Hardcore Zen : punk rock, monster movies and the truth about reality Part 5

FROM THE ALb.u.m "THE EVIL ONE"

A nightmare of shattered shapes and bizarre sensations followed by a waking nightmare of inescapable panic, a cold sweat, a racing heart. Sheer black terror. No way out.

Where am I? What's this big room? Why are there bodies all around me? Why am I on the floor?

Breathe. Think. Look. What is this place?

A temple. Ah yes, I'm in a temple!

It's a Buddhist temple, I recite it to myself. A Buddhist temple in s.h.i.+zuoka. The people around me are not dead, I realize, just sleeping. It is the first night of the 1997 summer zazen retreat. There is nothing anywhere near me that could do me the least harm.

Then why am I so afraid? I want to run as far and as fast as possible, to scream b.l.o.o.d.y murder and cry for help. But where would I run to? Away from what-some nerdy-a.s.s Zen students sleeping on the floor? I tell myself again and again there's no need for panic, there's nothing to be afraid of. Stay calm.

I tiptoe out of the sleeping room, slide open the ancient wooden door to the main hall of the temple and quietly go in. At least there are lights on out here.

I am in surroundings of utter serenity devoting my days to the pursuit of inner peace through the silent practice of zazen-what could possibly be less frightening? Still my breath comes in panting gasps, my T-s.h.i.+rt is soaked through with sweat and I can't stop s.h.i.+vering. I have never felt such panic in my life. If I'd been being pursued through a darkened alleyway by a vicious gang out for blood and armed with motorcycle chains I couldn't have felt more fear. All the fear I'd ever felt in my life has descended upon me in the middle of this night.

I sit on a bench facing the Buddha statue in the center of the main hall, a few feet from the spot where Nis.h.i.+jima lectured to us just hours earlier. I work hard to try to hold my body still against the s.h.i.+vering. I force my breathing into a normal pattern by very deliberately breathing in for a count of three, out for a count of three. I try to come up with anything real that is even potentially dangerous around here. I try hard, but can't think of anything genuinely scary. Am I having some kind of premonition of imminent danger from some unimagined source?

Gradually, I force my thought processes to return to normal through logic alone, since my emotions are completely out of control.

I realize I've had a dream and that it was some kind of subconscious message. Something in my life is causing me tremendous distress and I haven't even been aware of it. As surreal as the images are, there is a message in them that I can interpret consciously. I can see what needs to be done and I resolve to do it. I realize clearly that I am the cause of my own distress and I am the only one who can put an end to it. When my heart-rate settles and I begin to breathe normally again, I slide back into the sleeping room and crawl into my futon. After an hour or so, my mind settles enough that I fall into a troubled half-sleep.

IF YOU PRACTICE ZAZEN SINCERELY, eventually you'll encounter demons. The demons are psychological, but they're just as scary as the fiery denizens of h.e.l.l. Practicing zazen is like taking the lid off a pot of boiling five-alarm chili and turning up the heat at the same time. All the stuff inside your mind wells up and spills over the edges. It can get messy.

All day long, every single day, you repress all kinds of thoughts and urges that appear in your mind. You have to-that's part of being a functioning member of society. All of us have nasty antisocial tendencies. Every last one of us. It ain't just the n.a.z.is, al-Qaeda, and people on the registry of s.e.x offenders-or whatever enemy-of-the-week the media is pus.h.i.+ng. All those evil-doers are you. And me too. They're every single human being in the world without exception. Maybe you don't have whatever specific urges the media is telling you are the very worst (you tell yourself you don't, anyway), but you have others and they're just as nasty and disgusting. Every human being does. That's part of the nature of being human.

Society conditions us to ignore certain aspects of universal human nature because these aspects go against the preservation of society. All human beings have unsavory desires-but you can't have a functioning society if people are running around continually raping kittens, knifing retail clerks, and stealing old ladies' underpants. And raping, killing, and stealing are just the tip of the iceberg. There are billions of lesser urges we all have which are equally if more subtly antisocial-and those need to be repressed too. Only we don't call most of this stuff merely unacceptable or even merely antisocial. We have a much more powerful category for it. We call it "wrong" or "sinful" or "evil." What's anti-society is "wrong" and what's pro-society is "right." True True right and wrong don't necessarily overlap completely with society's definitions of right and wrong-and different societies don't even agree on those definitions in the first place! right and wrong don't necessarily overlap completely with society's definitions of right and wrong-and different societies don't even agree on those definitions in the first place!

A lot of religious teachings sprang from the genuine understanding of certain fundamental things that had to be done or to be avoided in order to preserve society. The Jewish prohibition against eating pork probably appeared after people had died from eating spoiled pig meat. In those days simply making the connection between such a death and the meat that was eaten was a significant leap of intelligence. But then people went on to unnecessarily conclude that this indicated that eating pork must therefore be a against G.o.d's will.

