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Foreword to Big Mind/Big Heart by Genpo Roshi
Ken Wilber
February 04, 2007
Let me state this as strongly as I can: the Big Mind Process (founded by Dennis Genpo Merzel Roshi) is arguably the most important and original discovery in the last two centuries of Buddhism.
It is an astonishingly original, profound, and effective path for waking up, or seeing one’s True Nature.
It is such a simple and universal practice it can be used in any spiritual path you wish, or even just alone, by itself, as a practice for realizing your True Nature—which you can call God, Allah, Jahweh, Brahman, Tao, Ein Sof—it doesn’t really matter, because the core of the Big Mind Process is Emptiness itself, which, having no specific content at all, can and does embrace anything that arises, integrating it all.
What Dennis Genpo Roshi has done is not only the most original discovery in Buddhism in the last two centuries, it is unbelievably simple, quick, and effective.
In Zen, this realization of one’s True Nature, or Ultimate Reality, is called kensho or satori (“seeing into one’s True Nature,” or discovering Big Mind and Big Heart).
It often takes five years or more of extremely difficult practice (I know, I’ve done it) in order for a profound satori to occur.
With the Big Mind Process, a genuine kensho can occur in about an hour—seriously.
Once you get it, you can do it virtually any time you wish, and almost instantaneously.
It is nothing less than the discovery of your True and Unique Self, Ultimately Reality, the Ground of All Being—again, call it what you like, for “they call it Many which is really One.”
[...]
The Spectrum of Consciousness
Ken Wilber
[...]
The
Ego Level and the Existential Level together constitute our general feeling
of being a self-existent and separate individual, and it is to these levels
that most Western approaches have addressed themselves.
Eastern disciplines, on the other hand, are generally more concerned with
the Level of Mind, and thus tend to completely by-pass the levels of egocentricity.
In short, Western psychotherapies aim at “patching up” the individual
self while Eastern approaches aim at transcending the self.
So while we find ourselves at the Ego Level or the Existential Level,
let us avail ourselves of the existing methods—largely “Western”—of
creating healthy egos, of integrating projections, of coming to grips
with unconscious drives and wishes, of structurally re-aligning our bodily
postures, of accepting responsibility for our being-in-the-world, of dealing
with neuroses, of living us to our full potentials as individuals.
But should we seek to go beyond the confines of the individual self, to
find an even richer and fuller level of consciousness, then let us learn
from those investigators—largely "“Eastern”—of
the Level of Mind, of mystical awareness, of cosmic consciousness.
It is certainly obvious that Eastern and Western approaches to consciousness
can be used separately, for that is exactly what is happening today; but
it should now be clear that they can also be used in a complementary fashion.
[...]
From:
Ken Wilber
The Spectrum of Consciousness
Quest Books
The Theosophical Publishing House, 1977
P. 8-9
No-Self: You Are Not What You Think
Dennis Genpo Merzel, Roshi
After we are born and have lived some years, we create a false separation between our self and others, beginning with mother and then with other people and the environment. We begin to identify our self as a separate individual.
As soon as we do that, we enclose and limit our self. We think of our self as residing in this body, maybe in the head.
We identify with this body or with our mind as who we are and create a false barrier or membrane, an invisible membrane that separates us from everything else—from earth, from sky, from other beings, human and non-human.
As soon as we do that, we create this inner “me” and that outer “not-me.” A lot of problems arise from this division, because anything considered not me or outside of the membrane poses the potential threat of destroying the “me.”
It’s like a bubble on the surface of the ocean. Anything that might puncture the very thin membrane that allows me to be a separate individual is a threat and is regarded with skepticism, paranoia, fear.
The important thing becomes maintaining this identity to be sure that “me” continues to exist in the form I’ve become familiar with, the known.
Allowing the membrane to break would be merging into the unknown, a state of just being, returning to original nature, which is expanded consciousness. All the past and all the future, all space and all time, are included right now, right here.
The ego fears this merging more than anything else in the world, because in that state the “me” disappears.
When there’s me-ness or ego, everything revolves around “me” and there is a tremendous self-centeredness or self-concern. We see our self and our life as extremely important. We see everything we do as the center of the universe, and all our problems are magnified.
The way to go beyond viewing the world from this narrow perspective is to expand consciousness, expand the mind, so there is no outside, no outer boundary, no membrane. Then there’s neither outside nor inside and everything is included.
What that
takes is becoming very quiet, very still and quiet, and allowing the mind
to expand in all directions simultaneously and infinitely. Nothing is
excluded and you see everything as yourself. You’re not separated
from it. Then the state of merging can happen all the time.
From:
Dennis Genpo Merzel
24/7 Dharma: Impermanence, No-Self, Nirvana
Journey Editions, 2001
P. 39 - 41
Some Quotes
Problems
can never be solved with the same mind that created them.
Albert Einstein
In our present
world science is so dominant that we give it the authority to explain
even when it denies what is more immediate and direct—our everyday,
immediate experience.
