GENIUS FORUMS

Hi All,

It's been a while! Up until recently, I had a bit of a conundrum that I think I've managed to solve, but I wanted to run it by this forum. I've basically understood the ultimate nature of reality on an intellectual level, but I still didn't understand how I could maintain this understanding on a constant basis. That is, even if I understood the ultimate nature of reality, what if some "external" event came along and made me temporarily forget this understanding, and thus made me believe that the event was ultimately real? For example, let's say a tiger came into my room right now. It's safe to say that though I'm almost convinced that it's ultimately not real and thus couldn't harm me (since I'm not ultimately real either!), I would still probably be carried away by terror and fear for my life, and thus not be able to hold my near-certainty about ultimate reality in my head.

My solution to this problem is the following: that we don't have to hold the cognitive construct of certainty about ultimate reality in our mind all the time. In the end, it's impossible to think of two things at once -- how are we supposed to do the laundry and remember that it's ultimately not real at the same time? Instead, we have to somehow make our realization into an emotional state. That is, I have to create the conditions which allow me to feel the truth of this analysis and the ensuing peace (and dare I say, bliss?) as constantly as possible. That way, when the tiger is in this room, though on a more superficial level I am afraid, underlying that fear is a deeper, more robust emotional state which is the deepest kind of reassurance that ultimately, this tiger can't harm me. So, while my past conditioning leads to a superficial and conditioned fear response, I take the situation lightly. (And who knows? Maybe with time it's possible to even eliminate our conditioned responses...)

Now, if this analysis is accurate, then I want to talk technique. How to achieve this emotional state in the most constant way possible? Is it just a question of remembering (cognitively) that ultimate reality is what it is, and then resting in the resultant emotional state? Or are there other techniques out there that people know about?

Best,
Otiose

Good post.

Instead of talking about the need to turn one's intellectual realization into an emotional state, it is better to think of it as needing to infuse this understanding with the very fabric of our being. To make it a part of our bones, as it were. After all, the emotions themselves are just as fragile and fleeting as the conceptual understandings that arise and fall in our minds.

In other words, we need to bed it down more deeply than the level of the emotions and into life itself. It has to be infused with everything that we are and everything that we experience. And not artificially either. It has to be a natural outcome of our mental and spiritual development.

Chuang Tzu observed:

• "The stillness of the sages does not belong to them as a consequence of their skillful ability. It is their basic nature."

Regarding technique, my advice is this:

Firstly, to keep developing your intellectual understanding until you are beyond the stage of having to remember any particular concept or understanding. And that means being able to completely let go of the idea that reality has a form, either real or unreal. It means becoming fully convinced of the truth that in every single moment, in everything that you experience, reality is always presenting its true and complete form. As such, there is nothing that you need to reject, and nothing you need to seek.

I would advise, then, as a first step, that you use your meditational periods to immerse yourself deeply and intensely in the spontaneity of reality's formlessness. And while you are doing this, to also learn how to return to this spontaneity in the blink of an eye. In other words, to make a habit of instinctively pulling yourself up whenever you see that your mind is wandering or that you have become enmeshed in some kind of worldly worry and drive your mind instantly back into the Way - that is, into the spontaneity of formlessness.

You should find, after practising this for a while, that you can begin to drive your mind back into the Way in any situation you find yourself, no matter what you are doing in the world. And so from this you have the basis for permanently infusing your understanding of reality with everything that you are.

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David: After all, the emotions themselves are just as fragile and fleeting as the conceptual understandings that arise and fall in our minds.

Me: But how about the so-called joy of liberation? It seems to me that if we're seeking something, then it ultimately has to have a positive valence.

David: Chuang Tzu observed:
"The stillness of the sages does not belong to them as a consequence of their skillful ability. It is their basic nature."

Me: Wouldn't "stillness" have a positive connotation?

David: Firstly, to keep developing your intellectual understanding until you are beyond the stage of having to remember any particular concept or understanding. And that means being able to completely let go of the idea that reality has a form, either real or unreal.

Me: But isn't ultimate reality characterized by something positive, the peace and joy of liberation?

David: It means becoming fully convinced of the truth that in every single moment, in everything that you experience, reality is always presenting its true and complete form.

Me: "True and complete" also have a positive connotation, right?

David: drive your mind instantly back into the Way

Me: I think I do this sometimes, and not to beat a dead horse, but there's a deep peace and joy there, not complete formlessness.

There is certainly always a deep peace there. As for joy, that only emerges when the ego is aroused. "The joy of liberation" is essentially the inverse ego response to the frustration of being imprisoned. True liberation means being liberated even from joy.

It seems you don't understand what I mean by formlessness. What do you think I am referring to?

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David: There is certainly always a deep peace there. As for joy, that only emerges when the ego is aroused. "The joy of liberation" is essentially the inverse ego response to the frustration of being imprisoned. True liberation means being liberated even from joy.

Me: OK, that makes sense.

David: It seems you don't understand what I mean by formlessness. What do you think I am referring to?

Me: To arrive at an understanding of formlessness (as far as understanding can take me, anyway), I generally use the example of a table, which can then be applied to any other thing in the universe besides the deep peace we spoke of. I observe that what we call a table is a mere label that we apply to "something" that doesn't include that label in any way. The label is not included in any of of the parts of the "table", nor is it all the parts together. It's a delusion, a hallucination. So the point is that form of any kind is a delusion, besides the deep peace. Hence formlessness.

Formlessness doesn't mean that labels, concepts and forms aren't real and useful.

The form is the appearance of the thing, identified abstractly with a concept. The concept assembles the parts of a thing mentally. The label is a handy tag tied to the concept. None of this mental activity is a delusion, or hallucination, or worthless.

Consider how a form is created out of parts. Each of the parts is mentally linked, forming the whole object. If you zoom in on each of these separate parts, you should be able to see its own constituent parts.

In other words, all the links between parts, and the separate forms, are arbitrarily bounded and linked. The mind sets limits and draws boundaries, creating parts. This kind of flexibility in thinking up forms and objects, zipping one section off from another, joining others as if they were never separated, is a pointer to the meaning of formlessness.


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But isn't a concept ultimately a delusion, since it misrepresents the true nature of reality?

otiosedodge wrote:But isn't a concept ultimately a delusion, since it misrepresents the true nature of reality?

Any concept is limited, yet may well define an aspect of Reality. The quality of being limited does not make the concept delusional.

However, considering Reality to be none other than one’s knowledge of a particular aspect, and being unaware of the limitations of this consideration, is delusional.

It’s like the blind woman who, limited to perception of an elephant’s trunk via the sense of touch, defines elephant solely according to that limitation.

That's why I said that it's ultimately a delusion.

Ultimately, an elephant’s trunk is not delusional, as anyone who’s been smacked upside the head with one can attest to.

But isn't the pain (another concept) that results from the elephant's trunk ultimately unreal, just as any concept of a person to be hit is ultimately unreal? I don't claim to have reached the state that would immediately recognize the ultimate unreality of these phenomena as they were happening to me. But I have enough trust in the idea of emptiness to continue practicing, in the hope that one day, I will be able to find complete peace.

Physical pain from either an elephant smackdown or a phantom limb are both real. The experience of the physical pain can be physically modified with drugs, or psychologically modified via total surrender. Psychological pain, or suffering, which is effected by attachment to an arbitrary concept of memory, or conceptual desire for a particular future, is delusional and can be dropped.

Ultimate Reality is itself a concept, and as mentioned, any concept is limited.

Yes, peace is ever existent, and can only be found right now.

Maybe we need to clarify the difference here between conventional and ultimate existence. I agree that physical pain is conventionally real, but not ultimately real.

What do you mean by "total surrender"?

"Psychological pain, or suffering, which is effected by attachment to an arbitrary concept of memory, or conceptual desire for a particular future, is delusional and can be dropped. "

I agree that both of the things you mention are useful in cutting through delusion. But I also think that attachment to any concept ultimately furthers our delusions.

"Ultimate Reality is itself a concept, and as mentioned, any concept is limited."

Agree completely. So isn't physical pain limited as well?

"Yes, peace is ever existent, and can only be found right now."

Agree here too.

otiosedodge wrote:But isn't a concept ultimately a delusion, since it misrepresents the true nature of reality?

Not necessarily. If concepts point out to you that Reality is representationless, and manifest in everything, including concepts, then the concepts undelude you. They have helped you to see the true nature of all things. But not seeing this is the essence of delusion.

The trick is to see that concepts are themselves representationless Reality. But to be deluded is not to recognise the representationless nature of the Absolute in everything you see and do.


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Kelly: If concepts point out to you that Reality is representationless, and manifest in everything, including concepts, then the concepts undelude you.

Me: I understand that concepts can be valuable pointers in our search for Reality. But how can they be Reality itself? Aren't they merely hallucinations? When I think a table is a table, then there's clearly something there which isn't Peace, even if it's not true.

Kelly: They have helped you to see the true nature of all things. But not seeing this is the essence of delusion.

Me: Again, I agree that they can help. But as the Zen tradition says, don't confuse the moon and the finger pointing at the moon.

Kelly: The trick is to see that concepts are themselves representationless Reality. But to be deluded is not to recognise the representationless nature of the Absolute in everything you see and do.

Me: I think you can recognize Reality underlying everything you see and do, but that doesn't mean that everything is Reality. Take, for example, the Tibetan Buddhist teaching that samsara is like a nightmare. In a nightmare, we think that we're suffering, but it's not real. So, enlightenment is like waking up from the nightmare.