-Japanese version has been posted separately- 
-日本語版は「余は如何にしてミニマリストになりし乎 壱」のタイトルで
別個に掲載中です-


・Prologue 


The title is a parody of a well-known autobiography of a Japanese author.


Although I am still far from being liberated from attachments to random thoughts, emotions or sentimental values, I have realised that my materialistic desires have lessened over the years. I have found myself becoming a minimalist.

   

Looking back to my younger self, I was all about obsessions - both to emotions and material possessions: patriotism, attachments to my hometown, family, egocentrism, and my love of collecting things etc...



・A Major Transformation


...in my lifestyle was brought about by the emergence of the internet. My first computer opened the door to a world, where I could not only store information but share almost an unlimited volume with others in the form of internal storage to cloud drive, blog and SNS. This freed up not only my bookshelves but spirit on a large scale.


In my life, I have changed dwelling more than 20 times - another city, another place, and another human soul. It was hard to keep the intensity level of obsession high for anything. Subconsciously, I developed characteristics such as:


  1. keeping my belongings to a minimum


  1. when purchasing household appliances, furniture and items of necessity, I have got to chose something as cheap and easy to dispose of as possible.


  1. upon moving, get rid of as many possessions as I can.


  1. Avoiding getting attached to a land, accommodation and human relationships



・Atheism and Science - My Initiation to Western Philosophy


It was no mystery for a person like myself to tune into the frequency which Buddhism, Vipassana meditation or minimalism render.


As funny as it may sound, somewhat oxymoronic even,

in my case, Eastern philosophy and shamanism were introduced to me by Western people.


Above all, these five people have changed my worldview in a big way.



George Carlin(comedian)

Ricky Gervais (comedian)

Joe Rogan(comedian and podcast host)

Sam Harris(neuroscientist, philosopher and podcast host)

Richard Dawkins(evolutionary biologist and ethologist)


The level of my indulgence to them was, 


Like with these comedians, I have watched and listened to almost all episodes of their podcasts. At one point, almost able to recite most of the main lines on all of their comedy albums. I have listened to pretty much all episodes of their podcasts and almost every debate or lecture given by those academics, that had been uploaded on youtube.


・Buddhism


Seemingly paradoxically, it was atheism and a scientific worldview that had freed my mind and opened me up to Eastern philosophy and shamanism.

Personally, I could detect no contradiction in this transition - it is nothing but a scientific approach to observing everything without prejudice and superstitious beliefs - what you see in meditation sessions or psychedelic trips are not exceptions.


Theravada Buddhism is practised by the majority of people in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand and the surrounding area. In Japan, and I presume East Asia it used to be patronizingly called "Small/Deficient Vehicle Buddhism", contrary to their "Great Vehicle Buddhism." It would not be an injustice if I said, this is the cream of the original teaching of Buddhism. It is the concept of Enlightenment(Satori in Japanese - To enter Nirvana - total liberation from every obsession) and the meditation techniques, by which one can learn and use to achieve Enlightenment. Theravada Buddhism is widely regarded as a religion. However, Alubomulle Sumanasara, one of the elders and leaders of the school, explicitly describes the practice as follows: "Buddhism is not a religion but science of consciousness, by way of clearly observing it. Therefore, anyone of any creed can practice it".


Religion exists only on the premise that its deity(ies) and mythology(ies) remain absolutely unquestioned. It would collapse if they were to allow an inch of doubt in their existence.

Buddhism, undoubtedly,  has its religious or superstitious aspects, which I have no belief in. Naturally, I am not interested in the deification of mortal Buddha - even whether he physically existed or not has never been a big issue to me. "The teachings of Buddha" could be created by himself, or it could be the crystallization of the collective wisdom of numerous meditaters. What matters is that human beings have been left with this great gift from our ancestors - profound insights into our consciousness and elaborate techniques to observe and study it. This is known as "Meditation" and "Buddhism".


Therefore, being an atheist, practising Buddhism has never bothered me as contradictory. To be more accurate, mine is on the side of agnosticism rather than atheism.

I  do not see any reasons to accept all those deities and mythologies around them at face value, neither Testament, Old or New; Quran nor Nihon Shoki (the Japanese founding mythology).

On the other side of the coin, certain phenomena that are perceived by many who are experiencing mysterious or religious episodes in psychedelic trips, deeply meditative state or under extreme stress, do exist. Isn’t it purely scientific attitude to observe those phenomena intently without prejudice…and try to find a truth out of them?


Going back to the topic of Buddhism, in East Asia, for example in my native Japan, the main concept of the original Buddhism: Moksha or liberation from all the worldly attachments and the practice of meditation, have been largely neglected.  Buddhism has become blended into indigenous religions, superstitions and ancestor worship. Yes, Japan has Zen and Mikyo. However,  I must say neither of them is sufficient as a philosophy nor method of meditation.  The former emphasizes the idea of becoming Mu or 'state of void or nothingness', to the point that itself turns into an obsession. It is their custom for patrolling monks to hit each meditator with a slapstick at a retreat, under the assumption that they are being entertained by 'undesirable thoughts' in their heads. Ironically, nothing could be further from Moksha than this obsession for nothingness. Mikyo has its own magical rites which on the surface look like meditation. Conversely, they are based on their own mythical worldview, which again contradicts the principle of meditation practice which is a pure observation.