Varela, Thomson & Rosch
You know,
I’ve never heard anyone near death say—and I’ve never heard
of anyone who’s ever known anyone near death say—‘I wish
I had spent more time at work.’
Irving D. Yalom
(Psycho)Analysts
seem more certain of everything than I am of anything.
Irving D. Yalom
Aan logica
alleen kleeft altijd iets gebrekkigs, wat tot zwaarmoedigheid stemt.
Fjodor M. Dostojewski
When I say
that science has gradually converted into a slow-acting poison, I mean
that the attribution of certainty to scientific knowledge by the common
wisdom, an attribution now made so nearly universally that it has become
a commonsense dogma, has virtually delegitimized all other ways of understanding.
Joseph Weizenbaum
The declaration of independence of the scientific man, his emancipation from philosophy, is one of the subtler after-effects of democratic organization and disorganization: the self-glorification and self-conceitedness of the learned man is now everywhere in full bloom, and in its best springtime—which does not mean to imply that in this case self-praise smells sweet.
Here also
the instinct of the populace cries, ‘Freedom from all masters!’
and after science has, with the happiest results, resisted theology, whose
‘hand-maid’ it had been too long, it now proposes in its wantonness
and indiscretion to lay down laws for philosophy, and in its turn to play
the ‘master’—what am I saying! to play the PHILOSOPHER
on its own account.
Friedrich Nietzsche
[...]
more
quotes...
Deze citaten zijn verzameld door:
Prof. dr. Gert Storms, hoogleraar psychologie,
Centrum Hogere Cognitie en Individuele Verschillen,
Universiteit van Leuven.
Gert Storms
schreef een artikel met de titel:
Psychologie: wetenschap, praktijk, en zelfkennis.
Het verscheen
in:
Maha Karuna Bericht, 2006 nummer 3,
Thema: Psychologie en spiritualiteit.
Maha Karuna Ch’an wordt geleid door Ton Lathouwers.
Lees ook dit artikel over het verband tussen Boeddhisme en westerse psychologie.
Love
Itself
Leonard
Cohen
for L.W.
The light
came through the window,
Straight from the sun above,
And so inside my little room
There plunged the rays of Love.
In streams
of light I clearly saw
The dust you seldom see,
Out of which the Nameless makes
A Name for one like me.
I’ll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on
Until it reached an open door -
Then Love Itself
Love Itself was gone.
All busy
in the sunlight
The flecks did float and dance,
And I was tumbled up with them
In formless circumstance.
I’ll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on
Until it reached an open door -
Then Love Itself
Love Itself was gone.
Then I came
back from where I’d been.
My room, it looked the same -
But there was nothing left between
The Nameless and the Name.
All busy
in the sunlight
The flecks did float and dance,
And I was tumbled up with them
In formless circumstance.
I’ll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on
Until it reached an open door -
Then Love itself,
Love Itself was gone.
Love Itself,
Love Itself was gone.
From:
Leonard Cohen
Ten New Songs
Sony Music Entertainment Inc., 2001
www.leonardcohen.com
www.leonardcohenfiles.com
Wetenschappelijke
Raad voor het Regeringsbeleid
Lecture 2006: Voorbij de scheiding
tussen kerk en staat?
19 december 2006
Zowel in de wetenschap als in het publieke debat is er sprake van een voor velen onverwachte en verwarrende ‘come back’ van religie.
Godsdienstsociologen stellen de eerder dominante hypothese van steeds voortgaande secularisering van moderne samenlevingen ter discussie.
Recent empirisch onderzoek dat verder kijkt dan kerkbezoek biedt inzicht in een zich ingrijpend transformerende ‘religieuze praxis’.
In het publieke debat wordt gewezen op de waarde van religie voor de samenleving, maar blijkt telkens ook de felle weerstand die zij oproept.
Er worden veel vragen gesteld over de rol die religie mag spelen in het publieke domein en over de trekken grenzen van staatsinvloed op de manifestatie van religie.
Deze vragen doen zich voor terwijl de grenzen van het publieke domein vervagen onder invloed van internationalisering en virtualisering.
Het nadenken over de verhouding tussen religie en publiek domein kan daarom niet worden opgesloten in discussies over het beginsel van de scheiding tussen kerk en staat.
[...]
WRR-Lecture ‘Voorbij de scheiding tussen kerk en staat’
Dealing With Close-Mindedness
Steve Pavlina
November 27th, 2006
[...]
You can still deal with close-minded people rationally without emotionally resisting their position.
Make an effort to see if you can help them become a little more open-minded without making them wrong.
Benjamin Franklin had a great method for this.
He would introduce an absentee third party into the discussion whenever he had to disagree with someone.
For example, he’d start a sentence with, “How would you respond if someone suggested that…” or “I once heard someone say that…” or “Some might say that…” or “It’s been rumored that…”
Then he’d maintain a posture of curiosity rather than defensiveness.
He’d put himself and the other person on one side of the table and the ideas on the other side.
This would allow him to debate the ideas and be very persuasive while keeping the egos in the room from going to war.
