Thursday 11 September 2014

red coat



several days ago, maybe three or four, I was just kneeling down with my face pretty much into the seat of the chair like I often do as a sort of "meditation posture" that is reasonably comfortable

i'm not sure what happened, I was tired, but suddenly there was this most intense vision of a man in a very impressive uniform/coat, maybe something like the royals in the 1966 alice in wonderland, but not quite like that, maybe not a uniform, who knows, but it very red and the vision was like incredibly detailed, hyper real, more vivid and detailed than any thing in real life . . .

he was very angry at me and sort of railed and gesticulated

I'm sure it's a vision, it had that sorta "timelessness"

RED is a very significant colour, sorta an aspect of infinity that requires our effort and I am taking the vision to mean that infinity is unhappy with the way my life is going, all the endless hours into reddit zen and writing in a way I guess, it's hard for me to be critical of what I am doing, but I think reddit zen for instance is turning my writing and attention in a certain direction, less of the pure poetic and more of a certain philosophical fragmentation . . .

well I am certainly thinking about it and perhaps have a better grip on reddit zen . . . .

it is "buji zen", you just can't stop it, there's just new people constantly piling in without any sort of contemplative background and it's just a different road, posturing with verbal bullshit, as rigid as donkeys . . .

well that's because they are . . . ! :o)

but my introduction to zen was through "the story of the stone/dream of the red chamber" and weekly zen meditation sits and a sesshin retreat with john loori at the end of the year, very different, there was something real and the origin creates an entirely different trajectory,

the fact is these people on reddit zen come from a different road and can never cross into anything w o r t h w h I l e

anyway the man in the beautiful red coat and clothes is upsetting and a little frightening (infinity can be a b i t c h) so I am . . .

9 comments:

  1. I don't know why, but I think it was Arthur Rimbaud.

    "I'm now making myself as scummy as I can. Why? I want to be a poet, and I'm working at turning myself into a seer. You won't understand any of this, and I'm almost incapable of explaining it to you. The idea is to reach the unknown by the derangement of all the senses. It involves enormous suffering, but one must be strong and be a born poet. It's really not my fault.[69][70]"

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    1. in the end he gave it up and went into business as a pioneer of the coffee trade in harar, ethiopa !

      tho his relationship with verlaine might do that to anyone ! :o)

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  2. My acquaintance who was diagnosed with some kind of mental illness has these kind of visions, she calls it "the other world". I think there is a connection between enlightenment and what is called "psychosis". It's a difficult subject, but there is something to it. It's possible that "meditation" only works in a certain way on people who have a predisposition for psychosis. I understand psychosis to be a radical disconnect from the "group mind"... So what is the relationship between buddha and madman? And what is a madman, beyond something socially unacceptable, something useless, something the herd has no need of? Could it be that the olden times had a special place for people inclined towards what we call mental illness? Instead of treating it like a sickness, they saw it as a spiritual problem? And the solution thereof lead to some kind of permanent psychosis called enlightenment? The problem with psychosis is that most people aren't able to function in society normally... but some are able to keep a "healthy" relationship between their psychosis and their normal life - which enables them to balance "this world" and "the other world".

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj7GmeSAxXo

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    1. "It's possible that "meditation" only works in a certain way on people who have a predisposition for psychosis"

      I have always wondered about that because no-one else seems to get from meditation what I got !

      i'm always in a different world and really it's all I am interested in, reality only intrudes and needs attention to keep from getting 'sacrificed" to the moron world and its needs one way or another !

      as you say a lot of what is called "buji zen" is really a denial that this "other world" is enlightenment and perhaps more than just slackness "buji" is a reluctance to throw away "normality" and step into the true surreal . . .

      that's a thoughtful post thanks ! :o)

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    2. I'm sorry, but I'm not willing to go that far. You can call me a scoundrel for all I care.

      I do not respect shit like Shamanism, Paganism, or superstition, and psychosis is indeed very real. It is just a gameshow pointing to no deeper reality in their cases.

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    3. sepehr, what is scary about visions is what they tell you and how one's brain can see so clearly what the situation is when as a person we don't have that view !

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    4. I think we have to distinguish from the fake visions from the real visions.

      I'm pretty sure you've had genuine ones, yeah.

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    5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sMXd5v1hzc

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