My Buddha Dancing post is a quote from Ken Wilber's Collected Works as well as a new compilation, The Simple Feeling of Being.
I posted it here, to begin to answer Fran's comment / question about my brain injury. And also to begin writing about the larger journey of living with a disability.
Ken Wilber's writing about intrinsic, extrinsic and Ground values describe part of the journey I've had to make in finding my own value while living with significant limitations. I didn't use his terms. But I did discover, and almost immediately after my accident, that there was a vast difference between a "brain" that was injured and "mind" that was not. And equally, there was a spiritual landscape (Ken Wilber's Ground) that was enormously present for me even as my outer world had become instantly smaller.
Wilber wrote about people who were "crippled in depth," and he also realized it was somehow easier to see the Buddhas in them. For me that was one of the gifts of my wounding. I was shown my own Buddha Nature. At the very start of my disability journey, at a time when my brain was literally lost in confusion, I was deeply aware of a sweetness and a radiance that was emanating from within. It was naturally present. And I know that because I was beyond all abilty to intentionally create any kind of affect when it first appeared.
Later I heard Buddhists describe the foundation of our being as Basic Goodness. And I knew the truth of that quality in all of us. Because I had seen it in myself.
........................
Back to Reading Ken Wilber. The Simple Feeling of Being is a good way to connect with his writings. It's not about his integral theories and it doesn't have the density of those works. It's a good One Taste of his poetic and mystical writings and I encourage you to check it out.
The book includes some beautiful excerpts from Grace and Grit written with his wife Treya, as she lived and finally died from cancer. This book came out just after my brain injury. It was an important book for me, even though I was able to read very little of it. (Reading and writing are still hard work.)
You might also be interested in Ken Wilber's official site, IntegralNaked.org. Lots of amazing resources and people, with interview presentations available for download. Membership to most areas of the site is $10 per month, but there's a free one month trial.
Comments