Intfere S.:
Hello all,
I wanted to find a place to describe my experience and ask my question and found this site. Please share your thoughts!
Originally I don't come from a buddhist tradition, but somehow meditating led me to a conclusion that contradicts my own tradition and resembles the buddhist doctrine of anatta, which I used to consider ridiculous. While meditating I got a strong certainty that I do not have an "I", or free will, or identity, and that others do not have it, either. I tried to find it outside of meditation, ascribing my meditation-induced ideas to random alternative states of consciousness, but failed to find any counter-evidence.
At first I tried to solve the problem by ascribing free will only to what is commonly referred to as "consciousness", or sometimes "the witness", i.e. a thought process witnessing everything happening, including itself. But after investigating it I walked away more certain than ever that this consciousness is not conscious at all, it's as unconscious as everything else.
The natural thing to do after that was to stop fighting and to go with the flow of life, considering all evils and goods inevitable, rather than earned or directed. And that's what happened, I started to go with the flow. Now, I do not mean it in any higher sense, it means what it says and nothing else.
But I've reached an impasse. In the world and life that isn't conscious and lacks free will, what is the point of meditation or anything of that nature at all? I try to do things well and just experience them until they last, but something is lacking. It's going with the flow making me feel that life is just a one-ticket ride, the only point of which is to be experienced, and it doesn't matter in which manner you take this ride. Everything is sort of equal.
It's not a bad attitude to life at all, and my life has changed drastically to the better with it. But I want to find other points of view. What does it mean for any effort of "spiritual" nature? No matter how you try, you won't get free will out of nowhere, you can't gain what you've never had. Still, I know there are some people who do consider it possible, that really puzzles me, and I'd like to know how they came to their conclusions and how they discovered their "real me". And there are other people who think that there's no other "I", buddhists (as far as I understand them).
So I came to this forum, hoping to meet both types of people and to get from them something that I failed to find elsewhere, mostly in books. Usually books only speak of which mantras you need to chant and how you should meditate or, if they're theoretical, they push their own doctrine forward, hinting that once you get a revelation you will know everything on your own. But now I have a small revelation of my own, btu I still don't know if it's right or wrong and want to know it. With help from real people who lived through similar experiences and perhaps drew different conclusions eventually or discovered different ways to accomodate them in their lives.
Hi, consider what I wrote here and the conversation with Thusness:
......
...not to be mistaken that will has no part in all these. The teaching of anatta or no self does not deny will or the aggregates... The buddha teaches that a sentient being is simply a convention for five aggregates: matter/body, feelings, perception, volition, consciousness. Notice that volition is part of it. This will/volition can be directed towards a wholesome or unwholesome path. However, also remember that the five aggregates are empty of self - and are without agent. Does that mean there is no free will? In a sense yes, but neither does it imply determinism: another dualistic extreme. Free will means subjective controller determines action, determinism means objective world determines subjective experience. In reality there is no subject and object - in thinking just thought, in hearing just sound. But there are requisite conditions for every manifestation. Those conditions can be changed if there is a correct path.
A concrete example: if you ask a beginner to run 2.4km in 9 minutes with an unfit body, that is asking for the impossible. No matter how hard willed is he, he is never going to make it. Why? The current requisite conditions of his body is such that the result of running 9 minutes is impossible. Control, agency, doesn't apply when manifestation always arise due to conditions.
It however also means that if you exercise regularly for months or years, there is no reason the body (conditions) cannot be improved to the degree that running 9 mins is definitely possible. This is what I mean by working with conditions.
So those teachers who say meditation are useless are not understanding latent tendencies and conditions. They mistook no doership with some kind of fatalism. Every proper practice has its place in working with one's conditions.
Just because there is no self, no doer, doesn't mean my body is fated to be unfit and I can't reach the 9 min. Just because I exercise regularly doesn't mean I am reinforcing the notion of self or doership. In any case, action is always without self.
