Great Determination....Hopefully

Teacher: "Every time....same medicine!"
Student: "Every time....same illness!"

I have been absent for some time, mirroring how my sitting has fallen away for a while. Once again, I return to the mountains and clouds of zazen, while sitting amidst the toys and clutter of my kids. There was no one thing pulling me away from daily practice, but a series of little things that are part and parcel of the householder's life. So, another chance to return to the breath, to Mu! Each time I return, I wonder what possessed me to take leave of zazen again. It is a still mountain of certainty.

Patchwork Mind

Often it seems like my day is a householder's patchwork quilt. It may begin in the zendo listening three strikes on the keisu and sitting zazen for an hour, but it then becomes a quilt of ten thousand things. Trying to hold all the patches together (or avoid collecting any more!) is exhausting. But not to try seems like abdication of my responsibilities as a householder, parent, supervisor, child, and all the other roles. That I spend much of my time at work on a computer does not help, with e-mail and ten thousand more distractions. I suspect my teacher would say: Sitting on the zafu, only Mu! Being in the world, only Mu! Going to sesshin, only Mu!

Only Mu.....

Samsara: Light and Dark

Watching longing and grasping arise and fall, seeing the light and dark, the ten thousand things all intertwined. It is a wonder I can find the breath at all in this darkness, or see in the light. All I want to do is grasp it! And yet, each grasping pulls threads of life, distorting the web, catching me in my own desires. Where is Mu in all of this? Yes indeed, where is Mu?

Equanimity

Suddenly, this morning during zazen, equanimity arrived. There I sat, longing in one corner, equanimity in the other. Connected to ten thousand threads of life, a gentle pool of still water. And in this, longing was gently present. But now I could sit and watch without succumbing blindly. Threads, light, water....

Longing

"I don't know you, but I want you, all the more for that."

Falling Slowly
Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová

Unfocused, raw longing has crept into my zazen lately. None of us are strangers to longing; longing for the past, for the future, for things, for a lover, for some thing that is not now. And that is the crux of it, as longing takes you out of now into time past and time future. Not this breath, but that last-lost-perfect one, or no... the beautiful one-that-is-coming! Now I sit with this longing, unsure of what it is for, but painfully aware of it's intensity in my hara. Watching it during zazen, not acting, not feeding the animal. This ache is hard, exquisite, painful, hungry, and here!

Righting the boat

I capsized my practice recently, just tipped right over and fell out. I got to a point where I came up against a wall, and then just flipped the boat. Ten thousand things crashed in, and I went below water. All of the old coping strategies were sampled, once again clinging desperately to old habits, although I knew they would fail. They did not disappoint. This morning in the zendo, I came up for air, righted the boat, and got back to zazen. Boat, water, air....mu!

Summer Maple

Summer is here, and the Japanese maple in the neighbor's garden is beautiful. The deep maroon will change into fiery red when fall arrives. Nestled in a sea of green surrounding trees, it reminds me of the contrast of the seasons. I have been absent for a while, as life and zazen have been quite fragmented. Too much travel, and the pounding surf of ten thousand things crashing through the gates of awareness. But a new spark now gives inspiration, and so the rise and fall of the breath brings me focus again.

Old tree, new leaves
Who is the wind blowing?

Parent and Child, Teacher and Student

Raising children brings to the fore the always-changing nature of teacher-student. Often we thing of being a parent as being the teacher, protector, and provider for our children. And yet, there is no separation between parent and child on the path. At times, the child is the teacher and the parent the student, a student of what we once knew as children and forgotten, a student of what we never knew but our children have taught us. Isn't this the nature of zazen practice? We try to realize, to truly live without concepts, what we already have...our essential nature. What do our children seek, yet they already have? We are all parent and child, student and teacher, trying to see the true nature of impermanence and attachment, death and birth, and delusion all around.

Second Zazen

I recently explored the on-line phenomenon of Second Life, a virtual world where you can interact with others via an avatar (designed pictorial persona). You may style your avatar to reflect how you would want yourself to look, and change that representation at will. No more taking what is given (how old-fashioned) ! Avatars can fly, teleport, walk, talk, and otherwise interact with other avatars. There is no food required, except for the wandering hungry ghost avatars who search for objects to purchase, virtual money to purchase them with and, it seems, virtual sexual experiences. That is not to say that all is hunger and tawdry things. Some interesting avatars do populate the virtual world, and there is kindness, compassion, and mindfulness.

Ironically, there are multiple Zen sites "in-world", including a Zen Center with a zendo and several others. Your avatar can even sit zazen in some of them, achieving the painless full lotus and posture so hard to earn in your First Life. So far, I have not seen virtual dokusan, sesshin, or kensho, (Ha!). Some sites have teshios.

For now, zazen in my First Life is enough.