No one will put up much of a fight against a third party that isn’t even present.
It was also harder for anyone to attack Franklin personally because he didn’t claim ownership of the ideas he presented.
I’ve used Franklin’s strategy on many occasions, and it works wonders.
It takes a bit of practice to get used to separating your ego from your ideas, but I think you’ll find the results are worth the effort.
If it can work in negotiating the U.S. Constitution, it can probably work for you.
[...]
From:
Steve Pavlina
Personal Development for Smart People
Mind your own business
Megan Gressor
November 24, 2006
Concentrate
on every little action
to reduce racing thoughts and stress.
It is said to boost performance and wellbeing, decrease anxiety, depression and chronic fatigue, and have beneficial effects on conditions ranging from chronic pain and fibromyalgia to psoriasis, multiple sclerosis and even cancer.
But it’s not a futuristic wonder drug - it’s an ancient Buddhist discipline gaining increased acceptance in mainstream medicine.
It is mindfulness meditation, also known as “insight meditation”.
Its foremost proponent is Jon Kabat-Zinn, who is visiting Australia this month.
Professor Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, where he founded the Centre for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society, Kabat-Zinn has researched mind-body interactions for more than 25 years, focusing on the applications of meditation in the treatment of stress-related disorders.
He developed the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program now used in settings as varied as schools, corporations and prisons in the US and hospitals worldwide.
[...]
Individual and Social Origins of Neurosis
Erich Fromm
August 1944
[...]
Today we come across a person and find that he acts and feels like an automaton; that he never experiences anything which is really his; that he experiences himself entirely as the person he thinks he is supposed to be; that smiles have replaced laughter, meaningless chatter replaced communicative speech; dulled despair has taken the place of genuine pain.
Two statements can be made about this person.
One is that he suffers from a defect of spontaneity and individuality which may seem incurable.
At the same time it may be said that he does not differ essentially from thousands of others who are in the same position.
With most of them the cultural pattern provided for the defect saves them from the outbreak of neurosis.
With some the cultural pattern does not function, and the defect appears as a severe neurosis.
The fact that in these cases the cultural pattern does not suffice to prevent the outbreak of a manifest neurosis is in most cases to be explained by the particular severity and structure of the individual conflicts.
I shall not go into this any further.
The point I want to stress is the necessity to proceed from the problem of the origins of neurosis to the problem of the origins of the culturally patterned defect; to the problem of the pathology of normalcy.
[...]
In this article, first published in American Sociological Review (Vol. IX, No. 4, August 1944) Fromm for the first time speaks of “culturally patterned defects” to be distinguished from “individual neurosis” and of “the pathology of normalcy”.
Who Binds You?
Dennis Genpo Merzel, Roshi
The Buddha taught that suffering is an inevitable aspect of life; this is his first noble truth.
But if you stop there and look no further into the teaching, you will miss the whole point.
Buddha realized that we need to face the fact of suffering head-on before we can understand its source and discover the Way to liberation.
After he himself realized the Way, Buddha couldn’t keep the treasure for himself; he was compelled by compassion to tell everyone who would listen: the key to liberation lies within each of us.
[...]
From:
Dennis Genpo Merzel
The Path of the Human Being:
Zen Teachings on the Bodhisattva Way
Shambhala, Boston & London, 2003
P. 45
Addiction
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Addiction is a chronic disorder proposed to be precipitated by a combination of genetic, biological/pharmacological and social factors.
Addiction is characterized by the repeated use of substances or behaviors despite clear evidence of morbidity secondary to such use.
Decades ago addiction was a pharmacologic term that clearly referred to the use of a tolerance-inducing drug in sufficient quantity as to cause tolerance (the requirement that greater dosages of a given drug be used to produce an identical effect as time passes).
With that definition, humans (and indeed all mammals) can become addicted to various drugs quickly.
Almost at the same time, a lay definition of addiction developed.
This definition referred to individuals who continued to use a given drug despite their own best interest.
This latter definition is now thought of as a disease state by the medical community.
Physical dependence, abuse of, and withdrawal from drugs and other miscellaneous substances is outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV TR).
Unfortunately, terminology has become quite complicated in the field.
To wit, pharmacologists continue to speak of addiction from a physiologic standpoint (some call this a physical dependence); psychiatrists refer to the disease state as dependence; most other physicians refer to the disease as addiction.
The field of psychiatry is now considering, as they move from DSM-IV to DSM-V, transitioning from “dependence” to “addiction” as terminology for the disease state.
[...]
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Soortgenoot onder de soortgenoten
* Een alcoholist weet wat u doormaakt.
* Een alcoholist weet wat u voelt,
hoe u zich voelt.
* Een alcoholist weet wat u uzelf aan sprookjes en halve
waarheden vertelt.
* Een alcoholist weet dat u niet van het tiende glas
dronken wordt, maar al van het eerste.
* Een alcoholist weet dat u uzelf
wijsmaakt dat u geen alcoholist bent.
* Een alcoholist weet ook dat u
niet met uw drankprobleem te koop wilt lopen.
