5 upvotes, 2 direct replies (showing 2)
View submission: Attaining the Unattainable: "Nothing to Attain" is NOT "Do Nothing Zen"
This back and forth between you and chintokkong is very amusing to be honest. Anyway, one point I kind of agree with him on is that your approach sounds a little bit like a form of "self-hypnosis". Sitting with the conviction that there is no other place to be and nothing to achieve feels like you are trying to convince yourself of it. Whereas, sitting solely for the sake of sitting would already encompass the fact that there is no other place to be and nothing to achieve.
Comment by JundoCohen at 24/01/2025 at 12:55 UTC*
4 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Many aspects of traditional meditation are visualization, embodying a Buddha to become the wisdom and compassion of Buddha. Even many of the Koan call for becoming the ancient masters in the Koan. I believe that there is a certain aspect like that, emulating the Buddha. What's wrong with it? Taigen Dan Leighton, the Zen priest and historian, has a wonderful essay on that ... Zazen as Enactment Ritual ...
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"Buddhist meditation has commonly been considered an instrumental technique aimed at obtaining a heightened mental or spiritual state, or even as a method for inducing some dramatic ‘‘enlightenment’’ experience. But in some branches of the Zen tradition, zazen (Zen seated meditation) has been seen not as a means to attaining some result, but as a ritual enactment and expression of awakened awareness. This alternate, historically significant approach to Zen meditation and practice has been a ceremonial, ritual expression whose transformative quality is not based on stages of attainment or meditative prowess. The Zen ritual enactment approach is most apparent and developed in writings about zazen by the Japanese Soto Zen founder Eihei Dogen (1200–1253). ... Before focusing on teachings by Dogen, we may briefly note that such enactment practice is usually associated with the Vajrayana branch of Buddhism, in which practitioners are initiated into ritual practices of identification with specific buddha or bodhisattva figures. Although Vajrayana is often considered the province of Tibetan Buddhism, increasing attention is being given to the crucial role of the Japanese forms of Vajrayana (J. mikkyo). ... For Dogen and others, Zen shares with the Vajrayana tradition the heart of spiritual activity and praxis as the enactment of buddha awareness and physical presence, rather than aiming at developing a perfected, formulated understanding." https://terebess.hu/zen/szoto/Leighton-Zazen-ZenRitual.pdf[1][2]
1: https://terebess.hu/zen/szoto/Leighton-Zazen-ZenRitual.pdf
2: https://terebess.hu/zen/szoto/Leighton-Zazen-ZenRitual.pdf
Comment by Caculon at 24/01/2025 at 12:19 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I don’t know, we only really learn to ride a bike by getting on a trying to ride. The conviction that everything is ok sounds, to me, like skillful means. If we feel like we’re always lacking something arousing the opposite feeling would be a kind of neutralizing force.