Thank you Joan.🙏 Agreed (oh! Opinions are not zen! :p )
This. here and now. Meditation to me is simply getting in touch with Life again.
I'd be curious to know, if you don't mind sharing : reflecting back on your own path, do you feel that you had to maybe first meditate in a classical way, to get to that point where you write what you write now? I mean, truth is available at any time if we unveil our blinded mind, however would we be able to feel the path is more direct than we first thought, if we did not come across obstacles, predicaments, and the belief that we have to go a long way? (I mix I and we without intention to say my/our experience are exactly the same) Sorry if it's not clear or if it seems simplistic (like of course experience brings some wisdom at the end of the day). I guess I wanted to say something like : do you feel like being a beginner is one of the most needed things to begin the path and being constantly reborn to the truth? And mabye overtime, returning to the beginner's mind refine our understanding, more efficiently and wisely than anything else?
I'm very much an enthusiast for beginner's mind--a willingness to not know, to look freshly, to see new things. Once we think we know it all, watch out!
Meditation can mean so many different things, that I don't know what you might mean by "classical" meditation. I don't think there is one right way for everyone. Everyone has a unique path, in my view. For me, that path included formal Zen, non-traditional meditation (Toni Packer), Advaita, and various forms of what might be called radical nonduality. My path also included years of near fatal alcoholic drinking, psychedelic drugs, revolutionary politics, having one arm, being a gender non-conforming somewhat bi-sexual lesbian, and having cancer (among many other things). Our whole life is our path. And yes, obstacles and suffering and making mistakes is very much a vital part of how we learn and grow, in my experience.
I'm very grateful to have had a background in more formal, traditional Zen, but I don't think such a background in a tradition is necessary for everyone. Toni Packer often said, when asked if her Zen background wasn't essential to her understanding, that the people without any background in meditation often "got" what she was pointing to far more easily than those who had that background. In other words, the background can also get in the way.
I sometimes distinguish between seeking and longing. Longing comes from the heart--it is Home calling us Home, so to speak. Seeking is a kind of addictive pursuit of curative fantasies, ever looking elsewhere and elsewhen for something bigger, better, different. With luck, seeking falls away more and more.
My experience of this shift from the story to awareness is that it seems to happen all by itself. Not that I am not able to do it at will, but it often just "flashes" into me, and feels like a bright blessing. Sometimes it seems momentary and at other times it lingers for a while before fading, and then I'm back in the story.
You emphasize the momentary nature of this experience. My question is about its lingering quality: could this indicate that am I making a story of it? And if I do, is that a problem?
All experience is impermanent. Some days are going to be sunnier and brighter than other days. That is the nature of life. And in my experience, attention naturally moves between different dimensions and perspectives, so that sometimes we have a strong sense of being spacious, open, unbound, impersonal presence-awareness, and sometimes we feel more identified as a particular individual person, sometimes in a purely functional and necessary way, sometimes in a more "problematic" way.
We have a tendency to make stories out of everything, including experiences of all kinds. So if we notice that a story is taking shape, that can be seen. Is it a helpful story or is it a kind of suffering? We can look and see. That's meditation, not just formally on a cushion, but throughout our everyday life, noticing how thought is concretizing experience into narratives and apparently solid things, how it identifies and takes things personally, how it claims credit or pronounces blame. All of this can be seen. Is it a problem? Well, I'd say, find out! In one sense, it is and in another sense, it isn't (see my paragraph in this article about samsara and nirvana, heaven and hell).
Thank you very much for the care you take to address my/our questions, much appreciated.
I do see what you mean, I believe: that paying attention to what is happening reveals that there is a tendency to personalize events, sensations and thoughts, and that this tendency can diminish as its painful effects are experienced.
You wrote:
"But the more we knowingly abide in the freshness and aliveness of open aware presence, the more an ability opens up to respond in new and different ways."
This is so encouraging, and now that I have some experience of the alternative perspective that personalizing tendency is increasingly giving way to awareness, which is such a blessing, and new and different ways are showing up every day.
