Chris, My comments are embedded in your thought-provoking post below:
--- In [email protected], Chris Austin-Lane <chris@...> wrote: > > On Friday, May 20, 2011, Bill! BillSmart@... wrote: > > > My discriminating mind also invents categories such as these to try to rationalize > >my experiences and create an order that I can better deal with - perhaps to > >allow me to believe I have control over things. Â I'm in fact very good at this. > >I use these analytical skills in my profession and in other aspects of my daily life. > > > But all these are illusions and should not be given any special significance - like they > > represent 'truth' or 'reality'. Â These are like any categorizations or divisions. > > Â They are invented for a purpose, but outside of that purpose they have no meaning. > > Bill! > > I have a quibble about your language here. It seems to me that you > often use the word illusion to describe thoughts, conceptualizations, > judgements, dualistic mentation of all sorts. I definitely do believe all these things are illusion. > To me that implies some > pushing away of them, rather than seeing them as they are. To me > illusion seems to connote something which is not there. The term 'illusion' does might connote to you something that is not there, but to mean it means something that is mis-perceived. Here is the definition of the term from Merriam-Webster Online: Definition of ILLUSION 1 a obsolete : the action of deceiving b (1) : the state or fact of being intellectually deceived or misled (2) : an instance of such deception 2 a (1) : a misleading image presented to the vision (2) : something that deceives or misleads intellectually b (1) : perception of something objectively existing in such a way as to cause misinterpretation of its actual nature All agree with all of these definitions, but the way I use the term 'illusion' in the context of zen is best represented by the one I've highlighted 2b(1). This definition 'connotes' or refers to something that 'objectively exists' - which is the result of the discriminating mind creating the dualities of self (subject) and illusions (objects). This definition also 'connotes' or refers to the illusion as a 'misinterpretation of its actual nature' which is key to zen. It is the discriminating mind which 'interprets' (never mind the mis- part) and creates the illusions. The 'actual nature' is Buddha Nature which is direct experience (no interpretation) and One (not dualistic - no subject/object). >Certainly the > thought that someone is bad is really there is my brain. The badness > is an illusion, but the thought is just a thought. The quality of 'badness' itself is a dualistically-based judgement. It is purely the creation of the discriminating mind - an illusion. A tearing apart of Buddha Nature into dualisms (self/somone-else and badness/goodness), then applying a judgement and a category. If you really BELIEVE this 'someone' is 'bad' then you have an attachment to this illusion. >I know for myself, > having tried both ways, that I do better when I can stand to be aware > of my own dualistic thoughts than when I am not aware of them. Being > aware of my own thoughts as thoughts is actually what allows me to > know that the goodness is an illusion, and be free(er) from that > illusion, able to act as needed at the time. I agree with everything in your paragraph above. That leads me to beleive we really see eye-to-eye on this. I think our disconnect is (as is usual) in our ideas of what a specfic term means. In this case that term is 'illusion'. ...Bill!
