Alchemy and Emptiness

[sean]

Ian made a really interesting comment recently in the Emptiness and the conditions for awakening thread.

The fascinating thing is that Sifu Yap used to teach his students to use a mantra, inside a lower body space, not the tan tien, but behind the bladder, I forget the name.

 

BUT he changed to just feeling the arse on the chair, because the mantra, iho, is further away from emptiness in that it requires mind, where feeling doesn't.

This is something I am really trying to work through myself right now, and also a fascinating topic IMO. There are so many approaches to cultivating emptiness (jhana, samadhi, flow). And so many theories about what emptiness is and how it fits into a path of cultivation it can be mind numbing.

 

 

For the sake of clarity, I'll distinguish at least gross, subtle, empty (often called "causal"), and nondual dimensions of reality (these can also be thought of as bodies as well). If you look at the hierarchy you can imagine that there are these two, broad, primal impulses, one "upward" toward emptiness and transcendence (Eros) and the other "downward" toward gross incarnation and immersion (Agape). In traditions that emphasize transcendence, there is often the belief that one must navigate formless states beyond awareness of the senses, the jhanas for example, in order to truly transform one's false identification with body-as-Self. In extremes this can lead to neglect and even mortification of the body, severe asceticism, etc. In the more immersive traditions, it's felt that "this is it", the body, and life, and family and the marketplace are where we grow. Practices that honor manifestation, life, celebration, movement and love are engaged. In extremes this can lead to chaos, getting lost, addiction, hedonism, etc.

 

So it seems like there are these two impulses going in completely different directions. One is "upward" toward stillness, peace, freedom and sees the "downward" impulse as "lower"; a bunch of pagans and a cult of chaos. The other is "downward" toward love, light and movement and sees the "upward" impulse as escapist, delusionary and even a cult of death. What's going on here?

 

Well first, I think the reality is that, nowadays, it's much more complex than simply Eros vs. Agape. Today there is so much cross-fertilization between traditions occuring, and access to the best insights in each. So IMO it may be more accurate to say that, in modern times, the various methods and schools are each sophisticated attempts at different types of alchemical operations that move and blend up and down, around and through the dimensions in different ways and with different emphasis.

 

Let me paint some examples with really broad strokes.

 

I see Michael Winn's emphasis as remaining rooted in the gross while using gross and subtle movements designed to open up to emptiness. To "bring down emptiness". This influx of emptiness is appreciated for it's ability to act as a faciliator for subtle and gross evolution.

 

Bodri, Jhananda and to an extent Theravadan Buddhism and Esoteric Christianity in general, seem to place the utmost priority on techniques that quickly bring one's awareness into the deep, empty states detached from gross and subtle. It's believed that prolonged awareness of emptiness without form not only automatically completes the subtle work, but that it's the only non-imaginary way to do the work. Further, gross and subtle body work is thought to possess little if any power to cultivate any sort of spiritual transformation when done without a foundation of emptiness.

 

Yogani's Advanced Yoga Practices also teaches emptiness through stillness meditation as the essential foundation for spiritual transformation. Subtle body (pranayama), and gross body (asana) are also included as methods of safely accelerating and embodying the process. The litmus test for progress is always "ordinary life" off the cushion.

 

Considering CST as a path for a moment, it strongly emphasizes the gross body as the most clearly measurable ground where transformation occurs. Subtle, empty and nondual realms are seen as speculation distinct from what is externally measurable in the physical world and are almost entirely cut out of the "official" conversation. Refining gross body movement, nutrition, and community are seen as suitable ways to open emptiness (flow) into one's life.

 

The neo-Advaitans, ie: Adyashanti, Gangaji, Eckhart Tolle to some extent, and many others, their emphasis is strongly on the nondual. Even emptiness (samadhi) is seen as just another state, no fundamentally different than anger or laughter. Here the idea that any sort of practice is needed at all is even seen as subtly reinforcing the false notion that you are separate from the truth and need to do anything to get somewhere else. "What does not change even when samadhi arises and passes" is pointed to again and again. The concerns of gross and subtle body are dealt with only briefly as springboards for surrendering completely, in the moment, to nonduality that is always fully present.

