I started Zen practice when I was in high school -- in the early-mid '60s. The high school period was a really bad time for me. I won't go into details at this time, but I may at some point. Now that I have "let go" of it I can speak of it, but for now, no.
In fact "letting go" was part of my impetus for practicing Zen. And indeed, in my mid-twenties, a point came when I could do that. Almost all of the bad things that had practically consumed me, indeed, practically killed me, before that moment (and it was a moment) I "let go" went away as if they had never been, and through Zen practice one learns that those bad times had never been. The sense of liberation was profound. And that's when I gave up and let go of Zen practice as well.
It was available at any time, but I felt it wasn't necessary any more.
I went on a wholly different path, a pilgrimage of sorts, which ultimately led me to where I am now, circling back to my youthful Zen era.
The Enso is apropos, no?
The dharma talk I mentioned and criticized and reconsidered in the previous post was in part about pilgrimage and how in many cases the pilgrim is a "nobody" (consider the word) among "nobodies" on the way to something/nothing different, or not. We don't have to get into the details of "some/nothing." It's not really a contradiction, but some would see it that way. The dharma talk proposed that all of us are ultimately on pilgrimage, even if the pilgrim is only taking one step. That step itself can be or represent the whole of a pilgrim's passage.
In Zen practice, the pilgrimage is an important activity, and many Zen practitioners, sensei and roshi go on pilgrimages to Japan, to India, to Tibet, and some now to China (other places too, but those are mentioned frequently) to, I suppose, inhale the same air as the Buddha, trod the same paths as Bodhidharma, explore the same hills and woods as Dogen and thereby... wait, what's the point of it?
Hate to say it, but there is no point. One goes on pilgrimage... because one goes on pilgrimage. The choice of where to be a pilgrim -- if there is a choice -- is almost always a product of desire. And desire, as the Buddha discovered, is the source of suffering.
Letting go of desire relieves suffering and... can lead to enlightenment.
Yet in my mid-twenties I began a life-pilgrimage not driven by desire, at least not desire I was conscious of, that was often a wild ride, yet was always instructional. Every step -- well, nearly -- a learning experience.
Much of it was risky as if on a mountain precipice. Teetering so close to the edge, then somehow falling back toward if not exactly to safety, then teetering again. And again and again.
The nature of a life's pilgrimage can be that of risk, but it isn't always. A single step, for example, can embody an entire pilgrimage, and that step may or may not embody risk. The individual experience is what it is. We don't know and can't say in advance what it will be. Afterwards, we won't necessarily know what it was. In some Zen traditions, we never know and can never know. It never begins, it never ends.
But I don't much want to get into that right now. There will be a time for koans and contradictions. But not right now.
Instead, for the moment I want to focus on the "Y" of Zen -- the "why." Note: "I want to..." is an expression of desire, and I accept that for the moment.
And because it's Halloween and the little ones are swarming at the door, I'll have to put off that "why" for a little while longer.
Zen Buddhism has often been referred to as a form of psychotherapy rather than a religion, and its practice is seen as a form of self-discovery and repair rather than idle ritual.
Zen practice can be alarmingly difficult, even brutal, particularly in sesshin, but typically it's not. Most people who practice Zen are not destined to become monks or nuns, nor will they become sensei orroshi (teachers or wise leaders). That is neither their purpose nor ambition in practicing Zazen. The goal, if there is a goal, for most Zen practitioners is an inner peace which may -- or may not -- be or lead to satori, sudden enlightenment.
I found in practicing Zazen many years ago that the presence of any desire inhibited practice. One cannot desire enlightenment, for example, or desire to count one's breaths, or desire to clear one's mind. These supposed benefits or objectives of Zen practice cannot be desired while in sitting meditation or the whole point of the meditation is lost. In fact, it quickly becomes apparent that meditation itself is impossible in the context of desire.
This is a conundrum and paradox in the Buddhism, one that the Buddha himself wrestled with constantly -- until he didn't. Desire itself, he learned, was the cause of suffering. Lose desire and you lose suffering. But how do you do that?
