Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 7: Like Space.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

In this post, I'm a bit past the half-way point of my first Zen retreat, a week-long sit in 1988. Earlier posts have detailed my initial struggles with formal sitting and self-inquiry, as well as the daily interviews (koan or kong-an practice) with Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS), aka Dae Soen Sa Nim.

Four or five days had gone by, filled with endless hours on the cushion, bringing up the great question, looking for the true nature of my self and this moment. Over and over, answers would appear in my mind. Then another thought would appear, recognizing my answer as an idea, as just thinking. The cycle had repeated itself -- I can only estimate -- approximately a billion times. Still at square one. I hadn't advanced a millimeter, hadn't made a dent in "What am I?"

I'd gotten nothing but exhausted on every level. Even the thoughts themselves seemed tired, not passing in a blur, but kind of limping by on crutches. At least that made it easier to see each thought for what it was. Like watching a magic trick in slow motion: after a while, it's no longer amazing, it's just some guy pulling a Nerf ball from his sleeve.

I'd been tangled up in my efforts to crack the great mystery of existence. At this particular point, I started to get a little perspective. I felt like I was watching these physical and mental struggles... as if I were in a movie theater, and thoughts (feelings, perceptions, sensations, everything) were flickering lights on the screen.

This witnessing perspective wasn't so new or unusual. It was just that the first part of the retreat had been so challenging that I'd been enmeshed in my efforts for days, unable to simply observe till now. It was a bit of a relief.

Then, I dunno, something shifted. Hey, it wasn't that I was watching flickering lights on a movie screen. Holy Shit! EVERYTHING was like flickering lights, INCLUDING that thing called "I"! Jesus Tap-Dancing Christ! For so so long, that "I" had seemed so so solid. But it was a thought, appearing and disappearing, just like the rest of them.

Suddenly, all pain and fatigue disappeared. There was no problem; there wasn't even the possibility of problems. There wasn't anything solid to which a problem could adhere. This wasn't fuzzy like drug-induced euphoria. What did ZMSS always say? Don't Know is "clear like space." Of course! What's space like? It's empty; it's like... nothing at all.

The rest of the sitting session passed by seamlessly, with all thoughts, all things, just appearing and disappearing. Except that now and then, a thought would appear that was a bit stickier than the rest, a thought that started to gain weight, and threaten to become substantial. Thoughts like, "Will this last forever? Is this that Spiritual Enlightenment I've heard about?" But each time, within a second or two, it became clear that this too was just insubstantial thinking. Self, no-self, enlightenment, no-enlightenment, temporary, permanent... all just thoughts, coming and going, by natural process.

The sitting session ended, time for an hour-long break before dinner. What to do? I left the house, and walked towards the U.C. Berkeley campus a block away, curious about what the world would be like. It felt as if for my whole life, I'd been walking into a stiff wind, fighting resistance with each step. The wind had been so constant that I didn't even notice it. And now, my body had somehow become porous, transparent, empty or something, so the wind could pass right through it. There was no more resistance, everything was effortless.

The northern border of campus was a busy street without a traffic light. I'd crossed it here hundreds of times. Often it wasn't reasonable to wait till there was no traffic, so I'd make an automatic calculation of how far away the cars were and how fast they were going, and attempt to walk across safely.

Walking across the street was the same this time... except wait, there was something missing. Typically, as I crossed, there'd be a little voice in my head, saying something like, "What if I misjudged? Maybe I'm wrong; maybe I'll get run over. Damn, that'd make me feel stupid!" Maybe that voice was what ZMSS had called "checking."

I hadn't noticed my checking so much all those other times. Now, though, its absence was evident. Of course I was trying to avoid getting killed, but there was a limit to what I could know for sure. My job was to do my best to cross correctly, step by step. Beyond that... hell, that was all! I had to laugh.

I hadn't walked 50 feet into the campus when I saw a young woman approaching me. There was something about her body language, or maybe it was the stack of pamphlets she was carrying, that made me suspect she was a Jesus Person. Y'know, one of those folks who stop you on the street and try to get you to accept Christ and save your soul. I'd always been a magnet for them. This should be interesting.

In upcoming entries, I'll tell an amusing story about getting proselytized, and then describe how I finished the final days of retreat, got some key direction from ZMSS, and tried to digest it all. Kindly bear with me; just a couple few more of these blogs and I think I can bring this long and tiresome story to a close.

Zen Master Blog

Zen Master Bon Soeng (Jeff Kitzes) is our Abbott and Guiding Teacher at Empty Gate Zen Center. I've just added a link (see the link section on the right of this page) to his new blog on the Zen Center site. There are a couple of entries so far, and last week he told me he intends to start out posting at least once a month, and maybe increase it from there.

ZMBS/Jeff is a teacher in the Kwan Um School of Zen, having received transmission (i.e., was acknowledged as a Zen Master) by Zen Master Seung Sahn (aka Dae Soen Sa Nim) in 2001. He carries on the tradion that ZM Seung Sahn brought to the West from Korea, including formal koan ("kong-an") teaching.

He is (1) a transmitted teacher in this lineage stretching back to Buddha, (2) a licensed psychological therapist, and (3) a "former" hippie. He combines these talents into a unique teaching style.

So if you have any questions about Buddha's teaching, go ask a tree, and the tree will give you a wonderful answer. Then, if you don't understand what the tree is telling you, please check out ZMBS' blog at http://www.emptygatezen.com/blog. He'll welcome all questions in the blog's comment section.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 6: Smile.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

I've been describing my first Zen retreat. The previous blog post was about the the initial efforts of formal sitting and keeping the great question "What is this?" or "What am I?" This post will be about the daily private interviews with Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS, aka Dae Soen Sa Nim). In the better-known Japanese-style Zen, these sessions are called koan practice. In Korean, the word is kong-an.

I'd read a lot about kong-ans, and had squeezed some info from the more senior students I'd talked to, so I had some idea of what I was supposed to say and do. ZMSS would ask these strange, pointed questions, and it was my challenge to respond from the direct, before-thinking experience of that moment. It was like pushing the Clear button of your mental calculator (ZMSS would say). First you return to zero. Then from there, respond to the just-now situation: 1+1=2.

I had a few things going for me. First, I was outrageously intimidated by ZMSS. The fear and adrenaline made it kind of hard to think anyway, allowing me to automatically answer with whatever popped up. Also, ZMSS' Korean accent and broken grammar forced me to use most of my mental energy to just understand what he said. That helped keep the conversation simple.

Following are some memories that have stuck with me from those early interviews.

After some preliminary explanation, ZMSS went right to the big guns. "What is God?" he asked. I knew that in Zen, this question was the same as asking about Truth, Buddha, Mind, Consciousness, etc. Those are all different words that point to the substance of everything.

I knew I shouldn't wax philosophical about how each and every thing is God. That may be a good idea, but it's just an idea, just thinking. (An ancient Zen master had famously said, "Even a good thing isn't as good as nothing.") I'd been told to respond to kong-ans not with explanations, but out of the truth of that moment. What did I perceive just now? "Your robe is grey," I answered. "Correct," said ZMSS. It was nice to get that little matter, God and Truth and all that, out of the way.

"What is your name?" ZMSS asked. "Stuart," I replied. "No, no, no," he scoffed. "That's just body's name." It was confusing. I'd given a clear, simple answer. His words, though, were a philosophical idea, the type of unnecessary thinking I'd been told to throw away. But what could I say? How could I question his teaching, when he was the Big Zen Master, and I was the new kid?

After some awkward silence, ZMSS explained, "Now you must say, 'You are incorrect, Zen Master.' When I make mistake, you must correct it." Wow. After all the years I'd spent meeting gurus who claimed perfection, here was ZMSS, right from the get-go, saying that I had to watch for his mistakes.

"How old are you?" ZMSS asked. "27," I shot back. "I don't believe you," he challenged. "You are incorrect!" I replied. "Wonderful," he said.

But wait, oops, I was actually 28 years old. I guess my before-thinking mind isn't that great with numbers. But it answered without waffling, so I passed. This must be like my poker game, where a confident bluff is sometimes good enough.

ZMSS put a mug of water between us. "What is this?" he asked. I replied that it was water. "That's just name," ZMSS said. "You're attached to name. What is it?" I had nothing, so ZMSS told me to ask the question back at him. When I did so, he immediately took a drink. I see. To be intimate with all things, just do it, moment to moment.

[As a courtesy to any readers who may someday want to try this practice themselves, I'll relate the rest of these memories without giving any more actual kong-an answers. The answers aren't the important thing anyway; it's all about questioning, about finding and using Don't Know Mind.]

