"The Buddhist view is a non-view, but not a non-view that is the opposite of a view, a wishy-washy noncommittalism.

Non-view is an attitude, a spirit of openness, kindness, and flexibility with regard to language. Non-view is a way to stand within language, to make use of language, to connect without being caught by— and separated from the world by — language.

What makes us miserable, what causes us to be in conflict with one another, is our insistence on our particular view of things: our view of what we deserve or want, our view of right and wrong, our view of self, our view of other, our view of life, our view of death. But views are just views. They are not ultimate truth."

Beyond language - Tricycle: The Buddhist Review - Summer 2011

"Craving 'to become' is an impulse that makes us lean forward, away from here, into a better moment, a better self. When we do so, we separate that idealized moment from the actuality of what is just here. It’s only when we learn to end the separation of the possible and the actual that we also learn to end this dichotomy between doing and being. Calm abiding is a present-tense phrase, a way of being in the midst of our lives. We learn to calmly abide in the body, in the mind, in the midst of reactivity. Nothing has to go away. It’s the shift from the object orientation to the seeing orientation. All of our likes and all of our dislikes, our wanting and not wanting, are born of object orientation. This object orientation—defining identity by objects (including the contents of our consciousness)—limits us. We’ll always have a sense of unease within it.

Calm abiding is something different. It’s a deep knowing of the ways in which events come and go, both unlovely and lovely. It’s knowing that we can’t control or define ourselves by those events. It’s learning to rest in a non-preferential, non-reactive relationship that is sensitive, receptive, and free from the demand that things go one way or another.

Meaningfulness is found not only in the dramatic and the intense but also in the small moments, illuminated by a curious awareness. We discover that meaningfulness is in our being present. We don’t need to seek meaning, but to understand our capacity to be present in this responsive, still way."

Doing, Being, and the Great In-Between - Tricycle: The Buddhist Review - Fall 2016

"Gotama has not eliminated the forces of Mara but became immune to them.

When regarded with mindful awareness, greed and hatred are seen for what they are: impermanent emotions that, when left to their own devices, will fizzle out. Realizing that they are conditioned processes and not essentially 'me' or 'mine' takes away their power.

Nirvanic freedom is the result of understanding how reactivity works.

Mara is whatever imposes constraints and limits upon us." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age

"From the orthodox perspective, the goal of our practice is the attainment of a final, transcendent nirvana. A secular reading, however, treats rebirth as a metaphor for a repetitive existence in which we remain locked into cycles of reactive behavior. In this case, the goal of the practice is to stop thinking, speaking and acting reactively, thereby liberating ourselves to respond to life unconditioned by such impulses. Instead of lying beyond the transient, suffering world, nirvana is revealed to lie in the very heart of our own sentient experience here and now.

Transcendentalists regard the cultivation of the path as a precondition for the attainment of nirvana; secularists regard the experience of nirvana as a precondition for cultivating the path." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age

"The dharma has always been about: embracing the suffering of the world, letting go of reactivity and experiencing that still, clear center from which we respond to the world in ways no longer determined by self-interest alone." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age

"The body is not self. If it were, it would not get sick. You could tell your body: be like this or don't be like that. But because the body is not self, it does get sick. You can't tell it: be like this or don't be like that. He points out that the same is true for feelings, perceptions, inclinations and consciousness. You cannot determine in advance how you will feel, what you will perceive, how you will be inclined to act, or what you will be conscious of. You do not choose to feel happy rather than sad, to perceive a world that delights rather than disturbs you, to always incline to a calm rather than an agitated response, to be unconscious rather than conscious of something distressing. In others words, you are not in charge of what is going on within your own experience.

The liberating insight he [Buddha] proposes is not the realization that there is no self but the realization that I am not the same as or reducible to any or all of the five bundles (aggregates) that constitute me.

Gotama understood awakening as the result of directly knowing how experience comes about.

The key to freeing oneself from the repetitive cycles of reactivity and beholding nirvana is attention. When attention becomes embodied through contemplation of the transient, tragic, impersonal and empty nature of the bundles, our relationship to experience begins to shift in disconcerting ways. The practice of embodied attention challenges our habitual perceptions of self and world as permanent, satisfatory and intrinsically ours. By stabilizing attention through mindfulness and concentration, we begin to see for ourselves how pleasurable and painful feelings trigger habitual patterns of reactivity and craving. These two insights not only undermine our inclinations to hold on to what we like and to push away what we fear but open up the possibility of thinking, speaking and acting otherwise.

'Seeing things this way', says Gotama at the conclusion of his discourse on not-self, 'the attentive noble disciple disengages from form, disengages from feelings, disengages from perceptions, disengages from inclinations, disengages from consciousness. By disengaging, reactivity fades; non-reactive, he is freed; the knowledge arises: 'I am freed.'' This is the experience of nirvana as immediate and clearly visible; it is at this crucial point that one sees for oneself how one is free not to react to life but to respond to it from a perspective that is no longer conditioned by such inclinations." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age

"Gotama declares: 'I will show you the burden and the carrier of the burden, the burden's addition and the burden's relief.' He explains that the burden is the five bundles (aggregates), the carrier of the burden is the person of such a name and clan. What is added to the burden is reactivity/craving and the burden relief is the fading away and ceasing of that reactivity, that is, nirvana." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age

"As soon as I come in touch with a situation in the world, it feels a certain way, makes perceptual sense and inclines me to adopt a stance toward it.

Consciousness emerges out of the entire complex of interactions between an organism and its environment.

Consciousness is a seamless whole that is not equivalent to the sum of its parts.

Consciousness has a total, unified awareness of what is happening that none of its constituents (feeling, perception, inclination, etc.) can achieve on their own.

For Gotama there can be no such thing as "pure" consciousness, an unconditioned or pristine "knowing" that exists independently of the phenomenal world of discrete physical things and mental processes.

Without a condition there is no arising of consciousness.

Consciousness is determined by the particular conditions that give rise to it. 

Consciousness  is a impermanent, contingent, compounded and varied as anything else in experience." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age 

"The goal of the fourfold task, I would argue, is to lead an integrated life.

An integrated life is the outcome of having embraced the suffering world, let go of reactivity and beheld reactivity's ceasing. From this still and empty space one then responds with intuitions, thoughts, intentions, words and acts that are not determined by reactivity.

The moment in which reactivity ceases is also the moment that allows a "complete view" (the first branch of the path) to emerge." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age 

"Mara, the personification of reactivity, is conquered not by eliminating every last reaction from one's mind but by finding a way to become impervious to his attacks. We acquire freedom from reactivity yet without the reactivity ceasing to occur. If we observe these impulses and do not feed them, they will die down over time and diminish in frequency.

Gotama continued to be subject to Mara's attacks even after his awakening. As long as we are embodied in flesh, nerves and blood, reactivity will be part and parcel of what it entails to be human." 

After Buddhism: Rethinking the Dharma for a secular age