Luckily we have guides including the Buddha. In Zen many additional threads are woven together. In other words, we learn to practice not just from the Buddha but from a long lineage of disciples, devotees, teachers and masters, each of whom provides a distinct and ultimately necessary insight into the practice we call Zen today.
Why Zen then and not some other Buddhist school or practice? There are quite a few different versions of Buddhism after all. Zen is often considered the severest and most difficult. Oddly, or perhaps not, I didn't find it so at all.
In fact, it seemed remarkably easy.
That's not to say there wasn't inner struggle. Of course there was and still is. Sitting meditation (Zazen) itself, however, is not really hard to do. It's hard or impossible for me now to assume the correct posture sitting on the floor on a thin cushion. Nope, no can do. But it's not necessary. Sitting, yes, but not necessarily on the floor in the lotus or semi-lotus position. No, any position that is not too comfortable for you (so you don't go to sleep!) in a chair or sofa or bench or what have you is fine. The proper Zen meditation position (which I won't elaborate here, but which is quite detailed and complex, at least at first) is a necessity only for monks and nuns in training, and even then, exceptions can sometimes be made. The notion that every Zen practitioner must adhere to the proper form of sitting is laughable.
One sits as one will.
One sits though, and one allots a length of time, usually half an hour, for quiet meditation as one sits. Typically, the meditation period is announced with a bell or other signaling device at the beginning and end of the period. Years ago, we kept a small brass bell for the purpose, but now we use a Tibetan "singing bowl" -- from Nepal, of course. Anything can be used though, anything that makes a distinct sound when struck, preferably one that holds a tone for a time.
One sits, eyes closed, head down; one focuses on one's breathing and counts one's breaths. That, almost entirely, is it. One does that for half an hour and at some point during the meditation, without really noticing it, one stops counting, one stops noticing one's breathing, one is liberated from thought, concept, presence, and perhaps only momentarily one stops being "one."
Of course when you're doing this at distance, not in company with a sangha or in close communication with a roshi or sensei one doesn't really know whether what one has experienced in sitting meditation is this or that. And in the early-mid '60s, while there were a number of Zen communities in California, they were not directly accessible to me, so I had to do a remote and individualized practice which at the time seemed perfectly acceptable. I started on my own using a thin book as a guide, and then corresponded with a Zen teacher affiliated with the San Francisco Zen Center who encouraged my individual practice and didn't seem at all put off that I was doing it on my own. Many people did.
I'm not sure whether I still have the guide book (I suspect not, but with thousands of books accumulated over the years and no card catalog to sort them, who knows?) but at some point, it seemed unnecessary, even superfluous to my practice. Once you get into a sort of meditation groove as it were, guidance becomes more and more problematic.
That's because one's path in meditation is one's own. There are no universal absolutes. Satori is what it is, but it isn't necessarily the same for each individual. The Buddha seemed to understand that. My own Zen teacher certainly understood it. And when I reached a point we no longer needed to correspond, I honestly didn't know whether I had reached satori or not. And here's the thing: It doesn't matter. Because one still chops wood and carries water before as well as after enlightenment.
I thought of attending a dharma talk at a Zen center in Santa Fe a couple of weeks ago. The topic was interesting: The freedom to be Nobody. Turns out I didn't go. It's an hour-twenty to get there, maybe more giving allowance for traffic and possibly getting lost, and I ran out of time. But that's an excuse, as I could have arranged my time more carefully that day than I did, and I could have made it before the start of the talk.
I was put off, however, by some of the non-welcoming attitude, shall we say, of the Center's operation as reflected by its website. Certainly a serious Zen community will have rules, but in this case, it seemed obsessive to the point of absurdity. The dharma talks supposedly welcome anyone who wishes to attend, oh but...
One must arrive by a particular time, one must park in a particular place, one must dress in a particular way, one must observe particular rituals and practices that one might not be familiar with at all, one must engage in zazen as well as kinhin, one is expected to give danato the speaker... wait, this is crazy. This is not a welcome to anyone who wishes to attend. This is a barricade against that very thing. Deliberately so. It's clear enough to me that this particular Zen Center desires most of all to keep people in general out, and wishes to welcome only a select class of participants and only on very strict terms.
