Just explained to someone why emptiness is not the non-conceptuality of non-mentation (which as John Tan said before, is just shamatha [practice of calm-abiding/one-pointedness concentration] without insight, it does not even approach 'I AM' level of realization in terms of insight, let alone the deeper insights like nondual, anatman and shunyata).

Mr Z:

The main insight I’ve had since I posted (whether more right or not, who knows) is that there is objectively something - energy, consciousness, whatever “this” is… and my body and thoughts do appear in “this”
However the way I have defined some of “this” as “I” is the question. I have indeed defined it. What I am… how I think. What is possible for me. What people think of me. I’ve defined all of that.
And I suppose the insight I’ve had is - was the definition a helpful thing? Does it have to be defined? If not, there is no “I”
I can’t say I’ve ended that definition, I still feel much the way I did, but I think I have a different viewpoint on it now… I am aware of it
Does that match with your experience in some ways?
I’m aware of the definition process i am doing, where before I just assumed the definition was me

Soh:

that's not the same. what you are saying is more of non-conceptuality, or an experience of suspending conceptual verbalizations. what we point to as the anatman realization is the seeing through of the view of an inherently existent (having its own existence independent of experience/perception and conditions) Self, or agent, or knower, or doer, or controller, that is perceiving, operating, controlling an external world. the structure of a subject-action-object is seen through as fundamentally delusion.

I explained it in my own words in this article: http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2018/08/the-wind-is-blowing.html

The Wind is Blowing, Blowing is the Wind
I wrote in 2013:

V: "...there is somewhere a One Thinker (of thought)"

Me: "A thinker is thinking a thought" is simply a construct of a faulty framework and view of inherent and dualistic self. Just like language is structured in a way that it often requires subject-action-object predicates, making us to say things like "the wind is blowing", "I am thinking a thought"... but is there really a truly existing and independent thing called "the wind" that "is blowing" or is "wind" and "blowing" simply two words referring to a single activity? Likewise is there truly an "I" that is "thinking, a thought" or is "I", "thinking", and "thought" three different labels imputed on a single activity? Seer, seeing and seen are just a conventional view... they only appear as separate, independent existences due to ignorance but such a view does not tally with reality.

River is flowing doesn't mean there is an independent thing called "river" that is "flowing", it actually means river IS the flowing and apart from the flowing there is no river... just conventional labels applied to a single activity. Wind is blowing means wind IS the blowing and apart from blowing there is no other wind... seeing the scenery means seeing IS the seen/scenery and apart from that seen/scenery there is no other seeing (nor a separate seer), there is no other consciousness apart from the specific manifest experience - seen/heard/sensed/smelled/touched/cognized. Mere conventions applied to a single activity, appearing to co-locate with each other in an independent and separate manner due to a distorted view that causes us to misperceive reality in a fundamental way, just like mis-perceiving a rope as a snake. Once we see that there isn't anything that 'nouns' point to than pure action/activity, then the verb alone is sufficient - 'blowing', 'flowing', 'thinking', 'seeing' - which is none other than the seen, thought, etc. There is no 'you', 'seer', 'thinker' apart from seeing which is sight, hearing which is sound, etc.

When we directly contemplate, investigate and challenge our view of 'seer-seeing-seen' and see that in the seen is merely the seen - that seeing is simply the seen and seen is just the seeing without any seer apart, that there is no other consciousness apart from the 'mere seen/mere cognized', a permanent quantum shift of perception takes place. When this is directly realized in one's experience and not merely understood inferentially, any delusion of agency (doer, controller, feeler), subject-object/perceiver-perceived gaps, divisions are seen through, the gapless/undivided self-clarity of experience without an agent, center or boundaries simply shines vividly in its raw, direct, unfiltered purity, and just that is free and liberating in itself. Later comes this seeing - the mind, the body, the breathing, the environment, in seamless exertion!

