If one has got difficulty in connecting to “Anatta” experientially, then perhaps it might be useful to look up “Shunyata” instead - as those 2 terms have been equated:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%9A%C5%ABnyat%C4%81
Quote:
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In Theravada Buddhism, suññatā often refers to the non-self (Pāli: anattā)
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In my understanding Shunyata is that simple open ‘emptiness’ which removes the dual wall i.e. the barrier, the screen between subject and object.
Shunya meaning ‘empty’ and ta meaning –‘ness’.
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Also I kind of see why they do not call going beyond the 6th sense door (mind) as ‘perceiving’ anymore.
Mind looks/perceives and thinks ….. but Shunyata is more like clear cognizance - on the spot - i.e. inner knowing without a need to look and without any words needed to describe “what is”.
In other words Shunyata does not need an interpreter or a commentator to clearly cognize the ‘isness-of-emptiness’ as “what is”….
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Anam Thubten say:
Quote:
The sky is always in a state of meditation.
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But Space is always in a state of meditation ….
He has also written a book called
“The Fragrance of Emptiness” ….
I haven’t read the book, but since
“emptiness is also form” - in my understanding this refers to the ‘isness’ quality of form.
The ‘isness’ quality of a spruce-tree (the presence of spruce-
ness) is entirely different to the presence of ghostgum-
ness.
So this ‘isness’ quality discerns, without the mind discerning anything, without the mind needing to verbalize it in order for the awareness to cognize it.
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It is as if we live in 2 different kinds of dualities. (The Cross).
One is ‘horizontal’ between the self and the other … and the other one is ‘vertical’ between the relative (self) and the absolute.
Not saying that Shunyata is the ultimate, whatnot, but it is vitally important.
Shunyata removing the 'horizontal' dual barrier is as if the first step on the ‘vertical’. The union of both.
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Without the ‘isness’ qualities of emptiness, there would just be the mind dictating to self and others “what is”.
To put “what is” into a mould, into a box, into a straitjacket - in order for the mind to seek ‘control’ over “what is”.
To put this into a very samsaric, dualistic and crude example:
If somebody tells you that: “If you are not
for me you are
against me!
Well, the ‘isness’ quality of such ultimatums are confrontational aggression as I sense it, in order to box, to control …..(no spatial freedom).
Yet, it has been said that
Samsara is the language of Nirvana ….but with that from horizontal to vertical twist …
If one is not
for Shunyata – one is
against it. And it is as crude, as black and white and as cutting as that.
In other words, if one doesn’t live according to the ‘isness-of-emptiness’ dictates – one lives according to the mind dictates …..
But. If one is already beyond the mind dictates – then there is no need to be stuck on the mind’s habitual aversion/attraction/ignorance point ….
Shunyata and its ‘isness’ liberates one from that.
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