Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts
Someone on reddit just described to me his journey from the I AM realization to the dissolution of the witness (the *DISSOLVING* away of the sense of Awareness being a formless and infinite Eternal Witness underlying everything or like a canvas residing behind everything, once thought to be ultimate at the I AM phase) and dissolving into everything. I told him that is not yet anatta insight, but "nondual".

Dissolution of witness can be into an overarching awareness like One Mind, or even when One Mind dissolves into the mere luminous sceneries, taste, touch, sensations, it is still as a form of peak experience of No Mind rather than realization of Anatta. I will also add a brief note about what is post anatta at the very bottom of this post.
15/4/13 12:41:53 AM: John Tan: In this case (One Mind) all is being consumed/subsumed into the source
15/4/13 12:42:45 AM: John Tan: Sound is consciousness is not one mind but no mind
15/4/13 12:44:02 AM: John Tan: When the hearer is gone and there is only sound, that sound is precisely consciousness
15/4/13 12:45:15 AM: John Tan: That is the experience of no-mind
15/4/13 12:50:31 AM: John Tan: No mind is like the mirror becomes transparent and there is just that
15/4/13 12:51:22 AM: John Tan: But the view is the reflection and the mirror is not the same
15/4/13 12:52:09 AM: John Tan: Like sky is not the flowing cloud
John TanFriday, November 22, 2013 at 8:25am UTC+08
But this is also good so that the point that a practitioner may hv clear experience of no mind but a view of one mind..
John TanFriday, November 22, 2013 at 8:26am UTC+08
Thus view, experience and realization
15/4/13 12:53:28 AM: John Tan: Anatta is a realization that there isn't a consciousness besides sound, scenery...etc
15/4/13 12:56:15 AM: John Tan: U c through reification of that agent and get in touch with the base manifestation where the label rely upon
15/4/13 12:57:02 AM: John Tan: So sound is the actual consciousness is referring to
15/4/13 12:57:36 AM: John Tan: There is no consciousness other than that
15/4/13 1:01:13 AM: John Tan: When they see through reification, then phenomena has a different meaning
15/4/13 1:02:04 AM: John Tan: Seeing everything as awareness is not one mind
15/4/13 1:02:52 AM: John Tan: Seeing everything as the same unchanging mind is the problem
15/4/13 1:04:09 AM: John Tan: When u c through reification, u realized "awareness" is just a label point to these manifestations
15/4/13 1:04:32 AM: John Tan: So there is nothing wrong saying that
15/4/13 1:05:24 AM: John Tan: Only when we treat awareness to b of true existence then we r deluded because there isn't any
15/4/13 1:11:14 AM: Soh Wei Yu: I see..
15/4/13 1:11:36 AM: John Tan: In hearing, there is only sound
15/4/13 1:11:57 AM: John Tan: Hearing implies the presence of sound
....
Session Start: Sunday, 29 May, 2011
(7:17 PM) Thusness: anatta is often not correctly understood
it is common that one progress from experience of non-dual to no-mind instead of direct realization into anatta
(7:19 PM) Thusness: many focus on the experience
and there is a lack of clarity to penetrate the differences
so u must be clear of the various phases of insights first and not mistake one for the other
at the same time, refine your experience
these few days...have deeper sleep and exercise more
balance your body energies
The conversation with the redditor:
Soh:
Also on dissolution of witness, a convo with thusness in 2008 (i only realised anatta in late 2010):
(10:34 PM) AEN: ken wilber say the witness must completely disappear into everything
(10:58 PM) Thusness: what ken wilber said is good. 🙂
(10:59 PM) Thusness: That it whether it is realised as a stage or as an insight that has no entry or exit point. 🙂
(10:59 PM) AEN: ken wilber said tat?
(11:00 PM) Thusness: u said "ken wilber say the witness must completely disappear into everything"
(11:00 PM) AEN: ya i mean wat u mean by That it whether it is realised as a stage or as an insight that has no entry or exit point. 🙂
(11:00 PM) Thusness: yes
(11:00 PM) Thusness: what X said is not what ken wilber said.
(11:01 PM) Thusness: it [what X said] is witnessing
(11:01 PM) Thusness: what ken wilber is the dissolving of that witnessing
(11:01 PM) Thusness: what i said is that the dissolving is also an illusion. That is by itself a dualistic view though the experience is there.
(11:02 PM) Thusness: ken wilber said there is a dissolving
(11:03 PM) Thusness: means he actually feel that there is a dissolving
(11:03 PM) Thusness: although he experiences the non-dual, the insight is still not there.
(11:03 PM) AEN: Because at some point, as you inquire into the Witness, and rest in the Witness, the sense of being a Witness “in here” completely vanishes itself, and the Witness turns out to be everything that is witnessed. The causal gives way to the Nondual, and formless mysticism gives way to nondual mysticism. “Form is Emptiness and Emptiness is Form.”
(11:03 PM) AEN: oic
(11:04 PM) AEN:
Kw: Across the board, the sense of being any sort of Seer or Witness or Self vanishes altogether. You don’t look at the sky, you are the sky. You can taste the sky. It’s not out there. As Zen would say, you can drink the Pacific Ocean in a single gulp, you can swallow the Kosmos whole – precisely because awareness is no longer split into a seeing subject in here and a seen object out there. There is just pure seeing. Consciousness and its display are not-two. (etc)
(11:04 PM) AEN: insight that means anatta?
(11:05 PM) Thusness: insight requires us to have clarity or our nature...that there is no self at all from begining....all is because of dualistic and inherent views...
(11:05 PM) Thusness: i will talk about that later
Mr H:
"This has been my experience as well: "as you inquire into the Witness, and rest in the Witness, the sense of being a Witness “in here” completely vanishes itself, and the Witness turns out to be everything that is witnessed."
Funny enough. I was thinking about this conceptually yesterday and this is exactly how I phrased it: "precisely because awareness is no longer split into a seeing subject in here and a seen object out there."
Your timing is always impeccable. Lol.
Also my feeling self seems to have re-emerged or re-asserted itself. It's very interesting. For example. When I use to see certain people that conjure an image in me when I was in immediacy. I felt nothing and there was no internal activation of image/emotional affect. Now I'm getting emotional innervations again.
