Welcome

Welcome back to Meta Zen—the meditation for game changers and future generations. I am Marc Bubel.

This is the 2nd of five episodes in the series. 

Remember from the previous episode, there are two stages of meditation. Also remember I gave you the following sequence of terms: zen, liberation, bliss, enlightenment and nirvana. Write them down as I’ll talk about them now.

The first stage of meditation leads to zen, which unlocks the second stage of meditation. Achieving the second stage of meditation is a liberating experience. Clearly.

Zen is just expressing objectivity through every pore of our body. We no longer view people with different points of view as wrong or corrupted. We know having a negative opinion about someone only leads to arguments. When someone has a different point of view, that’s a calling card to listen and express objectivity. When we wake up to that truth, we’ve achieved zen. 

We’re no longer grinding it out. We’ve figured it out and we can now spread our wings. 

Let’s call this experience bliss because we’re pretty happy about achieving the second stage of meditation. Imagine you now know how to clear the pole vault bar. That is a liberating experience and it feels pretty darn good. That’s bliss.

Imagine you have achieved zen. Undoubtedly, it’s hard work being the only person to be objective. Therefore, you naturally want to enable another person to achieve zen. Then, you can enjoy zen fully without worrying about arguing.

Imagine you have enabled another person to achieve zen. You both have the ability to listen and have a conversation even when you have different points of view. 

Undoubtedly, both you and the other person who has achieved zen want to enable more people to achieve zen. 

Let’s say there are now 10 people who have achieved zen. You are no longer grinding your way through trial and error to enable people to have zen. You know how to do it, which is a liberating experience. We can officially say you are now…enlightened.

Imagine you are enlightened, which means you are surrounded by people who are routinely objective. There are no taboo topics. People might have different points of view, but they all know that they themselves have yet to articulate themselves well enough to finalize the discussion once and for all…without oppression. Instead of thinking the other person is wrong, they continue to listen to each other and have great conversations. 

Engaging in a single conversation filled with objectivity is refreshing. It’s a breath of fresh air. We know this. 

When we have objective conversations all the time, it’s refreshing all the time. It’s liberating. This means we’ve dropped our guard. We are free to say what’s on our mind. Let’s call this experience…nirvana. 

For clarity, nirvana is just the situation where we are surrounded by people that are objective all of the time. It’s nothing more. It’s refreshing being around people who won’t make mountains out of molehills. 

When a person expresses a different point of view, instead of shaming or ostracizing them, they have an objective conversation and whether they reach a conclusion or not, they continue to be friends. 

Back in the day, nirvana could be achieved by a tribe or community. But it could be taken away by a neighboring tribe or community. Ultimately, nirvana needs to be a global ambition, a global phenomenon for it to be achieved. This makes it the world’s greatest moonshot.

The way we achieve nirvana is by first creating small pockets of enlightened people here and there around the world and then we scale it upward.

All we are looking for is something like a business model to follow.  Then, we can scale liberation around the world.

This model is the Ariya Eightfold Path.

Beginning in this episode, I’ll describe it in layman’s terms. 

Meditating consciousness

To kick things off, I want to put you into a meditation on something specific as it will give you a technique that helps make meditation as effortless as breathing.

Close your eyes.

Imagine, you are opening the door to a home much like your own  though this one has different colored walls and no furniture. All it contains are Persian rugs and round bolster pillows. You step inside and you look around. It has lots of space. 

This home is like your consciousness.

Unlike a house or an apartment, we fill our vacant consciousness with whatever we choose at a moment’s notice. And when we are done with our thoughts, our consciousness becomes vacant once again for our next concentration. 

When we are unfamiliar with objectivity, we pack unresolved thoughts like a hoarder, which fills the space and gives our consciousness little room to breathe. When we exercise objectivity, our consciousness becomes like a zen garden—The sun shines into our consciousness plus a light breeze and the sounds of birds chirping flow through the open windows.

Have a look at a vacant room in your consciousness.