V: "Yes... only verbs... This is a great pointer!!!! Wow!!! Thank you Soh! I will sit with that pointer! It is so powerful! It is blowing my "mind" ! How could there ever be a story only with verbs? Yes! Yes! That's it! A verb can't "build" a self. Thank you so much!!!!!"
Labels: Anatta |
i see that you are into zen buddhism. there are two links, in fact three, that you can read.. all are the explanations of anatman from zen masters, contemporary and old:

http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2008/10/sun-of-awareness-and-river-of.html - explanation of anatman by late zen master thich nhat hanh
http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2022/10/some-zen-masters-quotations-on-anatman.html - quotes by past zen masters on anatman
http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2011/10/a-zen-exploration-of-bahiya-sutta.html - explanation by still living zen teacher alex weithxabir Snoovatar

Mr Z:

I’m a bit confused because first you say it is not the labeling and defining (the perception and knowledge) that is the problem, but then you talk about the labeling of the wind is blowing vs wind and blowing being the same thing etc…

It strikes me as the same realization. River is a construct. Flowing is a construct. Everything is “only” my perception and knowledge based on my past, and not what is objectively real. Of course, human beings have only one small slice of possible experience and so we try to define it even though it’s not necessarily true.

This misconception and our inherent need to define includes the idea of a self, but the self isn’t necessarily there. In fact, if we didn’t experience the sensations of self the self wouldn’t be a thing. Before we were born there was no self. When we die, there is no self. I do understand this… is it not a correct view? Is it not the same as no self?
Before birth, after death, and even now- no real self

(I’m not trying to be difficult, just expressing the confusion)

Soh:

it is not the labeling that is the problem. it is the view that knower and knowing has a changeless and independent existence, independent of the river of experience/perception
you can label it knowing, awareness, clarity, no problem
it is mistaking it into an atman, an inherent existence that is an issue
this is why buddha did not teach atman, although we do not deny mindstream
the difference is this:
Ven. Hui-feng: “Venerable Hui-Feng nicely explains the difference between the view of "atman" and "mindstream" (as taught by Buddha):

In short:

"self" = "atman" / "pudgala" / "purisa" / etc.
--> permanent, blissful, autonomous entity, totally unaffected by any conditioned phenomena

"mind" = "citta" / "manas" / "vijnana" / etc.
--> stream of momentarily arising and ceasing states of consciousness, thus not an entity, each of which is conditioned by sense organ, sense object and preceding mental states

Neither are material.

That's a brief overview, lot's of things to nit pick at, but otherwise it'll require a 1000 page monograph to make everyone happy.

You'll need to study up on "dependent origination" (pratitya-samutpada) to get into any depth to answer your questions.”
" Before we were born there was no self. When we die, there is no self. "

there never was a self. even when we are alive. anatman is a dharma seal, it is what is always already the case, it is the nature of mind or consciousness
it is not a stage or a state of experiencexabir Snoovatar

as i explained in http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2021/07/anatta-is-dharma-seal-or-truth-that-is.html - partial excerpt

"
First I do not see Anatta as merely a freeing from personality sort of experience as you mentioned; I see it as that a self/agent, a doer, a thinker, a watcher, etc, cannot be found apart from the moment to moment flow of manifestation or as its commonly expressed as ‘the observer is the observed’; there is no self apart from arising and passing. A very important point here is that Anatta/No-Self is a Dharma Seal, it is the nature of Reality all the time -- and not merely as a state free from personality, ego or the ‘small self’ or a stage to attain. This means that it does not depend on the level of achievement of a practitioner to experience anatta but Reality has always been Anatta and what is important here is the intuitive insight into it as the nature, characteristic, of phenomenon (dharma seal).

To put further emphasis on the importance of this point, I would like to borrow from the Bahiya Sutta (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/ud/ud.1.10.irel.html) that ‘in the seeing, there is just the seen, no seer’, ‘in the hearing, there is just the heard, no hearer’ as an illustration. When a person says that I have gone beyond the experiences from ‘I hear sound’ to a stage of ‘becoming sound’, he is mistaken. When it is taken to be a stage, it is illusory. For in actual case, there is and always is only sound when hearing; never was there a hearer to begin with. Nothing attained for it is always so. This is the seal of no-self. Therefore to a non dualist, the practice is in understanding the illusionary views of the sense of self and the split. Before the awakening of prajna wisdom, there will always be an unknowing attempt to maintain a purest state of 'presence'. This purest presence is the 'how' of a dualistic mind -- its dualistic attempt to provide a solution due to its lack of clarity of the spontaneous nature of the unconditioned. It is critical to note here that both the doubts/confusions/searches and the solutions that are created for these doubts/confusions/searches actually derive from the same cause -- our karmic propensities of ever seeing things dualistically.

