Have You Had a Taste Yet?

A thought-provoking passage from a story Yam Gruel by the early 20^th century Japanese writer Akutagawa:

“Yam gruel is a gruel made by boiling slices of yam in a soup of sweet arrow-root.  […]  It was regarded as the supreme delicacy. […]  Accordingly, such lower officials as Goi could taste it only once a year when they were invited as […] guests to the Regent’s Palace. […] On such occasion they could eat no more of it than barely enough to moisten their lips.  So it had been [Goi’s] long-cherished desire to satiate himself with yam gruel.  Of course, he himself did not confide his desire to anyone.  He himself might not have been clearly aware that it had been his life-long wish.  But as a matter of fact, it would hardly be too much to say that he lived for this purpose.  A man sometimes devotes his life to a desire which he is not sure will ever be fulfilled.  Those who laugh at this folly are, after all, no more than mere spectators of life.”

I have but one question for you this morning, but I’ll state it thrice:

Are you aware of what drives you and why? 

What yam gruel are you still chasing?

Have you had a taste of life yet?

Reference:  Rashomon & Other Stories, by Ryunosuke Akutagawa

Before Skin

Before (the origin of) Life, World was naked - not boundless, but unbound; undifferentiated, and it was neither bad nor good.

Euphonious Apophenia

1.
Unsolicited, reality streams.
If your ear’s already trained to the sound of reality, you hear nothing but random noise.
If, however, your ear is epistemologically* still new, you hear marvelous melodies of meaning.
2.
We all start out as equal.
But then we get preferred, selected, chosen.
In: the beautiful (as the mind’s eye sees it)! Out: the ugly!
3.
We keep trying to maximize the signal-to-noise ratio**.
We seek more signal, we seek less noise.
We find more discrimination, we find less harmony.
4.
Reverse the polarity of your preference:
Let the pattern-hunting mind find nothing but noise.
Heal thyself from your euphonious apophenia***.
5.
In: beautiful!
In: ugly!
Out: no difference!

*Epistemology, or theory of knowledge,  is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope (limitations) of knowledge.  It addresses the questions:  What is knowledge?   How is knowledge acquired? What do people know? How do we know what we know?  (source: wiki)

**Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR): is a measure used in science and engineering to quantify how much a signal has been corrupted by noise. It is defined as the ratio of signal power to the noise power corrupting the signal. A ratio higher than 1:1 indicates more signal than noise.  “Signal-to-noise ratio” is sometimes used informally to refer to the ratio of useful information to false or irrelevant data in a conversation or exchange.  (source: wiki)

***Apophenia is the experience of seeing meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data. The term was coined in 1958 by Klaus Conrad who defined it as the “unmotivated seeing of connections” accompanied by a “specific experience of an abnormal meaningfulness.” (source: wiki)

Rascal Grin of the Original Face

I am a rascal grinning at myself in a mirror. (C. Jung, Red Book, p. 241)

Speaking dichotomously, there's form, there's essence, but (speaking non-dichotomously) there's no difference between these two sides of oneness.  Essence = substrate/consciousness.  Form = configuration/informationa/material manifestation.  Form is essence objectified.  Essence is subjectivity of a given form.  When essence sees itself in the mirror of reality (which is itself!) it sees a distortion: the Original Face of Consciousness meets the Rascal Grin of Form.

Of course, none of this is ultimately expressable: as I try to untangle what feels like an intuitive understanding of this dialectic, word-forms grin at the very meaning-essence I am trying to lay out.  No biggie: mind is a leg, it itches for a stroll, so I took it out for a spin around the block (which remains uncarved).

Mahayana School Bus Goes "Oops-Oops, Lets-Lets"

In a House of Consciousness, mind is a guest.
Freedom Turnstile swings, oscillating between half-open and half-closed.
Tenant-self long evicted, no one lives and no one leaves.
Sorrow’s Unknown and so is joy!

