The Chief Hoodlum from "Sayings" of Lu Yen

[UserD503]

I was reading through "Vitality, Energy, and Spirit" by Thomas Clearly (his translation).  In the section on Lu Yen's "Sayings" I found:

 

The Chief Hoodlum

"To learn the Way we must first kill the chief hoodlum.  What is the chief hoodlum?  It is emotions.  We need to wipe out that den of thieves to see once again the clear, calm, wide open original essence of mind.  Don't let conditioned senses spy in.   / What is this about?  It is about quelling the mind.  One removes emotions to quell the mind, then purifies the mined to nurture the great elixir."  (p. 86)

 

Over the years, I've become a lot less emotional.  I've wondered if this is a bad thing, as if I were becoming numb or callous as a defense mechanism and not being "fully human" (whatever that might mean).  Is it?  Is there any reason to hang on to emotions or to give emotions a due place in the mind? I often see how emotions really blur things in other people's lives as emotional responses seem to lead to drama and even trauma.

[sagebrush]

I enjoy the blur at times.

its like riding a wave. other times I have to get out of the water and step away.

 

I don't know it seems so harshly written and not practical to me.

If you drove down the road and witnessed an event that triggers emotion-its just gonna happen

 

 

[silent thunder]

I've come across a similar concept in Buddhist worldview.  Called the storyteller, or builder.  The aspect of mind that habitually creates entire scenarios and universes of content, from a momentary reactionary emotional trigger.

 

 

[UserD503]

2 hours ago, silent thunder said:

I've come across a similar concept in Buddhist worldview.  Called the storyteller, or builder.  The aspect of mind that habitually creates entire scenarios and universes of content, from a momentary reactionary emotional trigger.

 

 

I have that storyteller in my head.  He makes up all kinds of crap, quickly.  I have gotten better at catching myself, but sometimes I'm entrenched in one of these scenarios before I realize it's going on.  And if I can't stop it, I wish I could put the storyteller to work in something creative.

[silent thunder]

This transition zone between raw presence and story is where the game plays out for me lately. 

 

The play between raw simple unfolding beingness, pure sensation and living in and engaging in storylines of life... is endlessly ebbing and flowing.  It's fascinating, this blurry interplay between voluntary and involuntary.  The thoughts arise involuntarily.  How i engage that, is often more voluntary.  Which avenues of thinking do i feed with more attention and energy.

 

Silence and emptiness manifest off the mat, it's such a simple joy to fall into raw being for moments on end, though like a bellows, some sensation triggers the storyteller i'll find the sweeping story arising again. 

 

I'm fascinated by the involuntary seeming source of these stories and their endlessly deep detailed structures, for being instantaneous, spontaneous occurances... they are often entire noumenonical worlds of themselves, arising and crashing down in a few moments in the scape of thinking.