Forgetting Everything

The Simplicity of What Is

Being Just This Moment

The delicate sound of wind caressing the leaves, a plane flying over, feeling the warm cup in my hand, the taste of tea, the vast listening presence beholding (being and holding) it all. Whether all this is Consciousness, energy, light, stardust, God, or no-thing in particular doesn’t matter to me and seems irrelevant and impossible to know. It needs no label. Here it is. Subtle. Deep. Profound. Unresolvable. Vividly present. Closer than close. Boundless, infinite. Disappearing every night into the germinal darkness of deep sleep and reappearing every morning as this amazing movie of waking life.

At one point in Shunryu Suzuki Roshi’s newest posthumous book, Becoming Yourself, Suzuki is talking about the Buddha’s enlightenment—how the Buddha had been practicing and studying many different things, different philosophies and religions, and, “When [the Buddha] realized he was caught by this, he lost interest in such things. He got tired of that kind of effort, and he gave up everything.” He sat down under a tree where, as the story goes, he attained enlightenment.

Of that, Suzuki Roshi says: “We say, ‘he attained enlightenment,’ but it may be better to say, ‘he completely forgot everything!’ He had nothing in his mind at that moment.”

YES! Best definition of enlightenment I’ve ever heard: Completely forgetting everything! Beautiful!

What remains in that first instant of forgetting everything and holding on to nothing at all?

That question isn’t about coming up with “the correct answer.” It’s an invitation to see for yourself, to check it out.

And of course, this doesn’t mean literally forgetting everything you know and forever after going through life with a completely thought-free empty mind. That would be absurd. It points rather to the possibility in any moment—in THIS moment, the ONLY moment, the one bottomless moment that is ever-present here and now—of all the chasing and resisting dropping away, so that there is simply being here, not knowing anything, not trying to figure it all out, not believing or disbelieving anything, not doing anything other than simply being alive, present and aware, breathing, seeing, hearing, listening, experiencing—just this. Being what we cannot not be. This simple, effortless aliveness that includes the entire universe.

Buddha famously said, “I truly attained nothing from complete unexcelled enlightenment.”

One of my Zen teachers, Charlotte Joko Beck, said: “Enlightenment is not something you achieve. It is the absence of something. All your life you have been going forward after something, pursuing some goal. Enlightenment is dropping all that.”

Or as my first Zen teacher Mel Weitsman put it, “Our suffering is believing there’s a way out.”

Enlightenment, awakening, liberation, or whatever fancy word we use refers simply to the end (in THIS moment, NOW) of that search for an escape, the end of looking for something bigger and better, the end of trying to figure it all out, the end of needing to know, the end of trying to get somewhere or become something other than what is. It’s nothing more or less than simply being this moment, right here, right now, just as it is, just as we are. Simple. Simple. Simple.

And very importantly, it’s not some final one-time event that lasts forever after, leaving “me” in some permanent enlightened state as an Enlightened Somebody. It’s only RIGHT NOW. And right now, in simple presence, there is no “me” or “you” or “the world” or “past” or “future” or “enlightenment” or “delusion.” There is just breathing, seeing, hearing, being. Borderless, boundless, centerless, limitless—without any separation. No gap. No “me” observing or experiencing or being or awaring or doing “something else.” No “awareness” apart from “experiencing.” No division. Just THIS. Undivided. Ungraspable. Unpindownable. Unavoidable.

Of course, THIS can seemingly be overlooked. The world of apparent duality, separation and complexity can magically arise. What a show! Attention can become absorbed in and mesmerized by the virtual reality (the mental movie world) of thought, memory, imagination and identification as the central character in a suspense-filled story that seems to be unfolding over time. The world drama and our personal drama, our hopes and fears, the whole movement of emotion-thought and imagination. And it’s not just mental. The body hums along, contracting and tightening, feeling queasy or heavy-hearted.