All of our religious and social codes came down to us from human beings who made connections between certain actions and their results. Sometimes their deductions were correct and sometimes they were dead wrong. But correct or not, they were pa.s.sed down from generation to generation, each time gathering more psychological and social weight. Thousands of years later, one man's supposition about the connection between something he did last Thursday and some good luck he had the following weekend has become a Rule of G.o.d that none shall violate lest he be d.a.m.ned for eternity.

Whatever society you were born into has hundreds upon thousands upon millions of these rules, little and big. Some are so subtle you'd never even notice them. They're a.s.sumptions built into the very fabric of our languages. It's more acceptable to say "use the toilet" than "take a s.h.i.+t" because the former implies that you understand that good members of society take their s.h.i.+ts in a special place called the toilet. Most words we consider obscene refer to things society wishes to ignore or at least keep very private. You go through your whole life automatically repressing those things society has taught you are "bad"-either deliberately or inadvertently. (Then of course, there are more subtle issues like the fact that most languages oblige you to reinforce the concept of self self in every sentence: in every sentence: I I am p.i.s.sed. am p.i.s.sed. I I like chocolate-covered slugs. like chocolate-covered slugs. I I got enlightened.) got enlightened.) Most of this stuff is repressed so quickly and efficiently that it doesn't even have time to enter into your conscious mind as a thought or idea.

You can't p.o.o.p on the floor. You can't pick your nose in front of the babysitter. You can't play with your wee-wee in front of anyone. And you sure as h.e.l.l can't play with someone else's wee-wee. All of this stuff gets categorized as "wrong."

Why?

There are traumas we've all carried around in our heads since before we were three years old. This deep, deep stuff is so abstract it's almost impossible to really recognize it for what it is. Think about it. The traumas you suffered as a toddler were experienced by an ent.i.ty very little like what you call your "self" today. Were these things to suddenly start to flood back into your consciousness, there's no telling how your brain would end up interpreting them.

In my case, all this stuff and tons more came back up as deep, sourceless, desperate fear. Later on, the same kind of stuff popped back up as astounding dreams of fabulous wonders (more on that later).

The restrictions we place upon ourselves are the price we pay for having a civilization. There is no other way for civilization to exist. Yet we've reached a point in our own society where we can start to understand this phenomenon for what it is. Far from being the dangerous loosening of morals so many warn us about, this kind of thing is actually human society's awakening to a new sense of real real morality, a morality that is much more powerful than any which could be maintained through the fear of a G.o.d whose existence most of us question. morality, a morality that is much more powerful than any which could be maintained through the fear of a G.o.d whose existence most of us question.

WHEN YOU DO ZAZEN, you are sitting in a state in which the mechanisms of psychological repression begin to become a little more fluid, a little less restrained. That's when the demons are released from the caves we keep them in. Some people may find their repressed thoughts so alien that they take on abstract shapes or appear in the form of hallucinations, things literally experienced as "out there."

One time I actually heard the song "Kashmir" by Led Zeppelin playing all the way through, just as if there were a radio next to me. I even looked around to see if someone had brought one into the room. The demons represented in ancient paintings or spoken of in legends are nothing more than stuff just like this. Those beautiful drawings in Tibetan Buddhist art are representations of all the things that distract a person from finding the truth. The problem is that so many folks get confused and think these kinds of depictions are of the truth itself.

On the final night of forty-nine days of zazen that led to his enlightenment, Gautama Buddha is said to have faced Mara, the king of the demons. When Mara confronted him with all sorts of horrors (and all sorts of delights), Buddha touched the ground as a symbolic gesture of grounding himself in reality. You often see him in this pose in statues, sitting in the lotus position with one hand touching the ground. The story is remarkably similar to that of Christ's "last temptation" in the desert. Both stories are undoubtedly referring to the same psychological phenomenon.

Zen Buddhism speaks of makyo makyo or "the world of demons." Of course there really isn't any actual realm that is the world of demons. But disturbing psychological states can seem so real that people react to them just as if they were absolutely real, and that is a problem. or "the world of demons." Of course there really isn't any actual realm that is the world of demons. But disturbing psychological states can seem so real that people react to them just as if they were absolutely real, and that is a problem.

Encounters with G.o.ds and demons, visits to heavenly realms and h.e.l.lish ones-this stuff is fun to read about but not so relevant to people in modern Western society. These days people don't see demons and G.o.ds as much as they used to. What the ancients called visions of G.o.ds and demons and visits to heavens or h.e.l.ls are what we now call hallucinations, manic states, depressive states-even psychosis.

