The "subject" is not something given,
it is something added and invented and projected behind what there is.
~ Nietzsche;
The Will to Power
I am beginning to think that anatta (no self) is an
invention of the narcissistic mind; and that sesshins, retreats, caves and monasteries are all unnecessary prisons in which to figure out, in a breathtaking breakthrough moment (arguably deserving
of the title “kensho”, awakening or enlightenment) that it’s not about
me.
The saying goes “great doubt great awakening”. But maybe that's
only if you've got a great ego to begin with. There is a story about a peasant
woman making a long trek to see Huineng (I think) so she can ask him one very
simple question. When he answers her, she is awakened, says thank you, and
walks away. Small ego,
small awakening. Nothing to write home
about.
Those who are the most blown away by what they discover at
the heart of themselves (Look Ma! No
self!) are the very ones who covet the mantle of "teacher" and then go on to preach ad nauseum to others about
what they have found, paradoxically reinforcing with every word the very “self”
they invite others to transcend when it's really a no-brainer.
Take "creo", the Spanish
word for “I believe” or "I think". It illustrates how a verb needs a
subject appended to it in order for an experience to be hung somewhere, otherwise it would just sort of hang in the
air like the smile of a Cheshire cat and that would be rather odd. So we create an “I” to hang it on, like a
painting, or like the moon in the sky, as a referent for something that is intangible. Believing springs
from nowhere, that same nowhere from which we came and to which we all return. That is the nature of experience. Of thinking. Of being. Anatta.
It’s really as simple as that.