If you don't follow the rules pretty much exactly, you are not welcome.
No, I'd put it more generally: you, a "nobody", are not welcome there at all.
Ironic given the topic of the talk.
A few days later, I listened to the talk on podcast, and I was not sorry I missed it. Well, there are many points at which Zen by its nature is a contradiction. The contradictions and occasional absurdities are part of the practice, and the whys are interesting, but I won't get into them here.
In the case of this talk, which I intend to listen to again, the speaker was not prepared, ran off on several tangents that weren't necessarily interesting in themselves, and ultimately he indulged his own personal desires (yes!) because he didn't know what else to say.
In fact, I'm listening to the talk again now because I suspect I must have gotten it wrong. We'll see.
...
RECONSIDERATION: All right. My first impression of this dharma talk was wrong. I have listened to it again, and for all its faults, the talk is actually on point, coherent and.. helpful. As a Bodhisattva, the speaker is illuminating the Diamond Sutra with many different lamps in many colors. As a "nobody" on pilgrimage, you may not be welcome everywhere or anywhere, but what's to worry?
I listened before with one ear closed, and I missed much of the talk through distractions, of which there were (are) many. I listened with both ears today, and found a far more complete.talk. Letting go is a perpetual issue. It may have been simplistic and based in desire, but it was fuller than my initial impressions, and it was not because he didn't know what else to say or because he wasn't prepared.
I may have more to say about pilgrimage and letting go in due time. Which also has to do with my continued reluctance to join a sangha.
Minimalism is a Thing thanks in part to TeeVee celebs like Marie Kondo and others, as well as the roller coaster ride of the ever more expensive and luxurious tiny house movement. The message is that we don't need all the stuff we accumulate, and we don't need big houses to live well, especially after we've disposed of the bulk of our accumulations.
Simple (albeit possibly elegant) living is a good thing in and of itself.
Zen Buddhism is often cited as one of the main source-points of modern simple living ideals and minimalism.
It's not the only one, but it is an important one, especially to people on the US west coast who were influenced by Japanese immigrants in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Japanese domestic architecture, itself influenced by and influencing Zen Buddhism, first came into prominence in the West in the 1880s as the island nation was being extensively explored and remarked upon by observers from the United States, England and Germany.
Japan was for them a revelation. Its contrast with Europe and the United States was widely admired though often discounted because of the general racism of the era. The Japanese and their domestic architecture might have some admirable qualities but they could not match the extraordinary accomplishments of civilized nations.
Could they?
In some ways Japanese domestic accommodations exceeded Western ones -- particularly in honesty, simplicity, cleanliness, artistic effect, and comfort, so long as you were accustomed to it. In fact, Western observers were often distinctly uncomfortable in Japanese domestic accommodations, as there was essentially nothing in them with which the Westerner was familiar. There were no chairs or beds or rugs or window hangings. There were no doors or windows as a Westerner would recognize them. There was no paint or paper on the walls, and in fact there were few walls at all. There were no glittering and glaring light fixtures, no bric-a-brac, no high plastered ceilings, no effort at all to imitate the style, look or finish of any previous era or location.
And yet once the Western observer was able to let go of his expectations of domestic accommodations and accustom himself to the Japanese ways, he found himself astonished and entranced. Disbelieving and yet delighted.
For all the absence of things in Japanese domestic accommodation, the result was liberating. The revelation of this liberation was to be immensely influential as it still is today.
Minimalism had long been practiced as a kind of rule in the West -- think monasteries and such-- but in Japan it found a style.
Zen Buddhism was at the root -- and yet Japanese domestic architecture could be said to be at the root of Zazen: sitting meditation. The Empty Center.
The fact that Western observers remarked upon most often was that Japanese houses were almost completely empty -- or at least appeared to be in contrast to the superabundance of stuff that filled and overfilled typical Western houses in the Victorian era.
Another phase of Western minimalist living was about to be born.
Minimalism in the West had always been associated with religious and monastic life. So it would be with minimalism derived from Japanese domestic living, a lifestyle at least in part derived from Zen Buddhism, but also helping to influence the practice of Zen.