ZMSS handed me a book and pointed to a paragraph for me to read aloud. It was about Buddha's Flower Sermon. All Zennies know this story. Buddha was set to give a discourse, and many hundreds had gathered to hear the Renowned Holy Teacher explain enlightenment 'n' stuff. But when he faced the assembly, Buddha said nothing. He just stood there a few minutes, and then held up a flower.

No one in the vast audience understood. Then a monk named Mahakashyapa looked at that flower and smiled. Buddha saw him smile and said, "I have got the Wondrous Dharma Seal of the Supremely Enlightened Mind, the Gateless Gate to Formless Nirvana. I now transmit it to Mahakashyapa."

All Zen schools and Masters trace their lineage back to that transmission incident. What was it about? What was transmitted? Damned if I knew. It was a puzzle, and I like puzzles. Maybe with intense contemplation and special experiences or something, I'd figure it out some day.

I finished the reading and waited for my question. "Buddha held up flower," said ZMSS. "Mahakashyapa smiled. Why did Mahakashyapa smile?"

Was he kidding? I'd been doing Zen for about 3 days, and he was asking me about the great fundamental secret? I wanted to understand... but my mind went blank. How the hell was I supposed to know?

I tried another poker technique, staring ZMSS right in the eyes, looking for a tell. My read on his expression was that he'd give up absolutely nothing. But he seemed supremely patient, ready to wait forever till I got it myself. And most bizarrely, he looked like he had every expectation that I could answer!

Uncomfortable seconds passed. Then out of nowhere, a response appeared, as if on its own. It wasn't like I knew the right answer. It was like the answer had come from a place before thinking, where there's no right and no wrong. It was only a moment later that I realized that I'd given an answer, and checked ZMSS for his response. "Ah," he said, "now you understand smile."

After days of sitting, I was super-sensitized to what was going on in my mind. It was amazing how the answer had appeared right out of the Don't Know. Maybe this'd inspire me to keep plugging away at "What am I?"

Kong-an answers -- good answer, bad answer, no answer -- don't matter. Even if you answer one, the teacher just throws a new one at you, bringing back Don't Know.

"Somebody comes to Zen Center," said ZMSS, "smoking a cigarette. He walks to Buddha-statue, blows smoke in Buddha's face, drops ashes on Buddha's head. You're there. How do you teach him?"

I tried to stay in the moment. "There's no cigarette-man here," I said. ZMSS immediately mimed a cigarette in his hand and pretended to smoke. "I am cigarette-man!" he declared. "You must teach me! What can you do?"

I was befuddled again. "But... you're not smoking..." I offered with hesitation. "Don't check!" ZMSS shouted back.

This time, no answer appeared. Seeing that I was hopelessly stuck, ZMSS changed his tone. "You must attain True Self," he told me. "What is True Self?" he asked, then he paused.

The pause seemed very long, because something big was going on in my mind. What is True Self? I'd been asking that question constantly for days. In a sense, I'd been asking it my whole life. I could tell that ZMSS had brought up the question rhetorically, that in a few seconds, he'd give me his own answer.

Of course, everything in this tradition had been teaching me that any answer was just an idea, just thinking. Zen-style didn't depend on a secret, special answer from a teacher. Zen meant not depending on anything. But my habit, my reflex of wanting to get something from an authority, was still there.

I saw a big "I want" in my mind, a desire for this Famous Zen Master to just give me The Answer, so I could stick it in my pocket and hold onto it forever. This "I want" was like a fish, ready to swallow whatever juicy worm ZMSS was about to give me. A fish too hungry to notice what hook might be hidden in the worm.

"What is True Self?" ZMSS repeated. Then, slowly and deliberately, he answered, "I... DON'T... KNOW!"

Oh yeah, that. I returned to my cushion in the meditation room, ready to continue sitting with the great question and the big Don't Know. About an hour later, a very interesting thing happened, which I'll blog about next time.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 5: Sitting.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

In the last episode, I was beginning my first Zen retreat, a week-long sitting in the Korean tradition. It was led by Zen Master Seung Sahn (I'll abbreviate as ZMSS), commonly addressed as Dae Soen Sa Nim.

There were over 20 of us in a single-family residence, with a connected living room/study area serving as the Dharma room (that's where the formal group practice takes place; "Dharma" means "truth"). The crowded conditions made for a complete lack of privacy, confusion in storing and dealing with my personal stuff, lines to the bathroom, etc. The long hours of a new sitting style, plus the new practice of 108 bows every morning, made my body ache. It was cold, keeping me awake much of the nights I spent in my sleeping bag on the Dharma room floor.

I mention all this because it may be a non-trivial part of the equation: that the first few days had this foundation of physical discomfort, exhaustion, and frustration. But mostly I'm interested in trying to articulate the mental experience.

In my earlier years of meditation, I'd spent plenty time obsessing about proper technique. Should I use a mantra? Which one? Should I control my breath in a particular way? Should I cultivate a feeling or hold some belief? Didn't I have to do these things just right in order to get the enlightenment prize? Different teachers I'd known had touted particular techniques as the surest, best path to the absolute... but they were all different.

ZMSS would talk about techniques -- mantra, breath, etc -- but without the sense that one was better than the other. He did stress, though, that if you considered the question "What am I?", you'd find yourself stuck, with nothing in the mind, just "Don't Know." Whatever technique you like, just do it, but do it with this "Don't-Know Mind."

Keeping a big question appealed to me, because it built on my earlier practice style, not negating it. Famous Indian teachers, such as Ramana Maharishi and Nisargadatta Maharaj, had spoken on self-inquiry, looking into the nature of this "I." There's a story in the Zen tradition that particularly struck me as in harmony with this practice:

Huai-jang lived in China centuries ago, on a mountain called Sung Shan. He somehow heard about a Buddhist temple where Hui-neng had a strange new teaching. This was in the early generations of the development of Zen in China; Hui-neng is now known as the sixth patriarch of Zen. Huai-jang was curious enough to make the long trek to the temple.

Eventually he completed the journey and found Hui-neng. The Patriarch asked the newcomer, "Where are you coming from?" Huai-jang replied, "I've traveled here from Sung Shan to receive your teaching." The funny thing about Hui-neng's response is that he didn't actually give a word of teaching, not in the sense that Huai-jang was expecting or looking for. Instead he asked, "What is this thing that has traveled from Sung Shan?"

Huai-jang had no idea what to say. He turned around, went back home, and continued his simple life on the mountain. Whatever he did now, throughout each day, he had that question in his mind, "What is this?" After 8 years, one day, boom, it became clear. He went back to the temple to see Hui-neng again. This time, when the patriarch asked that same question, Huai-jang replied, "To say even one word is to miss the point entirely." Hui-neng accepted his answer, acknowledging his enlightenment.

I took up this story as my guide, intending to compress Huai-jang's 8 years into my week-long retreat. It was just like the self-inquiry that I'd read about and tried in India. Except that the Indian teachers and scriptures tended to speak of this self in such beautiful, poetic terms. Stuff like: "Prajnanam Brahma: Consciousness is infinite, the absolute, the highest Truth." On web sites dedicated to Ramana's teachings, the self we're inquiring into is described with phrases like "ultimate truth" and "complete immersion in God."

Zen style would have none of that. It was always sparse: What am I? Don't know. What will all this effort get me? Don't know. So what should I do next? Just try, try, try.

Everything about it was simple and direct. The chanting had its appeal, but nothing like the lush melodic beauty of Indian chants. The Yoga sitting style had been more relaxed, with eyes closed, allowing a pleasant, dreamy mind-state. Zen posture was tighter, eyes open, just facing what is.

I sat there, keeping "What am I?", and it was interesting for a short time. Then it became more and more obvious that any answer I thought of, no matter how insightful or clever, was by definition thinking. So then what am I before thinking? ZMSS used to say, "Descarte said, 'I think, therefore I am.' But if I'm not thinking ... what?"

On top of all the physical discomfort, I now had the profound frustration of this self-inquiry process. How could I make the slightest head-way, when whatever idea I came up with was immediately useless? But I'd made the decision to stay the week, and wanted above all to not end up with regrets, with "What if I'd just tried a little harder?"

I'd remember repeatedly the advice I'd read in some classic Zen book. It said with this type of practice, you'd sometimes feel like a mosquito trying to bite through a thick steel door. When that happens, just continue the questioning with still greater effort.

