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Zen saying: "Before enlightenment chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment chop wood, carry water". Some more from Ram Dass: “Just because you are seeing d

by Liquix 6y ago

Zen saying: "Before enlightenment chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment chop wood, carry water". Some more from Ram Dass: “Just because you are seeing divine light, experiencing waves of bliss, or conversing with Gods and Goddesses is no reason to not know your zip code.” "If you see yourself as God and then you come back from this state and somebody says, "Hey, Sam, empty the garbage!" it catches you back into the model of "I'm Sam who empties the garbage." You can't maintain these new kinds of structures. It takes a while to realize that God can empty garbage." What I get from it is that if you are considering starting a cult, creating your own government, going to war, or how to integrate your newfound knowledge into the bureaucracy of the world, you're not quite out of the woods yet.

_def 6y ago
Those are very inspiring quotes, thank you.
raxxorrax 6y ago
Depends if you start the cult for personal enrichment or not.
- HenryBemis 6y ago
  I know the guy who wrote the book: "How to Start Your Own Religion: Form a Church, Gain Followers, Become Tax-Exempt, and Sway the Minds of Millions in Five Easy Steps" Cool guy and a very fun read! https://www.amazon.com/How-Start-Your-Own-Religion/dp/1440538581 https://www.amazon.com/How-Start-Your-Own-Religion/dp/144053...
jchook 6y ago
"When you meet the Buddha, kill him!"
MaxBarraclough 6y ago
Your first quote reminded me of this from Bruce Lee: > Before I learned the art, a punch was just a punch, and a kick, just a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick, no longer a kick. Now that I understand the art, a punch is just a punch and a kick is just a kick.
- Liquix 6y ago
  Thanks for the quote, Bruce is a really admirable guy. May have been paying homage to another old Zen saying: “Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after a first glimpse into the truth of Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and waters are no longer waters; after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.” ― Dōgen
  - romseb 6y ago
    That is beautiful, thank you for sharing.
  - waterhouse 6y ago
    A hobby of mine is taking sayings like that and saying, "Well, if it weren't mumbo-jumbo, then what might it mean?" In this case, it would seem to be: At the start, you have a bunch of knowledge, concepts built on other concepts; studying Zen involves breaking all of that down and reforming it from scratch; at the end of the process, you have a new bunch of knowledge and concepts built on concepts, and you have similar labels for the concepts of material objects like mountains and waters, but it's possible that (e.g.) the lower-level concepts they're built on are different. Physics is kind of like that as one develops successively better models of molecules, atoms, and particles, replacing the bottom-level concepts each time. Though the stuff on top of them doesn't change a huge amount every time.
    - miek 6y ago
      Wow, that is impressive. I would love to read more of these translations if you ever post them somewhere!
      - waterhouse 6y ago
        Really? I'm flattered! To me it's just a simple description of what I'm guessing something might be supposed to refer to, but if it's sufficiently non-obvious to others... Well, I haven't kept a list, but here's another that comes to mind. Someone's signature was "How do you prepare for death? Learn to live. How do you learn to live? Prepare for death." On the face of it, this is a trollish non-answer. However, there is a way to interpret it. The first sentence is straightforward: Death is going to happen, how do I prepare for it? The second sentence is saying: You can't stop it, so the best you can do is figure out what to do with the life that you have. The third sentence is also straightforward: How do I figure out what to do with my life? The fourth sentence is saying: Imagine you're going to die, figure out your obligations that you'd want to fulfill before you die, fulfill them now, and then you will have freedom to focus on exploring what you really want to do. The phrases "prepare for death" and "learn to live" are each used twice, with different intended meanings each time. There is always the possibility of getting a quote that is actually nonsense and was meant as nonsense (or, today, was generated by a computer), and "interpreting" wisdom into it that comes from the interpreter rather than from the quote. Or there could be multiple, similarly wise-seeming interpretations. For example, I could have interpreted the fourth sentence instead as: Imagine you're going to die; then, from that perspective, observe which things seem important and which no longer seem so important; thus, the thought-exercise of imagining you'll die is an exercise that teaches you how to live. It's possible that cryptic sayings were devised to hold wisdom. It's also possible that they were devised by trolls surrounded by gullible admirers. Perhaps there were wise people who, as an apparently necessary evil, made themselves look cryptically impressive so as to attract funding from gullible rulers, or to keep their ideas from being misused by outsiders who might have bad intent. Perhaps there was a mixture of trolls and well-intentioned wise people. I really don't know. I am generally a fan of straightforward textbook explanations that don't play word games, or, if they do, they have straightforward explanations of the word games. Still, it is possible that there's something to the cryptic stuff. And so it can be a fun game to try to get meaning from them.
dr_dshiv 6y ago