 

As a diehard syncretic Tao Bum, I say all these ways are right to some degree. No one is smart enough to always be wrong. "The Way" can't be systemized and our evolution thrives on experimentation and dialogue between perspectives. It's really a blessing to live in a time when we have access to so many.

 

From here there are finer subtleties, more detailed brushwork, like the one Ian touched on between using mantra to enter emptiness vs. areas of the body itself.

 

My experience is that mantra is a much easier entrance to tasting deep, formless emptiness. Through my daily mantra meditations, emptiness has spilled into my life in a global way.

 

Then, from my brief experimentations so far with opening LTT into emptiness, I find that it's much more challenging to navigate regions of the body into a state of emptiness. And I also sense that there is a different kind of power here. Targeting a specific region, say the LTT, probably leads to more acute transformation in that region.

 

Would always keeping all of our meditations body-centered prevent a fuller depth of emptiness from penetrating our cultivation?

 

This relates to what I found myself arguing with Scott Sonnon about, and also to many of the long, basically zazen only vs. chi kung threads on HT. Can movement meditation as one's only meditation really open one to spiritually transformative depths of emptiness? I seriously doubt it. But maybe this is a new experiment, a new form of alchemy that will lead to it's own wisdom tradition. Every path has it's strengths and unique hurdles anyway (although some more severe than others). While my suspicion is that a big hurdle in movement-only meditation will be in truly tasting emptiness distinct from exercises and the endorphin release. Is this fundamentally different than advanced Buddhist meditators gradually misidentifying zazen as the true source of their flow? Not sure. Every path has it's limitations and it's dark night I suppose.

 

Would keeping all of our meditations formless prevent a deeper integration of emptiness into our bodies and into our lives?.

 

Yes. I believe so. But then waitaminute! What is formless meditation? Is it even possible? Is body-centered vs. formless even a legitimate distinction?

 

From a third person, exterior perspective we are human beings inhabiting gross bodies. Any experience we have that can be remembered, interpreted or described, is, not entirely "out of body", not really formless and not actually empty. Navigating the jhanas all probably shows up in our brain waves for example.

 

This is likely why mysticism remains an esoteric science. An inner, secret science that can't be proved externally, only validated internally. Have an experience of God and strict materialists will find the area of your brain that lights up and tell you this is the cause. Hmmm, alright, so is the cause of my perceiving the scientist that conducts this study also the area of my brain that lights up when I see him?

 

The grin of irony on the mystic philosopher though is that 3rd person, exterior perspectives always occur in the imagination of a 1st person perspective. And the deeper grin on the enlightened mystic is the realization that 1st person perspective is the imagination of One Awareness.

 

Yet still, no matter how deeply I personally realize the truth of my Identity-as-Empty-Awareness, I am stuck having to interpret this absolute awareness through the filter of how myself as a single, conditioned human being, experiences "it" in an apparently separate, physiological body and worse, I am left to describe it through the filters of a personality and an intrinsicly dualistic language.

 

Sean, I have no meditation experience but I am a reasonably intelligent person. What is this emptiness you are talking about?

 

Oh, that is easy! It's an opening. But it's not an it. Or an opening. Uhhh... It feels like returning home. But a home I never left. Yup. My mind becomes clear and pure. But even when it's not. Dammit. It's space! Yes. It's space. And also what is in the space. grrr. It's a container with no container! FUCKIT! *hanging head* I'm sorry buddy, I can't help but sound like a fool.

 

GARggghh...

 

From our first person perspective when we try to take a third person perspective on our own phenomena and then attempt to communicate it, our emptiness doesn't sound very empty. Because, on the gross level, we can only be transformed by emptiness, we can never "attain" emptiness. There is nothing to attain. Form is Emptiness. It's space. And also what is in the space. So obvious it's ignored. IMO, skillful means involves baptizing our gross selves again and again and again and again and again in this everpresent obviousness until "it" becomes our center of gravity. The irony being that, ultimately, it always was. No other center of gravity was ever possible, even for a single instant.