Dear Joan, My experience is precisely in resonance with your words in this posting... that is, the unmediated by thought or distraction, feeling experience in the body of the energies of life itself, Now... and that life wholesomely connected with all life in the Cosmos. The encrustations of a lifetime of conditioning, trauma, and delusions of a sick collapsing global zeitgeist just fall away....
This is the countercurrent to that global collapse; more and more people are discovering this natural human endowment and living from this space; naturally connecting and recognizing the others that are aware without having to feed or defend the, necessary to survive, left brain generated model of an epistemic agent... just pure awareness with no self.
Your writing is particularly clear and relevant as you point again and again to this possible human awakening... Thank you!
Though I am tempted by this and Barry Magid's 'curative fantasies', I'm aware that there is the 10 Fetter model which, if approached diligently (and subtly!) can remove the filters that prevent us from 'seeing things as they are'...
I would love to simply let go of any effort after 40 years of practice but until I've exhausted the Fetter model it doesn't feel appropriate- what do you think?
I always say, follow your heart and trust your own experience and what feels liberating to you. We're all different in that regard. My only familiarity with the 10 fetters approach is having read through the writings of Kevin Schanilec on his website "Simply the Seen" (https://www.simplytheseen.com) which I thought was very good. He seemed to be covering the same basic insights that had become clear here through other means. And it seemed like a valid way to examine and see through commonplace delusions and false assumptions. I've heard from several people who have found this approach very liberating, so if it feels that way to you, I'd say go for it.
My one beef with Kevin was what felt to me like his promise of some kind of final, complete, perfect liberation, which he seemed (as I heard him) to indicate he had arrived at, and in my view, that is a curative fantasy. As I said in response to another comment below, in my experience, there is no end to this awakening journey of seeing and waking up from delusion, letting go, and (at least sometimes) being able to respond in a non-habitual way to triggers, stressors, conflicts, and other challenges. So if you're chasing that, I'd say let it go. What matters is right here, right now, which is all you ever really have. If a practice is bringing you to right here, right now, I say it's on the mark.
"Perhaps this devotion, this open attention, this unconditional love is the greatest gift we can offer to this often troubled and confusing world"
Immersing in the ever-deepening opening of this subtle fact of alive being, does "the heavy lifting" as Peter Brown says.
Presently I do feel that is all that is called for amidst the world challenges, even as I experience various emotions, indignation, incredulity and thoughts of this must be a series of Twilight Zone or Black Mirror episodes.
Beautifully expressed. I consider it my great fortune to have bought the Signet edition of the Teachings of the Compassionate Buddha in a paperback book rack about sixty years ago in the small town of Neosho, MO, and have fumbled around in it even since. Our mind creates such imaginative stories that are rooted in a deep desire for a permanent satisfaction. The day it finally dawned on me to me dukkha, dissatisfaction was the nature of the human mind was they day I began to relax enough that I could let it do what it does without engaging in behavior that hurts myself and, inevitably, everyone else.
Thank you for sharing. And in my experience, there is no end to that awakening journey of waking up from delusion, letting go, and (at least sometimes) being able to respond in a non-habitual way to triggers, stressors, conflicts, and other challenges. 🙏
That last sentence - very well said, Mack. I find that I have to begin again with that truth whenever I suffer, again and again - it's like the first crucial door, and that when the insistence on 'happiness' falls away awareness graciously opens. And simple compassion. Hence "First Noble Truth".
Thank you Joan.🙏 Agreed (oh! Opinions are not zen! :p )
This. here and now. Meditation to me is simply getting in touch with Life again.