It seems to easy to reach enlightenment when you are living in a monastery with a bunch of dudes and no responsibilities but to "chop wood, carry water." But an enlightenment philosophy that can help a father of 3 with a hard marriage and a fulltime job or two...? Hmm, maybe the enlightment philosophy project will take a few thousand more years...
- seisvelas 6y ago
  The Vimalakirti Sutra is about exactly this. Vimalakirti is a laymen householder who achieves enlightnment. Upon his passing, Buddha sends a bunch of spiritual masters and bodhisattva's to Vimalakirti's deathbed. Vimalakirti proceeds to chastise them for how useless their 'enlightenment' is when it doesn't help anyone in the real world, and is only a self centered quest to save one's ego from suffering. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimalakirti_Sutra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimalakirti_Sutra
  - alfiedotwtf 6y ago
    Within all these comments, to me this was the most enlightened.
  - Balgair 6y ago
    The Bhagavad Gita is similar to the OP's issues. It deals with the conflicts we all face in life and how to resolve our wants with our duties. It's not a very long read, actually. Note: Find a translation that works for you. Specifically, the word 'duty' meant something very different than it does today. I recommend : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1586380192/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1586380192&linkCode=as2&tag=stucosuccess&linkId=FSXA3GZUT5SFDAZ4 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1586380192/ref=as_li_tl?ie... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita EDIT: For a more western take, I'd also recommend the Bible's knowledge books: Ecclesiastics, Proverbs, and Job. Again, a good translation is essential here, but I'm not about to recommend that.
- disprofuse 6y ago
  You should listen to the lecture “Stop trying to improve yourself.” https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fqqE1BLvISI# https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fqqE1BLvISI#
kordlessagain 6y ago
Krishnamurti was thrust into it and still managed to escape!
- krackers 6y ago
  Jiddu or UG Krishnamurti?
  - swatkat 6y ago
    I guess they meant Jiddu. But, that statement works for both.
adamsea 6y ago
Yes! : ). I came here to remind everyone about chopping water and carrying wood as well ; ). I'd add that, imho, the aphorism means, enlightenment isn't an answer to the struggles of your material existence, or even your own unhappiness, from whatever source. Enlightenment is just enlightenment, it's not a magic happy pill which makes you no longer a flawed human being.
Regenschirm 6y ago
Sounds exactly like my lsd experience. At the lsd height, i was everyone and the world only progressed through me. I also knew that i wanted to keep this enlightend state and thought about mechanism to bring me back into my 'normal' form. I thought up religion to only discover that it did not work, i came to the idea of creating an idol something like lsd. Something which will give me access back to this state and will be discovered and easily to be distributed. After that, i was normal again. Continuing my life.
- bergstromm466 6y ago
  > At the lsd height, i was everyone and the world only progressed through me. Have you heard of Open Individualism, or read the short story 'The Egg'?
  - Regenschirm 6y ago
    I read 'The Egg' but i haven't heard of Open Individualism, tx :)
zzzeek 6y ago
yup, basically if this is you: > But a question nags at you: why can’t the world already know what you know? They’d be so much better off. So much happier. we can't define "enlightenment" but we can probably name endless things that would not be a central feature of enlightenment. That above would be pretty high on the list.
pontifier 6y ago
I have felt a great sense of enlightened several times in the past. It's most similar to the feeling of flow while programming... When you're juggling all the pieces of a big question and somehow they all slot into place. Everything just makes sense, but it's easily disrupted. It's impossible for me to maintain for long, but I do my best to collect takeaways while I can. Mostly what comes back with me are cheesy phrases like "just do your best" or "everything will be ok". Occasionally I come back with some type of specific insights about how to approach a problem that has been causing me problems or newfound motivation to persevere. Occasionally I think about starting a cult afterward, but I really just want to collect kind, intelligent and motivated people around me. Would that really be so bad?
- unkulunkulu 6y ago
  I have had a couple of moments in life when a lot of pieces fall in place and perspective changes. A friend of mine found a nice metaphor for this: a supercooled water, the mind looking for an answer or a solution to a problem and then something happens and the crystallization starts and now everything is suddenly ice. Definitely great moments leaving strong emotional impact and sense of joy and happiness.
gregfjohnson 6y ago
Related: "Beginning programmers write simple code. Intermediate programmers write complicated code. Masterful programmers write simple code." In the context of this discussion, "masterful programmers" could be considered equivalent to "enlightened programmers".
ZoharAtkins 6y ago
Excellent! I linked to this story in my other comment: https://www.ibiblio.org/zen/gateless-gate/2.html https://www.ibiblio.org/zen/gateless-gate/2.html The point is that nobody should claim to be free from causality (though maybe the esoteric interpretation is that this is not because one can't be, but because the non-Enlightened will misuse or misunderstand the teaching). We are always culture-bound, and thus always biased, and thus mistake-prone, even if or when we achieve samadhi.

by Liquix 6y ago

_def 6y ago

Those are very inspiring quotes, thank you.

raxxorrax 6y ago

Depends if you start the cult for personal enrichment or not.