G.o.ds and demons are culturally bound. The Salem witch-hunts, it's been theorized, were the result of several people becoming poisoned with ergot, a fungus containing the same chemical that was later synthesized and called LSD. These people believed their "visions" were the results of witchcraft. Innocent women were tortured and killed because these people did not have the understanding that certain chemicals can cause changes in the brain that can lead to the release of repressed psychological drives and can even lead to hallucinations. This is dangerous stuff.

Visions and auditory hallucinations, whether you're seeing four-armed buddhas doing the Hippy Hippy Shake or hearing talking wallabees tell you to buy an AK-47 and wipe out the office are signs of faulty processes within the brain. Nothing more. I've never exactly understood why, for example, people who hear disembodied voices seem to be inclined to do what those voices tell them. If some stranger sat down beside you on a bus and said you should break into the White House and fondle the president's dog, would you do it? Would you even consider it? Why are disembodied voices any more trustworthy? If a disembodied voice ever told me something like that, I'd tell him to go find a body and go screw himself.

Apart from my "Kashmir" moment, I've never actually hallucinated as a result of zazen. Most people these days don't. What's more likely to happen to you if you're fairly stable is that all the junk you've suppressed all your life will start bubbling up to the surface in a far subtler way.

All that suppressed stuff has gotten reshaped, twisted, and remolded by conscious and unconscious processes for decades. And what's worse is that you've given the name "me" to the result of twisting all this c.r.a.p around in your brain all these years. You have to recognize that that "me" includes a lot of things that you find really disgusting and awful. You can't be truly balanced until you come to terms with this. Most people are able to successfully repress the really awful stuff at least to the point where they won't actually act it out, but pretending you don't have such urges doesn't really resolve anything on its root level. It's just denial of reality.

And neither zazen nor Buddhism is about denying reality; they're about seeing it clearly.

Recognizing your suppressed desires certainly does not mean you have to act on them. But you have to know that they're there. Pretending only abnormal people have certain desires is extremely unhealthy and extremely dangerous.

Here's why: A person discovers he has a desire that society likes to pretend exists only in truly sick and demented people. He comes to believe this desire is unique to him or at least to a very select and special group of people to which he belongs. He has every reason to believe this because society as a whole, made up as it is of people who cannot face up to the very existence of their own worst desires, tells him over and over again that this is the case. Our unbalanced friend begins to think that he must must act upon this unique desire in order to express his own unique, "true" self. We all believe the urges that appear in our minds are somehow our "true" personality, our "real" self, and must therefore be satisfied in order for us to be really happy. Our crazy friend remains blissfully unaware, as society remains steadfastly in denial, that such desires are anything but unique. They are a universal. act upon this unique desire in order to express his own unique, "true" self. We all believe the urges that appear in our minds are somehow our "true" personality, our "real" self, and must therefore be satisfied in order for us to be really happy. Our crazy friend remains blissfully unaware, as society remains steadfastly in denial, that such desires are anything but unique. They are a universal.

Every one of us is Charles Manson, Saddam Hussein, and Adolf Hitler.

When your antisocial urges come to the surface you can feel, as I did, that it's evidence you're not a good person. You think you're just pretending to be good, fooling everyone when really you have all these terrible urges. Since the terrible urges are part of your mind, you think they must be part of "you," that they are in fact "the real you" and that the nice, normal "you" society knows is just a farce. But that's really, really not it. At all. Everyone everywhere has urges like you do. The best among us are those who see this the most clearly. You can only do good when you know what bad really is and where it comes from.

The biggest, ugliest, most damaging lie that religions spread is that truly moral people never have immoral thoughts. What a dangerous, damaging load of c.r.a.p. It's not that a "good person" has only moral thoughts. It's that they act only upon the moral thoughts and not the immoral ones. l.u.s.t in your heart is not the same as adultery. Only adultery is adultery. l.u.s.t in your heart is something no one can ever, ever avoid. People who pretend they have no impure thoughts are seeking to get fat on the guilt of others.

Your desires are not what you really are. Not even close. Your thoughts aren't the real you either. They're just electrical energy bouncing around in your brain. If you do lots of zazen you often end up going for longer and longer periods where very few thoughts occur. The brain goes quiet and Descartes' old axiom "I think therefore I am" makes no sense anymore because you're not thinking, yet existence existence still is. (But be patient with this: most folks have to do zazen many years before anything like this happens.) still is. (But be patient with this: most folks have to do zazen many years before anything like this happens.) What is existence then then? Sit zazen and see for yourself.