Taking what is given

What is given is sometimes a thing, a path, a desire. With children, taking what is given can be trying. As a householder and parent, you want to help them understand that cruelty, disdain, and slander are not appropriate offerings. At one level, this is certainly not taking what is given. But what does this precept truly mean? Surely not taking destructive acts? Perhaps it means taking what is offered, as it is offered, in the exact spirit, and working with that rather than what you hoped would be given. Then, when your children see the anger taken as anger, absorbed, and returned as something transformed, you become a living lesson by example. When they see love taken, filtered through the anger at one's bad day, and returned hewn by that anger, oblivious to their true offering, that too is a lesson. Take what is given, return it transformed, and let compassion and choiceless flow along the path determine the transformation.

Attachment to Anger

A number of years ago, I had many difficult interactions with a co-worker. He did some terrible things, was dishonest, and caused much suffering among those around him. Then he moved on to another place. The other day I learned that he had been fired at his current job. My first reaction was to be cheered by the misfortune he had brought on himself. Of course, this was attachment to my own anger and suffering, even though it was many years ago.

My teacher has a bumper sticker on his car "Mean People are Suffering". I am not yet there...

Imperminence

It has been a difficult several weeks, with the unexpected death of a good friend and close colleague, another unexpected death of the young daughter of a co-worker, and a destructive flood in my office at work. It is one thing to ruminate about imperminence, another to directly experience the suffering from attachment to that which is gone. Attachment to people, all of whom will die one day; attachment to things that water permeates and destroys; and attachment to oneself.

I can understand leaving behind attachment to things, but to people? Yes, love, friendship and family ties can all bring suffering, but to renounce these seems to make us less human, less alive, less engaged. After all, the Ox herding series ends with a return to the marketplace; did we ever truly leave it? What does the Buddha's child say of the suffering he experienced when the Buddha abandoned him and his mother?

Only Mu?

Seeing My Death in Zazen

Sitting the other day, I suddenly felt the clear reality of my own death. Breathe in, breath out, and one day this too will cease. As a child, I distinctly remember when I first became aware of the inevitability of own death. I must have been about 5 years old. I was eating lunch and my parents, as was their habit, had the radio on with the news. I listened to a short piece about how "scientists" estimated that Earth would cease to exist in several billion years. I suddenly felt my vision was bright and crisp, accompanied by that awful feeling of being punched in the stomach. Since then, I have this experience every so often, but this is the first time while sitting zazen.

Boil water, Put the kids to bed, Sit zazen

I just finished reading Jeff Wilson's essay in Tricycle "Meditation: a rare practice" discussing how rare zazen practice is for householders in most Buddhist cultures, including Japan. It puts a new perspective on the Western householder practice. Emphasizing zazen as a foundation of householder practice seems to be a new and particularly Western practice. The struggle to balance householder life and zazen is being lived out as a great experiment in our time and place, and we do not yet know the outcome. I am not sure how I feel about this new information. On the one hand, it is daunting to think that zazen practice has perhaps been tried by other householders in far more supportive cultures and not taken root. On the other hand, it is exciting that we live in a time and place where we have the luxury of building sanghas around this Zen experiment. Boil water, put the kids to bed, sit zazen.

Hiding in Zazen

When the ten-thousand things seem to press in, I find myself hiding in zazen. This is usually related much more to aversion than taking refuge, it seems. Zazen then becomes a place-time-state to hide from fear of the ten-thousand things (or the one or two that seem really frightening or oppressive at the moment!). What does it truly mean to take refuge?

The Language of Being

Words and speach are the language of knowing. The languague of knowing divides, categorizes, judges, describes, makes images of the unimaginable, and seeks communication. It has a speaker, that which is spoken, and an audience. Action and non-action, movement and stillness, the void and the ten-thousand things are the language of being. Zazen, koan practice, shikuntaza, kinhin, and compassion are expressions of the language of being. There is nothing to speak, nothing which is spoken, and no audience. Be zazen, be the koan, be compassion. Children have this ability, and one merit of family practice is the opportunity to become the language of being with your children, to re-learn it.

Lessons from our Children

Householders with children have the advantage of seeing the world anew through their children's eyes. A few years ago, one of my kids did something that she knew she was not supposed to. Discussing the "event" at bedtime, she succinctly described that sinking feeling. "You know when you aren't supposed to do something, and then you just did it?" Yes, that jolt of eyes-wide-open clarity after action and before consequences. Children seeing karma clearly. In zazen, I am re-learning to immerse my "self" in that flash of bright stillness.

Cup of Mu

After sitting at the zendo early in the morning, I usually indulge in coffee at the local cafe. It is an attachment that I enjoy, and thus has become linked to one part of my practice. I have tried to wean myself from this attachment, but it is strong. Cup of java, cup of Mu! Wondering if I should unchain myself from this pleasure, or take it as it is...

Stones Thrown in Water

A New Year comes, and here we are. Well, here we always are, resolving to practice as we are able, to stop throwing our own stones in the water. What will be different about this New Year? New and now, on the cushion and off. We resolve for this New Year to go beyond duality and distinction, and in resolving we invoke discriminating mind. To resolve is to think that we are not that, and in that same instant to desire to become that. No resolve, just practice.