Zen Enlightenment

Zen and Enlightenment Zen (the Zen sect) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism, which is regarded as having been adopted in China from India by Daruma (Bodhidharma), a well-known monk of the era. Zen was introduced to Japan in the Kamakura period, and developed under the protection of the Muromachi Shogunate during the Muromachi period. Zen and Enlightenment Zen (the Zen sect) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism, which is regarded as having been adopted in China from India by Daruma (Bodhidharma), a well-known monk of the era. Zen was introduced to Japan in the Kamakura period, and developed under the protection of the Muromachi Shogunate during the Muromachi period.

ZEN ENLIGHTENMENTAND THE ART OF TYING SHOES. ZEN ENLIGHTENMENT. AND THE ART OF TYING SHOES. Have you ever heard an old Zen saying that goes something like: 'When you are hungry, eat. When you are tired, rest. When you are cold, put on extra flannel.' I’m intrigued by Zen meditation as a supposed path to enlightenment. I’ve tried repeatedly—lying silent in bed, blanking out my mind, hearing nothing but the rhythm of my breathing, seeing nothing but dark blurs behind my eyelids. But all it does is put me to sleep. In the end, I never get a smi. Zen Enlightenment There are five schools of Zen; however, the two most prominent are the Rinzai and the Soto. The others are the Ummon, the Ikyo and the Hogen schools. The Rinzai stresses very sudden illumination, the use of koans and various “teaching” methods of the Roshi, such as striking a novice.

CHIYONO: No Moon, No Water

Over and over, for centuries and in one form or the other, the question has been asked, 'How does one go about triggering the the fruitations of the Enlightenment-experience as suggested by the ancients in the Sutras and so forth, so that the resultant outcome of that fruitation IS that which IS Enlightenment?' How does the 'mind get ripe,' 'how does the bottom of the pail break through?' In other words:

Answers and attempted answers to that question have been forthcoming for just as many centuries. 0ne would suspect, considering all the formidable personages that have approached the question, that by now an end-all, conclusive response would have been formulated. Such it seems, has not been the case. Tying Your Shoes, which you should read even if you go no further, probably gives as potentially succulent inkling to a possible answer as anything. Otherwise, for myself, I have unfolded a variety of 'responses' on occasion depending on the circumstances and the nature and background of of the person posing the question. For the most part it usually boils down to a fairly simple Nutshell of a procedure not unlike what is presented below.

Before moving on, however, you might be asking yourself another question: Why even consider what is offered here? The following quote may clarify your reasoning --- as well as mine:

'THOSE WHO HAVE NOT ATTAINED AWAKENING SHOULD PENETRATE INTO THE MEANING OF REALITY, WHILE THOSE WHO HAVE ALREADY ATTAINED SHOULD PRACTICE GIVING VERBAL EXPRESSION TO THAT REALITY' (source)

• First, until you have developed some expertise and knowledge of the Way, it is suggested you shy away from any formal or established group, Zendo, Sangha, or person with or without a following claiming to be a Guru of one sort or another...and especially so if they want you to put in any free labor, time, money, or buy something from them.
  
• Second, take some time and seriously consider the possibility of enrolling in a secular yoga class in a community college, recreation department, or adult education setting to learn proper breathing and sitting without all the bells, candles, and rituals, find a convenient power spot (discussed later), and practice meditation on your own.
  
• Third, search out read, ingest, and absorb anything written by Nagarjuna or Dogen because all of their works were written post-Enlightenment. According to tradition Nagarjuna is the fourteenth in succession in linage from the Buddha and Dogen is the Twenty-fourth Zen Patriarch in succession from Bodhidharma, which is neither here nor there. Both Nagarjuna and Dogen are cited extensively throughout the offerings presented in Awakening 101 (the above two links you can click through).
  
• Fourth, read all one-hundred koans and their commentaries in the Blue Cliff Record and all forty-eight koans and their commentaries in the Mumonkan over and over until you are blue in the face...but ALWAYS read them by never taking your mind's eye off what you find by going to and reading Mu
  
• Finally, read the following three books on Sri Maharshi Ramana titled:
  • Be As You Are: The Teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi
  • Ramana Maharshi and the Path of Self-Knowledge
  • The Spiritual Teaching of Ramana Maharshi

  because for the most part, in easy question and answer format they get around all the Typical Zen Bull. All three books can be accessed online, free in PDF format by clicking HERE.

