Kensho and Satori

Bodhidharma said that one who wants to be liberated from all delusions and all karma should do only one thing: "see the self-nature directly."

Ken=seeing. Sho=true-nature.

Bodhidharma never spoke about satori, though he alluded to it in passages of the Hsieh Mai Lun where to describes a mysterious "brightness" appearing in dreams or when a person is alone in a forest meditating.

Some later Zen writers confused kensho with satori, or just used the terms interchangeably.

Kensho is seeing the true unborn nature from within dualism. Hui-Neng, when he had kensho, said: "Who would have thought . . . ?"

In Satori, one does not cry out, "Who would have thought . . . ?" but instead laughs and weeps like a madman. Satori is the actual breaking through of all barriers, the experience of nonduality as all-pervading great bliss.

The Zen Masters who had satori were following the Buddha Dharma. They were, in modern terms, "Buddhists." They chanted sutras and used the terminology of Mahayana.

But one does not need to be religious, or a Buddhist, or to have read any sutras, to experience satori.

If one drops all thinking (linguistic, conceptual processing) in full awareness while in an "extended" or "higher" energetic state, one will instantly experience satori.

But be careful: for one who drops thinking in full awareness while in a "withdrawn" or "lower" energetic state may simply experience a boundless sense of terror.

Also, if the dropping off of concepts is not complete you may instantly fall back on a concept that you are now "God" or "Buddha" or some other such idea.

Arouse your energy before doing the "cutting off" of thinking that leads to satori. When you drop conceptual processing, drop it completely, and be resolute about maintaining clear, unthinking alertness.

Then you will astound the heavens and shake the earth.