I don't even feel a need to push though because I know it's not about forcing anything. I AM is always there and I AM is the one "true" experience."
Soh:
ken wilber only managed to describe from I AM then into the collapse of the witness into nondual awareness, but stays at the level of one mind. it is not yet the anatta realization
xabir Snoovatar
he isn't clear about anatta, and certaintly not clear about anatta as a dharma seal (he sees dissolution of witness as something akin to a stage). on anatta as dharma seal, what i explained here:
...
3) No-Self in terms of what I call realization of Anatta
But then there is b), where one realizes that not only is it the case that all forms are merely modulations of consciousness, in actual fact 'Awareness' or 'Consciousness' is truly and only Everything -- in other words, there is no 'Awareness' or 'Consciousness' besides the very luminous manifestation of the aggregates, whatever is seen, heard, sensed, touched, cognized, smelled...
Anatta is not merely a freeing of personality sort of experience; rather, there is an insight into the complete lack of a self/agent, a doer, a thinker, a watcher, etc, cannot be found apart from the moment to moment flow of manifestation. Non-duality is thoroughly seen to be always already so: here is effortlessness in the non-dual and one realizes that in seeing there is always just scenery (no seer or even seeing besides the colors) and in hearing, always just sounds (never a hearer or even a hearing besides the sounds). A very important point here is that Anatta/No-Self is a Dharma Seal, it is the nature of Reality all the time -- and not merely as a state free from personality, ego or the ‘small self’ or a stage to attain. This means that it does not depend on the level of achievement of a practitioner to experience anatta but Reality has always been Anatta and what is important here is the intuitive insight into it as the nature, characteristic, of phenomenon (dharma seal).
To illustrate further due to the importance of this seal, I would like to borrow a quote from the Bahiya Sutta (http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/…/ajahn-amaro-on-non…)
‘in the seeing, there is just the seen, no seer’, ‘in the hearing, there is just the heard, no hearer’…
If a practitioner were to feel that he has gone beyond the experiences from ‘I hear sound’ to a stage of ‘becoming sound’ or takes that ‘there is just mere sound’, then this experience is again distorted. For in actual case, there is and always is only sound when hearing; never was there a hearer to begin with. Nothing attained for it is always so. This is the main difference between a momentary peak experience (lasting minutes or at most an hour) of non-duality, and a permanent quantum shift of perception that makes that peak experience become a permanent mode of perception.
This is the seal of no-self and can be realized and experienced in all moments; not just a mere concept.
In summary, after the realization of anatta of b), and even a), non-dual no longer becomes a passing peak experience that comes and goes, as the entire paradigm of consciousness, knot of perception, mental proliferation -- the continuous activity of projecting a 'self' or 'subject/object dichotomy' is severed at a more fundamental level as the delusional framework through which one perceives the world is undermined. What I can say is that for me personally, for the past 9+ years after realizing anatta, I have not experienced the slightest sense of subject/object duality or agency at all, not even the slightest trace. That is gone for good and is not merely a peak experience here....
also ken wilber's view falls into substantialist nondualism, thusness stage 4. not yet thusness stage 5. it is also the one mind as distinguished from no mind or anatta realization as explained https://www.awakeningtoreality.com/.../differentiating-i...
also i recommend this article which discusses at length the difference between thusness stage 4 and stage 5:
2008:
(11:46 PM) Thusness: Does ken (Ken Wilber) talk about anatta
(11:46 PM) AEN: no
(11:47 PM) Thusness: Or Advaita sort of understanding
(11:47 PM) AEN: advaita (Ken Wilber is at Thusness Stage 4 http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/.../thusnesss-six... )
(11:47 PM) Thusness: Then y u kept asking me.
(11:47 PM) Thusness: What is anatta?
(11:48 PM) AEN: ya but wat i mean is nondual experience is not as in stage 2 type of passing experience, but as everpresent reality?
(11:48 PM) AEN: anatta is no agent and dependent origination?
(11:48 PM) Thusness: Didn't I tell u understanding non-dual experience as verb. (Soh: refer to my article The Wind is Blowing, Blowing is the Wind)
(11:48 PM) AEN: icic
(11:49 PM) Thusness: Not an entity that is independent and unchanging?
(11:49 PM) AEN: but ken wilber say "You are that, and there is no you – just this entire luminous display spontaneously arising moment to moment. The separate self is nowhere to be found."
(11:50 PM) AEN: *oic
(11:50 PM) Thusness: Non-dual experience is there is clarity of no separation (As in Thusness Stage 4)
(11:51 PM) Thusness: Stage 2 is there is merging
(11:51 PM) Thusness: As if I dissolved and merge..
(11:51 PM) AEN: icic..
(11:52 PM) Thusness: There r two, dual
(11:52 PM) AEN: oic..
(11:52 PM) Thusness: Non-dual is there never was a separation
(11:52 PM) Thusness: No split
(11:53 PM) AEN: icic..
(11:53 PM) Thusness: There is no separate I.
(11:53 PM) AEN: oic..
(11:53 PM) Thusness: But this awareness is still very much constant, permanent and unchanging
(11:54 PM) AEN: icic..
(11:54 PM) Thusness: Anatta goes further and understand exactly what is non-dual experience
(11:55 PM) Thusness: This is a break-through in insight
(11:55 PM) AEN: oic..
(11:55 PM) AEN: its about discerning it as DO?
(11:55 PM) Thusness: There is thinking, no thinker
(11:55 PM) AEN: icic
(11:55 PM) Thusness: Seen no seer
(11:56 PM) Thusness: Sound no hearer
(11:56 PM) AEN: oic
(11:56 PM) Thusness: Understood becoming no being
(11:56 PM) AEN: icic..
(11:57 PM) Thusness: Understand that object@
(11:57 PM) AEN: wat u mean
(11:59 PM) Thusness: Object/subject is the result of compartmentizing 'verb'
(11:59 PM) Thusness: Action
(11:59 PM) AEN: icic..
(11:59 PM) Thusness: Thinking becomes thinker and thoughts
(11:59 PM) Thusness: That is anatta
(12:00 AM) Thusness: It is the direct experience that there is no thinker, just thoughts
(12:01 AM) Thusness: In seeing, always only the seen.