An old saying goes: We are the results of what we were; we will be the results of what we are. If the above endeavors are coupled with an escort of the right intent the outcome WILL be favorable. A Pali text called The Anguttara says it best:

'It cannot come to pass that the fruit of a deed well-done by the body, speech, and thought should have for a result that which is unpleasant, hateful or distasteful. But that it should be otherwise is quite possible.'(source)

What is important to take into mind of course, considering the above, is having set into motion the correct set of principals in the past, so the fruit beared from those endeavors would be impacting one's present. To have that present be a positive experience my own mentor's suggestion, extracted from the sutras, went something like:

1.) From the first generate only thoughts with the right escort.

2.) Support right thoughts already risen.

3.) From where thoughts arise, generate no thoughts that carry negative escort.

4.) Dispel any negative thoughts already risen.(source)

It is often said that when a teacher is truly needed, one will appear. This may due to some inexplicable serendipity. It may be due to the fact that the seeker has searched deeply within himself or herself and determined what sort of instruction seems to be required. It could be swept over him or her similar to the events abscribed to the First Death Experience of the Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, or the Bhagavan's little known Second Death Experience wherein in both cases Ramana's Guru was possibly somewhat more ethereal in concept than physical.

It could be a mere spark that ignites a spiritual fire within or a spiritual desperation on the part of the seeker. It may be a combination of the previous factors, or some intuitive awareness beyond expression. The coming together of the results of inner and outside forces, some within one's control, some without, some with a teacher, some without, but, more often than not, for whatever the reason, the saying is found to apply.

Merely looking at the guru and receiving the guru's glance has been shown over and over to manifest an ability to transfer an immense spiritual energy, which CAN profoundly transform one's consciousness. On the Indian side of things the blessings communicated through being in the presence of a holy person is called Darshan. Generally speaking Darshan is similar in respect to the role that Dokusan plays in Zen and Buddhism, albeit while Dokusan is typically a more formal meeting in a more formal setting, it still basically came up through the system from Indian tradition.

However, it cannot be stressed enough, the whole secret --- if there is a secret or if it can be called a secret --- to Enlightenment is for the MIND TO BE RIPE. To ensure such one should endeavor to consider incorporating the above four precepts into their repertoire until they all become a unified natural, fully ingrained second nature of one's being. It could take a long time or no time at all.

For those who just won't take the suggestion of one's 'mind being ripe' I direct them toward the Enlightenment ordeal of a once-removed Sri Ramama follower

MATHRU SRI SARADA

COMMENTARY ON THE TEACHINGS OF RAMANA MAHARSHI

HEADSPACE OR CALM FOR MEDITATION: NEEDED OR NOT NEEDED?

RESTITCHING THE HOLE IN THE FABRIC OF SPACE-TIME

Want to find out if the Spiritual Guide, Teacher, or Guru you like, want, or have selected is right for you --- or if the one you already have can cut it or meet spiritual leader guidelines? See:

CODE OF ETHICS FOR SPIRITUAL GUIDES

SPIRITUAL GUIDES: PASS OR FAIL?

FALSE GURU TEST

As for myself, in what I feel is a close analogy, the following by British author and playwright W. Somerset Maugham as found in his novel The Razor's Edge writing about the American spiritual traveler Larry Darrell as he sought and reached Enlightenment during the post war period:

'He has no desire for fame. To become anything of a public figure would be deeply distasteful to him; and so it may be that he is satisfied to lead his chosen life and be no more than just himself. He is too modest to set himself up as an example to others; but it may be he thinks that a few uncertain souls, drawn to him like moths to a candle, will be brought in time to share his own glowing belief that ultimate satisfaction can only be found in the life of the spirit, and that by himself following with selflessness and renunciation the path of perfection he will serve as well as if he wrote books or addressed multitudes.'

THIRTY MINUTES TO ZEN ENLIGHTENMENT

ENLIGHTENED INDIVIDUALS I'VE MET

SRI RAMANA'S WESTERN DISCIPLES

STEVE JOBS

BHAGAVAN DAS

THE WANDERLING AND WIKIPEDIA

DOING HARD TIME IN A ZEN MONASTERY

Fundamentally, our experience as experienced is not different from the Zen master's. Where
we differ is that we place a fog, a particular kind of conceptual overlay onto that experience
and then make an emotional investment in that overlay, taking it to be 'real' in and of itself.