John Tan adds: "This is the seal of no-self and can be realized and experienced in all moments; not just a mere concept.""xabir Snoovatar

Mr Z:

If you as a teacher or another student have achieved this realization and I haven’t, isn’t that proof there is a you and a me? Or are you saying each of us has only awareness but we are separately able to perceive that? Either way there is two of us practicing, no?

Soh:
"If you as a teacher or another student have achieved this realization and I haven’t, isn’t that proof there is a you and a me? Or are you saying each of us has only awareness but we are separately able to perceive that? Either way there is two of us practicing, no?"

we do not deny conventional self, only inherently existing self. incidentally i just sent these excerpts to someone maybe half an hour ago:

“Would an arahant say "I" or "mine"?

Other devas had more sophisticated queries. One deva, for example, asked the Buddha if an arahant could use words that refer to a self:

"Consummate with taints destroyed,
One who bears his final body,
Would he still say 'I speak'?
And would he say 'They speak to me'?"

This deva realized that arahantship means the end of rebirth and suffering by uprooting mental defilements; he knew that arahants have no belief in any self or soul. But he was puzzled to hear monks reputed to be arahants continuing to use such self-referential expressions.

The Buddha replied that an arahant might say "I" always aware of the merely pragmatic value of common terms:

"Skillful, knowing the world's parlance,
He uses such terms as mere expressions."

The deva, trying to grasp the Buddha's meaning, asked whether an arahant would use such expressions because he is still prone to conceit. The Buddha made it clear that the arahant has no delusions about his true nature. He has uprooted all notions of self and removed all traces of pride and conceit:

"No knots exist for one with conceit cast off;
For him all knots of conceit are consumed.
When the wise one has transcended the conceived
He might still say 'I speak,'
And he might say 'They speak to me.'
Skillful, knowing the world's parlance,
He uses such terms as mere expressions." (KS I, 21-22; SN 1:25)” - https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/jootla/wheel414.html

The Buddha was seen to use personal pronouns much of the time, including right after his awakening, while proclaiming his unsurpassed awakening to a bypasser:
“…On the way not far from Gayâ the Buddha was met by Upaka, an ascetic who, struck by the serene appearance of the Master, inquired: "Who is your teacher? Whose teaching do you profess?"
The Buddha replied: "I have no teacher, one like me does not exist in all the world, for I am the Peerless Teacher, the Arahat. I alone am Supremely Enlightened. Quenching all defilements, Nibbâna’s calm have I attained. I go to the city of Kâsi (Benares) to set in motion the Wheel of Dhamma. In a world where blindness reigns, I shall beat the Deathless Drum."
"Friend, you then claim you are a universal victor," said Upaka. The Buddha replied: "Those who have attained the cessation of defilements, they are, indeed, victors like me. All evil have I vanquished. Hence I am a victor."
Upaka shook his head, remarking sarcastically, "It may be so, friend," and took a bypath…” - http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/buddhism/bud_lt13.htm
“Buddha never used the term "self" to refer to an unconditioned, permanent, ultimate entity. He also never asserted that there was no conventional "self," the subject of transactional discourse. So, it is very clear in the sutras that the Buddha negated an ultimate self and did not negate a conventional self.” – Dzogchen teacher Acarya Malcolm Smith, 2020

“Anatman is the negation of an unconditioned, permanent, ultimate entity that moves from one temporary body to another. It is not the negation of "Sam," "Fred," or "Jane" used as a conventional designation for a collection of aggregates. Since the Buddha clearly states in many Mahāyāna sūtras, "all phenomena" are not self, and since everything is included there, including buddhahood, therefore, there are no phenomena that can be called a self, and since there are nothing outside of all phenomena, a "self," other than an arbitrary designation, does not exist.”