* Een alcoholist weet ook
dat u de oplossing van uw drankprobleem het liefst aan iemand anders zou uitbesteden.
* Bij alcoholisten bent u soortgenoot onder de soortgenoten.
[...]
Wassilissa the Beautiful
[...]
When the little girl was eight years old the mother fell ill, and before many days it was plain to be seen that she must die.
So
she called her little daughter to her, and taking a tiny wooden doll from under
the blanket of the bed, put it into her hands and said:
“My little Wassilissa, my dear daughter, listen to what I say, remember well my last words and fail not to carry out my wishes.
“I am dying, and with my blessing, I leave to thee this little doll. It is very precious for there is no other like it in the whole world.
“Carry it always about with thee in thy pocket and never show it to anyone. When evil threatens thee or sorrow befalls thee, go into a corner, take it from thy pocket and give it something to eat and drink.
“It will eat and drink a little, and then thou mayest tell it thy trouble and ask its advice, and it will tell thee how to act in thy time of need.”
So saying, she kissed her little daughter on the forehead, blessed her, and shortly after died.
[...]
So the Tsar and Wassilissa the Beautiful were married, and her father returned from the far-distant Tsardom, and he and the old woman lived always with her in the splendid Palace, in all joy and contentment.
And as for the little wooden doll, she carried it about with her in her pocket all her life long.
Iron John
[...]
On the third day the King had ridden out hunting, and the boy went once more and said, “I cannot open the door even if I wished, for I have not the key.”
Then the wild man said, “It lies under thy mother’s pillow, thou canst get it there.”
The boy, who wanted to have his ball back, cast all thought to the winds, and brought the key. The door opened with difficulty, and the boy pinched his fingers.
When it was open the wild man stepped out, gave him the golden ball, and hurried away.
The boy had become afraid; he called and cried after him, “Oh, wild man, do not go away, or I shall be beaten!”
The wild man turned back, took him up, set him on his shoulder, and went with hasty steps into the forest.
[...]
The maiden laughed, and said, “He does not stand much on ceremony, but I have already seen by his golden hair that he was no gardener’s boy,” and then she went and kissed him.
His father and mother came to the wedding, and were in great delight, for they had given up all hope of ever seeing their dear son again.
And as they were sitting at the marriage-feast, the music suddenly stopped, the doors opened, and a stately King came in with a great retinue.
He went up to the youth, embraced him and said, “I am Iron John, and was by enchantment a wild man, but thou hast set me free; all the treasures which I possess, shall be thy property.”
Lees beide verhalen.
En deze overwegingen.
Maar word eerst helder.
Houd op pijn te vermijden.
Ga zo nodig in therapie.
Lees nog eens Ken Wilber.
Daarna
kun je veilig met zen
beginnen.
The Shadow and the Disowned Self
Ken Wilber
[...]
By way of summary, I will walk through the dis-owning process one more time.
If
this is already clear to you, please forgive the repetition.
We began with anger as a shadow-impulse.
The anger starts out as a first-person reality (my anger; I am angry, I have anger).
For various reasons—fear, self-restriction, super-ego judgments, past trauma, etc.—I contract away from my anger and push it on the other side of the I-boundary, hoping thereby not to get punished for having this horrible emotion.
“My anger” has now become “anger that I am looking at, or talking to, or experiencing, but it is not my anger!”
In that moment of pushing away—that moment of resisting or contracting—in that moment of pushing away, first-person anger has become a second-person presence in my own first-person I-stream.
If I push further, that anger becomes third-person: I am no longer even on speaking terms with my own anger.
I might still feel this anger somehow—I know somebody is angry as hell, but since it simply cannot be me, it must be you, or him, or her, or it.
Come to think of it, John is always mad at me! Which is such a shame, since I myself never get angry at him, or at anybody, really.
When I push the anger on the other side of my I-boundary, it appears as a second- or third-person feeling that is nonetheless still within my I-stream.
I can still feel “his” anger or “her” anger or the “it” anger. If the projection actually worked, after all, I would never feel it again and I would not have any problems.
I would throw the anger out, and that would be that.
It would be like amputating a leg—it would be totally gone, and it would really work—painful as it might be, I’d actually get rid of the leg-anger.
But I am connected to my projection by the secret ownership of the anger (it is not really an object, it is my own hidden-subject).
It would be like not cutting my leg off, just claiming that it is really your leg.
It’s not my leg, it’s your leg!
It’s not my anger, it’s your anger! (Now that’s a major dysfunction, isn’t it?)
So the hidden attachment or hidden-subjective identity of the “other’s feeling” always connects the projection to its owner by a series of painful neurotic symptoms.
Every time I push the anger on the other side of my I-boundary, what remains in its place on this side of the I-boundary is a painful symptom, a pretend lack of the alienated feeling that leaves, in its place, psychological pain.
Subject
has become shadow has become symptom.
So now we have dissociated or dis-owned anger within my own I-stream.
This anger might indeed be projected onto others “out there.”
