Bodhisatva Vows- #2

These series of sketches were taken from a journal of mine done in 1983  while i was in transition in between Green Bay, Wisconsin and Sandpoint , Alaska. Most of these were random doodling of whatever the mind had to puke out at the moment in time. Some reflects time and space while others were done from a head filled with liquor of dope. but all were done just to fill the empty spaces of my imagination or to simply justify my existence. I tried to never let a moment go by without a sketch to remind me of it.. if nothing else it cures boredom..

The second of the Bodhisatva vows states; DELUSIONS ARE INEXHAUSTABLE, I VOW TO  END THEM!

'The doctrine of Buddhism is a finger pointing at the moon. Do not mistake the finger for the moon.' Or so we might say in the West, the idea of God is a finger pointing at God, but what most people do is instead of following the finger, they suck it for comfort. And so buddha chopped off the finger, and undermined all metaphysical beliefs. There are many, many dialogues in the Pali scriptures where people try to corner the buddha into a metaphysical position. 'Is the world eternal?' The buddha says nothing. 'Is the world not eternal?' And he answers nuttin'. 'Is the world both eternal and not eternal?' And he don't say nuttin'. 'Is the world neither eternal nor not eternal?' And STILL he don't say nuttin'. He maintains what is called the noble silence. Sometimes called the thunder of silence, because this silence, this metaphysical silence, is not a void. It is very powerful. This silence is the open window through which you can see not concepts, not ideas, not beliefs, but the very goods. But if you say what it is that you see, you erect an image and an idol, and you misdirect people. It's better to destroy people's beliefs than to give them beliefs. I know it hurts, but it is The Way. ( Alan Watts ) 

According to most religious belief we are living in a dream a world of illusions and fantasies . A world that our deluded minds have a hand in creating and this has been going on for a long long time since ...Well sometimes we wake up from this ignorance through one form of help or another like getting a kick in the butt or winning a lottery or having someone very close to one dies on you. Then fo a moment in time you become wide awake to the reality that has confronted you and all your perception or the mind created ideas you have accumulated to be the truth falls apart at least temporarily and what you have is an awakening, rude or otherwise.

It is usually the job of the Bodhisatva to show you the way like a guardian angel making sure that you do not fall too deeply into the illusion created by this deluded mind of yours a mind that mistakes the finger for the moon. This is the mind  that is trapped with the idea of a 'self within' somewhere, a self that is experiencing this life that is reading and writing, that is making all kinds of judgments and clinging on to all kinds of thoughts and ideas. The Bodhisatva is the guy who shift your gear into the right speed so that you do not grind your engine to a halt. He is the guy who hand you a napkin when you are about to make a mess throwing up in public, he is the guy who slap your back so you dont choke to death. 

The Buddha has already pointed out to humanity that life is  suffering and that  suffering is because of desire  but most of us fail to see the connection or refuse to accept the truth of the matter and we would rather go about our business as though there is not a thing to worry about until there is... this is true especially if we are on a roll. We are well off and everything seems as it should be for us and we become attach to who we are simply because of this, until again shit happens as it often does in this fleeting life of ours. 

Delusions or ignorance are in-exhaustible  , like weeds ever sprouting  as soon as  the field is left alone and I vow to end them, I aim to root them out by their roots so that there is no chance of them ever sprouting again. To put the mind to rest is a lifelong effort and by Buddhist standard would take many a lifetimes of incarnation. But the Buddha suggested three basic methods of Dyana or meditation, contemplation and cannot remember the third one but its there. 

 But the great vehicle shows people that nirvana is not different from everyday life. So that when you have reached nirvana, if you think 'Now I have attained it, now I have succeeded, now I have caught the secret of the universe, and I am at peace,' you have only a false peace. You have become a stone buddha. You have a new illusion of the changeless. So it is said that such a person is a pratyeka-buddha. That means 'private buddha.' 'I've got it all for myself.' And in contrast with this kind of pratyeka- buddha, who gains nirvana and stays there, the Mahayanas use the word _bodhisattva_. 'Sattva' means 'essential principle'; 'bodhi,' awakening. A person whose essential being is awakened. The word used to mean 'junior buddha,' someone on the way to becoming a buddha. But in the course of time, it came to mean someone who had attained buddhahood, who had reached nirvana, but who returns into everyday life to deliver everyday beings. This is the popular idea of a bodhisattva--a savior. 

"So they revere those bodhisattvas as the saviors, come back into the world to deliver all beings. But there is a more esoteric interpretation of this. The bodhisattva returns into the world. That means he has discovered that you don't have to go anywhere to find nirvana. Nirvana is where you are, provided you don't object to it. In other words, change--and everything is change; nothing can be held on to--to the degree that you go with a stream, you see, you are are still, you are flowing with it. But to the degree you resist the stream, then you notice that the current is rushing past you and fighting you. So swim with it, go with it, and you're there. You're at rest. And this is of course particularly true when it comes to those moments when life really seems to be going to take us away, and the stream of change is going to swallow us completely. The moment of death, and we think, 'Oh-oh, this is it. This is the end.' And so at death we withdraw, say 'No, no, no, not that, not yet, please.' " Alan Watts

"So the bodhisattva saves all beings, not by preaching sermons to them, but by showing them that they are delivered, they are liberated, by the act of not being able to stop changing. You can't hang on to yourself. You don't have to try to not hang on to yourself. It can't be done, and that is salvation. That's why you may think it a grisly habit, but certain monks keep skulls on their desks, 'momentomori,' 'be mindful of death.' Gurgdjieff says in one of his books that the most important thing for anyone to realize is that you and every person you see will soon be dead. It sounds so gloomy to us, because we have devised a culture fundamentally resisting death. There is a wonderful saying that Anandakuri- Swami[?] used to quote: 'I pray that death will not come and find me still unannihilated.' In other words, that man dies happy if there is no one to die. In other words, if the ego's disappeared before death caught up to him."
Alan Watts