Question(s) about Zen, No-understanding.

TheFound

Okay so I'm hearing this a lot:

"If you try to UNDERSTAND , Intellectually, you will NEVER understand it"

"If you try to grasp it, You cannot"

"If you use your intellectual, egocentric, discriminating mind- that you are trapped in, You will not get it!"

It pains me horribly, horribly, to hear that I can't rely on my 'concepts' and intellectual understanding of things..

The ....(concept?) of non-separateness ....
It appears SOO MUCH SO, that I am separate, from things,
I feel , I sense, -these things 'outside' of me...they don't feel or sense..
Do they possess some hidden buddha intelligence?

Do I have to start referring to 'myself' as "THEY"?? in the same category as them??

I get... that I am like "WEATHER" I'm a bunch of things..
happening to make this "Weather/TheFound"
I have a duration..
I have a direction, based on my predecessors and karma.
and when my storm's over the weather will change to something else...like a violent storm I have to DIE, but was it ever really born? or will a storm really DIE? (no, it just changes to something else)

but to think in terms of being everything..
non separate? I think I would go crazy if I grasped it..it's like i'm not just weather i'm the earth at the same time, I'm the sky , the moon, the universe all at the same time...

but I AM CUT OFF from it, I'm stuck inside this bag of bones and senses.. based on that I AM separate...

Is there a deep meditation that actually brings you outside the prison of our bodies? etc? .

I've heard, I need to seek the Un-born, and there!
is where we can unite or something.. wTF:mad:

prajnamind

Do not concern yourself with this Zen stuffs. They are difficult for many to understand. Just stay with the elementary - that is, keep the precepts as pure as you can.

The wind does not die. They will only manifest or appear in activities, like when the trees and leaves are moving, there is wing. Likewise, our physical self is only a manifestation of our essential True Self. Just as the wind is not the trees, our True Self is not our physical bodies. These are just revelations in forms. Forms is emptiness, and emptiness is form also.

AriettaDolente

Zen seems complex and mystical, but it is really sheer simplicity. To get to the bottom of the matter, you must meditate and see for yourself. All they are trying to get you to do is let go. As long as you so desperately grasp for meaning, like water, it will slip through your fingers. In the West we are raised on the mantra, "try harder!" In Zen, the harder you try the farther you get from your goal.

Try softer!

~ AD

Geoff-Allen

Hi there

I haven't read a LOT about Zen - mainly a few koans etc.

Found this the other day -

Zen is not a religious doctrine passed from generation to generation. It is a living experience of life itself of which the traditional teachings are a faint echo. Zen teachings are often compared to a finger pointing at the moon. The finger is not the moon, and the teachings are not Zen. They gesture towards something ineffable and ultimately completely incommunicable. To see the moon it is necessary to stop looking at the pointing finger. Likewise, Zen teachings are only finally understood when they are abandoned.

"Zen teaches nothing. Whatever teachings there are in Zen, they come out of one's own mind. We teach ourselves; Zen merely points the way."
- D.T. Suzuki

http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=zen+finger+pointing+at+the+moon&meta=

Namaste

Geoff-Allen

A couple more links I found -

http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3484&Itemid=0

http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3405&Itemid=0

http://www.viewonbuddhism.org/meditation_practice.html

Namaste

fivebells

TheFound wrote: »

but I AM CUT OFF from it, I'm stuck inside this bag of bones and senses.. based on that I AM separate...

Is there a deep meditation that actually brings you outside the prison of our bodies? etc?

I've heard, I need to seek the Un-born, and there!
is where we can unite or something.. wTF:mad:

Yes, the meditation you learned in Zen will get you there. If you want to know what these terms refer to, study dependent origination.

Subjectivity9

Found,

We are under the impression that we are going to go out, and getting Realization. Actually Realization is coming for you, just like the morning comes, and you Wake Up.

In the mean time, look around and see the lay of the land, in this strange place where you have arrived. Just watching it and you closely will make them melt away.

Peace,
S9

Kikujiro

TheFound wrote: »

"If you try to UNDERSTAND , Intellectually, you will NEVER understand it"

All I've learned from Zen is that you should stop spending so much time trying to understand reality. Then, you get more of a chance to witness it. That's when real understanding come into play. Reality is so, so far away when you think your not it. You are reality, pay attention to your self without thought or rationalisation, just witness. We are blessed with this ability.

Thinking you know or ever will is the biggest wall between you and knowing.

Kikujiro

TheFound wrote: »

The ....(concept?) of non-separateness ....
It appears SOO MUCH SO, that I am separate, from things,
I feel , I sense, -these things 'outside' of me...they don't feel or sense

The sense of separateness I've found is exacerbated but alienation or isolation, in anyway. Be it philosphically, or any other way. Look for the things that are unifying and soon you'll realise everything is that way. What other people do is potential and reasonably what you would do in their situation. Have love for others, like metta, focus loving feeling upon others in a non-attached way. This brings a lessering of focus on you or in your case "I". It takes work.

Its not to say the reality you live in as seperate is totally unreal. But its not a balanced view. We are one but at the same time seperate. 1 and 2. Black and white. Up and down. Both are applicable.

jinzang

TheFound wrote: »

but I AM CUT OFF from it, I'm stuck inside this bag of bones and senses.. based on that I AM separate...

Is there a deep meditation that actually brings you outside the prison of our bodies? etc? .

You're not cut off from anything. You are just assuming you are cut off. If you quiet your mind through shamatha meditation and then look at it, you will see that your assumptions about who you are are false. That is all.