(12:01 AM) AEN: is this wat u mean by nondual yet permanent (for ken wilber):
You are not the one who experiences liberation; you are the clearing, the opening, the emptiness, in which any experience comes and goes, like reflections on the mirror. And you are the mirror, the mirror mind, and not any experienced reflection. But you are not apart from the reflections, standing back and watching. You are everything that is arising moment to moment. You can swallow the whole cosmos in one gulp, it is so small, and you can taste the sky without moving an inch.
(12:01 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:03 AM) Thusness: Yes what I called desync of view and non-dual experience
(12:04 AM) Thusness: When insight arises, there is no desync
(12:04 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:05 AM) Thusness: Non-dual experience is clearly understood because there never was one.
(12:05 AM) Thusness: It is always only manifestation
(12:06 AM) AEN: there never was what?
(12:06 AM) Thusness: DO is the operation mechanism of the Transience
(12:06 AM) Thusness: A self
(12:06 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:10 AM) Thusness: It is very difficult to have such clarity
(12:11 AM) Thusness: Only Buddha has it
(12:11 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:12 AM) Thusness: Even buddhist practitioners have so much mis-conceptions
(12:12 AM) Thusness: They can't see how consistent and precise the teaching is
(12:13 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:14 AM) AEN: btw this is not yet nondual experience rite, more like I AM?:
(12:14 AM) AEN: "the world moves forward as it is..... but instead of seeing the diversity as the ulitmate the One underneath it all is rested in..... Like the ocean reality or maya is simply the surface waves of moving consciousness.... shakti which manifests the underlying Ocean of Consciousness into a limited visible form..... But what is beneath and around and within that form is simply the same consciousness which comprises the Whole of the Ocean.... But in the calm of the depths you know the vastness instead of the limited......"
(12:16 AM) Thusness: Yes
(12:16 AM) AEN: icic
(12:17 AM) Thusness: Under the influence of the 'bond' without knowing it
(12:17 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:17 AM) Thusness: Stage 1 to 6 cannot be skipped
(12:17 AM) AEN: wat do u mean
(12:18 AM) Thusness: Best experienced that way.
(12:18 AM) AEN: oic
(12:18 AM) Thusness: A practitioner cannot skip stages
(12:18 AM) AEN: but buddhist path skips some rite
(12:18 AM) AEN: like dharma dan never go through 'i am'
(12:18 AM) Thusness: Yes
(12:19 AM) Thusness: the depth of clarity will not be there
(12:19 AM) Thusness: Like grimnexus see 4 same as 5.
(12:20 AM) Thusness: But a person that undergone knows clearly.
(12:21 AM) AEN: oic
(12:21 AM) AEN: ya he tot its the same
(12:21 AM) AEN: btw grimnexus at stage 4 rite
(12:21 AM) Thusness: Like ken and Ajahn amaro, seems the same but even Ajahn Amaro thought it is the same.
(12:21 AM) AEN: long time nv see him online liao, he like never came online for many months
(12:21 AM) AEN: oic
(12:21 AM) Thusness: Why u worry so much abt others ppl stage?
(12:22 AM) AEN: lol
(12:23 AM) Thusness: Rather pray hard that u will not be misled and go through countless lives of rebirth again
(12:23 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:23 AM) Thusness: What u must have is to correctly discern
(12:24 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:25 AM) Thusness: If u want to hv clarity of the essence of the six phases, discern and understand correctly.
(12:25 AM) Thusness: What if I m no more around?
(12:25 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:26 AM) Thusness: If Ajahn Amaro cannot know the diff, much less is others
(12:26 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:26 AM) AEN: dharma dan leh
(12:26 AM) Thusness: Rather ask urself have u correctly understood then abt others
(12:27 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:27 AM) Thusness: How I know?
(12:27 AM) AEN: oic
(12:27 AM) Thusness: U kept asking abt others, I worry more abt u.
(12:27 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:28 AM) Thusness: If u know, u will be able to know r they there.
(12:28 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:29 AM) Thusness: Like ken and Ajahn Amaro clearly have same experience but different understanding
(12:29 AM) Thusness: David loy treat them the same too.
(12:29 AM) Thusness: Not realizing the differences
(12:30 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:30 AM) Thusness: So have the right understanding
(12:31 AM) Thusness: One is abiding, the other is non-abiding
(12:32 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:32 AM) Thusness: One is still efforting, the other is effortless
(12:32 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:33 AM) Thusness: One is Brahman, the other is DO
(12:34 AM) Thusness: One is mirror, the other is pure manifestation
(12:34 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:36 AM) Thusness: 'Self' is grasped unknowingly because it is independent, changeless
(12:36 AM) Thusness: Therefore they can't treasure the Transience
(12:37 AM) Thusness: They can't c conditions
(12:37 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:37 AM) Thusness: The Transience and conditions are most sacred
(12:38 AM) Thusness: How can Self c this?
(12:38 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:39 AM) Thusness: But one must know the emptiness nature of Transience, unfindable and ungraspable
(12:39 AM) Thusness: And rises when condition is
(12:40 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:40 AM) Thusness: When we say attributes, we r referring to the empty nature of awareness
(12:41 AM) AEN: wat u mean
(12:41 AM) Thusness: But awareness is full of colors
(12:41 AM) AEN: u mean attributelessness?
(12:41 AM) AEN: icic
(12:41 AM) Thusness: Like 'redness' of a flower
(12:42 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:42 AM) Thusness: But to advaitins, it is absence
(12:42 AM) Thusness: Nothing to do with awareness
(12:43 AM) AEN: u mean they see awareness as formless?
(12:43 AM) Thusness: yes
(12:43 AM) AEN: icic
(12:44 AM) Thusness: Means absence of attributes as colorless, formless
(12:44 AM) Thusness: But what buddhism is referring is its emptiness nature
(12:45 AM) Thusness: Not that there is a real formless entity
