Brad Warner

Consider this:1. Would you ride in a car whose driver was on the consciousness-expanding "entheogenic" drug LSD?And here's a bonus question:2. Why does an "expanded consciousness" include the inability to operate a motor vehicle?

We always believe that there's going to be some high, just around the corner that's going to pull us way, way, way up, where we'll stay forever. If our current romance doesn't do that for us, we'll look for a new one. When the giddy high of the first date wears off, we're ready for another fix.There's no problem with loving something, we coupling up, with enjoying someone's company, and all the rest. But if you want to enjoy all that stuff to the fullest, the best possible way to do it is to stop looking for the big highs, peak experiences, and sweeping flights of blissful romance. All that stuff just causes its own counterreactions. Watch your own body and mind, and you'll see this for yourself.

When you get high on something - including "spiritual bliss" - there is always going to be a low. The comedown is your body / mind returning to balance, or the closest thing to balance that it knows. If you desperately crave bliss while your body / mind needs balance, you are bound to label the changeover as "feeling bad," when in fact it's the best thing that can happen.Zen practice is not about getting high on anything and in so doing, getting high on absolutely everything. We then find that everything we encounter - bliss and nonbliss - possesses a tremendous depth and beauty that we usually miss.

So I do fear death in the sense that I find the prospect of dying pretty scary. But I no longer fear that I will one day be annihilated and cease to exist.

The thinking brain influences the body__ responses and it makes a neat little loop.