mistakes by westerners on the Path II

[Guest guest]

Phil Servedio: The most common Errors made by Westerners on the Spiritual Path.

 

Intermediate Mistakes

 

Clinging to a particular goal Westerners

in particular, and western men even more

so, have been trained from early on to

set goals and achieve them. When one takes

up spirituality this mindset is

transferred into the spiritual dimension,

and makes for a neurotic yogi, due to the

self-defeating nature of goal orientation

in spirituality. This only serves to harden and solidify the self-notion and a

subject-object point of view. Spiritual hubris Though this can happen at any

stage,

arrogance really begins to manifest when

one begins to think that they've got the

answer, or is now on top of it, suffused

with new energy, experience and insight.

 

Hubris is often a compensatory mechanism

for low spiritual self-esteem. Hubris for

a beginner: arrogance due to clinging to

a concept or an idea often picked up in

a book or teaching. The speaks to the

folly of knowledge based undertanding -

one such example is if one reads that

" It's all perfect from the start " as in

the Dzogchen or Taoist tradition, and assumes that s/he has " got it " , and

starts preaching to friends.

 

Hubris for the intermediate: arrogance

due to the identification with experience

and insight, trying to own wisdom as an

ego*. Hubris for the advanced: arrogance

due to the identification with a

realization that is not complete, but is

mistaken to be complete. Wanting to take

whatever level of realization that has

occurred and cash in in some way for the

purposes of ego gratification, monetary gain, etc. Castenada's Don Juan said

that

one of the obstacle to a man ok knowledge

is 'clarity'. Or identification with realization as referred to by " the

stink of Zen " .

 

Confusing intellectual understanding that

one is aware with wisdom The mere intellectual knowledge that 'awareness is

aware of awareness' only cuts so deep,

and clinging to that concept or insight

is an obstruction to a real spiritual breakthrough. Knowledge is not the

Witness nor is it Rigpa. Confusing

attention with Non-dual Awareness This is

a big one, based on a misunderstanding

of what is expressed in many non-dual traditions. While non-dual awareness and

ordinary awareness are not different,

the functioning of both are worlds apart.

 

Ordinary awareness is bound to the view

and misunderstanding of a substantive

subject viewing external reality, whereas

the arrival of non-dual awareness signals

the end of this misunderstanding, spontaneously and effortless abides in

itself, as itself even in the midst of objective appearances. Confusing a quiet

mind with Witness Consciousness or Rigpa

 

This is the classic mistake of assuming shamatha alone will bring about

realization and liberation without the radical insight of vipassana.

 

People mistake the goal as being a quiet mind, whereas a mind free of discursive

thoughts is only the context from which radical insight can occur within a

gradual process. For sudden schools the notion of a quiet mind is bypassed. But

nevertheless, goal orientation for a quiet

mind is itself more generation of mind,

it has to be let go of. Awareness has to

become self-knowing and self-aware from

the deepest point of being and unbound

at source point (the causal body).

 

The " I " must no longer exclusively be

assumed to exist as a 'point' or to be locatable; self-imputation has to be

uprooted. Believing wisdom is seated in knowledge Having gained some experiences

and insight through engagement in the spiritual process, there still may lurk

an underlying belief that innate wisdom

is borne of acquiring knowledge. This is

a result of the misunderstanding that

wisdom is not inherent but must be sought.

 

Relying upon external source is simply

being a parrot of someone else's understanding. The pundit error.

 

Believing realization is seated in

experience Gaining experience over time,

and noticing that those experiences are

characterized by joy, bliss or love, one

extrapolates that realization is some

kind of supreme experience, not

understanding that the whole imputation

of a separate someone or entity having an

experience has to be dismantled.

 

Attachment to bliss, joy and ascendancy

Life is full of such difficulties and suffering so much of the time, that it

can't be helped that when experiences of

bliss or joy occur, or other forms of

relief from the karmic burden, people will

spend enormous amounts of energy trying

to get back to that experience from

memory and if this is actually

accomplished, to try to make it permanent.

 

Insight into the nature of clinging has

to be discovered to see that this

attachment is solidifying elements of existence that have no fundamental

substance. Another stategy regarding bliss

is wanting to get out of here, not taking

responsibility for being an adult in an adult world, and embodying the puer

aeternus Peter Pan archetype that wants

to use the spiritual to fly away from

painful or ordinary life experience.

 

 

This is another kind of throwback into wombness, or a great misunderstanding

regarding spirituality: that somehow we

must become child-like in all ways, a

classic " pre-trans " fallacy as

elucidated by Ken Wilber.

