XPost: alt.buddha.short.fat.guy, alt.philosophy.taoism, alt.philosophy.zen   
   From: wudao@wuji.net   
      
   Tang wrote:   
   > awaken21 wrote:   
   >   
   >> Words of the masters still have the context of the   
   >> circumstances of the moment in which they were   
   >> uttered, something masters are one with.   
   >   
   >As present-day aspirants, should we try to replicate   
   >being one with the old masters in the circumstances   
   >of the moment in which their words were uttered?   
      
   Aspirants should never use the word should   
   and should try to not try as much as possible.   
      
   Then, less and less.   
   Until, finally, one arrives.   
      
   And then, discard  *that*  as well.   
      
   >Or should we try to just be one with the circumstances   
   >of our moment?   
      
   Trying tends to get some aspirants far from where   
   they would like to be getting in their understanding.   
      
   The more they try the more far flung they are.   
      
   Realizations arise when they arise as the Sun   
   or the Moon when their time is time to shine.   
      
   A flower cannot be forced to bloom.   
   Nor a mushroom made out of tune.   
      
   > If the former, are we trying to relive a   
   >long gone moment, like a dead insect pinned on the   
   >wall of some museum?   
      
   Simply sitting, when there is nothing to do, doing nothing,   
   an aspirant may notice something.   
      
   Some aspirants notice many things.   
   Some notice everything.   
      
   When everything is noticed, all at once,   
   some aspirants have what is called an experience.   
      
   For some, everything is turned inside out.   
   It can be called a figure-ground reversal.   
      
   >If the latter, do we need the   
   >context of the circumstances of the moment in which   
   >the masters uttered their words?   
      
   When the aspirant has fully accomplished nothing   
   there is nothing that is left undone.   
      
   Such can be called the Great Undoing.   
      
   Yet some aspirants don't see it, know it, get it   
   nor have even a partial understanding,   
   let alone a full fledged insight.   
      
   >Are we trying to fit into an ancient context, with exotic   
   >overtones all around? Or are we trying to be free?   
      
   Aspirants are always free.   
      
   Some seek exotic paths because there is nothing   
   close to home that fills their well being that they know.   
      
   They know that, but they don't know, *that*.   
      
   They feel empty, yet are not entirely empty.   
   There are grains of truth, and *that* remain as grist.   
      
   And so, they seek out how to find what is missing within.   
      
   Eventually they find there is nothing and are full   
   when they no longer aspire to any thing.   
      
   >If   
   >the former, we would be merely antiquarians with   
   >voyeuristic tendencies. If the latter, we would shed   
   >everything and live in the moment, in the here and now,   
   >with everything else sloughed off, floating around like a   
   >butterfly in the golden breeze of Autumn.   
      
   At times, a leaf is born. It grows out of a twig.   
   When its time is ripe it leaves its tree and enters a form.   
      
   It enters an emptiness in which all leaves are falling   
   when they fall from their trees in their time.   
      
   >Of course, it can be argued that we take a ride on the   
   >freedom of the old masters by way of their recorded   
   >words and gestures, and try to bring back their   
   >freedom to life in our flesh and blood lives.   
      
   Jargon can be used as stepping stones at times.   
   Sometimes one word is able to kill an entire flock.   
      
   > But   
   >precisely, their freedom freed them from whatever their   
   >milieu was, so why would we need to recreate their   
   >scenery, right down to the last comma?   
      
   Play is sometimes entered in two where even more may be   
   gathered for the sake of the Great Play on words.   
      
   Some rules are such that not a single dot over an eye   
   nor a crossing of a knife or fork in a tea ceremony   
   is out of place, for the sake of the ritual.   
      
   The more attention is paid, the more gain of an antenna.   
      
   But to use such an obscure term, gain,   
   may gain one nothing in return   
   as one returns to silence.   
      
   During a ceremony.   
      
   >Of course, to wish for freedom does not make it so, and   
   >it still takes long and hard work, with no guarantee of   
   >success, but we can just be mindful, which means being   
   >mindful of ourselves in our circumstances, whatever   
   >they are or are not, and be one with them, which means   
   >dropping all identifications with anything and anybody,   
   >ourselves included.   
      
   Children know how wishes are as happy fishes.   
   They live in the land of making and believing.   
      
   Play is natural for them until they are fully grown.   
      
   When fully grown, having forgotten how to play with light   
   hearted minds and spirits, they enter in to what's called   
   the real world of adult hoods and strait jackets.   
      
   Some get confused and need to find a Way   
   to return to how things were, and always are,   
   for those who can be reborn as an infant, a leaf,   
   and branch out from there on.   
      
   >If so, why do we need the context of   
   >the circumstances of the moment in which the masters   
   >uttered their words?   
      
   Some people need because they are all tied up   
   in knots and don't know how to untie them.   
      
   They need to find an exact set and setting to unbind   
   the binds that bound them when they were determined   
   to grow up and be an adult, instead of a child at heart.   
      
   >Why load ourselves up on it, just   
   >when we try to unload everything and be free? Should   
   >we not travel light? (All the usual disclaimers ...)   
      
   When should enters the mind, one could be aware   
   of how shoulds work, along with the oughts.   
      
   Shoulds are contingent and are among the ropes   
   learned to be untied by those who know.   
      
   Shoulds weigh down the light with mass in flight   
   and geese get cooked from dawn until past mid-night.   
      
   Some techniques include straw to make dogs and men.   
      
   When the last straw finally breaks the camel's back,   
   the camel is able to pass thru the Eye of the pupil   
   as the pupil has been needled through and through.   
      
   Then the pupil has one's very own magic   
   woven in and out of carpet threads and able to fly   
   far above and over the heads of others   
   who aspire to ascend to on high.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)