It also does not mean that "will" has no place at all. "Will" is often misunderstood to be linked to a self or agent that has full control over things, whereas it is simply more manifestation and conditions. Yes, sheer will going against conditions isn't going to work – this is not understanding no-self and dependent origination. But if will is directed properly with correct understanding of no-self and conditionality, at a proper path and practice, it can lead to benefits.
That is why the first teaching of Buddha is the four noble truths: the truth of suffering, the cause of suffering, the end of suffering, the way to end suffering. This path arises as a result of his direct insight into no-self and dependent origination.
Like a doctor, you don't tell your patients "you are fated to be ill and sick and in pain, because there is no individual controller, everything is the will of God". That is nonsense. Instead, you diagnose the illness, you seek the cause of illness, you give a treatment that eliminates the cause of illness. There is no self, there is no controller, but there is conditions and manifestation and a way to treat bad conditions. This is the way of the four noble truths.
........
(November 2010)
(4:49:42 PM) Thusness: therefore i do not want u to misunderstand and falls into fox zen
(4:50:03 PM) Thusness: there must be clear understanding of the supporting conditions...
(4:50:17 PM) Thusness: not everything is the universe causing it...
(4:50:29 PM) Thusness: u have no choice...knock ur head
(4:50:34 PM) AEN: haha
(4:50:50 PM) Thusness: in fact that is one of the disease of non-dual and desync of views
(4:51:00 PM) AEN: so there is choice?
(4:51:07 PM) AEN: there is intentions right
(4:51:09 PM) AEN: and choice
(4:51:11 PM) Thusness: yes
(4:51:14 PM) AEN: ic..
(4:51:16 PM) Thusness: there is no control
(4:51:30 PM) Thusness: there is influences of the outcome
(4:51:40 PM) Thusness: no perfect control...
(4:52:08 PM) Thusness: it is no different from having a self
(4:52:17 PM) Thusness: except that there is no division
(4:52:36 PM) Thusness: no someone standing out apart from the flow of phenomenality
(4:53:05 PM) Thusness: the inter-dependencies are too complex and subtle to penetrate
(4:53:26 PM) Thusness: and this moment of whatever arises are the result of such dependencies
(4:53:58 PM) Thusness: chanting has its effect
(4:54:05 PM) Thusness: do merit has its effect
(4:54:33 PM) Thusness: insights are transformational
(4:54:51 PM) Thusness: the path of practice has their effect
(4:55:03 PM) Thusness: self enquiry help u to realize "I AM"
(4:55:14 PM) Thusness: no-self lead u to realize non-division and anatta
(4:55:30 PM) Thusness: allow the direct experience
(4:55:35 PM) Thusness: of the transient
(4:56:15 PM) Thusness: what you wrote and ur summary provide u the penetrating insight of non-duality
(4:56:22 PM) Thusness: and insight into anatta.
(4:56:38 PM) Thusness: how is it that there is no way to impact?
(4:57:22 PM) Thusness: it just does not manifest the way the dualistic and inherent mind perceive it to be
(4:57:54 PM) Thusness: means reality is not what it seems to be
(4:58:08 PM) Thusness: not the way dualistic and inherent mind sees it
(4:58:24 PM) Thusness: DO and emptiness is the way to correctly understand it
(5:00:32 PM) AEN: oic.. yeah everything impacts everything... even right view is important and the right practice... the notion that 'theres nothing to do for enlightenment' or that enlightenment is some random event is really off the mark
(5:02:31 PM) Thusness: if u practice chanting a billion times, ur consciousness in the 3 states will be affected
(5:03:35 PM) Thusness: mere will in the conscious state will be able to stop the momentum
(5:03:43 PM) Thusness: that is self view...get it?