Your opinions and preferences are not you either. A famous Zen poem called Trust in Mind Trust in Mind begins, "It's easy to follow the Buddhist Way, just avoid picking and choosing." Opinions, preferences, and other such mental c.r.a.p are just thoughts that have been reinforced so often they've become unconscious and nearly unavoidable habits. begins, "It's easy to follow the Buddhist Way, just avoid picking and choosing." Opinions, preferences, and other such mental c.r.a.p are just thoughts that have been reinforced so often they've become unconscious and nearly unavoidable habits.

Your personality isn't you either. It's just a collection of very deeply embedded opinions and preferences. Again, if you do enough zazen there will come times when even your personality ceases to function-at least in the old familiar way. Things you'd taken for granted as unique to you are seen as facets common throughout the universe.

I've said it before but it bears repeating: Everyone has a self-image, an ego. You have one, I have one, Nis.h.i.+jima has one, Dogen, Nagarjuna, and Gautama Buddha had one too. The difference is the way a Buddhist views his or her self-image. When a person who understands Buddhism uses the word I, I, the word is just a convenient way of locating something. The word the word is just a convenient way of locating something. The word I I is used by Buddhists in the same way people use any other designating phase, the phrase is used by Buddhists in the same way people use any other designating phase, the phrase Les Paul guitar Les Paul guitar for instance. You don't have any really strong attachment to the guitar (well, if it's a Les Paul, you may-but that's not what I'm talking about); you know it's just a bunch of wood held together with screws, and that the wood had its origins as parts of trees, and that the tuning keys, frets, and screws were once parts of rocks in the ground. The guitar will come apart eventually (and it'll come apart really quick if you take to a hardcore gig at a redneck bar in Ohio). But none of its components will ever really disappear. They just change form. And though they don't disappear, there comes a time when they can no longer be called a guitar. After this point you can never rea.s.semble that Les Paul guitar no matter how hard you try. The thing that the word for instance. You don't have any really strong attachment to the guitar (well, if it's a Les Paul, you may-but that's not what I'm talking about); you know it's just a bunch of wood held together with screws, and that the wood had its origins as parts of trees, and that the tuning keys, frets, and screws were once parts of rocks in the ground. The guitar will come apart eventually (and it'll come apart really quick if you take to a hardcore gig at a redneck bar in Ohio). But none of its components will ever really disappear. They just change form. And though they don't disappear, there comes a time when they can no longer be called a guitar. After this point you can never rea.s.semble that Les Paul guitar no matter how hard you try. The thing that the word I I refers to is just like that. refers to is just like that.

It's very difficult to reach this kind of understanding when it comes to your sense of self. We've been taught implicitly since birth that our "self" is something fundamental and important and real. But our self-image is nothing other than the sum total of those particular things about universal human nature we've chosen to emphasize in our own lives. Some teachings like to differentiate between "self" spelled with a little s s and "Self" with a big and "Self" with a big S S, but this just obscures the problem with unnecessary complications. No matter how you spell it, self is an illusion.

IF YOUR ZAZEN PRACTICE IS REASONABLE, if you're not doing too much or striving too hard to reach some goal, your demons are unlikely to appear in the form of hallucinations or ma.s.sive attacks of fear and panic. But mark my words: your demons will will appear. To experience such phenomena is a sign that your practice is maturing. The key is to not get sucked into it and to not push it away. Don't get frightened by the scary experiences and don't get seduced by the seductive ones. Keep your head. Finding a real teacher will help. appear. To experience such phenomena is a sign that your practice is maturing. The key is to not get sucked into it and to not push it away. Don't get frightened by the scary experiences and don't get seduced by the seductive ones. Keep your head. Finding a real teacher will help.

The fear I felt that night in the temple was the fear of knowing myself and the fear of what I was about to discover-that there was no me. Self is an illusion. The doctrine of no-self is such common currency in Buddhist circles that pretty much everyone who's read a few books with "Buddha" or "Zen" in the t.i.tle figures they have it down pat. I did too, before that night. But I only understood it intellectually-and that was nothing like staring that truth right in the face.

Society tells you that you must suppress your urges for the good of society. Yet all of these same social codes are based upon a profound misunderstanding of who we truly are. They're based on the concept of the individual self. The concept of self relies upon past and future. "I have a past. " have a past. "I have a future." You say " have a future." You say "I was made fun of as a child because of my horribly out-of-fas.h.i.+on shoes," or fear that " was made fun of as a child because of my horribly out-of-fas.h.i.+on shoes," or fear that "I will die some day in a freak accident with a bowling pin." Where is that will die some day in a freak accident with a bowling pin." Where is that I I who will die? For that matter, where is the who will die? For that matter, where is the I I that is reading this word right now? that is reading this word right now?

Try to define it. Try to find it. Really, really try. It's essential you do.

