Your take on Buddhist liberation

[rousseau]

I've been studying Buddhism and Zen Buddhism for about five years now. In that time I've read the likes of D.T. Suzuki, Alan Watts, Dogen, and The Blue Cliff Record. So I'm starting to get a sense of what Buddhism is about when you get into the depths of it. But I'm confused about the concept of liberation.

Early Buddhists believed that total liberation was possible, but to my eye many of their methods look like a modern mindfulness technique. In a nut-shell: understanding what the world is, understanding what I am, and accepting the world as it is. No doubt very helpful ideas and philosophy but .. liberation? Is it real? Is it possible?

As far as I can gather Buddhism lays a sheath of mysticism over the natural world, and helps adherents find it bearable. But we still have real, material problems that don't go away.

What do you think?

 

[steve_bank]

When I read Buddhism in the 70s I came to think it was a psychology. Buddha was the first 'self help' guru im modern parlance.

To live is to experience suffering. Some not your ding, some suffering caused by what you become attached to. If you think to be a happy man you have to look lke a 20 something body buider to attract women you will likely make yourself unhappy. We form meaningless attachments and suffer when we don't get the illusory image.

I think the rise in younger suicide, drug addiction, alcoholism, and poor mental health has to do with with how people are attached to the pop culture images. Pop culture is as empty as it gets.


The elimination of craving, or being ruled by desires. In modern terms liberation simpy means a healthy balanced kife were you understand karma, IOW mental causality, of what drives you to self destructive behavior.

If you value, or crave, accunulating material things then yuu suffer if you don;t get it.

To me the goal is being in a good mental or spiritual state without needing crutches t maintain it.

What is the Buddhist theory of liberation?
The Buddha and the Quest for Liberation | Online Library of ...
The Buddha also taught that the attainment of Nirvana would end the endless cycle of rebirths that subjected people to an eternity of pain and suffering. In the Buddha's teachings, Nirvana, the attainment of enlightenment and the ultimate end of craving, is the ultimate, final liberation.Feb 3, 2022

Some don't consider Zen true Buddhism. It is a mix of Buddhism and the old Bushido warrior philosophy.

I read Suzuki's book, it was popular in the 60s 70s. People like Watts came out of the drug culture and was not interested in those kind of writers. Buddhism was turned into a kind of mysticism, the mysterious east as opposed to western mainstream Christianity. The so called counter culture rejected traditional middle class values considered materialistic. They turned to drugs and traditions like Hinduism and Buddhism. Remember the Beatles hung around the Transcendental Mediation guru the Maharishi until they realized he was a fraud.

Mediation is about not being distracted by what you experience and random thoughts, away from that feel good state.

I believe reincarnation id metaphor for spritual cycles we go through. Work through yuur ;karma' and with prce you dwell in a ste of feel good mental state.

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.


The Great Renunciation is rejecting the materialistic world. The wandering Sadhus who still exist in India.

Great Renunciation - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Not all Buddhists agree., like Christians.

Haven't thought abut this stuff in a long time.

 

[steve_bank]

You might find this book useful. The Dali Lama was trained in Tibetan Buddhism from an early age.

Stages of Meditation book by Dalai Lama XIV

Buddhism and psychology - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Buddhism includes an analysis of human psychology, emotion, cognition, behavior and motivation along with therapeutic practices. Buddhist psychology is embedded within the greater Buddhist ethical and philosophical system, and its psychological terminology is colored by ethical overtones.[1]: 3  Buddhist psychology has two therapeutic goals: the healthy and virtuous life of a householder (samacariya, "harmonious living") and the ultimate goal of nirvana, the total cessation of dissatisfaction and suffering (dukkha).[1]: 107 

Buddhism and the modern discipline of psychology have multiple parallels and points of overlap. This includes a descriptive phenomenology of mental states, emotions and behaviors as well as theories of perception and unconscious mental factors. Psychotherapists such as Erich Fromm have found in Buddhist enlightenment experiences (e.g. kensho) the potential for transformation, healing and finding existential meaning. Some contemporary mental-health practitioners such as Jon Kabat-Zinn find ancient Buddhist practices (such as the development of mindfulness) of empirically therapeutic value,[2] while Buddhist teachers such as Jack Kornfield see Western psychology as providing complementary practices for Buddhists.

