Expert: Joe McSorley - 10/10/2007

Question
Hi Joe I was wondering about happiness and purpose and is zen beyond the realm of the two. What I mean is does zen Buddhism believe that the infinite universe has purpose? or is there no need for it? If it did not have purpose, then being a part of this universe am I then wasting my time looking for it? where is the boundary between human nature and zen?
hope that makes some sense!

Answer
Hi Stephanie,
  Sorry for the delay, I’ve been out of town and just got back.  Purpose is a huge question in the West but not so in the East.   The universe is, as it is, here and now in all its glory, it’s not a goal-oriented idea.  In the Western traditions the purpose of humanity is driven by religion but when you really look at the fundamentals of those religions are they really promoting a purpose anyone would want to fulfill?  The Judeo/Christian idea of purpose is that we were created to worship for eternity a vengeful God who will throw us in hell if we don’t.  Our meaning is basically the same thing in the Judeo/Christian tradition, or more precisely, we have no meaning unless we believe and worship.  Nature’s purpose is to be nature.  Animals are fully alive and fulfilling their nature without the question of what they should be doing or what their purpose is and they are not in distress without knowing what their purpose is.  A flower blooms fully expressing all nature yet we wonder what we are doing here.
 Happiness is another word that is used very often without really inquiring deeply as to what it means.  Have you ever really thought about what can make you happy?  Those who have everything from fame to fortune don’t appear very happy.  What does it mean to be happy?  Is it to get your desires fulfilled or get adulation?  Any of those things become boring after a while.   So we have this sense of self that wants to be happy but does not know what it is to be happy nor does it know who it is that is unhappy.  It’s chasing its own tail.  Many religions and philosophies teach that you need to either get something from them or to give yourself up to them in order to be happy.  Some claim that happiness can only come after death so you can’t disprove them, very clever of them!  But fundamentally, what does it mean to be happy?
  If you think of what makes you happy, really happy, most people will say that it is when they fall in love that they are the happiest.  I won’t go into what love is here but I’ll just go along with the emotion.  When you fall in love what happens to you, do you feel more alienated as a self or less?  I would say most people feel like less of a self, that they lose themselves into the other person and are therefore happy.  People also do this by losing themselves in art or sport and feel wonderful at the time till they fall out of that feeling.  So there is a loss of the egocentric self in happiness, a loss of self that is a gain of self.  What do people long for most, love…and what do they fear most, death.  And what is each?  A loss of the self, so it ‘s a very odd paradox here.  We want to lose ourselves in love but not lose ourselves in death though losing oneself is also gaining a larger sense of self.  In Zen the self sees itself as separated and therefore unhappy and alienated.  It is the goal to destroy this illusion so that the everyday sense of self dies and is reconstructed as nature expressing itself as you.  The master Shibayama once said that we are the paintbrush mistaking itself for the painter.  If you awaken to nature as the artist expressing itself as you, you are free from being Stephanie and at the same time, fully alive and vibrant in the moment as Stephanie and nature simultaneously.  You might say the purpose of self is to realize it’s true nature and happiness through all nature.
   I am working on 4 hours sleep here over the last 2 days so I hope this makes sense.
Take care,
                  Joe