I lived in Africa as a child, played ba.s.s for Zero Defex from 1982 to 1984, moved to j.a.pan in 1993, got married in 1999, and so on, and so on, and so on. Though I did all of these things, there was, from the beginning, no "self" involved in any of these actions. We tend to think of time as a line stretching from the past, to the present, and into the future, and we can see the action of cause and effect. For instance, when I was a little kid living in Nairobi, Kenya, I kept three-horned Jackson's chameleons as pets (amazing creatures they were too, just like miniature triceratopses), and these lizards left scratches on my hands that turned into tiny scars I can still see. So there is some relations.h.i.+p between the boy of ten in 1974 and the person who's typing this now. This is a fact, and based on these kinds of facts, we've created the idea of "self."

But time isn't really like a line.

Sure, you can find evidence that things happened, photographs, old letters, scars on your hands. But the time itself is gone. I can plan for the future. I'm writing these words right now hoping someday they'll end up in being read by someone who's interested in them. But that doesn't exist where I am now. It's a dream for me. The only thing that exists right now is the action of typing. The only real time is now. Real time is so short you can't even perceive it. Perceptions necessarily lag after the real events that trigger them. Thoughts are even further behind.

There's no past and no future. And if there is no past and no future, the concept of "self" ceases to make any sense.

It's like when The Who were on The Russell Harty Show The Russell Harty Show in 1973. Pete Townshend pushed over one of his Marshall stack amps which fell with a thud and a crash of cymbals onto Keith Moon's drums, which in turn collapsed upon John Entwistle's Ampeg amp stacks, which also crashed to the studio floor. "Now" is like Keith Moon's drums. "The past" is Pete Townshend's amp, which created the motion by which Keith's drums now fall. "The future" is John Entwistle's amplifiers. "Self" only exists as a collective name for that series of smashes, crashes, and bangs. That's all. in 1973. Pete Townshend pushed over one of his Marshall stack amps which fell with a thud and a crash of cymbals onto Keith Moon's drums, which in turn collapsed upon John Entwistle's Ampeg amp stacks, which also crashed to the studio floor. "Now" is like Keith Moon's drums. "The past" is Pete Townshend's amp, which created the motion by which Keith's drums now fall. "The future" is John Entwistle's amplifiers. "Self" only exists as a collective name for that series of smashes, crashes, and bangs. That's all.

"He p.i.s.sed me off," we may say. The actual fact is that some action took place in the past that wasn't to your liking at some specific time. What arose in response to that action were your long-developed habits of feeling aversion to that kind of action. A "you" appeared because because of what happened. "He p.i.s.sed me off" isn't what happened. What you should say is, "being p.i.s.sed off caused me to exist." "You" didn't exist until there was something for "you" to exist in relations.h.i.+p to, and in this case that something is something to be angry about. "You" are the reaction called "being p.i.s.sed off." "You" is that sustained stream of thoughts that reinforces anger, that sees itself as being the same ent.i.ty to which "he" did something in the past. It is a memory being played over and over like an old school dance-beat on a DJ's tape loop, working hard at sustaining itself, knowing that the moment it stops repeating itself "you" will cease to exist. "I'm angry" is wrong. "Right now I am anger," is closer to the truth of the matter. of what happened. "He p.i.s.sed me off" isn't what happened. What you should say is, "being p.i.s.sed off caused me to exist." "You" didn't exist until there was something for "you" to exist in relations.h.i.+p to, and in this case that something is something to be angry about. "You" are the reaction called "being p.i.s.sed off." "You" is that sustained stream of thoughts that reinforces anger, that sees itself as being the same ent.i.ty to which "he" did something in the past. It is a memory being played over and over like an old school dance-beat on a DJ's tape loop, working hard at sustaining itself, knowing that the moment it stops repeating itself "you" will cease to exist. "I'm angry" is wrong. "Right now I am anger," is closer to the truth of the matter.

My sister's ex-husband wrote me an email as he was going through the divorce proceedings with my sister, and stated our usual concept of anger wonderfully: "It's impossible not to feel angry when you are facing the gale-force winds of your emotions whipping across your body." Most of us experience most of our emotions like that most of the time.

But try this on: Experiencing anger is like sitting in the bathtub frantically thras.h.i.+ng around and throwing handfuls of water into the air while simultaneously wondering why the h.e.l.l your head and face keep getting wet. You're in a stupor so deep you cannot even see that you're the one causing the problem. If anyone should know about this it's me, by the way. I used to like to bust things up when I got mad. A lot of my stuff still bears scars from such outbursts long ago.

