The Illusion of the Other

This past week struck me the thought that’s fundamental to solipsism theory. Some sort of “The Truman Show”, solipsism questions the reality of one’s life and how can one be certain (REALLY certain) that any of the other minds in the world truly exist.

Each one of us seems to be absorbed in our own experiences and internal worlds, while our consciousness is the only one we ever truly access. The terrifying beauty of this theory is how it explains the feeling of being alone even in a crowded room, maybe because the crowd itself can be perceived as just an elaborate construction of our own mind.

And yet, while I was reflecting on this unquiet solitude, I reminded myself of a different perspective. Dōgen, a Zen Buddhist master and Japanese philosopher who lived in the 13th century, states that there is no separation between the individual self and the universe. Each mind, each thing and each moment of experience manifests the whole.

From this perspective, the distinction between the self and the external dissolves. What appears as “other” is, in truth, part of the same field of being. This marks the dissolution of the ego’s most basic illusion.

So, in both views, there is ultimately only one mind, but for solipsism, it is the isolated individual mind, whereas for Zen, it is the universal mind that encompasses all things and beings.

Dōgen used to say that this understanding can only be realized by the practice of Shikantaza, which means, “to sit still”. For us living in the West, it is understood as meditation, but it is much more than that. It is a practice of sitting in silence, without any distraction, without holding to any thought, without any action. There is no “mandala visualization” or “breath countings”. Shikantaza is not mindfulness, it is not a technique, it is not a method. It is simply the action of being present with our natural state of mind.

…And then, with time, the veil of illusion begins to fall.

So, tell me, which mind is yours? 🤔

Sources

• Wikipedia: Solipsism
• Dogen’s Cosmology of Space and the Practice of Self-Fulfillment

This post was written originally for a couple of Instagram posts; you can find them here and here.

Images that illustrate this post are my own creations. You can check out more of them at Hyperink Lab.