Freedom in SHINJIN - Part II
This is a continuation of a dialogue that started HERE.
A dharma friend writes:
I’m not sure whether the freedom of shinjin has any concrete implications for our continued existence in samsara, or functions mainly to assure us of Pure Land birth.
After all, personal “transformation,” or any kind of Path of Sages agenda is moot, right? No sort of personal change is to be sought after or expected.
Thanks for helping me sort all this out.
Good question. Here’s my answer.
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Freedom in SHINJIN (true entrusting) has MASSIVE implications for our continued existence in samsara. I’ll talk about three of them.
IMPLICATION #1: CERTITUDE
Ever since I began my “spiritual” life (this time around), I’ve wanted to be enlightened.
I don’t mean a little enlightened, or a lot enlightened - I mean FULLY enlightened, just as Shakyamuni Buddha was after his final breakthrough under the Banyan Tree.
Whatever forays I made into trying to shed my illusions and blind passions, my progress was always temporary - and easily reversed by the disturbances coming from within and without.
Over the course of 30 years, I went from desire to become an enlightened person (a Buddha), to uncertainty about whether I could, to a sickening certainty that I could not.
Now I am living with the certain knowledge that I CAN - and I WILL.
IMPLICATION #2: GRATITUDE
This certitude comes entirely because of the Person and the Work of Amida Buddha.
I now know that this 30 years of trying and failing were the necessary prelude that made me ready to listen deeply to Shakyamuni’s teaching in the Larger Pure Land Sutra - as explained by the Dharma Master Shinran.
Underneath all the fluctuations of goofy thoughts and feelings that still roil my mind at the slightest provocation - my life is defined by an adamantine substrate of gratitude.
No matter how much I screw up - in thought, word and deed - it simply doesn’t matter anymore. It’s all just grist for the mill of deep and abiding gratitude:
- gratitude that this is my last trip around on the train of hell
- gratitude that this is my last life as a non-buddha
- gratitude that I can look forward to death with great anticipation, rather than with FUD - fear, uncertainty and doubt
- gratitude that as a Buddha I will finally be able to act on behalf of others who suffer with power, precision and purity - as I cannot right now
- gratitude that I will finally become part of the karmic solution, rather than continuing to be a part of the problem, as we all are because of our blind passions
- and gratitude that I have begin given something infinitely precious to share with my loved ones - and the world: the one teaching of awakening that really can and does change karmic destinies forever in this current age of darkness.
IMPLICATION #3: QUIETUDE
If you go to the local mega-bookstore, you can check out all the books and magazines about Buddhism.
Tricycle, Shambala Sun, etc. And then over to the books.
Every once in a while, you’ll see an article from someone whose been practicing Buddhism for quite some time - and is just plain worn out.
Bone tired.
Exhausted, like Sisyphus, from rolling the stone up the mountain, only to see it fall down, over and over again.
Frustrated about going from one teacher, to another, in search of what seems to be a unicorn: true awakening that doesn’t quit, even when life gets wicked bad.
Dead beat - because they never do find it, no matter where they seek. And those teachers who are honest admit that they haven’t found it yet either.
Here are the cold, hard facts: Shakyamuni found it - TRUE ENLIGHTENMENT - in 7 years. And, in the first age of the dharma - the days of his presence on earth, and for hundreds of years afterwards, others practiced and found it too.
It was hard - but not impossible - because of Shakyamuni Buddha’s persistent energetic field.
It just doesn’t happen today, in this, the age of dharma decline.
Mostly this universal failure to achieve our common objective of Buddhahood is something Buddhists don’t like to talk about. It makes them defensive. It’s the proverbial white elephant in the livingroom.
But the reality that seekers each and all live with is a continued RESTLESSNESS. The hope is this: that somewhere over the NEXT ridge there will finally be a place of rest - with no more falling back into the delusions, obscurations and blind passions that make life a suffering hell for us all.
I’m done with that restlessness - all of it. Finished. Through.
Now when I thumb through the magazines (and I rarely do), looking at the ads for this teacher and that retreat, looking at the articles about this practice and that contemplation - I just shake my head.
I know that all this FROTH of activity can only produce one result, ultimately - the one result no one wants: FAILURE and BURNOUT.
It might take more than one lifetime - but that is what will happen. No ifs, ands or buts about it.
As I said, people on the Path of the Sages get defensive when someone says it this so bluntly. Shinran did say it, just this directly - and people didn’t care for it back then. And people don’t care for it now, either.
Nevertheless, this statement about FAILURE and BURNOUT - about the impossibility of getting to the goal by any and all of the 84,00 paths available in the Dharma - or the 95 non-Buddhist paths - is the first thing Master Shinran learned from his teacher Honen.
It remains his fundamental proposition. Take it - or leave it.
Because of the experience of my own life, I’ve taken it. Shinran is right, as far as I am concerned - not just about me and my inability, but about US.
And that’s why I am done, finished, and through with any and all of these exercises, contemplations, etc.
Now, I just live a plain person’s life, and don’t worry about any of it, any more. I don’t go chasing after enlightenment teachers - either Buddhist ones or Taoist ones or Hindu ones or New Age ones.
These enlightenment teachers are each and all “short sellers” in the religion market - selling something they just don’t own themselves - whether they think they do, or not.
This is my quietude - the quietude of SHINJIN. Not the hopeless attempts to quiet my monkey mind, but the quietude of not having to buy the next book, tape, seminar, retreat, blessing, method - or whatever.
I just entrust myself and my karmic destiny to Amida Buddha: I live my little life life as best as I can, do what seems good to do, make what amends I can for my inevitable screw-ups…
And wait with expectation for my birth in the Pure Land.
Certitude. Gratitude. Quietude.
These are my implications - given to me by Amida Buddha.
This is my FREEDOM IN SHINJIN.
NamuAmidaButsu.
Paul R.
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8/5/05 - A Postscript
When one person speaks the True Teaching of Shinran cleary, and another person listens deeply, Amida Buddha causes Shin Dharma transmission to occur.
Here’s a living example. Read the effect that this SHIN UGLY dialogue had on my dharma friend HERE.