As to the subject of donations, for those of you who may be interested in doing so as it applies to the gratefulness of my works, I invariably suggest any funds be directed toward THE WOUNDED WARRIOR PROJECT and/or THE AMERICAN RED CROSS.

ZEN ENLIGHTENMENT AND THE SOUND OF ONE SHOE TYING

NAGARJUNA

If you are an old hand at searching into 'How do I get Enlightened' or brand new, the whole Enlightenment thing can get complicated the more you read and the deeper you get into it's history and how to go about the variety of methods dissipating the veil shrouding the light of Enlightenment. In that search, it usually boils down to two major divisions, the Buddhist version and the Indian version. For Enlightenment the main Buddhist thrust is of course, Zen. The Indian version is typically related to what is called Advaita. Both main catagories break down into several branches, each with their own set of rules to follow if you expect to reach your final goal. In the quote below there is a mention of Nagarjuna and in the main text above I mention Nagarjuna as well. When you clicked that link and you came to this footnote you were most likely expecting to go to a Nagarjuna page. The link that will do that is at the bottom, but first I would hope you would indulge me a on the below quote --- which is a little too much to shoehorn into the Nutshell version, but highly relevant in the long run. Thank you.

The following quote by Tiruvannamalai-based Kevinandaji, whose stuff I absolutely love but whose blog is a major bane and thorn in the side of a good portion of the hawk Enlightenment crowd, will put into perspective what I present for those who may be so interested because, as Kevinandaji presents it, so closely parallels my perfume on the subject that if I were to write it myself there might be copyright infringements:

'Traditional and Gaudapadian Advaita have failed to address the arguments of Madhyamaka Buddhism. This too is the legacy of Gaudapada's political formulation of Advaita. We know that Gaudapada borrowed from theMadhymakans and reinterpreted their thesis of non-origination without crediting them. Unlike the Sarvastivadin and Yogacarin positions, the Madhyamaka teaching of non-origination was not nihilist. Its main teachers Nagarjuna and Candrakirti - now classified as Prasangika Madhyamaka - rejected outright both nihilism and eternalism. They advocated instead a new interpretation of the Buddha's Middle Way which says (as modern theoretical physics confirms) that absolutes are impossible. There cannot truly be any enlightenment, Self or Brahman to attain - nor can there truly be any jiva, 'I' or method to attain it. This position does not say 'no I' or 'no method'. It says all things including the person exist as empty, co-dependent arisings which are neither totally existent nor totally non-existent. Methods may happen, methods may not - what happens simply happens - and whether someone practises a method or not is completely irrelevant ...'(see)

Historicly Gaudapada is considered the teacher-guru of Govinda. Govinda inturn, is said to have been the teacher-guru of Shankara --- Shankara being the main bigtime heavyweight dude behind Advaita Vedanta as it has come down to us today. As Kevinandaji points out in the above quote, Gaudapada borrowed from the Madhymakans and reinterpreted their thesis of non-origination without crediting them. While the non-crediting is valid, researchers and scholars on Gaudapada seem to think how and what he has presented his works indicates a strong familiarity with Buddhism both in language and doctrine. Many of those same researchers and scholars seem to think he was originally a Buddhist and simply brought his philosophy with him.

So, what is being said, whichever of the two you seek to use to contribute toward your 'mind being ripe,' if you seek either, they are in the end, based in common roots. All the bells and whistles are just exterrnal trappings like the plumage of the peacock --- to attract you --- that is, if you are a peacock.

Painting legs on a snake won't make it traverse the ground any better or reach it's goal any faster.

• NAGARJUNA
  
• HUI NENG
  
• BHAGAVAN SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI
  

• BE AS YOU ARE: THE TEACHINGS OF SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI
  
• RAMANA MAHARSHI AND THE PATH OF SELF-KNOWLEDGE
  
• THE SPIRITUAL TEACHING OF RAMANA MAHARSHI
  

Since a great deal of what I would like to conjure up regarding 'reading,' the necessity of reading, and any of my suggested books hoping for you to read, et al, parallels much of what has been stated quite adequately in the above few paragraphs, rather than ending up in a potential copyright infringement rights discussion by saying almost the exact same thing in the exact same words --- or remake the (Dharma) wheel saying the same thing by reshuffling the paragraph's words --- I have, with some very minor editing for our purposes here, extrapolated the above from a rather lengthy stand-alone article that covers much of the same area, and well worth reading just on it's own, by leading up to and out of the subject matter.(see)