When we are not conscious of what we are doing, like when we used to have an exclusively warm shower, our consciousness is very delicate. For example, if someone used all the hot water before us, our consciousness can be as turbulent as a storm.

When we are familiar with objectivity, like from the CTW Shower, our consciousness is as large as the vacant room. If someone used all the hot water before us, our objectivity continues and maybe we even laugh at ourselves for not anticipating the situation. In other words, our objectivity runs around in our consciousness like a child running with a propeller on a stick.

In a moment, I’ll be asking you to pause the podcast.

Think of a few things you have brought to the second stage of meditation.

If negative points of view come, exercise objectivity and push them off to the side.

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Pause now, reflect and come back when you are ready.

Open your eyes.

What you’ve just done was a simple exercise of organizing your thoughts. You do this in your consciousness when you leave the bustle of your life and you concentrate.

I’ll share with you one thing you might have brought to the second stage of meditation: walking. 

We are naturally conditioned to have spontaneous thoughts as they serve animals well. When a species becomes intellectual, they need to practice organized thoughts. Otherwise, they are more animalistic than intellectual. 

When we have organized thoughts, we stop playing little deceptions in our minds and with others. We wake up and start becoming who we are meant to be. 

Organized thought takes practice. If you were unsuccessful with finding something you’ve brought to the second stage of meditation a moment ago, at least you pushed negative points of view out of your mind. If negative points of view won the battle, the CTW Shower will help you develop your objectivity. Remain patient.

Organized thought is neurohack #6. It’s a game changer. Practice by reflecting on small organized concepts like the Four Ariya Truths. Use the relationship of each part to recall them. If you use memorization, you will encourage yourself to welcome indoctrination, which will do more harm than good.

When you begin with small concepts, you can assess them and develop your skill. Like, why did Marc number the neurohacks in that order? As your skill develops, you will naturally increase the size of the concepts you reflect on and create. Maybe you’ll create something as impressive as the Ariya Eightfold Path one day.

Write neurohack #6 in your journal. It's organizing thoughts. 

View, thought, speech

Return to the Eightfold Path in your journal.

Beside objective view, write an equal sign and objectivity.

Strike out objective thought and write organizing thoughts. This podcast is helping you organize your thoughts.

We are now shifting our attention to the third fold: Objective speech.

What we express through our speech tells us how far we've come with our objectivity and our consciousness.

When we effortlessly express objectivity even through what we do not say like through our actions and inactions, we express zen.

Strike out objective speech and write express zen. In the line below this, write, express objectivity through what we say and do not say and through our actions and inactions.

Exercising moxie

The fourth fold is objective action.

This refers to a specific action:

Action is something different from expressing zen.

Getting ourselves a drink of water is an action though not the action our ancestors were talking about. When we get ourselves a drink of water, we could do it while expressing zen. Like turning it into a tea ceremony.

If, however, we’re desperately thirsty in a desert and we come across a well with no rope and bucket, we’re now reflecting on a specific action.

Like, how do we lower ourselves into the well to get some water?

What our ancestors actually mean is the initiation of action that is uncomfortable yet makes things better in the long term. 

We’ll now deepen our understanding of initiating action.

Please stand up and close your eyes:

Imagine we are standing on a cliff edge. This is where people jump into the water below. 

When you are sincere with your imagination, this is an intimidating experience. 

Look down with your mind's eye. The water is clear and you can make out the seabed with its sand and rocks. There are light ripples on the surface that glimmer with the early morning sun.

I've jumped first so you know this is a safe place. You’ve also seen me climb out so you know how to get out of the water.

It's your turn to jump. You walk to the edge and look again.

What's in your mind? Negative points of view or objectivity?

You jump.

You fly through the air, crash into the water, swim up to the surface and you are fine and joyful. You did it. You survived. You swim to the edge, climb out and climb back to the top to do it again. You want to relive the experience knowing you will be fine.

The second time, the negative points of view are still there but they’re now off to the side crossing their arms instead of standing in your way.

The third time, negative points of view are further away.

Each time you jump, negative points of view fade away. 

