I wanted to share my absolutely beginner view on the essence of Zen, so I can get feedback from the community and get my experience a bit closer to reality.
I believe Zen can be looked at from at least three sides:
You can develop your experience of Zen by studying and practicing. This can involve reading and meditating, in order to develop an undistorted experience of reality, without getting attached to any dogma, religion or practice. If reading Zen Masters, or the Bible or Harry Potter gets you closer to awakening, then do it. You just need to be wise enough to not get confused by or attached to those texts. I acknowledge it might be wiser to read Zen Masters rather than the Bible or Harry Potter, though. That's what I am doing now.
You can gauge your experience of Zen by looking at your daily life. Have you attained total cessation of suffering and craving? Have you absolute, constant, imperturbable peace of mind? This is not Zen per se, but it's the shadow that Zen casts upon human daily life. It's the simplest way to gauge your true grasp of Zen. Simply because anger, attachment, craving, aversion, etc. all raise from delusions and the ego.
Finally, you can look at Zen directly. Realize that there is no spoon, etc.
The 1st item seems straightforward to pursue. I've started reading ancient Zen texts, and I plan to read a lot more.
The 3rd item seems clear. You either have realized this or you haven't.
But what about the 2nd item? Does it sound reasonable? Or is Zen completely unrelated to the mundane life, to suffering / non-suffering, etc.
Submitted February 13, 2018 at 07:49AM by hookdump http://ift.tt/2sqsoD1
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