It has been 45 years since I began exploring my true Self through Zen meditation and other practices. Looking back now, what I experienced there has enriched my life. I want to share this experience with my loved ones and wish them happy lives. Therefore, I want to summarize and record my experience here briefly.
To begin with:
It was in the sixth grade of elementary school that I started to wonder who I was, why I was born, and what happens after death. This was a natural question as I had experienced many deaths in my life, such as the escape from Manchuria after defeat in World War II, returning to Japan, my younger sister’s death immediately after that, and my father’s death in a prisoner-of-war camp, and my uncle’s death in a southern island during the war. At the age of 35, I experienced the death of my elder sister. That year, a fig tree that I had been growing in our small garden produced a fist-sized fruit, which was a unique event that had never happened before and never happened again. I was convinced this was my sister’s answer to my question about what happens after human death. My mother, who had been a nurse at a Navy hospital, had witnessed many cases where the soul remained even after the patient had died. Therefore, she did not doubt the existence of the soul. Later, when we developed photos taken at a cemetery during a visit to my sister’s grave, we noticed many transparent, round objects resembling soap bubbles in the background. It was similar to a mysterious phenomenon that appeared in a haunted spot shown on TV. My mother and I thought it was a reflection of many souls in the cemetery and became frightened. We hurriedly burned the photos. This experience led me to believe that consciousness (the soul) remains even after the physical body dies, and I began to practice Zen meditation.
Furthermore, while practicing Zen meditation in Japan, I met Sai Baba in India, which led me to deeply explore the meaning of being born as a human. My mother had been my companion in my Zen meditation practice, but she passed away at the age of 94. After her funeral, I slept in her house and heard a loud slamming sound every night. It was the same phenomenon that my mother had experienced when her sister passed away. According to my mother’s experience, several days after the funeral, her sister appeared at her bedside, bowed silently, and then disappeared. She said that the sound stopped after that. In my case, I did not experience such a thing, but the sound stopped after my mother’s seventh-day memorial service. I believed it was my mother’s way of letting me know she was still alive. From these experiences, I realized that the consciousness of human beings lives even after the physical body dies. However, my questions about who I really am, why I was born here, what process I go through after death to be reborn in the next life, and what determines it became even deeper. Since then, in addition to daily Zen meditation, I have been studying many reports of spiritual researchers. I also attended a week-long training camp to experience an expansion of consciousness in the US. I also made an extensive study in these areas through Sathya Sai Baba’s transcripts and many books on regression hypnosis and near-death experiences. The results were surprising. (If interested, please refer to my diary titled “My Journey for Seeking the True Self” for detailed accounts.)
In conclusion, although the physical body dies, the Self does not. This life is created as an opportunity for us to know, experience, and learn our true nature. Joy and sadness, success and failure, as well as the presence of enemies and allies, all appear in accordance with this purpose throughout our cycle of reincarnations. Experiencing even a part of this truth or having faith in it can greatly change one’s perspective on life and, as a result, change one’s life itself.
Next, I will briefly explain my experiences and understandings that led me to this conclusion:
Understanding the nature of the true Self through personal experiences:
1. Zen experiences
After practicing Zen for about three years, I participated in a five-day Sesshin (concentrated Zen practice) at Koukokuji Temple’s specialized monk hall in Fukushima. While concentrating on “mu” (nothingness), I suddenly realized I was seeing myself from behind. The person doing “mu” seemed like me, but he was not the one I’m conscious of right now. The person was simply intensely focused on “mu.” I was looking at him from behind. Then I began to wonder what was happening, and suddenly, my consciousness returned to my body.
In the following Zen, I realized clearly that my true Self does not die. This body that I think of as myself lives and dies. At this point, I was filled with a deep sense of peace and the thought, “I have realized it.”
Usually, I am aware that my body is me. In other words, the consciousness trapped in the body thinks it is me. However, when I intensely concentrated on Zen, I experienced my consciousness leaving my body and becoming free. Under this expanded consciousness, the body was just an entity in the phenomenal world, like a Zen master, companions, the tatami mats, and the dogs. I feel everything is me, and nothing exists but me.
When I sat with the master in the solo meditation room (Dokusan room), I felt as if I could feel his thoughts and feelings even if he did not say them in words.
