ultimate reality

On all the Buddhas. . .
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On all the Buddhas. . .

Contemplate all phenomena as devoid of inherent nature.

The same is true of their arising and cessation.

False  designations are merely used to describe them.

All phenomena do not come into being; all phenomena do not cease to exist.

If we understand in this way, all the Buddhas appear before us.

Avatamsaka Sutra

i. What does this mean to me?

So far in this scripture we’ve come to understand from the previous lines that all our experience of phenomena is an internal mental representation. We can see this if we imagine things that are not in the so-called real world. For instance, if we think of a pink and white striped elephant, the mind will immediately ‘create’ an image. The mind is very accommodating that way.

When we look at the lines of scripture we’re contemplating today, they are merely describing our experience of ‘reality’. Let’s go back to the striped elephant. Can we say the elephant came into being? No. It’s simply a thought we made up. Can the elephant cease to exist? No. Because the only existence the striped elephant has is as an internal mental representation. The moment we turn our attention to something else –poof!—it’s gone. An internal mental representation can neither be said to “come into being” nor “cease to exist”.

Striped elephants are one thing. But what about our day-to-day existence? How is that different? Our experience of the world is the same coming and going of internal mental representations. After all, do we go around and think ‘I have to hold on to this image so that…” No. There’s no realistic end to that thought. We have to hold on to the thought so that…what? A striped elephant is going to come through the door just because we keep thinking about it? Literally, the only place that happens is in a dream. Why is that? It’s because, like a dream, the elephant is a mere transformation of consciousness, which is to say it’s an internal mental representation.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

There’s a story my teacher, the Venerable Tashi Nyima, first told me. It’s the story of the snake and the rope. If you go into a dark shadowy place and a rope is coiled up in the shadows, it can look very much like a big, coiled snake. All sorts of things happen if we experience this. The heart rate goes up, adrenaline is released, the fight or flight instinct kicks in. Before you know it, you’ve run from the dangerous coiled snake, feeling lucky to escape with your life.

Now comes the daytime, bright and sunny, and you go to the same place. There you find a harmlessly coiled rope in the corner. So where did the snake come from? The same place as the elephant. It was an internal mental representation caused by the mind misunderstanding reality.

Can we say that the snake came into being? Or that it ceased to exist? No. The snake was only happening in the mind. Most importantly here, notice that the snake didn’t come out of thin air. There was an actual rope there. The mind simply misinterpreted reality based on our limited senses. Buddhism does not claim that there is nothing there. Rather, the thought is that some ultimate reality (like the rope) is there, but with our limited senses in a limited body, we misinterpret what is actually there

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

I bring this teaching into my life by realizing that absolutely nothing is as it appears. That’s not the same as saying there’s nothing there. It means I’m not understanding what’s there. The mind is simply projecting and superimposing my thoughts on ultimate reality.

When I’m feeling stressed at work, I take a step back and take a couple deep breaths. And for a quick moment, I ask myself is there really anything to be stressed about? We all have Buddha Nature, it’s just covered over by samsara and lifetimes of habit. We will all realize liberation and enlightenment eventually.

Samsara tricks us into believing that everything we see is real. It deludes us into thinking that everything has an arising, and everything sooner or later ceases to exist. This is not true. Existence is an unceasing ebb and flow. The mind chops this flow into pieces like days, years, months, even lifetimes.

When I take a few moments at work (or whenever I’m stressed) I slowly become aware that all I experience is a superimposition of my own mind’s internal mental representations onto ultimate reality. When we can understand phenomena and ultimate reality this way, “…all the Buddhas appear before us”. If we can notice the relationship between our thoughts and ultimate reality, we can realize we are all awake, we are all Buddhas.

On false designations…
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On false designations…

Contemplate all phenomena as devoid of inherent nature.

The same is true of their arising and cessation.

False  designations are merely used to describe them.

All phenomena do not come into being; all phenomena do not cease to exist.

If we understand in this way, all the Buddhas appear before us.

Avatamsaka Sutra

i. What does this mean to me?

Last time we looked at this scripture, we talked about phenomena being devoid of inherent nature. In these two lines, the scripture asks us to consider that phenomena has no “arising” and no “cessation”. We merely use “false designations” to describe phenomena that arise in the mind as internal mental representations.

Although we perceive phenomena as ‘real’, the truth is that all phenomena are internal mental representations. We understand this by using our reason and experience. We know we can’t physically fit actual objects into our head, but yet we ‘recognize’ objects and people by their designated names.

When does an internal mental representation arise? When do they cease? They actually don’t truly arise or cease. They ‘arise’ when we turn our attention to them. And they cease when we turn our attention away. This being the case, can we say that a phenomenon has an “arising” or a “cessation”? It’s almost like a dream. Can we say when a dream arises or when it ends? No. The dream arises in the mind, and dissipates once we wake up, or in other words, when we withdraw our attention.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

When we break down or ‘analyze’ any phenomenon in our experience, we’ll soon see that we end up with atoms and molecules made up mostly of space. What does this mean? ‘Seeing’ is a trick of the mind. Our experience seems very real to us because for uncounted lifetimes we have relied upon and accepted what our senses report without question.

So when the scriptures say that phenomena has no “arising” and no “cessation”, it’s describing our experience of reality through our internal mental representations. To keep confusion to a minimum, we name what we believe we see, or as the scripture puts it, we give them “false designations” to “describe them”.

