The Significance of Free Will in Spirituality and How It Relates to Popular Ideas of No Agent

[Brian]

Interesting. Who said that?

 

Well, personally, the mentality of spirituality is to not take anything as fact unless it is supported by personal experience. And even then, contemplate it endlessly. My personal experience does not yet encompass wisdom of quantum mechanics, so I cannot speak on it, or know where to place the piece into reality's puzzle.

 

I'll tell you this though, the study of life through external means would get you a fraction of results that inner realization can, and has by present and past mystics. (Although I love science's contribution, and is definitely an important piece to our life). My personal advice still, don't attach to external information while it still evolves to full comprehension. Nice post nonetheless. However I can't do anything with it. It is just brain-talk, and gives no wisdom, which actually has potential in solidifying ignorance.

 

 

Curious response, I think.

 

As I read it, you are saying that you aren't aware of the significance of quantum theory within/upon your personal experience and you therefore fully discount it as vapid "brain-talk" -- void of "wisdom," likely ignorance-causing, and beneath your evolution of spiritual mentality?

 

Fascinating. Do you take this approach whenever you encounter something new?

 

There is more in heaven and earth, my friend, than is dreamt of in your philosophy. I would encourage you to study all of life.

[C T]

What is important is one's ability to sense energy flows because the world is real.

Why is this important, and how does this relate to Wu Wei?

[silas]

>>Why is this important, and how does this relate to Wu Wei?

 

One senses the Tao currents and so flows with them to be in harmony with the surrounding world.

 

Wu-wei is action without action, without attachment, so that the action is harmonious with one's inner nature and the outer world. To achieve wu-wei, one must sense the energy flows in the surrounding environment. To sense the energy flows, one must still desires (although one must have to desires to recognize the manifestations of Tao). To still desires, one enters a meditative state. Hence, wu-wei is a meditative state, wherein one does without doing in harmony with nature.

[et-thoughts]

I have always struggled with the idea that if there is no-self there is no free will, which seems like the most logical conclusion. And often you will encounter teachings that say, "there is no one, and therefore was no one to choose in the first place." Ideas such as, "there is just things happening with no one there," are abundant.

 

But in direct experience it is not like this. The less you identify with a self, the stronger your sense of choice is. Why? Because when you believe you are something, such as the body or the mind, you are constantly reacting as that object you identify with. For instance, patterns build up around a mental personal identity and form a personality. When you are engrossed in a personality, an idea of a self stuck to these thought patterns, or in attachment to the body, actions don't arise from a conscious choice, but a conditioned reaction.

 

So the purest way to express free will is when I am perfectly present, and without identification with any "thing" in experience as a self. How can any-"thing" in existence have any choices anyway? It will always be conditioned. But if I begin to see life in it's immediacy, seeing everything as they are, then the choice is true. You are creating a new situation that is not a reaction, but a creation.

 

Note: I'm not saying there is no-self or a Self or a background consciousness or whatever. I am speaking from what I perceive. And from what I perceive, acting with this sense of free will is much more rewarding than convincing yourself there is no free will and only scenery of life happening.

 

The self that binds itself to what be the truth becomes enslaved by the truth and while being enslaved to this master experiences the freedom offered by the truth ... where as the self that frees itself of what be the truth becomes enslaved by the deception of being free while ignoring the truth of being enslaved... personally I prefer the binding truth than the delusional freedom...

[Jetsun]

>>Why is this important, and how does this relate to Wu Wei?

 

One senses the Tao currents and so flows with them to be in harmony with the surrounding world.

 

Wu-wei is action without action, without attachment, so that the action is harmonious with one's inner nature and the outer world. To achieve wu-wei, one must sense the energy flows in the surrounding environment. To sense the energy flows, one must still desires (although one must have to desires to recognize the manifestations of Tao). To still desires, one enters a meditative state. Hence, wu-wei is a meditative state, wherein one does without doing in harmony with nature.

 

Maybe you don't need to sense energy flows at all, rather you just have to let go of the blocks to the flows so they go where they need to and harmonise themselves, so there is the action of natural harmonisation within you without you doing anything.

 

For example I have been doing a pure mind awareness exercise which appears to allow my body and mind to start to return to a greater state of harmony and balance, but I don't sense how it is done I just trust the Tao currents will do their thing if I get "me" and my story about myself out of the way.

[Jetsun]

'No-agent,' just means that there isn't any inherent (i.e. absolute, eternal, unchanging) agent seperate from the action or chain of events as it unfolds.

 

Suffering there certainly is, but no sufferer,

no doer, though certainly the deed is found.

peace is achieved, but no-one's appeased,

the way is walked, but no walker's to be found.

 

- Visuddhimagga* XVI, 90

 

*English title: Path Of Purification by Bhadantacariya Buddhagosa.

 

There may not be an eternal unchanging agent but there might be temporary fluid one. Just because a sufferer and a walker is not found it doesnt mean there isn't a sufferer or walker it just means you can't find them or define them.

[C T]

>>Why is this important, and how does this relate to Wu Wei?

 

One senses the Tao currents and so flows with them to be in harmony with the surrounding world.

 

Wu-wei is action without action, without attachment, so that the action is harmonious with one's inner nature and the outer world. To achieve wu-wei, one must sense the energy flows in the surrounding environment. To sense the energy flows, one must still desires (although one must have to desires to recognize the manifestations of Tao). To still desires, one enters a meditative state. Hence, wu-wei is a meditative state, wherein one does without doing in harmony with nature.

To achieve... To sense... To still...