Or it might be dissociated and projected into parts of my own psyche, perhaps showing up as a monster in my dreams, a monster that always hates me and wants to kill me.
And
I wake up sweating from these nightmares.
Let’s say I am doing a very sophisticated meditation practice such as Tibetan Buddhism (Vajrayana Buddhism), and I am working with “transmuting emotions.”
This
is a very powerful technique in which one contacts a present negative emotion,
feels into it with ever-present nondual awareness and brilliant clarity, and then
allows the negative emotion to transmute into its corresponding transcendental
wisdom.
So I start with my nightmare, and I notice that I have fear because of this monster. In the face of this monster, I feel a great deal of fear.
So
to transmute this emotion, I am instructed to feel into the fear, relax
into the fear, and then let it uncoil and self-liberate into its corresponding
wisdom of transparency.
Fine. Except that the fear itself is an inauthentic and false emotion (i.e., the product of repression), and transmuting inauthentic emotions not only presumes and reinforces the inauthenticity, it converts it into what might be called inauthentic wisdom, which is wisdom resting on a false base.
And the repression is still in place!
You haven’t done a thing for that.
So each time you experience anger, it will be projected to create monsters all around you, which will bring up fear in you (which is really fear of your own anger, not fear of that monster), and you will get in touch with that fear and transmute that fear—NEVER getting at the real and authentic emotion of anger.
You will own the inauthentic emotion of fear, not the authentic emotion of anger.
[...]
From:
Ken Wilber
Integral Spirituality: A Startling New Role
for Religion in the Modern and Postmodern World
Integral Books, Boston & London, 2006
Pp. 134-136
Wikipedia over Ken Wilber.
A Guide to Japanese Buddhism
Japan Buddhist Federation
[...]
Introduction
of Soto Zen
Dogen (1200-1253) also studied Zen in China, and upon
his return to Japan he established Soto Zen.
From the beginning, Dogen disliked to engage in worldly affairs and hated to submit to the authority and power of the military government.
He built Eihei-ji, the mountain monastery, in Fukui Prefecture and wrote 95 volumes of essays.
Soto Zen teaches that the practice of sitting in meditation is the sole means to discover our true selves and to attain enlightenment.
It
does not require any reasoning or inferring.
Zen meditation is not a mystic union with Buddha or the simple confrontation with a religious object for one in a prescribed discipline at a specific time and place, but rather a way of life for everyone in any circumstances.
It teaches a way to live and to die peacefully, meaningfully, and pleasantly.
This teaching particularly attracted the warriors whose lives were constantly threatened by their enemies.
The Bushido, the warrior’s spirit, developed out of its teaching.
[...]
From:
A Guide to Japanese Buddhism
Published by Japan Buddhist Federation
First edition October 2004
P. 13
Read the whole booklet.
buddhanet.net
buddhist
information and education network
Shushogi:
What is Truly Meant by
Training and Enlightenment
Great Master
Eihei Dogen (1200 -1253)
[...]
The Four Wisdoms, charity, tenderness, benevolence and sympathy, are the means we have of helping others and represent the Bodhisattva’s aspirations.
First
Wisdom
Charity is the opposite of covetousness; we make offerings although
we ourselves get nothing whatsoever.
There is no need to be concerned about how small the gift may be so long as it brings True results for, even if it is only a single phrase or verse of teaching, it may be a seed to bring forth good fruit both now and here-after.
Similarly, the offering of only one coin or a blade of grass can cause the arising of good, for the teaching itself is the True Treasure and the True Treasure is the very teaching: we must never desire any reward and we must always share everything we have with others.
It
is an act of charity to build a ferry or a bridge and all forms of industry are
charity if they benefit others.
Second Wisdom
To behold all beings with the eye of compassion, and to speak kindly to them, is the meaning of tenderness.
If one would understand tenderness, one must speak to others whilst thinking that one loves all living things as if they were one’s own children.
By praising those who exhibit virtue, and feeling sorry for those who do not, our enemies become our friends and they who are our friends have their friendship strengthened: this is all through the power of tenderness.
Whenever
one speaks kindly to another his face brightens and his heart is warmed; if a
kind word be spoken in his absence the impression will be a deep one: tenderness
can have a revolutionary impact upon the mind of man.
Third Wisdom
If one creates wise ways of helping beings, whether they be in high places or lowly stations, one exhibits benevolence: no reward was sought by those who rescued the helpless tortoise and the sick sparrow, these acts being utterly benevolent.
The
stupid believe that they will lose something if they give help to others, but
this is completely untrue for benevolence helps everyone, including oneself, being
a law of the universe.
Fourth Wisdom
If one can identify oneself with that which is not oneself, one can understand the true meaning of sympathy: take, for example, the fact that the Buddha appeared in the human world in the form of a human being; sympathy does not distinguish between oneself and others.
There
are times when the self is infinite and times when this is true of others: sympathy
is as the sea in that it never refuses water from whatsoever source it may come;
all waters may gather and form only one sea.