(12:45 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:45 AM) Thusness: Awareness is appearances appearing when condition is
(12:46 AM) AEN: icic..
(12:46 AM) Thusness: awareness is not free of thoughts
(12:46 AM) Thusness: To advaitins, it is.
(12:47 AM) Thusness: To buddhist practitioner, thought is awareness
(12:48 AM) Thusness: One thought arises
(12:48 AM) Thusness: Next one
(12:48 AM) Thusness: Like what Ajahn Amaro said
(12:48 AM) Thusness: There is no worry abt no thought, no conceptuality
(12:49 AM) Thusness: All will be experienced in their most vivid forms
(12:49 AM) Thusness: I got to go now.
(12:49 AM) AEN: oic..
(12:49 AM) AEN: ok gd nite
(12:49 AM) Thusness: Nite
....
15/4/13 12:53:28 AM: John Tan: Anatta is a realization that there isn't a consciousness besides sound, scenery...etc
15/4/13 12:56:15 AM: John Tan: U c through reification of that agent and get in touch with the base manifestation where the label rely upon
15/4/13 12:57:02 AM: John Tan: So sound is the actual consciousness is referring to
15/4/13 12:57:36 AM: John Tan: There is no consciousness other than that
15/4/13 1:01:13 AM: John Tan: When they see through reification, then phenomena has a different meaning
15/4/13 1:02:04 AM: John Tan: Seeing everything as awareness is not one mind
15/4/13 1:02:52 AM: John Tan: Seeing everything as the same unchanging mind is the problem
15/4/13 1:04:09 AM: John Tan: When u c through reification, u realized "awareness" is just a label point to these manifestations
15/4/13 1:04:32 AM: John Tan: So there is nothing wrong saying that
15/4/13 1:05:24 AM: John Tan: Only when we treat awareness to b of true existence then we r deluded because there isn't any
15/4/13 1:11:14 AM: Soh Wei Yu: I see..
15/4/13 1:11:36 AM: John Tan: In hearing, there is only sound
15/4/13 1:11:57 AM: John Tan: Hearing implies the presence of sound
14/5/13 9:39:15 PM: John Tan: One mind is different
14/5/13 9:40:04 PM: John Tan: One mind as I told u is the witness is gone but subsume into an overarching Awareness
14/5/13 9:40:31 PM: Soh Wei Yu: Is there a distinct phase of one mind in your seven stages?
14/5/13 9:40:48 PM: John Tan: Phase 4
14/5/13 9:41:23 PM: Soh Wei Yu: But u said phase 4 u already realised anatta and experience no mind?
14/5/13 9:41:51 PM: Soh Wei Yu: So does that mean the insight already arise by tendency to sink back to one mind is still there
14/5/13 9:42:03 PM: Soh Wei Yu: But
14/5/13 9:42:17 PM: John Tan: All such gray area is put onto phase 4 insight when view isn't completely clear
14/5/13 9:42:44 PM: John Tan: There is no way to describe the grey scale
14/5/13 9:43:24 PM: John Tan: Even in anatta there r so many different degree of refinements
14/5/13 9:43:34 PM: Soh Wei Yu: I see
14/5/13 9:43:59 PM: John Tan: But it is not practical to talk abt all
14/5/13 9:44:44 PM: Soh Wei Yu: Oic.. U mean not describable
14/5/13 9:45:32 PM: John Tan: No...not that it is not describable but not practical to describe
14/5/13 9:46:48 PM: John Tan: Like AF is part of the deviation looking into purely physical flesh and blood of pure experience ... Some went into details some does not
14/5/13 9:47:51 PM: Soh Wei Yu: What do u mean by went into details
14/5/13 9:48:54 PM: John Tan: It is like I M, there r all those experiences u undergone but I do not say they r diff phases
14/4/13 7:35:01 PM: John Tan: When u say "weather", does weather exist?
14/4/13 7:35:20 PM: Soh Wei Yu: No
14/4/13 7:35:42 PM: Soh Wei Yu: It's a convention imputed on a seamless activity
14/4/13 7:35:54 PM: Soh Wei Yu: Existence and non existence don't apply
14/4/13 7:36:02 PM: John Tan: What is the basis where this label rely on
14/4/13 7:36:16 PM: Soh Wei Yu: Rain clouds wind etc
14/4/13 7:36:25 PM: John Tan: Don't talk prasanga
14/4/13 7:36:36 PM: John Tan: Directly see
14/4/13 7:38:11 PM: John Tan: Rain too is a label
14/4/13 7:39:10 PM: John Tan: But in direct experience, there is no issue but when probed, u realized how one is confused abt the reification from language
14/4/13 7:39:52 PM: John Tan: And from there life/death/creation/cessation arise
14/4/13 7:40:06 PM: John Tan: And whole lots of attachment
14/4/13 7:40:25 PM: John Tan: But it does not mean there is no basis...get it?
14/4/13 7:40:45 PM: Soh Wei Yu: The basis is just the experience right
14/4/13 7:41:15 PM: John Tan: Yes which is plain and simple
14/4/13 7:41:50 PM: John Tan: When we say the weather is windy
14/4/13 7:42:04 PM: John Tan: Feel the wind, the blowing...
14/4/13 7:43:04 PM: John Tan: But when we look at language and mistaken verb for nouns there r big issues
14/4/13 7:43:22 PM: John Tan: So before we talk abt this and that
14/4/13 7:43:40 PM: John Tan: Understand what consciousness is and awareness is
14/4/13 7:43:45 PM: John Tan: Get it?
14/4/13 7:44:40 PM: John Tan: When we say weather, feel the sunshine, the wind, the rain
14/4/13 7:44:58 PM: John Tan: U do not search for weather
14/4/13 7:45:04 PM: John Tan: Get it?
14/4/13 7:45:57 PM: John Tan: Similarly, when we say awareness, look into scenery, sound, tactile sensations, scents and thoughts
......................
"So what is one mind, what is no mind and what is original mind in this context? One mind is post non-dual but subsuming leaving trace. No mind is just one mind except that there is evenness till the last trace is gone. Like what explains in the text. Uji...all is time therefore no time. When you go from dual to non dual or one mind to no mind, those are stages and experiences... If u got the condition to get pointed out that originally there never was a mind, there are no stages to climb... that is original mind. This requires insights and wisdom." - John Tan, 2020
(Note by Soh: the original mind spoken here does not mean some unborn metaphysical primordial mind such as the I AM, but the originally, already-is nature of mind -- empty of itself -- "originally there never was a mind", empty of all self/Self)
.....
Soh:
xabir Snoovatar
stage 5 anatta insight in particular requires this insight:
No nouns are necessary to initiate verbs
Xabir = Soh
User avatar
level 1
Fishskull3
· 9 hr. ago
Everything isn’t made of awareness, it quite literally is awareness itself. In your direct experience there isn’t anything inside looking out at something. the very thing that you presently think is the “seen” is the ongoing activity of the “seer” or awareness.
3level 2
xabir
· just now
