Knowing things as they are and knowing things as they appear is possible when we can rest in knowing without the projection of thought or emotion, which is a different way of describing those two distortions. The distortion of conceptual knowing is the projection of thought. And the distortion of emotional reactions is the projection of emotion. So we can say that what buddhahood is, is to know things without projection of thought or emotion.
Now, just take that in for a moment. What would that actually be like? And the first thing that often arises is--we can’t imagine this. Because we are so conditioned to thought and emotion. But if we stay with it a little bit longer than that, we can see that it's going to be a clarity and a precision and an immediacy in that kind of knowing which are almost unimaginable. And there is going to be no possibility of editing, there’s going to be no operation of preference or prejudice. And there’s actually not going to be any sense of separation between subject and object. There will just be experience itself. Experience and awareness arising together. Do you follow?
2010-12-01
Buddhahood
A gem from Then and Now, session 36:
We can come to see how things are through our own efforts
More inspiration from class 36, Then and Now!
The Joyful One (from TAN36: Then and Now (class) 00:08:33.06 - 00:11:21.05)(download into iTunes)
The first stage of bodhisattvahood arises at the path of seeing, if you remember that from the five paths, last time. And this refers to seeing the nature of experience--which is of course emptiness--and knowing that to be how things are.In a lot of respects, this is where practice actually begins. Which may sound completely deflating because--I mean, "I have to get that far before I’ve even got to the beginning?" And in my opinion it’s very questionable, or it's a very interesting question to consider: what does this actually refer to in terms of our own experience?These descriptions make it sound very lofty, as do the descriptions of the five paths, where in order to attain this you have to have twenty-four hour stable samadhi or stable attention. Which seems pretty far out there. Not too many human beings ever get to that stage. So, are we relegated to sitting--being like the person who is just looking in the window and seeing all of these wonderful things that we can never know? Or is there something else going on here, where we can actually relate to this?And my own view which is not, probably, not a traditional view, is that this is very attainable. That is, we can come to see how things are through, through our own efforts. And when we do that, everything changes; we can’t go back to our ordinary way of living. And often a tremendous joy that comes with this, because now that we know that whatever state of mind arises, whether it’s peace or disturbance, it is simply a state of mind. It has no ground, it's not a thing in itself. And so we know the freedom in everything that we experience. And that’s why it is called The Joyful One
The full audiofile of this class and the other classes in this series can be accessed HERE.
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