Contrary to all the above, Vipassana meditation, in Theravada tradition, also known as mindfulness meditation in the West, focuses solely on observation of consciousness.

The object of this observation method can be anything from breath, any sensation that is registered by each of our five senses to thoughts and emotions that come and go in the field of consciousness; paying attention to every detail, without any judging suppression or exception from the moment it emerges until it fades away. This "ultra-sensitivity camera" only captures each moment live - there is no "rewind" nor "forward" on its remote control. It simply keeps observing "now" through the lens of consciousness.

 

From the viewpoint of ultimate liberation (Moksha -Satori liberation from all the worldly attachments, thoughts and emotions), the border between subjects - "who" sees - starts to melt away into " the act(or the state) of seeing" itself. Also, it starts to feel like the subject "who sees" and the object "which is being seen" are one and the same - a realm beyond words.


I myself have experienced the feeling that I was the beholder at the same time as the one being observed - to be more accurate, this strange, extremely vivid sight inseparable with the sense of touch, which was almost sensual. With extreme concentration and with otherworldly senses, it felt like I had seen a million years passing by within a matter of five earthly minutes.


This theme of melting points for each border between object - object, subject - subject and object-subject; between each worldly sense and another, seems to share features with those realms such as  'collective subconscious' coined by Carl Jung. Also, the 'visions' that people who are undergoing their near-death experience, psychedelic trips, and mystical experiences(for example, prophecy, spiritual encounters,  alien abductions etc. )


Psychiatrist Stanislav Grof of Czechoslovakia, one of the founders of transpersonal psychology, highlighted the similarities between the experiences and aftereffects of an LSD trip and near-death experience. Likewise, Professor Rick Strassman of the University of New Mexico argues that there are shared features of a DMT trip, near-death experience and prophecy. His book 'DMT: Spiritual Molecule' is the cream of his works. Along with the studies by Grof, it is full of deep insight. I would recommend it to every humble student of consciousness.


・Counter Culture and Psychedelics, Buddhism and Shamanism


The counter culture of the 1960s, no doubt played the biggest role in the introduction and popularization of Buddhism into the West.  The distortion of western civilization ー which somewhat derives from imperialism, white supremacy and Abrahamic religions themselves ー had culminated in the Cold War and Vietnam War, through two world wars. Destruction of old values and the creation of new through a liberation of the soul were desperately called for by the youth in this era. Preceding this decade, psychedelics like MDMA and LSD had been discovered and successfully synthesized for mass production. It is no surprise that the new adventurous generation craved for a spiritual journey to a brand new world of consciousness: by way of meditation, Eastern philosophy, Buddhism and psychedelics, as the world desperately needed a drastic change of (spiritual) value.


The truth, which often goes untold, is one is more or less guaranteed to experience an "alternate state of consciousness" during a psychedelic trip, whereas, other methods in which these chemical compounds are not involved, will not assure one to get "there". Whether they admit it or not, many of those senior leaders of Buddism in the West who experienced "there" during their psychedelic trips in their youth have attempted to recreate the state through the practice of Buddhism and meditation.


On the other hand, psychedelics got out of hand - abuse of these substances by the ignorant masses lead to social unrest, which peaked in a series of psychotic violence and murder cases by the likes of the Manson Family and Hell's Angels. The response to the trend by (Western) society and its leaders was short-sighted and extreme - an outright ban on all psychedelics including their uses for any research purpose in any academic institution in the U.S.


Psychedelics had been successfully utilized in treatments. Experiments for the treatment of psychiatric trauma, alcoholism and drug addiction have proven effective.

In South American tradition,  Shaman facilitate tea ceremonies with Ayahuasca - a beverage brewed from the psychoactive substance DMT contained in the "sacred plant" called Chacruna. Those who, in their quest into deeper layers of the consciousness, often with some kind of psychological trauma, travel to "the other side" on the vehicle of the tea. Then they share their experiences with their shaman, who themselves drink the beverage so they can offer interpretations and advice of the visions participants have.



Similar practices exist in Central America with San. Pedro cactus or psilocybin-containing mushrooms. These traditions, dating back to the pre-historical era, have been cherished dearly to the present day. In recent decades, they have gained worldwide popularity with a mass increase of participants from the West.


Judging by all these above, I would say the tradition of the original Buddhism and Vipassana meditation have been passed on in a purer, more orthodox way on a larger scale in the West, rather than in the Far East, let alone Shamanism...


All things considered, my spiritual journey through time and space, crisscrossing the East and West, might have been an inevitable one from the beginning.



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"Dreaming Nirvana" (Photo taken by the author at Mt. Imakuma, Yamagata, Japan)