Some mind-guests – before me – called it “Gateless Gate.”
Some mind-guests - after me - will walk by in silence.
I – whenever I come to my word-senses – call it "Doorless Door."
Or any other pair of two words that say nothing, you name it...

One thing-less thing for sure:
this I-pod has no re-wind touch-button.
Neither does the Wind of Life that plays the mind-music on it.

Oops: I didn’t mean to give the nameless Nothing a name of something that doesn't apply,
My bad!
- Nah, let’s just Om this naming faux pas away into the endless ether of Uni-verse. One Om-word should clean this right off!
Let’s! Let's!

No nails on chalkboard can stop this lesson: compassion is the way of the Uni-verse.
Ever-expanding, Emptiness has always self-storage for our irrational ego-guilt.
Put differently, an Ocean always embraces a wave of sameness
In a Uni-verse of words any word is kin...

In the meantime, notice the Mahayana school bus pass.
It never stops
because there ain't no Unlearned onboard.
Make this mental note while your mind is still blank:
"Zero-sum double negation is not exactly a nonduality but it is a part of it."
Or, here's the short version of this uni-versal verse:
"All is one, one is all, in deed and non-deed!"
Just as the Bodhisattva bus-driver keeps on om-ing…

Oops-oops, lets-lets.
Mahayana school bus fumes compassion-nonsense
but no karmic exhaust.
Oops-oops, lets-lets.
Mahayana school bus passes by in silence
muffling no plea for understanding...

This isn't a po:em* but a poem.
So, the only space for interpretation is in between letters, not lines.




pavel, dodging Duality School again...

*po:em - a pattern interruption poem, i.e. not a poem

Ouch: Lotus Blossomed!

If you smile long enough,
even the Torturer gives up...
Oldest trick in the book: pain is pleasure.
Trick is: un-trick the difference.
End of po:em* is always the beginning of space:


pavel, counting Sunyata petals, 2 (for difference), 1 (for sameness), 0 (for no difference between 2 and 1)

*po:em - pattern interruption poem, i.e. not a poem

Here are some words of wisdom from Rouzanna Vardanyan re: this po:em, she writes:

"You are actually torturing the Tortutrer with your long enough smile, enough for the Torturer to give up, for he is unable to bear this torture of smile any more...

Sunyata petals i count like this: 1 for torture, 1 for smile, 0 for no difference between them, and 2 for the sameness of the Torturer and me, smiling..."

 

Sometimes a comment says far more than a post, huh?

DJ Dervish

I misunderstood the high of life,
in all of my words, I missed the concept that I am alive for the last time…
No more reincarnations…
No immortality,
no nonduality,
just one shared oblivion of life.
I’m game, I just needed to know what DJ we spin to…


pavel, misunderstanding words into words

DNA of Nonduality

I know you’ve been caught too long polishing a mirror you didn’t want to be reflected in.
Been in that mirror myself, the Polisher.
My slave-Slavic DNA of consciousness tells me:
neither I, the slave, nor my master are what the mirror of Nonduality reflects.
We both, I and my master, are free.
I know that much about not-knowing.



slave (n).
c.1290, "person who is the property of another," from O.Fr. esclave, from M.L. Sclavus "slave" (cf. It. schiavo, Fr. esclave, Sp. esclavo), originally "Slav" (see Slav), so called because of the many Slavs sold into slavery by conquering peoples. (source: etymonline)

The Hunt for Red-Blue October

At a
sub-atomical level
of, course, I am matter.
But at a
sub-atomical level
of, course, I am consciousness.
Is the sub of your meaning diving or resurfacing right now?

Consciousness U-Rail

1.
Intimacy of reality increases 3-D and all-channel
as you get closer to your own origin.
2.
A train of thought runs on tracks, right?
Right.
3.
Question is: who laid these tracks?
To answer this question, un-ask!
4.
Go in reverse: ride the u-rail of metacognition
from thought back to thinker!
5.
Next stop: you.
Self isn't destiny but destination, mind-tourist!


pavel, a stowaway-mind