When this hypnotic entrancement happens, suffering and confusion are inevitable. So naturally, we long to wake up, to be free. This longing to be free, to forget everything, to let go is a perfectly healthy and natural desire, but the problem is, this desire quickly gets co-opted and morphs into another plot line in the movie story. The character in the story, the illusory “me,” is desperately seeking a way to wake up (in the imaginary future) from “my” suffering and stay awake (forever). This phantom “me” seems to stand apart from what’s happening, trying to manage and control it, trying to make something happen or trying to stop something else from happening. This doesn’t work. It only adds more suffering, more confusion. This is the Buddha before he gave up, sat down, and forgot everything.

Eventually, it is realized that THIS isn’t ever actually absent, since it is all there is. THIS simply sometimes momentarily takes the shape of thoughts, memories, stories, imagination, identification as the central character in a movie that seems to be unfolding over time, and all the suffering and confusion this inevitably entails: depression, anxiety, disagreements, conflicts, wars, genocides, marriages, divorces, birth and death.

Consciousness seems to enjoy getting lost in stories. It loves going to the movies. It loves thrillers and mysteries, comedies and tragedies, horror stories and love stories, all kinds of stories. The whole appearance is a great work of art, and like sand castles on the beach, it is always disappearing back into formlessness.

Eventually, every great movie ends and there is that moment of forgetting everything, that absolutely free moment where there is no problem, no confusion, no added suffering. There is just THIS. And no imaginary “me” or “awareness” seems to stand apart from THIS to contain or resist or judge or grasp or understand or control what is. There is just THIS, as it is. Undivided and whole, infinitely varied and ever-changing, impossible to pin down as this or that.

A frustrating and suspenseful new movie resumes as soon as thought pops up and says, “This is it! I’ve got it! I’m enlightened! This is wonderful! I need to hold onto this!” And then, “Oh no, I’ve lost it! I was thinking again! How can I get that freedom back?” This is the great cosmic game of hide and seek that may (with luck) eventually wear itself out, leaving only this aware presence, this ever-changing experiencing, that includes both movies and the absence of movies.

Even the absence of movies is revealed to be a kind of movie—movies within movies within movies, dreams within dreams. But there no longer seems to be a main character in need of salvation. No one seems to be lost in the movies, trying to get out. That character and that whole drama were in the movie! There is no center to experiencing. Only vast emptiness. The movies are an amazing display, a wonderful play of dancing emptiness—ever-changing, impossible to grasp. Just THIS.

Of course, thought wants to know what “THIS” is. After all, “it” must be “something.” So, what is that something? Is it consciousness, matter, energy, GOD, Mind, atoms and molecules, spirit, or what? But these are all words, concepts, ideas, formulations. THIS is simply THIS. It’s not something and it’s not nothing. It can’t be pinned down, boxed up, reified or held onto with any concept. And it doesn’t need to be. It’s all-inclusive. No inside or outside. THIS is all there is. Nothing is left out. Everything is included. Stillness. Movement. Noise. Silence. The fragrance of roses. The smell of exhaust fumes. The moments of confusion and contraction. The moments of freedom and peace. The germinal darkness of deep sleep. The infinitely varied movies of waking life. It’s all included. It’s always only right here, right now. This is it! And “it” is it-less, and yet vividly and undeniably present!

This marvelous cup of coffee. This movement called “driving on the freeway,” in which (amazingly enough!) we never depart from right here, right now. This conversation at work. This moment in the check-out line. This smelly diaper. This screaming child. This white cloud drifting across the blue sky. This gust of wind. This rippling water. This raindrop glistening on a leaf. This smell of cigarette smoke. This sound of a leaf blower. This experience of laughing. This Substack post. This inexplicable happening, right now, called “reading.” This very moment. Bottomless. Eternal. Timeless. NOW. Always right here. Holographic: containing the whole universe, swallowing all of time and space. Always changing shape. Always dissolving. Nothing behind. Nothing at the core. Nothing hidden. Not one, not two. Just THIS.

Simple. Simple. Simple.

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Love to all…