 

Form is Emptiness. Emptiness is Form.

---The Heart Sutra

 

In shikantaza my mind is given complete freedom to wander. It flits and glides from object to object to object. Eventually, even through this flitting and gliding, my non-seeking, non-grasping attitude becomes a portal to emptiness.

 

In mantra, before I know it, my mind leaves the mantra and clings to a dark cloud below my heart. I don't resist the clinging to return stubbornly to the mantra, I allow the clinging while I return my focus to my mantra. The dark cloud opens up.

 

In LTT meditation, my mind wanders around the feelings of my belly, pierces into my gut, hangs out at my lower back for a few minutes. Then I get lost in thought for a moment. I notice. I allow the thoughts to be. And I return my awareness to my LTT. The thoughts are brought into and dissolved in the emptiness opening up.

 

Emptiness happens in spite of my chosen focus or lack of focus. It's mysterious. And it dissolves hard distinctions between my chosen entry point. Regardless of my focus, my most pressing "irrelevant" material is going to come up and distract me from it. And this pressing material will be allowed and included in the return to my chosen focus, subtly being transformed in the process, or it will continue to show up in different forms, distracting me from further depth. I think this is really what Bodri is getting at when he says that shooting for emptiness takes care of all the alchemy. Because my own personal shit is going to come up in this process, and so genuine alchemy has to occur in order for your emptiness to progress.

 

If a fool would persist in his folly, he would become wise.

--- William Blake

 

Is our choice of meditative focus then completely arbitrary? The question is a meditation on skillfull means.

 

From a nondual perspective, awareness does not belong to our little selves. Everything we perceive is seen by One Eye. So what even really decides what we focus on through our life? In my view there is clearly an element of Grace involved in enlightenment. Enlightenment is not the result of anything. Enlightenment is not caused. If it were caused it would be something the little self can achieve and earn. Just another notch off our to do lists.

 

But a thermostat is still said to control the temperature of a room even if it's a mysterious hand that moves the dial. While it's clear from a study of metaphysics (and even neuroscience) that ego is no "prime mover", we are still left no choice but to choose, and to do our best to choose wisely.

 

And so I believe that making distinctions between various "entrances" to emptiness is important. And interesting. And I'm curious how each differs, however subtly. For instance, what kinds of temperaments are suited more for practices that emphasize certain types of focus, certain types of movement or stillness and ill suited for others. Which kinds of practices might be more suited for beginners, intermediate, and advanced students in general. What kinds of entrances are better suited for feminine or masculine essenced students?

 

Lot's of questions. Questions about questions. On and on.

 

In my own practice I've been exploring three entry points to emptiness lately. The intention in the first angle is to open up an area I am stuck on. It is essentially identical to Eugene Gendlin's Focusing method where one holds the felt sense of an entire problem gently without attempting to let go of it prematurely, or to get lost inside of it. Just hold the whole sense of it and open up into emptiness through it. The problem can be something that comes up in my daily life, an angry or fearful reaction to a co-worker say, or it could be physical, a knot in my neck during a forward bend. The second angle I am working with is basically samyama, and I think of it as baptism in emptiness. The practice is to hold a positive quality I believe is worth manifesting (much like a problem is held in Focusing), and "take it into" emptiness so that my desire is "blessed by emptiness" and becomes a vibration in my being I imagine to be resonating with the universe. The third angle is a meditation that's hard to describe, but it's probably just your basic zazen in which either (or neither) of the first two angles can arise spontaneously, while I place my emphasis a bit more on "just dropping".

 

 

Sean

[mbanu]

Nice picture. I used an anology like that once before when trying to explain the difference between Daoist and Buddhist enlightenment. Daoist enlightenment would be the void in the center, and Buddhist enlightenment the void around the perimeter. The picture I used has a reversed spectrum though. Daoism is a pretty gross path to enlightenment, what with the drunkards and assholes and immortals and all.