If you have gone to the Nagarjuna footnote(see) most of the above question would have been answered. You would also have read about Gaudapada. For all practical purposes Gaudapada, if not the father of, he is the prime inline ancestor in the formulation of Advaita Vedanta. The footnote also has the following which sort of sets the stage for Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta being tied very close together in more ways than one:

'(R)esearchers and scholars on Gaudapada seem to think how and what he has presented his works indicates a strong familiarity with Buddhism both in language and doctrine. Many of those same researchers and scholars seem to think he was originally a Buddhist and simply brought his philosophy with him.'

ALL IS ILLUSION?
A Chinese-Indian Dichotomy In Advaita and Zen

MADHYMAKANS

You can also 'borrow' a copy of the book to read free through Archive.org's online lending library. You do not get a book in the classical sense as if you borrowed in from a traditional library, but an online version you are given a certain time to read via your computer. To find out more click HERE

Be advised, if you search online for a PDF version, that you are not instead finding yourself in a search quagmire and or end up with the wrong book with a similar title. The Ramana book I make reference to, 'The spiritual teaching of Ramana Maharshi,' has within it's opening and is clearly marked as having a forward written by C.G. Jung. If the book does not have a forward by Jung then it is not the book you are looking for.

• WILLIAM SOMERSET MAUGHAM
  Good biography. Lots of Maugham graphics, from early childhood to late adult.
  
• W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM: A BIOGRAPHY
  
• MAUGHAM
  
• MAUGHAM IN INDIA
  
• LITERARY AMBULANCE DRIVERS
  Everybody knows Hemingway drove an ambulance during WWI, nobody knows Maugham did.
  
• THE ART COLLECTION OF W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM
  

SPIRITUAL GUIDES, GURUS, AND TEACHERS INFLUENTIAL IN THE RAZOR'S EDGE:

• BHAGAVAN SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI
• SWAMI RAMDAS
• YASUTANI HAKUUN ROSHI
• FATHER ENSHEIM
  Includes a section on the missing years of the Razor's Edge

Mysticism has been on my mind again lately, in part because of the success of Why Buddhism Is True by my friend Robert Wright. During a mystical experience, you feel as though you are encountering absolute reality, whatever the hell that is. Wright explores the possibility that meditation can induce powerful mystical states, including the supreme state known as enlightenment.

I ventured into this territory in my 2003 book Rational Mysticism. I interviewed people with both scholarly and personal knowledge of mystical experiences. One was the Buddhist teacher Stephen Batchelor, a profile of whom I just posted. Another was a professor of philosophy who prefers to remain anonymous. I’ll call him Mike. I didn’t tell Mike’s story in Rational Mysticism, but I’m going to tell it now, because it sheds light on enlightenment.

Before I met Mike, I read an article in which he claimed to have achieved a mystical state devoid of object, subject, or emotion. It occurred in 1972, while he was on a meditation retreat. “I had been meditating alone in my room all morning,” Mike recalls,

when someone knocked on my door. I heard the knock perfectly clearly, and upon hearing it I knew that, although there was no “waking up” before hearing the knock, for some indeterminate length of time prior to the knocking I had not been aware of anything in particular. I had been awake but with no content for my consciousness. Had no one knocked I doubt that I would ever have become aware that I had not been thinking or perceiving.

Mike decided that he had experienced what the Hindu sage Shankara called “unconsciousness.” Mike’s description of his experience, which he called a 'pure consciousness event,” baffled me. Can this be the goal of spiritual seeking? To experience not bliss or profound insights but literally nothing? And if you really experience nothing, how can you remember the experience? How do you emerge from this state of oblivion back into ordinary consciousness? How does an experience of nothing promote a sense of spirituality?

Mike, it turned out, lived in a town on the Hudson River not far from my own. Like me, he was married and had kids. I called and told him I was writing a book about mysticism, and he agreed to meet me to talk about his experiences. On a warm spring day in 1999 we met for lunch at a restaurant near his home. Mike had a ruddy complexion, thinning hair, and a scruffy, reddish-brown beard. Eyeing me suspiciously he said, “A friend of mine warned me that I shouldn’t talk to people like you.” His friend’s advice is sound, I replied, journalists are not to be trusted. Mike laughed and seemed to relax (which of course was my insidious intent).