Oh you seekers of enlightenment, meditate deeply upon these teachings and do not make light of them: give respect and reverence to their merit which brings blessing to all living things; help all beings to cross over to the other shore.
[...]
Uit:
Introduction to the Tradition of Serene Reflection Meditation
Shasta Abbey Press, Mt. Shasta, California, 2000
P. 13-15
Lees dit boekje (pdf-file)
Lees Dogen’s Shushogi (pdf-file)
Lees
ook:
Dogen Zenji
Shobogenzo Zuimonki & Fukanzazengi
Juwelen
uit de Schatkamer van het Oog van de Ware Leer & Universele Aanbeveling van
de Regels van Zazen
Vertaling: Dirk Horai Beemster
Inleiding: Nico Tydeman
Uitgeverij
Asoka, 2001
Bestel
dit boek bij Bol.com
Law
and Karma:
Dalai Lama to speak publicly
for first time about the law and
social change
In his very first visit to a U.S. law school conference, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama will publicly share for the first time his thoughts on how religion, particularly Buddhism, can influence law and bring about social change.
The conference, Law, Buddhism and Social Change: A Conversation with the Dalai Lama, will be held Sept. 20-21 at the University at Buffalo Law School opening with an intimate two-hour discussion between the Dalai Lama and legal practitioners and scholars from around the world.
“This will be one of the first times the Dalai Lama has been asked about legal subject matter,” says UB Law School Professor and conference organizer Rebecca French, an international authority on Tibetan law and author of The Golden Yoke, the first book on Buddhist legal traditions in Tibet.
“It will be fascinating to hear the Dalai Lama describe the best way, from a Buddhist perspective, to think about punishment, rehabilitation and retribution, and I suspect the conversation will address how Buddhist beliefs might influence the U.S. legal system,” adds French, who notes that the Dalai Lama has participated in a series of similar public forums on the subject of science and the mind.
The conference is being organized by the Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy and the UB Law School.
[...]
Great
Sangha Gathering
Led
by Dennis Genpo Merzel, Roshi
Ameland, The Netherlands
Arrival and Orientation Day, Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Schedule begins Wednesday, January 17, 2007
This exciting annual event presents the Big Mind process within the context of Zen practice and serves as a gathering for practitioners from around the world.
The
daily schedule includes Zen meditation in the morning, Big Mind sessions with
Genpo Merzel Roshi in the afternoon, Zen meditation and group events in the evening.
Genpo Roshi will be assisted by his successors Genno Roshi (France),
Tenkei Roshi & Nico Sensei (Holland), Doen Sensei (USA), Jiho Sensei (Poland),
Genshin Sensei (UK), & Musho Sensei (USA).
Newcomers are very welcome
to join and will receive special attention.
The retreat will take place at “Stayokay” hostel on the Island of Ameland off the northern coast of Holland.
For
more detailed information:
PDF
Download
God’s
Playing a New Game: Integral
Spirituality,
Evolutionary Enlightenment, and the Future of Religion
Andrew Cohen & Ken Wilber in dialogue
[...]
Ken Wilber: Yes. The analogy is, let’s say you get run over by a bus and you are sitting in the street looking at your broken leg.
You can say, “I’m not that, I’m not that, I’m not that,” and you will feel better.
You
can actually get in a higher state of consciousness with a broken leg and you
will feel better, and that’s fine.
But I’m saying that you need to fix the broken leg first and then also do “I’m not that, I’m not that,” and you’ve got the best of both worlds.
The shadow is the broken leg, so we’ll tell you how to fix that.
We’re not saying you can’t do the other, but fix the broken leg first and then also do vipassana or Vedanta.
The leg is your vehicle of bodhisattvahood; it’s your vehicle of transmitting truth.
If you are enlightened and you are sitting there with a broken leg and can’t walk anywhere, what good is it?
You can’t teach if you’ve got a broken leg!
But a lot of people do.
They have awakened to these higher states of consciousness, but they have broken legs.
So what we want to do is basically heal the vehicles through which we will manifest our enlightened awareness.
[...]
From www.wie.org/j33/guru-pandit.asp
Het
verhaal van Joop Boer (60)
die maar twee vuiniszakken per jaar vult
Opgetekend door Renate van der Zee
‘Het beslissende moment in mijn leven was een bijna-dood-ervaring.
Ik was drieëntwintig jaar oud en ik stond in een boomgaard in Noord-Israel grapefruits te plukken op een aluminium ladder.
Opeens gleed die ladder weg en raakte een elektrische leiding die niet was geïsoleerd.
Ik kreeg een zware elektrische schok en viel bewusteloos op de grond.
Tenminste, ik leek bewusteloos, maar in werkelijkheid heb ik mijn hele leven niet zo intensief geleefd als die twintig minuten.
Ik herleefde alle ervaringen uit mijn leven die mij hadden gefrustreerd of die ik niet begreep.
In een aanzwellende golf van opluchting na opluchting zag ik van al die zaken hoe het werkelijk zit.
In een overweldigend besef van goedheid en geluk begreep ik opeens dat alle problemen in de wereld schijnproblemen zijn.