The only thing is, Zen is not a religion, it's more of a practice.
One sits.
One counts ones breaths.
One empties ones mind.
Anyone can do it almost anywhere at almost any time.
One sits, meditates and then goes about his or her day.
That day may include any number of different activities, all of which/none of which have the potential to lead to satori. Enlightenment. Sudden, unanticipated.
But then, maybe not.
The minimalism of Zen Buddhism can be an aid to satori. But then, anything can. Or nothing.
I started Zen practice in high school, sometime between 1964 and 1966. I had become intrigued with traditional Japanese architecture, as so many Westerners are, in part because the house I lived in at the time had a few Japanese style details.
My interest was sparked, though, by a large format book -- not quite coffee table size -- that I either bought or checked out of the library (probably the latter) that covered traditional Japanese domestic architecture with numerous extraordinary black and white photos, floor plans, and scholarly text that I found fascinating. I believe one of the authors was Japanese; indeed, the entire book may have been a Japanese production. I believe the title was "The Japanese House and Garden" (*) published in 1962. But my memory is so full of holes and blank spaces these days, don't take my word for it.
Thanks to the inspiration of that book, I must have designed and drawn dozens of houses in the Japanese style. I think I still have one or two of them in a portfolio out in the studio.
The text made numerous references to Zen Buddhism as part of the motivation for the style of many Japanese houses as well as the often hyper-minimalism of their interiors and gardens. I was constantly amazed at how empty seeming these houses and gardens were -- especially in comparison to typical Western style -- and yet how abundant all this emptiness seemed. There seemed to be so much space, even in tiny 4.5 mat rooms, or 3 X 7 meter gardens. Construction details were fascinating, particularly the construction of houses and tea-houses that utilized no nails or other metal fastenings.
The constant reminders of "abundant emptiness" led me eventually to start studying Zen with a detour or two through Jack Kerouac's ramblings on the road and as a dharma bum. I found a master I could correspond with as there were no Zen centers near where I was, and I began to sit in meditation, counting my breaths and clearing my mind. I was no more than 17 years old. I ceased practice in my mid twenties. I was never really good at it, to hyper and ADD most of the time, but the elements of Zen practice never really leave you once you've taken them in. You just don't do it all the time.
I spent the next 40 years or so doing something else.
That led me down a variety of different paths and all over the country, learning and teaching all the way. One of the things people noticed about me was how calm I could be under stress. Yes, well... that's part of what "letting go of attachment" means. It doesn't mean you don't care. It does mean you're not attached to a particular state or set of circumstances or people or things. You're just there in
the moment.
What I call "O"- Zen is in part that absence of attachment. It's also "abundant emptiness." The "empty circle" -- Enso -- which symbolizes the center: some/no thing.
Enlightenment. Not that that was a state I ever achieved 😃🕉
So here we are, many decades down the road, and slowly, slowly, I'm returning to the practice, but so far only intermittently and only in part. First, I'm unable to sit in proper Zen posture. There are plenty of things I'm physically unable to do anymore, and that's all right. I'd usually been doing too much anyway. Or trying to. But being unable to assume the correct Zen sitting posture, and being unable to rise from that posture if somehow I was able to do it is difficult to accept. I'm not 17 anymore!
I take a shit-ton of powerful medications to control my condition -- so far, doing good -- but there are noticeable side effects, one of which is apparently memory loss and brain farts. I brought it up with my rheumatologist earlier this month. He was... concerned, especially when he witnessed one of the problems I had remembering and saying the name of another specialist I see from time to time. I just couldn't get it out. It wasn't coming into my conscious mind, and so I couldn't say it, though only moments before we were speaking about her as if she were in the room.
Well, that's an example of how holey my memory has become, especially regarding short term matters, so there may come further tests and medications. We shall see.