I am not an expert and have never been a practicing Buddhist. The practices I did in the 70s were a help at different times. Most recently getting through heart failure and rehab.

 

[rousseau]

You might find this book useful. The Dali Lama was trained in Tibetan Buddhism from an early age.

Stages of Meditation book by Dalai Lama XIV

Buddhism and psychology - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Buddhism includes an analysis of human psychology, emotion, cognition, behavior and motivation along with therapeutic practices. Buddhist psychology is embedded within the greater Buddhist ethical and philosophical system, and its psychological terminology is colored by ethical overtones.[1]: 3  Buddhist psychology has two therapeutic goals: the healthy and virtuous life of a householder (samacariya, "harmonious living") and the ultimate goal of nirvana, the total cessation of dissatisfaction and suffering (dukkha).[1]: 107 

Buddhism and the modern discipline of psychology have multiple parallels and points of overlap. This includes a descriptive phenomenology of mental states, emotions and behaviors as well as theories of perception and unconscious mental factors. Psychotherapists such as Erich Fromm have found in Buddhist enlightenment experiences (e.g. kensho) the potential for transformation, healing and finding existential meaning. Some contemporary mental-health practitioners such as Jon Kabat-Zinn find ancient Buddhist practices (such as the development of mindfulness) of empirically therapeutic value,[2] while Buddhist teachers such as Jack Kornfield see Western psychology as providing complementary practices for Buddhists.

I am not an expert and have never been a practicing Buddhist. The practices I did in the 70s were a help at different times. Most recently getting through heart failure and rehab.

Thanks for tip. I've had a foray into Zen Buddhist meditation, so I'll be interested to hear what this book has to say.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.

Is it not just this, the freedom from samsara, that the Buddhist is being ‘liberated’ from?

I wonder whether this is an issue of the translation of words from concepts. I looked into Buddhism a lot back in late high school and early college, and I got a sense that a bunch of the terms were not being used in the plain language definitions of English. Like “suffering” and “liberation” as you refer to.

Though I never learned the languages of Buddhism, I learned enough of the context of the religion to realize that there was more meaning there, being lost in the translation.

 

[steve_bank]

Another book tat might interest you, read it and other books by the author in the 70s. It is a translation of Tibetan Buddhist practices.

He was an anthropologist who in the early 1900s immersed himself in Tibetan culture. You might say he was a real life sort of Indiana Jones.

Walter Evans-Wentz - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Tibetan Yoga and Secret Doctrines: Seven... book by W.Y. Evans-Wentz

 

[rousseau]

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.

Is it not just this, the freedom from samsara, that the Buddhist is being ‘liberated’ from?

I wonder whether this is an issue of the translation of words from concepts. I looked into Buddhism a lot back in late high school and early college, and I got a sense that a bunch of the terms were not being used in the plain language definitions of English. Like “suffering” and “liberation” as you refer to.

Though I never learned the languages of Buddhism, I learned enough of the context of the religion to realize that there was more meaning there, being lost in the translation.

My understanding of Samsara is that it represents 'everyday, mundane reality'. Those who are in Samsara are lost in the everyday turmoil of life. 'Someone cut me off on the way to work, and now I've been mad all day'. The realized Buddhist isn't thinking about it, it doesn't even register.

 

[steve_bank]

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.

Is it not just this, the freedom from samsara, that the Buddhist is being ‘liberated’ from?

I wonder whether this is an issue of the translation of words from concepts. I looked into Buddhism a lot back in late high school and early college, and I got a sense that a bunch of the terms were not being used in the plain language definitions of English. Like “suffering” and “liberation” as you refer to.