Grilling me about my attitudes toward mysticism, he compulsively completed my sentences for me. I said that when I first heard about enlightenment, my impression was that it changes your entire personality, transforming you into... “A saint,” Mike said. Yes, I continued. But now I suspected that you can have very deep mystical awareness and still be... “An asshole,” Mike said. “So that's what you want to think about?” he continued, scrutinizing me. “You want to think about whether enlightenment is really all that cool?”

Mike’s edginess lingered as he began telling me about himself. Especially when instructing me on fine points of Hinduism or other mystical doctrines, he spoke with an ironic inflection, mocking his own pretensions. His fascination with enlightenment dated back to the late 1960’s, when he was an undergraduate studying philosophy and became deeply depressed. He tried psychotherapy and Zen, but nothing worked until he started practicing Transcendental Meditation in 1969. Introduced to the west by the Indian sage Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Transcendental Meditation involves sitting with eyes closed while repeating a phrase, or mantra.

“It was magic, hugely effective,” Mike said of TM. Over the next decade, he became involved in the TM organization. “I hung out with Maharishi a fair amount.” He distanced himself from the TM movement after it began offering seminars on occult practices, notably levitation. “I did that technique,” Mike said. “It was an interesting experience, but it sure as hell wasn't levitating.” The Maharishi also proposed that the brain waves emitted by large groups of meditators could reduce crime rates and even warfare. “I thought it was silly,” Mike said, “and I didn't want to be identified with it.”

Mike pursued a doctorate in philosophy in the early 1980’s so that he could defend intellectually what he knew to be true experientially: Through meditation we can gain access to realms of reality that transcend time and space, culture, and individual identity. Yes, as William James documented, mystical visions vary, but mystics from many different traditions, including Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, and Judaism, have described experiences that are devoid of content. These are what Mike calls pure consciousness events.

“If you say all crows are black, all it takes is one white crow and you've blown the thesis,” Mike said. “We got a whole range of these white crows.” Mike noted that if he and I described the restaurant in which we were eating, our descriptions would almost certainly diverge, even though we were seeing the same restaurant. Shankara, Meister Eckhart, and the Zen master Dogen described their pure consciousness events in different ways, but they were experiencing the same deep reality.

Our conversation then took an unexpected turn. I said I was mystified by the notion that enlightenment is nothing more than a “pure consciousness event.”

“That's not enlightenment!” Mike interrupted. He stared at me, and when he continued he spoke in clipped, precise tones, as if trying to physically embed his words in my brain. The pure consciousness event is just a stepping-stone, at best, to true enlightenment. Pure consciousness events and other mystical states are “fascinating, interesting, very cool things. But they are shifts in perception, not shifts in the structure of perception. And that's, I think, when things get very interesting, when structural shifts take place.”

Mike held up his water glass. Normally, he said, when you look at an object like this glass, you sense a distinction between the object and yourself. He set the glass down, grabbed my pen from my hand, and scribbled on his napkin. He sketched the glass, complete with ice cubes and lemon, and an eyeball staring at the glass. During a “pure consciousness event,” the object vanishes and only consciousness remains, Mike said, drawing an X through the glass.

There is a higher state of awareness, however, in which consciousness becomes its own subject and object. “It becomes aware of itself. And there is a kind of, not solipsism exactly, but a reflexivity to consciousness.” Bending over his napkin again, Mike drew an arrow that emerged from the eyeball and curled back toward it. “It's like there is a self-awareness in a new sort of way.”

Our Caesar salads arrived. As the waiter grated parmesan cheese over our bowls, Mike told me about the final state of enlightenment, which he called the “unitive mystical state.” In this state, your awareness enfolds not just your individual consciousness but all of inner and outer reality. “What you are, and what the world is, is now somehow a unit, unified.” Mike drew a circle around the eyeball and the glass.

Are there any levels beyond this one? I asked, pointing to the circle. “I don’t know,” Mike answered, looking genuinely perplexed. “I haven't read about it, if there is. Some people want to say that there are, beyond here, experiences. But I'm not convinced of that.”