And then, "O"- Zen. 😃🕉
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(*) NOTE: I did some research, and by golly, that is the title of the book that pointed me to the dharma path. Surprisingly, it was first published in Germany in 1935, during Hitler-time, and I vaguely remember its German origins. Its original publication in the US was in 1955, but the edition I was so taken with was from 1962 or 63. I haven't found any reference to a 1962 edition but I have seen references to 1963 and 1969 editions. I have not found any illustrations from the book on line, but I remember the photographs, plans and drawings as remarkable, some even breathtaking. They live in what's left of my mind to this day. The link in the post is to Questia's online excerpts, text only, but quite a bit of it is included in the Table of Contents on the right of the linked page.
I'm wondering how it was received in Nazi Germany. I know I was astonished by it.
FURTHER NOTE: I just ordered a copy of the 1955 edition, but the outfit selling it I think is in a portion of California currently under power blackout thanks to PG& E. We'll see whether it arrives...
As we know, China is the rising super-power while the US continues to falter and decline. The Chinese have created a nigh-on miraculous transformation of their society in a very short time, and this isn't the first time they've done it. The whole Mao-ist revolutionary period was one enormous transformation after another, almost unprecedented in world history. The current rise of China would be unbelievable if we didn't have the prior examples of Chinese transformations to consider.
Part of that transformative process has involved Tibet, a supposedly autonomous province of China that has been subjected to repeated waves of "reform" by the Chinese under Mao and every subsequent central government with the stated objective of getting rid of Tibetan barbarism, backwardism, and worse, while bringing the benefits of modern civilization to uplift the Tibetan masses and guide them into the 21st Century -- while preserving as much as possible of Tibet's unique and ancient culture.
That has meant in practice overthrowing rule by the lamas, exiling the Dalai Lama, disrupting and partially destroying the lamasery system, freeing the Tibetan peasantry from what had amounted to serfdom and in some cases outright slavery, bringing codified law, plumbing, drainage, electricity, roads and railroads, universal education and so on to the masses, instituting public health practices and much more in what is objectively a colonial/imperial project, driven from Beijing, to integrate Tibet into the Greater Chinese Domestic Empire.
In the West there is a highly romanticized notion of what Tibet was like prior to the Chinese revolution. We are ledto believe it was some sort of primitive paradise under the lamas, happy people spinning prayer wheels all the live long day while the Dalai Lama and his lines of Buddhist monks and nuns preserved, protected and defended ancient peaceful Buddhist practice from the Potala in Lhasa to the hundreds of lamaseries throughout the country.
Truly, that romantic version of Tibetan Shangri-la is... off the mark by quite a bit.
The Chinese knew how phony it was, but so did numerous Western travelers and observers -- prior to the Revolution, that is. Tibet as it was, and as many observers testified, was demon-haunted, riven with violence and intense poverty and disease, grossly and deliberately kept backward by the lamas, and despite the constant spinning of prayer wheels, was a society that was too often behaving the opposite of Buddhist practice.
Chinese intervention was not welcomed, not by a long shot, but resistance was futile, as is so often the case with colonial/imperial projects launched from powerful centers. There was-- and still is -- resistance though, and China has not been able to fully transform Tibet into a glittery simulacrum of what so many people seem to believe it once was. It's an uncomfortable hybrid of Chinese driven "progress" and oppression together with surprisingly strong remnants of its former lama-driven but essentially cruel feudal past.
This is the Chinese propaganda version of the Tibetan transformation since the Revolution:
Nice, right? Well, it's not quite like that. The gloss is not quite so shiny, and the benefits of living under strict Chinese colonial control are less than ideal for many Tibetans who face severe restrictions on their freedoms of belief and action and punishment for disobedience and resistance.
This is the Dalai Lama's propaganda version of Tibet Today and Yesterday:
Horrible, right? Well, it's not quite like that.
A different take:
Like most colonial projects, Tibet since the Chinese take over has been a mixed bag. There has been immense material progress while suppressing the lamaseries. There has been resistance and acquiescence. The Chinese have sought to sanitize and monetize the Buddhist, lama-dominated Tibetan culture while exploiting the land and people for the benefit of China. All of which is typical of colonial projects undertaken in the West over the past centuries.
In addition, Han Chinese have emigrated to and settled in Tibet in numbers sufficient to make them the majority of the population. It's not clear to me whether they are unwelcome, any more than it was obvious that the British were unwelcome in all of their various colonies during the Imperial period.
