sean

Bumped into this today, thought it was relevant. Via Apophatic Mysticism Ming: Enlightenment When your discernment (Ming) penetrates the four quarters Are you capable of not knowing anything? Lao Zi, Chapter Twenty CLZ Gazing at the muddy water's surface, I was deceived and missed the deeper clarity. Zhuang Zi, Chapter Twenty Taoist enlightenment is a "return to the original light (ming)."(LZ52) This light is subtle (xuan): without an analytic understanding of how one is proceeding, one is yet able to engage the people and things of the world with an intimacy that is accurate and effective. Embracing all things, good and bad, "is called following the light (ming)". (LZ27) The Taoist seeks not a salvation of the soul from a mundane realm, but a redemption of her perception, a recall of the miraculous quality of world, a reawakening to the astonishment of simply being here. The carved and the uncarved, the prejudiced and the impartial. The tao is a difficult problem for the small mind of the human being, it does not seem to fit into our categories of thought: The tao, the uncarved block (pu), also includes within itself, the carved and the carving. We humans are to "embody the tao" (ti tao), we are to duplicate within our minds this coexistence of both the carved and the uncarved. The tao is the zi ran, self-so, self-ordering. The modern "systems (or complexity) theory" aptly describes the behavior of the tao. "The tao resides within all things" (Zhuang Zi). All dynamic systems under heaven are self-ordered (zi ding). Everything is part of a local system and also part of the One system. The self-organizing force of the tao is primal, impartial, (bu si) disinterested (wu jin), and undivided. The manifest mind of man is subsequent, partial, biased, and divisive. The original mind of man is a replica of the primal tao. But as Zhuang Zi indicates, in order to thrive, the original and the manifest mind must work together. (liang xing) I cannot get through a doorway unless my mind is able to "discriminate out" the outlines of a door from my general visual field. But I will not thrive if I only react partially to my world, if I simply respond to each in the series of individual things I am able to notice in my perceptual field, if I only notice doorways, and if I try to get through every doorway that I notice. My perceptual field must be seen in its parts and also seen as the whole that it is. "The great man joins together the partial to become impartial (da ren he bing er gong). This is why for influences from outside he has an appropriator which makes them his own, and he does not cling to one or another; and for outgoings from within he has a regulator which sets them in the true direction, so that others do not resist them." Zhuang Zi (A. C. Graham)

Bumped into this today and thought I'd share in this thread: Via Apophatic Mysticism Honest selfishness "Fully provided for by heaven and earth, by giving away to others, he only gets even more for himself." Zhuang Zi. Here there is not the idea of selflessness, putting others first, or sacrifice. There is no need for Zhuang Zi to kid himself and think he is not interested in pleasing himself. He allows his motivation to be transparent. What Zhuang Zi has realized are the dynamics of qi. There is a reciprocal exchange and increase of qi when qi is concentrated and expressed outward. This is why Lao Zi says, "Don't honor the sage." The sage is no less selfish than you or me, she has simply learned a much more enlightened selfishness.

Are you published? Pushing a shopping cart of other people's words. What a gem. This whole poem. More more!

IMO satori is the mind's attempt to label something bigger than any label (including no label), bigger than human experience, bigger than what what can be conceived of by the human mind. I think substituting the word Nothing for Enlightenment in this case could clarify. How can you have an experience of Nothing? How could you lose an experience of Nothing? Nothing cannot be gained or lost. Just my two cents, and after I said my wise little "it's not what you think" and tried to duck out, shit. I thought I could keep a cool, detached distance and play Mr. I'm too wise to even discuss enlightenment, so thanks for fucking up my pose there Lozen. Sean

I agree with the Father. One doesn't fall in and out of a state of enlightenment because enlightenment is not a state. Satori is just an experience. It's a hindsight conception of what the mind thinks it was like to be Truth, and the mind is really incapable of languaging This. Satori, flow, beautiful detached loving feelings, anger, joy ... it all comes and go. Enlightenment simply is.

Really nice to have you here. I've been browsing your website and reading through your book and really enjoying it. I hope you start a discussion on Quantum Cosmology sometime. Coincidentally (or not ) the subject came up very recently on the second page of the Enlightenment and Evolution thread, so clearly there is some interest here for a discussion of this sort. In any case, welcome Wayne. Sean

It's not what you think it is.

I get into a zone writing sometimes where I am attempting to steer my mind, and maybe my reader as well, into giving up for a split second and opening up to the clarity of the present moment. My words are also just another part of the dream though, probably best taken as a little melody you are overhearing me whistle. There are two components of my personal experience going into this post that I'd like to describe. First, is what I sublimely feel as a result of my meditation. This feeling does come and go (seems to prefer going at this stage ). Second, it's what I've come to realize that I already know and have always known on some level ... self-evident Truth, tacit knowledge, Big Mind, not sure what to call it. But it's incontrovertible. It makes more sense on the deepest level of my being than anything else I've encountered so I'm sticking with it for now. It's true I am not embodying this realization. In fact I keep forgetting who I Am constantly and get caught up in the illusion more often than not. So this knowledge has an element of faith to it. Because my "everything is perfect" frame is just words, it's a frame. So it drops away like everything manifest. This is where the next line in my post is crucial. "This perfection includes all of the ways we convince ourselves otherwise and play unpleasant games with our freedom." Enlightenment is so free it can pretend to be a separate human reading someone else's post on The Tao Bums. My faith is a kind of umbilical cord to Source, nourishing me no matter how lost I get. When I catch myself thinking "just this next book or this next technique will help me become free", my faith sets off a little light bulb and I can recognize that, even though I may not feel it strongly in the moment, or even believe it fully, I Am already That. My experience is "merely part of the endless creativity of a playful void", to borrow from a recent post by our Father Paul here. And I don't even have to put the book down though or stop my practice. Because what would be the alternative? Sometimes we find ourselves in situations where we must make choices as if we were only a separate self. How to wake up from this kind of dream willfully? It's a double bind. This is just what is arising in that moment. Seeking comes and goes on it's own. And even post-enlightenment we can still enjoy meditation and reading, I think you agree with that. They are natural activities, like eating and sleeping. This is such a wonderful meditation. I like to ponder Baker Roshi's quote that I indirectly referred to in that post, "Enlightenment is an accident. Meditation makes you accident prone". Sean

I'll be borrowing this piece of advice from you triple dots, thanks. Need it right now, but let me know when you want it back and I'll get it right over to you. Sean

Hey Cloud, did you start Yogani's stuff in order with iam? I think he recommends doing iam meditation every day, morning and night, for twenty minutes until you feel really stable and comfortable with it before adding spinal breathing. This could take six months, who knows, no rush. Then just start with 5 minutes of spinal breathing and, again, hang with it. Oh, and do what I do, whenever you get just a little bored, make sure you skip way ahead and add three or four of the most advanced high energy practices at once and, why not, double the recommended times and pooh pooh those silly warnings as your inner heat and pressure gradually percolate into overt irritability and your finances start bottoming out.

Via AYP Forums Hi Kirtanman: Yes, I agree that the process of enlightenment is the same everywhere, determined by the inherent capabilities in the human nervous system, rather than by any particular approach. Of course, different approaches may "bring it on" in different orders of manifestation (some easier to traverse than others), but eventually all the steps have to be gone through, leading to the integration of inner silence and ecstatic energy awakening we talk about so much here. Your comments on Adyashanti point to the presence of an energy awakening in conjunction with the rise of stillness/Oneness/no-thingness. Not having traveled the Zen path, I can't offer further corroboration, but do find a kinship and loving affection for his condition. I believe we stand on the threshold of many thousands entering this same condition. Won't that be something? I'm currently finishing up the next AYP Enlightenment Series book on Asanas, Mudras, Bandhas & Kundalini, and have been describing all of this from the other side this time around -- weaving physical methods into an overall routine centered on sitting practices, including spinal breathing, deep meditation, samyama, etc. And then looking at the energy awakening from the neurobiological side, and tracing it back into the emergence of Oneness/Unity. Hopefully this will be helpful to the many out there these days practicing mainly physical yoga. No matter what our path, "experiences" will be a two-edged sword. To move forward we will have them. Yet, to engage in experiences as "the enlightenment" at the expense of our practices will tend to stall our progress. Spiritual progress does not come from experiences. It comes from practices reaching beyond experiences. A very important point that is not lost on the Zen folks, or on anyone who is engaged in effective spiritual practices. Paradoxically, enlightenment is not an experience. It is becoming that which is beyond all experience, and thereby becoming the experience itself, which then manifests as outpouring divine love in the world. The different traditions deal with the inevitable rise of energy experiences in different ways. How they deal with this phenomenon has a large impact on how successful they may be in shepherding folks on through to enlightenment. Unlike the few people who come into this life more or less ready for enlightenment (I agree with you on that, Weaver), many of us may have a longer road to travel with energy experiences associated with the purification and opening occurring in our nervous system. So it is good if we can understand what these experiences are ("scenery") so we can stay the course, preferably while enjoying ourselves along the way. Ultimately, experiences are transcended, and integrated into the divine purpose, which is stillness in action. This is what we see in realized people from any tradition. Bring them on! The guru is in you.

I guess I am attracting disaster. I think I am still in manifestation kindergarten. I have this real feeling though that this is one of those "darkest before dawn" situations. Yoda, actually you might be on to something. At first I was like, what is he talking about, I am happy as a clam ... but in hindsight I've been pretty hot-headed lately ... with, just like you said, really amazing pockets of calm and bliss that buzz through my day and I guess make it hard to notice how bumpy of a ride I may be having. Plus, dog year for a dragon ... that's always a roller coaster. Mythmaker, thanks for the book recommendation. Anything with over 300 reviews on amazon is as a rule something I like to at least peek at, I will definitely check this out. Hagar, thanks for the link, I'm plugging it into iTunes now. Sean

Have you checked out Dynamic Tao? Funny enough the author Wayne just joined here so I'm sure you could get into a very fruitful discussion with him about this. I've been reading through the book there and it's really intriguing. I also had some quantum mystical bubbles popped by Wilber, but now am having a chance to rethink my perspective.

Man, you're getting up there. You in the "mids" yet? Happy Birthday man, it's really great having you around, I've learned a lot from you.

Brilliant.

http://www.neave.tv/#freeland_soul Seemed relevant somehow, maybe I'm just really drunk.

I am so broke right now I am like going into physical shock. Just a bunch of shit hit the fan at once for me financially and frankly I am getting pretty uptight about it. Trying to find a way to stay positive and keep my center. This situation is getting me more focused on money than I have ever been in my life though so I guess this is a good thing. Despite living just ahead of paycheck to paycheck most of my life, I've had this unshakable carefree attitude about money up until now.

I have to admit, I got pretty burnt out on politics several years ago so I'm not sure how long I'll last here, but there are some interesting points drawing me out. Basically I think that an insistence on an elusively defined ideal of fairness is one of the biggest timbers in the eyes of the left when attempting to present a coherent politicoeconomic philosophy. And then history keeps showing us that the most well intentioned master plans built around some typically liberal group's idea of fairness always seem to end up needing a violent revolution to begin with and/or be enforced, top-down at gunpoint. Shouldn't that be the first clue something is wrong? Anarchism, individualism, libertarianism, laissez faire ... these approaches more accurately mirror the reality of life and are more in the spirit of Taoism. A forest does not need a centralized committee to redistribute resources "fairly". Mice do not need a political correctness board to protect them from the insulting howls of wolves. Order emerges from chaos most naturally when we get out of the way and stop trying to control things. Like Campbell says, follow your bliss. If it makes you happy and your life more meaningful to lend a hand to people that need it, do it! You don't need to read a book to prove the value of so-called altruism. Give your Mom a call or your girlfriend a massage or a man on the street ten bucks and feel into the oneness of your hearts. These things can objectively feel good. Not for everyone, but then can this be changed by force? I imagine the 60's and 70's were some amazing times. But in a way I think this generation was the most selfish in recently recorded history. Think about it, three quarters of a generation of youth decided they didn't feel like supporting their country anymore, didn't care what their families thought, didn't care about working to contribute to society, basically just dropped out to become active in intellectual political ideologies (some of which turned out to be essentially totalitarian), experiment with psychoactive drugs, open sexuality, new forms of music. Sure there was sacrifice but their hearts were on fire! Real sacrifice was the previous generation of men, grinding away in mind numbing jobs without any sense of entitlement to self-actualization, artistic expression or even happiness, all just to support their family and die with stomach ulcers ... and the previous generation of women, who swallowed any concept of personal autonomy to wither in joyless, sexless marriages, again just to keep their families together. THAT is sacrifice. Real sacrifice is doing what you don't want, what is not even that helpful and then having nothing to show for it, and no applause. Growing your hair out, playing the drums and holding up anti-war posters is not. Sorry. But see, I am siding more with the hippies here. I would have done the same shit. I just think their cause went downhill when the self-righteousness came to a boil. The reality that the real power was coming from follow your bliss, not "we are heroes saving the rest of the corrupt selfish world" got lost and the party went sour. I really agree that materialism, in the sense of a flatland, one-dimensional vision of reality, is at the heart of so much evil. But ironically it's the left now that are the loudest proponents of secular materialism, insisting spiritual values are backwards, can not be taught publicly and should have nothing to do with how a country is governed. I understand why. Because they are trying to respond to a fundamentalist religious right. But the left has completely lost it's own positive vision. It just nitpicks and deconstructs the conservative vision into an incoherent patchwork and wonders why the majority of the country is not taking them seriously. And don't even get me started on the right! Arggghhhh! *Sipping magnolia tea to calm myself* Anyway, I think it will only be through spiritual revolution that we each cultivate and spread that we will make it through these precarious times ... hopefully into something none of could have ever thought of. Sean

I know I'll probably get slammed for this, but I have yet to find a more organic, benevolent and in many ways Taoist economic approach than laissez-faire. Communism, socialism, even participatory economics which is the most intelligent attempt IMO ... at a certain point I realize I just can't possibly picture these societies being enjoyable at all. I want to work as hard as I want to work for the lifestyle I want. Call me selfish, but I think it is overall less harmful than me wanting to work as hard as I want to work to try and impose the view of society I want and think is best upon everyone else.

Nice post Sean (good name too ). You are sincere and this seems like an incredible opportunity for people drawn to it. I hope you do not feel that I have slammed your path or your teachers in any way. I respect the perspectives you are bringing here and I doubt I speak for myself when I say you've given me an opportunity to reevaluate some of my opinions. Thanks.

Thanks for taking the time to input those quotes forestofsouls, I really appreciate that. I'm still unsure how these quotes are supporting the idea that powers are a pre-requisite to enlightenment though. I am genuinely interested in you, seandenty, anyone's thoughts on my main point of contention here. I think it's very possible that the cultivation of certain powers are only possible when someone has reached a degree of enlightenment. It makes sense that nature would have a kind of safeguard requiring wisdom to access power. But I do not think that these powers are necessary at all or even natural by-products of full awakening. I see them as a separate line of development that is more or less a choice to develop further, although I'm sure some powers do spontaneously emerge in cultivators. In other words, going to school to become an exquisite chef is only possible if you have access to the finances to do so. But having access to the finances does not mean you will even go to school let alone become an exquisite chef. So it is not logical to assume that if someone cannot cook they do not have access to wealth. In this way I think it's very inaccurate to assume that all awakened teachers have the kind of powers being discussed here. I want to say though, that this thread and the John Chang Video thread are fascinating and giving me a lot of food for thought. My previous comments may have come off too dismissive or harshly. I do think there is a value in cultivating powers. At the very least I think witnessing/co-creating events that show us without a doubt the reality that we are all just part of a larger pattern of energy must have a powerful effect on one's consciousness --- could turn many more people to the Tao and skyrocket the bhakti of those already on the path. Sean

Hehhe... I started this thread and then totally didn't get involved. Really enjoyed everyones thoughts so far though. Just to clarify the post title, I didn't intend it to mean was Jesus literally a Taoist, although that is an interesting thought, I more meant to ask, was Jesus' teachings more resonant with the philosophy of Taoism as we understand it today then with the religion called Christianity built out of his teachings? Re: petitioning a higher power. IME this is an invaluable practice and the only way to tap into lineage energy on your own IMO ... surrender into it's stream. In a way it's just letting go of resisting the Truth if that's easier to swallow. The Buddhists call it tariki, "other power", as contrasted with jiriki, "self power". In Christian terms I think it's a distinction between grace and will. Please do. I'm particularly interested in hearing which translation(s) you recommend. I am about to pick up Henry Wei's The Authentic I-Ching (mostly because someone told me it touches on the Taiji tu diagram which I've been studying for awhile now, and I buy anything that talks about it ) Sean

Later y'all. I just picked up a sheet of clean acid and a plane ticket to India. I just hope I'm not too late. (Thanks Lezlie). thWEFvUeTPg

Oh wait, you posted this before didn't you? .... Well what a way to start your day! His smile is contagious. How about the Drum & Bass version V1zTT9dUxJU