I was reading a little bit of Shunryu Suzuki this morning and this reminded me so much of Kōshō Uchiyama's words from a week, or so, ago:
You are living in this world as one individual, but before you take the form of a human being, you are already there, always there. We are always here. Do you understand? You think before you were born you were not here. But how is it possible for you to appear in this world, when there is no you? Because you are already there, you can appear in the world. Also, it is not possible for something to vanish which does not exist. Because something is there, something can vanish. You may think that when you die, you disappear, you no longer exist. But even though you vanish, something which is existent cannot be non-existent. That is the magic. We ourselves cannot put any magic spells on this world. The world is its own magic. If we are looking at something, it can vanish from our sight, but if we do not try to see it, that something cannot vanish. Because you are watching it, it can disappear, but if no one is watching, how is it possible for anything to disappear? If someone is watching you, you can escape from him, but if no one is watching, you cannot escape from yourself.
Zen Mind, Beginners Mind
Shunryu Suzuki
After reading that, i looked around the room to see if anyone else wanted to comment on it and, low and behold, over in the corner was Venkatesananda jumping up and down like a kindergartner with his hand flying about in the air — "me, me, pick me, oh, oh, oh, me, pick me..."
OK, OK, calm down....
Knowledge, to be complete, perfect and free from the possibility of doubt arising, should be total knowledge – or knowledge of the totality. Knowledge of the totality implies the synthesis, the unification (yoga) of knowledge, the knower and the known. That is, there is an experienced division, which is intuitively realised to be non-existent, and which is also intuitively realised as the source of all pain and sorrow.
Can this experienced division be realised to be non-existent? That is what they call an intuitive understanding, or self-realisation, enlightenment, etc. If that is also an experienced (divided) experience, if you see God as you are seeing another, you are seeing something which you have created, which comes into your life and departs from your life. Everything that has a beginning has an end. A state in which neither a beginning nor an end was experienced, the deep sleep state, was a state of no problems, no pain, no sorrow, no division. Can that state ‘prevail’? (If you use the word ‘experience’ you are trapped. An experience arises and therefore it has to come to an end.)
This is the problem dealt with in the Bhagavad Gītā: on the one hand there is an experienced division, on the other hand there is an intuited state of non-division. That intuition at the same time reveals that the state of divisionlessness is also free from sorrow – sorrow being an experience. And, (what is important), any experience related to that which has a beginning and an end, which comes into being and goes, is sorrow.
The Song of God: Bhagavad Gita Daily Readings
Swami Venkatesananda
Morning sun rises
Mu chi yaku mu toku
Moon fades in the light
Each breath a new birth
Each birth unconcerned with why
I mu sho tokko
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