I like your answer. Also, I would like to add, awareness is none other than the ongoing activity. It is not the case that awareness is an unchanging substance modulating as everything. 'Awareness' is just like a word like 'weather', a mere name denoting the ongoing dynamic activities of raining wetting sun shining wind blowing lightning strike and so on and on. 'Awareness' has no intrinsic existence of its own than moment to moment manifestation, even if at that moment it is just a mere sense of formless Existence, that too is another 'foreground' non-dual manifestation and not an unchanging background.
Just like there is no lightning besides flash (lightning is flashing -- lightning is just another name for flash and is not the agent behind flash), no wind besides blowing, no water besides flowing, no nouns or agents are needed to initiate verbs. There never was an agent, a seer, or even a seeing, besides colors, never an agent, a hearer, or even a hearing, besides sound. Anatta.
Some excerpts from the 2nd most famous Buddhist masters (right after the Dalai Lama) of our time, the Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh :
some other quotations which Thusness/PasserBy liked from the book --"When we say I know the wind is blowing, we don't think that there is something blowing something else. "Wind' goes with 'blowing'. If there is no blowing, there is no wind. It is the same with knowing. Mind is the knower; the knower is mind. We are talking about knowing in relation to the wind. 'To know' is to know something. Knowing is inseparable from the wind. Wind and knowing are one. We can say, 'Wind,' and that is enough. The presence of wind indicates the presence of knowing, and the presence of the action of blowing'.""..The most universal verb is the verb 'to be'': I am, you are, the mountain is, a river is. The verb 'to be' does not express the dynamic living state of the universe. To express that we must say 'become.' These two verbs can also be used as nouns: 'being", "becoming". But being what? Becoming what? 'Becoming' means 'evolving ceaselessly', and is as universal as the verb "to be." It is not possible to express the "being" of a phenomenon and its "becoming" as if the two were independent. In the case of wind, blowing is the being and the becoming....""In any phenomena, whether psychological, physiological, or physical, there is dynamic movement, life. We can say that this movement, this life, is the universal manifestation, the most commonly recognized action of knowing. We must not regard 'knowing' as something from the outside which comes to breathe life into the universe. It is the life of the universe itself. The dance and the dancer are one."
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Comments by Thusness/PasserBy: "...as a verb, as action, there can be no concept, only experience. Non-dual anatta (no-self) is the experience of subject/Object as verb, as action. There is no mind, only mental activities... ...Source as the passing phenomena... and how non-dual appearance is understood from Dependent Origination perspective."
.............
Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh:"When we say it's raining, we mean that raining is taking place. You don't need someone up above to perform the raining. It's not that there is the rain, and there is the one who causes the rain to fall. In fact, when you say the rain is falling, it's very funny, because if it weren't falling, it wouldn't be rain. In our way of speaking, we're used to having a subject and a verb. That's why we need the word "it" when we say, "it rains." "It" is the subject, the one who makes the rain possible. But, looking deeply, we don't need a "rainer," we just need the rain. Raining and the rain are the same. The formations of birds and the birds are the same -- there's no "self," no boss involved. There's a mental formation called vitarka, "initial thought."
When we use the verb "to think" in English, we need a subject of the verb: I think, you think, he thinks. But, really, you don't need a subject for a thought to be produced. Thinking without a thinker -- it's absolutely possible. To think is to think about something. To perceive is to perceive something. The perceiver and the perceived object that is perceived are one.When Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am," his point was that if I think, there must be an "I" for thinking to be possible. When he made the declaration "I think," he believed that he could demonstrate that the "I" exists. We have the strong habit or believing in a self. But, observing very deeply, we can see that a thought does not need a thinker to be possible. There is no thinker behind the thinking -- there is just the thinking; that's enough. Now, if Mr. Descartes were here, we might ask him, "Monsieur Descartes, you say, 'You think, therefore you are.' But what are you? You are your thinking. Thinking -- that's enough. Thinking manifests without the need of a self behind it."Thinking without a thinker. Feeling without a feeler. What is our anger without our 'self'? This is the object of our meditation. All the fifty-one mental formations take place and manifest without a self behind them arranging for this to appear, and then for that to appear. Our mind consciousness is in the habit of basing itself on the idea of self, on manas.
But we can meditate to be more aware of our store consciousness, where we keep the seeds of all those mental formations that are not currently manifesting in our mind. When we meditate, we practice looking deeply in order to bring light and clarity into our way of seeing things. When the vision of no-self is obtained, our delusion is removed. This is what we call transformation. In the Buddhist tradition, transformation is possible with deep understanding. The moment the vision of no-self is there, manas, the elusive notion of 'I am,' disintegrates, and we find ourselves enjoying, in this very moment, freedom and happiness."
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Labels: Anatta |
P.s. I mentioned that I will briefly mention about what's after anatta. Although most of my sharings are only up to anatta because I think it's pointless to discuss the deeper insights with someone that still has not broken through I AM and one mind into anatta (and very few have even reached anatta), still it is important after anatta not to stagnant in "in the seen just the seen, no seer" and no agent, but to penetrate further into dependent origination and emptiness/non-arising of all phenomena.
What I share here that I wrote recently doesn't do justice to the profundity of D.O. but is a start:
If what appears does not have any nature and lacks an agent, how does it appear at all?
By dependencies.. like net of indra, one node reflected in all nodes
Each and all factors are the conditions for this illusory and essenceless appearance
Precisely because of its dependencies it is essenceless, precisely because the appearance is essenceless, they originate in dependence.
Each of those conditions are also essenceless and dependent on all other conditions like net of indra
The appearance are ones radiance clarity, and all other conditions like the sense faculty, object, and innumerable conditions exerting as the empty and luminous appearance
If appearance are not empty they would not originate in dependence but have inherent self nature
So when you see something like the room the room is not truly there by itself but depends on the bodily position you stand in the room the room lighting the space and air and your eyes opening and so on exerting that empty luminous appearance of room in a given moment
Its both empty like a reflection and a total exertion of all conditions and mind radiance as one of the conditions. Nothing could exist by itself like one node in net of indra would not appear without being linked to all nodes
......
Also, I like what John Tan wrote in 2009,
Zen Patriarch Bodhidharma on the Inseparability of Awareness and Conditions
The following blog entry is from a post made in my forum on 9th October 2008. It is about seeing awareness as manifestation instead of a mirror reflecting, and seeing the inseparability of awareness and conditions. This is also related to a previous blog entry Dependent Arising of Consciousness which contains a related text by Arya Nagarjuna.
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Passerby/Thusness saw some inadequateness in one of the Zen Patriarch Bodhidharma translations, and translated himself a certain passage and commented on my forum:
Original Chinese text from Bodhidharma's Bloodstream Sermon (血脉论): 若智慧明了,此心号名法性,亦名解脱。生死不拘,一切法拘它不得,是名大自在王如来;亦名不思议,亦名圣体,亦名长生不死,亦名大仙。名虽不同,体即是一。圣人种种分别,皆不离自心。心量广大,应用无穷,应眼见色,应耳闻声,应鼻嗅香,应舌知味,乃至施为运动,皆是自心。
(I myself translated certain parts to fill in the gap): With the illumination of wisdom (prajna), mind is known as Dharma Nature, mind is known as Liberation. Neither life nor death can restrain this mind, no dharmas (phenomenon) can. It’s also called the King of Great Freedom Tathagata, the Incomprehensible, the Holy Essence, the Immortality, the Great Immortal. Its names vary but its essence is one. Sages vary, but none are separate from his own mind. The mind’s capacity is limitless, and its conditional functions are inexhaustible. With the condition of eyes, forms are seen, With the condition of ears, sounds are heard, With the condition of nose, smells are smelled, With the condition of tongue, tastes are tasted, every movement or states are all one's Mind.
Comments by Passerby/Thusness:
若智慧明了,此心号名法性,亦名解脱。
A better way to translate this should be:
With the illumination of wisdom (prajna), mind is known as Dharma Nature, mind is known as Liberation.
Comments: It is important to know that mind is itself liberation. That is why knowing the nature of our mind is the way of liberation. If Liberation is not experienced, then the clarity is still not there. There is no true understanding of what mind is.
Liberation is this Pristine Awareness itself in its natural state. That is why understanding this Pristine Awareness is the direct path towards liberation. If we cannot see that the 5 aggregates are themselves our Buddha Nature, then we will not understand there is nothing to shunt from the transience. Thought liberates, sound liberates, tastes liberates. The transience liberates. If we do not see that, then we are taking a gradual path. It is also not advisable to speak too much about spontaneous arising or self liberation. It can be quite misleading.
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应眼见色,应耳闻声,应鼻嗅香,应舌知味,乃至施为运动,皆是自心。
A better way to translate should be:
With the condition of the eye, forms are seen, With the condition of ears, sounds are heard, With the condition of nose, smells are smelled, With the condition of tongue, tastes are tasted, every movement or states are all one's Mind.
Thusness/Passerby's comments:
Here there are 2 important points to take note. First is that Buddha Nature is the transience. Second it is more of '应'. Means with the condition of the eye, forms arise. With ears, sound arises.
Awareness is not like a mirror reflecting but rather a manifestation. Luminosity is an arising luminous manifestation rather than a mirror reflecting. The center here is being replaced with Dependent Origination, the experience however is non-dual.
One must learn how to see Appearances as Awareness and all others as conditions. Example, sound is awareness. The person, the stick, the bell, hitting, air, ears...are conditions. One should learn to see in this way. All problems arise because we cannot experience Awareness this way.
Conventionally we experience in the form of subject and object interaction taking place in a space-time continuum. This is just an assumption. Experientially it is not so. One should learn to experience awareness as the manifestation. There is no subject, there is only and always manifestation, all else are conditions of arising. All these are just provisional explanations for one to understand.
Further comments:
What's seen is Awareness. What's heard is Awareness. All experiences are non-dual in nature. However this non-dual luminosity cannot be understood apart from the ‘causes and conditions’ of arising. Therefore do not see ‘yin’ as Awareness interacting with external conditions. If you see it as so, then it still falls in the category of mirror-reflecting. Rather see it as an instantaneous manifestation where nothing is excluded. As if the universe is giving its very best for this moment to arise. A moment is complete and non-dual. Vividly manifest and thoroughly gone leaving no traces.
Other comments:
Phrase like “everything arises from Emptiness and subsides back to Emptiness” is equally misleading. By doing so, we have made ‘Emptiness’ into a metaphysical essence; similarly not to make the same mistake for “causes and conditions”, not to objectify it into a metaphysical essence. All are provisional terms to point to our insubstantial, essence-less and interdependent nature.
Labels: Anatta, Dependent Origination, Zen, Zen Patriarch Bodhidharma |