Though I never learned the languages of Buddhism, I learned enough of the context of the religion to realize that there was more meaning there, being lost in the translation.

Like I said I am neither expert nor practicing Buddhist. To me to understand Buddhism think of living in our chaotic tumultuous reality and all the terms and metaphors we use to describe it. I struggled with the Sanskrit terms until I thought it was a psychology about dealing with reality.

I read samsara described as the facade of reality much like the building facades of a movie set.

In Tibetan Yoga And Secret Doctrines there is a chapter Yoga Of The Psychic Heat. It talks about retaining the 'pearly white fluid'. After puzzling through the text it dawned on me the technique involved erotic imagery to raise metabolism increasing body heat. One has to avoid ejaculating, IOW pearly white fluid.

One of the goals as I understood it was to see liberality as it is, not trough being fooled by facades. like today's pop culture.

Nirvana and Samadhi are states of awareness. A state of clarity. I think a lot of people look to Buddhism for something arcane and mysterious, but it is really not that way at all.

I am an armature, I am sure there are academic books that translate Buddhism to modern terms.

 

[steve_bank]

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.

Is it not just this, the freedom from samsara, that the Buddhist is being ‘liberated’ from?

I wonder whether this is an issue of the translation of words from concepts. I looked into Buddhism a lot back in late high school and early college, and I got a sense that a bunch of the terms were not being used in the plain language definitions of English. Like “suffering” and “liberation” as you refer to.

Though I never learned the languages of Buddhism, I learned enough of the context of the religion to realize that there was more meaning there, being lost in the translation.

My understanding of Samsara is that it represents 'everyday, mundane reality'. Those who are in Samsara are lost in the everyday turmoil of life. 'Someone cut me off on the way to work, and now I've been mad all day'. The realized Buddhist isn't thinking about it, it doesn't even register.

That maybe a better description. I am not an expert.

Munane raelity in principle the same as today as in ancient India.

 

[rousseau]

Buddhists recognise that there is a continuous cycle of life, death and rebirth. This cycle is known as samsara. The ultimate aim of Buddhist practice is to become free from samsara.

What is samsara in simple terms?
: the indefinitely repeated cycles of birth, misery, and death caused by karma.

Samsara is the constant turmoil we have in our heads caused by our karmic causal connections or attachments.

Is it not just this, the freedom from samsara, that the Buddhist is being ‘liberated’ from?

I wonder whether this is an issue of the translation of words from concepts. I looked into Buddhism a lot back in late high school and early college, and I got a sense that a bunch of the terms were not being used in the plain language definitions of English. Like “suffering” and “liberation” as you refer to.

Though I never learned the languages of Buddhism, I learned enough of the context of the religion to realize that there was more meaning there, being lost in the translation.

My understanding of Samsara is that it represents 'everyday, mundane reality'. Those who are in Samsara are lost in the everyday turmoil of life. 'Someone cut me off on the way to work, and now I've been mad all day'. The realized Buddhist isn't thinking about it, it doesn't even register.

That maybe a better description. I am not an expert.

Munane raelity in principle the same as today as in ancient India.

I think you pretty much got it with your 'facade of reality' metaphor. Buddhism and some strands of Hinduism posit the existence of a universal, unchanging reality, and most of the underlying philosophy is corollary to that reality (e.g. do not harm, don't take your desires that seriously).

Those in Samsara don't see or understand the universal.

 

[Politesse]

I've been studying Buddhism and Zen Buddhism for about five years now. In that time I've read the likes of D.T. Suzuki, Alan Watts, Dogen, and The Blue Cliff Record. So I'm starting to get a sense of what Buddhism is about when you get into the depths of it. But I'm confused about the concept of liberation.