Even if you're trying to empty the ocean with a spoon, at least you've got a tool that's of some value. But in this task of inquiring into my true self, it was becoming horribly apparent that the tool I'd always used before -- thinking, understanding -- wasn't just inadequate, it was useless. I looked to my will, the center of my being, all around, trying to find anything at all that I could throw at the question.

Thus passed the first few days of retreat. In the next blog entry, I'll talk about the other aspect of the retreat, the private interviews with ZMSS, in which he introduced me to the formal teaching style of this tradition. Through a combination of that teaching, my exhaustive efforts, and hell, I dunno, something different appeared.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 4: Finger in Socket.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

In the previous chapter, our hero found himself in a moving vehicle with famed Korean Zen Master Seung Sahn (whom I'll abbreviate as ZMSS, and was commonly addressed during his life as "Dae Soen Sa Nim"). ZMSS taught in a tradition that uses difficult, piercing questions, and I'd reluctantly been drawn into a dialog with him that went like this:

ZMSS: How long have you been doing Yoga?

Me: I've been meditating for about 7 years.

ZMSS: After doing Yoga for so long, have you gotten anything?

Me: Yeah, sure.

ZMSS: What have you gotten?

Me: My mind used to give me lots of problems, but as I meditate more, it gives me fewer problems.

ZMSS: If mind is such a problem, why do you make "mind"?

Me: Thinking just appears on its own.

ZMSS: Thinking is no problem; it's like clouds passing through the sky. But if you attach to thinking, you make a mind, and that's a big problem. So when you're doing something, just do it! Don't make "mind." That's true Yoga. OK?

What was that about? "Just do it"? This guy was supposed to be some extraordinary Master. How could he get away with a teaching that said so damn little?

My apartment in Berkeley was coincidentally just a few blocks away from one of the handful of Zen Centers that ZMSS had established around the world. I visited a few times to hear talks by other teachers that ZMSS had authorized, and to read from a couple of his books.

The teaching was always so simple, it was practically invisible. Human beings enter the ocean of suffering when we make something, i.e., when we attach to I/my/me-thinking like "I like/dislike something," "I want to get something," etc. But our original, before-thinking mind always shines purely, like empty space, or a clear mirror. Red appears, and this mirror-mind only reflects red. White appears, only white.

Simplicity shouldn't have bothered me. By my latter days in India, I'd already been pondering how sometimes my spiritual efforts seemed like building a house, by acquiring and stacking together special experiences and understandings. I'd decided that I really needed to do the opposite, to metaphorically tear down that building by throwing away whatever ideas I found myself clinging to.

But still... I guess I'd been holding out hope that as I kept returning to witness-consciousness, it'd eventually lead me to some lasting, substantial attainment. Famous teachers I'd read, like Ramana Maharishi, had spoken about a permanent attainment, enlightenment or self-realization or some such. I think Ramana had said it was like our self-effort was necessary to keep us bobbing on the surface of the ocean, not drowning in the world. All we could or should do is to patiently continue our efforts till God would swoop down and take us the rest of the way. Did I really need to give up all hope of this "enlightenment," and be left with nothing but "just do it"?

Sometime around then I got introduced to a guy who hung out in People's Park selling LSD. I'd had one acid trip in college, but years later, when I described it to an old hippie, she told me, "If your ego didn't completely disappear, you need a bigger dose." True enough.

When I was around 7 years old, a light bulb burned out in our house, and my parents removed it, but didn't have a replacement. For many days I walked past that empty socket, till I finally flicked the switch on and stuck my finger in. It was an awful, frightening, painful few seconds till I managed to pull my finger back out (hence my continued survival). Thing is, in those days leading up to my shocking experience, I may have pondered about when and how I'd stick my finger in that socket, but I never seriously considered not doing it at all. That's my particular mind, or karma; it's just inconceivable to let an opportunity like that pass by.

I took 3 hits of the acid. During the first hour or so, there were some frightening moments, as I/my/me disappeared 90% or 99% and I desperately worried about losing the rest. But then it indeed disappeared completely, and remained that way for hours. The world was revealed as harmless, dream-like mind-stuff. The distinction between "I" and "this" was revealed as far less obvious than previously thought.

At the end of the trip, the world re-solidified, and I/my/me popped back up from somewhere or other. Those few hours in the perfect dream-world were intriguing; maybe LSD could serve as crowbar in my mental deconstruction project. I think I tripped about every other weekend for the first few months, then continued irregularly, several times each year during 1985-87.

Near the end of this period, I took a serious dose, and a couple of hours later found myself seeing the universe and my place in it from a strikingly wide and clear perspective. I saw all those efforts I'd made for years to detach from my wants and opinions, and how that had removed some suffering. Then I saw that it was the nature of the universe that desires arise endlessly. The best I could ever hope for was a temporary break in the suffering, till new desires and delusions appeared and continued the cycle. It was like mowing a lawn in which the grass never stopped growing. Like painting the Golden Gate Bridge, and finding that as soon as you finish one end, the other end needs painting again.

I was never going to escape suffering. My whole life direction was like running on a treadmill. I was like a hamster on one of those hamster-wheel thingies. It wasn't just tragic, it was meta-tragic. I mean, Hamlet is a tragedy, but it's OK, because at least people can watch the play and get touched by existential insight. In my tragedy, the tragedy of all beings, the tragedy of struggling to find a lasting refuge from suffering and never ever reaching it, there wasn't even any audience to appreciate the epic story. OK, maybe the occasional acid-head could watch it for a few minutes, but that didn't count for much.

As I languished in this hell, trapped in this box of hopeless existence, I heard a voice whispering. I'd rarely gotten auditory hallucinations, and I'd never put much stock in disembodied voices. But this was a desperate time, and I was ready to listen to anything. I concentrated on the voice, which was repeating the same phrase over and over, gradually getting louder. I recognized it as ZMSS's voice, saying with a light and amused attitude, "Don't make anything."

Suddenly it was clear: the horrific universe I was perceiving, the "me" trapped in it, all of it, was made by thinking. Just one moment of not thinking, and that whole world of infinite suffering never existed. Dang, that was something. That simple little teaching phrase had saved me from a hell that had no possible escape.

Every year, right after New Years, ZMSS would come to that Zen Center near me and lead a week-long retreat. I had good reasons to avoid it. The intensity of Zen practice, the sheer number of hours of sitting meditation, was greater than anything I'd contemplated previously. All my years in ashrams, meditating at most a few hours in a day, couldn't prepare me for it.

The Zen forms (sitting posture, chanting style, rules, etc) would be new and different. I'd gotten comfortable with the Yoga style, but this new style would be difficult, even physically painful. At Yoga, I had some expertise, I'd been an old-timer at the ashram. At a Zen retreat, I'd be starting over as a rank beginner. I could recite philosophies from Yoga scriptures decently well, but if I went to the Zen Master again, there'd be those horribly uncomfortable questions, and I had absolutely no bloody clue how to respond or what it was all about.

But there was a major curiosity factor. And I couldn't deny that the teaching had proven its usefulness. Lots of teachings will work in most ordinary situations, but "don't make anything" had helped me even in the midst of the weirdest and worst of extreme bad trips. Crap. As with the light socket, I'd have to go to that retreat. It was January 1988.

Next time, I'll blog about this first retreat, which included difficult and amazing experiences during sitting practice, and formal teaching interviews with ZMSS that hit my mind strongly.

Politics: scoffing at free markets

Berkeleyite that I am, I frequently hear political conversations in which self-described liberals make derisive references to the free market. These are people who take the general stance of preferring government solutions over the free market alternative. Government solutions involve men with guns enforcing particular values on the public. A market involves people not being forced to choose one option over another.

Whenever you desire a particular outcome, the use of violence, force, or government is the most effective way to get it quickly and completely. That in itself comes nowhere close to justifying that option. The Golden Rule demands that if we don't like others forcing their values on us, we ought to refrain from doing so to them, no matter how effective or convenient it may be.

This came up today on Arianna Huffington's blog. In talking about Alan Greenspan's new book, Huffington wrote of his "free market uber alles" philosophy. This turn of a phrase frames the free market alternative in the most derisive manner possible, by associating it with Nazism. Here's the response I posted in her Comments section:

I find it hypocritical when the same people who are critical of the "free market" (e.g., Huffington here using the phrase "free market uber alles") can elsewhere be found uncritically championing "peace." The two words mean essentially the same thing. Either you have people with guns who use violence and threats to force their values on others, or you have the absence of that, which we call "free market" or "peace."

