experience of mountains.)

Then I go to college, get exposed to new and often radical ideas, experiment with psychedelics, learn yoga, become initiated into a mystical Eastern religion, spend hours a day meditating, read lots of spiritual books, write several spiritual books, become convinced that there's much more to reality than what earthly existence offers, and then... in my old age, now, I realize that all of my spiritual seeking has led to me seeing mountains as mountains again, after so many years of believing that mountains, and everything else in physical existence, were an illusion, a pale reflection of a higher reality.

So in a sense I've come full circle. As, I'd suggest, most spiritual seekers do, if they're honest with themselves. What we seek is right before our eyes. It just takes looking elsewhere to come to that realization.

I've finished Joan Tollifson's engaging little book, Nothing to Grasp. Here's how she puts her own realization in a concluding chapter.

Here/Now is the Beloved that we long for. We are attracted to the Beloved, drawn to the Beloved, and this attraction, this longing actually comes from our own Heart, our own True Nature, but we don't realize this at first.

We search for the Beloved "out there" in many different forms -- in an intimate relationship, a teacher, a guru, an enlightenment experience. And finally, in a moment of awakening, we pass through the gateless gate.

We realize the Beloved is Here/Now, and in love, we find there is no separation, that the Beloved is all there is, the emptiness bursting forth as clouds and trees and pencil sharpeners and thunderstorms and light bulbs and concentration camps and meditation centers and words on a computer screen.

Here/Now is formless, and yet it is appearing as every form. It is invisible, and yet it is visible everywhere. It is as subtle as space, and yet it is more solid than the ground beneath your feet. No word can capture it, and yet every word is only it.

It's not a particular experience or state of consciousness, it's not an object or a substance that can be seen or grasped, it's not a conceptual formulation, it's not some mystical essence or transcendent reality apart from the messiness of ordinary everyday life. It is just this, exactly as it is.

When we are awake, our whole spiritual journey loses its seriousness. It melts away like a cloud formation. No one was actually running from a tiger, and no one was actually saved from the danger. The whole problem never really existed. It was only a dream.

To realize this is to be totally intimate with the world as it actually is (and not as we think it is), open to everything, holding on to nothing.

Comments

[Ron E.]

@ Brian; “So where have I journeyed to after more than half a century of avid spiritual seeking? Pretty much the same place where I started.”

Unless one tires of the whole ‘spiritual search’ and ‘stops off’ at a comfortable place (usually a belief a doctrine of some sort) I reckon it’s inevitable that one arrives at (or rather who) one starts off with. There are many stories recounting the return – even the bible has a tale of the prodigal’s return.

Brian’s previous piece on naïve realism interested me: that is, the idea that the senses provide us with direct awareness of objects as they really are. We know that the brain is a predictive organ that basically works via the senses for our survival. Every sentient animal has different perceptions of the world that helps it navigate its environment, perhaps through ultraviolet vision, extra color receptors, echolocation and so on and many ‘see’ the world through the senses of smell, touch or sound.

The point is, that although we all have different perceptions of the world through our brain’s ‘best guesses’ based on our particular sensory inputs, prior experiences, expectations etc. The thing that re-ally separates us from the world has to be the habit of believing everything is as we think it is. It is one thing to perceive things as determined by our body and senses, but we seem to have gone a step (or more) in the direction of believing in abstract thinking that wants us to be special and different from the natural world we inhabit.

All succinctly described in Toliffson’s concluding chapter here, (thanks Brian). Although I don’t have her book ‘Nothing to Grasp’, her website – particularly the ‘Outpourings’ pieces (to me), says it all.

[um]

What happens when the dust of two world wars settles?
People start to ask themselves how it could have happened to them.
If the worldly and spiritual elite could not prevent such happenings, they are no longer deserving the respect they had before and new perspectives. had to be found. and they were found in the east.

The east offered meanings and value to life as it was not known before other than in a very small circle.

