David T and SQUAD:
Well, Jeez. I guess it doesn't take an athlete to be a poor sport. David
T can delaete my posts if he likes, but I like to read 'em all. It's
hard to learn anything if all you read is what you already agree with a
find reassuring.
And just for the record, the reason I was baffled by David T's
swordsmanship post is that I didn't see how it was relevant to the
topic. Still don't.
(Are the editors on vacation, or what? How is this stuff even getting
through? I mean c'mon folks. Don't you think David T's Sunday post was
way off the topic and very far from courteous? You've bounced better
stuff.)
But I really am sorry if I hurt your feelings, I was trying to be
critical without being mean. Honestly.
Please don't get me wrong. I'm a big fan of Suzuki. In fact he is
indexed and foot-noted extensively in the Alan Watts book I used to
explore "dhyana". (THE WAY OF ZEN) It's safe to say that Suzuki had an
enormous influence on Alan Watts.
As for Bachelor, he doesn't seem so bad the way David described it. And
hey, I I already admitted that it was only a guess. But again, I was
baffled because I didn't see how it connected to the topic. Still don't.
But it also seems that "Buddhism with Adaptable Beliefs" would have been
a more apt title. All religions are transformed by cultures when they
are adopted by them. We can see the same kind of thing in the West. I've
got not problem with that kind of cross-cultural analysis. Which finally
brings me to the question at hand....
I have tons of questions rattling around in my head. I wonder about the
exact methods and practices involved in the "dhyana" state of mind. And
there are even more questions about the perfection of static patterns
and rituals outside a monastery. I'm pretty sure that the common
"workplace" is no place for dhyana. I mean its not likely to happen at
work, is it? I wonder what ritual has to do with addiction or
obsessive/compulsive disorders. Seems like our need for ritual is
connected to those dis-eases? I hope someone has a handle on those
issues and and that they'll come to the rescue. I'm just putting the
questions out there. I won't even try to answer them here.
I've been exploring the meaning of "dhyana" because Pirsig refers to it
in terms of freedom. I've been trying to get and the Dynamic side of the
question, the freedom side of the equation, because the static/ritual
side is already more than fully represented in out culture and in our
lives, isn't it? Static patterns and daily ritual are the prisons that
we need to escape, don't you think?
Rich posted an excellent piece of work today. He compared the MOQ to the
ideas in Ken Wilber's "Up From Eden". I wish he had posted it on this
forum instead, it seems highly relevant to our topic. It was a great
read, couldn't put it down. Two thumbs up. Way up! : -)
Anyway, I'm going to steal a few quotes from that post. I want to point
out that there are historical people who can be seen as examples.
Clearly none of them thought of it in terms of "obtaining sQ and DQ
simultaneously", but it doesn't matter what they called it. Ken Wilber
writes...
"A human being is a part of the whole, a part limited in time and space.
He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something seperated
from the rest - a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This
delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal
desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be
to free ourselves of this prison."
"Because Man wants real transcendence above all else, but because he
will not accept the necessary death of his separate-self sense, he goes
about seeking transcendence in ways that actually prevent it and force
symbolic substitutes. And the SUBSTITUTES come in all varieties: sex,
food, money, fame, knowledge, power - all are ultimately substitute
gratifications...That is why human desire is insatiable, why all joys
yearn for infinity - all a person wants is Atman; all he finds are
symbolic substitutes for it."
Notice how all the substiutes are static patterns; sex, fame and
knowledge clearly correlate with the biological, social, and
intellectual levels. This is the stuff our daily ritual is made of. This
seperate-self sense, this ego consciousness that we won't let go, is
precisely what creates the prison. Its part of the "clutching" that
dhyana is supposed to relieve. And I think this same "optical delusion
of consciousness" is behind the terrible lonliness of the 20th century
and a lot of other SOM problems described by Pirsig.
But there is also reason to be optimistic.
"...at all stages of human history, certain highly advanced individuals
managed to evolve considerably beyond their fellows and into aspects of
the higher realms. These were the prophets, the saints, the sages, the
shamans, the souls who , as the growing tip of human consciousness,
discovered the higher levels of being through an expansion and
precocious evolution of their own consciousness."
Notice how his "growing tip of growing consciousness" resembles Pirsig's
"cutting edge of reality"? Okay, I don't like the wordy, new-age style
either, but listen to what he's saying anyway...
"History is the narrative of man's relationship to his own deepest
Nature, played out in time, but grounded in eternity."
"Nothing can stay long removed from God, nor long divorced from that
Ground of Being, outside of which nothing exists, and history, as a
movement of human consciousness - is the story of men and women's love
affair with the Divine."
Again the vocabulary ought not get in the way. God, the Ground of Being
and the Divine can easily be replaced with Dynamic Quality. And this
whole view isn't just very MOQ it is also...
"Known in general as the "perennial philosophy". It forms the esoteric
core of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Sufism, and Christian mysticism, as
well as being embraced, in whole or in part, by individual intellects
ranging from Spinoza to Albert Einstein, Schopenhauer to Jung, William
James to Plato..."
In the broad view, I think we could say that the saints, sages and
creative geniuses in history have been endowed with a "higher" mind.
They've led Dynamic evolution throughout our history. In that sense
Buddha and Einstein are in the same category. But this list of
extraordinary fiqures ought not discourage the rest of us from tapping
into the same source they drew from. There must be millions whose names
history did not record, who never lead a scientific revolution or
founded a new religion, but were able to find Dynamic freedom. And
again, I think this "dhyana" business is a good place to start.
Thanks for your time.
David B.
MOQ.org - http://www.moq.org
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