Early Buddhists believed that total liberation was possible, but to my eye many of their methods look like a modern mindfulness technique. In a nut-shell: understanding what the world is, understanding what I am, and accepting the world as it is. No doubt very helpful ideas and philosophy but .. liberation? Is it real? Is it possible?

As far as I can gather Buddhism lays a sheath of mysticism over the natural world, and helps adherents find it bearable. But we still have real, material problems that don't go away.

What do you think?

Liberation from what? The endless cycle of recurring and re-accruing karma is at the heart of ancient Buddhism, but writers whose work is aimed at selling Westerners on the discipline don't emphasize it as strongly. There's no hope of a cure if the patient cannot acknowledge they have the disease. To really master Buddhism, will require more than reading some books, and I think that Watts and Suzuki and so forth knew that. Rather, by teaching the practices of mindfulness, they hoped to set people on generally the right path, and perhaps the deeper insights of the practice would eventually open up to their students. Like many religious orders, Buddhists believe that their "beliefs" are in fact a priori truths that any thinking person could eventually reason their way to on their own. Instruction of any kind, to a Buddhist, is the beginning of the journey to liberation, not the end.


At least, so I have come to understand. Alas, I've never had time to fully explore the Dharmic faiths as I would like.

 

[steve_bank]

It comes down like Christianity to interpret ions. In the Tibetan books I read it is said 'mind is ultimate reality'. Does it mean mind creates physical reality or does it mean we build our own preconceptions of reality in our minds. I think it means the latter.

There was also 'primordial mid' which took to mean our mind when we start out, unconditioned. Part of the practice involved unraveling all the strings going back to beginning, a parallel in modern psychology.

If you watch the Dali Lama videos you will hear him say science is about physucal reality, and Buddhist practice is about science of mind.

From the Tibetan book I read it was about a very strong mental discipline and training. One exercise involved looking at a complex mandala, closing your eyes keeping the mental picture, and mentally panning and zooming the image.

If you went to Asia or India to a real Buddhist institution where monks train it would probably not be what you think.

If you want to make a journey try Dharamashala India the Tibetan Buddhist center outside of communist Tibet and find a teacher to query.

As n historical side note, 60s pop mysticism.

 

[rousseau]

I've been studying Buddhism and Zen Buddhism for about five years now. In that time I've read the likes of D.T. Suzuki, Alan Watts, Dogen, and The Blue Cliff Record. So I'm starting to get a sense of what Buddhism is about when you get into the depths of it. But I'm confused about the concept of liberation.

Early Buddhists believed that total liberation was possible, but to my eye many of their methods look like a modern mindfulness technique. In a nut-shell: understanding what the world is, understanding what I am, and accepting the world as it is. No doubt very helpful ideas and philosophy but .. liberation? Is it real? Is it possible?

As far as I can gather Buddhism lays a sheath of mysticism over the natural world, and helps adherents find it bearable. But we still have real, material problems that don't go away.

What do you think?

Liberation from what? The endless cycle of recurring and re-accruing karma is at the heart of ancient Buddhism, but writers whose work is aimed at selling Westerners on the discipline don't emphasize it as strongly. There's no hope of a cure if the patient cannot acknowledge they have the disease. To really master Buddhism, will require more than reading some books, and I think that Watts and Suzuki and so forth knew that. Rather, by teaching the practices of mindfulness, they hoped to set people on generally the right path, and perhaps the deeper insights of the practice would eventually open up to their students. Like many religious orders, Buddhists believe that their "beliefs" are in fact a priori truths that any thinking person could eventually reason their way to on their own. Instruction of any kind, to a Buddhist, is the beginning of the journey to liberation, not the end.


At least, so I have come to understand. Alas, I've never had time to fully explore the Dharmic faiths as I would like.

Right, most books emphasize that the meat of Buddhism is beyond intellectual concepts. Watts, Suzuki etc point the way but the reader has to get themselves there.

The thing that threw me off is that ancient Buddhists were quite literal about liberation. But maybe one needs to put this in it's historical context. At the time the awareness of 'no soul' must have felt very much like liberation. Where today it's commonplace.