Does this mean that we dream reality into being? No. It means that, just like a magic show there’s a trick and simultaneously there is an underlying reality. Buddhism understands that there is an ultimate reality, but with our limited bodies and senses, we’re only able to perceive the ‘trick’, not the underlying reality.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

In the end, when I contemplate this scripture, it means that we do not have to be swayed by so-called reality. Once we understand that, relative reality is exactly that – relative. We don’t have to be dominated by reality. In my day-to-day life reality can sometimes feel overwhelming. When this happens, I take a mental step back and breathe. After doing this, reality kind of fades and seems more tenuous, less solid. It seems, in other words, like exactly what it is: an internal mental representation.

Looked at this way, there’s no question that our experience is internal to us, not external. When the mind is trained, this understanding can lead to a kind of peace. When the mind is at peace, we can plainly see that we don’t have to go with the emotions that reality evokes. Having realized this, we can experience the world in a kind of neutral gear. We can let phenomena come and go with the clarity that our experience is an internal mental representation, and we are free to step back, breathe, and question the experience. This eventually leads to a less agitated and more peaceful mind. Don’t we all want a little more peace in our days?

On reality…
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On reality…

“Such ones do not take anything seen, heard, or thought to be ultimately true or false. But others get attached, thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” Buddha Shakyamuni, Angutarra Nikaya

i. What does this mean to me?

This is a direct quote from the historical Buddha. What did he mean by “such ones”? The Buddha is referring to those who, like him, are enlightened. We call these enlightened ones ‘Buddhas’, which simply means those who are awake.

If we look carefully at the scripture, it’s saying that enlightened ones or ‘Buddhas’ don’t take anything they see, hear, or even think “to be ultimately true or false.” Why not? All that we see, hear or think are internal mental representations. We can understand this by considering how we interact with the known world. There’s no question that we can’t physically fit a dining room table into our head. Even if it’s from a dollhouse, it still won’t fit.

But yet, we know what a dining room table is. How do we know that? Because we’ve seen countless dining room tables. This being the case, we’ve created a mental image and labeled it ‘dining room table’. The same is true of any phenomenon. If you think about windchimes in a mild breeze, you’d hear the sound of windchimes, right?

But is the sound really there at that moment? No. The sound itself is an internal mental representation. With thoughts, it’s a lot easier to understand this. The only interactions we ever have with our thoughts are as internal mental representations. After all, we can’t take a thought out of our head and hold it in the palm of our hand, can we?

If we look back at the verse, this is what the Buddha is saying. Buddhas (those who are awake) understand that all their experience is internal mental representations. This is why Buddhas don’t take anything in their experience to be “ultimately true or false.”

Buddhists are not nihilists. We know there is an external ultimate truth. But due to the limitations of our mind and bodies, we can’t know what it is. Those who are enlightened understand that the internal mental representations we experience are nothing but ideas about what ultimate reality might be. Based on our everyday experience, we can’t say whether or not our internal mental representations reflect some truth about ultimate reality.

The Buddha goes on to say that “others” (those who have not yet realized their own enlightenment) “get attached, thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” All that stops us from realizing our enlightenment are our preconceptions, namely wrong views and afflicted emotions. If, the Buddha is saying, we can resolve just these two things, we will realize the truth of our own enlightenment.

ii. How would I explain this to someone else?

I’d start by asking them to describe a dining room table. If they describe a rectangular table, I’d ask if a dining room table could be round. Of course, the answer is yes. Now there’s a dilemma. Which table is the ‘real’ dining room table? Is it the round one or the rectangular one? This is kind of a trick question. The answer is that neither is the ‘real’ table. We know there is an ultimate truth that ‘dining room table’ refers to, but we don’t know what that ultimate truth is.

The Buddha says that “…others get attached thinking it is the truth, limited by their preconceptions.” In the world as we experience it, there is entropy. Things fall apart. Even people fall apart. The Buddha taught that there are four signs of ultimately reality: true purity, true bliss, true permanence, and true being. I like to add a fifth one to help me understand, “no retrogression”. Ultimate reality is not subject to entropy.

Because entropy is our only experience with ‘reality’, we become attached to this point of view and take it to be the truth of how things are. But ultimate reality is not subject to anything in samsara. In fact we could argue whether or not ultimate reality is part of samsara. It’s not. Samsara is a realm of illusion. Ultimate reality is . . . well . . . real.

iii. How do I bring this into my life?

Samsara gets so much airtime in the mind. It surrounds, inundates and penetrates the mind until through sheer repetition, we believe it to be true.

This is why it’s so important to recite prayer or mantra whenever we can, wherever we can. I have a wonderful new practice (new to me) that helps a great deal. It’s called Ten by Ten. It means ten times a day pause to take ten slow deep breaths. For me, I recite “Ohm” with each in-breath.

I find this helpful because it ‘pokes holes’ in the false reality of samsara. For a few moments at a time, I can focus on just my breath, just rest in the empty luminosity of the mind. And in those fleeting moments I see through the illusion of samsara, a few seconds at a time.

And really, that’s all it takes. Enlightenment is easy. If we can, for any length of time escape the illusion of solidity that samsara imposes, we can see through the illusory quality of samsara. And with this clear seeing, we can experience our true enlightened selves, our own Buddha Nature, if only for a few moments.