Throughout this time, your consciousness has been expanding. It's been encouraging you to think of the experience. 

But now, something new enters your consciousness and you are not sure what it's saying yet.

Then you hear it. 

Do a flip.

Keep your eyes closed.

Welcome to your curiosity. It lives in your consciousness along with your objectivity. 

Now, negative points of view might have returned to block your way.

Negative points of view, left unchecked, turn us into bitter human beings that reinforce negative points of view throughout the world.

When you are objective, you remain with your objectivity. It tells you a flip is an interesting idea and you will be patient to size it up. There is no way you’ll cross your fingers.

If there are some negative points of view in your mind, your objectivity says, have faith in me. Step aside and observe the master at work.

You keep jumping like before and think of all the considerations. 

How do you push with your feet, how do you throw your body and how do you use your arms?

You jump again thinking the same thoughts to figure out if you can achieve enough rotation.

I remember one time, I didn’t achieve enough rotation. It was close so no harm done. I also remember in that last moment of the jump, I had a doubt. I rushed myself. I crossed my fingers.

Everyone's different. If the conditions are not there for us, there is nothing to be ashamed of when we are objective.

If we lie to ourselves, we'll use lies to protect our lies, which is the downward spiral. When we are honest with ourselves, we will reap the benefits of our consciousness.

If flipping is not in the cards for us, we are encouraging. We live vicariously through others.

Moxie 

sit down.

In your journal, you can write an equal sign and curiosity next to organized thought. Also notice, curiosity initiates objectivity. They have a chicken and egg relationship.

Imagine we are with a group of people jumping off the cliff together. Then one person surprizes us by doing a flip. 

We would say that person has moxie.

In your journal, strike out objective action and replace it with the initiation of action then write an equal sign and the word moxie.

In the line below that, write do what is uncomfortable that make things better in the long term.

Notice, moxie initiates objectivity, curiosity, expressing zen, livelihood and perseverance. 

Notice, we can also initiate action by crossing our fingers.

Crossing our fingers is a risky way of initiating action. We cross our fingers when we don’t think long enough for what we are going to do.

When we first had the CTW Shower, we might have crossed our fingers. That's okay. We can objectively cross our fingers. We know we’ll survive the CTW Shower. Similarly, when we see someone else jump off the cliff, we have a level of confidence that we will be fine doing the same.

Can you objectively cross your fingers to do a flip off the cliff? No. That’s how you hurt yourself. When people have negative thoughts when I said do a flip earlier, it's because they cross their fingers to initiate action more often than they should.

When what you do impacts others, you never want to cross your fingers. Never gamble when it touches the lives of other people.

Close your eyes and think:

When you had your second CTW Shower, did you just do it or did you use objectivity? 

Just doing things is like crossing your fingers. It’s rote learning, which is a belief you will become entitled. When you exercise objectivity, you are on the path to enlightenment. 

From now on, when you have the CTW Shower, turn on your objectivity before you turn on the water.

Seventh neurohack

It's time to learn the 7th neurohack.

Stand up, close your eyes.

You are by your shower and are disrobed. The water is off, you step into the shower and stand below the shower head. You put your hand on the dial and wait. 

With your mind's eye, look up to the showerhead. 

You know the cold water will come and it will rain on your chest. 

Are you ready?

You are ready when you are certain objectivity will tell negative points of view to fade away. It’s just cold and the warm water will come. No big deal.

Take a deep breath as you reflect on objectivity. Let the negative points of view move further away.

It feels like suspense.

What you are experiencing is the objectivity that goes into moxie. The more you practice this, the more you will become excited to figure out how to objectively overcome uncomfortable obstacles to achieve amazing things. 

Open your eyes.

Moxie lives in our consciousness along with our curiosity and objectivity. It opens the door to let the outside world into our lives.

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Moxie appears when we are certain we will be successful. When it’s our first time to do something, our moxie comes with hesitation to make sure we’re fully objective. But here is our rite of passage: 

Do we take a deep breath to initiate action every day for the rest of our lives or do we abandon our moxie to become bitter human beings that don't listen to other points of view?