HenryBemis 6y ago
I know the guy who wrote the book: "How to Start Your Own Religion: Form a Church, Gain Followers, Become Tax-Exempt, and Sway the Minds of Millions in Five Easy Steps" Cool guy and a very fun read! https://www.amazon.com/How-Start-Your-Own-Religion/dp/1440538581 https://www.amazon.com/How-Start-Your-Own-Religion/dp/144053...

jchook 6y ago

"When you meet the Buddha, kill him!"

MaxBarraclough 6y ago

Your first quote reminded me of this from Bruce Lee: > Before I learned the art, a punch was just a punch, and a kick, just a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick, no longer a kick. Now that I understand the art, a punch is just a punch and a kick is just a kick.

Liquix 6y ago
Thanks for the quote, Bruce is a really admirable guy. May have been paying homage to another old Zen saying: “Before one studies Zen, mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after a first glimpse into the truth of Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and waters are no longer waters; after enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and waters once again waters.” ― Dōgen
- romseb 6y ago
  That is beautiful, thank you for sharing.
- waterhouse 6y ago
  A hobby of mine is taking sayings like that and saying, "Well, if it weren't mumbo-jumbo, then what might it mean?" In this case, it would seem to be: At the start, you have a bunch of knowledge, concepts built on other concepts; studying Zen involves breaking all of that down and reforming it from scratch; at the end of the process, you have a new bunch of knowledge and concepts built on concepts, and you have similar labels for the concepts of material objects like mountains and waters, but it's possible that (e.g.) the lower-level concepts they're built on are different. Physics is kind of like that as one develops successively better models of molecules, atoms, and particles, replacing the bottom-level concepts each time. Though the stuff on top of them doesn't change a huge amount every time.
  - miek 6y ago
    Wow, that is impressive. I would love to read more of these translations if you ever post them somewhere!
    - waterhouse 6y ago
      Really? I'm flattered! To me it's just a simple description of what I'm guessing something might be supposed to refer to, but if it's sufficiently non-obvious to others... Well, I haven't kept a list, but here's another that comes to mind. Someone's signature was "How do you prepare for death? Learn to live. How do you learn to live? Prepare for death." On the face of it, this is a trollish non-answer. However, there is a way to interpret it. The first sentence is straightforward: Death is going to happen, how do I prepare for it? The second sentence is saying: You can't stop it, so the best you can do is figure out what to do with the life that you have. The third sentence is also straightforward: How do I figure out what to do with my life? The fourth sentence is saying: Imagine you're going to die, figure out your obligations that you'd want to fulfill before you die, fulfill them now, and then you will have freedom to focus on exploring what you really want to do. The phrases "prepare for death" and "learn to live" are each used twice, with different intended meanings each time. There is always the possibility of getting a quote that is actually nonsense and was meant as nonsense (or, today, was generated by a computer), and "interpreting" wisdom into it that comes from the interpreter rather than from the quote. Or there could be multiple, similarly wise-seeming interpretations. For example, I could have interpreted the fourth sentence instead as: Imagine you're going to die; then, from that perspective, observe which things seem important and which no longer seem so important; thus, the thought-exercise of imagining you'll die is an exercise that teaches you how to live. It's possible that cryptic sayings were devised to hold wisdom. It's also possible that they were devised by trolls surrounded by gullible admirers. Perhaps there were wise people who, as an apparently necessary evil, made themselves look cryptically impressive so as to attract funding from gullible rulers, or to keep their ideas from being misused by outsiders who might have bad intent. Perhaps there was a mixture of trolls and well-intentioned wise people. I really don't know. I am generally a fan of straightforward textbook explanations that don't play word games, or, if they do, they have straightforward explanations of the word games. Still, it is possible that there's something to the cryptic stuff. And so it can be a fun game to try to get meaning from them.

dr_dshiv 6y ago

It seems to easy to reach enlightenment when you are living in a monastery with a bunch of dudes and no responsibilities but to "chop wood, carry water." But an enlightenment philosophy that can help a father of 3 with a hard marriage and a fulltime job or two...? Hmm, maybe the enlightment philosophy project will take a few thousand more years...