….

More quotes by Soh:

Ken wilber holds wrong view. He still clings to a delusory identity of awareness as unchanging



2007:


(3:55 PM) Thusness:    it is not to deny the existence of the luminosity

(3:55 PM) Thusness:    the knowingness

(3:55 PM) Thusness:    but rather to have the correct view of what consciousness is.

(3:56 PM) Thusness:    like non-dual

(3:56 PM) Thusness:    i said there is no witness apart from the manifestation, the witness is really the manifestation

(3:56 PM) Thusness:    this is the first part

(3:56 PM) Thusness:    since the witness is the manifestation, how is it so?

(3:57 PM) Thusness:    how is the one is really the many?

(3:57 PM) AEN:    conditions?

(3:57 PM) Thusness:    saying that the one is the many is already wrong.

(3:57 PM) Thusness:    this is using conventional way of expression.

(3:57 PM) Thusness:    for in reality, there is no such thing of the 'one'

(3:57 PM) Thusness:    and the many

(3:58 PM) Thusness:    there is only arising and ceasing due to emptiness nature

(3:58 PM) Thusness:    and the arising and ceasing itself is the clarity.

(3:58 PM) Thusness:    there is no clarity apart from the phenomena

(4:00 PM) Thusness:    if we experience non-dual like ken wilber and talk about the atman.

(4:00 PM) Thusness:    though the experience is true, the understanding is wrong.

(4:00 PM) Thusness:    this is similar to "I AM".

(4:00 PM) Thusness:    except that it is higher form of experience.

(4:00 PM) Thusness:    it is non-dual.



So although experience is nondual there is no real breakthrough needed for liberation



Better look into zen master dogen



As John Tan said in 2007 about Dogen, “Dogen is a great Zen master that has penetrated deeply into a very deep level of anatman.”, “Read about Dogen… he is truly a great Zen master… ...[Dogen is] one of the very few Zen Masters that truly knows.”, “Whenever we read the most basic teachings of Buddha, it is most profound. Don't ever say we understand it. Especially when it comes to Dependent Origination, which is the most profound truth in Buddhism*. Never say that we understand it or have experienced it. Even after a few years of experience in non-duality, we can't understand it. The one great Zen master that came closest to it is Dogen, that sees temporality as buddha nature, that see transients as living truth of dharma and the full manifestation of buddha nature.” 


"When you ride in a boat and watch the shore, you might assume that the shore is moving. But when you keep your eyes closely on the boat, you can see that the boat moves. Similarly, if you examine many things with a confused mind, you might suppose that your mind and nature are permanent. But when you practice intimately and return to where you are, it will be clear that there is nothing that has unchanging self.


