zandtao has been suffering with agitation arising from dukkha advice; this does not necessarily resolve the advice and agitation but it is a step in the right direction.
It started to resolve itself in the intro of zeering forward (this is an edited version of the intro) - a temporary title that vision needs to change:-
“Intro
This is the end of unleashing. Let’s be very clear. Nicola’s “love Unleashed” LINK is a best book as is Teal’s “How to Love yourself” LINK. Any seeker can dig into themselves through these books, and when you do that you can see these are “best books” but what they are not are books for z-quests. No that’s not a correct truth, they are not books for zandtao’s current z-quests because what is arising is tedious.
Yet even that is not true because what is arising is far from tedious for zandtao but on review it appears that in the writing zandtao is going down a tunnel of mindful tedium. These are wow moments of discovery for zandtao but they belong in journalling and are not appropriate for his book-writing. Perhaps the biggest thing he learnt was the notion of “hidden” - that his soul had chosen to hide in life, just experiencing leading to consciously-loving-and-evolving-consciousness late in his dotage. But that doesn’t sound big, it sounds like spiritual bypassing. “hiding away having no value in sampajanna but all value in consciousness” sounds like the epitome of spiritual bypassing, but for zandtao with his age and health there can be nothing else - in fact his age and health are part of the intention. And in a way hidden is not exceptional because in old age a turn to spirituality is natural; what is not so usual about the hidden is the number of quality daily-life relationships that were missed, and the way hidden explains those.
What was happening with the writing of the z-quests on these best books. Starting Nicola coincided with the recognition of Sacred Wounds. Spiritually Sacred Wounds are huge, living through the holy khandha is essentially the path before autonomy. As became so much clearer in his studies of gabikov the choice of his soul is exhibited through the Sacred Wound; the 3 characteristics work through the Sacred Wound.
That needs explaining as part of zeering forward. The 4NT talks of the Noble 8-fold path - magga - as ending clinging - the characteristic of clinging - anicca. For zandtao releasing attachment has been about no-self - ending anatta, yet in that release there was also unconscious release of dukkha. But that was not always unconscious as with Nyanga. Recently releasing the spectrum of suffering that arises from the advice and warnings of dukkha has shown zandtao that this characteristic has so much to offer - that had been unconscious until recently.. Because of his autonomy zandtao now does not see himself as Buddhist so as not to cause offence to the teachers and teaching, zandtao terms these as the 3 freedoms ending the restrictions through letting go of clinging, releasing attachment and ending suffering through seeing the intention of the advice of dukkha - seeing the consciousness of dukkha. The 3 freedoms are characteristics of zeering forward now becoming central to his practice.
In the actual intro zandtao goes further into the importance and mechanisms of hidden but that is not relevant in this zeersight. Z-quest is a learning tool - learning through writing bouncing off the creativity of others. How has this worked for zandtao? z-quest has been a tool for healing the Sacred Wound, it had reached the stage where this journalling was almost a requirement for zandtao to go deeper. But burrowing the way through an internal blockage is now part of a deepening process for zandtao but in the writing perhaps comes across as indulgent in its minutiae. Any such burrowing is valid as a way of showing the path - does the seeker recognise path-awareness in themselves based on what they have read? That is not now what zandtao is writing for, that is what the writing started as.
What zandtao called the pathtivist trilogy consisted of the Treatise, Manual and Companion. The Treatise was a description of how bill crossed from the conditioned daily life to life on the path. It was about the good fortune of the firstgrace LINK of upheaval and how developing the 3 tenets of the vihara (kaya, vedana and mind) together with experience enabled an early retirement bringing developing abidance. The Treatise could raise flags as signposts. Have you felt these signposts? Then the path is for you, join a Culture of Awakening. In the Manual he developed pathtivism, activism as embodiment in path development. Pathtivism proposes that activism is not concerned with a set of ideals - no matter the compassionate intention of such ideals. Ideals are restrictive. Compassion can work with good ideals but ideals build traps as the Manual pointed out. For zandtao the way out of the traps that are in conditioning was through his practice that grew from Buddhadasa’s MwB (mindfulness with breathing LINK). Whilst his practice now focuses on the 3 freedoms zandtao still sees it as MwB but followers of Buddhadasa might not so he now calls it ZPAP.
Key to this trilogy is what zandtao sees as zandtaomed, at that stage zandtao did minimal work as a meditation adviser. This was part of his development, and as far as he can see was beneficial for all concerned but it was risky. Patriarchy is now creating so much mental illness that there are dangers in meditation without good supervision and advice. Nicola and Teal are both highly conscious of this, and adopt strategies to compensate for this conditioned mental illness. Nicola’s strategy was system-oriented - becoming a PhD, and her strategy included all the systemic knowledge concerning this mental illness. .zandtao did not have such knowledge as zandtaomed, and this was the risk of his meditation so he withdrew as adviser. But the trilogy LINK and advice LINK can all be beneficial especially with the help of an adviser.
Viveka-zandtao LINK noted how centring in solitude had been constant through his life after upheaval. Looking back and finding that space in solitude and the awakening studies of Thay led to what he called his autonomy - Prajna - the crossing of the threshold into autonomy. .zandtao saw this threshold as distinct from his path up to that point because of his autonomy from Buddhism. In autonomy it was only his soul directing even though his soul was still strongly entangled with Buddhism. But most significant was that his autonomy recognised the love-wisdom balance that he developed through Real Love LINK; he took his love-wisdom balance further with Secular Path? - starting with secular Buddhism and then a broader secularism. Whilst this was based in his new-found autonomy he was still following z-quests. Recognising the broad theme of love was not delving into minutiae, and examining Stephen Batchelor’s scythe that led into embodiment did not seem to be concerned with minutiae either. But now studying these best books there just seems minutiae on review. It appears trivial but it isn’t because what zandtao now learns is not for advice but for the evolving of consciousness.
When zandtao calls Nicola and Teal as best books he means it. Take each word of those books and make them part of your seeking. One definition of seeking could be unleashing love, another could be learning to love yourself. Completion of seeking cannot occur without this loving, and questions have to be asked of the wisdom traditions concerning this. There is no doubt in zandtao’s understanding that patriarchy has compromised some traditional approaches into a form of spiritual bypassing where the institution focuses on the wisdom marginalising the power of love from daily life. The equanimity of love-wisdom balance is described in such traditions but is it embodied? Patriarchy is satisfied that it is not.
Nicola describes the two foundations of unleashing love as feminine and masculine and gives us many practices to develop these two foundations - there is no point in zandtao diluting these through z-quest. His study helped him see their usage in his development, and so there are the two best books for seekers to unleash their own love and so love themselves - without any zandtao dilution.
.z-quests had become a lazy way of development, find a book bounce off it and let the path develop. But that is now not working because the development is deepening but not suitable for advice. .zandtao now needs to consider writing in terms of vision from his autonomy. .zandtao’s latest study has been gabikov. Whilst he has yet to study her book her teaching style is not suited to zandtao’s z-quests. There was learning LINK based on her science of the soul youtube clips, and the consolidation he gained from that learning has given him a much clearer grasp of the soul’s journey - the fractal. But to make use of that consolidation zandtao needs to step out of z-quests into zeering - moving forward into the visions of his autonomy. As yet he knows not how these visions will be expressed - it is almost empty, but he knows from this intro that there is space that will be filled - the joy of spiritual anticipation.
Hence we have vision-writing as opposed to z-quests - stand back and write with vision. Was Wai’s zifi concerned with vision? Maybe so. Storylines came to him and then he developed them. Will such visions come? Not with the dukkha agitation. Is there more zeersight needed or is it greater discipline?
|