(5:05:18 PM) AEN: yeah
(5:05:28 PM) Thusness: even in deep dreamless sleep
(5:05:30 PM) AEN: u mean 'will not'
(5:05:39 PM) Thusness: yeah
(5:05:47 PM) AEN: yea
(5:05:52 PM) AEN: what do u mean by even in deep dreamless sleep
(5:06:14 PM) Thusness: even in deep dreamless sleep...ur mind/body rhythm, heart beats are affected by this practice
(5:08:20 PM) Thusness: if penetrate anatta deeply...from moment to moment...thoroughly letting go of self and grasping and vivid presence, how is it that such practice will not affect the 3 states?
(5:14:39 PM) AEN: hmm
(5:14:53 PM) AEN: but in deep dreamless sleep if there is no conscious awareness how can there be an ongoing practice?
(5:16:26 PM) Thusness: the entire movement is not a matter of conscious awareness
(5:17:13 PM) Thusness: the momentum continues...the body, the cells are imprinted too.

(5:17:19 PM) AEN: oic..
(5:17:35 PM) Thusness: much like ur deep held attachments
(5:17:47 PM) Thusness: all inter-penetrates
(5:18:37 PM) Thusness: ur body can contract unnecessarily.

(5:19:24 PM) AEN: ic..
(5:22:09 PM) Thusness: so u may have the experience but u have to refine ur understanding.
(5:22:24 PM) Thusness: there are still some good pointers
(5:23:12 PM) Thusness: when u practice dropping, it will help
(5:23:27 PM) Thusness: when ur insight deepens, it will help
(5:24:10 PM) Thusness: so the mind can be clear
(5:25:19 PM) AEN: oic..
(5:25:57 PM) Thusness: thoughts create fear... the mind engages in story has fear
(5:26:07 PM) Thusness: this is true
(5:26:43 PM) Thusness: and being thoughtless, fear does not arise at that moment when we do away with thoughts and stop engaging in stories
(5:26:55 PM) Thusness: but the cause is the 'attachment'
(5:27:33 PM) Thusness: if the holding is there, there is no overcoming of the problem
(5:27:52 PM) Thusness: get it?
(5:28:43 PM) Thusness: knowing that it is just a thought, engaging in stories helps as a form of practice... ultimately, that deep held tendency must be relinquished.
(5:30:25 PM) AEN: ic.. so u mean the main focus is not thoughtlessness but relinquishing the tendency of holding?
(5:30:44 PM) AEN: and thats by insight and dropping?
(5:31:16 PM) Thusness: yes
(5:32:12 PM) Thusness: and because there is no holding, no attachment, there is thoughtlessness
(5:33:12 PM) Thusness: as I said certain teachings are good to certain point... after u arise the insight, u have to have other pointers
(5:33:41 PM) Thusness: before that, it can be helpful to get u there...they are good 'supporting conditions'
(5:33:49 PM) AEN: oic..
(5:34:56 PM) Thusness: but some of the expressions are beautiful. Some times just few of these beautiful phrases help to articulate expressions...
(5:35:13 PM) Thusness: and that is what i look for because it is so hard to express.
(5:35:39 PM) AEN: ic..
(5:36:25 PM) AEN: "Learned Audience, when we use Prajna for introspection we are illumined within and without, and in a position
to know our own mind. To know our mind is to obtain liberation. To obtain liberation is to attain Samadhi of Prajna, which is 'thoughtlessness'. What is 'thoughtlessness'? 'Thoughtlessness' is to see and to know all Dharmas (things) with a mind free from attachment. When in use it pervades everywhere, and yet it sticks nowhere. What we have to do is to purify our mind so that the six vijnanas (aspects of consciousness) , in passing through the six gates (sense organs) will neither be defiled by nor attached to the six sense-objects. When our mind works freely without any hindrance, and is at liberty to 'come' or to 'go', we attain Samadhi of Prajna, or liberation. Such a state is called the function of 'thoughtlessness'. But to refrain from thinking of anything, so that all thoughts are suppressed, is to be Dharma-ridden, and this is an erroneous view."
(5:36:27 PM) AEN: - hui neng
(5:37:53 PM) Thusness: yes