Of course "peace" isn't the magical answer to everything. No matter how much "peace" you have, it won't end sickness, old age, and death. When powerful, murderous tyrants sometimes appear in the world, it may be vital to control them with force, and "peace" would be catastrophic to human well-being.

The fact that "peace" doesn't solve everything doesn't matter. The important thing is that "peace" is superior to the alternative, and should always be championed over its alternative, unless and until exceptional circumstances demand temporarily departing from it.

Anyone who fails to see this, and would mock "peace" for being less than a panacea, is confused and dangerous. And the exact same is true of people who mock the "free market."

Water (a word from our sponsor)

The great public radio show, A Prairie Home Companion, has at times claimed to be "brought to you by ketchup." Or duct tape, or pepper. I've gone one better and secured the sponsorship of water. What with their product being freely available, The American Water Council and Advisory Board has a chronic shortage of funds, and apparently this blog is the biggest media outlet they can afford, to spread their message:

"Thirsty? Drink water."

Today I did a little promotional appearance for The Board over at Marta's blog. I think the topic connects with the story of my life and practice that I've been telling in this blog. At the end of my last installment, I'm just about to be introduced to the teachings of Zen Master Seung Sahn. I intend to write the next installment of my story next week as usual, but for the moment, here's what I posted to Marta's blog today:

MC said...
Stuart, your posts can be absolutely bracing in the am. Like a glass of grapefruit juice, unsweetened. [snip] Go easy on those who like a little sugar with their grapefruit. ;-)

Big thanks, MC. It's cool that you use this metaphor. My teacher said that good teaching is like water. Plain water with nothing in it.

Water doesn't have an especially good taste; it tastes like nothing. Likewise it lacks any interesting color like wine, aroma like coffee, or effect like beer. Most people don't like water so much, preferring those more interesting beverages.

But water's got one thing going for it. When you're thirsty, you drink it, and the thirst disappears. You can do that over and over, all the time, in every single situation you get thirsty in, and it'll be no problem. Quenching thirst with beer or soda is OK sometimes, but if you do it all the time, it makes you sick.

So maybe Siddha Yoga teaching is more like Coca Cola. It's got plenty of water in it, so it really does quench your thirst, but it also has all this other unnecessary stuff that over time may make you sick.

Politically, I'm a free-market libertarian, so I like to see everyone have all sorts of options that they can freely choose between. I'm glad people can choose Coke, lemonade, vodka, Tibetan Buddhism, Hare Krishna, Catholicism, and Siddha Yoga.

I personally don't feel the need to recommend any of these interesting choices, since there are plenty of other people trying to sell them. People can and do try whatever flavors they like. And sometimes they get sick or tired of these interesting choices, so I say it's good to remember that there's always water.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 3: Zen Master.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

My previous blog entry ended with my return, in 1984, to the USA after 5 years in Siddha Yoga ashrams, the last 2+ in India. This blog entry and maybe a couple more will take me through my first Zen retreat in early 1988.

I had gone from my family’s house to college to ashram, and now at 25, I was ready to begin the practice of being an independent adult. My grandmother had died during my ashram years, and I had a few thousand dollars she’d left me. I’d use it to start a new life in California. I’d grown up in the East Coast during the 70s, old enough to understand the hippies and the counter-culture and the Grateful Dead and all, but too young to participate. Like so many people, I felt a pull to California as a place for a fresh beginning.

I connected with a friend I’d met in India, and we hit the road. (Some adventures we had during this period are on my Strange Trips web page.) I ended up first in the Los Angeles area, then in Arcata, and finally in Berkeley (which had seemed alluring ever since my months in the Oakland ashram in ‘79). In various places, I did temp jobs to get by.

I had one year of college and no particular skills. I saw lots of office jobs available, but they required decent typing skills. I got an old typewriter and began to practice by typing out random paragraphs from the newspaper, hour after hour. It seemed impossible. How in the world was I to remember where all the letters were? But incredibly, after a few weeks of this, my fingers began to automatically know what to do. The power of practice never ceases to amaze me.

In my temp typing jobs, I was usually in front of a computer, and there was plenty of time when the workload was slow, so step-by-step I taught myself word processing, then spreadsheet design and programming. I learned how to support myself and take care of my own life, and these life lessons were as rich as those I’d gotten from philosophy and meditation. Learning how to survive and make a living didn’t feel separate or inferior to explicitly spiritual pursuits.

Life has its ups and downs, successes and failures. I had the usual succession of joy and depression and comfort and anxiety. I kept up with my formal and informal meditation practice. I’d practice attention to the moment, repeating a mantra, sitting still, watching my breath, and remembering that it’s all One. Whatever attachments or desires or entanglements appeared in my mind, I had this practice of returning to witness-consciousness, making it all OK. I didn’t know what, if anything, I should do more or different with these practices.

During this time, news filtered through to me about goings-on in the ashram world. Muktananda’s successors, a brother and sister guru team, had broken apart in a bitter sibling rivalry, filled with lies and violence. The sister (Gurumayi Chidvilasananda) sent out mud-slinging letters against her brother rival (Gurudev Nityananda), even going so far as sending goons to physically attack and threaten those who attended his programs.

The SYDA antics sounded so silly, and removed any lingering allegiance I felt to that group. While I’d always enjoy visiting and exploring different groups out of curiosity or entertainment, I saw no need to be part of a group. No guru or group held the magic or secret. I figured all that any teacher or group could do was lead me to the type of meditation practice and understanding I already had.

I was in contact with E, an old friend from my year at Yale. He was the one friend back then who’d joined me in learning to meditate and going to Siddha Yoga ashrams. We’d both been influenced at the time by reading Ram Dass and similar books. Our minds had been opened to wider possibilities by taking LSD, though that was just one low-dosage trip; my more high-powered drug trips would come later.

E had since become a monk in the Korean-style Zen school founded by Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS). He’d written me while I was still in India, and seemed enthusiastic for me to try Zen teaching and practice.

I couldn’t understand why E found Zen worth exploring. I told him that Zen seemed just like Siddha Yoga. The differences were superficial: a different language to chant in, a different posture to sit in, and a different statue on the altar. The actual practice of watching and quieting the mind, of returning to the witness that saw everything as One, was the real point; why care about any particular tradition? E said to me, “It doesn’t matter if you do Yoga meditation or Zen meditation or Christian meditation or any other kind. But it’s very important to look into WHY you meditate.” Hmmmm.

E’s words caught my interest a little, but it was more powerful when I saw him demonstrate them. I went to visit him in L.A. where he was staying at a Zen Center with ZMSS. E would soon go to Korea for an extended time, and I wanted to see him before he left. Coincidentally, Gurumayi was on tour at the L.A. Siddha Yoga ashram at the same time.

The first night I was there, E said to me, “I’ve got a great idea. Why don’t we get up early tomorrow, do Zen practice first, then go to the program at the Siddha Yoga ashram.” I didn’t see any point to it. All these practices were fundamentally the same, what difference did it make if we went to one or the other or both? But, whatever, I’d go along with him.

At the ashram, as we did the Siddha Yoga chants and practices, including going up to bow to the guru, I kept watching E, waiting for him to say or do something to try to convince me that Zen had something better than Siddha Yoga. But he didn’t show any difference. At the Zen center, he just followed the Zen forms; at the Siddha Yoga ashram, he just did the practices there like everyone else. The way he just did both practices, without offering any opinions about them… it made an impression on me. His attitude of just following each situation was a teaching that couldn’t have been expressed with just words.

Even though I saw all traditions as the same, there was a particular reason that I wanted to avoid Zen. I knew that part of that tradition was being confronted with very difficult questions from the Zen Master. I’m a shy person. I didn’t want to get involved in any fierce debates. I preferred being a still and silent witness.

But there we were later in the day, driving through L.A. on some errand. E was driving, next to him in the front seat was ZMSS, and I was in the back. I really wanted to avoid any sort of interaction with this Zen Master. I figured if I just stayed quiet, he wouldn’t bother me. It wasn’t like I’d ever asked him for teaching, after all.

E was telling ZMSS that the two of us first got interested in meditation back in college when we’d taken LSD. “Yes,” ZMSS offered, “sometimes when a person takes LSD, he sees that everything is changing, changing, changing, and he understands that attachment isn’t so good.”

E continued, “And after LSD, we started doing Yoga-style meditation.” Without looking back at me, ZMSS asked, “So, how long have you been doing Yoga?”

Crap. I didn’t want to get involved with any convoluted Zen dialog. But it was a moving car; I had no escape. “I’ve been meditating for 7 years or so,” I told him.

