4 foundations of mindfulness

Wes Nisker has a Wikipedia entry. He worked on radio and started publishing Buddhist books in 1998. He founded a Buddhist journal called Inquiring Mind. He's written a lot of articles (151) in his journal.

Mindfulness can be about anything. 

What does Buddhism suggest is the best focus of mindfulness? You could have mindfulness of soccer or what excites you, or what bores you. Darth Vader is mindful of the fears of loss, and his greed and desire for control. I tend to think some people as on the Sith path, their mindfulness is skewed. Trump is mindful of what he can try to get away with, a weirdo who doesn't know how to get things the right way and thinks we should all love him for his transgressions. I feel like he's a captive of his imagined influence at this point, he's even more alienated from his true self by his success. He could use some wisdom, that's for sure.

The Four Foundations of Mindfulness are based on the Satipatthana Sutta. They break the 4 things down further, but you are supposed to be mindful of your body, feelings, mind and Dharma. 

So I begin this book. Nisker went to India in 1970 and did his first meditation retreat at the age of 28. He'd done some graduate work, been to therapy, and found himself on retreat near the Bodhi tree. He likes the Theravada tradition, though he quotes the Lotus Sutra to start the book, and he's not a monk. He likes sciences and the idea of nature. He's an American from California, and is into the lay sect of Theravadan Buddhism called IMS, Vipassana or insight meditation. 

I feel a bit cantankerous doubting his quote of the Buddha: "True happiness consists in eliminating the false idea of "I"."  He cites the Kindred Sayings, and he could list where in there he got it, but he doesn't. I search "true happiness" in the Samyutta Nikaya and don't find anything. At Sutta Central I search "true happiness" and I don't come up with his quote.   

I can't help but think of Larry "Doc" Sportello from Inherent Vice. Wes "Scoop" Nisker is like tuned into the cosmic mysteries like Doc, and Scoop is high on meditation, not grass. 

I believe all the things he believes, I do believe in this interconnection, nature and oneness. I'm not as bewitched by science, but I do think it has some interesting bolstering aspects. Noticing how people lack a real persuasive argument, he riffs off books he's read. He states his opinions, very little argument. Nisker was a radio personality in California, and he's got some good quips in his wikipedia page. I'm not sure when I became allergic to California hippy spirituality talk. I'm embarrassed by that, I'm going to force myself to read on. 

Why do I think the insistence on nature should reference Concord Transcendentalist, or more likely influence, the Taoist? Chinese wisdom is melded more with Taoism, it's not uncommon for the hermit poets of Tang dynasty China to reference Taoism some, and Buddhism some. I'm not some purist who doesn't allow for syncretism. I like Taoism since I took a class in 1986 at the University of Wisconsin. 

Maybe Scoop knows about the origins of ideas of nature but he just wants to write about it without labeling everything where it comes from. Perhaps that's my obsession. I feel like it's an unknowing smoosh of ideas. Scoop is one of those guys that quotes everything including the Bible in a book that seemed to purport to be the 4 foundations on Mindfulness. 

I am fascinated by the myths of Adam and Eve. We were whole but our consciousness or whatever caused us to not be happy. He remakes the garden of Eden into a garden of oneness, dualism is what has caused our fall.

He gives a history of the self. He quotes Julian Jaynes, Philip Cushman and David Darling whom I'm not familiar with. He's really riffing off a lot of stuff, it's a sort of flight of ideas. He's building the west coast case to be less egotistical. He quotes Alan Watts, the philosophical entertainer. He brings up the phrase "resonating neuronal assemblies" as an example of something. He quotes Colin Tudge.

"The sacred is alive not just in us, but everywhere." So this is my problem with sacred, because if it's everything, everywhere, then it's a meaningless word. But that's perhaps superficial, the insight is that we can appreciate everything, or we can profane everything. To get profits at the cost of humanity is profane. To spread misinformation is profane. To see we are all connected and therefore we must think of others and be kind is making everything sacred. Maybe sacred and profane are verbs. Sacred is a mental state of appreciation, gratitude and humility. The act of realizing our connections makes things sacred. 

He quotes Ken Wilber. The quote about how an environmental ethics springs from the sacred. End of Chapter 1. My recommendation is to skip this chapter.

(last edited 10/31/22)