What is our true self?
misecmisc1
I am a HinduIndia Veteran
Hi All,
Regarding the question What is our true self? or What was our face before our parents were born?, something just came to my mind on hearing this insightful talk from Suzuki Roshi https://youtube.com/watch?v=IiKGRvmavsA
so the answer to the above question seems to me is our aliveness or our consciousness - may be saying its ours might not be correct, since there is no 'us' as an entity inside us, so nothing can be ours - but if somebody asks us this question regarding what is our face before our parents were born?, then we can answer as our aliveness or our consciousness on a relative level.
may be on ultimate reality level, there is just aliveness or some continuity of consciousness, but what that is - i think words cannot express as it is prior to language.
above thoughts came to my mind on hearing above talk from Suzuki Roshi.
your thoughts over my above thoughts? may be it is complete non-sense which i have written above.
Comments
There's a concept in Mahayana Buddhism called "True Self", but that's different from what you're referring to, I think. In any case, "True Self" as the Buddha taught, is our Buddhanature, should we be fortunate enough to bring to realization our Buddhanature.
Who or what are "we" in-between lifetimes is a different question. They say it's the "seed consciousness", a very subtle consciousness that carries our karmic seeds from many lifetimes. I've participated in several discussions about this on Buddhist forums over the years, and I must say, OP, that you have a remarkably good grasp of it, which seems innate to you; somehow you've come to this understanding on your own. "There is no us" and "nothing is truly ours" are very insightful statements.
In one of his books, Matthieu Ricard, a well-known teacher in the West, calls it a "consciousness stream" that is distinct from other consciousness streams. So it carries some personal characteristics that would distinguish one individual "consciousness" from another, but it is ever-changing and evolving from one lifetime to another, and within each lifetime. It's a bit of a tricky concept, when discussed in the context of the Buddha's teachings on anatta, or "no-self".
That makes Buddhanature sound like an Atman though. I thought it was more like the potential for enlightenment?
You're so sharp! I think that could be debated ad infinitam. The way I understand it is that it's the potential for enlightenment, but upon Enlightenment, it's nature becomes permanent (yes, contradicting the teachings on impermanence). At that point, it may no longer be called "buddhanature" (tathagatagarbha), but "True Self" or Buddhahood. So "tathagatagarbha" is the seed, the potential, and the growth and flowering of that seed, the realization of the potential, is Buddhahood. But we all have the seed within us. Whether or not that corresponds to an Atman, I don't know. Anyway, that's what I've come to understand.
OK. I'm not very clear on this stuff myself, I always wonder how it fits with sunyata.
Not at all. It is incomplete non-sense
In other words you are on the right track/path BUT still grasping at a face to see, which of course only the unborn has not.
One thought is connected to another but only unthought is unconnected and connecting.
In other words, grasp at the True Self ... open your hand ...
Nothing.
... and now back to un-sense ...
Wu...
I guess there are a number of approaches one could take when answering such a question...
I find this quote that I came across a while back, by a Zen practitioner, insightful....
"Awareness is fundamentally non-conceptual before thinking splits experience into subject and object...It is empty and so can contain everything, including thought..It is boundless and amazingly it is intrinsically knowing!"
So from the above quote, it would seem the so-called "True Self" is non-conceptual awareness that is intrinsically knowing
Within Tibetan Buddhism's four schools the Gelug say that it is our potential for enlightenment. The Kagyu and Nyigma school's definition has a more essential nature to it, like the sky free from clouds or the water in a pond free of silt, its always present but obscured. I'm not sure the Sakya position. So it is an ongoing point of disagreement for sure.
I read something similar here many years ago that goes something like "whatever you think is the self is, is not the self.
in the you-tube talk given by Suzuki Roshi, which i referred to in my above post, i think there is a very important point which Suzuki Roshi said in this talk - 'something can disappear only when somebody is watching' or 'the sound is initially there, it is not that when two hands clap, then there is sound and when there is only one hand, there is no sound - it cannot be like that'. So taking this analogy further to - if any object appears, it should have been throughout - it cannot be initially it was not there and suddenly it appeared out of nothing (this seems logical with Dependent Origination too). Now taking this as the base, and bringing it to our current situation - now currently we are alive or we are conscious, so it means this consciousness should have been there forever with no begining and consequently no end - now it would be wrong to say that I was there forever, because firstly there is no 'I' as an entity and whatever I can assign 'I' to, that thing arose, so it would cease, so 'I' was not forever, but the consciousness which was initially there to think about I , that could have been forever - but this consciousness or aliveness would not have been a thing - So the Zen question would have arosen of What is this? which has an answer like suchness. This in turn maps to emptiness, as in that suchness, there is no object as an entity. So our current moment of aliveness, would have been there forever, or may be not - but since our thinking mind arose after our body arose and this aliveness or consciousness was prior to our body's birth, so our thinking mind would not be able to think about it. Moreover, thinking needs words and words arise in suchness or aliveness or consciousness, so words would not be able to describe a thing which it inherently is, like a knife cannot cut itself.
may be whatever i have written above is rubbish. sorry for wasting your time in my reading this post.
This reminds me of a Zen koan that goes like this " Anything you know 'about' cannot be you! "
Though non-conceptual ( non-dual? ) knowing makes all notions of "self" redundant, so oi dunno.
It's like there is just knowing.
just a thought came to my mind now on reading @SpinyNorman your above post. just now i thought about this word - knowing. i think this word - knowing - may itself be the problem. i don't know about others, but for me, knowing means to know something about some thing, or to know of something. i think in suchness or in aliveness of our current life, there is just aliveness or just consciousness. may be the problem starts the moment our minds starts to know something - may be then duality gets constructed immediately and we move from non-duality (which would be just being in here and now) to duality.