 

Summarily this is just another form of avoidance and aversion. Mistaking

analytical mind for non-dual awareness

As one gains insight over time, there

still may be an underlying assumption that

one's capacity for analysis and deconstruction be either identical to

or will lead to non-dual awareness.

 

There is still an extant clinging to

mental forms which must be transcended. Believing that practice will result in

enlightenment in a linear cause and

effect fashion When one discovers a

teacher, teaching or tradition that seems

to bear some fruit, one may throw him or

herself into the associated practice

hoping that it will eventually produce an enlightened happy self, sort of like a

spiritual assembly line. This kind of " formula consciousness " is a kind of

orientation that speaks of subtle

avoidance.

 

One may hope to get through the hard

parts by doing spiritual techniques that

will hopefully avoid having to look too closely at oneself or avoid any form of

unpleasantness.

 

The reliance upon a formula for

realization is at the root a

misunderstanding about the spiritual

process and realization itself, and

another form of subtle avoidance.

 

Believing that practice cannot result

in or, in fact, prevents realization

This is a classic error that is also very

popular. After reading about or understanding to some degree that

realization cannot be caused, one jumps

to the conclusion that any attempts at spiritual practice are utterly useless

or

harmful since realization is beyond

cause and effect. This is a one-sided argument based upon a severe lack of

understanding regarding spiritual process.

 

While realization is not caused by any

means, there is much practice needed

for most people to lay a foundation in

order for that realization to take fruit.

 

As someone said, " realization is an accident, meditation makes you accident

prone " . This is also a " sudden school "

point of view that people latch onto, thinking that they have understood

something profound, all the while using

their new found philosophy as means for

the avoidance of vulnerability and commitment to spiritual growth, as well

as avoiding the potential difficulties

that may occur in the midst of a life of

practice.

 

Advanced Mistakes (When I get advanced

I'll certainly add more!) Mistaking the

void state for the nature of self, mind,

existence Profound experiences may occur

when, by the ripening of the fruit of

the spritual process, or just by blind

dumb luck. One of these kinds of

experiences is when all objective

phenomena disappears, and one lands in

a void state, de-void of all content,

gross or subtle. While this is wonderful,

it is only a temporary state of an

extreme, and one may confuse various

void experiences for the nature of mind.

 

There is at the very least a lack of resolution with objective phenomena which

will still be an obstruction from

abiding in the nature of all. I've got

it: owning realization The nature of

the spiritual process is that there are degrees and levels of realization, and

it appears, in my opinion, that the difference of degree is a function of

the level of karmic purification that

an individual has undergone. The level

or type of realization is often based

upon the kinds of transmissions that a

person has been subject to in his or her search. And the ego mechanism may not

be

totally purified when realization

occurs; otherwise only Buddhas would be realizers, having undergone complete

purification.

 

So the process of identification, a

function of ego may be intact, and

forgetting the basic understanding that

there is no partcular one whom can be realized, one may identify with the

transformation that a realization

engenders.

 

This becomes yet another obstruction

and will result in a loss of that realization. I've lost it When the

" I've got it " sets in, in due time the

opposite of that will occur, as

everything in the phenomenal realm calls

in its opposite. Even if some profound realization has occurred, if one is not

rooted in a clear understanding and

view, the unenlightened view that there

is a substantive self that can take ownership will inevitably appear.

 

Believing that disassocation of conscisousness from objects is full realization

Part of the process of realization is to recognize the inherency

of consciousness, and this may occur in stages. At one point, some may become

adept at entering great empty spaces

with no content or other seemingly

profound experiences, and may assume

that a profound realization has occured.

 

Fixating upon the absolute to the

exclusion of the relative When someone

has undergone a breakthrough in

consciousness and can naturally

re-cognize the absolute nature of self

and of all existence, a tendency can

arise to attempt to identify solely

with the absolute to the exclusion of

the relative. But despite the most

profound realization, someone has to pay

the rent and pay the tax man.

 

Relative reality cannot be so easily dismissed except perhaps by the most

adept realizers. Assuming any perception, however subtle (even non-perceptions)

are

" it " The Nirvana ( " Nibbana " ** ) Sutra

and The Shurangama Sutra of Gautama

Buddha are, IMO, glorious and superb expositions of mistakes made by more

advanced practitioners on the spiritual

path regarding subtle perceptions and mistaking extremely profound experiences

and realizations for full enlightenment.

The Shurangama Sutra lists 50 ways in

which such an error can be made.

 

from: http://www.heartspace.org part I

http://www.geocities.com/mi_nok/mistake.html

 

~ Karta at self_realization_dialogues ~