- Dogen"




“Buddha-nature

For Dōgen, Buddha-nature or Busshō (佛性) is the nature of reality and all Being. In the Shōbōgenzō, Dōgen writes that "whole-being is the Buddha-nature" and that even inanimate objects (rocks, sand, water) are an expression of Buddha-nature. He rejected any view that saw Buddha-nature as a permanent, substantial inner self or ground. Dōgen held that Buddha-nature was "vast emptiness", "the world of becoming" and that "impermanence is in itself Buddha-nature".[39] According to Dōgen: 

Therefore, the very impermanency of grass and tree, thicket and forest is the Buddha nature. The very impermanency of men and things, body and mind, is the Buddha nature. Nature and lands, mountains and rivers, are impermanent because they are the Buddha nature. Supreme and complete enlightenment, because it is impermanent, is the Buddha nature.[40]”

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C5%8Dgen 




"To say that the mind is rattled and the nature is composed is the view of other ways; to say that the nature is clear and deep and the form shifts and moves is the view of other ways. The study of the mind and study of the nature on the way of the buddha are not like this. The practice of the mind and practice of the nature on the way of the buddha are not equivalent to the other ways. The clarification of the mind and the clarification of the nature on the way of the buddha, the other ways have no share in."

(Dogen: Talking of the Mind, Talking of the Nature)


Dzogchen teacher Acarya Malcolm Smith: 

Excellent case in point.




….




http://books.google.com.sg/books?id=H6A674nlkVEC&pg=PA21&lpg=PA21



From Bendowa, by Zen Master Dogen



Question Ten:



Some have said: Do not concern yourself about birth-and-death. There is a way to promptly rid yourself of birth-and-death. It is by grasping the reason for the eternal immutability of the 'mind-nature.' The gist of it is this: although once the body is born it proceeds inevitably to death, the mind-nature never perishes. Once you can realize that the mind-nature, which does not transmigrate in birth-and-death, exists in your own body, you make it your fundamental nature. Hence the body, being only a temporary form, dies here and is reborn there without end, yet the mind is immutable, unchanging throughout past, present, and future. To know this is to be free from birth-and-death. By realizing this truth, you put a final end to the transmigratory cycle in which you have been turning. When your body dies, you enter the ocean of the original nature. When you return to your origin in this ocean, you become endowed with the wondrous virtue of the Buddha-patriarchs. But even if you are able to grasp this in your present life, because your present physical existence embodies erroneous karma from prior lives, you are not the same as the sages.



"Those who fail to grasp this truth are destined to turn forever in the cycle of birth-and-death. What is necessary, then, is simply to know without delay the meaning of the mind-nature's immutability. What can you expect to gain from idling your entire life away in purposeless sitting?"



What do you think of this statement? Is it essentially in accord with the Way of the Buddhas and patriarchs?







Answer 10:



You have just expounded the view of the Senika heresy. It is certainly not the Buddha Dharma.



According to this heresy, there is in the body a spiritual intelligence. As occasions arise this intelligence readily discriminates likes and dislikes and pros and cons, feels pain and irritation, and experiences suffering and pleasure - it is all owing to this spiritual intelligence. But when the body perishes, this spiritual intelligence separates from the body and is reborn in another place. While it seems to perish here, it has life elsewhere, and thus is immutable and imperishable. Such is the standpoint of the Senika heresy.



But to learn this view and try to pass it off as the Buddha Dharma is more foolish than clutching a piece of broken roof tile supposing it to be a golden jewel. Nothing could compare with such a foolish, lamentable delusion. Hui-chung of the T'ang dynasty warned strongly against it. Is it not senseless to take this false view - that the mind abides and the form perishes - and equate it to the wondrous Dharma of the Buddhas; to think, while thus creating the fundamental cause of birth-and-death, that you are freed from birth-and-death? How deplorable! Just know it for a false, non-Buddhist view, and do not lend a ear to it.



I am compelled by the nature of the matter, and more by a sense of compassion, to try to deliver you from this false view. You must know that the Buddha Dharma preaches as a matter of course that body and mind are one and the same, that the essence and the form are not two. This is understood both in India and in China, so there can be no doubt about it. Need I add that the Buddhist doctrine of immutability teaches that all things are immutable, without any differentiation between body and mind. The Buddhist teaching of mutability states that all things are mutable, without any differentiation between essence and form. In view of this, how can anyone state that the body perishes and the mind abides? It would be contrary to the true Dharma.



Beyond this, you must also come to fully realize that birth-and-death is in and of itself nirvana. Buddhism never speaks of nirvana apart from birth-and-death. Indeed, when someone thinks that the mind, apart from the body, is immutable, not only does he mistake it for Buddha-wisdom, which is free from birth-and-death, but the very mind that makes such a discrimination is not immutable, is in fact even then turning in birth-and-death. A hopeless situation, is it not?



You should ponder this deeply: since the Buddha Dharma has always maintained the oneness of body and mind, why, if the body is born and perishes, would the mind alone, separated from the body, not be born and die as well? If at one time body and mind were one, and at another time not one, the preaching of the Buddha would be empty and untrue. Moreover, in thinking that birth-and-death is something we should turn from, you make the mistake of rejecting the Buddha Dharma itself. You must guard against such thinking.



Understand that what Buddhists call the Buddhist doctrine of the mind-nature, the great and universal aspect encompassing all phenomena, embraces the entire universe, without differentiating between essence and form, or concerning itself with birth or death. There is nothing - enlightenment and nirvana included - that is not the mind-nature. All dharmas, the "myriad forms dense and close" of the universe - are alike in being this one Mind. All are included without exception. All those dharmas, which serves as "gates" or entrances to the Way, are the same as one Mind. For a Buddhist to preach that there is no disparity between these dharma-gates indicates that he understands the mind-nature.



In this one Dharma [one Mind], how could there be any differentiate between body and mind, any separation of birth-and-death and nirvana? We are all originally children of the Buddha, we should not listen to madmen who spout non-Buddhist views.