I'd be curious to know, if you don't mind sharing : reflecting back on your own path, do you feel that you had to maybe first meditate in a classical way, to get to that point where you write what you write now? I mean, truth is available at any time if we unveil our blinded mind, however would we be able to feel the path is more direct than we first thought, if we did not come across obstacles, predicaments, and the belief that we have to go a long way? (I mix I and we without intention to say my/our experience are exactly the same) Sorry if it's not clear or if it seems simplistic (like of course experience brings some wisdom at the end of the day). I guess I wanted to say something like : do you feel like being a beginner is one of the most needed things to begin the path and being constantly reborn to the truth? And mabye overtime, returning to the beginner's mind refine our understanding, more efficiently and wisely than anything else?
I'm very much an enthusiast for beginner's mind--a willingness to not know, to look freshly, to see new things. Once we think we know it all, watch out!
Meditation can mean so many different things, that I don't know what you might mean by "classical" meditation. I don't think there is one right way for everyone. Everyone has a unique path, in my view. For me, that path included formal Zen, non-traditional meditation (Toni Packer), Advaita, and various forms of what might be called radical nonduality. My path also included years of near fatal alcoholic drinking, psychedelic drugs, revolutionary politics, having one arm, being a gender non-conforming somewhat bi-sexual lesbian, and having cancer (among many other things). Our whole life is our path. And yes, obstacles and suffering and making mistakes is very much a vital part of how we learn and grow, in my experience.
I'm very grateful to have had a background in more formal, traditional Zen, but I don't think such a background in a tradition is necessary for everyone. Toni Packer often said, when asked if her Zen background wasn't essential to her understanding, that the people without any background in meditation often "got" what she was pointing to far more easily than those who had that background. In other words, the background can also get in the way.
I sometimes distinguish between seeking and longing. Longing comes from the heart--it is Home calling us Home, so to speak. Seeking is a kind of addictive pursuit of curative fantasies, ever looking elsewhere and elsewhen for something bigger, better, different. With luck, seeking falls away more and more.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. 🙏
"With luck." If you feel like it, what's "luck" in this context? Made me smile.
Thank you dear, Joan. 🙏🏽❤️
My experience of this shift from the story to awareness is that it seems to happen all by itself. Not that I am not able to do it at will, but it often just "flashes" into me, and feels like a bright blessing. Sometimes it seems momentary and at other times it lingers for a while before fading, and then I'm back in the story.
You emphasize the momentary nature of this experience. My question is about its lingering quality: could this indicate that am I making a story of it? And if I do, is that a problem?
All experience is impermanent. Some days are going to be sunnier and brighter than other days. That is the nature of life. And in my experience, attention naturally moves between different dimensions and perspectives, so that sometimes we have a strong sense of being spacious, open, unbound, impersonal presence-awareness, and sometimes we feel more identified as a particular individual person, sometimes in a purely functional and necessary way, sometimes in a more "problematic" way.
We have a tendency to make stories out of everything, including experiences of all kinds. So if we notice that a story is taking shape, that can be seen. Is it a helpful story or is it a kind of suffering? We can look and see. That's meditation, not just formally on a cushion, but throughout our everyday life, noticing how thought is concretizing experience into narratives and apparently solid things, how it identifies and takes things personally, how it claims credit or pronounces blame. All of this can be seen. Is it a problem? Well, I'd say, find out! In one sense, it is and in another sense, it isn't (see my paragraph in this article about samsara and nirvana, heaven and hell).
Thank you very much for the care you take to address my/our questions, much appreciated.
I do see what you mean, I believe: that paying attention to what is happening reveals that there is a tendency to personalize events, sensations and thoughts, and that this tendency can diminish as its painful effects are experienced.
You wrote:
"But the more we knowingly abide in the freshness and aliveness of open aware presence, the more an ability opens up to respond in new and different ways."
This is so encouraging, and now that I have some experience of the alternative perspective that personalizing tendency is increasingly giving way to awareness, which is such a blessing, and new and different ways are showing up every day.
Dear Joan, My experience is precisely in resonance with your words in this posting... that is, the unmediated by thought or distraction, feeling experience in the body of the energies of life itself, Now... and that life wholesomely connected with all life in the Cosmos. The encrustations of a lifetime of conditioning, trauma, and delusions of a sick collapsing global zeitgeist just fall away....
