A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
Where can you find your unborn and unconditional freedom? Notice that the moment you search for it, you are no longer free. Seeking assumes that freedom is elsewhere, that you do not already possess it. But what if your very nature is already unconditional and free? What if the nirvana you have been looking for has been in your pocket all along? When the seeking mind finally comes to a complete stop, what happens?
A koan is a device designed to bring the mind to this stopping point. When every attempt to find an answer is exhausted and there is nowhere left for the mind to go, something quietly reveals itself.
Dharma teacher Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel describes the state of not-knowing as a riveting place to be and asks what would happen if instead of retreating to our habit of turning away from the unknown, we habituated ourselves to staying open.
Soto Zen Buddhist priest Myozan Ian Kilroy reflects on his own experience and a story in the Blue Cliff Record about awakening in total darkness to illustrate the openness but also the security in not-knowing.
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