There is a Zen story (very funny — ha-ha) about a monk who, having failed to achieve “enlightenment” (brain-change) through the normal Zen methods, w… - Robert Anton Wilson

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There is a Zen story (very funny — ha-ha) about a monk who, having failed to achieve “enlightenment” (brain-change) through the normal Zen methods, was told by his teacher to think of nothing but an ox. Day after day after day, the monk thought of the ox, visualized the ox, meditated on the ox. Finally, one day, the teacher came to the monk’s cell and said, “Come out here — I want to talk to you.” “I can’t get out,” the monk said. “My horns won’t fit through the door.” I can’t get out . . . At these words, the monk was “enlightened.” Never mind what “enlightenment” means, right now. The monk went through some species of brain change, obviously. He had developed the delusion that he was an ox, and awakening from that hypnoidal state he saw through the mechanism of all other delusions and how they robotize us. EXERCIZES