I often feel the joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness of others are like mine, and I feel happy and sad.
I think those were caused by the fact that we are one.
On the other hand, when I am attached to the ego, my consciousness is trapped in the body, and thus, I live in a world of self-other conflict (a world of duality). Usually, we live in this world.
2. Himalayan experience
After meditating in Sathya Sai Baba’s ashram, I stayed in Dampus, the starting point for trekking in the Annapurna region near Pokhara, Nepal. After a heavy rainstorm, I looked up and saw the Annapurna range in the setting sun, glowing in red. It was dazzlingly bright. I did not exist. Only the shining mountain existed. I became one with the mountain.
I had a similar experience while singing Bhajan in India. I became one with the singing. Only the singing voice was echoing through the air. There was no self.
When I forget myself, there is only the phenomenon in front of me. There is no awareness that I am seeing.
3. Past life regression experience
I participated in a one-week consciousness expansion training program at the Monroe Institute with researchers studying spiritual capabilities in the United States. There, I had a past life regression through Hemi-Sync, which provided me with external stimuli to deepen my meditation. I experienced a past life as an older man living off grazing animals in a place like Europe. In another past life, I saw myself living on a large farm and chateau in Europe.
Although I was lying on the bed at the Monroe Institute, I was observing my past life as if it were happening now, like an observer. Furthermore, if I tried to become involved, I would experience that life as if I were a participant.
I didn’t feel the time to say it was a past life or a present life. I was myself living in each world, and also I was myself watching it. There was no sense of time, past, present, or future; I could experience everything in this moment.
I just experienced that this world is a mere phenomenon, an imaginary world with no substance. Only the consciousness that feels hot, cold, happy, and sad is a fact.
4. Experience in Zen samadhi
As Zen meditation progresses, various thoughts floating in the mind disappear, and one can feel the silence. Hearing the bell signaling the start of the meditation, one concentrates on nothingness.
One time, during a five-day Sessin at the Yoyogi-Uehara Zen temple, I concentrated so intensely that everything disappeared, including time, space, and sensation. I was immersed in complete nothingness. My consciousness was still present, I believe, but I was not conscious of it. Suddenly, the bell signaling the end of the meditation rang, and I returned to myself. It was then that I realized I had spent a long time meditating.
In the state of complete concentration in Zen, the self, others, and everything else in the phenomenal world disappear. There is no awareness of self, and nothing happens.
On the other hand, if we exercise our consciousness here, a phenomenal world appears.
There, we live with an awareness of self and others. We live by experiencing the world of dualistic opposites, such as joy, anger, sorrow, love, hate, cold, and warmth.
5. Experience with Sathya Sai Baba
Sathya Sai Baba told me directly that although the world appears to exist, it actually does not. He said that everything in this dream-like world is me. You are me, and I am you. Therefore, abandon your ego and love and serve others as if they were yourself. He preached to keep “Love All, Serve All. Love Ever, Hurt Never.” in your heart and live by it. He also taught that God is love, he is the incarnation of love, and everyone is also an incarnation of love. Sai Baba also said that his thoughts became a reality immediately. “People call it a miracle, but everyone has this ability equally. However, they cannot demonstrate this ability because they are trapped in their ego,” he said. In other words, if we completely ignore our ego, we can transcend time, space, and the physical world to manifest infinite power. The true Self inherently possesses such infinite power. Through contact with Sai Baba, I witnessed this fact many times. Every time I listen to his speeches, I feel what is spoken enhances my experiences and understanding.
Once he told me, “This world you see is yourself reflected in a mirror, and the sounds you hear are your echoes.” I think he meant that the phenomenal world is myself.
The experience here is unbelievable to those who have not experienced it. The details are described in the aforementioned spiritual diary, “My Journey for Seeking the True Self.
6. What I learned from these experiences
Through these experiences, I have thought about the relationship between myself and the world around me, a phenomenal world.
*Human beings do not die. Even though the physical body may die, the true Self (consciousness) does not.
*The phenomenal world is like a dream that arises through consciousness recognizing itself and others. This consciousness evolves through the cycle of reincarnation in the phenomenal world.
