[sky]

Originally Posted by Within Silence

Spot on jonesboy! Excellent explanation. Now if only the entirety of humanity realized this, what a different world it would be.

Thoughts are the spell humanity is under, and what are thoughts but words and words are "spell-ed" thus in the words of Alan Watts; “You have to realize to what an enormous extent we are all utterly bewitched by words, and are trying all our lives long to solve problems which only words create. Because the human being has gotten himself into a very funny bind. Having developed words, which are enormously useful, obviously, we at the same time pay a price for them. We are simultaneously helped and bewitched by words. So you could say that being under Maya, under illusion, is also being spellbound. And enchanted. Because when you lay a spell… you do it by spelling! You see, you make a magic with words.”

Hence, to be spell-bound is to be attached, and what is it that one is attached to but its thoughts which are really words, so humanity is imprisoned in illusion/Maya through the seeming power of words, yet in reality words themselves hold no inherent power of their own, their power is the result of your belief in the validity of them, hence you are the power behind words. We create with words and we destroy with words, yet words themselves have never said a thing.

The Zen Master said; "From the bathtub (body is washed at birth) to the bathtub (the body is washed at death) all this time I have said much nonsense!"

I also love... Just as the ocean has waves, Sogyal Rinpoche writes some beautiful quotes, but this is one of my favourites.