“After doing Yoga for so long,” he asked, “have you gotten anything?”

It was a big question, and maybe a good cliffhanger. In my next blog, I’ll complete this conversation, and tell how it led to me looking into ZMSS’s teachings, and eventually to an astounding week doing a formal sitting retreat with him.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 2: India.

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

The previous blog entry describes my practice/life through my freshman year in college, 1977/78, when I encountered guru Swami Muktananda and his “Siddha Yoga” (SYDA) organization. He inspired me to give up ordinary-American style. I quit school, worked and saved for months, and started living in Siddha Yoga ashrams, joining Muktananda’s “3rd World Tour” by early 1979.

Today, as I progress into deep middle-age, it’s difficult to keep all these memories organized. In this case, though, I’m certain of the date. The first ashram I lived in was Oakland, CA, a stop on Muktananda’s Tour. After 2 months, I returned to see my parents near Philadelphia, PA. I recall my nervousness when flying back East, because the accident at Three Mile Island had just exploded. So I have a reliable time-stamp for my story at this point. We may assume that it’s pure coincidence that my years with Muktananda started with a nuclear melt-down.

Anyway: the great lesson I learned from Muktananda is that my thinking, what’s going on in my mind just now, is incredibly, amazingly powerful. Attending to how I keep my mind moment-to-moment can be a more interesting, rewarding, and efficient life direction than trying to get or control anything in the external world. In order to comprehend and experience the power of mind, it’s necessary to take a pause, slow down, and observe this inner world with care and energy. That is: this 5 year period in SYDA ashrams was when I began to do formal meditation practices.

It’s hard to break the habit of always focusing on the world of stuff, always striving to get stuff. Looking at thought-patterns is usually more difficult than distracting myself from them. Even the act of sitting still for long periods is itself physically painful. There are major hurdles to overcome in starting a meditation practice. The ashram helped me through this in a number of ways.

I had the support of the large group that lived and practiced together (human beings are herding animals more than we realize). I adopted the belief-system that Muktananda was on a higher, more spiritual level than ordinary people, so I could believe him when he told me that meditation was special and holy, that it would bring me to God, to enlightenment, and all that. I got lots of great, euphoric feelings from the practices, and from focusing on the guru. The community, the hope and desire to climb the spiritual ladder, and the good feelings inside kept me going.

And I liked the philosophy. I liked remembering that It’s All One. Just as gold can be fashioned into different types of jewelry and still be the same gold, all things in the world are in fact the same substance: God or Self or Absolute. This understanding freed me from clinging to particular things, people, or situations. If it’s all God, then wherever I go, whatever I do, whatever happens is OK. Following this understanding, after 2.5 years in American ashrams, I moved to the main ashram in India, effectively renouncing everything from my previous life.

I was there when Muktananda died; it didn’t bother me at all. By that point, I was really interested in exploring truth for myself, not so much in devotion to a guru. Sure, in the early years, it gave me energy to believe in god-like super-beings. Eventually, all that seemed cultish. I’d prefer to take my understanding and my meditation practice and run.

But on the other hand… everyone around me believed in the magical power that emanated from the guru, a power most concentrated in his physical presence, a power that’d exponentially quicken my ascent to enlightenment or whatever. What if they were right? It’d be stupid to give that up, and I didn’t want to be stupid. Muktananda had left successor gurus, so for a year after his death, I remained with them in the India ashram, uncertain about giving up my connection to the special power that was (maybe?) dependent on holy people and places.

Ultimately, I decided that I wanted to believe in myself. I preferred having a scientific mind that openly questioned everything, rather than believing in magical invisible energy, in Gods, in holy enlightened beings. I was tired of believing in things because other people did, or because some authority told me to, or because some old and popular book said so. If I could get enlightenment in a year by believing in a guru, or in 1000 lifetimes by believing in myself, I’d still prefer to believe in myself. What’s the hurry anyway?

So I left India in early 1984, figuring I’d go back the good old USA, where people are skeptical and cynical and don’t believe in any folktale that sounds nice. My kind of people! I’d find some simple life to sustain myself, continue to meditate, to train my mind to be quiet and focused, and use my remembrance of Oneness to remain as a witness. Whatever would appear in the real world, I’d watch it unfold as if a movie.

In the course of finding an ordinary life situation, I ended up in California by 1985. There I had my first encounters with Zen teaching and with major psychedelic experiences, which jolted me into a new direction and new understandings (or perhaps a lack thereof). Details to come in the next couple blog entries of my story.

Autobiography of a Boo Boo. 1: Something (Rather Than Nothing).

This series of blogs explains how I've come to my current Zen-style meditation practice. I'm calling the series Autobiography of a Boo Boo, in homage to the Hanna Barbera cartoons of my youth, and in recognition that I've never been good enough to be called a Yogi.

Grand disclaimer: If there’s anything I’ve learned from my life and practice, it’s that how I keep my mind just now, my own thinking, has remarkable effects; it’s powerfully and intimately connected with everything. When I blog about Yoga, Zen, or American culture, what I say is at least as much about my personal mind-state as I travel through these worlds, as it is about any external traditions. Since we share so much as human beings, I hope that there are others who can relate to these personal mind-states.

My original practice style was ordinary American life. I grew up in a secular Jewish, upwardly mobile middle class family, 2 generations removed from Ukrainian immigrants between the wars. The ethics I absorbed from this upbringing – to honor the Golden Rule and try to not hurt anyone – have worked out fine.

From my family, culture, and sub-culture, I didn’t find much satisfaction when looking for a big-picture goal or life direction. Mostly it seemed that people lived for the sake of getting nice things, situations, relationships, etc. All that’s fine, but a bit thin, in light of the great mystery of existence that was constantly staring me in the face.

I didn’t quite have words to express the vastness of the mystery I'd been sensing since the beginning. Years later, I encountered iconic philosopher/scientist Gottfried Leibniz asking “Why is there something rather than nothing?” and I felt an inner, “Yeah, that's what I’ve been wondering!” But as a child, I got hardly any support for engaging my big questions. No one else seemed to consider them very important, so I put them on the back burner till my late teens.

I’ll mention tangentially that my family did seem to have goals and direction that worked for them, but I couldn’t quite relate. My parents considered it of utmost importance to raise a family, to leave a mark on the world beyond their own lifespan. OK, but isn’t that just postponing the inevitable? Maybe leaving descendents means you “live on” after your individual body dies... but before too long, the sun will explode or something and the planet will get burnt to a crisp. Let’s not be dishonest by pretending that there’s any way to avoid total extinction.

Similarly, my parents cared about being part of the continuing story of the Jewish People. That has even less resonance for me. Even if my grandfather’s grandfather wore a certain type of hat and sang songs in a strange language, where was the meaning of doing the same things myself?

In college I naturally gravitated toward Psychology, Philosophy, and Religious Studies. That was something; it was cool to read the great Western philosophers express my mystery in clearer language, and especially cool to realize that people who asked my big questions were taken seriously in this world. But my professors themselves didn’t seem to spend much time and energy looking into the nature of the self and all that. They seemed to think the pursuit of these issues ran into a dead end centuries ago (Leibnitz died in early 1700s), and the profs spent their days trying to get published papers that quibbled about linguistic nuances. Any academic pursuit of Truth still felt terribly lacking.

I was 18, a freshman at Yale, when I encountered Swami Muktananda and his “Siddha Yoga (SYDA)” organization and community. One big pull was finally connecting with people who took the big questions of existence seriously, seriously enough to affect their lives.

Honest to God, I’m trying to be brief here. But the arc of my practice kinda encompasses my whole life; this story may take a couple more postings to get through. In upcoming entries, I’ll blog about the plusses and minuses of my time in Yoga ashrams, how I eventually left the ashrams, encountered Zen, and how a week-long Zen retreat profoundly affected my perspective on the whole journey.

Dharma Event in Berkeley this Sunday

This coming Sunday (Sept 9, 7-9pm) in Berkeley (1940 Virginia St), there will be a sitting, talk and Q&A with Zen Master Bon Soeng (Jeff Kitzes). ZMBS is one of about a dozen successors who received transmission from Zen Master Seung Sahn. That is, ZMBS was formally recognized by ZMSS as someone who could pass on Buddha's teaching tradition without diminishing it.

For over a decade, ZMBS has been the Abbott and Guiding Teacher of Empty Gate Zen Center. He has a private therapy practice as his straight job. Jeff's spent time on a Zen commune during the counter culture years; he maintains a bit of that hippie-mind, in teaching the fierce clarity of the Zen tradition with a wide-open and gentle style. The supportive, non-dogmatic, non-authoritarian style of Empty Gate has allowed many people like me to join in that sangha, people who would never put up with a more reverent, sanctimonious, or militaristic group.