Colonization is a mixed bag.
This is something I sometimes get into with regard to my Irish ancestry. Ireland was for 800 years a colonial possession of Britain, and for much of that time, the British behaved badly to say the least. Eventually, the Irish achieved a rough form of autonomy and then independence from Britain -- except for those in Northern Ireland who are still to this day subject to the Crown.
The Irish Republic, however, is almost as proud of its British heritage and legacy as the home country is.
You would think that once Ireland achieved independence, the Irish would reject pretty much everything the British imposed on them, and they haven't. Not even close. Same with India, Ceylon, Burma, Singapore, etc., etc. The United States, among so many other former colonies, treasures its British colonial past.
And so it goes. From the outside, it looks like that's the course Tibet is on as well. Ultimately, China's colonial impositions will be put in an overall positive context while acknowledging the bad things that happened.
Under the lamas, Tibet was a cruel and brutal feudal and demon-haunted place, not at all like the Shangri-la paradise of lore and legend or as hinted by mostly Western "Free Tibet" activists. The lamaseries had so many thousands of monks and nuns in part because they were places of refuge ("I take refuge in the Buddha; I take refuge in the Dharma; I take refuge in the Sangha.") from a truly awful outside reality, full of suffering and woe. The Chinese disbanded and destroyed many of the lamaseries -- and preserved others -- while transforming the domestic society into something more closely resembling the modern material societies in China and elsewhere.
Is this a good thing? Not entirely, and not necessarily in any case, but given their druthers -- which is unlikely -- I doubt that most Tibetans would want to go back to the way things were before the Chinese took over.
They, like most colonized people, like much of the material benefit that comes with colonization. They like running water, decent housing, electricity, paved roads, automobiles, and electronics. They like education and opportunity where once there was none outside the lamaseries. The elements of progress make their lives easier and potentially more rewarding. They like the end of arbitrary rule by cruel landlords. lamas and village chiefs. They don't like the oppression and suppression that seems to be built in to the Chinese psyche. They don't like having their faith and beliefs challenged by modernity and materialism, even if they like the benefits. They don't like their traditional ways of life being replaced by... what? Colonialism always leaves the question open.
I ponder the question of Tibet these days because of my slow-walking return to Buddhism after so many years in another realm of existence altogether. Tibet is a primary Buddhist center, both for philosophy and practice, and the Dalai Lama is the principal Buddhist spokesman in the world today, widely revered even by non-Buddhists.
It's gobsmacking how the bullies and toadies of the Trump regime are constantly able to pull victory from the jaws of defeat -- no matter what.
Even if the Impeachment Circus manages to culminate in Trump's removal -- I doubt it will -- the legacy of chaos, corruption, lies, fantasies, fabrications, and bullying will remain, not to be easily undone, perhaps forever more.
Some observers like to say that whatever is happening, whatever the regime is doing, whatever Trump is saying, and however much is disrupted, it's all "wonderfully clarifying," as if we wouldn't have known how rotten and diseased our politics and ruling paradigms are otherwise. Bollocks. Utter bollocks. We knew, we've known, I've been writing about it here since 2007 and before that in many other venues almost since the Internet began in earnest.
We knew. We know. "Clarification" is not the necessary element at this point. What's needed is action, profound and serious, to correct course, and I simply don't see that anywhere in the political firmament or in the increasingly captive realm of influencers and commentariats. It's almost all ruled by bullies and their toadies. No one else has a voice. And there is no goodness at or near the top anywhere.
Certainly there are no saviours. Not in today's politics, nor in academe, nor in any of the various sectors that rule us. Trump and his regime may represent the worst of it, though I'm certain there are worse examples we could dredge up from the depths of the muck, but taking them out of the picture, it's still really dreadful. As it has been for many a long year.
Yet we carry on because we must. It's instinctive.
Goodness may not be on the horizon no matter how hard we yearn for it, yet there are always escape hatches and alternatives.And they'll be turned to more and more as things deteriorate for the masses.
