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Can one communicate that which is
beyond words? How does one teach that which has no categories?
THE ZEN GAME is a do-it-yourself therapy merging Eastern Meditation with
Western psychotherapy. Playing THE ZEN GAME will enhance your
communication, provide an understanding of relationships, teach the
technique of transforming stress to tranquility, and initiate its players
into a way of liberation from the ego.
The word ZEN simply means MEDITATION or SEEING DIRECTLY WITHOUT THOUGHT.
The GAME can be mastered if one is able to see life directly JUST AS IT
IS, NOW. It is a new Western method of meditation which can be
practiced in the midst of activities, thereby freeing one from stress and
anxiety.
THE ZEN GAME is similar to Pacheesi, the royal Game of India which dates
back to ancient times and was originally devised as a symbol or teaching
device illustrating the PATH TO ENLIGHTENMENT.
The players move around the board in a circular fashion until they
discover the path that leads Home, where they are once again free from the
problems of life.
Most modern versions of Pacheesi have lost this ancient symbolism and are
played only for entertainment. The deeper metaphysical significance of
this and other games is usually forgotten.
In the game of LIFE (according to an ancient myth) GOD or the
UNIVERSAL
SELF is playing hide- and-seek with himself by hiding in the masks and
personalities of human beings. And every man and woman is GOD in
disguise pretending to be separate individuals.
Like the piece on THE ZEN GAME board, each one must travel around the
circular paths of life until finding the one path leading home to the
discovery of his or her TRUE SELF.
Playing THE ZEN GAME will reveal the pattern of PERSONALITIES that the
SELF (in hiding) puts on, becoming UNCONSCIOUS and forgetting his real
identity.
As you begin to see the pattern and your own part in it you will see life
as a play or dream from which you will begin to AWAKEN.
THE ZEN GAME can be played on two levels:
Simply as a board game or as the GAME OF LIFE itself, for it is the play
of CONSCIOUSNESS, its falling asleep and eventual re-awakening.
The BUDDHA in the center represents the state of PURE CONSCIOUSNESS which
is the ONE SELF of the UNIVERSE, the TRUE SELF of each individual.
In falling asleep, however, one becomes UN-CONSCIOUS, forgetting himself
and identifying with one of the eight ego roles on the outer corners
of the board.
This is the beginning of the game;
the game of hide and seek, the game of life and death. For
CONSCIOUSNESS now imagines itself to be mind and body, with a separate
personality and lifestyle in opposition to the other types
on the board.
The goal of life and object of THE ZEN GAME is to move the ego-pawns which
represent that particular type or couple, around the board, to the path
leading HOME.
When the ego reaches the end of the path it re-awakens to its true
identity, the BUDDHA-NATURE or PURE CONSCIOUSNESS at the center.
The WINNER is the player who’s pawns are first to arrive HOME to the Inner
Circle.
Only one who has returned to his CENTER realizes what the great poets and
masters have known all along; that life is nothing but a sleep and a
forgetting until we awaken from the dream and discover who we are.
There are only eight ego roles in society and YOU are playing one of them.
The EIGHT TYPES correspond to the ancient pattern in the I CHING, and to
the newly discovered GENETIC CODE.
The REAL PURPOSE of THE ZEN GAME, beyond mere entertainment, is to help
you discover which of the eight roles you are playing.
In discovering your own pattern, you will also uncover the inside secrets
of relationship that have been eluding you all your life. You will
see that throughout history there has been only ONE PLAY,
with the SAME EIGHT PARTS being re-enacted over and over again in
different variations.
In seeing clearly the role you were born into, you will also resolve the
conflicts experienced in relationships, for you will see things as they
are, not as you wish them to be.
In addition, you will learn the “inside scoop” on all the celebrities, as
well as understanding history
as a present event. By seeing the EIGHT EGO ARCHETYPES or
“ARCHETOONS” you will understand intimately all of the most famous people
throughout history.
When you have become fully aware of your own pattern and its relationship
to the others on the board, you will then be in a position to WAKE UP!
You will then know yourself, not as the limited ego role, but rather as
the CONSCIOUSNESS
that contains all roles, and at the same time transcends them.
One who becomes fully conscious of what was unconscious is a WHOLE PERSON.
. . A BUDDHA. . . and MASTER OF THE ZEN GAME.
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