We are trapped in the world of consciousness

If the meditation we engage in on a daily basis has taught us one thing is that the subject is always facing a world of objects from the most subtle and sublime thought-constructs, including sublime emotional feelings, to what our senses behold out there in the big city where we work and play. 

We, the hidden subject, are always facing an object-world.  Here is the important part: we know nothing about the subject except to explain it by constructing various thoughts about it which fall within the object-world.  Just a reminder, our thoughts and concepts are still objects, albeit, very fine and subtle objects.  They are not the subject.

The ironclad rule is this, the object (even thought) cannot see, grasp, or realize the subject.

The subject is primary for us.  It is who we really are.  It has always been before all objective conditions, all of which are secondary to it.  But the subject is also in a state of avidya meaning that it is ignorant of itself—unawakened.  It is also formational (saṃskāra) so that it becomes indirectly conscious of itself, as subject, but only through facing a world of objects which are its configurations (but never actually itself).  We experience this in meditation when our thoughts and feelings arise in front of us, the subject.

We believe we can find our self by making our way into the object-world assuming that the subject is a special kind of object!  This is our delusions taking charge.  Now we are trapped in the world of consciousness (vijñāna: subject-object knowing) in which all objects are related to the subject while, at the same time, the subject hopes to see itself as an object (a vicious circle).  This is the real source of suffering according to the Buddha who said, “Whatever suffering arises in the world, all is caused by consciousness” (Sutta Nipata 734).

To repeat myself from older blogs, it is only by the instantaneous removal of the objects (the conditioned) that the subject (which is unconditioned) is revealed.  Another way to look at it is the pure subject meets the pure object.  Difference disappears, the original one or the most primary is revealed.  This is our Buddha-nature.

Comments

[TheZennist]

Tivra: It's an object beyond all thought, concepts, imagination, utterly pure and transcendent. Call it "pure Mind" (viśuddha-citta). If you to grasp it, forget it — you'll be on a wild goose chase. Nevertheless, this is what Zen is about: intuiting the transcendent. If you are lucky it might take you anywhere from 5 to 20 years to accomplish this gnosis — and it is only the beginning.

[Tivra]

What do you mean by "pure object"?

It's clear what you mean by the ungraspable, un-objectifiable subject, the subject that can never be(come) an object.

However, what would the "pure object" be? Can you clarify this point? Thank you!