 

[abaddon]

... the concept of liberation .... What do you think?

No expertise here. But I've read some and formed a viewpoint also.

I think the early Buddhists wanted OUT, same as Hindus. Having to live again and again seemed like sheer misery, and in a culture that thinks it's your desires and other behaviors that trap you in the round of rebirths, the key to 'extinguishing the flame' is mind-control.

Later, Mahayana changed that and made it less escapist. Life is suffering because of our abstraction from reality, but the thing isn't to stop the thoughts nor to escape 'material' existence. Instead, the goal is to realize that you are, already, Awareness or Presence.

Liberation has to do with non-identification (ie, non-attachment) to the endless jabbering and explaining and wishing and regrets and the rest of the noise of the "mind" that puts a layer of Samsara over reality and causes the person to feel separate and distinct from the rest of Being.

Stopping the brain from its blathering is impossible. But side-stepping its blathering is possible. You do that by "defusing" (ie, detaching) from the wanting, fearing, explaining, et al, and residing in Awareness instead.

It's like identifying as the screen ("consciousness", or what I called Presence) instead of the drama playing out on the screen. When you do this, wordless reality replaces the half-ass story your left-brain analytic mode made out of reality.

ANY story by the blathering intellect is a "half-ass" story in the sense it's not real because it's abstract. Zen practice is to quiet the mind enough to recognize the abstraction process that our minds are doing to us to make us "suffer" (or feel like life just ain't good enough to please us).

 

[abaddon]

My understanding of Samsara is that it represents 'everyday, mundane reality'. Those who are in Samsara are lost in the everyday turmoil of life. 'Someone cut me off on the way to work, and now I've been mad all day'. The realized Buddhist isn't thinking about it, it doesn't even register.

I disagree. The "realized Buddhist" is the person who feels anger arise while in traffic but doesn't react to... doesn't attach to... the anger. If he's "Presence" then the anger is happening and he lets it happen (since it cannot be avoided), but he has a mental distance from it for not identifying with it. It's similar a drama unfolding on a screen (indeed the whole cosmos is like an unfolding in consciousness).

If it were true that the anger does not register with him, then he doesn't remotely qualify as mindful. Mindfulness is letting whatever's happening "be" there, but not attaching to and identifying with it. From moment to moment, phenomena arise and fall away. The only seemingly permanent non-thing is Presence. Since that is free of traits (it's "empty" except, I guess, it's receptive of phenomena/things), it doesn't have anger or fear or the rest. If you identify with that instead of the "self" thing in the mind that's thinking "how dare he cut ME off in traffic!", then the "self" thing is there, doing what it does, but you're "not that" as an advaitan hindu might say.

 

[Politesse]

Exactly. Anger is, they say, a candle that is lit for a while and in time goes out. You can choose to burn your hand in the flame, an experience of suffering, or you can choose to stand aside and watch as it goes through it's natural cycle, an experience of beauty.

I enjoy talking about the mystical, but in practice I am terrible at meditating.

 

[steve_bank]

There was a book on Zen koans or riddles in the 69s-70s.

My version of one I remember.

A student meets his teacher who gives him a puzzle to answer.

The teacher says 'What is the sound of one hand clapping?', and tellst he student to com back with an answer.

The student returns and launches into an intellectual logical dissertation of an nswer, and the teacher wacks him on the head with his rice bowl.

The student returns again, sits down, and silently waves one hand back and forth. Teacher smiles

The cliche back ten and on the orum in the past is that western thinking and science 'just doesn't get it', without explaiing what IT is.

We all use metaphor and analogy to communicate things not reduce able to Aristotelian logic, that is not unique.