Dat alles wat niet goed lijkt te zijn, slechts een kwestie is van misverstanden en onbegrip.
Dat er geen mensen met slechte intenties bestaan, maar alleen onvoldoende inzicht.
En
dat wij mensen de aarde hebben gekregen als een kostbaar geschenk.
Toen ik bijkwam, was mijn eerste gedachte: jammer dat ik terug ben.
Vervolgens dacht ik: nu ben ik vrij en er is niets om bang voor te zijn, want doodgaan is prachtig.
Omdat de ladder snel van de leiding was afgegleden, had de elektrische schok maar kort geduurd.
Dat is mijn redding geweest.
Lichamelijk was er niets met mij aan de hand: ik kon gewoon opstaan.
Maar geestelijk zou ik nooit meer dezelfde zijn.
Ik had ingezien hoe ongelofelijk mooi de wereld is en besloot voortaan mezelf en andere mensen altijd goed te behandelen en zo weinig mogelijk te doen om de aarde te schaden.
Als mens krijg je elke dag gratis, lucht, gratis schoonheid, de hele wereld, het hele heelal.
Dat is zoveel! Waarom zou je dan als dank de boel verpesten?
Ik heb mijn leven daarna zo ingericht dat ik zo zuinig mogelijk op de aarde ben.
[...]
Uit:
NRC Handelsblad
Zaterdags Bijvoegsel
Zaterdag 2 september en zondag 3 september
Blz. 42
Is
AA iets voor u?
We
houden er niet van iemand voor alcoholist uit te maken, maar u kunt de diagnose
zelf snel stellen.
Stap het dichtstbijzijnde café binnen en probeer eens beheerst te drinken.
Probeer te drinken en er dan ineens mee te stoppen.
Probeer
het meer dan eens.
U komt dan snel achter de waarheid, tenminste als u eerlijk tegenover uzelf durft te zijn.
Het
kan best een flinke kater waard zijn om tot een helder inzicht in uw toestand
te komen.
U alleen kunt beslissen of het programma van AA en de AA- levenswijze betekenis hebben voor u en u kunnen helpen.
Dit is een beslissing, die u moet nemen: niemand kan in uw plaats beslissen.
[...]
lees verder en klik op Iets voor U?
If It Be Your Will
Leonard Cohen
If it be your will
That I speak no more
And my voice be still
As it was before
I will speak no more
I shall abide until
I am spoken for
If it be your will
If it be your will
That a voice be true
From this broken hill
I will sing to you
From this broken hill
All your praises they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
From this broken hill
All your praises they shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
If it be your will
If there is a choice
Let the rivers fill
Let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these burning hearts in hell
If it be your will
To make us well
And draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light
In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will
If it be your will
Momma
Zen:
Walking the Crooked Path Of Motherhood
Karen
Maezen Miller
[...]
When my daughter was born, I saw my husband fall in love for the first time.
He is a good and loyal man, and he loves me. But he has never lost his footing with me, not in the goofy, tumbledown way he surrendered on first sight to his baby girl.
Within days of bringing our tiny daughter home, my husband took dibs on the nighttime feedings.
Born six weeks early, she had mastered bottle-feeding in the hospital but was weak and reluctant at the breast.
There was a double bed crowded into our nursery, a relic of the room’s recent use for guests, and there he slept, inches away from the mews, rasps, and mysterious eaps that emanated from her crib.
He slept there eagerly and even well, waking every three hours to dispense her bottles. Although most nights I was waking too, like a shell-shocked soldier, to pump my raw and weeping breasts, the nights belonged to him.
So intense were his affections that I was jealous. Not jealous of him, jealous of her.
He was hurrying home in the late afternoons to see her.
Calling home hourly to check on her.
Cradling her in the warm hollow of his chest for that last hour of sleep at dawn’s early light.
How could he possibly love an old, tired, slob of a frump like me anymore?
I looked at my love-struck husband looking at her and raised an eyebrow.
[...]
From:
Karen Maezen Miller
Momma Zen:
Walking the Crooked Path Of Motherhood
Boston: Trumpeter, 2006
Pp. 10-11
See
Amazon.com.
naar
boven
Old
Koans, New Koans, One Koan
Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi
Yes, I use koans in working with students of Zen. I use koans constantly in my own Zen work.
Koans are not old stories in dusty books about monks who lived a thousand years ago, irrelevant to life today.
“Old” koans are fresh and relevant, and there are “new” koans everywhere. The key to working with a koan is to plunge into it, become wholly immersed in it.
A koan can’t be figured out logically. The answer has to be experienced with the whole of body & mind. Breathe the words of the koan as you sit, bring the words of the koan up during the day, at work, in the car.
If you are working on an “old koan”, and you seem to be standing on the outside, change the words a little if you need to, to make it as urgent as it was to the people involved originally.
Mumonkan Case 16: Ummon said, "The world is vast and wide. Why do you put on your seven-piece robe at the sound of the bell?"
