Bill, Joe and Bob, Empty mind is just that, empty mind. No thoughts, feelings or other forms. Just pure consciousness with none of the usual CONTENTS of consciousness.
Spaciness is NOT empty mind, it's mind cluttered with a particular variety of New Agey delusions. Surprised you guys don't know the difference... Edgar On Apr 28, 2013, at 10:04 PM, Bill! wrote: > Joe, > > I empathize with you because I too struggle sometimes over what words or > phrases to use to describe experience. It starts from language being > dualistic and experience (Buddha Nature) being hoistic; but the difficulty is > also compounded by the different meanings the same words have to different > people. > > I agree 'empty mind' could be interpreted as 'spaciness', although the more I > think about this I'm not sure if that's such a bad thing. If you could just > tweak 'spaciness' to mean 'naive' it would almost fit; at least it would > almost fit for my purposes. > > I use the term 'illusion' a lot but actually 'illusion' has a heavy visual > connotation. I've thought about 'delusion' which is more applicable to > thoughts and therefore more closely describes what I mean to say - but > 'delusion' also carries a heavy connotation of mental illness. I don't mean > that. When your discriminating mind (intellect) creates 'illusions' or > 'delusions' it's probably functioning properly. I tried out the term 'mental > concept' for a while but discarded that. It's redundant also. There are no > 'non-mental concepts'. I guess I could just distill it down to 'concepts'. > That works for me but I'm not sure if it communicates effectively to others. > > Oh well...I guess that's a bog part of the reason I participate in this forum > - to try to develop a better way to communicate experience - Buddha Nature. > > All for now...Bill! > > --- In [email protected], "Joe" <desert_woodworker@...> wrote: > > > > Bill!, > > > > I eschew use of the term "an empty mind" because it could imply -- just on > > the off chance, at times, in some readers -- a "spacey" mentality (such as > > Astronomers have?). Mere blankness, I mean. > > > > But using it as a technical term, and avoiding the incursion of the > > colloquial connotation, I accept it, and can agree. > > > > A mind full of concepts, or even full of just one, is not necessarily Zen > > Mind, and most likely is not. > > > > No, I see no disagreement, Bill!. > > > > --Joe > > > > PS (It's not like me to quote aphorisms, or out-of-context teachings by > > others. But today is an exception. I'm not myself today). ;-) > > > > > "Bill!" <BillSmart@> wrote: > > > > > > Joe, > > > > > > What you wrote below is fine and I agree with it. I also think an 'empty > > > mind' is compatible to everything written below. I do not think a mind > > > full of concepts (illusions) is compatible. > > > > > > ...Bill! > > > >