Edited April 19, 2006 by mbanu

[RedFox]

Sean,

 

I'm still trying to digest this to see if I can add anything truly meaningful. I may only be able to add questions...

 

For the sake of clarity, I'll distinguish at least gross, subtle, empty (often called "causal"), and nondual dimensions of reality (these can also be thought of as bodies as well). If you look at the hierarchy you can imagine that there are these two, broad, primal impulses, one "upward" toward emptiness and transcendence (Eros) and the other "downward" toward gross incarnation and immersion (Agape). In traditions that emphasize transcendence, there is often the belief that one must navigate formless states beyond awareness of the senses, the jhanas for example, in order to truly transform one's false identification with body-as-Self. In extremes this can lead to neglect and even mortification of the body, severe asceticism, etc. In the more immersive traditions, it's felt that "this is it", the body, and life, and family and the marketplace are where we grow. Practices that honor manifestation, life, celebration, movement and love are engaged. In extremes this can lead to chaos, getting lost, addiction, hedonism, etc.

 

Did you happen to look at the link that Winn posted on his board the other day? Division Theory

 

I'm not sure I buy all of it yet, but what it did do was get me thinking somewhere along the lines you mentioned of eros and agape, where they're heading in seemingly opposite directions and why that might be. If Novak's right, perhaps the two directions are a manifestion (symptom?) of the two halves in some sort of dynamic tension. One needs the upward movement to develop itself, but the other, the downward. Or maybe rather than develop, i should say 'express'. A tendency towards one or the other may be an imbalance or dominance of one somewhere in the system.

 

I don't have a clear idea where that fits into the gross/subtle/empty/nondual yet (would the correlation be jing/chi/shen/wuji?). Or exactly where I fit, for that matter. I have a feeling that all these paths seem to have a piece of the truth. They all do seem to get some kind of desirable result ('desirable' depending on your personal goals of course). But maybe its true what Winn talks about, that they don't all lead to the same experience. I wonder if the pursuit of one path over another is reflective of our goals and desires for a certain kind of spiritual experience. Or.. if it reflects a striving of the individual to look for a specific experience to balance out some other aspect of their personality? Don't know.

 

My experience is only currently telling me that focusing back on the gross layer seems to be making the other aspects clearer to me. I don't know if that means, generally, that you have to start with the gross (ala Winn), or if its specific to me, doing that is beginning to correct some sort of pre-existing imbalance?

 

 

Good thread.

[Trunk]

A few scattered notes:

 

For the sake of clarity, I'll distinguish at least gross, subtle, empty (often called "causal"), and nondual dimensions of reality

I'd say that empty is non-dual; non-duality is the defining (non)quality of emptiness. That feel of "I'm in here, and all that is out there" - when that is gone, that's non-duality (the disolution of the subjective/objective split). And its empty, because all the energetic and mental confusion that we usually feel as that split, that we are so comfortable in feeling, is gone: empty.

 

two, broad, primal impulses, one "upward" toward emptiness and transcendence (Eros) and the other "downward" toward gross incarnation and immersion (Agape).

Mistake to identify emptiness as "up". There is up and down, I agree, but emptiness is inclusive. "God is in heaven and earth".

 

Part of the confusion, here, is a missing piece - and some historical traditional trends. I think we agree that there is confused dualism, "apparently seperate individuality". There is also "integral manifestation", "integral individuality", and (imo) its what the Tibetans refer to as the "diamond body" and the Taoists as "immortality".

 

A teacher that I sat with once said that there have been spiritual fashions.. That it used to be fashionable to be Totally Absorbed and phhht, you were gone. Totally sucked up into Eternity. And that, more recently, its become more fashionable to become Enlightened yet still stay manifest and integral. That further work could be done. He used the phrase once, "a bowl strong enough to hold the Tiger's Milk". The thing is, when you start being exposed to really powerful states of consciousness, there's a powerful draw, you get absorbed and disolved. There's a skill of entering into such states and becoming purified, and yet fostering coherency - not being utterly dispersed. Being able to "maintain your center". And that has a lot to do with how the center is the unification of concentration (manifestation) and openness (emptiness, non-dual).