Perhaps this koan seems foreign because the Mumon was talking to male monks in China about putting on their kesa and you are an American housewife.
So change it to make it yours.
Carry it with you all day long to make it constantly fresh.
“The world is vast and wide. Why do you put on your bathrobe at the sound of the stupid alarm clock?”
Or, “The world is vast and wide. Why do you pull the cookies out of the oven when the timer goes off?”
Or, “The world is vast and wide. Why then do you feed the same mouths and wash the same dirty dishes over and over and over?”
This koan talks directly to us all, no matter what age, sex or condition, because it is talking about the fundamental matter of who we are, how vast and wide we truly are, and how vast and wide is clearly revealed by the smallest, even unconscious, action.
[...]
Read the whole Teisho.
I Came To Believe
by
Johnny Cash
(1932-2003)
I
couldn’t manage the problems I lead on myself
And it just made it worse
when I laid them on somebody else
So I finally surrendered it all brought
down in despair
I cried out for help and I felt a warm comforter there
And
I came to believe in a power much higher than I
I came to believe that I needed
help to get by
In childlike faith I gave in and gave him a try
And I came
to believe in a power much higher than I
Nothing
worked out when I handled it all on my own
And each time I failed it made
me feel twice as alone
Then I cried, “Lord there must be a sure and easier
way
For it just cannot be that a man should lose hope everyday.”
And
I came to believe in a power much higher than I
I came to believe that I needed
help to get by
In childlike faith I gave in and gave him a try
Then I
came to believe in a power much higher than I
Yes, I came to believe in a power much higher than I.
From the album
American V: A Hundred Highways
Released July 4, 2006
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Cash
A
Working Synthesis Of Transactional Analysis
and Gestalt Therapy
Ken Wilber
ABSTRACT: By supplying the necessary theoretical link between the predominantly Gestalt concepts of retroflection and projection, a basic core is provided for the fundamental synthesis of Gestalt Therapy and Transactional Analysis.
This synthesis suggests that the ego states of Parent and Child correspond in most cases to particular forms of retroflection and projection.
The present activities of retroflection and projection take as their vehicles of expression the Parent and Child, which are by and large the products of past experience.
Transactional Analysis and Gestalt therapy are thus two complementary approaches to the same psychodynamic factors, and hence a synthesis of their best elements should prove stronger than either alone.
Read
the whole article.
It appeared in Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, research and practice,
vol. 15, nr. 1, 1978.
Explore the context in which Ken Wilber presents this article.
And
read Frank
Visser.
Then, listen to Ken
Wilber.
Transcending the Seven Bodies
Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh
[...]
Zen flowered in Japan but it began in India. Its roots came from yoga. Yoga flowered into Zen.
Zen has had much appeal in the West because the Western ego is, in a sense, crystallized.
In the West, they are the masters of the world; they have everything.
But the ego has become crystallized through the wrong process.
It has not developed through the transcendence of the first four bodies.
So Zen has become appealing to the West but it will not help because the crystallization is wrong.
Gurdjieff is much more helpful to the West because he works from the first body to the fifth.
He is not helpful beyond the fifth. Only up to the fifth, to the crystallization.
Through his techniques, you can achieve a proper crystallization.
Zen has been just a fad in the West because it has no roots there.
It developed through a very long process in the East, beginning with hatha yoga and culminating in the Buddha.
Thousands and thousands of years of humbleness: not of ego but of passivity; not of positive action but of receptivity — through a long duration of the female mind, the receptive mind.
The East has always been female, while the West is male: aggressive, positive.
The East has been an openness, a receptivity.
Zen could be of help in the East because other methods, other systems, worked on the four lower bodies.
These four became the roots, and Zen could flower.
Today, Zen has become almost meaningless in Japan.
The reason is that Japan has become absolutely Western.
Once the Japanese were the most humble people, but now their humbleness is just a show.
It is no longer part of their innnermost core. So Zen has been uprooted in Japan and is popular now in the West.
But
this popularity is only because of the false crystallization of the ego.
From
the fifth body to the sixth, Zen is very helpful. But only
then, neither
before nor beyond.
It is absolutely useless for the other bodies, even harmful.
To teach university level courses in the primary school not only does not help; it may be harmful.
If Zen is used before the fifth body you may experience satori, but that is not samadhi.
Satori is a false samadhi. It is a glimpse of samadhi, but it is just a glimpse.
As far as the fourth body (the mental body) is concerned, satori will make you more artistic, more aesthetic.
It will create a sense of beauty in you; it will create a feeling of well-being.
But it will not be a help in crystallization.
It will not help you to move from the fourth body to the fifth.
Only beyond crystallization is Zen helpful. The goose is out of the bottle, without any how.
But only at this point can it be practiced, after so many other methods have been used.
[...]
Uit:
Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh
The Psychology of the Esoteric
The New Evolution of Man
New York, Harper & Row, 1978
Pp. 89-90Oorspronkelijke uitgave:
The Inward Revolution
Bombay, Jeevan Jagriti Kendra, 1973