Expert: Joe McSorley - 9/21/2010

Question
QUESTION: Can you explain the Unconscious and how it relates to the conscious If I
understand DT Suzuki's explaination our goal should be to find that
immeasurable moment between the Unconscious and the conscious or that
instant before our intellect takes over. Is this where we begin to see reality?
Thank you for any help you can offer.

ANSWER: Dear Richard,
      I am not familiar with that particular quote of D.T. Suzuki.  If you would send me the book and page number I would like to look it up and read it in context.
   Consciousness and unconsciousness are not separable, one state is known because of its distinction from the other state.  You know you are awake because you are not asleep and you know you are asleep because you are not awake.  They cannot be looked at as separate entities.  The problem is that “I” which stands apart and makes these discriminations, who is this?  That which is attempting to see reality is precisely that which is making the separation from reality.  The ‘I’ in its attempt to know, creates the schism between knower and known, so it is not that we have a problem, a self that has a problem, we are the problem.  In this sense any attempt to see reality creates the problem.  The ‘I’ that wants to know, perceive or be awakened is precisely the cause of the schism.  To know something is to create the split between knower and know thus anything we know we necessarily stand apart from.  We cannot be that which we perceive because anything we perceive must stand apart from us as an object of our perception and therefore always alienated from us.  A simple quieting of the thought process or non-objectification of it is still an ‘I’ that stands apart to be creating such a process.  Not thinking is still a form of thinking for there is that which is doing the not-thinking.

   Clearly this creates a dilemma which is clearly demonstrated in these quotes:
"If you utter a word, you get thirty blows!  If you
do not utter a word, just the same, thirty blows!"
Te-shan

"When whatever you do [or do not do] will not do, what do you do!"
Shin-ichi Hisamatsu


These both address the same issue; if you do something, it won’t work but if you do nothing, it won’t work.  The problem is the ‘you’ that even attempts to deal with this.  This is the great dilemma of Zen and self-inquiry.  There has to be a block where the structure of our dualistic consciousness breaks down, is annihilated and then awakens.  The methods for this; zazen, koan practice or mindfulness, are all attempting to do the same thing which is to stop the dualistic self-reflective process.  To practice any of these things without the right understanding is just fruitless ritualistic process.  When you, yourself, realize the problem of your own thought process it will motivate you to end it at a deep existential level.
   I will try to make this a little more understandable.  When we, as humans, look at something we immediately have a process going on. I am here and the object is there.  I say I am here but who is the I that says that?  What exactly is that I?  So this I says, “that’s a tree” but it is reacting to the thought process, the objectification in the mind of tree.  It really doesn’t see the tree but relates to the mental perception of the tree.  From this perspective we say the tree is large, small, green, or whatever.  We can only identify it by what it is not.  It is not a rock, cloud or bird.  But we don’t know what the tree is without this dichotomy between itself, other and I.   In the sense of ourselves we know what we are not; the tree, rock and bird, but we don’t know who we are.  So that which is making all the judgments cannot even identity who it is, in fact, our self-identifications are how we know we are.  It is by our likes, dislikes, ethnicity, affiliations and so on that we identify ourselves but without these, aren’t we still a self, a sense of ‘I’?   There is no sense of I without the separation from other, we know that we are by what we are not.  We do not know who we are without this dichotomy.  If you remove the rest of the universe around you how do you know you exist?
The Zen practices are the attempt to break down the mental objectification of both the world and ourselves.  The space in between conscious and unconscious cannot be objectified; it causes the thought process to jam.  All Zen practice should cause this block to happen.  To see without subject and object, to just see.  It’s difficult to do but necessary.  
    When Hui Ka came to Bodhidharma he was not told to meditate, be mindful or practice a koan or any ritual, Bodhi said, “Hand me your heart/mind that I might pacify it”.  Hand me the self that is suffering.  This ends the dualistic process of the mind.
  Hisamatsu was with the theologian Paul Tillich and they had this exchange:
T:  If I follow a path I won’t get there, correct?
H:  Correct.
T:  If I don’t follow a path I won’t get there, correct?
H:  Correct.
T:  That’s a dilemma!
H:  That’s the path you follow!

This dilemma blocks the process.  Hisamatsu also put it this way; “If whatever you do, or do not do, will not do, what do you do? That’s the path”.
 So to see reality is to create a separate self that sees reality.  To see reality as yourself is to be reality.  I think a great tool in this quest is to view the ox-herding pictures.  They are a wonderful depiction of the attempt to see reality and the process that happens until the break down of dualistic consciousness.
  Richard, enlightenment is not attained, there is no goal, the wave sits on the ocean and wants to be the ocean, but what separates it from the ocean?  What separates you from reality?
   I hope this helps you, take care.
         Joe


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Joe;
"From the first not a thing is" according to Hui-Neng. Therefore nirvana, enlightenment, self,
buddha, kamma, conscious etc. are not. Can this mean that ALL is only concepts?  But something is creating concepts. I
can't ignore the pain in my knee even if I know it does not exist. And if I have a pain how is it that you would not
experience that same pain due to the idea that there is only one ocean. I have never liked the metephor of wave and ocean
but I will accept it. My answer to Hui-neng is-there never was a first and everything is because I make it every instant. I
hope this makes sense. I am trying not to be sophistic or philosophic. Thank you.







