Brad Warner is fantastic.

Check out his blog: http://www.hardcorezen.blogspot.com/

And his articles at Suicide Girls: http://suicidegirls.com/members/Brad_Warner/news/ (the articles are ok but the site itself is probably nsfw)

Hardcore Zen is my favourite book.

Slightly off topic but I just sat quietly for a few minutes and received a bit of enlightenment in the form of some creative fixes to some bugs in my code. :P

the beatnik in the author comes out at the end:

You don't need to go hang-gliding over the Himalayas, you don't need to screw your luscious and oh-so-willing secretary or party all night with the beautiful people. You don't need visions of merging with the totality of the Universe. Just be what you are, where you are. Clean the toilet. Walk the dog. Do your work. That's the most magical thing there is. If you really want to merge with God, that's the way to do it. This moment. You sitting there with your hand in your underwear and potato chip crumbs on your chin, scrolling down your computer screen thinking "This guy's out of his mind." This very moment is Enlightenment. This moment has never come before and once it's gone, it's gone forever. You are this moment. This moment is you. This very moment is you merging with the total Universe, with God Himself.

Zen and the whole "enlightenment" thing is a basically a sedative which some people mistake as some kind of puzzle or IQ test. The whole point is to help you achieve a kind of inner peace. Although it may be entertaining to some, that's not its purpose and it has little to offer anyone already living a healthy life.

You're quite wrong. It's not really about achieving an inner peace, it's about being right here, right now. If you're angry, you're angry. If you're ecstatic, you're ecstatic. It's about learning to not waste the time we have by paying attention to what we do have.

It's not about being sedated at all, if anything, it's about waking up.

Heh heh. +1 for good humor. ;)

But what if you are thinking about why you shouldn't be angry and how society would look down on you in this moment. To just throw that all away and be "angry" instead of "was starting to be angry and then restrained youself" you are not practicing Zen because you are artificially restraining yourself from restraining yourself.

Well, I have no first hand experience of the phenomenon we're talking about ;) But the way I understood it, it's about no longer not seeing reality by being distracted by your own thoughts.

Most people talking about it have no first hand experience either, which is why the talking is mostly useless.

Edit: I include myself in that.

You are all wrong and you are all right - that is Zen.

Wrong.

Frog.

Your comment is tea.

The interesting thing about Brad Warner (author of said article) and generally Soto Zen (his practice) is that "Enlightenment" is really just a distraction and not important at all. It is not intended to be the point of zazen/meditation.

Dogen's insight (and the core of Soto Zen teaching) is that practice and realisation (here, 'enlightenment') are fundamentally the same thing. So, the act of sitting IS enlightenment itself.

That's a better way of putting it. :)

Try vipassana.

And here's a book (complete text online) about vipassana meditation that is very practical:

http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html

Or you can just do a free 10-day course from this organization: http://www.dhamma.org/ or others.

urbandharma has perfect content :) also buddhanet.net is full of books on meditation practice.

I recommend that book as well.

If you think Zen is boring, you've never reached Nirvana.

Sorry, but that is exactly what the article is arguing against. Some great state you love and call "Nirvana" is just another escape from reality.

If you think Christianity is dumb, you've never been to Heaven.

I'm not talking about the religion of Buddhism, I'm talking about a mental state of nothingness. I only wish I could reach that state without the use of mind altering substances. As great as Nirvana is, it doesn't seem worth the effort to train the unenhanced mind to get there. That process is what is boring.

But if you're looking for shortcuts, I've got plenty of them.

i was comparing one imaginary place, and arguments based on it, with another.

That's easy, what's with the mind altering substances? I've never seen the need; it isn't hard to get into a state of semi sleepiness and drift off somewhere in your imagination.

Depends on my mood, but I've definitely reached "nirvana" for long periods of time. It is especially easy if I'm out in nature.

The second sentence just refers to the use of mind altering drugs in general. I've done things that cause my mind to drift off without my control, and to drift off under my control, and I prefer the latter.

How can you know whether you have unconscious thoughts in your mind?

Well neither have you.

unless the Internet stretches farther than I am aware.

Zen is not a philosophy; it's a technique. Not unlike masturbation.