A key to understanding the situation is the realization that We, the Rabble are expendable. That's key to recognizing how bullies and their toadies are able to rule no matter how bad or incompetent or worthless they are. None of us, the Rabble, are necessary to their way of looking at things, and the only reason we're here at all is because they let us live. Period.
Some of us may have some utility some of the time, but none of us are necessary.
That is supposed to lead us to being grateful. If we're not, there are always things that can be done to make us feel appropriate gratitude or to relieve us of our mortal coil. It's just that simple at bottom.
Whoever/whatever replaces the Trump regime may or may not be qualitatively better, may behave less outrageously, may show some signs of competence and compassion, but at bottom will still believe what the Trump regime believes about the rest of us, and will still act on that belief one way or another -- though perhaps with more caution than the Trumpies have.
We will not elect a Good Emperor after this shitshow.
No, a dismal precedent has been set in concrete. Elections may continue indefinitely -- they did in Ancient Rome, after all -- but their meaninglessness will be made clear as well. The Emperor will be chosen, by whom is not entirely clear, but it won't be by the People. Neither will it be by a monolithic Ruling Class. That class is riven with factionalism, fractured and in disarray. The young-ish "disrupters" of Silicon Valley are jockeying for ultimate power, and so far, the Ruling Class resistance to them is more stylistical than substantive. As long as the disrupters are able to keep the masses from coalescing, so be it. Otherwise, though, no.
So Zuckerberg may be a strange, alienish, robotic something or other, and Bezos is a bizarre offshoot of the human race, and so many of the other would-be High and Mighty tech tycoons likewise, they are useful enough that they're kept around by the faltering and factional Ruling Class. They may one day emerge as the successors to today's Ruling Class, but they will be no better. Arguably, they will represent the continued devolution of the Class.
And they are no less devoted to bullying and toadying. It is how they've achieved what they have, and how they fully intend to expand and maintain it.
To the extent they are able to exploit the rest of us they will do so. Otherwise, enh.
What to do?
Tolstoy wrote a book (173pg pdf) that seems almost as pertinent today as it was 130 years ago.
I may have more on this topic shortly, but for now...
This is our Buddha shrine. There's more to it, but you get an idea. It combines some of the aspects of the Buddha stories including the elephant, horse, other animals and plants, followers, centered meditation, and so on. It's not a place of worship, it's a place of reminder. As are a number of other shrines in the house, some focused on Native elements, some on St. Francis, some of them unfocused, such as the one in the bedroom that includes several carved birds, a dinosaur model, a tiny black and white cat, and cornmeal offering. Not to forget the skull images from Dia de los Muertos. Of course.
This is New Mexico where a polyglot amalgam of faiths is relatively commonplace. Honoring tradition is a basic cultural element in these parts, and tradition plays a huge part in faith communities. What was done hundreds of years ago is for the most part the same cycles and rituals done today.
I don't know the history of Buddhism in New Mexico, but there is a strong and growing community of practicing Buddhists and a diverse community of laypeople professing some aspect of Buddhist practice. I wouldn't call it "belief" because there isn't anything in particular to believe in Buddhism. One practices. One sits, one meditates for varying lengths of time, one goes about one's day. One studies the sutras or not, one questions, one takes action to be kind, compassionate, joyful, and "detached." One is not what one does or says or thinks or believes. All of that is illusion.
Even the concept that one is is an illusion. But this path of thought cannot lead to Enlightenment. It is more like an eternally turning wheel, not the Dharma Wheel, but not not it, either. Letting go of the concept of Is-ness is itself an element of Buddhist practice, but even perfect letting go is not sufficient in itself to achieve Enlightenment or Buddha-hood. Not that that is necessarily desirable in and of itself. It is simply something that may happen -- or not.
I've had the Diamond Sutra on speed dial lately. It never struck me as particularly profound, and I'm not sure it's meant to be. It's more in the nature of a reminder of how transitory our corporeal existence/experience is, and how false in some ways (all ways, no ways) it is. We live in illusion, creating that illusion as we live.
A talk on the meaning/not meaning of the Diamond Sutra is appended herewith:
