I am now a Zen practitioner.

[Adonai One]

Zen is now my way of living and has been longer than I have known. I knew what Zen was before the term entered me as doctrine, as concept.

I woke up to seeing a vision of a monk and the rest is history.

Three words: The Great Way

[Unbound]

Yeah, I can see that, glad you have found a path that works well for you!

[Adonai One]

I will make a glaring admission: My subconscious mind has been taken over with Zen Buddhistic stuff and my conscious, atheistic self is kicking and screaming about my life changing so drastically.

My Japanese past lives have taken over and they want a say, and they won the battle. I'm done. My Asian self wins! It's been calling from the onset and I've ignored it. And now it has had its claim.

[Unbound]

I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so...

[Billy]

Adonai you're back! Isn't the core of Zen no-mind? How do you have no-mind?

[Matt1]

That's cool. I went to an introduction course on Tibetan Buddhism called Karma Kagyu. Although i haven't taken refuge yet.

Good luck on your path.

[isis]

synchronicity:

i spent quite a while yesterday clicking on the 'random' link on reddit. i was presented with reddit.com/r/zen ... spent quite a bit of time there...saw this quote & thought about sharing it:

Zen is really extraordinarily simple as long as one doesn't try to be cute about it or beat around the bush! Zen is simply the sensation and the clear understanding that, to put it in Zen terms, there are "ten thousand formations; one suchness." Or you might say, "The ten thousand things that are everything are of one suchness." That is to say that there is behind the multiplicity of events and creatures in this universe simply one energy — and it appears as you, and everything is it. The practice of Zen is to understand that one energy so as to "feel it in your bones" (Alan Watts, What is Zen? p. 21).

[Rhayader]

*Plot Twist* zenmaster was Adonai from the future.

[AnthroHeart]

Zen from what I realize is paying attention to all your senses. Hearing things you normally wouldn't pay attention to.

[Adonai One]

Adonai you're back! Isn't the core of Zen no-mind? How do you have no-mind?

Rational concepts as doctrine have never been my foundation. In other words, what you term as "mind" has never truly been my foundation, for I believe the true self is an emotional, clear, constantly experiential being. To me enjoyable, emotional experience is true intelligence, true mind.

Additionally, as you intend by the term "no-mind", you will find very little rational "mind-based" doctrine in traditional Zen. To accept and truly enjoy, understand a school of thought with very little clear literature, you have to know what it's about emotionally. I believe I do.

At first I thought it was a religion about nothing. I now know it's about being, about humanity finding its way of intuitive, peaceful being in the present moment.

Zen is found internally, not externally. To find it externally is to play the part but not enjoy its benefits.

[Diana]

I think I'm turning Japanese, I think I'm turning Japanese, I really think so...

OMG I can't stop laughing at this.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Zen sounds like just being and staying in the now.

[Sabou]

Buddhism was my first introduction to spirituality facilitated by books and a plethora of Alan Watts lectures. I was lucky enough to be able to attend a Buddhist Centre in my town and even more so too have been able to spend time at a Monestary not far from my hometown. I too have a deep connection with Asian culture and especially that of monkhood. It was a really good experience but i learnt from my time there that i am not ready for that commitment or that i am here for a different task this life..

With that being said the temple was not a Zen tradition and i feel like Zen is also more my style

[Raz]

Zen...
dynamic flowing momentum of isness...
I have said to much...

[Parsons]

Good to have you back with us, my friend.

[Diana]

OOPS. I think I posted what I just removed in the wrong thread. I have no idea how that happened.

[native]

I feel Ra was basically trying to communicate a message along the lines of zen. They wanted you to feel love always, and so an intricate system was communicated in an attempt to see through illusion, but we get caught up in that system. They were trying to communicate a simple message I feel.

"The heart of white magic is the experience of the joy of union with the Creator. This joy will of necessity radiate throughout the life experience of the positive adept."

"The principle behind any ritual of the white magical nature is to so configure the stimuli which reach down into the trunk of mind that this arrangement causes the generation of disciplined and purified emotion or love which then may be both protection and the key to the gateway to intelligent infinity."

[Billy]

No self, how do you do that?

[Raz]

No self, how do you do that?

it´s a little like; if the whole world was blue, and there was no other color or hue, you would be in a world of "no blue".

When you realize there is nothing other than self, there is no self. You live in a world of no self as there is no point of reference to what is not self...

[seven]

I feel Ra was basically trying to communicate a message along the lines of zen. They wanted you to feel love always, and so an intricate system was communicated in an attempt to see through illusion, but we get caught up in that system. They were trying to communicate a simple message I feel.

"The heart of white magic is the experience of the joy of union with the Creator. This joy will of necessity radiate throughout the life experience of the positive adept."

"The principle behind any ritual of the white magical nature is to so configure the stimuli which reach down into the trunk of mind that this arrangement causes the generation of disciplined and purified emotion or love which then may be both protection and the key to the gateway to intelligent infinity."

I feel the same way. This statement really sank deep down my mind.

60.25 Ra: I am Ra. This is incorrect. However, many of your peoples request the same basic information in enormous repetition, and for a social memory complex to speak ad infinitum about the need to meditate is a waste of the considerable abilities of such social memory complexes.

[Sabou]

it´s a little like; if the whole world was blue, and there was no other color or hue, you would be in a world of "no blue".

Did you word this yourself?

[Raz]

it´s a little like; if the whole world was blue, and there was no other color or hue, you would be in a world of "no blue".

Did you word this yourself?

yes, but whatever you got out of it, was all you

[Adonai One]

No self, how do you do that?

Are you not all things? Does not all lead to emptiness, oneness aka "no self"?

I have "no self" as traditionally defined. What remains as any sense of "self" is only compassion.

I look back to serve. I no longer need to look back. I am gone yet I am not.

---

Additionally, I wish to take this moment to disavow any posts on my account that do not adequately use the scientific method towards predicting and assessing phenomena.

[Quan]

Adonai excellent to see you back and new focus in life, term life used loosely =, maybe Ra talk third density now.. ZEN is great toolkit\catalyst and seeing the quote "i look back to serve" Look forward to more posts and new light of focus from yourself\no self, ahh speech in duality, words make it difficult to speak beyond!

No self, how do you do that?

Are you not all things? Does not all lead to emptiness, oneness aka "no self"?

I have "no self" as traditionally defined. What remains as any sense of "self" is only compassion.

I look back to serve. I no longer need to look back. I am gone yet I am not.

---

Additionally, I wish to take this moment to disavow any posts on my account that do not adequately use the scientific method towards predicting and assessing phenomena.

[SunlitDoves]

"The day came when Eragon went to the glade beyond Oromis's hut, seated himself on the polished white stump in the center of the mossy hollow, and- when he opened his mind to observe the creatures around him-sensed not just the birds, beasts, and insects but also the plants and the forest.
The plants possessed a different type of consciousness than animals; slow, deliberate, and decentralized , but in their own way just as cognizant of their" surroundings as Eragon himself was. The faint pulse of the plants' awareness bathed the galaxy of stars that wheeled behind his eyes- each bright spark representing a life in a soft, omnipresent glow. Even the most barren soil teemed with organisms, the land itself was alive and sentient.
Intelligent life, he concluded, existed everywhere.
As Eragon immersed himself in the thoughts and feelings of the beings around him, he was able to attain a state of inner peace so profound that, during that time, he ceased to exist as an individual. He allowed himself to become a nonentity, a void, a receptacle for the voices of the world. Nothing escaped his attention, for his attention was focused on nothing.
He was the forest and its inhabitants." -Eldest