Carl & Zen
I came upon this interview the other day, and thought ya'll might be interested. It's an interview with Jungian analyst, James Hollis. I saw a brief TV interview with Hollis and was intrigued, and when I Googled him I found this article from Enlightenment Magazine (which I never read). In any case, he does talk about zen, and ego-consciousness. Interesting!
Cheers-
M
posted by Siren @ Tuesday, February 28, 2006
4 comments
4 Comments:
That was a really interesting article on Jung. I don't know enough to comment, but just thought I'd say thanks for posting that.
I have just started reading a new book recommended by Johndoe: Zen and the Brain by James Austen, a neuroscientist. He writes in the introduction the following relevant tidbit:
We expect serious scientists rigorously to challenge their biases and to reject any belief system that does not fit their data. In fact, Zen students face a not dissimilar task. They too, must be keen enough to diagnose, and strong enough to pull out by the roots, the dysfunctional aspects of their own egocentric self.
This suggests a slant on Zen that sounds rather like it's a self-help program / psychotherapeutic enterprise. It also speaks to my earlier comment that Zen students attempt to 'free themselves from their programming' ie their egos. Clearly complete freedom is both impossible (as pointed out by others here) and undesireable - but minimizing the impact of the ego, especially any 'dysfunctional' aspects of it, does seem possible.
"To study the buddha way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be actualized by myriad things. When actualized by myriad things, your body and mind as well as the bodies and minds of others drop away. No trace of realization remains, and this no-trace continues endlessly."
--from Dogen, "Genjo Koan"
Well, it's a 900 page book... might take a while!
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