Over time it was found that the east had something to offer but it didn't brought the solution that was expected it would. It could not as these asian approaches do not fit personal western interests. So little by little that whole movement came to slow down and to an hold.

Today there are some die-hearts, both pro and anti, that continue but for the most part nobody is any longer interested in eastern thought and practices. besides those that use it in wellness and spa programs, that have nothing to do with the real purpose of asian practices.

So instead of analyzing these Eastern practices, one would be much better of analyzing ones own motives behind being involved in eastern practices.

If those that are born in the USA would have been born in Japan, it is doubtful if they would ever had any interest in ZEN ..so the majority of people never had any real interest in ZEN in the first place.

All fodder for psychologists and certainly SOCIOLOGISTS.

[um]

And ...

Car engines are build to function and if they don't there are the constructors and mechanics to solve the problem.

The same is with NARRATIVES, be it worldly or religious / spiritual narratives.

The are all "end"products so toi say and an answer is included for every failure or success..Failures most of the time are based upon "human errors" or "Human mishandling" and sometimes to construction errors too when things are brought to the market in a rush ..to good to be true .. problems.

So whatever "failures" westerners have come up with relating to the teachers and teachings belonging to a practice, there is an answer to be found in the "Narrative"

Karma, reincarnation, rebirth etc, even being chosen and the duration of the trajectory.

If you do not like coffee ... do not drink it. but do not blame the producer, the barista let alone the coffee beans.
Have the courage to admit that there was never any "calling" real interest and that it was handled and used as an snake oil remedy for things that have nothing to do with spirituality.

THAt ... will set one free. ..without guilt, fear or blame.

Owning one's personal responsibility for one's life instead of outsourcing it to science, logic, spirituality.

Drink more coffee.

[Unknowing]

Reading everyone's comments on this blog, reminds me of this quote:
"He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened." Lao Tzu.
What more is there?

[777]

Can anybody imagine
anything more important all inclusive, terrific; natural than Love.

Tolliffson is a few inches separated from the notion that She is
The Eternal Majestic Omnipotent All Knowing All Loving Creatrice
in voluntary total amnesia to fill Eternity somewhat

777

[um]

@ Unknowing

https://www.taoistic.com/fake-laotzu-quotes/fake-laotzu-quote-Knowing_others_is_wisdom.htm

[[email protected]]

Hi UM

I promised a serious answer but I see Brian deleted the comments
so my answers will be deleted too

We are somewhat in the reality of extravagant Ego here
like

he will never believe
Danielle Smith , Gov of Alberta
who offered her excuses

Einstein related IQ to the ability to change opinion

777

[um]

@ 777

That is alright ... as long as my coffee is not deleted.
:-)

[um]

AND ...777

Most of the time I will stay far away from publicly taking a stand in these days.

For one because I am not interested in the content or consider the content a private affair, not to be discussed or debated in public.

But more important because I see these contents as an expression of an much larger sociological issue namely the confrontation between extremes that were previous separated from contact with one another by the middle class, the silent majority, that occupied the information that was shared in the media.

If somebody shouts in a cinema, ..FIRE ... whether there is indeed fire or not .. the first step to take is to stand back against the wall for otherwise one runs the risk to be trembled under the feet of the hurt running amok.

Draw a Gauss curve. Cut it in halve and glue the extremes together. You get a cup and you will understand what is going on in the media .. namely ... the extremes fighting with another in the media to be seen in the future as the new MEDIAN .. as the new NORMAL.

The new artificial median has split the , let us say 90% of the population in two halves, creating misery in society on all levels and one should not be surprised at all that it will end in a revolution of sorts.

What is going on imho has deep roots going as far back as two WW, and the events after 1968 and the arrival of global media, media that no longer the means of expression of the majority of the people

With your consent .. I prefer to stay far away and pass my time with simple pleasures as drinking coffee.

[William J]

Hi Brian

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0144000350/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?ie=UTF8&qid=&sr=