Awakening is an awakening out of stories, and that includes whatever guidelines (if any) used to invite in the awakening. As Gautama Buddha said, the teachings are a boat designed to get you over to the other side. No need to carry it with you after you land.
This is good advice at any phase of the process, whether it is before or within awakening.
And it is also good advice when the veils are thinning, since attachment to teachings as true may be among the last identifications. There may be an identification with the viewpoint of these teachings and all that comes with it, including dentification as content of experience, and as an I with an other.
(Other core beliefs and identifications are much more personal than that, maybe coming from wounds early in life, and beliefs innocently created in an attempt to protect ourselves.)
initial draft/version…..
Awakening is an awakening out of stories, and that includes whatever guidelines (if any) used to invite in the awakening. As Gautama Buddha said, the teachings are a boat designed to get you over to the other side. No need to carry it with you after you land.
This is also good advice before awakening. Do I take any of the teachings as (absolutely) true? What happens when I do? (Do I use them to create an identity? Do I identify with their viewpoints? Do I feel a need to prop up and defend these viewpoints?) Who would I be without taking them as true? What are the truths in their turnarounds?
What happens when I recognize them as stories only, with no inherent truth, with temporary, limited and practical value only, helpful in some situations and not other? And just some of many stories that may be equally – or even more – helpful in the same and other situations?
What happens when I hold these teachings (models, maps) lightly, as guides, pointers and questions?
The way to work with this is as with any belief.
First, notice one or more of the symptoms of taking a story as true: A sense of unease, stress, tension. Creating an identity out of the stories. Identifying with their viewpoints. A sense of having to prop them up and defend them. A sense of seriousness, dryness and staleness.
Then inquire into it to find what is (already) more true for me.
……………
outline….
- truth or Buddhism (or any ideology)
- Buddhism and other pointers, very helpful
- but at some point, awaken out of it all (awaken out of any ideology, b/c reality is not bound/limited by any of them) (wake up from stories, incluidng models, maps, ideologies)
- can’t any longer take it as true, only a (sometimes) helpful guideline, along with innumerable other helpful guidelines (guideline of temporary, limited and practical value, helpful in some situations and not other)
- at some point, is a choice (apparent choice) between truth and Buddhism (or any other framework)
And it is maybe especially good advice at the threshold of awakening, when the veils are thinning, because an attachment to teachings as true may be among the last identifications. They are an identification with the viewpoint of these teachings, which creates identification with content of experience and with/as I with an other.