The Saturday before Thanksgiving Hardcore Dharma gathered under the tutelage of the lovely, sore-footed Jessica to discuss two sets of triplicates in Buddhist teachings: the three dharma seals and the three doors of liberation.
The Three Dharma Seals (according to Thich Nhat Hanh’s Book, The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching”) are impermanence, non-self and Nirvana.  The Three Doors of Liberation (also according to TNH) are emptiness, signlessness and aimlessness.

Traditionally (well according to the couple other sources I read), the Three Dharma Seals are impermanence, non-self and suffering.  While I welcome discussion as to why suffering is more appropriate than Nirvana (is Thich just trying to “sell” Buddhism?  Can we say that suffering is Nirvana and Nirvana is suffering, in the way we can say that form is emptiness and emptiness is form?) I leave that to you, brave comment leavers.  I fry other fish.
Impermanence, Non-self, Nirvana, Emptiness, Signlessness and Aimlessness are all concepts that shift when we deal with them in relative (in relation to the world) reality and ultimate reality.  On the one hand they’re always touchable and they’re always present.  I dig it.  On the other hand, in order to reconcile them to living a responsible, layman’s existence we need to temper their all-pervasiveness.  At least I’m pretty sure we do. 
Why’s that?
Well lately I’ve been mentally equating these concepts within the relative world to the idea of continuity. We expect continuity from a book or an article or a film.  There is consistency in the characters and plot, there are themes that get developed that continue throughout.  If the leading man did not have a moustache during the breakfast scene, then no moustache during the afternoon bank robbery.  Because in order for us to “buy” a movie as a believable story in which we can engage we have to trust that its composite parts have enough in common to create a comprehensible whole.
Right so real life is not a movie.  But similarly, in relative reality we constantly work to create continuity so that we can engage with life fully.  And in that way we have to let go of these “ultimate reality” concepts or we risk going loco or staying in bed all day because we’re in a Freddy Mercury, “nothing really matters” dharma hole.  Right?
Let’s take impermanence.  Change is inevitable, surely, and the present moment always offers something different.  But in order to exist in relative reality normally (without having to tattoo ourselves like Guy Pearce in Memento) we absolutely have to hold on to the past.  My fingers are conditioned to play the violin through muscle memory and years of practice.  I have to hold on to my conditioning in order to play.  A burgeoning romance requires a narrative: trust and love don’t emerge in spontaneity; they emerge through a sense of shared history and memory.  Sensitive behavior towards the people you love requires that you condition your behavior towards your pre-existing knowledge of them.
And, relatively we can’t fully exist in non-self, right?  There are physical boundaries in my body.  If you cut me you will not feel my pain.  Similarly my specific combination of memories and books and experiences and ideas are exactly what makes my self my self.  Conceptually I can spin my way into knowing that all I am is an interdependent confluence of everything else in the world, but in order to engage in this world (and even in Buddhist study) I have to hold on to very self-y ideas.  For example, when I took my refuge vow this year I realized that I could relate to the idea of “confidence” much more strongly than “courage.”  Why?  Well I imagine because the interdependent causes led me to find “courage” a foreign, fairytale-esque kind of word whereas “confidence” resonated.  But “I” respond to “confidence”, and remembering that works for “me” is important information to consider as I *continue* on the Buddhist path.
I will lay off of quotation marks and other emphasizers starting now.
But on and on:  Nirvana (which Thich Nhat Hanh describes as the extinguishing of all concepts) can’t exist in the creation of art.  I require concepts (even if I see that they’re transparent and shifting) in order to relate to the rest of humanity.  Similarly while I can’t say what is exactly “bowl” about a bowl (be it the steel, the fire or the shaping hands), the world and I have to agree it’s a bowl in order to fill it with cereal.  Empty, yes.  Full of wheatabix?  Also true.  Similarly we have to agree that a rooster is called a rooster in order to relate to each other.  Signlessness in that way seems a trifle antisocial.  And as for aimlessness?  Without aim deliberate action seems almost impossible.
Please don’t think that I’m refuting these ultimate concepts.  I wouldn’t presume.  I’m trying to figure out how to incorporate them into my life in a way that doesn’t feel unrealistic.  I need a sense of continuity to form and hold relationships, to develop a career and to make an impact in this world.  But is that shooting the possibility of enlightenment in the foot?  Is any layperson studying Buddhism actually trying to get enlightened in this relative lifetime?  It seems sorta impossible.  Is it a matter of seeing the transparency in conditioned phenomena yet interacting with it nonetheless?  Twelve years in a cave?  Should I start by not drinking so much?
What do y’all think?