- Dzogchen teacher Acarya Malcolm Smith

for example
'weather'
'self' is just like 'weather', 'weather' cannot be pinpointed to be a stable findable entity residing somewhere but is merely a label denoting or collating an aggregation of everchanging conditions, wind blowing, rain falling, sun shining, then snow, and so on and onxabir Snoovatar

likewise 'self' does not reference an unchanging independent or inherently existing entity residing somewhere but is merely a convention collating the five aggregates that dependently originates
excerpt from the AtR guide:

~ Weather metaphor

There is no weather actively creating, as an independent agent, the activities of clouds, rain, sun, wind, etc. Weather is a designation conceptually established upon a multiplicity of events/activities which are seamlessly interconnected, dynamic, and conditionally-arisen.

It is important to realize these metaphors directly, as the empty nature of Awareness/Mind in one’s direct experience and not remain as an intellectual concept or ideation.

2010, John Tan:

I did not tell you that pure aggregates is awareness, that is non-dual. When you understand anatta, you realize awareness is like weather, it is a label to denote this luminous yet empty arising, that is pure aggregates.

2013 conversation with John Tan:

John Tan: When you say "weather", does weather exist?

Soh Wei Yu: No. It's a convention imputed on a seamless activity. Existence and non existence don't apply.

John Tan: What is the basis where this label rely on?

Soh Wei Yu: Rain clouds wind etc

John Tan: Don't talk prasanga. Directly see. Rain too is a label. But in direct experience, there is no issue but when probed, you realized how one is confused about the reification from language. And from there life/death/creation/cessation arise. And whole lots of attachment. But it does not mean there is no basis...get it?

Soh Wei Yu: The basis is just the experience right?

John Tan: Yes which is plain and simple. When we say the weather is windy. Feel the wind, the blowing… But when we look at language and mistaken verb for nouns there are big issues. So before we talk about this and that. Understand what consciousness is and awareness is. Get it? When we say weather, feel the sunshine, the wind, the rain. You do not search for weather. Get it? Similarly, when we say awareness, look into scenery, sound, tactile sensations, scents and thoughts”.

(Note that this is still understanding emptiness from the perspective of firstfold emptiness, in secondfold emptiness there is nothing to ground conventions on - to be elaborated in the chapter on Stage 6).

“24 Jun `06, 1:37PM
Thusness
Cog
The weather as Pristine Awareness
Look! The formation of the cloud, the rain, the color of the sky, the thunder, all these entirety that is taking place, what is it? It is Pristine Awareness. Not identify with anything, not bounded within the body, free from defintion and experience what is it. It is the entire field of our pristine awareness taking place with its emptiness nature.
If we fall back to 'Self', we are enclosed within. First we must go beyond symbols and see behind the essence that takes place. Master this art until the factor of enlightenment arises and stablizes, the 'self' subsides and the ground reality without core is understood. 😊” – John Tan, 2006

the problem doesn't reside in using the word or label 'weather', we can use the word weather all we want, as long as we are not confused into thinking that weather refers to an inherently existing entity or substance residing somewhere
instead we see the dynamic, everchanging aggregates or conglomeration of various phenomena dependently originating
even to call it aggregates is merely conventional, the aggregates themselves are nowhere to be found

in anatman realization we apply this to 'self', 'awareness', 'perceiving', all these too are deconstructed like 'weather' but not in an intellectual way but as a direct experiential realization
eventually this realization is extended to all phenomena, such that all phenomena, physicality, externality, everything is also deconstructed.. not into nothingness. also vivid appearances-clarity is realized to be empty clarity, vividly present but not truly there or anywhere, like a reflection

like a rainbow, or a reflection of moon on water that merely dependently originates as vivid presence shimmering luminously but is empty and unfindablexabir Snoovatar

Mr Z:

Well
I’d like to approach this a little slower if you don’t mind
My question:
Does each person (Soh and Jon are two conventional people in this conversation here)
Does each person have their own consciousness?
Consciousness means what we two people are independently aware of
Or let’s say streams of experience. Do you Soh and me Jon each have a separate stream of mind?
You’re sharing that there is no one who is aware, no one who thinks, no one who has the experience?
Only awareness, only thought, right?
Or are we specifically saying “only the river” - only the stream of thoughts and nothing else
If so then I’m asking - does Soh and Jon have two separate rivers?