ANSWER: Richard,
  I am a little unclear as to what you want me to address here but I will give it my best.  I understand you not like the ocean metaphor, we all have different things that will resonate within us, we just need to find them.
 Yes, it does mean that all human thoughts on reality are just concepts; they are not reality.  The idea of nirvana, dharmas and buddha are all constructs of the human mind and ultimately all of these concepts are empty, thus the expression, “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him”.  Why?  Because it stands apart and outside of you, it is not Buddha but a concept.  What is creating the concept is the mind/thought processes.  It is the troubling function of our mind because it is the only way the human mind functions and that is by contra-distinction, by standing one thing against another.  These things are not distinct like this in reality, all things are totally interpenetrating/permeating but our mind can only know by distinctions or dualistic thought.  We know the tree for what it is not and we know ourselves for what we are not.  This is the function of the mind and not of reality.  We know that we are but do not know who we are, who it is whose knee hurts.  When you say ‘my knee’ there is that which stands apart to identity your knee as opposed to other knees or your elbow. The crux is; who is that who stands apart to make such a distinction?  Why isn’t it just the knee hurting rather than a consciousness of it?  When asleep the pain may still be there but there is no perception of the pain, the perception comes and goes with self- consciousness.  What is germane here is exactly what you stated, ‘something is creating the concepts’.  When you search for that something, what do you find?  Is there a substance somewhere that stands apart to create this?  From the Zen standpoint, no, we are not something with an ego but we are the ego.  The ego here defined as the exact of separating to know.   In the Indian terminology it’s the dichotomy between the knower and known.  I know my knee hurts but don’t know who it is that says my knee hurts.  The knower is created by separation so there is a known.  When this self-consciousness arises, we arise and create the world by separation.
   Hui neng was a great influence on me when I first studied Zen. His story really resonated with me.  The difference in his and Shen Hsiu’s gatha is paramount to understanding Zen at its root.  Shen Hsiu’s idea of ever keeping the mirror clean so that no dust alights on it presupposes a mind that is there to gather dust. Hui neng’s ‘no tree, no stand, originally not a single thing’ hits the mark at the root.  There is no single thing, no thing that stands apart from the other, it’s an illusion and to dust the mirror recreates the illusion at every second.
The impetus is to realize this, not to change the sense of self but to destroy it because there is no where for dust to alight.  This is echoed in Chuang Tzu’s ‘heaven, earth and I arise simultaneously’, in other words, ‘not a single thing’.  I greatly admire the writings of Zenkei Shibayama and was disappointed when reading him one time and he talked about ever polishing the mirror but as I read on the last sentence was “ now smash the mirror”.
 Each moment you are aware of the world, you create that world in your mind that stands apart from you. If you are liberated from dualistic thought your knee hurts as the universe’s knee and at that same time it does not hurt because you are not rooted to that self as be only you.  Nature is living/dying simultaneously all the time, it is not a linear process, they define and are each other.  The universe is self-creating-self-destroying at every moment, not linearly.
  As far as there never being a first and everything, Lao Tzu has this paradoxical language to describe it, “At first there is a beginning but there is no beginning to that beginning……..”, it cannot be explained by dualistic concepts and they are the only way our minds can perceive things.  Your knee hurts but it is not your knee, it is of itself a knee and yet does not exist without all of existence, it is because the universe is and the universe is because it is.
   I don’t know if I addressed what you were looking for here, I hope I did.  Take care,
         Joe


---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thanks Joe for your answer. This is and has been an extremely difficult thing to get hold of. I
think sometimes I understand only to have it slip away. It is difficult to understand "no mind,
no thought" I have read many books and articles with the idea that someday I will come
across the magic word or phrase that could point me to understanding.  I have learned to
practice mindfulness more and more and this has helped me often to overcome impatience
and anger. I would like to hear your teaching on mindfulness. My mindfulness tells me that I
have a constant dialogue/monologue going on or music. Is mindfulness being aware of what
the mind is doing?

Answer
Dear Richard,
   You are trying to grasp the ungraspable.  You are trying to understand with thought that which thought cannot understand. This is common because this is what we all do.  You can have a deep intellectual understanding of the problem but eventually that understanding must give way to great doubt.  When Hisamatsu says, “if nothing whatsoever will do, what do you do?” or “If whatever you do, or do not do, will not do, what do you do”? He is not creating a base for understanding; he is saying there is no room for understanding.  This dilemma blocks the mind from reflective thought; it jams it tight so there is no going forward and no retreat.  This isn’t an understanding but an impacting of the thought process.  It is not just not thinking and it is not thinking, it’s a stand still.
  I would hope that some phrase or action would not point you to an understanding but point you in the direction of deep self-inquiry, something that would make the problem clear to you so that you would then engage it with all of your being.  When you truly realize that it is ungraspable but you still have to tackle it is when you will be fruitful in your endeavor.
    To be ever aware of what the mind is doing is to ever create the problem of the mind; you must stop the mind. To me mindfulness, zazen and koan practice are all the same and must be all the same.  There is nothing magical about any one of them; they all attempt to jam the self-reflective process, to make you live in the present.  To practice any of them without this as your sole objective is useless. There is a famous musician who was once asked about practicing his guitar and he replied, “when you practice all the time you get really good at practicing, I play the guitar.”  He was there for the end result and gave no glory to the practice.  For me mindfulness and all of the techniques are the ever-vigilant practice of facing yourself here and now.  Handing your heart/mind over, no retreat and no going forward.  To observe in absolute stillness, without judgment or bias, to see without a seer.
  I don’t know how much that makes sense to you but I hope it does.
I would like to send you a pdf. of an Indian teacher that might help you.  If you would send me your email address to: josmcsorley@yahoo.com I will send it to you.
   Take care,
         Joe