It takes far more energy to sustain anger than to let it go. It only seems difficult to drop your anger because you have built up a habit of responding in a certain way to certain situations. Reacting to anger is an addiction, pure and simple, just like smoking Marlboros. Objectively it takes more resources to keep smoking than to stop. Yet giving it up seems much harder than continuing because you're addicted.

But even the addiction of reacting to emotions isn't the root addiction. Ultimately, you are addicted to the idea of "you." It's intoxicating, fascinating, compelling. You think that there is something called "you" that perceives things, that thinks about things, that feels things and knows things. You think "you" are reading this book and evaluating whether it's true or worthwhile. But that's an illusion. Perception occurs. Thinking occurs. But there's no one doing that thinking, no one doing the perceiving. And there's no one reading this book (actually I do hope some people read this book, but you see my point).

Books on Buddhism always go on and on about "awareness" and "mindfulness." But these ideas are easily misunderstood. Being "mindful," to most people, means bringing "me" into the situation. "I" am mindfully reading this book. "I" am mindfully reading this book. This is a mistake. To paraphrase a line in Dogen's This is a mistake. To paraphrase a line in Dogen's Shobogenzo, Shobogenzo, real mindfulness includes you being mindful of the book, the book being mindful of you, you being mindful of you, and the book being mindful of the book. In real mindfulness, book and reader disappear completely, mind and body disappear completely. There is nothing to be aware of and no one to do it. Awareness pervades everything, awareness itself is people and books, and the smell of burning tar, the songs of birds, and all the rest. real mindfulness includes you being mindful of the book, the book being mindful of you, you being mindful of you, and the book being mindful of the book. In real mindfulness, book and reader disappear completely, mind and body disappear completely. There is nothing to be aware of and no one to do it. Awareness pervades everything, awareness itself is people and books, and the smell of burning tar, the songs of birds, and all the rest.

The universe desires to perceive itself and to think about itself and you are born out of this desire. The universe wants to experience itself from the point of view of a tree, and so there are trees. The universe wants to feel what it's like to be a rock, and so there are rocks. The universe wants to know what it's like to be a famous Austrian body-builder c.u.m c.u.m film star and so there is Arnie. We don't know if rocks and trees have an idea of "self," and it doesn't matter one way or the other. But we do know human beings like you and me and Arnie believe in the existence of "self." And this belief is the root of all of our problems. film star and so there is Arnie. We don't know if rocks and trees have an idea of "self," and it doesn't matter one way or the other. But we do know human beings like you and me and Arnie believe in the existence of "self." And this belief is the root of all of our problems.

We all think that what we call "me" belongs to us alone. It doesn't. It belongs to the whole of the universe. You belong to the universe. And the universe is more you than "you" could ever hope to be.

The shrill clanging of the temple's bra.s.s wake-up bell shatters my uneasy rest a scant few hours after my encounter with my demons. I get dressed, wash my face, and stagger through the cool morning air into the zazen hall to start another day of staring at a bare brown wooden wall. Later that morning at the lecture someone asks Nis.h.i.+jima a question. I can't remember who asked it or even what the question was. But in his answer, Nis.h.i.+jima says, "Just stop drinking alcohol." I look up and see he is looking straight at me. I smile, he smiles back. I don't have a drinking problem. In fact I really hate alcohol, never drank much, and hadn't had any at all for years. But what he says penetrates right to the heart of my problem. The words themselves don't matter. It is direct communication.

The idea of a self is the most potent intoxicant of all.

Does Nis.h.i.+jima realize what he's said, what I've heard?

At the moment of such direct communication, it doesn't matter-both self and nonself vanish.

IN MY NEXT LIFE I WANT TO COME BACK AS A A PAIR OF LUCY LIU'S PANTIES PAIR OF LUCY LIU'S PANTIES If there's one thing I wouldn't want to be twice, zombies is both of them!

ED WOOD, JR.

QUESTIONS ABOUT REINCARNATION inevitably come up at every one of Nis.h.i.+jima's zazen retreats. In fact that was one of the first things that got me really cheezed off at Nis.h.i.+jima. Sometime during the second retreat of his I attended, several years before the attack of my demons, Nis.h.i.+jima made the sweeping statement that "Buddhists do not believe in reincarnation."

What?! Richard Gere says Buddhists believe in reincarnation and so does that guy from the Beastie Boys not to mention nearly everyone else. " Richard Gere says Buddhists believe in reincarnation and so does that guy from the Beastie Boys not to mention nearly everyone else. "Of course Buddhists believe in reincarnation, you old goat! Millions of people all over the world who call themselves Buddhists believe Buddhists believe in reincarnation, you old goat! Millions of people all over the world who call themselves Buddhists believe very strongly very strongly in reincarnation." I didn't actually say this. I just sort of sat there with black smoke coming out of my ears. I did that a lot in those days. in reincarnation." I didn't actually say this. I just sort of sat there with black smoke coming out of my ears. I did that a lot in those days.

