Buddhism

I came across a great story in one of my non-holy inspirational books, "Complete Idiot's Guide to Zen Living."  Here's a simple way to prove whether a seemingly supernatural vision, thought, presence, or whatever really is other-worldly, or just an emanation of your own mind.  Adapt the proof as desired. There's lots of ways to do what this Zen master advised. An old Zen story tells of a man whose wife, on her deathbed, begged him never to go to another woman. A few months after her death, the man fell in love and became engaged. Immediately, he was haunted…

Last night my wife and I spent a pleasant couple of hours at a holiday gathering hosted by a Tai Chi friend. Meeting some new people, we enjoyed stimulating conversation on a variety of subjects. Including meditation, spirituality, that sort of stuff. At one point, I said something like: A few days ago I had a realization that seemed fresh to me, even after more than forty years of daily meditation. Why do I so often feel at odds with myself? After all, who is there inside my head in addition to me? What's up with my worrying about whether…

During most of my spirituality-seeking life, which spans about forty five years, I've considered individuality to be at odds with universality -- feeling one with the universe. The mystical philosophies that I embraced taught that ego, a sense of "I-ness," is what keeps us humans from becoming one with the One which supposedly is ultimate reality.  Not so, according to Zen Buddhism. So explains Kosho Uchiyama in "Opening the Hand of Thought," a book I blogged about recently.  That's a relief. Uchiyama has a take on this whole individuality/universality thing that makes a lot of sense to me. When I…

Enlightenment. It's an appealing notion. There I am, clueless, ignorant, unsatisfied, then bingo!, an enlightenment switch is flipped. Now I know what life is all about. I go around with a Buddha-smile for the rest of my days, blissed out because I'm no longer floundering blindly in cold cosmic darkness, but rather am basking on the always-sunny beach of enlightenment. Only problem is...some questions.  Does enlightenment exist? Could I tell if I've got it? Is it possible to know whether someone else is enlightened? Are there various types of enlightenment?  Short answer: nobody knows. Opinions abound. Demonstrable evidence is lacking.…

I'm damn sure there isn't an elephant in my house. I know what elephants look like. I know how large they are. I've checked every area where an elephant would fit. So it's reasonable for me to say "There's no elephant in my house." But not if I thought like a religious believer. Because then I could argue, "Yes, there's an elephant in my house, because..." It's an invisible elephant.I'm the only one who can see it.I can sense the elephant even if no one else can. Its disguised as an ordinary object.  There are other possible delusions that follow the…

For a long time in my spiritual seeking career -- about 1968 to the present -- I thought "self-realization" was a worthy goal. I knew people who were active in the Self-Realization Fellowship founded by Yogananda. I followed a meditation practice that taught "self-realization before god-realization." I avidly read books by people who has supposedly found their true self. Now, I'm much more inclined to the Buddhist viewpoint: there's no such thing as the self, so self-realization isn't possible. This differentiates Buddhism from other religions, spiritual philosophies, and mystic paths which hold that we humans have (or are) a soul…