I meant knowing in the immediate sense, not knowing about stuff. Mindfulness, being fully in the present, no room for a "self", no need for one.
Some moons ago I came across Yuttadhammo Bhikkhu and his series of "Ask A Monk" videos ...one of which was "What is mind"
Exactly so.
Not knowing something. Much more like being attentive, mindful, aware.
There is nothing here to see, folks!
Just a lot of woo!
I think true self can't be found via thinking about stuff. That's why a lot of zen teachers say things like "an open mouth is already a mistake" or "a dharma talk is an intentional mistake", etc, etc.
What is our true self?
CHANGE/ANICCA
I think "true self" is a misleading fiction. Not really a helpful idea at all.
I would say it's helpful for some people, not helpful for others.
Knowing and insight are pretty much the same thing - that's why facts aren't so factual because everything changes all the time and what's true one moment isn't so true the next. Life is living on constantly shifting tectonic plates - mostly just small movements, but movement just the same. That's why Buddha says "No clinging!"
"Everything evolves...Will come to mean 'nothing is true' !"
~Nietzsche~
Hmm... Let me know when water stays liquid at minus 20 celsius.
True/real self or atta is a convenient fiction with a name attached.
Some examples - USA, Microsoft Corp, European Union, London University, John/Alice, the greenback.
How is it helpful? It is just something else to cling to. Some people become "true selfers" and try to smuggle an atman into Buddhism, try to make it into another school of Hinduism. How is that helpful?
And how does it help if people grasp at Buddhanature as "true self", isn't that completely missing the point?
Perhaps at some point of persona development a strong concept of self is useful, in forming other mental structures like boundaries and self-confidence. However, I think if you're at that stage then perhaps psychology is more useful than Buddhism, it is often an indication of some damage sustained during growing up if these things aren't present.
I feel there are certain stages to the path of development as a person in particular which you have to go through before you can do something as challenging as practicing and understanding Buddhism. Real Buddhism, taking the teachings and implementing them, rather than just lip service to the Buddha, is the advanced course imho.
I think folks just want to get to the bottom of it. Personally, I have no ulterior motives but I do find the whole business quite interesting.
To say there is no self begs the question of who says. There are many fancy and seemingly surreal explanations but I rather like the Two Truths doctrine where subjectivity and objectivity cover each other.
In my view subjectivity is an aspect of objectivity while objectivity depends on the subjective to be experienced.
The subjective are pieces of the puzzle whereas the objective is the big picture which has no borders.
I feel the same. To me, Buddhism is more of the practical way to deal with inter-connectivity rather than trying to nail down all the implications of such.
I'd hazard to guess that any understanding of the dharma that does not increase or maintain the logic of compassion is a deviation.
I think the most helpful way to look at this is in terms of the Two Truths, ie conventionally there is a self but ultimately there is not.
I think the notion of a "true self" is a can of worms in a Buddhist context, more of a hindrance than a help, just something else to cling to and grasp at.
It's helpful when it's not reified. "True selfers" and "anti-true selfers" are both doing that, which is why neither one understands what the words are pointing to. The proper way to practice with it is to investigate it without any preconceived notions as to what it is or isn't, without any preconceived notions as to what the words mean or don't mean.
But the central teachings in Buddhism __are__ anti-true-self, ie anatta, sunyata, aka conditionality, lack of self-nature.
If we are looking for a true self we are practising Hinduism, not Buddhism.
I actually agree and wonder if it would have come about at all if it weren't for the confusion regarding no self doctrine as opposed to non-self doctrine.
Not from a zen perspective. From a zen perspective they are neither pro, nor anti.
Because I like to poke
But Zen is a Mahayana school and sunyata is a Mahayana teaching. So how do you square this circle?
Oh c'mon, @Spiny.... you can buy Neapolitan ice cream from Tesco's and Neapolitan Ice Cream from Morrisons and they will be the same but not the same.... right?
By contemplating the fact that sunyata does not separate things into this vs that.
No, this is more like saying that an empty ice-cream tub still contains ice-cream. It is just contradictory, it doesn't make sense.
Sunyata and self-hood are completely incompatible because sunyata negates self-nature.
Saying there are no separate things is just another way of saying that things don't have inherent existence, ie self-hood. But it doesn't change what I've been saying, ie sunyata negates self-nature and is therefore completely incompatible with notions of "true self", or indeed any kind of self.
I'm sure you get my point though.
What exactly is meant by "self"?
It is obvious that we exist so if that which exists is not a self, what is it?
The individual self is apparently a useful and possibly necessary illusion but that implies that there is something to fool.
The word seems to carry some odd implications that I wouldn't burden it with myself.
@SpinyNorman
My understanding is that Zen, and other more "true self" oriented Buddhism, deals more with the experiential side of emptiness rather than the philosophical side.
So then "true self" is obviously not helpful to you! But, just because that is the case for you, doesn't mean that's the case for everyone.
I do, that reality isn't whatever we want it to be. I suppose my point is, don't always be so sure you've got reality figure out.
What I am asking is how a notion of "true self" can be helpful to any Buddhist's understanding when it contradicts the central Buddhist teaching of sunyata, which negates self-nature.
What exactly do you think this "true self" is, and how do you square it with sunyata?
That was my point actually, lol.
So is emptiness experienced as "true self" then? How does that work? "True self" implies some inner essence which is "immune" from sunyata, but as the Heart Sutra says, "attainment too is emptiness".
The thing about emptiness is that it's empty all the way down, even emptiness is empty. No room for essences or absolutes, or selves, it's all just flux and conditionality.
Hmm...maybe this true self business is what some non-dualists call awareness?
(Me...I call it spirit.)
Here is a little emptiness, including kenosis ...
http://www.budsas.org/ebud/ebdha135.htm
... and now back to the form of emptiness