This is the countercurrent to that global collapse; more and more people are discovering this natural human endowment and living from this space; naturally connecting and recognizing the others that are aware without having to feed or defend the, necessary to survive, left brain generated model of an epistemic agent... just pure awareness with no self.
Your writing is particularly clear and relevant as you point again and again to this possible human awakening... Thank you!
Thank you Joan , so clear and grounding .
Thank you, Joan.
Another reminder that continues the sinking in process!
I look forward to your blogs!
Hi Joan,
Thanks for more inspirational writing.
Though I am tempted by this and Barry Magid's 'curative fantasies', I'm aware that there is the 10 Fetter model which, if approached diligently (and subtly!) can remove the filters that prevent us from 'seeing things as they are'...
I would love to simply let go of any effort after 40 years of practice but until I've exhausted the Fetter model it doesn't feel appropriate- what do you think?
love joe
I always say, follow your heart and trust your own experience and what feels liberating to you. We're all different in that regard. My only familiarity with the 10 fetters approach is having read through the writings of Kevin Schanilec on his website "Simply the Seen" (https://www.simplytheseen.com) which I thought was very good. He seemed to be covering the same basic insights that had become clear here through other means. And it seemed like a valid way to examine and see through commonplace delusions and false assumptions. I've heard from several people who have found this approach very liberating, so if it feels that way to you, I'd say go for it.
My one beef with Kevin was what felt to me like his promise of some kind of final, complete, perfect liberation, which he seemed (as I heard him) to indicate he had arrived at, and in my view, that is a curative fantasy. As I said in response to another comment below, in my experience, there is no end to this awakening journey of seeing and waking up from delusion, letting go, and (at least sometimes) being able to respond in a non-habitual way to triggers, stressors, conflicts, and other challenges. So if you're chasing that, I'd say let it go. What matters is right here, right now, which is all you ever really have. If a practice is bringing you to right here, right now, I say it's on the mark.
Ah Joan! "Everything always is as it is, whether we are allowing or resisting it"! This "nonsense" is so welll put!!!!!
This is a very clear and articulate piece. I resonate with much of what you write. Thanks for sharing it.
As usually … an invitation just to pay attention to what is. Show in up as sensorial and mental experience… nothing separate….Muchas Gracias Joan
❤️
"Perhaps this devotion, this open attention, this unconditional love is the greatest gift we can offer to this often troubled and confusing world"
Immersing in the ever-deepening opening of this subtle fact of alive being, does "the heavy lifting" as Peter Brown says.
Presently I do feel that is all that is called for amidst the world challenges, even as I experience various emotions, indignation, incredulity and thoughts of this must be a series of Twilight Zone or Black Mirror episodes.
Much love and gratitude 🙏
Thanks Joan .
Beautifully shared and observed and as connecting as always
Gently 🙏
Beautifully expressed. I consider it my great fortune to have bought the Signet edition of the Teachings of the Compassionate Buddha in a paperback book rack about sixty years ago in the small town of Neosho, MO, and have fumbled around in it even since. Our mind creates such imaginative stories that are rooted in a deep desire for a permanent satisfaction. The day it finally dawned on me to me dukkha, dissatisfaction was the nature of the human mind was they day I began to relax enough that I could let it do what it does without engaging in behavior that hurts myself and, inevitably, everyone else.
Thank you for sharing. And in my experience, there is no end to that awakening journey of waking up from delusion, letting go, and (at least sometimes) being able to respond in a non-habitual way to triggers, stressors, conflicts, and other challenges. 🙏
That’s my experience as well. No endpoint.
That last sentence - very well said, Mack. I find that I have to begin again with that truth whenever I suffer, again and again - it's like the first crucial door, and that when the insistence on 'happiness' falls away awareness graciously opens. And simple compassion. Hence "First Noble Truth".
So beautiful, Dear Joan...Every time your name appears on an email, the warm feeling of looking forward emerges. Reading your words is so so....
How wonder full!🥰🙏
💜