 

Then, from my brief experimentations so far with opening LTT into emptiness, I find that it's much more challenging to navigate regions of the body into a state of emptiness. And I also sense that there is a different kind of power here. Targeting a specific region, say the LTT, probably leads to more acute transformation in that region.

Agreed. The LTT is especially challenging; the upper centers are easier. The Taoists emphasize the LTT because it is so difficult, and imbalances can occur if the upper centers get really enlightened and the lower center hasn't yet developed any integration with .. non-duality.

 

And so I believe that making distinctions between various "entrances" to emptiness is important. And interesting. And I'm curious how each differs, however subtly. For instance, what kinds of temperaments are suited more for practices that emphasize certain types of focus, certain types of movement or stillness and ill suited for others. Which kinds of practices might be more suited for beginners, intermediate, and advanced students in general. What kinds of entrances are better suited for feminine or masculine essenced students?

Yup. Agreed. And this is the topic area that we are pressed up against, as a group. And I think it'll take a considerable amount of time before we get thorough answers on it.

 

Trunk

[cloud recluse]

.... Daoism is a pretty gross path to enlightenment, what with the drunkards and assholes and immortals and all.

Isnt that its strength

[sean]

I'd say that empty is non-dual; non-duality is the defining (non)quality of emptiness. That feel of "I'm in here, and all that is out there" - when that is gone, that's non-duality (the disolution of the subjective/objective split). And its empty, because all the energetic and mental confusion that we usually feel as that split, that we are so comfortable in feeling, is gone: empty.

 

Mistake to identify emptiness as "up". There is up and down, I agree, but emptiness is inclusive. "God is in heaven and earth".

I only got a minute here, but I wanted to say that if you look at the image, in my view "up" and "in" are interchangeable. "Up" and/or "In" is the mystic/transcendent, looking for what is Absolute, Unchanging, Still. The "Down" and/or "Out" is the impulse for expression, dancing, love, relationships, business, etc. The nondual is the unspeakable way in which these are not separate. Maybe it's both the bindu seed at the core of emptiness and all of samsara and neither at once. The reason I like the distinction between empty and nondual (and find it crucial even) is to make an important distinction between, let's say, a linear "let's get the fuck out of this horrible mess" hinayana cosmology vs. a living, breathing nondual Tantric one. What do you think? I'm still feeling into a cosmology I resonate with (obviously).

 

More later. Back to work.

 

 

Sean

[Cameron]

I have such a small and superficial understanding but it seems like the awakeness, presence, compassion and love that arises from emptiness is almost as important or even more important than the emptiness.

 

I don't know that emptiness is the goal but through emptiness I think we can realize our true nature. I don't know that concepts like empty or full, yin or yang can adequatly decribe it.

 

I think the zen tradition has a wonderful way of poking fun at concepts and putting them on there head so you see everything in a different way. Then when you see everything in a different way you see how you had essentially created THAT WHICH IS with concepts rather seeing with clarity.

 

I think zazen/emptiness meditation is essential since it gives you time to experience this. If you don't do it, you probably won't ever see it. Or maybe you can see it, but you won't go deeper into it. To me zazen is just the activity of sitting down and looking into your mind directly. I mean, maybe if you are sitting with an enlightened teacher you can sort of catch the vibe and wake up but 1. How many really enlightened people are around 2. What do you do if you wake up to your true natre.

 

The way I see it you wake up you still do zazen. If your sitting zazen for a few minutes or hours a day that is the amount of time you are actualizing Buddha Nature. Even if you don't realize it, by doing it and living it and practicing you are actualizing buddha nature and it will eventually manifest in your other life activities.