What is the difference between Zen and zazen?
Zen meditation, also known as Zazen, is a meditation technique rooted in Buddhist psychology. The goal of Zen meditation is to regulate attention. 1 It's sometimes referred to as a practice that involves “thinking about not thinking.”Apr 17, 2023

I once had a bok of pictures from a Japanese Zen monestary. Monks are siting in Zazen, one has bent over and is quacked on the back with a stick by the person keading the session.
The monk felt his concentration wavering and bent over for the wacking to get him self back on track.

Many facets to Zen.

Another picture was a monk sweeping a floor. The caption refereed to a Zen monk who attained enlightenment when he was sweeping and heard the sound of leaves rustling.

All this stuff is coming back.

The Chan Shout.

The idea is to shock a person out of his rigid conditioned logical thinking into enlightenment. A teacherr might jump out from behind a tree and shout at a passing student. Waking up the student outo f his 'dream' so to sepak.

Katsu (Zen) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The katsu shout, insofar as it represents a kind of verbal harshness and even violence, can be considered a part of the Mahāyāna Buddhist doctrine of "skill-in-means" (Sanskrit: upāya-kauśalya), which essentially teaches that even an action or practice which seems to violate Buddhist moral guidelines—in this case, the Noble Eightfold Path's injunction against "abusive speech"[11]—is permissible, and even desirable, so long as it is done with the aim of ultimately putting an end to suffering and introducing others to the dharma, or teachings of Buddhism.

The most celebrated and frequent practitioner of the katsu was the Chinese master Línjì Yìxuán (?–866), and many examples of his use of the shout can be found in the Línjì-lù (臨済錄; Japanese: Rinzai-roku), or Record of Linji, the collection of Linji's actions and lectures:

A monk asked, "What is the basic meaning of Buddhism?" The Master gave a shout.[12] The monk bowed low. The Master said, "This fine monk is the kind who's worth talking to!"[13]

The use of the katsu stands in a tradition of antinomian methods, such as striking disciples with a stick or a fly whisk,[14] which developed within the Mǎzǔ Dàoyī (709–788) lineage.[15] Linji greatly developed and used the katsu technique. In one of his lectures, often termed as "Linji's Four Shouts"[16] he distinguished four different categories of katsu:

The Master said to a monk, "At times my shout is like the precious sword of the Diamond King. At times my shout is like a golden-haired lion crouching on the ground. At times my shout is like the search pole and the shadow grass. At times my shout doesn't work like a shout at all. Do you understand?" The monk started to answer, whereupon the Master gave a shout.[17]

If you try and get Zen through intellectual analysis and meaning of wrods then you are missing the point.

A blast from the past, Nam-myoho-renge-kyo

Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Nam Myōhō Renge Kyō[a] (南無妙法蓮華経) are Japanese words chanted within all forms of Nichiren Buddhism. In English, they mean "Devotion to the Mystic Law of the Lotus Sutra" or "Glory to the Dharma of the Lotus Sutra".[2][3]

The words 'Myōhō Renge Kyō' refer to the Japanese title of the Lotus Sūtra. The mantra is referred to as Daimoku (題目)[3] or, in honorific form, O-daimoku (お題目) meaning title and was first publicly declared by the Japanese Buddhist priest Nichiren on 28 April 1253 atop Mount Kiyosumi, now memorialized by Seichō-ji temple in Kamogawa, Chiba prefecture, Japan.[4][5]

The practice of prolonged chanting is referred to as Shōdai (唱題). Believers claim that the purpose of chanting is to reduce suffering by eradicating negative karma along with reducing karmic punishments both from previous and present lifetimes,[6] with the goal of attaining perfect and complete awakening.[7]

 

[rousseau]

My understanding of Samsara is that it represents 'everyday, mundane reality'. Those who are in Samsara are lost in the everyday turmoil of life. 'Someone cut me off on the way to work, and now I've been mad all day'. The realized Buddhist isn't thinking about it, it doesn't even register.