We're all scared of dying and we all want some kind of a.s.surance that we're going to live forever. Having a kindly old man in black robes tell you you're going to be reborn after you die is pretty comforting. Plenty of old men in robes have made a good living that way. Nis.h.i.+jima's stock answer a.s.sures that at least half of the partic.i.p.ants at his retreats go home extremely unhappy. "There is no life after death," he always says. "When you die, you never come back to life again."

When Nis.h.i.+jima says Buddhism doesn't accept reincarnation, arguments usually follow. But I've never once seen the old man back down.

It seems that for a lot of people today, Buddhism is is the belief in reincarnation. There must be a hundred books at your local New Age book shop that give detailed explanations of how we move from life to life. Most of them cite the the belief in reincarnation. There must be a hundred books at your local New Age book shop that give detailed explanations of how we move from life to life. Most of them cite the Tibetan Book of the Dead, Tibetan Book of the Dead, a book accepted by many as a Buddhist scripture. You can find references to the idea of rebirth in pretty much any Buddhist sutra you choose to look at. Even Dogen's a book accepted by many as a Buddhist scripture. You can find references to the idea of rebirth in pretty much any Buddhist sutra you choose to look at. Even Dogen's Shobogenzo Shobogenzo is packed full of stories of people dying here and being reborn somewhere else, or even as some is packed full of stories of people dying here and being reborn somewhere else, or even as something else-a fox, for instance. Clearly, then, Nis.h.i.+jima must be wrong. Buddhists else-a fox, for instance. Clearly, then, Nis.h.i.+jima must be wrong. Buddhists do do believe in reincarnation. believe in reincarnation.

Whenever anyone-and it has frequently been me-points this out to Nis.h.i.+jima, particularly in connection with his beloved Dogen, he will say that these stories are just based on old Indian mythology. They're in there to add a little color to the piece. We were never meant to actually believe these people really, literally did die and get reborn somewhere else later. He likes to cite a chapter called "The Wholehearted Way" in the Shobogenzo, Shobogenzo, in which Dogen says the following about reincarnation: in which Dogen says the following about reincarnation: According to that non-Buddhist view, there is one spiritual intelligence existing within our body. When this body dies, however, the spirit casts off the skin and is reborn. If we learn this view as the Buddha's Dharma we are even more foolish than the person who grasps a tile or pebble thinking it to be a golden treasure.

The standard thing for me to do right here would be to to explain to you all of the ways in which the Buddhist idea of rebirth is completely different from the older Brahmanistic notion of transmigration. According to that theory of transmigration, there is a soul, an atman atman, that lives inside our bodies like a person renting an apartment. When the landlord, G.o.d, kicks the person out for making too much noise or not paying rent on time, the person moves to another building. We do not know if the soul gets its security deposit back, but I'm guessing that G.o.d pockets it and claims it was spent on cleaning and repairs. The Buddhist idea of rebirth, it is said, is a much more subtle view. There is no soul as such, as such, the standard line goes on to say, but the conditions that created the body and mind you have now will continue after your death and manifest themselves as another form, perhaps another kind of sentient being, usually a human, in the future. the standard line goes on to say, but the conditions that created the body and mind you have now will continue after your death and manifest themselves as another form, perhaps another kind of sentient being, usually a human, in the future.

This idea ends up sounding like, "You do reincarnate, but you just don't have a soul." For years and years that's exactly how I took it. After reading Philip Kapleau's The Zen of Living and Dying The Zen of Living and Dying in which he gives a very thorough and detailed explanation of why the Buddhist idea of rebirth is different from the usual idea of reincarnation I figured I had the whole thing down pat. Though Kapleau's ideas are well presented and logical, I think the best answer to the question of what Zen people think about reincarnation goes like this: in which he gives a very thorough and detailed explanation of why the Buddhist idea of rebirth is different from the usual idea of reincarnation I figured I had the whole thing down pat. Though Kapleau's ideas are well presented and logical, I think the best answer to the question of what Zen people think about reincarnation goes like this: A guy walks up to a Zen master and asks, "Is there life after death? The Zen Master says, "How should I know?" The guys replies indignantly, "Because you're a Zen master!" "Yes," says the Zen master, "but not a dead one."

When people ask about life after death they're a.s.suming they accurately understand life during life during life. But do they? Do you?

This the one of the most important questions any of us can ask ourselves.

When Gautama Buddha was asked about life after death, eternal existence, the origin of the universe, whether s.p.a.ce is finite or infinite, and other such imponderables, he said, "The question does not fit the case." Being less formal, I might phrase the same thing this way: "That's the wrong question, doofus!"