So if you're in the Bay Area, please consider coming by for the talk. It's sponsored by the East Bay Open Circle. From their website: The East Bay Open Circle is a non-sectarian and open group dedicated to supporting, celebrating, and exploring the practices of mindful awareness, meditation and other healing arts. Though not affiliated with any single tradition or teacher, we feel especially inspired and influenced by the satsang and Buddhist traditions of non-dual presence and awareness, as well as by other practices that support the opening of our hearts and minds. I've gone to one other East Bay Open Circle event, a John Sherman satsang that I later wrote about. I like the idea of this group of East Bay folks exploring various traditions without saluting any particular dogma.

This event is free; donations are accepted, but not coerced.

Whether or not you can make this event, please consider stopping by Empty Gate Zen Center for practice any time. At EGZC, Zen Master Bon Soeng gives talks and Q&A almost every Wednesday night, and private koan interviews most Saturday mornings. Practice (without so much talk) also takes place Tues and Thurs mornings and evenings, and day-long or weekend sitting retreats are held about once a month.

Practice

I make no apologies for blogging about gurus, philosophy, or pop culture. Those topics are fun, interesting, and important. But the most important thing is practice.

“Practice” is what you do. It may be mental rather than physical, but it's always something more than believing or understanding. “Jesus is Lord” or “I am pure consciousness” or “Everything is One” may be OK beliefs, but they’re not practices. As Nike said – and Zen Master Seung Sahn (ZMSS) said many years before – you have to just do it.

In the mid- to late-80s, I learned from ZMSS through spending time with him informally, attending his public talks, sitting retreats that he led and participated in, and having my first formal private koan interviews with him. He died in 2004, leaving about a dozen successor Zen Masters. The type of practice I do, and the way I understand it and communicate about it, comes mostly from him.

In this blog entry, I’ll talk about my practice, and hopefully other readers will respond in kind. Maybe we can do some cross-pollinating. In a separate entry next week, I’ll talk about the transition from my earlier yoga-style meditation when I followed Muktananda, to my current Zen-style. If there are readers who have gone through a similar process, integrating or switching between different practice styles, we can discuss it there.

My informal practice is trying to keep clear mind in all situations. Clear means empty, nothing at all, so acting with clear mind is just doing what I’m doing 100%. It means that when I’m doing computer work, I just do computer work; when I’m riding my bike, I just ride my bike; when I’m talking to a friend, I just talk to my friend; etc.

Of course I repeatedly get distracted by thinking: “I like this, I don’t like that, I want to get this, I want to keep that, this is good, that’s bad.” When I become aware of the thicket of thinking, I try to recognize it as insubstantial clouds appearing and disappearing, and return to the just-now situation, perhaps explicitly asking myself, “What am I doing right now?”

I use two special techniques to cut through thinking and return to clarity. One is mantra, inwardly repeating a phrase over and over. I use the mantra Kwan Seum Bosal, the Korean name for the thousand-armed Bodhisattva of infinite compassion. The meaning of the words don’t matter much; they’re mostly just a tool to help loosen my grip on any other type of thinking.

The other technique is to keep a Big Question. ZMSS always talked about questioning so strongly and sincerely that there’s nothing but Don’t Know. When I’m walking through town, for example, or riding the train, I’ll try clarifying my mind by bringing up a question like “What am I?” or “What is this?” Again, the exact words don’t matter so much. The point is to see existence as the total mystery it is. To find the mind that’s open, questioning, not-knowing, just reflecting each situation as it appears, like a mirror. When I notice that I’m holding some idea, I try to put it down, returning to Don’t Know and a clear perception of the moment.

That’s what I do in the midst of daily activity. I also do formal Zen practice, going to Empty Gate Zen Center 3 or 4 times a week for an hour or more of sitting, chanting, koan practice, bowing, and following various forms like wearing robes, lighting incense, and so on. In the Dharma room where we do formal practice, there are meticulous rules to follow. That means I don’t have to think about what to do; I just chant when it’s chanting time, sit when it’s sitting time, etc. This leaves me free to focus completely on how I keep my mind moment to moment. In addition to this regular practice, most months I’ll dedicate one or two days to a group sitting retreat.

Trying to keep clear mind during formal practice isn’t so different from making the same effort in ordinary life. Except for this: When I’m watching TV, for example, it’s easy to be attentive, since TV is interesting. When I’m riding my bike, I’m highly motivated to remain awake and aware, since otherwise I’ll get run over. But when I’m sitting Zen, being still and silent and looking at the floor, there’s nothing that’s helping me to remain present, to not get lost in memories or fantasies. It’s a worst case scenario, as simple and boring as it gets. Any moment that I can find clear mind while sitting Zen, it’s truly my own, since it doesn’t depend on the external situation. Since sitting depends on nothing outside, there’s the possibility that the clarity found while sitting can re-appear in any other life situation.

Sometimes evening practice at the Zen center feels like taking a mind shower. We take showers because ordinary activity makes the body dirty; practice is like cleaning the mind that’s dusty with the day’s thoughts. Sitting quietly, returning again and again to just-now mind, to the Don’t Know that reflects each moment… it’s like scrubbing the conceptual crumbs from the nooks and crannies of my brain.

I also work with koans (called “kong-ans” in Korean) with guiding teacher, Zen Master Bon Soeng (Jeff Kitzes). (Jeff is starting his own blog on the newly revamped Empty Gate site; check it out.) I find koan teaching an extraordinary and elegant method for pointing to the pure and clear truth of this very moment.

A great thing about doing formal group practice is that everyone automatically helps each other persevere. One of my jobs at the center is to run practice on Tuesday and Thursday evenings after work. If I've got some desire or agitation at 7pm on those nights, it doesn’t matter; I have to let it go when it’s time for evening practice. The fact that I have no choice but to be there makes it much, much easier. I don’t have to struggle to find a motivation to practice; I can just do it for the sake of supporting the other people there. If I don’t want to practice, I get to put down that I want, and putting down I want is the best medicine for suffering.

I guess that’s enough talk for now about my practice, about connecting with that thing that’s before words, speech, and thinking. More to come about my history with different styles of practice next week. Till then, I look forward to hearing from everyone else who’s willing to share their own practice perspective in the Comments section.

Understanding Spiritual Experiences

Over on Marta's blog about her years with Gurumayi (current guru of the late Swami Muktananda's SYDA org), there's some discussion of big special spiritual experiences. Lots of people were intrigued with Muktananda because of stories of people having trippy mind experiences around him. (I myself was influenced to follow Mukt in the late 70s by reading about a special experience that Ram Dass had when he met him.)

FWIW, here's what I just contributed to that blog discussion:

anony wrote:
I have met people who saw some gurus in their dreams when they (the people) were children, and people who heard the word "Muktananda" over the phone and got a blast of Shaktipat.

It's useful to remember that millions or tens of millions of Americans report having a huge spiritual experience at least once in their lives. It's just part of life, of being human. Sometimes it happens that people have amazing big non-ordinary experiences, psychotic breaks, spiritual epiphanies, etc.

There are millions of diverse situations when such things occur, and yeah, among those millions are a few who had them after having a dream or reading a book or hearing a funny-sounding Indian name over the phone.

After such an experience, there's a huge amount of interpretation that goes on. If you meet someone through SYDA, and they had some big experience earlier in their lives, chances are when they came to the ashram, they got lots of subtle and explicit peer pressure to interpret or re-interpret their memory of that experience according to "shaktipat" theology.

Maybe someone had a big experience when they were talking about Muktananda and eating yogurt. It's a matter of interpretation, of embracing a belief-system, that they end up thinking that they got the experience from Muktananda, rather than from yogurt.

It's useful to be literate about statistics. Someone says that 30% of all people arrested for reckless driving have marijuana in their system. That means precisely nothing; maybe 40% of all good drivers have pot in their system! So the fact that a few hundred people got an experience looking at Muktananda's photo means nothing unless you take it in the context of the millions of people who had some crazy experience thinking about Jesus, or seeing a flower, or looking at a child, or eating oatmeal.

It would be interesting to understand such phenomena.

Considering that our situation as human beings is that we get born into this world not knowing where we come from, where we're going, why we're here, or who we are... I wouldn't get too optimistic about understanding things.

Also, what's the need for understanding? The only point to understanding these special experiences would be to use that understanding to get more of those experiences. But why consider those big wow experiences so important?