*This phenomenal world is created for consciousness to experience and learn about the true nature of the Self through the world of duality. When this purpose is achieved through numerous cycles of reincarnation, desires and attachments disappear. As a result, the phenomenal world also disappears and becomes the ultimate nothingness. There is no God or Buddha that we refer to in this life.
*When consciousness is not conscious of the difference between the Self and the others, it becomes one with the phenomenal world, free from ego, and acts for the best of the circumstances.
*On the contrary, when one is conscious of the difference between Self and others, the phenomenal world emerges, and one acts with ego consciousness.
*The consciousness free from the bondage of the phenomenal world is called the true Self, Essential Nature, God, the consciousness of love, the consciousness of nothingness, universal consciousness, and so on. The consciousness of self and others is called the soul.
Death and consciousness:
Through these experiences, I understood the consciousness that distinguishes oneself from others (soul) will reincarnate.
However, in Zen, it is impossible to know how the soul is reborn after a person’s death. After some research, I found that this subject is currently being studied extensively at universities in the US based on testimonies of the person who had regression hypnosis or near-death experiences. I had an opportunity to meet some of these people involved.
Although there were differences in approach, the worlds that emerged were precisely the same. Therefore, I believe these research results are highly reliable. So here, I would like to convey the overview by referring to the three books, i.e., Dr. Michael Newton’s book about regression hypnosis (published as “Knowing the Afterlife Makes Life Richer”), records of Neal Walsh’s conversations with God about the afterlife (published as “Home with God”), and a book by Anita Moorjani about her own near-death experience (published as “Dying to Be Me”).
1. Achievement of the purpose of this life and death
Human beings reincarnate to experience, learn, and improve the essence of their true Self.
For example, he is born into a poor family, lives his life, experiences the coldness and warmth of his surroundings, and, at long last, chooses and experiences to live to help the poor and live their feelings of kindness and joy. Thus, the true purpose of being born in the body is not merely to know oneself as divinity but to experience and savor feelings. In this process, we meet many people, and our phenomenal world (life) unfolds through our thoughts, words, and actions.
During the course of life, we experience physical death due to illness, old age, accidents, and other causes. We cannot predict when this experience will occur, but it is bound to happen.
2. Leaving the body
As soon as you die, you realize that although you are dead, your life is not over. You look at your body lying down from above and realize you are not a body. You can stay there for a while.
Then, what you believe about death will happen.
Those who believe that their parents or siblings will welcome them will be welcomed by them.
Those who believe they will be embraced by God unconditionally will have that experience.
Those who believe they will go to hell will have that experience. (They observe themselves suffering in hell, but there is no suffering. If you say, “No, I don’t want to, help me,” you will be immediately assisted by a loved one, an angel, or a guiding soul to end this experience.)
Those who believe they are one with God immediately experience being one with God.
Also, in the world of the soul, what is thought or wished for is immediately realized. (Because there is no illusion of time.)
Loving friends, angels, and evolved souls (guiding souls) are waiting around you. You are never alone. If you call for help, you will be helped immediately.
3. Merging with the light
After these experiences, the next step is to bathe in the essence of light. At this moment, the good and the bad that you have had are exposed and absorbed into the light. You feel accepted just as you are. Fear, insecurity, shame, pride, everything melts away, and you feel nothing is left in your soul, it is gone. Pure love shines forth from this essence of light, and you are enveloped by the sensation of being covered by it. To put this feeling into words, you feel warmly enveloped, deeply comforted, treasured, cherished, truly valued, truly respected, gently nurtured, understood to the bottom, completely forgiven, embraced whole, cheerfully welcomed, fully honored, joyfully celebrated, absolutely protected, instantly complete, and unconditionally loved. It is said to feel as if these things are one. There, you enter into the light, blissfully losing all desire, not even wanting to know anything else, and dissolve into breathtaking glory, endless majesty, and incomparably beautiful feeling. It is a complete healing. In this union with light, which is pure love, you feel your Self completely dismantled and experience that you are not a body, spirit, or soul but something much greater beyond them. You fully understand that you are without self-consciousness, that you are a divine being, pure love. From there, you move forward with a renewed sense of Self.