 

TO conflict!! Such tall orders for anyone who seeks 'not doing'.

 

The pendulum does not 'to' anything without any external prompting. Even when prompted, its own nature will return it to stillness as the momentum wanes. When one reconnects to one's inner nature, that union alone will naturally return one to the remembrance of stillness, in time.

 

One can enter a thousand times states of meditation, only to find that when one comes out, all the desires are still actively desiring... then what? Most dont realize that when they 'do' meditation, what happens is that they are actually lending more momentum to the pendulum. Perhaps its good to explore letting meditation do 'me' instead.

[silas]

C T >> To achieve... To sense... To still... TO conflict!! Such tall orders for anyone who seeks 'not doing'.

 

Agreed, but for the purpose of explanation in words, an "active" answer seems to clarify better.

 

 

C T >> One can enter a thousand times states of meditation, only to find that when one comes out, all the desires are still actively desiring... then what?

 

Desiring is a problem only if one polarizes. Otherwise, desiring is necessary to perceive the manifestation of Tao, to navigate the real world.

 

From the TaoTeChing ch. 1 (D.C. Lau translation):

 

Hence always rid yourself of desires in order to observe its [Tao's] secrets;

But always allow yourself to have desires in order to observe its manifestations.

Edited August 3, 2012 by silas

[Simple_Jack]

There may not be an eternal unchanging agent but there might be temporary fluid one. Just because a sufferer and a walker is not found it doesnt mean there isn't a sufferer or walker it just means you can't find them or define them.

To expand on what was said:

 

Emptiness of the 5 skandhas does not negate the 5 skandhas. There is no seperate 'actor' from the action and none of these experiences can be grasped as I, me or mine. This implies that there isn't a seperate self/Self within or apart from the 5 skandhas. These being mistaken imputations on the experiences of the 5 skandhas.

 

A gatha from Ch'an master Tung-shan after seeing his reflection when crossing a stream:

 

Do not seek from others

They are far removed from me

Today I go on alone

Everywhere I meet him

Today he is me

Today I am not him

We must understand this way

Only then do we accord with Thusness

 

(Pg. 256 "Working Toward Enlightenment by Nan Huai Chin)

Edited August 4, 2012 by Simple_Jack

[Aaron]

I would think that the concept of Wu Wei would be the greatest argument against free will, in fact the state of Wu Wei is supposed to be one in which the practitioner responds to their environment without thought, moral judgement, or ideology, but rather as an intuitive response based on high virtue (Te). In this state Will doesn't exist, so one cannot really have free will or willpower, rather they only have an intuitive reaction towards their environment. Or maybe I'm missing something. This goes doubly for Buddhist thought, wherein one is supposed to realize that their is no self, hence no will to exert free will, it's just an illusion.

 

Aaron

[silas]

Aaron >>: I would think that the concept of Wu Wei would be the greatest argument against free will,

 

In classical Taoism, the self exists and is constituted from mystical Te. Wu-wei does not wipe out free will, but suggests an encumbered will, because one is subject to a range of influences from the outer world and the inner self, unconsciously. For example, you may lean (without realizing it) to walk one the left the of the street on a sunny day, even though you normally like to look in the windows of businesses which are on the right side. In the dark, you may keep a $20 bill you find, even though during the day, you would leave it on the street, because many people in the dark are more likely to be less ethical.

 

Aaron >>: This goes doubly for Buddhist thought, wherein one is supposed to realize that their is no self, hence no will to exert free will, it's just an illusion.

 

To a classical Taoist, the world is real and so is the self.

 

Like a high wind that never ceases.

The multitude all have a purpose.

I alone am foolish and uncouth.

I alone am different from others

And value being fed by the mother.

 

Tao Te Ching ch. 20, D.C. Lau.

 

Once, when Chuang Tzu was fishing in the P'u River, the king of Ch'u sent two officials to go and announce to him: "I would like to trouble you with the administration of my realm."

 

Chuang Tzu held on to the fishing pole and, without turning his head, said, "I have heard that there is a sacred tortoise in Ch'u that has been dead for three thousand years. The king keeps it wrapped in cloth and boxed, and stores it in the ancestral temple. Now would this tortoise rather be dead and have its bones left behind and honored? Or would it rather be alive and dragging its tail in the mud?"

 

"It would rather be alive and dragging its tail in the mud," said the two officials.

 

Chuang Tzu said, "Go away! I'll drag my tail in the mud!"

 

Chuang Tzu, ch. 17, Burton Watson

Edited August 5, 2012 by silas

[Simple_Jack]

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Edited August 5, 2012 by Simple_Jack

[Simple_Jack]

 

Aaron >>: This goes doubly for Buddhist thought, wherein one is supposed to realize that their is no self, hence no will to exert free will, it's just an illusion.

What it actually means is that our conditioned responses to the objective world; volition/impulses predicated upon our samskaras, stemming from self-grasping, which gives rise to the three root poisons of craving, aggression, delusion: Can be changed and new seeds planted that lead to the extinction of afflictive modes, stemming from these three root affictive patterns.

 

The notion of 'free will ' only applies from a theistic outlook. From the POV of dependent origination: It's a moot point, since phenomena arise and dissolve according to causes and conditions.

[et-thoughts]

What it actually means is .... phenomena arise and dissolve according to causes and conditions.

 

There are all sort of seeds within and which ones one chooses to cultivate and feed determine what will grow... and what will remain as a possibility. Infinite causes and conditions in the moment become manifested in a singular way. Choose wisely