Soh:

Each mindstream is unique, empty of self/Self/agent/perceiver/watcher/doer/thinker/controller/agent.

In Advaita Vedanta, consciousness is cosmic and shared -- reality is one without a second, all multiplicities are an illusion. In Samkhya, each person's atman is unique purusa, pure consciousness, but not cosmic.

In truth, universal consciousness is a reification and extrapolation of consciousness after an experience of impersonality. See http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2018/12/the-tendency-to-extrapolate-universal.html for more details. In light of the anatman insight, we neither accept the view of Vedanta nor Samkhya.

In Buddhism, the insight into anatman and conditionality allows us to free ourselves from reification and realise that in seeing there's just the colors, no seer, in thinking just luminous thought, no thinker or watcher, but it does not extrapolate a nondual experience into a cosmic, shared "one without a second" sort of oneness or cosmic ontological essence. In light of anatman, consciousness is always manifestation inseparable from conditions, it is empty of an unchanging or inherently existing essence. Even within this very mindstream of 'yours', each moment of consciousness is unique and different from the next moment of consciousness/manifestation, a sight is different from a sound (consciousness can be classified according to sense doors conventionally, they are not 'one' as explained in http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2011/10/a-zen-exploration-of-bahiya-sutta.html), let alone this mindstream from that mindstream (each mindstreams are unique and not 'shared' or 'cosmic'), conventionally speaking (but ultimately no mindstreams have an essence and no minds are established ultimately). Everything is vivid pristine consciousness without subjectification and objectification, like Kalaka Sutta.

Awareness is also not reified into a knower... Basically like a friend Kyle Dixon wrote,

"'Self luminous' and 'self knowing' are concepts which are used to convey the absence of a subjective reference point which is mediating the manifestation of appearance. Instead of a subjective cognition or knower which is 'illuminating' objective appearances, it is realized that the sheer exertion of our cognition has always and only been the sheer exertion of appearance itself. Or rather that cognition and appearance are not valid as anything in themselves. Since both are merely fabricated qualities neither can be validated or found when sought. This is not a union of subject and object, but is the recognition that the subject and object never arose in the first place [advaya]. ", "The cognition is empty. That is what it means to recognize the nature of mind [sems nyid]. The clarity [cognition] of mind is recognized to be empty, which is sometimes parsed as the inseparability of clarity and emptiness, or nondual clarity and emptiness."

Lastly I will leave you with a quote by Dr Greg Goode, who wrote books on Advaita and Madhyamaka based on his insights,

http://www.awakeningtoreality.com/2014/08/greg-goode-on-advaitamadhyamika_9.html

Dr. Greg Goode wrote in Emptything:

It looks your Bahiya Sutta experience helped you see awareness in a different way, more .... empty. You had a background in a view that saw awareness as more inherent or essential or substantive?

I had an experience like this too. I was reading a sloka in Nagarjuna's treatise about the "prior entity," and I had been meditating on "emptiness is form" intensely for a year. These two threads came together in a big flash. In a flash, I grokked the emptiness of awareness as per Madhyamika. This realization is quite different from the Advaitic oneness-style realization. It carries one out to the "ten-thousand things" in a wonderful, light and free and kaleidoscopic, playful insubstantial clarity and immediacy. No veils, no holding back. No substance or essence anywhere, but love and directness and intimacy everywhere...

....

Soh:

so "awareness" is not one monolithic thing like brahman 'one without a second', but is always this very manifestation, this vivid colors, sight-consciousness, this very vividly luminous thought (without thinker or watcher), thought-consciousness, or sound-consciousness, or.... so on and so forth. inseparable from conditions, unique moment to moment