finger and Moon, words and reality

I would like to make a simple suggestion: sometimes the finger points at the moon ( what you seem to describe), sometimes the moon points at the finger, sometimes finger and moon merge in one, sometimes they both fall away. OK. I can't agree more with you, the truth has to be experienced. But what kind of truth, or rather what experience of it? I f you talk about the truth of the truth, I have a difficulty with that. I prefer to say that what I meet eveytime I sit is the truth of how wrong I am, pure, simple, undiluted. What I face in the process of sitting is the resistance to a natural and balanced state of being. That's why I cannot hide my own confusion behind the false assumption that I have got it ( Sorry Jules if I could not make it clear enough for you). The truth is the increased awareness of a very rigid and stiff sitting practice. Having X years of zen experience, being approved by X or Y, being this and that, all that blablabla...fall down. The true state of zazen is unexperienced, in the sense that you-me-anybody is an absolute beginner or... a splendid fake. And that's it. No other options. again, Dogen never gave any precise physiological description of sitting zen, he knew too well that the key is not to fix the body in order to fix the mind ( what is practised everywhere, in almost every single zendo of our planet). The secret is to give up recipe and secrets and just allow the right thing to do itself. He called it Jujiyu zanmai in Bendowa, using and receiving the self. The secret is, in the process of sitting, to become aware of what is, of how far we are from it rather than fooling ourselves and others. A final suggestion: I may be wrong but I feel some prejudice against intellectualism and words in your comment. Of course, if you follow the beautiful metaphor of finger and moon, then you end up thinking that zazen cannot be expressed as such by words. reality on one side against a mere picture of it (sounds familiar in Western and platonic philosophy). But if you drop your preconceived ideas about ideas and reality, fingers and moon, yo might as well realize that what was pointing all along with that finger what the moon itself. When the moon points to the moon, then fingers get enlightened.