OK, I like having them on rare occasions, but it's not like they're the purpose of life. I got a big experience from doing formal sitting meditation and self-inquiry for 3 or 4 days. It was cool, but took lots of effort. Also there are drugs that will give such experiences quite reliably. Some of these drugs are even legal, and compared to getting involved with SYDA, they're far far less expensive, dangerous, or addictive.

Teachings from Zen Patriarchs

On this morning's commute, I was reading The Mirror of Zen, and enjoyed these quotes from the 5th and 6th Patriarchs:

It is better to keep your true, original mind than to contemplate the Buddhas of the ten directions.

If you only contemplate other Buddhas, you will never break free from life and death. You should keep your buddha-mind as it is in order to arrive on the other shore.

Buddha originates in your own nature. There is no need to seek outside yourself.

Ignorant people chant in the hope of being born in the Pure Land, or Land of Utmost Bliss, but true practitioners only focus instead on clearing their own mind.

The Buddha does not save sentient beings. Rather, sentient beings save themselves the instant they awaken to their true mind.

Gurudev Nityananda on "Baba Muktananda's Footsteps" Tour

Back around 1979-84, I misspent a chunk of my youth living in ashrams of Swami "Baba" Muktananda. Last night, I took a trip down memory lane by attending a free program of one of Muk's successors, Gurudev Nityananda, who's currently on a year-long tour marking what would have been Muk's 100th birthday. My impressions might be of some interest to people with a connection to Muktananda's old scene, his "Siddha Yoga (SYDA)" organization, and its offshoots.

So here's a little report I just posted on the ex-Siddha Yoga Yahoo group:

Went to see Nit Jr (Swami Nityananda) last night. It was the final program of the Northern Calif (Berkeley) leg of his "Footprints of Muktananda" year+ long tour.

7pm-9pm. Nity sat up on throne in his swami costume and all, but there was only a shadow of the "we're in the presence of the Supreme Lord, Omygawd!" atmosphere that there was in Baba's day. I wonder how much of the difference was external and how much was the change in my own perception. In any case, all the talk etc was about how cool and great Baba was; it doesn't seem that Nity is encouraging that much glorification of himself.

I'm not good at estimating crowds; maybe there were 150 of us? Middle aged with a smattering of kids. I think mostly folks who'd been on Baba's 3rd Tour or earlier, now with normalish lives, looking for some nostalgia or re-connection.

The program started with a puja that lasted the better part of an hour. The Sanskrit chanting was nice and gave me good feelings, but it did go tediously on and on. I mused that if I was looking to make something special, I could fixate on the good feelings I got from hearing the mantras etc, and build a mindset about how holy and spiritual and important it was. But these days that's no longer on my to do list.

Then a short movie with clips of Baba and Nity senior. Talking about how great they were, but again, not as over the top stupidly gushing as the old days. Then talk from Eddie Oliver, who was ashram manager during Baba's American tour days. Then a song, "6 verses on liberation" from Shankaracharya, in Sanskrit. Then Nity gave a talk, then Om Namah Shivaya chanting, and a few minutes of meditation, then people lined up to greet Gurudev as I exited with my friends.

It's all a little like Protestantism or Reform Judaism. That is, it seemed that people were looking for some good feelings, nice ideas, connect with some community, but nothing that'd really shatter their ordinary lives.

Nity's talk was kind of nice-sounding empty spiritual stuff. He did start out by quoting some scripture about how it's impossible to achieve the natural state without the guru's grace. Told a story about greatness of guru's grace. It was all kind of silly and meaningless. What does this have to do with real life? It's just something to make you feel good for a while when you think about it. And I think that's what people were looking for.

Unlike the old days, there didn't seem to be much suggestion that anyone should be transforming their lives. More like, hey, we've all been initiated by Baba, let's revel a bit in how wonderful and special that is, think a bit about how to connect that with the lives we're leading now. Maybe visit Nity on his tour sometime, or join or initiate a monthly satsang in the area so we can chant and meditate together, isn't this all sweet like those old days? A bit of High School Reunion in the air.

The worst I can say is that some people still seemed kinda ditzy. Like they were using meditation practices to get a goofy high, rather than to really perceive truth clearly, or to help other beings. To each his or her own.

Great Teachings At The Movies

Saturday night I was with a bunch of friends trying to decide on DVD entertainment, and we settled on True Romance. It's the first movie that Quentin Tarantino wrote, though Resevior Dogs got made first. Thumbs up, if you don't mind extreme violence.

As the plot unfolded, I at first thought the movie's title was a huge blunder. It had me expecting a chick flick, when in fact it's classic Quentin, blood and torture and action and low-down low-lifes. But slowly I realized that the story was a wonderful demonstration of Boddhisattva Mind. From their first scene, Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette are 100% dedicated to each other; the hellish chaos that swirls around them leaves no more impression than a bird's footprints in the sky. They just follow their karma while regarding this world as mere jugglery conjured up by some magician.

For pure selflessness, these characters are up there with Ashton Kutcher in the final scenes of Butterfly Effect.

Which got me thinking about my favorite Buddhist teachings from the movies:

#2) From Unforgiven: The young outlaw has just seen his first killing. He's completely rattled, and trying to calm himself, he says to crusty old gunfighter Clint Eastwood, "I guess he had it coming." And Clint drawls, "We all got it comin', kid."

#1) From Blues Brothers, when the train rushes past Elwood's little room, shaking everything like a 6.0 earthquake. Jake is amazed at the commotion and asks, "How often does that happen?" And Elwood replies, "So often, you won't even notice!"

What's the Matter With Berkeley?

OK, enough of all this spiritual crap. Time to talk politics. It’s not that different after all. In politics, as well as religion, there are those who cultishly cling to dogma. We want to believe whatever political views make us feel good, and then use reason only to justify what we want to believe. So it's fruitful to question deeply whatever we think we know.

The endless presidential campaign cycle has begun. In my hometown of Berkeley, CA, living rooms and coffee shops are filled with left-leaning political discussion. There’s one topic that comes up with surprising regularity: Democrats champion government programs that benefit working-class people, so why do working-class people in the American heartland favor Republicans? It’s phrased something like this, “I can understand why rich people would vote Republican, but it’s so baffling and disturbing that non-rich people do so, when it’s so obviously not in their own interest.”

These conversations usually make approving reference to Thomas Frank’s popular book “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” What’s wrong with these heartland voters? What makes them unable to see that voting Democratic is what’s best for them? Pundit Molly Ivans writes of Frank's book, “I promise y'all, this is the only way to understand why so many Americans have decided to vote against their own economic and political interests.”

I, in turn, am bewildered at this bewilderment. The conundrum can be easily understood by exploring a few points conspicuously ignored in these laments.

1) Self-interest is always dependent on personal values.

What’s best is dependent on each individual’s opinions and values. If I equate self-interest with maximizing material wealth, I’ll use that same standard to judge the interests of others. When I see a government program benefiting a group, I'll assume that those affected will support it. I’ll assume that a minimum-wage worker will automatically support whichever party raises the minimum wage.

Other people, though, value self-reliance or other ethical values more than financial considerations. The people in Kansas are far more religious than those in Berkeley, so it’s not surprising that they respond to more non-material appeals. Once we accept that individuals may legitimately hold different values, it’s no longer surprising that a Kansan’s view of his own interest isn’t what a Berkeleyite thinks it is or should be. Those motivated by non-financial values can’t be controlled by promises of more money from the government.

2) People tend to be the best judge of their self-interest

Each individual is usually in the best position to decide what's in his own interest. We experience the effects of government in our own lives. This feedback determines our idea of our own interests, and motivates us to make our political choices with care.

A Berkeley academic’s ideas about a Kansan’s interest is theoretical. He may read books and study statistics, and use them to imagine how government policies impact the Kansan’s life. This academic perspective will exaggerate factors (such as finances) that can be easily measured, while missing the non-material factors that dominate the Kansan’s actual life.

A child, a psychopath, or an idiot may be incompetent to judge his own interests, and require a care-taker to do so. These are exceptions, not the rule. Even if the Berkeleyite is better educated than the Kansan, is the typical Kansan really so stupid that others should decide what’s best for him? If Berkeleyites assume that the Kansan, like a child or idiot, doesn't know what’s best for himself... we can hardly be surprised at how unpopular Berkeley-style political thinking is in the heartland.

3) Do people really act strictly in their own self-interest? Should they?