 

Definetly days that I do zazen and dont' do zazen there is a change in the quality of my awareness. In zen terms sitting zazen devleops Joriki. this is a kind of mind power that is essential to waking up. If you dont' develop joriki you can still wake up but chances are that it will be harder to really live with what has been experiences.

 

I am more than open to adveta teachers who may or may not have a different view but still not sure what there life would focus on. Ultimatly, to a Buddha, everything is enlightened activity but zazen sort of gets the ball rolling in that direction I doubt many of us will get anywhere without it.

[freeform]

.

Edited December 18, 2019 by freeform

[Ian]

Would always keeping all of our meditations body-centered prevent a fuller depth of emptiness from penetrating our cultivation?

 

Would keeping all of our meditations formless prevent a deeper integration of emptiness into our bodies and into our lives?.

 

Very well put. Yes to both, I reckon.

 

I certainly notice that I struggle, in body-centred meditation, to get anything like the depth which it sounds like others achieve in formless practices. And I am prepared that it's a long slow path.

 

The progression, as I understand it, is that you can first feel the physical body, then the sensation within it, then a unification of that sensation such that you wouldn't have any awareness of indivdual body areas, (this may become a sorta visual thing) then the stillness between the sensation and then you're more or less home.

 

(Give or take a few tens of thousands of hours of letting all the knots of karma disperse without reacting to them.)

 

I've read quite a few stories of people who develop extraordinary mental powers and then have to try to apply them to the body afterwards. And I get the impression, though I'm way out of my depth here, that it is quite challenging, in that it involves in at least one sense a bit of a reversal of their previous practice. I know at least one "achieved" buddhist who is now studying alchemy. Nice problem to have, tho.

 

What keeps me on the slower and, to me, harder path, is Sifu's insistence that the body, quite literally, IS your karma. What you don't deal with in the body you will face in life.

 

 

Emptiness happens in spite of my chosen focus or lack of focus.

Is our choice of meditative focus then completely arbitrary? The question is a meditation on skillfull means.

 

I think where you need to get to, for it to really start working, is the same state for all. Which simply requires any practice where you will do it long enough to give up trying and let it happen., however long or not long that be.

 

Does that make sense?

[Trunk]

.. if you look at the image, in my view "up" and "in" are interchangeable. "Up" and/or "In" is the mystic/transcendent, looking for what is Absolute, Unchanging, Still. The "Down" and/or "Out" is the impulse for expression, dancing, love, relationships, business, etc.

Whatever description works for you.. For me, the image relates to my body and - as such - really lies upon a horizontal plane. "Up=in" and "down=out" creates some confusion for me, as I'm relating it more to my upright body (with your image also as a prompt). Maybe I'm stuck on relating "up" to the heavenly lift and "down" the earthly gravity, but it seems more descriptive.

 

 

The reason I like the distinction between empty and nondual (and find it crucial even) is to make an important distinction between, let's say, a linear "let's get the fuck out of this horrible mess" hinayana cosmology vs. a living, breathing nondual Tantric one. What do you think?

I can see where you're addressing some different traditional approaches. Or, perhaps more accurately, phases of development. Maybe in the beginning we need to stay really still in order to sustain emptiness (as you'd put it). But at a much more advanced level we can "play in the fields" and still sustain emptiness (non-duality, as you'd put it).

 

To me, the words are talking about the same non-thingness-Big-Spaciousness, but I get where you're coming from.

 

yap, yap, yap.

 

Trunk

[cloud recluse]

...The reason I like the distinction between empty and nondual (and find it crucial even) is to make an important distinction between, let's say, a linear "let's get the fuck out of this horrible mess" hinayana cosmology vs. a living, breathing nondual Tantric one.

 

Isnt there a Zen term ,"Dead Void Heretic",for someone who clings to Emptiness,setting up Form as an antagonist to Emptiness,& so refuses the final release into the nondual ?(I like the idea that the only real "refuge" is to plunge back into it all without looking for some final immunity). Im sure Ive come across it,but cannot place it.Any ideas anyone ? Id love to find a "scriptural" reference. Regards,Cloud.

