Please correct me if I'm wrong. I think concepts isn't the
problem... for practical purposes in life and for communication we
are always employing concepts to get things done.
The problem is when we 'believe' in the concepts -- when we
start to see things in terms of inherency and duality. Like what
the article says:
The conceptual categories that conceptual cognition
fabricates are cognitive representations snang-ba, mental
appearances) not only of what things are (words, meanings, wholes,
continuums, objects, kinds of things, and so on), but also of
things truly existing in that way. Truly existing (bden-par
grub-pa), here, means really existing in that way,
independently of imputation.
Otherwise, if we don't believe in the concept, if we don't
believe in the inherency, practical usage of concepts continue to
arise but is seen to be just illusory empty-luminous thoughts
arising, empty of any objective self-existence, and thus not held
on to. Just like for practical purposes I must say that "I am
[insert name], [insert gender], [insert my history]" but they are
really just concepts, names and forms, nothing to do with my true
nature... thoughts arise and the words are spoken but not
'believed'. Not 'believed' means, I do not take my thoughts to
refer to a true independent entity, or a real self. They are just
transient clouds floating in the blue sky, always changing form,
nothing graspable, and does not in anyway obscure or hinder the
sky-like mind.
Hence the goal here is not to get rid of all thoughts and all
concepts (can't be done forcefully either -- they can only
self-dissolve in its own accord through insight and non-clinging),
the point is really to see that all concepts are just thoughts
arising with no objective/external reality independent of
imputation. This frees us from all grasping and prevents us from
sinking into a 'spell-like state'.
Like what Byron Katie said here with an interview with Bill
Harris:
BK: Yes, it was impossible to see anything the same
way because I didn’t know what anything was and
you know, I had no reference for anything and when I
opened my eyes, it was amazing. It was like something
else looking out of these holes and this apparent being
and I would maybe look out the window and my mind
would say, “Sky,” but I couldn’t velcro to it. I couldn’t
believe it. I wasn’t able to hold it. It may as well... It is
like someone looking at the sky and calling it a tree. It
was chaos and none of it real and I began to laugh as I
saw that the mind, the moment that mind hit my head,
a world, absolutely, was produced, but then people
would say, for example, they would say, “Katie, how
are you?” And I’d have to look around to see who they
were talking to and they taught me my name was Katie,
you know, Byron Kathleen Mitchel, now, that’s my
birth certificate, Byron Kathleen Reed and actually, my
family came to get me and they told me my husband
and children were coming and I had no idea that I was
even married or had children. Nothing, but my mind
was such a yes! It was just so in love with everything
that a man and three grown people, you know, came
to get me and that’s how I knew I had a home. They
told me they were taking me home and it was just, it
was marvelous! You know? And learning the name
of everything and referencing, you know, learning
references and it is not as thought I had amnesia,
you know, I can like, talking to you right now, Bill...
If someone said, “What is your name?” I would say,
“Katie.” And I would say, you know, inside of my head,
“Just don’t ask me if I believe it or not.” So, nothing
has changed from that first instant of this amazing,
unlimited, infinite being.
.
.
.
BK: So, if I believe something, I have to see it because
it’s impossible to see what we can’t believe. For
example, if I am a child and my parents continue to
tell me this is a tree, this is a tree, this is a tree,
that’s
a tree, this is a tree. It doesn’t make it a tree to me.
I’m not separate, words don’t have meaning. It means
nothing except to them, but it doesn’t affect me until
there is that moment that I attached, you know, I
attach like that word to reality, a false reality, and in
that moment, I am separate. There is the tree and me.
BH: Because, tree is just a noise that represents a tree,
but it isn’t the tree. It’s just a representation.
BK: I can’t see a tree until I believe it. We cannot see
what we don’t believe.
BH: Well, you know what is interesting, you know,
with a little tiny child, they will point at a bunch of
stuff on the wall, a bunch of just, a mess on the wall
and say, “What’s that mommy?” Or, “What’s that
daddy?” And it isn’t anything that an adult has a name
for. It is just a bunch of marks on the wall and it’s
a disconcerting moment for the adult because they
are looking at that and the child is trying to attach a
name to it and there is no name for it. I heard Alan
Watts talking about this once and I thought that was a
perceptive thing for him to have brought up that there
are many things in the world that have no name and a
child already at two-years-old or three-years-old has
bought into this idea that they have got to attach a
label to this and then start mistaking the labels for the
things themselves.
BK: Yeah, or we buy in that we have to name
everything for the children and of course, it does have a
name. It’s a mark on the wall. So, we have two names
there. We have mark and then wall and, you know,
names for things. So that’s separating out of the whole
and it’s how the mind, it is how the mind... It mirrors a
reality that is false.
BH: Right...