This is perhaps the most puzzling point. The Berkeley Lefties I know express shock and disappointment that the Kansan worker can’t be relied upon to follow his self-interest (by voting for Democrats as long as they promise to help him financially). But if we ourselves aren’t strictly motivated by self-interest, why should the Topekan be?

Surely Kansans are motivated by ideas about what’s fair to others, to future generations, and about what conforms to ethical and religious values. Maybe those who ask “What’s the Matter With Kansas?” are themselves overly motivated by self-interest. That would explain their bafflement that selfish motivators fail to explain or control mid-American voters. Alternately, maybe California Lefties consider their own unselfishness to be a mark of intellectual and moral superiority, and are baffled when the inferior American masses show they're not totally self-involved.

The Berkeley political discussions I’m speaking of generally conclude that Democrats need to find a different strategy. They must somehow get it through the thick skulls of Kansans what their interests really are. Maybe someday I’ll start hearing, “What’s the matter with Berkeley? Why can’t we let Kansans decide for themselves what they value and what’s in their interest?” Maybe instead of looking for ways to force our own values on everyone in the country, we’ll start looking for ways to maximize the freedom people have to live according to their own values. When I start hearing conversations like that in the Berkeley coffee shops, I’ll know that the political landscape is ready to change.

Impeach Buddha!

I like to keep up with Guruphiliac, a site dedicated to exposing bullshit in the spiritual subculture. I resonate with that blog because, since childhood, I’ve always liked to question whatever other people hold holy or sacred. In the process, I've gotten tons of grief for not being sufficiently reverent. It’s a relief when I find someone who can outflank me on the irreverence front, and Guruphiliac fits the bill.

(Case in point... most commentators swoon over "Hugging Saint" Ammachi. Who could say a critical word about a simple Indian lady who offers motherly hugs to all and sundry, in grand programs around the world lasting for hours? Yet in a recent Guruphiliac posting, webmaster Jody makes it clear that he ain't drinking that Kool-Aid: "Just because she puts on a good show doesn't mean she's not a diva bitch when she gets off the stage.")

In that same comments section, nublet claims a wisdom dimension to the Ammachi phenom, making comparison to the immensely popular Indian teacher Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950): “The unimpeachable advaitan Ramana Maharshi had an utterly unfettered devotional streak that many modern non-dualists would presumably find quite embarrassing. Do I need to post some of this or are you already aware?”

Here's what strikes me, and motivates this blog posting. Isn't it strange to rely on an authority when speaking about non-dual Truth? It’s like… if you want to know how many fingers there are on a human being’s hand, one way would be to Google that question, and doubtlessly you'd find an authoritative site that’d supply the answer. But that’d be ridiculous, since anyone, any time, can look at their own hands and count for themselves. Likewise, anyone who wants to understand Truth can just pay attention to whatever they’re perceiving and doing right now. How bizarre to suggest we rely on some dead Indian guy to know what Truth is!

Hell, I dunno, maybe Ramana was adorable, walking around half-naked and saying all sorts of cute stuff about the nature of reality. But when we fall into the belief that Truth is the property of a special person, it hinders our real job of attending to this moment. How could we possibly connect with what we’re doing right now, if we think there’s a bigger Truth somewhere else?

Nublet called Ramana “unimpeachable.” Dammit, I say that everything and everyone is impeachable. The dictum is well-known: If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha; if you meet an eminent teacher, kill the eminent teacher.

It may seem that putting nice folks like Ramana and Ammachi on pedestals is an innocent thing. Well, it’s OK if that’s what you want, but there’s a price. As soon as we make that tiny distinction and believe that a special Sage knows more about Reality than we do… then heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

Living in the Material World

I've had a few brief life experiences in which something became apparent in a most direct, fundamental, undeniable way: "I" is a thought that appears and disappears. The idea that "I" is something with independent, substantial existence is exactly that, an idea.

Looking closer, "I" is carved out from experience by drawing a line between the "I" and the "not-I." The "not-I" portion includes what we sometimes call "the material world" or some-such. The "I" part is sometimes called "mind" or "consciousness" etc.

I'm not interested in going into further detailed philosophical analysis of this. Just in acknowledging the basic, powerful insight that all dualities -- good/bad, mind/matter, self/world, etc -- don't refer to independently existing realities, but to distinctions made by thinking. Any mind-created distinction may certainly be questioned. Any or all of them may turn out to be arbitrary and unnecessary.

Over on the Ken Wilber Forum, there was a thread touching on evolution and entropy. Evolution is the process by which simple organisms become more and more complex, while entropy is the apparently contradictory law that states that all orderly systems inevitably become more disorderly over time. Here's my contribution to that conversation:

wmgreene wrote:
> Perhaps you would be kind enough to explain how your view of
> existence/evolution itself does not violate the Second Law of
> Thermodynamics (that orderly systems tend--on their own--
> to automatically become disorderly and chaotic, such that the
> processes of decay and disintegration are an inherent,
> built-in characteristics of the material world as we know it
> today)?

You're talking about built-in characteristics of "the material world." But originally, there's no "material world." The original world is the truth of this moment. We're experiencing it, though we can't capture it with words or ideas.

With our thinking, we can divide up the original world into all sorts of dualities. One such duality is "consciousness" vs "material world." You state that "orderly systems tend---on their own---to automatically become disorderly." But this material world isn't "on its own." We may gain certain power or understanding by working with it as if it existed on its own, but in fact the consciousness/material split is an arbitrary creation that we can well question.

That's why I don't take the laws of the "material world" portion and conclude that they apply to the true, original world. Whenever we make the mistake of believing that the material world has its own, original, substantial existence, we're led to contradictions (e.g., if everything is subject to entropy, why do we see all this order?), and those contradictions can help point us to our mistaken belief.

Ken Wilber Comments

In the Comments section of my first blog posting, yomamma initiated discussion of Ken Wilber. I'm not a fan of or an expert on Wilber, but I do think he fails in an interesting way. I'd like to quote here from what yomamma and others have written, add a few of my own thoughts, and invite further discussion in the comments section.

yomamma said...
I read an article that Ken Wilber wrote later, that said he feels, Da missed the boat at some point, not that I want to defend Ken Wilber, he seems to now have transfered his need for guru affiliation and creation to Andrew Cohen.

One of Wilber's books that I did read was Grace and Grit. I was immediately struck by Wilber's arrogance (as a small example, quoting a man on page 150 who refers to Wilber as "the potentially greatest philosopher of consciousness since Freud.") Wilber's work is filled with categories of development with different "altitudes," such that one's spiritual state can be judged higher or lower. This of course allows Wilber to place himself on one of the higher rungs. When Wilber attaches himself to authoritarian gurus (Adi Da and Andrew Cohen), it allows him to bask in their reflected glory, bolstering Wilber's own claims of superior altitude.

My opinion is that people are desperate for meaning and mystery, which is great, but they don't want to practice any number of great traditions that are available without some kind of glamour/power factor involved. it's creepy.

Not just creepy, but ironic. If someone wants mystery, all they need to do is pay a little attention. The world around us is nothing but mystery, starting with the great question of What am I? Grasping at dogmas and ideas is an attempt to understand the unknowable, which obscures a clear appreciation of the mystery.

I read his last book and found it leaving me full of questions, like who decides the validity of this stuff? Is it practiced anywhere? Is it really helpful in any objective way? Is he just blinding me with pseudo science and big words?

Yeah, blinding you with pseudo-science and big words, that's what I'd say.

Anonymous said...
Dogen Zenji, founder of the Soto Zen sect, warned of the hazard of 'gaining mind' and that properly practiced, zazen was never done to attain any sort of result. The problem with the Wilberian approach is to take beautiful truthful elements piece meal from spiritual practices meant to emancipate us from gaining mind, and turns all these elements into a crusade fuelled by gaining mind--to turn oneself into a highly evolved person--according to KW's current specifications.

This hits the heart of the matter. If you want something, you have a problem. Dae Soen Sa Nim used to say that enlightenment is easy to get, difficult to keep. That is, anyone can put time and effort into a meditation practice and get an experience of clear, before-thinking mind. But in the next moment, we may try to capture the experience with concepts, as a way of getting or holding something for ourselves. Clarity isn't a thing that we can get; it's the direction of putting down our ideas over and over, and returning to questioning, to before-thinking.

The medicine to cure a gaining mind is to attend 100% to this moment, trying to act with clarity and compassion in the situation right in front of us. The desire to turn oneself into a highly-evolved person is just more I/my/me thinking. If Wilber is inspiring people to adopt this gaining mind, that's a big big mistake.