This exercise makes us a bunkmate with our moxie. Our moxie opens the door to the outside world and then turns us into persevering pioneers with a snap of our fingers. 

From now on, once a week like on a day off, stand below the showerhead, put your hand on the dial and learn the objectivity needed to keep the negative points of view far away. Imagine yourself turning the dial where it needs to go and as you do so, you maintain objectivity. It's all one motion. Become familiar with your moxie.

With your eyes closed, raise your free hand to the imaginary showerhead. Then, turn the imaginary dial and move your upper hand toward your chest like it's the water raining on you. As your hand reaches your chest, wear a smile. Repeat this motion and maintain objectivity.

After going through the motions of this exercise for a few months, you will be ready to turn on the water. Thereafter, do it once a week. 

When that day comes, you will be pleasantly surprised. If not, you needed to be more patient.

Open your eyes.

This is the 7th neurohack. Write ICTW Shower in your journal. 

The I stands for instantly.

Livelihood 

We’re now shifting our attention to the 5th fold called objective livelihood.

The common interpretation of objective livelihood concerns ethics—it’s in terms of right and wrong, good and bad. As you likely have inferred, ethics as we know it is a topic of points of view—aka dualities.

I struggled for years when I thought of lifestyle in terms of ethics. Then I realized objectivity was the first fold of the Ariya Eightfold Path. 

Why is it here too?

As the first fold is objectivity, strike out the word objective from the remaining folds. They are just duplication.

Let's look at livelihood objectively in today’s context and the context from a few thousand years ago when the Eightfold Path was defined.

Today, livelihood is work. The sooner we get out of work and retire, the better. We feel this way because our livelihood is filled with points of view and they exhaust us.

Back in our ancestor’s day, livelihood was a means of providing the necessities of life. They did it until the day they died. Sometimes they worked from sunup to sundown. Sometimes they relaxed and enjoyed the day.

What if we had a dream job that we never wanted to retire from? Is that more of a routine than work? Would we improve our routines to make our lives better?

Imagine you are in Japan when Buddhism first came to your nation and you are a sword maker. Do you continue making functional swords or do you express zen and make swords to the best of your ability so that you encourage a warrior to be worthy of the sword?

We just shifted our interpretation of livelihood from an obligation to opportunity. That's a world of difference. With objectivity as our interpretation, we are motivated.

Remember, Buddhism formed 2,500 years ago, Jainism, a religion centered on selflessness also formed in Northern India at this time with its roots going back 500 years earlier.

When Siddharta Gotama, the original Buddha, left his noble upbringing, he followed the tenets of Jainism. He then left the Jainism path, sat under the bodhi tree and had his epiphany.

Even Gotama changed the game in his day like we are doing today.

Selflessness and selfishness are dualities. Generosity is nonduality. 

Generosity is giving to others and giving to ourselves equally without an advantage given to others or ourselves. It's the positive sum game.

Make a note to yourself to look up the term, positive sum game.

Think of generosity this way: We use moxie to initiate perseverance which leads to free time. The free time leads to more generosity, moxie and perseverance. When we keep this up, we have an achievement. We have a livelihood we never want to retire from.

In your journal strikeout livelihood and write generosity. 

Takeaway

This concludes this episode. For your homework, you can turn these words into a mantra:

Curiosity

Perseverance

expression

moxie

Generosity

Choose what you need when you need it.

You also have Neurohack #6

Neurohack #6 is organizing thoughts. It’s recalling something simple that is organized or you are actually organizing your thoughts. The more you organize thoughts, the better your objectivity, curiosity, creativity and moxie and the better the byproducts of your moxie, which are expressing zen, perseverance, and generosity.

Remember, our advantage over our ancestors is that we can use paper and a computer to aid our meditation. People are already doing it to great effect. Like Steve Jobs and Leonard Cohen.

You also have Neurohack #7

Once or twice a week when you have a day off, go through the motions or have the ICTW Shower.

This will build familiarity with your moxie.