Beginners, and even veterans of Zen, often confuse experiences with realization. This is not discussed that much in Zen Buddhism. There is a fine line between experiences and realization. More than often someone who as been practicing zazen for a long time, even a beginner, has had a meditative ‘experience’ even many such experiences depending on how long they’ve been doing zazen. But this is a far cry from realizing our Buddha-nature or realizing pure Mind (other terms are used besides these).
According to some teachers, experiences generally consist of bliss, clarity of mind, and an absence of troubling thoughts and emotions, not to mention many other kinds of experiences. One may even call this a heightened state of physical and emotional well being. Still, there is no liberation because there is no realization of what transcends conditionality wherefrom suffering arises—even these blissful experiences.
The realization of one’s true nature or pure Mind is never an experience, strictly speaking. Neither is nirvana. To seek some kind of ecstatic experience in Zen Buddhism soon becomes a trap. To seek the realization of one’s true nature, on the other hand, is not a trap. When the realization of our true nature or pure Mind is accomplished we only have to meditate on this. It, alone, is capable of liberating and disentangling us by dissolving all that got us into this samsaric mess!
The practice of zazen can bring about a variety of, seemingly, profound experiences. This means that zazen can produce in us changes in our previous assumptions about ourself and others; it can even change how we look upon this impermanent world of ours and react to it. These transformations, if we can call them that are, nevertheless, experiences—not a realization of our true nature or pure Mind. These experiences are still well within the world of conditionality. They don’t go beyond this limit. Only the realization of our Buddha-nature, which is unconditioned, does this.
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