BLOWING OUT

Alan Watts, in a lecture entitled "Limits of Language" that he gave in Philadelphia in 1973, states: "There is nothing you can do to liberate yourself, to change yourself, the reason for which is ringing loud and clear.  The reason you cannot do anything about it is because you don't exist--that is as an ego, a separate will. It just isn't there.  Well, when you understand this, you're liberated (the paradox).

When I say YOU, it is as you conceive yourself to be, that is as your ego, your image of yourself.  It isn't there.  It doesn't exist. It's an abstraction.  It's like Three.  Do you ever see Three, just plain, ordinary Three?  No.  Nobody ever saw it.  It's a concept, a vikalpa.  So in the same way is one's self.  There is this happening, this suchness (physical existence), yeah, sure, you bet.  But it's not pushing you around, because there is no YOU to be pushed around.

By dying to yourself, by becoming completely incompetent, and found that you don't exist, you are reborn.  You become everything."

This view is echoed by J. Krishnamurti, not identified specifically with any religion, but whose heritage is Hinduism.  He said, "There must be the understanding that there is nothing, nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing you can do to improve, transform, or better yourself.  If you understand this completely you will realize that there is no such entity as YOU.  Then if you have totally abandoned this ambition, you will be in the state of true meditation which comes over you spontaneously in wave after wave after wave of amazing light and bliss."

When one has died to himself, has accepted that he is not his socially-conditioned ego, he returns to beginner's mind, or no-mind, as Zen terms it.  And what is beginner's mind, or no-mind, but consciousness alone, the so-called watcher or observer.  And what is the watcher or observer but the divine itself watching, observing, witnessing itself doing what it does, hence "You become everything," as Watts puts it, Krishnamurti's "amazing light and bliss."

There is, however, an option.  Beginner's mind, or no-mind, can be just this, just consciousness.  It need not have attributes or be ascribed to any entity.  It can just be.  It can be Suchness, Tathata, that which is so of itself.  All the same, it is experienced as peace, joy.  It is the "blowing out" that is nirvana.