Pushing the boat to the sea...
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Have you ever seen how the Goan fishermen prepare when they get the call to go to the sea?
Their boats are parked way into the beach on the sand to make sure they will not get swept away to the sea by the high tide. Sometimes the boats are 20-40 meter distant from the water.
When they feel it is time to go to the sea, they pull together and push the boat to the water. It is not easy as the sand underneath causes a considerable friction. They sometimes use various tricks to reduce the friction like putting wooden sticks on the trail and even pouring some oil on the sticks.
But once the boat reaches the water, their doing is done. Now the engine and the wind and the waves take control and do all the effort. The fishermen can now sit conveniently and silently on the boat's wooden seats and watch the beautiful enigmatic Goan sea in front and the distancing familiar shore behind.
Pushing the boat to the sea is the least and the most you can do on the spiritual path, the rest will just happen once you reach the water.
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How do you know when you've
How do you know when you've reached the water?
you feel strange sensations
you feel strange cold sensations in your feet...
there is no one then to know.
Trouble is...
... this advice isn't very practical, as I looked around for a boat but couldn't find one. Maybe it's sitting on the 'other shore' already? ;-).
P.S. if you're thinking "he knows what I'm talking about"... well, sorta, kinda... actually no, I don't :-p. Can you give a few concrete examples of "pushing your boat to the water, then leaving it alone to sail" ?
http://www.omkaradatta.info
The wet feet threshold
Hehe. I don't either, but I'm guessing what is meant is that mind is used as a tool to bring mind to some understanding and stillness, and then it's time to leave it alone and let the job finish itself. (ie drop the seeking) I was inquiring as to how one knows when this time has come and was informed that it's all about wet feet, so I'll be checking the dampness of my feet.
When the time comes...
... it will probably be obvious. Perhaps some dramatic experience, or perhaps just mental silence for the first time. One can only seek (A) if there is someone to seek, and (B) if there's something to seek. When either the subject or object (or both) is missing, seeking won't be an issue anymore. Or even if the nature of time is clearly revealed, as seeking requires future and one cannot seek the Now.
BTW, it's happening naturally anyway - if you're really not there, do you think you're having a purposeful effect on any of this? You are yourself a naturally-arising mind effect ;-).
http://www.omkaradatta.info
Yes, that's what I finally
Yes, that's what I finally concluded, that it ends when it ends, but that doesn't stop me from questioning it, which is also part of what's happening.
There are times now when the mind spontaneously stops because it's not being particularly entertained by itself anymore, and I prefer this over the sort of mind control methods so often being talked about here.
Future and now
Why worry about the future? Now push, push, push, push.
Swamping the boats
Because the future may be now. Continuing the seeking beyond the point where mind has clarity regarding it's delusions can become a trap to prevent realization, since the seeking must end. The purpose of the pushing is to drown the intrepid sailor. Hehe.
Notice in the picture above that they are not trying to push the boat out to sea, but to save it from the sea. Typical ego. HA!
Ahem
Why worry about the future? Now stop, stop, stop, stop.
http://www.omkaradatta.info
Effort
It is a beautiful allegory which simply tries to say (and explanations always destroy the beauty) that in the beginning, effort, from the perspective of the doer of the effort, may be needed but it will bring you only to the "starting point" of the path. From that point on, things will happen spontaneously and effortlessly on their own accord, again from the same perspective of the individual person. Moreover, trying to do from that point on (e.g. pushing the boat when it is already in deep water) will be for vain and even counterproductive.
Allegories, metaphors, etc...
I rarely find them beautiful anymore, as they are really only needed by a mind in darkness. Reality, this, here, now is so much more interesting and intense and real than some dreamy allegory.
Not to mention, isn't this rather obvious already? Who continues pushing a boat once it gets into deep water?
http://www.omkaradatta.info
When to stop pushing
Lots of boat pushers are drowned because they don't understand this simple concept. Hehe.
Allegories and koans are all you can have to communicate truth
One picture is worth 1000 words? One allegory's worth cannot be measured in words.
It's not a matter of ignorance or darkness. Reality can not be conveyed in words but at most be hinted through allegories and koans.
Of course, our mind wants clear definitions and words so that it could maintain its control.
When you get in tune with this allegory, you will see that it is not that obvious.
Your response reminds me the common response of some people to koans: obvious / rediculous / nonsense.
It was a joke. Folks here
It was a joke. Folks here are awfully serious. If you look further up in the thread you'll see that I not only described the meaning of the image/allegory for me but applied it to myself in asking how we know when it is time to stop the seeking.
why explain?
Mind mind mind...
This tale is beautiful and profound. Why spoil it with explanations?
There cannot be one explanation. Instead of asking for explanations, find your own interpretation of this allegory and meditate on it.
Finding our own
Finding our own interpretations is what the explaining is about. Some are doing that and others are bitching about it.