seisvelas 6y ago
The Vimalakirti Sutra is about exactly this. Vimalakirti is a laymen householder who achieves enlightnment. Upon his passing, Buddha sends a bunch of spiritual masters and bodhisattva's to Vimalakirti's deathbed. Vimalakirti proceeds to chastise them for how useless their 'enlightenment' is when it doesn't help anyone in the real world, and is only a self centered quest to save one's ego from suffering. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimalakirti_Sutra https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimalakirti_Sutra
- alfiedotwtf 6y ago
  Within all these comments, to me this was the most enlightened.
- Balgair 6y ago
  The Bhagavad Gita is similar to the OP's issues. It deals with the conflicts we all face in life and how to resolve our wants with our duties. It's not a very long read, actually. Note: Find a translation that works for you. Specifically, the word 'duty' meant something very different than it does today. I recommend : https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1586380192/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1586380192&linkCode=as2&tag=stucosuccess&linkId=FSXA3GZUT5SFDAZ4 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1586380192/ref=as_li_tl?ie... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita EDIT: For a more western take, I'd also recommend the Bible's knowledge books: Ecclesiastics, Proverbs, and Job. Again, a good translation is essential here, but I'm not about to recommend that.
disprofuse 6y ago
You should listen to the lecture “Stop trying to improve yourself.” https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fqqE1BLvISI# https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fqqE1BLvISI#

kordlessagain 6y ago

Krishnamurti was thrust into it and still managed to escape!

krackers 6y ago
Jiddu or UG Krishnamurti?
- swatkat 6y ago
  I guess they meant Jiddu. But, that statement works for both.

adamsea 6y ago

Yes! : ). I came here to remind everyone about chopping water and carrying wood as well ; ). I'd add that, imho, the aphorism means, enlightenment isn't an answer to the struggles of your material existence, or even your own unhappiness, from whatever source. Enlightenment is just enlightenment, it's not a magic happy pill which makes you no longer a flawed human being.

Regenschirm 6y ago

Sounds exactly like my lsd experience. At the lsd height, i was everyone and the world only progressed through me. I also knew that i wanted to keep this enlightend state and thought about mechanism to bring me back into my 'normal' form. I thought up religion to only discover that it did not work, i came to the idea of creating an idol something like lsd. Something which will give me access back to this state and will be discovered and easily to be distributed. After that, i was normal again. Continuing my life.

bergstromm466 6y ago
> At the lsd height, i was everyone and the world only progressed through me. Have you heard of Open Individualism, or read the short story 'The Egg'?
- Regenschirm 6y ago
  I read 'The Egg' but i haven't heard of Open Individualism, tx :)

zzzeek 6y ago

yup, basically if this is you: > But a question nags at you: why can’t the world already know what you know? They’d be so much better off. So much happier. we can't define "enlightenment" but we can probably name endless things that would not be a central feature of enlightenment. That above would be pretty high on the list.

pontifier 6y ago

I have felt a great sense of enlightened several times in the past. It's most similar to the feeling of flow while programming... When you're juggling all the pieces of a big question and somehow they all slot into place. Everything just makes sense, but it's easily disrupted. It's impossible for me to maintain for long, but I do my best to collect takeaways while I can. Mostly what comes back with me are cheesy phrases like "just do your best" or "everything will be ok". Occasionally I come back with some type of specific insights about how to approach a problem that has been causing me problems or newfound motivation to persevere. Occasionally I think about starting a cult afterward, but I really just want to collect kind, intelligent and motivated people around me. Would that really be so bad?

unkulunkulu 6y ago
I have had a couple of moments in life when a lot of pieces fall in place and perspective changes. A friend of mine found a nice metaphor for this: a supercooled water, the mind looking for an answer or a solution to a problem and then something happens and the crystallization starts and now everything is suddenly ice. Definitely great moments leaving strong emotional impact and sense of joy and happiness.

gregfjohnson 6y ago

Related: "Beginning programmers write simple code. Intermediate programmers write complicated code. Masterful programmers write simple code." In the context of this discussion, "masterful programmers" could be considered equivalent to "enlightened programmers".

ZoharAtkins 6y ago

Excellent! I linked to this story in my other comment: https://www.ibiblio.org/zen/gateless-gate/2.html https://www.ibiblio.org/zen/gateless-gate/2.html The point is that nobody should claim to be free from causality (though maybe the esoteric interpretation is that this is not because one can't be, but because the non-Enlightened will misuse or misunderstand the teaching). We are always culture-bound, and thus always biased, and thus mistake-prone, even if or when we achieve samadhi.