[Trunk]

Here's another angle on words that seems useful to me (made it up this morning), and relevant to this thread (maybe) :

A tan tien is a functional interplay of substance, space, and Light.

[sean]

Nice picture. I used an anology like that once before when trying to explain the difference between Daoist and Buddhist enlightenment. Daoist enlightenment would be the void in the center, and Buddhist enlightenment the void around the perimeter.

Thanks. And nice metaphor, I've been thinking about that. It kind of helps bridge both what Winn is talking about when he says emptiness is the center of the hub, or the root of our being, and what the Buddhists are talking about when they say that emptiness is the metaphysical quality of form.

 

Did you happen to look at the link that Winn posted on his board the other day? Division Theory

Thanks for the link. I haven't checked it out yet but I saw Winn's posts about it.

 

I don't know that emptiness is the goal but through emptiness I think we can realize our true nature. I don't know that concepts like empty or full, yin or yang can adequatly decribe it.

I love this description!

 

wow wow wow! That's an amazing post, Sean. It's a very thorough look into the tools-of-the-minute that many of us are using. I'm one of those people that tries to get the candle burning on both ends... so I do body-awareness stillness meditation along with all kinds of rmax-related movement, some qi gong and some NLP/EFT or other quite 'mental' techniques.

 

I think your excellent diagram would look even better as an animated pulsating thing

...

And below is a picture that he uses to demonstrate the different ways of existing in the world... I know you're a fan of diagrams, and I think this one fits in with the topic.

Thanks freeform! I am a candle burning at both ends kind of guy myself. As long as we are not pulling yourself in opposing directions countereffectively, why not include as much useful technology in our Yoga as possible? Seems like what being a Tao Bum is all about.

 

Great idea with the pulsing version of my diagram:

http://www.thetaobums.com/images/emptysubtlegrossnondual.swf

 

And thanks for the link/diagram on the MythoSelf, I think I've heard you mention that before, I'll have to check that out, your recommendations have always proved fruitful.

 

What keeps me on the slower and, to me, harder path, is Sifu's insistence that the body, quite literally, IS your karma. What you don't deal with in the body you will face in life.

Fascinating perspective. Makes perfect sense. It's like Candace Pert's quote, "Your body is your Unconscious Mind."

 

For me, the image relates to my body and - as such - really lies upon a horizontal plane. "Up=in" and "down=out" creates some confusion for me, as I'm relating it more to my upright body (with your image also as a prompt).

What if you imagine that this is a map of, let's say, the LTT ... gross is your outside structure, muscle, inward to fascia, then opening into the subtle body and how it intersects with the gross (more commonly felt internally than on the surface of our skin), then emptiness (often felt more "concentrated" toward the center of the LTT), then the bindu of nonduality often felt to be at the center but then also everywhere. In a sit with Mark G. once, he said something about this bindu that struck me profoundly. He described it as a purple droplet at the center of emptiness that is so infinitely small and also is the whole manifest universe. The next day in meditation at acupuncture I had an undescribable experience with this bindu that I could futiley try to write about the whole rest of my life and get nowhere ... and also I know that it wasn't even a taste of it ... like the equivalent of looking at a candle that is half a mile away with sunglasses on.

 

Maybe in the beginning we need to stay really still in order to sustain emptiness (as you'd put it). But at a much more advanced level we can "play in the fields" and still sustain emptiness (non-duality, as you'd put it).

This seems logical to me. I think if time is not an obstacle, one can do both, but if you only have 30 minutes a day, start with a more formless emptiness meditation until a taste is gotten, then add/blend in still body meditations, then movement.

 

A tan tien is a functional interplay of substance, space, and Light.

!! Beautiful!

 

Isnt there a Zen term ,"Dead Void Heretic",for someone who clings to Emptiness,setting up Form as an antagonist to Emptiness,& so refuses the final release into the nondual ?

Never heard this, but I dig that term and have promptly given myself permission to use it.

 

 

Sean