So are you enlightened? I asked. “As I understand it, yes,” Mike replied without hesitating. He had been expecting the question. He scrutinized me, looking for a reaction. “See, that's tricky. I just gave you a pretty tricky answer. Because I define this stuff pretty narrowly.” He might not be enlightened according to others’ definitions, but according to his definition he reached enlightenment in 1995.

Zen Enlightenment Pdf

Mike hastened to disabuse me of various myths about enlightenment. When he started meditating in the late 1960’s, he believed that enlightenment “was all going to be fun and games.” He emitted a mock-ecstatic cry and waved his hands in the air. “Just heaven,” he added, snapping his fingers, “like that.” But enlightenment does not make you permanently happy, let alone ecstatic. Instead, it is a state that incorporates all human emotions and qualities: love and hate, desire and fear, wisdom and ignorance. “The ability to hold opposites, emotional opposites, at the same time is really what we're after.”

Zen Enlightenment Crossword Clue

Enlightenment is profoundly satisfying and transformative, but the mind remains in many respects unchanged. “You're still neurotic, and you still hate your mother, or you want to get laid, or whatever the thing is. It's the same stuff; it doesn't shift that. But there is a sort of deep”--he raised his hands, as if gripping an invisible basketball, and uttered a growly, guttural grunt—“that didn't used to be there.”

Zen Enlightenment Origins And Meaning Pdf

Far from fostering humility and ego-death, Mike added, mystical experiences can lead to narcissism. Enlightenment is “the biggest power trip you can imagine” and an “aphrodisiac.” When you have a profound mystical revelation, “you think you're God! And that is going to have a hell of an effect on people… All the little young ladies run around and say, ‘He's enlightened! He's God!’”

Have you struggled with that problem yourself? I asked. “Sure!” Mike responded. When he first began having mystical experiences in 1971, he was on top of the world. “And after a while they sort of fall away, and you realize you're the same jerk you were all along. You just have different insights.” Mike resumed psychotherapy in 1983 to deal with some of his personal problems. “It was the best thing I ever did. Been in it ever since.” (What would it be like, I wondered, to be the therapist for someone who believes he is enlightened?)

Contrary to what some gurus claim, enlightenment does not give you answers to scientific riddles such as the origin of the universe, or of conscious life, Mike said. When I asked if he intuits a divine intelligence underlying reality, he shook his head. “No, no.” Then he reconsidered. He sees ultimate reality as timeless, featureless, Godless, and yet he occasionally feels that he and all of us are part of a larger plan. “I have a sense that things are moving in a certain direction, well beyond anybody's real control.” Maybe, he said, just as electrons can be described as waves and particles, so ultimate reality might be timeless and aimless—and also have some directionality and purpose.

Evidently dissatisfied with his defense of enlightenment—or sensing that I was dissatisfied with it--Mike tried again. He has an increased ability to concentrate since he became enlightened, he assured me, and a greater intuitive sense about people. “I can say this without hesitation: I would rather have these experiences than not,” he said. “It's not nothing.”

Zen Enlightenment Clue

A few days later, I went running in the woods behind my house. After I arrived huffing and puffing at the top of a hill, I flopped down on a patch of moss to catch my breath. Looking up through entangled branches at the sky, I ruminated over my lunch with Mike. What impressed me most about him was that he somehow managed to be likably unpretentious, even humble, while claiming to be enlightened. He’s no saint or sage, just a normal guy, a suburban dad, who happens to have achieved the supreme state of being.

But if enlightenment transforms us so little, why work so hard to attain it? I also brooded over the suggestion of Mike and other mystics that when you see things clearly, you discover a void at the heart of reality. You get to the pot at the end of the spiritual rainbow, and you don’t find God, or a theory of everything, or ecstasy. You find nothing, or “not nothing,” as Mike put it. What’s so wonderful and consoling about that? Does seeing life as an illusion make accepting death easier? I must be missing something.

I was still flat on my back when a shadow intruded on my field of vision. A vulture, wingtips splayed, glided noiselessly toward me. As it passed over me, just above the treetops, it cocked its wizened head and eyed me. “Go away!” I shouted. “I’m not dead yet!”

Further Reading:

Does Buddhism Give Us Answers or Questions?

Can Buddhism Save Us?

Why I Don't Dig Buddhism.

Research on TM and Other Forms of Meditation Stinks.

Cybertherapy, placebos and the dodo effect: Why psychotherapies never get better.