I disagree. The "realized Buddhist" is the person who feels anger arise while in traffic but doesn't react to... doesn't attach to... the anger. If he's "Presence" then the anger is happening and he lets it happen (since it cannot be avoided), but he has a mental distance from it for not identifying with it. It's similar a drama unfolding on a screen (indeed the whole cosmos is like an unfolding in consciousness).

If it were true that the anger does not register with him, then he doesn't remotely qualify as mindful. Mindfulness is letting whatever's happening "be" there, but not attaching to and identifying with it. From moment to moment, phenomena arise and fall away. The only seemingly permanent non-thing is Presence. Since that is free of traits (it's "empty" except, I guess, it's receptive of phenomena/things), it doesn't have anger or fear or the rest. If you identify with that instead of the "self" thing in the mind that's thinking "how dare he cut ME off in traffic!", then the "self" thing is there, doing what it does, but you're "not that" as an advaitan hindu might say.

I guess that's my meaning as well, in different words. You're going to get the initial jolt, but the Buddhist will find it easy to detach and move on.

 

[rousseau]

I enjoy talking about the mystical, but in practice I am terrible at meditating.

Back when I discovered how to accomplish Zazen I'd do it to unwind and for entertainment, but after a while just found it boring. I'd rather be doing something. There's a good D.T. Suzuki quote that comes to mind:

“If there is anything Zen strongly emphasizes it is the attainment of freedom; that is, freedom from all unnatural encumbrances. Meditation is something artificially put on; it does not belong to the native activity of the mind. Upon what do the fowls of the air meditate? Upon what do the fish in the water meditate? They fly; they swim. Is not that enough? Who wants to fix his mind on the unity of God and man, or on the nothingness of life? Who wants to be arrested in the daily manifestations of his life-activity by such meditations as the goodness of a divine being or the everlasting fire of hell?”

 

[rousseau]

... the concept of liberation .... What do you think?

No expertise here. But I've read some and formed a viewpoint also.

I think the early Buddhists wanted OUT, same as Hindus. Having to live again and again seemed like sheer misery, and in a culture that thinks it's your desires and other behaviors that trap you in the round of rebirths, the key to 'extinguishing the flame' is mind-control.

Later, Mahayana changed that and made it less escapist. Life is suffering because of our abstraction from reality, but the thing isn't to stop the thoughts nor to escape 'material' existence. Instead, the goal is to realize that you are, already, Awareness or Presence.

Liberation has to do with non-identification (ie, non-attachment) to the endless jabbering and explaining and wishing and regrets and the rest of the noise of the "mind" that puts a layer of Samsara over reality and causes the person to feel separate and distinct from the rest of Being.

Stopping the brain from its blathering is impossible. But side-stepping its blathering is possible. You do that by "defusing" (ie, detaching) from the wanting, fearing, explaining, et al, and residing in Awareness instead.

It's like identifying as the screen ("consciousness", or what I called Presence) instead of the drama playing out on the screen. When you do this, wordless reality replaces the half-ass story your left-brain analytic mode made out of reality.

ANY story by the blathering intellect is a "half-ass" story in the sense it's not real because it's abstract. Zen practice is to quiet the mind enough to recognize the abstraction process that our minds are doing to us to make us "suffer" (or feel like life just ain't good enough to please us).

The more I think about it, I think this awareness is exactly what the ancients had in mind. What throws me off is that if you read The Blue Cliff Record, the language is presented in a way to suggest that we can quite literally eliminate desire and concern completely. But from their perspective, the ability you're describing (to dissociate) would feel profound, and it would feel like they actually were eliminating desire. Couple that with people's affinity for mysticism and the result is an elaborate Buddhist history. So maybe it's really a question of interpretation: are we really eliminating desire, or just understanding how to see beyond it? In practice, the ancients were doing the latter, but they called it the former.

And my understanding is that there is Buddhist scripture which explains that some level of desire is normal, which maybe points to their awareness that we're not really 'transcending' desire. We're just seeing and interacting with the world in a more effective way.