Excellent Sarah, you write about all of this so beautifully and spaciously. And you have a way of somehow finding resolution at the end, even as you've just described its impossibility....
I've been thinking about these ideas some more, get ready for a spill...
'When he says ‘study the self’ I’m pretty sure he doesn’t mean ‘limit the self’ or ‘label the self’. He leaves us nothing more than the moment-by-moment experience of our lives, coming to us through our senses.'
I'm wondering if not meaning limit /label does actually only leave moment-to-moment experience. I think Buddhist ideas of no-self are very difficult for us to understand. Perhaps they're easier if you're brought up with the ideas from birth, or perhaps not. I have no trouble with understanding, even knowing from my own experience, that I have no intrinsic self 'inside me'. But it seems to me that we all have a 'sense of self', perhaps the same as your 'necessary fiction'. The sense of self has no intrinsic existence, but it nonetheless exists; it keeps us sane, and makes it possible to function in consensual reality. As far as I can see, the sense of self actually needs to be quite robust, to have its own understanding of boundaries and limits, in order not to be overwhelmed by everything in the world, including other people. Without a clear sense of self we can easily be led, confused, invaded and manipulated. Without memory or conditioning or identity we can't function, be useful, or survive.
I'm pretty sure that Buddhist psychology knows and accepts this, I imagine this must link to the skandhas in some way. The fact that Buddhism teaches the need to understand that the skandhas are not the whole story doesn't mean that they don't exist; that a person has no 'sense of self'. In fact, don't the skandhas indicate a recognition of that very thing? Couldn't study the self mean exactly this - study the way that your necessary sense of self operates, investigate and know your conditioning and impulses, rather than implying that the sense of self doesn't exist?
From this point of view, your relief at discovering new ways to make sense of your being is part of the whole picture. Finding some relief in the idea of 'being autistic' doesn't necessarily tie you to a misguided belief in a self, it just refines your understanding of your socially operating sense of self, which, let's face it, we all have to deal with every day, whether or not we believe it to be 'a thing' or 'no thing'.... :-)
Longer answer: I think what I'm exploring right now is a disconnect between the actual experience in meditation, where 'being autistic' doesn't really come up that much, and daily life, where I'm obsessed with all things neurodivergence, proudly claiming this as an identity, and understanding myself better as a result.
I was speaking to someone else about this, who pointed out this sense of disconnect is a kind of koan (which I think means I probably won't resolve it through thinking or reasoning, which is a shame because thinking and reasoning are my usual ways of trying to resolve things!).
The common autistic experience of masking is relevant here. Often autistic people learn to meet the world with whatever the world seems to require (because 'being themselves' isn't always very welcome) and, as a result, often lose touch with the solid sense of self you're talking about. Recent research links this to trauma. As an autistic meditator, I now find myself in the position of trying both to uncover or reclaim an 'authentic' self while also recognising, through the experience of meditation, that this has no ultimate reality. That's why I like that Dogen teaching so much. It seems to say that it can be both at once, that I don't need to choose 'self' or 'no self' (which I think is what you're saying too).
I was a bit worried that I had gone off on a tangent here and ended up just saying what you'd already said so clearly! Your comment about masking is interesting, that's another layer of complexity, isn't it? I'm not sure that anyone has a solid sense of self really, I think actually the sense of self is probably very fluid and unstable for many of us...
Excellent Sarah, you write about all of this so beautifully and spaciously. And you have a way of somehow finding resolution at the end, even as you've just described its impossibility....
Thanks Tamsin, appreciate you reading and commenting.
I've been thinking about these ideas some more, get ready for a spill...
'When he says ‘study the self’ I’m pretty sure he doesn’t mean ‘limit the self’ or ‘label the self’. He leaves us nothing more than the moment-by-moment experience of our lives, coming to us through our senses.'
I'm wondering if not meaning limit /label does actually only leave moment-to-moment experience. I think Buddhist ideas of no-self are very difficult for us to understand. Perhaps they're easier if you're brought up with the ideas from birth, or perhaps not. I have no trouble with understanding, even knowing from my own experience, that I have no intrinsic self 'inside me'. But it seems to me that we all have a 'sense of self', perhaps the same as your 'necessary fiction'. The sense of self has no intrinsic existence, but it nonetheless exists; it keeps us sane, and makes it possible to function in consensual reality. As far as I can see, the sense of self actually needs to be quite robust, to have its own understanding of boundaries and limits, in order not to be overwhelmed by everything in the world, including other people. Without a clear sense of self we can easily be led, confused, invaded and manipulated. Without memory or conditioning or identity we can't function, be useful, or survive.
I'm pretty sure that Buddhist psychology knows and accepts this, I imagine this must link to the skandhas in some way. The fact that Buddhism teaches the need to understand that the skandhas are not the whole story doesn't mean that they don't exist; that a person has no 'sense of self'. In fact, don't the skandhas indicate a recognition of that very thing? Couldn't study the self mean exactly this - study the way that your necessary sense of self operates, investigate and know your conditioning and impulses, rather than implying that the sense of self doesn't exist?
From this point of view, your relief at discovering new ways to make sense of your being is part of the whole picture. Finding some relief in the idea of 'being autistic' doesn't necessarily tie you to a misguided belief in a self, it just refines your understanding of your socially operating sense of self, which, let's face it, we all have to deal with every day, whether or not we believe it to be 'a thing' or 'no thing'.... :-)
Thanks for this Tamsin, lots to think about here.
Short answer: I agree!
Longer answer: I think what I'm exploring right now is a disconnect between the actual experience in meditation, where 'being autistic' doesn't really come up that much, and daily life, where I'm obsessed with all things neurodivergence, proudly claiming this as an identity, and understanding myself better as a result.
I was speaking to someone else about this, who pointed out this sense of disconnect is a kind of koan (which I think means I probably won't resolve it through thinking or reasoning, which is a shame because thinking and reasoning are my usual ways of trying to resolve things!).
The common autistic experience of masking is relevant here. Often autistic people learn to meet the world with whatever the world seems to require (because 'being themselves' isn't always very welcome) and, as a result, often lose touch with the solid sense of self you're talking about. Recent research links this to trauma. As an autistic meditator, I now find myself in the position of trying both to uncover or reclaim an 'authentic' self while also recognising, through the experience of meditation, that this has no ultimate reality. That's why I like that Dogen teaching so much. It seems to say that it can be both at once, that I don't need to choose 'self' or 'no self' (which I think is what you're saying too).
I was a bit worried that I had gone off on a tangent here and ended up just saying what you'd already said so clearly! Your comment about masking is interesting, that's another layer of complexity, isn't it? I'm not sure that anyone has a solid sense of self really, I think actually the sense of self is probably very fluid and unstable for many of us...