4. Seeing the whole picture of the life you just left
Here, you see the many aspects of your life you just left in images, like a flip-book picture. As you look at it closely, you experience everything that happened in your life. Not only what happened to you, but you feel as if what happened to all of them happened to you. Each image represents a moment in your life, and by looking at it, you see for the first time the “complete picture” of what happened in each moment. You realize that each moment was used to create your experience of Self. Here, if you feel that you have completed your purpose in this life, you move on to the realm of the soul. If you feel that you have not yet fulfilled your purpose, you return to the physical world and arrive at the moment when you are about to die. So far, this is consistent with the testimonies of near-death experiencers. (This is what it means to choose to die by one’s own will.)
5. Planning a new life:
The purpose of life is to know, choose, express, experience, and become fully one’s true Self. In the realm of the soul, you have learned and perfectly understood that you are a divine being. However, it finds that its experience can only take place in the physical world. So, the soul returns to physical life through birth. Thus, it re-creates itself and grows.
Specifically, you will reflect on your life just left and choose a task (purpose) for your next life. For example, if you severely hurt someone in your previous life, you will look back on your life and see how hurt and distressed they were. Therefore, in the next life, you plan a situation in which you will be hurt and suffer, and experience it yourself. Through this experience, you learn to be kind and compassionate to others, experience (practice) it, and immerse yourself in the feelings. This is how one’s Self (one’s consciousness, one’s soul) evolves. Some people call this cause and effect, but the next life is not something we are forced to learn according to cause and effect; rather, we decide on our own to advance our own learning.
Thus, once a new life purpose (task) is determined, the opportunity arises to see the image of life accordingly. So, among the many options available, you plan a life that meets your purpose. Then, you decide on the many souls you will meet and their role in that life.
(From this, it can be said that the people who surround you, both in past lives and in this life, are important partners in accomplishing each other’s tasks. In this sense, this world is a world without good and evil. But we don’t understand it because we see it from the perspective of our ego-crazed little world.)
Thus, having completed the preparation for what you will experience in your next life, you answer the question of the highly evolved consciousness (guides, masters, bodhisattvas), full of happy joy: “You know what you want. Do you know what you want? Will you return as a physical being?” If the answer is yes, you merge with the light again and enter into total melding. Then, you start the experience we call “birth.”
6. Birth:
The soul is born into the physical world, erasing its memories of the soul world. This is because if you know your planned life in advance, you will not be able to truly experience yourself (your true Self). All encounters and events are not coincidental; they happen as they are meant to happen. Therefore, events in the phenomenal world are complete in themselves. In the new life, sometimes you are attached to self-interest, and sometimes you think, act, express, and experience emotions for others. This creates causes and effects. This is how life unfolds. Its true purpose is for the true Self to experience its divinity and savor its feelings. This is only possible by being born into the physical world. Thus, the growth of the soul continues.
7. Relationships in this life
Birth in this life is the result of one’s consciousness reviewing one’s previous life in the spiritual domain, making concrete plans for what one will experience in the next life, and meeting with the people involved in that life to be born. Therefore, every moment that occurs in life is the best and perfect thing that is happening for oneself. But as long as we are conscious of our ego, we are unaware of it.
The people we have met so far and will meet in the future are those who appear in our lives and help us improve our consciousness (soul). This connection can be strong or weak and lasts for generations. Therefore, we+ should treat them with unlimited compassion. The poor children who suddenly appear before us are for us to express our compassion. Therefore, we should not look away from them. It is a precious opportunity for us to experience the Self.
Summary:
All existence, including the universe, is the Self, born out of pure nothingness. The farthest galaxy of this universe, myself, you, and everything else, are the Self that creates the world as it changes from moment to moment. The Self is pure love, and the only place we can experience it is the phenomenal world called the human world. Therefore, life is a precious opportunity to express oneself. Everything is as it was meant to be, and all we have to do is live joyfully and lovingly according to the circumstances.
Conclusion:
I have tried to convey what I have learned and felt, so the story has become difficult to understand. I hope you will read it again when your time matures.
I would like you to know at least what is necessary for life, derived from the conclusion.
That is, we must suppress our selfishness as much as possible, keep other’s interests in mind, and do things without ego. Then the situation will be optimally settled, everything will come to pass, and you will be able to enjoy your life.
Death is a passing point to create the next life anew. It is not something to be mourned but rather something to be celebrated.