There's plenty of discussion on both sides about the matter of rebirth and reincarnation, but quoting quotes from books, even good ones, will never solve any problem-even the philosophical ones. If I just quoted Buddha and Dogen and left it at that I'd be like one of those guys with the b.u.mper stickers that say, "THE BIBLE SAID IT, I BELIEVE IT, AND THAT SETTLES IT." I hate that kind of thing and I'll bet those b.u.mper stickers don't do much for you either.

Nonetheless, I'm gonna give you my take on the whole reincarnation thing. But it's what you see for yourself-what you realize realize for yourself-that really counts. What I say here is just another thing written in another book. for yourself-that really counts. What I say here is just another thing written in another book.

But here it is: Our brain likes to label things. That's its job. In our minds-and for the moment I'm using the words "mind" and "brain" to refer to the same thing-there is something we call "me." Our "me" consists of all of our memories, dreams for the future, likes and dislikes, ideas and opinions, thoughts and perceptions, and so on. We have a whole catalogue of "me" stuff like this. But "me" is also our label for something ineffable, something we cannot put into words. It's a name we have for something we really don't understand but a.s.sume is there. Fundamentally we don't understand any any of the things we give names to. I might call you "b.u.t.tnugget" but of the things we give names to. I might call you "b.u.t.tnugget" but b.u.t.tnugget b.u.t.tnugget is just a name I have for an image in my brain that I a.s.sociate with you. It doesn't mean I have any idea what the world looks like through your eyes. is just a name I have for an image in my brain that I a.s.sociate with you. It doesn't mean I have any idea what the world looks like through your eyes.

In moments of balance and clarity, we can see that what we call "me" does not belong to us at all. It is the possession of the universe. It is is the universe. Subject and object are the same. Nis.h.i.+jima says, "My personality extends throughout the universe." This something, this thing we sometimes call "me" and we sometimes call "everyone and everything else," is the same as the present moment. We think we have a mind of our own. We don't. We partake in a mind that includes all of creation. The present moment is eternal. It's always there. It is unborn and it cannot die. And it does not reincarnate. the universe. Subject and object are the same. Nis.h.i.+jima says, "My personality extends throughout the universe." This something, this thing we sometimes call "me" and we sometimes call "everyone and everything else," is the same as the present moment. We think we have a mind of our own. We don't. We partake in a mind that includes all of creation. The present moment is eternal. It's always there. It is unborn and it cannot die. And it does not reincarnate.

Nor does it hold any beliefs or opinions, for or against anything at all.

You prefer The Pogues to The Backstreet Boys, but the universe does not. It should, of course, but it includes and embraces both of them equally. Yet you and the universe are one and the same.

If we sit behind the old railway station in Kent, Ohio, and watch the Cuyahoga River flow, ignoring the noise from the frat boys hara.s.sing the art students on Water Street, we'll see lots of bubbles on the river's surface. They float along on the river for a while then burst. The bubbles are just air and water. The water returns to the river. The air returns to the atmosphere. But that one bubble we watched will never appear again.

If we buy a candle at Spencer Gifts shaped like something naughty, light it, then use the flame to light a second even naughtier-shaped candle while simultaneously blowing out the first, is the flame on the second candle the same flame as the first or entirely different? Where is the first flame? Where was the sound of Tommy Ramone hitting the first rim shot on Teenage Lobotomy Teenage Lobotomy before you heard it? After you heard it, where did it go? before you heard it? After you heard it, where did it go?

Still, to say that when we die we return to the Great River of Being continues to miss the point. The notion of returning returning implies that right now we're separate from the Great River of Being or from G.o.d or from anything else. We aren't. That bubble was always part of the river even when it appeared as a bubble. We don't return to G.o.d, because we never left G.o.d in the first place. implies that right now we're separate from the Great River of Being or from G.o.d or from anything else. We aren't. That bubble was always part of the river even when it appeared as a bubble. We don't return to G.o.d, because we never left G.o.d in the first place.

Don't get too hooked on explanations, though. Explanations are never complete.

When we die, we die. We never appear again. Dead, dead, dead. Gone, gone, gone.

But in truth, we die all the time. Every moment of every day we die. Where is the person who slid out of your mother's womb greasy and purply-red and screaming like a banshee all those years ago? Are you that person? You have no memory of that day. It's a day that was over and done with a long, long time ago. Where is the person who lost5 your virginity? Where is the person who woke up bleary-eyed and crabby yesterday morning? Where is the person who will fill your casket? your virginity? Where is the person who woke up bleary-eyed and crabby yesterday morning? Where is the person who will fill your casket?