What Does This Koan Mean?

[electroBeam]

Quote

A monk asked Master Haryo,

“What is the way?”  Haryo said,

“An open-eyed man falling into the well.”

I've been contemplating on this Koan for a while now. Can anyone give me some hints?

does it mean enlightenment is like being fully aware, but at the same time being totally out of control?

Edited May 30, 2017 by electroBeam

[cetus]

@electroBeam

1 hour ago, electroBeam said:

. Can anyone give me some hints?

That's cheating !   Seriously though, lots of koans don't have an answer to them. They are meant to break the mind that needs to find a logical answer to every question. The mind goes round and round in circles until finally it exhausts itself and gives up. At that point the master can start the true teaching because the student's mind has turned to tapioca. 

My answer would be; "A wise man buys Duracell Batteries because he knows an emergency can always strike".

But I could be way off on that one!

 

 

 

[Nahm]

@electroBeam it means you are open eyed, because you are seeking, or looking. The well refers to dreams and wishes, as asking reveals one does not realize they are the chooser. 

[cetus]

@Nahm I was contemplating that one. Oh well haha  I'll find another.

[cetus]

I feel that any answer that satisfies the mind is not the answer. and it is the process of contemplation on a koan that is often more valuable than the actual answer.

Edited May 30, 2017 by cetus56

[zazed]

It has no real answer. This one seems to have many answers or contemplations especially.
A Koan is something to think about, to loosen your mind.
Like a logical virus for your brain, as they use in some movies to destroy an evil AI computer  

 

One might look at it like this:
If the well is enlightenment, and the open eyed man is the seeker.
Then enlightenment is as effortless as falling into a well, and you might say, it didn't even require the man to be open-eyed to fall in.

One can elaborate:
The well was always there, and the man was not looking for something else. So enlightenment is finding that which you are NOT looking for, and falling in. Perhaps, if he was looking harder, he would have seen the well, and not fall into enlightenment at all!

 

But then i am just reformulating my limited knowledge on non-duality to match the Koan, which is meaningless really.
It is an answer that satisfies the mind, as @cetus56 warned about.
 

[cetus]

29 minutes ago, zazed said:

The well was always there, and the man was not looking for something else. So enlightenment is finding that which you are NOT looking for, and falling in.

@zazed I like that one!

[jse]

10 hours ago, electroBeam said:

What Does This Koan Mean?

The whole point of a Koan is to help still the mind.  Giving it meaning has the opposite effect.

[Natasha]

@electroBeam To me it means 'having physical eyes opened doesn't guarantee that one sees. The path is to develop spiritual seeing'.

[Leo Gura]

@electroBeam All koans mean the same thing: Truth

There is no point in "answering them". The answer is the Truth itself. You either experience it or you don't. There's nothing to puzzle out about koans.

When you become so openminded that you cease making a distinction between reality/unreality, and life/death, you will experience physical death. That is enlightenment. You become so openminded that you literally kill yourself.

[Guest Annetta]

@Fidelio Here here.

Good guy Leo. C:

[Leo Gura]

Idolizing me is counterproductive. Just take whatever info makes sense and grow yourself. That's all. There is nothing special or important about me at all.

Although I appreciate the thought.

[Guest Annetta]

@Leo Gura o.k.