End in Sight:
but the linguistic convention remains, and for the enlightened person, they are free to classify and separate experiences without being limited by those conventions, and without suffering on account of believing those conventions to be more than they are for even a moment.)
I mostly agree, the sutra describes IMO the experience of great liberation. The experience of having no center, and realizing that no one and no thing has a center, its all impersonal and therefore free from suffering.
In this place if someone we love dearly dies we might not experience any stress, we might just see the whole event as the play of changing empty and meaningless form. Nothing can touch us because we are empty and so is everything else. However according to the tradition (also my personal experience and that of my teachers) there is a next step, which might come years or even decades after.
In the Zen tradition, after this is deeply experienced and truly embodied, something happens, it's called the "Return of the self" or "Fall from grace". This is the return of the relative stuff and it's when we experience our humanity in a deep and raw manner, this is also the arising of deep compassion, a compassion that we
feel deep in our bones.
Then we gradually integrate this 2 aspects of our being, the personal and the impersonal (described in the heart sutra) and we are able to experience and love both. Seeing that this cycle is a natural process. Impersonal/personal like breathing in/out. Paraphrasing one of my teachers - Shinzen Young: Mahayana Buddism is about saving and loving a world that is not really there.
I was browsing to the site and found that someone had posted this link, I find it right on with what I'm talking about.
http://freestyleawakening.wordpress.com/2011/12/04/disintegration-and-reintegration-the-path-of-awakening-from-beginning-to-end/#comment-279
Thanks for all your posts End in Sight.